A Babysitter's Guide to Monster Hunting #3

by Joe Ballarini

  I ducked down as the goblin’s yellow eyes darted in my direction.

  “Where’s my fuzzblood?” a man’s voice shrieked from above. “I need it yesterday!”

  The goblin growled, corked the test tubes, and scrambled back up the stairs.

  I recognized that high-pitched voice.

  It was Professor Gonzalo. The mad scientist Boogeyman who transformed Kevin into an eight-foot-tall monster.

  “Ooooh, you’re in trouble now,” Meatball whispered.

  I reached back and whacked him with my sitter staff.

  At the top of the spiral staircase, I cracked open the door and peered into Gonzalo’s bizarre laboratory. It was like being in science class on another planet.

  Professor Gonzalo was standing before bubbling beakers and winding tubes filled with sparkling goo. He studied the black blood. His pointy goatee rose into a sweaty smile.

  The Professor danced around his lab, plucking ingredients off his wall. He was surprisingly light on his feet as he sang to himself.

  “A milligram of zombie warts.

  Three milligrams of dire wolf tongue.

  A quart of fire snake venom.

  And one gram of rabid fuzzbug blood.”

  A puff of purple smoke wafted from the hideous concoction. It glowed pink, then blue, then red. The Professor drew the devilish mixture into the needle of a long syringe.

  Seeing the needle made me woozy-wooze.

  Sidebar: I freaking hate needles.

  Ding! The timer of a microwave oven went off. The goblin assistant removed a stack of juicy cheeseburgers. The Professor meticulously injected the needle into each patty. The steaming burger meat plumped up and made weird growling sounds.

  Professor Gonzalo sniffed his creation. “Deelicious.”

  The mad scientist whisked the monster burgers away on a silver platter. His goblin assistant pulled on a chicken costume, and the Professor popped a tall white chef’s hat on his head. They vanished through a set of double doors.

  “Dinner is served!” the Professor exclaimed.

  A chorus of cheers erupted from the kids in the next room. They had no idea what they were about to really eat.

  I snuck into the lab and tried to think of a plan.

  The human beach ball strapped to my back smacked his lips in my ear. “I could eat those all day,” he moaned.

  I wiped Meatball’s drool off my shoulder. “That’s how they turn kids into monsters, isn’t it?”

  “Wow, Red. You cracked the case,” said Meatball.

  Stress crept up my scalp. I wanted to find Berna and the others, but I also wanted to save those kids from being turned into monsters. The only way I could do that was to take on Professor Gonzalo and his goblin. But that would mean giving up my hiding spot. I needed to stay stealth.

  “This is a real pickle,” I whispered.

  “Mm, pickles,” said Meatball.

  What would Liz do? She’d go in there, guns blazing, with no regard for her own personal safety and most likely get caught and have to fight her way out. Okay, not an option. What would Mama Vee do? She’d say something cryptic and then wait for the rest of us to force her into action. Berna would chew gum and calculate the odds with her brilliant brain. Smart as I am, I am not a walking Wiki like her. So, what would I do? Good question, me. What would Kelly do? Kelly would do her homework and watch A Time of Roses and Cattle: Special Edition.

  The lab had been filled with jars full of ingredients. Potions, powders. Firebird eggs. Spotted toadstools. Hobgoblin claws. Chupacabra venom. South American pixie wings. Death Beetle tongues.

  I narrowed my eyes. A memory twitched.

  I know these ingredients. I studied them for my concoctions and mixtures section on the Heck Weekend exam. Berna helped me study for it. We were on her living room carpet, and she was quizzing me. In my head I heard Berna read off the ingredients as she pointed them out in the guide.

  I swung Meatball off my back with a thud and flipped open my notebook.

  MONSTER CONCOCTIONS AND MIXTURES

  “HOMUNCULUS FUNGUS”

  This recipe for a living, sentient fungus is quick and easy.

  1 cup firebird egg, beaten

  2 hobgoblin claws, diced

  1 cup Chupacabra venom

  3 spotted toadstool caps and stems, minced

  4 South American pixie wings, whole

  2 Death Beetle tongues, crushed

  Whisk egg and claws together for one minute. Combine with venom and toadstool and mix until it thickens to a gray paste. Add wings and tongues. Simmer over low heat and stand back.

