“Yo, Helsing.”
“What, Boyle?” said Max with a weary sigh, turning about in his kayak to face his foe.
The paddle caught him straight across the temple. The kayak capsized, and Max went under. Three things occurred to him as he was deposited into the chill mountain waters of Bone Creek. First, he hated kayaking. Second, he hated Kenny Boyle even more. And third, he suddenly discovered a newfound appreciation for bubblegum-pink life preservers.
TEN
THE BOY AND THE BLOODSUCKER
Max stood naked in the boathouse, holding his towel open, and stared down. He could’ve fainted. There, high on his inner thigh, dangerously close to his unmentionables, was the biggest, most bloated leech he had ever seen. Its black flesh pulsed as it fed on him, firmly attached to his leg. Max took hold of its dark, moist body and pulled. The skin came with it, as the leech refused to let go of its tasty meal. Max placed a finger against his thigh beside where its jaws were locked on. He slid his nail along, pushing the creature aside and causing it to release him. His skin twanged back, spattering the floorboards of the boathouse with dark liquid as the leech squirmed in his grasp. He dropped it off the launch, the bloodsucker landing with a meaty plop back into the water it had come from.
“And I thought vampires were bad,” Max muttered, toweling himself dry. “Never thought I’d agree with Boyle, but I’m just about done with this dump.”
He was buttoning his jeans when he noticed a movement through the cracks in the timber board walls of the boathouse. He froze where he was, turning his head to listen. Whatever was out there was doing its darndest to tread stealthily, and it was working. Was it the beast from the night before? Max looked around for anything he might use as a weapon. Only a twin-headed kayak paddle with bright red blades was close to hand. He snatched it from the rack and darted out the front of the boathouse.
Sprinting barefoot around the back of the shack, he leaped out, paddle raised like a nautical Sith Lord. Whatever had been there was gone, but Max spied the bushes moving up the slope. Max was off after it, dashing up the incline into the woods, eyes fixed on the moving undergrowth ahead.
Ducking beneath branches and bounding through bushes, Max powered on, in monster-hunting mode. He had no doubt he was chasing the Beast of Bone Creek at last. Leaping over roots and rocks, Max saw the branches and leaves rustling just ahead of him. He spied a dark shape darting left, trying to peel away from his path, but he cut it off, changing the angle of his sprint and diving left. He exploded through the undergrowth, paddle raised and scything down.
There was no bigfoot there. Instead, there was a grubby little man, no taller than Max’s knee. The fellow looked up in shock as the paddle came down, leveled at his fur-covered head. Max twisted his arms at the last second, driving the makeshift staff into the earth just inches away. The man fell back, landing with a thump in the soil, as a breathless Max towered over him, chest slick with sweat. He pointed the paddle at the tiny man.
“Who are you?” he said, gasping. “And what have you done with the campers?”
“You going to kill me, Van Helsing? Is that it?”
The strange fellow dusted himself off and glowered at the boy. His weather-beaten skin was brown and leathery, and he carried a set of panpipes in his belt. His clothes were fashioned from patchwork animal skins—predominantly squirrel, from the looks of them—and adorned with birds’ feathers. His ensemble was topped off by a rabbit pelt that he wore as a hat, tied beneath his chin by the paws, the bunny’s ears sticking up as if it had just been surprised.
“How do you know my name, dwarf?” said Max.
The little man flicked dirt from the top of his panpipes with a tiny finger. He snarled, rising indignantly. “How dare you. I’m a brownie. Not that you’d give a flying fart, monster slayer!”
Max jabbed at the brownie with the paddle, sending his bottom back to earth with a bump.
“Stay put, short stuff,” said Max. “I’m not done questioning you. Where are the two people who went missing last night? What’ve you done with them?”
