You shout at Deadbeat to stop.
He slowly turns to face you, his mouth stretched into an unnaturally wide grin, his blue-rimmed eyes wide and wild.
‘It’s too late,’ he snarls, his singsong voice now harsh, rasping and inhuman. ‘The dimensional portal is opening. My siblings will soon have a way into your world. Your big, big, bright world, full of tasty, tasty people.’
He opens his mouth wide, his teeth growing – lengthening into needle-sharp points.
Dimensional portal? Siblings?
‘My home world,’ bellows Deadbeat. ‘A dark dimension. A place of exile where nightmares go to die. My siblings and I, we feed on them. We grow strong. We go to other worlds, searching for more food. So we find your world – full of tasty, tasty life. I, us, we borrowed the nightmare images of clowns. Now the door must open. We will come to feed … devour … consume … everything.’
He takes a step towards you. ‘But the window is small. More life force will increase the size. Time to give up your life force.’ He makes a grab for you but you dodge him, running behind some boxes.
The clown laughs. ‘No matter. My minions return with more souls.’
At that moment, a clown leads the girl back into the tent. Behind them are three more clowns, each of them with a struggling prisoner.
Deadbeat points to the chamber, where dark shapes still loom in the red sphere leering out at the world.
The girl is thrown into the chamber. As the glass mists, the shapes in the sphere take a more solid form – evil sneers, distorted red mouths, sharp teeth, vacant eyes, twisted claws, misshapen faces … all hungry for release.
You can see them pushing against the sphere, its surface stretching and straining.
You are filled with the overwhelming urge to run. To save yourself. To escape from these demons from another dimension.
If you want to run out of the tent, go here.
But if you run, will there be anywhere to hide? Perhaps it would be better to fight your fear and try to stop the clown? Go here.
You can’t trust yourself to throw the hamster at the sphere. It’s too important. Instead, you toss it to Flowerchild. The hamster squeaks as she catches it.
As Flowerchild takes aim, Deadbeat turns to see her.
She throws the cute fuzzy creature.
Deadbeat runs at Flowerchild and launches himself into the air. His face changes and distorts, his mouth opening impossibly wide. With a plaintive squeal, the Hamster of Segonax sails into his mouth and down his throat.
Deadbeat knocks Flowerchild aside as he lands, belching loudly and licking his lips.
You’re finding all of this mind-boggling. A demon clown just ate a cute mystic hamster!
Spurred on by Deadbeat’s success, the other clowns begin to overpower the acrobats.
The shapes in the sphere take a more solid form – evil sneers, stretched red mouths, sharp teeth, vacant eyes, twisted claws, misshapen faces … all hungry for release.
You can see them pushing against the sphere, its surface stretching and straining.
You are filled with the overwhelming urge to run. To save yourself. To escape from these demons from another dimension.
Go here.
You have to find your parents. You keep pushing through the panicked crowd, looking around frantically.
In the distance you think you see your mum and dad enter a small tent.
Hoping that it was indeed them, you push your way through the people and stagger into the tent.
You were right. It was your parents.
But they’re not themselves. Their faces are white, their noses are large and red, and their mouths are distorted grimaces.
‘Join us,’ your mum and dad say in unison, reaching out for you.
You close your eyes to block out the image of your clown-ified parents. And never open them again.
You push your way back through the people, past the tents and out into the grassy area behind the carnival.
You race over to the clown tent, ready to stop Deadbeat … or die trying!
Go here.
You decide to fight the clowns. But how? What can you do? You wrack your brains.
‘Next!’ growls Deadbeat, as he opens the door to the chamber. One of his minion clowns brings the next victim.
That’s it! He needs the life force of the victims to open the portal to the other dimension. All you have to do is return the life force to the people it’s been stolen from. Simple, right?
You charge at Deadbeat. Shouldering him out of the way, you slam the door closed on the chamber and squeeze the red nose control.
The tent is filled with a hideous screeching as the girl’s life force is returned to her. The glass door opens and the shadowy images fade a little. The girl stumbles out.
‘Stop him!’ snarls Deadbeat.
