The End of the World Club

by J; P Voelkel

  “Oh, come on!” complained Max. “You have to be faking.”

  No answer.

  Max resigned himself to the armchair and grabbed a spare blanket and pillow. After five cramped, hot, uncomfortable minutes, he threw off the blanket and got up to open the window. A mangy ginger cat on a nearby roof hissed at him menacingly.

  Max leaned out of the window and breathed in the night air. It was a little cooler than the air in the room and it carried a faint sound of Gypsy music and the scent of yellow roses.

  Down below, in the little square, some teenage boys played soccer with an old tin can and some teenage girls pretended not to watch them. In a pool of light beneath a streetlamp, two small children acted out the drama of a bullfight, one swishing an imaginary cape, the other charging with imaginary horns.

  At the far end of the square, a neon sign sputtered to life above a café, and a waiter came out to straighten the tables and chairs.

  In ones and twos and larger groups, people came out of the side streets and drifted toward the café. A woman in a red jacket waved to catch the waiter’s attention. With her long black ponytail and big sunglasses pushed back on her head, she reminded Max of a younger, more stylish version of Zia, the black-clad housekeeper who wore big black shades every waking hour, day and night.

  Max felt a pang as he thought of Zia and his parents, at home in Boston. He wondered if he’d ever see them again.

  “What are you thinking about?”

  He turned to see Lola, leaning out of the next window.

  “I was thinking about Boston,” he said.

  “I’d like to come to Boston one day,” said Lola. “See a ballgame with your famous Red Sox.”

  “If we get out of this dump alive,” said Max.

  “You promised to stop complaining,” Lola reminded him.

  “Starting tomorrow,” said Max.

  All the tables and chairs were full now. A man strummed on a Spanish guitar. The customers stamped their feet and clapped in time and shouted their approval. Max and Lola could just make out the dark shape of a woman dancing in the moonlight. It looked like the woman in the red jacket.

  “I read that Spanish towns come to life when the sun goes down. The people here are nocturnal—like jaguars.”

  “So long as they don’t go hunting in the night,” said Max.

  Somewhere in the backstreets, a dog howled.

  “Make sure your door’s locked, Hoop!” Lola teased him. She yawned. “Well, good night. We have a busy day tomorrow.”

  A busy day tomorrow.

  She made it sound so ordinary, like they were going sightseeing or shopping—instead of risking their lives to pay back the Lords of Death.

  Max locked his door and arranged himself in the armchair to sleep.

  Then he got up again, to lock the window shutters.

  As he leaned forward to pull them closed, something warm and sticky dripped on his head.

  He put his fingers to it and found that it was blood.

  He looked up to see a hellhound sitting on the roof above his window, a ginger cat clenched in its monstrous jaws.

  Chapter Seven

  THE STENCH OF EVIL

  As weak sunlight filtered through the shutters, Max stretched his aching limbs. Squashed into the armchair all night, listening for the hellhound, wondering if it would dare to break into the room, he felt like he hadn’t slept a wink.

  Had he imagined it?

  Or was it still out there, waiting for him?

  He remembered his promise to Lola: no more whining or complaining. He had four days left to find the Yellow Jaguar, and from now on, he was going to be strong and brave and focused on the mission.

  But first, he had to know if there was a hellhound outside his room.

  Taking care not to wake Lord 6-Dog, who was still snoring on the bed, Max quietly opened the windows. Then, heart pounding, he slipped the latch on the shutters and pushed them open an inch or two.

  All was silence.

  He looked around for some sort of decoy and his eyes landed on a broom leaning by the door. He took off a sock, put it on the end of the broom, and poked it out of the window to see if the hellhound would pounce.

  Still silence.

  Feeling braver now, Max threw the shutters open and looked out of the window, still holding on to the sock-clad broom handle, just in case.

  “What are you doing, Hoop?” asked Lola, still half asleep and peering blearily out of the next window.

  “Just airing my socks,” said Max blithely. It wasn’t technically a lie.

  “If you say so,” she said.

  Max cast a quick glance at the roof above his window. No hellhound. “You, er, haven’t seen anything strange out here, have you?” he asked.

