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Caine practically threw her hand up and down as he shook it, laughing. “Yes! It worked! I’ve got another one!”
She took as big of a step back as she could, shouting the only word that came to her head: “Huh???”
“Welcome…” He floated up to the stage, stopping at the top to loom over her. “… to the Amazing Digital Circus! You’re going to love it here, my dear Pomni!”
“Your dear what?” He swept down to her, grabbed her hand, and dragged her up onto the stage. “Hey!”
“I’ve got a plethora of acts prepared for you, Pomni! Let’s do them all right now!”
As if by magnets, her wrists and ankles shot back until they hit a target behind her, fastening even though there were no visible straps. Caine casually pulled out a knife from a bunch he had just conjured.
She gasped. “Wait a second--!” she screeched.
Every single one of the knives went straight into her flesh. The whole time, she screamed and begged him to stop, but it was as if he couldn’t hear her.
When the “act” was done, the target dropped her and disappeared, but the knives remained. She fell to her hands and knees, panting and trembling violently. Caine laughed and clapped. “That was amazing, my dear!” He conjured a cannon. “Let’s try this one next!”
Several more butchered circus acts came and went, and no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t get Caine to stop, slow down, or even explain to her what was going on.
He also kept calling her that strange thing: “Pomni”. What did that mean? Was it some sort of weird nickname?
Caine grabbed her and spun her around with glee, while she panted from exhaustion, feeling sick. “Oh, I am so happy to have a new friend! I know I have some already, but I can never have enough! I can’t wait for you to meet them, but first…” He snapped his fingers, and all the knives and such disappeared from her body. She gave a small sigh of relief, though most of the pain was still there. “… I thought you might like to see your new form.”
He snapped his fingers and conjured something in front of her. She instinctively squeaked and covered herself before realizing this wasn’t another weapon. It was a mirror. She gasped at what she saw in the reflection.
A clown.
A jester.
A fool.
She shook her head in disbelief and horror.
Every hurtful thing that people had thought of her was staring back at her.
Caine clapped his hands with delight. “Oh, you look positively smashing, my dear!”
No, I don’t! she thought. I look like an idiot! Still looking in the mirror, she grabbed one end of the jester hat and pulled. She shrieked, not expecting it to hurt so much, but she didn’t stop. Tears streamed down her burning face as she kept yanking and yanking, despite the stinging pain.
Oh, but Caine loved the sight! He laughed and laughed and laughed to the point where tears began to appear in his own eyes. Even though the audience seats were all empty, she felt as though an entire crowd was laughing at her. She hyperventilated. If the hat wouldn’t budge, then maybe the other accessories would? She tried to peel off her gloves, then her shoes, all with the same results.
Finally, she gave up, fell to the floor, and sobbed in a ball of shame.
“Oh, you are a delight!” Caine wiped a tear as he finally wound down. “Welp, time to meet the others!” He teleported them both to a red hallway with many doors on either side. He pushed Pomni forward, but with the way she was digging her heels into the floor, it was like pushing a stone statue.
After everything she’d been through in the last 5 minutes alone, the last thing she wanted was to have to meet new people.
“EVERYONE, COME OUT AND MEET THE NEW CLOWN!” he shouted through a megaphone, making Pomni cover her ears.
“Please don’t call me that,” she murmured, burying her face in her hands.
One by one, the doors opened, the occupants peeking out warily before exiting their rooms.
“Everyone, this is Pomni!” Caine shoved her hands down, making her squeak. Once again continuing over her protests, he said “Pomni, this is your new troupe! Kinger, Ragatha, Gangle, Jax, and Zooble!” Despite him pointing out each one as he said their names, he rapid-fired through all of them so fast that Pomni couldn’t even hope to keep up. “Oh, and of course,” he removed his hat, and out came a bubble with beady eyes and razor-sharp teeth, “my pet Bubble!”
Caine petted it, and it let out a soft “Ahh…” as he did so.
Pomni chuckled nervously. “Cute,” she replied, half sarcastically.
“Isn’t he? I’ll leave you all to get acquainted.” Caine disappeared in a bunch of sparkles. Bubble looked around blankly for his owner in the silence that followed.
Slowly, Pomni turned to face the others with wide eyes.
