Location 059MV part 3

 I promised there would be another part of "Location 059MV" posted and I delivered. We get to see even more of the strangeness that happens around the Midnight Village amusement park. As I've said before, this is one of my favorite entries in The Agency and I enjoy posting excerpts of it. So, grab some cotton candy and make sure you're buckled in.

Location 059MV

Testimony 2004-01-05

Arch. Fuller: Statement of Zachary Forbes regarding the incidents surrounding the death of Darwin Washington at Location 059MV, recorded direct from subject by Archivist Kris Fuller.

Forbes: He wanted to set a record. Longest time on a carousel. And he wanted to do it at the park on the Zodiac. We got there early and talked to the owner himself. The owner said he liked the idea and that it would give the park good publicity, maybe even make the Zodiac a more popular ride. I guess kids these days aren’t really excited by carousels like they used to be. Whatever. He agreed and gave Darwin a pass to ride the Zodiac without getting off, but said that the ride would stop as normal to let people on and off. The owner said we could just set a record for longest time on a carousel instead of longest time riding a carousel nonstop. Darwin didn’t care.

            I was filming as everyone began boarding. He picked the horse. That was his zodiac sign and he was a bit of a traditionalist, believing that horses were the best carousel animal. He took his spot and the ride began. By the second time I saw him, he looked in pain. The third time, he yelled out that the horse bit him. By the fourth time, he was screaming for the ride to be stopped, begging for help. By the fifth time when the ride was stopping, he was slumped over with his hand in the horse’s mouth. The operator called for the owner and their medics. The owner and medics arrived, removed him from the ride, and checked his pulse. He was dead.

            When they removed him from the ride, his hand came out of the horse’s mouth. When it did, a snake came out of the horse’s mouth. The owner called security and they caught the snake. I thought it was kind of funny, really. The security guards that caught the snake were both women and they weren’t dressed the way the other security guards were. I don’t know how to explain it, but there was something different about their uniforms. Whatever. That’s not important. Darwin died on that ride and the owner had two snake charmers on standby? Is that a normal thing?

            Anyway, the Zodiac shut down for a couple hours while they checked the other animals. No more snakes. The ride reopened and there was a long line. I’ve never seen so many people lined up to ride a carousel. Guess death’s a big seller.

Arch. Fuller: Statement ends. Toxicology reports revealed that Mr. Washington died after receiving a bite from an Agkistrodon piscivorus, otherwise known as a cottonmouth, which was discovered to have been inside the carousel horse’s mouth, likely sheltering there to escape the cold, and retrieved by support team Lambda members Sara Cole and Poppy Wilson. I am curious about how the owner relates to all the entities. Has he made a deal with one or all of them? The Executioner has said before that he has an arrangement with the owner and the owner seems to defer to the Executioner’s whims. Hopefully, we’ll gain more information about this without having to result to talking to Shaw again.

Testimony 2005-07-10

Arch. Fuller: Statement of Jaycee Lyons regarding being trapped at Location 059MV with her friends Laney Watts, Mckayla Clarke, Henry Brown, and Tommy Porter, recorded direct from subject by Archivist Kris Fuller.

Lyons: Our parents all work for the same company and the company paid for them to go to Midnight Village with their kids. We were all excited and couldn’t wait to ride all the rides. Our parents kept us in Midnight Village and Lunafair—Lunafair! Like we’re babies. I mean, we’re all ten or eleven. We’re old enough to go to Terror Land and ride those rides. Henry’s been tall enough to beat the height restrictions for months. And our parents didn’t want us to go there. “It’s too scary and sinful, it’s not Christian.” Ugh. We just wanted to do something fun, but instead we were stuck in the two most boring places in the whole park.

             We got off the Pendulum and began trying to figure out what to do next. Our parents wouldn’t even let us go in the Vault, though I can actually kinda understand that one. It even says on the entrance that it’s for fifteen and up and we’re not old enough yet. So we were arguing about what to do next, then we realized that we couldn’t find our parents. I figured that they had just missed us getting off the ride or maybe we’d walked past them while we were arguing. But we didn’t see them anywhere and I couldn’t get service on my phone. I can’t make any calls except to 911 and my parents, but still, I have a phone and I’m the only one in the group with one because I’m the most mature.

            I couldn’t even dial 911. The phone just wouldn’t turn on and I know I charged it. I keep it charged all the time because Mom freaks out if I don’t and has threatened me with taking my phone away if it dies. I couldn’t call anyone or anything. I tried talking to a person, but they just brushed me off, didn’t even acknowledge me. The others tried and no one saw us, no one heard us, no one acknowledged us. At first, we were excited. This meant we could do whatever we wanted and no one could stop us.

            We tried to leave Midnight Village and go to Terror Land, but when we walked through the archway, we were walking back into Midnight Village. We tried that several times, but every time we just ended up back in Midnight Village. We even tried to go to Lunafair, but we couldn’t. We ended up right back in Midnight Village. Well, that was a little disappointing, but still we figured we could have fun here and there were snacks we could get.

            We rode every ride there at least six times, had every flavor of ice cream, Dippin’ Dots, and soda, and sampled every snack they had available from burgers to their potato tornadoes. It was a blast. No one saw us, no one said anything. We could do whatever we wanted. We didn’t try to go in the Vault, though Tommy suggested it. We all voted and decided it sounded boring and not as fun as unlimited rides on the coasters.