  “You mean, apart from a boy with a sock on the end of a broom?”

  “I’ll take that as a no,” said Max.

  No hellhounds.

  “Look!” yelled Lola, pointing at the sky.

  Max shaded his eyes and looked up. All he saw was the hot Spanish sun.

  “Hoop! It must be nearly noon! We’ve overslept!”

  “What? That’s crazy! Do you think Carmela drugged us?”

  “I think it’s jet lag, but we need to hurry! I’ll wake Lady Coco, you wake Lord 6-Dog, and I’ll see you downstairs!”

  “Okay!” Max leaned out as far as he could and took a last look around the square. Everywhere was quiet, all the buildings shuttered tight against the noonday sun. Funny how the same scene could look sinister by night and charming by day. He had to stop thinking that every stray dog was a hellhound.

  Wham! Something slid off the roof, bounced off the back of his head, and plummeted to the ground.

  “What the …?”

  He looked down.

  A dead ginger cat looked up at him, its eyes frozen in fear, its coat matted with blood.

  Max slammed his window shut with a crash that made the glass rattle.

  Lord 6-Dog sat up in bed.

  “Has the battle begun?” he shouted, twirling an imaginary sword.

  Max nodded, still too shocked to talk.

  Lord 6-Dog sniffed the air. “What is that stink?”

  “Sorry,” mumbled Max, kicking yesterday’s socks into a corner.

  “Not that.” Lord 6-Dog’s supersensitive nostrils were working overtime.

  “There’s a dead cat out there, is that it?”

  “It is neither thy fetid foot garments nor a fallen feline. It is the stench of evil. Mark my words, Ah Pukuh is in this place.”

  “But the cat … I think it was killed by a hellhound.”

  “Splendid! Let us gird our loins and join the fray!”

  They arrived downstairs just as Carmela was going out. She grunted at Lola and indicated a table laden with stale breads, old pastries and rock-hard yellow cakes, a jug of not-very-hot chocolate, and a large bunch of over-ripe bananas. Then she shielded her face from Max, crossed herself, and went out the front door, dragging a wicker shopping basket on wheels behind her.

  Lola tiptoed over to the kitchen and peeked inside.

  “All clear,” she said, coming back to the table. “Your Majesties can speak!”

  “Well, isn’t this nice?” said Lady Coco. She was wearing her Spanish dancer dress again and she carefully unfolded her napkin and laid it on her lap, with impressively ladylike motions. “Our first breakfast in Spain.”

  “I’m sorry, Lady Coco,” said Lola, “but we don’t have time.”

  “No?” The former queen looked crestfallen.

  “No!” bellowed Lord 6-Dog. “We should be out there engaging with the enemy, not sitting around eating cake like old women.”

  “This old woman,” said Lady Coco, reaching for a cake, “believes that an army marches on its stomach.”

  “Well, maybe just a quick hot chocolate, while we plan our route,” said Lola quickly, before hostilities broke out in earnest.

  “What a treat!” said Lady Coco, holdin
g out her cup. “In our day, we called it chokol ha, which means ‘hot water.’ Everyone had their own recipe, but I made it with ground kakaw beans and chilies; it was 6-Dog’s favorite.”

  “I hope you like the modern version,” said Lola dubiously. “They make it with cows’ milk and sugar.”

  “It looks delicious,” said Lady Coco diplomatically

  “It looks like dishwater,” sneered Lord 6-Dog.

  Lola sighed. “I think it’s going to be another long day.”

  “Here,” said Lady Coco, offering him a banana. “You’ll feel better if you eat something.”

  “How should I feel better?” bellowed Lord 6-Dog. “I am a Maya king in the body of a howler monkey. Where once I received tributes of rare spices, jade, and quetzal feathers, thou dost offer me a banana that is older than I am?”

  Lady Coco thumped on the table. “That’s enough! May I remind you, Your high and mighty Majesty, that if you weren’t sitting here in that fur coat, you’d still be floating around in the circles of eternity. You’ve been dead for a thousand years and you should grab this chance with both your hairy little hands. I have told you time and again, it is what’s on the inside that counts. Here we are, at this glorious moment in history, and I, for one, intend to live every moment to its fullest.”

