Falcon Quinn and the Black Mirror (10 page)

“Ankh-hoptet,” said Falcon. “Maybe you should—”

“Stop this impudent attack!” said Ankh-hoptet. “I command—”

But at this moment something stuck in her throat,
and the mummy began to cry.

It started off as just a soft trickle of tears, but in no time at all the mummy was sobbing. “I'm so sorry!” she wailed. She grabbed some of the loose gauze that was trailing from her arm and wiped the tears off her cheek with it. She fell onto her knees. “You hurt me!”

Falcon, Jonny, Megan, and Destynee all looked at each other.

Pearl flew to a position even with their heads and looked at them all triumphantly. “This is the fate,” she said, “of those who would threaten the ones whom I have sworn to protect! It is the big black stinger that shall pierce their undead bottom!”

Ankh-hoptet was now sobbing piteously. “Oh, it hurts!” She looked at the others pleadingly. “It really, really, really hurts!”

Lincoln Pugh stepped closer to her. “I have some pink bismuth liquid,” he said. “It's for my ulcer. It's soothing. You want some?”

Ankh-hoptet looked at the tiny boy with the orange hair and the orange rectangular glasses. “I'm such a total loser,” wailed Ankh-hoptet through her tears. “I'm not even from Egypt. I'm from Illinois.”

“Illinois!” said Pearl. “The mummy is from Illinois!”

“Where in Illinois?” said Falcon.

Ankh-hoptet wiped more tears from her face with her
ragged gauze bandages. “Cairo,” she said.

“There are monsters in Illinois?” said Megan.

“There are monsters everywhere,” said Ankh-hoptet. “But they do not show their faces. They live in secret.”

“Where do monsters come from, anyway?” asked Destynee.

Quimby bubbled in his jar. “Hel-
lo
. From other monsters, of course.”

“But—my parents weren't wereslugs,” said Destynee.

“Must have been something,” said Jonny Frankenstein.

“They would have
told
me if they were monsters,” said Destynee. “Wouldn't they?”

“I, for one, come from a long line of
Chupakabras
!” said Pearl. “This legacy has been handed down, from generation to generation, among my people! The pursuit of the goat! It is a glorious history!”

“My parents weren't…,” said Destynee. “Anything. I don't think.”

“Of course they were,” said Jonny. “They just hid it from you.”

“They lied to me? About who I am?”

“Maybe they were trying to protect you,” Falcon said thoughtfully.

“My father was a mummy,” said Ankh-hoptet. For a moment, after she'd said this, there was silence.

“Well,
that's
awkward,” said Quimby.

“What about your parents, Falcon?” said Destynee. “Did you know?”

“My father's dead,” said Falcon. “My mother's…as good as dead. I don't know what they were.”

“So it's inherited?” said Megan.

“Yes, of course it's inherited,” said Quimby from his jar. “Monstrosity. But the children can be a different kind of monster from their parents. You never know what sort of thing children are going to turn out to be. It's a mystery!”

“My sisters,” said Megan softly. “They must have been—”

“Did humans find out about them and come after them with pitchforks?” said Jonny. “Or did the guardians get them?”

“They
drowned
,” said Megan. “No one
got
them.”

“This is what they told you,” said Pearl. “It would be interesting to know the full story.”

“Guardians?” said Destynee. “Who are the guardians?”

Jonny just shook his head. “You guys really don't know anything,” he said.

“I am well acquainted with these guardians,” said Pearl with a shudder. “They are the hunters of monsters. They pursue us without end!”

“But why?” said Falcon.

“They are sworn to destroy us!” said Pearl.

“I don't understand,” said Falcon. “Why can't everybody just leave each other alone?”

“Now, now, kids,” said Quimby from his jar. “You'll learn all about the guardians in your classes. It is a long history, the war between the monsters and the guardians. I believe Mr. Shale has a fascinating lecture on just this very subject.”

“Fascinating for you, maybe,” said Pearl. “For us it is a matter of life and death!”