The brownie placed the pipes to his lips and blew across them. Instantly Max swayed where he stood. He recognized the tune—he’d heard it before, atop High Crag before rappelling. The notes put him at ease and caused the fight to flood from his body. He was no longer so keen on smashing the paddle over the brownie’s head. Sleep was a more promising proposition. He was even eyeing a nice bed of moss when his training kicked in.
Fairy enchantment: Jed’s lessons had taught him how to react. The key was distraction, anything to take his mind off the music for the briefest of moments, but also to distract the spellcaster.
Max sang a line from his favorite Queen song—badly—the lyrics disrupting the brownie’s melody. The little man was surprised to see his cantrip countered.
“Scaramouche! Scaramouche!” shouted Max, striking the pipes from the brownie’s hands before pinning him to the leaves with a bare foot.
“What foul magic is that?” said the brownie.
“‘Bohemian Rhapsody,’” said Max with a grin as his senses returned. “Beats nine out of ten fairy spells.” His smile slipped. “You seem to know a lot about me, brownie, but I know nothing about you. How about you start answering some questions?”
“Or what?” snapped the tiny man, squirming and punching Max’s foot ineffectually. He fished a pinecone out of a pouch on his hip and launched it at Max. It struck him hard across the bridge of his nose, making him see stars.
“That was you lobbing cones at me yesterday?” he said.
“And I’d do it again! Maybe rocks, next time!”
Max reached down with his free hand and grabbed the brownie by his animal pelt jacket. He gave him a shake, irritation and anger getting the better of him. This wasn’t Max’s style, but all of his frustrations were boiling over.
“Where are those campers?” he shouted. “What have you done with them?”
The brownie raised his little hands as if to shield himself from what was to come. Max saw genuine terror in the fellow’s eyes, and it sickened him to the pit of his belly. He could feel the blood pumping through his veins, his head thundering. The little man might indeed know where the campers were, but brutalizing him wasn’t going to bring Max any answers. He slackened his grip as the brownie began to speak.
“It’s not us what’s done nothing,” he began. “It’s . . .”
His words trailed away as he looked up at Max. His confession ceased abruptly, his eyes wide, no longer fixed upon his tormentor. They were looking past the boy, behind him. Max felt a cold chill settling over him as if the sun had been blocked out. He craned his neck and glanced back over his shoulder.
Being a monster hunter had prepared Max Helsing for many things. But nothing had prepared him for the Beast of Bone Creek.
ELEVEN
BAREFOOT VS. BIGFOOT
Max didn’t need the Monstrosi Bestiarum to recognize a bigfoot. The monster towered over him and the stricken brownie, blocking out the light with its massive, menacing frame. Its head was hidden in shadow, the sun shining at its back like a halo. Well over eight feet tall, its body was covered in a shaggy coat of dark black fur. It was as broad as a barn door, as Jed was fond of saying, with muscles that rippled and bunched across those mighty hunched shoulders, where the coat was turning gray. Its arms were hung down to its knees, and two enormous shovel-like hands clenched at their ends. Leathery palms flexed as long, thick digits twitched, the clawed tips like bullets of ivory. Slowly, the monster leaned closer, revealing its fierce face to Max as he scrambled back, paddle in one hand, brownie in the other.
The beast’s head was perhaps twice the size of a human’s, the skin dark as ebony, its broad slab of a forehead large and cumbersome. There were pronounced ridges across both its brow and cheekbones, while its nose was flattened, splayed as if it had taken a baseball to the face. Th
e eyes were sunken within its head, circular and golden, and when they caught Max looking at them, they fired right back. It was like being stared down by a gorilla: something smart, something close to human, only not. Max saw an intelligence there, way beyond anything he’d ever encountered in the animal kingdom, and beyond much he’d encountered in the monstrous realm as well. The beast snarled, dark lips peeling back to reveal a frightening set of teeth to the boy and the brownie. Jagged incisors and cracked canines grated against one another, as a deep, gut-curdling growl emanated from the creature’s chest.
