UGLY

Copyright (c) 2017 by Randall R. Peterson ALL RIGHTS RESERVED This is a work of fiction. All persons, locations and actions are from the author's imagination or have been used in a fictitious manner.

UGLY

By R. Peterson

Cloverdale school officials tried to get Mr. and Mrs. Huang Lee to let them call their daughter by initials or another name but they refused. Ug was an honored ancestral name in China and they were proud immigrants. The fact that Ug was born with horrible facial deformities made no difference. Surprisingly most of the other students didn’t tease … they were all terrified … for good reason.

          The first hour science classroom went as cold as the inside of an ice cream truck when Mrs. Williams read the role-call.

            “Arlene Adams?”

            “Here!”

            “Samuel Brown?”

            “Present!”

Everyone kept sneaking glances at the husky new kid, Tommy Everett; he’d only been in town about a week and was labeled an army brat and a bully by those who walked sheepishly into Cloverdale junior high school sporting black eyes and swollen noses. Tommy the Terrible as he was already being called behind his back squirmed in his seat wearing a tight white t-shirt with a box of Junior Mints rolled under one sleeve like a greaser car-hood carries his cigarettes. Ug was sitting two seats behind me, not that I looked, that would have been insane, but I knew she was there. It was as if I could feel her two dissimilar oriental eyes drilling holes into the back of my head.

            “Vicky Cartwell?”

            “Here!”

            “Allen Davis?’

            “Here!”

            “Tommy Everett?”

There was silence as Tommy sat there shaking his head in exaggerated disbelief. He was sitting on the front row under a portrait of President Lyndon B. Johnson, the place where all new students sat. Mrs. Williams paused for a moment and then called him name again. “Tommy Everett?”

Tommy looked around the classroom as if the teacher had just asked the stupidest question he’d ever heard then banged his fist on his desk. “Yo!” he blurted, then added with a smirk. “When did I become invisible … and where is the girl’s locker room?” No one laughed.

            Mrs. Williams adjusted the glasses on her nose and then stared at the new student sitting less than a yard from her. “You are requested to answer here or present when I call your name!”

Tommy stared at her for a full ten seconds before he replied slowly and loudly “Here or present!” The “You old cow!” that followed was barely more than an exhale … but most of the class heard.

Mrs. Williams ignored him and went back to the role-call. Tommy unwrapped and crammed two sticks of Juicy Fruit gum in his mouth and began to chew loudly imitating the teacher’s stilted movements.

            “Ben Johnson?”

            “Present!”

            “Lester Kelly?”

            “He’s not here today,” Vicky Cartwell replied. “I sat next to his little brother on the bus and he said Lester has the flu.”

            “Nancy Killion?”

            “Here!”

Everyone except Tommy Everett held their breath; we all knew what was coming.

            “Judy Lambford?’

            “Here!”

            “Ug Lee?”

Tommy burst out laughing. He whirled and kneeled up on his seat so that he could scan the classroom. Malicious eyes searched for the owner of the hilarious moniker. I couldn’t help myself … I looked too.

Ug was in the middle row, near the back, reading Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World. She closed the book and looked up. The near normal blue eye stared at Mrs. Williams while the much larger brown one rotated until it was aligned like a futuristic laser gun at Tommy Everett.

            “Here!” she said. Her voice was not much above a whisper but with the smothering tomb-like silence in the classroom she could have been yelling.

Tommy’s face was as white as the sheets on my mother’s clothesline as he turned and settled in his seat.

I glanced at Tommy several times during the period but his head was always buried in his arms. 

Recess came, and I was the last to leave. I was trying to finish an essay on space travel that was due on Friday. Mrs. Williams prodded Tommy out of his seat and told him about the baseball game the boys always held behind the school. After Tommy left, I got up to sharpen my pencil and saw the puddle of urine where he’d been sitting before the janitor showed up with Pine Sol to make it go away.

Tommy didn’t return after the twenty minute break. Mrs. Williams said, with what sounded like a sigh of relief, that he had gone home sick.

-------2-------

                My last class ended at three twenty. If I ran all the way home I could watch Lost in Space before I had to meet the truck at the corner of Townsend and Wallace at four thirty and pick up my sixty-four copies of the Vanishing River Tribune for my evening paper route. I had a Schwinn three-speed bicycle with crooked handlebars but the duel canvas paper-bags, thirty-two papers on each side, balanced and rode nicely across the top tube with the extra wide tires. On television you always watched the paper boys ride past on bikes and toss the papers onto the lawns or sidewalks, not so in Coverdale. Each paper was folded in half and placed between the screen and the front door unless the subscriber had a special receptacle … few did.

            I left my bike parked in front of the vacant house on Garlow while I walked across the street to deliver three papers to a group of apartments. When I came back I realized the white house with the peeling paint was no longer vacant. Tommy Everett was just pushing my bike - newspapers and all - into the neighbor’s fish pond. “Hey!” I yelled, secretly glad that he turned and ran back into the dilapidated rental home before he could beat me up. I had a hard time pulling the bike out of the water. Landscaping plants, weeds and dead water lilies tangled around the handlebars like fishing nets. When I finally got the bike onto dry ground my newspapers were gone. “Looking for these?” Ug Lee appeared and handed me the green canvas bags with Vanishing River Tribune printed in bold yellow letters on the sides. “I think I pulled them out before they got too wet!”

