Hamish and the Monster Patrol

by Danny Wallace

  ‘I think it’s better I don’t say,’ said Kit, reaching for his Mon-Stunna and switching it on.

  But nothing happened. It had a large crack in its side, obviously from their hard landing.

  ‘Well, your toy’s knackered,’ said Alice, through gritted teeth. ‘I’m carrying one green banana and some tea bags.’

  Kit ignored her and continued to stare at the Mon-Stunna.

  Alice lost patience again. This was ridiculous! How could you call yourself the leader of something like Monster Patrol if all you could do was walk on bridges and spot footprints in the soil and break your toy gun?

  ‘Do you, Kit Alexander Lopez – as the only human member of Monster Patrol on Earth– have anything else that might actually help with monsters at all?’ Alice said.

  Kit looked at her, weighing something up, trying to decide whether now was the right moment.

  And he took off his bag.

  And he brought something out.

  A chain. Some kind of medallion.

  No, not a medallion.

  Alice had seen one of these in the Wunderkammer on board the ship.

  It was a claw.

  Kit put the chain and claw around his neck and looked nervously at Alice.

  He was going to try something.

  Sensing his hesitation, Alice decided to change tack, realising that now was not the time to be annoyed. Now was the time to be encouraging.

  ‘You can do it,’ she said. ‘Don’t worry!’

  Kit took a deep breath and began to murmur.

  He raised his arms to his waist.

  And a moment or three later, small flashes and flares began to crackle and burst in the air around him. Like fireworks seen from twenty miles away.

  Alice stepped back, amazed.

  Was this . . . magic?!

  Kit smiled, and grew in confidence, and raised his arms high into the air.

  Alice stepped back. Whatever Kit was doing was angering and confusing the unicorns. And they were getting ready to strike. She was frightened. But something was happening and it was indeed . . . magical. She took cover behind a tree, as Kit suddenly stopped his murmurs and shouted . . .

  ‘AND IT SHALL BE SO NOW!’

  Alice slammed her hands to her mouth in awe.

  Kit was no longer Kit. His hands were growing into paws. His fingers had become claws. His ears were pointy and sharp and above his head, and his nose was now wet and black.

  And the teeth!

  Kit was furry. Kit was fury.

  Kit was . . .

  ‘A werewolf?’ whispered Alice.

  Kit was a monster himself.

  But wait, thought, Alice – only temporarily! Kit’s gran had POW! taught him that spell. And it would make sense to fight monsters with monsters!

  But Kit hadn’t finished.

  He was still growing . . . his back arching upwards, the bones in his body crackling as they became bigger and more powerful.

  The unicorns were more aggressive now and seemed ready to blow fire and fury of their own. They surrounded Kit, but with one powerful SWIPE, he knocked one into the ravine.

  It fell and fell, until it had the sense to flap out two wings and speed off into the distance.

  The other unicorns tried their best, but were no match for a giant werewolf.

  They fled, SCREECHING so loudly they could be heard for miles.

  They could be heard, in fact, by Hamish.

  ‘Guys!’ said Hamish, arriving through the bushes on Uni. ‘I found you! Well, we found you.’

  He gave Uni’s mane a little stroke as Alice punched the air at seeing her friend again.

  ‘Wait,’ she said. ‘You’ve befriended that unicorn?!’

  ‘He’s a bit licky, but you get used to that,’ said Hamish. ‘Hey, where’s Smasha? Where’s Kit?’

  Why was Alice all alone in the jungle?

  ‘Smasha’s gone to get the plane,’ she said. ‘And Kit’s, uh, a bit shy.’

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘I’M GETTING CHANGED!’ came a voice from the jungle.

  Basically, as I’m sure you know, when you turn into a werewolf it tends to rip all your clothes off. So it was lucky Kit always carried a spare uniform in his bag.

  ‘Things have been a little traumatic since you galloped off on your new pal,’ said Alice.

  ‘Well, follow me,’ said Hamish. ‘Because I think we’ve made quite the discovery . . .’

  19

  DAYS UNTIL ARRIVAL: 3 (IT WAS A LONG DAY, OKAY?)

  ‘Uni brought me here,’ said Hamish, leading the gang through a thicket towards higher ground. ‘A cave! I found a boot, and he sniffed it, and I guess he recognised the scent? What if it’s . . . Lydia’s?’

