3A: Welcome



“He told me you’d be coming...”

Dolly Waters half-leaned against the large door to Corey Smith’s manor. Her hair was tied in a bird’s nest above her head, lifted off of the slack leather jacket hugging her shoulders overtop a black t-shirt. Her face shared a complex mood: part-amused and part-bemused; part-enlivened; part-disquieted; all animation forcefully veiled behind plucked eyebrows and a made-up face.

“Am I imposing?” the visitor stammers, eyes down as his foot nervously kicks around specks of dirt atop the entrance mat. Dolly pauses, assessing the fragile frame in front of her. She audibly sighs, making a point of it.

“No.” The tone of her voice does nothing to reassure him that he’s welcome, but with a dramatic eye roll she steps to the side and motions for him to enter. Courteously, he wipes his feet upon the doormat. The door shuts behind him as his eyes adjust to the dimmed brightness inside the house. “Do you want a drink or something? Maybe a bite to eat? You er… you do eat like food and stuff, yeah?”

He opens his mouth but is interrupted before he can get anything out.

“Oh yeah! Thad asked you that already!” She playfully taps her head, hinting that she knows it was a dumb question. From the side of his eye, the visitor eyes a pinboard on the wall next to the door with several photos on it. His eyes immediately find Thaddeus Duke’s. Dolly screws up her face. “Hey! I know y’all have got some weird fucking hatefest going on, but you’re not bringing that here, you hear me?”

She slaps her hand twice against the top of the board, and the visitor looks up to see text printed across the top: ‘STOP BEING DICKS AND LET THESE PEOPLE IN!!!’

“Have the other residents been giving you trouble?” he asks, gesturing with his head towards the sign.

“The others are little shits,” she quickly fires back. As soon as she said it, her face winces and she fiercely bites her bottom lip. Another audible sigh. “The others are… fine… they just like to mess around is all. I figured this board would help things while Corey was away. Did they bother you at all?”

“No, why would they?” he questions. She replies by pointing her finger at another picture on the board.

It’s the visitor.

“I... uh… nobody even spoke to me.” He shuffles on the spot.

“Good. Maybe those little fuckers are finally STARTING TO LISTEN TO ME!” She shouts the last part right at the door, making every effort to be heard by anybody outside. On the other side of the door, a couple of young men giggle and then run off. Dolly groans. She closes her eyes. “I am not a murderer. I am not a murderer. I am not a murderer.”

As Dolly recites her mantra, the visitor turns towards the board again. He notices the face of XWF Hart Champion, R.L. Edgar, also there. Scanning through some of the other photos, he doesn’t recognise any faces.

“So are you coming or what?” Dolly calls from half-way down the entrance corridor, having clearly decided today is not the day to start stabbing people.

“Uh, yeah…” he calls back at half Dolly’s volume. He flicks one last look at the board and then sets off after her. In his haste, he misses spotting the face of the old man in the bottom right corner, with the words ‘TELL AN ADULT IMMEDIATELY’ scribbled across it in a red marker.

“I’m not sure exactly what you’re looking for, but Corey told me to take you to the old library,” Dolly says without looking back. Behind her the visitor slows from the half-jog he needed in order to catch up and falls into lockstep. “Is that what you’re after?”

“That would be great,” he timidly confirms. “Thanks.”

“Jeez…” she glances over her shoulder at him, narrowing her eyebrows. “You’re not exactly as spooky as your reputation, ya know?”

The visitor opts not to say anything in response, simply shrugging instead. As they make their way through the manor, he catches glimpses of the lives of its inhabitants like pictures framed by the doorways. Each character within each painting wears its scars upon their face; the burnt remnants of their own journeys through the flame. Life is the greatest artist.

“Here we are!” Dolly’s sarcastic enthusiasm snaps the visitor back into the moment. She stands in a doorway once again - her own piece of art - and gestures for him to enter the room beside her. Somewhat hesitantly, he steps through the picture in front of her. “As you can see, it ain’t much of a library anymore.”

He nods to indicate that he heard her as he scans the room. The library is now a games room; complete with darts, foosball, ping pong, and a large couch in the shape of an arc around a switched-on television. A young man sits alone on the couch watching an old western. Hearing Dolly and the visitor arrive, he turns to greet them. The visitor forces a friendly smile to put him at ease. It doesn’t work. Unnerved, the young man quickly rushes out of the door nearly bowling Dolly over in the process.

“Hey! Watch it!” she screams after him, before grumbling to herself and stepping further into the room. A wicked smirk creeps over her face. “You know, I caught that guy jerking off to furry porn the other week.”

Dolly giggles, and the visitor meets it with a chuckle of his own. The fleeting laughter quickly passes, but it leaves a smile of genuine warmth on both of their faces; something they both notice in each other.

“Feel free to look around if it’ll help,” Dolly says as she walks over to the dartboard. She pulls a handful of darts out and steps back several steps. “Corey got rid of all the old spooky shit when he first moved in. Too much bad mojo, ya know?”

He did know. Still, he would do what he could. He didn’t pay much attention to the furniture in the middle - it was clearly newer and not exactly the style of the previous owner, nor the generations that occupied this land prior to Madison Dyson as per The Salmon-Coloured Minotaur’s research. Instead, the visitor turns his attention to the walls, floor, skirting board, and where possible, the ceiling. He studies each attentively, tapping whatever he could reach and listening for any deviation in structure. He studies the crevices that nails were banged into; the chips of paint; the thin lines of emptiness between the wooden panels. Anywhere where something other could be.

