The Chupacabras of the Río Grande Read online

  A blue blur rose into the air in front of him. Two red wings came beating up into his face.

  “AHHHH!”

  “Elliot! Relax! It’s just Jersey!” Uchenna was laughing.

  Jersey settled in Elliot’s lap and looked up at him, blinking his big yellow eyes. Elliot exhaled and stroked the soft fur on Jersey’s head.

  The plane suddenly roared to life. The doors locked with a loud click. They began to taxi down the school parking lot toward the street.

  “¡Nos vamos a Texas, vaqueros!” shouted Professor Fauna over the roar of the engine. Then, in a horrible Western accent, he repeated himself in the language of cowboys from old TV shows: “Vamoose, buckaroos!”

  Elliot settled back with a sigh, strapping himself in again. The Phoenix picked up speed as it reached the end of the lot, but the professor didn’t yank back on the yoke to lift it into the air. He was busy fiddling with the dials of the radio.

  “We need to find the perfect music, amigos míos!” he exclaimed.

  “Excuse me?” Uchenna said, indignant. “When did you get a radio in this plane?!”

  “It seems our Muckleshoot friends at the Boeing plant installed it.* Now, to face the chupacabras, we must get into the right mood.”

  Elliot’s eyes went wide as he looked through the cockpit window. He pointed, terrified.

  Dozens of cars were moving slowly through the school zone.

  The plane was going to drive right into the traffic.

  “Professor!” Elliot shouted. “Pull up!”

  Suddenly, a song began blasting from the speakers: trumpets, guitars, violins, and emotional singing in Spanish.

  “Mariachi!” Uchenna shouted. “I love mariachi music!”

  Then, just as they were about to plow into the passing cars, Professor Fauna yanked back hard on the yoke, and they rose above the street, their wheels almost grazing the top of a city bus.

  The Phoenix shuddered under the strain. Elliot thought he might pass out.

  The professor and Uchenna didn’t seem to care. They were singing together, in unison with the radio:

  “¡México, lindo y querido!”

  As the trumpets crowed and the guitar was strummed dramatically, Elliot stroked Jersey and sighed.

  They were going to Texas. All the way down to the border.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Uchenna looked out the window at misty green peaks below them.

  “Those are the Appalachian Mountains, aren’t they?”

  “Yes,” Professor Fauna said. “We are making very good time.”

  Elliot was pretty sure they were making unrealistically good time, but he decided to change the subject back to mythical creatures. “So, what else do we need to know about chupacabras?”

  “Well,” Professor Fauna replied, “the word first appears in 1995, in Puerto Rico. Over the course of a few months, sheep and goats were found dead, drained of blood, in the town of Canóvanas.”

  Elliot brightened at this grisly news. “Oh! No wonder I hadn’t heard of them. They’re pretty new!”

  “In truth, Elliot,” Professor Fauna said, “these creatures have, like all animals, been around for millions of years. But the name chupacabras is new. Twenty years before they were identified in Canóvanas, the Puerto Rican town of Moca lost much livestock to a being the residents called el vampiro de Moca.”

  “The Moco vampire?” Uchenna tried translating. She had started attempting to pick up a little Spanish from Professor Fauna, since they were spending so much time together.

  “Close, but not quite. Moca, not moco. Moco means ‘booger.’ The booger vampire would not be very scary. And the chupacabras is closely tied to what people fear. After the 1995 incident, people throughout Latin America began reporting similar attacks. But in most cases, there were no chupacabras. When people are afraid, they give their fear a name. Sometimes, you are afraid of something and you don’t know why, or it is too complicated to talk about. So, you come up with another cause of your fear. You might be afraid of hunger, or crime, of your society changing, or even of the government. But you call your fear el chupacabras.”

  “Wait,” Elliot said. “Are you telling us chupacabras are not real?”

