A clown at night - 1. The Meeting

You know what's messed up about leaving everything behind? How good it feels. Just… liberating. I didn't have any regrets as I revved up my bike and sped out into the night. Goodbye, suburbia. Goodbye, life of lies.

I didn't really have a destination in mind. I just let the road take me wherever it wanted, and the feeling of the night wind on my face was exhilarating. Despite everything that had happened, I found myself smiling. I took the freeway north, hunched over the handlebars, and fired up the engine as fast as it would go. I had no helmet on, but fuck it. That was the old me, the one always worried about what if, the one following every rule, conforming to the faceless mass until my individuality was all but forgotten. Not anymore. I had wasted seventeen years of my life but it was over. I was going to be someone new.

I threaded my way through an increasingly thick throng of cars leading out of the city. My motorcycle was almost an extension of myself as I left frustrated commuters behind, and I couldn't help a sneer of pity from creeping up to my face as I thought about their boring, meaningless lives. They were just going through the motions, each and every one of them. They'd probably never had a moment of clarity like it was now having, the one time when shit hits the fan and it's up to you to decide what's going to become of yourself. I was taking responsibility. I was shaping my own future.

I was definitely not running away.

The ring was safe in a chain around my neck, jolting every which way as I made sharp turns left and right without regard for my own safety. I deliberately pushed it out of my thoughts, and everything it symbolized. For now, it was just me and the night. Everything I owned in the world was in the backpack on my shoulders and the roaring machine between my legs. I could do anything I wanted, and I planned on doing just that. Anything. My mother wasn't here anymore to look at me with that special kind of disappointed reproach that would make me feel so bad. The jerks at school were far behind, and hurtful names they'd called me were being carried away in a flash of light and sound and wind. I had complete, total freedom, and instead of being terrified I laughed out loud even as I left the freeway and headed off to the right onto a random side road. I didn't know where I was going and I didn't care.

I had once read at school that some philosopher or another had lamented the fact that our freedom to make choices was exactly what constrains our freedom, shackling us to whatever we had decided in an ever-narrowing spiral of inevitability. Nietzsche or something. Philosophy had been the one class I had liked, but I didn't agree with that view of the world. There was always a choice to do something unexpected, always a way out. Your parents might have made some choices for you, and you might have made taken some wrong turns earlier in life, but there was always a chance to start over. Yeah. Like right now, I could do anything. I could drive all the way to the coast, find work in a bar where they wouldn't mind my being slightly underage, and become a surfer dude. Or I could keep going north all the way to the border and not even stop until I reached Alaska. Or maybe I'd stop by San Francisco and finally find other guys like me who just wanted to get laid. No questions, no responsibility. Just freedom.

Midnight came and went and I still kept going. I kept telling myself it was because I wanted to, not because I was afraid they were following, and I was so concentrated on thinking about nothing all that I didn't notice the low fuel warning until the bike started sputtering.

"Fuck!" I shouted, slowing down immediately. I was going through a pretty deserted rural road in the middle of nowhere. Of course. I could see some lights up ahead, maybe half mile away, and I gritted my teeth and refused to pray to some higher power all the while I drove there.

I must've been running on fumes by the end, but I made it. And it was a gas station.

I squashed the irrational urge to give thanks for the stroke of good luck and told myself that I would have been fine even if it hadn't been a gas station. Sure, I would have had to walk a little, maybe. It wouldn't have killed me.

Not unless they found me.

Nobody was following me that I could see, and I knew perfectly well that what I was doing right here was anathema to their most skilled trackers. They would predict where you were going to be based on what they knew about you, your previous choices, your inevitable path. I wasn't following a path. I was doing whatever the hell struck my fancy.

I drove all the way to the first pump, patted my pockets, and realized I had no money. Duh. I'd left it all behind. I did have my mother's card with me, but I didn't want to use it because it would be like lighting a beacon on my current position.

I looked around, looking for inspiration on what to do. There was a convenience store close by, but the clerk inside looked to be half-asleep and she wasn't even glancing in my direction. I checked whether any of the pumps was operating, but this was one of those pay-first-then-get-gas deals.

Damn.

The station was pretty isolated, though. And the clerk was barely older than me. I was strong, and I knew I was big. Almost as big as my dad, relatives used to say back home. As if it was a compliment. As if it didn't hurt to be compared to someone I had never known.

As long as the clerk didn't have a gun or anything under her desk, maybe I could… Convince her to give me some gas. Yeah. It was that, or walk.

I nearly chickened out as I stepped off my bike. Breaking the law? The old me would've never even considered it. Not in a million years. Now, though, things were different. I wasn't bound by ancient codes anymore, which listed everything I shouldn't do around normal people. There wasn't anyone to tell me to pretend being weaker or slower than I really was. I could do whatever.

