The Monster Catchers--A Bailey Buckleby Story

by George Brewington

  Bailey already feared what Axel Pazuzu could do with Henry. “If the sea giants destroyed San Francisco when they were looking for their lost baby before—”

  “Oh no,” Savannah said, realizing the horror. “That dog-head could bring Henry to any city on the coast he wanted and destroy it, too!”

  “Which he will threaten to do,” Nikos said, “unless he is paid. It has been his plan to hold all the world to ransom, starting with Los Angeles for three billion in gold.”

  “Three billion in gold?” Savannah exclaimed. “That’s crazy!”

  “The cynocephaly has convinced himself the city will pay it.”

  “My dad can’t give him Henry,” Bailey said desperately, but he already knew his father would if he thought that’s what it would take to save him. He plugged his phone into the Jeep’s cigarette lighter to call his father, but there was no answer.

  Nikos pressed the gas and turned onto Marina Way. The Golden Gate Bridge, an enormous mangled ball of red metal, took center stage of the dramatic skyline of stormy skies—a reminder of the horrible damage two desperate sea giants could leave in the wake of their grief. Lightning flashed against the western sky. For just a second, Bailey saw what used to be the Farallon Islands silhouetted against the sky. Now the islands were rising, forming the shapes of heads and shoulders.

  Bailey looked at the single red Frisbee in his lap.

  “We need to make a stop. I need to buy more ammo,” he said.

  “There isn’t much time,” Nikos said.

  “There’s a sporting goods store up ahead on the right. Pull over.”

  There was only traffic heading north as they hurried south. Against his better judgment, Nikos whipped the Jeep over and into the store’s parking lot. Bailey put his hand out.

  “I need a hundred dollars.”

  “What? Young Buckleby, I’m in dire financial straits. I have too much debt for a minotaur my age. One hundred dollars is a great sum for me!”

  “Mr. Tekton,” Savannah said with her most serious voice, squeezing in between the front seats of the Jeep, “I have two things to show you. The first thing is this sword.”

  Nikos turned around, and when he saw the hilt of the sword bearing the silver bullhead, his big eyes began to well with tears.

  “Where did you get that sword, young lady?”

  “My great-great-great-great-grandfather gave it to me. He was a captain in the Bullhead Brigade.”

  “The Bullhead Brigade,” Nikos said quietly, in awe. “May I hold it?”

  Savannah handed the sword to him in both palms. Bailey tried his best to be patient.

  Nikos held up the sword so he could examine the bullhead carving on the hilt and the intricacy of the designs etched into the blade. “This sword was crafted at a time when men fought side by side with minotaurs for the freedom to rule their lands as they wished. They fought like warriors against the British to protect their farms and their mazes.” Nikos caressed the weapon with his big bull hands, letting the sharp blade cut his flesh slightly. A single bead of his red blood trickled down its edge. “Those were different times,” he said sadly. “Savannah Mistivich, I am honored to know you.”

  Savannah smiled and reached into her hoodie pocket. “Bullheads should help each other. I collected this from the ceiling of the goblin tunnels.” She opened her hands to reveal a pile of small gold nuggets, all sparkling in the storm-infected sunlight. “If you help us, Mr. Tekton, all this gold is yours. It should help you pay off your debt.”

  His bull eyes widening, the minotaur quickly calculated the value of what she held in her hands. He reached into his pocket and handed all the bills he had to Bailey, who then ran into the store.

  “You honor me, young lady, with an honor I have yet to earn.”

  Savannah put her arms around his thick bull neck and hugged him hard. “Take this,” she said, and she poured the gold chunks into Nikos’s hands. He choked on the thank-you he tried to deliver, because after so many months of humiliating debt, he had lost his faith in everybody and—worst of all—himself.

  A few minutes later, Bailey was running across the parking lot toward them with twenty Frisbees, ten under each arm. He jumped into the Jeep.

  “Hurry,” he said as calmly as he could, because the sudden realization that he could lose not one parent but two was rapidly filling him with an emptiness that he feared would make him more hole than human.

