Monsterworld, p.114
Monsterworld, page 114
part #1 of Monster Slayer Series
I calmly unhooked my pack from my shoulder. If it came to blows, I was prepared for it, but I hoped words would suffice. Unfortunately, harsh words were needed in this situation. “Bu’ploog, something had to be done. Your women were dying. And you were sleeping.”
“Me needed rest. Me had control.” The giant tried to maintain his stern, rageful façade, but it faded swiftly under the biting teeth of the truth I wielded.
“I get it. You were sad. You lost people you cared about. But there are plenty of others still alive, and they needed you to be strong.”
“How dare youse?” the giant said, taking a heavy step forward. The accusation sounded weak and brittle around the edges, like it was spoken to himself rather than to me.
“I dare because I must,” I said. “This world has bigger problems than Kong, although he may be crucial to the solution. The Morgoss are threatening everything with an army of shadow warriors. Time is of the essence. You are either with us or against us.”
Bu’ploog opened his mouth angrily to respond, but I cut him off.
“I want you to be with us,” I said, taking the bark out of my words and pushing what I hoped was sincerity into them. “We need a warrior like you. We need your tribeswomen. Only united can we stand against the evil that threatens us all. What do you say?”
Bu’ploog blinked his big ol’ eyes, surprised at the turn the conversation had taken. He opened his mouth again, closed it. Looked unsure of himself. “Me so tired,” he admitted, hanging his bulbous head.
“We all are,” I said.
“Boo,” Chastity said tenderly, stepping forward. She reached up and grabbed the giant’s finger and pulled him down into a squat. “We are always with you, whatever you choose. But I’ll tell you what we want: We want to fight the Morgoss. We want to do more than hide in the forest. And we need you to go to the Council of the Tribes and garner support for a unified war against the Morgoss.”
Bu’ploog frowned. “The Council? Me…can’t. Me can’t leave youse all here agin.”
“We won’t be here,” Chastity said. “I told you, we want to fight. We’re leaving.”
“Me can’t abandon our home,” Bu’ploog said.
“We’re not abandoning it,” Misha said, adding her own voice to the conversation. “We’ll come back as soon as the war is over.”
“How?” the giant said, shaking his head in bewilderment. “We are overrun. Kong be invincible.”
“Maybe not,” I said. I reached into my pack and pulled out the lump of a heart. It throbbed in my grasp.
Bu’ploog’s eyes widened. “Is that…”
“Yes. Kong was being controlled by the Syrene. But no more. Now he’ll work for us.”
“What did youse do?” Bu’ploog said, eyes narrowing as he took in the bloodstains on our skin and the upper portion of our clothes. “Where’s Belle? Where is she?”
It was the question I’d been dreading. My mouth felt dry as I prepared to answer with the blunt truth.
“She is waiting for us on the outskirts of the forest,” Misha said before I could answer.
My head jerked to meet her eyes, which told me to go along with the lie.
The only problem: I was honest to a fault these days. I couldn’t lie to this giant anymore than I could lie to the Three, Vrill or Eve.
“She is?” Bu’ploog asked, sounding skeptical—and for good reason.
“No,” I said. “She’s not.” Misha closed her eyes and shook her head.
“Youse lied to me?” The giant directed the question to Misha, wearing an expression that almost looked as if he’d been slapped.
Misha opened her eyes. “Boo, we love you, but do you know how hard things have been? While you’ve been sleeping, we’ve been surviving. Hunting for food in a forest that wants to kill us. Never knowing when one of our sisters won’t return. It wears us down day by day, hour by hour. And where have you been? You’ve been a ghost.”
If Bu’ploog was affected by the harshness of her words, he didn’t show it. Instead, he seemed laser-focused on one thing and one thing alone. “Where. Is. Belle?”
I let Misha answer, since she was the one who’d initially lied. “The Syrene have her. She chose to stay with them, to prove to them that we wouldn’t go back on the deal we made.”
