Part Five: Time for the Obligatory End of Level Boss Battle

The red and white of the now fully-formed big top loomed over me as as I strode towards it, seeming to grow taller and more warped with every step. When I finally reached the entrance, it towered above me like some ancient (stripy) fortress. Holding onto every last shred of the courage that Barry had stirred within me, I walked through the threshold and quickly found myself in an impossibly vast space, the gritted ground of the circus floor stretching out into the gloom, encircled by rows of empty benches. The roof of the tent was not visible, only darkness lay overhead.

As I strained my eyes to adjust to the dimly lit arena before me, it seemed as though some of the shadows around the periphery were moving. I squinted in frustration, trying to make sense of what I was seeing. The shadows continued to fluctuate, and then began drawing together in a wholly unnatural and frankly very creepy way. Shapes, perhaps even figures, were forming before me in the darkness, but who or what they were I simply could not see. Feeling panic rising within me, I looked furtively around for some source of light, and quickly – to my great relief – saw a huge directable spotlight, set a little to the right of the entrance. I rushed over to it and threw the switch up, and it blazed into life. The dazzling light was almost too much for my eyes, which were just becoming accustomed to the dimness, but I quickly found levers on the back of the spotlight stand and figured out how to direct its beam. I shone it directly at the place where the shadows had been forming, but there was nothing to be seen.

Leaving the light in place, I reluctantly ventured over to the very spot where I could have sworn I had seen someone, or something, lurking – but there was no sign of life or movement. As I stepped out of the beam to begin walking back to the spotlight, from the corner of my eye across the other side of the arena, I sensed movement in the darkness and again could make out distant shadowy figures. I quickly rushed back to the spotlight and wrenched it around to shine on the location, but to no avail; the source of the shadows had gone. Exasperated, I saw now that shadows were forming back in the original spot I had seen them. It seemed that I and the darkness were at an impasse, and if I was to progress any further, one of us would have to give way.

As I reached to pull the switch down and plunge myself back into the gloom, in the hope that whatever lurked out there would show itself fully, I noticed that the switch had not two positions but three. The top one was labelled “Light” and the middle “Off”, but the third – bizarrely – was labelled “Dark”. Dark? But that is what you get with the absence of light, i.e. the “Off” position. It didn’t make any sense, but I figured it was worth a try. I pulled the switch down to the central position and then down again. What I saw next was almost beyond description.

The beam of light had become a beam of darkness, the blackest most complete and total darkness I had ever seen, far beyond the simple absence of light. The darkness was so absolute, so all-consuming, that I felt I might be sucked into it just by looking at it; this was the opposite of being blinded by brilliant light, somehow, it swallowed up everything it touched, and I felt that it wanted to consume me too. In the area where the shadows had been before, the figures were now visible in the total blackness, and although I was registering that they were only a darkish grey in colour, they glowed almost angelically against this intense super dark beam.

The figures had looked humanoid to begin with, but they were growing larger, twisting into outsized, freakishly proportioned creatures, something so primal and absolutely the opposite of human that the word “inhuman” seemed completely inadequate to describe. I watched in horrified fascination as the shapes became more solid, and what had been mere shadow, now like light within the impossible blackness, became three-dimensional. And as my brain was finally able to begin to make sense of the vision before me, I realised that I was looking at…

A piercing whistle blasted through the arena, so loud that I could swear my skull was actually rattling. Without warning or interaction on my part the spotlight switched back up into the “Light” position, the shadows evaporating as the spotlight swung itself to the centre of the arena. Standing there was a man who looked somehow familiar. He looked a lot like me, but with slicked-back hair and ridiculously upright posture. He was dressed in a black shirt with white highlights and black shorts. He had a scowl on his face and his hands were on his hips, and there in his mouth – presumably the source of that awful sound – was a whistle. He was unmistakable in his distinctiveness as he began to stride towards me, moving as though he had a stick shoved up his ass, waggling his finger and blowing on that infernal whistle again. This was going to be interesting.