The Game at Carousel: A Horror Movie LitRPG

Ramona looked to where the terrible metal-covered man had been only moments earlier. He was no longer there. It felt as if she had been standing in that very spot for hours. Her joints were stiff, and she was parched.

The voices continued.

Where was the murmuring coming from? From her vantage point, she couldn’t see anyone. She ducked down and looked around. They were thirty feet away from her, at least, yet she could hear them whispering as if she were far closer.

Ramona had seen enough movies to know that if the plot required it, characters could overhear more than physics ought to allow, but she had no idea that she was in a movie. In fact, she had no idea she was in a different decade.

Still, she couldn’t help but listen. She was hidden from the view of the car as she crouched in the field behind a row of poorly trimmed bushes. Ignoring human speech is easy, but human whispers have a way of catching one’s attention.

“When is he supposed to get here?” one man asked.

“Geist is tearing him a new one about some movie scene,” another voice said. “He let the air out of Geist’s town car’s tires to make sure ol’ Carlyle would need a ride. If I’m right about Bensen calling Daddy for help, Carlyle will be here soon.”

Carlyle Geist? Ramona thought. Everyone knew that Carlyle Geist was dead. What was the rhyme about the Geist’s deaths again? Middle school in Carousel was quite an odd experience.

She tried to remember…

Bart met his end, scared by his own shadow,

Lost in the night, alone in a meadow.

Ellie fell in a well, left there to dwell,

Tom got caught in a spell, rang heaven's bell.

Children gone missing, some snatched in the night,

Vanished from beds, a community's fright.

Cherise, they do say, was gnawed by a rat,

In the asylum's halls, her habitat.

Carlyle and Bensen, with gears and a crash,

In the factory's grave, they turned to ash.

The rest were charred in the manor's fierce blaze,

Smoke, flames, and just deserts ended their days.

Old Jed remains, with a grin ear to ear,

He's outlasting them all, year after year.

~-~

That was right. There were more, of course, though the deaths before Bartholomew were not as sensationalized.

Carlyle Geist had died in a factory accident. She looked at the building in the direction the men were staring—a factory. The word Geist was painted on the building large enough that she could read it from where she was, even in the dying sunlight.

That couldn’t be. Ramona refused to believe the picture her mind was piecing together. What proof could she find, though?

She listened further to the men as they sat in the car and repeated their plans over and over in different ways. If she didn’t know better, it almost sounded like they wanted her to understand what was going on.

That couldn’t be it. If she had been thinking about movies, she might have called this lazy writing. Having men of ill intent speak their intentions in earshot of a hiding main character. She wasn’t thinking of movies. She was thinking that these men had, to the best of her understanding, hired someone to burn down the factory.

She couldn’t believe they were after Carlyle Geist. He was dead. This had to be some kind of misunderstanding.

And then she saw the car arrive. It was a mid-size car, fairly well-kept. It pulled up to the front entrance of the factory, and the passenger door opened. An older man with a cane stepped out.

Did she recognize him? She couldn’t tell in the distance. She had definitely seen Carlyle Geist before. He was famous when she grew up. He had been in a lot of Geist films, though he usually just did introductions for things like double features.

She recognized the cane. That was his trademark accessory. What were the odds that this man carried a cane, just like Carlyle Geist?

He walked into the building and the car that delivered him left.

No, it wasn’t leaving. It was coming in her direction. It ended up parking right next to the brown car with the men talking.

A man stepped out. He wore a brown jacket and had a ratty goatee.

“If he is still alive in the morning, I’ll kill him myself,” the man said as he slid into the backseat.

As they spoke, she learned that he was a film director who hated Carlyle Geist for some petty reason or another.

Then, after learning more than she could have hoped about these odd men, she saw them light a fire in a flask and then jump out of the vehicle as it smoked and spat.

She practically crawled away from her hiding spot and ran down the street, hoping that they didn’t see her. She needed to find a pay phone or a newspaper stand or something to confirm that she wasn’t going mad.