“What deal?”
“It doesn’t matter. What matters is that we have the key to ending Kong’s reign in our forest! We have a chance to do something important for the betterment of all of Tor. Don’t you want to be a part of that?”
“This be treason,” Bu’ploog said. “Mutiny me say!” He stood back up to full height, beating a fist against his chest.
“Calm down, Boo,” Chastity said, trying to smooth out the situation before it got out of control. Unfortunately, we were already past that.
“Me will crush youse, Sam Ryder. Me will kill you.” The giant took a powerful step forward, fists locked together and raised over his head like a massive hammer about to be used to squash a pesky bug. I pulled out my own hammer and prepared to defend myself.
I didn’t need to. Misha stepped in front of me, putting herself in the line of fire, right between the giant and me. “Then you’ll have to kill me too,” she said.
“And me,” Chastity said, moving into position beside her tribe-sister.
“Traitors, all of ye,” the giant said, teeth gritted together. His muscles flexed and it appeared that he really was going to crush the three of us together.
That’s when something remarkable happened.
More women, Misha and Chastity’s tribe-sisters, ran over, crying, “Me too! Me too!” They positioned themselves in a group between their former giant leader and me. It was an awe-inspiring but also exceptionally sad scene to witness, mostly because the tension left Bu’ploog’s body in an instant, his arms sagging back to his sides. A single tear leaked from the corner of his eye.
“Youse don’t want me no more?”
“We do want you, Boo,” Chastity said, speaking for the group. “But only if you’re willing to fight for us, for this world we all call home. Starting with pushing for an alliance with the Council of the Tribes.”
Her words hung in the air, the silence palpable as Bu’ploog stared at his former tribeswomen. All the while, that single tear continued to meander down his cheek, finally reaching his broad chin, hanging for a few moments, quivering.
And then it fell.
“Then ye have made yer decision,” Bu’ploog said. I could hear the toxic mix of sadness and anger in his tone, and for a second I feared he really would follow through with his threats and try to kill all of us “traitors.”
Thankfully, however, the moment passed, and he lumbered past, crashing open the door and hustling outside, slamming it back into place in his wake.
And then the giant was gone. Perhaps forever.
“I’m sorry,” I said, the only thing that felt appropriate. I knew these women cared about the giant, even if they disagreed with him as of late.
“Something had to be done,” Misha said, though I could tell she was overcompensating for the pain she felt.
“It was inevitable,” Chastity said, her voice cracking on the last word.
The women hugged each other and I watched, a witness to the strength of their emotions. I slipped away before any of them could notice me. Lace and Silk followed me, all of us outsiders in this situation.
~~~
I told Lace and Silk to wait for me at the big tree. Lace opened her mouth to protest, but I held up a hand to stop her. She shook her head. “Fine. But if you die, I’ll be very pissed off.”
“I would expect nothing less,” I said. As I walked away, I hoped the rest of the tribeswomen would know I wasn’t abandoning them like Bu’ploog had. I hoped they knew I just needed to do this alone, to protect them from the unknown.
I continued to hold Kong’s heart in my hand, letting my feet fall into rhythm with its pulsing beat. I returned my hammer to my belt—if whatever came next became violent, I wouldn’t have a chance anyway.
I wasn’t even sure where I was heading, but I did my best to maintain my bearings, walking in a straight line so that I could retrace my steps if necessary. I heard the sound of tinkling water and I made for it, ducking under low-hanging vines and branches before catapulting over a fallen log. The spring was small, but the water was clear, cleansed by a small waterfall as the creek made its way down from a low rise in the forest tapestry. I placed Kong’s heart back in my bag and then knelt down and cupped my hands to draw a mouthful of water, bringing it toward my lips.
The water’s surface quivered and I stopped, staring at the previously undisturbed surface. I frowned intensely at my water-filled hands, head cocked to the side.
There it was again, the slightest quiver on the water’s surface, like a plucked bowstring. Misha’s words came back to me:
Kong will find you.
