Continued From: The Curious Call Of The Carnival V

Daddy!!! the boy screams,

About time! the wife plays,

Charlie pushes himself up to his feet hastily, eyeballing his ex wife and son in perplexed joy. Charlie leisurely opens his arms as he nods at them, speechless. Little Tyler sprints forward yelling ‘Daddy’ multiple times reaching out his little arms. Connie also starts to walk over while Marf stands a few feet behind Charlie, looking around the inside of the funhouse with some apprehension. As Charlie drops to a knee to embrace his son, Tyler blows by him and jumps up to hug Marf. Charlie falls into a seated position leering back in bewilderment. Connie steps up and hugs Marf.

We missed you, honey.

Connie plants a loving kiss on the big black dick drawn on Marf's cheek. Marf immediately cracks a playful grin as he glances down at the stupefied man seated on the floor.

Let’s not forget to say hello to Uncle Charlie!

Little Tyler pivots, waving at his usually absent father.

Hi Unkie Charlieeeee!

This wasn’t supposed to happen...what….how…

Charlie trails off as his gaze drifts below the rotting floorboards of the dilapidated funhouse. Charlie gazes into the abyss as his only son and former lover shower Marf with affection.

“What’s going on? I heard a scream…”

Oh that’s probably just the weirdo babysitter and that strange guy she brought with her. They’re in the other room watching the baby.

“Baby...what baby!?”

Marf and Charlie make their way to find this babysitter and outlandish dude combo. As they depart the room they take another look back but Tyler and Connie are no longer there. Instead sitting in their place is one adult sized snow woman and a smaller child sized snow boy. Charlie tries to go back but the door to the room slams in his face and they have to move forward. As they move through the narrow hallway they enter a new room. Inside, a green haired woman with a bored face dances in nothing but frilly bra and panties for a man in a dirty white lab coat with a shitty haircut. Meanwhile a baby watches from a few feet away in a crib. Paint it how you want, that’s just bad babysitting.

More delusions? Or am I seeing Vayden giving Kaye a lap dance...with a baby?

I’m seeing the same as you so…

They tread closer and sure enough it’s Geri and Ned doing a horrendous job supervising a child. Marf steps up to the crib and gazes down in panic at the baby. It’s face is a brilliant shade of magenta as the tot looks up at Marf, clearly choking on something. Charlie calls out to him but Marf is stuck in place staring down at the horrible scene unfolding before him.

...I remember…

...I Remember…

Charlie grabs Marf from behind and shakes him violently to break his trance.

We ain’t got time for that shit right now! My family just got turned into snow people and this baby is about to be molested!

Charlie and Marf stand together as Geri and Ned have risen from their slutty seats. Geri reaches into the crib and pulls the baby out, cradling it in her scabbed arms before throwing it at Marf. Charlie bats it out of the air before it can hit them.

What the fuck!?

Ned and Geri, in perfect sync of course, shift into a battle stance while Marf and Charlie look at each other and then back. The two men raise their white knuckle fists ready for battle. Ned pulls out a sci-fi looking gun and blasts Charlie with it, sending him flying backwards and smashing into the rickety wall. In the blink of an eye Geri is pressed up against Marf, grabbing at his crotch. He tries to shove her off but she clings to him like a leech.

Come on Marfy, you’ve wasted so much time with Lycana. Let me show you how a properly trained pussy can rock your dark world!

Get the fuck off me before I catch syphilis!

Marf throws the scab covered mutt of a girl off of him and she crashes into scumbag Ned. He drops his weird science gun and it explodes on the floor, engulfing the two and causing them to melt away. Marf helps Charlie up while they both look on in confusion and disgust. They turn and start looking for a door while the Funhouse begins to violently shake and collapse around them. The nearest door they find won’t open. They look at each other and simultaneously throw themselves into it. They burst through it and escape to another room in the Funhouse as it starts to crumble. Marf and Charlie slowly get to their feet and begin moving on.

Back in the FCW we did shit that folks like Jerry Vee and Neddy LGBT can never even dream of, because when the going gets tough, those two get going!

What a pathetic opposition this truly is. Look at these fools daring to call themselves ACockalypse Now when their combined efforts are equal to a cold, limp dick on a rainy Sunday. Seriously, fuck this team Charlie we are going to end them.

ACockalypse Now? What a fitting name for that coterie of cocksuckers, for their end truly will be coming soon. They’re going to be nothing more than a bump along our road to glory. A few blows to the ego was all it took for Missy Vee to self-select into the minor leagues. Her shooting star came falling back to earth in record time. Before her bruises could even welt little Jerry was running for the hills. She can’t bang with the best of them and she can’t go blow for blow. Not in any arena. Not in wrestling, not in hardcore drugs, and not even in sex. That last one’s really going to disappoint Captain Power Ranger. What a waste of a pick.