  “No! I only mean that many of these reports are not true. For example, I am certain that chupacabras do not kill their prey when they suck their blood. If they did, many more animals would be dead, and the chupacabras would have been hunted to near extinction, like the wolf. My guess is that they are much more like a vampire bat: Their prey would have to be asleep and would likely not even know when they woke up that the chupacabras had been there.”

  “But you said sheep and goats were found dead,” Uchenna objected. “And that rancher dude’s cow was definitely dead.”

  “Ah yes,” said Professor Fauna. “This is confusing to me. This is why we must go to Laredo to investigate.”

  “Because now chupacabras seem to be killing things,” Elliot clarified. “Yeah, that sounds like a perfect time to go check them out.”

  Elliot stared out the window and reconsidered every choice he’d made in his life that had brought him to this moment. Jersey crawled into his backpack to sleep, and Uchenna pulled out a smartphone.

  “When did you get a phone?” Elliot asked.

  “My birthday,” she told him. “I bugged my mom and dad. Told them it would be perfect for doing research online. Which is what I’m doing now.”

  “Research into what?”

  “Laredo. Listen to this. It sounds like Laredo, Texas, has got a pretty interesting history. It was founded as part of New Spain. When Mexico gained its independence, Laredo rebelled and became the capital of the Republic of the Río Grande.”

  “I’ve never heard of the Republic of the Río Grande,” said Elliot.

  “That’s because it only existed for one year,” said Uchenna. “The Mexican military retook it. But then in the Mexican-American War, the United States took Laredo—and all of Texas and California, too.”

  “Texas and California are states,” Elliot informed her.

  Uchenna laughed. “Yeah, but they used to be part of Mexico.”

  Professor Fauna tapped some buttons and turned some dials that didn’t seem to do anything. “Yes, children. For one hundred and fifty years, Texas, California, Nevada, Utah, and most of the Southwest have been part of the United States. For the thirty years before that, they were part of Mexico. For three hundred years before that, they were claimed by Spain, though many had never even heard of Spain! The people along the Río Grande lived like they had for six thousand years, members of Coahuiltecan nations like the Carrizos and Comecrudos. But for that land and those tribes, the borders and rulers keep changing.”

  “That sounds confusing,” said Elliot.

  “Yes,” agreed Professor Fauna. “When an army shows up and tells you you’re suddenly in a different country, even though you haven’t moved at all, it can be very confusing indeed.”

  “Check this out,” Uchenna said. “After Laredo became part of the United States, the people of Laredo asked the United States government if they could rejoin Mexico. When the US refused, many of them moved across the Río Grande and founded the city of Nuevo Laredo, on the other side of the border. Now they are sister cities. Families have members on both sides.”

  “Wow,” said Elliot. “Can they visit each other?”

  Professor Fauna answered. “It used to be easier to go back and forth. Now everyone must have the right papers and status and so on. Some officials on the US side want even more separation than just the river and the border patrol. Look out the window. We are almost there.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Uchenna peered over Elliot, out the window of the Phoenix. In front of them, a broad river snaked its way between two sprawling cities. “Laredo,” Elliot said, pointing out the city to the north.


  “And Nuevo Laredo,” Uchenna said, pointing out the city to the south.

  Professor Fauna crawled out of his seat and started rummaging on the floor behind it. Without him at the controls, the Phoenix began to pitch and yaw, up and down, back and forth.

  Uchenna quickly unstrapped herself and slid behind the steering column to keep the plane steady.

  “You know you don’t have a license,” Elliot scolded her.

  “I’m not sure he does, either,” Uchenna shot back as she struggled with the yoke.

  “¡Los encontré!” the professor shouted, brandishing a pair of binoculars. “My young friends, look more closely.”

  Elliot took the binoculars and peered through them toward the river. On the southern side, Nuevo Laredo was built right up to the wide waterway, which marked the border between the United States and Mexico. But on the northern side, the city of Laredo was set back, with some low trees and chaparral between the buildings and the water’s edge.

  “So, is there a fence or a wall or anything?” Elliot asked, scouring the banks of the river for some sort of boundary between the two countries.

