The Amazing Mr Carnival Man

The Amazing Mr Carnival Man

You can take an illiterate 30 year old man, a man with the mind of 18 year old, who can barely utter a few sentences outside of a mumble, a man whose only talent appears to be his ability to holler curses, vulgar and distasteful, with a brain span of about five minutes, you can take that man body and soul and transform him into a poet in about five years –

- Give or take.

Here is the trick…

Lock him in an empty room.

Give him only food and water.

Nothing else.

Never speak to him.

Never see him.

Leave him with nothing except himself.

In the years to follow that man will pass through four stages:

ANGER

DESPERATION

DEPRESSION

ENLIGHTENMENT

Before he entered the room he had no dreams.

Now he lives in dreams.

Now he feeds not on bread and water, but on his mind, on his soul.

He feeds on himself.

He draws nourishment from his mind.

Now he is a poet – and an artist like no other one Earth!

PART 1

He had it all…

His own business.

A good sized house.

Lots of land.

A swimming pool.

Plenty of money and plenty of enemies…

“I am like a piece of meat in a pool full of piranhas,” he told the reporters.

And they came for him, those piranhas and they ate him to the bone…

‘I’ve got to get out of this damn country.’

‘But my dear friend there is a way,’ said Silus. ‘I have given you the way long ago but you have ignored me. You could afford to ignore me back in the day. You can’t anymore. Will you listen to me?’

As far as hope was concerned Greg was a starving man – a cornered rat stuck at a dead end, a man with no options. He agreed to listen.

‘Five years ago I took ten thousand dollars with me to the Philippines, married a local girl and became a citizen. I bought a house and a car. Ten thousand dollars in the Philippines makes you a very rich man. You can buy anything you want. You can live like a king!’

Greg sat listening intently to his friend.

Silus had this voice that sounded so convincing. He could make you believe in anything! If he told you he had found a way to turn ordinary rocks into golden nuggets you would believe his word without question.

‘DO you know what else I did with my money? I built a studio. I display art. I love art as you know. Underground art. Dark art. It’s my thing. I have purchased many of the works of Sgt Baroos, and Gier Toffman. Their works are like the interior of a complex brain. When I think of the inside of a brain, and of course I refer to human imagination, I imagine a huge house with a spiral staircase inside going up and down forever. That is what I say in the dark swirls of their art.’

His passion was inspiring.

He made the life he lived abroad sound like a perfect little dream.

Greg wanted a slice of it!

Greg decided to stab his friend with a question.

‘How much do you think I would need to become a citizen and settle down?’

‘How much money can you get your hands on right now?’

‘I’ve got two thousand. That’s all.’

‘That’s enough,’ said Silus. ‘That’s about twenty thousand. If you are that keen to go, then you can leave with me. I’m catching a plane in two weeks once I have finished business here. You can stay in my studio. You will have upkeep – but don’t worry about that too much. I am not interested in money. But there will be one or two tasks I will want you to carry out.’

To the ears of a desperate man like Greg the offer sounded too awesome to decline.

His friend was willing to put him up in his studio rent free!

So he would have a few tasks to carry out?

So what?

Greg wasn’t afraid of hard work.

So he accepted the offer.

‘Then mu friend when you return to the Philippines I will go with you!’

And so the date was set and the deed was done.

Greg’s fantastic journey saw him flying halfway across the world to the city of Manila.

From there they took flight to the archipelago of Milas, and then after a five hour trip inside this tight little vehicle the locals called a Jeepney they made for the local town of Malatas.

But this was not the end of the journey.

It was time to do some backpacking.

They left Malatas on foot, heading in the direction of a great rise in the land.

Silus pointed to the hilltop and said to Greg, ‘That is where I live! Let us make haste!’

It was a long and dirty journey which lasted three days.

All Greg could think in all those days of hiking was how far off the beaten track they were.

Why weren’t they following a road or a path?

Why were they cutting their way through the wilderness?