  Warning: use precise measurements ONLY as the fungus will grow a hundred times its size.

  Darting around the lab, I swiped ingredients off the shelves and threw them into an electric mixer. So I didn’t follow the recipe exactly like the guide instructed, but I didn’t have time for exact measurements.

  As the whole mess churned into a soupy slime, I listened to Professor Gonzalo’s voice explaining the meal he had painstakingly prepared for the kids, as if he were a gourmet chef. The kids banged their forks and knives on the table, demanding cheeseburgers.

  The mixer rattled and jumped. The purple goo ballooned out of the bowl and spilled onto the floor. Yellow and green spores bubbled across its surface as it inflated into a towering, purple sludge monster with eight slimy arms.

  The top of its mushy head bumped into the ceiling. Its limbs puffed out and knocked over lab equipment. Glass shattered. Sparks erupted. The homunculus fungus expanded like a demented hot-air balloon.

  “And people say I’m gross,” said Meatball.

  I grabbed Meatball and tucked behind the double doors. They flew open. The Professor and his goblin barged inside.

  “My lab!” cried Professor Gonzalo.

  I ducked into the next room while the Professor tried to contain the ever-expanding fungus destroying his lab. I locked the double doors behind me, trapping Gonzalo and his goblin inside.

  The twenty bad kids from the amusement park were seated at a long table in a room drearily decorated like it was someone’s birthday party. They were wearing colorful party hats and throwing confetti at each other.

  “Who are you?” they asked.

  “My name’s Kelly. And I’m here to rescue you,” I said.

  “What’s up, losers?” said Meatball.

  The kids screamed and pointed at the troll strapped to my back.

  “It’s okay. He’s with me,” I said. “He’s my tour guide.”

  “No I’m not. I’m an innocent guy who’s been kidnapped. AMA!” said Meatball.

  I snatched the platter of monster cheeseburgers from the table.

  “Hey! That’s our dinner!” screamed the kids.

  “You can’t eat these. They’re bad for you.”

  “Are you vegan or something?” sneered a girl.

  “I’ll eat ’em,” Meatball said.

  The Professor’s muffled screams shot from his lab. The green and yellow fungus seeped out from the cracks in the double doors.

  “Kids, this park isn’t what you think it is,” I said. “We need to get out of here right now. Follow me.”

  I dumped the cheeseburgers in the trash, but a boy swiped one from the tray.

  “Little boy, do not eat that,” I said slowly.

  “No one tells me what to do,” the boy said, wagging his cheeseburger. “Not my parents. Not you. No one.”

  “He told you,” chuckled Meatball.

  I dove for the burger, but the boy defiantly shoved the whole thing into his mouth. I grabbed his cheeks and tried to fish it out, but the little brat bit my finger and swallowed. The kids watched in horror as I wrestled the boy and tried to give him the Heimlich maneuver.

  “Stop it!” cried the kids. “You’re hurting him!”

  The kids ganged up on me. They pulled my hair and punched me to get me to let go.

  “You’re a horrible, mean person,” said a girl. “You need to leave right
now.”

  The twenty kids glared defiantly at me. The kid who scarfed down the cheeseburger stuck out his tongue at me.

  “Fail video,” mumbled Meatball.

  The hinges on the doors leading to the lab strained and buckled.

  I held out my shaking hand. “Kids, I know you think I’m crazy, but you need to come with me.”

  “No way!” they said. “We were having fun until you showed up and dumped our dinner in the trash.”

  “I know you don’t understand, but it’s for your own good.”

  “You sound like my mother!”

  That made me pause. I did sound like a mother. Suddenly, I understood all those times when she told me I couldn’t do something and I didn’t understand why.

  I took a breath. “Let me start over. My name’s Kelly. I’m a babysitter. I’m a good guy. Here’s my business card.”

  I was interrupted by a painful burp that came from the boy who had eaten the cheeseburger.

