Zadi is part zombie, part fairy with a little bit of robot, which makes her a misfit monster. She lives with other misfit monsters, with their quirky parts in their makeshift town. They survive by hunting at the nearby hunting grounds taking items discarded by humans and making them into something useful. Hunting is risky because they could be captured by humans. Zadi is an excellent hunter and maker, but now she’s finding it difficult.
Something unusual has happened. There have been no new deliveries to the hunting grounds. This means there are no new items which can be used to recycle into something useful, and they are beginning to worry and fight with each other.
Can Zadi come up with a plan which will help the misfit monsters and bring them together as a community?
Enter the world of the misfit monsters, their quirky lives, and be part of their fun and adventures.
Extract
***
Zadi screamed and dropped the rope. The pulley landed heavily on her right foot, rope tangled in a mess in front of her.
“Ow,” she screamed and jumped up and down as the pain rattled up her robot legs. Shutting her fairy eyes tightly against the pain.
“Oh, are you all right?”
Zadi knew that voice. She opened her eyes a little. It was Tamra. Her friend had a cheeky smile, dancer’s legs, pointed ears that stuck out, and long dark hair.
“You didn’t think you could go off without me?”
Zadi shook her head and took a deep breath. Her foot throbbed with a dull beat. She just knew it would hinder her from today’s hunt. After all this work.
“You don’t know what I’m doing,” challenged Zadi. “How do you know you want to come along?”
Tamra huffed heavily and rolled her eyes. “I don’t need to know, whatever it is I’m in.” She tilted her head and gave a cheeky grin. “Besides, you’re breaking the rules, and I just have to be in on that.”
“You do not.” Zadi picked up the pulley with a huff.
With Tamra here now they might just get the bolt lock open, but she wanted to see if her invention would work.
“Oh, come on, Zadi. At least I didn’t tell Terant, or Mon, or Pie.”
“Well, that is something.” Zadi shook her head as she pulled the rope back through the pulley taking up the slack. Tamra couldn’t keep a secret to save her life. “You have to be quiet. Your bells are too noisy, best you stay here.”
“They are not. You haven’t even noticed!” Tamra pointed to one of the bells on her jester’s hat.
Zadi looked closely. There was some white tissue paper stuffed in the little hole of the bell.
So, that’s why I hadn’t heard her.
She had to admit this was possibly one of the cleverest things Tamra had ever done.
“So, you’re letting me come then?”
“Shhh,” hushed Zadi harshly. She rolled her eyes. It wasn’t like she had a choice now. Even if she said no, Tamra wouldn’t listen and would come along anyway. “If you make any more noise you’ll have to go back.”
Tamra made a cross on her heart. “Promise.”
“Stand back then.”
Tamra stepped out of the way. Zadi held her breath and pulled on the rope. Nothing. She tugged harder, keeping the tension tight on the rope. Just when she was thinking it wasn’t going to work, the tension forced the bolt to move. She kept pulling on the rope until the bolt was completely open.
“Yippee!” Tamra jumped up and down and clapped.
“Shhh…” Zadi hushed her half-heartedly. She was beaming that her invention had actually worked. Not that it was anything spectacular, it was a simple pulley system after all.
“Of course.” Tamra stopped jumping and clapping while Zadi unhooked her rope and pulley and put it back in her hessian bag. She didn’t need the extra weight when hunting this morning, but there was no way she was leaving it behind. Besides, it would let others know she’d broken a rule, but it would be likely stolen by other misfit monsters and claimed for their own. There was a rule of finders keepers in this town.
“Let’s go.” Tamra rushed to the gate.
Zadi was about to call her back but figured there was no point so followed quickly. “Help me.”
Together they pushed on the gate, in the center, moving the two halves apart. Zadi shivered as she looked ahead to the flat open space.
Tamra started walking off toward the hunting grounds.
“Hey, we got to close the gate,” Zadi called after her. She had thought about this plan very carefully. She didn’t need Mayor Ori to find out she had managed to open the gate and go to the hunting grounds ahead of everyone else. Zadi took out another contraption she’d made which she hadn’t named yet, but it had a huge magnet on the end. She hoped that it would work to pull the lock back in place. By hooking it up to a battery system, she’d ramped up the power of the magnet. She just hoped there was enough iron in the metal that made up the bolt for this to work.
She turned to see Tamra still skipping away. “Tamra!” Zadi quickly clamped her crooked mouth shut. She hadn’t meant to make so much noise. As if in pain she groaned.
So what if Tamra ran off, I had planned to do this by myself anyway.
Zadi put the hessian bag on the ground and rummaged around inside finding the contraption she’d finished making last night. She sneezed from the dust caught in the fibers of the bag.
“Wait for us,” the yell came from the other side of the gate.
Thank you, Lily Rose and Rachel’s Random Resources.
About the author
Lily Rose enjoys world building and creating characters for these unusual worlds. She enjoyed creating the misfit monsters world, and is looking forward to writing more of their adventures.
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