| Horror and Thriller Fiction posted May 31, 2016 |
  |
People gone mad.
The Cage
by Ric Myworld
The author has placed a warning on this post for violence.
The author has placed a warning on this post for language.
Moneybags lay in stacks covering the floor.
Art and Homer sipped Tennessee whiskey and chain-smoked Marlboro cigarettes as they sorted and counted bag after bag of the night's take. Figuring the cage a huge success, jubilant shouts of “Yee Ha,” accompanied the men’s high-fives and mighty fist bumps.
Five-feet high, a pyramid of ones to hundred-dollar bills adorned the center of a colossal conference table and peaked near the ceiling in a haze of smoke.
Four bloody battles from the undercard had enthralled and primed the crowd.
The highly anticipated finale turned all-out war, fought to the unconscious collapse of its warriors, leaving neither expected to live past morning.
Spectators’ ranting chants had drownded out the loud speakers, completely. The patrons begged for action and hoped for carnage, an army of bloodthirsty, screaming fans whooping it up with the enthusiasm of Aztecs offering humans for sacrifice.
Every week new gladiators had signed up, bigger, stronger, and better. The more money from entry fees, the larger purses had grown to attract contestants.
No one could have ever imagined the interest and support of all ages and social classes, the poor to the very rich, from unknowns to worldwide celebrities.
Sponsors continued to line up, each trying to outbid the other, wanting to brand the sport with their own logos.
<><><><><>
Another week passes, quickly.
The once Friday night fights having expanded to Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays. In addition, starting this week there are afternoon and evening sessions on Saturdays and Sundays. A bonus match for each period, making five matches on every card.
The sport has caught on faster than anyone could ever have imagined possible.
People frozen in wild-eyed trance, eyes dilated from the bright lighting or mind-altering substances of choice, almost hidden in the deep, dark circles that surround them.
Men, women, and children with the hunger of savage beasts, obsessed with the violence and sadistic beatings.
Angry viewers worked into frenzy by masked maulers who revel in limp, broken, and sometimes dismembered bodies.
For those stimulated by intense, so-called, entertainment. Soon, jagged bones will protrude through torn flesh during an exuberant crescendo, yielding to the shaking, twitching overture to the pinnacle of death.
<><><><><>
The weekend blast-off for the biggest show yet, has arrived. And so far, every show’s attendance has outnumbered the last.
Paid seating for the fairgrounds at slightly over 23,000 has already overfilled. Standing room only areas have overflowed, pushing paying patrons outside the park gates.
Clusters of potential customers, with no possibility of getting in, line both sides of the adjacent roadways for miles, all with the intentions of attending the giant cage’s action-packed main attraction.
The masses swarm yards, parking lots, then driveways and the streets. Jumping hedges and fences, sitting on shoulders, climbing trees, and now even scaling walls to reach the rooftops of houses and buildings, desperate to catch any glimpse of the mayhem.
A humongous, perfectly round globe shape, built of steel girders bolted and welded into diamond designs brace and support the cage’s Plexiglas liner.
Impeccably cleaned and disinfected between every match to remove germs and wash away the blood smears and particles that hinder fans’ fight visibility.
The countdown to show time is twenty-two minutes and counting.
Party animals grow impatient and become rowdier by the second, throwing cans, bottles, and rocks to display their frustrations.
Gut Wrench Walter verses Ball Basher Burke, the feature matchup. The event everyone is waiting to see.
After two-long weeks of jaw jousting threats and predictions, the observers are ready for some real eye gouging, ear biting, brawling bloodbaths of combat.
Bang, bang, bang, three quick blasts, unmistakable sounds of pistol shots.
Then, a frosted-green Rolling Rock bottle whistles through the air smacking an unsuspecting young girl on her right-orbital bone and lays it wide open. Her sliced skin droops down over her eye, dangling like chicken-liver on her cheek.
More shots ring out, concussive sounds from tinny to deep, and definitely from different grain bullets and caliber firearms.
Thrown rocks bust out windshields and cause drivers to lose control. Glass from the vehicles shatter and explode into pebble-sized fragments as they crash and run off the roads.
