They figured out the existential mystery fairly quickly—the soldier, the dancer, the clown, and the strongman—toys in a barrel, cursed with consciousness but not perception, soulless automata who can never know Christ, yadda yadda—and after an impossible to measure span of time they all run out of terror and just sit quietly together. Exhausted, emotionally dry, wrung out.

“So what now,” said the strongman, not to anyone in particular. “An eternity of domestic betrayals or what?”

“What does it matter,” said the dancer, bitterly. “Speak or remain silent, stand or sit, nothing serves to further. What now? Now nothing.” And she fell silent and glassy-eyed.

“I keep trying,” said the soldier, staring down the barrel of his gun. “No bullets. It just makes a noise.” The dancer laughed, a tinny bark of static.

The clown said nothing, but he sure honked his horn a lot, and pulled the oversize scissors out of his pants.

“As good an idea as any,” said the strongman, and laid his head at the clown’s feet.