29 - Monster Blood III

  MONSTER BLOOD III

  Goosebumps - 29

  R.L. Stine

  (An Undead Scan v1.5)

  1

  “The Monster Blood! It’s growing again!” Evan Ross stared at the quivering green blob in his driveway. It looked like an enormous wad of sticky green bubble gum, and was bigger than a beach ball. Bigger than two beach balls!

  The green blob trembled and shook as if it were breathing hard. It made disgusting sucking sounds. Then it started to bounce.

  Evan took a step back. How did the sticky goo get out of its can? he wondered. Who left it in the driveway? Who opened the can?

  Evan knew that once Monster Blood starts to grow, it can’t be stopped. It will grow and grow, and suck up everything in its path.

  Evan knew this from painful experience.

  He had seen a giant glob of Monster Blood swallow kids whole. And he had seen what had happened when his dog, Trigger, had eaten Monster Blood. The cocker spaniel had grown and grown and grown—until he was big enough to pick up Evan in his teeth and bury him in the backyard!

  A small chunk of Monster Blood had turned Cuddles, the tiny hamster in Evan’s class, into a raging, growling monster. The giant hamster—bigger than a gorilla—had roared through the school, destroying everything in its path!

  This gunk is dangerous, Evan thought. It may be the most dangerous green slimy stuff on Earth!

  So how did it get in Evan’s driveway?

  And what was he going to do about it?

  The Monster Blood bounced and hiccupped. It made more disgusting sucking sounds.

  As it bounced, it picked up sticks and gravel from the driveway. They stuck to its side for a moment, before being sucked into the center of the giant wet ball.

  Evan took another step back as the ball slowly started to roll. “Oh, noooo.” A low moan escaped his throat. “Please. Noooo.”

  The Monster Blood rolled over the driveway toward Evan, picking up speed as it moved. Evan had tossed one of his Rollerblades by the side of the house. The green goo swallowed up the skate with a loud thwoccccck.

  Evan gulped as he saw the skate disappear into the bouncing green ball. “I—I’m next!” he stammered out loud.

  No way! he told himself. I’m getting out of here.

  He turned to run—and went sprawling over the other skate.

  “Ow!” he cried out as he fell hard on his elbows and knees. Pain shot up his arms. He had landed on both funny bones.

  Shaking away the tingling, he scrambled to his knees. He turned in time to see the seething goo roll over him.

  He opened his mouth to scream. But the scream was trapped inside him as the heavy green gunk splatted over his face.

  He thrashed both arms wildly. Kicked his feet.

  But the sticky goo wrapped around him. Pulling him. Pulling him in.

  I—I can’t breathe! he realized.

  And, then, everything turned green.

  2

  “Evan—stop daydreaming and eat your Jell-O,” Mrs. Ross scolded.

  Evan shook his head hard. The daydream had seemed so real. His mother’s voice still sounded far away.

  “Evan—hurry. Eat the Jell-O. You’ll be late.”

  “Uh… Mom…” Evan said softly. “Could you do me a really big favor?”

  “What favor?” his mother asked him patiently, pushing back her straight blond hair into a ponytail.

  “Could we never have green Jell-O again? Could you just buy other colors? Not green?”

  He stared at the shimmering, quivering green mound of Jell-O in the glass bowl in front of him on the kitchen counter.

  “Evan, you’re weird,” Mrs. Ross replied, rolling her eyes. “Hurry up. Kermit is probably wondering where you are.”

  “Kermit is probably busy blowing up his house,”

  Evan replied glumly. He pulled the spoon out of the Jell-O. It made a gross sucking sound.

  “All the more reason for you to hurry over there,” his mother said sharply. “You are responsible for him, Evan. You are in charge of your cousin until his mom gets home from work.”

  Evan shoved the green Jell-O away. “I can’t eat this,” he murmured. “It makes me think of Monster Blood.”

  Mrs. Ross made a disgusted face. “Don’t mention that slimy stuff.”

  Evan climbed down from the stool. Mrs. Ross pushed a hand gently through his curly, carrot-colored hair. “It’s nice of you to help out,” she said softly. “Aunt Dee can’t really afford a babysitter.”