A white, convertible Mercedes's tires screech as it slides, giving prelude to a deafening metal-to-metal crash. The ejected driver hangs in a tree.
Almost simultaneously, another car slams headlong into a mammoth Norway maple with a deadened thud, its horn stuck, blaring.
Flames ignite, and the driver’s face melts as the stench of burning flesh overwhelms the onlookers.
Then, knees go weak and stomachs twist in knots at the horrific sight of a truck that never slows down, mowing over a congregation of innocent people who are only trying to escape the madness and go home.
Pushing and shoving, people surge picking up steam as they walk on top of those who have fallen. Giving swift kicks to those hysterical and smothering, desperately struggling to get up.
Nothing can stop the tidal wave in motion, a human tsunami leveling everything in its path with the force and precision of an asphalt roller.
The delirious revelers stampede up the steep-angled service ramp, streaming into the cage in droves.
Fighting everywhere, weaponless bystanders at the mercy of armed crusaders who smile at every fearful scream or crying child’s tears, thrilled to be hurting anyone.
Merciless beatings fueled by rage and executed with stolen shovels, brooms, bats, and crowbars from the looted homes, garages, and offices.
There is no sign of the hundreds of house and business owners. Obviously frightened away by those who, had at first seemed normal, now morphed into crazed lunatics on the warpath.
Ransacked contents and belongings strewn everywhere, from undergarments to refrigerators.
Reminiscent images of a city dump in Bangladesh.
People nosedive from rooftops, pitched by guilty aggressors. Screams echo, arms and legs flailing as their bodies plummet. Pleasure seekers cheering the repulsive trauma and terminate impacts.
On its rotating axis, with the entranceway still open, bodies fly out of the cage as flimsy projectiles waving in the wind every time the opening swings around to the bottom side.
Helpless victims torpedo toward diminishing groups below. Resembling a porous net as those catapulted hit the ground between them, mangled messes in puffs of dust. Prior to contact, someone in the crowd, yells, “Bombs away!” followed by an upsetting roar of laughter.
The production tower stands four stories tall, the exact height of the cage’s concrete and steel base.
Inside, Art and Homer watch the psychotic rampage through the tinted glass of their dream-come-true venue’s controls. Witnessing the park's sudden demise by the very out-of-control followers who made it a success.
Bodies seen from the tower cover the grounds like an extra-generous helping of Dip-n-Dots, some of the injured wail in agony, while many never move or make a sound.
An alarm blares. Art yells for Homer, “They’ve broken into the first floor.”
A second alarm goes off. The intruders heard trashing the second floor.
Art and Homer cornered with nowhere to go, convinced that no amount of begging and pleading can persuade pity from the outlaw gang. Trapped in what was to be their “Never Never Land,” doomed to the invader’s will.
Sure enough, the fourth floor’s metal door slams down with a rumble and the whole building shakes.
The freak hellions wrap Homer and Art in ropes and chains, as they yank and pull them down all four flights of stairs, kicking and stomping arms, legs, heads, and whatever is seen exposed.
By now, most able bodies have gone, leaving only the dead and disabled that litter the midway of refreshments, outlets, and game booths.
Few remaining stragglers hobble along, dragging others on blankets or pieces of cardboard, still in panic mode, trying to get away.
The elevator door opens for the ride up to cage level.
Two burly, bearded-goliaths of men snatch up Art and Homer and literally heave them into a heap in the cab’s left-rear corner. The biggest of the boorish, barbarian oafs jumps on top to sit.
The ride up is quick. At least for all but the owners turned captives, with the man of gargantuan proportion crushing them.
Soon as the door opens, the behemoth men pull the two spivs, Art and Homer, out by handfuls of hair and the seats of their pants as they whimper like little pansy-assed girls.
Hard to imagine how these gourd heads could have created intimidating tough-guy personas and masterminded such brutal entertainment, now proven pretentious cowards.
Down unfolds the arched-entry chamber and before it is all the way open, the massive brutes grab Art and Homer around the throats with both hands and throw the wannabe entrepreneurs winging it into the cage.