Even if it meant hurting someone. Just a little. Just for some gas.

My footsteps crunched on the asphalt. My hands were in the pockets of my leather jacket, bunched into fists. The midnight wind picked up, bringing a slight chill with it. And something else. The smell of… chocolate?

"This is how it starts, you know," a male voice said to my left. I was so surprised I nearly jumped out of my skin. I hadn't heard him. I hadn't seen him. It had been months since anyone had managed to sneak up on me like that.

"What the fuck?” I spat.

The man came out of the shadows carrying a large tray in one hand. His mouth was set in a thin, suspicious line, but he had a large red smile painted on his face.

The guy was a clown. Literally. He had a green wig on that looked as if it had been partially burned by something, a big plastic nose that must've been red at some point, but which now was a dirty brown color. His brightly colored suit hung on his emaciated frame in tatters, hints of pink and orange buried under layer after layer of grime. Only the paint on his face looked fresh, and the spotless white around his eyebrows was a shocking contrast to his yellowing eyes. He shuffled closer to me and I caught a whiff…of nothing. I had been expecting a revolting mix of stale sweat and cigarette smoke, but instead I had gotten nothing from him. Except for the chocolate, of course.

I watched him as he grabbed a handful of the cake on the tray, his fingers smearing dirt all over the beautiful decorations made by soft white cream on the light brown chocolate. He kept unblinking eye contact with me as he stuffed his mouth with the dripping mixture in his hand, chewed, and swallowed.

"Want some?" he asked me. His voice was gravelly, like that of a eighty-year old chain smoker, but underneath the makeup I could tell he was only middle-aged.

"Get lost," I snapped. "Or else."

The clown smiled, and the way his real smile mimicked the garish design on his lips was unnerving. "Or else what?"

I open my mouth to answer, then realized I had nothing. What would I do? Beat him senseless? For what?

"Ah. Some conscience left in you, I see. That's good for me, I guess. I couldn't stand up to such a hulk of a man, even if I tried. Not to mention the other stuff, am I right?"

My eyes narrowed and I seized his collar faster than the eye could see. I lifted him clear off the ground, but the fabric under my fingers ripped and the guy stumbled down while I held onto the tatters. He tripped backwards, lost his footing, and fell on his ass, somehow managing not to drop the cake.

"Did they send you?" I asked him, fists at my side.

"They? Who's they? I was just here having a cake, is all."

"Where did you come from? Were you tracking me?"

"I wasn't tracking anyone, sonny. I was just here, you showed up, and that's that. You sure you don't want any cake?"

He reached a grime-encrusted hand with another handful of cake to me and I batted it away.

"You realize I have to kill you know," I told him.

"Have to? I thought the name of the game was not having to do anything."

I drew air in sharply. "How do you – who are you?"

He gave me a one-sided grin which looked grotesque underneath his makeup. "Me? No one. Just like you, right? What's your name?"

"None of your damn business."

"See? Two no ones. Happily meeting each other at a gas station. Although one of us is really rude."

I took a step towards him, but the clown jumped up on his feet and away for me with unexpected nimble agility. He had been fast. Almost as fast as me.

I hadn't known their trackers would be this fast. That changed everything. I would have no chance of escaping.

"Now, now, don't get all down like," the clown told me. "I told you, I'm not with them. Wait, did I? Anyway, I'm not. I don't even know who you are, remember? You look hungry, though. You sure you don't want any cake?"

"Stop playing games with me, clown. Tell me what you want, and leave. Or else."

"Funny, seeing as how me being a clown involves playing games and everything. At kids' parties, mostly. It's not that bad of a business. You'd be surprised at just how much parents are willing to shell out in exchange for a memorable birthday for their kids. A couple even gave me cruise tickets once, plus my pay. Awesome."

"I won't ask again," I warned him, walking closer. I could feel the anger simmering inside me, burning, amplified.

I suddenly wanted to hurt him.

I wanted to make him suffer tortuous pain and tell me everything as I ripped him limb from limb. He'd tell me if he was a tracker, how he'd found me, where the rest of them were. He'd confess every word screaming.

"It's getting hot, isn't it?" the clown said sadly. He wiped his right hand on his filthy suit, smearing cake everywhere. Then he lifted a finger and pointed.

Right at my chest.

If he hadn't said it I wouldn't even have noticed, but the ring was hot now, and when I unbuttoned my shirt, the jewel in it was glowing hungrily, blood red in the night.

My eyes widened with shock. Not once had I been able to awaken the ring.

