This is a bad idea,” James said as we appraised the abandoned two-story building. “We’re supposed to go inside this monstrosity?”
James was the only person I knew who could use the word monstrosity in a sentence and not sound weird. But he wasn’t wrong.
Squeezed between a pet shop and an apothecary, the building’s white paint looked like someone had attacked it with a cheese grater. The second floor jutted over a patio with boarded-up doors and windows. A dilapidated sign hung over the entrance read, After Words Books.
“I don’t know, it could be fun,” I said, trying to keep my voice upbeat.
“Can I see that case again?”
I handed him the briefcase Wasslehook foisted off on me as he pushed us out the door. He opened it and pulled a hoop out.
“So, if we turn it onto the green side, things can go in, and if we turn it onto the red side, things can come out?”
“I think so,” I said. “But how are we going to get in? He said to use the basement window.”
“Which this building doesn’t even have. Unless. . . .”
I followed him toward the edge of the porch where we saw an opening under the stairs. I dropped to my knees and peered inside. Sure enough, there were a couple dark spots that looked like window wells.
“Want to give this way a shot?” I asked.
James eyed it disdainfully. “Not particularly,” he said.
I couldn’t blame him. Fine then. I poked my head under the stairs.
“Don’t get lost,” I heard James say.
I army-crawled forward until I was fully under the stairs.
“Looks like the glass has already been broken out.”
“Charming. Are they boarded up?”
I pulled my phone out and turned on the light. “Nope! I think we can get in.”
“Don’t let me stop you.”
“You’re coming too, right?”
James didn’t answer.
“Right?” I repeated.
“It’s filthy. . . .”
“Yeah, I’m planning on bathing myself in hand sanitizer later,” I said, trying to keep the anxiety out of my voice. I really didn’t want to go into another haunted-looking building on my own. I mean, Misty had been there at the last place, but she didn’t really count. “It’s not so bad down here,” I tried.
“Santiago, you’d say that if there were a dozen giant hungry spiders webbing you.”
“I need you,” I said, my voice cracking.
Again, there was silence. Then I heard James drop to the ground.
“Fine. But I plan to flee the place squealing like a frightened pig on slaughter day if any giant spiders rear their ugly heads.”
I smiled.
“Well, are we going in or not?” he asked. “Tally ho then.”
Not wanting to literally dive in headfirst, I maneuvered my legs so my calves and feet were dangling in the window well. I hesitated there for a few moments, then took a deep breath, stowed my phone light in my pocket, and dropped into the window well. I didn’t feel any glass but the window frame scraped against my back as I slid through and landed on my butt with a big thump.
My arrival seemed to trigger the scurrying of dozens of tiny feet as though hordes of tiny creatures were tap dancing all around me. It smelled like wet laundry.
I climbed to my feet in time for James to come crashing down on me, bringing me back down to the floor.
“Watch where you land,” I complained.
“Watch where you stand,” James retorted.
As I withdrew my phone from my pocket, I asked, “Can you pull out your light?”
At the mention of the word light, a dozen kerosene lanterns lining the walls flickered to life, illuminating the room.
“Whoooa,” I said.
It was as if we’d stumbled into an old library. Aisles of bookshelves were crowded into the room. Dust and cobwebs clung to the ancient-looking tomes that lined the shelves. James walked up to a set of shelves, reached up to grab a book that appeared to be much higher up and then jumped as the shelf began slowly descending into the floor as more shelves rolled down from the ceiling.
“That . . . was unexpected,” James said as he stopped the bookshelf and started it going up the opposite direction. “How many shelves are on here?”
“That’s freaking awesome,” I said, walking up to a different shelf. I gave a gentle push up and shelf after shelf rose up from the bottom like a slot machine as the upper shelves disappeared into the ceiling. I counted a couple dozen unique shelves before I started noticing the same ones repeating, coming up from the bottom.
“He said something about a lure,” I said.
“Music,” James said. “Do you have some?”
“Yeah,” I said, as I tried one last shelf. This time, however, something fell off it right onto me. I yelped. It was like someone’s sweaty foot had landed on my head.
I jumped back and it went flying off me.
“What was that?” I asked, my adrenaline pumping. I caught a brief glimpse of electric yellow hair before it darted behind some books, knocking a couple smaller ones over.
“Congratulations. You found our first rodent,” James said, eyeing the shelf with distaste. “And let it escape.”
I felt the hair on the back of my neck stand up as I noticed several dozen pairs of eyes glowing from a dumbwaiter in the wall. For a moment, I thought the eyes were literally on fire, before I realized that they were merely reflecting the flickers of flame from the lamps.