The safety latch shut and a carter-pin inserted, the ousted renegade promoters have become prisoners of their own domain.
The cage slowly begins to turn.
Art and Homer walk to stay upright, looking all around for anyway out, but of all people, they should know there is none.
Faster and faster the cage spins.
Centrifugal force glues the riders tight against the wall. Accelerating even faster still, until it takes their breath, the mighty pressure distorting their faces.
Then, the cage starts to flip and spin in all directions, showing its enhanced power and mechanical efficiency. Intense, nimble maneuvers comparable only to the dexterous robotic hand, and far superior to any carnival ride or space research-training module.
In an instant, the cage stops.
The men fall, smashing to the ground with a splat, and no sooner have they flopped than the mega cage rolls again, repeatedly, as if having a mind of its own?
All but a few people have gone when a young boy pushes the emergency-power button gearing the cage down to a crawl, and then it stops.
Art and Homer the two sick-minded adventure-seekers torn and crumpled, lie motionless, lifeless.
Leaving behind a certain sense of justice for the warped and so insensitive, those who would produce and enjoy such a slaughter of the ignorant and oblivious.
Local and state police finally race in to the rescue, making a grand entrance of flashing lights and loud speakers. Unfortunately, yet as expected, arriving too late to make a difference.
As a journalist, wanting to point out all that I can see, and so much that I was unable to hear from a safe distance, I do hope that readers will not find this piece primarily about blood, guts, and dysfunction.
It is more of an honest admission and observance concerning the weak and easily misguided “Monkey see, Monkey do” mentality of human animals.
The Cage contest entry
Moneybags lay in stacks covering the floor.
Art and Homer sipped Tennessee whiskey and chain-smoked Marlboro cigarettes as they sorted and counted bag after bag of the night's take. Figuring the cage a huge success, jubilant shouts of “Yee Ha,” accompanied the men’s high-fives and mighty fist bumps.
Five-feet high, a pyramid of ones to hundred-dollar bills adorned the center of a colossal conference table and peaked near the ceiling in a haze of smoke.
Four bloody battles from the undercard had enthralled and primed the crowd.
The highly anticipated finale turned all-out war, fought to the unconscious collapse of its warriors, leaving neither expected to live past morning.
Spectators’ ranting chants had drownded out the loud speakers, completely. The patrons begged for action and hoped for carnage, an army of bloodthirsty, screaming fans whooping it up with the enthusiasm of Aztecs offering humans for sacrifice.
Every week new gladiators had signed up, bigger, stronger, and better. The more money from entry fees, the larger purses had grown to attract contestants.
No one could have ever imagined the interest and support of all ages and social classes, the poor to the very rich, from unknowns to worldwide celebrities.
Sponsors continued to line up, each trying to outbid the other, wanting to brand the sport with their own logos.
<><><><><>
Another week passes, quickly.
The once Friday night fights having expanded to Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays. In addition, starting this week there are afternoon and evening sessions on Saturdays and Sundays. A bonus match for each period, making five matches on every card.
The sport has caught on faster than anyone could ever have imagined possible.
People frozen in wild-eyed trance, eyes dilated from the bright lighting or mind-altering substances of choice, almost hidden in the deep, dark circles that surround them.
Men, women, and children with the hunger of savage beasts, obsessed with the violence and sadistic beatings.
Angry viewers worked into frenzy by masked maulers who revel in limp, broken, and sometimes dismembered bodies.
For those stimulated by intense, so-called, entertainment. Soon, jagged bones will protrude through torn flesh during an exuberant crescendo, yielding to the shaking, twitching overture to the pinnacle of death.
<><><><><>
The weekend blast-off for the biggest show yet, has arrived. And so far, every show’s attendance has outnumbered the last.
Paid seating for the fairgrounds at slightly over 23,000 has already overfilled. Standing room only areas have overflowed, pushing paying patrons outside the park gates.
Clusters of potential customers, with no possibility of getting in, line both sides of the adjacent roadways for miles, all with the intentions of attending the giant cage’s action-packed main attraction.
The masses swarm yards, parking lots, then driveways and the streets. Jumping hedges and fences, sitting on shoulders, climbing trees, and now even scaling walls to reach the rooftops of houses and buildings, desperate to catch any glimpse of the mayhem.
