#horrorprompt 1843 Carnival

Gremlin missed the #MadCarnival, when he could crawl out of the tall grass and wander through the fairway, undetected in the shadows, flitting in and out of the propane tanks and the wheels of the carts, looking for little toes to nibble upon - and occasionally tear off

For those of you who know Mad Queen Storm, she has posted on the "other place"

I wanted to share it here for anybody who loves #SlamWords and #MadCarnival

I have said it before and I will never stop saying it: Mad Queen Storm created two of the most fantastic prompts in all Social Media history: #SlamWords and #MadCarnival.

Those, plus her giving nature and soul filled with grace, makes her one of the best people in all the #writingcommunity

Yes I think i know you from the other place... I know the dear Mad Queen has only been posting infrequently updates about hee health. But SlamWords and #MadCarnival are two of the greatest prompts of Twitter and she is an inspiration for all writers

As humans we do not have enough depth to swallow darkness. It hides too much. #MadCarnival #writing #prompt

Searching desperately is spitting in the wind. The search overtaken by anxiety, fear, a sure sense of failure. Sit, wait, work the beads. It may come to you. #MadCarnival
#writing #prompt

Suddenly you are engulfed. The air is flat. The atmosphere languid. You are abandoned by all. Creeping silence has overtaken. #MadCarnival #writing #prompt

#MadCarnival #spookyseason
Now you see it, now you don't.
Did you really?
Did it see you?
Perhaps it wants to remain unseen
By you.
#Writing #Prompts

How was he found?
Face down.
Why?
Clowning around. #MadCarnival #writing #prompts

Welcome to the show
Tickets unnecessary
You may frazzle
Or be dazzled
Regardless prepare for flow
Your eyes display doubt
No need to be wary
No regrets, no exits
No need to tarry
Captive at last
The end will not be fast.
#writing #prompts #MadCarnival

What began with fog and a scream ended with a windstorm and a whisper. Orion woke up where the Big Top used to be. Izzy was close by, surrounded by shards of broken glass. The entire Carnival—and Mara, and what now lived inside Mara—had vanished without a trace.
#MadCarnival 31 ~fin~

“Give her back,” Orion rasped.
The thing hiding in Mara shook her head. “There comes a time all living things must pay a price for…admittance. Existence. This one opened herself to Us, an offering to house Our being—to save the people of this town. To save…you.”
#MadCarnival 30

“The Ringmaster has a most generous offer for you.” The knife-thrower traced her cheek with a blade. “You join the show, or you sit in the stands and watch your little friends be torn apart slowly.”
“And if I play along?” Mara asked.
“Maybe they get out alive.”
#MadCarnival 29

“How’s this for a performance?” Mara snarled, seizing the Ringmaster's Key. It was dull and dense and pulsing with power. She choked, swallowing down darkness, unlocking something ancient and evil within herself, outside of herself—
The Carnival grounds trembled.
#MadCarnival 28

Orion ran, following dim reflections of his sister, both of them searching desperately for Mara.
“You have to get her out,” Izzy had told him in the Fortuneteller’s tent. “Even if it means leaving me behind. That—thing—under the Big Top cannot get ahold of her.”
#MadCarnival 27

“You’re that new troublemaker, aren’t you?” the chimera singsongs. “Caught the eye of the Ringmaster, yes?” The mismatched heads laugh. “That means you’ll work until you fall apart, darling! Then you’ll be stitched together with the rest of us sideshow rejects.”
#MadCarnival 26

The trapdoor deposited them under the Funhouse; the temperature dropped &, despite drains in the floor, they were left red up to their elbows. Mara half-convinced herself it was just paint, but the abattoir scent & buzzing of flies haunted them down the corridor…
#MadCarnival 25

The music and lights cut out simultaneously.
Mara shivers in the creeping silence, grabbing for Orion’s hand—but he is already gone. Taken.
A spotlight snaps on, over a small, unmarked tent. Clearly a trap. But they are out of time.
The Ringmaster waits for her.
#MadCarnival 24

The Magician with the glass eye bellows, “Now you see her, now you don't—”
Orion is yelling her name, as a velvet curtain wraps around her—and then it is cold and dark and she cannot breathe and then—she is in a cage, surrounded by things that should not be alive.
#MadCarnival 23

They passed a room where dozens of shroud-wrapped bundles hung from meathooks, the chains disappearing into a fathomless ceiling. Mara’s gaze caught on one bundle, drawn by the way it dripped, thick and red—
Orion covers her eyes. “It’s not real. Keep moving.”
#MadCarnival 22

In the sun of a new day
The horrors wait for those who wander
Bodies hanging
Moving #in_the_swing_and_sway of the morning breeze
#heart_wrenching cries echo
Who would do such a thing

Deep beneath the ground sleep the night hunters
Full
For now

#MadVerse #MadCarnival
#horrorwriting
#author

Lost in the maze of the Funhouse, their watches stopped—
“If we’re still in here at midnight—”
Mara shivered, finishing the thought: they’d be at the Ringmaster’s mercy, two more puppets tripping on their strings to the Big Top, to feed the Carnival’s curse…
#MadCarnival 20

“We can’t trust anything that comes out of the Carnival—”
“Izzy’s in the Carnival! If the message is from her—”
So they took a chance, following the signs back to the Carnival gates—the ticketmaster waved them through with a grin as the back of Mara’s neck burned—
#MadCarnival 19

Orion looked into the mirror—reflected back was a giggle of nightmare clowns. Their gruesome grins, stitched and stapled, mouthed mockery over ragged motley. One pressed a bulbous nose into the glass—which strained, then cracked—and the whole horror show vanished.
#MadCarnival 18

For one heart-wrenching moment, Mara thinks she is lost—the ghouls drawn in by her scent, by her screaming thoughts—because why wouldn’t they have mind-readers in this godforsaken show?
The footsteps draw close, then speed away as gunshots blast from the midway.
#MadCarnival 17

Mara tried to stand up—Orion grabbed her arm. “What the hell are you doing?”
“The Ferris wheel is a ghost—” she said, caught in the swing & sway of a vision, their seat stalled at the top—
But somewhere else, some*when* else—the whole structure came crashing down—
#MadCarnival 16

The trapeze artists suddenly froze in midair, hovering in time and space with no net. Most of the audience were too busy staring up in disbelief to notice the Ringmaster arguing with the stagehands—they'd lost control of the situation, and there'd be hell to pay.
#MadCarnival 15

Mara felt the knife pierce her skin, and then she was wide awake & screaming in her bedroom—not trapped, not dancing on puppet strings for the Ringmaster. But Izzy—
Mara scrabbled for her phone—and couldn't find her friend’s number.
The Carnival was erasing her.
#MadCarnival 14

While they waited in line for tickets, Mara asked Izzy what her family’s Carnival story was.
“Gram says my mom stumbled in at two in the morning, really messed up, talking about her twin sister. How the Carnival took her.” Izzy shrugged. “My mom’s an only child.”
#MadCarnival 13

Halfway through October, there was a matinee viewing of the carnival’s history. The entire audience fell asleep within five minutes, and could remember nothing of the reel upon exiting. But their dreams were plagued by macabre imagery until the carnival moved on…
#MadCarnival 12