One huge hand went up in the air, curling into a fist. Then it came down like a sledgehammer. Max tumbled back, pulling the brownie with him, and a shower of dirt erupted from the ground as the bigfoot punched the earth. The other arm shot out, grasping for Max’s ankle. The boy narrowly avoided it, half running, half scrambling as his bare feet struck the soil. He hit a tree, catching his breath, turning in time to see a row of broad black knuckles flying toward him like a freight train. Max ducked and the fist pummeled the tree. He felt it shudder against his back, splinters of bark showering him and the brownie. He looked up to see the bigfoot almost on top of him, spittle frothing from between those tusklike yellowed teeth. Max dashed behind the tree, out of its reach, the brownie tucked under his arm like a football.
“Let me go!” shouted the little man.
“If I let you loose, you’ll just be an appetizer for the bigfoot, before he gets around to me,” he said, wrestling with the brownie. “Stop squirming. This is for your own good!”
Max was running again. The woods were dense here, with dark blankets of shadows looming left, right, and center. He was disoriented, but knew he had to keep heading uphill. That would take them away from the campsite and his classmates. Keeping monster and schoolkids apart was in everybody’s best interest. As cryptids went, this one wasn’t happy. Hell, it was furious.
The beast exploded from the foliage to Max’s right, running straight at him, knuckled fists tearing up the forest floor. Max lashed out with the paddle in his right hand, catching the creature across the face and redirecting it into a pine. The tree bowed and groaned as the Sasquatch connected with it, sending roosting birds flying from the branches high above. It looked back at Max, amber eyes flashing with malevolence. Max backed away, trying to find a route through the woods that would be impassable for the bigfoot. He swiped the paddle at the beast, holding it at bay while the brownie squirmed in his armpit. Once, twice, three times it struck across the knuckles of the beast as those enormous feet shuffled forward. The creature roared, jaws open wide as it showered Max with stinking drool.
“Let me go!” cried the brownie. “For all of our sakes!”
The monster seized the bright red blade, wrenching it from Max’s hand. With a quick snap, the paddle was reduced to kindling and tossed aside. The beast lurched toward the boy, grasping for him. Max dove forward at the same moment, skidding low as he went between the giant’s legs. He came out behind it, leaving the bigfoot clutching at thin air as Max leaped up for a branch. The monster turned, in time to receive said branch in its face, prompting a hideous howl. Max didn’t wait to see just how mad he’d made the creature. He’d taken three steps when he let out a scream of his own: the brownie’s teeth were sinking into his hand.
Max dropped the little man in an instant. He tripped over a hidden root, landing against a toadstool-riddled trunk as the grubby brownie scuttled free. He was gone in a heartbeat, the bracken swishing with his passing. Max looked up at the bigfoot, who was also watching the brownie vanish into the undergrowth. It stood over the fallen teenager, free to smite Max. Instead, the monster stared at the boy, cocked its head, then turned around. Max lay against the tree trunk, panting, pained, and stunned as the bigfoot sloped off into the depths of the forest.
“You could’ve killed me. But you didn’t.” Max whispered to himself as the Sasquatch vanished from sight. “You were . . . protecting the brownie?”
Max rose unsteadily to his tattered feet. If the bigfoot was a peaceful beast, looking after its fellow creature of the forest, then what on earth was responsible for the disappearance of the campers? There had been a bigfoot print in the dirt, hadn’t there? Yet the fur Max had found snagged on the bushes had been russet, not black. Max was certain of only one thing: the bigfoot wasn’t the Beast of Bone Creek.
So what was?
TWELVE
THE MAN WITH THE ANSWERS
Max sat on the stoop of the general store and shook his head. Beyond the shop, every parking space was now occupied, with trucks, SUVs, station wagons, and jeeps. Cheesy stickers adorned bumpers and windshields—choice examples included HUNTERS WILL DO ANYTHING FOR A BUCK and BORN TO HUNT, although the highlight was a baby sign that read LIL HUNTER ON BOARD. Macho men (and in some cases even more macho women) stomped up the steps in their army surplus boots, slapping one another’s plaid-shirted backs with bloodthirsty anticipation. One hunter posed before the carved bigfoot, rifle in hand and blowing a kiss, while her husband took a snapshot with his cell phone. Bone Creek was suddenly a lot more crowded than when the school group had first rolled into town, and Max didn’t like it one bit.
