Marvel Monsters Unleashed: The Gruesome Gorgilla!

by Steve Behling

  But he didn’t wake up.

  What am I going to do? Amrita thought. We only have a couple of minutes, and it’s going to take FOREVER to wake up Hairy here.

  “SEAL THE PERIMETER!” blared a voice over a loudspeaker. “SEAL THE PERIMETER!”

  The voice startled both Amrita and Kid Kaiju. They looked up, and then they heard the wail of a horn—the loudest, most irritating horn you could possibly imagine. It was loud enough to wake the dead.

  Or a couple of giant monsters…

  AMRITA DOUBTED she had ever moved so fast in her entire life. From the moment the horn blared, Gorgilla stirred, unleashing an angry roar. She flung herself backward, sliding across the floor and away from the grumpy monster.

  “That solved the waking-up problem!” Amrita shouted to Kid Kaiju. He had done almost exactly the same thing as Amrita the moment Fireclaw woke up. They were now sitting next to each other, watching the irate monsters roaring, groaning, and pulling on the restraints that held them fast to the floor.

  “What are we gonna do, Kid?” Amrita asked. “Wait, why am I still calling you ‘Kid’? Or ‘Kid Kaiju’? I’m calling you Kei! From now on, you’re Kei, and that’s final!”

  “Kei is fine,” Kid Kaiju said. “We need to find the unlocking mechanism—some way of releasing the restraints so we can free the guys!”

  But there didn’t seem to be any sort of “unlocking mechanism” in the antechamber—in fact, there didn’t seem to be much of anything in the antechamber, except the two monsters, Kid Kaiju, and Amrita. The kids looked at the instruments that the goons in white had dropped on the floor when they fled the room, chasing after Scotty. They had no idea what they were. And it didn’t seem like a good idea to grab them and just start pressing buttons.

  Braving Gorgilla’s awful, bad attitude, Amrita raced to the monster’s side. He roared at Amrita, but she did her best to ignore him. She examined the restraints that held him fast. They looked like they were made of solid metal, completely smooth on the outside. There were no bumps, no holes, nothing that looked like a keyhole.

  The horn blared again. And another voice came over the loudspeaker: “SECURE GORGILLA! SECURE GORGILLA!”

  “We’re gonna have company in about two seconds,” Kid Kaiju said. He was now examining Fireclaw’s restraints. “There doesn’t seem to be any way of opening these things!”

  “HALT!”

  Amrita and Kid Kaiju whipped around and saw a stream of people in white suits pouring in through the doors of the antechamber. They were all holding strange weapons, just like the people Amrita and Kid Kaiju had encountered in the woods earlier. They advanced on the kids, slowly and in huge numbers.

  Had they come this far only to be captured again?

  SNAP!

  It was like something out of a comedy. Almost in unison, the people in white stopped dead in their tracks and craned their necks to look at the monsters. They all had the same deer-in-headlights look. The kind of look that said, We are in for a world of hurt.

  The sight was pretty funny, Amrita had to admit. Or it would have been, if the situation weren’t so dangerous.

  The SNAP! was the sound of Gorgilla breaking free from one of his leg restraints. There was another SNAP!—the metal restraint from his right wrist was gone. Gorgilla was very nearly free!

  Then it was Fireclaw’s turn. He managed to yank the restraint that held his left wrist right out of the ground. Grabbing the metal in his paw, he threw the restraint directly at the people in white. The huge hunk of metal hit the ground, scattering the goons in every direction.

  The sound of metal restraints being snapped from the floor continued. As quickly as it started, it was over. Both Fireclaw and Gorgilla were free, upright, and angry.

  Oh yes, they were very angry.

  “H-halt!” said one of the people in white. Only this time, the guy didn’t seem quite as confident as before. The small army still had their weapons, but they were backing away slowly, moving toward the entrance to the antechamber. In response, Gorgilla and Fireclaw started to move forward.

  The people in white moved faster.

  “I hate to burst your bubble,” Amrita said to the goons as they kept on retreating, “but I don’t think either one of these guys is gonna be halting anytime soon.”

