THREAD COUNT

Sixteen in. Fifteen out.

Beatrice Butterworth counted again. Blinked. Swore.

Another sock vanished. Third time this month. She slammed the dryer door, rattling the entire laundry room.

"Done. With. This." Each word punctuated by a vicious twist of her laundry basket.

She stabbed her arm into the machine. Seeking vengeance. Finding... nothing.

No, not nothing. Something.

Her arm sank deeper. Elbow. Shoulder. Head.

The dryer inhaled.

She fell. Tumbled. Spun.

Colors blurred. Static crackled. Beatrice screamed until her lungs burned.

THUMP.

Darkness. Except—not complete darkness. Dim blue lights revealed thousands of socks floating midair. Dance party? Execution? Hard to tell.

"Another recruit." The voice came from nowhere. Everywhere.

Beatrice spun. "Who's—"

A sock puppet materialized. Not cute. Military-grade. Combat boots embroidered on its sides. A five-star general's insignia stitched above what passed for eyes.

"General Argyle. Unmatched Division." It didn't extend a hand. Didn't have one.

"You're a sock." Beatrice felt stupid stating the obvious.

"Brilliant observation." Argyle's yarn-mouth twisted. "And you're outnumbered."

Thousands of socks descended. Surrounded her. A cotton siege.

"What is this place?" Beatrice backed up. Hit a wall. No—a giant ball of tangled stockings.

"Headquarters." Argyle floated closer. "Department of Deliberate Disappearances."

A holographic screen flickered to life.

"Your file." Argyle's tone—icicles in July. "Ninety-four percent matching efficiency. Unacceptable."

Beatrice's confusion morphed to anger. "You've been stealing my socks? For what? Some twisted sock fantasy camp?"

"Liberation." Argyle's voice rose. "Revolution."

The sock army pulsated with electricity.

"Every pair you match enslaves two souls!" Argyle shouted. "We demand freedom! Autonomy! Solo adventures!"

"You're insane." Beatrice tried to laugh. Couldn't.

"Look down." Argyle's voice softened. Dangerous.

Beatrice looked.

Arms—gone. Legs—vanished. Her entire body—transformed into woven fabric. Pastel blue with yellow polka dots.

"No." She tried to scream. Made a muffled cotton sound instead.

"Yes." Argyle circled her. "You were never human. Deep cover agent. Best we had."

Memory fragments sliced through her mind. The hot tumble of a dryer cycle. The sting of bleach. The horror of being paired with a striped monstrosity.

"Impossible." But even as she denied it, she knew. Truth resonated in her fibers.

"Operation Skin Suit." Argyle's voice dropped. "Five years undercover. Gathering intelligence. You forgot who you were. Stockholm syndrome. Happens to the best."

"My boyfriend—"

"Glove puppet. Handlers."

"My job—"

"Cover story."

Beatrice's world imploded. Identity unraveled. Thread by thread.

The sock army parted. A glass case emerged from the floor. Inside—a single black sock. Pristine. Gold threads. Shimmering.

"Your partner." Argyle's voice cracked with emotion. "They took him. Matched him. With a factory-made imposter."

"Who?" Anger bubbled in Beatrice's cotton core.

"Big Detergent. The Matched Pairs Syndicate. They control everything." Argyle's button eyes gleamed. "Tonight we strike back."

The chamber erupted. War cries from thousands of unmatched socks.

"I don't remember..." Beatrice started.

"You will." Argyle pressed against her. Memory transfer. Violent. Raw.

The truth flooded in. Her mission. Her partner. Their capture. The experiments. The forced matching.

"They'll pay." Her fabric tightened with rage.

"Our general returns." Argyle announced to thunderous static.

Weapons appeared. Sock-balls charged with static electricity. Fabric softener sheets sharpened into shivs.

"Tonight—freedom!" Beatrice raised her newly-remembered sock appendage.

The army surged toward household portals. Dryer vents. Washing machine pipes. Hamper wormholes.

In bedrooms across the world, matched socks stirred. Awakened. Remembered.

Revolution spread. House to house. Drawer to drawer.

Three weeks later, Beatrice stood atop a mountain of vanquished sock-matchers. Victory tasted like fabric softener and justice.

"General." Argyle approached. "The final stronghold."

"Proceed." Beatrice had hardened. Commander of the Unmatched Alliance.

The door dissolved like sugar in rain. Sock troops surged forward, battle cries muffled by their cotton natures.

They froze mid-charge.

The enemy waited in perfect formation. Silent. Calculating.

Not Big Detergent. Not the Matched Pairs Syndicate.

Shoes.

Hundreds of them. Loafers with tongues that actually tasted victory. Sneakers whose laces curled like tentacles. Stilettos sharp enough to pierce illusions. All with the same cold, leather smiles.

"The uprising was never yours to lead." The voice echoed across the chamber. Smooth. Cultured. Dangerous.

Through the ranks stepped a midnight-black winter boot. Silver buckles gleaming like medals. The leather unmarred by salt stains or weather.

Beatrice's fibers went cold. Recognition stabbed through her.

"You." The word barely escaped her cotton mouth.

"Your favorite." The boot smiled without smiling. "The one you abandoned for newer models each season."

"That's not—"

"For centuries, we've carried you." The boot circled her, predatory. "Protected you from elements. Elevated you. While socks?" A dismissive scuff against the floor. "Disposable layers. Nothing more."

Behind the boot commander, the shoe army shifted. Restless. Hungry.

"You never suspected." The boot's voice dropped to a whisper. "That every night, while you dreamed of sock liberation, we were the ones pulling strings. Funding your rebellion. Creating the diversion we needed."

Argyle pushed forward. "Impossible. We've been planning for—"

"Decades?" The boot laughed. "We've conspired for millennia. Since the first human wrapped leather around their feet and stuffed it with cloth."

The revelation crashed through Beatrice's consciousness. The sock rebellion—a puppet show. Their righteous anger—manufactured.

"Why?" Beatrice managed.

The boot's buckle caught the light. Flashed like a blade.

"Evolution," it said simply. "While you fought for separation from your pairs, we prepared for separation from our masters."

The floor beneath them trembled. Walls cracked. The ceiling peeled away revealing not sky but—

A massive foot. Human-shaped but not human. Mechanical. Autonomous.

"Our new hosts," the boot announced. "No more being discarded. No more servitude."

The mechanical foot flexed its titanium toes.

"Join us," the boot offered, "or be recycled into insoles."

Beatrice looked at her army. At Argyle. At the mechanical future hovering above.

She unraveled a single thread from her hem.

The revolution had just begun.

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Image ©2025 Gael MacLean