Krankenstein's Crazy House of Horror

by Jeremy Strong

  Another voice spoke and Charlie almost fell off his perch with shock and surprise.

  ‘There was two of ’em. I’m tellin’ you, I locked ’em both in. The other one’s gotta be in here somewhere cos there ain’t no other way out.’

  Small-Tall! She pushed into the cupboard and gazed upward. ‘See? There’s a space up there. How was I supposed to know there’s a bloomin’ shaft goin’ up there? He’ll be hidin’, I bet. Oi, Charlie-boy! There ain’t no way you’re gonna escape. You’re trapped an’ we’ll just come an’ getcha so you may as well come out now!’

  Charlie stuffed a fist into his mouth to stop himself squeaking with terror. His legs had turned to porridge and he had to press his knees into the corner of the wall to stop them from shaking so much.

  ‘I want that boy now!’ raged The Stitcher. ‘Krankenstein is waiting!’

  Charlie gnawed his knuckles. He couldn’t believe that he and Ben had been betrayed by Small-Tall. He pinned back his ears and tried to eavesdrop on the conversation. Small-Tall and The Stitcher were considering action.

  ‘Where does that shaft go?’ grunted The Stitcher.

  ‘Dunno,’ said Small-Tall. ‘Up above somewhere.’

  The wrinkled crone pulled a face and copied Small-Tall’s voice. ‘Up above somewhere. Hmm. OF COURSE IT GOES UP ABOVE, YOU MINDLESS MOTHBAG! Get up there after him!’

  ‘I ain’t goin’ up there,’ whined Small-Tall. ‘It’s dark an’ everyfing.’

  ‘You get up there,’ hissed The Stitcher, ‘or I’ll get one of those saucepans, pop you in the particle-synthesizer and fix you up just like the monsters.’

  Ben suddenly shouted out to Charlie. ‘Climb higher, Charlie. Find a way out! You’ve got to escape before it’s too late!’

  ‘You shut your mouth or I’ll sew it up!’ screeched The Stitcher, but Charlie was already on his way, struggling upward until the walls of the shaft narrowed to such a thin gap that there was no way Charlie could go further. In fact, he was already having nightmare visions of getting stuck there, in the shaft, forever. And nobody will ever find me, he thought to himself. I’ll slowly die of starvation and turn into a skeleton and nobody will ever know what happened to me.

  It was such a sad and lonely thought he wanted to cry all over again. He slowly allowed himself to slip back down to the little shelf. He was trapped, doomed and done for.

  Down below, The Stitcher hissed at Small-Tall. ‘You get up there, double quick, and flush him out.’

  Small-Tall flashed a grubby grin at The Stitcher and poked Ben. ‘Ain’t no need for me to go chasin’ Charlie-boy. We got all we need here.’

  ‘If you don’t start climbing by the time I’ve counted to one, it’s the saucepan for you,’ warned The Stitcher.

  ‘Nah, you listen,’ answered Small-Tall, undisturbed by the old hag’s threats. ‘What we do is this, see. We got Ben-boy, ain’t we? So we take him an’ we turn him into a monster. You put a saucepan on his head an’ make him a monster.’ Small-Tall raised her voice to make sure Charlie could hear.

  ‘We’ll turn Ben into a monster unless Charlie-boy comes down an’ gives himself up. Do you hear that, Charlie-boy? You come down here or your pal gets monstipated.’

  Ben was shouting again. ‘Don’t listen to them, Charlie! Find a way out and escape!’

  The Stitcher began to laugh. ‘Listen to the darling, trying to save his friend.’ She turned to Ben. ‘Hmm. You should be thinking about saving your own skin, not Charlie’s.’

  Ben looked The Stitcher right in the eyes. ‘The biggest monster in this place is YOU!’ he announced bravely, but it only made The Stitcher cackle louder.

  ‘Ha ha! Oh, no, no. Me – the biggest monster? You haven’t met Krankenstein yet, have you? But you will, you will. He’s – rather tall. Hmmm! Come on, baby Ben monster. Let’s take you to the particle-synthesizer!’ She turned to Small-Tall. ‘Take this rope and tie him to the back of my chair. I’ll set some monsters to guard the cupboard so if Charlie tries to come back down he’ll get a nasty shock. Hmm.’

