Jacob pov:
My name is Jacob. Just a man who lived in a town where the carnival came and went like a storm—bright, chaotic, and gone before anyone could catch their breath. Elmwood was small, the kind of place where everyone knew everyone else's business. I worked at the hardware store, tinkered with my garden, and spent my evenings on the porch with a beer, watching the sunset bleed across the river. Life was ordinary, comfortable, safe. At least, it used to be.
I had a son. A boy with wide eyes and a laugh like wind chimes. He loved the carnival more than anything. I remember holding his hand, walking through the flickering midway lights, hearing the barkers call out, smelling popcorn grease and cotton candy, and watching him vanish into joy. I thought that joy was harmless—an escape from the monotony of Elmwood. I was wrong.
It was the last summer, the night he disappeared. I remember it like a photograph blurred at the edges. One minute, he was chasing bubbles from a clown whose wig was too bright, whose shoes were too big, whose face was painted in impossible white and red. The next… gone.
I ran after him, heart pounding, only to see the clown—Bubbles, they called him—drag him behind a trailer, just for a second, and then vanish. No trace. No scream reached me. The crowd kept laughing, oblivious. I told people what I saw. Some nodded politely, but they laughed it off. "That clown's just a trickster," they said. "Probably gave him a fright, that's all."
But I knew better. I had seen him with my own eyes. And from that moment, I became obsessed.
How I knew something was odd about that clown when I first noticed it in Bubbles during a performance one afternoon. The kids were laughing, sure, but not the way they used to. Their eyes flickered nervously at his painted face. His smile lingered too long, twisting just a little at the corners. He juggled and danced, his movements sharper than before, almost too precise, as if testing reactions rather than entertaining.
Other performers noticed it too. Lena the contortionist whispered to Rico one night behind the Ferris wheel. "Have you seen him? He's… off." Rico just grunted. Old Hank shook his head, muttering something about "boys who get the bug too deep." Everyone laughed it off, pretending it was just stage nerves—but the unease was there.
I watched him. Every night, hiding behind tents, keeping a distance. He was still Jim, still the boy who loved bubbles, but that innocence had cracked. He muttered to himself, practicing expressions in the mirrors—wide-eyed joy, exaggerated fear, and sometimes… something darker. A curiosity, a hunger in his gaze when a child flinched or screamed.
Then it happened. A Tuesday, hot and humid. I was perched on the ridge behind the carousel, binoculars pressed to my eyes. He blew a bubble toward a group of children, and one of them shrieked—terrified, caught off guard. And Jim—Bubbles—paused. The laughter of the crowd faded in his ears. He stared at that fear like it was a spark to feed a flame. I swear I saw something change in him in that moment.
The next days confirmed it. He started arriving earlier, lingering longer, practicing in empty tents, obsessively testing reactions. Children would come up smiling, but he would study them closely, almost calculatingly, the grin on his painted face too sharp. Townsfolk began whispering. "He's not himself," one woman said. "He's… different."
And it wasn't just the kids. He grew irritable with other performers, snapping at Lena when she misfolded a mat, glaring at Rico if a fire-eating trick went wrong. Small things—tiny signs—but they built like a storm.
I knew what I was watching. That seed planted in him at the carnival long ago—the seed of curiosity, of fascination with fear—was growing. The boy who chased laughter had started chasing something darker. Something that no one but me seemed to notice.
By midweek, it was undeniable. He snapped completely during a small performance at the midway. A child tripped over a balloon, stumbled into the path of Jim's act. The boy cried—not just scared, but panicked. Jim… didn't help. He didn't laugh it off. He froze, watching, leaning closer. For a split second, the whole carnival seemed to hold its breath. Then he shoved the child gently—enough that the kid stumbled back in terror. The parents gasped, horrified, and Jim laughed. But it wasn't the cheerful, silly laugh of a clown. It was sharper, sharper than the first crack of thunder on a summer night.
That was when I knew. The Bubbles everyone loved—or tolerated—was gone. In his place, a new creature had emerged. Quiet, calculating, dangerous. And my obsession, my need to stop him, became more than grief. It became urgent.
I started mapping the carnival, memorizing trailers, exits, where children wandered alone. I spoke to neighbors who remembered Jim from years ago, when he had been just a boy with a bubble wand. They shook their heads, unsure. "He was always a little odd," someone said. "But not… not like this."