  “Stand your ground!” said another one of the people in white, trying to sound brave. The others looked at the person like he was out of his mind, but they obeyed. “Activate the sleep gas! Use your filters! See that the monsters are recaptured, and take the two prisoners back to their cell!”

  “Sleeping gas?” Amrita shouted to Kid Kaiju.

  That’s when Amrita heard it—a loud sound, like a thousand helium balloons being inflated at once. But it wasn’t helium balloons.

  It was the sleeping gas.

  The kids saw great puffy clouds of purple gas rolling into the room from vents that lined the floor. It must have been the same stuff they had used before to knock Amrita and Kid Kaiju unconscious. The people in white were all wearing their containment suits, so they would be immune to the effects of the sleeping gas. But Amrita, Kid Kaiju, Gorgilla, and Fireclaw weren’t so lucky. Even if they did manage to find a couple of white containment suits for her and Kid Kaiju, Amrita was pretty sure they didn’t come in size MONSTER.

  If they didn’t leave, and leave now, it would all be over!

  AMRITA COVERED HER mouth with her hand, and Kid Kaiju did the same. The purple sleeping gas billowed into the antechamber, seeping up around their feet. At least they were prepared for it this time. They could cover their faces, which would help a little. But it wouldn’t take long before she and Kid Kaiju would be overcome. Same with Fireclaw and Gorgilla.

  Whatever they were going to do, they needed to do it right now.

  Amrita saw that Gorgilla was already doing it. The great beast lunged toward the line of people in white, followed closely by Fireclaw. Huge, fur-covered limbs were swinging in every direction, pushing their enemies aside. In the relatively close quarters of the antechamber, the people in white were on top of one another. They couldn’t fire their weapons at the monsters without hitting one another—that meant they were going to have to wait for the sleeping gas to do its thing.

  On the other hand, neither Gorgilla nor Fireclaw needed any weapon to press their attack.

  Gorgilla picked up one of the people in white before they could even react. The guy screamed a little scream, then said, “Oh man, oh man, oh man, please don’t hurt me, please don’t hurt me!”

  The monster kept the conversation going by roaring directly in the guy’s face. Amrita wasn’t sure if the guy had peed in his pants or not, but she wanted to think he did. Gorgilla took the guy, then waved him around, blowing a cloud of purple sleeping gas away from the kids. Then he flung the goon like a bowling ball at some of the other people in white. They went down like a bunch of bowling pins.

  “Strike!” Amrita yelled, quickly covering her mouth so she didn’t accidentally gulp in any of the sleeping gas.

  Meanwhile, Fireclaw was keeping the rest of the people in white at bay with his fiery claws. Brandishing them from the backs of his paws, Fireclaw swept at the ground around him, creating a semicircle of flame. The fire burned high and hot, and the people in white couldn’t get through it.

  The fire also had another effect—it was consuming the purple sleeping gas!

  Overhead, the horn kept on blaring, and a voice came over the loudspeaker: “Sending reinforcements to the antechamber!”

  “Reinforcements?” Amrita said, rolling her eyes. “Ugh, these guys need to lay off. Gorgilla! We gotta roll!”

  The giant apelike monster whipped his tail around and turned his head to face Amrita. Had he recognized his name? Or just the sound of Amrita’s voice? Either way, he seemed to respond to her.

  “Fireclaw!” Kid Kaiju called, and the monster looked down at him. “Make an exit, now!”

  As the people in white struggled to make their way around the
wall of flame, Fireclaw ran toward the side of the antechamber. He sliced the fiery claws on his right paw through the wall. Then he sank the claws from his left paw into the wall, too. He did this several times, weakening the wall bit by bit.

  Then Gorgilla came running. The beast ran at the wall, leading with his left shoulder, and plunged right into the spot where Fireclaw had been slashing.

  If you ever wondered who would win in a fight between two giant monsters and a wall, we’ll save you the trouble.

  The wall loses.

  Every. Time.

  THE WHITE WALL came tumbling down as Gorgilla shouldered his way through and spilled into the fresh night air. The hole he made was gigantic (naturally). The dome was now missing a good section of wall. Barely a second after Gorgilla had barged through the wall, Fireclaw emerged. He carried Amrita and Kid Kaiju in either paw, storming outside with a speed that belied his tremendous size. A trickle of purple sleeping gas could be seen seeping into the air outside.