  And with that, she peeled the banana and took a defiant bite.

  Lord 6-Dog stared at her. “Why, Mother,” he mused, “I do believe thou wouldst have made a fine battle chief in thy day.”

  “This is my day,” she declared. “Ko’ox!”

  Lord 6-Dog smiled. “Ko’ox!” he repeated.

  “What’s co-osh?” asked Max.

  “It’s Yucatec for ‘let’s go’!” Lola studied Max’s face. “You’re very quiet this morning, Hoop. And you haven’t eaten anything. That’s not like you. Are you okay?”

  “Last night, there was a hellhound. It killed a cat … a ginger cat … a pelirrojo. I think it was a warning to me. I think it’s out there, waiting for me. There might be a whole pack of them.”

  “Or,” suggested Lola, “it might have been a fight between a couple of strays. Not everything is an omen, Hoop.”

  Max gave her a weak smile.

  “So fill up and let’s go!” She pushed the water jug across to him. “Ko’ox!”

  Max filled his water bottle from the jug and threw the bottle, with the breakfast leftovers, into his backpack. The yellow cakes sank like stones to the bottom. “It weighs a ton,” he groaned as he followed the others out into the street.

  “So we’re all agreed that we start at the castle?” Lola was saying.

  “Indubitably,” said Lord 6-Dog.

  “Sounds good to me,” said Lady Coco.

  Max took a deep breath. This was it. He was about to go find the Yellow Jaguar. “Okay, everyone,” he said in a strange, squeaky voice that betrayed his terror, “act normal. We’re on vacation, just strolling around.”

  “That reminds me,” said Lola, rooting in her day-pack and pulling out a child-size Hawaiian shirt, “I brought this for you, Lord 6-Dog, to make you look like a tourist.” The shirt was brightly colored and printed with parrots, palm trees, and tropical flowers.

  “It’s beautiful,” cooed Lady Coco. “It has all the colors of the jungle.”

  Lord 6-Dog tried to look disinterested, but his eyes betrayed his delight as he tried it on.

  “Perfect!” said Max. “All you need now are a camera and a baseball cap.”

  “You’re the one who needs a cap, Hoop,” said Lola. “You should cover up your hair before you upset any more old ladies.”

  Max looked in his backpack. “It’s not here; I must have left it in the room. You go on ahead. I’ll run back for it and catch up to you.”

  Lola pointed down the street. “We’re going that way, toward the Plaza Mayor, the main square. But hurry, Hoop, daylight’s burning.…”

  Max ran back into the hotel, raced up the stairs, and flung open the door to his room, only to find Carmela standing there, riffling through his passport.

  “Qué … qué …?” Max spluttered. His Spanish simply wasn’t up to the job of questioning the old woman. For her part, Carmela made a big show of dusting the dresser, carefully replacing the passport, and moving on to make the bed. She did not meet his eyes. Not knowing what else to do, Max grabbed his passport and his Red Sox cap and ran back downstairs to find the others.

  The street was deserted when he came out.

  He started walking in the direction of the main square.

  He heard a noise behind him and turned around.

  Nothing.

  He carried on walking.

  Something was behind him.

  He turned again, and a hellhound jumped out of the shadows and lunged at him in a frenzy of snarling teeth and gnashing jaws.

  Max slipped off his backpack, heavy with food and water, and swung it at the creature. It fell back a little, giving Max time to reach into his bag for some little cakes, as dense as cannonballs. Stuffing them into his pockets, he began to run, the huge dog at his heels. He turned and lobbed a sugary missile. It bounced off the hound’s nose and landed in its gaping maw, which swallowed it in one gulp. Max ran faster than he’d ever run in his life, but he could hear the hellhound growling and slavering behind him. Not sure now whether the dog wanted him or more baked goods, he threw cakes and pastries over his shoulder as he ran.

  In the distance he saw Lola and the monkeys, waiting for him.

  “Run!” he yelled. “Run!”