  “Well, for many years the only barrier was water—that river you see—which we call the Río Grande,” Professor Fauna said. “But in some places, they have built a fence. Look over there.”

  Elliot followed his outstretched finger to what looked like a college campus on the American side. There, a tall, black, wrought-iron fence, with sharp, curved spikes at the top, ran alongside the scrubby desert.

  “And now,” said Professor Fauna, “look there.”

  Uchenna saw it first, even without binoculars. She gave the airplane’s controls back to the professor, tapped Elliot on the shoulder, and said, “There.”

  Next to one stretch of the wrought-iron fence, huge machines had torn great holes in the earth. Part of the fence had been ripped down, and towering slabs of concrete replaced it, casting a long shadow over the dry ground.

  “They’re building a border wall,” she said quietly.

  “Así es. Correct.” Professor Fauna began to circle the Phoenix away from the river. “We should not land nearby. It would draw too much attention. I think that highway, just outside Laredo, makes better sense.”

  Elliot double-checked his seat belt and got a firm grip on the backpack. Landing was not one of Professor Fauna’s strengths.

  The professor pushed forward on the yoke. The plane dropped toward the blacktop below. Elliot closed his eyes, gritted his teeth, and dug his fingers into the armrest of his seat.

  A minute later, the Phoenix settled onto the highway with the slightest of jolts, its motor sighing softly as it shut off. The brakes engaged gradually and smoothly.

  Elliot opened his eyes in shock. They were rolling to a stop. Nothing bad had happened.

  “What?!” exclaimed Uchenna. She looked out the window, slightly disappointed. “No plowing through the creosote? No smashing through cactuses?”

  Elliot coughed. “Cacti.”

  Just then, a metallic groan shuddered throughout the Phoenix, and both its wings fell off onto the asphalt.

  “Yes!” Uchenna shouted.

  Elliot shook his head, his mouth suddenly dry. “What if they’d fallen off when we were flying over the Appalachians? We would be so dead right now.”

  In response, Professor Fauna spun a dial on the radio until the voice of a DJ came blaring out in a mix of English and Spanish.

  “Chequen sus cabras and cows, folks! Get them in the shade si no están muertos. It’s gonna be a hot one aquí en Laredo today!”

  “Ah, Tex-Mex,” the professor said with a smile. “Welcome to the border, my friends!”

  CHAPTER SIX

  Cars zoomed by the Phoenix as it rattled its way, wingless, down the two-lane highway. The air was hot and dry—the kind of hot and dry that makes you want to sit on your front porch and drink soda from a glass bottle. Jersey clambered out of his backpack to look out the windows. The fields around them were filled with sagebrush and stubby acacia trees. Black, shiny birds swooped from low branches to the edges of the highway, looking for trash to peck at.

  “Look at that desert,” said Elliot, as the heat rose in shimmery waves from the dry, shrubby ground.

  “This is the chaparral,” Professor Fauna said. “Not quite desert, but close.”

  Uchenna pointed at the shiny black birds. “Those are the weirdest crows I’ve ever seen.”

  “Not crows. Grackles,” Professor Fauna replied. “You should hear the noise they make. They sound like an old radio. Speaking of radios, listen to this classic norteño tune!”

  A swaying melody came from the Phoenix’s small speakers. Accordion, guitar strummed lightly with the fingertips, an acoustic bass.

  “It’s a little corny,” said Elliot.

  “Yeah,” Uchenna replied. “And I love it.”

  “You love this and you love heavy metal?” Elliot asked, incredulous.

  “And rap and country music and gospel and—”

  “I get it! You like music.”

  “No,” said Uchenna, fixing him with a stare, “I love music.” Then she turned up the volume, so the walking bass line and the squeeze of the accordion filled the hot little plane. And Uchenna started to make up words to go along with the instrumental tune:

  Oh, here we go

  To Old Laredo,

  Capital of the Río Grande.

  Just watch your step,

  Or the sucker of goats

  Will suck blood from your hand.

  Or your foot.