He left the area around the dartboard to last, giving Dolly space when she's armed with sharp pointy things. Something told him that was a good idea. Eventually, that area was all that there was left to search though. Dolly threw the last of the darts into the board and left the visitor to it. She collapsed onto the couch that the furry-lover had been sitting on, her legs splayed over the back of it so her knees were stretching the holes in her jeans. With the way she stared at the screen, if anyone were to walk by, they would swear that she was watching the movie. The visitor knew better. She was elsewhere.

He continued his excavation of the last corner of the room, tapping and listening and squinting and rubbing. Nothing. He sat defeated upon the ground, confused and unsure of what to do next. In the background, he heard Dolly, coming back from wherever she had zoned out to, beginning to flick through channels on the TV. The sound of explosions cut to canned laughter which then cut to an Arabic news report and then to an advert asking everyone to join B.o.B. It all started to sound like white noise eventually.

White noise flicked to white noise.

White noise flicked to white noise.

White noise flicked to white noise.


It flickered in and out. Puzzled, he pulled himself out of his defeat and pushed himself to his feet. Turning to the couch, he saw the screen was only showing static, and Dolly had her face pressed right up against it.

"What are you…" He doesn't get a chance to finish.

Large, ghostly hands reach from the screen and grab Dolly by the shoulders. They start pulling her in!

"No!" he shouts. He races over as Dolly gets sucked further in. He grabs her by the boot, but he's not strong enough.


Dolly is lost completely. Holding her foot, he follows her in.

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3B: The Fall

They enter horizontally.

T
h
e
y

f
a
l
l

v
e
r
t
i
c
a
l
l
y.

Down.

Down.

Down through the white noise to an entirely different noise all together.

THUD.

They land in a crumpled mess in a familiar hallway. The visitor is sprawled on his back, his head ricocheting off the solid concrete ground and rendering him unconscious. Dolly’s limbs flail when she lands. The impact similarly knocks her out, with one leg sprawled across the chest of the visitor.

---Six hours later---

The two are stirring, but not yet with it enough to rise. Suddenly…
























MARTY?!?!


ZzzzzzONEzzzzZZZ



zzZZZzzTWOzZZzzzz




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zZzZzZzTHREE!!!111!!zzZZzZ

!

Seeing the commotion in the distance, Vinnie Lane sprints down the hallway from out of nowhere and stares in disbelief at Marty.

”Whoa! Really? What was the challenge?” he looks to Marty, expecting an answer. Before he even realises the ridiculousness of that proposition, he quickly moves on. “Oh screw it, let’s throw a little spice into the mix!

And NEW Freestyle Champion - Dolly Waters!

Both Dolly and the visitor stir and slide themselves towards opposite sides of the corridor. Dolly’s foot drags off the visitor’s chest (before the twelve hour mark it should be noted!) as Vinnie excitedly hugs Marty.

“What the fuck?” Dolly asks, blinking furiously to try and bring herself back to reality. On the other wall, the visitor rubs his head and checks it for blood.

“You’re the new Freestyle champ, Doll’!” Vinnie beams. He turns to the visitor. “Give her the belt, man.”

“W… wha..?” he stammers.

“Oh don’t play stupid, now!” Vinnie scolds him. “Be a good sport and cough it up!”

“What are you talking about?” Dolly interjects, the world coming back into focus now.

“Marty here just found you two taking a nap here” he begins to explain. “Dolly’s foot was on Ollie the Magic Bum’s chest, and so Marty, being the greatest referee in XWF history - don’t tell Chaz or John I said that - did his job and counted the pin. And now McScrooge over here won’t give up the title! What a sourpuss.”

“I don’t have it here…” the visitor states, a little more clarity creeping into his voice.

“Well what the hell are you doing in here if you’re not bringing the belt with you?” Vinnie has a good point. As the visitor regains his senses, he recognises this as being the Freestyle hallway.

“Fer fucks sake, we don’t know how we got here!” Dolly pipes in again, saving the visitor from the accusations. “We got sucked through a fucking TV, fell through some batshit fucking white noise and landed in the middle of this fucking corridor!”

“Yeah… that totally sounds believable,” Vinnie sarcastically dismisses her explanation. “But whatever, sort out the belt amongst yourselves. Dolly - you’re the new champ. Congrats.”

Vinnie waves the two of them off and walks off down the corridor. Marty buzzes alongside him and as per his programming, puts up with Vinnie whinging about how many crazy people the XWF employs. As the primary owner and referee extraordinaire (quite literally extraordinary) disappear, both Dolly and the visitor struggle to their feet. The world spins under the visitor’s feet, so he steadies himself against the wall until it settles. Dolly, meanwhile, tries to shake loose an ache in her hip. Even when she thinks it’s resolved, her first steps don’t bear her full weight.

“I’m… er… I’m sorry about that,” she says, growing more confident in her walk.

“Don’t worry about it,” the visitor reassures her, stepping away from the wall as well. “It’s the nature of the beast. Sooner or later it was going to happen. I’m kind of glad it’s someone like you, to be honest.”

“Someone like me?” she says, narrowing her eyes. Those words don’t often carry a positive connotation.

“Someone who hasn’t been trying to attack me every other day,” he elaborates. Dolly’s face shows her understanding. Finding their feet, the two of them scan their environment.

“What now?” she asks.