Before that day I don’t think I ever knew exactly where the monster-of-the-seventh-grade lived. She had only been in Cloverdale for six weeks and we all just took it for granted that the she-beast slept in the dark dungeon of a mossy castle on a foggy hill somewhere, not in an unfinished basement-house in a lot overgrown with weeds on west Garlow. I would have grabbed the newspapers and ran, but my legs felt weak. I sat down on the un-mowed lawn instead. She was right the newspapers were miraculously dry except for the two on the top. They were the overprints the newspaper company always sent along … just in case and prospective customers were interested.

            “I’ll take this one for my trouble,” Ug said pulling the soggy paper out of my hand. “You still have one extra and I’ve been wanting to find out more about the community I’m living in.”

My train of thought had derailed and didn’t know what to say. “Nice place you have here.” The instant the words left my mouth I felt like a stupid jerk.

Ug shook her head and smiled. Her lips looked like they belonged on a large sea-fish. “It was left to my family by my uncle,” she said. “My father plans to restore the gardens and the fountain when he has the time … and the money.”

            “I better go; I’m going to be late … thank you!” I gulped as I hung the bags back on my bike.

            “Thanks for the delivery, Jeffery Roland Bland.” She said as she held up her free newspaper.

I peddled away as fast as I could without actually looking like I was speeding. I don’t know how the newspapers stayed so dry I had watched the entire bike go underwater. And how did she know how many extra papers I had? I shivered as I peddled down the street. My wet tires left wiggly water lines on the sidewalk. And she knew my name … that was the scariest thing of all. She knew the name only my mother and grandmother ever called me.

-------3-------

Tommy Everett’s father Butch, was inside the glasses-in foyer of the principal’s office when I arrived at school the next morning. I could hear him and Principal Marcus Dunn arguing even from the hallway, so could most of the other arriving students, that part of Cloverdale Junior High was deserted … there’s nothing like loud angry voices  to clear a room. I picked up shouted words like “abomination” and “It’s bad enough we have to live next door to that freak!” and I hurried along also.

Tommy the Terrible was not in class, Mrs. Williams announced that he had been transferred to another home-room. I held a book in front of my face to hide my smile. Everyone was stealing glances at Ug. I couldn’t help myself; I stole a glance too and then quickly turned away. The monster of the seventh grade had her head buried in a book. I watched a tear roll down a bulging cheek from the overlarge brown eye … then I too turned away. There is a certain social order in early adolescence … hang with the wrong crowd and you become them.

The fact that Marine Corps Drill-Sergeant Butch Everett had gotten his son transferred to a different classroom seemed to embolden Tommy. I couldn’t help but remember the puddle of urine on his seat the day before; fear always brings out the worst in anyone including our hero’s children.

Tommy was next to home plate on the baseball field choosing team members for a one inning game at recess. Stan Morris was the other captain. “I’ll take the Hicks Brothers, Joe Martin and Larry Stump … you can have all the rest of these retards on your team!” Tommy looked around for approval then turned on Stan. “If you don’t like it ask for my uncle … this was his idea!” He slapped Stan playfully in the side of the head, so hard Stan’s glasses fell into the dust.

“You need to get a strap for those,” Tommy said. “You might need to see if you ever get a hit and have to run the bases.” He looked around smiling. “As if that’s ever going to happen!”

Tommy was pitching of course. The first pitch was high and to the outside. When Kevin Bates didn’t swing and declared it a ball Tommy just smiled. “Like ‘em a little closer do ya?”

The second pitch was a fastball that hit Kevin in the leg. He could barely stand as he limped to first base. After that, every player on my team swung at every pitch … no matter how outrageous. Tommy walked one, then struck out two in a row. Tom McLeary miraculously hit a fly ball to right field and it was caught by Louis Hicks. Once Tommy’s team came up to bat they never left. Tommy was just as intimidating running the bases as he was pitching. He stood directly between first and second and when he’d charge to steal second he wait till the pitcher threw then move back toward first until finally one of the basemen missed the catch then he’d run all the way home. He made all the rules … there was no arguing with him.

Mrs. Williams came out to announce that recess was over and insisted that both teams line up and shake hands to show good sportsmanship. “You need to get some water-wings on that bike of yours,” Tommy said when he slapped my hand. “What if next time you ride it into the river?”

I couldn’t help but glace toward where the girls were playing as Mrs. Williams herded us into the school. Ug sat alone on a swing set while other girls played hop scotch and jumped rope. Loneliness is worse than hunger Mother Teresa would say some years later … she was right.

-------4-------

There were two extra newspapers in my stack when I picked them up on my bike after watching Lost in Space. I was still thinking about how Greedy Dr. Smith had used an alien ring to turn all the lost space-traveler’s food into useless platinum when I saw the new subscription notice. Mr. Huang Lee didn’t surprise me; Ug had shown an interest in the soggy paper that I’d given her. It was the next name on the list that made me groan. I figured Robert “Butch” Everett was too busy destroying new recruit’s self-esteem to read the Vanishing River Tribune. This had to be Tommy’s idea.

I put off delivering to West Garlow until last. Huang or his wife had made a receptacle for the paper out of a plastic milk jug with one end cut away. They had nailed it to a post with The Vanishing River Tribune blocked in artfully with a blue Magic Marker. I slid the paper in the receptacle and was just turning toward my bike when Ug stepped out of a clump of still dormant early-April rose bushes with pruning-shears in her hand. “I convinced my mom and dad that subscribing to the local newspaper would be a great way for them to learn to speak proper English,” she said. Then she added almost as an afterthought, “although it was quite expensive.”

Every month, I had to collect for the newspaper. Three forty-five didn’t seem like a whole lot of money to me.

            “Where does your father work?’

A look of anguish crossed Ug’s deformed face. “He works for Lemont Hick’s at his garage and my mom cooks for the Hicks family and cleans their house on weekends.”