“It is life and death for me, too,” muttered Quimby. “Or didn't you notice—
I'm a head in a jar.
Do you think I was born like this? Do you?”

Jonny smirked. “Watch out, Pearl,” he said. “You're making him angry.”

“So how did you wind up in the jar, Quimby?” asked Falcon.

“I don't want to talk about it!” shouted Quimby.

“What about your parents, Jonny?” said Destynee.

“Frankensteins don't have parents,” said Jonny. “Thanks for reminding me!”

“Why don't you have parents?” said Destynee. “I don't understand.”

“Because we're
made
,” said Jonny. “Not born.”

Lincoln Pugh came back out into the hallway, holding a bottle of Pepto-Bismol. “Here,” he said. “Have some of this. It's soothing.”

“The princess wishes to be soothed,” said Ankh-hoptet.

Megan looked at Ankh-hoptet suspiciously. “Why did you come up here, anyway? Did you really think Lincoln would go to the bash with you if you started yelling at him and ordering him around? Is that the way you usually interact with people, yelling at them and cursing?”

Ankh-hoptet shrugged as she drank the pink liquid. “Always worked before,” she said.

“But now things are different!” said Pearl. “Now you have tasted the poison of—yes!
The famous goatsucker of Peru!”

“I thought you said your stinger was lethal,” said Falcon.

“There are many kinds of poison in this world, and in this life,” said Pearl. “The mummy has been given the poison of humility! The mummy has been given the poison of truth!”

“Ha, ha!” said Destynee. “The mummy got the poison in her butt.”

“You're mean,” said Lincoln. “Hurting her like that when she came here for help.”

“Help?” said Destynee. “She came up here
yelling
at us and
cursing
us.”

“I'll just go,” said Ankh-hoptet, standing up again. “I'm sorry I bothered you. Like I said, I'm a loser. Always was, always—”

“I'm
glad
you came,” said Lincoln. “You're the only person here with a sense of humor.”

“Wait,” said Falcon. “You think she's—kidding? About being a mummy?”

“Thanks for the Pepto-Bismol,” said Ankh-hoptet.

“Do you still want to go to that dance?” asked Lincoln. “If you still want to go, I'm not going with anyone.”

“Aw,” said Quimby. “This is so touching.”

Ankh-hoptet looked angrily at Quimby. “What is this being?”

“I'm a ten-pound head in a nine-pound jar!” said Quimby.

The mummy shook her head. Her voice was slowly gaining in power once more. “The head in a jar should not address the princess! The head in a jar must not—”

“Ah, ah, ah,” said Quimby. “Don't start up with that
princess
stuff again, Princess.”

“Not unless you wish once more to feel the sting of
la Chupakabra
,” said Pearl.

“Okay, okay,” said Ankh-hoptet. “Sorry.”

“So, do you want to go to the thing with me?” asked Lincoln. “Or what? We might have fun.”

“And so shall it be done,” said Ankh-hoptet. “The Princess of Decay shall accompany this one with the glasses of fire! So shall his spectacles provide a vision of the future. A future of
death
!”

Lincoln Pugh laughed. “You say the nuttiest things!” he said.

Megan leaned toward Pearl and whispered, “How long does that poison of yours last?”

“The poison of humility,” said Pearl regretfully, “wears off in minutes. Unlike the poison of death, which lasts for all time.”

“Right,” said Megan. “Well, something tells me Linky's going to have his hands full.”

“You might have to give her another few jabs before the night's done,” said Falcon.

“She would be a good woman,” said Pearl, “if there was someone to sting her every day.”

A
little later, Falcon, Megan, Destynee, Ankh-hoptet, Lincoln Pugh, and Jonny Frankenstein walked down the creaking steps of the front porch of Castle Grisleigh together as Pearl flew just behind them. On the quad outside, they ran into Max, who was wearing a tuxedo and holding a bouquet of flowers. Falcon and Jonny stopped for a moment, amazed at the boy's transformation from common bigfoot to man-about-town.