I dropped the water without drinking as the next crash of Kong’s foot made the ground beneath me tremble. I reached into my sack and retrieved his heart once more, searching the surrounding trees for any evidence of the direction he would arrive from.
THUD!
I whirled around, still seeing nothing amiss.
THUD!
The impact of his footstep shivered up from the ground through my body.
THUD-CRACK!
A tree was snapped in half and now I knew exactly where he was coming from—just behind me. I spun around once more, just in time to see a massive tree topple over before I could even think to shout “TIMBERRRR!” Though it was at least a hundred feet tall and five feet wide, it had snapped in half like a toothpick.
Kong backhanded what was left of it, sending it flying. His eyes locked on me through the remaining foliage between us, and I could see the recognition in his eyes. He remembered me, the one who’d tried to lure him into a trap and then murder him from above.
He opened his mouth and roared, revealing those deadly teeth.
What was left of the day was gray now, making his enormous frame a blotch of black against the dull backdrop, his white teeth almost ghostly.
He slammed his fists against his chest as if to exhibit that he was the alpha in this situation.
Maybe he was before, but not now.
I was the alpha.
I lifted his heart in the air, relishing the throb of his powerful life in my hands. With one squeeze, I could end this magnificent creature so he couldn’t terrorize anyone else. But that was a last resort, only to be used if absolutely necessary.
Kong froze when he saw what I held, the very thing that must’ve drawn him to me like a moth to a flame.
I wasn’t sure what to expect next. Would he roll over onto his belly like a lovestruck puppy and demand I scratch him in all the right places? Would he shake in fear and beg my forgiveness and pledge to do my bidding? Would he run off in defiance, crashing a path through the forest?
Nope, I was wrong on all counts.
I wish I wasn’t.
Because
Instead
He charged.
“Oh fuck,” I muttered as more trees cracked, tossed aside by the monstrous gorilla like they were children’s toys.
I ran, wishing I hadn’t been by the spring’s edge, because it forced me to run around the water so as to not get bogged down. I reached the other side and looked back to find that Kong had already cut the distance between us in half with his mighty strides.
“Shit, shit, shit,” I said, leaping over a log and dodging a thorn bush that scraped against my skin, drawing blood. As I ran, I scanned the terrain for one of the tribes’ hollowed-out fallen logs to take shelter in, hoping to find one of the tunnels that would lead me back to their secret tree.
There was nothing but thick undergrowth and trees that were about to be felled by Kong as he pursued me. I wouldn’t get far before he caught me, his thunderous footsteps bucking the ground beneath my feet.
This was no longer a fight or flight decision, because either choice would yield the same result. Namely, my death.
So I chose the third option, which felt suicidal but which I hoped was just crazy enough to have a chance of success.
I stopped and turned around, holding my ground as I continued to grasp Kong’s heart in my large hand. The gorilla continued his charge, destroying everything in his path to get to me. I held my breath as the distance between us vanished. Fifty yards. Thirty. Ten. When my destruction was all but a foregone conclusion, I gave the heart a slight squeeze. Enough to put pressure on it but not harm it.
Kong skidded to a stop, knuckles grinding against the ground. He released another roar, so close and loud that I could feel the wind from it. Some of his saliva splashed against my face, warm and wet.
I squeezed harder, not backing away even an inch.
Kong’s eyes widened and grew wild and he began to put on a show, beating his chest as loud as drumbeats, roaring once more, pushing his face all the way up to mine, hot stank-breath washing over me like the putrid fumes from a garbage dump.
I squeezed even harder.
His mouth gaped and his tongue lolled out. He gasped as if he’d been punched in the gut by a wrecking ball.
I said, “Fuck with me and I’ll pop your heart like a balloon.” I didn’t know if he understood English at all, but I hoped the translation got through to him via my hardened expression and the continued pressure I was putting on his heart.