Behind me, I heard the pitter patter of feet scratching on wood and I turned just in time to see shapes moving behind some books on the waist-high shelf behind me. I nudged James to point these out but by the time he turned, they had gone.
A moment later, it was James’s turn to hurriedly grab my arm in time for me to see another figure dart behind books.
Then I heard a book fall to the floor a few feet to my left. I turned and saw a shoe-sized rodent on top of it, giving me my first ever look at a krank illuminated by the light of my phone.
I immediately wished I could unsee it. It was ugly.
UGLY.
I nearly gagged.
It was like a cross between a lizard and a rat . . . except with wings too. Its blackish-grayish skin was blotchy and wrinkly with a pinkish underside. A dash of bright yellow hair rose out of its head like a mohawk. A mess of long whiskers protruded like porcupine quills. Veins protruded everywhere and the thing was wet as though covered in sweat.
“So much for hedgehogs,” James said. “That is the most hideous thing I’ve ever seen.”
“I think we woke them up.”
We heard a shrieking sound right above us. Before either of us could look up, I felt something peg me in the back of the head before swooping up and out of sight. A split second later, I heard James let out a grunt as he was hit as well.
“The hoop! Where’s the hoop?” I asked.
“Window well!”
I sprinted over to the window as more kranks dive-bombed me, tripping over another rodent and careening into a bookshelf. I felt one fall onto my face, its wet, clammy skin against my cheeks. It smelled rank, like a high school locker room.
GAH!
I tore the thing off of me, flinging it across the room then pulled my shirt up to wipe my face and hands. I stumbled over to the window well and grabbed the briefcase and set it on the ground.
“Any day now,” James said as he swatted at a krank with a book.
I fumbled with the latch for what felt like hours before it clicked and I was able to open it.
“Red side lets them out and green side lets them in,” James yelled. I didn’t need the reminder. I turned the hoop around so that the green side was up.
“Got it!”
I heard a screeching sound and ducked as another krank flew right where my head had been.
By now, dozens were airborne and circling us, the bolder ones attacking at random. The awful screeching sound was practically nonstop, echoing off the walls.
I narrowly avoided tripping over another pair that were crawling on the floor.
“This is what he calls a ‘relatively small number?’” James said.
“He must not have known–”
“Oh no. He knew,” James said. “Santiago, the music!”
I whipped out my phone. Somehow, despite the noise around us, I heard a faint pop below me. Curiously, I looked down and discovered that there were actually four down there.
“Where did you guys come from?” I asked curiously.
Two of them touched noses and immediately started trembling and engorging. “Uh James. . . .” I said, tapping James’s shoulder.
He looked over just in time to see two of the kranks split into four.
“Did that krank just–”
“Yup. When they touch noses, they divide in two.”
“I am going to vomit. Where’s the music?”
I pulled my phone out of my pocket, opened the music app, and punched shuffle.
A painfully 90s song began playing. “A lonely mother gazin’ out the window. . . .”
“What is that offensive noise?” James asked.
“It’s from the nineties party,” I said.
“Whatever it is, it’s not working.”
He was right. Nothing seemed to have changed.
“If at any time he’s in a jam, she’ll be by his side. . . .”
Another one swooped at us, almost causing James to step into the hoop.
“Maybe they don’t like the nineties,” I said.
“As hideous as they are, they apparently have standards. Try another song!”
I hit the forward button as James grabbed one by the tail and tossed it toward the hoop. His throw was good but the thing spread its wings and swerved up.
The creatures didn’t seem to like Rihanna, Shawn Mendes, Taylor Swift, Johnny Cash, or Elvis. I was about to call it quits when my phone shuffled to “Holding Out for a Hero.”
Immediately, the screeching stopped. A swooping krank suddenly switched from targeting James to heading for my hand. I stepped back, tripping over another krank and falling on my butt.
Suddenly, kranks were coming out of everywhere. Several leaped onto my legs and shoulders. I almost let go of my phone as I felt their sweaty bodies claw their way onto me.
“AAAARGH!” I shouted as one dropped onto my head. Tiny claws sank into my clothes as I catapulted another one off of me.
The tiny little creatures converged on the arm holding my phone, which was currently blaring, “Late at night I toss and I turn and I dream of what I need!”
“Do something!” I yelled at James.
To my horror, James was busting up laughing, coming dangerously close once more to stepping into the magic hoop.
“You’re a jerk,” I said.
“I’m so- I’m sorry!” James heaved, taking a picture of me with his phone. “You look hilarious!”
“Get these things off of me before they eat my hand!”
With great effort, James started whacking the creatures off my hand with the briefcase as they tried to close in.
“Hold your hand over the hoop,” James said.