  But he was a Buckleby and a Whalefatian. He had to be strong. He had to be the vanguard. Axel Pazuzu had to be stopped. His father and millions of human lives were depending on him, as well as three sea giants. As Nikos drove, Bailey unwrapped the Frisbees from their plastic packaging. He knew he had all a man needed—twenty-one Frisbees, his wits, and a determination to fight for what was right—even if it cost him his own life.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  PUNKS

  THE HIGHWAY EXIT to Whalefat Marina was barricaded by military trucks and Humvees, but Nikos knew another way.

  “Hold on to your horns, we’re going off-roading.”

  Savannah grabbed the back of Nikos’s seat with both hands and screamed, “We don’t have horns!” The minotaur turned the Jeep off the highway and down a green slope of the Marin headlands at a very steep angle.

  “Don’t roll us!” Bailey wailed.

  “Trust me, young Buckleby.”

  The Jeep caught air more than once as it bounced down the grassy hill toward the marina access road below. Nikos veered between several eucalyptus trees, increasing speed as he did. Bailey wondered if the minotaur had done this before—he seemed to almost be enjoying it.

  Ahead of them, Bailey saw two slabs of slate sticking up out of the ground. Nikos gripped the steering wheel hard as if he had already made his decision.

  “No,” Bailey screamed.

  “We must,” Nikos declared victoriously.

  “What?” Savannah yelled. But two seconds later she realized the minotaur’s intentions as Nikos hit the gas and the Jeep wheels made contact with the rock. The seven-foot-tall Labyrinthian pulled on the steering wheel and leaned back as far as he could.

  And they were airborne.

  “We’re flying!” Savannah screamed with excitement because she had never been in an airplane before, let alone a flying Jeep. Their front end pointed up to the sky, and after what seemed whole minutes, the rear wheels of the Jeep touched grass and Bailey flew up into the air before landing again in his seat. He quickly put on his seat belt.

  Nikos laughed and swerved the Jeep through the grass and onto the access road, nearly running over the snow-cone guy on his tricycle, who was desperately pedaling up the hill to get away from whatever danger lay below at the marina. Thunder cracked above them, and just as their Jeep swerved into the opposite lane, the snow-cone guy yelled, “PUNKS!”

  Bailey and Savannah did not need to ask what he was pedaling away from. Ahead of them, giant waves splashed against the docks, and boats bobbed high in the water. The surfers showed no fear, running out to catch the most tubular waves of the year. And way out on the horizon, the sea giants could be seen taking great steps in slow motion, their elbows above the water now, dark gray storm clouds obscuring their faces.

  Hysterical tourists, who had only come to Whalefat Marina for a pleasant diversion, were now running to their cars in the parking lot in pure panic. No matter whether they thought the giants they saw rising from the ocean were real or not, their reaction was the same—run.

  Nikos Tekton scanned the crowd of crazed vacationers.

  “He’s here. Somewhere.”

  Bailey saw them first. “There.” He pointed.

  They were standing on the docks next to a slick motor yacht painted in alternating red and white stripes. On the bow of the boat, the name was written in bold letters—The Sweet Tooth. Candycane Boom wore his puffy black coat to protect himself from the wind. The four slouching sophomores turned to watch Nikos swerve the Jeep right onto the dock. Bailey leapt out over the Jeep d
oor, because he had always wanted to do that. He readied a Frisbee in each hand.

  “Do I need to teach you juvenile delinquents another lesson?” Bailey yelled against the wind and the roar of the ocean.

  The sophomores snarled and prepared to pounce, but Mr. Boom smacked Fuzzy in the head with the back of his hand.

  “At ease, dum-dums.”

  Nikos and Savannah stepped out to flank Bailey. Savannah waved her sword in front of her like she meant to use it. The tenth graders stepped back like beaten wet rats.

  “No need for a fight,” Mr. Boom said. “The real villain has just left the scene, and he didn’t pay me, either. If I get the chance, I’m going to snap his dog-neck in half.”

  “What goes around comes around,” Nikos said flatly, his bull nostrils flaring. “He didn’t pay you, and you didn’t pay me.”

  “Bouncing Betty, Nikos! How could I pay you if the demon didn’t pay me? He was supposed to pay me one hundred and fifty thousand if I delivered Henry to him.”

  Bailey looked up into Mr. Boom’s big-framed eyes. “Did you give him Henry?” he demanded, trying to keep calm and focused, though he badly wanted to hurt this man.

