Long Live the Harelquin

Blitzo winces, his head throbbing painfully, eyes sore and sensitive to light. He groans, his mouth as dry as cotton.

Where was he?.

What happened?

The last thing he could remember was Stolas's face hidden behind a menu: bits and pieces of that night came flooding back to him, he was strapped to a tabble secured by leather straps.

Blitzo's voice cracks as he screams out in pain, feeling his bones crack and break and painfully contort. He continues to struggle specs of blood were smeared everywhere.

Nothing made sense to the Boss imp, his limbs felt weighted at his side: both sore and bruised. his head lulled listlessly to the side, as he tried to make out where he was. When his vision cleared he found himself inside a dark, rusted out old trailer. That was hidden somewhere out back of Ausmodeous's lucraditive house of lust.

His cries of anguish were muffled by a strap of leather bound to his mouth.

The scarlet devil whimpers, but it is no use. No one can hear him cry. With tears in his eyes, he looks around: he was attached to a makeshift lab. There was an IV drip that lead up and into his arm. His eyes wide and fearful, he searches the room.

Fizzorolli's grinning face pops up in his line of view.

"Wakey, Wakey BlitzO,"

"Bad dreams?" Fizzorolli said while adjusting the drip.

-

"Here, let me get that. After all, were family" Too bad about your sister should've fucked her when I had the chance.

"But then again, she wasn't you," Fizzorolli told him. But I'm going to give you another chance the jester spoke. this time you'll be happy with what you are. No memories of your past life as a boss imp will exist.

"No-one, will find a sad little BlitzO. You can smile at last,"

Blitzo held back the tears collecting at the corners of his eyes.

"Your body is already regressing.. soon your mind will follow," the jester told the Harlequin.

An image of Barbie-Wire plummeting to her death burns through his mind as Blitzo closes his eyes. He could still hear her piercing scream echoing through his head as she called out for her little brother.

The sudden gasps filling the big top, and Mammon standing up in the bleachers with a worried look on his face, his eyes locking on the surviving sibling. Fizzorolli had planned it all out.

He'd finally be sharing the limelight with his obsession. But this time would be different, the jester told himself as he pours some water into Blitzo's mouth. I'll groom you BlitzO. Mammon will have no choice but to take you back to Loo-Loo-land, where he will work you until you can no longer move.

"I can't have you. Stashed here, it would be too obvious your little critters would try to find you. But when they catch onto what I'm planning for you, my Harlequin, it will be too late," He cackles.

-

Each day Blitzo would ask if anyone was looking for him, his hopes growing dim as each day Fizzorolli would lie to him.

"Who would love you, you can't even tell a joke right" the jester cracks a grin. But that will all change

Blitzo hated to admit it, but his memories were fading. He couldn't remember what he had said five minutes ago. When Fizz went away for the night, he'd take out his phone and look through some pictures, but he couldn't recognize half of them. He stared for almost an hour into Moxie's face before a name came to mind.

He cried.

-

Then one day, he asks if the jester if they were friends, and why would the clown put him through this amount of torture? Did he hate him? Had he wronged the clown?.

How long had he known Fizzorolli?.

Blitzo cries out, feeling his bones crack and contort as Fizzorolli checks on his vitals. It was already demeaning the way Fizz had put a catheter inside him.

Fizz was giving him a sponge bath. "We've always been friends. Don't you remember Blitzo sneaking out to get some popcorn and snacks, watching wacky and zany cartoons on the projector outside the big top? The way your sister used to snitch on us when she caught us necking" "

"Snitches get stitches", he sang-songed into Blitzo's ear.

"Barbie never liked me. She always thought I was a bad influence, so you see BlitzO, that's why she had to go-"

Blitzo shook his head. Where did she go?

what was Fizz talking about?.

"you see Blitzo, you were lost to us years ago, you and your sister ran away from Loo-Loo-land leaving me behind,"

"I forgave you because she dragged you away from me. She's always hated me!" snarls Fizzorolli.

"What did you do?- fizz!" Blitzo cries.

"I did what I had to, to ensure that you stayed, but you never did- you always wanted something bigger and better. You thought you were special BlitzO, the truth is you aren't."

"None of us are," Fizzorolli continues. Barbie filled your head with fairytales, but your mother dies, leaving Mammon to take care of two orphans" spat Fizzorolli.

Blitzo could've sworn he saw green fire flashing in Fizz's eyes as he recoils from the jester.

"you are going through some changes. Don't be scared BlitzO, it's for the best you want to be my friend right, to stay together forever. I can make that happen," Fizzorolli told him.

There were days, horrid days of clarity when Blitzo could recall everything, remember everyone: his daughter, his employees and Stolas.. pain sears through his chest as Stolas's face flashes through his head.

"Striker was right," he thought. "He was using me. He would've found me by now if he cared.. but here I am alone with a demented clown. now he was regretting not taking the offer the cowboy had given him. The wrangler had given him a way out on a silver platter and the boss imp had spat at him.

But he wasn't thinking clearly nowadays. and as soon as he was finished with the de-aging process, no one would recognize him. The Boss imp was dead, long live on the Harlequin.