The Carnival - Henmei shikei

[Moridanu]

*The sound of screaming filled the air, and she couldn’t help but roll her eyes at her friend Rosie over the hood of the car as they both slammed the doors shut. Rosie laughed ~Aw come on Jo Jo, don’t be such a killjoy! We are here to have fun, remember? You know that thing you used to do before whatshisname?~ Jo let her tongue do the talking, by sticking it out at her best friend, as she hoisted her backpack over both shoulders while waiting for her other friends to pile out of the car.

Jo tried not to laugh as she watched Katie climb out of the backseat, followed closely by Chris. Chris’ infatuation with the six foot stunner was written all over his face, and everyone knew that he would kill for the girl of his dreams, especially Katie. She yawned as Chris offered to carry her bag for her, before shooting Jo a look that clearly showed how bored she was getting with her new toy. Throwing the bag at him, she snarled ~Just don’t drop it, it cost a fortune ya know?~ She failed to mention that her boyfriend Steve had bought the bag for her as an “I’m sorry I cheated on you with that girl across town” present, and also didn’t bother to mention that she had forgiven this transgression a few weeks before. Jo suspected that Steve would turn up once they stepped inside the carnivals gates, the whole “wow, what a coincidence..” spiel spilling from his lips. Although those lips were featured on an incredibly handsome face, Jo had no patience for Steve after all the things he had done to hurt Katie in the past. Katie however seemed to have no problem forgiving him, and Jo shrugged as she gave Chris a sympathetic smile. He failed to notice though, as he scampered after Katie who was striding towards the main gate.

The last member of their group to climb out of the back of Rosie’s car was Brett, and Jo had to look away quickly as she watched him plant a kiss on Rosie’s cheek. The two of them had been together for years, and the familiar love between the two of them was like a stab in her heart as she thought of Michael. Determined not to let the thought of her recent ex bring her mood even further down, Jo fell into step behind Chris and the five of them were soon paying for their entry in the ticket booth. As the fat lady behind the counter fixed a purple band around her wrist, Jo had the sudden feeling that the flimsy purple band was made of a constricting metal, similar to that of handcuffs. The feeling was so strong, that she stared down at her arm in surprise for a few moments, before Rosie bumped her lightly with her hip and told her to get a move on. Jo did as she was told, and was soon standing in the main entrance of the carnival grounds.

For fifty one weeks of the year, the grounds were used by a local football team which Jo and her friends did their best to support somewhat regularly. Despite her familiarity with the grounds however, the presence of the carnival tonight altered her perception and she felt as though she had stepped into a wonderland. All around her, bright lights, loud music, screaming and laughing overwhelmed her senses while the smell of roasted nuts, hotdogs and fairy floss made her mouth water. She stood where she was, looking around at all the different rides and games of test your luck, before she noticed that everyone was looking at her expectantly. Giving them all a blank look, Jo shrugged as Rosie asked what she wanted to do first.

~I don’t know.. I don’t really care guys.. it was your idea to come..~ she said to Rosie.
Rosie sighed in exasperation as she linked her fingers with Brett. ~Yeah, but we came to cheer you up, so you get to plan everything tonight. And since we all know how much you love to be in charge, that should cheer you up right?~ She grinned up at Brett as he smiled down at her, and Jo looked away as that stab in her heart seemed to deepen.

~Uh.. I dunno.. the Ferris Wheel I guess?~

Katie squealed. ~ OOOH remember all those stories they used to say about the Ferris Wheel back in school? What was it…? Oh yeah.. that if the Ferris Wheel stopped while your car was at the top, that you just disappeared and then your car would come down the bottom and the guy running the ride would just put someone else in your seat.. and you were gone.. poof! Never to be seen again!~ She tried to do an evil laugh, but dissolved into giggles instead as Chris gazed at her adoringly.

Brett snorted. ~What a load of shit. The Ferris Wheel is lame Jo, lets go on that haunted train ride! That looks like a blast.~

Rosie squeezed his hand as she smiled up at him. ~ Babe, we can do that later. Jo wants to go on the Ferris Wheel first, so lets do that, okay?~
Brett just shrugged while Chris said ~I’m happy with whatever Katie wants to do..~
Just then, Steve appeared as if by magic, walking up to the group carrying a large wand of fairy floss on a stick. His look of fake surprise was enough to make Jo gag, and she looked over at Chris to see his happy smile drop.

~Wow.. it’s Steve!~ Katie exclaimed, as if nobody else had seen him. ~ What a coincidence!~ Steve walked over and stood at Katie’s side, literally shouldering Chris out of the group. ~Hey guys! What a coincidence we end up coming here all on the same night eh? Mind if I walk around with you?~

~Of course we don’t mind!~ Katie giggled and slid her hand around his large forearm. ~Actually guys, I don’t feel like going on the Ferris Wheel, so I might walk around with Steve for a while, okay? I’ll catch up with you at the fireworks.~ And then, she grabbed her bag off Chris and was gone.

Rosie blinked at Jo in shock, while Brett clapped Chris on the back. Chris just sighed and said ~Lets go to the stupid Ferris Wheel then..~
Sighing, Jo fell into step with Rosie as the boys followed close behind. The Ferris Wheel was more fun than they had thought with Brett scaring the hell out of the girls by rocking the car back and forth when they got to the top. Rosie had screamed ~ We are going to disappear forever!~ but all four of them came down safely and moved onto some more rides.

Two and a bit hours later, the foursome wandered over to the grandstand to get their seats for the fireworks show. They found Katie leaning against the fence, tears on her face as she slowly ripped a green stuffed teddy bear to shreds. Jo rolled her eyes and reached out to grab Chris to stop him from running towards her. Rosie looked at Jo to see who was going to be the good friend and go and see if she was okay, but Jo just shrugged, took Chris by the arm and began to climb the grandstand. She was getting sick of the whole Katie and Steve saga and was not in the mood for anymore dramatics this evening. Seeing that Rosie had been nominated for friend duty, Brett shrugged and followed Jo and Chris and they found a seat to watch the show. Jo noticed Rosie and Katie join them a few minutes later, and she literally had to hold Chris back from going to sit next to his beloved.

~Just play it cool, okay? Let her come to you for a change..~

Chris nodded and slumped back in his sheet. Jo sighed and stared up at the night sky as fireworks of all different colours exploded in the darkness. She was aware of Brett and Rosie making out beside her, and she wrapped her arms around herself, feeling increasingly lonely while the sky lit up all around her.

Soon the fireworks were over, and the gang decided to go and try their luck in sideshow alley. An hour or so later, Chris had cheered Katie up by winning her a purple giraffe, Brett had won several large toys for Rosie (one of which she gave to Jo – an aqua elephant with pink ears) and they were all nearly out of money. Brett reminded them then that they hadn’t been on the Ghost Train yet, and as it was nearly closing time, they set off for the far side of the park where the Ghost Train was set up.

A cool chill had developed in the last hour, and a quick glance at her watch showed Jo that it was nearly midnight. The park had quickly emptied out with only a handful of patrons still wandering around. As they stepped up to the Ghost Train, Jo shivered. Brett was like a little kid, he was bursting with excitement. Rosie laughed as she handed the old guy that stood in front of the ride enough money for both Brett and herself to ride. Chris paid for himself and Katie, and Jo handed over the last of her money. The old guy taking the money had a crooked grin full of missing teeth. What teeth remained were cracked and stained. When he grinned at her, Jo felt violently sick. As she turned to see her friends walk up to the front door of the ride, Jo felt a sudden and overwhelming sense of impending danger. Every fibre in her being told her not to get on the ride, but her friends were already climbing into the car. As she approached, the old guy that had taken her money barked ~ Four to a car!~ as the bars came down over her friends heads. Rosie turned around to grin at her. ~Oh sorry babe! I didn’t know there was only four.. I’ll go through and then we can go through together if ya want. ~ The old man shook his head, long grey scraggly hair flying around his gnarled face. ~No time for that. She can ride on her own..~ as he flicked the switch and the car carrying her friends jerked into life. Rosie turned around to shoot Jo a look before the doors ahead opened and the car disappeared into the darkness. Minutes later, Jo heard their screams and shivered again.

