Robots versus Slime Monsters Read online

  ROBOTS VERSUS SLIME MONSTERS

  An A. Lee Martinez Collection

  A. Lee Martinez

  Published by A. Lee Martinez at Smashwords

  Copyright 2013 A. Lee Martinez

  Table of Contents

  Kickstarter Backers

  Acknowledgments

  Bigfoot Dreams

  Wizard Bait

  Penelope and the Willful Blade

  Greyback in Blue

  Death, Dust, and Other Inconveniences

  Work Ethic

  My Dinner with Ares

  Pizza Madness

  Cindy and Cragg

  Imogen’s Epic Day

  Afterword

  Thanks to our Kickstarter backers

  Alison Alvarez, Audio Mike Amman, Paul Angelosanto, Jan Arrah, Azhrei, Rodney Baker, Robert Bartsch, Sarah BaeHurst, Susan Bailey, Mark Baker, Jeffrey Barnes, Aaron Bartel, Jesse Baruffi, Sam Baskin, Jeffery Ericvonfluttenbyrd Beckman, Jan Beisenkamp, Shawn Belton, Katie Berger, Chad Bever, Jeremy Bort, Robert Bouthot, Megan Brackett, Aaron Bradford, Paul Bulmer, Michael Butson, Peggy Callaway, Melanie Carrin, Carter, Stephen Carter, Michael Carter, Michael Carter, Michael Cavaliero, Andrew Cherry, Chris, Nicola Claire, Rosemary Clement-Moore, Martin Conover, John Cooke, Kevin Corey, Kate Cornell, Richard Scott Crawford, Andrew D’Apice, Peter Darley, Kyle Anthony Davis, Russell Davis, Kevin Deenihan, Gary Denton, Gary Denton, Joe DeRouen, Michael Dial, Todd DiGiacinto, Dreamingsamurai, Lue Driver, Ralph A DuBreuil, Matthew Duda, Dustin, Steve Dwyer, Elizabeth, Eric, Joshua Evridge, Angela Adams Fleider, Duncan Fletcher, Tiffany Franzoni, Willian Fritts, Rick Fryar, Kaia Gavere, Kameron Gibson, Joshua Gillman, Giobblin, Donovan Glidden, Carlo Gliha, Karen Goetsch, Cathy Green, Cathy Greytfriend, Grumpyhawk, Carol Guess, Bill Gumina, Jonathon Haar, Craig Hackl, Julie Harden, Charles Harrington, Robert Harrold, Andrew Hayes, Michael Haynes, Sarah Heile, Juan Herrero, Bobby Hitt, Phil Holland, Nik Holman, Morgan Ineson, Dawn Jackson, Robert Jackson, Rolanda Jackson, Jason, Michael L. Jennings, Tabitha Jensen, Justin Jessel, Jester59388, Eugene Johnson, Justin Julian, Stefan Krzywicki, Elise L., Kathleen Lafollett, Loa Ledbetter, Kevin Lee, Tristen Lee, Matt Leitzen, Angela Leone, Greg Levick, Neal Levin, Andrew Lin, Brian H. Littrell, Gary Lobstein, Zachary Logan, Kenny Louis, Kyle Lowry, Justin Macumber, Scott Macumber, The Mad Hatter, Stephen Manning, Joey Manley, David K. Mason, Herbert Mason, Joe Matise, Matthurlburt, Grace McCall, Don McCowan, Chanté McCoy, Richard McCreary, Charles McDougald Jimmy McMichael, Paul McMullen, Paul McNamee, Steven Mentzel, Rod Meek, Insa Miller, Rob Miller, James Minot, Monkeygritz, Felice Moreno, Wayne Morrison, Cathy Mullican, John Murphy, Eric Noble, Gloria Oliver, Rebeca Paiva, pdqtrader, William Pearson, David Peery, Pen Ultimate Productions, Tony Peterson, Noah Ramon, Webberly RattenKraft, Andreas Rauer, Adam Roberts, Antonio Rodriguez, Roque Rodriguez III, Elizabeth Rogers, Matt Russell, Jairo Sanchez, Margaret St. John, Shawn Scarber, Charles Scott, Gary Scott, Noel Petersen Seaver, Aaron Settle, Sonya M. Shannon, Michael Shelton, Amy Sisson, Nathan Skank, Crystal Skelton, Pamela Skjolsvik, David Sloan, Andreas Stahlbock, Noel Steinle, David Swanson, Jim Sweeney, Charles Tan, Tania, Robby Thasher, Tibs, Denis Trenque, Geoffrey S. Turi, Lisa Weinberg, Donald Whittington, Jeffrey Wikstrom, Lance Williams, Matthew Williams, Andrew Wilson, Robert Wilson, Jaimie Vandenbergh, VonEther, Philip VonNeida, Jeff Xilon, James Yu, the ZBBC, Zipthebunny, ZuZuBe

  ADDITIONAL ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  In addition to the many fine Kickstarter backers of this project, I’d like to mention a few important people behind the scenes that made this collection easier.

