The Cryptid Keeper

by Lija Fisher

  “Hey, guys,” Clivo said, entering the room and putting down the plate of cookies.

  “HEY!” a chorus of five happy voices said in unison.

  Clivo winced at the loud shouts.

  “Welcome back, dude!” Charles said, hurrying over. “Kinda took you a while this time. You losing your touch or something?”

  “Be nice, Charles,” Stephanie said, giving Clivo a big hug, her face blushing its usual shade of pink. Her blond hair was tucked into a ponytail, and a stray wisp tickled Clivo’s nose.

  “Oh, do we hug now? Is this a thing?” Amelia asked, lifting her round body from a chair to embrace Clivo, her sparkling nose ring standing out against her dark skin. “Oooo, too tight.”

  “I’m just going to fist-bump you, dude,” Adam said, his bony arm reaching out to give Clivo a fist bump.

  “I’d like a hug, please,” Hernando said quietly. Clivo leaned over to give the short boy a squeeze.

  The Myth Blasters lived in Portland, Maine, but at the end of the school year they had all decided that being in the same place for the summer would make it easier to do their cryptid research. It was safer, too. With the evil resistance trying to find Clivo and the immortal, he felt better having the Blasters close by in his secluded mountain home.

  After the Blasters had gotten permission from their parents to attend a special “math and science camp in the mountains” for the summer, they’d all arrived on Clivo’s doorstep, much to Pearl’s concern. On one hand, she was excited that Clivo had nerdy friends to keep him out of trouble, but on the other, she was wary about having so many teenagers in the house because every book she’d read said that the only thing teenagers did was create mischief.

  Upon arrival, the Blasters had set up the basement so they could keep up their cryptid research and continue narrowing down which one might be the immortal. After their handiwork, the basement looked like mission control for a group dedicated to finding mythological creatures. Laptops sat on desks, maps covered the walls, and shelves filled with hundreds of books on legends and folklore were crammed into each corner. Tapestries hung from the ceilings, and white Christmas lights blanketed the room in a cozy glow. The only thing missing compared to their previous headquarters was the vast array of candles and lanterns used to light the space. It was the one thing Clivo nixed because an old wooden house surrounded by forest was not a place to play with fire. Instead, he’d bought some fake candles that cast an orange light upon the spooky figurines of cryptids that dotted the space.

  Clivo had bought all of the equipment the Blasters asked for with his Diamond Card, down to the equipment Charles used to figure out if photographic evidence of supposed cryptids was fake or not. Clivo normally wasn’t allowed to buy such extravagances with the card that had been given to him by his cranky old boss, Douglas Chancery. And Douglas didn’t know about the Blasters yet, mainly because Clivo didn’t want to give the old man more people to yell at. But Douglas was so impressed with Clivo’s catching skills that he allowed Clivo to buy the equipment without question, provided that he promise not to get used to making such expenditures.

  The one thing Clivo wasn’t allowed to spend money on was new clothes, which Douglas deemed to be a nonessential item, along with food. So Clivo still wore the ill-fitting ones from Palace of Pants that Pearl bought for him, which led to merciless teasing at school. But Clivo didn’t care. Whatever extra money Douglas gave him he wanted to use to help the Blasters.

  “So, how’d the catch go?” Stephanie asked when everyone was sitting around a large wooden table that was worn and weathered, like something King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table would have used.

  “Pretty good, except the Ugly Merman was anything but harmless,” Clivo reported, scratching his face. “He had this long, disgusting tongue that kept throwing things at me.”

  Charles clenched his fists with joy. “A weaponized tongue is so awesome!”

  Adam grabbed a cookie. “That’s weird,” he said. “Maybe the cryptids are living so long that they’re adapting better protection mechanisms.” He eyed the cookie suspiciously. “Are these gluten-free?”

  Clivo nodded. “Aunt Pearl is well aware of your dietary restrictions.”

  “Awesome, gluten makes me bloat,” Adam replied, taking a giant bite out of the treat.

  “It sounds like you need to be super careful going forward, Clivo,” Amelia said, bringing the conversation back on track. “Adam’s right; as old as some of these creatures are, who knows how their bodies have adapted.”

