The Monster War

by Alan Gratz

  Wait, she told herself. Wait …

  “Hachi, jump!” Clyde called.

  Mishipeshu leaped. Hachi turned and ran. The Mangleborn hit the covering of trees and the roof collapsed. Hachi jumped. Mishipeshu roared and thrashed. The tree beneath Hachi’s feet fell away, and she was falling, but then Buster’s big brass hand was there to catch her. Buster popped Hachi in his mouth and pounded on the Mangleborn—KRANG! KRANG! KRANG!—before quickly pushing heaps of earth and rock back into the hole. Hachi scrambled up to the bridge as Clyde hammered on Mishipeshu again, keeping it in the hole while Buster kicked more dirt in on top of it.

  “You’re crazy!” Clyde told her.

  “You’re not the first person to say that,” Hachi told him. Her flying circus fluttered in through the hole Archie had punched in the steam man’s head, and Hachi was relieved to see that none of them were hurt. She let them buzz around the room while Clyde finished pushing dirt on top of Mishipeshu. When he’d piled on the last of it, he made Buster jump up and down on it. CHOONG. CHOONG. CHOONG.

  When it was good and flat, Clyde told Buster to stay and waited to see if the Underwater Panther was going to dig its way out. When the ground didn’t move beneath them, he looked at Hachi and smiled.

  “Dogs rule, and cats drool!” Clyde said.

  Buster whistled happily.

  “Good work,” Hachi said. “I just hope Fergus and the others are having as good a luck with that giant skunk.”

  33

  Fergus, Martine, and Gonzalo weren’t having any luck with the giant skunk.

  Fergus couldn’t lektrocute it, because Mangleborn fed on lektricity. Gonzalo couldn’t shoot it, because Aniwye’s thick black fur was too matted and monstrous for a raygun to cut through it. Señor X had only heard of it by legend, never fought it. And all Martine did was stare at the slagging thing.

  The Mangleborn, meanwhile, would burrow down into the ground, pop up randomly somewhere on the battlefield, and lay waste to dozens of soldiers at a time with its toxic farts.

  “Take cover!” Fergus yelled. “He’s gonna blow!”

  Brrrrrrrrrt! The Mangleborn filled the air with another cloud of the noxious green gas.

  “I am getting seriously tired of this stinker,” Fergus told the others through his gas mask. He’d whipped up masks for each of them using parts he’d found on the battlefield, and now they were the only ones who could get close to the Mangleborn without dying from his stench. Not that it had done them any good.

  “I’ve shot it in the eyes, in the mouth, in the chest, and in the feet,” Gonzalo said, “and none of it does any good.”

  “Martine? You got anything?” Fergus asked.

  Martine tilted her head. “I need elevation,” she said.

  “That I can do,” Fergus said. A rod shot up out of the backpack he wore and sprouted rotors. With a lektric blue spark they started spinning, and Fergus swooped over to pick up the science-pirate.

  Aniwye burrowed down into the ground and disappeared.

  Fergus sighed. At least that would give them a few moments where the Mangleborn wasn’t killing swathes of UN soldiers. Gonzalo waited atop Alamo for Aniwye to reappear while Fergus lifted Martine high above the battlefield. From here, Fergus could see the ground all around dotted with massive holes where Aniwye had come and gone, each one surrounded by dead bodies in a fog of green haze. Fergus watched as Buster wrestled with the Underwater Panther and Archie hammered on the Wendigo with the barrel of a busted clanker tank, but Martine was focused on the holes.

  “There,” Martine said, pointing to part of the battlefield where UN soldiers still fought Manglespawn.

  “What there?” Fergus asked.

  The ground where Martine pointed ripped and split, and Aniwye burst up into the battle, squeezing off deadly green farts.

  “Whoa!” Fergus said. “How did you know that’s where the beastie’d come up?”

  “I formulated a logistic regression model using the creature’s previous occurrences to determine its future location,” Martine said.

  “You did what now?” Fergus asked.

  “I did the math,” Martine said.

  “But it looks totally random!”

  “Aniwye may not even be aware of it,” Martine said. “But even Mangleborn operate within predictable parameters.”

  Aniwye burrowed underground again.

  “All right then, where’s he going to pop up next?”

  Martine pointed to another spot on the battlefield, and Fergus swooped down quickly. “Gonzalo! Help us get these soldiers out of here!”