  “I did not,” he said with his bottom lip turned up. “I merely suggested to the dog-head that if anything would motivate your father to leave the Buckleby fortress it would be a threat to his son. When the goblins carried you and your girlfriend off, I thought Pazuzu had successfully captured you. But he said you were not in his possession and he therefore could not make any idle threat. I reminded him that your father didn’t know that, so the demon dressed up two pillows in hoodies to look like you both. He put them on his boat, far enough out to sea so that your father wouldn’t be able to recognize you without binoculars. In his haste, your father did not bring binoculars, and so thought that you and this young lady were the wind demon’s captives.”

  “Where are they now?” Savannah asked in panic.

  Candycane handed Bailey his binoculars and pointed out to sea. Through them Bailey could see a Bermuda rigged sloop with two tall brilliant yellow sails jigging and jagging toward the giant torsos haloed by lightning flashes. The sloop was towing two aluminum fishing boats—the first piled high with desk lamps, Christmas tree lights, headlamps, chandeliers, and streetlights, while the second boat contained twelve small figures seated in three rows of four.

  “Your father and Henry are on that sailboat—with him.”

  “We need to get to him,” Bailey said urgently.

  “I wouldn’t, boy,” Mr. Boom said. “The wind demon has your father and Henry tied up and is delivering them to certain doom. Even if you could reach them before they get to the giants, a great storm is coming, and that demon can make things worse. He has my megaphone.”

  “So what if he has a megaphone?” Savannah said, her sword pointed at his nose.

  “A cynocephaly’s lies are deadlier than most,” Nikos said gravely. “With a megaphone, the giants will be able to hear his lies, and in their desperation to find their son, they will be likely to believe him.”

  “The minotaur speaks the truth,” Mr. Boom said. “If I were you, Bailey, I would weigh my odds and make the sensible decision—give your father up to his fate and sell your shop to me. Take the profit and invest in yourself. Go to college. Get yourself a degree in software programming. Give yourself the best gift a smart boy can give himself—a comfortable future. Your father has lost his wife and now himself. You deserve better, son. Go home.”

  Bailey felt anger bubbling inside him. The desire for revenge filled him, and he knew that if he said only one word, Nikos would throw punches and Savannah would swing her sword, and Candycane Boom would be on the dock bleeding to death. But instead of responding violently to his insults—which was so tempting—he calculated the exact number that would motivate his opponent.

  “How much to rent your yacht?”

  The four sophomores snickered. Mr. Boom stomped on Chinless’s foot, and the scrawny boy squealed like a poked pig.

  “Bailey, you’re my favorite young adult, but you can’t afford to rent The Sweet Tooth, especially since I know you intend to drive it to its inevitable destruction, as well as your own. I can’t have your blood on my hands. Also, I really do love this boat.”

  Lightning cracked. Behind him, Bailey heard sirens approaching and scared citizens screaming. The wind was whipping against them and even the earth was beginning to shake. The giants’ heads loomed high up in the clouds, their arms slowly swinging like deadly pendulums, and Axel Pazuzu was getting away, taking his father and Henry with him.

  Bailey took a long breath as he considered the right price.

  “Seventy-five thousand dollars. If you drive this yacht for us for one day, I will get my father back and pay you seventy-five thousand in cash, even if it takes the rest of my life to do so.”

  Mr. Boom laughed deeply from his evil belly. “Bailey! My life is worth far more than that! To risk my own life for your father’s is beyond negotiation, and besides, I know you can never earn that much in my lifetime. The monster business isn’t that lucrative, even for a smart little man like yourself.”

  “Ninety thousand,” Bailey said evenly. Savannah gasped.

  Mr. Boom stopped laughing. Bailey, skilled negotiator, knew he had him within the realm of possibility. “Young man, listen. I’ve always liked you. But—”

  “One hundred thousand!” Savannah piped up in all seriousness. “And the debt will be mine as well as Bailey’s.”

  Bailey saw a look of determination on Savannah’s face that he had already grown to love, but still he said, “Savannah, really. This will have to be my debt and mine alone.”

