As humans and monsters settled in, noise and smoke filled the stadium. Lethal Lake burnt with noxious crackers. A wafting, stinky rotten-egg smell hung in the air. The skies were laden with coils of particulators, their thick smoke curling about the humans, trying to find cracked oxysuits and lungs to infect.
A moment later, the stadium shook. Silence washed over us all. A whirlpool formed near Terrible Treacle. A jelly-like substance oozed out. It kept rising, like a black bubble of oil, becoming the size of a small hill.
The jelly giant had bits and pieces and things stuck in its gelatinous belly. It burped. Noxious fumes flew out of its crater-like vast mouth.
Trash Rajah was here.
‘Clap in joy for the Kindly Kingpin of Trash!’ Junkfan shouted in the mike.
Humans cheered, hooted, clapped. Monstersquitoes tittered. Fatflies buzzed. Plastocrocs snapped their plastic-filled gums. Bloatrats squeaked. Dogroaches howled.
Rajah’s cavernous mouth slobbered onto the Terrible Treacle Treat, his mandibles sucking, tentacles pulling in solids from the treat, into his endless mouth. He guzzled, finishing it up in one hungry gulp.
It was too much food, even for him. His stomach rumbled.
‘Oh, it’s happening,’ exclaimed Meera. I nodded, my heart drumming like a puppy. Will he explode? He bloated and bloated.
A big, fat burp thundered out, sending a few monsterquitoes spiraling towards the cliff and into Lethal Lake. Eighteen little newborn Virulates rose up into the evening skies of Pretty City. Trash Rajah gargled in pleasure.
‘More!’ Trash Rajah thundered. Minions scurried towards him, dumping more food into his vast mouth.
‘And now, for today evening’s main show! The public destruction of cleanorists!’ shouted Junkfan. As if on cue, Trash Rajah puked sludge all over across the ground.
‘Ugh!’ the mayor cried, looked up at his king. He quickly changed his sentence. ‘I mean thank you for your kind approval, O Vast Mountain of Hope!’
Excerpted from Kungfu Aunty versus Garbage Monsters by Shweta Taneja. Published by Talking Cub (the children’s imprint of Speaking Tiger Books). Rs 299.
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