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Luckily, pay phones and newspaper dispensers were a common sight in those days. She never did find something to prove she wasn’t going mad.

The newspaper told her the day’s date: January 1, 1984.

Either this was the world’s most elaborate prank, or she really was lost in time.

Resolute, she called the fire department and told them there was about to be a fire at the Geist Factory.

After she called, she ran to find a place to watch everything go down.

Eventually, she saw the man covered in metal walking toward the factory, but the adrenaline had worn off, and she did not dare approach him.

Moments after he entered the factory, a fire started. Moments after that, the fire department arrived and evacuated everyone.

All the while, Ramona fought off thoughts about her sister’s fate, her chest crushed under the weight of a metal girder.

She couldn’t bear it.

Having done her good deed, she needed to get back to the festival. This time, she walked, observing the world of the past. She had been nineteen years old in 1984. She couldn’t tell if everything was the same. Time was funny that way. Change happens slowly, and the past fades. Dates get blurry.

By the time she arrived back at the town square, it wasn’t 1984 anymore. It also wasn’t April 12, 1992, the date of the real Centennial, where her sister had died.

It was March 15, 1993. She had been gone for nearly a year.

~-~

The next few days were some of the strangest of her life. Officially, she was dead. Her name had even been etched into the side of a monument for those who had been killed. She slept in motels and abandoned houses while she planned on what to do next.

It also turned out that Carlyle Geist hadn’t died in the factory fire after all. No, he died later in a film set accident. She hadn’t changed his fate; she had merely nudged it.

During this time, she consulted a psychic, who led her to communicate with Jedediah Geist’s spirit. She always hoped that she might find a way to change her sister's past like she had for Carlyle Geist.

Even as Jedediah Geist rambled on and on about his understanding of Carousel, her hopes grew dimmer. The doomed spirit was little help to her. She dropped the fire poker that had been used to kill Jed in the house with so many other weapons as she left. All the trouble she went through to sneak it out of the Cold Case Museum without being caught was for nothing.

All would have been lost if it had not been for the man she found standing outside Jedediah Geist’s home when she left her seance.

“Good evening, Ramona,” he said courteously in his deep voice, “Or should I say morning, now?”

He smiled warmly.

She froze in panic. In the month since she had gotten back, she had not been recognized by anyone. It had almost been like they had been ignoring her.

“Don’t be afraid,” he said. “Not of me, at least.”

But she was afraid because, in a strange way, she felt like she had seen him before.

“The less I say, the less likely things go off track,” he said. “Déjà vu, yes?”

She nodded.

“For me as well,” he said. “You take it well. Otherwise, this whole thing might have been trouble.”

“Where do I know you?” she asked.

He chuckled. “I suppose you might recognize me because you paid attention in your history class. Silas Dyrkon, in the flesh.” He held out his hand.

Ramona didn’t shake it. Had she had this conversation before?

“Yes, you have,” he said.

She took a step back. Had her intense curiosity not been triggered, she would have already run.

“You were about to ask me if we had this conversation before,” Silas said. “Yes. We have.”

“Did I—”

“No, this is the only part you have to repeat anymore. We found the right preparations long ago. Trying to control a player is difficult. Trying to control you, doubly so. You all can’t be controlled, only positioned.”

He was so familiar to her. Stepping out onto that porch and seeing Silas Dyrkon. She had done that before. It wasn’t until she took the step that she remembered it.

“I failed,” she said. “I don’t remember what happened. You were going to help me save my sister.”

Silas shook his head. “I wouldn’t say you failed. For your part, you did wonderfully. But you aren’t the only cog in this timepiece.”

Ramona could barely breathe as she took it all in. That moment in time took hold of her brain in a way she could not understand, even though she had lived through it many times before.

“I’m sorry,” she said, a tear falling down her cheek. She had yet to remember what she was sorry for except that she felt she had failed her sister. She never would remember the details.

