Chapter Text
Done.
He was done with it all.
Done with getting bullied by his little brother despite being ten years older.
Done with his mother never doing anything about it.
He left the concert with them, but quickly surged ahead. He’d drive home alone tomorrow morning, he said. He needed some space while she dealt with his siblings.
He remembered the old tech building out in the woods nearby, about 10 miles away, from old stories his grandpa had told him. That should be a good place to stay for a bit. No people, no surveillance cameras, probably some electricity in case he needed it.
After a careful drive through some backroads, he pulled up the heavily cracked asphalt to the rusted metal fence. He should have expected this, he thought.
By the light of his headlights, he found a sliding bar into the ground. Lifting it, the gate swung open and he pulled his car in and behind the building. He made sure to close the gate before he went inside.
He was glad it was decently cool for August. Perfect temperature for resting without heating or air conditioning.
He decided he’d look for a room on an upper floor. More hidden from anyone snooping around.
As he reached the third floor, a soft hum reached his ears. Some light was shining out from a room labeled “306 - Computers”. The brass on the label was heavily tarnished. He was confused as to how anything was still functioning after two decades, but figured the running computers could provide heat if he needed it. After all, he wasn’t paying for the power.
Inside the room were about a dozen computers, all looking like something out of the bronze age. About half of them were on, white lights shining a bit harshly for his liking. Maybe he wouldn’t sleep here tonight.
As he turned to leave, his eyes found what looked like a VR headset sitting on one of the running computers. It looked much more modern than anything else in the room, and very out of place thanks to that.
Eh, why the hell not, he thought aloud, walking back over to the computers. He placed the headset on his head before he saw the triangular caution labels on either side, where his temples were now held behind some foam. A bright flash caused him to flinch, and when he opened his eyes, he saw a vibrant room, albeit dark with the night.
He innately felt at home as he looked down and noticed the stage he was standing on. Cool, he thought. It works after all this time. Who knew they had tech like this back in the 90s.
He realized he hadn’t picked up any controllers, yet his hands still moved when he wanted them to move. He held them up to his face. They twitched slightly, like they always did. Super cool, he thought. Hand tracking tech. Some of his friends at college would go nuts over this stuff.
He took in more of his surroundings. A massive tent, more faded in color than everything else, sat in the room. What appeared to be a bar sat just outside of the room to his right. Some supersized toy blocks sat over to the left of the tent, letters on them.
Stepping down off the stage, he walked over to his left, where a doorway appeared to lead into some long hallway. As he entered the hallway, he saw strange art on the walls, resembling some eldritch abomination’s dreams of world domination.
About 50 wooden doors lined both sides of the hall, somewhat out of place among the almost painfully bright pinks and oranges. A handful had some weird looking creatures on them. A cat’s string worm toy, some blob that resembled a speckled M&M, and somehow the most normal of them all, a little girl’s stuffed doll, not unlike his little sister’s. He shuddered at the thought of going back to see her tomorrow morning. She would be insufferable on her birthday soon.
He continued walking down the hallway, noting a handful of other doors, before he noticed that nearly all of them had red Xs on them, including the one he was looking at now, one of a purple rabbit with a shit-eating grin that didn’t look quite right, with its yellowed teeth and jaundiced eyes. A few doors down, he found another unique one with a strangely familiar face on it.
This face had glasses about an inch thick, with slightly squinted brown eyes magnified through them. His hair looked painted on, poofy and mussed up underneath a tilted black top hat adorned with gold glitter and stars. His lips curled slightly upward as if he was faking a smile for a family photo. Looking closer, he realized why his hair looked painted on. Everything was. This creature’s face was made of wood.
Alright, that’s enough nightmare fuel, he thought, making to lift the headset off. As his hands reached in front of his eyes, he froze. They were the same color and texture of wood as the puppet in front of him. Weird, he thought, before continuing. His hands didn’t hit the hard grey plastic of the headset, instead continuing up, bumping the top hat atop his head.
What the fuck? He thought.
He tried again. Nothing.
“What the fuck?” He said aloud.
He looked around wildly, begging for any sign of a prank, dream, or nightmare.
“Hello?” He yelled. “Anyone?”. No response
“Come on, assholes, this isn’t funny!”
A door creaked open down the hallway. The little girl’s doll peeked her head out, rubbing her eyes groggily. She looked down the hall at him and did a double take.
“Um, hello?” He yelled. “Who the fuck are you? What am I doing here?”
Two more doors opened. A short cartoon jester stepped out of one, bells jingling on her hat. She also froze as she saw him. A freakish white king chess piece stepped out of the other, much closer than the doll or jester. His uncomfortably realistic human eyes were freaky as hell. He also froze as soon as he spotted the new guy, eyes blinking just out of sync.
Two more doors creaked open. A weird ribbon creature opened one door, staring at him with its face resembling a comedy theater mask. Some freaky triangle headed thing with two antennae like his old pet ants opened the other, and just like everyone else, it froze when it saw him.
However, this one spoke.
“Dude, what the fuck?”
The three things farther in the back crept closer, occasionally rubbing their eyes as if to make the weird apparition go away. The doll spoke next.
“Um, hello? When did you get here?”
Next came some high pitched, almost childish voice from behind the doll, probably the jester.
“Is this Caine fucking with us?”
“Who the fuck is Caine?” The new guy responded back, on the verge of a panic attack. His foot began to tap rapidly, making a loud clacking sound every time.