“I have no idea,” he admits. “I usually have someone who can help me in these situations…”

“Someone not like me, you mean.” The snark in her voice carries strongly, not at all concealed by the humour.

“Someone bigger, hairier, and with horns,” he responds, refusing to bite. Dolly has no clue what he’s talking about.

“W…”

“Shhh!” the visitor silences her, his eyes widening. “Do you hear that?”

Dolly listens intently. Somewhere in the distance, she hears a faint whining whistle.

“Yeah… I do,” she says. “Is it getting closer?”

Sure enough, the whine gradually becomes louder and louder, and the sound of a terribly out of rhythm beat begins pounding just under the piercing whistle.

“What do we do?” Dolly asks.

The arrhythmic beat grows louder, matching the whine in volume. As it closes in, they both realise that it’s coming from behind a door at the end of the hall. The awful sounds grow to the point where they seem to be just on the other side.

BANG!

The door rattles as something thumps it. Dolly jumps a little.

“What the fuck is that?” she hisses.

BANG!

The door rattles again.

“I think it’s…”

BANG!

“I think it’s time for us to go,” the visitor insists. He grabs Dolly by the arm and whisks her down the hall.

BANG!

BANG!

BANG!

“That door’s not going to hold for long!” Dolly shouts, as their hurry turns into a full sprint.

“We need to get out of this hallway!” the visitor shouts back.

“This way!” Dolly yells back, ducking to the side and pulling the visitor in behind her. They bust through an unlocked door just in time to hear a loud crash behind them as the door buckles under the repeated smashes against it.

They escape through life’s picture frame.

---

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3C: For My Amusement

“Step right up! Step right up!” calls a clown in billowing pink and black striped pants with white suspenders pulled over a bare torso. As Dolly and the visitor emerge from the nothingness and step towards the clown, he turns to face them. His face is painte… wait… that’s just his regular make-up.

“Vinnie?!” Dolly accuses. “Again?”

“Who’s Vinnie?” the clown who most definitely looks like Vinnie Lane asks, a goofy grin stuck upon his face.

“Seriously?” frustratedly, she turns to the visitor.

“I told you...” he pleads, “I usually have a guide for this stuff.”

“Did I hear you say ‘guide’!?” Definitely-Maybe-Probably-Vinnie pipes up, withdrawing a brochure from a pocket in his nipple.


“Well do I have a ‘guide’ for you!” he exclaims, handing it towards the visitor. Dolly snatches it from Clown-Not-Vinnie’s hands.

“Jesus fucking Christ, what the hell is this?” she complains, holding the guide up to Version-Of-Vinnie-With-A-Better-Fashion-Sense. In big bold font the words ‘DOLLYWOOD’ are printed at the top of the folded pamphlet.

“Uh… it’s the ‘guide’, genius.” He gives the visitor a ‘what’s this chick’s problem?’ look. Dolly turns to the visitor again herself.

“Is this enough of a guide for you?” She forcefully shoves it into the visitor’s hands and waits for a response through gritted teeth. Vinnie-With-Better-Makeup beams stupidly in the background. The visitor opens the guide up and reveals a map of a theme park. On cue, the screaming sounds of a roller coaster whizzing past rings through the sky. Dollywood itself - or a version of it - rises up into the dark behind Is-Vinnie-Just-Fucking-With-Me.

“It’s a map,” he announces, turning it towards Dolly.

“Oh joy!” she sarcastically replies.

“No…” he smiles at her. “Maps are a good thing. Trust me.”

“Do I have a choice?” She groans. In the distance, a quiet whistling whine starts rising above the clattering of the coaster car on its tracks. A terrible beat accompanies it. Both Dolly and the visitor shoot their eyes to the side towards the nothingness they came from.

“I don’t think either of us do,” the visitor says. Without a word, Dolly agrees. The two of them take off towards the theme park, fleeing the growing sounds of whining and shitty music.

“You two have fun now!” Probably-Would-Be-A-Better-Owner-Than-The-Real-Vinnie shouts behind them as they disappear into the park.

As they jog under the colorful archway marking the theme park’s entrance, the visitor holds the map in front of him. Tiny green glowing footprints denote the trail they need to follow and he lets those little feet guide the way. A glowing circle representing the two of them traces along the path as they go.

The map leads them past theatrical Kings and Queens performing a show. They prance and posture for the camera; all vying for attention and fame but oblivious to how the world spins on its axis. Ignoring the tragedy-cum-comedy, Dolly and the visitor rush past. The characters in the show cycle out of relevance and the world keeps spinning without them.

The visitor stops and Dolly follows his lead. The incandescent green footsteps have reached the end of their short-lived existence and they fade away from the map. The visitor looks up at their destination. Goat-faced chariots trot through the night in front of them, spinning off-kilter around a carousel. They encircle the world.

“Now what?” Dolly says, catching her breath and trying to find anything more interesting than a poorly constructed children’s ride.

“We ride it,” the visitor replies, far too matter-of-factly for Dolly’s liking.

“Are you serious?” she complains. The visitor has already begun walking over to where the goats chart their orbit. Sighing, she follows after. They enter an opening through metal bars that shape out the path the queue should follow and dutifully snake their way up towards the gate to the ride. The ride’s operator, in a pink and black pinstripe suit, greets them with a smile.

“Hello!” he exclaims, gleefully.

“Oh for fuck’s sake, Vinnie!” Dolly also exclaims, much less gleefully.

“Care for a ride?” His painted face refuses to acknowledge Dolly’s ire.