A clown minion lunges at you. You dodge him and he stumbles into the chamber. As the door closes you squeeze the red nose.
‘NO!’ screeches Deadbeat.
He’s beside you now, his hands around your throat.
Behind you, the chamber door opens and the former minion stumbles out, his life force returned, his humanity intact.
‘You’ll pay for this,’ snarls Deadbeat, pushing you towards the open door.
You struggle against him, but he is too strong.
You gasp for help.
The girl you saved and the other former clown come to your assistance. They free you from Deadbeat’s grasp and thrust him into the chamber.
You quickly squeeze the red nose.
The glass begins to mist over, the evil clown’s face pressed up against the surface. His features distort, mouth widening into a silent scream, eyes growing larger. His eyeballs melt away, revealing twin black holes that lead to nothingness.
The strange shapes around the chamber fade away and Deadbeat vanishes in a burst of darkness.
When the chamber door opens, all that is left of him is his smouldering clown costume. Behind you, Deadbeat’s minions stagger about in confusion, their faces normal again.
There’s just one more thing you need to do.
You pick up a chair and smash it down onto the cabinet controls. There is a shower of sparks and a puff of multicoloured smoke. The sphere above shatters, and the contraption collapses into itself.
The threat is over. You have saved the world.
But will anyone believe you?
Come on, demon clowns from another dimension wanting to eat our world? It’s a bit far-fetched … isn’t it?
You whisper a quick apology to the hamster, take aim and throw it at the red sphere.
Deadbeat sees your move and jumps to intercept … but he is too late. The animal sails over his outstretched arms and hits the sphere.
It sinks through the surface and disappears with a squeal of triumph. Inside, the clown faces scream and distort, dissipating into nothingness, as the hamster grows to enormous proportions, gobbling up the wispy darkness.
‘Noooooooooo!’ screams Deadbeat.
Claws grow from his outstretched hands as he turns to face you. His mouth opens wide to reveal long pointed teeth with dripping saliva. His eyes sink into his skull and disappear. The sockets are filled with a dark emptiness, like twin black holes.
‘I will devour you!’
But the red sphere has started to crack. It splits apart. Deadbeat is pulled backwards as the giant hamster inhales. He snarls and spits and gnashes his teeth, but the intake of breath is too much for him and he’s pulled through the portal into his own dimension.
Your mouth is hanging open as the sphere collapses in on itself and vanishes.
The remaining clowns collapse, their faces suddenly normal.
‘You’ve done it!’ says Flowerchild. ‘The portal is destroyed. Deadbeat is gone. And the clown slaves are human again.’
The hamster, back to normal size, scurries across the tent, runs up Flowerchild’s leg and disappears into her hair. The acrobat leader readjusts
her bun and continues speaking.
‘Now, you must go. My acrobats and I will clean up the mess and make sure these kidnapped people are returned to their lives. No one must ever know what happened here today. They would never believe it.’
You leave, knowing that you have just saved the world … but will never be able to tell anyone about it.
You run, stumbling out of the tent, falling onto the muddy grass.
Behind you, the sound of Deadbeat’s laughter rings out. And a screeching sound fills the air.
You get up and continue running as the noise gets louder. As it reaches a crescendo, you look back over your shoulder.
The tent erupts as the air is filled with giant, distorted clown images – dozens of them soaring across the carnival grounds. One of them swoops down towards you, mouth wide. Sharp teeth frame a cavernous blackness, getting wider and wider, until …
You are consumed by the dark!
You point to the card with the carnival tents.
‘Interesting choice,’ says Madam Mags, picking up an incense stick and blowing the smoke towards you. ‘Try to remember that it is sometimes better to stand your ground.’
You wonder what she’s on about when the little puff of incense smoke hits you in the face. Your eyes water and your nose tickles as you inhale the sickly sweet aroma. You sneeze, closing your eyes and doubling over.
But as you open them and recover, you realise you’re no longer in the fortune teller’s tent. You’re outside, in the carnival.
Though it’s late and the carnival is shut, you can see dark shapes moving about, packing things up.
You step forward through the front gate and a voice shouts out:
‘Stop right there!’
But do you?
