In the winter of 1911 the pleasure pier at Sarnwick went into the sea. It went in a single night, in weather the harbourmaster's log calls ordinary, and it took with it a ballroom, a carousel, a fairground organ, four hundred coloured bulbs and the whole of that season's prize stock. Nobody drowned. That is the only part of the story the town likes to tell.
You are minding Brindley's Amusements on the promenade, out of season, in November, because the man who owns it is not well and the man who owns it is your uncle. The cabinets are dark. The shutters are down. It is the sort of quiet where you start reading things you find under the counter — which is how you come across the ledger, and the word in the flyleaf, and the note about five prizes that were never redeemed.
The fair is still down there. It turns out you can get to it. Getting back is the same trick in the opposite direction, and getting back carrying something is the whole of the game.
This is a full-sentence parser and there is no AI in it anywhere. Type what you mean — LOOK UNDER THE MAT · GIVE THE CHIPS TO THE GULLS · UNLOCK THE GREEN DOOR WITH THE KEYS. Type HELP for the verbs, ABOUT for where this came from. There is no hint command. There is a bird.