Beasts & Geeks

by Joe Ballarini

  Only three hours from us.

  4

  “Kelly! Liz!” screamed Berna from downstairs. “Come quick!”

  We rushed to the lab to see Mama Vee and Madame Moon laying the last of the babysitter contenders on the bed. Enzo Calabrazzi, a short class clown from Boston, was unconscious, and his face was smeared with a sticky, blackish-purple sludge.

  Penelope, the glowing recon pixie, spun frantically over Enzo’s body. Vee pulled at the ooze covering his face. The other trainees and I crowded in the doorway and watched in terror as the rubbery goo thrashed in Mama Vee’s hand. It was alive and fighting back.

  “It’s gone down his throat,” Mama Vee said. Her long platinum hair was coming unbraided.

  “Don’t touch it!” screamed Madame Moon.

  “I know what I’m doing, Leanne,” said Vee as she struggled with the Scumsucker.

  Madame Leanne Moon, the head of the entire New England operation, had come to oversee Heck Weekend. As the head sitter, Madame Moon outranked all of us, including Mama Vee. There had been a weird tension between them the whole weekend.

  “You’re agitating it, and it’s expanding into his windpipe,” scolded Madame Moon.

  The blubber stuck in Enzo’s mouth wrapped itself around Vee’s arm.

  “It’s coming loose—don’t just stand there. Help me!” said Vee.

  Vee scowled at Madame Moon while the creature undulated between them. “You’re the one who assigned the kid a Scumsucker when I specifically told you not to.”

  “Ooooh!” said Big Fran, who seemed highly amused.

  Madame Moon and Vee glared at us.

  “Liz, get them out of here!” Vee shouted.

  Liz ushered us out of the lab and closed the door in our faces.

  “You heard the lady,” said Cassie, trying to take charge. “Everyone upshtairsh! You’re going to want to be well reshted for tomorrow. Your final tesht. And trusht me, it’sh going to be horrible.”

  5

  The next day Big Fran, Georgie, Arlo, Esme, and I stood at attention before a rocky waterfall, deep in the hidden woods behind HQ. I hadn’t spent much time back here because, despite the beautiful setting, Vee warned me there were things lurking in the lake I was not yet ready to face. Madame Moon and Mama Vee marched to the front of the misty falls.

  “Welcome to your final test!” Madame Moon shouted over the rippling waves. “Unfortunately, Enzo will not be joining us. Let this be a lesson to all of you.” Madame Moon stared us down. “Babysitting requires your utmost attention. It must not be taken lightly.”

  Little harsh.

  “Now, then!” said Madame Moon, clapping her hands together. “Your final test is in there.” She pointed to the roaring waterfall behind her. “All you need to know is its name is Kang. Good luck.”

  “Do we get to bring a weapon?” asked Georgie.

  “Not every test can be solved with fighting,” said Mama Vee. “Sometimes standing your ground can be an act of defiance.”

  “Running for your life works too,” I grumbled.

  “The Mighty Kang will look into your very soul. If it deems you worthy, it will let you live.”

  I raised a trembling hand. “And if it doesn’t?”

  Madame Moon shrugged. “Swallows you whole. Who wants to go first?”

  She held out a scuba mask and a wet suit. We all stood frozen, gawking bug-eyed at the cascading falls. Were they really going to send us into the jaws of a giant? I’m pretty sure someone’s parents would sue over that. But then one of our parents would have to know what we were doing.

  “Kelly Ferguson,” said Madame Moon. “Very brave of you to volunteer to be the first one in.”

  I didn’t volunteer. Mama Vee winked at me, as if to say, You got this. Vee was my sitter when I was a little kid, and she’d taken me under her wing since I’d decided to become a babysitter. I couldn’t disappoint her.

  I must have hesitated for too long, because Madame Moon looked confused. “Sorry, my mistake. I thought I was talking to the Kelly Ferguson who vanquished the Grand Guignol and his army of nightmares on All Hallows Eve. Wrong Kelly?”

  “That’s me,” I mumbled.

  The other kids looked at me in shock.

  “Whoa! You’re the newbie who killed the Grand Guignol?” shouted Big Fran. “I had no idea!”

  “Why didn’t you tell us?” cried Arlo.

  “Been kind of a busy weekend,” I said.