  Gonzalo followed along at a gallop without asking questions.

  “Oy, you lot!” Fergus called, amplifying his voice lektronically. “Clear out! That skunk thing’s coming!”

  Gonzalo helped hurry the warriors out of the way just as the ground began to shake and split open. Aniwye burst aboveground again, ripping a powerful green fart. Brrrrrrrrrt!

  “Ha!” Fergus cried. “He who dealt it is the only one who smelt it!”

  Aniwye growled and burrowed underground again.

  “There,” Martine said, predicting where he’d come up again. Fergus and Gonzalo hurried to clear away the UN soldiers from the area, and the Mangleborn erupted into another empty field.

  Brrrrrrrrrt! Aniwye sprayed more toxic gas, but there was no one there to breathe it.

  “Looks like you’re making a stink over nothing, big guy,” Fergus said.

  Aniwye snapped at him, but Fergus easily took to the air to get away. The black-and-white Mangleborn had sharp teeth and powerful claws, but its real weapon was its stink bombs.

  The giant skunk burrowed underground again, and Fergus landed beside Gonzalo and Martine.

  “Okay,” Fergus told them. “Thanks to Martine, we know where he’s going to pop up. Now we need to find a way to put a cork in him.”

  “Yeah,” Gonzalo said, “Um, I’m not doing that.”

  “I also would prefer not to get near its anus,” Martine said.

  “Well I’m not eager to go on butt patrol either,” Fergus said. “But we gotta stop farting around. So to speak.”

  Together they cleared the next area Aniwye was due to appear. While they waited for the Mangleborn, Martine swept her aetherical harpoon through the air and studied the strange symbols that appeared on its handle.

  “The gas the Deep One emits,” Martine said. “It is flammable in high concentrations.”

  “Okay. Good to know,” Fergus said. “Nobody light a candle around that thing’s butt.”

  “No, that’s exactly what we do,” Gonzalo said.

  “You mean, light one of its farts on fire?” Fergus asked.

  “The Mephitis mephitis’s spray is not technically flatulence,” said Martine. “Their defensive spray is produced by a pair of scent glands around the anus. To produce enough spray in a high enough concentration to ignite it, we would have to rupture one of the scent glands.”

  “Eh?” Fergus said.

  “If we shoot it in the butt, we can light its farts on fire,” Señor X translated.

  “But what do we use to ignite it?” Fergus asked.

  “A lektrical spark of sufficient strength should be enough to ignite the gas,” Martine said.

  “Oh, I see,” said Fergus. “Meaning you want me to get close to that thing’s butt and let it fart on me.”

  Martine frowned. “As I said, technically, the gas is not flatulence but—”

  “Yeah, basically,” said Señor X.

  “I like this plan,” said Gonzalo.

  “Because you’re not the one who has to get farted on,” Fergus said.

  The ground began to rumble.

  “Let’s do it,” Gonzalo said, charging Señor X.

  “Now wait a minute—” Fergus said.

  Martine slipped a bracelet off her wrist and gave it to Fergus. “Before you spark the gas, push this button,” she told him.

  “Hold on a second—” Fergus said.

&
nbsp; Croom. Aniwye burst from the ground. Fergus took off into the air just to get away, and Gonzalo spurred Alamo around behind the Mangleborn.

  Aniwye laid down another toxic cloud. Brrrrrrrrrt! Green gas oozed across the field, but again there was no one around to breathe it.

  Gonzalo reined Alamo to a stop. “Fire in the hole!” he cried.

  BWAAAAT! The portable wave cannon Martine had put Señor X into erupted in a bright yellow beam, hitting Aniwye right in the anal scent gland. POOM. The gas sac exploded, and Fergus swooped in on his gyrocopter, his head turned away.

  “Gross gross gross gross gross!” he said.

  Fergus’s fingers sparked, and—

  KA-THOOM!

  Trees flattened and the ground heaved like a meteor had struck the Earth, knocking most of the UN Army and the Manglespawn who were left on their butts. Martine and Gonzalo and Alamo went flying. When they picked themselves up, they found Aniwye a quarter of a mile away, upside down and unconscious. But there was no sign of Fergus.

  “Do you think … Do you think he got blown up?” Gonzalo asked.

