Le Cirque Navire

by Chele Cooke

  He sighed and blinked, the couple vanishing around the corner. Shaking his head, he tried to remember why he’d come down this way. There had been a woman, but the only ones that came to mind were the star glittered aerialists. Perhaps if he continued along here, he’d come back to them.

  Instead, when he ducked through a low doorway, he was in the largest room he had seen so far. Cages were propped on high tables and straw littered pens were roped off along every wall. The noise was incredible. Screeches and whinnies echoed off the metal walls, hoots slunk from the shadows, and caws that sounded suspiciously human pierced his ears. Lachlan walked in, gulping.

  A different animal sat in every cage and stood in every pen. Animals he had only ever seen in storybooks or on litcoms. Bird with unnaturally bright feathers ruffled and flapped where they perched on swings. Zebras and horses ate their hay serenely in their pens as a coyote prowled back and forth in his cage, never missing a movement of a prey he couldn’t reach.

  Lachlan jumped as a short-fingered hand came down on his shoulder. He spun around and came face to face with a pair of large round chocolate eyes. A heavy brow was lifted in curiosity and nostrils flared and contracted. The chimp pushed out his dark lips, showing the fleshy pink inside. He let out a cheerful hoot. Lachlan stepped closer, letting the ape pick and stroke at his shirt, breathy hoots slipping happily past his puckered lips. He smiled and the animal returned the gesture showing two rows of yellow and uneven pegs of teeth.

  “Hello there,” he said.

  The chimp released his shirt, lifting his hand and slapping the plaque on the corner of his cage. The chimp’s name was Chester.

  “Hello, Chester,” Lachlan beamed.

  Chester grabbed his hand, turning it over to see if anything was inside. When he found nothing, he waved for the other hand. Lachlan showed it to him, empty. The animal’s uneven smile faded and he gave another hoot as he grasped the bars with one hand and rocked back and forth. He picked at something inside his ear, never taking his gaze from Lachlan. Lachlan reached up and tugged on his earlobe. Chester copied him, grinning again.

  It came as the grumble of a mule spluttering to start up, a low growl that rumbled through Lachlan’s skin. Chester’s chocolate eyes widened and he bounced in his cage, screeching. A collection of black horses behind him pawed the metal ground, tugging on the ropes binding them to the wall. The growl came again, louder, rolling through Lachlan’s stomach like the gnaw of hunger. He picked his way across the straw-covered ground, following the rumble, knowing what he would find at the other end but not quite sure he could believe it. He’d known that there was a chance they would have dangerous animals at the cirque but to see them up close was something he hadn’t ever dreamed.

  A mane of russet and sand spiked in every direction around the large head. White teeth, sharp as any knife, were bared as the lion pulled its lips back and let out another grumbling growl. Lachlan stared back at it in awe. Amber eyes were alight with the promise of pain to those who got too close but he was as beautiful as he was deadly.

  Four pale claws raked down the bars of the cage before the lion sat back on his haunches, watching him. Letting out a hissed breath, Lachlan took a step closer. He didn’t dare move too quickly and his head swam with braveries even he knew were folly. He was only feet away from the magnificent creature when it sniffed and promptly stood. It opened its jaws, sand-haired lips pulling back and, with a rattled breath in, let out a roar.

  A scream replied.

  Lachlan dropped in surprise, crouching and looking over his shoulder. The scream was not one of fear at the sound of the lion’s roar but of ear-splitting pain. At the other side of the menagerie, crashes and grunts echoed amongst the screams. Lachlan jumped behind a tall row of cages, forgetting to look inside to see whether the animals were dangerous. His hand went to his holster before he realised he’d left his gun at home.

  He crept along the row of cages, slipping on a patch of sodden straw. Clinging to one of the cages, he righted himself, peering past the last of the metal bars.

  A man hit the ground with a heavy thud. The scent of blood crept into the air as it poured from the man’s neck. The birds screeched and squawked on their perches, flapping madly. The lion let out another roar. Lachlan stood, frozen against the bars, unable to make more sound than a desperate breath.

