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The simplicity of a bedtime routine was something that Stabberz still couldn't believe was available to her once again. It was something that after spending years stuck in the lab made them delighted, even the most boring parts of it felt like going to an amusement park every day. Not having a set schedule every day was nice too, but a little overwhelming at times, so having a routine that she set for herself and could modify was amazing. It was funny how the normality of it all made her giddy.
Today the weather was nice so they ate outside, cake because they had a lot of sweets left and because they wanted to eat some the whole day. Nobody stopping her from eating outside was nice. After that Stabberz went back inside to get ready for bed, they took their pyjamas from their room and a bowl from where they left it last night. It was right next to the door, thankfully she didn't trip over it. They went to the bathroom and took a shower and got on their pyjamas, the shirt had long sleeves and black stripes at the end of them, and the shorts had them too. Her pyjamas were grey and very comfortable, a little uneven because she made them herself, but still comfortable. Stabberz started brushing their teeth, with how much sweets and straight up sugar they eat, they had to wash them thoroughly very often. Honestly, the lab could make her be able to float in a bubble, but couldn't make sure that her teeth didn't rot? Stabberz had a method to brushing their teeth, they split their teeth into sections, upper teeth and lower teeth, then left, right and front. Bottom of her teeth and the front. Twenty seconds for each section and brushing hard enough that sometimes their gums bled. She spat out the toothpaste in a sink, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand after, to get rid of the foam. The taste of toothpaste was gross.
She took the bowl from where she left it next to the door and threw it into the sink to fill it with water. They turned off the tap when it was about half full and untied their eye patch. It tangled itself up with her hair and she had to pull it harshly to get it off. The short pain was worth the relief of finally getting to take the eye patch off after a whole day. Stabberz sighed, if not for the benefits the eye patch provided they wouldn't wear it at all. It was so much nicer to have it off.
She threw the eye patch in the bowl and cringed, the water immediately started to go brown. That was disgusting, they were wearing that the whole day! Stabberz couldn't remember what she had been doing that day, normally it was never that dirty. She looked around the bathroom for some soap she had specifically for her eye patch, it was unscented and made in a way that made sure that even if any of it got into her system nothing would happen. They couldn't find it though, they needed to look for it in their storage room and if they couldn't find it there then they'd have to use normal soap. Not a preferable option, but it was either that or washing it with just water and with how dirty the water was it wasn't an option.
She walked downstairs to her storage room and started rummaging through chests. That's wood, that's stone and similar, that's miscellaneous, but none of them had soap in them. After about ten minutes of searching they finally gave up and resigned to their eye patch smelling like flowers for the next few days. She can deal with it and the inevitable itchiness, she went through worse stuff in the lab.
"..." as Stabberz went up stairs they halted, at eye level they could now see the bottle of soap they left next to the bathroom door. She left it there specifically in order not to have to look through chests. It was standing there, mocking them. She glared at the inanimate object. "Seriously?"
They picked the bottle up with a sigh and went inside the bathroom, they opened it and poured a decent amount into the bowl with the eye patch. She swirled it around with her hand a little, then she looked up and... froze. They forgot, how did they manage to forget about that? The mirror above the sink, there was fabric in the bathroom specifically to cover it, but today she forgot to do it. How? How did they manage to forget? Why did Stabberz forget to cover the mirror? It was one thing to know what was behind her eye patch, it was another one to see it. There was a reason why they only took off their eye patch to sleep and never confirmed any of the theories others had about what was behind it.
Stabberz's eye was just... gone. Instead all that was left was an empty eye socket with the skin scrunched up around it. Like a flesh accordion, since her skin never fully healed there. What did the lab do with their eye? Stabberz didn't know, they just knew it wasn't in her possession anymore. What would they even do if the lab allowed them to keep it? Put it on a shelf? Replacing her eye was something akin to a bubble machine, bubbles tinted red poured out at a fast pace, around half of them didn't even fly up to splatter into bloody circles on her floor and walls. Instead they slid down their cheek, leaving a bloody trail behind. To be honest she could never fully get rid of it, maybe the soap irritated the skin there enough to at least partly destroy it. Stabberz could feel that there was a small change to the texture of the skin there. In their opinion it would be better if there was nothing in their eye socket instead of the bubbles, then they could get a glass eye instead of being stuck with an eye patch. She wouldn't have to deal with any of that.
