Chapter 3: The Clockwork Carnage

Chapter 3: The Clockwork Carnage

The god-awful jingle was the worst part. It bored its way into Leo’s skull, a cheerful maggot feasting on his sanity. It was the soundtrack to Jon’s corpse, lying twisted and broken on the synthetic green, a dark stain spreading from beneath his head. The sight was so grotesque, so fundamentally wrong, that Leo’s mind refused to fully accept it. It was like looking at a special effect in a cheap horror movie, one that was trying too hard. But the coppery smell of blood was real, sharp and sickening in the humid night air.

“We have to go back,” Kate whispered, her voice a raw, ragged thing. She was staring at the gate, her knuckles white where she gripped her blue putter. “We can climb back over. We have to.”

“The gate is sealed, Kate,” Aaron said, his voice unnaturally calm, though a fine tremor ran through his hands. He pushed his glasses up his nose, his eyes darting around the course, cataloging, analyzing, searching for a flaw in the system. “When Leo checked, it wasn’t just locked. It was… solid. It’s part of the trap.”

“So we’re just supposed to play?” she shrieked, whirling on him. “They’re dead! Lissa and Jon are dead!”

“Continuing the game is the only variable we haven’t tested for survival,” Aaron stated, his detached logic a bizarre and flimsy shield against the unfolding horror. “Refusal resulted in a penalty. Attacking the entity resulted in a penalty. The only path forward is the one it has laid out.”

“Next up, Hole 2!” the voice of Putt Head boomed, as if on cue. The lights around Jon’s body flickered and died, plunging him back into merciful darkness. Simultaneously, the next hole lit up, a beacon in the gloom. “This one’s a real hoot! A cuckoo for a challenge!”

The three of them turned, drawn like moths to the horrifying flame. Hole 2 was a garish, Bavarian-themed nightmare. A miniature chalet with painted-on flowers sat at the far end, and blocking the path to the hole was a giant, wooden cuckoo clock, at least ten feet tall. Its oversized pendulum swung back and forth with a deep, resonant thump… thump… thump that vibrated through the soles of their shoes. A large, ornate bird door was set just above the clock face.

“Par 3,” Aaron murmured, reading a small sign. “You have to time your shot to pass under the pendulum.”

“It’s a death trap,” Leo said, the words flat and dead in his mouth. He could feel it. The simple obstacles were gone. Now, the course was actively trying to kill them.

“Everything here is a death trap,” Kate snapped, her fear manifesting as pure vitriol. “We know that. What’s your point?”

“My point,” Aaron interjected, stepping onto the starting mat, “is that it’s a system. All systems have rules. Patterns. I just have to find the pattern.” He placed his ball, his movements jerky but deliberate. He watched the pendulum, his brow furrowed in concentration. Thump… thump… thump…

“Aaron, don’t,” Leo warned, a cold dread coiling in his stomach. “Just hit the ball. Don’t try to outsmart it.”

“It’s physics,” Aaron insisted, not looking at them. “Every seventh swing, the pendulum’s arc is slightly higher. It’s a timing puzzle. See? One… two… three…” He counted under his breath, watching the hypnotic swing. Kate chewed on her lip, her eyes wide with terror.

On the seventh swing, Aaron was proven right. The heavy wooden disc at the end of the pendulum swung a few crucial inches higher than before. “Now!” he declared, a flicker of triumphant logic in his eyes. He drew back his putter and made a clean, perfect stroke.

The ball shot forward, a white streak across the green turf. It rolled directly under the pendulum at the peak of its modified arc, clearing it with inches to spare. It was a perfect shot.

A moment of relief washed over Leo. Maybe Aaron was right. Maybe it could be beaten with logic.

But the ball didn’t reach the hole. It rolled into a hidden depression just in front of the clock and stopped dead.

BZZZZT!

The game show buzzer blared again.

Aaron stared, his brief moment of triumph curdling into confusion. “But… the shot was perfect.”

At that moment, the bird door above the clock face burst open. But it wasn't a small wooden bird that emerged. It was a monstrous, metallic thing—a cuckoo made of rusted gears and sharpened steel, its beak a wicked, pointed spike. It shot out on a powerful spring mechanism with a sound like a guillotine dropping.

SHREEEEEEK-THUNK!

Aaron didn't even have time to scream. The metal bird’s beak plunged directly through his chest with sickening force, pinning him to the astroturf. His glasses flew off his face and skittered across the concrete. He convulsed once, a gurgling sound escaping his lips, and then was still. The mechanism retracted with a grinding screech, pulling the blood-soaked steel bird back into the clock. The little door snapped shut.

The pendulum continued its steady, indifferent rhythm. Thump… thump… thump…

Leo felt his stomach heave. He stumbled back, turning away and vomiting onto a patch of dead grass. The acidic taste of bile filled his mouth. When he looked up, gasping for air, there was only Kate. Her face was a canvas of absolute horror, her mouth open in a scream that wouldn't come out. They were the only ones left. The buffers were gone.