  ‘Büüüüg droppings,’ said Kit, pointing at a teetering pile of dirt outside the entrance.

  Kit had asked Alice not to mention the whole werewolf thing to Hamish just yet. People reacted strangely to magic, when it worked. Everybody seemed to love the idea of it, but when they realised it was real, well, they would look at him differently. As if he was freakish somehow. It had happened a lot in his life. That’s why he preferred hanging around with Smasha. That’s why he didn’t really have many other friends. But the science of magic, he’d told Alice, was about belief. If you don’t believe in magic, then magic won’t exist. A spell won’t work unless you believe it will, and the more belief there is, the more powerful the spell.

  ‘But science isn’t about just believing something is true,’ said Alice.

  ‘It is, if belief is a real thing,’ Kit had said. ‘If it is a real feeling – as real as feeling hungry or happy and it is powerful and present and undeniable – it becomes part of the formula!’

  If Alice hadn’t seen it happen with her own eyes, she’d have thought it sounded like hokum. She wished she could tell Hamish. As I’m sure you can imagine, usually the second you find out someone can become a werewolf, you’re pretty desperate to shout ‘they can become a WEREWOLF!’, aren’t you?

  Kit traced his finger down the walls of the entrance. There was a strange, gooey, neon green liquid all around it, as if the mouth of the cave had applied some really disgusting lipstick.

  ‘BÜÜÜÜG snot,’ said Kit, gravely.

  ‘Then this must be its lair!’ said Alice. ‘Unless BÜÜÜÜGS use caves as hankies or something.’

  She looked around to make sure no more unicorns were anywhere to be seen. Uni bridled, nervously. Hamish reached into Alice’s bag and tossed Uni one of her cactus sugar lumps.

  ‘Only one thing for it, Alice,’ Hamish said, puffing out his chest and trying to be brave. ‘We go in.’

  The hole was small so Hamish had to de-puff his chest almost immediately. Goodness knows how a mighty Büüüüg could fit through that. Hamish wondered if that meant there was another opening elsewhere. This might just be a secret back door, used for quick escapes or sneaky entrances.

  The ground at the mouth of the cave was covered in small loose rocks and cave chippings that crunched as they stepped in. The kids watched their shadows blend in with the darkness inside, as if they were melting into the gloom. They guided themselves by placing their hands on the wet walls. Above them, sharp stalactites stretched towards the ground.

  ‘Anything could be in here,’ said Kit. ‘Bats. Spiders. Snakes.’

  Uni snorted, obviously not a fan of bats, or spiders, or snakes.

  ‘Can’t be worse than a BÜÜÜÜG,’ whispered Alice, conscious that she didn’t want to start an echo if she couldn’t be sure what might hear it. ‘They have bug eyes, and wings, and claws, and teeth, and all sorts of other horrible things.’

  ‘Alice,’ whispered Hamish, feeling less brave and a bit queasier now. ‘Maybe we could focus on the positives of the situation?’

  Alice nodded and tried to think of some.

  She couldn’t.

  Further in they went. Hamish was actually quite glad that Uni was here. This was his world, after all . . .

  Kit
fished out a torch from his bag and shone it around. There were pools of stagnant water around them. A beetle the size of a cat scuttled away to find darker corners.

  ‘Look,’ said Alice, as they carefully squeezed through a narrow gap in the cave walls. The rocks were jagged and uneven and the kids had to be careful not to bump their heads.

  Up ahead, some way off, they could make out a tiny pinprick of light. Hamish’s heart was beating loudly in his ears. It’s not normal to be somewhere so dark. Somewhere the sun or the moon can’t reach, and where time suddenly seems to have no meaning.

  As they got through the gap, the smell of wet rock and old water hung heavy in the air. The pinprick of light was easier to see now, and with every careful, crunchy step they took it grew bigger. It was impossible to see what that light was. There were no details. It just looked like a sheet of white light, until finally it was right in front of them.

  ‘Whoa,’ said Kit, putting his hand out carefully.

  This was obviously the entrance to something. But it was covered and shielded by some kind of thick silvery fabric. It shimmered in the light that came from directly behind it. It was dense, though it flapped very lightly from a sudden small breeze.