“No, he seems too complex.” The chess piece said, “I think we’ve got a new troupe member!”
“What the fuck do you mean, weirdo?”
The little jester ran forward, past the doll, chess piece, ribbon thing, and triangle creature. She poked at his chest hard, as if trying to vanish some hologram. The sudden sensation of a hard poke hurt.
“What the fuck? Why can I feel that? Why am I not waking up from this hellish nightmare?” He said.
“I wish I could tell you it was a nightmare, but it’s not.” The jester said.
The new guy began to panic. His breathing quickened as he began hyperventilating. He wasn’t getting enough air. He felt his limbs begin to tighten up as all his joints flexed without his control. Things only got worse from there as he lost control over his own body. He practically froze in place, teetering on the verge of falling flat on his back.
“Easy buddy, everything’s gonna be fine.” The doll said in a soothing tone, running up and squeezing him tight.
The feeling of fabric pushing into him felt like a weighted blanket. His breathing began to slow, and his joints loosened.
“There we are,” The doll said, “Much better.” She patted his back before stepping away.
“Who are you?” He simply responded, still with panic in his voice.
“Oh yeah, I forgot to introduce myself. I’m Ragatha.” The doll said.
She gestured to the jester, who had stepped back slightly. “This is Pomni.”
Then to the chess piece, who was walking away down the hallway: “Kinger.”
To the ribbon-like figure, who lifted one ribbon as if in a wave: “Gangle.”
To the triangle-headed creature, standing with its arms crossed: “Zooble.”
“Okay…” He said, trying his best to remember those names. “I’m-” He paused. “What the fuck? Why can’t I remember my name?”
“What, do you think we got these names from our parents?” Zooble said.
“Yeah, you need to pick your own name when you enter the circus. Whatever program makes your body erases certain things from your brain scan.” Pomni said, matter-of-factly, as if that wasn’t a completely unhinged thing to blurt out.
“What do you mean brain scan?” He said, ignoring the whole missing name thing as his mind lagged.
“Well… I think you may need to adjust a bit before we can fully explain everything to you, but the short version is that the headset scanned your brain and put a copy of it through some programs that made your body and removed those memories of things like your name.” Kinger said, walking back down the hallway, accompanied by what appeared to be a floating set of dentures in a suit with eyes hovering between its teeth.
“That’s the short version?” He responded. “I’ll sure hate the confusion I’ll be feeling when I get the long version.”
“Well,” interjected the dentures the a deep, boomy, voice of a 1940s showman, “I think you should choose a name before I show you around so everyone can adjust to having a sixth human around for the first time in a while”
Pomni flinched and rubbed her arm at that phrase, looking sadly downwards.
“Uh,” The new guy said, “I guess you guys can call me… Echo. You know, I used to have a parakeet named that.”
“Cool, nice to meet you, Echo.” Said Zooble. “Now, if you don’t mind, I’m going back to sleep.”
“Fair enough.” He responded, as Zooble walked back through the door.
Ragatha was comforting Pomni now, as a small puddle of tears accumulated under the jester’s face.
“You good, Pomni?” Echo said.
Pomni looked up, eyes filled with tears. “Yeah, it’s just…” Her voice trailed off as another teardrop fell to the ground.
The dentures decided that this was the perfect time to yank Echo away.
“Well, pal, it’s time for your tour of the grounds! Welcome to the Circus, by the way. I’m Caine, I made the place.”
“Nice to meet you?” Echo responded.
“Well, the place you’ve seen so far is the tent,” said Caine. “This is where everyone sleeps, eats, and chills out. Gangle and Zooble have been hanging out with me lately and teaching me howtobeniceandplayalotofgamesrandi’vebeenhavingagreattimeand-”
“You want to, uh, breathe at any point, Caine?” Echo interrupted, overwhelmed by the rapid voice.
“Oh, no need to! I’m an AI!” Caine stated cheerily. “Now, back to the tour. We changed up a handful of things in here recently, but a lot of the big changes are outside of the tent! I brought in a lot of fun places from old adventures so everyone could go places and have fun on their own time, and some of the troupe members helped me make some personalized spots for everyone!”
“Cool,” said Echo, “I’ll have to make one for myself sometime.” He began to brainstorm what he could make. Something musical theater? Maybe flying?
Caine beamed happily. “I’ll be glad to help you whenever you want to get started! We’ve already got a bunch of stuff here.” He pointed to 5 sections at once. “There’s the shopping mall, restaurant, ranch, art studio, and climbing wall. I could go on, but we’d be here all day if I showed you everything! I think you’d better talk to your new pals to figure out more of everything.”
Caine pulled him back at high speed, and they practically teleported to the main stage of the circus, where this whole thing had started.
“Well,” Caine said, “I think it would be a good idea for you to get some rest. I can’t imagine how strange it must be having this thrown at you, and I was created to imagine!”
“Wait,” Echo said just before Caine could leave. “What did you mean when you mentioned it had been a while since you had six people here? Also, what’s with all the Xs on the doors?”
Caine simultaneously deflated and tensed up. “I’m not the best at explaining… that. I think you should talk to Ragatha or Pomni if you want to know. Before that though, I think you should get some rest.”
Caine zipped away, leaving Echo to wander back to the hallway. Everyone was gone now, probably in their rooms. He walked down to his room, noting the X’d out frog across the way, before stepping inside to get some long-overdue sleep.