“This is your fault,” she finally choked out, her voice trembling with a potent cocktail of grief and rage. She pointed her putter at him, the tip quivering. “This whole stupid, nostalgic trip was your idea! ‘One last hurrah,’ you said!”

“My fault?” Leo shot back, his own shock and horror igniting into anger. It was easier than feeling the terror. “You were the one who wanted to prove you were ‘adventurous’! You were sick of your old life, remember? Well, here it is, Kate! Something new!”

“I never should have left him for you!” she screamed, tears finally breaking free and carving paths through the grime on her cheeks. “You’re just… nothing! You drift through life with that stupid, sarcastic smirk, and you’ve dragged us all down into this hell with you!”

Her words were like shrapnel, each one finding a mark. He knew she was just scared, lashing out, but the truth in them stung. He was a drifter. He was directionless. And now his friends were dead.

“Oh, what a lover’s quarrel!” Putt Head’s voice cut through their argument, dripping with saccharine delight. “Don’t let a little friendly competition tear you apart! On to Hole 3, you two lovebirds!”

The lights on the cuckoo clock died, and a new hole was illuminated. This one featured a rotating platform in the middle, surrounded by what looked like a series of funhouse mirrors.

Their argument died in their throats, replaced by the cold, immediate dread of the next test. They walked towards it, the space between them a frigid chasm.

“The rules for this hole are a little different,” the voice chirped. “This is a trust exercise! One of you will putt from the start, while the other stands on the platform. Your goal is to get the ball into the hole on the other side. Simple!”

Kate looked at Leo, her eyes full of raw hatred. “I’m not getting on that thing.”

“Fine,” Leo said, his voice hollow. “I’ll do it.”

He stepped onto the circular platform. It immediately began to rotate, slowly at first, then picking up speed. The funhouse mirrors warped his reflection, stretching and twisting his form into a dozen grotesque shapes.

“Now, Kate, it’s all up to you!” Putt Head encouraged. “But be careful. The shortest path isn’t always the safest! A ricochet might be your best bet!”

Kate glared at the setup, then at Leo’s spinning form. She placed her ball. She could try a straight shot, but it would have to be perfectly timed to pass through the gaps between the mirrors as the platform spun. Or she could, as the voice suggested, try to bounce it off one of the angled side walls.

“Don’t listen to it, Kate,” Leo called out, his voice strained as he fought to keep his balance. “Just hit it straight!”

His plea seemed to decide it for her. Her face hardened, a mask of bitter defiance. If he said to go straight, she would do the opposite. She was going to be the one in control. She lined up her shot not for the hole, but for a mirror on the far right wall, angled perfectly to bounce the ball back toward the cup.

She swung. The shot was clean and powerful. The ball sped towards the mirror.

But it wasn't a mirror.

The instant before the ball made contact, the reflective surface dissolved into a shimmering heat haze. Behind it was a deep, dark pit. The ball sailed through the mirage and vanished into the blackness.

BZZZZT!

“Kate, no!” Leo screamed.

On the platform, the world tilted. The section Leo was standing on remained stable, but the half of the platform behind him suddenly dropped away like a trapdoor. Kate, standing on the starting mat, was perfectly safe.

“Oh, what a shame!” the voice crooned. “You failed the trust exercise. And the penalty for that… is for your partner.”

Kate’s eyes widened in horror, understanding dawning a second too late. The trick wasn't on the person putting. It was on the one who trusted them.

Leo felt a lurch as the entire platform he was on began to tilt vertically, tipping him not into a pit, but directly toward the spinning blades of a giant, decorative windmill that had been part of the next hole’s scenery. The same windmill Lissa had been so excited to see. Its wooden blades, which had been still and skeletal moments ago, were now a whirling blur of motion, emitting a low, hungry whoosh-whoosh-whoosh.

He scrambled for purchase, but the smooth surface offered none. He slid, faster and faster. He saw Kate’s horrified face, her hand outstretched as if she could somehow pull him back from across the twenty-foot gap.

Then he hit the blades.

There was no single sound. It was a chaotic symphony of splintering wood, tearing fabric, and a wet, percussive series of impacts. He was thrown, a broken doll, into the darkness.

Kate stood alone, her scream finally tearing loose, a sound of utter, soul-shattering despair. She stared at the bloody, spinning blades of the windmill, then at her putter.

“Looks like we have our final contestant!” Putt Head’s voice announced, its cheerfulness reaching a fever pitch. “Let’s give her a big hand!”

But Leo wasn't dead. He lay in a crumpled heap in the dirt and grime just outside the light, his body a roadmap of agony. His arm was broken, ribs shattered, and a dozen deep cuts bled freely. But through the blinding pain, one thought seared itself into his brain as he heard the whirring of some new machinery starting up near Kate.

She thought it was my trap. It played us. It played us both.

And through the darkness, he heard one last, final scream from Kate, abruptly cut short.

Then, silence. The jingle started up again. Leo was utterly, completely alone.