Chapter 5 — Twin Flip Monster
And thus begins Chapter Five.
Now, children.
Eventually
I left Space Gun.
The council gasps.
Fun Meter empty?
Absolutely not.
Full.
Overflowing.
Children.
Space Gun had solved the flaw of the wave pool.
No waiting.
No dead period.
No existentially disappointing piss soup.
It provided what it promised.
Adrenaline.
Constantly.
Reliably.
Sit.
Strap in.
Question life.
Swing.
Become sky object.
Return.
Repeat.
The council nods.
Perfect machine.
So why leave?
Children.
Something caught my eye.
The council turns.
There.
In the distance.
A structure.
A machine.
A
monstrosity.
The council narrows its eyes.
Against mortality itself.
I could not yet see what it was.
Could not read a sign.
Could not understand the mechanics.
But I could see enough.
Something moving in ways machinery should perhaps not move while containing humans.
Children.
It looked wrong.
Beautifully wrong.
And remember
I had already outsourced self preservation.
The council becomes alarmed.
Yes.
Space Gun had taught me something dangerous.
Not:
I am brave.
No.
Much worse.
I had decided that staying alive was someone else’s department.
The engineers.
The operators.
The nice gentlemen with restraints.
Them.
The council writes:
NUO:
CUSTOMER.
SURVIVAL:
SERVICE INCLUDED.
Exactly.
So when I saw this distant crime against anatomy,
fear did not say:
Avoid.
Curiosity said:
Mine.
The council sighs.
I finished one last Space Gun ride.
Harness opened.
I stepped out.
And instead of immediately rejoining the line
I turned toward the monstrosity.
Quest marker acquired.
FIND THAT THING.
The council looks across Wonderla.
Do you know where it is?
Vaguely.
Do you know the route?
No.
Do you have a map?
Children.
Please.
I had direction.
Somewhere
that way.
Good enough.
And so I wandered.
Not toward a known ride.
Toward a silhouette.
Through paths.
Around buildings.
Past attractions.
Other rides appeared.
The council points.
That one looks fun.
Irrelevant.
What about
No.
Children.
Focus.
The monstrosity existed.
Everything else had become scenery.
This was no longer:
Try whatever appears.
This had become a hunt.
I walked.
Looked up.
Lost sight of it.
Walked farther.
Saw part of it again.
Corrected direction.
Maybe took a wrong path.
Probably.
Twelve year old Nuo did not think in terms of navigation failure.
He simply kept moving until the desired object reappeared.
The council nods.
Search.
Far and wide.
By amusement park standards.
Past rides I cannot name.
Past people I did not know.
Past the school group,
wherever they had disappeared to.
Children.
I did not care.
Only one thing occupied the visual field.
Monstrosity.
Find.
Eventually
I did.
The council grows quiet.
Up close,
it had a name.
Twin Flip Monster.
The council pauses.
That sounds
Accurate.
Very accurate.
Children.
Space Gun looked intimidating,
yes.
But once I understood it,
there was logic.
Swing forward.
Swing backward.
Higher.
Higher.
Eventually upside down.
Back again.
Organised terror.
Neat.
Predictable.
Elegant,
even.
The council nods.
Twin Flip Monster?
No elegance.
No dignity.
No apparent respect for the concept of orientation.
Children.
Imagine a seat.
Easy.
Now
make that seat rotate.
The council follows.
Fine.
Then make the entire section containing that seat revolve.
Less fine.
Then make the whole arrangement travel up and down.
The council goes silent.
Now combine all three.
Children.
That.
That was Twin Flip Monster.
Rotation.
Revolution.
Vertical movement.
Simultaneously.
The council looks horrified.
Which direction is up?
Optional.
Exactly.
You did not ride Twin Flip Monster.
Twin Flip Monster processed you.
The council laughs.
I watched it.
Seats twisting.
Arms moving.
Bodies turning through directions I had not previously considered valid.
