"Don't call me that," Eugene grumbled. 


"Wowwee! Wowwee!" 


Forty Minutes Later 


"...and so, after you gave Head Arby lip, he gave you Mortimer 
because it was so fond of you. The End." Pius finished his 
monologue, grinning to himself. He doubted his audience of two was 
even listening anymore, though he was thoroughly enjoying the 
spectacle unfolding before him. 


"Well, it seems they brought the Circus back to town single- 
handedly. Fuller would be delighted." 


Mortimer and Eugene were engaged in a violent but very one-sided 
fight that began after Eugene called Mortimer "Mort" around the 
thirteenth minute of Pius' tale. The ensuing tussle had leveled what 


was left of the Circus, yet strangely had brought some life back into 
it as well. The merry-go-round horses had been thrown off their ride 
and were now frantically galloping and whinnying in place as they 
tried to run away in terror. Boxes of Herman Fuller Animal Crackers 
lay strewn over like a miniature zoo and were screeching their 
respective animal cries as they were trampled underfoot. Leftover 
masks and costumes had split from their wardrobes and were 
waltzing and performing acrobatics with each other without wearers, 
while legged fun-house mirrors stretched and squashed whatever 
came into their sight, both reflected and physical. A few 
tumbleweeds rolled by, followed by an ominous rumbling sound of 
gravel on metal. 


Pius sighed. "That'll be the Ferris Wheel." It rolled past him then 
came to a stop at a melted hot dog stand before falling over on it. 
Pius smirked. "To go, please." He turned back to take in the 
wrestling match, which had now moved into the Big Top. 


Mortimer, who was now steadily refilling its Milk supply due to the 
scuffle, was relentlessly swinging a meat cleaver at Eugene's head 
while in the form of a giant pig wearing a chef's hat. Eugene, who 
was already low on Milk, was running out of steam. 


"| don't care about your story anymore!" Eugene screeched as he 
avoided yet another vicious knife swing. "Help me already!" 


"You were listening to me!" Pius called happily. "Keep up the good 
work! At this rate we should be able to make a Ring within the next 
half hour!" 


"Eat— my —ack!" Eugene was cut short as Mortimer the flaming, 
unicycle-riding grizzly bear ran him over. Eugene's clown form 
shook violently as he lay in the dirt covered in a tire track. He looked 
like a wax figure struggling to stay solid in a firestorm. 


Dear, dear, he's straining to keep his Clown form up, Pius thought. 
At this rate he'll revert within the next few minutes. Should | 
intervene? Ah, well, the Highers or Manny can restore him when we 
get back. 


The Fun-Lover pedaled back over to Eugene, who was still lying in 


the dirt unmoving. Mortimer turned back into its default form, and 
began prodding the Clown with its hands. It rolled him over. Eugene 
gave a withering glare at the walking udder. That was enough for 
Mortimer to decide there was still some life in his plaything. The 
Fun-Lover turned into a literal Hammer-head shark. It swung its iron 
mallet face downwards towards the unfortunate Lesser Clown, who, 
by now, was simply too upset and too low on Milk to resist. When 
the hammer struck, the Clown crumpled and dissolved into a black 
puddle with a sploosh and a gurgle. The liveliness around the main 
attraction continued as if nothing had happened. 


Pius stared, raising his eyebrows in genuine surprise. Perhaps less 
than a few minutes. "Oh, dear me," he sighed, looking down at the 
shallow pool and shaking his head. "That was a little rough, 
Mortimer." 


The Fun-Lover peeled its head away from the Clown and reverted 
back to its many-armed sac form. It had finally stopped laughing. 
The vesicle was now bloated with black liquid. 


Pius grinned at the full Milk supply. "Though, | guess you had your 
reasons. Well done." 


"You piece of—squick, pbbttth, plbbrrrtthh..." An angry high-pitched 
bubbling emanated from Eugene the Puddle. 


"Hello, Gene. You've finally come to. Look! Mortimer has enough 
Milk to take us back, | believe!" 


