:: Dark Ride :: a Spike/Drusilla ficlet.
Title: Dark Ride
Author: fenderlove
Rating: I'd say PG to PG-13 probably.
Summary: This ficlet is dedicated to sororitysarah who wanted something about Spike and Drusilla visiting a fair. By the way, I based the rides and fair in this fic after my actual hometown county fair. Haha!
Written for my posting day at seasonal_sd.



:: Dark Ride ::
The following takes place at the Henderson County Fair in Tennessee during 1990.

There was no greasepaint nor roar of the crowd to compare with the circuses and fairs of old; only a dull droning of the unwashed masses and a greasy odor of every kind of food that could possibly be deep-fried and placed on a stick remained. Spike vividly remembered how going to a fair was an occasion to wear one’s Sunday best. However, viewing the young woman wearing a tube sock masquerading as a t-shirt that proudly displayed her C-section scarred muffin top while she fellated a corndog and an overweight hulk of a man sporting a t-shirt emblazed with Confederate flags pawed at her with his big meaty hands made even the progressive-minded Spike nearly vomit up his funnel cake.

Drusilla was attempting to feed carnival confections to the armload of stuffed animals Spike had won for her. Throwing darts at balloons, shooting BB guns at moving targets, guessing which colour hole a mouse was hiding in, getting hoops over pegs, and sinking ping-pong balls into goldfish bowls weren’t exactly strenuous tests of the preternatural powers of a vampire, but they won Spike’s princess whatever her unbeating heart desired.

“What adventure should we go on next now that we’re suitably filled with sweets, Pet?” Spike asked, licking a last bit of pink cotton candy fluff and powdered funnel cake sugar from his fingertips.

“I want to go on a scary ride, Spike. I want to scream,” Drusilla purred seductively.

“Well, love, I don’t think it gets much scarier than this toothless slice of hillbilly Americana,” he smirked, “but we’ll see what we can find.”

Putting his arm around her shoulders, they traversed the dirt pathways of the fairgrounds making their way around concession stands and games of chance. Dru kept tight hold on her treasures, which included a big pink panda, a Kermit the Frog, an old fashioned Kewpie doll, and a chalk dog.

“So which do you want to ride? The Zipper? The Centrifuge?” Spike looked around at the swirl of colour and lights, the cries of excited youths having a thrill on the rollercoasters and tilt-a-whirls.

Drusilla looked around, her pale blue eyes scanning her surroundings, “That one, Spike! I want to go in there!” She began pointing excitedly towards an old fashioned-looking haunted house ride.

As they approached the garishly painted building, Spike was unsure. The ride looked rundown, not likely to be the least bit exciting. “Are you positive you want to go in there?” he asked.

“Yes, yes, please, Spike,” she nipped at his chin playfully.

“You should listen to the little lady,” a fat carnie wearing a wife-beater, leaned over the bars at the start of the ride. “Ya’ll will find more thrills and chills in this here ride than in any other part of the fair.”

Spike quirked an eyebrow, “Is that so? ‘Cause I’m looking at the ferris wheel over there that appears to be held together with rubber bands and duct tape, which seems far more frightening.”

“Tell you what, son,” the carnie grinned a smile of crooked yellow teeth, “I’ll let you take your gal on this ride, no ticket required, and I promise it’ll make a believer out of you, or I’ll give you a free wristband good for all the rides for the rest of the week.”

Spike thought it over for a moment, “What the hell, I’m game.”

Letting Drusilla get situated in the car first, Spike was stopped by the grizzled carnie laying a hand on his chest. The old man said with a wink, “Since you’ve got such a pretty gal here, I won’t be sending any other cars in until you’re done. Ya’ll will have the privacy ya want.”

Spike smirked. He thought to himself that the old man probably had a security camera set up in the ride, hoping to catch horny teens going at it in the dark. Well, he and Dru could surely give the slimy bastard a show.