  Martine tilted her head. “If he did not press the button on the bracelet in time, there is a 99.999998 percent probability that we are breathing in his atoms as I speak.”

  Gonzalo looked a little green.

  Choom. Choom. Choom. Buster the steam man strode up to them. “Hey, you guys lose something?” Clyde asked through his speaking trumpet.

  In Buster’s hand was a very weary, very blackened Fergus MacFerguson. Martine’s bracelet shield fzzted and crackled, winking on and off again with glowing green aetherical energy.

  “Fergus!” Gonzalo cried.

  “Silent but deadly,” Fergus said. “That’s me.”

  “Two down,” said Hachi.

  “Need help digging a hole for it?” Clyde asked. “Buster likes digging holes.”

  Buster whistled and wagged his tail pipe.

  “This one’s a digger,” Gonzalo said. “It’d just dig its way out again.”

  “We’ll get the UN Army to tie him down Gulliver-style until we can deal with him,” Hachi said. “They’ve just about taken care of Moffett’s Monster Army anyway. We need to get to Archie and help him with the Wendigo. He’s been fighting that thing all by himself for a long time now. We just have to hope—”

  She didn’t have to say it. They were all thinking the same thing.

  We just have to hope Archie hasn’t blown a gasket again.

  34

  Wham! Wham! Wham! Archie pounded away at the Wendigo with the shattered remains of an oak tree, knocking him away. Thoom. Thoom Thoom. The mindless ice giant staggered back toward Archie as he stopped to catch his breath. Wham! Wham! Wham! Thoom. Thoom. Thoom. Wham! Wham! Wham! Thoom. Thoom. Thoom. With each whack, the giant ice monster reeled back, and with each pause it marched forward again. Three steps forward, three steps back. Three steps forward, three steps back. Archie felt like the mythical Sisyphus, doomed to roll a giant boulder up a hill only to watch it roll back down again, over and over and over again for eternity. Wham! Wham Wham! Thoom. Thoom. Thoom. Wham! Wham Wham! Thoom. Thoom. Thoom.

  Archie’s mind wandered as he beat on the Wendigo. Was Sisyphus some Mangleborn instead? A giant dung beetle rolling around a world-crushing ball of manure, maybe? Or maybe Sisyphus was a hero, an ancient Leaguer who’d performed some incredible feat of strength like rolling a massive rock or a giant gear.

  There didn’t seem to be a great deal of difference sometimes between the Mangleborn and the heroes who fought them, Archie thought.

  Wham! Wham Wham! Thoom. Thoom. Thoom.

  Wham! Wham Wham! Thoom. Thoom. Thoom.

  “Archie. Archie!” someone was yelling. It was Clyde, inside Buster. The rest of the League besides Kitsune stood on the ground at his feet. They looked at him hopefully, but Archie could sense the fear in them too. How long had Clyde been calling his name?

  Wham! Wham Wham! Archie beat the Wendigo back again.

  “Archie!” Clyde called again.

  “Hey,” Archie said, breathing heavily. “Sorry. I’m okay. Just … lost in my own thoughts … you know?”

  Thoom. Thoom. Thoom. The Wendigo marched back toward them.

  “Little help this time?” Archie asked.

  Buster’s arm became a raycannon. Gonzalo charged Señor X. Martine’s aetherical harpoon glowed. Fergus’s fists crackled with lektricity.

  KA-THWAM!

  The League unleashed the fury of its strength all at once, and the ice giant went flying. KOOM. It landed on its back with an earth-shaking thud.

  “Thanks,” Archie said. He tossed the broken tree he’d been using on the pile of a dozen other shattered trunks he’d used to hold off the Wendigo while they were away.

  The Wendigo stirred, trying to get up, but Buster sat on him and held him down. The others climbed up the icy crags and stood on the Mangleborn’s chest.

  “Now what?” Gonzalo asked.

  “The Wendigo is a giant ice monster with a human heart,” Señor X said. “By which I mean there’s a human being inside him, where the thing’s heart should be. A human cannibal. The ice is just an extension of him. It grows thicker every time he eats somebody.”

  “He must have eaten a lot of people,” Fergus said.

  “So what do we do, trap it like the others?” Hachi asked.

  “The Wendigo never sleeps,” Señor X said. “Not like other Mangleborn. It just keeps walking, keeps wandering, keeps eating. The only way to stop it is to kill the man at its heart.”