  “Kelly Ferguson,” whispered Georgie, looking at me strangely.

  “If I were you, I’d wear a T-shirt with my own face on it,” said Big Fran.

  I felt my cheeks flush red.

  “Then what are you waiting for, Kelly?” said Madame Moon. “Show us how it’s done.”

  6

  The wet suit gave me a serious wedgie as I scrambled across the slippery rocks toward the powerful waterfall. Through the shimmering wall of water, I could see a faint, glowing light. There was a cave hiding behind the falls.

  “Go get ’em!” shouted Berna from the shore. “Just think warm thoughts!”

  Warm thoughts: sunshine, kittens, and not being here.

  I pulled my scuba mask over my eyes, took a deep breath, and jumped.

  SPLASH! I landed in a pool of icy water. Pins and needles shot through my body. The falls punched down on me, sending me spinning. My arms and legs went numb as I desperately swam toward a rock and pulled myself onto the sand.

  “So cold! So cold!” I screamed.

  My voice echoed. I removed my mask and watched as ripples of sunlight waved along the walls of the gigantic cavern. In the shadowy depths a dark shape breathed. I ducked behind a boulder.

  Since when do boulders have a pulse?

  My rocky hiding place was layered with large spikes and scales. I was crouching behind the tail of a fifty-foot-long sleeping serpent.

  Classic me.

  With shaking hands, I unwrapped my guide from its plastic bag and opened it to C.

  From Kelly Ferguson’s copy of A Babysitter’s Guide to Monster Hunting:

  NAME: The Mighty Kang

  HEIGHT: Twenty-three feet

  AGE: Nine hundred years old!

  TYPE: Class 9 Cloud Serpent

  ORIGIN: Shisha Pangma Cave in the Himalayan Mountains

  LIKES: Sleeping. Retirement. Eating the unworthy.

  DISLIKES: The unworthy. Loud music. Being woken up or made to do anything.

  STRENGTHS: Flight. Astral projection. Oracle-like dreams.

  CURRENT RESIDENCE: The waterfall behind Rhode Island headquarters

  NOTE: It sees in you what you can’t see in you.

  “The heck does that mean?” I whispered.

  A low snore made me look up from the guide.

  Long, ivory feathers plumed from the Mighty Kang’s back. Wonderstruck, I found myself walking the length of its body, which was rhythmically rising and falling with each enormous breath. I quietly put the guide away as I approached its huge, doglike nose. Its wrinkled eyelids were closed, sleeping.

  Such a beautiful creature.

  The brain-freeze level of pain in my body melted away as I reached out my hand to touch its coiled horns. I couldn’t help myself. They were ringed with feathers. I ran my hands along its soft fur and pearl scales. It was warm; not scary at all. Then its long neck uncurled, and a pair of angry, yellow-and-black eyes glared down at me, and all those enchanting warm fuzzies vanished into a puddle of near pants-peeing fear.

  The great serpent reared back, hovering over me with a grin that reminded me of a cat about to eat a mouse.

  Be brave, Kelly, I thought. They wouldn’t send you here if they didn’t think you could survive this. Or would they? Madame Moon doesn’t seem to dig your chili.

  The serpent cocked its head, swaying back and forth. I didn’t dare break eye contact. I couldn’t. I was mesmerized. So, I engaged in the longest, craziest staring contest of my entire life.

  Say something. How do I make small talk with a
Cloud Serpent?

  “Hey there,” I said, my voice cracking. “Y-y-you must be the Mighty Kang. It is a great honor to meet a, um, Cloud Serpent.”

  I bowed as if I were meeting the Queen of England. This was not in the guide, but it felt like the right thing to do.

  “My name’s Kelly. And, uh, I’m here because Madame Moon and Mama Vee sent me? I’m not, like, here to steal your gold or anything. Not that I see any gold. Not that all serpents hoard gold. I don’t mean to stereotype serpents. Nice place. You live alone?”

  “Ssssilence!” it hissed in a murky voice.

  “Sure, yeah, silence. I can do that,” I said.

  “Ugh. Jussst ssstop talking!”

  I zipped my lips and threw away the key. The Mighty Kang unfurled a pair of translucent wings and let out a guttural shriek.

  “Bow your head and prepare to be judged.”

