The Mallow Marsh Monster

by Gary Ghislain

  “Why didn’t you just destroy the horn if you knew it could bring back the monster?” I had asked Mayor Carter.

  “I didn’t believe any of it, Harold. My ancestors did. They believed that the Mallow Marsh Monster lived in between two worlds—ours and a magical one in the marsh. They believed that the monster traveled between dimensions, stealing men, women, and children from our town. They used the horn to punch a hole in our reality, to hunt the monster on the other side. The horn was a symbol of power for them. They would proudly display it to the villagers, reminding everybody that they should be feared because they could bring back the monster. For me, it was just folklore and superstition. A harmless old artifact that most everybody had forgotten. Then here comes this couple. The Farrells. They say they’re scientists and offer me a huge amount of money for an odd little horn collecting dust in my museum. So I did exactly what my father told me not to do. I sold it to them. And not a month later, the Mallow Marsh Monster was back.”

  * * *

  —

  I looked at the horn in Ilona’s hand as we started down the dock.

  The Farrells had come to Bay Harbor specifically to get their hands on the horn and explore the magical dimension, Ilona and I had concluded. They knew the legend and had seen the picture of the horn in the newspaper article, so they knew where to get it. They went into the other realm and brought back a slug that bit Mrs. Farrell and transformed her into the monster that terrorized us.

  My wheels went over a loose board. I grabbed the handle of the mirror to keep it from falling into the water just in time.

  “The mirror’s magic, Harold,” Mayor Carter had told me when she gave it to me. “If you point it at the monster, it will send it back to its world with no possibility of coming back into our realm. That’s how my ancestor used to get rid of it. That’s the only way to get rid of it.”

  “Mayor Carter will never forgive herself for betraying her ancestors,” I said as we reached the point where the dock collapsed into the water.

  “If anything happens to Suzie, I won’t forgive her either,” Ilona said, and called for her dad.

  Birds flew off from a nearby shrub. Insects buzzed around us. Creatures of various sizes scuttled on the ground and splashed in the water. Frank Goolz and Uncle Jerry were nowhere to be found.

  Ilona and I looked at each other. Then we looked down at the horn clenched in her fist.

  “Do it,” I said.

  She took a deep breath and brought the horn to her lips. I expected it to honk, but it produced only a low hum, almost imperceptible.

  “Did you hear anything?” she asked.

  “Like, almost nothing. Maybe try again?”

  Ilona gave it all she had. Her face turned red, but the sound didn’t get any louder. Then I noticed the air at the mouth of the horn. It looked wavy, like it came out piping hot. I looked out at the marsh.

  “Ilona, stop!”

  “What?” She wiped her mouth.

  “Look!”

  She looked. “Holy flop! It works!”

  The dock was no longer submerged in the water. It extended across the marsh, the boards straight and clean, no longer covered in moss. Ahead of us, a hill protruded from the water, like an island in the middle of the marsh.

  “Was that there before?” I asked.

  “I’d remember something like that!”

  The dock led straight to the hill. Ilona took a syringe from her coat pocket and we crossed into the magical world.

  “Do you think your father will be able to find us, if we get lost or can’t get out?”

  She shrugged. “I think we’re on our own, Harold.”

  “What if there are a whole bunch of monsters in there?”

  “Then we’re in deep doo-doo.” She held out her hands—one holding the trumpet, the other the single syringe. “We’re not exactly equipped for a massive marsh-monster attack.”

  The dock stopped at the foot of the hill, the ground around it covered with a thick layer of dead leaves. Giant, petrified tree trunks lay where they had fallen eons ago.

  “This place is dead.”

  “Please, Harold. Don’t make it sound even spookier than it is,” she said, then shouted her sister’s name.

  “Should you really advertise our presence like that?”

  “I want to find her and get out of here as fast as we can.”

  “I want the same thing, but let’s not wake anything that we’d rather stay asleep, that’s all I’m saying.”

