THREE

Tralfamosaur Hunt Part 1:
Bait and Lure

The cargo train that had transported the Tralfamosaur had been derailed about four miles outside Hereford. The locomotive had stayed upright, but most of the cars were lying in an untidy zigzag along the track. There was a huge number of police cars, ambulances, and fire engines, and the night was lit by floodlights on towers. A willowy officer introduced himself as Detective Corbett and then escorted us up the tracks, past the shattered remnants of the train.

“The engine driver was the first eaten,” said Corbett as we stared at the wreckage. “See these footprints?” He pointed his flashlight at the ground, where a Tralfamosaur footprint was clearly visible.

“The creature headed northeast,” said Moobin after looking at several other footprints. “Any reports from the public?”

“Nothing so far,” said Corbett.

“A Tralfamosaur can be surprisingly stealthy,” said Lady Mawgon. “Discovering one near you and being eaten often happen at pretty much the same time.”

Corbett looked around nervously. “The roads are locked down for a fifty-mile perimeter,” he said in a hasty I’m leaving pretty soon sort of voice, “and everyone has been advised to stay indoors or in a cellar if they have one. Artillery batteries have been set up in case it goes in the direction of Hereford, and if you are unsuccessful by first light, King Snodd has agreed to send in the landships.”

“What about—” began Moobin, but Corbett had already gone.

It was a dark night, and a light breeze stirred the branches of the trees. Of the Tralfamosaur, there was no sign. Sending in the landships would be a last resort: little could withstand these immensely powerful four-story armored tracked vehicles, except trolls, who impertinently called them Meals on Wheels.

“I’m not sure a squadron of landships chasing after a single Tralfamosaur would do anything but cause a huge amount of damage,” said Perkins. “What’s the next step?”

“Search me,” said Lady Mawgon. “Moobin?”

“Not a clue. Let’s face it; recapturing nine tons of pea-brained enraged carnivore isn’t something we do every day. How was it captured last time?”

“Licorice,” came a loud voice behind us, and we jumped.

“I’m sorry?” said Lady Mawgon.

“Licorice,” repeated Once Magnificent Boo, who had just arrived on her moped. We fell silent. Boo never used more words than absolutely necessary, rarely smiled, and had eyes so dark they seemed like black snooker balls floating in a bowl of cream. “If you listen very carefully to my plan and follow it to the letter, we have a reasonable chance of catching the Tralfamosaur without anyone being eaten.”

“Define ‘reasonable chance,’” said Lady Mawgon, but Boo ignored her and continued.

“We require only a grenade launcher, six pounds of industrial-strength licorice, two spells of Class VIII complexity, a shipping container, a side of bacon, an automobile, several homing snails, a ladder, and two people to act as bait.”

Perkins leaned across to me and whispered, “Boo was kind of looking at us when the ‘two people as bait’ thing came up.”

“I know,” I whispered back. “It’s possible to refuse, but the thing is, who are you more frightened of: Once Magnificent Boo or a Tralfamosaur?”

An hour later Perkins and I were in my Volkswagen, parked near a crossroads on high ground a mile or two from the damaged train. We had watched the lights that dotted the countryside gradually wink out as residents were told to extinguish their house lights, a lure for the Tralfamosaur. Soon we could see nothing but the stars through the open sunroof and the pinkish glow of the Quarkbeast sitting on a wall close by, sniffing the air cautiously. The Quarkbeast had been created magically as a sort of bloodhound to track other magical beasts, so it would be able to sense the Tralfamosaur at a distance of at least five hundred yards.

“Enjoying the date so far?” I asked cheerily.

“It could be improved,” Perkins replied.

“In what way?”

“Not being used as Tralfamosaur bait, for one thing.”

“Oh, come on,” I said. “It’s a lovely night to be eaten by nine tons of hunger-crazed monster.”

Perkins looked up through the open sunroof at the broad swath of stars above our heads. As if on cue, a shooting star flashed across the sky.

“You’re half right,” he said with a smile. “It’s a lovely night. Crazy or nothing, right?”

I returned his smile. “Right. Crazy or nothing. Let’s check everything again.”

I flicked the two glowworms above the dashboard with my finger. A faint glimmer illuminated the SpellGo buttons that Moobin and Lady Mawgon had placed on the dash. Spells could be cast in advance and lie dormant until activated by something as easy to use as the two large buttons. One was labeled Bogeys and the other Float.

“Got the rocket-propelled licorice launcher handy?” I asked.

“Check.” Perkins patted the weapon, which instead of an explosive warhead contained a lump of industrial-grade licorice about the size of a melon. It smelled so strongly we had to poke the launcher out the sunroof to stop our eyes from watering. Tralfamosaurs could smell licorice from at least a mile away if the wind was strong enough.

We jumped as a snail shot in through the open window and skidded to a halt inside the windshield, leaving a slippery trail across the glass. Homing snails were one of Wizard Moobin’s recent discoveries. He had found that all snails have the capacity to do over one hundred miles per hour and find a location with pinpoint accuracy, but didn’t because they were horribly lazy and couldn’t be bothered. By rewriting a motivating spell commonly used by TV fitness instructors, communication by homing snail was entirely possible—and snails were more reliable than pigeons, which were easily distracted.

The snail was steaming with exertion and smelled faintly of scorched rubber, but seemed pleased with itself. I gave it a lettuce leaf and popped it in its box while Perkins opened the note that had been stuck to its shell. It was from Lady Mawgon.

“Reports from worried citizens place the Tralfamosaur three miles down the road at Woolhope.” Woolhope was the Kingdom’s sixth-largest town and home to twelve thousand people and a marzoleum processing plant.

I had a sudden thought. “It’s heading for the flare.”

Marzoleum refineries always had a gas flare lit on a tall tower, and it was this, I guessed, that would attract the Tralfamosaur. It might have a brain the size of a Ping-Pong ball, but when it came to looking for food at night, it was no slouch. Fire and light, after all, generally led to humans.

“There,” I said, stabbing my finger on the map near a place called Broadmoor Common, just downwind of Woolhope. “He’ll be able to smell us easily from there.”

I whistled to the Quarkbeast, who jumped into the back seat of the car, and we were soon hurtling along the narrow roads. It was about three a.m. by now, and I admit that I drove recklessly. The police had locked down the area tight and told everyone to stay in their homes, but even so, I was half expecting to run into a tractor or something. I didn’t. I ran into something much worse.

The Quarkbeast cried out first, a sort of quarky-quark-quarky noise that spelled danger, and as I braked, my headlights illuminated something nasty and large and reptilian on the road ahead. The Tralfamosaur’s small eyes glinted as it looked up. It was bigger than I remembered from my occasional visits to the zoo, and it looked more dangerous out in the open.

There were about fifty yards between it and us. We sat there for a moment, the engine of the Beetle idling. The creature stared at us blankly until I realized we were upwind, so it probably wasn’t aware of the licorice. I slowly backed the car up, but the Tralfamosaur didn’t follow. Against my better judgment I stopped, and then inched slowly forward again. Still it didn’t seem that interested.

“Better show yourself,” I said to Perkins, “and try to look appetizing.”

“Yes,” he said sarcastically, “I’m well known for my pie impersonations.”

Perkins took a deep breath, undid his seat belt, stood up through the sunroof, and waved his arms. The Tralfamosaur gave out a deafening bellow and charged.

I slammed the car into reverse and swiftly backed away, then pulled the wheel around, thumped the gearshift into first, and drove off with the Tralfamosaur in close pursuit.

Part one of the plan was now in operation.