When morning came and Codswallop opened the windows of the tent, she still had the smell of burning in her mind.

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In B__________ the youngest child labours Broth and Suzette eventually staggered out from under the Wheel of Misfortune, blinded by the sudden daylight, dry mouths exhausted, pale bodies and hearts beating only weakly and the batteries on the walkie talkie they clutched like a powerful Talisman long since depleted to dysfunction. At direct order of Monroe they were pressed immediately to the infirmary of the Amusement Park, there to be given all appropriate care that was available and rightfully, according to the laws of 1974.

Meanwhile, Valiant for her part, with Plaster at her side, had gone further yet inside the structure of the underside. There was less noise for a while, and less things to find on the ground now, fewer items of the trash or the treasure to collect between the great pillars that rose at regular intervals to support the ‘Wheel’ above them. The part of the underside they now strayed into seemed more distant from the central zones where thrill seeking passengers above were most apt to drop their possessions. Indeed, as Valiant and her companion progressed still further in the gloomery, they found themselves to be less like collectors or clearers of stray items and garbage and more like explorers, clambering cautiously thru what appeared to be temporary control or logistics centres or co-ordination structures, switching stations and semi-permanent unoccupied buildings, all erected there at some point in the dust and vastness below the surface, structures into and out of which all kinds, manner and size of wires and circuits ran this way and that, as Valiant and Plaster imagined it, sending information and impulses in all directions to guide the turning of the great Wheel of Misfortune, adjusting the flow of its passengers perhaps, altering the ambient light levels, changing speeds of rotation and triggering a whole range of customised sound effects and CGI aspects of the ride.

The fire, when it started at least, was a long long way away from them. Begun with the probably accidental dropping of a lighted match by some blokes who were riding the Wheel of Misfortune or else sparked by some kind of electrical fault in the circuits of machinery, the blaze intensified rapidly, quickly gaining ground in the timber structures of the ride itself and in the accumulated trash that piled high in places not yet touched by the clear up.

Since their route out by entrance they came in through was henceforth blocked because of the flames, Valiant and Plaster had no choice for their own safety but to press on deeper into the underside, moving as quickly as they dared, thru the grind and clanking of the machinery, driven on faster and faster, w new urgency by the dense approaching smoke, the distant yells, the shouts of distress from the passengers above and the growing glowing ‘sudden intensity of heat’ ©.

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