Traps and Specters (24 page)

After a few seconds, Charlie's laughter died down. “Why?” he said. He sat up to face Megan and winced at a fresh spot of pain along his back. “Why? Ohhh … you're about to see why.”

A deafening crash erupted and everyone turned to see that the two rear doors of the lower-el wing of Clarksville Elementary had banged open, slamming into the brick wall of the school. One battered door dangled crookedly on its lower hinge. In the dark doorway, a beastly leg appeared, then an arm. Something was stepping out onto the playground. The creature had to crouch and turn its body sideways to fit through the frame. Then it moved out of the school.

“No,” Sam uttered. “Impossible.”

Standing just outside Clarksville Elementary was a sasquatch, its mangy hair dangling off its muscular limbs, its bottom fangs pinching its upper lip. It locked eyes on the Crossers and sliced its long claws through the misty air. The sasquatch was followed by another, and another, and another—more and more snaking their crouched bodies through the open doorway. In all, six appeared.

Charlie Red continued to laugh from the ground—a sound that was suddenly more haunting than any Noah had ever heard.

Charlie had led them into a trap.

The scouts huddled behind the Descenders, who lined up side by side to face their adversaries and prepared to fight.

From behind them rose Charlie's voice: “Now.”

Noah swung his head back to see that Charlie wasn't speaking to the sasquatches—he was speaking into a walkie-talkie.

CHAPTER 46

A
t the west zoo entrance, a security guard set down his walkie-talkie and rolled his chair over to a large black box beneath a table in the small shack. He opened its top, exposing rows of knobs, buttons, dials, and lights. A large red switch had two positions,
off
and
on
.

The guard gnawed on a toothpick, then rolled it across his lips. As he leaned over the box, a goopy bead of pus dripped onto it. He swiped it up with a fingertip and held it near his eyes. Then he touched the cut on the side of his face, the place from which the pus had fallen. The wound was moist, fresh; he felt its heat.

He smiled. His change was already happening, just as Charlie had promised.

He turned his attention back to the large box in front of him. It was an RF Jammer, a military-grade device that could block communications across different radio frequencies. Not long ago, Charlie had secretly delivered it to him.

The guard reached back into the case. With a twist and pull, he calibrated a few remaining settings. Then he turned the big red switch to the
on
position.

CHAPTER 47

A
loud pulsing sound erupted in Noah's ear. As he swung his hand up and turned off his headset, he realized the other Crossers were doing the same.

“We're being jammed!” Sam said. “The headsets—keep them off!”

Noah glanced behind him and watched the smile spread on Charlie's face. This was part of Charlie's plan.

The sasquatches crept forward, snarling, their bodies slinking in and out of the shifting fog. Streams of blood oozed from their infected gums and trickled off their lower lips.

Hannah stood braced to fight. Tameron swept his tail back and forth along the ground, spilling waves of wood chips across its spikes. Sam shook his wings and ruffled his feathers. Solana held clusters of quills in her fists.

Noah looked to his friends. Ella was pale with shock, and Richie's whole body was trembling. Even Megan was afraid, her eyes opened as far as the rims of her narrow glasses.

“Guys,” Sam said, “we can't let these things leave the schoolyard. We do, and it's all over.”

The Descenders nodded.

Sam swung his attention to the scouts. “I want you to get back. Get out of—”

Before he could finish, the sasquatches charged and the scouts bolted into the foggy playground, a strange landscape of steel bars and dangerous heights. The four friends quickly crouched behind a row of play panels with gears that spun, wheels that turned, and bells that rang. They peered over and around the panels, watching as the Descenders and sasquatches jumped at one another.

Solana released the quills from her grip. The barbs flew like miniature missiles and stuck into the front of a sasquatch, which grabbed and pulled at its chest, tearing them out. Solana plucked more quills from her jacket and attacked a second time.

“The sasquatches—how did they get into our
school
?” Megan asked.

With his gaze locked on the fight, Noah said, “I have no idea.”

