Play With Me

Demons, We got them all.

And all the meat sacks that walk the earth, they have demons.

Some try and tuck them behind closed doors.

Some try and hide them under their covers.

While those that are real, will dress it up, make it look beautiful and waltz with them to the center of the sun.

We of the Darkest Carnival, cordially and humbly invite you to join Pro-Wrestling Experience, it’s cast it’s crew, the freaks, the outcasts and all those to bear witness to the fall of a hero.

Will he finally embrace what he truly is? Will he allow his darkness to consume the light?

Come dance in the flames Lachlan. The demons will embrace you, and lead you to your true glory.

Come play with me.

“Baby, baby please wake up!” she could hear her mother’s voice call out through her haze as she had already fallen asleep for the night but when her mother’s voice rang through, rousting her from her deep slumber.

“Mama? Is everything okay?” the young Angel says, barely awake, attempting to rub the sleep that had already gathered in the short time that she had been asleep. Instead she is waking up to the woman that gave her life and love pulling her drawers to her dresser open and grabbing what she can and throwing it in haste in a duffle bag, “Mama, what are you doing? What’s going on?”

Her mother turns to her, the look of panic in her eyes and she pulls her young daughter up to her feet by her arm, “I’ll explain to you later, but we gotta go Ness...now.”

Grabbing her by her forearm, her mother pulls her from the room, “WAIT! MY BEAR!”

The child tries to slip from her grasp, she struggles but keeps her grip tight, “I will get you another!”

But she keeps pulling away, “NO! I WON’T LEAVE WITHOUT HIM! MOM STOP!”

“BEATRICE!!!!” her father’s voice boomed from somewhere in their rather large home, “WHERE ARE YOU?!?”

“Oh God,” the color in her mother’s face had gone ashen at the sound of Thomas Wilde sounding none too happy about whatever was going on between them. It wouldn’t be the first time her parents had fought in front of her, usually regarding her older brother. Her mother dropped her arm, and the bag and tucked it quickly as she could under her daughter’s bed and turned and dropped to her knees, “Baby, I need you to go back to your bed. Do not come out under any circumstances.”

“But-”

“No buts, please...” she pleads with the young girl as she pushes her into her room and before the door closes, her mother looks at her and mouths ‘I love you’ and the door closes quietly but ‘Vanessa’ quickly runs over to her bed, grabbing her bear just incase and then goes back to the door and stands there, straining to listen but the thickness of the door only gives her muffled voices not really yelling but having a strong conversation and the name ‘Henry’ is said several times before they leave the area and suddenly it’s quiet. Eerily quiet.

And then the shattering of glass. The earth shattering crash that shook every part of the house and the sound that followed was so blood curdling that it almost made the young girl throw up at the sound of it.

The screaming. Coming from her mother at first and then her father.

“Oh my God, Beatrice! NO!”

The young girl couldn’t help herself, she ripped the door open and as fast as her feet could take her, ran to the stairs only to see her mother’s car had crashed through their front door, a young man slumped sideways stabbed in the neck with a shard of glass and not moving and her mother...

Lifeless, half laying on the hood, blood running from her mouth and her eyes still open. But it is obvious that the light is gone.

The young girl screams and drops her bear, not caring that glass was everywhere and her feet were getting cut up, she attempts to reach her but her father picks her up. The whole motion goes in slow motion as we can hear her scream for her mother as she gets carried away from the horrific scene. Her innocence left with the bear she dropped and left behind.

Innocence and Insolence.

They make us weak.

They make YOU weak, Lachy.

Her memories of that time have returned in flashes since her mother’s box was gifted to her. The memory of her death caused by her brother that killed him at the same time flooded back and it had turned her feelings even darker in the days that had passed since she crossed the line.

She had brutally beaten one of the freaks that stood guard in the room where her things from her past were kept; so bad that he had to be dropped off at the hospital.

“She’s grown stronger.” The Reverend Synnister had watched it all unfold, “She has grown so restless since her win.”

“Well, setting her loose against the O’Connell’s was your plan. It’s now unleashing the one thing that I had feared,” Thomas Wilde says standing to his master’s right, “She told me last night that her memories of her mother’s death.”

“Ah yes, your son’s doing. One of my many failures unfortunately.”

