COTK-NMS:Only the first chapter/prologues are in first person. Totally inspired by Raaiku's version of CDF.

Cirque du Freak: Tunnels of Blood
By COTK-NMS
Warnings: Two Mary-sue warning. Side characters, though - This story will still revolve around Darren.
Rating: T
Disclaimer:Everything to Darren Shan, but the OCs. Falicity belongs to COTK, as Mary belongs to NMS.
Summary:A woman begging for adventure in her life finds herself warpped up tight in half-vampire, Darren Shan's world. Though perhaps this was a little much for her sake... Through twists and loops, Mary and new friend Falicity are played as pawns right into the hands of creatures of the night. But are the creatures of good or evil?

Prologue 2 - Chapter Two - Mind's Eye

The Cirque Du Freak. I've heard a lot about it from my parents. They loved the mysteries that any and all things that had to do with people with special gifts, mal-formations held. They raised me and my sister by themselves, teaching me everything that had to do with that particular topic, but I never thought it was going to be the worst, yet best thing, in my life.

Always talking about how facinating it would be if at least one of their little girls could be as gifted and special as the people and creatures they talked about. They used to have us play games, pretending that we where from a special preforming circus. It was like that until I turned ten when I discovered my gift. At first neither of my parents could believe that it was possible, since they where out of town when it happened.

Ellen, my older sister, and I where having the usual sister spat when I got very angry with her.

Instead of concentrating my anger on her, I grabbed the table cloth and gave it a good yank. All the dishes came flying off in a white blur, crashing to the ground in a mass of glass and metal. We had both closed our eyes at the time, but when they where opened again, we couldn't believe our eyes! The kitchen table was across the room, smashed against the wall, and splintered into many pieces! Ellen gave me a terrified look and I stared at her with equally terrified eyes.

"How did you do that!?" She yelled, disbelieving.

"I didn't mean to! All I meant to do was grab this..." I said, holding up the white cloth in my hands. She rushed over to me, placing her hands on my shoulders and forced me to look at her.

"Falicity Jane Matthews, I want you to tell me how you did that right this instant!" She yelled, shaking me slightly. She's four years older than I am, so she was four-teen at the time, and thought she ruled everything when mom and dad where gone.

I instantly burst into tears and shrugged. It was all I could do at the time.

We eventually had everything sorted out and cleaned up by the time our parents came home. They where a little shocked at the missing dishes and shattered table in front of the house.

Once Ellen told them what happened, it was like they spontaneously combusted into a shouting fit from hell. Yelling threats of boarding schools and such, and repeating over and over "You choose to start acting out now of all times!" and saying things like "We're so disappointed in you..." and shaking their heads, or "Where did we go wrong in raising you...?" Little things like that.

Ellen eventually had to calm them down, they told her to take me to the park for a while so the could clear their thought of what to do.

"I really didn't mean to..." I said half-way to the park, walking next to her with my hand in hers, looking up at her angrily. She looked down at me with one of her 'You should watch what you say and do around them from now on, young lady' looks. I hated those looks, more than anything you could imagine... They where frightening.

I looked back down at the ground for a moment before my eyes stared burning, badly. I couldn't. and to this day cant, explain why they started hurting so bad, but they did.

I yanked my hand away from Ellen's, covering my eyes with both hands and fell to the ground, screaming they hurt so bad.

Ellen was shocked into a frozen daze of silence, until her natural motherly instincts took over and she quickly knelt down in front of me, pulling my hands away from my eyes so she could look. Her eyes went wide when I looked at her with tears streaming down my face.

"Oh my god! What happened!?" She asked, letting go of my hands, that snapped back to cover my eyes as soon as she did so.

After I didn't answer she wrapped her arms under mine and around to my back and lifted me up, carrying me back home in a full on run.

"Mom! Dad! We need to go to the hospital! NOW!!" She yelled, throwing the door open. They both looked at us with a slight glare, but snapped out of it when they saw me. Rushing over, dad pulled me out of Ellen's and into his, while mom pulled my hands away from my eyes to get a good look at what was wrong.