  She put the horn under her arm, the syringe back in her pocket, and moved behind my chair to help me up the hill. I pushed hard on my wheels to make it easier for her.

  “Next time, let’s battle something that lives on flatter ground,” I joked, but she just puffed along.

  “Wait,” I said. “Look at those leaves.” They were moving in waves. Something was crawling toward us underneath them.

  We stopped and I put on my brakes. A layer of leaves slid downhill, revealing flashes of black.

  “Ugh,” I said. “It’s more of those giant slugs.”

  I looked around us. The hill was alive with them. Dead leaves were shifting everywhere, revealing shining spots of slimy slug skin.

  “Cheese, no,” Ilona breathed out. “They’re coming for us.”

  “Crap!” I took out Mayor Carter’s mirror and tried to point it in every direction at once. “This isn’t doing a thing!”

  “She said it will send the monster back into his realm.” Ilona picked up a piece of dead wood and threw it at the moving waves of brown leaves to very little effect. “We’re already in its realm, Harold.”

  “Well, a little less magic,” I stuffed the mirror back into my pocket, “and a little more action!” I released my brakes, grabbed my wheels, and we kept going. The only way out was up.

  “This is so disgusting.” Ilona kicked a pile of leaves and a fat slug flew away. “They’re trying to bite me!” She kicked another in the opposite direction. “It’s like Mayor Carter said. They’re everywhere.”

  Suddenly she gasped and shouted, “Harold!”

  A slug lifted its head out of the leaves right in front of us, its mouth wide open and full of tiny pointed teeth covered in black goo. “Hell, no!”

  I gripped my wheels and pushed as hard as I could. The slug hissed when my chair rolled over its head. Ilona jumped over it and found the strength to run, fiercely kicking leaves left and right, sometimes hitting nothing, sometimes kicking away the thick body of a furious slug.

  “This is the most horrible place I have ever been in my life.” I turned my chair slightly to roll over a slug that was aiming for Ilona’s ankle. “I’m so giving it zero stars on Yelp.”

  The hill was easing into a glade, devoid of leaves. The top of the hill flattened to a surface of bare, dry ground, baked by sunlight.

  I pivoted when we reached the center of the clearing.

  “They’re not following us anymore,” Ilona said.

  She was right. Some of the slugs were trying to venture out of the leaves onto the plateau, but retreated immediately when the sunlight hit their slimy bodies.

  “It’s the sun,” she said, watching them slug away from the daylight. “They can’t stand it—just like the monsters.”

  “This isn’t the best place for a campout,” I said, panning around. Everything was dead: all the trees stood petrified. Nothing alive grew on the bleached ground. No birds were chirping. No insects were buzzing.

  Ilona drew in a deep breath and shouted “SUZIE!” as loud as she could.

  “Here!” a tree answered.

  Ilona ran to it. “Suzie!! Are you in there?” She knocked on the dead bark.

  “Yes, and it’s disgusting!” Suzie knocked back. “Get me out!”

  The tree had no branches. It was a hollow tube of desiccated wood.

  “The monster sealed me in with mud.”

  I touched a darker spot and felt moist soil.

  “It made the mud by mixing dirt wit
h spit! It was so creepy! I want to go home! NOW!”

  I looked over both shoulders, shaking with fear. “Where is it?”

  “Harold, I’m stuck in a tree!” she snapped. “How would I know? Just get me out before the sun goes down!”

  I started scratching at the mud with my fingers, but it was as solid as cement. Ilona picked up a rock.

  “Did it bite you?” I asked.

  Suzie growled in annoyance. “Are you going to ask me a thousand questions?”

  “Just answer him, Suzie!” Ilona struck the tree with the rock, and a few pieces flaked off.

  “No, it didn’t. What about Harold? Is he a monster?”

  “No,” I said. “The antidote worked.”

  Ilona gave me her rock and picked up another one. We started hammering the dried mud, breaking off larger and larger patches. Finally, we punched a hole and Suzie stuck her fingers through it. I caught a glimpse of one blue eye.