  ‘This is a web,’ said Kit. ‘A Büüüüg web.’

  ‘So we’re in the right place,’ said Alice, pushing her hand into the web to try and brush it away.

  ‘Gosh, this stuff is tough.’

  Hamish had a go next. He tried to poke a hole in the web with his finger, but it was impossible. It just sprang back, like an impenetrable skin on some old custard.

  ‘Büüüüg webs are incredibly tough,’ said Kit. ‘This is the result of years of work.’

  ‘There has to be a way,’ said Alice, picking up a rock and hurling it at the web, then watching it bounce straight back and roll to her feet.

  Hamish tried to give it a shoulder-barge, but this stuff was just not giving.

  ‘Wait,’ said Alice. ‘Listen!’

  They could hear noise, now.

  There was the gentle noise of running water.

  But underneath it, there was a low, rumbling, grumble.

  A noise that rose and fell. It was rhythmic. It was unsettling, strange, but somehow familiar.

  ‘Wait,’ said Alice. ‘Is that . . . snoring?’

  Alice knew this sound all too well. Her mum and dad were major snorers and sometimes the pictures on her bedroom wall would rattle from the sound of her dad’s naps.

  ‘What if it’s the BÜÜÜÜG?’ said Hamish.

  ‘Or what,’ said Alice, ‘if it’s Lydia?’ ‘We need to take a closer look without waking whatever that is,’ said Kit. ‘But there’s no way through. It’s too tough to cut without special equipment.’

  Which is when Hamish had an idea.

  ‘Hey, Kit,’ he said. ‘You said unicorn tusks are the sharpest things known to mankind, right?’

  The kids all turned to Uni.

  Uni sliced through the BÜÜÜÜG web in a heartbeat, and Kit chucked him a cactus sugar cube.

  They stepped through the web, parting it like curtains, and into the brightness of the unknown.

  They were not prepared for what they saw next.

  The cave widened right out. High above them, a hole in the ceiling let bright sunlight pour all the way down to the cave floor. Hamish shivered. The hole reminded him of the dream he’d had when he’d been knocked out by the tree.

  But it was what they saw when they looked down that was really incredible.

  There were coconut trees on the ground, stretching towards the sun on patches of bright green grass. There were flowers and strange berries. A stream of noisy fresh water ran down one side of the cave walls and into a small, clean rock pool at the bottom. Narrow wooden gutters had been put up around the walls, transporting water to different parts of the cave, including a small kitchen area full of old coconut shells. There were shelves made from fallen branches, and a table, and colourful paintings etched into the walls above bushes.

  Alice stared in wonder at the words she now saw, painted on to the wall in bright red paint and tall letters.

  ALWAYS BE PREPARED.

  And in the middle of it all, next to a homemade cup and a very old book of some kind, there was a bed. It was made from two old tree trunks, and covered in huge, wide leaves.

  And under those leaves was a shape.

  A slowly moving shape. Rising and falling.

  A snoring shape.

  20

  DAYS UNTIL ARRIVAL: 774

  I’M KIDDING. IT’S 3.

  Lydia woke in a panic.

  ‘BAAAAAH!’ she shrieked, terrified.

  ‘BAAAAAAH!’ yelled the kids, now just as terrified.

  The old lady shot out of her rickety bed.

  ‘INTRUDERS!’ she yelled, leaping into a karate pose. ‘What are you? Who are you? What’s your favourite colour?’

  She wouldn’t keep still. Her mind seemed to be racing at a million miles an hour as she ran her hands through her hair and tried to make sense of things. Hamish noticed the thick white stripe that ran through it.

  ‘What are you, spies?’ she said. ‘Why is there a unicorn? Who sent you? Is it teatime? You look like small humans. What are they called again? Think, Lydia, think. Stinkers? No! Kids!’

  ‘Yes!’ said Hamish, pleased to help. ‘We’re kids!’

  ‘Aha! IT SPEAKS!’ said Lydia. ‘Then prepare for a quick test! What famous city am I thinking of?’

  ‘Uh, how am I supposed to know that?’ said Hamish.

  ‘CORRECT!’ she said. ‘Who wants a coconut? What day is it, Wednesday?’