Another car came to a jerky halt on the track and Jo looked down at it before looking back at the creepy old man. He was looking at her and licking his cracked lips with a pale purple tongue. ~In ya hop Miss..~ Jo didn’t want to ride alone, yet she didn’t want to waste her money either. Michael had always given her hell for being a wuss, and this was exactly the kind of thing he would’ve teased her about. Determined to prove him wrong, she threw her long blonde hair over one shoulder, slid her backpack off and climbed into the car. Pushing the backpack down between her knees, Jo clutched the aqua elephant with pink ears as she waited for the ride to start. *

[Boston]

The carnival was far more crowded tonight, on its final night, than it had been any other day this week. Due to the rumors, no doubt, they all centered on strange things happening the night before the carnival left town. The crowd consisted largely of teenagers looking for a thrill – some seeking the thrill of a seemingly dangerous roller coaster, and some seeking the thrill of tempting an urban myth, testing a rumor, so sure that they wouldn’t simply vanish off the face of the Earth…

But as the seventh paper bracelet was strapped to Tommy Coffin’s wrist, a sinking feeling hit his stomach, and he wasn’t so sure.

“You’ll be working this carnival by Last Ride,” a low, raspy voice echoed from the ticket booth, and Tommy looked between the new crimson bracelet and the cashier. His flesh had begun melting off his face, but a sudden and powerful gust of wind blew the sagging flesh and his long hair up towards the booth’s roof. His eyes were darkened circles, eternally dense shadows that trapped the surrounding darkness, which floated off in wisps, as if smoke. His mouth opened wide and a razor sharp ring of teeth protruded.

Tommy looked back down at the bracelet to see it being clamped into place by a heavy steel clasp. He took in a low gasp and blinked his eyes several times, shaking his head for a moment. “W-what…?” He rubbed his eyes and looked at the cashier again, whose face had returned to normal.

“You should work for the carnival. You’ve been here every night this week.” The cashier nodded at Tommy’s wrist, which still held one bracelet for every night this week. The new crimson bracelet made seven.

“Oh…” Tommy just nodded slowly and headed through the gate, into the carnival. The paper bracelet felt heavier than usual, it reminded him of handcuffs…He shook the feeling off a moment later and rubbed the back of his head, sighing quietly, chalking it up to being overworked and malnourished. He had spent nearly every waking moment at the carnival every day this week, and had eaten nothing but carnival food. He would be glad when this carnival was gone, and his contract with his client fulfilled.

He tugged the sleeve of his dark blue suit jacket back down over his wrist, hiding the bracelets, not wanting to elicit anymore unwanted comments from smarmy carnies. Then with his hands shoved into the pockets of his matching slacks, he made his way through the crowd, trying to decide how to investigate tonight.

He bided his time in the carnival, waiting to hear someone call out “Last Ride”, the time around midnight when you only had time to get on one more ride before they started kicking people out – or, if you believed the rumors, before they started trapping people in.

His nights in this decidedly two-bit carnival (Tommy’s professional opinion after spending so much time here) had been spent testing out the several “Last Ride” rumors he had heard.

Night one was spent on the Ferris wheel; it took some creative timing on his part, but he had managed to be in a car that stopped at the highest point. He didn’t vanish, but he did have a decent view of the town, stretched out before him and the mountains in the distance.

Night two was spent in the Hall of Mirrors, waiting for the mirrors to fall down and trap him inside, trapping him in another dimension. He particularly liked that one, it reminded him of Superman 2. Alas, he managed to evade getting trapped in the Phantom Zone.

Night three was spent perched atop a white wooden horse, spinning around on the carousel, staring into the mirrors. Apparently making eye contact with yourself in a particular mirror after Last Ride was called turned you into a mindless drone, and the carnies put you to work as a ride operator.

Night four was spent on the roller coaster; in another marvelous demonstration of timing, he managed to be at the height of an upside-down loop just as Last Ride was called. As expected, Tommy was not taken away by any upside-down carnie demons that night while trying to sleep.

So by night seven, the idea of testing these urban myths was beginning to get rather tiring. He thought it was silly from the get-go, and was glad, to say the least, that this would be his final night in this place, surrounded by all these noisy people and dirty nomadic carnival workers.

Finally midnight approached, and Tommy heard the carnies starting to call out Last Ride. He sighed with relief and stood still amongst the crowd of people scrambling for one more trip on their favorite rides, and tried to decide what to test out. He had gotten all the urban myths out of the way, so figured he should just repeat one…he could have easily just left the carnival early instead of taking in another irritating ride, but he was being paid to investigate the disappearances of missing people. Although he was sure his client’s daughters simply skipped town, he needed to see the job through to the end, most likely as a matter of personal pride…

It was when he was trying to decide what to do next a small Asian man in a peculiarly old-fashioned suit crept up behind him to announce Last Ride.

“Saigo no damashimasu!” Tommy jumped a little, startled, and turned around to face the man. He wore a pair of tan slacks, with a matching jacket and vest; it all looked lightly caked in dirt, but the faded white buttoned shirt beneath the vest looked oddly clean, and neatly pressed. A dark black ponytail hung out of his tan bowler hat, and the silver chain of a pocket watch dangled from his vest pocket, “Rasu-to rai-du!” He shouted out, his Japanese accent very thick.

Tommy folded his arms over his stomach to listen to the wrangler pitch his ride.

“Stepu rai-tuh ahp and expeliance the threel of Henmei Shikei! Nevah befohr has a lide been so te-lifying, so dead-ry, so absoru-tu-rly sahr-ten to make sure…anata shogai owarimasu!” He was extraordinarily enthusiastic and animated in his mannerisms, waving a long brown cane in the air and motioning for the crowd to come closer.

“Henmei Shikei…” Tommy repeated to himself, quietly, “Damashimasu…” A little smirk tugged one corner of his lips up, and he couldn’t hold back a quiet chuckle, “Certain to bring your life to its end…” He nodded towards the Asian man, speaking a little loudly, so he could hear over the crowd he had gathered so suddenly, “Totemo riko desu!”

A particularly amused, perhaps cynical, smirk crept over the Asian man’s face, his eyes locked square onto Tommy’s. He took a step back and held his arm out to the entrance, motioning for him to get in line, “Su-tepu rai-tu ahp, tomodachi, and see…Flightening mon-stru-ah-cities, dilect frahm the Orient…”

Tommy nodded, and decided to take him up on his offer…Despite the fact he had been at this carnival from open to close every day this week, he hadn’t noticed this particular attraction until just now, which was very curious to him…Everything about the place screamed mystery and intrigue, the Asian man and his choice of words in particular.

Fluent in Japanese, Tommy not only knew what the wrangler was saying, but even picked up on the subtle plays on words. “Saigo” meaning “last” and “Damashimasu” meaning “ride”, but as in the expression “to take someone for a ride”, as in to deceive someone…

Admittedly, it was a good pitch. The Japanese was intriguing to those who didn’t speak the language, and pretty clever to those who did…The ride’s name was scary, it rhymed, and if there was going to be anything funny going on at this carnival, it would be happening on this ride…The last ride on the last night, on a ride that only appears on the last ride of the last night…

“Henmei shikei,” Tommy thought aloud to himself as he made his way through the twisting, largely empty line, stopping just behind Jo as he finished his thought, “Incognito Death Penalty…” He grinned to himself, then looked up at the gross old carnie shuffling people into the cars.

It was four to a car, so Tommy was shoved into the car beside Jo. The carnie grabbed him by the shoulder and pushed him into the seat, and Tommy scrunched his face and retracted from the dirty hand. “Ew, great, I’ve gone all week without being touched by one of you gross people, now I’m gonna have to send my jacket out to the laundry…”

Used to receiving such remarks, the carnie just snarled at Tommy and shouted for the ride to begin.

Tommy chuckled and then looked at Jo, offering her a pleasant smile as he dusted off the shoulder of his suit jacket. “Finally, this job’s paying off,” he thought. He certainly didn’t mind sitting next to pretty young girls on scary rides, in fact, he preferred, and often insisted upon, it.

“How’s it goin’, I’m – Oof!” The car bumped violently, nearly knocking the wind out of Tommy as it threw him into the metal bar that snapped into place over their laps.