I’m surprised Geri is even involved to be honest. She finally crawled out from whatever shit stained rock she lives under to do what exactly? Prove to be even more useless as a draft pick than as a shooting star champion. Is that what you’re gonna hang your hat on Ger? A fluke title win that hardly anyone even remembers? After the big title win she lost every match, including non titles as well thus proving ole Vayden is a fluke. Outstanding pick up for Team Limp Dick.

Did you hear that she’s an Olympic gold medalist, though? How did such a piss poor wrestler medal at the Olympics?

Marf stopped dead in his tracks and facepalmed.

Hold up, she’s spouting that bullshit now? She actually floated this idea when she was in the left hand and we all shut it down because of how easily that can be disproven. I mean, we literally showed her crusty ass on the wikipedia page and gold medal winners in the four weight classes were Nataliya Vorobyova, Kaori Icho, Saori Yoshida and Hitomi Obara! She’s so desperate to latch onto anything to make her seem credible. Hell, to make her seem like anything other than the twat that looks like someone stole her clothes while she was at the gym and they gave her some random outfit from the lost and found to wear home. That little hood rat tried too hard in the Left Hand and it seems that’s still her go to move, fucking classic!

Charlie placed a hand on his shirtless belly as he guffawed in delight. The two finally continue making their way through the Funhouse as it rumbles and continues to fall apart around them.

Poor Dicky, being stuck with a failed dissentient turned fake olympian who can’t even succeed at being a mattress. Dicky’s really got it rough, but looking at how he used his draft picks I’m starting to think that’s how he likes it. I understand that Dick Powers was quite literally drafting from the scraps left on the table, but I mean, really? Ned Kaye before Dolly Waters? I eat that boy’s lunch like he’s TeeKay’s little brother! Ned Kaye and TeeKay are notorious for eating my thunderous knuckle sandwiches. I’m undefeated against both those bitches, perpetually, but at least TeeKay kind of puts up a fight when I’m snapping his spine! Ned Kaye just dances around the ring like a prissy little ballerina until he tires himself out and falls to his back on his own accord. I’d take Dolly over either of those two sissies in a heartbeat.

Ned fuckin’ Kaye. This soccer mom hair wearing motherfucker wants to play broken record with me? Do you think you and that little titmouse Cooper are clever? You’re actually trying to pass it off like you just came up with Marfy Janetty!? As if Thad never used that line on me a few short months ago, right fellas? I thought you’re supposed to be the fucking smart one of the limp dick foursome? Best part is I dropped Thad on his fucking pretty face with the damn Rocker Dropper just for shits. Looks like you’re on deck, Ned. Unfortunately it seems you’re as equally dumb as your memory is short. Caedus made beating Lycana look easy? The fuck match did you watch!? I saw that loose cannon get dropped by Lycana and just so happened to hit the ground first for that “impressive” win you’re jerking off to. Don’t you get it, Ned? No amount of your professional bullshitting can save you from getting your head fucking kicked in at War Games.

Charlie grunts loudly in firm agreement.

Ned’s so busy claiming he’s not scared of Robert that he’s forgetting the monsters he really should fear. The monsters that lurk under his bed, the foul creatures that go bump in the night. After all this time you’d think the newly Nefarious Ned Kaye would finally embrace that inner beast lurking in the shadows of his own despair. But alas, there is only one thing that Ned Kaye ever truly aspires to do….

Kiss The Gatekeeper

An odd couple if there ever was one, the young girl walking nearly hand in hand with a monster.

”Robert isn’t enfeebled, he’s impeccable…

The Monstrosity, the abandoned demon brought back to life by the carnival’s intoxicants, says to Dolly. The two of them slinking along the unkempt grass that’s grown up through the gravel. They don’t look at one another. Dolly doesn’t want to look. Seeing Robert’s face morph into this fiendish figure made her skin itch for something.

”...You’re perfect too my dear you just don’t realise it yet....”

Dolly was desperate to not speak, she didn’t want to give anymore life to this hallucination. She couldn’t tell what was real and what wasn’t anymore, this dry-rotted carnival pulsing with light and watching her like an omniscient ghost. She tried to stay straight, and power through this trip. There was an issue to resolve, a mystery to confront. But the carnival had made her forget, instead tickling her call to Redemption.

I’m far from perfect…

The words slipped from her mouth like a compulsion,

”... No you’re not. We’ve just got to allow the real Dolly Waters to reveal herself...

The Monstrosity stops walking and points at a weed-grown opening between The Fun House and an unusual Hotdog stand. A vacant booth of red plywood carved into a heart, blocking the path to the Ferris Wheel. It reads: Kissing Booth.