  The menagerie man was identifiable by the long leather whip coiled in his belt, though he looked nothing like a man in this moment. He settled down into a crouch, as patient as a stalking lion, eyes as quick and intelligent as a trained chimp. His breath rattled noisily through his teeth. He did not retreat as the blood seeped around his bare feet. The injured man’s chest heaved and then he was still.

  Blood soaked through the straw from a series of puncture marks in the man’s neck. Lachlan thought he might be too far away but, from this distance, the holes looked to be in the pattern of a bite. He looked desperately around for a weapon, anything he could use to fend off the animal that made those wounds. Surely the menagerie man was waiting for a good attack. He knew the animals well, it was his job.

  Lachlan turned back just in time to see the worker hunch over and drive his teeth into the flesh of the dead man’s shoulder. Lachlan choked and heaved, unable to look away. A high laugh rattled from the coyote. The flesh came away with an agonising, sticky rip, muscle stringy and thick with blood. Yellow fat oozed from the skin, clumping in a congealing mixture. Lachlan covered his mouth and heaved again, bile rising in his throat. Desperate to turn away, but unable to run, he could barely breathe to make a sound. His legs turned to jelly beneath him and he clung to the bars to keep himself upright.

  The horses whickered and stomped, tugging mercilessly against their ropes. The cats growled and swiped at the bars of the cages in a desperate hope to join in the meal. Monkeys jumped and screeched, rattling their cages.

  The most dangerous animal here was not in a cage.

  He heard the crunch of straw and then the tacky pull of a boot drawing from a sticky substance that Lachlan could only assume was blood. His blond hair was swept haphazardly back from his face, his shirt untucked and sleeves rolled up to the elbows. The iron bull hook glinted in the light as he tossed it into the air and caught it beneath the spike.

  The man named Jack swung the bullhook down, cracking the leather-covered handle hard across the back of the menagerie man’s head. The thunk smacked through Lachlan’s ears, knocking him from his fear. The menagerie man slumped forward over the body, a raw, bloodied piece of flesh still dangling from his lips.

  “Is he dead?” Lachlan asked.

  “Shit!” Jack swore, jumping high into the air as he raised the bullhook high for another blow. He was shaking and sweat ran rivers down his temples. The hook wobbled precariously in his grasp as he rounded towards Lachlan.

  “Gods alive,” he breathed, lowering the hook. “Lachlan?”

  Lachlan nodded and pulled himself around the edge of the cages, not trusting himself to stay standing if he let go.

  “He… he… He was eating him.”

  Jack’s glance down at the menagerie man was so brief that Lachlan thought the cirque worker couldn’t stomach the idea any more than he could. He stepped away, his boots squeaking in the blood. Lachlan cringed.

  “Is he dead?” he asked again.

  Jack shook his head and tightened his shaky grip on the bullhook.

  “Just unconscious, I think, but I don’t dare get close enough to find out.”

  “You can’t leave him here. What if he wakes up and… continues?”

  The blood left Jack’s face as fast as it had left the dead man’s neck. He stared at the hook in his hands, as if hoping it would give him the answer.

  “I’ve never… Shit! What the hell?”

  Jack slung the hook away from him. It let out a reverberating ding as it hit one of the empty cages and clattered to the floor. Jack looked at the cage and leapt towards it.

  “Help me get him in here,” he said
.

  Lachlan stayed where he was. He didn’t trust the strength of his legs, let alone the strength of his stomach if he got any closer. He’d seen some horrible things since he joined the coalition army, but this was something entirely new.

  “Lachlan, help me!” Jack demanded in a voice that was vaguely familiar, if thinly veiled by panic. It was the stern voice of command, the voice he used on soldiers all too often.

  Gulping, he pushed himself off the cage and approached. Neither of them seemed keen on getting anywhere near the man’s mouth, so they each grabbed an ankle and hauled him across the gap, leaving a bloody trail in his wake. The flesh hanging from his half-open mouth slithered and slapped against the metal, making them gag.