What she saw was later described to me as a nightmare inducing scene. My eyes changed from the natural sky blue that I was born with, as red quickly bled into the Iris's, turning them a deep violet. The white's had become bloodshot, all three of them said later on that my eyes hadn't started bleeding on the spot.

They quickly rushed me to the city hospital, and it's all mostly boring medical terms from there.

Weeks later, after the bandages came off, the violet color stayed however, and my eyes where back to normal. Well, except for the now being purple part, they where normal.

But what wasn't back to normal was my attitude. When I got home, all I wanted to do was crawl into bed and sleep for the rest of my life, when I was awake, I was always cranky.

six weeks after my tenth birthday, we where playing circus again, and I was trying to balance on a rope that was about a foot off the ground. I've done it multiple times before that and thought I was ready for the one Ellen used.

Turns out I wasn't there yet. My ankle twisted underneath my leg, and I fell off the rope when no one was looking. When they realized it, I was already almost on the ground.

I was just about to hit the floor, when I stopped. Floating in mid air, not knowing how It was possible, and I was eased softly and slowly onto the ground by an unknown force, until I was securely laying flat on my back.

The three just stared at me with shock and disbelief, but all I could think of doing was giggling like a little kid who was being tickled.

Their looks slowly changed into that of slight fear at the way I was laughing.

Ellen was the first to get a hold of it and lightly slapped the side of my face, making me stop laughing instantly.

After that, I was able to control that ability at will. But that was only the start of it. Every thing else just came all at once. Scared the living daylights out of me. It all came rushing in like a tidal wave.

I could hear peoples thoughts, throw things across the room with my mind, everything.

My parents avoided any and all contact with me from then, mortally terrified that I could kill them. Then one day, three dys before I turned eleven, everything for me changed.

My mom pulled me out of bed, Ellen was sleeping at a friends house, and told me to get dressed and go to the living room.

I walked into the living room, after changing into some clean clothes, rubbing my eyes. Mom and Dad where standing in the living room, wearing their jackets, mom was holding mine. She handed it to me before grabbing the car keys off the hook.

"Hurry up honey, or we'll be late." She said, opening the door and walking out. I quickly put my jacket on and walked out of the house, my dad coming out after me. I looked up at his face, and saw a painfully sad look in his eyes. He looked down at me, but looked away quickly after.

I hopped in the back seat, mom in the drivers seat and dad in the back next to me. After a while of driving, I felt my dad put his arm around me and pull me close to him. I looked up at him again, but could only get a good look at the side of his face. But I could have sworn I could see tears in his eyes.

That image will forever be burned into my memory. The strongest person I knew, about to cry right in front of me.

With my parents acting so strangely, I was beginning to wonder what exactally was going on. Being pulled out of bed in the middle of the night to go on a mysterious trip down to an abandon area of town, while my dad was almost crying.

"Where are we going?" I asked, pointing the question towards any one of them, it really didn't matter, I was still looking at my dad, and he turned his head even further away from my view, but didn't answer. So I looked to my mom, who was looking through the rear-view mirror at my dad.

"It's a suprize, Falicity." She said sternly, she had been talking to me that way for a while before that, and she looked back at the road.

We soon stopped at a rundown theatre house on the edge of the city and got out of the car. My dad held my hand all the way to the door where we were greeted by the tallest man I had ever seen. My mom handed one of the short hooded men three green tickets and we walked, I kept staring at the tall man, he turned his head and gave me a heartfelt smile, deeper into the old building.

Soon we where sitting in th back row of dusty old seats that where falling apart, with wholes all over them. Then the lights went out, and the show started.

The Cirque Du Freak, the last time I would ever see my parents...

Alive.

In the middle of the show, my mom gets up, saying she'll be right back, that she was going to the bathroom. But she never came back, half an hour later, my dad grabs my attention by lightly shaking me, I look at him curiously when he asks.

"You know that I will always love you, right?" The look he gave me almost made me cry.

"Of course you'll always love me, daddy... You have to, it's irresistible not to love me." At least that made him smile, a little. But it quickly disappeared.

