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“I’m excited to help host the scavenger hunt, I wanna give super cryptic clues and frustrate the shit out of some kids.” Kaboodle tapped her fingers together like an evil mastermind.
Rek smiled at her as he put some snow globes onto the shelf in front of him. They were supposed to be restocking the gift shop for the next day, but it seems that out of everybody there, he may be the only one doing it. “I’m excited to finally see it happen too! I’ve gotten plenty of glimpses from Branzy over the years but I’ve never actually been here while it’s happening.”
“How many kids are you gonna fool?” She picked up one of the snow globes that he had just put away and shook it a little to watch the snow inside fall.
He scoffed, “None, hopefully. Maybe I’ll even counteract your trickery by leading some kids straight to the items.”
Kaboodle gasped in mock offense, “You wouldn’t dare!”
“Oh, I totally would. In fact, maybe-” He was cut off by his phone vibrating in his pocket and pulled it out, holding a finger up to Kab as if to say “One moment please.” Shortly after, his face went pale. “ Shit- Branzy got bit, Jaron you’re in charge!” He shouted to everybody present before running off in a hurry.
Squiddo and Jaron visibly cringed, “Yowch…” Jaron said before returning to his conversation with Squiddo, still ignoring the work he was actually meant to be doing.
“Wait, bit by what? Like a snake? I haven’t seen any around here.” Kab furrowed her eyebrows in confusion.
“Nah, the rollercoaster.” Squiddo answered with a face far too neutral for literally anything she could be implying.
Baffled silence followed.
“The… the what?”
“The rollercoaster.”
Kaboodle took a step forward, her face reading of pure confusion and befuddlement. “Rollercoasters don’t have teeth, Squiddo…”
“It bit him.” Squiddo replied innocently, beginning to find this amusing.
“That doesn’t answer any of the questions we have, Squiddo. What does it mean to be bit by a rollercoaster?” Clown cut in, his body language giving away that he was, at the very least, a little tense.
“Eh, he’ll go to the hospital, maybe get some stitches, and come back flaunting his new scars.” She shrugged as if this whole situation was nothing more than a kind of strange tuesday.
Kab’s jaw dropped, and though no physical indications of it could be seen, Clown radiated shock as well. “WHAT??” They both asked in unison.
“How are you so calm about this?!” Kaboodle asked, now even more baffled than before, despite still not knowing what exactly a rollercoaster bite even was .
Squiddo let out a short laugh, “Well when this is, what, the 5th time?”
“Something like that.” Jaron interjected, his expression almost bored .
“You get used to it.” She finished, “He’ll be fine.”
~
The rollercoaster needed some minor repairs, and as usual, Branzy was happy to do them. This time it was just standard maintenance at the end of a busy season, he knew it wouldn’t be too difficult. Just replacing a few parts and touching up some others.
He reached out for one wire in particular that was looking a little unsightly, planning to replace it with a fresher one, but he quickly realized as he cut one of the ends that he had made a grave mistake.
In the blink of an eye, pistons slammed down on his arm at maximum force. He gasped, both from the shock and the sudden pain, continuing to breathe labored breaths through a grimace.
Now, of course, this wouldn’t be the first time Branzy’s found himself in a situation like this. In fact, it happens often enough that you’d wonder why he even still insists on fixing the rollercoaster by himself. He doesn’t have a good answer for that, as Rek would tell you.
He knew he had to get his arm out of the mechanics before he could do anything else, and he knew that that was going to suck. It always did. He tugged on his arm just a little bit, trying to gauge how easy it would be, and let out a strangled whine when the pain only got worse. Shit.
He moved his free arm to try and push the piston up. The pistons were strong, but he may be stronger. He pushed the piston, feeling it move just a bit. It was difficult, but he thinks he could do it.
He could feel his heart pounding against his ribcage, his mind sending fight-or-flight signals out even though Branzy knew he was fine. Unfortunately, that knowledge didn’t stop the shaking, or the blurred vision, or the uneven breathing. It didn’t stop the excruciating, crushing pain in his arm either, so who knows, maybe his brain has a point.
He took a deep breath and prepared himself for the pain that would follow once he’s free, and pushed up on the piston with all his might. The pressure lightened up just enough for him to yank his arm out, and he let the piston slam back into the ground as he scrambled away.
Almost instantaneously, his arm was aggravated by the change in pressure, but it also felt better now that the injury wasn’t being actively worsened.
He took a second to breathe as he processed that his arm was definitely bleeding. He should probably go to the hospital, just in case.
He reached over to his phone and hastily sent Rek a text asking if he could drive him to the hospital. Usually, he would drive himself so as to not bother anyone, but Branzy had a gut feeling that if Rek found out he did that while he was also present in the park, a damaged arm might not be all he had to worry about.
With help very likely on the way, Branzy decided to look for something to at least contain the blood with. He’d like to avoid bleeding all over everything, if possible. Luckily for him, he had brought a rag to wipe the oil and dirt off of his hands with, and he hadn’t used it yet, so it was still clean enough to use. It was small, it wouldn’t do much, but he pressed it over some of the more rapidly-bleeding wounds and applied pressure to them until Rek showed up.