Max smiled. He looked nervously at Pearl. “Okay, so, like, I got these for you,” he said, holding the flowers toward her. The bouquet—a bunch of carnations, daisies, and roses—was nearly as big as Pearl herself.

Pearl buzzed toward the flowers and sniffed them. “Señor Max,” she said, “never before has anyone made a gift of such magnificence! They are as beautiful as life itself! And they are rich in the nectar as well. They will make for a delightful late-night snack: the petals and the pollen. An evening of delicacies—and great pleasure!—stretches out before us!”

“Yeah,” said Max, blushing. “It's going to be excellent.”

Falcon looked at Max's clothes. “Where did you get the tuxedo?” he asked.

“Down in the catacombs,” said Max. “There are a lot of dead guys lying around, all dressed up.”

Destynee wrinkled her nose. “You mean, like, some guy was
buried
in that suit?”

Max shrugged. “Seemed to me like he was done with it.”

Pearl was buzzing around Max's head so rapidly that it was getting harder to see her. “And now, the suit adorns the one who is the consort of
la Chupakabra
!”

In the distance they heard loud, blaring music, although it was unlike any music Falcon had heard before. It sounded like it was being produced on a series of tubes and drums and old refrigerators. There was also the distant roar of young people in celebration.

“Let's go,” said Jonny Frankenstein, and put his arm around Megan. They walked forward, and a moment later the others—Lincoln and Ankh-hoptet and Pearl and Destynee—followed after them. Falcon lingered behind for a moment with Max, just staring at him.

“You're dating the Chupakabra?” said Falcon.

Max grinned. “Dude,” he said. “What can I tell ya? I'm totally crushin' on the pixie.”

“Even though she's fourteen inches high, and you're—”

Max shrugged. “Love's messed up,” he said.

Falcon looked at Megan, Jonny's arm curled around her back. “You can say that again,” he said.

Castle Grisleigh was situated in the center of a large quad, with the Wellness Center on one side and an old gymnasium on the other. As the clock in the Tower of Souls chimed thirteen times, Falcon and his friends stepped into the gym. The place was filled with leprechauns and zombies, vampires and abominable snowmen, banshees and weredogs and mummies and Sasquatches, dancing and leaping and spinning with joyful abandon. Onstage, a band of bald men, wearing black robes and covered in bright green liquid slime, was banging on xylophones and drums. A disco mirror ball twinkled and rotated on the ceiling.

Against one wall was a long table full of bowls of corn chips and pretzels and sodas. There was an ice sculpture in the middle of the table in the shape of Castle Grisleigh; Falcon noted that the Tower of Aberrations was already beginning to melt. A dozen students were standing by the snack table self-consciously, looking at their dancing peers with a mixture of contempt and longing. Some of them were eating corn dogs.

A zombie girl came up to them, holding a platter of pink, fizzing sodas. “Hi, I'm Mortia!”

Jonny shook his head and laughed to himself.
“Mortia, Mortia, Mortia!” he said.

“Here,” said Mortia. “You want some Sicko Sauce? It's organic!”

“Of course we want some Sicko Sauce,” said Max, reaching out and taking a plastic cup and quickly downing about half the liquid. He paused to belch. “Sick!” he said happily.

“Are any of you vegan?” asked Mortia. “I'm vegan.”

“Wait,” said Max. “You're a vegan zombie? What does that mean, you only eat dead plants?”

“And minerals,” Mortia added, nodding.

“What is Sicko Sauce?” said Megan, a little apprehensively, as she took a cup and stared at the fizzing liquid suspiciously.

“Sicko Sauce? Why, it's the official soda of monster town!” said Mortia, handing out the rest of the cups. One of her eyes looked like it was about to fall out of its socket.

“Where is this monster town?” said Pearl. “Surely this is a place we should visit!”

“It's not an actual place,” said Mortia as the others sipped their Sicko Sauce. “It's
mental.
”

“Whoa!” said Max, his eyes growing large. “What's happening?”

As they watched, the Sasquatch grew taller and hairier. He looked around at everyone with surprise, then roared.

