Kid looked out the window. A huge monster, half-man and half-mushroom, walked towards the children’s shack. “Oh heck…”

She crouched, trying to hide herself.

“You’ve made him angry, chopping up his children like that. He needs a sacrifice, and bats won’t do this time.”

“Shut it,” she whispered to Sangre. “No one’s going to die on my watch.”

A brilliant yellow light flooded the window as the Mushman lowered an eye to gaze inside. When he saw Kid, he roared and smashed a yellow, wart-encrusted hand on the roof.

The children, Tom, and Ms. Renaldo screamed. But Kid stood strong.

“He wants me. He’ll get me. Snaggletooth, lead everyone away. I’ll distract him.” Hopefully her crush, Tristan, would be impressed by such an act of bravery, but he seemed preoccupied with running away.

She banged open the door and ran outside just as the Mushman slammed another fist into the building. The roof dented, and it began to fall apart. “Get out, everyone! Go!”

The class managed to escape in time, along with the adults. She waved her arms, hoping to distract the monster.

Once outside, she got a better look at the thing. It was shaped like a thirty-foot-tall man, but covered with fungal growths. Its arms were longer than normal, and its knuckles dragged on the ground. Its head bore a big mushroom cap with one eye. Inside that mushroom was a pod, big enough to hold a person.

Lin sat inside, jeering. She, too, had tasted the super-sluice, and her body was as bright as Kid’s.

“That’s my baby!” Sangre chuckled.

Kid dodged as the Mushman pounded a fist into the ground. The earth seemed to bend. Something swung on a chain on the Mushman’s neck—a huge, machine-gun-like object with a big tank. Her super-sight made out words on the side.

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The Catalyzer 9001!

Under it in smaller words it read: Powered by Mushman Tears.

It could burn the whole place to the ground, supposedly. Kid feigned left as the Mushman attacked, and began leading it away from the children.

But Lin, steering the monster, saw right through her plans.

“You’re a real fool, don’t you know it?”

The Mushman stomped towards her friends. They had a quarter mile of distance left before they could go up the stairs and three flights before reaching the nearest elevator. There was no way they could make it!

Snaggletooth was lagging. His old bones couldn’t keep up.

With an otherworldly scream, Kid leaped up at the monster’s throat. She bounded as if she had springs in her heels, and the pressure from the jump snapped her knees. In a flash, the lard’s powers healed her.

She tangled with the chain holding the Catalyzer 9001. The Mushman went ballistic. It tried every movement it could to fling her off. Kid’s arm snapped; it too was healed. But the pain made her lose focus for a second, and she fell to the ground.

“How much of this can you take? Lin, an experiment, please.”

Inside the Mushman’s head, Lin nodded. She stomped on Kid while she was down. Immortal as she was, it did nothing for the pain. Her body was reduced to a paste, and then, jiggling like jelly, it reformed itself. When she screamed, she heard her friends hesitate for a moment.

Lin noticed it too. She began directing the monster towards the class. They were halfway up the stairs by the time the Mushman crossed the cavern.

“No!” Kid shouted with all her might.

She chased after it and leaped again. This time, her hands were able to grip the Catalyzer and rip it from the chain on the monster’s neck. The Mushman howled.

She jumped back down. How could she work the thing? What even was it? And what good would it do to burn everything down while her friends were still in the building?

She found a button on the side, and pressed it. A little flame began burning at the tip of the Catalyzer.

“Stop it or I roast you!” she called to Lin.

Lin laughed. “What good will that do? You can’t stop an immortal!”

“Ah,” Sangre said. “She takes after her father. Unstoppable—my sweet princess.”

“Get over here and fight me,” Kid said.

“Or what?” She scowled. “You wouldn’t hurt a fly and you know it.”

She clicked the button again and the flame grew bigger.

“Ha! Mushman, attack,” she commanded.

The monster punched its fists into the ground as hard as it could, and Kid’s body jumped up. Her friends had made it to the top of the stairs, and entered the elevator. Triumphant, Kid waved goodbye to Snaggletooth and the gang.

“Mushman, more power!”

The monster drove all its strength into pounding the earth. The ground continued to bend… and then the earth gave way.