Flip the Coin [BL]

Henry’s POV

Feeling the familiar push, I stumbled forward.

Hahahahh, falling had never felt this wonderful.

Seeing the fire rings around me, I was sure I would land in the pool of paper planes, but instead, I fell into a pool of blood.

The iron fluid surrounded me, seeping into my clothes, into my nose and mouth as I sank deeply, fully surrounded, fully engulfed.

I moved my arms, instinctively trying to surface, and I eventually managed to swim up.

When I broke to the surface to take a deep breath, however, I was suddenly again standing on the flexible platform, felt the push again, and fell yet again.

Before I could process what had just happened, not a trace of the blood around me or on me was left, and I landed comfortably in the pool of confessions with all the paper planes I could have wished for.

Finally, finally, I am back.

Dazedly, I laughed, greedily reaching out for my confessions.

"Thank you, thank you, my love!" For coming to get me, for not leaving me behind.

I gathered the paper planes in my arms, burrowing my face in them to inhale greedily.

My hoodie was back on me too, my god, providing his believer with everything he ever wanted—

-With the exception of his presence.

With the exception of a presence that could be touched, hugged, and taken, reducing the believer to just that—someone blindly believing in his existence that surely, surely had to be out there.

I froze at that thought, then squeezed the paper planes, gathering them continuously, but because of the number and my limited capability, they slipped through my fingers like sand.

"KENNY!" I roared and looked around; Danny was standing in front of his unicycle, staring strangely at me, and so did the twins above.

But I didn’t care.

"KENNY, WHERE ARE YOU?!"

I brought my hand to the soft ears in my hair, losing more of the paper planes I so desperately clung onto.

I reached for my left cheek that had been ripped off in fear that Kenny’s wasn’t coming out because of how repulsive this monster had become... and found it healed.

I brought my hand to my back, finding it healed as well.

The blood pool... Kenny healed me...

This... sucking me into his space from another world, healing me...

I...

He really...

FUCK!

How much energy did that cost him in addition to maintaining the circus??

"FUCK!" My thoughts spilled, my grip on the paper planes tightening as I hated myself for even thinking that the Maestro would have the power to steal part of a god.

To foolishly follow him to eventually only cause more harm than good.

To sin continuously.

"They are hurt..." I looked at my confessions that I had just grabbed too hard and tried to flatten them again, panic taking over me.

"Henry, what is..."

I didn’t register Danny’s voice, suddenly remembering that with my fall from above countless paper planes had already been hurt.

I sprang to my feet, but when I did, I hurt them only more by stepping on them.

No... I didn’t... I would never want to hurt him.

"What is going on? Where were you all this time?"

I ignored the voice and lunged out of the pool to avoid stepping on them.

I fell face-first on the sandy ground outside with hay under it.

"Are you alright? What’s going on?"

I pushed Danny away and stood up before turning and stumbling over the red and white barricade.

I walked out, the daylight blinding me.

Kenny, Kenny, Kenny.

Where is he?

With a hand shielding me from the afternoon sun, I moved forward, turning randomly left to search for Kenny when I heard an aging voice calling out for me.

"HANNIBAL HENRY DEVIN!"

Kenny, Kenny, Kenny.

I turned around and saw Mrs. Howard in her wagon.

She was holding onto the bars in front of her, still closed in the long beige skirt and beige blouse with a big black ribbon on her collar.

Her beard was thrown over her shoulder, just like before.

"YOU WILL COME HERE, RIGHT THIS SECOND!"

I forced my heavy legs to her, the fear feasting on my ability to think and to move.

Where is he?

"DRINK!"

When I was in front of her, she stuffed the bottle of brandy through the bars right into my hand.

"Take a few slow sips and concentrate on the taste."

I did as I was told, feeling the burning sensation in my mouth, down my throat, and in my stomach soon afterward.

"Stop." Mrs. Howard ripped the bottle away from my hands.

"Breathe now."

I did as I was told, breathing in deeply, which accelerated the burning in my mouth but also gave me oxygen I had neglected to take in.

The alcohol couldn’t possibly work on me already, but the placebo effect it brought with it let my nerves relax a good deal.

"Have you come back to yourself?" Her aged gray eyes scrutinized me.

I nodded while letting go of a long breath.

"Yes. Thank you." I only noticed now that her wagon had been fully furnished in the meantime.

A bookshelf with books on the side, and in addition to the leather chair and little table, there was also a long chaise longuescreaming elegance and money.

"Where have you been for the last days? Why is there suddenly light?" She pointed upwards.

I looked up, only now understanding what such a big change meant.

I hummed.

"One of his counterparts was harming Kenny. A part of him was sucked into this world as well, and I killed him." It shouldn’t have been days, though.

I looked to my right, where an even bigger surprise waited.

The ’right dirt path’ had shrunk; it wasn’t nearly as long as before, and instead of ending in a stone street that would bring one to the right and out of the area, there was just part of a normal forest.

No firs.

"WHAT?" She bellowed, but I interrupted her.

"Was Kenny ever in a circus? Maybe as a child?"

Stumped, she needed a moment before answering.

"He surely had visited one or two! Do you know how spoiled..." She stopped before changing her words.

"When his mother was alive, they did many things..." She looked past me as if trying to recognize the area but didn’t seem to.

"I wouldn’t have accompanied them everywhere with my old bones."

I hummed again.

"The changes from night to day should be because the influence on this world brought by Kenny’s counterpart has now been gone. I’ll have to take a look around."

She reluctantly gripped the bars again before eventually harrumphing.

"Good then! Don’t dawdle and hurry up!" She bellowed after me while I turned back to the big circus tent.

In front of it was no little clown, no one playing the violin—but it wasn’t enough to confirm it with absolute certainty, given how long I did need to leave the tent.

I turned right again, this time walking behind the wagons, on the same path the woman had dragged the little child with his violin.

There were a few smaller tents, but not nearly as many as there had been before, at night.

And...I could see the view of a city in the distance.

I hurried up my steps but still noticed that the tent with the basin in front of it had been gone as well.

It didn’t take long until I recognized the city, even when I was currently looking down on it from atop of a big hill.

The strong wind that I hadn’t noticed before pulled on my clothes.

This was our city.

This circus had existed in two worlds, and while Kenny had visited it as a child, the Maestro had grown up in one as one of the extras.

Was the attraction of counterparts at work even without a portal connecting both worlds?

A coincidence?

It didn’t matter.

When Kenny had sucked everyone into his space, including the Maestro, the space displayed the only variable on the map that the two counterparts had in common.

Or maybe Kenny had just chosen a memory in which he had felt safe or a memory he had just recalled, and maybe the Maestro did accommodate it with his own childhood memories of a place they unintentionally shared at one point in time.

Whatever the case was.

I know where Kenny is.

He is amidst the visitors of this circus and possibly in the form of a child.