“Señor Max!” shouted Pearl. “You have become more—
bushy
!”

“I have become more—excellent!” Max shouted.

“Yeah, that's what the sauce does,” said Mortia. “It magnifies your monstrosity.”

“Wait,” said Destynee. “It does
what
?”

As she said this, Destynee's skin changed, becoming more rubbery and slimy. Her hair was sucked into her scalp, and her facial features dissolved entirely. A moment later Destynee was a giant slug—a hundred pounds of oozing, globular mollusk.

Jonny Frankenstein nodded. “Giant slug, all right,” he said.

Megan, for her part, began to spin around like a tornado. She rotated faster and faster, and as she spun, she grew translucent, like a wind blowing across dust.
“Wwwheeeeee,
” she said.

Pearl's wings grew longer and glowed a rich blue color. Ankh-hoptet's skin crackled and shriveled and turned to dust. The wind generated by Megan blew the mummy's loose gauze bandages around, and they fluttered horizontally in the gale.

Lincoln Pugh, meanwhile, had swelled into the form of the gigantic, snarling, grizzly bear that had attacked Falcon the night before. The enormous bear scratched at the floor with its tremendous claws, and then stood up on
its hind legs and roared. Max roared into the werebear's face. The werebear roared back.

Jonny Frankenstein, in whom there appeared to be no visible change, looked carefully at Falcon. “What's with your eyes?”

“What do you mean?” asked Falcon. “Something's changed with my eyes?”

“They're shining like—headlights, or something.”

From the floor to Falcon's right came a muffled weeping sound. He looked down. “Hey, Destynee,” he said, kneeling. “Are you okay?”

The slug just wriggled in reply.

“¡Ai!”
said Pearl. “Look at this Destynee! She is a slug of the earth indeed!”

“Hey, Falcon,” said Max. “I think you better pick her up, man.”

“Pick her up?” said Falcon. “You're kidding.”

“Well, she can't move very fast with that—slug-foot thing. And you don't want her to get stepped on.”

Falcon looked at the wriggling, slimy, mastiff-sized slug for a moment, wondering if there was any alternative to picking it up in his arms. He recalled that he had agreed to take Destynee to the dance in the first place only because Megan had asked him to, as a gesture of charity. As he bent down and lifted the warm, oozing mollusk into his arms, he wondered what other sacrifices this good deed
of his was going to demand of him before the end.

The mummy spoke in a loud, commanding voice. “And now my dynasty shall begin! By the tomb of Anubis, so shall this dark time now
commence
!” Max and Lincoln roared again.

Megan materialized for a moment, a tranquil face in the midst of a cyclonic wind. She looked over at Falcon, who was holding the giant slug in his arms. She looked like she was just about to say something to Falcon when Jonny turned toward her. “Let's go,” he said. And the two of them headed onto the dance floor, along with the others—Lincoln and Ankh-hoptet, Pearl and Max—as Falcon stood on the sideline, holding the oozing mollusk.

Young monsters' faces flickered in and out of the shadows. Some of them Falcon recognized from the cafeteria; others he was certain he had never seen before. There were also at least a dozen adults—teachers and support staff from the Wellness Center who were leaning against the wall with clipboards, casting their wary eyes upon the students as if watching a scientific experiment already in progress.

Two werewolves and a wereturtle drew near. The turtle was carrying a stick. “Hi,” said the turtle.

“Hey,” said Falcon. “I'm Falcon Quinn.”

“I'm…”

“A wereturtle. I know.”

“…a…”

“A wereturtle.”

“…were…”

“A wereturtle. I know!”

“…turtle. Turpin.”

The werewolves threw back their heads.

“Aroooooo,”
they howled.

“They're…,” explained Turpin.

“Werewolves, I know.”

“Aroooooo!”

“…werewolves.”

“I'm Scout,” said one of the werewolves. He had a leather collar and a big pink tongue. “That's Ranger.”

Falcon looked at the two carefully. “Hey, I hope you don't mind me saying this, but you look more like, you know,
dogs
to me. German shepherds, or something.”

