The Monster War

by Alan Gratz

  “The Hippocamp,” said a monotone voice behind them, and they all jumped. It was the Karankawan girl. She had come into the room from the front of the ship, and stood very still in the dark, her hands at her sides.

  “The Hippocamp? You mean those nice, friendly sea-horses in the old Greek stories?” Fergus asked.

  “There’s only one,” the girl said seriously, “and it’s not friendly.”

  “Yeah,” Fergus said. “I can see that.”

  The submarine moved away, and the Hippocamp didn’t follow.

  Archie let out the breath he didn’t know he’d been holding. “It’s ignoring us.”

  “I think it’s more interested in destroying Galveston,” said the girl. “Lights.”

  Lights like the ones in the cargo hold flickered on around the room, giving everything a greenish glow. Every other inch of the wall that wasn’t giant windows was lined with shelf after shelf of books—two stories of them, all held in place with leather straps. Ornate brass walkways on the second floor were accessible by twin spiral staircases at opposite ends of the room.

  “It’s a library,” Señor X told Gonzalo.

  “A big library,” Fergus said in awe. “There must be thousands of books here.”

  “Three thousand, nine hundred and one,” the girl said. “I read a lot.”

  Archie introduced himself, and everyone else.

  “My name is Martine,” the girl said.

  “Thanks for saving us,” Archie said.

  “You’re welcome,” Martine said. She tilted her head toward Fergus. “In the Lafitte’s court, you said you knew of other Deep Ones that had risen.”

  “Aye,” Fergus said. “We’ve fought a few of the land-based variety. But never anything like these beasties.”

  “The Deep Ones must be stopped,” Martine said, staring out the window. “Even the one I’m looking for.”

  “What Mangleborn are you looking for?” Archie asked.

  Something flashed out in the water, and Archie saw another Mangleborn right outside. Where the Hippocamp had been horse-like, this one looked more like an eel with a spiked, turtle-shell back. It twisted in the water, and with a kick of its stubby webbed feet it came shooting at them.

  Martine disappeared through a door.

  Archie and Fergus shared a glance, then hurried after her, with Gonzalo trailing casually behind. Archie followed Martine through a low engine room (where they lost Fergus, who couldn’t help but stop to look around) and on into the cockpit of the ship. Martine sat in a swiveling red leather chair and studied a broad, curving panel of glowing green instruments and readouts. There were buttons and switches, levers and wheels, and dozens of gauges and dials. There were even some displays the like of which Archie had never seen before, with glowing green numbers and ghostly images that refreshed every time a green spinning line passed around in a circle.

  The one thing there wasn’t was a window.

  “How can you see what’s out there?” Archie cried. “There’s no window!”

  “I don’t need to see outside,” Martine said. “Not with my eyes.”

  Archie heard Gonzalo give a grunt of approval as he climbed into the small room.

  “Well, I’d like to see what’s going on!” Archie told her.

  Martine pressed a button, and the roof over their heads slid back over a thick rounded window just in time for Archie to see the huge turtle-eel snapping at them.

  Archie ducked and screamed, but Martine turned the steering column and pressed on pedals, and the submarine twisted and dove out of the way. Archie looked back through the window and saw the Mangleborn chasing them. He ducked again, but this time Martine swung them up and around like a swallow doing a flip, and they ran upside down along the monster’s twisting, coiling back for a long moment before swinging down and around its belly and through its legs.

  “I take it back,” Archie said. “I don’t think I want to see outside after all.”

  “It’s called Yacumama,” Martine said.

  Archie was scared to death of it, but Martine piloted the submarine with the same expressionless calm she used when talking to them. No matter how the serpent coiled and twisted trying to catch them, she always managed to steer out of its way.

  “How do you do that?” Archie asked. “Like you know what it’s going to do?”

  “I do know,” Martine said. “The Deep Ones operate within predictable parameters.”

  Was she saying she actually understood the Mangleborn?

  Martine pushed the steering column forward, and they dove around the Mangleborn’s snapping jaws. Martine flipped another switch, and the ship’s tentacles came to life, wrapping around the Yacumama’s legs and tail. The Mangleborn kicked and thrashed, but Martine’s squid-sub held fast.