Surely there had to be a safer swifter route to home?

But finally the shrubbery subsided and they saw it!

The villa, stood against the warm blue sky – tranquil among the trees like a painting.

This was the home of Silus. They had finally reached their destination!

Silus stood at the doorstep and said to Greg, ‘Let me welcome you to my abode. My home is now yours. It is good to have a new worker living here with us!’

When Greg stood on the balcony and saw, properly, for the first time, the scene of turquoise sea, and green flecked islands, Greg truly felt he had made the right decision to flee his country.

He felt in his heart that he had found some kind of redemption.

It was like his worries were finally over!

How wonderful!

Silus slowly appeared from the back room, and stood at his side on the balcony. He was sipping whiskey while letting his eyes fly across the gorgeous view. ‘I often wonder why I live here,’ he said. ‘Then after a few months in England, I return and then I am reminded why I chose to plant my roots here. My hotel in London has a window looking upon a sight filled with block after block of gargantuan stone. Each window block has a thousand windows with a thousand eyes looking out in all directions. I see them, looking all about and yet looking at nothing, because there is nothing to actually see out of those windows. There’s just a lot of noise, that’s all. A lot of noise that drums inside the skull. It drums away inside endlessly without stop. It never loses energy because it is constantly supping away at the essence of your soul. You grow sick without knowing it. Then I stand on this balcony, see that view right here, see the real world, and I am cured. It’s the same for you right now I imagine, Greg? You didn’t realise you were sick a few days ago but I imagine that you do now? Don’t worry about it. Breathe in that air. Relax! You are finally free! Enjoy the cure. See the world as it is. This is your new life now.’

Greg breathed it in.

Good times were ahead!

His soul breathed lightly and his heart was glad.

Silus patted Greg on the shoulder. ‘Time to get to work,’ he whispered.

‘Yes I am ready to earn my keep,’ said Greg.

‘I am glad you understand the score between us,’ Silus replied. ‘I helped you, and now you will help me. Tit for tat if you will.’

‘I am ready to work,’ said Greg. ‘You got me out of nasty mess. You have given me a new life in this country far away from any of my old enemies. I am in certainly in your debt.’

Silus smiled.

For some reason the smile made Greg feel uncomfortable.

He didn’t know why.

Silus had the look of contempt.

Greg had never seen his friend hold such a look before.

Now Greg started to think very deeply about things.

Lots of thoughts were racing around inside his head.

How long had he known Silus?

Answer?

He didn’t know!

He couldn’t remember!

Did he know him enough to trust him?

Did he trust him at all?

Had Greg agreed to pack up and leave abroad with Silus because he was panicking?

Had he really thought any of this through?

The answer?

NO!

That was all the voice in his head screamed:

NO NO NO!

Something about this is not right!

‘You are indeed in my debt very much so,’ Silus replied. ‘And all debts must be paid in full. That is the policy in my house. As long as you understand this, Greg, we will get along quite well.’

Greg retired with those words in his head – “You are in my debt. All debts must be paid in full. Understand this, Greg.”

Greg couldn’t sleep.

This new sense of dread kept stinging his conscious mind.

He couldn’t shake the feeling that he was in trouble.

Finally morning arrived, hot and humid and full of the sounds of birds and beasts, and Greg was called into the living room.

There Silus told him that he had a task ready for him to complete.

Greg was so tired but he agreed to go along with things.

‘Alright what must be done?’

Silus called for his Filipino servant Penchy Gisborn. The dwarf stepped into the room bowing before his master, but as he swept Greg by he gave the man a strange dark look.

Silus now addressed Penchy directly:

‘Penchy! Let me introduce you to Greg. He is your servant from now on. He is to be put to work in the fields. You will oversee his labour, and provide additional tasks if need.’

‘I understand master,’ said Penchy.

Penchy looked at Greg and sneered. ‘You are my servant now, boy.’