  “Nice to see you,” I said, managing a smile. “We missed you.”

  We dropped the stones and pulled at the edges of the hole with our hands. Suzie did the same thing from inside. Soon the opening was big enough for her head, and then her shoulders. Ilona grabbed her hands and pulled. They both fell onto the ground.

  Suzie sat up, dusting herself off. She was covered in mud and monster tar, her hair glued with dirt into uneven patches, but she smiled. Her mood had greatly improved now that she was free.

  “Thanks, guys,” she said. She stood and gave me a big, long hug. “You’re the bestest friend in the world.” She let go of me and turned to her sister. They grinned. They laughed. They cried. And then Ilona got her own hug.

  “I love you, you little brat,” I heard Ilona whisper as she held her sister tight.

  Suzie let her go and wiped her tears, smearing the dirt on her cheeks. “Did you know this place is crawling with those horrible slugs, like the one in the Farrells’ lab?”

  “Correct.” I pointed at the edge of the glade. “And they’re waiting for us.”

  “I could hear them all night, trying to get me. There must have been like a thousand of them. It sounded like they were knocking their heads against the tree, trying to get in.”

  Ilona wiped away her own tears. “The monster must be resting in another tree, just like the one he used for you.” She took the syringe out. “This is our chance to put an end to this.”

  I scanned the glade. There were plenty of trees still standing. “We have to find one sealed with mud.”

  Ilona picked up the rocks we had used and handed one to me.

  Suzie picked up her own. “Let’s hope the monster isn’t sleeping on a bed of slugs.”

  I shuddered. “Let’s hope not,” I agreed, and we each chose a tree.

  16

  NO WAY OUT

  The slugs were restless, forming larger and larger packs in greater numbers at the edge of the glade—a living, wriggling wall all around us.

  “Blech, they creep me out,” Suzie said, knocking her rock against a tree. “Even if we find Mr. Monster, how are we going to get out of here?”

  “One problem at a time,” Ilona told her, moving to the next tree.

  We had divided the glade into three zones. Each of us was exploring one, looking for a suspicious tree.

  “Anything?” Ilona called.

  I inspected a new tree. It was clean. “Not yet.” I smacked it with the rock anyway.

  “Monster, monster, we’ll find you wherever you are!” Suzie slapped a tree in frustration. “Nothing here either.”

  I stopped and looked at the Goolz girls. We were such a good team, even when everything was bleak and hopeless.

  “Guys!” Ilona called, taking a step away from the tree she’d been whacking.

  We regrouped with her. The sun-bleached tree was slashed with a darker slit, similar to the one we had smashed to free Suzie.

  “That must be it,” I said.

  “This is the one. Guaranteed.” Suzie pressed her finger against the mud. “Let’s get rid of that ugly, red-eyed monster for good.”

  Ilona dropped her rock. “The monster is also Ed Farrell. This is a rescue mission, not search and destroy. We’re going to free him from that curse.” She took out the syringe and removed the plastic cap. “You two break the mud, and I’ll inject the monster as soon as I can reach it.”

  “Amen,” I agreed.

  The slugs started hissing disapprovingly. We turned to look at them. They were twisting and turning frantically at the edge between shadow and light.

  “They’re not happy.” I shifted my grip on the stone. I took a deep breath and looked at Suzie. She nodded.

  “Here goes.” I lifted the stone, closed my eyes, and smashed it against the tree. A large chip flew away and Suzie struck the second blow, breaking off another serious chunk. We worked on it in turns. She hit; I hit—back and forth in perfect synchronicity.

  “You’re almost there.” Ilona’s eyes were locked on the growing gap, ready to stab whatever came out.

  I struck the tree one last time and a massive cake of mud fell inside. We stopped. The hole was about as big as an apple and darker than night. Nothing moved inside. All we could hear was the maddening hiss of the slugs going crazy.

  “I wish you guys had brought the Zaporino. We could zap it and knock it out.” Suzie leaned against the tree, trying to get a look at whatever was hiding inside.

