“Now Come one come all to our tragic affair. Miguel Pablo invites you to The Cirque du Bella Murete. At his own Necromancy Theatre this all Hollow’s Eve!!”

The year is 3023 and the world has partially re-built itself after the near total apocalypse caused by World War Three. The world is once again as prudent as it was in the age of the Victorians yet we being the human race we are still fascinated by the macabre and the infamous Miguel Pablo supplies the small town of Mirsue with this fascination. Though a large portion of the town frown upon it in the open, many of them are regular attendees to see his shows.

Miguel Pablo’s troop consist of the unnaturally tall man in the top hat himself, His two vampire assistants Maria and Bella, The childish and slightly psychotic ringmaster, the many musicians, the trapeze twins with the ability to turn into snakes, a group of living dolls and a slightly psychopathic lycan child.

With this extensive troop of performers Miguel Pablo and his Necromancy theatre have become know around the near empty rock that makes up our once prosperous earth. And now you get to be part of his troop, or maybe you’re just a curious resident in town come to see the show. Whoever you are. I believe that tonight you will either be morbidly fascinated or scared and disgusted.

If there is one thing all people agree about the shows Miguel and his troop perform it is that they are not for the faint of heart.

And we hope to see you there. If you’re not too scared.



Maria stared out of the old dusty theatre window, watching a few of the kids from the town playingin the empty expanse of land between the edge of town and the home of the Cirque. They were lucky in her eyes, they would never know the horrors of war, they would never see man grow corrupt again. They would never lose they're love ones to another human being. Her eyes were sad as she watched them but she had a small smile playing on her lips, she was no longer thinking of how lucky the children outside were but of children she had once hoped to have and never had.

Aio was sitting on the stage, swinging her legs as she read the little booklet inside the case of a CD she'd scavenged years ago. She new the words by heart but looking at the pictures was something she never got tired of, she had three favorites one of a large bat winged creature,a skull for a head on a very tall rollocoster, One of a silloette in a bed, demons clawing at the bottom and three angles, wearing headphones lifting a skeleton upwards and the final one was of two skeleton's a man and a woman, facing eachother their hands on eachothers waists each holding a knife behind they're backs.

Lao Tzu leaned against a tree just outside the home of the Cirque, playing is flute as he usually did. He wasn't bothered by the fact that he couldn't remeber anything over a year ago or that many of the people in town shunned him or thought him as evil for being in the Cirque. He supposed it had something to do with them not being "normal". What was normal, anyway? He didn't exactly know. The musician just took the world as it was, normal or abnormal never reallly mattering much to him.

Kian watched the girl across the field. He knew that she was from the Cirque du Bella Murete and he yearning to ask her about it. The Cirque was the type of thing that adults told kids never to goto or even think about but by doing so, they inflamed the children's imaginations about it.
"Don't stare at her, Kian. My mom says those Cirque people have the Evil Eye," one of his friends whispered to him.
"What the hell is the Evil Eye?" Kian asked, raising an eyebrow.
"I don't know. It's like, when she stares at you, you get sick or die," his friend told him with a shudder.
"Sounds useful," Kian commented with a grin.
"Then go talk to her," his friend dared him with a smirk.
Kian shuddered and made up an excuse, "Er... My parents told me not to."
"Chicken," his friend told him superiorly.
"You don't know what that even is," Kian told his friend.
"It's what you are," his friend told him simply.
"I'm still not doing it," Kian told him.

Maria looked back at the children, making occasional glaces at her. She sighed but tried to smile kindly at them, she hoped she'd suceeded. She hadn't smiled when she was paying attention to the current world for nearly a centuary. She let the smile drop, she remembered a time when she never stopped smiling or laughing but she hadn't done that for a long time. "We're not evil," She whispered, though the children where much to far away to hear and only one or two where close enough to even see her lips move, let alone make out the words.

"Moo!" Kian's friend told him mockingly, "Moo, moo, moo!"
"That's not how a chicken sounds like," Kian told him, being effected by his friend's teasing despite himself.
"You would know, chicken," his friend told him triumphantly.
"Fine. I'll talk to her and I'll tell you she's not evil," Kian told him angrily as he marched towards the Cirque woman. To tell the truth, he was curious about the Cirque but his fear sort of held him back. Now, however, he was too angry at his friend to care. He smiled nervously at the vampire when he reached her and said, "Hi."