A humongous, perfectly round globe shape, built of steel girders bolted and welded into diamond designs brace and support the cage’s Plexiglas liner.
Impeccably cleaned and disinfected between every match to remove germs and wash away the blood smears and particles that hinder fans’ fight visibility.
The countdown to show time is twenty-two minutes and counting.
Party animals grow impatient and become rowdier by the second, throwing cans, bottles, and rocks to display their frustrations.
Gut Wrench Walter verses Ball Basher Burke, the feature matchup. The event everyone is waiting to see.
After two-long weeks of jaw jousting threats and predictions, the observers are ready for some real eye gouging, ear biting, brawling bloodbaths of combat.
Bang, bang, bang, three quick blasts, unmistakable sounds of pistol shots.
Then, a frosted-green Rolling Rock bottle whistles through the air smacking an unsuspecting young girl on her right-orbital bone and lays it wide open. Her sliced skin droops down over her eye, dangling like chicken-liver on her cheek.
More shots ring out, concussive sounds from tinny to deep, and definitely from different grain bullets and caliber firearms.
Thrown rocks bust out windshields and cause drivers to lose control. Glass from the vehicles shatter and explode into pebble-sized fragments as they crash and run off the roads.
A white, convertible Mercedes's tires screech as it slides, giving prelude to a deafening metal-to-metal crash. The ejected driver hangs in a tree.
Almost simultaneously, another car slams headlong into a mammoth Norway maple with a deadened thud, its horn stuck, blaring.
Flames ignite, and the driver’s face melts as the stench of burning flesh overwhelms the onlookers.
Then, knees go weak and stomachs twist in knots at the horrific sight of a truck that never slows down, mowing over a congregation of innocent people who are only trying to escape the madness and go home.
Pushing and shoving, people surge picking up steam as they walk on top of those who have fallen. Giving swift kicks to those hysterical and smothering, desperately struggling to get up.
Nothing can stop the tidal wave in motion, a human tsunami leveling everything in its path with the force and precision of an asphalt roller.
The delirious revelers stampede up the steep-angled service ramp, streaming into the cage in droves.
Fighting everywhere, weaponless bystanders at the mercy of armed crusaders who smile at every fearful scream or crying child’s tears, thrilled to be hurting anyone.
Merciless beatings fueled by rage and executed with stolen shovels, brooms, bats, and crowbars from the looted homes, garages, and offices.
There is no sign of the hundreds of house and business owners. Obviously frightened away by those who, had at first seemed normal, now morphed into crazed lunatics on the warpath.
Ransacked contents and belongings strewn everywhere, from undergarments to refrigerators.
Reminiscent images of a city dump in Bangladesh.
People nosedive from rooftops, pitched by guilty aggressors. Screams echo, arms and legs flailing as their bodies plummet. Pleasure seekers cheering the repulsive trauma and terminate impacts.
On its rotating axis, with the entranceway still open, bodies fly out of the cage as flimsy projectiles waving in the wind every time the opening swings around to the bottom side.
Helpless victims torpedo toward diminishing groups below. Resembling a porous net as those catapulted hit the ground between them, mangled messes in puffs of dust. Prior to contact, someone in the crowd, yells, “Bombs away!” followed by an upsetting roar of laughter.
The production tower stands four stories tall, the exact height of the cage’s concrete and steel base.
Inside, Art and Homer watch the psychotic rampage through the tinted glass of their dream-come-true venue’s controls. Witnessing the park's sudden demise by the very out-of-control followers who made it a success.
Bodies seen from the tower cover the grounds like an extra-generous helping of Dip-n-Dots, some of the injured wail in agony, while many never move or make a sound.
An alarm blares. Art yells for Homer, “They’ve broken into the first floor.”
A second alarm goes off. The intruders heard trashing the second floor.
Art and Homer cornered with nowhere to go, convinced that no amount of begging and pleading can persuade pity from the outlaw gang. Trapped in what was to be their “Never Never Land,” doomed to the invader’s will.