A dozen pair of short eye-stalks and tentacles sprouted from 
Eugene's "body." He had reverted into his weaker, "Normal" form, 
and was now violently cursing his attacker with a barrage of gurgling 
and hissing. 


"Hush now, Eugene. Thank you, really, for taking one for the team," 
Pius said to the puddle. "We'll get you fixed up soon enough." The 
still whole Clown knelt down and scooped Eugene in his hands. 
"Mortimer! Time to go home!" 


"Wowwee!" 


-A brick of 99.24 percent pure silver. 
-A nuclear bomb (politely denied). 


-A hand grenade of modern U.S. Military grade, which performed as 
expected in testing. 


-A blue 1963 Corvette convertible (politely denied). 


-The board game Monopoly, which Mr. Deeds won on the first 
playthrough. 


-A Fabergé egg (politely denied). 
-SCP- (politely denied). 
-A bouquet of fresh-picked red roses. 


-A bouquet of wild "ternbusty"s (politely denied; "ternbusty" is not an 
actual known type of flower). 


Tasks: 
-Cleaning of Dr. Mirth's car: Performed to near perfection. 


-Washing of dishes accumulated from a day's worth of meals from 
the cafeteria on level of : Performed, to much higher 
standards than usual. 


-Trimming of Dr. Mirth's hair: Performed, but it turns out that Mr. 
Deeds is not in fact a very good barber. 


-Washing of Dr. Mirth's laundry: Performed, and the clothing found 
to "fit better" in Dr. Mirth's estimation. 


-Assassination of Osama bin Laden: Politely denied: Mr. Deeds 
claimed bin Laden was too well guarded and entrenched, but could 
not or would not give further details. 


-Assassination of a D-class individual a room over: Performed with 
vicious precision using a buck knife to the throat. 


Note: Further tests with regards to Dr. Mirth's personal effects are to 


The now full Fun-Lover made one last transformation in the 
abandoned fairgrounds: an enormous, scarlet rotary phone, with a 
large, transparent vat of Clown Milk replacing the power cord. The 
dial wheel turned, and the receiver sprung into the air, then 
slammed down on Pius and Eugene; a hissing noise could be heard 
from within, along with the inward sucking of a vacuum and the 
clicking of safety belts. Two spherical bulges snaked their way 
through the receiver cord and squeezed into the main phone body; 
Pius and Eugene had just been sucked into the main cabin right 
behind the dial wheel. The vat gurgled as the viscous black liquid 
flowed from it to be pumped. A firework shot out from each of the ten 
numbers on the dial wheel; a glowing clown face exploded into 
existence, illuminating the ruined Circus grounds with renewed light 
for a final time as the abandoned props now all engaged ina 
frenzied jig. 


"Thank you for watching! We hoped you enjoyed the show!" The 
firework called, bursting into a rainbow of stars and confetti. The 
sparks encompassed the ground like a dome. 


The phone hovered off the ground, crackling as Clown Milk boiled, 
beginning the Ring sequence that would take the Clowns and their 
Fun-Lover back to the Circus. There was a resounding crack. All the 
re-invigorated Circus items collapsed. 


And then Eugene, Pius, and Mortimer were gone, leaving silence 
behind. 


Beep-beep-beep-beep-beep-beep-beep 
Ring... 

Ring... 

BnnNZz2ZzZzzzzz 

BnnN2ZzZzZzzzzz 


Click! 


YOU HAVE REACHED THE MAIN LINE FOR HERMAN FULLER'S 
CLOWN TRANSPORTATION SERVICES. PLEASE HOLD WHILE 
AN OPERATOR LOCATES YOU. THANK YOU FOR CALLING, 
AND HAVE A PLEASANT REST OF YOUR DAY. 


+ Entry of the Gladiators) 


".,..prbtthhhilthith-king hold music." 
"Eugene, you're back!" 


WOWWEE! 