  Lachlan didn’t dare get any closer to the man and so, once the man was half dragged into the cage, he and Jack used their boots against his shoulders to push him the rest of the way.

  Jack whipped the cage door shut so hard that it clanged and bounced against the frame. He wrenched the lock shut and leapt away from the cage as if the man would wake and leap for them at any second.

  All around them, the animals kept on screaming.

  The four men who juggled fire were barely clear before the little mule zoomed in across the sand. Chased by a small dog, the small vehicle spluttered and zipped a full circuit of the ring. The dog bounced along behind, yipping and snapping at the puffs of fluffy white smoke that popped from the mule’s exhaust. Even from her seat near the back, Hadley could see the wheels on the mule and knew that the smoke was not the result of a fuel engine. Mules were hardly ever this small and the amount of exhaust they gave off would have choked everyone in the big top. No, she assumed that they’d taken the shell of a mule and put it onto a better machine, perhaps even one of those electric ones they had in the central planets.

  Hadley had dreamed about working on the expensive and well-made machines of the central planets but she knew there wasn’t a hope of doing so all the way out on Corapolvo. No one could run one of those nice machines out in the dust and dirt of the outlying planets, not without clogging up the filters and destroying the engines. It didn’t mean she couldn’t dream.

  The remnants of smoke from the fire jugglers mingled with the puffy clouds of the mule, rising above the audience to hang beneath the multi-coloured swaths of silk. Hoots of laughter and restrained chuckles rose from the people around her at the sight of the little mule. Down on the straw, propped up on their knees against the barrier of the ring, children laughed loudly and urged the dog on with excited shouts.

  Dwarves spewed from the mule when it came to a stop, more than she’d ever expected could fit inside. They were all dressed in bright colours and mismatching outfits, gaudy wigs sprouting hair in every direction under pointed hats with woollen baubles on top. Their faces were caked in such thick make-up that Hadley wondered how it could ever be comfortable. She hid a giggle behind her hand but looking around, realised no one was paying attention to her. All attention was set upon the clowns.

  The dog ran amongst them as they tried and failed to extract a long ladder from within the mule. Two fell over and began hitting each other, miming that it had been the other’s fault. One was scratching his head and silently asking the dog for his opinion. Two more jumped on the car as if that would help free the ladder. When it finally came free, it was with an explosion of purple smoke and a loud bang. Children screamed and laughed harder than ever while the clowns tried to avoid the thwack of the rungs being swung around by a dwarf who didn’t know where they wanted it propping up. The dog continued to yap at their heels.

  Personally, Hadley didn’t like the clowns so much. It was entertaining, she supposed, but she preferred being made to gasp and stare. The laughter and silly japes were nothing compared to the skill she had seen out on the midway and in the ring. The fire jugglers had been amazing, tossing their batons with such precision that she never doubted a throw, all in perfect time. They had juggled three, four, five each, keeping more flames alight in the air as they tossed the batons between them. She had sat on the edge of her seat for the entire routine, unable to take her gaze from their flawless skill. The balancer, as she called him, had been even better. Jumping from pole to pole, he balanced himself on discs the size of his palm, launching his body into the air and contorting in odd positions. He was still as stone as he balanced on one hand on top of the tallest pole while it was lifted into the air by two helpers. After displays that made her bite her nails and gaze on in awe the clowns were a little disappointing.

  She guessed that it was for the children, but she wished they could move on to the next act. She’d heard from one of the women in a seat near-by that there was an illusionist who was truly amazing, absolutely magical. She’d come back to see another run of the show just to watch him again. Hadley wanted to see that one.

  The clowns raced around the car at break-neck speed as they tried to construct a castle like the ones people said were on Earth. Hadley had seen pictures and while she’d never seen a true castle, she was relatively sure that the towers were not made of bendable pink and purple spotted foam, and the moat was not a swath of blue cotton.