Sure enough, the fourth floor’s metal door slams down with a rumble and the whole building shakes.
The freak hellions wrap Homer and Art in ropes and chains, as they yank and pull them down all four flights of stairs, kicking and stomping arms, legs, heads, and whatever is seen exposed.
By now, most able bodies have gone, leaving only the dead and disabled that litter the midway of refreshments, outlets, and game booths.
Few remaining stragglers hobble along, dragging others on blankets or pieces of cardboard, still in panic mode, trying to get away.
The elevator door opens for the ride up to cage level.
Two burly, bearded-goliaths of men snatch up Art and Homer and literally heave them into a heap in the cab’s left-rear corner. The biggest of the boorish, barbarian oafs jumps on top to sit.
The ride up is quick. At least for all but the owners turned captives, with the man of gargantuan proportion crushing them.
Soon as the door opens, the behemoth men pull the two spivs, Art and Homer, out by handfuls of hair and the seats of their pants as they whimper like little pansy-assed girls.
Hard to imagine how these gourd heads could have created intimidating tough-guy personas and masterminded such brutal entertainment, now proven pretentious cowards.
Down unfolds the arched-entry chamber and before it is all the way open, the massive brutes grab Art and Homer around the throats with both hands and throw the wannabe entrepreneurs winging it into the cage.
The safety latch shut and a carter-pin inserted, the ousted renegade promoters have become prisoners of their own domain.
The cage slowly begins to turn.
Art and Homer walk to stay upright, looking all around for anyway out, but of all people, they should know there is none.
Faster and faster the cage spins.
Centrifugal force glues the riders tight against the wall. Accelerating even faster still, until it takes their breath, the mighty pressure distorting their faces.
Then, the cage starts to flip and spin in all directions, showing its enhanced power and mechanical efficiency. Intense, nimble maneuvers comparable only to the dexterous robotic hand, and far superior to any carnival ride or space research-training module.
In an instant, the cage stops.
The men fall, smashing to the ground with a splat, and no sooner have they flopped than the mega cage rolls again, repeatedly, as if having a mind of its own?
All but a few people have gone when a young boy pushes the emergency-power button gearing the cage down to a crawl, and then it stops.
Art and Homer the two sick-minded adventure-seekers torn and crumpled, lie motionless, lifeless.
Leaving behind a certain sense of justice for the warped and so insensitive, those who would produce and enjoy such a slaughter of the ignorant and oblivious.
Local and state police finally race in to the rescue, making a grand entrance of flashing lights and loud speakers. Unfortunately, yet as expected, arriving too late to make a difference.
As a journalist, wanting to point out all that I can see, and so much that I was unable to hear from a safe distance, I do hope that readers will not find this piece primarily about blood, guts, and dysfunction.
It is more of an honest admission and observance concerning the weak and easily misguided “Monkey see, Monkey do” mentality of human animals.
Art and Homer sipped Tennessee whiskey and chain-smoked Marlboro cigarettes as they sorted and counted bag after bag of the night's take. Figuring the cage a huge success, jubilant shouts of “Yee Ha,” accompanied the men’s high-fives and mighty fist bumps.
Five-feet high, a pyramid of ones to hundred-dollar bills adorned the center of a colossal conference table and peaked near the ceiling in a haze of smoke.
Four bloody battles from the undercard had enthralled and primed the crowd.
The highly anticipated finale turned all-out war, fought to the unconscious collapse of its warriors, leaving neither expected to live past morning.
Spectators’ ranting chants had drownded out the loud speakers, completely. The patrons begged for action and hoped for carnage, an army of bloodthirsty, screaming fans whooping it up with the enthusiasm of Aztecs offering humans for sacrifice.
Every week new gladiators had signed up, bigger, stronger, and better. The more money from entry fees, the larger purses had grown to attract contestants.
No one could have ever imagined the interest and support of all ages and social classes, the poor to the very rich, from unknowns to worldwide celebrities.
Sponsors continued to line up, each trying to outbid the other, wanting to brand the sport with their own logos.
<><><><><>
Another week passes, quickly.