  “Don’t worry, I’ll be more on my toes from now on,” Clivo said, grabbing another cookie. He was still happy to be eating anything that was not fish. “Speaking of which, any idea where my next catch will be?”

  “Let’s take a look at the map,” Adam said, bounding over to a piece of brown parchment paper tacked on the wall like an old pirate treasure map. Pins marked where either Clivo or his dad had found cryptids. Adam grabbed another pin and stuck it in the northwestern part of Russia where Clivo had just found the Ugly Merman. “So,” Adam continued, “your dad taught you four foreign languages—Russian, Hindustani, Japanese, and Arabic. We assume those are the places where he wanted you to look for the immortal. You just caught the Merman in Russia. Over Christmas break you found the Japanese Thunder Beast—”

  “That guy was awesome,” Charles said.

  “Having a flying wolf heading straight toward me was actually a bit less than awesome,” Clivo corrected.

  Charles waved his hand dismissively. “You can take it, dude.”

  Adam cleared his throat. “As I was saying, over spring break you caught the Barmanu, the Bigfoot-like dude in Pakistan, where you spoke Hindustani. So the only language we haven’t covered is Arabic.”

  Amelia tapped her fingers on the table. “I’m still figuring out exactly what region your dialect is from, and once we figure that out we’ll locate the nearest cryptid. It shouldn’t be more than a few days.”

  “That’s fine,” Clivo said, stretching his arms over his head and yawning. “I could use a few days of soaking in a hot bath, anyway.”

  “And if the next catch isn’t the immortal, then we’re out of clues,” Stephanie said. “We’ve been doing our best to research which other cryptid it might be, but we haven’t come up with much.”

  “But don’t worry, we’re on it,” Amelia said encouragingly.

  “On it,” Hernando agreed quietly.

  Clivo stifled another yawn. “I don’t know whose job is harder, you guys finding the cryptids or me catching them.”

  Charles snorted. “Dude, we make magic outta nothing.”

  “You definitely do.” Clivo stood up. “If it’s okay with you guys, I’m going to shower and go to bed. I still smell like a beached whale.”

  Charles wrinkled his nose. “I was wondering where that smell was coming from. I thought Adam was trying a new cologne.”

  “Same as always,” Adam said, proudly sniffing his shirt.

  “Good night, team,” Clivo said.

  Clivo dragged his backpack and tired body upstairs to his bedroom, shooing the cats out of the room with a gentle nudge of his foot. He needed a good night’s rest without being smothered by furballs.

  After a long, hot shower that he could have stayed in forever, he printed out his selfie with the Ugly Merman and grabbed a photo album from its secret hiding place in the back of his closet. He flipped through the photos of his dad’s cryptid catches, a smile always on his face and a legendary creature propped up at his feet. Clivo paused on the family photo, the one with him as a baby cradled in his mom’s arms and a gunni, a wombat-like creature with antlers, held in his father’s. He traced his finger across the photo and let the familiar ache of grief settle in his chest. He had lost his mom to cancer and his dad to a murderous fellow catcher, and Clivo missed them every day. They were the good guys—some of the few—and they had left him the legacy of finding the immortal, a legacy he intended to fulfill.

&n
bsp; Clivo flipped a few more pages to his own photos, bright with fresh colors. The look on his face with Nessie always made him laugh—he looked so surprised and shocked to have actually found his first cryptid. He appeared absolutely terrified in the photo with the Otterman, who had chased after him. But with every photo, with each passing catch, Clivo could see that he looked more and more confident.

  Clivo turned to a fresh page and secured the Ugly Merman photo to it. He definitely looked rattled from the unexpected battle with the creature’s mutant power tongue. But something else in the photo caught his eye, as well. In the background, near a desolate hill, was the light he swore he had seen the evening of his catch. Why was it bothering him so much? Something wasn’t sitting right; he just wasn’t sure what it was.

  A while later, a timid knock sounded on his door, and he opened it to find Stephanie holding a cup full of a steaming liquid. “Sorry to bother you. I thought you’d like some warm milk with cinnamon.”