He coughed and wiggled against the bar, groaning a little at how tight the carnie had made it, “Damn nomad’s got it out for me…”

It was easy for him to ignore the sense of dread and foreboding he had as the rickety car tugged along the tracks into utter darkness; he was convinced that there was nothing special about this carnival, and all he needed was a good night’s rest and a meal that consisted of something other than hotdogs and snow cones…

[Moridanu]

*Sitting there, clutching her aqua elephant with pink ears, Jo felt like a five year old. As her green eyes stared ahead at the closed doors that held unknowing horrors ahead, she remembered sitting crunched up on her bed, her blankets pulled up to her chin while she clutched her teddy bear and stared miserably at the closet that she knew had demons and monsters hiding inside. Of course her closet had held nothing but her clothes and shoes, and she was sure that the doors ahead held nothing but a lame attempt of a ghost train ride, but still she could not shake off the feelings of fear and dread. So caught up with dreading the horror that lay ahead was she that she failed to see the man in dark blue approach until he was sitting in the car beside her. She glanced over at him and offered a shaky smile in return to the one he had flashed her, giggling slightly at his reaction to the car shifting into gear.

~Nice to meet you “Oof”, I’m Jo.~ As the car lurched forward and they started their ride along the bumpy track, the carnie called out “Last Ride” which seemed to echo into the darkness of the tunnel ahead as the doors opened, delivering them into the world of “Henmei shikei”. Jo shivered and hugged her elephant tightly, her knees locking her backpack into a death grip.

The car travelled along the bumpy track for a few moments, introducing them into a world of darkness so black that she could not have seen a hand in front of her face if there was one there to see. Something slimy touched her left shoulder, and she instinctively moved over to the right, closer to where her new friend was sitting. A strong gust of cold air blew down on them from above, causing her long blonde hair to blow over her face, the soft tendrils feeling like spider webs and freaking her out even more.

Then, nothing but the darkness for another few moments, before the car jerked to the right, giving them the view of a long tunnel lit dimly with red. A loud maniacal laugh could be heard just as something large flew down at them from above. Jo screamed and ducked, almost knocking herself out on the metal bar as she whacked her head against it. Groaning, she lifted her head, rubbing her forehead. ~That’s gonna be a nasty bruise..~ she muttered to herself as she clutched the elephant so tightly she could feel her sweaty palms slipping against its soft, aqua fur.

~I hate these rides..~ she said to the guy beside her. Why couldn’t Brett be here sitting next to her? He knew how much she hated scary rides and as such usually sat next to her with his strong arm around her to make her feel better while Rosie sat in the front with Katie, laughing and screaming. Of course, that had been before Chris had become the official tag along of the group… Thinking of her friends, she wondered if they had finished the ride yet or were somewhere up ahead. She hadn’t heard any screams since they had first disappeared into the ride.

Now that the tunnel was dimly lit in a sickening red glow, Jo’s eyes could make out the macabre decorations that were on either side of the tracks. They passed by a large yellow jar that had what appeared to be a disgustingly deformed foetus floating inside an orange liquid. Jo shuddered and turned to look at the other side of the track, closest to the man in blue. Here there was what appeared to be a modern day torture chamber. As well as the various torture devices such as a guillotine and a bed of nails, that same maniacal laugh they had heard before was clearly on repeat as they heard it again while a guillotine came down on a papier-mâché head. Realistic fake blood spurted from the neck as the body slumped to the ground behind the guillotine. Jo saw the hot pink jacket on the body and thought to herself that it looked like Katie’s favourite jacket. A slight smile came to her face as she could hear Katie in her head going off about the price of Prada and the atrocity of using a Prada jacket for such a lame gag. The smile fell from her face though as the papier-mâché head rolled closer to the tracks. Though she had to strain to see in the dim light, Jo was certain that the head was not papier-mâché, but in fact, belonged to her friend Katie.

The train moved on before she could get a better look, but Jo tried to twist around in her seat, her eyes unable to tear away from the sight. When the train jerked to the left, delivering them into a new tunnel, Jo looked at the man beside her and started screaming hysterically just as something large and dark jumped out at them and screamed something in Japanese. *

[Boston]

Tommy rubbed the soreness from his stomach after the ride started moving at a less bumpy pace, and grimaced slightly as he glanced over at Jo. “Well it’s a pleasure to meet you, Jo…But only close friends call me ‘Oof’, the name’s Tommy Coffin.” He would have offered his hand in a handshake, but the ride whipped around a sharp turn and threw him off his balance. He shouted out as he was forced to slide up against Jo, and then quickly tugged himself along the bar to put himself back on his side of the rickety car.

The girl sure was freaking out, and Tommy couldn’t help but laugh. It was an amusing sight, and the sounds she was making were just plain funny to him…

“It’s okay, gal, it’s just a ride.” He reached over and patted Jo on the back in comfort, then quickly returned his grip to the safety bar, to hold himself in place as the car whipped so violently around the entirely unseen turns.

When the ride finally began its attempts at scaring them, Tommy wasn’t too impressed. For a ride that was supposed to steal your soul, everything looked suspiciously cardboard…There were some headstones planted in what actually looked like real soil and grass, but the headstones themselves were obviously spray painted styrofoam.

Tommy squinted and leaned over, leaning half his body out of the car, trying to read the name on one of the tombstones. It was difficult to see from this distance and in the poor lighting, but he could have sworn the name inscribed was “Tommy Coffin”.

As he leaned over the side of the car inspecting the tombstone, his gaze naturally panned onto the next scene. Sitting in the grass a few feet from the small graveyard scene was a short stone well, an eerie gray spotlight cast down over it. As Tommy stared and squinted through the dim lighting at it, what looked like a thin, gray, transparent arm jutted from the well and wrapped around the edge, as if someone was trying to climb out.

His eyes went a little wide and he leaned closer and closer, until he nearly toppled out of the car. Shouting and waving his arms for a moment, he managed to grab onto the side and push himself back onto his seat.

He let out a quiet sigh of relief, and then grabbed tightly onto the safety bar. He figured that his last name, “Coffin”, was commonplace in a horror ride…So he shouldn’t think anything odd of it, providing he had even seen it correctly in the first place. As for the ghost arm coming out of the well, well that could easily have been the one projector in the entire carnival. One of these rides was bound to have something halfway fancy on it.

Next, Tommy spotted the guillotine and watched the blade fall and lop off that girl’s head. The head rolled over to say hello, but it was on the other side so he couldn’t see it. Though his eyes narrowed and his nostrils flared slightly at the scent of blood, which he immediately recognized as real. For all the movie magic that a two-bit carnival might be able to produce, Tommy had never encountered a fake blood that actually smelled realistic…

“I think there’s something funny going on here…” For the first time all week, he thought he may have actually gotten a break in his case. Unfortunately, the break just happened to come when he found himself sitting beside a girl that he was sure would be absolutely hysterical in a haunted house that was actually haunted…

“We gotta get off this ride.” Up until now he had been ignoring the sense of dread and impending doom in the pit of his stomach, but the scent of fresh blood always got to him. Jo chose that point to start screaming hysterically at him, and he cringed, turning his ear away in annoyance, just as the form appeared and shouted in Japanese.

In a flash, Tommy was out of that rickety car. There was no mistaking the scent of real blood, so as far as he was concerned, there was certainly something funny going on with this ride – which meant that for the rest of the night, there was no such thing as an overreaction.

In an instant he had reached into the back of his suit jacket and pulled a silver revolver from the holster hidden beneath, and reached out to grab at what would be the chest of the form that appeared. He threw all his weight forward and pushed the barrel of the gun against the form, beside his hand, and brought his knee up high onto where its stomach would be if it were a person.

The form fell to the ground and collapsed under Tommy’s weight, a papier-mâché dummy done up to look like a zombie which crumbled easily. The voice box in its chest was crushed by the barrel of his gun, so looped and repeated “Atamaaaaa~”.

Upon seeing it was just a dummy, Tommy holstered his gun and stood, dusting himself off, and walked alongside the car, beside Jo. He reached his hand out for her, to help her out of the seat. “C’mon, we gotta go back the other way. I gotta get you outta here.”

Going back the way they just came, in theory, would be a quicker way out than following the tracks forward. Little did Tommy know, the tracks suddenly stretched on for what would seem like miles in either direction.

[Moridanu]

*Jo soon ran out of breath, her screaming finally breaking down to a series of gasping sobs. She had to go back and see if that really had been Katie. Of course, if it was her friend, that meant that she was dead, and there was nothing that Jo could do about the situation. Still, she had to find out once and for all, if only to relieve her worried mind, so she was relieved when the man formerly known as “oof” but now known as “Tommy” told her that he too thought something weird was going on and hopped out of the car. She tried to turn around to follow his movements with her scared wide eyes, and saw him tackling the dummy that had swooped down at them. Jo started shaking, wondering what the hell she had stumbled upon. If the freaky ride wasn’t bad enough, now she was stuck with some mad man that liked to tackle dummies. And was that a gun she had seen him whip out of his jacket?!