The once Friday night fights having expanded to Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays. In addition, starting this week there are afternoon and evening sessions on Saturdays and Sundays. A bonus match for each period, making five matches on every card.
The sport has caught on faster than anyone could ever have imagined possible.
People frozen in wild-eyed trance, eyes dilated from the bright lighting or mind-altering substances of choice, almost hidden in the deep, dark circles that surround them.
Men, women, and children with the hunger of savage beasts, obsessed with the violence and sadistic beatings.
Angry viewers worked into frenzy by masked maulers who revel in limp, broken, and sometimes dismembered bodies.
For those stimulated by intense, so-called, entertainment. Soon, jagged bones will protrude through torn flesh during an exuberant crescendo, yielding to the shaking, twitching overture to the pinnacle of death.
<><><><><>
The weekend blast-off for the biggest show yet, has arrived. And so far, every show’s attendance has outnumbered the last.
Paid seating for the fairgrounds at slightly over 23,000 has already overfilled. Standing room only areas have overflowed, pushing paying patrons outside the park gates.
Clusters of potential customers, with no possibility of getting in, line both sides of the adjacent roadways for miles, all with the intentions of attending the giant cage’s action-packed main attraction.
The masses swarm yards, parking lots, then driveways and the streets. Jumping hedges and fences, sitting on shoulders, climbing trees, and now even scaling walls to reach the rooftops of houses and buildings, desperate to catch any glimpse of the mayhem.
A humongous, perfectly round globe shape, built of steel girders bolted and welded into diamond designs brace and support the cage’s Plexiglas liner.
Impeccably cleaned and disinfected between every match to remove germs and wash away the blood smears and particles that hinder fans’ fight visibility.
The countdown to show time is twenty-two minutes and counting.
Party animals grow impatient and become rowdier by the second, throwing cans, bottles, and rocks to display their frustrations.
Gut Wrench Walter verses Ball Basher Burke, the feature matchup. The event everyone is waiting to see.
After two-long weeks of jaw jousting threats and predictions, the observers are ready for some real eye gouging, ear biting, brawling bloodbaths of combat.
Bang, bang, bang, three quick blasts, unmistakable sounds of pistol shots.
Then, a frosted-green Rolling Rock bottle whistles through the air smacking an unsuspecting young girl on her right-orbital bone and lays it wide open. Her sliced skin droops down over her eye, dangling like chicken-liver on her cheek.
More shots ring out, concussive sounds from tinny to deep, and definitely from different grain bullets and caliber firearms.
Thrown rocks bust out windshields and cause drivers to lose control. Glass from the vehicles shatter and explode into pebble-sized fragments as they crash and run off the roads.
A white, convertible Mercedes's tires screech as it slides, giving prelude to a deafening metal-to-metal crash. The ejected driver hangs in a tree.
Almost simultaneously, another car slams headlong into a mammoth Norway maple with a deadened thud, its horn stuck, blaring.
Flames ignite, and the driver’s face melts as the stench of burning flesh overwhelms the onlookers.
Then, knees go weak and stomachs twist in knots at the horrific sight of a truck that never slows down, mowing over a congregation of innocent people who are only trying to escape the madness and go home.
Pushing and shoving, people surge picking up steam as they walk on top of those who have fallen. Giving swift kicks to those hysterical and smothering, desperately struggling to get up.
Nothing can stop the tidal wave in motion, a human tsunami leveling everything in its path with the force and precision of an asphalt roller.
The delirious revelers stampede up the steep-angled service ramp, streaming into the cage in droves.
Fighting everywhere, weaponless bystanders at the mercy of armed crusaders who smile at every fearful scream or crying child’s tears, thrilled to be hurting anyone.
Merciless beatings fueled by rage and executed with stolen shovels, brooms, bats, and crowbars from the looted homes, garages, and offices.
There is no sign of the hundreds of house and business owners. Obviously frightened away by those who, had at first seemed normal, now morphed into crazed lunatics on the warpath.
Ransacked contents and belongings strewn everywhere, from undergarments to refrigerators.
Reminiscent images of a city dump in Bangladesh.
