Pennywise's Arc

Chapter 2 of 3

The town did not scatter. It gathered. They came to the striped tent with torches and bats, not screams. Their fury burned bright. Pennywise felt it as heat, not food. He needed their terror, but rage tasted like nothing. The blood moon was coming. A raging mob gave him no meal. Marilyne stood at the front. She had run for help, and help had come armed. She pointed at the tent flap. "There. He took the kids." Beside her, a crowd of five civilians shouted and jabbed their fingers at the big top. Two men stood frozen, mouths open, but even their fear was drowning under the mob's noise. Pennywise smiled anyway. Anger was just a shell over fear. He only had to crack it. He lifted his hand and pulled the tent flap wide. Inside, three children huddled on the carousel floor. The boy in the red shirt held the smaller two close. Their eyes were wide. Their fear was real and bright, the kind he craved. Pennywise let the mob see them. "You want them?" he called. "Come and take them." The crowd surged forward. Then a cluster of red balloons drifted down from the tent's peak. Each one carried a face. The faces belonged to the townspeople. A woman saw her own child's eyes. A man saw his brother's mouth open in a scream. The torches lowered. The shouting broke. One by one, the mob remembered what they feared to lose. Rage cooled into dread. A mother dropped her bat and grabbed her daughter's arm. "We have to go," she whispered. Pennywise drank it in. The fear returned, thick and cold. It poured down the dark shaft beneath the carousel. His light burned brighter. The shell had cracked. But Marilyne did not run. She climbed onto the carousel while the others fled. She reached the three children and pulled the boy to his feet. "Come on. All of you." The balloons popped one after another. Pennywise reached for her. His arm stretched long across the ring. Marilyne shoved the children toward the tent flap. "Run! Don't look back!" They ran. The boy in red dragged the little ones past Pennywise's grasping fingers and out into the night. Pennywise caught only air. He turned to Marilyne. She stood alone in the empty ring, chest heaving, no way past him now. The mob was gone. His bait was gone. But she had walked into his lair to save them. "Brave girl," Pennywise said. His smile stretched wide. "You gave them back to me and kept nothing for yourself." The tent flap fell shut behind her. The dark shaft yawned open at her feet. The town had scattered in fear, and his feeding had begun. But now he had only one guest left, and one guest could not feed a whole town before the blood moon.