  First of all, there are the many fine writers of the DFW Writer’s Workshop, who offered sage advice on how to make these stories better. (And they were pretty amazing to begin with, so that’s saying something.)

  Next, my lovely and talented wife, Sally Hamilton, designed the cover and did a hell of a job. To all you aspiring writers out there, marrying a graphic artist is definitely the way to go. Just FYI.

  Editing a book is tough, and I had some great backup in my ever-helpful Mom and Aunt Peggy. A better pair of copyeditors would be hard to find. Especially ones that work for free.

  Russell C. Connor offered experience and guidance into my first step into self-publishing. Check him out at Darkfilament.com.

  Finally, I’d be remiss if I didn’t thank you for buying this collection. Writers only get paid to write because people care enough to buy their stories to read. So thanks for caring enough about animated witch’s brooms and talking gorillas to keep on buying stories about them. You keep buying them, and I’ll keep writing them.

  BIGFOOT DREAMS

  Gil’s All Fright Diner

  I’ve developed a strange fascination with the Animal Planet reality show (in the loosest definition of that word) Finding Bigfoot. If you haven’t watched it, I can’t recommend it because it’s a show built entirely on the principle of wandering through the woods and NOT finding bigfoot. Somehow, they’ve managed to squeeze several seasons out of it. I find the show alternately amusing and frustrating, but it did inspire me to write a bigfoot story. So there’s that at least.

  Bigfoot was going to kill Clinton.

  He tripped wildly through the forest, running in no direction except away. In those flickering moments between panicking, he realized he should head back to the trail if he was going to find his way out of here, but he was hopelessly lost already. Even if he did regain his wits, it was too late for that.

  If he’d been in the right state of mind, Clinton would’ve remembered that time he’d gone camping as a seven year old boy and how he’d seen a sasquatch. No one had believed him, and after a while, Clinton didn’t believe it himself. Just the overactive imagination of a kid who didn’t know better.

  Now that thing he’d mostly forgotten about had caved in Billy’s head with one blow and had been in the midst of tearing Jefferson to pieces when Clinton, in his mad fear, ran. Jefferson’s screams and the howls of the bigfoot had long ago faded, and now, all he could hear were his own ragged breaths, whistling through his deviated septum.

  If he got out of this, he swore he’d never go camping again. He’d stay in town, and he’d never even step into a goddamn public park if he could help it. Then he tripped over something, struck his head against a tree, and writhed in the dirt for a few moments.

  Something big and black moved in the corner of his vision. The hairy giant bent down and sniffed him. Clinton shut his eyes tight and tried not to breathe in hopes of . . . well, he wasn’t quite certain. But it was either that or run for it, and running would’ve been a waste of time.

  “Is he dead?” asked someone from behind the bigfoot.

  “No,” said the bigfoot.

  Clinton opened one eye and looked into the bright yellow eyes of a wolf’s face. The wolf stood up and put its hands on its ample gut.

  “Holy shit,” said Clinton. “You’re not bigfoot.”

  The skinny guy in overalls beside the wolf laughed. “No shit. You ain’t never seen a werewolf before?”

  He cocked his head to one side and sighed.

  “Aw, hell, I was just giving him a hard time,” he said to no one.

  He bent down and offered his hand. “Let me help you up there. Looks like a nasty hit you took to the head.”

  The werewolf fell to the forest floor and started sniffing around.

  “Please, don’t hurt me,” croaked Clinton.

  “You can relax,” said the skinny guy. “Duke doesn’t hunt humans. Too easy, right?”

  The werewolf chuckled.

  “Hell, man, you don’t even got a gun on you,” said the guy.

  “Fishing,” said Clinton. “I was fishing. We were fishing.” He grabbed the guy by the
suspenders. “We have to get out of here. There’s a monster out there.” He glanced at the hulking werewolf. “Not like a friendly one either. It killed my friends. I think it’s still after me.”