Tameron lunged forward and turned, sweeping around his tail about four feet off the ground. Two sasquatches dodged backward, just missing his attack, but a third wasn't so fortunate. It flew sideways and slammed down about ten feet away, plowing through wood chips and raising dust in the fog.

When a sasquatch cocked its arm to swipe at Sam, the Descender dove straight up. He kicked out his feet, released his talons, and clasped the sasquatch's arm as it passed beneath him. With a yank of his legs, he pulled the beast to the ground.

Hannah jumped onto her hands and flipped, planting her boots against the gut of a sasquatch. The beast buckled, shot backward through the air, and crashed against the brick wall of Clarksville Elementary, rattling the ceramic shingles on the rooftop.

To Noah, everything suddenly seemed impossible again. How could monsters live in a world connected to his? How could kids use magic to transform themselves? And how could these two groups be fighting on his school playground?

Tameron heaved his tail through the wood chips and took out the legs of a sasquatch, which fell to its stomach with a ground-shaking thump. Hannah sprang forward, several stories high, and came down directly on its spine. The monster went limp, and its bloody tongue slipped from its mouth.

“Guys!” Ella said. She pointed over the panel in front of her, a tic-tac-toe game with large spinning letters. “Look!”

Over to one side was Charlie Red. A few quills still dangling from his back, he ran through the fracas and disappeared through the open doors of the school.

Megan jumped to her feet and swung around the panel in front of her. “We can't just let him get away!”

“Megan, wait!”

But Megan was already running after Charlie. She seemed to partly evaporate in the fog before disappearing in the dark school.

As Ella stood to chase after her best friend, Noah grabbed her arm and yanked her down beside him. The panel that she'd been hiding behind exploded into pieces, tic-tac-toe spinners shooting in all directions, bouncing and rolling across the playground. In the jagged remains of the panel stood a sasquatch, wood chips stuck in its hair. Its yellow eyes looked straight at Noah.

Noah peered around the sasquatch to Richie. “Go! Help Megan!”

Richie stood frozen in his nerd costume, his pants pulled high, his white socks exposed.

Ella waved her hand toward the school.
“Richie—go!”

Richie turned and ran toward the dark doorway.

Ella and Noah had no choice but to turn and run the other way. They dodged a few play panels and headed across the playground. After a few seconds, they heard the sasquatch grunt and chase after them.

Ella cut across Noah, saying, “Follow me!”

She circled the merry-go-round and weaved through an assortment of spring riders—seats that were shaped like animals and rocked on giant springs. At the play structure, an elaborate contraption with slides and bridges and hutlike platforms, Ella jumped onto a short metal deck and bounded up the stairs. Noah followed. At the first hut, they huddled behind two plastic walls and hid from view.

They waited. They listened. They heard the now-distant sounds of the Descenders battling the sasquatches, but nothing else. With their knees pulled up to their chests and their arms wrapped around their shins, they were so close to each other that Noah could feel Ella's breath—warm and moist, like steam from a pot. Patches of dense fog rolled through the play structure, leaving wetness on their costumes. He thought of Megan and Richie and whatever danger they now faced in the school. He thought of the Descenders and how Sam had ordered the scouts away. Were the scouts useless? Had the Descenders been right a year ago to want them kept away?

They heard something. A grunt. Then a growl. The sasquatch was nearby. Something snapped loudly—a piece of metal, maybe. Noah peered out between two panels: the sasquatch had broken a spring, knocking a yellow duck to the ground. The beast took a few steps, grabbed a happy blue whale, and hurled it into the air. Noah pulled back his head. The sasquatch was coming their way.

Noah stared into Ella's eyes and mouthed,
Don't move
.

They soon heard another grunt, this one almost directly beneath them. Noah looked down. Through the openings in the metal grate, he saw the ground—a distant spread of wood chips.

Another sound came. A soft, rumbling growl, closer than ever. Through the grate, Noah saw nothing.

Then … something. A long leg of the sasquatch. Then its arm, its body.

The monster was directly beneath them.

CHAPTER 48