As the car started up down the tracks and into the ride, Spike pressed close to Drusilla, nuzzling behind her ear. The music was the same thrift store Halloween fodder all haunted house rides seem to have, lots of black lights and day-glo paint. Ghosts of wires zoomed past and corpses popped up out of fiberglass coffins.

“I’m afraid there won’t be anything to make you scream here, love, but maybe I can help,” Spike whispered headily, his hand delving under her skirt.

Drusilla’s thigh muscles tightened a little, her hands batting at his, “Something smells yummy.”

“Why, thank you, Pet.”

“Not you, silly,” she giggled, “Your breath smells like those funnel cakes.”

Spike pouted, but after Drusilla mentioned it, something did smell really appetizing. Blood. Lots of it. The ride chugged along lazily from the spooky graveyard scene into that of a mad scientist, piles of broken body parts everywhere.

Drusilla ran her hands onto the edge of a table with a dissected corpse on it. She licked the syrupy substance off her fingers, “It’s blood, Spike! It’s real blood, not corn syrup!” She giggled and reached to pull out some of the viscera out of the dead body which was shrunken and shriveled as though it was partially embalmed. Spike yanked her hand away despite her protests.

“Something is definitely not right about this ride,” Spike frowned. He had heard about fake skeletons turning out to be real on carnival rides, but never large amounts of fresh human remains.

Suddenly, their car jerked to a stop. Drusilla squealed when she dropped her little Kewpie doll. Just as Spike went to retrieve it for her, the lime green light was gone, and they were plunged into total darkness save some red emergency lights.

“Dru, Pet, we need to go,” Spike said, standing up.

“But my doll,” Drusilla pleaded tearfully.

“I’ll get you a truckload of new ones, promise-” Spike stopped, hearing noises coming towards them, like metal grinding on metal.

“Ya’ll don’t worry. Just stay where you are,” the voice of the carnie echoed through the tightly enclosed space. “There’s a generator that’s been actin’ up, but it’ll be up and runnin’ soon.”

Spike called out, “Why are you in here instead of out there fixing it?”

The grinding sound paused momentarily before continuing again. Within the exit of the mad scientist scene stood the carnie, a fairly large ax dragging the ground behind him.

“Now I hate to do this to ya’ll, but ya see, I haven’t added anything new to this here ride in many months. Business has been a might slow, and the big boss-man has been threaten’ to shut me down,” the carnie stated, his yellowed crooked teeth looking even more disgusting in the dim red emergency lights.

“So you think that chopping up a few customers here and there is going to spice up this sorry excuse for a ride and keep it going? Even with the real blood, this is most boring carnival ride I’ve ever been on! And I’ve been on the teacups at Disneyland!” Spike let out a bark of laughter.

“It’s funny you should say that, son,” the carnie hauled the ax up and let it rest on his shoulder, “I’ve been thinkin’ that I need a new approach. Maybe an old school freak show room, like a true dark ride. I don’t wanna mess up your little gal’s face there; she’d make a real’ purdy Fiji mermaid.”

Spike glanced down at Dru. At first he thought she was crying with how her body was shaking, but it was soon apparent her body was wracked with tremors because she was laughing so hard. When she lifted her head, her vampiric brow descended in a crunch of bone.

“I’ll give you one thing, Bubba,” Spike smirked, adopting the carnie’s Southern drawl and vamping out as well, “my gal is damned purdy.”

The screams emanating from the haunted house ride were loud enough to drown out the other revelers on the fairgrounds and draw a crowd near the entrance. Spike and Drusilla exited through the emergency door, arms linked. Drusilla laved bits of blood and brain matter off her Kewpie doll with her tongue.

Stepping up on the barker’s platform and flipping on the ride’s switches back on, Spike shouted, “Come one, come all, see the greatest show on earth! This ride’s got thrills, chills, and possibly a fat redneck’s guts laying on the track! Watch out for the last room though- it’s a scream.”