I knew the entire Hick’s clan and they were a bunch of illiterate, selfish, hillbillies … I felt sorry for anyone who had anything to do with them. If they were employing Ug’s family they were paying peanuts for wages … if anything at all.

            “You could have asked,” I told her. “I usually always have a couple of extra papers and this is almost my last stop. One half of her face smiled and it almost made up for the desolation of the other side.

            “Thank you for thinking of me,” she said. Her brown eye closed, but the blue one stayed partially open. “I don’t have too many friends.”

She turned and scuttled back toward the basement house before I could answer. You don’t have any I thought. Thank God I didn’t say it. Looking back my life has been one long list of regrets and things that I am ashamed of … something that heavy might have torn the page.

The screen door was hanging crooked on the Everett house; rusted screws were pulling out of rotted wood and it almost fell off its hinges when I opened it to slip the newspaper inside. “What did you do to our door?” Tommy had come around the side of the house and stood behind me glaring with his fists clenched.

            “I didn’t do anything,” I stammered. “It was that way when I found it.”

            “Bullshit!” He shouted so loud my ears rang. “It was just fine before you showed up!”

He jerked the paper from my hand and smiled. “Don’t bother trying to collect for this month’s paper,” he growled. “My father agreed to let me handle all of our transactions.” He added figures with his pudgy fingers and I could see the reflections of things he was going to buy with my money in his eyes. “A box of screws, wood putty and my labor … you’ll be lucky if you don’t owe us for next month’s delivery too.”

I turned and pedaled away as fast as I could on my bike. I was furious and intimidated … mostly scared and miserable. If this was what I had to look forward to seven days a week then I might as well quit. There goes the motorcycle I’d been saving for. “Next time roll the paper in a plastic bag and put it on the step like a white man,” he called as I was halfway down the sidewalk. The tears in my eyes kept me from seeing where I was going and I ran off the curb and tipped over my bike just around the corner. Thank God Tommy didn’t see me fall. I don’t think I would have ever gotten his laughter out of my head.

-------5-------

The next week might have been a nightmare, except Tommy secured a spot on the seventh grade wrestling team and they practiced each night after school until five. I started delivering his paper first, rolled and put into a clean plastic grocery bag, I got a hundred of them from Hunter’s market for a quarter and managed to always miss him. I was feeling almost happy. My birthday was on Tuesday April 12^th. and my mom and dad had promised me a mysterious something special.

Special turned out to be a gangly Border Collie - Lab mix pup and he was tied to our front porch with a piece of old clothesline when I came home from my newspaper-route. My parents had rescued him from an animal shelter and they said his name was Sparky but I could choose something else if I wished. Something surely lit my fire that day I turned thirteen and Sparky he stayed.

As the days went by me and my new best friend became inseparable. We played fetch and cops and robber dogs every night until the street lights came on. I didn’t want him tagging along when I went on my paper route but he whined and looked at me with those soft brown canine eyes filled with such misery that I couldn’t resist. Using the same clothesline my mom had used when he’d first arrived, I tied him to the metal carrier on the back of my bike and he ran alongside as I went house to house. Sparky waged his tail every time I collected money from my route and licked my face, as if healing a wound, each time Tommy Everett laughed and refused to pay. Tommy always managed to let me glimse the three dollar bills the quarter and two dimes his father had given him tucked into his t-shirt pocket.

-------6-------

The papers were late on Tuesday, April nineteenth. A semi-tractor trailer hauling fuel oil had jack-knifed on the highway north of town and the newspaper’s editor wanted pictures on the front page. It was a quarter after five when I picked up my papers and pedaled directly for Tommy Everett’s house. I left Sparky tied to the bike while I hurried up to the step with the newspaper carefully wrapped in plastic. In the same place I usually left the paper a note taped to the cement said. Please put the paper on the back step. I thought I heard Sparky bark once when I went around the house. Someone had left a sprinkler going and I had to walk around it. I was just placing the newspaper on the back porch when I heard Sparky barking loudly and I knew there was trouble.

I rounded the corner at a run just in time to see Tommy Everett dragging Sparky into his back yard and closing the gate. “Give me back my dog,” I screamed as I chased after him.

“You’re too late,” Tommy laughed. “My dad says I get to shoot any dog that crosses our property.” Tommy latched the gate behind him and by the time I found an empty milk box to stand on and pulled myself over the wooden fence, Tommy had Sparks tied to a tree and was loading a rifle. “No!” I screamed as he took aim and I lunged. I grabbed the rifle barrel and thrust it to the side just as Tommy fired. Rage made me tear the weapon out of his hands. There was a smell like dead animals and a hissing noise coming from the house next door. My captive dog was barking furiously and straining against the old clothesline. A bang like a car back-firing sounded and then a flash of light and the sound of breaking glass just as Sparky broke free and leaped toward a broken-out window. Tommy’s stray bullet had ruptured a propane line going into the basement home. In a matter of seconds the whole dwelling, fed by the pressurized gas, burst into a raging inferno.

The smoke and heat burned my eyes and I forgot about Tommy Everett as I stumbled toward the flames. I fell to the ground coughing just as Ug’s piercing scream came from inside the burning basement. A second later, Sparky’s terrified yelping told me that he was inside with her.

TO BE CONTINUED …

Keeper and the Queen of M2467 part 2

Copyright (c) 2017 by Randall R. Peterson ALL RIGHTS RESERVED This is a work of fiction. All persons, locations and actions are from the author's imagination or have been used in a fictitious manner.

