The Bigwoof Conspiracy

by Dashe Roberts

  Is he a Bigwoof? A Spiderwoof? Will he even know who I am any more?

  Carefully, Lucy side-stepped the goo. She pulled out the battered packet of chocolates Millepoids had given her and peeked inside. Amid the chaos, the candies had been smooshed into a single dense mound. It did not look appetising. But maybe it can help the others. She wasn’t sure that all the candy in the world could cure Millepoids.

  Shaking her nerves out through her fingers, she ventured down the hall to a staircase that descended into bright white light.

  Quiet as an owl in flight, she crept down into a high-ceilinged warehouse, empty of clowns, doctors or other members of the Nu Co. cryptocorporate machinery. Rows of fluorescent strip lights flickered and hummed overhead. The room was filled with rows of plastic-wrapped cardboard boxes stacked several metres high. Each was enthusiastically labelled: “NuCotton Candy!”, “Nu Co. Cola!”, “Now With All-new Nucralose!” The eerie clown mascot mocked Lucy over and over from every side.

  On the other end of the warehouse was a wooden door with the word “PRIVATE” stencilled over it in ominous red letters.

  I’ll bet that’s where they are.

  Lucy tiptoed to the nearest row of packaged products. There was just enough space between the boxes and the wall for a smallish person to uncomfortably squeeze into, which she was, so she did. She shimmied through the cramped space until she reached a central aisle. Now it was a matter of crossing to the other side of the room unseen.

  As soon as Lucy stepped into the aisle, the PRIVATE door swung open. Two men, a stranger in a lab coat and a very shabby-looking clown, entered the warehouse, deep in conversation. Lucy dropped to the floor and slid under a pile of wood pallets. She spat out a dust bunny and peered between the slats.

  “Thank you for your assistance.” The older man in the white coat spoke softly, assuredly. His hair was close-cropped and uniformly white, his skin a deep, unnatural tan, speckled with age.

  “That weatherman is more feisty than he looks,” said the clown. Lucy recognised the Captain’s voice at once. His red nose was gone, as was his orange wig. Remnants of his blue-painted smile were still visible on his sweaty cheeks. “Tell me, Doctor Vink,” he sniffed, “how much longer are we going to be stuck in this backwoods town?”

  “As long as it takes,” replied the doctor.

  “Hmph,” grunted the Captain. “I’m starting to feel like an overgrown babysitter, and I don’t like it.”

  “Perhaps you should speak with Mr Fisher.”

  “Maybe I will. I’ve had enough of this hillbilly enterprise. I say dissect them all, strip the land and be done with it.”

  Lucy flushed with anger. So they really are planning on dissecting people.

  “You have a problem with the fresh air, Mr Murl?” asked Doctor Vink.

  “The air, the ugly trees, the creepy locals,” the clown responded. “It’s the whole town. Nothing but freaks.”

  Doctor Vink looked bemused. “A wise man once said, there is a great deal to be gained in uncommon places where no one is watching.”

  “As long as I get what’s mine,” Murl chortled. “And that’s all of it.”

  Lucy gritted her teeth. These guys might be the biggest clods I’ve encountered today. And that’s saying something.

  The men ascended the staircase, their laughter fading as they disappeared into the hall. Lucy seized her chance and sprinted over to the PRIVATE door, shutting it gently behind her.

  Whoa. What is this place? She was in a long underground tunnel made of stone. The cool air smelled faintly of eggs.

  The arched ceiling was a mosaic of glittery stones in shades of grey, green, yellow and pink, arranged in swirling geometric patterns. A row of antique light bulbs dangled from fraying cloth cords, giving off a warm glow. The light faded into darkness before Lucy could make out the tunnel’s end. Large wooden panels on tarnished sliding tracks were set along the walls. Is this some kind of dungeon?

  Gingerly, she descended a shallow stone staircase, each step bowed at the centre as if worn by centuries of footsteps. The bottom step was inlaid with a set of glyphs, spelling out something in a strange language Lucy had never seen before.

  She pulled the iron loop handle of the nearest door. It slid open with a creak, triggering a set of fluorescent lights to seize fitfully into illumination.