“Yes,” the visitor calmly says, having a much greater tolerance to nonsense. “That would be lovely.”

Vinnie-But-With-More-Clothes-On opens the gate, letting them into the ride. As they walk through the gate, Dolly raises middle finger to Definitely-A-Version-Of-Vinnie-Because-Of-How-Annoying-He-Is-Being. He just keeps smiling back which only annoys Dolly further. The carousel slows as they approach it, even though Stupid-Face-Vinnie just seems to still be standing in the same spot and waving at them. They each climb aboard identical goat-faced horses, small and lean compared to other rides, with dark manes and notable scratches in the decorative detail on the romance side of the steeds, including above the eye. Their rides begin to wobble as the carousel begins to spin again.

“I like your ride…” the visitor awkwardly says, trying to kick the elephant out of the room. Dolly’s face clearly shows she has no clue what he’s talking about.

“Thanks…” she hesitantly replies. “So, uh… how long do we have to be on this stupid thing?”

“I don’t know,” he admits. Dolly frowns.

“You know what I’m going to ask, right?” She tries to quieten her frustration.

“Yeah…” he replies, drifting off a little at the end.

“But you’re going to make me say it anyway?” Her eyes are wide and her jaw is clenched.

“Yeah…” he repeats. Dolly swallows, still trying to keep some sort of lid on her temper.

“What…” she begins, pausing. “...the fuck… are we doing here then?”

“I can’t explain it.” He turns his head to face her. The earnestness in his eyes soothes her in a way that she cannot explain. “Things just happen to me and I just… react.”

“That…” she tries to respond. She purses her lips and breaks eye contact, looking down at her steed. “That kind of sounds horrible to be honest.”

“Kind of like that beat.” His eyes shoot out into the spinning world, past Do-Nothing-Vinnie who still stands there waving and into the darkness swirling in the background. The growing familiarity of a beat that can’t hold its rhythm can be heard above the creaking and whirring of the strangely silent merry-go-round. The whining whistle pairs itself with the beat once again. As soon as the visitor mentions it, Dolly notices it as well.

“Fuck…” she mutters as the whistle and beat grow louder. “We need to go, right?”

The visitor nods. The sounds of approaching doom grow louder and louder. Useless-Fucking-Vinnie continues to wave, offering no solution. The carousel begins to move faster.

“What the hell is happening?!” Dolly shouts as the pace quickens.

“We need to jump!” the visitor yells back. Dolly doesn’t have a chance to process this as the visitor is already swinging his leg over the back of his dreamy goat-horse and preparing to leap. Panicking, Dolly copies. “Ready? One… Two… JUMP!”

The visitor leaps. Dolly follows. They land on the ground and roll across the stony concrete.

“Gah!” Dolly lets out a shriek. The visitor shoots his head towards her in concern.

“Are you okay?” he desperately asks.

“Yeah… I think so.” She rubs her arm and sits up. “This is NOT what I had in mind for today when I woke up.”

“Welcome to my world,” the visitor forlornly says, the double meaning not lost on him.

CRRRKKKKKKK…………...CRUNCH!

Startled, both Dolly and the visitor look up at the carousel as it gets crushed into rubble.

“Oh fuck!” The whining whistle and beat are louder than ever. “Let’s get out of here!”

The visitor is already half a step in front of her. She scrambles to her feet to follow him and they take off once again.

“In here!” Dolly shouts, not even given the visitor time to reference the map. She grabs him by the sleeve of his cardigan and pulls him into a rotting wooden shack with the word ‘STATION’ barely hanging on in neon yellow above it. They bound up a short staircase two steps at a time and then leap over a turnstile each and speed past a vacant ticket booth.

They rush out through an open wall in the building and onto a train station platform. An open-roofed steam engine sits on the tracks waiting for them and they board it in search of a hiding spot. A more pronounced whistle - significantly less whiny than the one pursuing them - sings the moment that they climb on.

“All aboard!” the conductor shouts, leaning back over to salute them before they can find a place to duck down.

“Vinnie? A-fucking-gain?” Dolly stares daggers at the visitor as Conductor-Vinnie turns back around and triggers another whistle from the steam train. The train chugs to life and whisks Dolly and the visitor away from the whine and the beat.

The train takes off. It trucks along the tracks under trees speckled with dead leaves. Fireflies flit from low-hanging branch to low-hanging branch, forcing Dolly and the visitor to take cover on the ground of the train. The carriage rumbles and they sit in silence, staring up at the six-legged fairies dancing auroras across the sky. The bioluminescence flickers off the dew resting on the trees’ deadened tips. The sky above resembles a glass ceiling, covered in a Māori koru.

“It’s kind of beautiful…” Dolly says, staring at the moving art above.

“It was, once.” The visitor watches, but less absorbed than Dolly. While her eyes are drawn to the lights, his are drawn to the dead branches and what they used to represent. “It used to be beautiful. Powerful and foreboding, but beautiful. It’s not like that anymore. Its reputation has changed. Now it’s just a barrier. A reminder of what used to be, but not what is.”

“You’re kind of living in your own world aren’t you?” she quizzically stares at him.

“Like I said…” he returns her gaze, “I just react to things.”

“So how do you want to react to that?” She points to the glass ceiling of the past above them.

“I want to fucking smash it.”

With the confidence and bluster of a world-beater, he rises to his feet and breaks the glass ceiling of his mind. The patterns flee. Branches break. Everything that was is cast aside. The train slows and stops. Vinnie-The-Tank-Engine-Driver turns to face them.