Keeper and the

QUEEN of M2467

Part 2

By R. Peterson

            The mining planet M2467 was unbelievably hot. Special suits resistant to high temperatures had to be worn by all workers and the cooling material they were made of needed to be recharged every ten hours. Not only was food rationed according to productivity but also the environment the slaves worked in. When production quotas dropped, the temperature the slaves worked in went up. Each shift was twenty hours long with a four hour rest period. Keeper, Jeff Bland and Teuth were assigned to work in an area where crushed ore was moved by monorail cars from a huge open pit to a distant refining center. Jeff guided empty mine cars to the loading station where Teuth filled them from inside an enclosed digger. The excavation equipment provided extra protection for his naturally aquatic skin and his multiple arms facilitated using the numerous controls on the high tech machinery in the most efficient way. Still the cephalopod was quickly becoming dehydrated and neither Keeper nor Bland expected their friend to last more than a few hours without adequate moisture.

Keeper attached a filled car to a train-terminal and sent it on its way. A dust cloud appeared on the horizon. “Here comes the devil,” Keeper said. A semi-humanoid squamate reptile brought a meager amount of water for each slave every hour, laughing and showing off a Hammurabi communicator he wore around his neck as he appeared in an air-conditioned truck-pod loaded with bottles.

“Your productivity has gone up the last two hours,” Gwolat sneered. “But I decided to raise your ore-quota to compensate for your unusual endurance.” He opened each and every bottle and swigged a long drink before he handed them to the thirsty workers. “We can’t have you crogs working at less than your full potential!”

One of Keeper’s crew members working in the area next to them collapsed and the sadistic lizard scampered to where he lay moaning in the sand. The squamate beat him viciously with a whip until, amazingly, the man rose to his feet. “No water for you!” Gwolat grinned as he poured a full bottle on the ground and the delirious man writhed in agony.

After Gwolat left, Keeper and Jeff each took one swallow and poured the rest into two half-full bottles stolen from Gwolot’s truck. Teuth was almost dying of thirst as they handed him one. “I don’t know how much longer I can last,” Teuth gasped as he downed the pint of water. “Even a quart every hour would not be enough for my subaquatic metabolism in this heat.” Keeper and Bland both looked away and tried not to lick their lips.

            “Bland and I are working on a plan to get us out of here,” Keeper assured him as he ran to give the dying crew member some stolen water.

            “Yeah I wanted to beat that lizard’s head in with a big rock the first time he showed up,” Jeff grumbled. “But Keeper insists that we work out all the details.”

            “We’ve got to stay alive until sundown,” Keeper said. “I don’t know why the Hammurabi stop production for four hours while this planet is dark … but all the old-timers, the slaves that have managed to stay alive for more than one day, insist that they do. When our friend Gwolat comes back for the last time on this shift … we’ll be waiting for him!”

-------2-------

                “Gwolat!” Jeff pointed when the sadistic supervisor stepped out of the truck he’d brought to return the slaves to the compound. “We got a guy here that refuses to do his share of the work!” The last rays of light from the mining planet’s two suns were disappearing over the horizon, but even in the smoldering shadows you could see the lizard was pleased for the opportunity to administer one last beating. He raised his whip high above his head and almost danced to where Keeper lay sprawled on the ground.

            Jeff caught the end of the leather whip when the creature swung it back to render a bloody first lash and yanked the lizard off balance. Keeper rolled over quickly and pulled Gwolat’s feet out from under him. The lizard shrieked and tumbled to the ground. A look of astonishment twisted his ugly face into a knot when Gwolat realized the cries of anguish that he’d expected to hear from his victim instead came from deep within his own throat. “No water for two days!” he screeched. His long forked tongue waved in the air like a conqueror’s flag even as Jeff Bland hovered over him with a head-crushing rock.

            “Not yet!” Keeper said to Jeff as he pinned the lizard to the hot sand. “There must be a source of water on this planet! We all need to drink before we can think about escaping.” Keeper had to slap the lizard twice to make him stop struggling. “Where do you get the water to fill your bottles?”

Gwolat hissed something about cutting them both into tiny pieces and scattering them across the desert.

            “He isn’t going to tell us anything,” Keeper said. “Use the leather from the whip and tie him to that cactus. It’s getting dark fast. The Hammurabi will come looking for their missing truck!”

Gwolat looked horrified when he realized they were going to leave him in the desert. “No!” he screamed. “I’ll tell you were to find water!”

            “I suppose you want us to just let you go?” Jeff kicked him as he tied him to a cactus.

            “I won’t stay here when the night comes,” Kwolat screeched. “The water comes from a cave less than thirty miles down this road!”

Keeper and Jeff ignored the lizard’s cries of terror as they helped all the slaves into the truck. “Don’t leave me here!” The lizard was tearing at the leather bindings as the truck began to pull away.  Too late Keeper saw Gwolat break one of straps and yank out a blaster that he’d obviously hidden under his pant leg.

            “Duck!” Keeper screamed as Jeff sped the truck away.

A blast of laser light lit up the sky like fireworks. Keeper and Jeff were both astonished when they saw that Kwolat had taken his own life. “Wow! That lizard really must not like the dark!” Jeff commented.

Both Keeper and Jeff couldn’t help but notice the shocked looks on the slave’s faces as they peered into the gloom. “The night will devour us all, I want someone to shoot me,” a slave rumored to have worked the mines for more than a month and obviously suffering from delirium shouted.