People nosedive from rooftops, pitched by guilty aggressors. Screams echo, arms and legs flailing as their bodies plummet. Pleasure seekers cheering the repulsive trauma and terminate impacts.
On its rotating axis, with the entranceway still open, bodies fly out of the cage as flimsy projectiles waving in the wind every time the opening swings around to the bottom side.
Helpless victims torpedo toward diminishing groups below. Resembling a porous net as those catapulted hit the ground between them, mangled messes in puffs of dust. Prior to contact, someone in the crowd, yells, “Bombs away!” followed by an upsetting roar of laughter.
The production tower stands four stories tall, the exact height of the cage’s concrete and steel base.
Inside, Art and Homer watch the psychotic rampage through the tinted glass of their dream-come-true venue’s controls. Witnessing the park's sudden demise by the very out-of-control followers who made it a success.
Bodies seen from the tower cover the grounds like an extra-generous helping of Dip-n-Dots, some of the injured wail in agony, while many never move or make a sound.
An alarm blares. Art yells for Homer, “They’ve broken into the first floor.”
A second alarm goes off. The intruders heard trashing the second floor.
Art and Homer cornered with nowhere to go, convinced that no amount of begging and pleading can persuade pity from the outlaw gang. Trapped in what was to be their “Never Never Land,” doomed to the invader’s will.
Sure enough, the fourth floor’s metal door slams down with a rumble and the whole building shakes.
The freak hellions wrap Homer and Art in ropes and chains, as they yank and pull them down all four flights of stairs, kicking and stomping arms, legs, heads, and whatever is seen exposed.
By now, most able bodies have gone, leaving only the dead and disabled that litter the midway of refreshments, outlets, and game booths.
Few remaining stragglers hobble along, dragging others on blankets or pieces of cardboard, still in panic mode, trying to get away.
The elevator door opens for the ride up to cage level.
Two burly, bearded-goliaths of men snatch up Art and Homer and literally heave them into a heap in the cab’s left-rear corner. The biggest of the boorish, barbarian oafs jumps on top to sit.
The ride up is quick. At least for all but the owners turned captives, with the man of gargantuan proportion crushing them.
Soon as the door opens, the behemoth men pull the two spivs, Art and Homer, out by handfuls of hair and the seats of their pants as they whimper like little pansy-assed girls.
Hard to imagine how these gourd heads could have created intimidating tough-guy personas and masterminded such brutal entertainment, now proven pretentious cowards.
Down unfolds the arched-entry chamber and before it is all the way open, the massive brutes grab Art and Homer around the throats with both hands and throw the wannabe entrepreneurs winging it into the cage.
The safety latch shut and a carter-pin inserted, the ousted renegade promoters have become prisoners of their own domain.
The cage slowly begins to turn.
Art and Homer walk to stay upright, looking all around for anyway out, but of all people, they should know there is none.
Faster and faster the cage spins.
Centrifugal force glues the riders tight against the wall. Accelerating even faster still, until it takes their breath, the mighty pressure distorting their faces.
Then, the cage starts to flip and spin in all directions, showing its enhanced power and mechanical efficiency. Intense, nimble maneuvers comparable only to the dexterous robotic hand, and far superior to any carnival ride or space research-training module.
In an instant, the cage stops.
The men fall, smashing to the ground with a splat, and no sooner have they flopped than the mega cage rolls again, repeatedly, as if having a mind of its own?
All but a few people have gone when a young boy pushes the emergency-power button gearing the cage down to a crawl, and then it stops.
Art and Homer the two sick-minded adventure-seekers torn and crumpled, lie motionless, lifeless.
Leaving behind a certain sense of justice for the warped and so insensitive, those who would produce and enjoy such a slaughter of the ignorant and oblivious.
Local and state police finally race in to the rescue, making a grand entrance of flashing lights and loud speakers. Unfortunately, yet as expected, arriving too late to make a difference.
As a journalist, wanting to point out all that I can see, and so much that I was unable to hear from a safe distance, I do hope that readers will not find this piece primarily about blood, guts, and dysfunction.
It is more of an honest admission and observance concerning the weak and easily misguided “Monkey see, Monkey do” mentality of human animals.
 Recognized |
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