“You know, you could have just pulled the cord if you wanted to get off.” He points to a cable strung up along the tops of poles down the length of the carriage. Dolly makes a face at him as she and the visitor exit the train at a new station. She looks to head off again but the visitor raises his hand to ask her stop. He pulls out the map.

Amber footsteps glow upon the brochure and signal a new path. He shares it with Dolly and she nods in understanding. With a greater approximation of a plan, they set off again and trapse their way through the park once more. The whirs and screams of a roller coaster roar again as the steel frame itself materialises before them. Empty cars rise and fall, and twist and turn. A final, glorious loop-de-loop leads the car back into the station.

“That’s where the path is leading,” the visitor says. Dolly isn’t impressed.

“Of course it is,” she sarcastically says to nobody. “Let’s just get this shit over with.”

The visitor begins to walk the snaking path of the queue laid out before them once again. Dolly shakes her head at him. She hops over rail after rail and beats the visitor to the front by several strides.

“OH FUCKING HELL!” she shrieks, before the visitor can catch up. When he eventually does, he’s met by yet another smiling face of Vinnie Lane. The roller coaster car arrives at the same time as the visitor.

“Here’s your…” Dolly storms off towards the coaster before Yet-Another-Fucking-Vinnie can finish his first sentence. The visitor gives I-Hope-This-Is-The-Last-Vinnie a helpless look and follows after. The strap themselves into the front of the car - obviously the best spot - and wait for the traffic lights in front of them to tick from red, to amber, to green. On green, the car lurches forward.

“Oh shit…” the two of them exclaim in unison. They both heard the same thing. That whining whistle. That beat made by someone without any musical ability. It draws nearer once again. There’s nowhere to go! They’re strapped in with a restraint lowered over their shoulders and though they struggle against it, it just won’t budge!

“I can’t get out!” Dolly yells as the car draws higher and higher up the first peak.

“Neither can I!” the visitor replies. The nose of the car pokes out over the peak. It falls.

Down.

Down.

Down the tracks it goes and it whizzes into a helix corner. The speed forces Dolly and the visitor back into their seats, interrupting their attempts to escape. They hold on for the ride as the coaster takes them on a journey through peaks and valleys, a surprise around every corner. Ahead of them looms the final challenge - the largest loop that you’ve ever seen. The coaster car careens down a hill towards it. It hits the base and then rises in an arc. It slows.

“Shit! It’s not going to make it!” Dolly shouts. The visitor shares her worry. The whistle and beat grow nearer.

The coaster comes to a perfect rest at the top of the loop, leaving its two passengers dangling upside down with their shoulders driven into the restraints. They kick their legs and writhe their bodies but nothing gives. Blood rushes to each of their heads.

“What do we do?!” Dolly shouts again.

“There’s got to be a way!” the visitor shouts back. It’s not as reassuring as he hopes.

“That’s not a fucking answer!” she screams. The whine and the beat grow louder than they ever have. The visitor looks down - always a dangerous game when heights are involved - and below he sees a shadow moving its way along the track. Dolly follows his vision. “What the fuck is that?”

“I know what it is,” the visitor calmly states. His serenity stuns Dolly. Below them, the shadow starts to scale the loop.

“Well?” She looks at him expectantly. The shadow grows higher.

“It’s Reggie,” he states. Dolly's mouth hangs agape as the shadow is nearly upon.

"Reggie Estrada?" she asks. "This is all about Reggie fucking Estrada?"

And with that the Reggie-Monster is upon them. It's human-sized, quadruped frame clings tight to the steel track, slick and damp, with bony protrusions outlining its contorted spinal position. Its face is the only human part about it, but even that is on the verge of mutating into something else. Its nose and mouth have begun jutting forward as if to form the smallest snout; small pointed growths have begun to form at the tips of its ears; its hair has grown flaky and thin. The Reggie-Monster is on the verge of losing himself and turning into something… unrecognisable.

It inches forward with its clawed hands. The roller coaster groans with each step under the added weight. Suddenly…

CRASH!!!

“FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK!” Dolly screams as the entire roller coaster begins to collapse. A section of the loop falls apart and takes the Reggie-Monster with it! It bounces off the track below and thwacks into the bark beneath where Dolly and the visitor still dangle. The impact of the Reggie-Monster falling onto the track reverberates a shockwave right through the steel beams and up to the car still hanging above them. The already vulnerable coaster car shakes. A wheel scratches against a part of the frame it was never supposed to touch. It unhitches. Like dominoes, every wheel on the right-hand side of the track comes off the rails, leaving only the left. It’s not enough. They fall.

Down.

Down.

Down to the hell below.

“FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK!” Indeed.

The collision is immense. The moment the nose of the roller coaster car connects with the ground, the safety harnesses strapping Dolly and the visitor in unlatch and they’re rocketed out. They soar through the air, clearing shrubbery and fences to be propelled completely out of the safety zone around the coaster and onto a gravelly concrete pathway once again. They finally come to a halt lying next to each other, barely touching save for the back of the visitor’s left hand resting upon Dolly’s forehead. Unconscious, but alive.

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3D: A Brief Interlude

---Six hours later---





MARTY?!?! Again?!?!


ZzzzzzONEzzzzZZZ



zzZZZzzTWOzZZzzzz




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zZzZzZzTHREE!!!111!!zzZZzZ

!!

Roller-Coaster-Vinnie sees the count being made and breaks character completely as he rushes over.

