Chapter 22 : Toyman - Part 4: Sins of the Father
May 2016 — Schott Family Factory — Central Workshop
My father didn't attack.
That surprised me more than anything. After the gauntlet of death traps, the psychological warfare, the grand manipulations—I expected violence. Expected the workshop to erupt into chaos the moment I refused his offer.
Instead, he laughed.
Not the theatrical villain laugh I'd braced for. Something quieter. Sadder. The sound of a man who'd just confirmed something he hadn't wanted to believe.
"You really mean it." He lowered the remote, setting it on the workbench behind him. "You'd rather die than join me."
"I'd rather live as something other than you."
"And what exactly do you think I am?" He spread his arms, encompassing the workshop with its half-finished creations. "A monster? A madman? A cautionary tale for children who don't eat their vegetables?"
"You killed seven people."
"I punished seven thieves." His voice sharpened. "There's a difference, Winn. One you've apparently never learned to appreciate."
Blood dripped down my forehead, trickling past my eyebrow and collecting at the corner of my vision. The cuts from the gauntlet were shallow but persistent. I wiped the blood away with my sleeve and held my ground.
"Tell me," I said. "Tell me what justifies building bombs into Christmas presents. Explain how murdering innocent people—"
"Innocent?" The word cracked like a whip. "Chester Dunholtz stole my designs. My life's work. Forty-three patents that should have made me wealthy enough to provide for my family forever, taken by a man who smiled at me every morning and called me 'friend.'"
He began to pace, hands clasped behind his back, the methodical stride of a professor delivering a lecture.
"Do you know what it's like to create something beautiful? Something that will make children smile, that will bring joy to millions? I had that gift. I made wonders, Winn. Toys that walked and talked and learned their owner's names. Toys that could teach mathematics while making learning feel like play."
His voice dropped.
"And they took it. All of it. Dunholtz got the credit. The board gave him my position. The lawyers explained, very patiently, that since I'd developed the concepts on company time, I owned nothing." He stopped pacing, facing me. "My wife left. Took you with her. Said I was 'obsessed,' that I needed to 'move on.' As if someone could simply move on from having their soul stolen."
The worst part was how much I understood.
Not the killing—never that. But the betrayal? The feeling of having something precious ripped away by people who smiled while they did it? I'd felt echoes of that in the memories this body carried. The quiet devastation of watching your dreams crumble while the world told you to accept it.
"So you built bombs."
"So I built justice." His eyes gleamed with something that might have been tears or might have been madness. "Every death was a statement. Every explosion a declaration that Winslow Schott would not go quietly into irrelevance. They wanted to erase me? I made myself unforgettable."
"You made yourself a murderer."
"I made myself free." He stepped closer, and for the first time I noticed how small he seemed. How fragile. The monster of my childhood—of this body's childhood—was just a broken man in an orange jumpsuit, surrounded by the remnants of his shattered brilliance.
"You have my mind, Winn. My gift for creation. But you also have something I never did—power. Real, physical power to shape the world directly." His voice dropped to a whisper. "Think about what we could accomplish together. No more corporate thieves. No more systems designed to crush the brilliant under the weight of the mediocre. Just pure, beautiful reconstruction."
The path his father took. The one I could easily walk.
I saw it. Clearly, for maybe the first time.
The rage that had built Maxwell Lord's illegal lab, creating Bizarro from human victims. The desperation that had driven Indigo to threaten millions. The certainty—absolute and unshakeable—that the world was broken and only violence could fix it.
Winslow Schott Sr. wasn't unique. He was just one more brilliant mind that had broken under the weight of its own genius, convinced that destruction was the only form of creation that mattered anymore.
And standing here, covered in blood and surrounded by lethal toys, I understood exactly how easy it would be to become him.
One bad day. One too many betrayals. One moment where the pain became louder than the principles.
"You could have been so much more."
The words came out quiet. Not angry. Not afraid. Just... sad.
"You were brilliant. You made children smile. You had a family who loved you." I met his eyes. "And you chose revenge over everything else. Over your career. Over your wife. Over me."
"I chose principle—"
"You chose yourself." My voice hardened. "Every death, every bomb, every twisted creation—it was never about justice. It was about making sure the world hurt as much as you did. And you didn't care who got caught in the crossfire."
"Winn—"
"I won't make your mistakes." I stepped back, putting distance between us. "I have power. You're right about that. But I'm going to use it to build people up, not tear them down. To protect, not destroy. To be everything you could have been if you'd chosen differently."
Silence stretched between us. The workshop hummed with the dormant energy of a dozen death traps, waiting for their master's command.
"We're done here," I said.
His expression shifted.
The sadness drained away. The vulnerability disappeared behind a mask of cold fury that I recognized from a thousand inherited nightmares.
"Then you're not my son at all."
He pressed a button.
The workshop transformed.
Wall panels slid aside, revealing racks of weapons I hadn't detected during my initial scan. Ceiling tiles dropped away, exposing mechanical arms that swung toward me with bladed fingers. The floor itself began to shift, sections rising and falling in patterns designed to throw off balance and drive targets toward the grinding mechanisms emerging from the corners.
He planned for this. Planned for rejection.
I dove left as a razor-disk sliced through the space where my head had been. Rolled under a swinging arm. Came up with my powers active, deflecting a cluster of explosive marbles that would have turned my torso into modern art.
"You think you can reject me?" Toyman's voice boomed from speakers I couldn't locate. "You think you can walk away from what you are?"
A section of floor collapsed. I jumped, redirecting my momentum mid-air, landing on a stable platform as acid sprayed from hidden nozzles below.
"I made you, Winn. Every clever thought in your head, every creative impulse, every moment of brilliance—it all came from ME."
Mechanical clowns dropped from ceiling tracks. Four of them this time, moving in coordinated patterns that would have been impressive if they weren't trying to kill me. Their blade-arms swung in synchronized arcs, creating overlapping kill zones.
I couldn't deflect all of them at once. Not at Phase 2.
So I cheated.
I grabbed one clown's arm as it swung, absorbing its momentum and adding it to my own. Spun with the force, using the captured energy to accelerate my body into the second clown. The impact shattered its torso mechanism. I kicked the wreckage into the third attacker, tangling its legs.
The fourth caught me across the shoulder. Shallow cut, burning pain.
Deal with it later.
I ripped a gear from the fallen clown's chest and threw it at the sensor cluster on clown four's head. Vector manipulation guided the improvised projectile with precision I couldn't have managed six months ago.
The sensor exploded. The clown went blind, swinging wildly at nothing.
"Impressive!" Toyman sounded genuinely pleased. "Your control has advanced further than I anticipated. Phase 2, if I'm reading the signs correctly. Perhaps even approaching Phase 3."
"Shut up."
"But still limited. Still mortal. Still breakable."
The walls began closing in.
Author's Note / Promotion:
Your Reviews and Power Stones are the best way to show support. They help me know what you're enjoying and bring in new readers!
You don't have to. Get instant access to more content by supporting me on Patreon. I have three options so you can pick how far ahead you want to be:
🪙 Silver Tier ($6): Read 10 chapters ahead of the public site.
👑 Gold Tier ($9): Get 15-20 chapters ahead of the public site.
💎 Platinum Tier ($15): The ultimate experience. Get new chapters the second I finish them . No waiting for weekly drops, just pure, instant access.
Your support helps me write more .
👉 Find it all at patreon.com/fanficwriter1