‘You are free to beat the man if you feel it is necessary,’ said Silus, to Greg’s surprise, he spoke that sentence quite casually to his dwarf servant.

Silus farm grew coconuts.

The warehouses were full of busy people jostling and shouting, buying and selling.

It was loud and smelt bad

Greg was quite out of his depth.

Penchy stood next to Greg laughing.

He was enjoying Greg’s discomfort. He held a stick up to Greg’s throat. ‘I expect you to sell fifty coconuts by the days end, or I feed you to komodo dragon!’

And he laughed O my how he laughed!

All Greg could in that situation was panic…

And he sol no coconuts.

Penchy sighed, tutted, and started to shake his head.

‘It’s punishment time for you my boy,’ he said.

Greg’s heart was in his mouth!

What punishment had this dwarf in mind for him?

Just the thought of this alone was too terrible for him to bear.

Greg tried to plead his case to the dwarf.

‘Please,’ he started. ‘I am new to this and I don’t know what to do! At least train me? Tell me what to do! We can start again tomorrow.’

‘I give no second chances to you,’ Penchy replied. ‘Punishment will do you good! I punish you right away!’

Penchy took a very forlorn Greg towards a barn full of giant snakes!

Greg counted at least ten of these terrifying reptiles.

‘You will sleep here for the night,’ Penchy told him. ‘I will lock the gate and you will stay here with these beasts, in the dark!’

‘But they will kill me!’

‘You will fight! Penchy fight snakes! Penchy work alone on the coconut farm. Snakes attack me all the time. And dragons! They attack me. They try to kill me. But Penchy fight. I have scars,’ he rolled up his sleeves and showed the great scars on his arms.

His index finger had been severed by a giant lizard.

He revealed that his left leg was made of wood – a crocodile had at him, but Penchy , versatile slippery Penchy, escaped the iron grip of the monsters jaws.

‘My right eye is made of glass see,’ he said to Greg.

Greg saw the fake eye.

The eye was red, like a lunar eclipse.

‘Great cat attack! Penchy alone. Fight the beast. It take out my eye. But Penchy does not run. Penchy bight with teeth, like a savage. Penchy win. Penchy live to speak another day. Penchy work hard on Lord Silus farm. Penchy bleed for Lord Silus. Now you bleed for Penchy!

‘I beg you not to do this to me!’

But Penchy wasn’t listening.

He had no mercy in his heart for Greg.

‘You go in barn now!’

Greg was no going inside that barn.

Not for anything.

Run.

Run!

He ran.

But where could he go?

He was alone and lost in a land that was alien to him.

And Penchy knew the countryside.

It was not long before Penchy found him, collapsed, exhausted, and shaking with terror.

Penchy got together a few of his boys and they carried Greg back home.

There, in his house on the hill surrounded by the beautiful turquoise sea, Silus was waiting.

He was not happy with Greg.

He was holding a glass of wine in his hand, and poured the contents out on Gregs head.

‘You are a fool Greg,’ he said. ‘I expected more from you.’

‘I don’t know how to sell coconuts! And I can’t fight snakes! Come on man! You know this!’

IN a fit of anger Silus snapped, and tossing his wine glass onto the floor he grabbed Greg by the hair of his head and pulled the man’s left ear to his mouth.

Then he hissed, and spoke:

‘Damn you! Ungrateful dog! I take you in. Save you from the lone sharks after you the money lenders sold the loan they gave you. They were going to gut you like a fish if they got their hands on you. You would be dead now if it wasn’t for my generous heart giving you a second chance at life. I gave you so much! A roof over your head and good food and drink! All I asked was that you worked for these goodly things I have given you. I give you good honest work so that you had the chance to repay me! Is that too much to ask? I believed in you Greg! I had hopes in you. And then you ran away from me. Damn you! Poor Penchy had to send his men to hunt you half way across the island. They walked miles, so that they could find you and drag you back to me like so worthless animal. You cost me time, Greg, and like in all business time is money.’