”Again, Marty? Jesus!” He looks at the hapless bodies in front of him. “Ah fuck it, let it ride!

And NEW Freestyle Champion - Alias!

Vinnie-The-Ride-Operator fades into the background leaving Marty still buzzing away as both Dolly and the visitor begin to come back to consciousness (FYI: their shoulders again both rise long before the 12-hour mark)

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3E: Guided

“Gah!” the visitor lets out a shriek. Dolly shoots her head towards him in concern.

“Are you okay?” she desperately asks.

“Yeah… I think so.” He rubs his arm and tries to sit up.

“Welcome to my world,” Dolly says, déjà vu setting in as she recalls the carousel. And the name of the park. “Why do I get the feeling something really stupid just happened?”

“Probably because of that…” the visitor points at Marty, still beeping and booping in place.

“Congratulations… I guess?” she offers as she tries to stand up.

“Thanks… I guess,” the visitor reluctantly accepts as he follows suit and wills himself to his feet. They stagger towards a flimsy fence surrounding the trashed roller coaster. Peering through the debris they can see the remains of the Reggie-Monster. The nauseatingly bad beat and the incessant whining whistle still can be heard over the sound of moving parts of the metal wreckage grating against itself.

“I don’t think it’s dead,” Dolly states the obvious.

“Nor do I,” the visitor concurs. He reaches into his inventory and withdraws the brochure once again. Upon the map of the park, intense red footprints now lay out another path. He grits his teeth. “I think this might be our last chance.”

“Well let’s get going then,” Dolly says. “The sooner this is over, the better.”

Yet again they set off through the park, feet pounding on pavement as they go. It winds its way past merchandise stores and food trucks - peak capitalism - surrounding another performance. This is a one-person show, featuring a man in a mask sitting under the learning tree of a false idol. With each sentence he plays pretend, acting as the voice of the people. The audience cries with him. They laugh with him. They laugh at him. His act has merit but misses the point completely. Dolly and the visitor miss the ending as the race by. Everyone misses that ending…

The bright red footsteps lead them off the main road and up a narrow trek. A domineering mountain rises in the background, accompanied by the sound of running water. Their run slows to barely a jog as they navigate the increasingly treacherous terrain, leaping from boulder to boulder and balancing on log bridges that cross an increasingly furious stream. A mine shaft opens in the mountain face, framed by wooden beams. They dart into another of life’s pictures and are immediately presented with the zigzagging metal beams denoting another queue for a ride. Ignoring the order of things, they both start bounding over the beams as the maddening sounds of the Reggie-Monster once again grow louder and louder.

Dolly leaps over the turnstiles first with the visitor hot on her heels. Another-Fucking-Vinnie steps in front of them, that same dumb fake grin plastered on his face. Dolly cocks her fist back and fucking decks the cunt! Vinnie-Who-Got-His-Ass-Whooped crumples to the ground and Dolly skips over him. The visitor shows some concern for The-Fallen-Vinnie but has no time to support. The footsteps are red and the Reggie-Monster is making an infernal racket.

Awaiting on the other side of Vinnie-On-The-Ground is a small hollowed out log bobbing up and down in a chute of water, with only enough space for two people. Dolly slides into the front - objectively the most fun position. The flume takes off before the visitor can get there, forcing him to make a daring leap from the platform to the log. The sudden change in weight forces the raft down, scraping it along the bottom and letting a little water into the back passenger seat. The visitor doesn’t care. The sounds of the Reggie-Monster diminish a little as the water carries them into a tunnel.

Harmless ‘baddies’ pop up out of nowhere as the log flume carries on through the dark. Dolly and the visitor fairly easily ignore them (like everyone should) as she and the visitor are lifted higher and higher into the mountain that some of their more foolish compatriots are still trying to climb.

“This all seems so bizarre,” Dolly says, disrupting the silent dark with a rather obvious statement. “What the fuck happened to Reggie?”

“That’s not him,” the visitor explains. Dolly gives him a ‘no shit’ look. “I mean, it is, but it’s also not. It’s an aspect of him. He’s been following me for months. Slowly, but steadily, losing his humanity. I don’t think he even realises it. If he does, he certainly doesn’t care. He’s leaning into it.”

“So this happens?” She points up, as if the sounds were coming from there. Wait… they are. The visitor shuffles forward in his seat as both he and Dolly look up. The carved ceiling of the mountain trembles above them as something traverses its outside.

“It’s almost sad…” the visitor says in a hushed voice. “He got up the mountain so easily, but never had an interest in reaching the peak. Such a wasted opportunity...”

“I’ve got an idea,” Dolly interrupts. The visitor turns to her as the trembling mountain pushes the water against the log with greater force. Small waves rise closer to the openings they sit in. “Hear me out: Why are we running?”

“Uh… spooky monster with gnashing teeth and a desire for my flesh. That’s generally a good reason,” he sarcastically points out.

“But you’ve already been running,” she continues. “It hasn’t worked.”

“So what do you propose?” he asks.

“Stand and fight.” The message is clear and determined. “It’s Reggie Estrada, for crying out loud! Or it was, anyway.”

The visitor broods on this. He remembers lecturing others on this very thing - fight or flight. But it’s easy to sit there and tell others how to live their lives. Living it yourself… well, that’s a different story. She’s right though. How many chances could he give Reggie before he needed to act? How many times could Reggie assault his person before he acted? Shit… even the Demos pointed that out weeks ago. His eyes consent as the log begins another slow rise. She smiles.