“Hang on,” I said. I knelt down as more kranks joined in. My arm was heavy with all the rodents hanging from it, but I gingerly moved it over the hoop. James took the case and whacked a couple into the hole. They disappeared into it and didn’t reemerge.
“It works!” I said, relieved.
“It’s a miracle,” James said, whacking more of the creatures in there.
The kranks kept climbing up my body toward my arm, or landing there directly, sinking their claws into my shirt. I shook my arm vigorously. Several fell off but even more clung on tightly.
I’d had enough. I pushed pause on the music.
The kranks went crazy. They shrieked and convulsed, their claws digging through my clothes into my skin. I squealed as I felt tiny teeth bite into me as the kranks expressed their displeasure. James continued whacking the creatures off, some of them making it down into the hoop, others not.
I couldn’t take it anymore. I pushed play again and the shrieks stopped. Several jaws disengaged and I felt the claws loosen.
“Take my phone,” I managed to say as one crawled down my face.
“So they smother me? No thanks,” James said as he knocked another one into the hole.
“Hold it over the hoop,” I said, using one of my krank-covered arms to knock the krank off my face.
James looked skeptical but begrudgingly took the phone. He held it over the hoop and immediately, half a dozen kranks leapt off me. James moved his hand in time for the kranks to drop into the hoop and disappear. So far, none of the kranks had reemerged from the hoop, so I assumed it was working.
“You don’t think it hurts them do you?” I asked.
“I certainly hope so,” James said, yanking one off the back of his neck with a look of disgust.
This method seemed to work. Several minutes later, about half of the kranks had been coaxed into the hoop. I was just beginning to think we might get out of there eventually when. . . .
The phone went to the next song—“All Star” by Smash Mouth—and the rodents immediately started wailing. James fumbled with my phone, his fingers hitting the back button a couple times. The instant the first notes started shooting out of the phone, the screeching stopped and the kranks began making their way toward the hoop again.
At least, they did for about ten seconds. Then a particularly bold krank nosedived into the phone. I watched as if in slow motion as the phone toppled out of James’s hand and into the hoop. A krank eagerly pursued it, tongue hanging out the side of its mouth as it dove after the phone with a delighted look on its face.
There was a heartbeat of silence.
“Oh crap,” I said as James let out a sarcastic, “Oh fantastic.”
The wailing sound returned louder than ever. The kranks swarmed us.
“What are we going to do?” James asked nervously.
“Hurry, pull out your phone!” I said, covering my face with my arm as two kranks attempted to get at me.
“I don’t have any music on it, though.”
“You, the music king, don’t have any music on your phone?”
“I stream everything!”
“Then sing! Quick!”
“What should I sing?”
“Whatever! Anything!”
“Baby, baby, baby, ooooh,” James started hesitantly.
“You make fun of my music then go and sing early Bieber?”
“It’s the first thing I thought of. Stop distracting me!”
He closed his eyes and got that serious artist look he wore when performing.
“Dude, just sing!” I yelled as a krank dug its claws into my calves through my trousers.
But James ignored me, apparently not noticing the horde of angry kranks landing on him. Then, “You know you love me, I know you care. . . .”
At first, I didn’t notice a change. But James kept singing.
“Just shout whenever, and I’ll be there. You want my love; you want my heart. And we will never ever ever be apart. . . .”
Slowly, I felt the claws pull out of my arms as the kranks went airborne. I was nervous that they’d attack James, but instead, they began to circle him—a hideous cyclone of sweaty skin and neon blond hair spouts.
I picked up the hoop and carefully placed it back in the wooden case with the lid open. I didn’t want any kranks escaping. Then I picked it up and inserted it into the krank vortex and watched as krank after krank flew straight inside.
Meanwhile, James appeared to be really getting into his song. He was dancing in place like he’d done last summer when he was really into making music videos. At one point, his hand slapped a krank, but the creature didn’t seem to mind as it continued orbiting James.
Soon there were only twenty left circling him. Then ten. Then five. The last one was a little trickier because it was flying up high and I’m pretty short. It took James repeating the song five more times before I was finally able to jump at just the right moment to catch it.
“It’s about time, my voice is going raw,” James said.
“You’ve gotta do that as a music video,” I said, slamming the briefcase closed.
“Remind me to send a thank you note to Bieber,” James said. “Can we leave now?”
“Hang on—the journal!” I said, remembering the second part.
James groaned. However, it didn’t take us long to find the book in the corner of the room. Unlike the kranks, it was as straightforward as it sounded. The worn leather had scratches in it. Gold lettering on the front said, Diary.
Normally, I’d be curious about a 200-year-old journal found in a magic bookshop. After our experience with the kranks, however, I just wanted to escape. I nabbed it and said, “Let’s get out of here.”