  Hamish cast an eye to Alice. He couldn’t help but feel that Lydia might be a little bit . . . mad. Sitting on her own in a cave for years and years had obviously not been good for her.

  Alice was staring at Lydia, a great big smile beaming across her face.

  ‘I can’t BELIEVE we FOUND you!’ she said, and her eyes might as well have been heart-shaped.

  ‘I can’t BELIEVE I’ve been FOUND!’ replied Lydia.

  ‘I gave up hope years ago! And yet somewhere out there, someone was looking for me! Never ceasing their quest! Always searching! Relentlessly! Tell me, child, how long have you been looking for me?’

  ‘In all honesty, about twenty-four hours,’ said Alice.

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘But Kit here has been at it a lot longer!’

  ‘You look familiar,’ said Lydia, looking at Kit. ‘In fact, you all look a little familiar. If a bit odd.’

  ‘I am Kit Alexander Lopez from Monster Patrol,’ said Kit, a little hurt. Hamish noticed. He saw that underneath all the bravado and shouting, really Kit lacked a little confidence.

  ‘Monster Patrol?’ she said, surprised, and studying the logo on Kit’s plumber/boiler suit. ‘But . . . but you’re a child! Why would Monster Patrol send a child?’

  ‘My grandmamma entrusted me with the quest to keep looking for you once she had passed. Monster Patrol needs you.’

  ‘Your grandmamma?’ asked Lydia. ‘Wait . . . you said your name is Lopez?’

  ‘My grandmamma was Luciana,’ said Kit, nervously.

  Lydia turned away. She stared at the wall for a few seconds, thinking of her old friend. The many adventures they’d shared. How much they loved each other.

  ‘So she never gave up on me,’ she whispered.

  ‘Never,’ said Kit, feeling so proud. ‘And nor would I.’

  From somewhere outside the cave there came a noise.

  Birds were taking flight from trees!

  They shot past the sun. The shadows flashed across the clearing.

  Lydia, being someone who knew the value of pulling yourself together, took a deep breath and turned back to face the children.

  ‘Be prepared!’ she said, her eyes darting nervously around.

  ‘The BÜÜÜÜG could return at any second!’

  ‘So how big exactly is this thing?’ asked Hamish, nervously, and Lydia realise
d she still had no idea who the boy with the unicorn was, or the strangely quiet girl at his side.

  ‘What’s the story with you two?’ said Lydia, spinning round and pointing at Hamish and Alice. ‘Spill the beans, bozos!’

  Alice suddenly felt shy. She didn’t know how to handle this. Or what a bozo was. She wanted to fling herself at her grandma, but Lydia seemed so tough and no-nonsense. Alice didn’t want to make a fool of herself.

  ‘I’m Hamish, and this is my best friend Alice,’ said Hamish, taking charge. ‘We’re from a town called Starkley and we need your help.’

  Lydia gasped.

  ‘Starkley?’ she said. ‘I remember that name!’

  ‘It’s in real trouble. You’re the biggest monster expert in the world, and it looks like there’s a pretty big monster headed our way.’

  ‘Starkley,’ said Lydia, to herself. ‘Then they did it. Then they went ahead with the experiment . . . What did you say your names were?’

  ‘Hamish Ellerby,’ said Hamish.

  ‘And Alice,’ said Alice. ‘Alice Shepherd.’

  Lydia stared at the girl before her.

  Alice Shepherd?

  From Starkley?

  She studied the big eyes, her determined face. She noticed her cherry red army boots, her ALWAYS BE PREPARED badge, the blue stripe in her hair.

  She broke into a huge smile, opened up her arms, and just as she was about to launch herself at Alice . . .

  BVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV!

  It sounded like the flight of a million billion bees.

  It sounded like it had the power of a thousand jet planes.

  It sounded like fifty of your dads, all snoring at once.

  Something was coming. Squeezing its way through one of the tunnels on the way to Lydia’s tropical jail cell.

  ‘We can catch up on the way,’ said Lydia. ‘But right now we need to be anywhere in the world other than here.’

  The noise grew. Dust began to fall from the ceiling, as the vibration of the BVVVV shifted the very foundations of the room. Uni bridled, nervously. And for good reason.

  ‘The BÜÜÜÜG!’ cried Lydia. ‘My dreaded captor!’