If you choose to obey the voice, go here.
If you think it might be better to run, go here.
You’ve had enough of this carnival and all the poo and spit and stink.
You storm off, ready to go home. But there’s a creepy clown lurking around the front gate. You don’t want to go near him, so you slip around one of the tents, hoping there’s another way out. But a clown is skulking about in the dark there, too. Its eyes glow red as it spots you.
You retrace your steps and race into the tent … a tent full of woven baskets.
You walk among the baskets wondering what’s inside them. Should you look?
You can’t help yourself. You lift the lid on the largest one in the centre.
A giant cobra rears up, hissing at you, mouth wide, fangs dripping with venom, its forked tongue dancing about.
You stumble backwards, knocking over other baskets – snakes pour out of them. This must be the snake charmer’s tent. But these snakes are anything but charming!
As you dash for the door, you feel fangs sink into your ankle …
You fall.
The venom works its way into your bloodstream and you become weak. You can hardly move as the snakes slither around and writhe all over you.
Your eyelids are getting heavy. Your mind is slipping into unconsciousness.
The last thing you see is the giant cobra opening its jaws wide and heading straight for your head.
Your conscience won’t let you run away and abandon the acrobats.
You throw yourself into the fray, attempting to cartwheel at one of the clowns. But all you manage to do is land flat on your back. As one of the clowns looms above you, his mouth stretched into an unnaturally wide grin, an acrobat lands on his shoulders, wrapping his legs around the clown’s neck and riding him like a horse.
You pick yourself up, ready to try again. You rush at one of the clowns, but he sidesteps, and you crash into the carnival gate, knocking your head. Consciousness slips away as you sink to the ground.
You wake up the next morning with a sore head. Sitting up, you see that the carnival is all packed up and gone. You are in the middle of an empty field.
There’s a piece of paper gaffer-taped to your T-shirt. Large red letters scream at you: Beware the evil clowns!
You live the rest of your life in fear, avoiding carnivals and circuses.
You run out of the carnival and head home.
You are gasping for breath by the time you burst through the front door.
Your parents are not happy! They don’t believe a word of what you’ve just told them.
You’re grounded for the rest of the month. Your Xbox is confiscated. And you are banned from watching television.
But you don’t care. You’re just glad you escaped the carnival and its creepy clowns.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
George Ivanoff is an author and stay-at-home dad residing in Melbourne. He has written over 70 books for kids and teens, including the Gamers trilogy. He has books on both the Victorian and NSW Premier’s Reading Challenge lists, and he has won a couple of awards that no one has heard of. As a kid he loved reading interactive books, where he got to make decisions about the direction of the story. Now he is ridiculously happy, having the opportunity to write that type of book. He has had more fun plotting and writing the You Choose books than pretty much anything else … and he hopes you have just as much fun reading them. George drinks too much coffee, eats too much chocolate and watches too much Doctor Who. If you’d like to find out more about George and his writing, check out his website: georgeivanoff.com.au
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted by any person or entity, including internet search engines or retailers, in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including printing, photocopying (except under the statutory exceptions provisions of the Australian Copyright Act 1968), recording, scanning or by any information storage and retrieval system without the prior written permission of Random House Australia. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.
Version 1.0
You Choose 5: Night of the Creepy Carnival
9780857986702
Copyright © George Ivanoff 2015
Illustration copyright © James Hart 2015
The moral right of the author and illustrator has been asserted.
A Random House Australia book
Published by Random House Australia Pty Ltd
Level 3, 100 Pacific Highway, North Sydney NSW 2060
www.randomhouse.com.au
Random House Books is part of the Penguin Random House group of companies whose addresses can be found at global.penguinrandomhouse.com
First published by Random House Australia in 2015
National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication Entry
Author: Ivanoff, George, 1968–
Title: Night of the creepy carnival [electronic resource]
ISBN: 978 0 85798 670 2 (ebook)
Series: You choose; 5
Target Audience: For primary school age
Subjects: Plot-your-own stories
Dewey Number: A823.3
Cover and internal illustrations by James Hart
Cover design by Christabella Designs
Internal design by Midland Typesetters
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