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Canto Fifteen – Inside the Structure

Nervously Farbick crept forward into the depths of a dark interior hallway.  What was the cause of the crazed Galtorrian monster that killed one cadet and contributed to the death of another?  Was some terrible brain parasite working on the population of Galtorr Prime?  Would it kill Tellerons too?

Starbright was following him behind and to the right.  Biznap was behind and to the left.

“Do you think that was the last of the living Galtorrians?” asked Biznap, apparently to anyone who could answer.

“There were billions of people on this planet the last time we surveyed it,” answered Starbright.  “If one was still alive, there is a very good chance that others are still alive as well.”

“We need to find someone alive to talk to,” said Farbick, peering into the darkness ahead.

“If we find someone, I will skortch him!” declared Commander Biznap.

“We have too much we need to find out about this planet and the shape it’s in,” said Farbick coolly.   “We still need a place to live.”

“We can’t live with monsters that will try to eat us!”

“Farbick is right,” said cadet Starbright.  “We have to find someone rational enough to explain what terrible things happened to this planet.  I really don’t believe that just one terrible thing could devastate the entire planet so badly.”

“All right!  Okay!   I get it!  No skortching!  …Unless I feel any kind of threat at all.  I will vaporize them long before they can tear out my throat and eat me.”

Farbick nodded in the darkness.  He’d be happy as long as Biznap didn’t panic and skortch either Farbick or Starbright by mistake.

“There!” cried Starbright pointing.  In the distance ahead, a door was being pulled open by whatever was on the other side and inside the room.

“Stay in the shadows,” whispered Farbick.

“They can see body heat, remember?” scolded Biznap.

“Have your pistols ready,” suggested Starbright, though both of the others obviously out-ranked her.

“We can not only see you three, but we can hear you perfectly,” came a deep voice from the shadows above them.  “You are on our security monitor right now.  Put down your scary weapons and walk through the door with your empty hands on your heads.”

“Yes, on your ugly, Telleron fin-heads!” said a second voice, one obviously more high-pitched and irritating.  The kind of voice you would expect a monster to have if he were effeminate or otherwise girly yet not female.  Not that Farbick was prejudiced against any of those things, but he knew the voice of a bully and a coward when he heard one.  The late Commander Sleez had a high-pitched totally annoying voice like that.

“We run in shooting?” Biznap asked.  “They won’t be expecting an attack.”

“Yes they will,” said Farbick.  “It is an obvious trap.  We either surrender and walk in, or we head back out and fight our way back to the Golden Wing.”

“I vote going back!” said Biznap hurriedly.

“You don’t have to vote, Commander,” pointed out Farbick.  “You can command us.  But I think we should try to find out whatever we can.  I will surrender myself while you and Starbright go back.”

“You’ve been listening to Harmony’s sermons from the Bible about self sacrifice,” accused Biznap.

“Yes, well, not everything your Earther mate says makes me laugh,” said Farbick in return.  “Her old book has some practical applications too.”

“Okay,” said Biznap, “you and I go forward and Starbright goes back.”

“No, sirs,” insisted Starbright.  “I am not going back alone.  I am the most expendable Telleron here.  Besides, if I went back alone who would fly the Golden Wing?”

“Good point,” said Biznap.

“I thought you had flight training,” said Farbick.

“No, that was cadet Buckabuck,” said Starbright.  “Whootney could navigate and do repairs.  I am a cook and a capable armsman.”

“We’re all going through that door,” said Biznap.  “Be brave.”  He put his skortch ray down first and started towards the door.  Farbick was a little amazed right then.  Biznap was a better leader than he was given credit for.  He led from in front, and took the risks he also expected his followers to take.  Farbick put his weapon down, then so did Starbright.  They quietly followed Biznap through that terrible door.

*****

Canto Thirteen – The Plaza of Bones in the Ruined Palaces

Farbick couldn’t see Starbright, but he knew she was immediately to his left as they moved towards a large pile of skeletons and rotting corpses.  He could hear her soft footfalls.  He was fairly confident in her abilities, something he couldn’t say about most Tellerons.

“Look at these bodies, Mister Farbick,” Starbright whispered through the hostile environment suit comm.  “Some of them have been slain violently by the others in this plaza, but some, like this group of three armed lizard men have no visible wounds or other indications of death by violence.  The toxic atmosphere by itself is not sufficient to explain the deaths of three such otherwise healthy individuals.”

“Could they have died of disease?” Farbick guessed.

“I don’t know the difference between a healthy-looking lizard man and a sick one, I guess,” she responded.  “But I can see nothing wrong with them.”

Suddenly, without warning, a large, muscular lizard man with a full Galtorrian dragon crest on his scaly head leaped up onto a marble portico and glared directly at the invisible searchers.  He snorted and sniffed the air.

“Stay quiet,” whispered Biznap from somewhere to the right.  “If he can’t see us, he won’t know we’re here.”

But before Farbick could even doubt the reasoning behind the order, the naked Galtorrian warrior was on the back of an invisible Telleron, raking him with claws and biting at what was probably the throat.

“Skortch him!” cried Biznap, the voice coming from a direction that proved the lizard man’s victim was not Biznap.

Skortch rays are not in themselves visible, but as the beam slashed outward from where Biznap was obviously wielding his ray pistol, there was a visible line of sparkles and flashes as the disintegration effect acted on small particles the air was obviously laden with.  The shape of a Telleron  flared into view as Biznap’s ray connected with one of the cadets who had the misfortune to be standing between Biznap and the monster.  The cadet screamed as he dissolved.  The other cadet screamed as he died of his wounds and became visible in the clutches of the lizard man.  The invisibility cloak, like the hostile environment suit it was attached to, was shredded and shorted out.  It obviously had not stopped the predatory lizard man from knowing exactly where his prey was.

The lizard man lifted the cadet’s corpse to throw at either Biznap or one of the other two.  He was looking directly at Farbick as Farbick uttered a brief prayer to Charlie the Crocodile God that Biznap was not now between him and the target, and then squeezed off a vaporizing shot that disintegrated the lizard man and the cadet’s body as well.

Biznap immediately uncloaked.

“Well, that was unpleasant,” he said.

Starbright also uncloaked.  “Mister Farbick,” she said, “you may as well uncloak.  Invisibility is useless against creatures such as these.”

“What do you mean, cadet?” Farbick said as he uncloaked.

“They obviously have heat vision of some sort.  They can’t see us with visible light, but they sense us almost as if they can see us.  They may have developed some kind of natural thermal imaging in their eyes.  Or the creature could have had bionic eyes built in.  Didn’t you see the way his eyes flashed with the color red?”

“Yes,” said Biznap.  “I wish I had known that before accidentally skortching what’s-his- name.”

“The two cadets were Buckabuck and Whootney, Commander, sir,” said Starbright sadly.

“Oh, yes, well…. I have heard of them, of course,” said Biznap in what could only be interpreted as a guilty voice.

“I’m sure they regret your not knowing more about them than you do, Commander,” Farbick said.  He also believed those red shirts weren’t standard issue for a very good reason.

*****

Brekka and the Man-eating Plant (version one)

Brekka and the Man-eating Plant (version two)