Silus let go of Gregs hair, and walking to the other side of the room he sighed. ‘I will pay you back now, Greg, for the time you have cost me. I will pay you back double for the money I have lost today.’

Silus turned to Penchy the dwarf and nodded his head.

He had given him a sign.

‘Throw him in the pit. We will see how long he lasts without food water or company.’

Penchy grinned like some demon of old, and gleefully snatched Greg up with his arms, and with strength that seemed almost impossibly inhuman for a man of Penchy’s small stature, carried Greg over to the edge of the pit, and through the man down into the darkness!

When Greg reached the bottom of the pit he hit his head on the hard ground and fell unconscious.

Penchy stood there at the edge, and spar on Greg. ‘You try to climb up again boy and I beat you freely. I beat you till your legs fall off! Haha!’

Penchy laughed like a mad dog before retreating into the darkness beyond.

So there was Greg at the bottom of the pit, trapped in the dark alone.

It was the worst kind of situation anyone could find themselves.

When Greg finally awoke, opening his eyes to see absolutely nothing, he panicked!

Was this some kind of purgatory?

Then his memory came slowly sliding back and then he saw it all and knew where he was.

It was the end of the road, Greg knew it.

He felt so foolish!

Why had he trusted Silus?

He asked himself that question again and again.

There was only one answer.

He had been stupid.

Utterly stupid and now he was paying the price.

A harsh price but that was just the way of the world.

No second chances.

Make one mistake and you’re finished.

Days would go by.

Food was thrown down to him from above. So Silus still wanted to keep him alive.

Greg couldn’t understand why this was so.

Why torture him in such a way?

Why leave him to rot in the dark for such a long time.

Absolutely nothing made sense anymore.

After a few weeks Greg stopped trying to understand.

He’s lot now was the darkness.

Darkness inside.

Darkness outside.

That was it.

More weeks went by, and then something strange happened.

The despair that Greg felt evaporated.

He had grown used to the darkness.

After another few weeks he actually began to feel that he rather liked it.

At least at the bottom of the pit, with constant food being thrown down to him, he had nothing to worry about!

And then after the passing of more time, now weeks months and years had become one, Greg made a friend in the dark.

Greg couldn’t remember how they started talking.

It felt like his new friend had always been there, not just in the pit, but with him at his side on his journey of life all along.

He just hadn’t bothered to say ‘hi,’ not until the pit – and well now there was no one else to speak to, so he might as well speak up to the friendly soul he shared the darkness with.

He was called the Face of Fate.

‘How long do you intend to stay in the pit?’ said The Face.

‘I thought that much about it,’ Greg replied. ‘As long as I have to I suppose.’

Then The Face asked him some questions.

‘Do you want to be free?’

‘I don’t know. I don’t know what being free is.’

‘Do you feel like a prisoner?’

‘All the time. Even before the pit I felt like I was in a cage. I couldn’t go anywhere. I had enemies on all sides. I don’t think I can be free.’

‘Do you like being a prisoner?’

‘I don’t like it. It’s just there is nothing I can do about it.’

And The Face asked Greg once more:

‘Do you want to be free?’

This time Greg answered: YES.

‘I can help you,’ said The Face.

‘Can you free me from the pit?’

‘I can free you from EVERYTHING.’

‘Help me.’

‘I will help you, Greg. But you must help yourself first. Are you willing to let go of everything you know to be real?’

‘Nothing is real to me anymore,’ Greg replied.

‘Open your mind, Greg. Let me enter your brain – and the journey will begin.’

‘How do I do that?’

‘Lie down and relax,’ said The Face. ‘Think about NOTHING! Just relax. Let all thoughts fly away!’

Fly away!

Fly away!

When Greg opened his eyes again he saw a thousand million colours…

That is to say Endless colours.

Colours going on forever into the abyss so that even the abyss was full of colour.

Colours that had no name.

Colour had no meaning in this land.

