Circus

He tried to shield his eyes—but his hands suddenly tore open, as if invisible bullets had pierced clean through.

"Agh—!" he gasped.

In a blink, the holes were gone. His hands were whole again.

The crowd around him sat eerily still—hundreds of faceless figures, their features blurred like smeared paint on glass. Though they looked human, none felt alive. Caspian found himself being pulled—no, placed—into a front-row seat beneath the red-and-gold striped tent. As if his body belonged to someone else, he gave up resisting. What was the point? This nightmare had him in its grip.

Beside him, a figure—half-lit and watching—didn't clap, didn't move, didn't blink. Its attention was fixed squarely on Caspian, as if trying to decipher something in him. Like he was… out of place.

Then came the emcee.

Smoke hissed up from the ground in a whirl of glitter and sulfur. A man rose with it, dressed in a black-tailored suit, crimson top hat, and the white comedy mask of ancient Greek theatre—grinning eternally. His curly red hair bounced with theatrical flair, his voice like a silk ribbon pulled taut:

"Welcome, one and all, to my Circus!"

The crowd erupted in cheers that sounded too synchronized, too clean. Manufactured joy.

"I must thank the organizers of this Carnival," the announcer declared, tapping his mic. Tap.

The crowd went instantly, impossibly, silent.

He turned, slowly, and locked eyes with Caspian.

Caspian's chest tightened. His pulse raced.

Why him?

"Well then…" the announcer smiled behind the mask, "Let the show begin."

Hands clapped in perfect rhythm. Even Caspian's own hands betrayed him—joining the applause without his consent.

The lights dimmed. A single spotlight fell center-stage.

Under it: a tiny clown car.

Ten clowns emerged, one by one, laughter echoing around the tent like a looping track.

But Caspian's blood ran cold.

He knew that face.

One of them—the grin, the eyes—was him. The clown who caused the accident.

Pain surged through Caspian's skull. The memory slammed into him: twisted metal, the shriek of a ferris wheel coming unhinged, his parents' screams—then silence.

The stage began to shift. The clowns contorted, melting and reforming into figures Caspian recognized from the island. The tent's floor transformed into a miniature stage, upon which a scene began to unfold—their story. A giant parchment hovered beside it, its words forming on their own:

"The island was calm, but thinning—

Starved seas watched its withering skin.

The Beast awaited, hungry for the fall.

For what grows, must be devoured."

From beneath the model island, a serpent emerged—long as the landmass itself, scales like shipwrecked iron, eyes burning with cruel intelligence.

"You humans…" it hissed, its voice reverberating across the tent,

"Are so terribly fun to watch."

Caspian jolted awake.

Gasping.

Soaked in sweat.

Alone.

Caspian opened his eyes to the sterile scent of alcohol and faint lavender. He was lying on a makeshift bed in the island's medical ward—a room Haebin had stitched together with effort and long nights. IV bags dangled from thread-woven hooks, humming faintly under solar lights.

A figure leaned over him, calm but focused. A second-year med student from Indonesia, if Caspian remembered right—thin wire glasses, surgical mask always in place, and fingers that moved like they were born in an operating room.

Unlike most, he didn't just use his threads blindly. He had a rare, secondary ability—Thread Perception.

Caspian had only heard of it in passing. The ability to visualize threads, not with the eyes, but through a heightened neurological sense—like synesthesia tailored to Cordyx activity. To him, threads weren't lines or shapes, but flashes of temperature, pressure, and vibration in space—almost like sonar wrapped in feeling.

That's how he could weave muscle to tendon, bone to socket, nerve to nerve, all without ever making a mistake.

"Oh good. You're awake," the medic said, eyes narrowing slightly behind his lenses. "You passed out during lunch. Started convulsing and—well—vomiting blood. Haebin panicked. Thought you got exposed to Ichor or something."

Caspian groaned softly. His chest felt tight. His skin cold.

"Vitals were unstable for about five minutes," the medic continued, checking a handheld monitor, its screen flickering with bio-thread data. "Heart rate peaked at 178 BPM. You were in a state of acute autonomic dysregulation—sort of like a neurogenic shock. Pupils were dilated, skin was diaphoretic. You had some mild hemoptysis too—blood in the vomit, but not from the lungs directly. More like a stress-induced GI response."

The medic pulled back the covers and gently palpated Caspian's abdomen. "No sign of internal bleeding. We're guessing it's psychosomatic. Possibly triggered by a high-stress dream state. What were you dreaming about, if you don't mind me asking?"

Caspian hesitated. His throat was dry. His tongue tasted like iron.