Maria looked up, her lips twitching up slightly,"Hello." The boy was an innocent looking creature,with big trusting eyes that held the faintest glimmer of fear. They were a pretty colour to in Maria's eyes, nearly gold but not quite and his hair was bright aswell. She smiled as a memory ran through her head before it was gone again," I don't think your parents would like you talking to me. Humans haven't change much over the centuaries, they don't like people who are different to them." She snapped out of her thoughts relising that the sentence she had just verbalised made it oh so slightly apparent that she was no longer human.

"You're not human?" Kian asked the girl nervously but with curiosity shining in his eyes, "You're right, my parents don't want me going anywhere near the Cirque. They're sort of scared of you guys. Everyone is. If you're not human, what are you?"

Maria sighed,"Some of us are human, there are the dolls aswell of course. Me? I am ledgend of a creature, one who walks among the famous living dead as it were,a vampyre. Even before the war there were few of our race. Now me, my sister and the ringmaster of the Cirque are the only ones left." She sighed again,"Tell me, why are they scared of us? We are different true, the things we do revolve around the horror of times long passed but we only do it to earn a living. Just as your parents work to put food on the table so must we, well technically speaking I don't eat..." She shook her head."You seem a nice boy, the sort I would have liked to have," She smiled,"I'm glad you'll never see the corruption of men."

Kian felt himself gulp when she mentioned she was a vampire but she didn't seem interested in sucking his blood. He immediately started feeling sorry for being scared of the nice girl before him. He spoke, "I guess, everyone's scared of things that they're not familiar with. I don't know about not seeing the corruption of men. My mom says that some people will always be mean or selfish. She told me that was why the War was started."

Maria nodded,"Your mother's wise. All wars start from a act like that. Not so much when I was young...human but more so as technology advances, as people become more greedy. And when the war starts people fight, because they think they're lives will be better if their side wins or just to justify the pain war brings to families,"Her eyes dropped to the ground, a mournful far away look crossing her face. She looked back at him,"In time long after you, maybe even after I'm gone the human race will become as corrupted as it was and once again we'll come back to this." She looked over at the other children,"I don't suppose you friends will come and talk to me to will they? But just one thing, tell that one over there,"She otioned over to the once of Kian's friends who had been calling him a chicken,"That chickens are...were a type of bird and definatly didn't go moo."

"That's sad," Kian commented, thinking about what the vampire said to him. He smiled at her correcting his friend, "I'll do that. By the way, I'm Kian. What's your name?"

((Wow. Didn't see this thing. Catching it up.))

Betty Liz was rocking back and forth on her heels. She was listening to a thing they called a CD way back a millenium ago. There always was trash and junk that nobody wanted around The Cirque. It was called "American Idiot", wherever that was. It was a rather loud song, but she learned that if you hated it, you had to learn to deal with it. Loud noises drove her up the walls, but it also let her do anything, like a drug. She never really got it, but then again, she never really got herself. The horror finally ended, and she took the headphones, or whatever they called them way back then, out.

She put the CD Player down in her room, and walked out onto the field to see Maria talking to someone. It looked like a kid that was a little older than her, but the same height, as lycans were taller than most people, so she was taller than the average kid. "Hey, Maria. Whatcha doing? And who's this?" She pointed at the guy she was talking to. She seemed to say this pretty fast, and was tapping her hand on her leg, being ready in case something happened, like someone bombed the place, or something attacked her or something. Hey, I'm jumpy, but what you gonna do when something does happen?

Kian looked up to hear someone say something really fast. He saw that it was a strange girl about his age. She looked as though she wasn't meant to hold still. He spoke, "I'm Kian. Who are you?"

"I'm Betty Liz, half lycan, half human. You intrested in the Cirque? About all the kids your age are. They always have those rumors about us." She looked up. The place was humongous, bigger than anything, she thought. She always felt that right here was almost hte center of the universe, where nothing could get to it. Not even nuclear war. It was her safe haven. "Especially me. They think I went insane because I killed my family, and if you stare at me, then you won't wake up tomorrow morning." She listened for a moment, seeing if anyone was walking in. Nope. No animals escaping, no nothing. Everything is fine, everything is fine, she told herself, and tapped her heartbeat on her side.

"You don't look like a murderer," commented Kian, not wanting to judge the girl like he previously judged the vampire, "You just seem to have too much energy. Did you take a stimulant or something? My dad says they're only for emergencies."