  “Kermit doesn’t need a baby-sitter. He needs a keeper!” Evan grumbled. “Or maybe a trainer. A guy with a whip and a chair. Like in the circus.”

  “Kermit looks up to you,” Mrs. Ross insisted.

  “Only because he’s two feet tall!” Evan exclaimed. “I can’t believe he’s my cousin. He’s such a nerd.”

  “Kermit isn’t a nerd. Kermit is a genius!” Mrs. Ross declared. “He’s only eight, and already he’s a scientific genius.”

  “Some genius,” Evan grumbled. “Mom, yesterday he melted my sneakers.”

  Mrs. Ross’ pale blue eyes grew wide. “He what?”

  “He made one of his concoctions. It was a bright yellow liquid. He said it would toughen up the sneakers so they would never wear out.”

  “And you let him pour the stuff on your sneakers?” Evan’s mother demanded.

  “I didn’t have a choice,” Evan replied unhappily. “I have to do everything Kermit wants. If I don’t, he tells Aunt Dee I was mean to him.”

  Mrs. Ross shook her head. “I wondered why you came home barefoot yesterday.”

  “My sneakers are still stuck to Kermit’s basement floor,” Evan told her. “They melted right off my feet.”

  “Well, be careful over there, okay?”

  “Yeah. Sure,” Evan replied. He pulled his Atlanta Braves cap over his head, waved to his mother, and headed out the back door.

  It was a warm spring day. Two black-and-yellow monarch butterflies fluttered over the flower garden. The bright new leaves on the trees shimmered in the sunlight.

  Evan stopped at the bottom of the driveway and lowered the baseball cap to shield his eyes from the sun. He squinted down the street, hoping to see his friend Andy.

  No sign of her.

  Disappointed, he kicked a large pebble along the curb and started to make his way toward Kermit’s house. Aunt Dee, Kermit’s mom, paid Evan three dollars an hour to watch Kermit after school every afternoon. Three hundred dollars an hour would be a lot more fair! he thought angrily.

  But Evan was glad to earn the money. He was saving for a new Walkman. Trigger had mistaken his old Walkman for a dog bone.

  But Evan was earning every penny. Kermit was impossible. That was the only word for him. Impossible.

  He didn’t want to play video games. He didn’t want to watch TV. He refused to go outside and play ball or toss a Frisbee around. He didn’t even want to sneak down to the little grocery on the corner and load up on candy bars and potato chips.

  All he wanted to do was stay downstairs in his dark, damp basement lab and mix beakers of chemicals together. “My experiments,” he called them. “I have to do my experiments.”

  Maybe he is a genius, Evan thought bitterly. But that doesn’t make him any fun. He’s just impossible.

  Evan definitely wasn’t enjoying his after-school baby-sitting job watching Kermit. In fact, he had several daydreams in which Kermit tried one of his own mixtures and melted to the basement floor, just like Evan’s sneakers.

  Some afternoons, Andy came along, and that made the job a little easier. Andy thought Kermit was really weird, too. But at least when she was there, Evan had someone to talk to, someone who didn’t want to talk about mixing aluminum pyri
te with sodium chlorobenzadrate.

  What is Kermit’s problem, anyway? Evan wondered as he crossed the street and made his way through backyards toward Kermit’s house. Why does he think mixing is so much fun? Why is he always mixing this with that and that with this?

  I can’t even mix chocolate milk!

  Kermit’s house came into view two yards down. It was a two-story white house with a sloping black roof.

  Evan picked up his pace. He was about fifteen minutes late. He hoped that Kermit hadn’t already gotten into some kind of trouble.

  He had just pushed his way though the prickly, low hedges that fenced in Kermit’s yard when a familiar gruff voice made him freeze.

  “Evan—were you looking at my yard?”

  “Huh?” Evan recognized the voice at once. It belonged to Kermit’s next-door neighbor, a kid from Evan’s school.

  His name was Conan Barber. But the kids at school all called him Conan the Barbarian. That’s because he had to be the biggest, meanest kid in Atlanta. Maybe in the universe.

  Conan sat on top of the tall white fence that separated the yards. His cold blue eyes glared down at Evan. “Were you looking at my yard?” Conan demanded.

  “No way!” Evan’s voice came out in a squeak.