And I knew I wasn't imagining it.
Something had snapped in him. Something that would change the carnival forever. And the town… the town was about to find out just how dangerous Bubbles could be.
Something had snapped in him. Something that would change the carnival forever. And the town… the town was about to find out just how dangerous Bubbles could be.
I couldn't sit on my porch anymore, nursing beers and pretending the world hadn't gone crooked. I had seen the crack in Jim's mask, seen the way his eyes latched onto a child's fear like a starving dog spotting meat. My neighbors whispered, but I knew. And when a man knows—truly knows—he either acts or he drowns in regret.
I chose to act.
It started with quiet conversations. A word with Mr. Gaines at the hardware store. A hushed confession to Mary Ellen, whose niece had stopped smiling after a carnival visit. Some people laughed me off, shaking their heads at the "crazy widower chasing shadows." But others… others leaned in close, their voices trembling. "My boy said the clown touched his arm too tight." "My girl wakes up screaming, says the bubbles won't stop." Small stories, tiny truths. Each one a nail in the coffin of doubt.
By Friday evening, I had a list of names. Not written—never written—but carved into memory. Fathers with clenched jaws. Mothers whose eyes burned with sleepless nights. We gathered in the back room of Hank's bar, the jukebox humming low, the air thick with smoke and fear.
"We can't let this go on," I told them. My voice cracked, but the weight of my son's absence steadied me. "He's not just playing anymore. He's hunting. You've felt it. You've seen it."
A murmur rippled through the crowd.
"What do you expect us to do?" someone asked.
The question hung there, heavy as a noose. I swallowed hard. "We stop him. Together."
It wasn't easy. We weren't vigilantes, weren't killers. We were farmers, shopkeepers, mechanics. But grief sharpens a man, hollows him until only resolve is left. By the time the meeting broke, we had a plan. Torches. Ropes. A storm waiting to break over the carnival.
The days crawled, each one heavier than the last. I kept watching Bubbles—Jim—through my binoculars. He was unraveling faster now. Snapping at coworkers. Lingering in shadows. The children still came, but fewer laughed. More clung to their parents, wide-eyed. The carnival smelled wrong, too. Beneath the sugar and grease, there was something sour, something rotting.
I told myself I was doing this for my boy. For all the children. But deep down, I knew there was another reason. I wanted to see fear in his eyes. I wanted him to feel what he had fed on for so long.
When the night came, it was heavy with heat. Thunderclouds gathered over Elmwood, thick and black, as if the sky itself wanted to bear witness. We met behind the old feed store, twenty of us, faces grim in the torchlight. Tools clutched in white-knuckled fists—hammers, crowbars, axes. Ordinary instruments twisted into weapons by desperation.
"This is it," I said, the firelight flickering across my face. "We go in quiet. We find the kids. And we end this."
A chorus of nods answered me.
The carnival glittered in the distance, music floating faintly across the fields, cheerful and hollow. A painted lie. We marched, a line of shadows carrying fire, hearts pounding like drums of war. For the first time since my boy vanished, I felt something close to hope.
But I also felt fear. Not just of what we would find—but of what we would become.
Jim pov:
They weren't laughing anymore.
That was the thought that gnawed at me as I sat alone in my trailer, the mirror smeared with greasepaint and sweat. Once, the children's giggles filled me up like a feast. Their joy had been mine. But now, when I blew bubbles, when I juggled, when I danced… their faces pinched. Their laughter stuttered, cracked into shrieks. Some of them cried.
And God help me, I couldn't look away.
Fear was louder than joy. Fear was honest. Laughter could be faked—polite chuckles, giggles forced to please a parent—but fear? Fear was raw. It vibrated through the air, and when their little eyes widened, I felt alive.
I didn't mean to hurt them. Not at first. I only wanted to keep that moment of truth, to hold it. That's why I started taking them.
Not kidnapping. Not in my mind. Just… keeping them aside for a while. Holding on to the moment. If they cried, if they trembled, I could study it. Understand it. Harness it.
The first one was a boy with red hair. He'd been laughing, chasing a bubble, when his smile faltered. I saw the flicker of fear when I leaned too close. I told myself I'd bring him back. But when the crowd swirled, when the music pounded, when no one noticed, I slipped him into the storage tent. "Just for a little while," I whispered.