  “They’ve escaped!” cried one of the people in white, still inside the dome.

  “These guys are masters of the obvious,” Amrita said. “Are they even paying attention?”

  “They’d make great reporters,” Kid Kaiju joked.

  “No kidding,” Amrita said. “There’s no way these guys work for A.I.M. or Hydra—they’d never hire people this dopey!”

  It was a whirlwind. They had managed to escape from their holding cell, rescue Gorgilla and Fireclaw, and break free from the dome. Now, all they had to do was get away, and make sure that the people in white could never find Gorgilla again!

  Something much easier said than done, considering that the moment Amrita and her friends escaped outside, they were surrounded.

  Surrounded by an army of people in white. They stood their ground, leveling their strange weapons at the monsters.

  “Knock them out!” said one of the people in white. “We can’t allow Gorgilla and that new monster to escape!”

  Fireclaw turned his furry head to look at Gorgilla. Gorgilla returned the gaze. Was it a trick of the light, or did Amrita see Gorgilla actually smile?

  The next thing Amrita knew, Gorgilla and Fireclaw charged right at the army of goons. Adding to her week of firsts, Amrita had never seen such a large group of people scatter so quickly in her life. The people in white dropped their weapons and ran every which way, falling all over themselves just trying to avoid becoming a permanent part of a monster footprint.

  “Let’s go!” Kid Kaiju shouted. He sprinted behind the monsters, and Amrita followed. Gorgilla and Fireclaw were heading straight into the woods in the distance.

  “What about Scotty?” Amrita called out. There was so much commotion, she wasn’t sure if he had heard her or not.

  “He’s a big boy, he can take care of himself!” Kid Kaiju yelled back. So he had heard.

  Neither Amrita nor Kid Kaiju wasted any time looking behind them. If they had, they wouldn’t have liked the sight. The people in white were surging toward them.

  They were about fifty yards from the woods, escape in sight. Suddenly, a white van crossed their path, blocking their way. Amrita couldn’t believe it. They couldn’t get captured now!

  The passenger door popped open. “Need a lift?” came a voice from the van.

  It was Scotty, smiling, in the driver’s seat. “Hop in!”

  Amrita and Kid Kaiju dived inside the van and slammed the door shut. She looked out the window and saw the large group of goons in white rapidly approaching.

  “Go go go!” Amrita called as the men in white raced toward the van. In the distance, she could see three white vans just like the one Scotty was driving. They were getting closer and closer.

  Scotty hit the gas and the van lurched forward. The kids were thrown back into the seat.

  “Seat belts!” Scotty called. “Safety first!”

  Kid Kaiju suppressed a little laugh as he put on his seat belt and said, “Safety saves sickness, suffering, and sadness.” Amrita gave him a funny look as she clicked her seat belt in place.

  “Just something my dad likes to say,” Kid Kaiju said, smirking.

  The van sped down the dirt road away from the dome and back to the main road. Passing through the woods on either side, Amrita thought she had caught sight of Gorgilla as he stormed away with Fireclaw.

  The three white vans were in hot pursuit. Amrita looked through the back window and saw the other vans. They were pulling closer and closer.

  “Um, Scotty? I don’t want to tell you how to drive, but maybe we could go faster?” Amrita said.

  “Yeah, like, as fast as this heap can possibly go?” Kid Kaiju added.

  Scotty tilted his head. “Okay,” he said. “Just remember, it’s been a while since I drove, so it might be a bumpy ride.”

  Scotty put the gas pedal all the way to the floor, and the van tore off down the dirt road.

  THE WHITE VAN swerved from the dirt trail and onto the main road, kicking up a cloud of dust behind it. Amrita braced herself on the dashboard and floor with her feet and hands. It felt like the van was on two wheels! She took a quick glance out the back window and saw the other three white vans hot on their tail.

  BUMP!

  BUMP-BUMP!

  BUMP!