  Duke sniffed Clinton’s neck and armpit. “The stink of fear you’re putting out, I wouldn’t be surprised.” When Duke spoke, every word was a coarse, sharpened thing. It didn’t ease Clinton’s terror.

  Both the werewolf and the guy turned their heads in the same direction and grumbled.

  “Yeah, you’re right,” said the guy. “S’pose a little compassion is in order.”

  “Who are you talking to?” asked Clinton.

  “My girlfriend. You can’t see her cuz she’s a ghost.”

  “Oh.” Clinton backed away from the lunatic until he pressed up against a tree.

  “You’re running from a bigfoot, talking to a werewolf and a vampire,” said the guy. “But ghosts . . . yeah, that’s crazy.”

  “You’re a vampire?”

  The vampire cleared his throat and smiled, showing a pair of fangs. “But don’t worry. I don’t bite people unless they deserve it.”

  “Oh God,” said Clinton. “Is everything in these woods a monster?”

  “Monsters, he says.” The vampire sighed. “We ain’t been nuthin’ but unfailingly polite to you.”

  He nodded at something his ghost girlfriend said.

  “I know he didn’t mean nuthin’ by it, but it’s still an insensitive word.”

  Clinton attempted to slink away, but Duke’s giant, clawed hand clasped him on the shoulder. “You should stick with us if you want to live.”

  Staring into the toothy maw of the wolf’s head, Clinton didn’t feel particularly safe.

  Somewhere in the darkened forest, a chilling bigfoot yowl pierced the night. It could’ve been a mile away. Or just behind the next bush.

  “Oh God. It got Billy and Jefferson.”

  “Friends of yours?” asked the vampire.

  “Sort of. I mean, not really. We don’t hang out a lot. But Jefferson wanted to go fishing and talked Billy and me into it. We were just camping by the river, bullshitting. Then it just came out of the dark and—”

  He closed his eyes and concentrated on the black nothingness rather than the horrible sights and sounds swimming around in his memory.

  “They’re dead. Aren’t they?” he asked.

  “’Fraid so,” said the vampire. “And you’ll be next if you get too far away from us.”

  “But why? I didn’t think bigfoots were supposed to be dangerous.”

  “They aren’t normally. Most of the time, they’re docile nature spirits. They slip in and out of the spirit world, walking between planes the way we walk between rooms.”

  “Spirits? But I thought they were animals.”

  Duke and the vampire laughed. “What kind of goddamn sense does that make? Giant ape men strolling around in the forests, somehow not leaving a trace behind? No, they’re more like ghosts, but ghosts that were never alive. Just sort of have always been here, crossing between worlds, peeking into ours when they get curious. Harmless, really. Except sometimes, one of the damned things decides it wants to be human, and the only way to do that is to eat the hearts of three humans under the light of the half moon.”

  The canopy was too thick to see much of the sky, but he remembered the light of the half moon shining down on the camp.

  “Shit.”

  The vampire said, “Don’t worry. You’re safe as long as you’re with us. Duke is more than a match for any bigfoot. And that’s why we’re here anyway. Duke’s got a mad on to kill this rogue squatch. Don’t know why.”

  Duke growled.

  “Yeah, yeah. Your duty as an emissary of the forest and humanity. Or some other bullshit. Honestly, I just think it’s because you can’t resist a good scrap.”

  Duke chuckled, and the laugh sent a chill through Clinton’s bones.

  Another howl broke the silence, and it was joined by a second. Then a third. Then too many to count.

  “Okay, now that sounds like it could be trouble,” said the vampire.

  He paused.

  “Easy for you to say,” he said to his ghost girlfriend. “You’re immaterial.”

  Duke crouched on all fours. His ears fell flat. The black fur on his back rose. Unseen things rattled around in the foliage.

  “Run,” he said.

  Clinton hesitated. “But you said—”

  “I said run!” roared Duke.

  A massive creature burst from the dark and came barreling at Clinton. Duke intercepted, plowing into the bigfoot with enough force to knock the creature into a tree, nearly uprooting it. The werewolf pinned the bigfoot against the tree and sank his snapping jaws into its shoulder. It bellowed, and its cries were echoed by a dozen other invisible monsters.

  The vampire grabbed Clinton’s arm and pulled him in the opposite direction. Or so Clinton hoped. He couldn’t pinpoint a direction. The calls seemed to be coming from everywhere and nowhere at once. Monsters rustled in the dark.

  “Not really your night is it, buddy?” said the vampire. He dragged Clinton through the woods. There were times Clinton would’ve tripped and fallen, but the vampire was stronger than he looked and kept Clinton going.