  “Tie it in a knot!” Archie told her.

  Martine tilted her head, considering the idea.

  “What kind of knot?” Martine asked. “A butterfly knot? An overhand knot? A square knot? A figure-eight knot? A slipped buntline? A clove hitch? A half hitch? A sheepshank? A monkey’s fist? A hammock knot? You can’t just say ‘Tie it in a knot.’ There is no ‘knot.’”

  Archie was incredulous. Of course there was such a thing as a knot! “A knot’s a knot!” Archie told her.

  “No, it’s not,” Martine said.

  Archie wanted to pull his hair out.

  “A square knot,” Gonzalo said.

  Martine nodded. “I will tie the Yacumama into a square knot.” She took control of the tentacles, and Archie watched out the window as she twisted and pulled on the Mangleborn, tying it into a knot. When she finished she let go of the Yacumama and it sank, thrashing and squirming, into the dark abyss from whence it came. They were free!

  Fergus hurried into the cockpit. “You guys! You won’t believe what this thing runs on! It’s not steam-powered, or lektric-powered. It’s—”

  KaFWOOM.

  The submarine rocked as something exploded in a fiery ball a few fathoms above them.

  KaFWOOM.

  Another explosion went off on their starboard bow, and alarms rang out in the cockpit.

  “What is it?” Archie cried, searching the window above them and seeing nothing. “Is it another Mangleborn?”

  “No,” said Martine, quickly making adjustments to her controls. “It’s depth charges. We’re being attacked by the Texas Navy.”

  A giant pinkish-white tentacle covered the window above them, and the submarine lurched.

  “And the Hippocamp,” Martine said.

  10

  KaFWOOM! Another depth charge went off, rocking the submarine, but that was the least of their worries. The Hippocamp had wrapped around Martine’s submarine, and was dragging them down.

  Martine pushed a button. BWAAAAT. Whatever it was sounded like Buster’s raycannon going off, and the sea all around them flashed green. The Hippocamp roared, but didn’t let go, squeezing the hull even tighter. More alarms went off.

  “That was my biggest gun,” Martine said in her even monotone. “Unless we can shake the Hippocamp, it will crush The Kraken’s hull in seven minutes.”

  “You have an aether cannon?” Archie asked.

  “That’s what I’m telling you,” Fergus said excitedly. “The whole ship runs on aether!”

  “That’s impossible,” Archie said. “Aether comes from the Mangleborn. It uses a … a different geometry,” he said, remembering the phrase Tesla used. “That’s why nobody can do anything but make guns out of it. No one understands it.”

  “I do,” Martine said.

  “Can we maybe figure that out later?” Señor X asked. “If she’s right, we’ve got approximately six minutes and twenty-seven seconds left before that sea monster cracks this tin can.”

  “What about the tentacles?” Gonzalo asked.

  Martine wrangled the controls. “The Hippocamp is stronger.”

  “Let’s throw the Jandal a Haad at it,” Señor X said. “He can keep it busy while the rest of us
get away.”

  “Archie,” Archie said. “My name is Archie.”

  “Nae,” said Fergus. “That beastie’ll just swallow him.”

  “Which is exactly what we want it to do,” said Gonzalo.

  Everyone looked at him like he was crazy, but he didn’t notice.

  “The raycannon couldn’t pierce the Hippocamp’s hide from the outside,” Gonzalo said. “But if it’s anything like an armadillo, it’s squishier on the inside.”

  “What, you want me to swim out there with a raygun, get swallowed, and shoot it up from the inside?” Archie asked.

  “Not just any raygun,” Gonzalo said. He pulled Señor X from its holster with a flourish, spun it in his hand, and held it out to Archie grip-first.

  “Oh, no,” Archie and Señor X said together.

  “I’m not getting swallowed by any fish,” Señor X said. “I knew a guy once who did that, and it did not end well for him.”

  “And I’m not going in there with a raygun that can just decide he’s not going to shoot.”

  KaFWOOM! Another depth charge went off, but much farther above them now. The Mangleborn was pulling them down.

  “Five minutes, twenty-one seconds,” Martine said.