Then another. And another.
I hid them in the old funhouse at the far edge of the carnival. The mirrors there were cracked, the paint peeling, the laughter track broken into warped chuckles. No one went there anymore—it was perfect. I gave them water, food swiped from the concession stands. I wasn't cruel. I told myself that. I wasn't cruel.
But when I looked into their eyes, when I saw the way they shrank from me, part of me… fed.
"Why are you doing this?" one of them, a little girl with braids, asked me once. Her voice was small, trembling.
I crouched down, smiling too wide, greasepaint cracking. "Because you're special," I said. "You see me. You're honest."
She started to cry.
And I laughed, because I didn't know what else to do.
---
The carnival carried on as if nothing was wrong. The music still played, the rides still spun, the crowds still came. But I knew the whispers were growing. The parents clutching their children tighter. The glances in my direction. The performers looking at me sideways.
They didn't understand. They never did. I just wanted to be loved. I wanted them to remember me, to see me, to need me.
But instead, they were afraid.
And then, one night, as I sat in the funhouse listening to the children's muffled whimpers, I heard it—the sound that froze me.
Voices. Not the playful shouts of carnival-goers, not the music of the midway. Angry voices. Low, determined, many of them, moving like a wave.
The townsfolk.
My blood turned to ice. They'd come for me.
I scrambled, pacing the length of the funhouse, sweat soaking the collar of my costume. If they found me here, if they found the children, it was over.
Think, Jim. Think.
I shoved the kids deeper into the maze of mirrors. "Stay quiet," I hissed. "Don't make a sound." Their little faces, pale and streaked with tears, stared back at me from fractured glass. A dozen terrified eyes reflected my painted grin.
I didn't want to hurt them. God, I didn't. But I couldn't let them go. Not yet. Not when I was so close to… something. I didn't even know what anymore.
The torches came first, flickering through the cracks of the tent walls. Then the footsteps, the crunch of gravel under boots. The carnival air shifted—no longer music and grease, but smoke and rage.
Panic clawed at my chest.
If I fought, I'd lose. I had no strength against so many. No tricks left, no allies.
So I hid.
I crawled behind the funhouse stage, pressed myself into the shadows, heart hammering like a drum. The children whimpered softly in the distance, and I prayed the mob wouldn't hear.
But they did.
"Over here!" a voice shouted. Jacob's voice.
The door splintered. Light poured in, blinding. The townsfolk surged forward, faces twisted, torches raised. And then—the children's cries filled the air, sharp as knives.
The mob gasped, horrified, and rushed to free them.
I knew it then. It was over.
They turned their fury on me. Hands dragged me from my hiding place, fists striking, boots kicking. I tried to speak, to explain, but my voice cracked under the roar of their rage.
"Please," I begged. "I didn't mean—"
"No more lies," Jacob spat, his face inches from mine. His eyes burned with grief, with hate. "You took them. You scared them. You never brought them back."
I tasted blood. The world spun. Around us, the carnival was burning—flames licking the tents, devouring the wooden rides. My life's stage turned to ash.
They bound me, dragged me to the center of the midway, the children huddled safely behind them now. Their faces—those little faces—stared at me not with laughter, not even with fear anymore. Only disgust.
"I'm sorry," I croaked. My throat raw, my chest heaving. "I just wanted everyone to love me."
Jacob's reply was a hammer blow: "Nobody loves you. You made them hate you instead. You're finished."
The flames rose higher. Heat blistered my skin, smoke choked my lungs. I tried to cling to something, anything—the memory of blowing bubbles as a boy, of laughter that had once felt pure. But it slipped away, burned to nothing.
The last thing I saw was Jacob's hard eyes, and the last thing I heard was the crackle of fire consuming everything.
And then—darkness.
---
But the darkness wasn't empty.
In that void, something stirred. A whisper, curling around me like smoke. A voice, neither man nor woman, soft and cruel.
"They hated you," it breathed. "But I can give you more. Power. Revenge. Fear that never ends."
I wanted to scream, but no air filled my lungs.
"You don't have to be forgotten, Jim," it whispered. "You can be eternal. All you have to do… is take."
And as the last ember of my life flickered out, I felt it—cold hands dragging me from the fire into something deeper. A new light, not warm but sharp, piercing, waiting to remake me.
I reached for it.
And the world turned inside out.