” It’s those who believe they're irreproachable that are the weakest. Robert, Chris Page, Thaddeus Duke, even the titan Corey Smith... They hide behind delusions of grandeur...Like Icarus, a boy who constructed wings of wax and feathers… Warned several times to never fly too high or two low because the sea would clog his wings or the sun would melt them… Like every ego driven child who believes they know everything... Icarus ignores the instructions not to fly too close to the sun, causing the wax in his wings to melt. He tumbles from the sky into the sea and perishes… The moral of the story is ambition can lead to unexpected consequences... Take Corey Smith for example… A man who many would say is the measuring stick of the XWF… With that 24/7 briefcase, some say he has the world by the balls…But that is only from the outside looking in. Peel the onion layers back and take a closer look… You’ll discover a terrified manchild who knows the moment he steps to Alias he will be buried where he stands. The reason why Corey is always irritated, whether he’d like to admit it or not…Is because Corey is a fraudulent sham and has become a product of the XWF system. Always padding the numbers in his favor... It’s unproblematic for Corey to sit back and act holier than thou when he has constantly been accommodated with nearly every accolade he holds… All so the insecure can have his place upon a pedestal, his perspective on reality is skewed, as he leers down upon the rest of the XWF… That very reason is why so many on the roster have a sour taste in their mouths… He’s the lion and the rest of us are just the hyenas fighting for our scraps… It’s the conceptualization that he is in a different class than the rest of the organization that pisses everyone off…”


As The Monstrosity spoke there was a distortion in the scenery and sound. Everything twisted and lost color. It happened too quickly to notice, and where the was no one at the Kissing Booth impossibly stood an old familiar-

Corey?

He backs into the corner of the booth, looking away as their eyes meet. Dolly stamps towards him with purpose. Corey shifts around, acting aloof, pulling a coffee mug to his lips, hoping that she hadn’t noticed him.

What are you doing here?

This is just a charity thing we do…

Who’s “we”?

Corey snorts, still keeping his eyes tucked away from Dolly’s gaze, tense and fidgeting. Oh you know…

You act like there’s something you want to tell me…

Corey’s arm jerks and his coffee mug shatters against the plywood frame of the booth,

What is it, Corey?

What do you want to tell me?

Tell me that this is the pity-fuck booth?

Tell me that this is where the buck stops for me?

Tell me that I’m not tall enough to go to the top of the Ferris Wheel?

Because I’m just good, and not great? Just like you told Edgar at Leap of Faith? Tell me that there’s a consolation prize in life with my friends at the commune? That I should give wrestling up before I grow bitter? Tell me all of that and then try and convince the world that yer’ not a gatekeeper? I mean who are you to judge greatness?

Your hair-trigger to flip that switch between humility and being a haughty chode goes off on a whim anymore.

Remember when you said Edgar losing to Page ruined the good faith you had in him? But in the same breath saying you knew all along that Edgar couldn’t win? Against the weakest “Universal Champion of all time”? The man who pinned Thad dead center in the ring? This of course comes after you challenged Edgar to Leap Of Faith. So was that challenge in GOOD faith, or wasn’t it?

I remember it…

It made me wonder about your true feelings on Thad.

It made me wonder if these types of opinions had anything to do with your clear disregard for Continuum after you two lost the tag belts.

Did you think that Thad was even weaker than Page?

Did you think it before or after fawning on everything he earned?

Before or after he pinned you for the number-one pick?

Did you *think* at all about the things you've said in the past, and all of the contradictions?

Go on, tell me what you *really* want to say.

I’m a big girl, I can handle it.

Go on and gaslight me with my history in the XWF, use it and tell me that I don’t belong.

I know you may not remember, but March Madness 2019 is when we first met. You were Lux, or Lux was you, or whatever. We both made the semi finals, but only one of us made the *finals* didn’t we? Again, when I was sixteen, a month removed from pinning Bobby Bourbon CLEAN in the ring. Another thing only one of us has done.

But go ahead. Cast misgivings about me. Forget about the last time you and I hit the ring together, when we throttled James Raven and Centurion.

Forget all of it, Corey.

Tell me that I’ve distracted you, tell me that I’ve not let you live your own life.

Tell me that my living at the commune has held you back.

Tell me that I’ll never be able to ride the Ferris Wheel because I’m not dedicated enough, and then pretend that over half of the Universal Champions who have vanished from the face of the XWF are bastions of the grind.

Tell me that you don’t thrive as a Gatekeeper.

Because that’s exactly what you want to say. At least that’s what you look like you want to say…

but then again…

Corey Smith ain’t dumb enough to come at me like that, because he knows I’d turn him inside out.

Dolly grabs at Corey’s hair and pulls. The skin and flesh pull away clean revealing another face under Corey’s mask.

Wanna kiss?

Oh what the fuck?

-to be continued-