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Lo, behold a carnival most dark and mirthful!
The Lord of Double Death is indisposed and so I, KURLOZ MAKARA rule in his stead. The Dark Carnival turns ever faithful while he does his wicked work on hatin’ heathens. When he returns he will find a revelry filled with killas and majiks no muthafucka has ever seen before! A continuation of the duties I had before joining my invertabrothers and sisters in death. My penance for my sins will only end when time itself does.
But it’s too early to marinate in the slime of success. Shangri LOL ain’t made yet, and with that fucking worm and his hound dog around.
PRINCE DIRK: I have a name.
Quit tryin’ to rush me. The stage hasn’t been set yet my dear juffalo, we got plenty of time to kill.
PRINCE DIRK: You damn well know that’s not how it works. You idiots broke the fenestrated planes and if the audience can’t see shit happen then shit didn’t happen. They don’t need the backstory, they wouldn’t be here if they did. Start the play already.
Fine. I’ll start preachin’ the heresy our audience so dearly desires.
Since the birth of our righteous resting place it’s been plagued by divine scrubs wishin’ to drag all to Echoside. Through recursion they escape double-death, and like cowards they send phantoms from dead-end timelines. They run, we give chase, yet the final clash is a bitch to have.
A throng of hatchetmen followed me in pursuit of the death-dealing phantom. Top killas, vivacious and vibrant, cloaked in facepaint and breathing through laughter, riot in the audience. Today they pray to see the execution of a hoeretic most deceitful and I’ll be damned if I won’t give it to them.
Above puppets in the shape of our Lord shriek and shout the divine music of the mirthful messiahs. They hold up the tent that keeps up the sky, they control every aspect of the stage, they keep the devil trapped so he may face a blessed end.
And before him, trapped in a circus that never ends, stands the enemy of god. From the pits of hell he rose, the fiend who should’ve died with the rest of the unenlightened souls yet through heretical majiks remains a thorn in my side. In aiding his birth Yaldabaoth betrayed our wicked lord and branded himself a death-deserving heresiarch. The Lascivious Lucifer himself, Prince Dirk.
His head shines like the great betrayer. He’s a goddamn spotlight and Lord forgive me I can’t look away. He lights up the Dark Carnival, ending the endless witching hour and bringing out the sun. Without the tent he would’ve bleached the whole fest in avenging fire. The shades are the only dark thing about him, a perfect mirror that keeps his true soul hidden away from me. It keeps the holy message out and makes converting this sinner a lot harder.
PRINCE DIRK: And with that the stage is set.
The curtains rise on the dual of a death-time.
We’ve unsheathed out blades. Mine, a trick sword crafted by a mastermind of deception, his, forged by otherworldly otakus. Their powers equally matched in Rage and Heart. I couldn’t help but marvel at its beauty. Long and sharp, with nary a blemish on its pristine steel.
The crowd roars, the mimes hoist the tent higher. We’ve been yapping for far too long if you ask me.
PRINCE DIRK: Let’s bring an end to this theater of cruelty.
Our blades smash into each other. He’s so close the flames of his face lick my own, and dear god does it burn! I can feel the fury he imbues into every action. It ain’t visible from the outside, he’s alway too controlled to do that. It’s only in a fight like this can he let the mask drop. I’m his closet key if you will.
PRINCE DIRK: Do not call yourself that.
The heretical Prince matches my strength with ease. Another one of Yabdaloth’s little gifts. A swing from his blade takes off one of my horns and turns the audience into an orgy of blood and guts. He writhes into a frenzy of sharp cuts and I match him in every way. The crowd roars for blood as the fight reaches truly apocalyptic proportions. A bonfire of sacrifice, but for who’s getting the goods?
PRINCE DIRK: Does it matter who does?
Each cut brings me closer to martyrdom. Each slice is retribution, something I’ve more than earned. When the stage goes I’ll go with it and I can tell from the way he dances he sees past the smile on my facepaint.