  Gonzalo put the serpentine raygun in Archie’s hand. “Señor ain’t gonna leave you hanging, ’cause if he does, he’ll be stuck in there with you,” Gonzalo told Archie. “And you ain’t gonna get stuck in the belly of a whale, because Archie can’t be et. Plus, you finally get to kill something.”

  “You can’t kill a Mangleborn,” Archie and Señor X said at the same time.

  “Then mess it up some,” Gonzalo said. “All that matters is that thing lets us go!”

  The Kraken strained and shuddered against the Hippocamp’s crushing grip.

  Archie sighed. “How do I get outside?”

  Martine led him to an airlock on the underside of the ship. One of the Mangleborn’s tentacles covered part of it, but Archie could squeeze through. Just looking at the pale, slimy thing made Archie shiver.

  “Isn’t there some other way?” Archie asked.

  “Two minutes, fifty-eight seconds,” Martine told him.

  Archie looked at the turquoise raygun in his hand. “Do you trust me?” he asked the raygun.

  “No,” Señor X said.

  “Good, because I don’t trust you either,” Archie told him, and he jumped into the water.

  Sploosh! Archie hovered for a moment, the water swirling around him, and then he started to sink. He grabbed for the Mangleborn’s tentacle, but it was too slimy and slippery. He was sinking fast, away from the Hippocamp’s tentacles, but he was too heavy to swim. This wasn’t good. Sinking to the bottom of the ocean wasn’t going to help anybody!

  KaPOW! Señor X fired without Archie pulling the trigger, hitting one of the twisting tentacles. The Hippocamp growled, and the tentacle shot out and snatched Archie up. Quick thinking! Archie wanted to tell the raygun, but he couldn’t talk underwater.

  The tentacle dragged Archie through the cold, dark water to the ugly head of the Hippocamp, and it studied him with its big glassy eyes.

  Jandal a Haad, the Hippocamp growled in his head.

  Archie raised the raygun at the big eye and squeezed the trigger.

  KaPOW! Señor X hit the Hippocamp with everything it had, and the monster roared. Then it did exactly what Archie didn’t want it to do.

  It ate him.

  The Hippocamp’s razor teeth chomped on him, cracking and breaking on Archie’s stone body. Archie fought to pull Señor X’s trigger as the Mangleborn’s tongue moved him around in its mouth, but the raygun shot without him. KaPOW! KaPOW! KaPOW! KaPOW! It kept shooting as the Hippocamp swallowed them, and Archie closed his eyes and tried not think about the fact that he was moving down a Mangleborn’s slimy esophagus. It felt like the Hippocamp was thrashing and writhing from the raygun blasts, but that might have just been the muscles of its stomach tossing Archie around—if Mangleborn even had stomachs.

  Jandal a Haad, the Hippocamp said. Jandal a Haad and Xiuhcoatl.

  Archie frowned. What was a ‘she-oh-co-at-ul’? Another name for the Jandal a Haad in some ancient language?

  * * *

  All at once Archie wasn’t in the belly of a Mangleborn anymore—he stood beside a wide river, surrounded on both sides by jungle. He was himself, but he wasn’t. He could see a tall, strong man in this dream, and he knew the man was him. This other-Archie had black and yellow bands painted horizontally across his face and arms and legs, and wore nothing but sandals, a loincloth, and a white feathered headdress. The other-Archie’s right foot was gone, and in its place was a replacement made of obsidian. In his hands, he carried a tall spear and a shield so polished it was a mirror.

  The other-Archie was joined by two others. The first was a jaguar-woman covered all over with yellow fur with black spots. Her face was a mix of feline and human, and her hands and feet were claws. She wore a purple blouse and skirt, decorated with images of the moon. Beside her was a brown-skinned man with the top half of his face painted black, wearing white leather armor and a leather helmet decorated with blue and green hummingbird feathers.

  In his hand, he carried Señor X.

  Tentacles rose from the river in front of them, and the horse-like head of the Hippocamp emerged from the river, its fangs dripping.

  “Huitzilopochtli, stay back and hit it with Xiuhcoatl!” the jaguar-woman ordered. “Tezcatlipoca, get in close and cut off some of those tentacles! I’ll try to climb up it and put this bomb down its throat!”