Soon he was walking alongside the car, offering her his hand to help her out of the car. Jo weighed up her options. Either she could ignore the mad man now known as Tommy (though she preferred the thought of calling him “Oof”) and continue riding in the car until it hopefully reached the end, or she could jump out and go back to see if it really had been Katies’ head. She figured that if she rode the rest of her way with her eyes closed, it really wouldn’t worry what frightening sights were laid out before her and she could just sit in the car, eyes closed, until the ride ended. Of course, that plan allowed for this just being a lame ghost train ride, and she had stopped regarding it as that when she had seen the Katie head roll towards the train.

Turning to look at Tommy, she remembered the gun and thought to herself that she might be safer with him. So she took the offered hand and climbed out of the rickety car, grabbing her backpack with one hand and her elephant with the other, once she had let go of Tommy’s hand. Hoisting the backpack onto her back, she hugged the elephant to her chest like a little girl and looked around them as the car clicked its way along the tracks and away from them.

She nodded at Tommy’s suggestion for them to go back the other way they had just came, but when she looked back in that direction, the track looked a lot different than the one they had just been on. She felt overwhelmingly disorientated and more than a little frightened.

~Um..I don’t know about you.. but this is really freaking me out.. the tunnel we just came through was red.. but look!~ She pointed down the line of tracks where they should now be going, only to see that the tracks disappeared into a tunnel that was dimly lit with a white strobe light bouncing off the walls occasionally. A horrifying sound of something wet being dragged along the ground filled the tunnel, and Jo instinctively backed up until she was almost standing on top of Tommy. Turning around to look at him, she realised her bottom lip was trembling. She hated the fact that she was coming across as a scared little girl, but she was terrified and didn’t know what else to do. Hoping that he had a plan of attack, she looked at him expectantly.

~Um.. the thing is.. that torture chamber that we went past? Well.. um.. ~ tears filled her eyes as she thought of Katie. ~ I’m pretty sure that I saw my friend Katie getting her head cut off.. I know.. it’s crazy! But.. I dunno.. it just.. it was so real! I want to go and check, just to make sure.. ya know?~

She sniffed, wiping away her tears with her sleeve, another echo of the five year old she was starting to emulate. Looking at Tommy with wide, terrified eyes she whispered ~Can we go check? Please…?~ *

[Boston]

Tommy rolled his eyes a little at how Jo was acting, but he couldn’t blame her. She’s just a young girl, and most certainly had never been in a life-or-death situation before. She wasn’t Tommy’s first encounter with a hysterical young lady, luckily(?), in his line of work he met all sorts. So at the very least he knew how to handle her without resorting to unnecessary gunplay.

He heard the wet sound of something being dragged along the ground at the same time as Jo, and noticed that the tracks had suddenly changed…Jo backed into him at that point and then turned around, and Tommy grabbed her shoulders and looked down at her.

“Sh, be quiet for a moment…” But then she started talking about the torture display and her friend while he was trying to listen. “Yeah, yeah, we’ll check it out, it’s on the way…Keep quiet, okay?” He was paying more attention to the approaching sound than to Jo, and patted her head lightly in a poor attempt to calm her down.

Tommy’s nostrils flared gently, sniffing at the air as the sound grew louder and louder. He recognized the scent of blood again, and with his hands on Jo’s shoulders, walked her a few feet over to the wall. He pushed her back against it tight, and locked eyes with her to try and emphasize his words. “Stay here, okay? Do not move a muscle, do not make a sound.”

The sound was soon accompanied by heavy footsteps, the sound of bare feet, there was something, someone, dragging the heavy, wet object along the ground. Tommy turned away from Jo and drew another gun from within his jacket, a 9mm, different from the revolver. He held it in both hands and pulled close to his chest, shades of a professional, as he walked cautiously further down the tracks, soon disappearing into the strobe lights.

The first thing he noticed was that the tracks ended a few feet into the strobe lights. The wooden planks on which they had been placed were also gone, and the ground was just loose, dry dirt. He stepped carefully and quietly, and then from Jo’s point of view, there suddenly rang three gunshots. The first two shots came quick, one right after the other, the third following a few moments later.

The muzzle flare flashed bright, overpowering the strobe lights for just a moment, just long enough for Jo to catch a glimpse of what was going on. The image of Tommy, still somewhat marred by the strobe lights and only visible in the brief flashes, shot a muscular red form twice in the chest and it dropped to the ground. The third gunshot was for good measure, a bullet to the form’s forehead as it laid on the ground.

“Come take a look at this, is this your friend?” Tommy holstered his gun as Jo approached.

Though hard to see in the strobe lights, Jo might notice two deep gashes on Tommy’s face; two deep slices across his left cheek slowly seeped blood down his neck and throat, it dripped off his chin, but didn’t seem to bother him too much. Lying in the dirt at his feet was what appeared at first to be the form of a particularly muscular, shirtless man. His flesh was a dark red, though, it matched the blood that oozed out from around the bullet wounds.

Instead of the face of a man, his mouth was twisted upward in a frighteningly wide grin, baring several large, yellow teeth. His eyes were wide and his thick black eyebrows were turned up in perpetual surprise. His nose was perhaps the most unusual feature, as it was at least several inches long, and curved somewhat upward. The hands of this man were more like razor sharp talons; three long, thick fingers bared claws at the ends – one of which still gripped the ankle of a dead body, a few limbs of which, including the head, were missing.

“Might be a little hard to identify…But do your best…” He spoke casually as he pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket and wiped the blood off his chin and throat, dabbing around the thick gashes before shoving it back into his pocket.

He knelt and poked lightly at the man’s stomach and chest, scraping at the flesh lightly with his fingernails. Tommy pushed his fingertips against his chest around the bullet wounds and forced more blood to seep from the wounds. Upon closer inspection, it became rather obvious that this was not just a man in a costume – the flesh, the talons, that creepy face, it was all real.

[Moridanu]

*Surprisingly the feel of Tommy’s strong hands on her shoulders made her feel a little more relaxed, and she let out the long shaky breath she had been holding subconsciously. She nodded at his request for her to be quiet and stood there obediently, chewing on her bottom lip nervously, as he patted her head as though she were a small child. Her feminist pride began to murmur slightly at the back of her throat, but she decided to play it safe for now, before those same strong hands began to push her backwards. She arched a brow when he told her to stay here and not make a sound. Not making a sound meant that she couldn’t screech at him and tell him not to leave her alone like she really REALLY wanted to right now, so she snapped her mouth shut and folded her arms angrily in front of her, the elephant squished against her chest as she watched helplessly while Tommy walked away from her.

She watched as he moved further away from her, walking towards the strobe lights and towards that sickening sound that made her stomach turn. And then, he stepped out of her view all together. She had a moment of panic where she wanted to run after him screaming, despite his telling her stay put and be quiet, and then she heard three gunshots. The flare of the gun lit up the tunnel for the briefest of moments, sending Jo mixed up images of what nightmare lay ahead. It appeared that Tommy was shooting something large, but she couldn’t make out what it was exactly from her safety point within the shadows. Finally, she heard his voice as he called out for her to come and take a look at whatever he had shot.

Running so fast she nearly ran into the back of him as she skidded to a halt, Jo finally registered his last words “is this your friend?” as she looked down in horror at what lay at his feet. The strobe lighting illuminated everything for a moment before plunging them back into darkness, but it was long enough for her to see all that she needed to see. The thing he had shot was so hideously deformed that Jo’s mind refused to let her look at it. Instead, her eyes went to the body the thing had been dragging, a body wearing Katie’s designer jeans and that pink Prada jacket, now stained a bloody red.

Tears welled in her eyes, and she instinctively turned away. She was sick of letting this guy see her cry, and sick of playing the helpless victim. Still, her friend was dead, and she was in the middle of some horrible nightmare so she thought she should be allowed a few moments to compose herself. She nodded and whispered ~That’s her..~ before she turned away and walked back towards the area that Tommy had told her to wait in before. Only now her safe little shadowy corner was gone. The tracks now stretched on forever and Jo felt that she was starting to lose her mind. How could this place keep changing like this? It was enough to make her go mad. Wiping her eyes, she willed herself not to look at Katie’s body, instead glancing over at Tommy. The strobe lighting lit up the tunnel in which they stood again, and she could now see the deep gashes in Tommy’s face. He didn’t seem to be too bothered by it however, as he knelt down and began to touch the disgusting body at his feet. Jo rolled her eyes as she looked away, hugging the elephant to her chest as she sniffed her tears away in one last choking sob.

