Bad Unicorn Page 11

  “You know there’s a difference between games and reality, right?” Sarah asked.

  “It’s all in the Codex,” Max continued. “It’s kind of like this never-ending encyclopedia.”

  “It is said that this was once a human world,” Yah Yah continued. “But then the great destroyer consumed the last of your kind.”

  “Princess the Destroyer,” Max said, turning to his friends. “Now Robo-Princess. Just like I told you.”

  “And when there were no more humans, my people were brought here to be hunted for sport.

  “See, all the movies had it right,” Dirk announced, looking at Sarah. “Machines do rise up and take over the future.”

  “Some of our scouts have seen their great city,” Yah Yah added. “They gather to watch the hunts, and build champions to destroy us.”

  “That’s horrible,” Sarah exclaimed, looking at Max and Dirk. “What kind of place is this? Who would take pleasure in doing something like that? Everything is completely wrong here. This is not our future—it can’t be.”

  “The future is a gift,” Glenn added, speaking up from his spot on Max’s belt. “That’s why we call today the present. Just think about it, that’s all I’m saying.”

  “Wow,” Sarah added. “You’re seriously not helpful. No wonder the dwarf gave you up.”

  “Eh,” the dagger replied, shrugging its tiny ivory shoulders. “I think of it as being re-gifted.”

  They had talked for hours, going round and round about what was possible and what wasn’t, if they were actually in the future or not, what they should or shouldn’t do, when Max finally excused himself and found a spot alone near the fire. As he sat and tried to make sense of the day’s events, the only connection between his normal existence and everything that had happened was the Codex. He’d read about Princess the Destroyer before he actually saw her, and he’d read all about frobbits and treeshires before being taken to them. He’d even seen a picture of Dwight as a real dwarf before discovering it was true. Somehow the Codex was connected to everything, and so the Codex had to be the key for making everything right.

  With his back against a large tree and the fire at his feet, Max opened the old book to a random page and began reading . . .

  On the Evolution of the Moon

  WHETHER AS CAVE MAN, ASTRONAUT, OR advertising executive, man has always considered the moon to be his greatest prize. At first, humans used the heavenly body to measure the cycles of time. Then, it became the inspiration for a new age of technology and moon-based food development. (Moon pies were the clear winner, with Chinese moon cakes taking second place. Moon biscuits never really took off, however, likely because of their grayish color and rock-hard consistency.) Finally, with the cost of web banners and Super Bowl commercials on the rise, the moon became the ultimate twenty-four-hour floating billboard—just sitting up there, waiting to be exploited.

  Thus the great marketing race began in earnest. What corporation would be the first to claim the lunar landscape as its own? It was the question on everybody’s mind. In the end, the McDougald’s hamburger chain got there first (although some claim a crafty thief known as the Cheeseburglar stole the plans from a competitor). McDougald’s went on to “re-envision” the moon as a giant, glowing cheeseburger—specially priced at $3.99 for a limited time. Unfortunately, McDougald’s didn’t have much time to enjoy the benefits of their monumental marketing effort. Two days later Princess the Destroyer began her systematic conquest of the human world. At that point, a cheeseburger—even value-priced at under four bucks—wasn’t that enticing.

  Max looked up at the moon hanging overhead. “Well, at least that sort of makes sense,” he said to himself.

  “What makes sense?” Sarah said, walking over.

  “Oh, uh, just that we apparently turned the moon into a billboard for cheeseburgers.”

  “Figures,” she replied, looking from the moon back to Max. “Humans are pretty good at messing things up. Mind if I sit down?”

  “Max gestured at the ground beside him and Sarah sat. A chorus of slurred singing erupted nearby. “Dwight?” she asked. Max nodded. Neither of them said anything for a few minutes, and that seemed okay. They sat and watched the sparks flying from the fire.

  “I’ve been considering our situation,” Sarah said after a while.

  “Oh. What do you think?”

  “Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote that when all other contingencies fail, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.”

  “Er,” Max replied, trying to work it out in his head. “You mean that barbarian guy in the movies?”

