Retribution
The situation began to feel more hopeful as Princess Verumi took off to lecture Prince Porodor and make him regret being born. Cissy’s small crew, with Wylo and Taro’s family decided to hunker down and await whatever was going to happen in the little white house.
“Do you think your cousin can get us freed from this mess?” Cissy asked Suki.
“Verumi has a very forceful personality. But she hates Porodor nearly as much as he hates her. Her rank in the clan is equal to his.” Suki looked out the window nervously after answering.
Crocodile Guy shimmered back into visibility.
“The space whales are on our side,” he said. “They have been talking about the situation amongst themselves. They are very intelligent, maybe more so than me. But they don’t have much in the way of mechanisms or powers to help us in any way.”
“Well, that’s a good thing,” said Cissy, understating the fact of it by a factor of a million.
“You really think the space whales are smarter than the average Nebulon?” Suki asked Crocodile Guy.
“They have a collective intelligence. Anything one whale learns is almost instantly known to all of them. And they are discussing things all the time. Only a few Nebulons with Psionic powers know that they talk like that. And the mind-readers among your people generally keep their knowledge of whale talk to themselves.”
“That figures. The warlords and royalty generally punish and limit that kind of power among our people.” Suki frowned.
“Judging by their statements of philosophy and rationality, they are very wise, very empathetic, and possessed of an inner peace far greater than any I have encountered among any humanoid species in the galaxy,” Crocodile Guy said.
The group awaiting punishment engaged for a while in the Nebulonin games of Phokkocaraht and Akkohrahtia for the remainder of the afternoon. The Earther nearest-equivalent games would be checkers and tiddlywinks.
Along about supper time Crocodile Guy had more news via whale observations.
“I am afraid things did not go well for Princess Verumi. The whale saw her confront Porodor, become exceedingly angry, and she threw ceremonial dinnerware at his head. He responded by yelling and having his honor guard throw their ceremonial halberds at her. She received two flesh wounds and still managed to escape capture or being killed. The guards are searching for her now, not realizing that the space whale is helping her hide from them.” Crocodile Guy delivered it in a deadpan voice.
“Ooh! I iz maddening up!” declared Friday.
Diznee, sensing the little Lupin’s distress, put her arms around the puppy girl’s neck to calm her down.
“The Prince has dispatched an execution squad to deal with all of us,” said Crocodile Guy.
“Oh, good grief!” said Cissy in answer.
“Can the whale hide us?” Suki asked Crocodile Guy.
“It says to get the condemned into the tailward corners of the house.”
“Tahkaarac nah timbuhran,”said Taro. “Ahckah na Saronac sah!”
“What did he say?” Cissy looked at Suki.
“He says we do what the whale says. He and his family will deal with the squad and send them away.”
So, Cissy, Suki, Friday with Diznee around her neck, and Waylo took up positions along the tailward wall. Taro, Sonno, and their sons put themselves in between the door and the wall where the prisoners stood. A section of the floor bulged and grew like a blooming vegetable and formed itself into a new interior wall, concealing the prisoners, and shortening the room in ways that were barely discernable to anyone who hadn’t seen the transformation take place. Crocodile Guy made himself disappear once again.
When the execution squad showed up, they confronted Taro with a lot of angry yelling in the clakkity-clack-ur-ack language of the Nebulons. Suki didn’t translate and no one was even breathing loudly behind the partition. Then they heard what could easily have been some sort of shooting and Taro’s voice was not heard again. Friday hugged Diznee tightly to keep her silent.
There followed further thumping and dragging and scraping sounds, followed by utter silence as the executioners gathered things and left, presumably to find the escaped prisoners.
When the secret wall finally came down, only Crocodile Guy stood in the empty room with a stunned look on his holographic face.
“Taro sacrificed himself and his family to help us escape.”
Diznee now sobbed uncontrollably.
Suki looked grim. “It is up to us to make sure his sacrifice was not for nothing.”
Catch a Falling Star 