  “Be careful,” I told her.

  She glanced at me. “Relax, Harold,” she said. And then she screamed.

  A green hand darted out and grabbed Suzie’s dirty sweater with its pointed claws. It slammed her against the tree, trying to pull her inside. “Harold!” she cried.

  I grabbed the back of her sweater and pulled the other way until the monster’s arm was halfway out of the tree. It shrieked in pain and let go of Suzie as the sunlight hit its skin. Suzie crashed into me, my chair tilted, and we fell to the ground, knocking Ilona down with us.

  The mirror fell out of my pocket. It landed on the dry ground with a sharp CLING. “Crap!” I said.

  “Is that Mayor Carter’s mirror?” Suzie asked.

  I picked up the broken mirror and looked at my reflection. The glass held in place, but it was split in two, displaying my face twice, both of them looking horribly scared.

  “Do you think this is really the right time to check for pimples?” Suzie yelled at me.

  I wanted to explain to her that the mirror was actually a potent anti-monster weapon, but something screeched inside the tree, calling us to attention.

  We looked up at the hole. The monster had retracted its arm inside.

  Ilona held up the syringe. It was empty. “I got it.”

  The monster started thrashing and screaming inside the tree. Suzie sat up and brushed monster goo from her sweater where the monster had grabbed her.

  We stayed on the ground, watching the tree as the monster kicked and screamed. White and gray clouds of toxic fumes puffed out of the hole. And then the monster fell silent.

  The slugs didn’t like that. Some of them got so agitated that they braved the sun. They slid into the glade, oozing black goo, then dried up and died just a few feet from the shadows where thousands of their cousins were waiting for us.

  The girls helped me back into my chair. I put the broken mirror back in my pocket, swapping it for my phone. We used the phone’s flashlight to look inside the tree. The half monster, half man inside was curled into a fetal position, breathing deeply, just like Mrs. Farrell had after her transformation.

  I turned off the light and looked up at the sky. The sun was starting to sink. It wasn’t going to protect us for much longer.

  “We took care of the monster.” I nodded toward the slugs still writhing in the shadows. “Now we have to deal with that situation.”

  Some of the slugs used the shadows of fallen trees to venture closer. Suzie threw rocks at them. There were so many that she couldn’t miss. They jumped and hissed at the impact, then slid a lit
tle closer as the sky continued to dim.

  “We have to use the horn,” I told Ilona. She had slid it up her arm and was carrying it around her shoulder. She nodded and took it down.

  “I’ll do it,” I said. She handed it to me, then stopped me with a hand on my arm just as I was about to blow into the horn.

  “Wait.”

  “What?”

  “Mr. Farrell. We need to get him out of the tree and make sure he makes it back with us.”

  I turned toward the tree where he was slowly turning from monster to human. Then, I checked the sun. It was moving along the tips of the trees, edging down dangerously.

  “Let’s do it fast then.”

  Suzie found another rock, and the three of us went to work together on the tree. Smash, smash, smash in perfect rhythm. I glanced over my shoulder. The slugs were everywhere, slipping from shadow to shadow, sliding over and around each other, hissing angrily, their mouths snapping open and closed.

  “We have to use the horn right now,” I said. “And pray it gets us out of here.”

  Ilona pulled out a large chunk of mud. “We’re almost there, Harold.”

  Suzie swept an armload of dirt from the other side of the opening to the ground. Finally, the hole was big enough to extract an adult body.

  “I’ll try to pull him out.” Ilona took off her coat and stuck her head and shoulders into the gap. “As soon as he’s out, you blow the horn,” she said, her voice muffled by the hollow tree.

  I tightened my grip on the horn and prayed that my escape plan worked.

  “I got him!” Ilona yelled. “Suzie, help me!”

  Suzie grabbed her sister’s waist and pulled. My breath came in quick gasps as I watched the slugs drawing nearer. They were so close now that I could smell their meaty stench.