Finally, composed and determined to stop being a scared little girl, Jo looked back down at Tommy and squared her shoulders.


~So, obviously this place is seriously fucked up. I don’t know what or who that thing is at your feet or why he .. I mean.. it.. I mean.. whatever the fuck it is.. I don’t know why it had to kill my friend. And I don’t know if my other friends are still in this ride, or if they too… are… ~ she trailed off, unable to finish that thought out loud. After a moment, she took a deep breath and continued. ~All I do know is I want to get the hell out of dodge. So stop playing with the road kill and lets get moving, eh?~ *

[Boston]

Tommy couldn’t really blame Jo for carrying on anymore…She’s just a kid, and now she’s found her friend murdered on a carnival ride. He allowed her time to compose herself while he inspected the body, and then when she made her way back over, he stood and nodded in agreement with her.

“Right, we’ll keep walking this way. Hopefully it’ll get us back the way we came in.” Tommy started walking, but immediately came upon a turn that was not there just moments before. He sighed and shook his head, taking a moment to back up against the wall beside the corner, to peek around and look ahead for any signs of danger.

Luckily, the strobe lights were replaced by a more reliable, albeit hidden, source of light just around this corner, and Tommy could see that the entire environment had changed once again. A tunnel stretched on further than he could see, the roof and walls of which were made of loose dirt, which occasionally shook loose and rained down to the floor. Tall patches of grass littered the ground, and the entire tunnel was bathed in a thick, gray fog.

There weren’t any immediate signs of danger, so Tommy signaled that they should continue. “You’ve probably heard all the rumors that surround this carnival,” he glanced over his shoulder to Jo as he spoke, looking between her and where he was walking, “I’ve spent this past week investigating them, but it looks like I finally caught a break in the case…I guess that walking, talking, ethnically insensitive stereotype out front wasn’t joking around when he said this place would eat our souls…”

At that exact moment, the dirt of the wall next to Tommy collapsed, and the top half of a skeleton tumbled out. Its arms flew above its head and wrapped around Tommy’s neck from behind, the lifeless bones dangling limp. Tommy immediately grabbed at its wrists and slammed his back into the wall, crushing its torso easily under his weight, and then hurled the arms over his head. He slammed the shoulders onto the ground and whatever bones had been still connected fell apart with the cartoonish sound of bones collapsing.

Tommy grunted and took a step back, then immediately forward when he realized that had placed him near the wall again. He reached out and grabbed Jo’s arm and pulled her away from the wall quickly, holding on tight to keep her by his side in case she began to panic again.

The urge to protect this girl was growing stronger as his sense of heroism was beginning to kick in. He hadn’t felt this rush of mystery and danger for a long time. Although the skeleton didn’t seem to be animated, he figured they still needed to be careful. Any number of things could just as easily walk out of the dirt walls.

“Stay close, and away from the walls.” Tommy drew his 9mm again, and held it ready at his side. If monsters were going to be springing out from the walls, he figured it would be a good idea to keep it close.

As they walked, sounds of a funhouse echoed from all around, seemingly coming right out of the dirt. Doors creaked, ghosts laughed, chains rattled, and babies cried. Hazy images darted through the thick fog up ahead, tall people walking left and right, but even as Tommy and Jo continued onward, they didn’t seem to be getting any closer to them. A strong gust of wind swept down through the tunnel, accompanied by the sound of strong wings flapping, as if something was flying up ahead. It swirled the fog and caused it to form a small whirlwind around the two, which just as quickly dissipated.

Spots of the dirt walls and ceilings bulged slowly, the dirt protruding several inches, the images of faces peeking out and following Tommy and Jo with their gazes. Dirt trickled down to the floor as the faces’ lips moved in silent words, and Tommy looked all around, keeping an eye out for anything that looked as though it was about to attack.

Several minutes later, Tommy needed to say something, if only for the sake of hearing something rather than the funhouse noises. “How many people did you come in here with?” He figured that anyone else she came in with had probably by now met a similar fate as her headless friend, but he needed to at least know for how many people he should be looking out.

[Moridanu]

*Jo cast one last look down at her dead friend. She could hear Katie’s infectious laughter in her ear, and even smell her perfume, these senses causing a deep stabbing pang in her already heavy heart. She wanted to pick Katie up and carry her out of this place. She wanted to take Katie home to her family so that they could say goodbye and give her the proper burial that her friend deserved. But Jo knew that this was impractical. She would be lucky to drag her own sorry ass out of here in one piece, let alone carry Katie for God knew how long. Sighing, she tightened the straps of her backpack over her shoulders in a purely automatic movement, before she hoisted the elephant under one arm and moved to follow Tommy.

She thought that Tommy’s words probably made sense and that they should continue to walk the way they were going, but her heart sank even further as she saw that the pathway ahead had changed once again. ~I thought this place was supposed to be a freakin Ghost train, not a Hall of Mirrors.. this is ridiculous.~ Angrily, she kicked at the ground beneath her which was now nothing but loose dirt. The walls and roof of the tunnel were also dirt, and although the tunnel was now quickly filling up with a thick grey fog, she could see tall tufts of grass here and there. Scared that she might lose him in the fog, Jo moved quickly closer to Tommy and reached out to him with her spare hand just as he started telling her about his investigations. Jo stood there, her hand outstretched to him as his words washed over her.

~Huh.~ was all she could think to say while he told her about his investigation. ~What and people actually pay you to check out urban legends and shit?!~ She was taken aback by this but still heard his comment about the goon outside saying this place would eat their souls. Bristling, she felt her anger slowly taking over from her fear. ~Fuck that! I like my soul just where it is thank you very much!~ Again, she kicked at the ground beneath her, which proved to be a costly mistake as the ground on which she was standing, suddenly shook. Just then the earthen wall beside Tommy burst open and a skeleton reached out with its bony embrace to grip a hold of Tommy. Jo screamed and yelled out ~Look out!~ a tad too late to be any kind of a warning, which didn’t seem to matter to Tommy who made quick work of the skeleton.

All around them, the walls began to bulge and the tunnel filled with horrible sounds as they walked onwards over the shaky ground. Jo tried to keep her eyes on the tunnel ahead, but to be honest it scared her to look anywhere but at the back of Tommy’s head. She lowered her own head as he asked her how many people she had come in here with.

~The train before you and me.. there were four of my friends. I don’t know if the other three.. well.. I don’t know if they are okay or not. But.. I don’t see how they can be. I mean.. why would Katie be.. uh.. ~she gulped, unable to bring herself to finish her sentence. Something else happened then, making it even more impossible for her to finish her sentence. With a loud creak and an even louder groan, the ground underneath her feet shook violently before collapsing beneath her, causing Jo to fall screaming into darkness. She felt as though she was falling for an eternity before she landed with a loud splash into a thick syrup like substance. Gasping for air, she swallowed more of it than she would like as she flailed about, the elephant bobbing in the thick goop beside her. Looking up at the hole from which she had fallen, the small ray of light seemed to be a thousand miles away, yet still she prayed that Tommy would be able to hear her as she screamed up at him to help her. Something slithered against her legs, something long, slimy and cold, and the scream died in her throat as she began to pray that she wasn’t about to meet the same fate as Katie had.*

[Boston]

Tommy shook his head when Jo questioned his profession, “People pay me to investigate whatever they pay me to investigate…My client’s daughter vanished a few weeks ago, and this carnival was the last place she was seen.” He stopped for a moment and held his arms out to either side, steadying himself as the very Earth seemed to shake beneath their feet, “For my client’s sake, I was working the haunted carnival angle…”

He sighed with exasperation as he continued walking, rubbing the back of his head with his free hand in thought, “Back when she supposedly went missing, this carnival was on the other side of the state…I came here expecting to find the girl working, you know, a young girl drawn in by the mystery and adventure of running away with a roaming carnival…”

Tommy stopped walking when the tunnel started to seem particularly endless. He glanced over his shoulder to Jo to finish his thought, “I figured it’d be an easy gig, just grab the girl and take her home. But now I’m finding bodies, shooting at monsters, throwing down with skeletons…”

It felt like they’d been walking forever. The noises all around weren’t getting closer or further away, and the scenery wasn’t changing either. Tommy sighed and holstered his gun, beginning to grow a little frustrated.