  Fisher’s people had restyled the ancient room as some sort of office. There was a long desk along the wall, atop which sat two computers and a CCTV monitor. A pair of swivel chairs sat askew, as if they had been quickly vacated. On the other side of the room was a freestanding whiteboard covered in chemical equations, DNA sequences and question marks. At the top, somebody had translated the glyphs Lucy had seen on the stairs: “Beware the Pretenders”.

  Curiouser and curiouser.

  There was motion on the monitor. Lucy leaned on the desk to examine it, accidentally knocking over an empty can of original-formula Sticky Sweet Soda with her elbow. It hit the floor with a BANG and rolled clatterously over the cobblestones.

  She snapped around to check the open doorway. Had anyone heard? She held her breath for several seconds. Nobody came.

  They’re still busy with Millepoids. But for how long?

  The CCTV displayed footage of a big white-walled room outfitted with IV stands and other medical equipment. Large, sturdy metal beds lined the walls, all bolted to the stone floor. Six of the beds were occupied. Sitting on a bed closest to the window, a woman in a mint-green hospital gown stared into the camera, looking quite cross.

  Mrs Stricks!

  Lucy raced into the hallway, her footsteps echoing in the stale air. Where is she? She slid open the next door and found a small, darkened chamber. It contained nothing but a couple of folding chairs and a video camera on a tripod. The camera faced a large rectangular window set into the wall.

  On the other side of the big window, Mrs Stricks gazed sadly in Lucy’s direction. Her short hair was mussed and unwashed, her gaunt face covered in a sparse layer of wiry Bigwoof hair, her eyes droopy with fatigue. Electrodes stuck out of her chest and head, connected to a blinking machine at her side.

  Lucy jumped up and down to get her teacher’s attention. Mrs Stricks scratched her nose obliviously. She can only see herself, Lucy realised. This isn’t a window, it’s a two-way mirror.

  Tex’s dad, Serge, knew about all kinds of spy stuff (though he insisted he wasn’t one). Serge had once explained to Lucy how two-way mirrors worked. The trick was that one side of the glass needed to be dark and one side needed to be light. If a person looked at the glass from the light side, they would see their own reflection, like a mirror. If a person looked at the glass from a dark room, they could see through it like a window, while remaining hidden from the person on the other side. If both rooms were light, however, both sides of the two-way glass would be transparent, like a regular window.

  Lucy found the light switch by the door and flicked it on.

  Mrs Stricks stood up, a shocked expression on her furry face. She squinted. “Lucy?” she seemed to say.

  “Mrs Stricks.” Lucy waved her hands and mouthed her words deliberately. “I’m coming to get you!”

  Mrs Stricks shook her head. “You have to get out of here. It’s not safe.”

  But Lucy had already darted back into the hallway, hauling boots to the next door.

  She yanked on the handle but the panel wouldn’t budge. The door had been latched with a heavy padlock.

  Clamsauce. I need a key.

  Racing back to the office, she searched the desk, sifting through neatly filed papers, calculators and boxes of granola bars. Key, key, where’s the flippin’ key?

  She was on the brink of giving up when she picked up a small matchbox from the Banana Slug Saloon. Something metal rattled inside. Aha! She slid it open and dropped a silver key into her palm.

  She careened back to the locked door. Hands shaking, she struggled to insert the key. At last, the padlock opened with a CLICK.


  The massive panel opened and the sharp scent of antiseptic wafted into the tunnel, stinging Lucy’s eyes.

  “What are you doing here?” Mrs Stricks gasped. A thinning stripe of white hair ran from her anxious forehead to the tip of her nose, like a badger. She gaped at her student as if unsure she was real. Lucy noticed that Mrs Stricks’s canine teeth looked longer than usual. “You have to get out of here,” the teacher insisted. “It’s not safe.”

  “I’m not going anywhere unless you go with me,” said Lucy. She lurched forward and gave Mrs Stricks a big squeeze.

  Mrs Stricks embraced Lucy, her arms shaking.

  “Who’s there?” croaked a voice from the far side of the room. An emaciated man sat up in his bed, his shoulders and neck covered in a mottled coat of brown and black. “No more tests, please. Not today.”

  “It’s not the doctor, Alastair,” said Mrs Stricks.

  “Is it pizza?” he asked.

  “It’s never pizza,” snapped Mrs Stricks. She daubed her forehead with the back of her hairy hand, her palm dark like a monkey’s paw. “This is Lucy Sladan. Silas’s daughter.”

  “The one who’s into aliens?” He chuckled painfully. “It figures.”