“No master, it was mine. He was so far gone even before I sent him to you...” he says with a sadness in his voice, “I thought you could save him.”

“So many souls...”

A manly yet very painful scream comes from down the hall.

“So little time for her to collect them all.”

The men look at each other as Angel walks out of the room, her body coated in sweat and in her hand she holds a crowbar. She looks back with a twisted smile on her face, “Next time, don’t flinch.”

“You seem to be enjoying yourself, my child.” Synn says as she glares in his direction.

“Something like that,” she says, handing him the crowbar, and nods back, “My condolences to his family.”

She walks past him before Synn speaks up, “You have a family here, my child.”

“Family.” a bitter laugh crosses her crimson red lips, “What a joke.”

“Ah treasure, family comes in many different forms.”

“My family is my father. After that I have no family here.” she growls, “I serve you proudly, master. But these freaks are nothing more than pawns to be used. Just like you used my brother.”

“Your brother was weak and your mother attempted to pull you away from it before anyone got hurt. Unfortunately....” her father pipes in.

“She just wasn’t fast enough,” she sneers at her father before looking right at Synn, “It’s what you have been working at all this time. Turn me cold to the light, to the warmth of the idea of family. You wanted me to be this monster and I have gladly gone along with your entire plan from the word go.”

“And you have done beautifully, my treasure,” Synn says, reaching out, but she swipes his hand away, “You battle these demons of your own for so long. It’s time you realize that while your life felt perfect but it was far worse than anyone let on.”

“You were so young...”

“Shut. Up. Dad.” she shouts at Thomas, “Mom was trying to save me. You stopped her. My innocence was stolen that night because YOU stopped her. And you brought me here, where I had no choice but to grow into this. I am labeled a monster and act like one with little remorse. I have played with the minds of the best and have made them face their innermost fears.”

“So much more than your brother could have ever done. He was weak.”

“ENOUGH!” Synn yells out, gripping Angel by the hair and pulls her down the hall and into an empty room, slamming and locking the door behind them, shutting Angel’s father out and leaving just the two of them. He grabs her by the throat and shoves her against the wall, “You will listen to my words, my child. I CHOSE YOU to give the world the greatest power that I have ever given ANYONE. Because you, my girl, are special. You may feel like you are lower than ever because of your memories coming back. You believing in happily ever after like the O’Connell’s is nothing but a weakness. There IS no happily ever after ANYTHING IN WHAT WE DO!”

“I know that!” Angel spits out with a venom-like tone behind her voice, “You made me because you knew me seeing what they were would bring this out in me. But at what end? What, if anything, will this accomplish?”

He squeezes just a little harder and brings himself closer to her face, “To show the world that despite all their best efforts, that ‘Good’ is an illusion and that we all have demons we must face. Lachlan’s goes deeper than any of them. ...well maybe not as deep as his sweet little sister-in-law, but his is so much darker and him holding it back is making him weak.”

She snickers, “And in the process, bring my demons out?”

“That is the dynastic plan, my treasure.” he leans his head onto hers and inhales her scent, “You purposely test me, don’t ya?”

She leans in and licks his face seductively, “Pleasure in the pain...master.”

“Do what is asked and I will take care of what you truly desire.” he whispers, “Til then, enjoy the fruits of your victory.”

She looks at him but he tucks his eyes away from her, “And if I don’t win?”

“You win...we win.” he lets her go and turns to leave.

“Can I ask one thing?” she says and it causes him to stop in his tracks with his hand on the door, “What will it take for you to truly give in to your desires...master?”

Those last two syllables roll off her tongue almost in a snake like demeanor, he glances back at her for a moment, “Perhaps, I’ll answer that for you...after you complete the final part of the mission.”

And with that she is left alone in the room. And sings a familiar childhood song "Say, say, oh playmate, Come out and play with me

And bring your dollies three, Climb up my apple tree, Slide down my rainbow, Into my cellar door, And we'll be jolly friends....Forever more." 

Laughter filling the halls with the echo from the she-demon herself.

Hell is an old friend.

He greets me and seduces me.

The devil is hidden in all of us.

Let’s have our demons meet.

Tear apart our true desires.

Playing with my own has gotten boring.

If I show you mine,

Will you show me yours?