A Circus of a Wreck » 


Family Ties 


Elisa sighed contentedly as she sat in the moonlight, her head 
cradled in Tom's lap. He was just a lowly worker for the circus and 
she was a member of Fuller's collection of freaks, but while there 
had certainly been a few raised eyebrows, the rest of the circus folk 
did not seem to have any particular opinion on their relationship. 


"It's so beautiful out here at night," her beau said. He caressed her 
cheek. 


"Tom, why are you with me?" she asked. 


"Because | love you, Elisa." He sounded sincerely baffled by her 
question. 


"But why? Look at me, there is very little for you to love." 


"There's more than enough to love," he said and picked up the 
disembodied head in his lap. He slowly turned it towards him, and 
looked her in the eye for a moment before kissing her. 


Elisa closed her eyes and savored the warmth of his lips on hers. 
After breaking the kiss, Tom leant back and cleared his throat. 


"Elisa, can | talk to you about something ?" 

"Sure. What's on your mind, handsome?" 

"Don't you ever grow tired of life in the circus?" 

"Tired? How would | get tired? I'm just a head." Elisa said giggling. 
"I'm being serious," Tom said. 


"Fine, you're being serious. No, | don't get tired of the circus life. 
Why?" 


"Because we can never settle down. Every time | think to myself 
‘hey, | like this town’, off we go to the next place and the next show." 


"And?" 


"And | don't like that at all, Elisa. I'd like to settle down with you 
somewhere," Tom said, aware that his love didn't seem as 
enthusiastic as he'd hoped. 


Elisa sighed. 


"| really don't know what to say. | didn't take you for a hopeless 
romantic. Or an idiot, for that matter." 


"ELISA!" Tom exclaimed, "Why would you say that?" He put her 
down in the grass. 


"Seriously Tom. You might not have noticed this, but | am just a 
head. How exactly did you figure us settling down?" 


Tom looked angry. 


"Well, I'm sorry for believing that if people just got to know you, 
they'd accept you and we could live together in-" 


She finished his sentence for him: "-some nice little cottage 
somewhere in the country. Picket fence? Couple of kids? I'M A 
HEAD, TOM." 


"| had noticed that, yes," Tom muttered. 


Elise relented a bit. "Look, honey, | get it. You like me, | very much 
like you, but there's a reason I'm with the circus," she said. "Pick me 
up, please." 


Tom huffed, but he did so anyway. They looked into each other's 
eyes. 


"What do you want from me?" he asked, "What do you want from 
this relationship." 


Elisa sighed. "I want to be with you, Tom. But | want to be with you 


here, with the circus." 


"And what if | don't want to live this life anymore, Elisa? What if I'm 
tired of not having a real home." 


"But you do have a real home. It's just not fixed to the ground like 
some whitewashed coffin with four walls," Elisa exclaimed in 
frustration, "Don't you get that? There's nothing out there for you 
that you don't already have here." 


"Well, | don't agree. And you know what? | think you'll agree with me 
once we're safely away." 


"What do you mean, ‘once we're safely away'?" Elisa said and 
raised an eyebrow. 


"| mean that I'm done talking about this. We're leaving tonight. I've 
got my bags packed, and I'm sure | can get some of your stuff too 
before Manny notices." 


Elisa closed her eyes and gritted her teeth. 
"Tom, did you ever ask me how | feel about my life at the circus?" 
"No, but..." Tom began, before she interrupted him. 


"No, you didn't. The Circus is my home. You may believe my life to 
be horrible, but | think I'm the only one who gets to judge that. 
Besides, Manny would never let me leave." 


"| can take him." 


"No you can't, Tom. And besides, you're not listening. | don't want to 
go. Not with you, not with anyone. The circus is my family." 


Tom huffed. "Some family; they put you on a shelf in some dusty 
wooden wagon every night." 


She'd really hoped he was different, that he'd be the one to get it. 


"There is more of me, Tom." 


"| Know you're more than the girl without a body," he replied. 


