The Monster Missions Page 18

  What would happen if the pirates took command of the Britannica? Would they let these creatures starve? I realized with surprise that the thought made me feel a bit ill. We’d faced more than our fair share of deadly sea monsters, and I didn’t feel bad at all when the diving crew brought one of those down in order to save a ship, but we also came across monsters that weren’t really all that monstrous. It was one of the reasons I actually enjoyed working with Weaver every day. It was satisfying to study a living mystery and then release it back into the ocean to live its life. However, the idea of pirates troubling themselves with releasing monsters back into the ocean was laughable. It had been pretty clear that they had no knowledge of sea monsters, and I realized that, compared to them, I was now somewhat of an expert. For the first time since I’d boarded the Britannica, I didn’t feel like a complete rookie.

  Just in time for everything to go south, I thought sourly as we finished up the last tank and headed back to the sink to hang up our buckets.

  “Now what?” Garth asked.

  “I wish I knew,” I said. Garth sighed, leaning back against the cabinet next to the sink. As he did, he bumped into the large metal bucket I’d been using to store my failed lock attempts, and I watched in horror as it wobbled and started to fall. I lunged for it, but even as I reached a hand out, I knew there was no way I could reach it in time. It tipped and hit the metal floor with an earsplitting bang before bouncing to crash noisily into the cabinet, and a cascade of locks clattered across the floor. Kate and Max came flying around the corner to see what had happened. Max stepped directly onto one of the locks, and his foot shot out from under him. His arms flailed for a second before he went down, almost taking Kate with him. Garth and I stood frozen in horror, both of us with our hands uselessly outstretched from our failed attempts to keep the bucket from tipping.

  “Smooth,” Max hissed as he gingerly pulled a lock out from under himself. Before he could even get back to his feet, the door to the classroom burst open again, and we all went silent as more pirates rushed in. These four were slightly better kempt than the first three, but they had the same angry look to them that reminded me eerily of a hungry shark.

  “You’re sure the noise came from in here?” a heavyset male pirate said as he turned this way and that, taking in the seemingly empty room.

  “I’m sure,” said a red-haired woman as she walked around the room, peering in each of the tanks. I said a silent prayer that all of Weaver’s specimens had finished their breakfast. The woman continued her inspection as the other three grumbled something and stomped back into the hall to look for the source of the noise. I held my breath as the woman passed the tanks we were hiding behind. I expected her to leave then, but she stayed, standing in the middle of the room, studying the tanks. While the first group of pirates had seemed rough and crude, she had a cunning look to her narrowed eyes that made my skin crawl. It was as though I could see her mind work to solve the puzzle of the tanks and the noise. After what felt like an eternity, she finally left, and we all sagged in relief.

  Sorry, Garth mouthed, but Max just shook his head and pointed to the floor, making it clear that Garth’s walking-around privileges had officially been revoked. Garth did what he’d been told, sinking sheepishly to the floor. I sat down next to him, feeling more than a little responsible, and leaned back, only to sit up again as the knob of the cabinet dug into my back. I realized that I was leaning against the very cabinet Weaver had told me to come check out.

  Our conversation that morning about creating something to collect the hydra’s poison seemed ages ago. I’d been hoping to find a sponge that I could carve into the shape of a fish and somehow seal so that when the little monsters bit it, their venom would be collected without risking a human life. It probably would have worked, I reasoned, but we had bigger problems now. We were outnumbered, and we didn’t have a single thing we could use to defend ourselves.

  I opened my eyes and looked again at the row of tanks in front of us, filled with their strange assortment of the bizarre and the unusual. I hoped those stupid pirates did try to eat the hidden-fanged loogie. They were right, it did look like a harmless blob of snot, but it had teeth the size of steak knives. Lucky for them that Weaver kept the monsters under lock and key, or the loogie might just have taken off one of their dirty dumb hands, I thought. The loogie blinked its bulbous eyes, and I smiled as an idea pushed its way through all the worry clouding my brain. That idea felt just like one of the sunrises I’d witnessed standing at the rail of the Atlas as the darkness was peeled back to reveal the hope of a new day.

