Disclaimer: I pwn you. But, um, legally, I ain't got jack diddly squat.
Author's note: This is for the PFN Morbidity Writing Contest: Halloween Edition! And - dundundun - it's a songphic. Yes, that's right. But you'll see no whiny Celine Dion or... or... that 'concrete angel' thing everyone makes songphics of which drives me crazy... because I made this song! Oh yeah. That's hot.
And I think Paris Hilton owns the phrase, "That's Hot". That's... not hot.
Anyway, on with the phic!
In a sea of blood and cherries a crimson chariot rose, peeking reluctantly over the mist-strewn hills of the fair. Silhouetted against the unfeeling light there rose, majestic and horrible, a black tent. All was dark inside. This was part of the effect, at night-time; in the morning it was a dull and dreary place of shadows. You entered, yawning, to hide and fetch some long-forgotten semblance of sleep that your friends did not seem to need. Tirelessly they set up booths and magic tricks in the freezing October mist, while within the black tent – the contents of which you had forgotten – your blood ran colder.
Come inside and you shall see
something that ought not to be...
see the devil, see his child,
feel your heart that thumps like wild...
Come and see, sir, only thirty sou –
now you shall see something new!
You knew at once what was kept within these surroundings, though you had never seen them in your years of the fair; you knew the legends and the horror. That was enough. This was the tent of the Living Corpse, who had struck those most pliable chords within the deepest roots of fear. That thing which could not be thought upon, which wreaked much of sorrow, more of terror, and not a little disgust was kept here. Yet even as you stared, unable to assault your flying, fleeing senses and legs like frog-spawn, you knew something was different and something was wrong.
What is that inside the cage?
Where's the man on the little stage?
Where is the rod and where is the flask?
There is the man – and there is the mask!
For there, lain low inside the cage there was a man, shaped; it seemed, as other men and silent, dozing with an unbefitting serenity. No-one would guess that it was that secret beast that held the utmost power in its lowest vision… it seemed merely a man, prostrate in the hay. Like a panther, like a rat-trap, waiting to spring, to kill, to... oh, god, what was that smell? The sickly sweet and pungent perfume of some dead creature raped your nostrils, inescapable, filling the air with a musky, saccharine decay, and in some effort to escape its decomposing wrap about you, fearful at once that it was or would be you this way, you found yourself staring at the thing in the cage, on the straw on the floor... it wore a mask, filthy, once grey, perhaps and now stained with blood and dirt and refuse...
Yes there is the mask,
and there is the man,
and there is the hat,
and there is the hand...
The smell was worse down here, much worse, closing in about you with its damp rankness and creating a limp and heavy presence in the back of your throat that made you want to retch. Somehow you gained height and your gaze and mind averted themselves desperately elsewhere in the tent. You could not move... you wondered if your legs would crumple their own weight, if they already had, if you had legs at all... There were all the normal things, and yet something was utterly out of place. The shabby grey and slightly frayed bowler hat Roget used to collect coins in was there, apparently emptied into his purse, and the empty crates and boxes used in other acts... but something was missing... or else something that ought not to be there was.
Come inside and you shall see a wonder!
Come inside and you shall see the terror of the age!
Come inside and you shall see
that which always, always had to be...
Music. Why was there music? Like the last echoes of a dying strand of song, swept from the lips of a dark-winged angel, it filled your senses. It nearly overwhelmed the stink of death... nearly. In waking you dreamed and you walked the circle round the black tent... the voice that was not there commanded it. So that was where your legs had gone... they weren't yours anymore; that was all. And that wasn't too bad, was it? You knew, in that moment, that you would gladly give them and only be bewildered that the music had not asked for more… you could give it. Reverently, slowly, you paced and you touched the things that lay on crates and suitcases... a rod, a switch, a flask, a walking-stick, they were all cold with the touch of that angel who sang:
See the man upon the floor,
notice though what is gone:
The chains can't be found for they're not by the door,
and they're not in the cage
and they're not by the hitch—
there, by the switch, is a different bind, pale and pink and still warm...
glistening with rubies, shining with green, ropes with a livelier charm.
Intestines. There, by the switch – how had you missed it – they lay, in a steaming heap, and the smell became overwhelming. Your hand was taken, and you felt how soft and warm they were... like a kitten, really, only not as cute… you considered taking them into your arms to feel their warmth… And it was then that you fought, a sudden sanity beyond that melody yours. It was then you turned, repulsion rising in a great wave of bile, and averting your eyes with all your might – you saw what had become of the chains that normally lay there.
They were inside Roget, coiled tightly in a powerful replacement. Stronger. You wished you, too, had a steel belly, chilled with your own freezing vomit to the cockles of your heart. Roget was the man in the cage. The corpse was Roget… you caught a glimpse of a tattered grey hat and then a spilling red stream. And as you fell, a dagger in your belly, as you felt its steely warmth surgically cutting away the pale, pink, flesh of your face, and as you felt nothing at all, the angel sang its song.
Come inside and you shall see that roles have been reversed.
Come inside and you shall see the siren's silent curse.
For there is the tent
and there is the place,
and there is the mask,
but where is the face?
Come inside, not a sou,
Come inside, see something new!
See and forget
what the devil has rent
for it costs not a cent
to see life gone misplaced –
for there is the mask, but where is the face?