  Archie could feel the bloodlust welling up inside the other-Archie, the shadow Tezcatlipoca, as he charged out into the river after the Hippocamp. The other Leaguer, Huitzilopochtli—their warrior?—fired Señor X again and again. KaPOW! KaPOW! KaPOW!

  The Hippocamp smacked the other-Archie away, and he flew off into the jungle. He got up seething, hot steam coming off his body in the humid jungle air. Tezcatlipoca roared and charged back through the forest, bursting out of the jungle with his spear raised. He carved off one of the tentacles and batted another away with his shield, but there were too many of them. Tentacles beat at him and squeezed him and choked him.

  Jandal a Haad, the Hippocamp said, the name echoing in the other-Archie’s head.

  Then the jaguar-woman was there, slashing at the tentacles that held him with her claws, and he was free. But Tezcatlipoca was mad, and he lashed out at the jaguar-woman and the tentacles with equal venom. His mirrored shield slammed her in the face, and she crashed into the water.

  “Ix Chel!” Huitzilopochtli cried.

  KaPOW! A raygun blast from Xiuhcoatl hit Tezcatlipoca in the head, and he roared. He threw his spear at his brother and missed. Ix Chel jumped on his back and covered his eyes with her claws.

  “Tezcatlipoca! Try to think!” she cried. “We’re not your enemies! The Cahuayoatl is your enemy!”

  “I’ll tear off your skin and wear it as a pelt!” Tezcatlipoca bellowed.

  Jandal a Haad, the Hippocamp whisper-sang. Necoc Yoatl. Enemy to Both Sides.

  Tezcatlipoca grabbed Ix Chel by the tail and dragged her to him, raising her high above his head, and started to pull her apart.

  “Tezcatlipoca! Wake up! Tezcatlipoca!” Huitzilopochtli yelled, shooting him in the face again and again. KaPOW! KaPOW! KaPOW! KaPOW!

  * * *

  Something kept hitting Archie in the face, and he put a hand up to block it. KaPOW! KaPOW! KaPOW! KaPOW! It was a raygun. Señor X was shooting him in the face.

  “Archie! Wake up! Archie!” Señor X cried.

  “I’m awake! Slag it, Xiuhcoatl, stop shooting me!”

  “Hey! I’m not the one who fell asleep inside a—wait, what did you call me?” Señor X asked.

  “Where are we?” Archie asked. Everything was still dark and squishy.

  “The upper intestines, I think. If Mangleborn have intestines,” Señor X said. “What I want to know is, how do you know my name?”

&n
bsp; “I—I saw you. In a vision. That’s why I passed out. The Hippocamp showed me a vision of another League. An old one. And you were there. And I was Tezcat—Tezcat—”

  “Tezcatlipoca,” Señor X said, low and angry.

  Archie floated in the alien goo of the Mangleborn’s intestines for a long moment.

  “I’m not him,” he said.

  “It’s been more than seven minutes,” Señor X said.

  “What?”

  “It’s been more than seven minutes. We saved the sub, or the Cahuayoatl crushed it and they’re all dead. But either way, we can get out of here now.”

  “Cahuayoatl. That’s what Ix Chel called the Hippocamp,” Archie said.

  Señor X was quiet again for a few seconds. “It means ‘Water-Horse.’ Different people have different names for the same monster, you know. Like Jandal a Haad and Necoc Yoatl and Archie Dent.”

  “I get it,” said Archie.

  Señor X shot through the intestines to the Hippocamp’s skin, and Archie punched his way out from inside. The dark, cold seawater was a welcome relief. At least it washed off the white goo that covered him.

  The Hippocamp sank slowly in the water, its tentacles twitching like it was half-dead. Or maybe just asleep. Señor X had done enough internal damage to it to put it out of commission for a long time.

  But where was The Kraken? Had the Mangleborn crushed it? Archie clung to the side of the Hippocamp, searching the murky depths for any sign of the ship. He was afraid if he let go he’d sink to the bottom, and he’d never be able to climb out again.

  Señor X fired, scaring Archie, but his yellow beam lanced out like a beacon. Something small and green and glowing came toward them out of the darkness. Archie pointed Señor X at it, but the raygun didn’t fire.