"No Tom, | said more of me, not more to me. | do have a body," she 
said. 


"Wait, what? You do? Where is it? It's not in your wagon." 


"Yes, | do, Tom. | just don't feel the need to tell everybody and their 
dog about it. It invites...shenanigans. And no, it isn't in my wagon. 
Manny holds it for me. It's better that way." 


Tom put her down in the soft grass underneath the tree. 


"HOW? How is that better? He's holding it hostage, Elisa! He's 
holding you hostage!" he exclaimed and started pacing. 


"No, he's not, Tom. My body's not important; I'm the attraction, not it. 
By keeping it for me, Manny makes sure nothing happens to it.” 


"Well, I'm going to find Manny and get your body back. And then 
we're going to..." 


"You'll do nothing of the sort, Tom Brenneman, if only because | was 
very serious when | said you couldn't take Manny, and | love you 
enough to want to you to stay in one piece." 


The sound of breaking branches cut the conversation short. 


"You know, Tom, | did notice," the Man With The Upside-Down Face 
said as he stepped into the moonlight. Behind him stood the Circus' 
clowns. The juxtaposition of their unsmiling faces and their cheery 
facepaint was unsettling. 


"Two things. One, Tom, you should really choose a better hiding 
place when you take Elisa here out on a date. And two, you really 
shouldn't confide in your fellow freaks about your plans to abscond 
with one of my star attractions," Manny said before turning to the 
head in Tom's hands. "Hello Elisa." 


She hesitated, unsure how this would play out. 


"Hi Manny. Tom's just being silly. You weren't really planning to take 


me and run, right Tom?" she said, a note of desperation in her 
voice. 


Tom'd frozen when Manny showed up, but he snapped out of it now. 
"We weren't running, no," he said, somewhat unsure of how to react. 


The Man with the Upside-Down Face smiled. "Ah, but you were, 
Tom. | appreciate your attempt at backpedaling though - it's 
definitely an A for effort, but I'm afraid the evidence's stacked 
against you." 


With an almost imperceptible nod from Manny, the clowns swarmed 
forward, pinning Tom to the ground. He dropped Elisa as he went 
down and she cried out in pain when she hit the earth. Manny 
stepped forward to pick her up. "Don't worry, Elisa. He wasn't going 
to get far anyway." 


Elisa shuddered. She'd meant it when she'd said the circus was 
family, but that didn't mean she always liked the way it operated. 


"We don't take kindly to abduction, Tom," Manny said. 


"Abduction!?" Tom said as he struggled, "Admit it, you can't stand 
the idea that she wants to be with me. You want her for yourself." 


Manny cocked his head. 


"| really didn't take you for an idiot, Tom. It's not about Elisa, it's 
about the Circus. What happens when you remove a brick from a 
building, Tom? Do you know?" he asked, but didn't wait for an 
answer, "It gets weaker, Tom. The Circus is that building, MY 
building, and Elisa is that brick-no offense, Elisa." 


Elisa didn't answer. 


"LET ME GO, YOU DAMN CHUCKLEHEADS!" Tom yelled at the 
top of his lungs, but the clowns didn't react. Instead they smiled, 
exposing a set of perfect, shiny white teeth. Somehow that was far 
more disturbing than the scraggly collection of pointy dentures he'd 
expected. One of them seemed to be salivating. 


The Man with the Upside-Down Face approached Tom's prone form 
and knelt beside him. 


"Tom, you're a good lad; you love Elisa, | can see that. But you 
chose to turn your back to the Circus when you made plans to run 
off with her. | can't let that slide. If | did, where would that leave our 
little family?" 


Tom didn't answer, he just struggled furiously against the vice-like 
grips of the clowns. The strange odor of talcum powder, cotton 
candy and rotting moss they carried with them almost made him 


gag. 
"Come on, guys. Let me go, the fun's over." 


The clowns stared at him with their lifeless eyes. He could see the 
moon reflected in them.