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa,” said Fergus. “I thought you all said you can’t kill a Mangleborn.”

  “You can’t,” Señor X said. “We can kill the man inside, but never the monster. This Wendigo will be gone, but the next time some frozen, starving wretch eats another human being to survive, his heart will turn to ice and he’ll become a new Wendigo. He’ll crave more human flesh, and the ice in his heart will grow. Surround him. Consume him. The more people he eats, the colder his heart will get, and the thicker the ice will become. Same monster, different person.”

  “Like me,” Archie said quietly. He was the same shadow that had always plagued the League of Seven, just with a different name.

  Archie slammed his fist into the Wendigo’s chest—KOOM—and everyone jumped back.

  “Archie, what are you—?” Clyde started to ask, but Archie hit the Wendigo again and again.

  KOOM. KOOM. KOOM.

  Huge chunks of ice went flying as Archie dug deeper, chipping away at the frozen cannibal. KOOM. KOOM. KOOM. The other Leaguers stood back and watched in silence, letting Archie lose himself in the work. KOOM. KOOM. KOOM.

  At last Archie smashed all the way through the ice, revealing the head and shoulders and chest of the man trapped inside. He looked like he’d once been an Inuit, one of the tribes of the far, far north, but his skin was bluish-white now, his face shrunken and shriveled. Blood still stained his lips.

  “Is he dead?” Fergus asked.

  “My sensors indicate he is alive, in a way,” Martine said, reading the symbols on the shaft of her harpoon. “Perhaps he is sleeping.”

  The cannibal’s eyes shot open, and everyone took a frightened step back.

  “K-k-k-kill … m-m-m-me,” the man whispered. “K-kill m-me. Please. I’m s-s-sorry. I’ve s-suffered enough.”

  The Leaguers looked around at each other. Señor X had told them killing the cannibal at its heart was the only way to stop the Wendigo, but until now none of them had realized one of them was actually going to have to do it.

  Archie nodded. It was his job. He was his League’s Shadow, after all. He already had the blood of a hundred men on his hands. What was one more?

  Archie raised his fist, but Hachi put a hand to his arm to stop him. Schnik. She drew her dagger.

  “No,” Gonzalo said, pushing them both away. “I’m the Lawbringer.” Gonzalo aimed Señor X at the frozen man’s head. “What’s your name?”

  The blue
Inuit looked inward in panic. He couldn’t remember his own name.

  “Taktuq!” he said at last with relief. “Taktuq. Taktuq. My name is Taktuq.”

  “Taktuq of the Inuit, it is against the laws of Texas and every other civilized tribe and nation to eat the flesh of another human being,” Gonzalo said. “Moreover, it’s against the laws of nature itself.”

  Taktuq sobbed once, and ice crystals formed in the corners of his eyes. “I’m s-sorry,” he said.

  “The sentence for cannibalism is death,” Gonzalo told him.

  Taktuq closed his eyes, and Señor X hummed.

  “Make it as quick and painless as you can,” Gonzalo told Señor X.

  “Thank you,” Taktuq whispered.

  Señor X flashed yellow, and—ka-POW—Taktuq the cannibal was dead.

  Krik. Krack. The ice beneath their feet began to break apart, and Clyde scooped everyone up into Buster’s arms. They watched from above as the Mangleborn crumbled to pieces, burying the body of Taktuq in the ice his sins had collected.

  “The fighting,” Clyde told them. “It’s just about over.”

  He was right. But for a few random raygun blasts as the last of the Manglespawn were put down, the Battle of Gettysburg was over. The Monster Army was destroyed, and the Mangleborn were defeated once more. For General Lee and the UN Army, there was still the work of keeping the Union together. But for Archie, Hachi, Fergus, Clyde, Kitsune, Gonzalo, and Martine, there was only one job left to do.

  It was time for the League of Seven to stop Philomena Moffett. Together, and for good.

  35

  Buster stood at the edge of the Palisades Airship Park, overlooking the city of New Rome. The sky over the biggest city in the United Nations was still filled with airships of all sizes, and the skyline was still dominated by the seven-story-tall Emartha Machine Man building. Submarines still churned just beneath the choppy waters of the New Rome Harbor, and locomotives still chugged crisscross patterns across the city. Archie felt the wonder of the city all over again, but this time it was mixed with fear.