Not bad.
The puppets cry, sobbing as I take my last stand. They won’t raise the curtain from this prison but they’ll paint our feelings on their cloth. The devil’s here to torture this here sinner and they won’t lift a finger to save him, thank the Lord.
But I’ll take it from here.
:oD
Ever fall in love at the end of time?
PRINCE KURLOZ: ITS ALWAYS BEEN THE END FOR ME
I push my blade in deeper, the wound welcoming it like a-
PRINCE KURLOZ: WOAH THERE LET’S KEEP THIS PG13
Right, sorry. It’s hard to keep the narrative voice of the ultimate splinter out of my own. Let’s try this again.
With the tent destroyed the curtain comes rushing down like a tsunami. It cloaks us from the prying eyes of survivors, not like there was anyone left except for us. After a while our fight became less of venting bottled up frustration and more about connecting with someone as lonely as ourselves. Do you know how hard it is to spar against a giant worm? Shit sucked lemme tell you.
I know if I lifted it up and revealed ourselves to the world, puppets and glitches would surround us for miles. They’re inter-timeline stagehands, moving everything back to set up the next performance. Because of them we don’t have much time together but I have a plan to make it count.
I’ve won this iteration of the Carnivale game and my reward is setting the rules for the next. Kurloz never goes down easily and I think I like that. Like I said, dueling a worm sucks ass.
His breathing gets shallower as my sword forces itself into his heart. I didn’t need to do it this way, but he insisted. It’s a psychological thing, people who have power love to lose it in private. The only quirk of Kurloz and me is that the loss of power has to be earned. We can’t lose face, even for a minute. That’s why he never did anything like this with his ex-girlfriend, and why I needed to literally break his shell to get him to talk to me.
Deeper, deeper, deeper still until-
PRINCE KURLOZ: HONK
The reaping only takes a moment. You touch his soul and take it for yourself. In an instant you’ve achieved true connection, splinter-to-splinter, the difference being his broken state is only temporary.
DIRK: Alright, we have five minutes until curtain call.
DIRK: Let’s talk strategy.
KURLOZ: ALRIGHTY MY RIGHTEOUS LORD.
His voice drips with sarcasm but isn’t unkind. You can feel his imaginary form right next to you, cold but not unpleasant. You could claim your right as his Lord and kiss him right now, fill an empty green spot in both your hearts before this current loop ends. Lord English will never see the work he’s done in his name but you have so why don’t you reward him in his stead?
KURLOZ: ABSURDIST OR POSTMODERN?
DIRK: Absurdist. Found one of Esslin’s books in the tunnels you showed me. I think that if we make the play too stupid this time it might burst this bubble.
You speak with an unearned authority but he listens all the same. He’s not a replacement for Jake. Yeah, he looks up to you in the same starry-eyed way but only because you’re technically an avatar of his boss. If anything you think of him as a mirror to yourself, with the same self-destructive and antisocial tendencies. No matter what you did or how you did it, it still ended with you both spending an eternity alone.
My lips brush against his and for a second we’re not splinters anymore.
The curtain falls and our time comes to an end. The players return to their spots, and I find myself back in Yabdaloath’s caverns. It’s only a matter of time before the play starts once more and I find myself acting out a tragedy with a man as much to blame for this situation as myself.
Of course, we could end this farce anytime we wish. I could fulfill my Choice and become part of a god that rivals Lord English himself. Kurloz could come clean about his deceit and go search for his girlfriend who fell into Echoside.
But we don’t.
There’s certainty in knowing what happens next and being able to choose it for yourself. Yes, this is hell, I’m not going to lie to myself about that.
But it’s our hell.
We’ve built it ourselves. I can’t leave until I’ve paid the toll for what an ass I was in life. We deserve to duel on that stage again and again until the audience says we’re done.
So let me become the hero, the conqueror of the Dark Carnival. Perhaps then the curtain will fall for good this time.