  Ben trudged wearily up the passage, dragged along by The Stitcher’s motorized tea-trolley. He eyed Small-Tall furiously.

  ‘You were spying on us and plotting all the time. How could you?’

  Small-Tall smiled and answered instantly, ‘I like chocolate.’

  Charlie heard their footsteps die away, but not before four monsters had taken up sentry duty outside the store cupboard. He crouched down on the tiny stone shelf and wished that he was a billion miles away.

  What was he to do now? He was alone in a house full of monsters, not to mention Krankenstein, who sounded like a nightmare on legs. Meanwhile Ben had been taken prisoner and was about to have his brain liquidized. The only way to stop that was for Charlie to give himself up or to think of some way to save his friend.

  Charlie almost choked on the bitter truth he was facing. He would either have to try to escape and get back home by himself, or he would have to try to save Ben. Or both. And whatever it was he decided to do, he would not be able to escape the one thing that Charlie had feared most all his life –

  THE FEAR OF FEELING FEAR.

  It was as if he was born scared and things had got scarier ever since.

  No wonder Charlie had slumped into a heap and was holding his head in both hands, trying not to cry even though his eyes stung like mad. He rubbed his eyes with his fists and stared at his pyjamas in what faint light there was. They were the cause of everything. The pyjamas had brought all this misery, whizzing them out of his own home and bringing them to this wretched House of Horrors. Well, those pyjamas didn’t look so magical now, dusty with flour and cobwebs. They seemed to spell nothing but disaster and despair.

  As that very thought passed through Charlie’s head, the pyjamas really did spell out something, quite literally. Amazing! It was so astonishing and unexpected that Charlie sat bolt upright, the hair on his neck prickling with anticipation and his eyes almost popping from his head.

  A tiny thread of softly glimmering letters appeared on his left sleeve, slowly winding between the little pictures of planets and people, animals and mountains.

  LOOK IN THE POCKET

  That was all it said. Look in the pocket. Charlie didn’t remember a pocket at all. He patted the jacket all over. No pocket. He felt around the top of the trousers. Still no pocket. He stood up and felt jacket and trousers again, but there was no pocket. Charlie lifted his sleeve. The writing was snaking up to his shoulder now, getting fainter all the time, but it definitely said, Look in the pocket, until it vanished altogether.

  Charlie sighed. There was no pocket. He sank down, leaning back against the wall, and that was when he felt the lump near the back of his neck. He put a hand to it. There was something there. Something small. Charlie carefully slipped off the jacket and turned it round. Right up near the collar, on the back above the shoulderblade, there was a small pocket. What a weird place to put it! No wonder he couldn’t find it at first.

  Charlie eagerly dipped his hand inside. There was something in there, something small and soft. Charlie wiggled his fingers around it and carefully lifted it out in his hand. He opened his fingers to see what it was and found himself gazing straight into the small, bright, beady eyes of a mouse.

  9 Pizza-Face Loses His Head

  A mouse. A small mouse. In fact, it was probably the smallest mouse that Charlie had ever seen, although it did have a rather sweet, long tail. And very pretty pink ears. And neat feet.

  ‘You’re going to be a fat lot of good,’ Charlie murmured. ‘What am I supposed to do with you?’

  The mouse sat on the palm of Charlie’s hand, looking completely at home and not the least bit afraid. Charlie shook his head in wonder.

  ‘Don’t you realize there are monsters waiting for us down below? And if we are lucky enough to get past them, we’ll certainly get monstipated by The Stitcher. Aren’t you the least bit scared?’

  The mouse glanced up at Charlie as if to say, �
�No, why should I be?’ and carried on cleaning its whiskers.

  Charlie sat there, looking at the mouse and wondering what he should do. Quite simply, he wanted to go home. Maybe he had a small chance of escaping the guards and finding a way back. Charlie was beginning to think the Cosmic Pyjamas might help. If the pyjamas could suddenly produce vanishing writing and pockets, then surely they could take him home?

  And then there was Ben. Charlie knew, deep down, that there was no way he could abandon his best friend. And that would mean facing the monsters and The Stitcher and any number of saucepans and synthesizers, no matter how scared he felt.