  “Oh, thanks, Stephanie. After a week in the Arctic, I still haven’t completely thawed out.” Clivo gratefully accepted the cup. He took a sip and noticed that Stephanie just stood there, looking uncertain. “What is it? Are you and Amelia okay in your room? Are you comfortable enough? Do you need more blankets or something?”

  Stephanie shook her head. “Our room is fine, even though we can hear Charles snoring through the walls. And the boys are okay in their bunk beds next door, despite Adam’s complaining about the non-hypoallergenic pillows.” She giggled for a moment, but then her face turned serious. “We didn’t want to bother you with this ’cause it’s probably nothing, but there’s something weird going on.”

  Clivo laughed. “Weirder than finding a merman with an attack tongue?”

  Stephanie smiled, but she pulled at a stray piece of hair nervously. Clivo stopped laughing. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to make a joke. What’s going on?”

  Stephanie glanced down the stairs, probably to make sure Pearl wasn’t eavesdropping, and slipped inside the room, shutting the door behind her. Clivo pulled out the desk chair for Stephanie to sit on and turned to find her looking through the photo album. She noticed him watching her. “Sorry,” she said quickly. “I didn’t mean to pry.”

  “No, it’s fine, I should have showed this to you guys a while ago, since you helped my dad find some of the cryptids.”

  Stephanie continued to flip through the pages, her eyes slowly taking in each creature. “They’re incredible, aren’t they? Such amazing beings.”

  “They are,” Clivo agreed. “I know we’re eager to find the immortal, but discovering these guys along the way has been really special, too.”

  Stephanie stared in awe at the photo of the blue tiger. “I wish I could see one of them in person. Just once.”

  Clivo knew the feeling. It really was incredible seeing a legendary creature for the first time. But he didn’t want to make her feel like she was missing out on much, so he simply said, “Trust me, when the Barmanu is trying to eat your head, seeing it in photos seems like a much nicer experience.”

  Stephanie smiled and delicately closed the photo album. “Anyway, like I was saying, it’s probably nothing, but for a while now I’ve noticed something bizarre going on in the crypto chat rooms.”

  “What do you mean?” Clivo asked, taking a seat on his bed.

  Stephanie shifted on the chair and folded her legs beneath her. “Fellow cryptozoologists always share information about cryptid sightings. They’re not all accurate, of course, but most of the time there’s a shred of truth to them. As soon as I found out your dad had caught the chupacabras, it struck me that I hadn’t heard of any sightings of the creature for a while. So I dug around and couldn’t find sightings for other creatures that either you or your dad caught, starting from around when they were caught.”

  “Which ones?” Clivo asked.

  Stephanie’s blue eyes flashed with worry. “All of them. All except Nessie, I should say. She’s still happily in the loch. But it’s like the others just … disappeared.”

  Clivo’s chest tightened. He put down the warm milk and leaned forward. “Do you guys have any theories about what’s going on?”

  Stephanie shook her head. “We really don’t know. We’re hoping that the creatures just get spooked and go into hiding after their encounters with you. But the Myth Blasters are data people, and the data are showing us that after a cryptid is caught, it’s never heard from again.”

  Clivo exhaled sharply and ran his hand through his shaggy wet hair. “So, what do we do? I know we want to find the immortal, but we also want to protect the other cryptids. What if something I’m doing is somehow hurting them?”

  “I know,” Stephanie said, frustration furrowing her brow. “We’ll keep monitoring to see if some chatter about sightings comes back. Again, it could be nothing. In the meantime, just be alert on your catches. If you see something out of the ordinary, just, I don’t know, pay attention.”

  Clivo thought of the weird light in the distance and the feeling that he was being watched. But there was nothing Stephanie could do about it, and he didn’t want to worry her more than necessary. “Thanks, Stephanie. I’m glad you told me. Let’s hope it’s nothing.”

  Stephanie stood up to go. She slowly opened the door to see if Pearl was peeping around the corner. “Just be careful out there, Clivo. I’m not sure what’s going on, but it gives me goose bumps.”

  III

  The next day was Friday, the night he usually had dinner with his best friend Jerry and Jerry’s parents. After Clivo lost his dad, the Coopers had let him move in for a bit while Aunt Pearl was away on an Acapulco salsa-dancing adventure. Spending time with a family in a cozy home, despite the constant pranks that Jerry pulled, had made Clivo feel less alone in the world.

