It’s all fun and games until someone loses an eye, then it becomes a sport.

  Terrible 20th century saying.

  *****

  Sci-Fi sat in a sterile hospital tent, her head hanging low over a pair of scuffed and dull oversized red shoes in her hands. They belonged to the person on the bed, though they lacked the parts below the knee needed to wear them. If it weren’t for the brightly coloured curly hair sticking out from the top of the heavily bandaged person she might not have known it was Cassy laying on the bed.

  The Big Top had assembled at the clarion call of the Cat from Montreal. Every friend of Cassy’s that could make it had followed the whimsical clown into the path of the falling moon.

  Sci-Fi laughed, perhaps a bit bitterly, to herself. Since meeting Cassy those months ago, the fear of fighting the antithesis had left her. The Clown had managed to make it all feel like a surreal game. No matter if they were in the thick of an incursion, or rebuilding a city, or teaching kids the best way to throw pies at balloon animals, it all felt like one of her carnivals.

  When they’d arrived in the Montreal A.O., a member of the joint forces had contacted them, told them what quadrants were theirs to protect. The motley crew of The Big Top, and their leader in motley, had fanned out, each pulling out their best and brightest toys, tools, and surprises.

  Sci-Fi had spent every last point she had on a new mech suit. It wasn’t as cool and fancy as the giant anime style one that marched with the menagerie, but she was proud of it all the same. She’d taken inspiration from another classic series of movies. Most people loved the movies for the parts where the main character played “super hero” when jacked into the machine's virtual world. She loved the parts where the last bits of humanity survived in a deep underground city. Those mech suits with their ape like arms, and massive rotary cannons had always put stars in her eyes. Bonus being she wouldn’t have to wait for a kid with a wheely cart to bring her ammo refills.

  Cassy had pulled a massive tent out of her pockets, and plunked it down in the middle of the forested area they had been assigned. The tent did its best to mimic military camo, but no one would ever mistake it for anything but the circus tent it was. Wooden hand scrawled signs had told its purpose, supply and medical aid. The surrounding area was soon bustling with minions, Cassy’s and the Game lady’s alike.

  The first waves from the moon fell soon after they arrived, Cassy had pouted about not having time to give one last rousing speech to the troops. She had found time to change her outfit though. She was General The Clown today, her motley matching the almost camo pattern of her tent, a helmet and licorice cigar to match Sgt. Fluffle finished off the look.

  In the battle that followed, Sci-Fi had lost track of the General more times than she could count, but every time she’d felt overwhelmed by the chaos and death around her, when she’d thought this was going to be her last hurrah, the crazy grinning Clown had bounced on springing shoes, or swooped in hanging upside down from her impossible flying watch, and relieved the pressure just enough that Sci-Fi could keep on going.

  The battle was hectic, but she was surrounded by friends: The kids sent from the potato king in L.A. With their potato planes, that looked like a cross between a WW2 mustang and a potato, firing spuds of every imaginable variety into the planty masses.

  Mistress of Games, getting more and more haggard every time they crossed paths, was throwing out drones and game pieces from every conceivable source she could find. Sci-Fi wasn’t sure what was injuring her more, the antitheses, or the horrors she was creating as she combined greater and greater varieties of games into a single chaotic ruleset. Italian plumbers playing holographic twister while swinging cartoon snakes would make most players start pulling out their hair.

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  When things had gotten their worst, Sci-Fi had done her best to stick by the young girl in the glorious mechanical frog. She hoped Cassy’s programming was filtering out the worst of the horror and gore around them. If not, she might have to start being concerned about the sheer amount of joyous giggling bursting from the frog as it crushed and swallowed the monsters falling around them.

  A shifting from the figure on the bed had Sci-Fi’s eyes snapping up to check on the bandaged clown. Still unconscious, just another sleep tremor. The wiggling of the IV lines and sensor leads brought back memories of the battle, she shuddered at the recollection.

  Cassy had brought her friend from Antarctica with her, a long way to travel for a guy she thought just made fancy, and very delicious, candy. She had been terribly wrong in her perceptions of the man. His happy Hawaiian shirt had disappeared under a dull black layer of shifting flesh, the mass of tentacles that composed his body below the waist had grown and grown.

  Lozenge might have started off as an aquatic Samurai from the ice cold oceans of the south, but he still managed to be utterly terrifying in the frozen forests of the north. The brief glimpses she had gotten of him during the fray had stirred images of what would happen if Cthlulu had discovered the joys of chemical weapons. She had stayed far far away from his area of control.

  It wasn’t until the all clear had been called that she had realized she hadn't seen or heard from Cassy for some time. On her way back to the supply tent she had found the shoes she now held, although there had been some red sticky syrup on them at the time. She’d cleaned it off, Cassy’s shoes were supposed to be bright and shiny, like her personality.

  The others were all off helping with clean up, or rebuilding, or giving aid to the injured. They’d all offered to buy healing things for Cassy, but Barty had spoken through a hovering drone. She had already consumed some powerful stuff, and just needed time. Besides, he had added, Cassy would prefer they spend their time and points on the other people that needed it.

  Sci-Fi shifted on the folding canvas chair, one of the shoes slipping slightly in her grasp, as it released a pair of red springs, with a sad little sproing. She sniffled softly, and wiped an arm across her face. “None of your stuff ever makes sense, you do the impossible with silly balloons and whipped cream. Heck, one of your best friends is a sapient trash bag! Why isn’t the magic working now? Why are you stuck here? We could, the world could… I, I could use a bit of laughter right now.”

  Cassy shifted on the bed, her voice came out muffled behind bandages. “If people need some joy, why are you sitting here moping? Get out there and tickle people! I bet one of your shows has a great episode about high tech tickles.”

  Sci-Fi’s head snapped up, the shoes dropped from her grip and she pounced, crying, on her friend.

  “Hey Barty, why am I covered in so many bandages, you said it was just my legs missing, and some massive head trauma I’d need to sleep off.”

  A speaker on the ceiling carried Barty’s voice. “I thought you might want to see my ideas for next halloween! Classic monsters from centuries past!”

  Cassy wrapped heavily bandaged arms around her crying friend, and gave a look down at her missing shins. “Barty. I think we might need to change the name from Moon Shoe Budget, to Moon Leg Budget”

  “Noted” Her AI replied softly.

  *****

  Half an hour later.

  Sci-Fi was still hugging Cassy on the hospital bed, although the bandages around her face had been unwrapped.

  “I could really go for some Ice cream about now. Mind giving me a piggyback ride to the mess tent Sci-Fi old friend?” Cassy said with a grin.

  “How is your makeup still perfect under all those wraps” Sci-Fi asked, as she lifted her friend into a piggy back ride.

  “Makeup? What makeup? Wait. Is there something on my face? You’d tell me if I had something on my face right?”

  “What face? I can’t see anything past that huge red nose!”

  “My Nose! A model 1 flew off with it! We must find it!”

  “It’s on your face Cassy”

  “Oh, so it is. Yay! Must have been a nightmare, it’s hard to tell the difference sometimes…”

  The two girls giggled together as they ambled toward the mess tent. The few trees still standing appreciated the sound greatly.

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