"How?" I had intended to shout it, but it came out as a whisper. I could feel the power coming from it now, reaching out hungry tendrils of awareness that almost brushed against my conscious mind. In all my fantasies, I had always imagined the ring's awakening to be marked by a momentous event, the climax of a desperate fight, maybe. Or the one thing to save me when my life was in danger. I had always imagined it would happen in the presence of all my family, so it would shut them up once and for all. Particularly my uncle, my father's brother. The asshole who seem to think that training me to fight involved torture and humiliation. The one who never lost an opportunity to say that it was a shame I had been my father's only son. That I wasn't a real man just because I didn't like women. That I was a disappointment. A shame.

My awakening of the ring would be glorious, and it would show him and the rest of them I could live up to my father's legacy, surpass it even, tame the power inside the ring and make it my own instead of running away like my father had done. I'd imagined the moment so many times… But never like this.

It was too sudden. And, despite my anger and resolution, I felt an echo of fear in my mind. I wasn't ready. When the first true touch of awareness from the ring fused with my thoughts, I knew a moment of absolute terror when I realized the unquenchable hunger and berserk violence that hid inside its depths. There was power in there, sure. But also madness tinged with flame.

"It will burn your thoughts if you let it," the clown said to me, and his voice cut straight through the overwhelming hunger in the ring and brought me back to the present. I realized the clown had come closer, and he was resting a hand on my shoulder.

I shook off the contact with a brusque motion and regretted it instantly. The moment his hand wasn't touching me, my mind was overtaken by mindless hunger once again. And the desire to destroy. To hurt. To kill.

I turned to look at him, and suddenly he wasn't a clown but just a bag of meat, an annoying speck of order whose mere existence was an affront to me. I raised my hands as fury pumped adrenaline through my veins. He had to be destroyed. Everyone had to be destroyed. Only in death could the true beauty of the universe be appreciated. Only chaos was the true shape of reality.

"So young," the clown said. His voice came to me as if from far away, barely piercing the red haze before my eyes. "Good thing I found you so soon, I guess."

He reached out to me and I struck. My fist was flying through the air faster than thought, but somehow the clown dodged it. Infuriated even more, I used my own momentum to power me through a spinning kick that was aimed right at his midsection. I knew it had enough force behind it to break bones. If I landed it just right where I was aiming, it would kill.

The clown blocked it, and my surprise was so great that for an instant I lost my concentration. No normal person would have been able to do that.

The clown used my hesitation to his advantage. He pushed my leg away, stepped forward before I could react, and put both his hands on my shoulders.

"Let go," he said to me, and suddenly his voice thrummed with power.

The hunger abated. The bloodlust faded away. I blinked and swayed on my feet where I stood, feeling as if something incredibly heavy had been snatched from my shoulders.

Then my eyes could finally focus, and I saw the clown had the ring in his hand, dangling from its chain. Even as I watched, the mad glow inside its jewel faded, struggled, and was finally swallowed by the darkness of the night.

"I'm sorry you had to experience that," the clown told me, putting the chain around his own neck. Now I didn't shrink away from the hand he still rested on one of my shoulders. The contact was welcome. It was like an anchor to the world. "I can already tell they didn't prepare you properly. But now you have seen it, haven't you? The reason I couldn't stay. We two are the only people who could ever hope to control this thing, but it will end up devouring us, along with everyone else. It was too dangerous to be near it, and so I left. I'd like to tell you I kept watch over you all through these years, but the truth was that the ring had taken too much from me, and I haven't been the same since. I doubt I'll ever be. I'm always aware of it, you know. It's the reason I came here in the first place. I could sense it coming, and through it, I could sense you."

I looked into those eyes, and the face behind the paint. I had grown up seen photographs of my father, and the handsome, strong man of those pictures looked nothing like this emaciated wreck before me. Yet the eyes… The eyes were the same. They were just like mine, ice cold like a sunken glacier. I saw myself in them and gasped.

"What… What happens now?" I asked my father.

"Now, we run. Together we might do what I couldn't, get rid of this awful ring for good. We have to move fast, before the trackers find us."

I nodded. "I'm with you, Dad."

He smiled. "Never thought I'd live long enough to hear you call me that, Cain."

"Where do we go, though?" I asked. "I don't have any money of my own. You saw my bike run out of gas."

He winked at me and reached into his left pocket. He started pulling out length after length of colored handkerchiefs all tied together and for an instant I thought it was supposed to be a joke.

"You're in luck. Remember those tickets?" He finally fished out what he was looking for. Something that looked like concert tickets. "Two economy-class tickets for a cruise to Alaska. Valid until the end of the season. We can dump the ring in the ocean when we're at sea."

"And then?" I asked him.

He clapped me on the shoulder. "Then, Son, I have a lot of things to teach you. The trackers will come for us, ring or not. And when they do, you must be ready."