  “So how’s that math and science camp you’ve got going on there, son?” Mr. Cooper asked as he scooped up a heaping mound of mashed potatoes. Mr. Cooper was a standard dad, with a paunchy belly and a rumpled white collared shirt that stood out brightly against his dark skin. The only thing un-standard about him was that he was head of the SETL Institute, an organization dedicated to the Search for Extraterrestrial Life in the galaxy.

  “Oh, it’s going really great, Mr. Cooper. The other kids are super smart, so I’m learning a lot.” Clivo dished up some mac and cheese and felt a rush of relief. He’d missed a lot of dinners lately because he was so busy with the Blasters, and he was happy that the Coopers were over their healthy-diet phase and back to eating regular stuff instead of boiled cabbage and raw nuts and berries.

  Mrs. Cooper, a turnip-shaped woman who was so pale it looked like she had lived in a cave her whole life, pinched Clivo’s dimpled cheek. “Oh, it’s nice to hear that you’re doing so well, honey. Teenagers can really go off the rails sometimes.”

  Clivo laughed. “Yeah, Pearl is just waiting for me to start stealing cars or something.”

  Mr. Cooper cleared his throat and looked meaningfully at Jerry, who raised his eyebrows in mock shock. “I didn’t steal your car, Dad, I simply tried to hot-wire it should I need it in case of an emergency. And I couldn’t figure it out anyway, so no harm, no foul.”

  Jerry had inherited his father’s dark skin, but not his father’s love of science. Jerry preferred sports, though he kept getting kicked off every team he joined because of his practical jokes. He had already been booted from the summer flag football league for putting itching powder in everybody’s jerseys, which had led to his team losing their first game because nobody could stop itching and scratching. Jerry managed to return two punts for touchdowns because nobody else on his team could quit wriggling long enough to run or catch the ball, so he considered the game a victory.

  “You ruined the electrical system so the radio only plays country music, Jerry. Country,” Mr. Cooper pointed out.

  Mrs. Cooper shook her head. “You know that twangy music puts your father in a foul mood.”

  Clivo stifled a laugh. It was always nice spending
time with the Coopers, even though they did bicker a bit, because he always felt so welcome in their home. Even Hercules, the droopy-eyed basset hound, was happy to see him, as evidenced by the dog resting his snoring snout right on Clivo’s foot. “So, Jerry, since football isn’t happening this summer, are you working in your dad’s lab again?”

  Jerry misbehaved so much that during the school year his dad had finally gotten him a job at the SETL Institute to keep him out of trouble. Jerry had initially claimed it wasn’t that cool working there, until he finally fessed up that the institute had indeed found aliens, they’d just kept the information super classified (information that Jerry stole, of course).

  It was nice having a best friend who also knew important international secrets.

  “I guess,” Jerry said, going in for an extra hamburger.

  Mrs. Cooper swatted his fork away. “Eat your vegetables first!”

  “I’m a growing man, Ma! I need to eat flesh! And who broils broccoli? It’s all burnt and crispy and disgusting!”

  Mr. Cooper eyed Jerry. “Apologize to your mother, Jerry.”

  Jerry gave his mom a kiss on the cheek. “Sorry, Ma. Thanks for dinner.”

  Mrs. Cooper rubbed her son’s head. “You are the light of my life. Now eat your broiled broccoli or I’ll stuff it in your mouth myself.”

  “Anyway, getting back to your question, son,” Mr. Cooper said to Clivo, and then sighed, adjusting his incredibly large glasses on his face. “Yes, Jerry is back working with me at SETL.”

  “Yeah, it’s cool,” Jerry said, wincing as he crunched on the burnt broccoli. “Dad’s giving me more responsibility this year besides making him coffee.”

  “Yeah? What are you doing?” Clivo asked, sneaking his broccoli to Hercules, who had snorted himself awake.

  “I get to … Wait, can I share this part, Dad? It’s not top secret?”

  Clivo almost laughed. Even if it was top secret, Jerry would share it with him later, anyway.