It was almost too much for Greg to bear, to begin with, but the Face of Fate was there to pick him up and guide him.

‘Follow me!’ said The Face.

And Greg followed The Face, by many strange twists of vibrant Gloon and Cherry Splasm Bloor, up jewelled stairways of shining Floorshell, by lakes of glistening Tollandon, and by ravines filled with screams of banshees toiling in the red and yellow waves of Embriscien.

Finally they reached a precipice, the edge of the great blue Mountain of Gond, the end of their journey. The Face of Fate turned and around and said to Greg, ‘Are you ready to breath in the power of this world?’

‘I am ready for anything,’ Greg replied.

‘Know something friend Greg,’ said The Face, speaking in a solemn voice. ‘You have a good heart. Your heart will affect the power you wield. You will wield the power for good. And in turn you will do much that is good in time. But you must know that it cannot last, for there cannot be good without evil. The balance cannot be broken. One cannot be at all without the other.

‘You cannot have red without blue.

‘You cannot have stars without human minds to write them.

‘No pleasure without pain. No life without death. And no death without life.’

‘I understand,’ said Greg. ‘I am ready for the power.’

‘Are you ready to wield the power forever?’

‘I am!’

‘Why are you ready?’

‘Because I know that everything in the universe is one, a circle. Nothing ever ends.’

And The Face of Fate cried – ‘And so thou shalt wield the power!’

A streak of bright green light flowed into Greg’s eyes.

The power was leaking into his brain. Greg could feel the power flow from his mind into all his sinews. It melted his whole body into a pool of slime, and then out of the puddle pulled him back up and reshaped him from the liquid into something new.

Something completely new.

‘Greg you were but now no longer!’ said The Face of Fate. ‘Now you live and breathe as the Amazing Mr Carnival Man!’

Inside a streak of living lightning he returned to the world.

Greg no more.

Now Mr Carnival Man.

He looked at himself in the reflection of a lake.

Now he was a creature from another world!

He was a jester, with spikes, and wings, and elfin features. Beautiful and terrifying!

And he could move like a bird, but he also felt like had the strength of a typhoon, and that he could pull up trees!

He could be here there and anywhere in a streak of lightning.

‘Silus I will find you!’ he cried into the sky.

He found Silus, in his office, with Penchy and three other shady characters – business associates.

The three strangers fled in terror, jumping out of windows!

Penchy hid in a corner, and was shaking like a frightened puppy.

Carny looked down at the frightened dwarf – but could not find it in himself to take action against the man. He felt only pity for him. As evil as the man was his cruelty had never been plucked out of desire. The little man had found himself in that dark place by following a long and sad road of trauma and hardship.

Carny looked into the dwarf’s heart and saw this.

He felt the dwarf’s pain.

So Carny forgave Penchy.

‘I forgive you Penchy. Go now! Return to your family. Make haste afore I change my mind and remember the evils you did me!’

Penchy fled in terror and was never seen again.

Now that Penchy was dealt with Carny turned his bright eyes to Silus, the man who had really been behind all his troubles and pains.

The man who had tricked and betrayed him.

The man who had left him to rot and go mad inside the darkness of the pit.

It was time to have revenge and deal justice to the villain!

Carny could see fear in the eyes of his enemy.

He had never before seen Silus look this way.

His face had become a mask of terror.

Finally Silus understood the shape of things: his evil actions, deeds that had made him powerful, now struck back like a viper - the universe had turned its back on him. The sun and the moon that had once danced to his tune had sunk into the hills and now he was stooping beneath the shadow of the Amazing Mr Carnival Man.

‘What will become of me?’ he said.

Carny knew already what he was going to do long before the man asked.

And so Carny replied, ‘I will deal with you as you dealt with me.’

He grabbed Silus by the throat and drawing him to the edge of the pit, ‘Know thy evil with thine own eyes,’ and with one stroke of his hand he threw the man into the deep dark hole.