  I lowered my head and felt the bottom of its wispy beard brush the back of my neck. My insides were a fireworks factory explosion.

  Its huge wet dog-snout nudged into me, sniffing. I chanced a look up. Wrinkled, whiskery lips slowly peeled back, revealing deadly fangs. The serpent’s tail coiled around me, pinning my arms, and lifted me off the ground.

  Oh no! It’s found me unworthy! Am I unworthy? I thought I was doing okay.

  “No, please! Oh Great and Mighty Kang, I only came here because I want to do good things and help make the world a better place and I have a feeling you do too otherwise you wouldn’t be here—”

  I wheezed as the air was crushed out of me.

  “Jussst becausssse I am in your guide doessssn’t mean you know me, child.”

  “Yeah, but let’s be honest, you could live wherever you want. You don’t have to spend the winter in some damp cave behind a waterfall, but I think you do it because you like living next to the babysitters. Or it means they’re protecting you maybe? From other bad monsters? Which maybe makes you a good monster and not a bad one. Am I warm?”

  The serpent threw back its old head and shook with a deep, unsettling laugh. Its tail relaxed, and I could breathe again.

  “You are wissse. And a bit ssssilly. You have much to learn on your quessst.” The Mighty Kang leaned its furry chin on the ground. “I will let you live.”

  “Thank you, Oh Big and Frightening Kang,” I said, bowing my head repeatedly.

  “Thisssss time.”

  Gulp.

  “Before you go I musssst warn you. Lassst night I sssaw a vision.”

  “A vision about me?”

  “No. Your aunt Mabel.” The serpent started laughing again, its golden eyes focused on me. “Yesssss. You.”

  Then it spoke with a chilling voice. “Protect the turtle hatchling.”

  I blinked. Maybe I misheard. “Turtle hatchling?” I asked.

  The shimmering serpent nodded. “The turtle will bring peace to the world of sssssun and air.”

  “I see,” I said, nodding as if I understood what the Mighty Kang was saying.

  “Don’t jussst agree. Lisssssssssssten. Ugh. Perhappssss I should jussst eat you.”

  “No, please! I got it. Protect the turtle. I will do that. That’s our job, right? Protect kids?”

  Kang burst into a gleeful giggle fit. I laughed along with it, even though I was totally terrified. “Among other thingssssss.”

  “But seriously. I don’t know any turtles—”

  WHOOSH! The end of its feathery tail swung around, batting me off my feet. I crashed through the waterfall, landing with a shriek in the freezing cold lake.

  7

  “A turtle?” Mama Vee asked for the third time.

  “Maybe it’s code for something,” Madame Moon suggested.

  We were in Vee’s office on the top floor of babysitter HQ. Despite the collection of daggers and monster skulls lining the walls, it was cozy and threadbare. I was glad to be sitting by a fire in warm clothes.

  “Or maybe,” I said, hopeful, “it was just a dream. The other night I had a dream I was at school, but I wasn’t wearing any pants. We’re talking total Donald Duck. I woke up and I was like phew.”

  “This is not a time for jokes,” said Madame Moon, looking at a clipboard.

  “Wasn’t really joking,” I mumbled.

  Madame Moon took a big long sniff. Her eyes felt like heat lamps on my forehead.

  “You barely made it through this weekend, Miss Ferguson. Aside from Enzo, you scored the lowest out of everyone here.”

  I cringed. I pride myself on my good grades and perfect attendance in middle school, but I had only been at this for a month.

  “I handled the written exam well,” I said.

  “Really?” said Mama Vee, peering over Madame Moon’s shoulder.

  “She didn’t wrangle the night crawler and return it to the stable.”

  Mama Vee crinkled her nose. “Oh yeah. You lost a whole grade for that one.”

  “I was supposed to bring that big bug back here?” I said.

  “We are not barbarians, young lady,” said Madame Moon. “We try to study these creatures, not just throw them off cliffs.”

  “It was on loan from the Great Lakes chapter,” said Mama Vee. “We’re gonna owe them big-time.”

  “It was trying to kill me!” I said in my defense.

  “Well, of course it was!” shot Madame Moon. “It wouldn’t be any kind of a test if it wasn’t, now would it?” On the wall behind her hung a minotaur’s skull. It looked like the horns were coming from Madame Moon’s head.