  “Thanks,” I whispered to the loogie as hope shook itself like a wet bird and puffed inside my chest. If I played it right, we might just be able to save the Atlas as well as the Britannica.

  15

  Everyone slept on the floor that night using their arms as pillows. We took turns staying awake to stand guard. I was slightly surprised to see just how many locks I’d made in my attempt to stump that mean old mollusk Elmer. In total I’d made over thirty different prototypes, but only eleven of them had actually worked. Although, it was really more like ten since Elmer had crushed one into a compacted metal ball that refused to be uncrushed no matter how hard I tried. It wasn’t enough. We needed at least twice this many, and unfortunately, I only knew of one place to get them. Finally I reached over and shook Garth awake. He sat bolt upright so fast that we nearly cracked heads, and I could see his wide, panicked eyes in the dark as he looked around for a potential threat.

  “Shhhhh,” I said. “Everything’s fine.”

  “Are we still hiding from pirates?” he whispered back. I nodded and he scowled, rubbing at his eyes. “Darn, I was hoping that was a nightmare. What’s up? Is it my turn to take watch already?” I shook my head, glancing over with a tug of guilt at the sleeping forms of Kate and Max. If they knew what I was planning, they’d probably try to stop me, but then again, it wasn’t their families’ lives in danger as we sat around waiting for a good time to try the impossible.

  “Do you trust me?” I asked. Garth nodded without hesitation, and I smiled at him in the dark. “Follow me,” I instructed, “and watch out for buckets.”

  “You’re not funny,” he whispered back as we carefully maneuvered around our sleeping friends and over to the door. I unlocked it and swung the tanks inward so we could slip out, making sure to lock the door behind us with Weaver’s key ring.

  “Where are we going?” Garth whispered.

  “The large-specimen room,” I whispered back. “I have an idea, but we need a few supplies from there if it’s going to work.”

  “Whatever you say,” Garth said, and together we tiptoed to the classroom door and pressed our ears against it. I couldn’t hear anything but the thrumming of my own heart, so I eased the door open and slipped out into the hall. The floor was no longer covered in an inch of water, but it was damp enough for me to see that the water wasn’t too much of a distant memory. I could hear the rough rasp of unfamiliar voices coming from the front of the sub, and closer still the grating rumble of someone snoring, but there wasn’t a pirate in sight. Knowing that that wouldn’t last long, I jerked my head at Garth to follow me, and together we crept down the Britannica’s now-familiar hallways, taking care to stop and listen before turning every corner. Every muscle in my body felt like it had been stretched to the breaking point as we made painfully slow progress back to the large-specimen room. Despite one close call, where we had to duck inside a storage closet moments before two pirates rounded a corner, we managed to make it there in one piece. I eased the door shut and locked it. Hopefully it would deter any nosy pirates, or at least slow them down.

  “Whoa,” Garth said. I turned from the door to see what he was making a fuss about and gasped. The tank that had held the adolescent sea pig was shattered, the water inside spread across the floor in a mottled puddle. We’d only had this particular monster for a few days, and I’d found something almost charming in its smashed-in snout a
nd fat flippers. It was harmless, according to Weaver, feeding mostly on the vegetation that grew on the ocean floor. Of course, if you stuck your arm in its tank, it would probably try to rip it out of its socket, but you couldn’t really blame it for that. Now it lay prone in the middle of the mess, and I covered my mouth in horror as I took in the deep slashes and gouges along its bristly sides. I glanced away as my stomach rolled.

  “Why do you think they killed it?” Garth said.

  “No clue,” I said, crouching down to inspect the sea pig. Its long tusks were stained with blood, which I hoped belonged to a pirate.

  “What supplies do we need?” Garth said.

  I shut my eyes and willed myself to focus. “The locks off all the tanks, and any extras Weaver has in the supply closet . . .” My voice trailed off as I caught sight of the supply closet for the first time, the key ring I’d been preparing to use falling uselessly to my side. The supply-closet door had been pried open and was hanging loose and crooked on its hinges. I peered inside gingerly to find that most of the well-organized contents of the tiny room had been trashed.