  “Are you TRYING to hit every pothole?” Amrita cried.

  Scotty still had his foot all the way to the floor and was struggling to keep control of the speeding van on the pothole-ridden street. With every hole, the van jerked upward, launching its occupants toward the van’s ceiling. It was only their seat belts that prevented them from clocking their heads.

  “I did say it’s been a little while since I drove a car.” Scotty chuckled. “How many potholes does this town have, anyway?”

  “All of them,” Amrita answered. “And just how long has it been since you drove a car?”

  There was a moment of silence as Scotty thought. “Thirty years. Give or take.”

  Kid Kaiju slumped in his seat. “We are gonna die.”

  “Maybe not,” Amrita replied. “Look!”

  She pointed to the van’s back window. Kid Kajiu turned around to see the white vans that had been following them were falling behind! Scotty was outrunning them! For the first time all night, Amrita allowed herself a little bit of hope that their plan might succeed.

  As Scotty burned down the street, one of the white vans suddenly bounced up into the air. When it landed, the van began to skid out of control. It must have hit a pothole and blown a tire! Amrita thought.

  “Bless you, Scotty!” Kid Kaiju screamed.

  “Aye, Cap’n!” Scotty said. Both kids just stared at the scientist, who let out an embarrassed chuckle. “Sorry. I guess you guys never saw that show, huh?”

  Amrita wasn’t sure how long they had been driving. She and Kid Kaiju kept looking over their shoulders to see if the two remaining vans were still following them. Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not out to get you, Amrita thought. One by one, the vans dropped out of sight, until at last there was no one following them.

  “I think we finally lost them,” Kid Kaiju said, relieved.

  Scotty looked into the rearview mirror. “Sure seems like it!” he said. “Kids, I think we are in the clear!”

  At once, everyone let out a deep sigh of relief, and sank back in their seats.

  “Now we have to find Gorgilla and Fireclaw,” Scotty said.

  “I thought we might be able to use this,” Amrita said. In her right hand, she held up what looked like a small flash drive, the kind used for computer data storage. It had a red light at its tip that was flashing rapidly.

  “What’s that?” Scotty asked.

  “That,” Amrita said, somewhat proudly, “is a gadget that will home in on Gorgilla’s tracking device.”

  Scotty crinkled his brow. “How did you get that? When did you get that? And how did you even know what to get?”

  “So many questions. I’m the reporter, remember?” Amrita said. �
��It was easy. When you made your little distraction back there, I saw the opportunity to do some quick recon. I noticed that only one person had this device on his belt. One very specific person. I recognized him from a few days ago when I saw the people in white cleaning up brush around the dome. He was the one who used his badge to get in, making him a high-ranking employee with top security clearance. It was then simple to deduce that he was the most likely person to be trusted with top secret information. And what’s the most top secret-est information? Gorgilla’s location. See? Easy.”

  “Amrita, you’re a miracle worker,” Kid Kaiju said.

  Amrita smiled as the van rumbled down the road.

  “No,” she said, looking at Kid Kaiju. “I’m a reporter.”

  THEY HAD LEFT the van by the side of the road. As Amrita, Kid Kaiju, and Scotty walked away from the vehicle, they were all surprised to hear a loud POP! Amrita whipped her head back toward the car and saw that the back right tire had just blown out.

  Then something metal dropped from the bottom of the van.

  Was it the muffler?

  That was followed by the front bumper, which fell to the ground.

  In just a matter of seconds, their escape vehicle had basically self-destructed. It was now a big metal heap, and it wasn’t going anywhere.

  Scotty laughed so hard, Amrita thought he was going to choke.

  “Are you okay?” She chuckled.

  “Oh yeah,” he said, still laughing. “I guess I shouldn’t bother applying for a driver’s license anytime soon. Boy, I sure gave that van a beating, didn’t I?”

  It was true! Scotty had made that white van do much more than it seemed capable of doing. It really was a miracle that the thing had lasted as long as it did, and didn’t just break down in the middle of the chase.

  “We better keep moving,” Kid Kaiju said, looking at the tracking device in Scotty’s hand. “I wouldn’t just assume that those goons in white just gave up.”