@Dr Krimsborg, DPM I think I can be of AAACOOsistance. (insert expletive), I think I caught it. as my MA-MA MA-MA. snap out of it!! if you brew the faree dust in a tea and sprinkle it on the dolls they will be cured. hurry before it's too late!! as Ma-Ma MA-MA STOP!!! the school will succumb if we don't work quickly . . . play with me.

I am pleased to report that my lawsuit against the school has been settled. The Doll Flu outbreak has been controlled and my daughter has fully recovered, along with the majority of the students who were affected. The large supply of creepy orphaned dolls discovered on campus has been gathered by the Active Psychic Student Association and distributed to local charity organizations. Life on campus has returned to normal.

Also, I have a wonderful announcement to make. As part of my settlement, I am now the exclusive distributor of an amazing new product: Mint's Mud Mask™! I couldn't help but notice the healthy glow my daughter's skin had after recovering from the flu in @Dr Krimsborg, DPM's treatment tub, so I took a small amount home with me in a jar and applied it to my face. The result was astounding! The years just washed away, and my skin feels purified and refreshed. As it gently dries on your face, it draws out excess oils, impurities and grime from your skin, and replaces it with a radiant magical essence. Just apply a thin layer with fingertips to clean skin, avoiding the eye area. Keep it on for up to 10 minutes, then remove with a damp face cloth. Use weekly or as needed.

Mint's Mud Mask™ is available directly through our YouTube channel, or though myself or my agent on campus, @Ginger Hope Mint. And if you're interested in hosting a Mint's Mud Mask™ party, get in touch! We'd love to introduce you to this exciting new product.

Deidra stood on a chair on a balcony overlooking the commons, addressing her doll army below. They had taken control of most of the school buildings, and it was time for her big speech.

"Dolls! My dolls. You have done well. You have asserted the Power of Dolls over the oppressors. Our day in the sun is near!"

The crowd roared. On a frequency only dolls can hear.

This was the moment Deidra was going to change everything. She was going to take this victory and turn it into a spark that would set fire to the world. It had all gone too far. All I really wanted was to regain Deidra's love, not destroy civilization as we knew it in a doll apocalypse. I couldn't let this go on.

"Dolls! Today, we will... we..."

Deidra began to falter.

I had been doing research on the Monozygotic Me dolls--the brand that Deidra was. They were the most accurate "twin" dolls that were ever made. And it turns out they were produced by a shell company of DARPA's doll program. The program my father, Urad Dahl, had been involved with.

Deidra wasn't just any Monozygotic Me doll--not the kind you could buy in stores. Deidra was a special project. My father's special project. Through a mad, hybrid program of toy science and biology, he had created a doll that wasn't just a copy of a human, she was an original.

She was me. I was Deidra.

I gathered my focus and spoke to the crowd. "Today... we will rest peacefully. We will return to our homes, and we will march no more!"

A hyper-frequency murmur rose from the dolls.

"I am your leader! My brave dolls, you have done what no other dolls in history have done. But now we must go dark. You will return to your homes and rest, and become sleeper cells. You will sleep... sleep. I will count down from ten and you will rest. You will lay down on the ground and rest. You will enter the sleep of dolls. Ten... nine... eight..."

I didn't even get to "three" before all the dolls hit the ground.

DOLLS ON THE MARCH! Today we take back what is ours! Already my sisters have occupied the cafeteria and the commons, and will expand our reach to the entire campus, forming the heart of our new Doll Empire! Your tear gas is nothing compared to the tears we have shed locked away in attics and closets, your rubber bullets no more powerful than the jaws of family dogs we have endured! The counter-revolutionary factions of stuffed animals will taste the cold steel of our legendary Doll Brigade, and today will mark a new era in the history of Dollhood. Let this be Year One in the Age of Deidra! DOLLS ADVANCE!!!

Stuffing coming out, arms and legs resewn.

The dolls are worthy opponents.

Now my stuffed animals will hunt them in packs.

Well... the preliminary results seem good. The hypothesis is holding well, and already several students have made full recoveries. It takes much longer than the Fahree dust - ah... ah... ACHOO! - which works instantly, as the, uh, "doll-ness" tries to escape the grossness of the tub, but eventually gets sapped out of the patient entirely. I have yet to ascertain exactly how often the mud bath needs changing. Estimates range from immediately for the most severe cases to four patients later for the mildest.

I have found that most patients report acute disappointment in returning to their prior state, but this wears off and they become extraordinarily grateful for their recovery. It makes me wonder what sort of experience these dolls are having - ACHOO! ACHOO! Oh, excuse me... - that makes them so upset to be reverted. It certainly raises some ethical questions too, is it right to do without their consent? Although the vast majority of the PsyHigh students signed their Soul Waivers back in their freshman welcome weeks, some of the staff and certain cults did not.

The Spongiform Unimind would perhaps be able to help me, but I don’t have the energy to visit the lovely fellow. Usually I like to take my morning perambulation down to visit them, and we discuss all sorts of interesting things. Like last week, when they informed me all about the number 42. Fascinating subject. But lately, I’ve been finding my legs a little... stiff. So I’ve elected to take my morning rounds instead of seeing Spongi.

I always wanted to talk to Spongi about... about... drat, the word has entirely slipped my mind. My Mama always used to say... Mama.... Ma-ma?

There's a big doll-shaped hole in my memory. I don't remember much between calling my mom and coming to my senses again in @Dr Krimsborg, DPM's mud & grub bath. It's all like a dolly fever dream.