            Eventually, though, we got bored, but we still couldn’t talk to anyone. It started getting dark and we wanted to go home. We wanted to go home and eat real food and sleep in our own beds and we couldn’t call anyone or talk to anyone or anything. Laney started crying. She was scared because she wanted to go home and see her bunny, Hopper. Her parents got her one for her birthday because she’d gotten straight-As and she wanted to see Hopper and was worried that we’d never leave and she’d never see him again and he’d never know what happened or why she wasn’t there anymore. We all wanted to go home, but it was dark and we couldn’t find our parents and we were starting to see weird things, shadows and shapes stalking us.

            We walked around the park a little more, trying to talk to someone. Trying to find someone that could see us. We kept seeing the shadows moving and following us, stalking us. We were being hunted by something, a lot of somethings, and we didn’t like it. We just wanted someone to see us, someone to hear us, and rescue us. I don’t know which one of us started running, but one of us did and then we were all running, faster and faster, through so many crowds. Their faces blurred together, they looked like faceless cutouts of people, stand-ins. Props. Everything and everyone looked fake except the shadows that had broken away from whatever they were supposed to be with and begun chasing us. The shadows started chasing us and there was laughter, like demented clown laughter. Like from a haunted house.

            Suddenly, everything went too bright and then it was the middle of the day again, we’d just gotten off the Pendulum and our parents were there. They asked us what we wanted to do next and we all said we just wanted to go home. Laney was still crying and said she just wanted to see Hopper. I’m pretty sure we all hugged our parents like they’d vanish if we didn’t after we saw them again. They couldn’t understand what was wrong and we tried to explain, but I know we didn’t make any sense. We kept talking about getting to run around the park and no one saw us or anything. They said we’d just gotten off the ride, but I know that’s not true.

            We were all freaking out so our parents took us home. I know the others talked about making appointments with doctors and my parents planned to make me one as well. As we were walking out of Midnight Village, I looked back and I saw a guy dressed in weird clothes. Like, an old-fashioned court jester outfit, except instead of the traditional colors, the outfit was black, gray, and dark blue, covered in dried blood. I screamed when I saw the face. It was a skull and it was laughing, the same laughter from when we were being chased.

            My parents said I’m not going back to Midnight Village and my therapist says that’s a good idea. I don’t want to go back anyway. I never want to go back there. None of my other friends do either, but they didn’t see the figure I did. No one saw it, but me, and I never want to see it again. I still have nightmares about it.

Arch. Fuller: Statement ends. At least she’s a well-behaved child. Definitely an improvement over Shaw’s personality and attitude. It is strange that they were isolated while in Location 059MV and they could see everyone else, but no one could see them or interact with them. This is the first instance we’ve heard of something like that, and I have a feeling it won’t be the last. The skull-headed jester is another new figure we’ve not heard about before. I wonder how many other entities inhabit Location 059MV that we don’t know about.

Testimony 2006-11-03

Arch. Fuller: Statement of ride mechanic Jack Wilkins regarding the crash of The Comet roller coaster recorded direct from subject by Archivist Kris Fuller.

Wilkins: I don’t know what happened. I’d checked the ride earlier that day, checked the carts. I checked everything. Well, not the wheels, but that’s because my partner—Bruce Lowe—checked them the day before. We only work in Midnight Village, not the rest of the park. He checked them yesterday, so I didn’t check them today. Maybe if I had, this wouldn’t have happened, but I swear, I checked that part of the track. That track was fine. I know it was. The wheel assembly was probably fine, too, and only broke like that because some jackass smuggled on a video camera. People do that all the time and then drop it. That shit kills people. But the track was fine.

            It’s not like this is all my fault, even if it wasn’t fine. The Comet wasn’t supposed to be operated during high winds or temperatures that low. It was in the forties that day and they were still operating. The winds were too high for it to be operated, but it was. That wasn’t my call to make, so that isn’t on me. The kid operating the ride didn’t hit the emergency stop button quick enough or verify that the other cart was clear before sending the other one down the track.

            It all boils down to carelessness. Should I have checked the wheels? Yeah. But I know the track was fine. The operators should’ve cleared the track and hit the emergency stop button quicker. They should’ve made sure no one had any items they weren’t supposed to. Hell, they shouldn’t have been operating that ride that day anyway. But they were and because of that there’s six people dead.

            It would’ve been eight, but this one person started freaking out and screaming about the coaster going to crash so they let him and his boyfriend off the ride before it even left the station. No idea what he was on, but apparently he saw a skull-headed figure on the track in front of the coaster and had seen the crash happen. I don’t believe in premonitions or omens. All I know is there’s six people dead and two walked away from that ride because one freaked out. Nothing supernatural, just carelessness.

Arch. Fuller: Statement ends. It seems like a bunch of little things added up to create a problem. Poor maintenance on this particular wheel assembly of this particular cart, poor track maintenance on that section, delay of response from the employees, people smuggling items onto the coaster which they lose, the high winds, and cold temperature that day. On their own, each of these could be a problem, a minor inconvenience, but combined, it created this tragedy. The question then becomes, is it because of simple human error or were one or more of the entities involved? We do not have the answer at this time. And what about the vision one of the riders had?

 

The July 22nd post will be yet another part of "Location 059MV" and will hopefully be the part where the water park section opens.