  30

  The boy staggered around the room, clutching his stomach.

  “I don’t feel so good,” he moaned.

  Muscles twitched in his back, and he fell to his hands and knees. Hair slithered from his twisting, stretching body. Claws grew from his swelling fingers. Horns slowly emerged from his forehead. Tusks sprouted from his jaw.

  “What’s happening to me?” he moaned again.

  His huge paws reached out for help from the other nineteen kids, but they screamed and stepped back against the wall.

  “Totes gnarls,” said Meatball.

  I unhooked the troll from my back and approached the shivering, transforming boy.

  “I want my mommy.” The boy’s voice was eerily deep and low.

  I rubbed his furry back, trying to comfort him. “We’ll get you to her.”

  The boy’s eyes looked up at me. They glistened with fear, and suddenly, they clouded yellow and turned into catlike eyes.

  “It’s okay. This happened to one of my best friends. What’s your name?”

  “Hudson,” he whispered.

  “I’m going to take care of you, Hudson,” I said.

  “Mommy!” Hudson cried for his mother again, but it came out as a braying howl.

  Wobbling to his feet, he stood seven feet tall. He tried to speak, but instead, he barked. Frustrated, Hudson thrashed and roared. I ducked his swinging apelike arms.

  The other kids screamed. “Monster!”

  “He’s still Hudson,” I corrected them.

  Breath heaving, Hudson looked down at me. He appreciated that I understood what he was going through. I gently took his paw.

  “I’m going to help you, Hudson. But I need you to stay calm and do what I say.”

  Hudson wailed.

  I held Hudson’s paw and looked at the nineteen kids to show them that the monster on the outside was still a boy on the inside.

  “I’m going to get you out of here. Are you guys with me?” I asked the kids.

  The doors burst open. Waves of homunculus fungus flopped out with Professor Gonzalo and his goblin assistant floating and flailing in its growing jelly tentacles. Through the layers of goo, the Professor glared at me with surprised recognition.

  He tore a hole in the fungus and shouted through it. “Guards!”

  The nineteen stunned kids looked from him to me.

  They nodded in unison. They were with me.

  I scooped up Meatball and, holding Hudson’s paw, led the children out as the giant fungus exploded into the birthday party room.

  We rushed down a hallway filled with arcade games and found the exit. It was locked. I kicked it, but it wouldn’t budge. The corridor was filling up with the bulbous spore goo. In five seconds the homunculus fungus was going to swallow us all up.

  I showed Hudson the locked door.

  “There are perks to your condition,” I said.

  Hudson roared and knocked the door down.

  We dashed out into the night. The shockingly cold, fresh air filled my lungs. The outside of the Professor’s lab was painted to look like a happy Pizza Party Zone. The roof cracked and lifted under the swelling, rising homunculus fungus.

  I might have overdone that recipe a little.

  “We need to get these kids to the extraction point,” I said.

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Meatball said.

  I tried to contact Berna on my walkie-talkie. All I got was static.

  Quickly looking around, I noticed that the fun house tracks ended nearby. In the distance I saw yellow mist pluming into the sky.

  That’s the smoke I saw coming from the chimney stacks. That’s near the prison compound, which is where the extraction point is. Maybe that’s where Berna and the others went.

  A thick, thorny forest of scorched, dead vines and trees lay between us and the distant chimneys.

  “Is there a shortcut to the chimney stacks, Meatball?”

  “Only way I know is through those woods,” said Meatball. “But you don’t want to go through there.”

  I was about to ask why not when an alarm whooped. A spotlight from a distant watchtower swept the grounds.

  A tremendous wolf howl sent shivers down my spine. The kids froze in terror. The island hushed eerily quiet. Every living thing grew still with fear.

  “Aroooo!” cried the Baron.

  The Wolf was hunting us.

  31

  “Hudson, you’re the strongest one here, so I need you to give a few kids a piggyback ride, okay?” I said.

  Monster Hudson nodded. The kids hesitated, but Hudson gently offered his horns for them to hold, and they hung tight for their monster ride. I said a prayer as I led everyone into the dead woods. Thorns bit into my skin as I hacked my staff through brittle, twisting vines. Thick mud splashed under our feet, slowing our steps.