“Alright, so we’re looking for at least three more people on our way out…” He nodded slowly and ran his fingers over his head, pushing back his loosely slicked back brown hair which was beginning to fall out of place.

This girl was beginning to swear a lot, but Tommy couldn’t blame her. She was demonstrating a perfect bell curve. She was scared, now she seems to be growing angry. Given how she’s been acting so far, Tommy was able to predict how her temper would change as they went on, and so mentally prepared himself for any outburst she might suddenly demonstrate.

Obviously, Jo wasn’t the first girl he met in a tense situation. While he was thinking, the ground fell out from beneath Jo’s feet, and she went falling into a pit, her screams gradually fading.

Tommy didn’t waste a second, he hardly even gave the situation any thought. He threw himself forward and jumped straight down the pit after Jo, arms outstretched trying to grab for her, but he couldn’t see her in the darkness. Counting on this pit making just as little sense as the rest of the ride, Tommy heaved his body forward, flipping himself over mid-air, just in time to land feet-first in the same syrupy substance just beside Jo.

He sunk in with a bit of a splash and went in up to his waist, arms held out to either side as he looked down at the substance. “Ick, what is this stuff? These guys been hoarding maple syrup or something?”

When Jo began screaming, Tommy knew exactly why – he felt the same thing slithering around his legs as well, and he reached out to grab both her flailing hands. “Calm down! This stuff’s thick enough, just start pushing yourself over!” He shouted so Jo would be able to hear him over herself, and to get his point across.

Tommy grabbed her hands tightly and began kicking his feet, the substance thick enough he was able to almost wade through it, so he kicked his way through it backwards. Whenever he felt the thing slither against his legs he kicked harder and shook it off, and by the time it coiled around his ankle, the two of them had reached a ledge.

He let go of Jo’s hands and threw his arms onto the ledge, clawing at the cold stone apparently built into the wall, his legs by this point exhausted beyond belief. His teeth gritted and he grunted as he pulled himself out of the substance, it tried to suck him back down, but he was eventually able to heave himself onto the ledge and onto his back. He let out a deep breath and then reached back out for Jo, grabbing her wrists and bracing his feet against the stone, standing, his entire body shaking as he pulled her out of the syrupy substance and onto the stone with himself.

The thing that had been chasing them had wrapped itself around Jo’s ankle, though, what looked like a scaly tentacle coated in the syrupy substance, and tried to pull her back in. Tommy positioned himself between Jo and the edge, stomping down on the tentacle to hold it in place under his shoe, as he pulled the 9mm from his holster. He aimed and pulled the trigger, but it just let out a quiet, sticky click. The hammer slid back a quarter of an inch and the syrupy substance oozed from the hammer and the barrel.

“Dammit!” Now particularly angry that his gun was ruined, Tommy couched and began smashing the tentacle with his gun. Something hissed and growled, a loud roar erupted from somewhere in the area, and the syrupy substance began to bubble and boil. Tommy continued smashing the tentacle flat with his gun, grunting and shouting quietly. Before long this portion of the tentacle had become separated from whatever the rest of its body was, and the portion still attached retreated back into the syrup.

Tommy, exhausted from the sudden over-exertion, returned the now useless gun to its holster. He shrugged out of his suit jacket as he began walking down the only path available, a path carved through the gray stone wall, glancing over to Jo as he tore the relatively syrup-free liner out of the inside of his jacket. “C’mon, keep up…You okay?”

They didn’t have time to catch their breath. Tommy’s chest still heaved under his dress shirt and custom holsters. There was a 9mm handgun under each of his arms, but they were covered in the syrup and useless. At the small of his back were two revolvers, one kept up-side down on top of the other, one pointed left, and the other right. They were also covered in the substance, but Tommy had his mind set on cleaning them. He certainly didn’t want to be unarmed in this place, so he had to make it work.

He dropped the sticky jacket on the ground and left it behind, then pulled one of the revolvers from the holster and clicked the chamber open. He emptied the bullets and dropped them into his pockets, then used the cloth of his jacket liner to swab out the individual chambers and barrels.

“So we’re apparently underground, now, so keep an eye out for something leading up…Stairs, or an elevator…” He shook his head and sighed, “Or a damn dragon, I don’t know what the hell to expect in here…”

[Moridanu]

*Jo breathed a deep sigh of relief when Tommy landed in the thick goop beside her, almost inhaling more of the disgusting liquid in the process. Once she had finished flailing around, she shook her head, her long blonde hair heavy with the thick syrup.

~I don’t know what it is, and I don’t think I WANT to know what it is… all I know is I want to get out of it.. now!~

She screamed again as whatever lurked beneath the goop slid between her legs and when Tommy reached over to grab her hands, she quickly grabbed the elephant that was bobbing beside her before slipping it under her arm as she gripped hold of Tommy holding onto him tightly. Nodding obediently, she quietened down as directed and began to follow his movements, pushing herself towards him and kicking with her feet to propel her forward as he pulled her while moving backwards himself. They continued in this way for what felt like forever, before Tommy finally reached the ledge. Letting go of his hand, Jo tread the thick liquid that passed as water as she watched him heave himself out of the goop and onto the ledge. Just before he reached down to grasp her wrists, Jo screamed again as something long and slimy slid around her ankle, pulling her down deeper into the goop. As Tommy pulled her upwards, the slimy thing pulled her down and Jo felt as though she was nothing but a badly frayed rope in a game of tug of war as the elephant fell from underneath her arm and landed on the ledge. Luckily Tommy won the war and pulled her up onto the ledge, bringing with it what now appeared to be a tentacle wrapped around her ankle. The denim of her jeans was beginning to burn under the tentacles grip and Jo gritted her teeth against the pain as the skin on her ankle began to sting. She closed her eyes and prayed for release, and then suddenly she opened her eyes to see the thing had let go of her and Tommy was beating the hell out of it with his gun.

Surprised that one of her prayers had actually been answered, Jo made the mental point to re-evaluate her relationship with the big Kahuna upstairs at a later time as she muttered ~Thanks.. sorry about your gun..~ to Tommy’s back as he began to walk ahead of her down the only pathway ahead of them, shrugging out of his suit jacket while he walked. She saw him ripping the liner out of his jacket but was too distracted by the searing pain that was now pulsating through her entire left foot. As he told her to keep up and asked if she was okay at the same time, Jo could only nod and murmur ~yep..~ as she picked up the soaking elephant and limped after him, wincing at each step she took. She had no idea why she was desperate to cling onto the elephant, except for the fact that it made her feel still connected to her friends somehow.

Her backpack was heavy on her back, and although the outer shell of the thick canvas was damp, she was confident the contents would be relatively dry inside. The bag had been with her for years and had been with her while she had weathered many storms, literally. It was a treasure trove of items, and Jo thought that a few of them might come in handy somewhere along this crazy ride, so she was glad that she still had it with her.

She nodded miserably as Tommy spoke about the need to keep an eye out for something leading up, like a staircase or something. Limping along, she was trying to keep up to him, and as such, wasn’t looking where she was going. She cursed out loud as her already throbbing foot tripped over what first appeared to be a rock, sending her sprawling face first onto the rocky path. Putting her free arm out to brace herself, she managed to graze only her arm instead of her face as she swore under her breath and lay in a crumpled heap on the ground. A lesser woman would have given up right there and then, curled up into a ball and began to sob. Indeed, Jo could feel a tear beginning to form in the corner of one eye. But, she was so far beyond pissed off that the tear quickly dried as she snorted, her nostrils flared, while she looked around at her new spot on the floor.

The rock that she had tripped over was actually the bottom step of what appeared to be a rocky incline. It couldn’t be called a staircase exactly, but it did seem to be going up and the rocks seemed wide enough to be able to step upon. Jo looked around for Tommy, hoping he hadn’t walked off without her as she called out ~ I think I found a way out of here.. at least up a level from this hell anyway..~ *

[Boston]

After swabbing his guns clean, Tommy cocked the hammers back with his thumbs and then pointed them away to pull the triggers. The hammers clicked forward quietly, so he reloaded the weapons, and tucked them back into the holsters at the small of his back.