  “Weaver’s going to cry when he sees this,” Garth said, coming up behind me.

  “Let’s just find what we need and get out of here,” I said as I carefully stepped over the broken glass of a blood bomb. In a matter of minutes, we were loaded up with all the locks I could find, and I headed toward the stairs that led to the tops of the tanks, intent on the large metal locks that Weaver used to secure the tanks. That’s when I spotted Elmer, thrashing angrily.

  “What’s with him?” Garth said, pausing to eye his old nemesis warily.

  “He’s hungry,” I said. “He probably thought we were here to feed him, since I doubt Weaver had a chance to feed anyone before this whole mess started. He’s missed his breakfast and his dinner.”

  “Don’t even think about it,” Garth warned, but I turned around and hurried back to the supply closet. I heard Garth groan and mutter something behind me, but I was already rushing around the room, pulling out the refrigerated fish we kept on hand in case we weren’t able to bring in fresh.

  “You can’t be serious,” Garth said when I came out a minute later and thrust a full bucket at him.

  “I am,” I said. “Weaver won’t thank us if all these guys die of starvation. Now help me, and we can have this done in two minutes.”

  “He won’t thank us for getting caught, either,” Garth whispered, but he grabbed his bucket and dutifully followed me up the small steps that led to the walkway around the top of the huge tanks. Thankfully, the other aquariums were still intact, and I quickly took the lock from each one and slipped it into the empty bucket beside me, before easing the tank lid open just far enough for Garth to slip in the occupant’s food. We made our way around until there were only two tanks left: Elmer’s and the baby hydras’. I decided to save Elmer for last since he and Garth had a dicey history, but despite our utter lack of time, I still found myself hesitating after I confiscated the lock from the hydras’ tank.

  “You want to just let those starve?” Garth said. “Because if so, I can totally get on board with that.”

  “You’ve been hanging out with Hector too much,” I said, glancing up.

  Garth scoffed. “You’re probably right, but don’t act like it hasn’t crossed your mind.”

  “It has,” I admitted. “But Weaver thinks their poison might be useful. I mean, what if they are the key to creating some kind of weapon the ships can use to defend themselves?”

  “Don’t fall in,” Garth cautioned.

  “You’re not funny,” I said as I carefully flipped open the top of the enormous tank. I peered at the excited, writhing bodies of the baby sea serpents. They knew by now what the opening of the tank meant, and they were hungry. Garth dutifully handed me the bucket of dead fish, and I emptied it into the tank, watching as the little monsters ripped into their meal.

  A second later there was a surprised yelp, and I looked back to see a thick tentacle wrapped around Garth’s ankle. Elmer had unlocked his tank again. Like I expected, he yanked Garth off his feet and into his tank, dunked him mercilessly, and shot out the customary cloud of ink, covering him from head to foot. Garth was pawing at his stinging eyes as Elmer lifted him by the leg back out of his tank, but instead of dropping him unceremoniously to the floor, he moved his muscular tentacle over toward me. I saw what was about to happen like it was going in slow motion, and it took everything in me not to scream as Elmer released Garth directly over the tank full of poisonous sea monsters I’d just whipped into a feeding frenzy. I lunged forward, trying to grab Garth, but it was no use. He careened past me and into the tank headfirst. I plunged my hand into the water after him, only to jerk it out a second before one of the monsters could latch on to my forearm. Garth spluttered to the surface a moment later, and I grabbed him and hauled him out of the tank.

  “How many times were you bitten?” I asked, but Garth just coughed, choked, and pawed at his ink-filled eyes. I frantically searched my friend for the telltale puncture wounds that would mean he was as good as dead. Even one bite could stop a grown man’s heart—that was what Weaver had told us. Well, Garth wasn’t a grown man, and if he’d been bitten by one hydra, he’d probably been bitten by all of them, based on their reaction to the fish I’d just thrown in.

