Writer's Games: Carnival

Finals: Aspen Facine

If I couldn't feel my heart pound in my chest, I would wonder if I even had one anymore. I feel empty. They know everything about me, who I am, what my secrets are, and have used it to pull my personality away from my core and meld it, until it is what they want it to be. I'm a mess, scattered everywhere in hollow pieces.
"Perdita? Is...is that you?" I ask the mess before me. Barely recognizable flesh, and green hair. It was not too far from my room, which I had entered upon hearing the creak of the door. Although I'm not sure how long it was after my silence. "I...no...it can't be." Too many people I had allowed to become close to me were dead. My teammates, Charlotte all gone. All whisked away with things like wishing upon stars, or catching fireflies in the park, or even my childhood.
I had seen enough gore to span at least one hundred B-type movies, and cried or witnessed enough tears to fill a small river, with the help of the gallons of blood spilled, of course. This whole things was merely a twisted form of competition, and I had played into it perfectly, like a pawn on a chessboard. Perhaps, for once, it wasn't good to have been an athlete, to be so driven on winning. Because winning meant living through death and trauma. I said it so many days ago, the winner truly is the biggest loser of all.
For a moment I stand at the body, staring at myself in the blood, before I quickly turn away to leave. Am I really so carved out, that I can't even cry? I guess so. I wander for a bit, not straying too far from the room I was trapped in, before coming across another body. That of a young girl, whose name is somewhere inside my traumatized head, but most likely so oppressed that I'll never remember it. Maybe I heard it when one of her friends screamed for help, I'll never know.
A shadow twitches close by, and the blood from the body is making small shakes, someone is coming, and an ear piercing scream accompanies it. It sounds younger than any of the screeches I've let out, far younger. Quickly I turn tail and enter a room similar to the one I stayed in. Maybe it was Perdita's or the dead girl's - or what's left of her - before me. Perhaps it was from a surviving tribute who scrambled away at first chance, just like me. From the crack of the door I peek out staring at the lumbering figure that has stopped before me.
It's a reverse horror film, normally someone would be in a room when suddenly and eye would appear looking through the doorway, or there would be a silhouette in the space between the door and the wall. But this time, it's the opposite, where it's me, the one near the crack in the doorway witnessing the frightful actions play out. A man in a clown suit holds in his hand a young girl, whose limp like a rag doll. I should do something, go out there and help, yet something keeps me inside. No clown would be left here unless it was that of Sayuri, Atilius or Callisto themselves, and I don't want to fight them. So I stay as immobile as a stone statue watching everything unfold before me. They don't know I'm here which means I can hide for now. How funny, that this whole event will end just like it began, with an "innocent" game of hide and seek.
In a flash, the lifeless girl is hurled against the door, with so much force that the wood splinters flying into my eyes and prickling my body. My hiding spot has just been breached, demolished and as soon as the clown is done with the young girl he'll easily kill me. I need to run and fast, at the right time when he's preoccupied with the child and her now bashed in head. The girls face stares at me with pure terror, it's a lifeless terror, for I know she's almost dead. Blood and skin is stuck to her forehead where her head has been shattered. Her head hands a good foot or two above the ground. I could try to pull her through, let her life the last seconds of her life in peace but it's no use. Either I let her die painfully and live, or save her and die. It's an awfully obvious choice.
As soon as the clown rips her head away from the hole through, I bolt, using my years of soccer to my advantage, I'm far gone by the time I hear the sickening noise of her head finally being crushed. Tears fly past me fastly, I'm crying, but they're empty tears. Another life lost, another hole punctured in my memories. I squeeze my wet eyes shut, trying to recall the simple things. The smiles on my friends faces, or laughing with my family back home. But the memories are married, I can only see the twisted smiles of all the killers here, and recall forced laughs I pushed out, in order to feel happy here, if only for a second.
In the darkness of my sight, I hit something. Perhaps it's a wall, but my heart races, the clowns caught up to me, and now he's going to kill me, shove my head through a door and crush underneath his foot, just like he did to the little girl back there. My eyes snap open, my tears now dry with fear. My heart beats faster and faster, harder and harder, reminding me yet again that I do indeed still have a heart. Which is amazing considering that I just let the girl die back there. She had been what? Four? Five? A life much too short.