  Charlie stared glumly into the darkness. A faint glow appeared near his right knee. He looked down. Some more writing was sliding across his leg. It was a single word:

  ELEPHANTS

  Charlie was beginning to think the pyjamas were just playing stupid tricks on him. First of all they had produced a mouse and now they said ELEPHANTS. What was the point in –

  BOINNGGG!

  Of course! Elephants. Mice. The connection! Elephants were supposed to be scared of mice. And if great big creatures like elephants were scared, then maybe the mouse would scare monsters. There was only one way to find out. It was Charlie’s only chance.

  Charlie carefully put the mouse on his shoulder and told it to stay put while he gingerly climbed down to floor level, as quietly as he could. The door was slightly ajar and, peering out, Charlie could see Pizza-Face, Dracolio, Handy Mandy and Weatherman. (He’d found his leg and had it sewn back on by this time.)

  Charlie cupped the tiny mouse in his hand and held it up to his face. ‘Now listen carefully,’ he whispered. ‘I want you to go out there and scare those monsters silly, but make sure you don’t get hurt, all right?’

  The mouse looked at Charlie and one eye flicked shut and opened again, almost as if it was winking at him. Charlie grinned. It was winking at him. He crouched down and put his hand on the floor by the door.

  The mouse sat there for a moment, nose twitching, whiskers all a-quiver. It ran forward a little way, off Charlie’s hand and up to the crack in the door. It paused. Charlie’s heart began to beat faster, and quite probably the mouse’s heart was going at a pace too. There were four ugly, horrible monsters out there. And then the mouse calmly trotted out into the passageway.

  ‘AAARGH! AAARGH! AAARGH!’ screamed Dracolio, pointing at the floor.

  ‘MOUSE!’ yelled Handy Mandy and immediately tried to climb up Pizza-Face as he was the tallest one there. In a few seconds she was sitting on top of his shoulders and clinging to his head. Unfortunately her hand was right over Pizza-Face’s eyes so he was sent into a blind panic.

  As for Weatherman, he’d gone into jerk-mode, which he always did when he was scared. ‘I – am – frigh – tened,’ he began, ‘but snow will fall and roads are likely to be blocked. If you’re driving home tonight do make sure you have sandwiches with you in case you get stranded, uhuh, uhuh, in your washing machine. Wazzo makes everything whiter, even your coloured clothes. Use Wazzo for unexpected results. Oh – dear – what – am – I – talking – about?’

  By this time the four monsters were charging about in all directions. Pizza-Face kept crashing into the wall or the other monsters because he couldn’t see where he was going. Handy Mandy was yelling useless directions at him. Weatherman was now broadcasting a crime-watch programme, while Dracolio danced about on tiptoe as if he was treading on hot coals, and all because there was one tiny little mouse sitting on the floor among them and twiddling its whiskers.

  Finally Handy Mandy managed to pull at Pizza-Face’s head so hard that it came off in her hand. ‘Argh! You idiot! You have pizzarized me! Put my head back on!’

  ‘I’m trying, I’m trying!’ cried Handy Mandy, shoving the head on upside down, sideways, nose first – any way except the right one. They both crashed into Dracolio and all three fell to the ground, where Weatherman immediately tripped over them and joined them in creating an impression of a gigantic octopus arm-wrestling itself.

  Charlie seized his opportunity, slipping out of the store cupboard and racing up the passageway, but not without quickly stooping to pick up the little mouse on his way.

  ‘Well done!’ he grinned, as he shot away from the monsters. ‘Now all we have to do is rescue Ben.’

  That thought slowed him down a bit. In fact, it slowed him down a lot. Rescue Ben? How was he going to do that? He didn’t even know where Ben was. The Stitcher wasn’t going to be scared of a weeny mouse. Charlie’s feeling of triumph at outwitting the monsters quickly disappeared.

  He began to look around him more carefully. The Stitcher could be anywhere and so, for that matter, could Small-Tall. Charlie still found it hard to accept that the little grubby-faced girl who had been so kind to them was actually spying on them all the time and carrying back information about them to The Stitcher.

  It was very creepy wandering around the dark corridors and soon Charlie’s nerves were so much on edge he almost screamed with alarm when he suddenly caught sight of his own reflection in a cobwebbed mirror. Every corner he came to meant potential danger. He had no idea where he was.