  “You were looking at my yard. That’s trespassing,” Conan accused. He leaped down from the high fence. He was big and very athletic. His hobby was leaping over kids he had just pounded into the ground.

  Conan wore a gray muscle shirt and baggy, faded jeans cutoffs. He also wore a very mean expression.

  “Whoa. Wait a minute, Conan!” Evan protested. “I was looking at Kermit’s yard. I never look at your yard. Never!”

  Conan stepped up to Evan. He stuck out his chest and bumped Evan hard, so hard he stumbled backwards.

  That was Conan’s other hobby. Bumping kids with his chest. His chest didn’t feel like a chest. It felt like a truck.

  “Why don’t you look at my yard?” Conan demanded. “Is there something wrong with my yard? Is my yard too ugly? Is that why you never look at it?”

  Evan swallowed hard. It began to dawn on him that maybe Conan was itching for a fight.

  Before he could answer Conan, he heard a scratchy voice reply for him. “It’s a free country, Conan!”

  “Oh, noooo,” Evan groaned, shutting his eyes.

  Evan’s cousin, Kermit, stepped out from behind Evan. He was tiny and skinny. A very pale kid with a pile of white-blond hair, and round black eyes behind big red plastic-framed glasses. Evan always thought his cousin looked like a white mouse wearing glasses.

  Kermit wore enormous red shorts that came down nearly to his ankles, and a red-and-black Braves T-shirt. The short sleeves hung down past the elbows of his skinny arms.

  “What did you say?” Conan demanded, glaring down menacingly at Kermit.

  “It’s a free country!” Kermit repeated shrilly. “Evan can look at any yard he wants to!”

  Conan let out an angry growl. As he lumbered forward to pound Evan’s face into mashed potatoes, Evan turned to Kermit. “Thanks a lot,” he told his cousin. “Thanks for all your help.”

  “Which way do you want your nose to slant?” Conan asked Evan. “To the right or to the left?”

  3

  “Don’t do it!” Kermit shrieked in his scratchy mouse voice.

  Conan raised a huge fist. With his other hand, he grabbed the front of Evan’s T-shirt. He glared down at Kermit. “Why not?” he growled.

  “Because I have this!” Kermit declared.

  “Huh?” Conan let go of Evan’s shirt. He stared at the glass beaker Kermit had raised in both hands. The beaker was half-full with a dark blue liquid.

  Conan let out a sigh and swept a beefy hand back through his wavy blond hair. His blue eyes narrowed at Kermit. “What’s that? Your baby formula?”

  “Ha-ha,” Kermit replied sarcastically.

  If Kermit doesn’t shut up, we’re both going to get pounded! Evan realized. What is the little creep trying to do?

  He tugged at Kermit’s sleeve, trying to pull him away from Conan. But Kermit ignored him. He raised the beaker close to Conan’s face.

  “It’s an Invisibility Mixture,” Kermit said. “If I pour it on you, you’ll disappear.”

  We should both disappear! Evan thought frantically. He let his eyes dart around the backyard. Maybe I can make it through that hedge before Conan grabs me, he thought. If I can get around the next house and down to the street, I might escape.

  But would it be right to leave little Kermit at Conan’s mercy?

  Evan sighed. He couldn’t abandon his cousin like that. Even though Kermit was definitely asking for it.

  “You’re going to make me invisible with that stuff?” Conan asked Kermit with a sneer.

  Kermit nodded. “If I pour a few drops on you, you’ll disappear. Really. I mixed it myself. It works. It’s a mixture of Teflon dioxinate and magnesium parasulfidine.”

  “Yeah. Right,” Conan muttered. He peered at the liquid in the beaker. “What makes it blue?”

  “Food coloring,” Kermit replied. Then he lowered his squeaky voice, trying to sound tough. “You’d better go home now, Conan. I don’t want to have to use this stuff.”

  Oh, wow! Evan thought, pulling the bill of his Braves cap down over his face. I can’t bear to watch this. This is sad. Really sad. Kermit is such a jerk.

  “Go ahead. Try it,” Evan heard Conan say.

  Evan raised the cap so he could see. “Uh… Kermit… maybe we should go in the house now,” he whispered.