  “This is why I don’t go outside,” complained Meatball.

  “Quiet,” I whispered.

  Behind us, flashlights danced through crackling branches. Snarling hounds leaped into the dead woods. They were gaining on us. We needed to hide. Up ahead, half buried in the ground, was a giant, hollow tree that had fallen. The massive, partially buried log was a good hiding place for the moment.

  The Wolf can smell people from a mile away. And between you, nineteen kids, a rancid troll, and a monster boy, your collective stink must be like a homing beacon to him.

  I stopped. Mud squished beneath my sneakers. The forest floor was covered in it.

  I suddenly remembered me reading to Victor one day at lunch. While I was reading the guide to him, I could feel his gaze on my cheek.

  From A Babysitter’s Guide to Monster Hunting

  HIDING, SHADOWING: Mud can blanket most smells. So long as there is sufficient mud to cover the entire scent, one could, in an emergency, hide beneath the muck.

  I scooped up a handful and slapped it on my face. The kids looked at me like I was crazy until I explained it was the only way not to get caught.

  They rolled in the mud. Meatball put up a fight as I smeared his face with glop. Covered in muck, we crawled into the shadows of the cavernous tree.

  “Don’t make a sound,” I whispered to them.

  Footsteps approached. Snouts snuffed the ground. The children’s eyes darted fearfully around behind their mud masks. We huddled together, shivering in silence.

  A pack of wild dogs, and goblins with flashlights, rushed past our hiding spot.

  I dared a look out of a crack in the log and saw four giant wolf paws stomping into view. A huge, wet snout snuffed the ground. It was the Baron, stalking us on all fours.

  The terrifying wolf stopped. His sharp claws clacked impatiently as he sniffed the air. The Wolf rose onto his hind legs and stood eight feet tall upright. He scanned the woods, pointy ears twitching.

  He doesn’t know we’re here, I thought. He’s lost the scent.

  “Come out, come out, wherever you are,” sang the Baron.

  The kids shut their eyes tight. My hea
rt slammed against my rib cage.

  The Wolf snorted and slinked after his hounds.

  I exhaled with relief. They were gone.

  “They’re over here!” cried Meatball.

  I slapped my hand over the traitorous troll’s mouth, but the little creep bit me.

  “I found them!” called Meatball. “Over here!”

  Paws slammed against the hollow log. The children screamed as the giant wolf leaned over and slowly smiled at us.

  “There you are,” said the Baron. “Snug as a bug in a rug.”

  32

  I lunged, but his sword flashed in my face.

  “I wouldn’t do that,” sneered the Wolf.

  “Meatball, you jerk,” I said through clenched teeth.

  “You’ve been pwned,” said Meatball.

  “What did you think was going to happen, Kelly?” the Baron asked. “You were going to rescue this hideous troll, take him back to your world, and tra-la-la, he’d live happily ever after? Look at him. He is a wretch. A freak. A monster. No one in your world would ever want to be his friend. He belongs here. Here, he is home with the other outcasts.”

  Six pairs of gargoyle claws stabbed through the tree bark above our heads. They shrieked, and the log shook. Trapped, we were lifted into the air. The ground vanished below. I held the children close as we were flown into the sky.

  We were dropped into a stone fortress that sat in the middle of a lake of bubbling black sludge. Inside, the prison was littered with broken toys and shredded coloring books. It was like day care at Alcatraz. Goblin guards snapped shackles on Hudson. They yanked his chain leash and led him farther into the dungeon. The nineteen kids were locked in a miserable prison cell. I was taken to a single cell scattered with old action figures. Guards tore off my backpack, searched me for weapons, and then slammed the bars shut with a clang.

  Moonlight beamed through a small window. I pulled myself up and saw we were surrounded by reeking tar pits that smelled like garbage melting into boiling asphalt. Huge methane bubbles popped on its surface. Skeletons of monsters were trapped in the tar, reaching out their limbs, as if they’d gotten stuck trying to escape.

  “Look who made it,” a voice said.