All the lights, shaded blue, slowly make their way to Lydia. Making her body glow teal, as if in a laser tag briefing room. I watch her tattoos awaken as they start to twitch and slither as she says, "For our first act, we require a few... volunteers," causing a sea of hands to go up around us. With a low chuckle, she says, "Ah, just what we like to see." She moves from the middle of the room and starts to make her way toward the seats, and the others follow suit. Once cast members approach the stairs leading to the audience, nearby clowns descend from them, all five sets, and join them in the arena.
Accept one.
The greeter, the zipper face clown.
It descends slowly from the stairs across the arena. Its head moves side to side, studying the crowd. Once it finally gets down, it heads towards the middle. It stays unmoving; It's head tilts while its eyes inspect the patrons. Its eyes move fast, like they're racing, until its gaze reaches our section.
It walks slowly towards us as Lydia says with mirth, " What a good crowd we have tonight! It's just so hard to choose."
It stands at the bottom of the stairs licking its slips, looking towards us. I can feel Jason stiffen beside me as it makes its way up. It stands in the middle licking its lips as Lydia says, laughing, " So why don't we do this," tension fills the air in anticipation of her decision. Her tattoos are moving more, ready to spring, to come off her skin. A hand – Dicks– grabs my shoulder to pull me back towards the other set of stairs as it keeps coming up. It's only a couple rows away as she says, " I choose all of you," her crew mates look towards her as if looking for confirmation, "and her face splits into a wide grin, " we are an interactive show, after all." Her tattoos start to blow brighter and one by one they start peeling off her skin, " what are you waiting for?" she asks the others, "Go."
Screams.
The tent is filled with screams.
I look around to see the escaped tattoos fly around the tent, corralling the humans away from the exit and down into the arena. The contortionist, firebreather, and a few other clearly human acts walk towards them on stumbling feet while the others forgo walking altogether and start flying after the patrons.
Dick tugs my shoulder hard, "Danny, come on, let's go," he says, slightly panicked, bringing my attention back to the clown in front of us. Unlike the others, it just stands there while waiting for us to make the first move.
"Are any of you armed?" I ask lowly, not wanting the clown to hear.
"Lightly," says Dami.
I take a deep breath and step back, prompting the clown to move. It climbs on all fours across the last two rows up to us, mouth open wide, drooling all over itself. I look back and see everyone heading off, adorned in domino masks, heading in different directions. I yell at them, "If you get close to Lydia, try to break the staff!" The clown lunges forward, snapping its teeth at me, making me jump into another row of seats causing it to chase me as I try to lead it away from others.
I can feel a chilled hum in my core as I reach into it and pull out ectoplasm, shaping it into a mask and sticking it to my face. As I'm running, I get close to Bruce. He's dodging attacks from a snake-shaped tattoo. I gather ectoplasm in my hand and shoot an ectoblast at it, causing it to burst. I shift to change directions, but not before saying, " Tim has something that can help with the ghosts."
He starts towards his next target and grunts, "No names in the field."
A gut-wrenching scream fills the air, forcing my attention. A clown tackles a woman to the ground with one hand on her head and another on her arm. He opens his mouth impossibly wide and chops down on her neck. She screams again, which is followed by a quick Bang Bang Bang. Each shot hit the clown in the back, but it only staggered forward. The clown flickers in and out of tangibility, and the three slugs buried in its back fall to the ground. The woman lays there, blood spewing out, staining her shirt, eyes wide, until she starts to move. She scoots backward, never taking her eyes off the center of the arena, holding a hand to her bitten-into flesh. The Clown goes off in a floating sprint toward Jason, the woman's blood and skin stuck to its teeth.
My eyes stray towards Tim, hoping he's seeing this, but he's occupied with the contortionist. So I slow down and let the clown get close. I wait until it's just an arm's length away before I stop and throw up an ecto shield. The clown has no time to stop as it rams right into it, flying away as if it's been hit by a car. It knocks into the tent, causing it to sway. I rush over to it and pull out a keychain. On it are three miniature containers about the size of chapstick, in sleek silver and green, a Phantom thermos (Name pending).
I take off the cap and suck up the Clown, and on the side of the tube pops up, ' ⅕.' I shove my keys back into my pocket, shoot down most of the remaining tattoos, ' Only three left,' and enter the arena.
I start to make my way toward Jason, seeing him struggling with a clown, but before I get halfway there, Tim comes up behind them and smacks the clown in the back of the head with a pole. The clown tumbles forward, and Tim pulls out his water bottle. He pours water into his hand and flicks it at the clown, causing it to hiss and flinch back. Where the water hit comes angry green skin; the longer the water stays there, the darker it becomes like it's burning into it. Seeing that it's distracted and I have a clear shot, I send an icy ectoblast straight to its chest, knocking it to the ground. I rush over and pull out the Phantom thermos again, sealing the clown inside.
" What the hell, man! Why didn't you bring that out before!" exclaims Tim.
" Sorry," I say, knocking out another tattoo, " but it's self-powered."
I look around, trying to find the others. I finally find Bruce and Dick engaging with other clowns and Dami fighting off the last two tattoos, making it so some civilians can break for the exit.
" give me some of that," Jason says, wrecking my concentration. He's grabbing at one of the holy water water bottles.
" No can do," says Tim, " It affects baby D. So...."
" Yeah, your point?" Jason asks, still grabbing at it.
" It could affect you too, dumbass."
I can hear Jason mumbling something suspiciously like, 'Timmy gets all the cool toys.' but I let it go. He lets off a couple of shots, both hitting their target.
They stagger.
Both bullets land in the contortionist, one in the shoulder and another in the kneecap. They go down hard. Their body twitches in a puddle of blood on the ground, trying to move. It twists and contorts, swimming in it, trying to do anything so that it can stand upright, but it's not enough. Their bloodshot, red eyes roll into the back of their head, and their body slumps down like a puppet that's lost their strings. Ejecting out of them is a tattoo in the form of a voodoo doll.
" What the fuck," says Jason.
" Possession," I say, unable to truly call that overshadowing, as it looks like anything but. " Why don't we team up? Help Dami with the rest of the tattoos, then take out the rest of the clowns?"
" What about the rest of the circus?" asks Tim.
" They look to be human," I say. Well, at least, I think. There is no telling if all of them are still alive. If they've been possessed the whole time they've been here, their bodies wouldn't have started decaying yet. " we can restrain them. I might be able to pull out whatever is controlling them."
"Like you did earlier? With the anger?" asks Jason.
" No," I say, shaking my head, " this is something different."
" But you think it will work?" asks Tim.
" As long as I don't run out of room in these," I say, gesturing to the thermoses.
" How many can they hold?" asks Jason.
" Five each; I have room for 13 more," I say.
" Well," says Tim securing the water bottles, " I guess it's time we start ghost hunting."
" Never say that again," I say with a shiver and make my way toward Dami.
" Was that offensive?" I hear Tim ask. He's quiet for a second before he whispers to himself, "Oh my god, that was probably offensive," causing me to snort.