  “Go ahead. Make me invisible,” Conan challenged.

  “You really want me to?” Kermit demanded.

  “Yeah,” Conan replied. “I want to be invisible. Go ahead, Kermit. Pour it on me. Make me disappear. I dare you.”

  Kermit raised the beaker over the gray muscle shirt that covered Conan’s broad chest.

  “Kermit—no!” Evan pleaded. “Don’t! Please don’t!”

  Evan made a frantic grab for the beaker.

  Too late.

  Kermit turned the beaker over and let the thick blue liquid pour onto the front of Conan’s shirt.

  4

  Out of the corner of his eye, Evan saw a monarch butterfly fluttering over the low hedges. I wish I were a butterfly, he thought. I wish I could flap my wings and float away.

  As far away from here as I can get!

  The blue liquid oozed down the front of Conan’s muscle shirt. All three boys stared at it in silence.

  “Well? I’m not disappearing,” Conan murmured, narrowing his eyes suspiciously at Kermit.

  Then his shirt started to shrink.

  “Hey—!” Conan cried angrily. He struggled to pull off the shrinking shirt. It got tinier and tinier. “It—it’s choking me!” Conan shrieked.

  “Wow!” Kermit squeaked, his black eyes glowing excitedly behind his glasses. “This is cool!”

  Evan gazed in amazement as the muscle shirt shrank down to a tiny shred of cloth. And then it vanished completely.

  Now Conan stood in front of them bare-chested.

  A heavy silence fell over the backyard. All three of them stared at Conan’s broad, bare chest for a few moments.

  Conan broke the silence. “That was my best muscle shirt,” he told Evan through gritted teeth.

  “Uh-oh,” Evan uttered.

  “I like your nose that way,” Andy told Evan. “It kind of tilts in both directions at once.”

  “I think it will go back to the way it was,” Evan replied, patting his nose tenderly. “At least it stopped hurting so much.” He sighed. “All the other cuts and bruises will go away, too. In time.”

  It was two days later. Evan sat across from Andy in the lunchroom at school. He stared down sadly at the tuna fish sandwich his mom had packed for him. He hadn’t taken a bite. His mouth wasn’t working exactly right yet. It kept going sideways instead of up and down.

  Andy wiped a chunk of egg salad off her cheek. She had short b
rown hair and big brown eyes that stared across the table at Evan.

  Andy didn’t dress like most of the other kids in their sixth-grade class. She liked bright colors. A lot of bright colors.

  Today she wore a yellow vest over a magenta T-shirt and orange Day-Glo shorts.

  When Andy moved to Atlanta in the beginning of the school year, some kids made fun of her colorful clothes. But they didn’t anymore. Now everyone agreed that Andy had style. And a few kids were even copying her look.

  “So what happened after Conan the Barbarian pounded your body into coleslaw?” Andy asked. She pulled a handful of potato chips from her bag and shoved them one by one into her mouth.

  Evan took a few bites from a section of his tuna fish sandwich. It took him a long time to swallow. “Conan made me promise I’d never look in his yard again,” he told Andy. “I had to raise my right hand and swear. Then he went home.”

  Evan sighed. He touched his sore nose again. “After Conan left, Kermit helped me hobble into his house,” Evan continued. “A little while later, Aunt Dee got home.”

  “Then what happened?” Andy asked, crinkling up the empty potato chip bag.

  “She saw that I was messed up,” Evan replied. “So she asked what happened.”

  Evan shook his head and scowled. “And before I could say anything, that little rat Kermit piped up and said, ‘Evan picked a fight with Conan.’”

  “Oh, wow,” Andy murmured.

  “And Aunt Dee said, ‘Well, Evan, if you’re just going to get into fights instead of taking care of Kermit, I’m going to have to talk to your mom about you. Maybe you’re not mature enough for this job.’”

  “Oh, wow,” Andy repeated.

  “And the whole thing was Kermit’s fault!” Evan shouted, pounding his fist so hard on the table that his milk carton tipped over. Milk spilled over the tabletop, onto the front of his jeans.

  Evan was so upset, he didn’t even move out of the way. “And do you know the worst thing?” Evan demanded. “The worst thing?”

  “What?” Andy asked.