Grabbing the nearest ‘baddy’ - hulking and masked - Dolly Waters effortlessly dissects it and pulls apart its limbs. The log flume nears the top of its rising conveyor as Dolly reaches over the side of the log and shoves a leg under it. She passes the brute’s glorious arms to the visitor and motions for him to start copying her. As she gets the other leg under the opposite side, he does the same with the arms at the back. The log rises out of the water, balancing in the air as the conveyor sends water crashing over the final plunge. The visitor continues to follow Dolly’s lead as she jumps out of the car and finds refuge on a thin steel strip that skirts the bottom of the mountain’s passageway. They both hear the Reggie-Monster right above them.

It’s here.

The Reggie-Monster swings down in front of the opening to the mountain. With its four legs working together it has no trouble pushing against the flow of the water as it stalks its prey. Pressed against the wall, Dolly nods to the visitor.

It’s time.

He drops into the water and steps in front of the Reggie-Monster. It snarls at him, doing its best to intimidate. Then it lurches forward to strike. Not today. The visitor side steps, completely unencumbered by the water. The Reggie-Monster misses. It turns to face him again and strikes again, swiping with its claws. With one hand the visitor catches the arm and rips it from its socket.


He bashes the Reggie-Monster over the head with its own arm before tossing it over the edge. The Reggie-Monster savagely lashes out once more. The visitor grows, larger than your average man. The Reggie-Monster simply bounces off of him and falls into the water.

The visitor reaches down and rips both an arm and a leg from the Reggie-Monster, and tosses them aside. The water begins to surge and washes the discarded limbs down into the abyss below. Operating on animal instincts alone, the Reggie-Monster rises again. It hobbles on one leg. With an awkward, humbled, hopping motion, it continues to charge. It never even makes contact. The visitor’s shadow repels it; an aura that the Reggie-Monster cannot help to penetrate. He approaches the monster again and pulls off the last remaining limb. It too tumbles into oblivion.

Writhing at the edge of the cliff, a limbless Reggie-Monster, with no weapons left but its blunt teeth and blunter bark, stares daggers into the visitor.

“The path is set,” the visitor says, condemning the Reggie-Monster to its place in history. “Obstacles must be cleared.”

With that, he rips out two of the props holding the log above the water. A fateful wave sweeps behind it with perfect timing, charging the log to life. It careens towards the Reggie-Monster’s helpless carcass and drives it over the edge of the waterfall. It cascades down into nothingness clearing out the obstacle for good. The hunter became the hunted.

An eerie calm takes over the mountain. The water quietens; its swell subsiding. A light splash behind him draws the visitor’s attention. He spins around to see Dolly wading through knee-deep water towards him.

“The music’s stopped,” she says, drawing attention to what he had yet to notice. She moves past him and peers over the edge, seeing the water billow down into the deep, beyond her range of vision.

“It’s over,” he replies. “Reggie’s done.”

“Sure as shit looks that way.” She pulls back from the edge and they look around the mountain cave. With their cart gone, they’ve lost their most obvious way out. “So… what now?”

“We need to get out of here,” he says. He peers over the edge for himself. “I think we need to jump.”

“What?!” Dolly yelps. “Nuh uh. I’ve had quite enough of falling today!”

“Do you see any other way out?” he pleads, hands raised in submission. She thinks for a moment, lips stretched tight over her teeth.

“We fell down to get here, right?” she asks, an idea hiding behind her eyes. “Aside from the stupid hallway, and all the theme park crap, I mean. At first, we fell.”

“Yeah…” he acknowledges, trying to keep up.

“Well this ride has taken us higher and higher,” she continues to expound. “So what if instead of going down again, we keep going up?”

“To the top of the mountain?” He’s wary of that option. It seems so… derivative.

“Not necessarily.” Dolly’s mind is still hard at work. “We didn’t fall down the mountain, we fell down…”

“...the nothing,” he finishes her sentence.

“Yeah…” She feels stupid even saying it, but something about this world is starting to make sense to her. “We just need a way up.”

“Like a ladder or something?” he ponders aloud. “Do you think we could build something from some of the ‘baddies’ further back?”

“I doubt it,” Dolly says. “The ‘baddies’ don’t have much place in the world beyond. They’re a distraction at best - not really good for anything. Wait… how do I know that?”

“I think you know a lot more than you realise,” the visitor states, a knowing smile creeping onto the side of his mouth. He encourages her to continue. “What do you think might work?”

“Maybe a… rope?” She doesn’t know where the inspiration for that came from, but somehow she feels confident about it. “We just need some sort of fibre or something to fashion it from.

“Would hair do the trick?” he asks.

“Ugh, gross, but yeah. You’d need a shit ton of it though,” she concedes.The visitor reaches into one of the back pockets on his tattered jeans and pulls out a clump of black, white, and blue hair - collected from Lycana and Geri Vayden, the latter a gift from Demos. He hands it to Dolly, who looks at it in disgust. “This is so fucking creepy, you know that right?”

“I just react…” he repeats in an effort to defend himself.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” she dismisses. “Do you have anymore?”

“Believe it or not, I don’t go around collecting hair,” he says, trying to turn the sarcasm tables on Dolly.

“You could have fooled me,” she wins the battle of wits by waving the hair in front of his face. “But if this is all the hair you’ve got, then we’re fucked. We need more.”

“We could use mine,” he says, flapping his shaggy mane about. “I still don’t think it’s enough to reach… wherever.”