-------3-------

Jeff and Keeper were expecting an inky blackness, instead minute’s later two moons rose in the east, one twice the size of the other. The larger reflected blue light while the other shown green giving the desert landscape an eerie horror-movie feel. The super-heated atmosphere was becoming much cooler. “I don’t know what everyone is all freaked out about,” Jeff declared as he steered the huge vehicle. “In fact, it’s light enough to turn off the headlights!” Which he did. “Why take a chance on having the Hammurabi spot us escaping?”

            The absence of artificial lighting showed that what they thought of as a flat desert was actually riddled with holes, each one large enough to swallow a man. The two moons raced across the sky as if they also were terrified of the coming darkness. In less than ten minutes they had traveled mid sky.

            The cave Gwolat had told them about loomed in the side of a mountain just off the road. A winding trail lit by the retreating moons threaded its way around still more of the strange holes. “They’re too round to be meteor craters,” Jeff marveled. “I wonder what could have made them.”

            “They are made by the night to hide from the heat,” the delirious slave declared. Keeper and Jeff ignored him.

Jeff stopped and Keeper ordered all the escaping slaves to stay in the truck. “Hopefully the Hammurabi have some empty bottles stored in there that we can fill.”

            “We’ll be back in five minutes and everyone will have all the water they want,” Jeff promised as they started down the trail.

They were almost at the cave entrance when a light appeared on the horizon moving quickly through the dark sky toward them. “It’s the Hammurabi, they’ve spotted us!” Jeff yelled. The two racing moons were now disappearing over the western horizon.

            “We’re about to lose our lights. Maybe that will be to our advantage!” Keeper yelled as he and Jeff both turned and raced back toward the truck.

The lights in the sky were in fact a Hammurabi transport vehicle. The massive spaceship hovered over the truck sucking slaves into the darkening sky like a huge vacuum cleaner.

            “We can’t help them now!” Keeper pulled Jeff back when he tried to intercede. “As long as we are free, Leika and the others have a chance!” As they turned toward the cave, darkness smothered the planet and they ran under starlight.

Both Keeper and Jeff were surprised when the huge alien vessel lifted into the air and then dashed away in the opposite direction. “It’s as if they are fleeing from something,” Jeff blurted.

The lights of the spacecraft were just vanishing on the horizon when the ground beneath the running men began to tremble. They were less than a hundred yards from the cave, when giant snakes rose out of every hole in the desert. The serpents towered over the twilight landscape blocking the light from the stars. At least three snakes lunged at Jeff at the same time luckily, their heads collided and only this kept him from being swallowed whole. He chanced a look back. Keeper’s legs were just disappearing into a hissing mouth. The scream that came from Jeff ’s mouth was involuntary  but it gave the serpent looming over him just enough time to envelope him in writhing living flesh … he could feel wet slimy mucus cover him as the snake opened its mouth wide and sucked him into its yawning mouth.

-------4-------

Jeff Bland felt the air in his lungs being forced outward as the muscles lining the snakes long body slowly squeezed him deeper inside the serpent. He was suddenly inside a larger cavity … a stomach? A fleshy tendril with a cup on the end covered his nose and mouth again. He could breathe, but just barely. Jeff now understood why the humanoids familiar with the mining planet’s fearsome night creatures were so afraid. The snake who had swallowed him was one of a rare species of Serpentes that digested their food slowly over a period of several months. The snake was keeping him alive to keep his meat fresh and would devour a small piece of him every day. I wish someone would have shot me, Jeff’s thoughts screamed.

Suddenly with a violent contraction, Jeff felt himself being shot out of the snake’s long body along with a sticky mass of mucus and vomit. When Jeff wiped the goo from his eyes, Keeper stood in the center of the writhing mass that was now two severed snake sections. One of his arms had been transformed into a laser. “Run!” he yelled.

The cave entrance was no more than ten yards away but before Jeff could take three steps another of the snakes was pulling him into its mouth. This time he didn’t reach the stomach but felt himself going unconscious from the contractions. When he opened his eyes again Keeper was dragging him into the cave. A twisting coil of scaly flesh towered over them both. “When we first met,” Jeff told Keeper as they ran down a narrow corridor. “You were missing both feet and walking on water. Now one of your hands is missing and you have a laser sword! You certainly pay an arm and a leg for all your equipment don’t you?”

A roaring hiss that sounded like a steam engine followed just a few steps behind.

“One thing I’ve learned from crossing through countless galaxies for thousands of years,” Keeper said as the reached a fork in the tunnel and chose the smaller passage. “Is that all things in the universe are in balance … by losing my hand function for a few minutes, I’m able to replace it with something more useful … like this light weapon.”

“I wish I had that ability,” Jeff said as Keeper turned and slashed at the monster following them. They had reached a dead end. The tunnel narrowed and then became a solid rock wall.

“You not only have that ability but you’ve used it before!” Keeper exclaimed as he sliced the head off the snake. Another larger snake was moving up to take its place.

“What part of me have I ever lost in order to gain some mysterious power?” The disbelief in Jeff’s voice made Keeper smile. Jeff leaped out of the way of a wave of blood as it splashed against the rock wall.

“You lost your head when you decided to come with me and became first officer on the Centurion!” Keeper grinned.

“How much longer is this going to go on?” Jeff yelled as two snakes tried to force their way in to the tiny recess at the same time and Keeper fought them off.

“We have about three and a half hours of darkness left,” Keeper said. “Be glad the nights on M2467 aren’t any longer!”

-------5-------

The planet’s two suns were just rising over the eastern horizon when Keeper and Jeff stumbled out of the cave. Portions of snake lay everywhere and some pieces were still writhing. The cave floor had become a river of blood. Jeff held his nose. “I thought I was going to die from the smell alone,” he said. “That has to have been the longest night of my life.”