Carny stood still and waited for the screams of his enemy to end, and then walked away.

He had defeated his enemies, but there was something in his heart that began speaking to him, relentlessly pouring words in his mind. When he looked into himself he saw that it was not once voice that was talking to him inside his soul, but thousands of voices, in song, singing in unison. Like a thousand birds singing with the arrival of the sun, a thousand songs were playing in and around the harpsichord of his soul.

There were no particular words being used inside the soul at the centre of his soul, but Carney felt that he understood what the song was all about.

He was needed in the wide open world.

There was still more work to do.

And so he set out, striking suddenly like lighting whenever there was any kind of evil at work.

Anything sinister, no matter how small, how great and terrible, The Amazing Mr Carnival Man was there to smite, drive out and to avenge.

He was everywhere at every time, a stream of purity and hope being continuously transfused into a nearly deceased planet.

When the Earth had been plucked out of the slime of destruction, polished off and put back on the shelf beside the other planets, The Amazing Mr Carnival man sat aside the sun, somewhere warm and bright, so that he could look back on the world, and it was safe, and have some much needed rest.

The Amazing Mr Carnival Man slouched on his bed of eternal ebony, looking about at the stars and planets he sighed and thought: “My work is done.”

Then the Face of Fate appeared, above, below, in all directions its voice spoke. ‘It is never done!’ it said.

After that Carny spent seven months meditating on the moon. While he sat ruminating on that great rock, The Face of Fate appeared again, and started speaking out of the abyss.

He told Carny a story.

This was it:

‘I found Silus in the pit. I trained him as I trained you. Now he has emerged from the pit and has in his hands the same powers like you, only he carries the shadow fully in his heart, and so great evil is flowing through him and out of him. You must face him now! You will meet him on the field of stars where the ultimate battle will be fought.’

So Carny heard out the words of the Face of Fate, and looking up into the dark he cried out in a voice that echoed in the corners of ten thousand stars: ‘Then I shall meet him and we shall do battle on the fields of eternity!’

And so the Amazing Mr Carnival Man set out into the stars to confront his old foe.

The battle lines were drawn between the two powers between the giant gas giant Jupiter, and the invisible volcanic orb known by the Zhenevellian Sprites as the Nor Bela – Eye of the Abyss.

At the foothills of the burning mountains of Nor Bela, Silus came forth ready for the fight.

He had been brooding many long days while down inside the pit, stewing in a pool of venom, dreaming about revenge, till the Face of Fate gave him the power to try and take it.

And so there he was. Silus, with the power of evil flowing right through him.

He was as great and might as a mountain, dark than space, and his eyes burned with a fury far greater than the heart of a new-born star.

They met in the jaws of eternal doom, between the great peeks of dark energy and they wrestled like two great storm clouds.

Back and forth they went.

Forming and reforming.

But they could not defeat each other.

They just went around and around.

“I cannot beat him!”
Then Carny thought, “There is no point in this!”

And so he sat down.

And Silus continued to attack him, but he could do nothing.

Carny just sat there, unaffected.

Silus saw that there was no point in fighting his enemy, so he simply gave up and withdraw into the darkness. He was out there, in the shadow, but he did not strike back with violence.

They both realised the fight was futile

Neither was going to win – one power was never going to better the other.

So they kept apart, but still remained in the universe.

‘Why could I not beat him?’ said Cany, looking down into the flow of endless colours.

‘You can never defeat each other,’ the Face of Fate explained. ‘One for all and all for one, but not one without the other. That is impossible. There must be two, always two. Not one mightier than the other, but in balance. That is what you have seen today. Rest now, make camp in the field of stars, and be ready for the journey that will take you around the world back here again – to the point in the universe where all things and anything is real. Be at peace! Live. Dream. Walk. Rest. Sleep. This is your journey!’

Carny heard the words of his mentor, and breathed out a great gust of air, that eventually swept over the world, to be breathed in again by a billion other living things.

THE END

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