Both of their eyes light up at the same time. Pretty quickly, Dolly’s bright eyes roll.

“No,” she weakly refuses.

“Come on… you know that’s got to be it,” the visitor tells her. Dolly groans and runs her hand through her blonde locks. “One should suffice.”

With a grimace, Dolly plucks a strand of hair from her scalp and hands it, along with the other clumps to the visitor. He weaves Dolly’s hair in amongst Lycana and Geri’s, and the tangled tuft shines a bright blue-white. A blinding flash eliminates all hope of vision from the mountain cave and when all sight returns, a long rope made of thick blue, black, white, and yellow strands sits in his hands.

“Whoa…” Dolly is in awe. Just when she thought she was getting a hang of this world, something happens that makes her question everything that she thought she knew. “Well that’s a thing that happened…”

“Do you think it’ll do the trick?” the visitor asks, completely unphased by the transformation.

“Only one way to find out.” Dolly points up again; up and out of the cave’s entrance. The visitor steps forward, enchanted rope in hand. He twirls it by his side, gaining more and more momentum. With a mighty heave he throws it up into the heavens.




The rope hooks upon a notch in the aether. He tugs upon it and it holds firm. Turning back to face Dolly, he happily pays homage to her wisdom.

“I hope you did well at gym class,” he wryly says.

“You first,” she retorts. He chuckles, reaches for the rope, and begins to climb.

---

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3F: The Ascent

Hand over hand they climb, relying on supernatural will to wriggle their way through eternity.


They retrace their steps. Below them the theme park falls away. Above them, they climb past Vinnie Lane kicking Marty the referee and complaining to Roxy Cotton about how the robot isn’t working properly anymore.

They climb further, up above the Freestyle hallway and back towards the shining light of Coreytopia - piercing its way through dimensions and leading both Dolly and the visitor home.

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3G: Return

The visitor rouses on the ground of the old library in Corey Smith’s mansion. He pulls himself up using the foosball table, and spies Dolly Waters sprawled across the sofa in front of the television. The screen has reverted to showing an old western. The visitor scurries over to where Dolly lays and tries to shake her awake. Groggily her eyes open.

“Wha… what the hell…?” she stutters. “What happened?”

“Uh… sorry about that,” the visitor apologises. “I didn’t mean for you to be sucked into my business.”

“A bit late for that,” she grumbles. “Was all of that… real?”

In reply, the visitor produces the rope forged in the amusement park and displays it for her. She touches its soft strands and recoils from it.

“How?” she asks.

“I don’t really know how any of it works,” he admits.

“Yeah, I know,” she stops him. “You just react.”

“Yeah...” he confirms. “Things just happen and somehow I wind up with something like this.”

He holds up the rope again, before tucking it away into a non-existent satchel.

“And all without a guide,” Dolly says as she finally manages to sit up straight.

“Are you sure about that?” he winks, rising to his feet and taking a few steps back.

“You don’t mean…” He shrugs at her. She sighs as she dramatically falls forward, slapping the cushion of the sofa and then bringing herself back to a seated position. “And what about Vinnie?”

“The XWF is his world I guess,” he tries to explain. “So he was either some sort of metaphor for that, or just complete and utter drivel. Could go either way to be honest.”

“So stupid,” she whinges. She gets up from the couch and stretches.

“I think you’re a former Freestyle Champion now though,” the visitor offers.

“Oh we’re rolling actually with that as fact?” she cocks an eyebrow. “Yay for me.”

The visitor stifles a laugh.

“Look… I wanted to say… thank you,” he tells her with intense honesty. “You’ve helped me so much, and you didn’t have to.”

“It’s not like I had a choice,” she downplays, but she can’t hold her cover for long. She softens. “But… I get it, you know? I get what Corey sees in you. I don’t understand anything that happened today, but I feel like I can… see your soul or something. I know how fucking lame that sounds.”

“Likewise,” he warmly grins as he offers his hand. Dolly takes it, but then brings him in for a rapidly quick hug that is over before it begins. They leave the old library, and she escorts him down the corridor of the old mansion and towards the front door.

“Your face is on the board fer a reason,” she says, looking at the photos pinned to the wall. “Come back any time, I mean it. Even if Corey’s not here. Hell, especially if Corey’s not here!”

“Thank you. Again.” He turns and exits through another of life’s artworks. He steps out into the yard as Dolly Waters watches from the entrance way. Seemingly no time has passed, but the residents of Coreytopia behave differently. They pay him no mind. Just another lost puppy, looking for a home.

Upon reaching the gate, he sends one last cursory glance over his shoulder at the busy estate. Maybe one day he too could have a place to call home.

Not yet.

Not while the fire still awaits.

The inferno burns in front of him, blocking his path. A trail of candy apple red paint chips lead a trail right through it. He throws his escape rope over his shoulder and squares up. In the flames he watches an army raise their hand while the resistance falls. Strangers are carved and marked with the insignia of the enemy. He knows not whether he is watching what is to come or what has already been, all he knows is that he has the answer.

He peels the glove from his charred right hand and raises its mangled form to the flames. They part before him.

He walks through fire only he can see, unmolested, and follows the breadcrumbs home.

On a platter of woe, he hands The Salmon-Coloured Minotaur the rope.

---

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3H: Afterword

“You know what this is, right Reggie? This isn’t a competition anymore, this isn’t just a match. This is me sending a fucking message at your expense. And I don't need another fucking monologue to Eat Reggie Estrada.”