A rag doll put her hands up against her cheek in an endeared smile. “Aww! Well, aren’t you a doll? I mean, not literally, but you know.”
“Oh, my gosh, hi! Another friend!” The red ribbon ran towards Pomni. Pomni cried and jumped back, and the ribbon tripped. Her cheery mask shattered on the ground, revealing a tearful one underneath. “Another victim.”
“So, what’re you in for?” asked the mess of shapes.
Pomni threw her arms out to the sides. “Nothing!” she squawked, flustered. “I just put on a headset and––”
They rolled their eyes with a huff. “Relax, newbie, I’m kidding,” they retorted, making her shrink back. “Same thing happened––”
“Oops! Almost forgot!” Caine reappeared, offering his hat to Bubble to float back into. It made Pomni feel better that she wasn’t the only one who screamed at his sudden reappearance. It made her feel worse when a purple rabbit snickered.
“Chickens,” he muttered.
“All right,” said Caine. “Now I’ll leave you all to get acquainted!”
With that, he disappeared again.
And then reappeared again. “Oh! And another thing!”
“Would you stop doing that?!” yelled a chess piece.
“If you look to your right or to your left, Pomni, you’ll see that each member of the troupe has their own room. This,” he floated to a door with a blank plaque, “is yours.” He snapped his fingers, and “✭Pomni✭” appeared on the plaque. “Please, feel free to use it whenever y—” She darted in instantly and slammed the door. “—oh.”
Pomni dove underneath a table and curled up in a trembling ball.
“Sorry about this, folks!” Caine called to the others. “When I said ‘whenever you’d like’, I didn’t think she’d take it to mean right now. One moment, please!”
“Um, maybe you should give her some space, actually?” suggested a small, sweet voice.
“Nonsense, Gangle! Everyone loves making new friends!” He opened the door. “See? She didn’t even lock the door!”
Pomni’s stomach dropped. She wanted to slap herself.
See, this is why everyone said what they did about you! her mind told her. Stupid, stupid—
“Pomni, you’ve barely met the others!” she heard Caine’s voice boom right next to her. “You know their names now, but that isn’t quite what I meant by ‘getting acquainted’!” He seized her leg and dragged her out. At first, she scrabbled at the ground, but upon realizing it was no use, she took to covering her face again instead. He dropped her just outside the room. “Now,” he said, firm yet still as cheerful as ever despite her disobedience, “you stay out here and get to know everyone properly! Until you’ve done that, these rooms are off-limits!” He snapped his fingers, and thick chains with dramatically large locks appeared on each door. With that, he disappeared again.
Pomni only curled in further on herself, burying her face in her knees. She didn’t want to meet these other AIs! She didn’t even want to look at them! After what Caine had already done to her, who knew what was coming next?
She whimpered as footsteps approached, and fabric rustled as someone knelt down next to her. “Hey, sweetheart,” the woman said just above a whisper. “I’m so sorry about Caine. He can get… a little pushy sometimes. He doesn’t mean it, honest. You’re safe here.”
An old man sighed. “Ragatha, please, please don’t lie to her. She needs our support right now, but she also deserves to know the truth.” Pomni turned away with a small whine as heavy footsteps hammered the ground straight for her.
Ragatha raised a hand. “Kinger, slow down! You’re scaring her!”
The old man winced. “I’m s-so sorry. It can be… hard to control my body at this point. Can’t stop… m-m-moving.” Taking a deep breath, he, too, knelt down before speaking to her. “Listen, child, Caine’s circus is a constant, living, waking nightmare, and all we have is each other, so we try to make the best of it. I’m so sorry that you’re here, but you’re here with us, and we with you.”
“Caine was wrong when he said that everyone likes making new friends,” said Gangle, “but sometimes it can be nice, right?” She hesitated, looking down and wringing her tiny, two-fingered hands together bashfully. “I mean, I’d like to be your friend, if you want.”
Pomni paused and thought. Well, I’m shy on the best of days, let alone after… all of that stuff, but if they promise they won’t hurt me… Pomni finally gained the courage to peek out at all of them. They certainly seemed sweet and supportive, but did they truly have her best interests at heart? She sighed. “I’m sorry. I really do want to trust you all, but I don’t think I’d be able to, even if you were human.”