  Or your neck.

  Or your face.

  Or your—

  “Uchenna!” Elliot said.

  Uchenna grinned and shrugged. “Sorry.”

  HONNNNNNNK!

  A deafening horn blast made Professor Fauna swerve onto the shoulder of the little highway, spitting up rocks from the Phoenix’s three wheels. Jersey squealed and dove back into his backpack. With a whoosh of air, a giant truck came barreling past. The tiny, wingless airplane shuddered and swerved in the draft of air that the truck created.

  “¡Qué barbaridad! That man is driving like a maniac!” cried Professor Fauna, trying to keep the plane steady on the narrow shoulder of the two-lane highway.

  HONNNNNNNK!

  Another eighteen-wheeler came roaring past. The walls of the tiny plane shook. This truck was identical to the first, with a shiny black cab and a long silver trailer. Dust billowed in its wake, coating the windshield of the Phoenix.

  Professor Fauna swerved back and forth, trying to see through the cloud of dust.

  HONNNNNNNK!

  “¡Palabrota!” the professor shouted. “What is this, a tractor-trailer convention?!”

  A third giant semi with a shiny black cab and a silver body came thundering by. Elliot stuck his head against the side window. “Look!” he called.

  “I wish I could!” Professor Fauna shouted back, trying to peer through the dust-coated windshield. “I can see nothing!”

  CRUNNNCH!

  All the passengers of the Phoenix were thrown forward against the controls console—except Jersey, who was plastered onto the windshield. The little plane shuddered to a halt.

  “For example,” said Uchenna, “you didn’t see the ditch you just drove into?”

  The plane’s front right wheel was wedged in a drainage ditch that ran along the side of the highway.

  “Precisely,” said Professor Fauna. “I did not see that.”

  Elliot threw open the door of the little airplane and hopped out. “Quick, look!”

  Uchenna and the professor clambered from the plane as quickly as they could. They followed the direction of Elliot’s outstretched finger.

  Their expressions became as hard as the dirt of the desert.

  “I
should have known,” Professor Fauna muttered.

  “Yup,” said Uchenna. “Of course.”

  “Those,” Elliot said, gesturing at the snake-like S on the back of the semi that was rumbling away in a cloud of dust, “are Schmoke Industries trucks.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  “But what are the Schmoke brothers doing down here?” asked Uchenna. “Do you think they came when they saw the TV report about the chupacabras?”

  Professor Fauna said, “Perhaps. But then why did they bring three enormous trucks? What sinister scheme requires that kind of hardware?”

  “I’m sure we’ll find out soon enough.” Elliot shuddered.

  Just then, they saw a little blue shape bound out of the airplane. The bright sun of South Texas lit up Jersey like a set of gemstones—a lapis-lazuli body with two ruby wings. He bounded across the hard-packed dirt, between sage-green bushes and stubby mesquite trees. The grackles croaked at him.

  “They do sound like old radios,” said Uchenna. “Like they’ve got static in their voices. And they look like someone spilled oil on their backs.”

  Jersey crouched in front of a grackle and growled at it, deep in his little throat. The bird flew away. But Jersey kept growling at . . . at nothing, it appeared.

  “Uh, what’s he doing?” asked Uchenna.

  Suddenly, Jersey bounded off into the chaparral. “Wait!” Uchenna called. “Jersey!”

  “He is probably chasing a jackrabbit,” said Professor Fauna.

  “Oh. That’s okay,” said Elliot.

  “Or maybe a rattlesnake,” the professor added.

  “What?! Jersey!” Elliot called. “Jersey, stop!”

  Elliot ran a few steps after Jersey, then thought about the rattlesnake and stopped, then decided that it was worth risking his life for Jersey, and then tripped and stumbled directly into a barrel cactus. “YEOWW!” he shrieked.

  Elliot walked back to the professor and Uchenna, clutching his arm. Long spines stuck out of his skin like acupuncture needles. As the professor helped Elliot pluck them out, Jersey came trotting up beside them.