Temporary Monsters by Craig Shaw Gardner Read Free Book Online Page B

mostly he’s got to sleep.”
    The vampire placed a pale hand on his chest. “You pierce me to the heart.”
    Lenore’s shapely left eyebrow rose in disdain.
    â€œHey, you’re the one with the fangs.”
    The vampire stared at Lenore, the slightest of smiles playing about his fangs. “When you torment me this way, I find you—strangely attractive.”
    Lenore quickly moved to the other side of Lenny. “Business, Herbert.”
    The Baron nodded as though all the joy had been drained from his existence. “Business.”
    An awkward silence descended over the group.
    Lenny supposed, according to the rules, he was supposed to say something. “What do we do now?”
    Karnowski nodded solemnly. “Karnowski has strict instructions from Ms. Siggenbottom—before she spoke of corn dogs. We take fight to them.”
    â€œAnd how do we do that?” Lenore asked next.
    â€œYou obviously need my sage advice.” The Baron stepped forward. Away from his women, he seemed far more animated. “I can fly over the city looking for clues. Lenore can use her psychic powers. Karnowski can quiz his many ghostly informants.”
    Karnowski raised his hand for silence. “None of that will work. According to Ms. Siggenbottom, Lenny must lead the way.”
    â€œReally?” The Baron regarded Lenny with perhaps a bit too much attention. “Our new recruit becomes more interesting by the moment.”
    â€œOf course!” Lenore looked at Lenny with an alarming intensity. “You know things you do not realize. And we will have to discover every one of them, before what happened to Withers and Ms. Siggenbottom overcomes us all.”
    A part of Lenny wanted to object to this whole conversation. But how could he argue about something he—by definition—couldn’t know? He decided he might as well start walking.
    â€œThe night calls me!” the Baron added enthusiastically as he fell in behind Lenny’s lead. “I need to get out in the open air.”
    Lenny agreed. He found this sub-basement oppressive. He tried to think how he had felt in the past, just before he had encountered runaway meteors or herds of lemmings. A tingling in his toes? A strange foreboding? He remembered, just before he met that mermaid, he had been thinking how much he was in the mood for tacos. If he could just isolate that feeling again . . .
    He stopped in front of a door with a sign that read AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY .
    â€œWe go in here,” he announced to his own surprise.

Chapter Six
    â€œHuh. Karnowski has never noticed this door before.”
    â€œNone of us have,” Lenore remarked with great portent. She tried the knob. It didn’t budge.
    â€œIf I may?” The Baron stepped forward and leaned against the door. It opened with a loud clang and the sound of rending metal. “This is why you need a vampire, despite what certain females say.”
    Lenore did not seem impressed. “Lenny, if you would?”
    Really? It was one thing to discover doors, another thing entirely to lead the way through to whatever was on the other side of them. But he was part of a team now. Everybody else knew what they were doing. He could pretend that he knew what was doing, too.
    He led the way again, walking into a long, straight access tunnel built with gray cinder-block walls. Small lights, suspended from the ceiling every twenty feet or so, barely illuminated a painted yellow line that led down the middle of the floor.
    Ending where? Lenny wondered. He guessed they were no longer under the building that housed Terrifitemps. Heck, they were probably no longer on the same city block. Did these tunnels parallel the subway? Or maybe they followed some ancient drainage system, or accessed some underground cables. Would the others know any more?
    â€œA minute,” Karnowski said just behind his shoulder. Lenny looked back at the tall, skeletal