“We barely survived and I’m exhausted,” Keeper said looking at his arm. The laser sword coming from his stump was now sputtering like a child’s sparkler. Keeper closed his eyes and a minute later his arm was once again flesh and bone.

“What do we do now?” Jeff asked.

“Recharge,” Keeper said rubbing his arm. “Then we’ll have to rescue Leika and the others. They are probably being held in the refining center Gwolat talked about.”

Miraculously, Gwolat’s transport truck was at the bottom of the hill where they’d left it. They walked toward it wary of the thousands of holes in the desert floor.

            “We forgot to get any water from the cave,” Jeff moaned.

            “Do you really want to go back inside that place?” Keeper grinned.

            “No,” Jeff told him as he looked back. “I hope you’ve figured out a way to get inside the refinery!”

The desert floor began to rumble just as they reached the truck. The massive Hammurabi transport vehicle that had captured the others was now hovering over them. “I have and this is it,” Keeper moaned as the enemy ship’s vacuum beam lifted them into the air.

-------6-------

            The refining center turned out to be a small city called Enol. Two armed Scorpenions escorted Keeper and Jeff through massive crowds lining the streets. All the species looked to be in ecstatic celebration. “The queen insisted that you be present at the biggest spectacle this planet has seen in more than a century,” One of the guards zapped Jeff with the striker on the end of his coiled tail to hurry him along.

            “Leika! This must be her execution,” Jeff moaned. “We really messed things up this time … didn’t we?”

            “I’m not so sure,” Keeper said gazing at the crowd. A smile was beginning to form on his face.

            “I’ve heard of optimism in the face of danger, but this is ridiculous!” Jeff frowned. “Nora promised a very painful death … and she is sure to deliver.”

            “Make way for the Queen,” someone shouted. The voice sounded oddly familiar to Jeff but his nerves kept him so on edge that he couldn’t place it. “The sea of spectators parted like water from the bow of a ship as the entourage approached.

            The queen wore layers of Vessidian satin adorned with about a billion Mateuse 17credits worth of rare diamonds and emeralds. A veil of gossamer silk covered her face. A half-dozen attendants on each side lifted her flowing train, while hundreds of children spread flower petals in her path.

            “She’s beautiful isn’t she?” The familiar voice was right next to Jeff. The Centurion’s navigator stood next to him. The cephalopod mouth in his bulbous face was grinning broadly. Jeff began to recognize other crew members. The crowd was filled with them.

The queen’s procession stopped before them and the guards flanking Keeper and Jeff each bowed. “My Queen. What would you have us do with these prisoners?” One of the Scorpenions asked.

            “I haven’t decided yet!” The Queen said as she lifted her veil.

            “Leika!” Jeff’s voice was almost a wail. “We thought you were going to die!”

            “Not today, my official coronation is going to take place in less than an hour … of course you both are invited.”

            “How did you go from being a condemned prisoner to Queen of the slavers?” Jeff demanded.

            “It was easy,” Leika said. “Nora didn’t tell us she had two sibling brothers who were also heir to the throne.” She gestured toward two entranced young men following her. Neither of the stumbling love sick brothers could keep their eyes off from her. “It was almost too easy to convince them that I would make a much better Queen than their older sister.”

            “When did you rescue Teuth and the rest of the crew?” Jeff was amazed.

            “Yesterday, just before dark,” Leika said. “I had one of my ships lift the remaining Centurion crew members from a transport truck parked on the desert … but sadly you two weren’t around!”

            “And you left us on the desert all night?” Jeff was furious … but Keeper just smiled.

“Most of my galactic advisors felt a night-time rescue was too dangerous,” Leika said. “Did you know the most feared species of snake in the universe lives in this quadrant?” Her eyes were green and mischievous.  “I’m only trying to be a capable leader,” She grinned revengefully at her two friends and her eyes became flashes of gold. “Someone on this planet has to be in charge!”

THE END?

Keeper and the Queen of M2467

Copyright (c) 2017 by Randall R. Peterson ALL RIGHTS RESERVED This is a work of fiction. All persons, locations and actions are from the author's imagination or have been used in a fictitious manner.

By R. Peterson

Keeper and three hundred expedition members, gathering exotic life forms from across the universe, were enjoying a feast of Maltese Eels, Gesperian horn-pods and Lembayo water-plant in honor of their cephalopod navigator’s fifth anniversary of joining the crew. Suddenly brilliant lights the color of fresh blood flashed throughout the massive dining room and a booming recording warned of an IMPENDING SECURITY BREECH.

With a crack of  thunder  and a tremendous flash of ozone, a giant winged worm as large as a storage tank materialized on the pad used to return oversized laborers to work levels. Tables overturned and the crew ran in all directions to the sound of breaking dishes and shattering glass. Guest of honor Teuth, dropped three of the Vorboolian cocktails he held in his eight tentacles as the giant worm wiggled across the domed room and devoured the electrical circuits in the atmospheric lighting panels with grinding rows of circular teeth.

Organic Science Officer Leika burst from the gyroscopic transporter seconds later brandishing a zookeeper’s diminution gun. “Don’t do that! You’ll only make her angry,” she yelled as the star ships security forces attempted to vaporize the monster with blasters. Seconds later Keeper and his stunned crew watched as Leika reduced the giant to the size of a bug and then chased after the flying creature and captured it in a bottle.

Male crew members were already beginning to stagger toward Leika like love-sick zombies. Leika grinned at Keeper. “Sorry,” she said. “This rare Winged-Kirminas is undergoing second-stage metamorphous and was scheduled for release in terrarium level six. That idiotic transfer technician you hired from some slum planet blundered again.”