“We're not weredogs,” said Ranger angrily. “We're werewolves. Okay? Were
wolves
.”

“Okay,” said Falcon. “Whatever.” Ranger leaned around Falcon's back and started to smell his rear end.

“What is he?” said Scout to his friend.

Ranger sniffed harder, then growled. “Hey,” he said. “What's the big idea?”

“What do you mean?”

“You know exactly what I mean,” Ranger said, and growled. “You don't belong here. You shouldn't
be
here.”

Now Scout was smelling Falcon, too, and growling. “He smells like—the
enemy
,” said Scout.

“You're not a monster at all,” said Ranger. “You're a
fake
!”

“Leave me alone,” said Falcon, walking away.

“For now,” growled Scout.

Falcon walked away from the weredogs, feeling heat in his face. Destynee wriggled in his arms. The words of Scout and Ranger echoed in his mind. What if they were right, that he did not belong here?

All around him, dancing with abandon, were zombies and vampires, Frankensteins and leprechauns and banshees. It seemed as if he, alone amid this wide world of ecstatic mutants, did not belong. What if it turned out he was human after all? Would he wind up an outcast, excluded from the lives of his friends? Or would they be understanding and loving, and accept him in spite of his deformity—the terrible shame of being human?

Falcon headed over to the snack table. Destynee wriggled violently in his arms as he drew near the bowls of potato chips and soft pretzels, and it was only after a few seconds of this that he realized why the giant enchanted slug was so upset.

The snacks were covered with salt.

Up onstage, the green men were playing odd instruments that looked like they were made out of junk that
they had hauled out of the garbage. One of them was using a pair of long, red mallets to bang on a set of glass bottles, each of which contained a different amount of glowing liquid. Another one of the green men was blowing into the mouthpiece of something that looked like a French horn at one end and a set of oversized human intestines at the other. The tubing wrapped around a pulsating purple gyroscope. The music blasted out of the horn's bell, which resembled the petals of the world's largest lily. As the man blew into the instrument, the petals fluttered and blossomed.

On the dance floor, Jonny was rocking out with the swirling tornado that was Megan. He was gazing directly into the heart of the gale with a defiant, smoky expression. Then Jonny reached forward and grabbed the tornado's arm and spun her around. He laughed as the cyclone tore all around him, then swirled toward the ceiling.

Max walked over to where Falcon stood. Max was holding another glass of Sicko Sauce. “Dude,” said Max. “Do it up!”

“I'm okay,” said Falcon.

“Hey, man,” said Max. “What's wrong? You look like you seen a ghost.”

“It's nothing,” said Falcon. “I had a little run-in with some weredogs.”

“Hey, anybody gives you a hard time, you tell me.
I'll peel 'em like a banana!”

“Listen, Max,” said Falcon. “You're happy about being a Sasquatch, right?”

“Well, of course, dude!” said Max. “I always knew I was something. Now I know what! It's excellent!”

“What would happen if it turned out—I wasn't anything?”

“What are you talking about? Of course you're something! They'll figure it out, man! You just gotta be patient!”

“Yeah, but what if it turns out—I'm not a monster? What if I'm—human?”

“You're not human,” said Max. “Dude. With your glowy eyes? There's no way you're human. I'm serious.”

“Well, what if I am, though? Would that—make a difference to you?”

Max laughed for a second, then looked at Falcon incredulously. “That's what you're all upset about? Dude, are you
mental
?”

Destynee wriggled in Falcon's arms again. “Yeah,” he said. “Maybe I am mental.”

Pearl flew over to them. “Never have I heard such remarkable music!” she said, enraptured. “Never have I seen such an impressive array of differently formed monsters! But what is this? Señor Quinn, you wear an expression of great gravity.”

“He's all wonky,” said Max.

“I'm not
wonky
,” said Falcon, smiling again. “I'm all right.”

“Me too!” shouted Max. “I'm feeling totally full of—stuff!” He raised his hairy arms in the air and roared.