“Branzy, oh my gosh, are you okay?!” He heard said man calling out as he rounded the path near the ferris wheel, picking up his pace as soon as Branzy was in sight.
“Eh, I’ll be alright, this isn’t my first rodeo… I just figured you’d probably kill me if I didn’t let you take me to the hospital.” Branzy gave a sheepish smile, standing up and taking a few steps towards Rek.
Rek looks halfway between horrified and furious. “You weren’t gonna go to the hospital?!”
“Nooo, I was, I was just planning on driving myself.” He replied casually.
“Drive yourself- are you crazy?!” He accused, “Actually, nevermind, I know the answer to that. Let’s just get you to a medical professional.” Rek moved to help support Branzy while they walked towards the parking lot.
“Shoot, I think I’m getting blood on you, sorry…” Branzy apologized, flinching away to avoid getting more blood on the other.
“I don’t care that there’s blood on me Branzy, I care that it’s quite rapidly coming out of you . And you know what will fix that? The hospital, move your feet!”
~
By the time Branzy and Rek got back, everyone was still waiting for them in the gift shop, interested in the situation for very different reasons.
It didn’t take long for Branzy to hold up his arm and show it off like it was an argument he’d won, “We’re back! Check out my new scars!”
“Branzy, hello, what the hell happened? Are you okay?” Clown asked, quickly approaching the other and giving his arm a once-over as if to confirm that the doctors did a good job patching him up.
“Oh, yeah, I’m fine.” He waved the assassin off with a flick of his wrist, “Check out these new scars though, this one looks like a heart!”
“Well, that’s good, but what-”
Clown was cut off by Squiddo, who—quite unnecessarily—vaulted over the cash register and ran up beside Branzy. “Ohh, I wanna see, I wanna see!”
“See, this one right here!” He pointed to one of his newly acquired scars that would maybe look a little bit like a heart if you squinted and were also delusional. Luckily, both Branzy and Squiddo were.
“Oh! I see it!’ She exclaimed with a grin.
“No you don’t, that looks nothing like a heart.” Jaron cut in with a chuckle, peering over her shoulder.
“You just have no creativity is what I’m hearing.” Branzy accused as Squiddo nodded in agreement.
Despite all of their attempts, nobody would tell Kaboodle nor Clown what a rollercoaster bite was.
~
Kab had gone around asking everybody to explain what a rollercoaster bite was, and all of them either told her that she didn’t want to know, or they gave her some weird, confusing description that spawned more questions than it answered.
She had already asked every single person who worked at the park, but today Ashswag was helping out, and at this point he’s her last hope at soothing her nosy heart.
“So, Ash,” she started as they walked boxes from one location to another, “the other day Branzy got bit by the rollercoaster, but no one will tell me what that means. Do you know?”
“Oh, yeah, I do. But are you sure you wanna know?” He asked, his voice taunting, as if he had something up his sleeve.
“Yes. Even Squiddo knows, and she doesn’t seem to care, it can’t be that bad.” She rolled her eyes with misplaced confidence.
“If you say so.” Ash shrugged, placing his box down where it needed to go and beginning to walk back. “So sometimes the rollercoaster needs basic repairs, and Branzy climbs into the mechanics to fix them, but you see, there are these pistons inside that make the rollercoaster go. He’s supposed to turn them off before he goes in, but sometimes he forgets, and if he makes a wrong move, the pistons will sort of…” He claps his hands together once, loudly, making a cracking noise to complete the action. “And it’ll keep pressing down at full force until he gets out. One time it fractured his arm. There’s probably blood all around the rollercoaster if you wanna go see.”
Kaboodle paused to stare in complete shock. “What?”
“Yeah. Unless someone already cleaned it up.” He shrugged, grabbing another box and continuing on his merry way.
She had to jog briefly to catch up to him again, “Wait wait wait, Branzy’s gone through that five times ?”
“Uh… yeah I think so. I dunno, I don’t work here.” He said, as though he wasn’t currently doing manual labor.
“My god, how is he still alive…” She shook her head slowly.
Ash let out a noise somewhere in between a scoff and a laugh, “I think we all ask that question every single day.”
~
Kab burst through the door of her and Clown’s shared home, “CLOWN YOU’RE NEVER GONNA BELIEVE WHAT I FOUND OUT TODAY!”
“Is someone dead or dying?” He immediately asked without looking up from his laptop.
“No…” She rolled her eyes.
“Then there’s no need to make that much of an entrance, take it down a couple notches.” He chastised, “Now, what did you want to tell me?”
“I found out what a rollercoaster bite is.”
Clown immediately shut his laptop and divulged his full attention to whatever she was about to say. “Continue.”
“So,” She hopped over the back of the couch and sat down, “I asked everybody I could, but no one would tell me. Until I asked Ashswag. He told me that when Branzy gets bit by the rollercoaster, it’s because he was doing repairs to it and forgot to shut off the pistons, so when he does something wrong they go-” she made the same clapping and cracking motion that Ash had earlier, “-and press down on him full force until he can escape.”
Clown stared, completely slack jawed, for just a moment. “And this has happened five times ?”
“That’s what I said!”
“… Honestly, I don’t know whether to respect him more for surviving it that many times, or to judge him for never learning his lesson.”
Kab pretended to think about it. “Can’t it be both?”