  Nikos stepped forward, towering over all of them. If he wanted, he could put Boom’s bald head between his giant hands and crush it like a watermelon. Instead, Nikos pressed the pile of gold nuggets Savannah had given him into the loan shark’s chest.

  “Here is a down payment for the children’s cause.”

  Mr. Boom’s eyebrows rose nearly off the top of his big bald head. He scraped at one of the nuggets with his thumbnail and whistled with greed. “Are you sure, friend? This looks like enough gold to pay off a certain minotaur’s debt.”

  The minotaur bowed his head. “The boy and girl need this gold more than me. A man’s life and a baby sea giant’s reunion with his parents depend on it. It is my honor, or at least, my attempt to regain it.”

  Mr. Boom weighed the gold in his hand. “Won’t you keep Henry for yourself, son?”

  “No,” Bailey said sadly. “I’ll give him back to his parents.” And as soon as he said it, he felt a swelling pride knowing that his father was right after all—Bailey was his mother’s son with a heart big enough to prove it.

  “One hundred and twenty thousand,” Mr. Boom said quickly.

  “Mr. Tekton,” Bailey said. “Hit him.”

  The minotaur cocked his right arm back.

  “Okay!” Mr. Boom said. “Fine, you little schemer! One hundred thousand, then. But you only get The Sweet Tooth until midnight. And that is my last offer. Suffering Sally, I won’t even get to spend it because you’re determined to kill us all!”

  “Deal,” Bailey said, and he shook the thug’s hand, even though Candycane Boom had threatened bloody and painful torture upon him just days before. Business was business, and Axel Pazuzu was now far out to sea.

  “I assume you want to leave right now?” Mr. Boom asked.

  Bailey nodded and they climbed aboard.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  THE SWEET TOOTH

  ABIGAIL WAS in the cabin below. Her tall brass cage had been jammed in between the leather pullout bench and the wet bar. She looked quite perturbed in her new quarters, and when she saw Bailey and Savannah, she let them know just how she felt with a chirp, chirp and a CHIRP!

  Bailey shot Candycane a look of disgust. “You took Abigail. Why would you do that?”

  Mr. Boom had to lower his head to enter the cabin. He sat dow
n on the bench and locked his fingers together.

  “I wouldn’t concern yourself with Abigail. You’ve got a much bigger problem, namely that our contract doesn’t include me fighting a wind demon for you. You have to do that all by yourself, and that’s if we can catch up to him. So we shouldn’t waste any more time discussing who took who.”

  Bailey had one of his newly purchased Frisbees in his right hand. With a quick flick of the wrist, he chopped it down on Candycane Boom’s left knee.

  “Dancing Dolly, that smarts!” It had been so many years since anyone had even considered physically assaulting him that he had forgotten how to defend himself or even how to react. He fell to the cabin floor, gripping his knee.

  “You really should respect your elders, kid!”

  “You took Abigail—an innocent, sweet harpy who had no part in any of this.”

  “Well, when your father surrendered himself to Axel Pazuzu along with Henry, he asked me to take care of her.”

  Bailey had grown adept at identifying lies lately. He whacked the Frisbee sideways into the thug’s left ear.

  “Cussing Catherine, stop it!”

  “My father has never given a monster to anyone for free, let alone the man who just tried to kill us. You took her when you saw the chance. After we save my father and Henry, you will return her.”

  It had been so many years since anyone had even considered giving Mr. Boom a direct order, he had forgotten how to reply. So as his ear began to swell into a red beet, he merely grunted, “Okay.”

  Abigail whistled, chiiiiirp!

  Bailey started to formulate a plan. “This yacht should be faster than a sailboat, right?”

  Mr. Boom groaned as he sat up, holding his ear. “The Sweet Tooth is a Riviera 4400. I can get this baby up to thirty knots.”

  “Is that fast enough to catch up to the dog-head?” Savannah asked as they followed him up to the deck.

  “It’s as fast as this yacht can go.” He shrugged. “You get what you pay for. Success in your mission was not part of our contract.”

  Bailey saw the cynocephaly’s yellow sails on the horizon, and even farther away, what looked like twin mountains on the move. The sea giants were creating waves that already rocked The Sweet Tooth from side to side and threatened to tip it over. Above them, Bailey saw the underbellies of helicopters charging forward.