  They stood there, waving at him and encouraging him on. There were no side streets or alleyways he could divert the dog into, so even if he’d been brave enough to sacrifice himself, it wasn’t an option. He had to keep running toward them, hoping that one of them would realize the danger.

  “Hellhound!” he screamed. “Run!”

  Still Lola and the monkeys didn’t move.

  “Whoo-hoo!” cheered Lola. “I didn’t know you could move so fast!”

  “There’s hellhound on my …” Max realized he couldn’t hear the dog anymore. He glanced quickly over his shoulder. It was gone.

  “There was a hellhound.… It was chasing me,” he panted as he drew level with his friends.

  “That’s not funny,” said Lola. “We’re all on edge as it is.”

  “You don’t believe me?” Max was outraged.

  “We watched you all the way. There was no dog, not even a small one.”

  “Not a dog,” insisted Max. “A hellhound. I think it was the same one that killed the cat outside my room last night.”

  Lola shook her head. “There was nothing. Get a grip, Hoop.”

  “You have to believe me.…”

  Lord 6-Dog leapt onto Max’s shoulder. “I believe thee,” he muttered. “The stink of evil is getting stronger.”

  Max sniffed. “I can smell it, too,” he said.

  An archway at the far end of the street marked the entrance to the Plaza Mayor. The closer they got, the more their nostrils filled with a nauseating odor.

  “Halt!” whispered Lord 6-Dog. “By the bristles on my monkey chin, I know this stench—it can only be the vile emissions of Ah Pukuh, lord of Xibalba. Mark my words, evil awaits us in this plaza.”

  And so it begins, thought Max as they walked into the square.

  What had he expected?

  Definitely an orange sky in the middle of the day … maybe overturned trucks and burned-out buildings … or alien spaceships and lizardlike monsters … even cackling hobgoblins and smoking bonfires—all standard end-of-the-world scenarios in video games.

  Or would it be something more Maya-themed? A pox-ridden death god belching fire, ominous drumming, strange animal lords, severed heads on poles, and beating hearts on wooden platters?

  Yes, that sounded right.

  But it was wrong.

  And most wrong of all was the sight that awaited him.

  He’d expected a certain amount of blood and gore and destruction, but
nothing like this.…

  This was …

  Well, the word that leapt into his brain was picturesque.

  It looked like the setting for a medieval tournament in a book of fairy tales.

  At one end of the square, an old stone church supported a stork’s nest on its precariously leaning bell tower. At the other end of the square was some sort of palace, a pennant flying from its balcony, a coat of arms emblazoned on its crumbling facade, and a knight in armor standing ready for the fray.

  Between the church and the palace and all around the square, tradespeople plied their wares in an arcaded gallery. On the square itself were pitched dozens of gaily striped battle tents. Men, women, and children in medieval dress milled around excitedly, lute music filled the air, and everywhere was The Smell, although no one but Max and his friends seemed to notice it.

  “It’s like we’ve gone back in time,” muttered Max.

  He’d heard that medieval streets stank of unwashed bodies and household waste, but he’d never imagined how hard it would be to breathe under those circumstances. His face was clammy from the effort.

  A girl in a red velvet gown stepped out in front of him, barring his way.

  “Queso?” she asked.

  She was dressed like a princess, a fairy-tale princess, but her round face was red and blotchy, and her hands were big like a man’s.

  He backed away.

  Next thing, he was surrounded by squires and wenches, all thrusting strong-smelling plates under his nose. The odor reminded him a bit of the dentist’s office. Was it chloroform perhaps? His head was swimming.…

  Lola clutched his arm.

  “I know what this is!” she said.

  Max looked at her with dread. What kind of ancient ritual was being enacted? He had not expected the Death Lords to make things easy, but this odor hinted at tortures he had never dreamed of.

  He swallowed nervously. “What is it?”

  “It’s a cheese festival!” She giggled. “It wasn’t the smell of Ah Pukuh you sensed, Lord 6-Dog—just all these free samples of cheese!”

  “Free samples?” said Max, suddenly interested.

  “Keep walking,” Lola commanded him. “We’re on a mission—the fate of the world and all that, remember?”