  The dog yipped and bounded around the back of the castle, coming up beside one of the dwarves. He didn’t look at the little dog. He waddled towards the castle with a large, brown, flat foam piece. It was the drawbridge. Hadley rubbed her hand over her face, blinking as she imagined the dog darting in front of the man’s oversized shoes. The man would trip, the drawbridge foam flying from his hands and crashing into the rest of the castle, which would topple and cover the rest of the clowns. She chuckled to herself and turned her gaze back to the ring.

  Turning around to mime annoyance at his friends, the clown did not see the little dog running around his feet. As he turned away, the toe of his giant shoe swept the dog’s back legs out from beneath him and over the man went. Hadley’s mouth opened as the foam flew from his hands and knocked off two of the towers. Foam tubes bounced and rolled away from the structure while the walls wobbled precariously. Clowns ran in from all directions to steady it, but the castle collapsed, burying them under a mountain of foam walls and fluttering silk banners. One was even knocked on the head by the falling flagpole.

  Hadley glanced around at the audience around her. They howled with laughter and clutched at their sides. The clowns were up within moments, blaming each other, trying to rebuild their fallen castle. The little dog continued to run around, its excited yips louder than ever.

  It was nothing, Hadley told herself. The clowns were predictable. It was a show for children, nothing more. They were supposed to knock things over. The dog hadn’t been used for anything else in the show so far. It was probably there so that one of the clowns could mime falling over it and knocking the castle down. She had guessed, that was all. Most of the adults in the audience had probably guessed what had been about to happen. It was nothing special. It wasn’t.

  So why did she still feel a tingle against her skin that told her something far crazier than a falling foam castle had just happened?

  The clowns had barely managed to pack up their little mule. The ladder was carried aloft by a clown running along in the mule’s wake, and pink foam sprouted from every window. The children had been amused, as had most of the adults, as the clowns tried desperately to pack up the vehicle, but Hadley was starting to feel queasy again. A hand clasped at her insides, twisting and wringing them out. She wrapped an arm around her stomach and stared at her knees as the lights in the big top dimmed.

  Fingers of mist crept into the ring. Reaching and grasping, they spread across the sanded floor, clamouring to be the first to reach the centre beam. As the tendrils converged, they billowed upwards into a whirl of smoke, exploding outwards and falling into waterfalls of misty rain.

  He appeared within the waterfall and the audience held its collective breath. Smoke and mist solidified. A pair of eyes as blue as a spring sky blinked out through the hazy curtain. Next a nose, lips, and dark
red hair. He stretched out his fingers, testing their dewed flexibility. Rolling his shoulders, she saw a hint of a smile.

  “It can’t be real,” someone whispered. They were immediately shushed by those around them.

  He placed a hat as dark as an ocean at midnight upon his head and the smoke fell around him with a splash that sent water flying in all directions. The audience roared their approval as the illusionist lifted his hands into the air.

  The illusionist didn’t say a word. He didn’t need to tell them to pay attention. Every eye was on the well-dressed man in the centre of the ring, searching for an explanation Hadley knew they wouldn’t find. They would talk about this man for months, perhaps years to come. They would ponder over how he performed his tricks and try to replicate them without an ounce of success. She could see them. Clear as standing before her, a farm hand attempted to make his cigarette smoke curl into shapes and visions.

  Hadley blinked.

  A mirror had appeared in the centre of the ring that hadn’t been there a moment before. Hadley rubbed her fingers against her eyes and glanced at the people next to her. None of them seemed to have noticed anything out of the ordinary. Well, despite the fact a man in the mirror was dancing while the illusionist stood still as a corpse. Two well-dressed assistants came into the ring and moved the mirror, where the illusionist repeated his trick to those on the other side of the ring. She could see the other side of the mirror. There was nothing behind it. Still, it had to be a display, something he had recorded beforehand.

  Everyone leaned closer, craning their necks to get a better view as the illusionist stepped closer to the mirror. One of the women behind her was half-standing, whispering down to her friend that she wasn’t going to believe it. The entire audience began to creep forwards on their seats, pushing themselves up inch by inch. The illusionist stroked the mirror with caution, curiosity, before drawing his hand back and punching it with an almighty crash.