“Did you have your assistants escort the sixteen-ton worm to the transporter room while you monitored the release from the safety of your lab as I requested?” Keeper looked stern.

“According to the biologists on Mateuse 17, only five of this species exist in the entire universe, despite their formidable shielding. I was only making sure this specimen came to no harm at the hands of your clumsy crew.” Leika’s eyes were radiating a soft baby powder blue … but the spines she had in place of hair looked ready for a fight.

“Leika, you know the male members of this crew have a hard time functioning while you are in their work areas,” Keeper scolded. “That Porosities attraction aura you unconsciously release when you are near men is destructive to their concentration.”

“It’s not my fault your crew can’t control their sexual responses?” Her emotion-charged eyes flamed yellow-red.

“I’m sorry Leika, you are the most brilliant biologist I know, but your insubordination leaves me no choice but to confine you to quarters … for twenty-four hours.”

“Twenty-four hours!” Leika screeched. “You treat me like a child!” She knocked the rest of the drinks out of Teuth’s tentacles before she kicked over the table Jeff Bland sat at and stomped toward the gyroport.

“That went well!” First Officer Jeff Bland commented as he wiped spilled liquor and half eaten horn-pods from his uniform.

“I’m only trying to get you to follow the rules,” Keeper called after the tantalizing crew-member, “… someone on this ship has to be in charge!”

Leika slammed the transporter hatch and vanished without looking back.

-------2-------

Less than six hours later, a sleepy First Officer Jeff Bland was summoned to the ship’s bridge by Navigator Teuth; he met Keeper as they entered the gyroport. The Captain had received the same message. “It hasn’t been twenty-four hours!” Jeff looked at his watch. “Don’t tell me Leika has found a way to jimmy the time-lock on her quarters.”

      “This doesn’t sound like Porosities trouble,” Keeper said. “This sounds like the real stuff!”

      “You don’t think that half the things that go wrong on this ship are not due to that walking sex bomb? I find that hard to believe!” Jeff said as the transport mechanism began to move. The gyroport rotated much like a gyroscope, efficiently conveying those inside to any section of the massive globular spacecraft.

      “I find our Organic Science Officer delightful and entertaining,” Keeper said. “Although I am immune to most of her more annoying charms.”

      “Annoying?” Jeff moaned. “She once cornered me in a restricted area of engineering level three and forced me to hand feed her orgasmic grape-pods while splashing around naked in a pool of fermented Lustarian oil.”

      “I warned you of the dangers of this voyage!” Keeper smiled.

      Teuth was staring at a distorted communications hologram when they arrived in the ship’s main control room. A transparent dome the size of a football stadium covered hundreds of similar areas. “Problems?” Keeper asked.

      “We received an encrypted message from Mateuse 17, but the data was scrambled before our computers could decode it.” Teuth’s eight tentacles were busy moving through the light beams under the image attempting to find out why.

      “A problem with technical engineering,” Jeff suggested.

      “No,” Teuth said. “All our transcribers appear to be working correctly. Our messages are being jammed by something from a distance.”

The words were barely out of the former sea creature’s mouth when alarms once again sounded throughout the ship. “POSSIBLE HOSTILE FORCES APPROACHING!”

      “Take us up to max light speed until we find out what we’re dealing with,” Keeper ordered.

Moments later, Helmsman Dorg, a species of Canidae who resembled Earth foxes, barked his report. “We are at maximum speed and the unidentified craft is still closing fast!”

      “Can we obtain reverse light?”

      “Negative! The erratic orbits of the stars in the approaching galaxy prohibit any kind of time heightened travel.”

      “Identification!” Keeper commanded.

Teuth was the first to report. “It appears to be a very large A class Hammurabi vessel possibly from one of the troseddu systems. Mateuse 17 has no diplomatic relations with that part of the universe and considers the authorities there outlaws!”

      “Hammurabi? I’ve never heard of them.” Jeff was amazed, it was one of the few times he had seen worry on the ship’s captains face.

      “The Hammurabi are a small family in the business of mining planets for exotic minerals and gems.” Keeper said. “They need millions of workers for the hundreds of worlds they deplete and they use ruthless tactics to maximize profits.”

      “That sounds like Wal Mart back on Earth,” Jeff suggested. “Do these people have  medical and retirement plans?”

      “I’m afraid what we have pursuing us is a massive slave ship,” Keeper said, “and there are no benefits …. the  Hammurabi work all of their laborers to death.”

      “Aren’t we going to put up a fight?” Jeff demanded.

      “That’s not possible,” Keeper said. “The reason Mateuse 17 doesn’t interfere with their disgusting human rights violations is because they are so powerful. When you control half the wealth of this part of the universe you can buy the best weapons and protection.”

      “What are we going to do?” Jeff covered his ears to block out the repeating alarms.

      “We’re going to run,” Keeper said. “Teuth, guide us into the dancing sisters in G sector at max speed,” he ordered.

      “We’re in deep trouble and you want to go to a party,” Jeff moaned.

      “The Dancing Sisters are a series of star systems that orbit each other with erratic trajectories that routinely hit and miss … scattering planet debris and clouds of hydrogen gas in random patterns.”

      “Sounds like the inner-city in Chicago each time the Cubs lose!” Jeff moaned as the ship changed course drastically and massive G forces slid him across the floor.

Keeper held tight to Teuth’s holographic projection mount. “Sorry,” he yelled at his young friend. “But I’m afraid we’re in for a wild ride!”