"What are you staring at?" A guy in front of me says frantically. "Get up!"
Quickly I scramble to my feet. "Run!" I shout at him, and there's a girl behind him to. Viola. None of us have ever really talked, but I guess since we're the last ones left, we've resorted to helping each other no matter what.
"What? Why?"
"He's coming, he's coming!" I scream already sprinting for the exit to the funhouse which is not to far away.
"Who?" Viola asks, trailing slightly behind.
"I don't know, someone in a clown suit. I assume it's Callisto."
"How can you know?"
"Because he killed her. He killed a little girl!" I shout. "And there's only three monsters I know that would do that and he's one."
We stop at the door, and Viola's hands desperately jiggle at the door. "It's stuck!" She says. "Morgan help me."
The guy, who I now know is Morgan nods and they ram against the door. Callisto is getting close now and everything slows down, even the thumping of my heart and my ragged breath. I have a choice, I can take on Callisto and buy Viola and Morgan some time or help them in hopes of getting out without confrontation. I run towards the clown. Perhaps I do have something left in me, and I'm the shell of a girl just yet.
"What are you doing?" Morgan screams.
"There's no time." Is all I manage, before pushing the clown with all my force. Pain shoots through my body, as Callisto falls to the ground. I'm not going to last against him. I'm going to die after getting so far. If I had known this I would've given up in the beginning. At least then I could've died without having to go through so much terror. Maybe I could've died with a little bit of peace, and dignity.
The clown quickly gets up. The sewn on smile, on the mask makes everything so horrifying, the way it just stays there and never falters. Why wont it grimace after killing so many people. Why wont Callisto just feel his guilt for once. The clown pulls out a knife and my hearts sinks. I really am going to die. I'm not going to live to be a professional soccer player like I have wanted, I'm going to die a scarred killer. I'll never see my fifteenth birthday or play another game with my teammates.
Something sparks in my mind. Although my memory is gashed and bloodied, torn and twisted beyond repair I can remember speaking those words before. Those are the words I told myself on the bus, after being shot. But I lived and that gives me hope. I have to fight. I may die but then at least I'll have tried to live. I have to fight, because if I don't Morgan and Viola won't even have a chance at escaping. I have to fight, so that the stories of those in here can live, so that people know of the sacrifices the people have made, and don't forget what people did.
The clown is clunky when barreling towards me and slow due to being in a suit so it's easier to dodge the knife than I assume it would be otherwise. His vision must also be impaired because his next slash is farther off from me than it should be. I know it's too dangerous to try to take the knife from him because I could easily get cut, but if I can knock him out I can run away. I kick his kneecap in the wrong way and it makes a sickening crunch. I've broke it, but I can feel the bones in my foot twist too. But Callisto continues to move on despite one leg being out of use. He doesn't even scream in pain.
But then the clown takes a gamble and throws the knife and I know before it hits me that I can't dodge it. I move slightly in a desperate attempt to save myself but it sinks deeply into my right arm near the shoulder. My left hand moves shakily up to the knife. I'm numb, I can't even feel the pain. Blood slowly oozes out and I grip the hilt through the slick red substance.
"Aspen!" Viola shouts, "The door, we got it."
"Then go." I scream pushing back cries of agony.
"But what about you?" Morgan asks as daylight seeps into the funhouse.
"Leave me here." The clown is limping it's way towards me. Out of all the things I've seen here, even my own fears, this is what scares me the most. The sight of someone so determined to kill me even through pain.
"But, you could die!"
"Just go, before you die too!" I pull the knife out of my shoulder and sticky liquid sprays everywhere. I know I shouldn't have pulled it out, but I need it to defend myself. I've seen what Callisto can do without a knife. The light I only saw moments ago disappears and I smile. I'm glad they left. Quickly I run away from the clown which lumbers slowly behind, he's limping, but still fast. My left hand with the knife shakes faster, and I grip the knife with my right hand to, as pain shoots throughout my body. I stop running. Running I what I've been taught. I run after the ball, I run away from the killers. No more.
