#i've raved pages about this fic to the author directly so I wont make my comments on it too long

[ask-joeydrewstudios]

Henry's Unfortunate Ink-antation [Part One]

[submitted by: @the-elusive-blue-skittle]

Sigh… The animation is WELL overdue AGAIN. Henry sits at his desk, with a chewed-up pencil resting between his teeth like a cigar- not that he’d know how to smoke one. That’s Sammy’s thing.

“Ugh, this is all wrong… How did the pose get so stiff,” the man asks himself, slumping over in his chair. “It’s been a hard week, and it’s only Tuesday…”

He tugs at the tie tucked beneath his sweater. Why can’t he seem to get his hands to work today? Perhaps he just hasn’t had enough coffee…

Meanwhile, the toons are chasing each other around the studio. Bendy, who’s filled a plastic bucket with ink from the Machine, is running as fast as his little inky legs can take him.

“Bendy! You put that bucket down right this instant,” Alice yells, holding her halo over her head with one arm, the other desperately grasping for Bendy’s tail.

“Fat chance, sweetcheeks! I never get ta pull pranks ‘round here,” the demon replies, kicking up his speed as ink sloshes in every which direction. The bucket doesn’t seem to get any emptier.

A wide grin creeps its way onto Bendy’s face as he spots a certain someone’s wide-open office door.

Henry’s office.

The man rakes his fingers through his soft brown hair, smiling as he finally gets the details right on his drawing. He’s getting somewhere at last.

“There we go… Much better.”

…

“SURPRISE, HENRY!”

“BENDY, NO-”

S P L A S H.

… Ink is EVERYWHERE. Henry blinks a couple times as the liquid dribbles down his entire body. He grimaces and tries to wipe the ink away from his eyes and mouth, but to no avail. It’s as if the ink replaces his entire form en masse. Henry coughs a wet cough and stands up, leaning against his desk.

’… Huh. Well, that’s a little funny. The desk looks a little higher up than it was when I sat down. Maybe it’s just the fumes getting to my head…’

At least, that’s what Henry THINKS before his body seems to hiccup, sending him another inch closer to the ground. That CAN’T be right. The shrinking seems to speed up as the man’s sight seems to get blurrier and blurrier, though quickly fixing itself as his field of vision converts to full color-blindness. The poor sap, now lacking nine inches in height, unwittingly gets simpler under all that ink. His hands shift and shape into chubbier, more exaggerated versions of themselves, with four fingers on each now-gloved hand. The changes travel up his arms, which get thinner and more versatile as they lose definition, becoming simple curved lines, free to wiggle, contort, and stretch as needed. Henry’s inky frame gets chubbier as the ink soaks in to over-exaggerate the facade his sweater gives off, making the man look weightier than he really is. His legs go through similar changes to his arms, getting thinner and stretchier, though his feet get larger to make the ‘character’ look more grounded, and less likely to topple over.

On Henry’s face, his features get simpler. All constructs of his eyes dissipate, except for the ‘pie-style’ eyes they’re replaced with. The man’s eyebrows reduce to simple lines as they gain the freedom to even surpass the top of his head to convey more dramatized expressions. His neck slimming, Henry’s vocal cords regress, making the changing man’s voice much more high-pitched, though not in a boyish or unflattering way. The fluffy, brown hair doesn’t change, much to the dazed man’s relief, though soon enough, all the color seems to leak out from the bottom of his form, and therefore, with the rest of the thick ink that would soon soak through the floorboards and leave Henry as… A toon.

He’s a toon.

“Gosh…” Henry slaps his hands over his mouth. What did he say? “What happened to my voice?! Did you hear me say that just now?!”

This is when he starts to panic, though in a cartoonish, goofy way. ‘Sweat drops’ fly from his forehead as his noodly legs wobble underneath him. He chews at the tips of his gloves like they’re his usual fingernails. “H-How much of that stuff did you even get on me, Bendy?”

“Uhh… I got a bucket full 'f ink from the Ink Machine?”

“YOU WHAT?!”

“Uh.. Eheheh… Whoops,” Bendy grins a big, nervous grin, placing his hands behind his back and backing away cautiously. “But ya know what? It’s gonna wear off in a few days! No need to worry at all!”

Henry glares with a menacing scowl, stomping the floor and groaning in frustration. “I have a wife waiting for me, Bendy! She’s gonna be looking all over for me, for pete’s sake!”

“Well, gee, Henry, I’m sorry,” Bendy sighs, kicking the floor in a meek manner as he shoves his gloved hands in nonexistent pockets, head hung low. And what a way to make Henry feel guilty, for as soon as Bendy apologizes for the horrible prank, the man-turned-toon’s expression softens. Henry inspects his body to the best of his ability, seeming somewhat shocked at the remaining joints in his arms. Clenching and unclenching his fists, the former human looks up from the floor to Bendy.

“… You know what? This can’t get any worse, I guess!” Henry exclaims with a sudden determined expression, pounding a fist into an open hand. “It shouldn’t take too long to wear off, right?”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It’s been an hour. Henry ALREADY can’t stand the sudden change, feeling very uncomfortable at the loss in height and mass. He finds himself a lot more prone to tripping and comedically falling on his face on every loose nail or floorboard. Tired of this nonsense, the new toon pouts and plops down in the middle of the floor, resting his head in a four-fingered hand.

… To which someone obliviously trips over him and lands with a light 'thud’ nearby.