  “You’re Alastair Chelon, the factory worker,” Lucy exclaimed. “People have been looking for you for weeks.”

  “It’s nice to be noticed,” Chelon smiled.

  “You look an absolute mess,” said Mrs Stricks. “What’s happened to you?”

  “What’s happened to me?” said Lucy. “What’s happened to you? Are you all right?”

  “I’ve…” Mrs Stricks ran her tongue over her oversized teeth, “been better.”

  “You look better than you did yesterday,” grunted Chelon. “When you almost bit my head off before they restrained you.”

  Lucy looked around the room and noted that all the steel beds had thick straps at each end, one for each arm and leg. These aren’t regular hospital beds, these beds were made for Bigwoofs. Fisher knew about this all along.

  “We need to get you out of here before Fisher comes back,” said Lucy.

  “We’re not prisoners,” said Mrs Stricks.

  “You’re not?” said Lucy, genuinely perplexed. “But, this place…” She gestured to the hallway. “It’s like a dungeon. The door was locked. Nobody knew where you were!”

  “It’s for our own safety,” said Mrs Stricks, anxiously pulling at the hair on her chin, “and the safety of others. We … we keep turning into…” Her voice cracked, tears welling in her eyes.

  “Bigwoofs,” said Lucy.

  “I was going to say ‘monsters’,” Mrs Stricks sniffed.

  “It won’t stop,” sighed Chelon. “Every time they bring us back to normal, we change again. It could happen at any moment.”

  “How can eating Nucralose turn people into monsters?”asked Lucy.

  “Fisher doesn’t know.” Chelon sat up delicately and draped his skinny legs over the side of the bed. “But he’s trying to find out.” His furry limbs were covered in bruises and welts. Dark circles shadowed his eyes. “Or, at least, he says he is,” he added darkly.

  “All we know is that the Nucralose sneaks up on you,” said Mrs Stricks. “It builds up in your system over time. First you feel hot, then you start to tingle all over. Then – well.” She waved a hand over her body.

  “Hairy and scary, as it were,” said Chelon.

  “Mr Fisher has assured us he and his … doctors,” Mrs Stricks’s nostrils flared angrily, “have been working on a cure. But they don’t seem to be any closer to finding one.”

  “We’re starting to think they’re not really trying.” Chelon leaned against the wall with a grunt.

  Mrs Stricks grabbed Lucy by the shoulders. “Where’s Esther? Does she know you’re here?”

  “The Other Mrs Stricks is safe,” Lucy assured her. “Mr Millepoids found her before Fisher did. I haven’t seen her since she saved me and Milo from being attacked by a bear.”

  “Excuse me?” said Mrs Stricks, aghast.

  “She was a Bigwoof at the time,” said Lucy.

  “She was?” Mrs Stricks looked horrified. “In public?” She sat and pressed her palms into her eyes and rocked back and forth. “No, no, no, this can’t be happening.”

  Chelon stood, weakly. “Where is Mandy now?”

  “Mr Millepoids is upstairs,” Lucy spoke rapidly. “He fell into a vat of Nucralose and turned into a big ugly Spiderwoof.”

  “Bigwoof, Spiderwoof,” Chelon chuckled. “I like this kid.”

  “We have to do something,” Lucy urged. “Fisher threw a carnival today. They’re feeding Nucralose to everyone. He’s trying to turn the whole town into Bigwoofs.”

  Mrs Stricks stood, suddenly filled with teacherly authority. “He did WHAT?” she growled.

  Lucy took a startled step backwards.

  “That explains the new additions.” Chelon eyed the four unconscious occupants strapped to the beds around them. They were all full-Bigwoofs. At least one of them was snoring. He squinted at the nearest monster, which had eyelashes about a mile longer than any of the others. “Is that Carlos Felina, the weatherman?”

  The beast’s eyelashes fluttered as if in response.

  “I thought I recognised that face,” Chelon mused. “He looks better when he’s clean-shaven.”

  Lucy gingerly approached the Carlos creature, a pink tongue lolling out the side of his toothy mouth. “Will he bite me?”

  “Probably not,” Chelon shrugged. “He’s heavily drugged.”

  Lucy reached out and touched his face. Carlos’s lip quivered in an involuntary snarl and her hand shot back.