He was panting now, scrabbling at his chest with his meaty hands. Gurgling sounds were coming from the back of his throat and I wondered whether I’d gone too far, if I’d squeezed too hard, permanently injuring something inside him.
But then—
He took a step back and settled onto his haunches, sitting down with an earth-shaking BOOM!
I breathed. In and out. I released the tightness of my grip on his heart just a little…
He sprang up and cocked his fist back. I squeezed again and he froze, releasing an angry bellow.
“Don’t,” I said, forcing as much command into my tone as possible. “Don’t.”
Kong seemed frustrated now, and he put on a show of stomping in a circle, which nearly threw me off balance. However, I managed to keep my feet, maintaining that small degree of pressure on his heart until he stopped and flopped down once more.
“Better,” I said. “I’m going to release you again. Don’t try anything.”
This time when I eased back my grip on his heart, he just stared at me. He began to play with his fingers. Then, to my surprise he lifted his hands and peeled back his lips to show his teeth, grinning at me cheekily. Wait. Was he…being silly?
It reminded me of an orangutan I’d seen at a zoo once. The guy was a character, putting on a goofy show for all the people watching, making faces and scratching his balls and doing all sorts of things. A real show off.
Was Kong really just a silly guy beneath all that bluster?
It was hard to believe.
He finished making his face and made a chuffing sound, as if he’d amused himself. All around him, his ape minions began to appear, looking as unintimidating as puppies, swinging and playing and carrying on. It was like a switch had been flipped and they’d gone from fearsome wild animals to loving pets. I’d take it. Of course, I was also hoping I’d be able to flip the switch the other way so they could help us rip the Morgoss army limb from limb. But for now, not having to worry about my own arms being ripped off was enough.
I clapped my hands to get all the performing apes’ attention. They responded, clapping their own hands and making ooh ooh ah sounds to show their appreciation. “My name is Sam Ryder,” I said, not sure how much of my communication they’d be able to understand. “I’m your master now. I’m sorry, but we’re going to leave this forest for a while. I hope you’ll get to return someday.”
Before I could start my next sentence, they rushed me, all of them at once, with such speed I barely managed to flinch and then reach for my hammer.
Too late.
One of them swung down from a branch upside down and grabbed me, strong arms lifting my bulk into the air as if I was a featherweight. My body whooshed through the air and then the gorilla released me. I was weightless for a second, but before gravity could reclaim me, another gorilla swooped down and snatched my arms, like I was nothing more than a prop in a trapeze artist’s act. This ape swung me higher, passing me onto another of its buddies. At first I tried to get to my hammer so I could stop whatever chain reaction my little speech had set in motion, but then I realized there was nothing violent or malicious in what they were doing. It was almost like they were including me in their playing, tossing me back and forth higher and higher until…
Kong caught me in one of his massive outstretched palms. Despite his size and strength, he took great tenderness and care as he held me up to his face, inspecting me. “Ooh?” he said.
“Nice Kong,” I said, glad Beat wasn’t here to mock me for such a dumb reply.
“Tattoo-ah-ah,” the beast said, thumping its opposite fist against its chest. I was glad he used the correct hand or I’d have been inadvertently crushed.
“Uh, is that your name?” I pointed at him. “Tattoo-ah-ah?”
Me speaking his name seemed to delight him. He got very animated and made several more Ooh ooh sounds, practically jumping up and down, which made me far queasier than a flight on Mrizandr’s back.
When he’d settled down again, I thumped my own chest with my fist and said, “Ryder.” Better to stick with just one name to keep it simple for the ape.
“Ryeeee-derrrrrr,” the ape said, grinning when he got the pronunciation more or less correct.
I was pretty damn impressed, if I was being honest. “Yeah! You got it!”
I expected more giddiness and jumping up and down, but instead Kong—I mean, Tattoo-ah-ah—took off with me still in his palm. To prevent me from falling from his grasp, he curled his fingers around me, gently, like a seatbelt. Up and down and twist and up and down and—