  “Learning from one’s failures is the only way to improve one’s successes,” said Mama Vee, trying to keep things calm. “So, Kelly, what did you learn?”

  I blanked. I was supposed to be scribbling notes while I was running for my life? In the silence I heard a wooden creak. A shadow under the side door stepped aside. Someone was eavesdropping on our conversation, and none of the adults seemed to notice.

  “Night crawlers can climb trees. I wasn’t expecting that. And it certainly wasn’t in the guide.”

  Mama Vee nodded thoughtfully.

  “Add it to the guides,” said Madame Moon. An eternity passed as she wrote something down on her clipboard.

  “I’m deferring your graduation,” Madame Moon said flatly. “You shall remain a sitter in training.”

  “What?” I shot to my feet.

  The scratching of her pen stopped with a forceful period that felt like a judge’s gavel coming down.

  “You are not a babysitter.”

  I took a sharp breath. A sick lump filled my heart.

  “Look. I can do better,” I said, looking to Mama Vee for help.

  “You need to do more than better!” Madame Moon slammed her fist on the desk.

  “Take it easy, Leanne,” said Mama Vee. “You didn’t see Kelly on Halloween. She was a champ. She’s only been at this a month. Those other sitters have been training for a year. I think Kelly’s doing her best.”

  Madame Moon shot her a hard look. “You know as well as I that it’s not good enough.”

  Ouch.

  “That’s not what she means,” said Mama Vee, sitting down beside me. “Kiddo, I don’t think you realize what you’re up against.”

  Another creak. The eavesdropper was listening closely.

  “After what you did last month, now more than ever, you need to be at your best,” said Madame Moon.

  “It’s not that we think you’re not up for the task,” said Mama Vee. “If you were just going to be a babysitter like the others, we’d be thrilled.”

  Why can’t I be just a babysitter? What more do they want from me?

  Madame Moon gave Vee’s compliment a begrudging wave. “You are an exceptional young woman, Kelly, and the order is lucky to have you.” She leaned forward, her voice filled with grave concern. “But what you did on Halloween, defeating the Grand Guignol, one of the seven Boogeymen . . .”

  “Boogeypeople,” I said under my breath.

  “It changed everything. The other six are
not going to take that lightly.”

  Cold tingles raced down my back.

  The other six.

  Vee clicked a button, and a large computer screen glowed with various images of the Boogeypeople.

  I put that X there, I thought.

  “I don’t want to scare you,” Vee said, “but you might have kicked off something far worse than any of us can imagine.”

  “You had better prepare yourself, Kelly,” Madame Moon added, “because these monsters will seek their revenge.”

  Madame Moon slid a math textbook across the desk. I opened it to see that the pages had been cut out in order to hide a dagger with a wide blade. A jewel—a piece of jade—embedded in the handle swirled with a living cloud of strange, green light.

  Vee peered out of the window overlooking the sweeping, wintry forest. I could see her reflection in the glass; the dire expression made my insides twist.

  “It’s time you understand, Kelly, that more monsters than ever are going to start coming out of the woodwork, looking to hurt you and everyone you love.”

  8

  “Kelly? The answer?” demanded Mr. Flogger.

  I snapped out of my daydream and rubbed my face. Algebra. Monday morning.

  On my desk my math book was opened to chapter six: values of x and y. I squinted at the board where an equation read: 3x3-4y4 = -67.

  “Um,” I said. “x is negative one and y is negative two?”

  Mr. Flogger’s tough glare softened. “That’s right. Just try to stay awake.”

  It was the day after Heck Weekend, and I could barely keep my eyes open. Plus, being told you’re being hunted by six of the deadliest monsters on the planet makes concentrating on school a teensy bit difficult.

  Friday was our last day before Christmas break. And then it was one week of no school, cozy socks, hot chocolate with peppermint sticks and marshmallows, and the presents.

  As I sleepwalked down the hall after class, I could feel the bubbly, electric anticipation fizzing among the kids and the teachers, who were united, if just for a few days out of the year, in their common desire to ride the Polar Express. But my muscles were so wrecked that I could barely lift my arm to open my locker. I stared blankly at my textbooks. I had a feeling this was going to be an interesting Christmas. And by interesting, I meant deadly.