  The bigfoots continued to close in, and all he could think was that they weren’t going to make it. The monsters were going to catch him and drag him back into the woods. He couldn’t let that happen. He didn’t want to go back. Not ever again.

  “I think the road’s back this way,” said the vampire.

  A bright red sasquatch came out of nowhere and belted him across the jaw. He tumbled to lay in a heap. His head twisted at a weird angle, and by all rights, he should’ve been dead. But he groaned and struggled to stand.

  The bigfoot beat its chest and grabbed for Clinton, who fell back just out of reach. Duke launched himself from nowhere, and the werewolf and his opponent tumbled into the dark.

  The vampire mumbled through a broken jaw as his head rolled around limply on his shoulders. His posture was strange, slumped, off balance, with his right arm sticking out at an angle, like he was holding onto something.

  Must’ve been his ghost girlfriend holding him up, decided Clinton.

  Two more bigfoots emerged from the woods.

  “Shhttt,” said the vampire with his fractured jaw, just before one of the creatures grabbed him by the legs and smashed him into the ground several times, breaking more bones. The shattered vampire twitched in the bigfoot’s grasp.

  “Fk yi,” he drooled.

  The bigfoot dropped him. The second one seized Clinton and threw him over its shoulder. They were dashing through the darkened woods within moments, and out of the darkness, there were suddenly seven or eight more of the creatures. Even as the cold night air erupted from their nostrils in white puffs, they were as silent as ghosts.

  A sharp pain ran through him as the world changed. The darkened woods filled with a soft blue light, and the forest opened up for the pack of sasquatches. The trees twisted into strange shapes. The overwhelming scent of honey and smoke filled the air.

  Clinton didn’t call out for help. It was too late for that. The bigfoots had taken him, dragging him back to their spirit world, the invisible realm behind what he’d always called reality. It was familiar yet strange at the same time, and he couldn’t fight against them.

  They reached a clearing, and the bigfoots deposited him with surprising gentleness on the ground. The night sky was a rainbow of colors without a single star in it. Just a half moon shining down upon him.

  The bigfoots surrounded him. The leader, a large, gray-furred brute, growled at him. He could almost understand the creature.

  His arm felt funny, and he rolled up his sleeve to see thick, white fur sprouting from his forearm. He felt his face. It was hairier, and it’d changed shape. His mouth was bigger, his teeth larger and flatter. He tried to speak, but could only grunt.

  The sasquatches raised their heads and howle
d in a beautiful cacophony, and the gnarled trees swayed in rhythm with their rough chorus.

  They were turning him into one of them.

  Clinton scrambled to escape, but one of the creatures knocked him down. He tried twice more with the same results. He could feel himself slipping away. His mind faded as alien thoughts and instincts filled him.

  A woman and a dog charged out of the brush. Neither of them were much to look at. The dog couldn’t have weighed more than twenty pounds. The woman was armed with a baseball bat, but still stood several feet under the smallest of the squatches.

  The terrier pounced onto the leg of the leader, and despite the absurdity of it, the bigfoot shrieked as if mauled by a lion. The other bigfoots ceased singing, and Clinton’s mind returned. Not all of it. There was still something inhuman in there, but it was buried deep underneath.

  The bigfoots intercepted the woman, but she knocked them all aside with one mighty swing. The laws of physics here were screwy because they didn’t fall away. They hurtled into the sky and didn’t fall back down.

  She wound up for another swing. The dog joined her side. It lowered its head and growled, and the sound that came out was the rumble of a hellhound. The spirit world was a weird place.

  “Who else wants some?”

  The creatures readied to charge, but their leader raised his hand and grunted. Improbably, impossibly, one by one, they shuffled into the phantom forest, disappearing into worlds unknown.

  “Are you all right?” she asked.

  Clinton nodded. “I am now. Who are you?”

  “I’m Earl’s girlfriend. Cathy.”

  “The ghost?” he asked.

  “Good thing for you too. Only a pair of ghosts could’ve followed you into this place.”

  “The dog’s a ghost too?” he said. “Of course it is.”

  “I’d introduce you, but we should probably get back before the doorway closes. Hate to be stuck here.”

  The dog barked.

  Clinton was worried they might not be able to find their way back, but the ghostly woods showed the way with a glowing trail. It was almost as if they place couldn’t wait to be rid of them. He wasn’t sure exactly when he crossed back into the real world. It wasn’t an obvious moment. He only noticed that the monster under his skin faded and the fur disappeared.