Peter Escabond and May Wheeler are the two happy owners and founders of Topsy-Turvy Circus (or Escabond and Wheeler), a circus of both wondrous joy and horrifying history. The acrobats, dancers, lion tamers, magicians and clowns may all seem like no...
(Contains self harm and some gore, be warned.) Riley sat in his room, he felt bad for not getting to Miles quicker but it was David and he was trying to prevent an accident. He lay on his bed and thought about the lab he ran from, the lab that Ms. Wheeler had saved him from many years ago, he was only seen as a test object that his parents and their scientist colleagues toyed with. Riley shut his eyes and tried to rest as he replayed these memories....
The scientists were trying to create a serum for superhuman strength- like that in movies- but all the test subjects were literal sheep and all of them died, that's when Riley's parents decided to use their own son instead. The other test subjects had died because they weren't human but Riley was.
Riley Monroe was only five at this time, he had noticed his parents acting weird and spending lots of time at their lab instead of caring for him. Sometimes his parents would drag him along only to dump him in a lonely room with just a single security camera and a couple of puzzles for the boy to play with. His parents always commanded him to never wander to the west wing of the lab, to always return to that room until his parents got him, at such a young age little Riley thought this was all a punishment- all this time of isolation and solitary- and he was trying to figure out what he did wrong.
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
Everyday he would draw his parents little sketches of sunflowers to gain their praise and acknowledgements, his parents loved sunflowers and always made them smile so that type of flower also became his favorite, but all his hard work was only paid in turned backs or the occasional, "Not now kiddo, I'm busy." Riley longed to be held, to be hugged, to have someone be proud of him for one goddamn minute! The boy began to develop an unhealthy behavior and mindset, he would do careless things and get hurt to try to get his parents to notice him. None of these attempts worked, they only made his parents furious that he was distracting them from work...
Soon the boy began to self harm, his parents didn't care about him, the only thing his parents cared for was their work. For every time they ignored him when he needed them the most a brand new streak of crimson was added to some place on his body. For every instant his parents never praised him, he'd down a whole bottle of whiskey. This all continued until one day, when he was the tender age of 11, his parents finally began looking at him like he existed- it was amazing, his parents didn't forget about him!- or so he thought... Riley was naive, his parents had transferred him to a much larger room- gave him some odd clothes which were all white- one with large glass windows and stainless white walls that were padded and a single hospital bed rested in the midsts of it all.
"Riley," one of his parents placed a hand on the boy's shoulder, "We need you to be calm and complacent for this, alright?"
