Shawn took the stage again. “OK guys. Next up we have a classic Camp Acorn favorite story. This is a story about a terrible, evil, and vile monster known as the ‘Medicrin’.”

Several of the campers gave out a big ‘whoop’ with this announcement. I guessed it was an annual camp story. Nate stepped into the circle and sat on the tree stump. 

The Medicrin!

“Once upon a time there was a small village that had a big problem.” Nate told us. “The village’s problem was that it was terrorized by a monster. They called this monster….the Medicrin!”

Ben leaped into the circle landing on all fours and startled everyone. He growled viciously as he crawled around in the sand, bearing his teeth and lunging at the campers who withdrew with screams and laughs. He was wearing only a pair of dark shorts and his skin had been painted brown. His eyes and nose had been blackened, his hair spiked up, he was wearing ferocious looking teeth and he had what looked like blood around his mouth. He looked a bit like a werewolf. I felt my son stiffen beside me.

“It’s only pretend.” I whispered. “It’s Ben.” He nodded as he watched but he still crawled into my lap. I wrapped my arms protectively around him and I felt him relax into me.

“The savage Medicrin would come out of the thick woods in the dead of night, find a sleeping child in the village and gobble it up!”

The Medicrin launched into a frantic ‘feeding frenzy’ as he grabbed Nate’s leg and pretended to maul it as he growled and tore. Nate watched seemingly unperturbed until the Medicrin stopped and looked up at Nate.

“Are ya done?” Nate asked patiently.

The Medicrin nodded and smiled. The crowd laughed.

“Of course the villagers lived in constant terror and sadness.” Nate continued the story. “They had tried everything but the Medicrin was too strong and too clever for their traps.”

The Medicrin stood up on his hind legs, hands on his hips, threw back his head and gave out a loud howl! My son shivered. Back down on all fours the Medicrin sneered and snapped at the campers as they shrieked and giggled.

“Finally the villagers decided that they needed expert help. They put an ad in the national newspaper and soon enough they got three applicants. The first monster expert they hired got caught in his own trap.” 

The Medicrin stopped in his tracks and giggled like a little girl. The audience snickered. 

“The second expert was eaten within thirty seconds of meeting the Medicrin.” 

The Medicrin licked his finger tips and rubbed his belly. The campers chuckled. 

“But the final expert was a young man by the name of Will.” 

Will, the counselor, stepped into the glow of the campfire. He folded his arms and stared at the Medicrin who gave out a loud dismissive snort.

“Now, by this time the villagers had pretty much given up hope of ever getting rid of the Medcrin. But the one thing that Will had that the other experts didn’t have, besides his handsome looks and incredible intellect, was ‘The Book of Terrible, Evil and Vile Monsters’.”

Will ran his fingers through his Mohawk hair cut, smoothed out his goatee, and then grabbed a pocket book out of his shorts. He flipped it open and ran his finger down the pages as he mumbled to himself.

“Here it is! The chapter on the Medicrin!” Will looked up with excitement.

“Will read the chapter thoroughly. What he found out was that the Medicrin, besides liking the taste of human flesh, it also liked to eat loons and sugar. So Will came up with a plan. He dug a deep hole in the center of the village.”

Will pantomimed digging frantically. He grunted and groaned as he did so.

“In the pit he placed a live loon that he had spent three days trying to capture.”

It’s a loony plan…but it might work?!

Will held his hands outstretched and a wooden duck was thrown into his grasp. We all giggled at that. Will plopped the duck into his hole and then scampered a few feet away, sat down, and covered his eyes, peeking out every couple of seconds.

“Then…he hid and waited. That night the Medicrin came into town. He sniffed the air. He could smell something scrumptious…” The Medicrin slowly crawled towards the loon, raising his head and sniffing the air. 

“The Medicrin could smell the delicious loon, but he could also smell….danger…” 

The monster sniffed over top of the loon pit but suddenly stopped. He shook his head. 

“So the Medcrin grabbed a village child and ate him instead.” 

The beast gnawed at Nate’s leg for a few seconds, stopped and gave out a loud burp. All the kids giggled at that one.

“In Will’s second attempt to catch the demon he filled the pit with twenty bags of sugar. And again the Medicrin was tempted but the overwhelming smell of danger kept the creature from falling for the trap.”

“Uh, uh, uh!” the Medicrin sang as he waggled his finger over the pit and then, again, chewed on Nate’s leg.

Who can resist?

“By this time the villagers wanted to throw Will into the pit as bait for the Medicrin. But Will begged for one more try. Well, the villagers didn’t have any other options, so they told Will he only had one more chance. Will decided he would put the loon AND the sugar into the pit and see if the Medicrin could resist the temptation of both of these. So that is what he did…”

Will placed the loon in the pit and mimed dumping bags and bags of sugar into the pit. 

“But immediately he saw that the loon proceeded to eat all the sugar! Every single grain of it!”

“NOOOOO!” shouted an anguished Will as he beat his chest and threw his hands towards the sky.

“But it was too late. The Medicrin approached and there was nothing Will could do but sit back and watch and hope. The devil sniffed the air. He smelled sugar. He smelled loon. He teetered over the edge of the pit, indecisively.” 

The creature hovered over top of the loon rubbing his claws together. But then he stopped.

“But the beast also smelled….danger!”

The Medicrine turned and began to crawl away when he stopped again. He turned back toward the pit.

OOF!

“This time however, the smell of the loon and the sugar was just too much for the demon to resist. He dove into the pit and grabbed hold of the gorged loon and began to feast ferociously. It had no idea what hit him when Will rained down upon him and exterminated him with a diving elbow drop!”


Will flew through the air and landed on a squealing Ben. The crowd went wild with applause and laughter. Will got up and dusted off his pants and then folded his arms across his chest. Nate waited patiently for the noise to die down. 

“So the moral of the story, dear campers, is that…..’A loon full of sugar helps the Medicrin go down!'”

Painful.