  In the next bed, a pot-bellied creature was snoring away. He was smaller than the others, almost human-sized. His blankets were covered in thick, wiry hair, which was shedding from his body in chunks, his ruddy flesh emerging beneath the fuzz.

  “Steve Kozlowski,” Lucy exclaimed. “We saw him running around as a Bigwoof in the woods.”

  “How many people saw him?” Mrs Stricks demanded.

  “Just me and Milo,” Lucy explained. “You know, Fisher’s son. He’s nice. Not like his dillweed dad. He’s in trouble now too. Everyone upstairs got turned into Bigwoofs, or worse.”

  Mrs Stricks looked like she might have a heart attack.

  Chelon shuffled over to Steve’s bed. “Huh. Take a look at this, Twyla. The effect seems to be wearing off faster than normal.” He exchanged a meaningful look with Mrs Stricks. “Much faster.”

  Mrs Stricks rushed over, yanking her IV stand along with her. “You’re right,” she said. “How is this possible?”

  The chocolate. Lucy triumphantly held up the smashed paper packet. “Mr Millepoids gave me this. He said it’s a cure.” She pointed to the shedding creature. “I gave one to Steve. I thought Millepoids might be nuts, but I think his chocolate might actually work.” She handed the packet to Mrs Stricks.

  “Oh sweet Susan.” Mrs Stricks eagerly opened the package. “That man is a genius, I’ve always said it.” She shoved a hunk of mushed candy in her mouth.

  Chelon whistled. “Mandy, Mandy, so handy with candy.”

  “I’ll bet Esther had a hand in this,” said Mrs Stricks, still chewing. “She’s quite good in the kitchen, you know.”

  Lucy glanced anxiously at the open door. “Everyone needs to eat, and fast. We have to escape before the clowns come back.”

  Mrs Stricks tossed the packet to Chelon, who caught it fumblingly with one hand.

  “We have to tell the world about this,” Lucy continued. “Carlos works for the news. He can put it on TV as soon as we get out of here.”

  “Oh, Lucy,” said Mrs Stricks. “No. Absolutely not.”

  Shmuhuh? “Why the flip not? Everyone needs to know what happened here. It’s like a messed-up miracle. Better than aliens, even!”

  Alastair Chelon nearly choked on his hunk of sweet medicine.

  “Lucy,” said Mrs Stricks, her tone severe, “listen to me very
carefully. You cannot tell anyone what you have seen. No one. Do you understand me?”

  “No,” said Lucy, “I don’t.”

  “There are things about Sticky Pines that you don’t understand,” said Mrs Stricks, choosing her words carefully.

  “You’re saying too much,” Chelon warned.

  “What do you mean?” Lucy fumed. “Mr Fisher turned human beings into actual monsters with his crazy formula. He’s a madman. He put the whole town in danger ON PURPOSE. Why would he do that? We have to stop him, and the only way to do that is to tell the truth.”

  Mrs Stricks shook her head. “Listen to me, Lucy,” she insisted. “Drawing attention to Sticky Pines will put us all at risk. You must trust me. I beg you. Nobody can find out what happened here.”

  “But … why?” said Lucy.

  “I am inclined to agree with the patient,” said an elderly voice coming from the open doorway.

  Everyone froze.

  The venerable Doctor Vink strode coolly into the medical room, clipboard in hand. “Publicity, at this juncture, would be detrimental to our endeavours.” Four clowns limped into the chamber behind him carrying the listless, exquisitely weird body of Mandy Millepoids.

  The poor banana man was covered in tranquilliser darts. Though hairy and misshapen, he was much smaller than when Lucy had seen him last. They hoisted his gangly frame on to an empty bed, strapped his many arms and legs down and began hooking him up to a series of electrodes.

  Mr Fisher entered behind them, his trousers stained to the knee with syrup. He guided a sticky and dishevelled Milo into the room by the back of the neck.

  “You’re OK,” said Lucy, melting with relief. “And you’re not a Bigwoof. How—”

  “There you are!” said Milo, too brightly. “I tell you,” he said to his father, “she’s got no sense of direction. It’s a maze down here. No wonder she got ‘lost’.”

  “Thank you, son,” said Mr Fisher. “Next time, leave out the finger quotes. You can go now.”

  “But, Dad, I really think—”

  “Go upstairs,” his father demanded. He cleared his throat. “These gentlemen will see you there safely,” he added more softly.