He shook his head in response to Jo’s apology, and then glanced over his shoulder when she fell. He moved to catch her, but was just a bit too late. “You alright? Ya gotta stop falling all over the place, you’re gonna break your neck.” He reached down and grabbed her hand to help her back to her feet, and then looked up the makeshift staircase when she pointed it out.

“Here, wash yourself off.” Tommy held out the last of his jacket lining for Jo, so she could get the ooze off her face and hands; he handed her a small black comb so she could comb it out of her hair, and then waited for her to finish cleaning up before he started up the stairs.

“We fell pretty far, I hope this takes us back up to ground-level…” He tugged one of the revolvers from his holster and held it in both hands in front of himself, pointed up the stairs as he began to climb.

Tommy hadn’t noticed, but the wound on his cheek had completely healed. There was just a light discoloration where the skin had been torn, and his cheek and neck were caked in his dry blood. However, as if the blood had naturally trickled down his skin in a looped pattern, it now appeared in the form of a chain stretching from where the wound had one been, all the way down his neck and into the collar of his shirt.

As the two climbed the makeshift staircase, the ground and tunnel around them began to rumble. It started violently and all at once, and knocked Tommy off his balance. He grunted as he stumbled into the wall, and reached his free hand out to grab Jo’s wrist – because if he was getting to know her as well as he thought he did, she would take another spill.

The wall against which Tommy leaned began to crack and crumble; a thin seam started at the floor and worked its way up, stretching all the way into the darkness overhead. A two inch in diameter round spot of stone erupted just beside Tommy’s head, and what looked like a tentacle belonging to the same creature as before emerged. It coiled immediately around Tommy’s throat, tightening and pinning him to the wall.

Tommy coughed and choked, his eyes widening and bulging as the tentacle clenched so tightly around his throat. He reached one hand up to grab at the tentacle around his throat but it was too tight, and his entire head was quickly turning a deep shade of red. Instead he put his free hand against his ear and turned his face away as best he could, clenching his eyes shut tight as he brought his gun up to the hole in the wall.

He mashed the barrel against the portion of tentacle coming through the hole and fired, severing it, causing it to fall limp and ease the pressure on his throat. He coughed and gagged, inhaling sharply to get his breath back, shoving the long barrel of his gun forward and into the hole, firing off two more shots.

Whatever creature belonged to the tentacle roared, growled, and hissed, and almost immediately the rumbling of the area came to a stop. The same slimy substance that Jo and Tommy had fallen into seeped from the hole and the cracks in the wall, and Tommy was left leaning up against the wall, panting heavily.

A thick bruise had already started to form around Tommy’s throat from where he had been held – the bruise, much like the blood on his neck, took the shape of a thick chain, despite the tentacle having been solid and smooth. He coughed and cleared his throat, then pointed his gun up the stairs again, and began climbing as if not breaking stride.

“We gotta move quicker.” His voice was a little raspy, but otherwise calm and collected. He glanced over his shoulder once to make sure Jo could keep up as he started climbing the stairs quicker, taking some two at a time, keeping his eyes upward and open, looking for either an end to the stairway, or another attack.

[Moridanu]

*Grateful for the opportunity to clean herself up to some degree, Jo immediately grabbed for the liner and comb, mumbling her thanks through the thick material as she scrubbed her goop covered face with it. Her hair was too tangled and matted to do too much with the small comb, but she managed to comb it back and out of her eyes, which was a vast improvement. She nodded and rolled her eyes at Tommy’s comment.

~Believe it or not, I am not usually this clumsy. I do gymnastics, and I trained as a ballerina for years.. normally I am very graceful.. yet down here.. not so much.~ she shrugged and started following him up the craggy stairs that were built into the rock.

The rocks beneath her feet and the walls around her began to rumble and she muttered ~Not again!~ as Tommy stumbled sideways and reached out to grab hold of her just in time to stop her toppling back down the stairs. ~Nice save there.. thanks!~ she called out to be heard over the loud rumbling roar that seemed to fill the entire cavern in which they climbed.

Jo screamed as another tentacle suddenly appeared from a crack in the wall around Tommy’s head and reached out to grab hold of his neck in a slimy embrace. The ground was still shaking, and with Tommy now more than a little distracted, Jo clung onto the large rock on which she now lay flat, her sore ankle screaming at her in agony. She looked up in time to see Tommy fire the gun into the hole and heard whatever owned the tentacles roar in pain before the rumbling finally stopped. Jo clambered quickly to her feet.

~Wow.. are you okay?~ she winced when she saw the purple bruise already starting to form on his neck. ~Ouch, that’s gotta hurt.. I wonder if it is as bad as my ankle..~ To demonstrate her point, she bent over to lift up the hem of her jeans so she could see her ankle. When she did however, she immediately dropped it, wishing that she hadn’t seen the dark purple black colour her ankle now was. Tommy obviously hadn’t seen it as he turned on his heel and began to climb even more quickly up the stairs. Jo’s shoulders slumped as he told her they had to move quicker. Her ankle felt like it was going to fall off and every step made her want to die. Still, she already felt like the weak helpless female in this partnership, so there was no way she was going to bring any more feelings of inadequacy her way. Instead she muttered ~Suck it up Jo..~ as she squeezed the elephant’s ears for luck before she reached back to grab her backpack.

~Right behind ya..~ she called out to Tommy’s quickly retreating back as she pulled her bag in front of her and bent down over it. Unzipping it, she was pleased to see that the inside was dry as she had suspected. Reaching in, she found a long red ribbon that had been used in an art project a while back. Working quickly, she tied one end of the ribbon to the elephants trunk, and the other to one of the straps of her bag. Knotting it tightly, the elephant was now securely attached to her backpack. Once she was done, Jo began rummaging around in the bag for her emergency first aid kit. Her friends always gave her grief for carrying one with her, yet they were always the ones that had needed to use it. Now was her turn however, and she sighed a loud sigh of relief when her fingers closed around the small tube of antiseptic ointment she had been looking for. Pulling it out of her bag, she looked up to see Tommy a far distance ahead, so she pocketed the tube and quickly zipped the bag back up. Throwing it over her shoulders, she promised herself that she would put some cream on both herself and Tommy the next time they stopped as she began to climb the stairs after him, moving as quickly as her fragile ankle would allow.*

[Boston]

Before long, Tommy and Jo had reached the top of the makeshift stairway, luckily without anymore sneak attacks. At the top there was a small flat landing of several square feet, and then a tall doorway carved crudely into the stone. Tommy stopped and took a moment to catch his breath, glancing back over his shoulder for Jo, who he was a little surprised to find managed to keep up despite her injured ankle.

He had noticed after the rumbling stopped that her ankle was injured, but certainly couldn’t afford the time to sit and patch her up. But now that they were at the top and about to enter what Tommy considered to be the next stage, he figured they could take a moment to rest up and save their data.

“How’s your ankle? You know how to dress it?” He saw that she had her own first aid kit, so figured she probably knew how to use it…But he figured he should at least be a gentleman and ask. “Sorry to have rushed you on that ankle, but I’m sure you understand, we couldn’t run the risk of being attacked while healing up on some narrow stairs…”

Tommy let out a quiet sigh and leaned against the wall, folding his arms over his chest, simply waiting for Jo to finish up with her wound. He wasn’t so concerned with his neck; it was just a bruise, the tentacle didn’t seem to have burnt him as it did Jo. “So, I wouldn’t have taken you for a ballerina…Do you still dance?”

Tommy was a decent small talker, it was a necessary skill for his profession. He wanted to speak to Jo while they had a moment, so that she might become a bit more comfortable and calm in tense situations. Given the current circumstances, that seemed fairly important…

He listened as he dumped the empty casings from his revolver and replaced them with fresh bullets, then spun the chamber and clicked it shut. When Jo was finished with her ankle and they were finished their chat, he held his hand out to help her to her feet. “You’re good to walk on it? We gotta keep moving.”

He would carry her if she needed it, but she probably didn’t…She hustled up those stairs well enough, now that she had time to bandage it up properly and rest for a minute, he was sure she’d be fine.

Taking his gun in both hands again, he held it out in front of himself and started through the doorway. It was too dark to see immediately inside, so he stepped slowly, feeling the ground and testing its sturdiness with the toes of one foot before stepping entirely inside. From Jo’s perspective he would have appeared to have vanished entirely into the thick darkness, and a moment later he let out a short, quiet shout, that sounded more like mild surprise than anything else.

“Be careful!” Tommy’s voice came through the door a moment too late, not that it would have helped much anyway.