  Sarah laughed. “No, Doyle wrote the Sherlock Holmes mysteries. The quote was from the murder mystery of Arthur Cadogan West.”

  “Oh yeah . . . that one,” Max said, trying to sound as if he knew what he was talking about.

  Sarah smiled. “Anyway, you mentioned earlier that the robot unicorn—”

  “Robo-Princess,” Max interjected, showing that he was still up to speed with the conversation.

  “Yeah, Robo-Princess. You said she mentioned you by name and called you a wizard.”

  Hearing it like that made it sound kind of embarrassing. “It’s stupid, I know,” Max said dismissively. “I shouldn’t have even told you guys about that part.”

  “Actually, I think it’s important.”

  It was probably the last thing Max expected Sarah to say.

  “Let’s take away the whole improbability of it and just consider the facts,” Sarah continued. “You find this old book under your bed. You bring it to school and after all the Kraken business we go to Dwight’s shop and show it to him. There we learn that no one can read it but you—but you don’t know any other languages, do you?”

  “Dirk and I tried to learn Klingon, but it sounded like we were choking on cabbage. The neighbors called nine-one-one.”

  “Right. So you don’t know any other languages, but clearly you can read a book that to everyone else is just a bunch of weird symbols. And then there’s the whole business of the book shocking everyone but you.”

  “Okay,” Max added. “But what’s the point?”

  “Well, it’s just evidence for now. I think we need to be like detectives here, so let’s keep going. Another thing I noticed is that something about the book scares Dwight. Probably because there’s a picture of him in it and it calls him out by name.”

  “Yeah, that was pretty weird.”

  “Exactly. So, when he pulls out the dagger and threatens you, you’re standing there with the Codex open. There could have been any number of things that ran through your head. But whatever the reason, we were standing there in the store and then everything changed. We were suddenly outside, in the woods. It’s night, and the moon is completely . . . wrong.”

  “Yeah, it’s a cheeseburger.”

  “Yep,” Sarah continued. “And as we investigate we find a poster that looks exactly like the one we saw in the Dragon’s Den. Then Dwight claims he found his cash register. But everything’s old, like we traveled hundreds of years into the future.”

  “And then I met Cenede and saw Robo-Princess in the woods.”

  “That’s right. And I think we can say this isn’t a dream or some kind of weird hallucination. We’re here, right now, with a bunch of frobbits. And, oh yeah, there’s a talking dagger.”

  “That pretty much sums it up,” Max agreed.

  “So,” Sarah said as matter-of-factly as she could, “if you add it all up—and believe me, it’s a lot to consider—I think you being a wizard is the only explanation that makes any sense.”

  “Me being a wizard . . . makes sense?” Max echoed, trying to get his head around it.

  “What remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth,” Sarah said, quoting the Sherlock Holmes passage again. “Remember?”

  If anybody else had said it, Max wouldn’t have believed it. But this was Sarah—probably the smartest kid at Parkside Middle School. She was the kind of person who
grew up to be an astronaut, or a brain surgeon, or even the president of the United States. And if Sarah believed he was a wizard, then he couldn’t just ignore it. Was it possible she was right?

  Max let the words sink in as he watched more sparks drift from the fire. Finally, he sighed. “Okay,” Max said. “Suppose you’re right. So what? What am I supposed to do now?”

  “Well, what it means, Max, is that you’re the only one who’s going to be able to get us home. I know that’s what Dwight’s been saying all along, but it’s taken me awhile to finally believe him.” And that was exactly what Max didn’t want to hear. He wasn’t the kind of kid who was supposed to be the leader, or have to come up with the right things to do, or make the hard decisions. That kind of pressure might make some people shine, but it didn’t work that way for Max. Pressure just made him crumple up like an empty soda can.

  “I don’t want it to be me,” Max said. “I’m not good at stuff like that.”

  “Maybe you are but you just don’t know it yet. Maybe you just need to believe in yourself first, then the rest will come together.”