He wrapped me in a deep, loving, depressing hug, and he hesitantly stood up. "Your mother should have been back by now, I'm going to go find her. Do not get up, even when the show ends and we are not back. We will come back for you." He said in one solid breath. His voice sounded shaky, and this time tears had successfully escaped his eyes. He left just like that.

I waited until the show was over, and then some. I sat on the tattered red chair with my knees folded against my chest and my head buried in my arms, waiting. I was thinking about disobeying my dads orders and looking for them when I heard a hiss, and felt something warm and soft slide across my leg.

Finally getting fed up with the constant annoyance, I lifted my head up to come face to face with a grey-ish green snake, flicking its tongue out into the air.

Then a hand popped out from behind the chair in front of me, Then a head of green-yellow hair slowly followed it, followed by the smiling face of one of the performers. Snake boy.

"There you are girl... Come on, we don't want to bother the pretty girl..." He said, draping the snake over his shoulders, still smiling and began walking off. He didn't look too much older than I was, about a year and a half, or two. Before he got too far, I reached a hand out and grabbed a hold of one of his arms

Slightly suprised, he looked back at me.

"H-have you s-seen my parents... By any chance?" I asked, he turned around and gave me a thoughtful look.

There was a moments silence, before he shook his head slowly. Sitting down on the seat he popped out from behind, he placed the snake on the ground after saying.

"Go find Mr. Tall..." Then, after watching the snake slither off, he turned back to me with a smile. "Want to see something cool?" He asked.

Not knowing what he meant, I nodded, and... Without any warning, his tongue shot out of his mouth and straight up his nose.

My eyes went wide with surprise. I really wasn't expecting his tongue to be that long, or for him to shove it up his nose.

Getting over the little shock, I felt a smile grow on my face slowly.

"Doesn't that hurt?" His tongue went back into his mouth and he smiled.

"Nope, not at all." There was a pause before he held out his hand for me to shake. "My names Evra Von." I slowly took his hand and shook, waiting for him to finish introducing himself with a blank look on my face. "What?"

"Aren't you going to finish?"

"Finish what?"

"Your name?" I laughed at his dumbfounded look.

"That's it. Just Evra Von." He shrugged, I opened my mouth to give him my name but was stopped by the tall man I told you about before, following behind Evra's snake quickly.

"Falicity Jane Matthews, I had a feeling you would be joining us today." He said, almost cheerfully. "I see you've already met Evra. Would you like to meet the rest of the Cirque?"

"I... Just want to know where my parents are..." I said quietly, looking up at him.

"Your parents aren't coming back for you..." He said, holding his hand out for me to take. I looked down at Evra, he had a reassuring smile on his face. I took his hand and stood up, following him and Evra to behind the stage.

"Mr. Tall." I said, walking up to him. He turned around with a smile. "Can I go away?" I asked with a smile.

"For what reason?"

"My older sisters having a baby, and wants me to be there... So, can I go?"

"Yes. Take as long as you need." He turned back around to handle the business he was attending to before I interrupted him. I walked off to the tent I slept in to pack a few things.

I walked out of the tent and looked around, spotting Evra while milking his snake. I walked up behind him, not letting him see me, and waited for him to finish his first chore.

He put her down and started petting her. Placing both hands on the top of his head, I tilted his head back so he was looking up at me.

"Do it..." I said smiling excitedly. "Please?"

With a smile he slid his tongue into his mouth, but brought it back out only moments later. He turned around and looked me up and down.

"Are you going somewhere?" He asked, sounding a little put-out.

"Yes, yes. But don't worry. I'll be back before you can say and spell antidisestablishmentarianism 5,342 times..."

"Okay... Do you want me to start now?" He asked with a smile.

"You can start anytime you want."

"Where you going?" He asked, standing up and whipping his hands on his knees. He quietly watched the snake slither around on the ground.

"Going to be an aunt soon."

"Oh." He smiled. I looked at the watch I had on my wrist, and frowned slightly.

"Yeah. I gotta go now..." I said, quickly wrapping my arms around his neck and slowly walking away. I never did like leaving the Cirque. Always felt like I was never going to come back home, never going to come back to him... I hate that the most.

I've been with the Cirque for nearly five years now, and I've never been happier. It truly is a home sweet home.