  At length he came to a shut door. He thought he could hear voices from the other side but he didn’t dare open it. He was standing there, wondering what to do, when several pairs of footsteps came clumping towards him. It sounded like an entire army and Charlie hastily moved round the corner out of sight.

  Soon the four monster guards appeared, arguing fiercely with each other.

  ‘You can tell The Stitcher he escaped,’ snapped Pizza-Face at Handy Mandy. ‘It was your fault.’

  ‘My fault? You lunatic, you were the one who went crashing about all over the place.’

  ‘That was because you pulled my head off!’ snarled Pizza-Face.

  ‘Take your umbrella with you this evening,’ interrupted Weatherman. ‘Rain is forecast for the whole world.’

  ‘Will you please-a stop-a rabbiting on?’ cried Dracolio. ‘Your TV rubbish makes-a my brain go like-a messy spaghetti!’

  The monsters pushed the door open and clumped in. Fortunately for Charlie, none of them remembered to close it. He crept to the door and peered round.

  There was The Stitcher, Small-Tall, at least ten monsters and poor Ben. He’d been tied to a huge wooden chair in the middle of the room. Beside him was a machine with a saucepan dangling from it on lots of electrical wires. Ben looked pale and tired and scared – not at all like the chirpy, cheerful Ben that Charlie was used to.

  Well, now it was Charlie’s turn to rescue Ben for a change. But how was he going to do that? The room was full of monsters, bogles and ghouls. Maybe the mouse could distract them, but Charlie doubted it. And it still left The Stitcher to be dealt with. Charlie swallowed hard. This was the biggest, most dangerous, most scary problem he had faced in all his life.

  10 The Rebellion Begins

  Charlie crept away from the chamber. He knew he couldn’t simply go charging in, expecting to rescue Ben on the spot. This was something that would need planning. First of all he needed to hide out somewhere. The monsters would be telling The Stitcher about his escape and soon the whole place would be on the lookout for him. But where could he hide?

  A distant memory floated into Charlie’s brain. It was a story he’d read about a man being chased by a gang. He escaped by hiding in a crowd, which surprised Charlie. Surely everyone would see you? But no – in a crowd you don’t get noticed. You become very difficult to spot.

  Charlie decided to hide in the one place where he knew there would be lots of people rushing about – the kitchen. He made his way there as quickly as possible and was soon in the middle of the usual hustle and bustle of food preparation. The stepladder was back in place and so was Pimples, ordering all the wretched child slaves about their tasks.

  Charlie went and sat in a corner to consider his problem. How could he rescue Ben without it all ending in disaster? Surely there was something he could do to overpow
er the monsters? He ransacked his brain cells until he’d looked under every single one but he couldn’t think of a thing. All that happened was that he ended up feeling even more useless than ever.

  He kept staring at the Cosmic Pyjamas in the hope that they would suddenly give him an idea, or maybe another pocket would appear, or at the very least something extraordinary would happen. But no, the pyjamas didn’t offer a thing. Charlie began to get more and more cross with them, but then realized how silly he was being. What was the point in talking to a pair of pyjamas?

  It was at that point that three panheads came into the kitchen, searching for Charlie. He leaped to his feet, pulled up his collar and set about trying to look busy. He went and stood by the huge sink where washing-up was constantly on the go and pretended to join in.

  The monsters wandered up and down the kitchen, casting an eye over everyone, but all they saw were slaves, slaving away. They did a bit of grunting and poking and treading on children to make them squeal, just to show that they were monsters, but eventually they left, empty-handed. Charlie breathed a sigh of relief.

  He was putting down the saucepan he had been pretending to wash when the idea came to him. He thought about the machine he’d seen next to Ben with the saucepan dangling from it, and the wires attaching the pans to the monsters’ heads. What would happen if the monsters didn’t have saucepans on their heads? Was this what made them work? Would they be able to move at all if they took them off ? Would they be able to control themselves? Would they STILL BE ALIVE?

  Charlie was beginning to think that he had hit on a good idea. The trouble was that there were a lot of monsters. Did they ever sleep? Surely there’d be guards who didn’t sleep? It was a tough job for one small boy to take on. If only he had some help.