“There is no need to cry about past mistakes,” Silas said. “Eternity is a hell of a thing to fall back on. Trust me.” He turned and faced the overgrown path that led away from Jed’s house. “Walk with me,” he said, never looking back to see if she would.

Of course, she did follow him.

“You want me to do something, is that right?” she asked. “You want me to do something for you, and you will help save my sister.”

Silas held up a hand with a smile. “Language, my dear, language. I merely suggest that if you want to save your sister, there is a way it can be done. I suggested nothing of an official arrangement nor promise.”

Ramona suddenly remembered him having said that before. She strained to try to remember why that was.

“You don’t make deals?” she asked, trying to remember how he had described it before.

“I promise; you do not want me to make you a promise,” he said with a laugh.

They continued talking in their own odd way. Much of the conversation happened in Ramona’s memories and continued into the present. Silas Dyrkon was patient and had a good idea of where her train of thought was headed at any given time. They found themselves sitting on a park bench.

“It was when you tried to help Lillian Geist,” he said. “That was all the proof we needed. Then, when your actions got your sister killed, you chased her killer. That, too, took us aback.”

“I got my sister killed?” she asked.

Silas solemnly responded, “Yes, you hold part of the blame, though I’ll gladly take the lion’s share. You couldn’t have known what would happen, but if lack of foreknowledge were an excuse for consequences, no man would be liable for anything. Yes, you could have escaped with her then before the Die Cast arrived. We only wanted you there for the players to meet you, if only briefly, when their time came. You chose to try to help a stranger. That was very noble of you. You can never predict which person will overcome their casting.”

Ramona began to cry again.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

“Wipe your tears, my dear Ramona; there will be time to cry later. Now is the time for me to tell you what you must do,” Silas said sternly. He handed her a handkerchief so she could wipe her tears away.

“You want me to pick up the ring,” she responded. She wrapped her arms around herself. She couldn’t remember past that moment, the moment he told her what to do to save her sister. “Over and over, right?”

Silas nodded.

“I don’t remember what happens after that,” she said.

“No, you wouldn’t,” he said. “Free will is a strange thing. If you know what you did last time, you might be bound to it or repelled from it. Free will is a precious commodity in this place, and you ought never to give it away, not for promises or reassurances. When you rescue your sister, it must be you who does it if you wish to truly save her.”

Ramona sat in silence and watched as the sun rose. Silas watched with her.

“What aren’t you saying?” she asked. Even without her full memory, she knew a liar when she met one, even if he was well-spoken. He wasn’t telling the whole truth.

“Most everything,” he replied softly.

She nodded. “So I pick up the ring.”

“You pick up that Omen every day,” he said. “It’s easier if we have you do it. Don't ask questions. It's political. You pick it up. Everyone will start preparing for a Centennial. Save Carlyle Geist, just like you did before; we liked that. If you do it every day, you will prepare the way for those who will come to help you. You’ll be one of them. Every single day, the real Centennial, your Centennial, will be close to appearing. It may take them a few tries, but eventually, they will seek you out and help you whether they know that’s what they’re doing or not. When that happens, your sister can be saved.”

“But no promises,” she said.

“None at all, Ramona,” Silas said.

She didn’t understand why he wanted that, but her memories of that moment compounded, and she knew he would explain no more.

“How long will I have to keep picking up the ring?” she asked.

“You will do it every day until something unusual happens,” he said. “Don’t you worry; time will fly by when you aren’t looking.”

Ramona’s anger had faded to resolve. Her stomach filled with butterflies.

“Can I succeed?” she asked.

Silas took in a deep breath. “There have been successes before. Fleeting success, but success nonetheless. Those who are coming may be different. They are… unorthodox. Carousel may hold a grudge against them; who could say? I should warn you, though, there hasn’t been a happy ending in Carousel yet.”

She furrowed her brow, but Silas didn’t explain any further.

“But we have eternity to fall back on?” Ramona asked.

Silas laughed.

“That we do,” he said. “That we do.”

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