Jo would find that as soon as she stepped through the door, naturally, she would fall again – it was quite unavoidable, really, as the door some how let out upwards. Tommy had taken a step through and found himself stepping off the edge of a well, as if he had just walked straight up its wall, and was now sprawled out on his back at its base, waiting to catch Jo.

Or, rather, waiting for Jo to land on him.

When they were both finally on their feet again, Tommy dusted himself off as best he could and looked around. “That was a trip, yeah?” He faced the three-foot-tall stone well they had apparently climbed out of, and nudged it with his shoe. It certainly was sturdy, and when he leaned over to peer inside, there was just darkness all the way down. “Well at least we seem to be outside again, right?”

He sighed and rubbed the back of his head, turning to survey the rest of the area. It was night time, and they certainly did seem to be back outside…There was an authentic cool, gentle breeze, and the stars in the night sky, as well as the full moon, were shining bright.

It was a small village they had wandered into; about a dozen one-level houses were arranged neatly on the lightly grassed earth, centered mostly around the well. The doors were Japanese-style paper sliding doors, and a few had paper lanterns hanging out front, a dim flame flickering inside them. The border of the town was made up of a thick forest, the trees of which looked like particularly huge evergreen trees.

“Are they…” Tommy frowned thoughtfully and wandered over to the tree line, leaning in close to the base of one of these trees, and reaching out carefully. He fit his fingernails under a loose piece of bark and pulled it away carefully, removing a thin, vertical strip of the reddish-brown wood. “This is cryptomeria…Where the heck are we?”

He turned and walked back to Jo, showing her the bark, and then walked towards one of the houses as he spoke – that is, as he thought out loud, “This tree is specific to Japan, there wouldn’t be an entire forest of this anywhere else…” He lifted the bark to his nose and sniffed it lightly, nodding in confirmation to his own working theory, “Definitely cryptomeria, I bet these house are all made of it…The trees that were once in this clearing were used to make this…entire village…But…”

Tommy leaned in to the outer wall of one of the houses, and knocked on the wall to test its sturdiness, “Cryptomeria are planted around…temples or shrines…” He glanced back to Jo, and then nodded for her to follow, “Why would a portion of a cryptomeria forest be cleared out and used for…houses…Unless, of course…” Once again thinking out loud, he stood in front of the paper sliding door of the small house, and knocked on the door frame, “Unless the houses were built here, and then the trees planted…Because the entire area is a shrine…”

He looked back over his shoulder to Jo, and wiggled his eyebrows at his own train of thought. “A sound theory, right? We may be on holy ground, so tread lightly, gal.” He grinned and then returned his attention to the door, but nobody answered…He sighed quietly and shook his head, then holstered his gun to shake the flimsy door with both hands, “Well it doesn’t look like anyone’s home, so maybe they won’t mind if we invite ourselves in…”

[Moridanu]

*Jo breathed a sigh of relief when they finally reached a small flat landing which seemed to be the end of the treacherous staircase. She nodded and flashed a grateful smile at Tommy as he asked if she knew how to dress her ankle.

~Yeah, I’ll be okay.. if we can just spare a minute, I have some cream that will reduce the swelling and bruising.~ she sank down onto a large rock and bent to attend to her throbbing ankle. Upon closer inspection, Jo could see that where the tentacles had gripped her, there were now large purple black circles with red raw edges to them. The skin was beginning to flake off, and large blisters were forming. The cream, though cool and usually soothing, burned as she applied it and Jo gritted her teeth while she rubbed the cream as gently as she could into the skin. Forcing herself to take deep breaths, she finished the task quickly and recapped the tube. Holding it out to Tommy, she offered it to him telling him that it might help with his neck, although she could see from where she sat that his injury was nowhere near as horrific as hers.

She blushed slightly and lowered her lashes as he asked about her dancing. ~Yeah, I still dance. I fell on stage a few years back, and basically wrecked my knee so it ruled out the chance I had of doing it professionally, ya know? But I still love to dance and do so whenever I get a chance. What about you? You seem to be in pretty good shape, what do you do to keep fit?~

She nodded when he asked if she was okay to walk, and after throwing the tube back into her backpack, she zipped it shut and slipped it back over her shoulder. ~Yeah I should be fine..~ Climbing to her feet, she gasped sharply at the immediate pain she felt when putting pressure on her ankle by standing, but soon it settled down to a dull throb and she knew that she could keep walking on it.

Following Tommy as he approached the doorway, she was surprised when he seemed to disappear into the darkness ahead of him. She heard a short surprised shout that did little to stop her from following him, despite his warning for her to look out. Stumbling, and then falling into the darkness, Jo rolled her eyes as she fell AGAIN and braced herself for the impact of landing.

The impact turned to be softer than she had anticipated as she actually landed on Tommy. There was an awkward moment of lying on top of a guy she had literally just met, before she mumbled an apology and rolled off him, blushing a deep pink. After helping him to his feet, she looked around her. Judging by the large well that was beside them now, it appeared they had just fallen out of that, which of course was impossible but she had realised by now that nothing in this place was impossible. Indeed, they appeared to be outside, and although she wished she could share Tommy’s enthusiasm for this latest development she couldn’t quite muster any enthusiasm to share.

Normally, Jo loved being out in the night air, particularly when there was a huge full moon as there was now. The stars were twinkling and a lovely breeze ruffled her goop soaked hair, but still Jo could not shake the apprehension that it was all just another illusion. Even the picturesque village with its surrounding evergreens couldn’t convince her that all was well. She watched bug eyed as Tommy walked over to the nearest tree and plucked a piece of bark from it. ~Cryptowhatea?~ she asked, in answer to his question about where they were. She looked blankly at the bark he presented to her, shrugging to show that she had no idea what kind of bark it was, or even why he was so interested in it. Then as he walked towards the houses, muttering to himself, she had no choice but to trail after him.

~So what are you saying? That we fell out of a well and now we are in Japan?! That makes no sense! I mean, I know nothing in this hell does make any sense.. but really.. Japan??!!~ She shut up as she realised he was still talking to himself. The word “shrine” made her entire skin break out in goose flesh and she shuddered, especially when he said that the entire area might be a shrine.

~Uh… a shrine to what exactly??! ~ she whimpered, quickening her pace so that she was now practically standing on top of Tommy. Although it was night and the air around them was already dark, Jo could swear it was growing darker. Thick dark storm clouds were beginning to form in the previously clear night sky of only a few moments before, blocking out the glowing full moon and making the night oppressive and dark around her. Further adding to the spooky atmosphere, an owl hooted somewhere in the distance and the leaves of the trees around them began to rustle in the breeze which was quickly becoming a strong wind. The rustling leaves sounded like hissing and Jo had the scary thought of a giant snake coiled up behind them, raising its head to strike. Of course, when she turned around to check, there was nothing behind them apart from the well and the forest of evergreens, but even Tommy’s wiggling eyebrows and smile couldn’t shake her feelings of fear and apprehension.

~Holy ground?~ she gulped, looking down. When she looked back up, she saw him knocking on the door again. ~Um, are you sure it’s a good idea to attract the attention of whoever, or.. er.. whatever lives here?~ Her question fell on deaf ears as he holstered his gun and started shaking the flimsy door, suggesting maybe they let themselves in.

~Are you crazy?! You just said this place is some kind of a shrine, on holy ground or whatever, and here you want to go barging in somewhere where we haven’t been invited, and probably aren’t wanted.. and .. don’t people who have shrines worship things?? Like, things that need sacrifices??? I mean what’s to stop us becoming sacrifices if we go in there??! ~ Jo’s babbling was stopped midstream by the sound of branches being broken in the thick forest of evergreens that surrounded them. Something large was making its way through the forest, something that was breathing heavily and bringing with it the smell of rotting garbage that was being carried towards them on the strong wind that was now blowing like a gale through the clearing. Jo glanced over her shoulder, saw nothing but the rustling trees and then moved even closer to Tommy so that she was now pressed up against his back, trembling.

~Oh hell.. what IS that???!~ She weighed up their options: break in and hope that they would be safe inside, or stay out here and see what was crashing through the forest towards them. It wasn’t too hard to make a decision. Taking a deep breath, she raised her voice to be heard over the howling wind. ~Okay then, let’s get inside! Can you get the door open??~ As she waited to see if he could, she kept a fearful eye turned back towards the sounds coming behind them in the dark forest as rain began to fall.*