"I was… in the Carnival again," he whispered. "This time, it forced me in."

The medic paused, then scribbled a note on the clipboard—a page laced with woven memory threads, able to preserve more than ink.

"Interesting…" he murmured. "If your dreams are consistent and vivid to the point of triggering a physical response, we might be looking at a rare case of REM intrusion syndrome—your body's entering fight-or-flight inside REM sleep, and bleeding it over into your waking system. That kind of neural misfire can mimic real trauma. Only, your brain thinks it's actually happening."

He looked up. "Any prior psychological trauma linked to this dream imagery?"

Caspian's fists clenched in the sheets. "A circus accident. Sixteen dead. My parents were two of them."

The medic gave a small nod of understanding. No pity—just clinical respect.

"Then that might explain it. Your Cordyx System might be interacting with your amygdala and hippocampus—the memory and fear centers. In some rare cases, threads evolve through psychological pathways instead of physical ones."

Caspian blinked. "You're saying… my thread ability might be linked to my trauma?"

"Potentially," the medic said. "It's not unheard of. But we'll need to monitor your vitals the next time this 'Carnival' appears. If it's not just PTSD... and more of a tethered construct—well, we'll cross that bridge if it builds itself."

He handed Caspian a canteen. "Hydrate. Your blood pressure dropped to 82 over 47 when we found you."

"Thanks," Caspian muttered.

"Oh," the medic added with a tilt of his head. "One last thing. Before you woke up, your threads were… active. But not in a way I've ever seen. They shimmered. They weren't connected to anything. They just… floated."

He turned to leave. "Get some rest, Caspian. Whatever's inside you—dream or not—is waking up."

Caspian sat upright, sweat clinging to his skin like frost. The dream hadn't faded like usual. It clung—crisp, cruel, and prophetic.

"The Island… the serpent… the feast…"

He clutched his chest. Was it a vision? A metaphor? A warning?

He thought about Haebin. The others. The dwindling supplies. The ocean that somehow stayed quiet.

Why would monsters that leveled continents ignore one measly island?

Then the whispers started.

Soft. Distant. Unsettlingly rhythmic.

"December 31st... December 31st... December 31st..."

He froze.

What the hell is that date?

"The beast… enjoyed the show."

Caspian pressed his hands to his ears, but the voice wasn't from outside. It was coming from inside. Underneath the surface of his thoughts.

A countdown. A promise. A curse.

He scrambled for his phone, heart still hammering like a warning bell in his chest.

The screen lit up.

December 24th.

One week.

Seven days until the Carnival comes for them.

His thoughts raced, crashing into each other like debris on storm-tossed water.

How could he warn them? Who would listen to the newsboy with no Thread?

He scrolled aimlessly—then stopped.

GLOBAL.BLOG.POL

A headline burned into his screen:

"Split in Two: Russian Fragment Severed by Humanoid Sea Entity."

It was a place once known as Zimorodok, now a fractured landmass adrift in cold ocean.

The report was sparse—blurry footage, panicked witness accounts.

But the description stood out:

"A humanoid figure. Long black hair. Staring with a gaze that... dug into your mind."

Caspian froze.

It was one of the clowns. The same face. The same eyes just without the make-up.

The dream wasn't fiction. It was a warning. A vision.

"This is it... this is my way in."

Everyone waited for his updates. Trusted him.

He alone could speak to all 361 survivors at once.

His hands trembled—not from fear, but from resolve.

"I can lie to them…" he whispered, staring at the flickering phone screen.

"If I twist the truth... I might just save us all."

Only one problem.

He was stuck in the medical ward.

The moment he opened his mouth about the dream or the date, the Carnival, or the monster with the staring eyes—they'd label him hysterical. Maybe even dangerous. A side effect of Ichor poisoning, they'd say. Thread strain. Early symptoms of Thread Fracture Syndrome.

"They'd isolate me."

His fingers clenched around the blanket, knuckles pale. He looked around the sterile room—bright from Haebin's fabricated sun-lamps, too clean, too quiet.

"They'd keep me here. Until it's too late."

If they wouldn't believe him, if staying meant dragging them all into the jaws of something they couldn't understand—then he had only one choice.

Leave.

Not just the room.

Not just the conversation.

The island.

Somewhere out there, in one of the splintered remains of the world, someone had to know more. Maybe another Equalizer. Maybe a survivor who's seen the Carnival too.

"I need to find shelter... and maybe the truth."

But how does a powerless man escape an ocean filled with monsters?

That would come later.

For now, he needed a plan.