Back in the lab they did try to give them a glass eye, they kept trying actually, for way too long. Stabberz gathered that they were testing to see if they could replace it before implementing a mechanical one. That was one of her most painful experiences in the lab, days of constant agony. The first time they had a glass eye they felt the pressure of the bubbles building up behind it, some liquid and smaller bubbles managed to leak through. The pressure kept building up until the eye shot out with a sickening sound, like a bubble being popped, but louder. She watched the eye roll onto the floor, unable to move for a few seconds, before the pain became too much and she passed out. They were barely lucid for the next few days, the lab probably preferred it that way, they couldn't fight back. They tried to put in the eye again and again, and again. Stabberz lost track after the third attempt. The result was always the same, first agony, second the eye being pushed out by bubbles, then she'd pass out. After a few times when that happened Stabberz had enough.
When she woke up and noticed the lack of freely floating bubbles she screamed. They screamed and cried until their throat was hoarse, they had to do something to stop this mad cycle. She was aware of the cameras in the room, it was sickening to know that someone was watching and probably writing this down on a clipboard. At the moment they didn't care, they just had to get rid of the source of the pain. She remembers it vividly, even though all that was going through her head at the time was in how much pain she was. Stabberz poked the eye first, just to make sure it was there again. It was, it was a near complete replica of their normal eye, the only difference was that they couldn't see through it and it was harder. She remembers bringing her hand to it, keeping her eyelids open with it and digging it out with the other one. It was disgusting and painful, the bubble liquid seemed to make things easier but more painful. The process of digging out the fake eye felt like hours, even though it was minutes at most. They dug their fingers into the flesh surrounding the fake eye, trying to get their fingers behind it and then pulled. It shot out with a sickening 'pop' and hit the wall with a bloody splatter. Stabberz couldn't see herself, but she imagines it was gruesome, blood was covering half her face and she was able to taste it. None of that mattered. The fake eye, the source of their pain for the last few days or weeks, was finally gone. She laughed in relief, it was over. Stabberz remembers laughing, sitting on the floor until a scientist and a guard came over to their cell. She could see them in the corner of her eye, her real eye, but paid them no mind. Whatever they wanted to do didn't matter, they just kept laughing. She remembers the guard pinning her down to the floor and the scientist injecting something into her bloodstream. It was most likely a sedative considering that they don't remember anything after that.
Stabberz considers it a success even though she was in pain for over a month after that. They didn't try to implement a fake eye again.
They blinked rapidly a few times, it was no use dwelling on that, their eye was gone, but they were free from the lab. She just had too much awareness of where exactly her eye sockets were. They looked in the mirror with the eye they had left, the skin around their eye socket was always slightly irritated, but it seemed to be slowly building up immunity. She wiped the flowing bubbles from her face, even though all it did was spread blood and soap around her face. They followed one of the proper bubbles with their gaze, it flew up a little and splattered on the mirror in a soapy-bloody mix. The whole mirror would be covered in blood soon if Stabberz didn't clean it. She licked her hand, it didn't taste good, but the bubbles were sugary. Imagine getting full from licking your blood mixed with soap. That's not something that even crosses normal peoples' minds.
They looked down, their pyjamas were stained by bloody bubbles popping on it. She'd get changed later, the mirror was stained too, but she can clean it tomorrow. They scrubbed the eye patch thoroughly, making sure to keep their head down, they didn't want seeing a glimpse of their reflection to send them down another spiral. After cleaning it, she picked up some spare fabric she had on the floor and wrapped it around her empty eye socket, she knew from experience that trying to get changed with just a hand covering it would be near impossible. Stabberz went into their room and took out clean pyjamas, they quickly got changed and threw the ones covered in blood in a corner, that would be a problem for morning Stabberz. She went to her bed and sat down, carefully unwrapping the fabric from her head, she could sleep in it, but the pressure would get uncomfortable even if there was no fake eye to pop out. They threw the fabric where they thought the dirty pyjamas were, hopefully the floor would be stained too much. She could finally go to sleep, Stabberz laid down her head on the two towels she had over her pillow. They didn't want to clean more blood than they had to. She was asleep in mere minutes.