Bingo debated on whether or not he should try out that roller coaster one last time while waiting for the Carnies to come after him.
“You think that thing would still hold my weight?” the clown asked the cleaners.
Clyde looked up at the rusty spiral of metal. “That thing? I doubt it could hold the weight of a chinchilla.”
Bingo was about to try it out anyway until he heard the footsteps racing toward them.
“Here they come,” Caesar said.
Before Bingo could even see if the machine was still operational he found himself surrounded by scruffy vanilla tattooed men with rolled-up sleeves and black suspenders. All of them were grunts and they were all better armed than the guys who’d hit him back at Isabella’s place.
“Well, I guess it’s time we got started,” Bingo said, slapping his knuckles together.
But the Carnies didn’t attack. They just formed a human wall around them, keeping them from getting away. The two cleaners inched their way behind the massive clown at their side.
“What do they want?” Clyde asked.
Bingo shrugged. “I guess they want us to wait here.”
The Carnies opened a path and let four of their men through.
“Who are they?” Caesar asked.
“They must really think we’re something,” Bingo said. “Sending their four generals out to greet us? I figured we’d have to kill a few dozen of them before they sent even one of the generals out.”
When Bingo saw the four generals, he recognized them from the first and only time he’d visited Carnival Island twelve years ago. Back then, they were lowly sideshow attractions. But now they were the lords of an army. There was Petunia the Bearded Lady, who was no longer as beautiful as Bingo remembered. She’d become a muscled beast of a woman with fists like bricks and a patch over her left eye. Then there was Gustav the Knife Thrower, smiling through his salt-and-pepper beard. Enzo the Human Pretzel, a scrawny bald man wearing only a loincloth, walked out on his hands with his legs tied around the back of his neck. And finally, there he was, the man who’d almost killed him all those years ago, the only man Bingo had ever met who was stronger than he was—Orlando the Strong Man.
Bingo eyed the strong man down as the generals approached. The big guy had aged more than a decade and Bingo had packed on twice the amount of muscle he’d had when he was nineteen, not to mention all the fighting experience he’d gained working for the Bozo Family. He wondered if Orlando could still take him, especially if he had all three of the other generals backing him up.
“You’ve got a lot of nerve coming here, clown,” said Orlando the Strong Man. “After what you did, there’s not a man on this island who isn’t dying to tear you limb from limb.”
Bingo had no idea what the guy was talking about. The beardy Carnie back at Isabella’s place had said the same thing.
“And what is it you think I did?”
The strong man ignored his question. “You’re not getting out of here alive.”
Bingo wondered if he’d done something to them during one of the fuzzy spots in his memory. He didn’t at all like the Carnies. Given the opportunity, there wasn’t much he wouldn’t have done to them.
“Look, whatever I did I’m sure you scumbags deserved it,” Bingo said. “But what I want to know is what you creeps did with Melinda and Isabella.” He waited for a response, but they weren’t talking. “I’m sure I’ll have to kill a good number of you before you take my request seriously, but if you give them back to me in one piece then I’ll see what I can do about sparing the rest of your lives.”
The Carnies weren’t listening to the clown. They had bloodlust in their eyes. Whatever Bingo’d done to them, they weren’t going to rest until either he or they were dead.
“Okay, I’ll take the big one,” Bingo said to Clyde and Caesar. “You guys take the knife thrower and the bearded lady.”
The two cleaners dropped their mouths open.
“What?” Caesar cried. “You expect us to fight them?”
“Would you rather just sit there and watch?” Bingo asked.
“That’s exactly what we hoped to do,” Clyde said.
Bingo cracked his knuckles and then rubbed his round red nose. “You guys really don’t know a good time when you see one.”
The four generals attacked first, all of them going after Bingo and leaving the cleaners to hide on the sidelines. When Bingo’s fist collided with Orlando’s, he realized that the strong man hadn’t lost any of his might after twelve years. The blow sent the clown stumbling back. If it were one-on-one, Bingo thought that maybe he could’ve taken the strong man. But he quickly learned that he was no match for the four of them working together.
The bearded lady lit a match and blew a cloud of fire into Bingo’s face. As he smacked out the flames, Enzo the Human Pretzel wrapped himself around the clown, turning himself into living bondage.
“What the hell’s with this guy?” Bingo said with smoking eyebrows.
He tried to pull the human pretzel off his back, but the wiry man only tightened his grip on Bingo’s arms, making himself impossible to reach. Then Orlando punched Bingo in the stomach until the clown went slack.
“You’re probably pretty amazed by how much stronger I am than you, eh?” Orlando said, punching Bingo in the ribs. “You have far more body mass than I do, but you see, I have something you lack.” He punched him in the jaw as Enzo tightened his inhuman elbow around the clown’s throat. “I’ve got steel rods implanted throughout my body. Nobody in this town’s tougher than me.” He punched him in the face again, knocking a tooth loose. “Especially not some gutter clown like you.”
When Orlando kneed Bingo in the stomach, the clown could feel exactly what the big man was saying. Bingo fell to the ground. Then the Carnies took turns beating him as the human pretzel tightened his hold on him.
“This isn’t good,” Bingo said, as his eyes went foggy. “Damn Carnies. I can’t believe they got me again…”
The clown couldn’t help but chuckle as he passed in and out of consciousness. He had a strong feeling of déjà vu.