When he comes full speed at me, the knife pierces through the clown suit and sinks into his stomach. I pull the knife out. The clown falls forward to the ground.
"How does it feel?" I shout raising the knife and stabbing it into the clowns back. "How does it feel you monster? To be killed? After all you've done how does it feel?" My left hand drives the knife over and over again into his body. My right arm is too limp to restrain it stop it. He deserves to feel all the pain of all the people he's killed. "You animal!" I shout at his bloody corpse. "Look what you've done!" I drive the knife the last time into his back and stop. I'm completely covered in his blood. It soaks my shirt and sprays my face. Yet I don't feel sick like I have when forced to kill before. He deserved it.
I take the mask off from his head, so I can see how terrified he was in his last minutes, or if he was still smiling. And from what I see, I shake so much that the mask drops from my hands involuntarily. It's not Callisto. I just painfully killed someone who didn't deserve it. I can recognize the face of Oris or Orbis or whatever his name was. He's the one who shot acid and killed the little girl but I know he was just another piece in Atilius, Sayuri and Callisto's carnival.
Quickly I run, so I can escape the sight of what I've just done. I run as fast as I can allow without my right arm being too painful. I should've ran before. There's a reason I was taught to run, and that's because it was better. Look at what I've done. I never should've stopped. Quickly I breach the outside of the funhouse, and I'm back into the hell of the rest of the Carnival. I'm expecting Morgan and Viola to be waiting there. But they aren't. Viola is lying on the ground hacked to pieces and Morgan is struggling with a figure not to far off. The actual Callisto.
"Morgan, stop get away from him!" I scream as blood drips from my arm and pools around my feet. "Don't try to fight him it's no use!" The words feel wrong in my mouth but I know that even if it means letting Callisto get away, at least then Morgan would live.
Morgan doesn't answer. Of course he won't, he's probably too focused on fighting Callisto. I should help him. It's one of my biggest fears to let people down, to not help my teammates. But I turn and run away, allowing my fears to crush down on my. I hear him wail in the background. He's probably dead, and I did nothing to say him. And now I am completely alone. I traded the fear of becoming a monster for the fear of letting my friends die. No one is here to comfort me. Charlotte, Sky, Perdita...they're all dead.
From the front gate I see the blue and red lights of police cars. It should motivate me to move faster towards the gate. Yet it makes me slow down. I'm afraid of facing the reality that I've become so isolated from, even though it was what I've wanted this whole time. Slowly but surely I make my way to the gates clutching my arm.
They swing open in creaky motions and families caught up in their worries stare at me. Mom, dad. I try to reach out to them as all the families rush towards me. I know they won't actually hug me, considering the state I'm, completely drenched in blood.
"Aspen. Aspen my little girl." My mother cries. "We've been so worried."
"Mom." I croak out, tears crashing down, leaving clear streaks on my blood face. It's at that moment that everything comes falling down on me. All the blood, and the tears what I've witnesses. From the acid, to my own fears, to watching others die. My legs give way and crash to the ground sobbing.
"Aspen...Aspen is it?" One woman asks. "Have you seen my daughter? Do you know where she is?"
I choke on my guilt and it takes me a second to be able to talk. "She's...dead." I whisper. I feel more hollow than before, and broken, like glass shattered against the ground.
"I'm sorry I didn't hear you, what did you say?" The woman asks. She probably heard me, she probably just doesn't want to believe it. I know I wouldn't. It's like the bus all over again, the parents trying to figure out if their child is amongst the bodies, or survived.
"I said she's dead!" I scream. "They're dead all of them."
"Miss please try to calm down." A police officer says and the background of police sirens begins to mix with the sound of sobs. "You're safe now."
My parent sit by me as I'm wheeled into an ambulance and paramedics try to fix my arm. Everything is going blurry and I want to close my eyes but I'm afraid. I'm safe now, I shouldn't be scared. I'm out, I'm finally free. It should feel like a dream.

But it feels so much more like a nightmare.