Nelson banged on Uncle Pogo’s front door, setting off the security light, until his fists turned red. “Open up! Let me in!” he shouted, but it was at least six minutes before Hoot opened the door and Crush rushed out to greet him.
“Honk! Honk! Honk!” cried Crush as he clutched Nelson’s leg and squeezed it with all his might.
“Sorry about that, old bean. Couldn’t have you breathing in all that toxic gas now, could we?” chuckled Hoot, but Nelson wasn’t listening; he was too busy trying to get across the living room with Crush clinging to his shin.
“What have you done to my uncle?” said Nelson.
“He’s not dead, if that’s what you’re thinking. Just asleep. All right for some, eh?” said Spike.
“Then why won’t he wake up?” said Nelson, with real panic in his voice.
“’Twas a ripe old stinker that Master Puff let loose from his derriere. Days may pass before the one-leg rises again,” said Miser.
“Days?” cried Nelson, his brain realizing that there was now no adult to look after him. Uncle Pogo started to snore.
“Who are you?” shouted Nelson, and the monsters fell into a stunned silence.
“And what are you doing here—farting in my uncle’s house and pushing me out like that?” he went on, trying hard to keep his voice from showing how freaked out he was.
“Is the boy sick or something? Don’t he know?” grumbled Stan, but Hoot fluttered forward and spoke on behalf of the group.
“Dear boy, it was you who made us. Or rather, I should say, you who crudely extracted us.”
“Extracted you? From what?” said Nelson.
“Your soul,” said Spike with a big sniff.
“My soul?” said Nelson.
“Is ’e gonna repeat everything we say?” snarled Stan, and Crush honked angrily in Nelson’s defense and squeezed his leg even tighter.
“Master Nelson is no doubt aware of the red marks on his back?” said Miser, now standing on the table behind Nelson.
“Oh, yeah. But I didn’t do it on purpose. I fell on a table with needles on it. It was an accident,” said Nelson. Then something occurred to him as he remembered Doody on the news. “Hang on. Did you come out of that machine? Are you…? Are you my sins?” It wasn’t the weirdest sentence he’d ever said, but it came pretty close.
“Yes, Nelly-son! Deadly sins! Deadly seven!” said Nosh enthusiastically. “I gluttony! Eat everyfing!”
“But I’m not a glutton!” said Nelson, choosing to forget how much lasagna he could eat in one go. He didn’t think he ever did much in the way of sinning at all, but he supposed that everyone did, a bit. Perhaps some people’s sins might make for scarier, less ridiculous monsters than the seven standing facing him right now. He could remember studying the sins at school, and after listing them on his fingers he decided that Hoot must be pride, Stan was obviously wrath (another word for anger), Spike was envy, Puff was sloth (which is laziness), and Crush must be lust (which, when you’re eleven, is mostly expressed as a powerful desire for things like football stickers or new sneakers). Miser, who was still stealing as many knickknacks from the mantelpiece as he could, was clearly greed. Now he came to think of it, Nelson could remember feeling most of these things over the last twenty-four hours.
“So did you not extract us in order to help you?” asked Miser.
“Help me with what?” said Nelson.
All the monsters (apart from Puff, who had gone back to sleep) groaned.
“Oh no. Please don’t talk about her. It hurts too much,” groaned Spike, clutching his chest.
“What? About who? What are you talking about?” said Nelson, but somewhere in the back of his mind the answer to his question was already there.
“Yes, I’m afraid I’m a little lost too. Do remind me—whom exactly are we talking about?” said Hoot.
“Celeste, you idiot!” barked Stan, and all the monsters howled. In fact, Stan was so angry that he punched the nearest thing to him—which happened to be Hoot—sending Hoot hurtling across the room and crashing into a piano that had been stripped of its exterior and had all its inner workings on display. You can imagine the noise Hoot made as he hit it.
All the monsters howled with the same awful howl Nelson had heard outside the house before they had come in. Nelson sympathized. He too felt like howling at the mention of Celeste’s name, but he managed to control himself enough to speak.
“How do you know about my sister?” he said, and this time it was Miser who answered.
“We share in your pain, Master Nelson, for we are born from your soul,” he wheezed, wincing as if he had just been punched in the stomach. The other monsters were still howling and clutching themselves as if struck by bellyaches, and without waiting for Nelson to say anything else, Miser continued: “This pain … It will not go away for any of us until we find her.” He seemed to be struggling to keep himself from toppling over.
“Find Celeste?” said Nelson, his voice cracking, and the animals howled again. “But they don’t know where she is,” he added, and at that all the monsters turned to look straight at him.
“We’re wastin’ time,” growled Stan, kicking the couch in anger.
Spike tottered forward to speak to Nelson. “Nelson, your soul is connected to your sister’s, and we’re connected to yours. Until we find her, we’ll all suffer this pain with you,” he said, straining to speak clearly.
“Stop da pain! Find da sister!” sobbed Nosh, tears rolling out of his tiny black eyes.
“Yes, but I can’t,” said Nelson, becoming more desperate by the second.
“We can find her,” hissed Miser, and the other monsters nodded and groaned in agreement.
“What do you mean? How is that possible?” said Nelson.
“Divining of the soul,” said Miser, and the rest of the monsters nodded again.
“How do you think we found you here, in this house, in this street so far from where you left us?” said Spike, but Nelson could not think of a reply.
“Close eyes, Nelly-son,” said Nosh, and all the monsters became still and closed their eyes too. The only sound was Uncle Pogo snoring into his fish-and-chips.
“What are you going to do?” asked Nelson, with a pain growing inside his stomach.
“To divine the soul we must focus, so we close our eyes,” said Miser, and Nelson obliged.
“Now we say ’er name,” said Stan, before taking a very deep breath.
As if under some kind of hypnotic spell, Nelson said his sister’s name. At the very same time, the monsters did too.
“Celeste.”
It was very strange to hear so many weird voices speaking in unison, but it sounded harmonious, almost musical, like the final note of a beautiful song.
There followed a peacefulness that Nelson had not expected. It was as if all his thoughts had suddenly floated out of his head. He slowly opened his eyes to see all the monsters standing as still as statues with their arms pointing in exactly the same direction. And they were humming.
“Ommmmmm,” they hummed.
“What are you all pointing at?” whispered Nelson, and all seven monsters growled at once.
“The way to Celeste.”