And I thought
yes.
The council collapses.
Immediately,
I joined the line.
No hesitation worth remembering.
No:
Maybe Space Gun was enough.
No:
This appears significantly worse.
Children.
Fear had been outsourced.
I was effectively immortal.
At least according to the legal framework inside my twelve year old brain.
Wonderla would not kill me.
Because that would be terrible for business.
The council refuses to endorse this reasoning.
Story Nuo required no endorsement.
Line moved.
I watched other victims
customers
return.
Alive.
Excellent.
Evidence.
Then
my turn.
The council becomes solemn.
I approached.
Sat.
Another nice gentleman arrived.
Different nice gentleman.
Same divine profession.
He secured the restraint.
Checked it.
Moved on.
The council whispers.
Any three second regret period?
Perhaps.
But now I had precedent.
Space Gun had tried to convince me I would die.
I had survived.
Therefore
this would also fail to kill me.
Flawless logic.
The machine started.
Children.
I saw ancestors.
The council erupts.
Not literally.
Probably.
But gods.
Space Gun had introduced me to adrenaline.
Twin Flip Monster introduced me to theology.
The seat moved.
Then the structure moved.
Then everything moved.
Up.
Down.
Around.
Over.
Sideways.
Some direction not covered in standard geometry.
The council clutches the table.
At one moment,
the ground was beneath me.
Then beside me.
Then above.
Then gone from any useful frame of reference.
My stomach became an independent political entity.
My organs rearranged seating assignments.
My soul briefly stepped outside for air.
The council gasps.
And Nuo?
Ecstatic.
Children.
Absolutely ecstatic.
Because fear was still there.
Of course it was.
Your body does not stop recognising danger merely because your brain has delegated paperwork.
But now fear had become fuel.
Every impossible movement produced another surge.
Every inversion:
holy shit.
Every drop:
HOLY SHIT.
Every rotation inside another rotation:
WHAT IS HAPPENING.
The council laughs.
Space Gun had a rhythm.
Twin Flip Monster had violence.
Beautiful,
mechanical,
professionally maintained violence.
Children.
This was not a ride.
This was a physics argument.
And physics was winning.
I screamed.
Probably laughed.
Possibly both simultaneously.
At some point,
perhaps the thought appeared:
I have made a terrible mistake.
Then immediately:
THIS IS AMAZING.
The council nods.
Humanity built machines specifically to manufacture that contradiction.
Eventually
somehow
the ride slowed.
The world returned.
Up resumed its traditional position.
Ground appeared beneath feet.
The nice gentleman released the restraint.
And I stood.
The council waits.
Legs functional?
Debatable.
Soul returned?
Mostly.
Fun Meter?
Children.
Destroyed.
Not empty.
Destroyed.
The scale no longer supported the number.
I stepped away.
Looked back at the machine.
And joined the line again.
The council erupts.
AGAIN.
Yes.
Again.
Seat.
Strap.
Ancestors.
God.
Survive.
Exit.
Line.
Again.
The council starts counting.
Do not bother.
The Archive does not preserve the total.
Enough that repetition itself became the memory.
Again.
And again.
And again.
Children.
At some point,
Space Gun must have noticed my absence.
The wave pool too.
The council turns toward the two thrones.
Ah.
Yes.
We need to discuss hierarchy.
Because until now
Wave Pool.
Love.
Sacred.
Then Space Gun arrived.
Co regent.
Twin throne.
Two great rulers of Wonderla.
Water and adrenaline.
Beautiful arrangement.
Then Twin Flip Monster appeared.
The council prepares another throne.
No.
Not a triple throne.
Children.
Be serious.
Twin Flip Monster did not sit beside them.
It sat above.
The council slowly looks upward.
Not royalty.
Divinity.
Exactly.
Wave Pool and Space Gun remained beloved.
Untouched.
Their crowns secure.
But Twin Flip Monster?
Children.