  As much as Max wanted to dismiss it, he knew that Sarah was probably right. “I can try,” he finally offered.

  “The truth has been inside of you, all along,” Glenn added. “You just need to look into your heart and find it.”

  Max jabbed at the dagger with his finger, “Seriously, shut up already.”

  Sarah laughed, but she sounded tired. “I think that’s a good start. Just keep reading and find out everything you can. But you need to believe in yourself, too.”

  “Okay, I’ll try.”

  “In the meantime I’m going to get some sleep,” Sarah said, yawning. She stood. “Good night, Max.”

  “Good night,” Max replied, watching as Sarah walked away. Without consciously realizing it, Max felt a little less like he had to do everything on his own. He had friends, and his friends were there to help him.

  Max returned to the Codex and opened it, feeling renewed hope that he’d find the answer he was looking for. But the book opened to a menu listing various McDougald’s specials. Apparently, finding the answers he needed wasn’t going to be easy.

  Dwight appeared from around the tree, finishing the chorus of some long-lost song and sloshing his drink as he steadied himself.

  “Betcha didn’t know dwarfs liked to drink, didya?” Dwight asked Max, slurring his speech.

  “Uh, pretty much everyone knows that. It’s like in every game, book, comic, graphic novel, or movie that has a dwarf in it.”

  Dwight frowned, nearly falling over in the process. “Is that so? Well, you just get that book of yours to get us out of here, Mr. Know-it-all. Don’t get me wrong, I like frobbits cause they’re shorter than me and they make funny drinks. But I’m not going to be stuck out here for the rest of my life. Got that?” Dwight pointed a finger at Max but the momentum took him stumbling past. A loud crash came from the direction in which Dwight had disappeared.

  Max took a breath, opening the Codex to another random page. This time it detailed a knitting pattern for orc mittens.

  “Orc mittens,” Max said to nobody in particular. “How will orc mittens ever be useful?”

  “Orc kittens?” Dwight called out from the darkness. “I love orc kittens!”

  On the Inn of the Flatulent Orc

  OF THE MANY INNS AVAILABLE TO travelers staying in Aardyre, the Inn of the Flatulent Orc may be the most colorful. “Colorful,” when used in any official Aardyre travel brochure, is code for “likely to get you robbed, stabbed, and/or beaten.” Many mistakenly believe the inn gets its name from the orc bouncer who works the door, but the truth is the name “flatulent orc” came from an Aardyre food critic who was guessing what might be in the soup. Obviously, he wasn’t a fan.

  Those travelers who decide to have an authentic Aardyre experience by staying at the inn should follow two important rules: First, never let a man nicknamed “The Dinkus” buy you a drink. Second, never, under any circumstances, agree to take room number nine.

  The problem with room number nine has to do with several peculiarities involving the number 432 (see “On the Number 432”). As it happens, room nine occupies a small corner of space/time from which travelers coming through the umbraverse enter the Magrus. Documented creatures known to suddenly appear include: the Screaming Banshee of Indeterminable Lung Capacity, the Cacuminal Crawling Tongue Beast, and Lady Gaga.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  NEVER ANNOY A UNICORN

  (THE MAGRUS—PRESENT)

  THE WALLS OF NYRIDOS WERE THE SAME PINKISH COLOR AS THE SAND that stretched westward as far as the eye could see. Princess and Magar decided to stay clear of the city, although the thought of a hot bath and something fresh to eat had nearly caused her to change her mind. It took two weeks riding along the coasts of the Crystal Sea until they had reached the borders of Turul, where the land became as sparse and inhospitable as the creatures that called it home. Turning southwest, they continued to follow the coastline past the spires of Nagalmosh until they came to the port city.

  Magar held his hands over his eyes and watched a dust plume form just outside of the city’s main gate. “I can’t tell who they are,” he announced. “But they’re obviously coming for us—there’s nothing else out here.”