“Gosh, are you okay?” GOD, he still hates that. The person that unfortunately didn’t see the tiny toon sits up and rubs his forehead, turning around to locate the source of Henry’s voice. Uh-oh.

It’s Joey.

“Pfft-” Joey starts to snicker before Henry would hastily shove a finger over his boss’s mouth. “Don’t. Laugh.”

“He-Henry, you- heheh.. You’re-”

“Choose your words CAREFULLY.”

Joey breaks down wheezing and giggling (like an idiot) as Henry reacts by turning a darker shade of grey, presumably getting red in the face from embarrassment. Joey wipes the tears from his eyes, catching his breath. “Y-You’re so… So CUTE…”

Leave it to Joey to find any and every way to push every button Henry has. The toon balls his fists and stomps angrily, like a toddler having a temper tantrum. And really? He’s not too far off from being just that.

“I am NOT cute, Joey,” Henry yells in his new, expressive voice. This prompts Joey to pinch the toon’s cheek, stretching it far past any human’s elasticity capacity.

“Ohhhh, yes you aaaare,” Joey teases with a big grin on his face. “How did this even HAPPEN?”

“Take a wild guess. And let go of me!”

Joey lets go of Henry’s cheek and gets up off the floor. “Let me guess. Is it something to do with the little devil himself?”

“Yeah, and when this is over, I’m getting rid of ALL the buckets in the studio,” Henry whines, crossing his arms and turning his back to his boss. “No exceptions! I don't WANT to be stuck like this forever!” The toon’s lip quivers as he’s thrown into a full-fledged, cartoony crying fit. He hardly seems to notice the shift in emotional expression, going from a stoic, no-funny-business animator to, well…

A goofy little dork.

Henry wails as literal waterfalls of tears flow from the corners of his eyes, water pooling on the floor at his sides. If someone doesn’t stop him, the entire room’s going to fill up!

Joey pinches the bridge of his nose. He ALREADY has to deal with THREE over-emotional toons! “Henry, you're NOT going to be stuck like this forever. But you WILL be stuck like this for at least a week.”

“A WEEK?!” Henry gasps, hands placed on each cheek. “I’M GONNA BE TRAPPED HERE FOR A WEEK? Ohhhhhh, this is UNBELIEVABLE…”

Joey rests a hand on the tiny toon’s shoulder, handing over a handkerchief so Henry can wipe his tears. Henry takes the cloth, sniffling pitifully as he blows his nose, prompting the sound of a trumpet blaring.  “What am I gonna do this whole time? I can’t animate like this!” The toon produces a pencil from behind his ear and holds it out. The pencil itself droops weakly as a spontaneous sad-trombone noise plays out of nowhere. He tosses the utensil behind him, proceeding to hit a nonexistent cat, a loud 'REEEEOW’ ringing out, followed by a CRASH.

Henry pulls, with stretchy arms, a fainting couch from what could only be called 'off-screen’. He rests a hand against his forehead as he crumbles onto the sofa with a weary expression. Joey rolls his eyes. It’s not like he can just tell Henry to stop being so dramatic.

“Now, Henry, there’s no need to… Fret,” Joey rubs the back of his head, somewhat bothered by the loss of his favorite handkerchief. “I don’t usually do this, but just this once, I’ll let you have a break for however long this lasts. How does that sound?”

Henry sits up in excitement. “Really? You'd do that? For me?”

“Well, I can’t imagine that it’d be very easy to draw with four fingers on each hand, and…”

Suddenly, Joey is wrapped in a hefty squeeze, with the toon’s arms wrapped around his form several times, like a coil. “Oh, thank you, Joey! I knew I could count on you,” Henry exclaims, with a big, goofy grin on his face.

“… It’s no trouble,” Joey smiles softly and hugs his co-worker back. “Now run along and do… Whatever it is you do when you’re not working. You can even try playing around with the other toons for a while!”

Henry pushes the fainting couch 'off-screen’ with a kick, resulting in another anomalous crash. “Play, huh? I haven’t played since sixth grade…”

“Well,” Joey starts. “What’s a toon to do other than goof around all day?” Henry raises a brow. “Oh, yeah? No. Not doing it.”

“You know you want to.”

Henry hesitates. Something in him agrees with his boss. He has some internal instinct to run amok and cause trouble, for sure. But on the other hand, he doesn’t want to get FIRED.

Plus, it’s REALLY embarrassing.

“… Well… I don’t know about this, Joey. It’s a little…”

“HENRY,” an unidentified voice, accompanied by swift footsteps rings out.

“Whuh, B-Boris- GUH!”

Henry gets tackled to the ground by the massive cartoon wolf, squeezed in one of his famous 'wolf hugs’. “Oh, Henry, look at you! You’re just like us!”

“Yeah, I, uh.. I noticed, buddy.”

Boris gasps. “You know what this means, right, Henry?”

Henry shrugs. “What DOES it mean, Boris?”

“It means that we gotta teach you how to be a toon!”

“I’m sure I know PLENTY.”

“Well, then, c'mon,” Boris exclaims, getting off of Henry, lifting him up and taking him by the hand. “Let’s go have some fun!”

“Wait, Boris-”

And just like that, Boris whisks Henry away as Joey watches with a smile. This is going to get interesting.

((hey guys in happier news, my friend skittle’s writing a super long and amazing toon henry fic for this blog’s au and this is part one. its amazing and adorable and i hope it gets the love it honestly deserves, and thank you again skittle for this Blessing of a fic :D))

part two | part three | part four | part five | part six | part seven