“I don’t mean to whizz in your root beer, Mr. W, but why do we have to stay in that shack? I’ve seen cleaner slums!”
It was Boyle’s voice. The entire group of students had come into town for a little sightseeing, but Boyle had taken it upon himself to badger the principal at the earliest opportunity.
“Kenny,” said Whedon through gritted teeth. “We’re all going to stay at the camp. There’ll be no skipping off into town for a fancy place to stay.”
“But—”
“And I don’t care if you have your father’s Amex card. We’re all staying in the bunkhouses. And that’s that.”
Boyle and his pals turned and stomped off down the street. Max saw Whedon’s smile slip into a grimace. He knew Whedon only endured the boy’s torment because of the kid’s father. Not that Max was about to feel sorry for Whedon anytime soon.
“I got change!” said Syd, punching Max’s shoulder as she skipped out of the store.
“Good stuff,” said Max, straightening as the two of them descended the stoop, sidestepping more hunters. “This place is a madhouse.”
“You’re telling me. The only person who seems happy to see them is the storekeeper. They’ve gone through his shop like a storm of locusts. Fridges have been wiped out, all the food has been bought up, and his ammo was selling like hot cakes.”
Max frowned as a family emerged from the store behind them, laden with food and drink as they made their way to a luxury SUV. As the trunk flipped open, Max spied the guns within. He shivered. He may have been a monster hunter, but he wasn’t big on hunting. He certainly never went near firearms. Crossbows and slingshots; that was Max Helsing’s style. Old-school weaponry, and even then only used against creatures that were a danger to mankind. He watched as Mom, Dad, and the twins fastened themselves in before pulling away from the store.
“There goes the happy hunting family,” he said wearily as Syd handed him her change, and the two headed to the end of the sidewalk. “I swear, this has all the makings of a disaster movie. Every man and his dog has turned up ready to go bigfoot hunting. I wouldn’t mind, but bigfoot isn’t even responsible!”
“I wonder how word got out?” said Syd. “Seems like every big-game enthusiast in North America is arriving in town.”
Max pointed across the way toward the police station, where Sergeant Earl was talking to a dapper journalist. The reporter’s immaculate black coiffure quivered as he held his recorder to the policeman’s drooping mustache.
“The police?” exclaimed Syd.
“Not officially,” replied Max. Walt stood behind his uncle, a goofy smile of excitement on his face as another carload of grizzled-looking hunters arrived into town. “The sergeant’s nephew reckoned he’d fo
und a bigfoot print near the campsite, but from what I could tell, his uncle was trying to keep a lid on things. Seems Walt isn’t singing from the same hymn sheet as Earl.”
“Did you see the footprint?”
“I told you about my encounter, Syd,” Max whispered. “Bigfoot could’ve ripped my arms out of their sockets and used them as Q-tips but chose not to. He was defending the brownie. No, something else is responsible for the campers going missing. That fur I found was russet, not black. And there were no other tracks that I could see, only hoof marks from deer trails.”
Earl shook hands with the reporter and waved good-bye, pushing his nephew back into the station before him like an admonished toddler.
“Well, this is it,” said Max, as they arrived at the ancient-looking pay phone on the street corner. It was fixed to the red stone wall of the bank, where bushes had grown around it after years of neglect. Cursing Whedon for having confiscated his cell, Max stared at the machine for a moment. It was a huge slab of ugly metal, covered in bird droppings and cobwebs, with a circular dial and cord handset attached to a pressure plate.
“You used one of these things before?” asked Syd.
Max Helsing and the Beast of Bone Creek Page 7