"No," Nai said. "She isn't a murderer. She's either trying to scare you or having another phantasm of the past." She dismissed it at that, but added to Betty Liz, "You should stop listening to that horrible CD. When you're all hysterica and jumpy like this I keep almost falling off." Nai readjusted her sitting position on the lycan's shoulder, gripping the fabric of her shirt a little tighter.

It must be strange for a nice kid like him to talk to a doll... one that's actually doll-size, Nai thought, but the only interaction she got with humans was with the few circus freaks who were human... and they weren't enough to satisfy her biting hunger. So she kept talking, her voice dripping with cynicism.

"She doesn't take stimulants, drugs, steroids, or any of the etcetera... She's just spastic. And insane. But not the psycho-killer type of insane, the jumpy, hysterical, voices-in-the-head type of insane." Nai shrugged this off as if it were the weather this week.

"So." Nai stated, lifting an eyebrow, "Who dareth to approach the Freaks of ze Cirque du Belle Murete? That takes guts. Or stupidity. Either way, what brings you to our side of town - that your mother undoubtedly warned you to stay away from?"

Maria sighed, looking at Kian,"Sorry about them. My names Maria though. The doll is called Nai." She smiled at him,"You should probably get beck to your friends but I hope to see you again some time, Kian."

After getting bored of looking at the pictures in the booklet, Aio went looking for Lao. When she found him jumped on his back. It was odd that despite her nature around others she acted much more openly towards him. She flicked one of the loose peices of hair next to his face, resting her head on his shoulder,"Lao-kun I'm bored!"

"I refer to myself as the actual insane, not the old movies insane." She turned to her doll best friend, Nai, who was standing on her left shoulder. "Sorry about that, I forgot you were there. But they're's no need to offend the guy, and don't go all question-y on him." She turned back to Kian, but looked past him and saw his awestrucken friend. She chuckled, and shook her head, careful to not knock Nai off. "You know, I understand why they think we're freaks, but why they shun us and are afraid of us, I don't really get. Think of how they would feel if we put them in some circus and was so suprised that they look different." she said, half to herself, half to Nai. "Oh, here I go, rambling on. Sorry about that, I hate to get rid of customers." How awkward are you?

"It's fine. Now that I'm actually talking to you, you guys seem funny and interesting," Kian told them with a strange. He cocked an eyebrow at the doll and poked him, accidentally knocking him over, but the boy managed to catch her, "Sorry about that."

Lao stopped playing his flute and smiled when he heard the familiar voice in his ear and felt the familiar weight on his back. He spoke teasingly, "Aio-chan, you get bored so easily. You must sit back and enjoy the Tao." The relaxed boy was grateful for Miguel giving him books containing the teachings of his namesake. He had recently become convinced that he was the real Lao Tzu reborn. Lao carefully ran his hand through Aio's hair and gently against her cheek. He never got over how it felt, different, but not doll-like exactly but just different.

((Nai is a girl >.>))

"And what's wrong with asking questions?" She demanded indignantly of Betty Liz.

Nai was about to say something back to Kian on his comment about the circus group being funny and interesting when he poked her with a large (to her) finger and, having enough trouble balancing on the shoulder of her friend with Betty Liz moving around so much, almost instantly lost her balance, teetering on the edge of the shoulder before falling with a mixture of a grunt-squeal. However, she did not have time to reach the ground, but was caught by the same terror that had knocked her over. Kian apologized.

"Why don't you poke someone your own size, eh?" Nai said coldly, standing up on Kian's hand and crossing her arms over the worn, faded dress that was one of the two or three things she owned that were her size: it was a light pink-purple with large dark pink-red flowers embroidered onto the flouncy, bouyant skirt, while the blouse of the dress was tight around her torso with buttons up the front that accented a cute but slight chubbiness that came from her previous body structure as a doll, a V-neck and puffy sleeves. Her glassy sea-green eyes were sarcastic, as always, and her porcelain face was framed by tapering hanks of gold-red hair that hung loose to a centimeter or so past her chin. Her small mouth was curled into a cynical frown.

She made no attempt, however, to move off Kain's hand since she was too far from Betty Liz's shoulder anyway; she simply waited for someone to realize this and put her back where she belonged.

"I'll remember to do that in the future," Kian told Nai apologetically as he lifted his hand to be level with Betty Liz's shoulder. He smiled at the energetic lycan, "So what's it like to be a lycan? I mean, I can't rely on the stories around town, can I?"