So first off I want to say that I absolutely love your work Mango! I was wondering if you could do some hcs on the gang in an amusement park?
Thank you so much! And thanks for the request, these were great fun to write!
The Van der Linde Gang in an Amusement Park/Carnival (headcanons)
Sadie, Javier, John, Sean and Karen are all huge rollercoaster nerds and even have a checklist for every amusement park they go to, to make sure they’ve ridden them all.
Karen always manages to look stunning in the on-ride photographs no matter where she is.
Arthur usually stays with their bags, scrolling grumpily on his phone.
When the adrenaline junkies come back from their ride it’s his job to help them walk it off.
Pearson has a detailed timetable of which food stalls open when and exactly what they sell, so he can enjoy as many nutritionally-void treats as possible.
Can most likely be found chowing down on a turkey leg at 10am.
Dutch wants to go inside the haunted house, much to Hosea’s dismay, who reminds him what happened last time (Lenny filmed the whole thing, then remixed Dutch’s screaming into a 10 minute compilation which reached over a million hits on YouTube).
But Dutch is insistent. Within two minutes of entering the haunted house he’s sweating and grabbing for Hosea’s hand.
Even Hosea jumps a mile when a terrifying masked axe-murderer leaps out and screams…but then a familiar voice comes from the under the mask.
“…Hosea? Dutch?”
“Josiah?!”
“Please…please don’t tell anyone else I work here.”
Dutch agrees so long as Trelawny doesn’t let anyone film him.
Bill races to the top of the helter-skelter but gets too scared to slide down.
Eventually Susan has to go up there to coax him down. He screams the whole way and won’t talk to anyone for hours.
Kieran proves a dab-hand at the claw machines and spends a good chunk of the day winning prizes for Jack and the girls.
Abigail loves the carousel and laughs delightedly as she rides around and around.
John rolls his eyes but he still rushes on ahead of her so he can get her the prettiest pink horse.
Arthur rides with Jack tucked in front of him.
Mary-Beth is far too timid to get on any of the rides until Tilly convinces her to go on the big wheel together.
She has her eyes covered the whole way up but when she hears Tilly exclaim how great the view is she takes a brave peep.
Tilly holds her hand tight for the whole ride.
Micah is brilliant at the shooting games, his face pinched with concentration as he hits every single target.
He keeps trying to challenge Arthur to competitions but he even humiliating Micah isn’t worth it for a cheap giant teddy bear.
Molly ends up accepting Micah’s challenge just to shut him up and wins the giant teddy for herself.
She carries it around the park all day and takes selfies with it, starting the hashtag #theadventuresofmollyandbear.
Strauss insists that he gets far to sick to go on any rides, but he enjoys sitting in the sun with a good book.
Jack eventually convinces him to have a go on at least one of the games. He wearily tries the hook-a-prize fishing game and walks away with half a dozen pet goldfish.
None survived.
Swanson accidentally walks into the hall of mirrors in the fun house and has to be rescued by Tilly.
Uncle falls asleep on the ghost train and gets mistaken for one of the staff, being rudely poked awake, gruffly handed a mop and told to get back to work.
He’s so terrified he physically runs away for the first time in about twenty years.
“How was the ghost train, old man?”
“...horrible.”
Hosea decides to take Dutch on a romantic ride on the chair swings.
He 100% underestimates how fast it goes and traumatises Dutch once again.
On the bright side, the gang members who have got separated from the others only have to follow the screams from overhead and they get reunited.
Sean buys an enormous candyfloss just before they all decide to drive home, saying it’ll be absolutely fine in the car.
He was wrong.
Sean’s face, the entire back seat and the back of Hosea’s head is soon coated in melted pink sugar.
On the journey home everyone pulls over in their various cars on a nearby hilltop so they can look back at the lights of the amusement park.