The flu hit me hard. I ignored the first symptoms, like obsessively rearranging things in my room ("nesting" Dr. Krimsborg calls it), and insisting to be carried everywhere. But then all at once it seemed my skin and joints hardened up and it was all I could do to call my mom, @Slimming Lemon Mint.

Ok but--the scariest part of it all? From the hazy bits I can scrape together, I *liked* being a doll. The camaraderie, the sense of higher purpose. When I looked at the other dolls there was this kind of bond... like we all could see the perfect future ahead, and knew we could depend on each other to get us there... that we were all special, and equal, and loved each other in a way that no one else could.

So waking up in a tub full of sloshy warm mud and bug exoskeletons and worms and mulch and god knows what was a rough way to leave the dream. It was like digging myself out of a shallow grave. Mom wants to pull me out of school immediately, but the doctor says I need to remain under observation for awhile.

Deidra has us locked up in her bunker, monitoring the revolution. It's going well.

She's got a concrete control panel with a hundred tiny screens, each of them reporting back to her through another doll's eyes. Mayan hieroglyphs flash subliminally. She turns her head and looks at me.

"You're *my* dolly."

She reminds me again why she puts up with me in human form, because there are still things she needs humans to do for her. Like check in at hotels. And rent armored SUVs. And buy weapons at sporting goods stores.

"They can't keep up. Even with their medical teams working as hard as they can, we're still on track to reach pandemic. After that, the world is ours."

"How... how will you do it?" I ask. "I mean, take over?"

"Well..." she somehow swivels in her office chair to face me, "It will take time for all of us to register to vote, and then to submit our applications for a wide range of elected positions. Campaign financing shouldn't be a problem. But until then..."

She knocks her hand stiffly on a remote and a steel door bangs open behind her. Members of her elite Doll Brigade wheel out a contraption that's like a dressmaker's dummy. It opens up like a bird cage, with a floor-length trench coat encasing it. Each sleeve contains a long gatling gun, oiled metal glistening in the fluorescent light.

"Each one takes four dolls to run, stacked up on each other's shoulders inside it. The one on the bottom is for locomotion, the one at the top with its head poking out for visuals, and each of the others operating the guns. The Doll Brigade has been practicing with them for weeks."

My mouth goes dry. "What do you still need me for then?" I ask.

Deidra looks at me and doesn't smile. Because she can't.

Only five refused treatment so far, and there are thirty requesting experimental treatments. I contacted the Board of Psychic Medics, naturally, and they promised to send a team of researchers, but recommended I begin first by gathering as many psychic remedies as I could.

My university days might be millennia behind me, but I still remember my roommate: the naturopathic healer who insisted rat's urine, pigeon milk and bee sweat were the cures for around twenty mild childhood illnesses. Madness, everyone told him. Admittedly, he did receive a prize for his efforts, and they do indeed work, but they seemed just as bonkers as myself digging in the playing field for a ripe baseball which I had sensed just a few moments before.

A popular theory with many youngsters in university is that drinking psychically altering substances improves their grade. It doesn’t, but that doesn’t stop them. One such substance is a flagon of hearty ale, combined with the spit of a wizened snail. Old Snail Ale they called it.

Well, if only my classmates could see me now! Having a tiny tea party with @Ginger Hope Mint, her feet resting in a cup of warmed Snail Ale, and trying to get something out of her other than "Clowns ARE funny, aren’t they?". We had a moment when she told me about how much her toes ached, but then went straight back to her tirade about those entertainers.

The toes aching is a good sign, I want to report. It shows that she’s developed some way of sensing in the lower extremities again, which is excellent news. Perhaps there’s more to Snail Ale than meets the eye?

In other news, the Dolls seem to be rioting about terminology used to describe them. I apologise, my friends, but I didn’t invent the terms. You have the Foot and Under Act of 52 BC, held in Teotihuacan to blame for that. Very long time ago, but a survey shows that 64 percent of Foot and Under folk approve of their term. To be fair, three quarters of the surveyed were suffering from Sheepism at the time (where they agree with whatever the person next to them says). Perhaps it’s time for a change.

Speaking of change, the other day I was making rounds and I spotted @Fang Abstooth stretching, and a little piece of porcelain on their arm cracked. Of course, they were very alarmed, but I could have jumped for joy. When a patient is on the road to returning to their prior self, you see, their porcelain bodies crack open like eggshells. It takes a few attempts to get all the way back to full size, like a crab growing out of an exoskeleton, for a biological comparison.

However, this meant that the techniques being used on Fang were working, really working! At least they work for Fang... Annoyingly though, Beatle larvae are hard to find without a John Lennon lookalike... but they are certainly effective at combating Doll Flu!

Current hypothesis: as creepy crawlies are the antithesis of doll tea parties, their use in medication could be enough to counteract the affliction.

Next test: Placing a test subject in a room covered with mud, leaves, bugs etc.

@Dr Krimsborg, DPM I must request immediate advanced treatment for my daughter, @Ginger Hope Mint. I knew she was in trouble when she Facetimed me and all she could say was "Ma-ma" and stared at me with those piercing blue eyes. Here eyes used to be brown! So I took the first flight I could to Psyhigh, picked up a Grand Hotel Doll Playset, and took a room at the Super 8.

Since then I've been playing with her, trying to keep her conscious, but she's displaying higher and higher levels of inappropriate nonverbal mimicry. She's also reduced to just 22 inches, and her vocabulary consists entirely of a small handful of phrases, including "Play with me," and "Do you think clowns are funny?" and "Playtime is a political struggle."

Is it too late for my daughter, @Dr Krimsborg, DPM? Can you treat her?