  “Stay here,” I said to Garth, leaping to my feet. “I’m going to get help.” Even as I said it, I realized there was no help to get. Pirates had taken over the Britannica, and even if they hadn’t, I knew there wasn’t any help I could get fast enough. For a week I’d watched the hydras bite into fish, which went rigid a second later. Any minute now my best friend was going to die, and it was going to be all my fault.

  I was halfway down the steps when Garth’s voice stopped me in my tracks. I whirled to see him flapping a hand at me to stop as he coughed up another mouthful of water. “Wasn’t bitten,” he managed to choke out between coughs, and I stopped in my mad rush to look back at him.

  “What?” I said.

  “I wasn’t bitten,” Garth said again. “Not even once. I would have felt it.”

  “Are you sure?” I said, hurrying back to his side.

  “Well,” he said with a half-hearted grin, “I’m not dead yet, so yeah, pretty sure.”

  “That’s a miracle,” I said, amazed as I looked back down into the tank, remembering my own near miss as I’d tried to grab him.

  “It was,” he said, getting to his feet. He gave Elmer a glare, but the octopus was skulking near the back of his tank and ignored him. “Why does his ink have to sting?” Garth asked. “And reek? It wasn’t enough that he tried to kill me—he had to blind me and make me smell like a dead animal, too?”

  “Sorry,” I said feebly as my best friend attempted and failed to wipe the mess off his face.

  Elmer looked over at me, and I held up a finger and shook it at him. “You and I are going to have a talk,” I said, but he just blinked at me in a very unimpressed sort of way. I glanced back down at the neighboring tank, where the baby monsters were still furiously finishing off the last of the fish. I turned to Garth.

  “But why didn’t they bite you?” I said. “They should have.” Garth just shrugged as my brain churned. There was a puddle of murky water surrounding us, and I ran my hand through it, looking at the oily ink left on my fingers. Garth was right: it did smell a bit like a rotting animal of some kind. “I wonder . . .” I turned back to Garth. “Give me your shirt,” I commanded.

  “Gladly,” he said, yanking the ruined garment up over his head. My heart racing, I got down on my hands and knees to mop up every last bit of the ink-stained water. That done, I approached the edge of the hydras’ tank and carefully dipped the end of the shirt in the water. The monsters immediately flinched back, cowering against the far wall of the tank, as far as they could get from the inky shirt. I pulled it back out, my mind abuzz with possibilities.

  “What are you doing, exactly?” Garth said.

 
“I have a hunch,” I said, clambering to my feet. I needed to know if the hydras were a fluke or if Elmer’s ink repelled all sea monsters. Well, I reasoned, there was one way to find out. I walked across to the tank that held the ribbon-thin monster so fond of trying to kill Weaver, and I shook my head. I’d already gotten lucky once today; I wasn’t going to push it by trying it on that guy. Instead I went over to a tank that held a small mortagog. We’d caught it about two weeks ago, and I’d enjoyed getting to see the mysterious creature up close. It had a large, blocky, almost hippo-like head, with four sharp tusks that curled back around its stocky body. Its body was smooth and streamlined, like a seal’s, but its two giant front flippers came complete with thick talons that had scraped the glass of the tank so badly it would need to be replaced. Its back half was more aquatic in nature, streaming back into a thick powerful tail.

  This mortagog was small, only about six feet in length, and not even a year old, according to Weaver. It had been tricky to feed, since it liked to crank its head up in an attempt to rip off the hand that was delivering dinner, but I didn’t need to stick my hand in its tank—just Garth’s shirt. It only took a moment for me to carefully slip the inky-covered shirt inside. The mortagog peered up at the strange new item in its enclosure, sniffed, and then let out an eruption of frightened bubbles from its huge nostrils as it thrust itself backward and away.

  So maybe it wasn’t just a fluke, I thought jubilantly as I hurried over to try the same experiment on the dogfish specimen we’d brought in last week. It took three more monsters shying away from the shirt like it was on fire to convince me once and for all. I felt a grin spreading over my face. I had something here. I wasn’t sure what, exactly, or how we could use the ink, but I knew this information was important. The problem was that unless we got the Britannica out from under the control of the pirates, I couldn’t tell anyone about this realization to find out just how important it might be.