Different category.
The deity before whom the throne bows.
The council writes:
WAVE POOL:
ROYALTY.
SPACE GUN:
ROYALTY.
TWIN FLIP MONSTER:
GOD.
Correct.
And with that
a tradition was born.
Not a vague preference.
A template.
A sacred Wonderla route that would survive into every later visit.
Children.
Wave Pool.
Space Gun.
Twin Flip Monster.
Repeat as needed.
The council pauses.
What about all the other rides?
What other rides?
The council looks around at an entire amusement park.
Children.
Irrelevant.
They may exist.
I assume they do.
Roller coasters.
Slides.
Spinning cups.
Mechanical nonsense of every variety.
Wonderful.
Happy for them.
But once I discovered the Three
why would I waste precious park hours pretending democracy existed?
The council laughs.
I had favourites.
Violently.
And after this day,
Wonderla became less an amusement park
and more a building containing three things I wanted.
Wave Pool.
Space Gun.
Twin Flip Monster.
Everything else?
Architecture.
The council nods.
This is why I cannot name most of the rides.
Not because memory deleted them.
Children.
I barely rode them again.
Why experiment when perfection has already been identified?
The council raises an eyebrow.
That is an unusually anti Wandering philosophy.
Perhaps.
But children,
wandering is not compulsive novelty.
It is following what calls.
And at Wonderla,
three things shouted louder than everything else.
The council nods.
Story Nuo did not phrase it so elegantly.
Story Nuo’s internal map was probably:
WATER GOOD.
SPACE GUN GOOD.
TWIN FLIP MONSTER HOLY SHIT.
Historical accuracy restored.
So there I remained.
Twelve years old.
Alone.
No friends by choice.
No school group in sight.
No teacher dictating the ride sequence.
No schedule except occasional glances at clocks.
And no objective except whatever had seized my attention.
The wave pool had released me during its boring phase.
Space Gun captured me.
Then a distant silhouette pulled me away from Space Gun while the Fun Meter was still full.
I hunted it.
Found it.
And discovered
divinity.
The council smiles.
This is the strange logic of a Wandering.
You do not always leave because the current thing has ended.
Sometimes the current thing is still magnificent.
But something else appears.
A glint.
A road.
A sound.
A machine performing crimes against mortality in the distance.
And suddenly
go there.
Children.
So you go.
Space Gun did nothing wrong.
I loved it.
I still left.
Because curiosity pointed somewhere else.
The council grows quiet.
And that somewhere else became part of every Wonderla visit after.
The Three.
A personal liturgy.
Wave Pool.
Space Gun.
Twin Flip Monster.
Again.
As needed.
Until body,
time,
or park closing intervened.
The council nods.
And somewhere,
perhaps still moving obediently through Wonderla,
was my school group.
Following the itinerary.
Trying rides in order.
Waiting for everyone.
Being counted.
Being supervised.
Children.
I had accidentally developed a better system.
For me.
Fun Meter.
Curiosity.
Go.
Repeat.
The council leans back.
The amusement park had stopped being organised.
Not because Wonderla lacked organisation.
It had plenty.
Signs.
Maps.
Queues.
Ride operators.
Safety procedures.
But my experience of it?
Untethered.
I was not consuming Wonderla in the order handed to me.
I was building my own version.
One accidental choice at a time.
And now,
that version had gods.
The council sighs.
Naturally.
Thus concludes Chapter Five.
The Distant Monstrosity.
The Hunt.
The Twin Flip Monster.
The Nice Gentleman Of Restraints.
The Brief Meeting With The Ancestors.
The Audience With God.
The Repeated Return.
The Two Thrones.
And The Divinity Above Them.
Children.
Wave Pool was love.
Space Gun was adrenaline.
Twin Flip Monster?
Twin Flip Monster was an argument against human mortality
that somehow had a queue.
The council nods.
And I stood in it.
Again.
And again.
And again.