-------3-------

A dozen M43 stars had begun to circle each other as they were drawn into a massive black hole. Each of the red giants held hundreds of planets and other astrophysical bodies in wildly fluctuating orbits that resembled a crowded skating rink with half the people moving in one direction and the other half going the opposite way. There were bound to be collisions. Planets exploded from direct contact while gravity from other near-misses siphoned off huge chunks of matter and gasses as big as continents. The resulting cataclysm was like a doorway into hell.

“Will you be able to navigate through this?” Jeff screamed at Teuth as the Centurion entered the star clusters at near the speed of light.  The massive gravitational pull of the black hole was bending light inside the spacecraft and Keeper, Bland and Teuth appeared as distorted images in a carnival funhouse … long and lean one moment and short and fat the next.

“There is no way to tell,” Teuth yelled. His voice sounded a mile away one moment and so close the next you could hear all six rows of teeth tattle in his head. “The laws of physics cease to exist once we move past the event horizon!” Burning spheres of molten rock hurled past the transparent dome. Jeff Bland took control of the ship and veered to the left, just as two moon-sized objects collided head-on and exploded less than a million miles away directly ahead. Chunks of matter, some as large as buildings, struck the outer shields and sent the alarm systems shrieking about impending disaster. First Officer bland guided the huge spacecraft through several near misses but the almost collisions were getting closer.

“Twenty seconds before we reach the event horizon … and then there will be no escape … for anyone!” Teuth’s tone suggested he was speaking at a funeral.

“Is the Hammurabi vessel still pursuing?” Keeper was considering his options … die or be taken captive.”

“They have reversed their engines,” Teuth’s sigh of relief was audible as was all those crowded into the control-room

“Maintain speed but stay just outside the event threshold,” Keeper ordered. “Hopefully  we can put a bottomless pit between the us and the slavers.”

“Our propulsion systems have all shut down and we are being pulled backward!” Teuth reported.

“A tractor beam!” Jeff groaned. “ Didn’t you say these people could buy anything?”

“Looks like our new towing friends have just pulled us out of disaster,” Keeper said. “And I can imagine what their price is going to be.”

“I hope it’s not hot,” Jeff moaned. “In the mine where they put us to work … I hope it’s not too warm.”

-------4-------

      Keeper tried several times to get Leika to leave her quarters. She kept insisting with great indignation that her time wasn’t up. “We have  problems,” Keeper told her. Hundreds of aliens resembling scorpions with Verulian lasers clutched in their pincher hands had already taken control of the ship.

      “More than before? I thought your quota of blunders would go down once I was confined to quarters!” Leika was still furious when she entered the bridge. “What the hell is going on here?” A Scorpinion guard, with a twenty-thousand volt electric tail arched over its scaly back, knocked her to the ground and then locked her arms in restraints.

“These creatures are tough fighters, but where is the brains behind their enterprise?” Jeff Bland asked Keeper as they lay bound together on the floor of the Centurion.

As if in response to his question, a large sphere of swirling energy appeared in the air several feet above the control room floor. With an ear-shattering bang, a dark haired scowling woman appeared in the midst of the captives. She was richly dressed and had a long crooked nose hovering over layered necklaces of priceless gems, obviously placed there to distract from her dermic shortcomings. “I am Nora Hammurabi … and with the unfortunate demise of my brother Richard … I am now the supreme leader of all eighteen Troseddu systems.”

“The Hammurabi are notorious for killing other family members and seizing power,” Teuth whispered to Keeper.

“I hope you will enjoy working with my company.” The ugly matriarch went on.

“Like a fish enjoys being fried,” Jeff whispered to a worried Teuth.

Helmsman Dorg who was restrained on the floor next to Officer Bland, unfortunately made a barking laugh. Nora was furious and had two Scorpinions  lift him off the floor. “No one laughs at the Queen,” she said. With the wave of her hand, the small fox-like crewmember was thrust into the air by millions of volts of electricity and fried alive before the crew’s eyes. “I think you will find me extremely charitable,” Nora said. “But I will not tolerate subordination. Each of you individuals will receive compensation based on the work that you perform … as your work diminishes … so will your rewards.”

“She plans to starve us to death,” Jeff whispered to Keeper, “and if we work real hard she’ll make the misery last.”

“I vow the loyalty of my subjects,” Nora told them. “Now as soon as you all have sworn allegiance to me … your new lives will begin.”

The crew members were forced one by one to kneel before the Queen and swear fidelity. Nora was not only ugly, but ruthless and cruel. A twitch of an eye or any deviation from complete subjugation was dealt with by a painful death. Random crew members were brutally murdered to put fear into others. Jeff Bland moaned when a cursing Leika was dragged before the woman.

            “You’re a Porosities aren’t you?” Nora smiled. “Your charm and beauty are legendary throughout the galaxy … almost a match for my own.”

Leika snorted a laugh. “You could place anyone next to a pig like you and they would look wonderful! Where did you get those ears … off from a Nuebarion weasel?”

Nora’s piercing scream made even the Scorpinion guards try to cover their ears. The captives on the floor moan in agony.

            “Death is too quick for someone like you!” Nora was twisting in rage as her guards lifted Leika from the floor. “For some time I’ve been considering a public event that will show my workers just how unwise it is to challenge my authority!  Bring her along.” Nora told her guards. “This special event may take days to prepare … the rest of you will start work immediately.”

“Didn’t I tell you Leika finds trouble wherever she goes?” A distraught Jeff Bland trying to make light of the situation as he whispered to Keeper. He was hoping for a positive response as they were marched into the slave ship

To his horror Keeper hung his head and choked on the words …

“I’m going to miss her too.”

TO BE CONTINUED …