  “Well, I’m certainly not going to run,” Princess said, turning to face whatever was heading their way. The two of them waited until the distant forms became men on horseback, their armor glinting beneath the bright sun. “From the shine of their armor I’d say they are Mor Luin riders, Your Highness.” The kingdom of Mor Luin lay between the Unicorn Nation and Aardyre, and Princess had taken to burning and pillaging all the way to the mountains south of Ledluin, Mor Luin’s capital.

  “Ah, so knights and their mages, then. I like combination plates you know,” Princess announced.

  As the party rode up, they could see it consisted of about thirty knights, complete with scores of pages and squires, who trailed after them. As was the custom in Mor Luin, they polished their armor to a near reflective hue, and preferred to fight with long swords and shields (which were colorfully painted to identify the various noble houses). The horses were reined to a stop as the lead knight trotted forward on a stunning white mare. He wore a bright red padded jacket beneath his heavy armor, and removed a plumed helm to look down at Princess and Magar.

  “You there,” he called from his mount. “I would have your names.”

  Magar scanned the ranks of men and noticed several mages mixed in among them. As was their tradition, they wore armor but preferred cowls to helmets. Magar eyed them warily as he counted six of them. Two dozen knights and six mages were not a group to be taken lightly.

  “And I would have you turn around and ride back to where you came from,” Princess replied. The knights broke out in laughter.

  “Well, here we were looking for a unicorn and her wizard, and we find a wizard and a mis-mannered wench,” the knight announced with a laugh.

  “This is not Mor Luin. You have no rights here,” Magar declared to the group. “I am a wizard and we are on official Tower business. You will not detain us further.”

  “Run along, wizard,” one of the mages shouted. “We need only warn you once, and then the Tower cannot protect you.”

  “Do not address him,” Princess shot back. “He’s but a dog on a leash. If you wish to talk to his master I am right here.”

  The mage laughed. He would never allow himself to be described like that—especially by a young girl.

  “So be it,” the lead knight answered, turning his attention to Princess. “You wish to speak boldly? Then boldly tell us your name.”

  “That’s all?” Princess said with a demure smile. “My name? It’s so hard to remember sometimes because I’ve been called so many things. Your Highness for one. But I’ve also been called villain and scoundrel. And I’ve been called slayer and executioner, and conqueror and avenger. But mostly you humans call me merciless.
And I think that name suits me just fine.”

  Princess’s horn was in her hand before the knights could react. She bounded forward, striking the lead knight on his leg. He groaned and slipped from his horse, falling to the ground with a thud. Then she thrust her horn into the air and a cyclone of dust and sand erupted from the middle of the armored men, blasting them off their horses and sending them tumbling head over heels.

  Princess turned to where Magar was shielding his eyes against the sudden gust of wind. “Lest you ever forget your place, remember this day, wizard!” Princess stepped forward, past the groaning knight at her feet. Around her the men and mages were beginning to rise and regain their bearings. She pointed her wand and yelled something incomprehensible. Streaks of blue lightning sizzled through the air. They forked, then forked again and again. They crawled across the air like a living thing, searching. Then each of the six lightning tines struck a different mage with a resounding snap!

  The concussion from the lightning exploded outward. The wave of energy toppled the knights and sent the mages flying backward—their once shiny armor now blackened and scorched. A few of the knights stirred, but none of the mages moved. Many of the knights did not move either.

  Magar looked on in astonishment. It was easy to forget how powerful unicorns were, even one who acted like a spoiled teenager. Then he noticed the knight who had been on the ground. He was rising slowly, but his skin had turned brown and taut. His once thick hair had fallen off in sheets, so now only a few strands remained. And his head was a living skull, devoid of eyes. Instead, a crimson glow emanated from within the empty sockets.

  “Go,” Princess commanded the horror that now walked in the knight’s armor. “Feast upon your brothers.”

  The creature lurched forward and grabbed a knight by the throat, breaking his neck with a savage twist. It then turned and moved toward another, who had just managed to find his sword. The terrified knight thrust the blade into the creature’s shoulder, but only pink sand fell from the wound. The knight shrieked as the undead horror knocked the sword away and grabbed hold of him.