“What is that supposed to mean?!” The mess of shapes advanced on her threateningly.
Pomni gasped, jumping up to back away with a hand held in front of her. “Huh? I-I don’t—”
“You think that just because you look more human than the rest of us, it makes you better or something? Huh?”
Ragatha held her hands towards them in a placating gesture. “I-I’m sure she didn’t mean it, Zooble!” She turned to Pomni with an unsure expression. “Right, sweetie?”
“Mean what?” cried Pomni. “What did I say?”
“You just said we weren’t human!” snapped Zooble.
Pomni blinked and stammered out her confusion. “Wait, are you— I thought… Aren’t you all AIs like him?” She pointed a thumb towards where Caine had disappeared.
Zooble’s furious response was interrupted by raucous laughter from the rabbit. “Wait,” he wheezed. “Wait, wait, you thought—” He took a few seconds to get a hold of himself before he continued. “Did it seriously take you this long to realize we weren’t some scaaaary AIs?” He clapped sarcastically. “Wow. You must be the second coming of Sherlock or something!”
“Jax, now’s really not the time,” hissed Ragatha. Zooble crossed their arms with a sigh and stared at the ground, most of the tension and hostility leaking out of their body.
Pomni recoiled, feeling like she’d been kicked as tears threatened to well up again. “Well, I… I don’t know! Everything here is so confusing…” She wiped her eyes.
“What was your name again?” Jax tapped his chin in mock thought. “’Palmy’ or some stupid clown name like that?”
“It’s… no!” she yelped. “My name is Pomni.” She flinched, blushing again, getting increasingly flustered as she kept trying to tell them her name. “I-I mean—! It-It— My-my-my-my name’s— is Pomni— I-I mean—!”
Kinger raised a hand toward her. “Easy, child! Don’t strain yourself,” he warned.
Jax snickered. “Yeah. Don’t fry your single brain cell too much.”
“That’s not what I meant,” the king replied, a bit of his frustration with the rabbit’s antics leaking through. He sighed and began to explain to her, “Another part of the cur-curse of being here is that we can’t say our real names. Whatever Caine decides to call you, that’s what you’re stuck with from now on.” He tensed and glanced around. “As you can tell… we are all v-v-very helpless in this wretched place.”
I can’t even tell them my name. More tears formed and fell, and she sniffled.
“Ohh, honey,” murmured Ragatha sympathetically. “Do you want a hug?” Pomni stiffened and shook her head, afraid that Ragatha would give her one anyway. Instead, Ragatha simply nodded and moved on. “For what it’s worth, I think ‘Pomni’ is an adorable name. I hope you’ll grow to like it, too.”
Pomni spent some time just breathing. When she felt better, she asked “So, um… n-no offense, I-I-I’m just trying to understand: Are you guys all… humans like me?”
Kinger nodded grimly. “Oh, yes. It was so long ago for me that I barely remember anything before being sent to this hellish realm. I do dream about it sometimes, though.”
“Kinger’s been here longer than any of us,” Ragatha explained.
“Makes him real fun to mess with,” added Jax. He sprang towards Kinger and yelled “Boo!”, giggling at the wooden man’s shout of fright.
Once Kinger recovered, he choked out “It hurts. It hurts so much. Our wounds heal quickly, but it still hurts so much.”
Gangle nodded. “We do get torn up a lot.”
“Buuuuuut you get used to it after a while!” Ragatha added loudly, trying to detract from the others. “It becomes fun, even!” She laughed nervously, and everyone gave her various degrees of ‘are you kidding me?’ expressions. She cleared her throat. “Anyways, honey, do you want us to show you around? This place is… weird, but it could still help you acclimate.”
Pomni nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, okay.” She paused. “Thank you all.”
Zooble sighed. “C’mon, newbie,” they said, much softer than before, as they and everyone else began to stroll out of the hallway.
“Hey, let’s show her that big cliff first.” Jax winked. “For no particular reason at all.”
Ragatha rolled her eye. “Jax.” She turned back to Pomni. “You’ll get used to him, too.” Pomni giggled, and Ragatha beamed. “Hey, there you go, honey!”