THE PLACES BETWEEN THE STARS
DISCLAIMER: Konnichi wa hazu (Hi Gang) and welcome back! First a big domo arigatou to Mr Haruka-San Takachiho and all the other creators of anything the Boss Man KZ and Story Teller Guy are using. Of course anyone who gives them credit where credit is due is quite free and welcome to use their creations as well. Now here's what happened at the end of Trucks In Space in case ya came in late.
Haru Glory and Elie were arguing with the Master and the Ranee that 'Decalogue' must never be wielded even without the 'Dark Bring' shadow stones. Harv and Natasha brushed off their fears as pointless old wives' tales.
"Have you got a target range on this old tub, Mr Harvey, sir?" asked the young RAVE Master and the Ranee pointed at the deck floor.
"Twelve levels down, kid. Why?" she demanded curiously.
"My RAVE sword is charged with only five 'Light Bring' RAVE stones but its power is tremendous. I want to show you what this blade can do but I want to do so safely, Miss Natasha." said Haru. Harvey nodded and allof us were soon trooping down to the lift cars. Very soon we were all standing in a dank cellar-like room. At the far end were all kinds of targets, come stationary, some moving. Natasha motioned for all of us to find seats behind the heavy shields constructed of translucent Kelvinite. Haru insisted that Miss Elie join us for her own safety and this she did though quite reluctantly.
"Are you ready, Master Glory?" asked Harvey and the kid yelled that he was ready and for us to watch carefully. Then he unlimbered a sword almost the same size as Mr Kurosaki's 'soul reaper zampakutou' and grasped its hilt in both of his fists. Taking a few practice swings just made the rogue time lord impatient. He kept checking his wristchromo. At last with a sweeping flourish of his sword Haru Glory 'fired' his blade like an ion cannon!
A blast of pure crimson/green flame eradicated the targets, all 2,000 of 'em! Not content with that the flame had soon turned the bulkhead of the TARDIS white hot and suddenly the entire back wall began to glow and melt!
"Stop. That is more than enough, Master Glory. Please extinguish your sword. Your point is well taken, sir but you labour under a misapprehension if you believe that I wish the 'Decalogue' and the 'Ultimate Dark Bring' shadow stone to annihilate anything. I am not as callous as all that after all.
"No. All I want is to possess the blade and stones. With just the 'threat' of those weapons I will soon bring all the worlds of all the Universes to their collective knees and I shall be the Universal Ruler of all creation! Evem those two doddering fool 'Guardians' of the Universes will be forced to bow down to me, The Master of all worlds! Now tell me all that you know of this 'Decalogue' blade and these Shadow Stones, boy! (Haru shook his head) Torg! Clap him in irons and toss him in the brig!" ordered the megalomaniacal despot of the Universes.
"Leave him alone or you'll answer to me, old man!" screamed Elie who was now armed with a pair of what looked like the cop nightsticks from 'Adam 12'! An instant later they shot fire and lead which merely bounced off Harvey's chest. Elie kept firing until her ammo had exhausted itself. Then she tossed her blasters down in disgust.
"She can keep the foolish boy company, Natasha! Put her ass in irons as well. To the brig with her dammit!" Harvey was purple with uncontrolled rage and the rest of us bolted back to the lift cars. Angie and Mr Solo had recognized where we were and had soon led us back to our dormitories in our part of the TARDIS.
There we remained until one day when Torg announced planetfall on the ninth planet of the Terran solar system- Pluto. Yeah I know the ancient Terran astrogeeks called it a star but I been there and they ain't! Trust me folks. It's a planet, not a moon, not a star, not an asteroid but an honest to goodness planet! And now to proceed-
Chapter 1 'Zoe's Homecoming' or 'Another Quest Begins'
We were all eagerly looking forward to strolling on a real surface instead of just metallic decks after so many weeks of traveling the solar systems of the cosmos. Nobody was looking forward to landing on Pluto than our navvy Zoe Morton. After all she had been born and bred on Pluto. Soon we had touched down with Harvey Master's TARDIS and using the chameleon circuit he and Natasha Ranee had disguised his Type 40 Traveling Machine to resemble a small bungalow on the outside. Oro a surprise though for anyone who ventured inside the place! TARDISes exist in more than a single dimension so they are bigger on the inside than they are on the outside, a lot bigger!
"I have been led to believe, Miss Morton, that Pluto was once your home world. Is this information correct, my child?" asked Harvey in as oily a voice as he could muster up. Zoe frowned at the rogue time lord.
"Yeah, I hail from the dog planet, Harv. So?" she replied icily. Harvey pointed to Haru Glory who was still waving around his RAVE sword much to the chagrin of several of the others whom he kept poking it into.
"Have you ever heard of a sword like that one named 'Decalogue' or the 'Dark Bring' sword? How about the 'Shadow Stones' that power it?" demanded the time lord anxiously. Zoe pursed her lips and knitted her brows in thought.
"Yeah but the thing ain't on Pluto or any of its moons or battle moons, sir. All I can tell you is that when I was a kid I once heard an old man talking about a 'dark sword' powered by dark crystaline stones. When Uncle George asked him where it might be found the old man laughed and told us to seek it in 'the places between the stars' if we dared. Uncle George bought him another drink and he told us that the blade would be found not more than sixty or seventy lightyears due Northeast from the very Northernmost tip of Pluto which is of course 'Terrayama' or 'Mt Terra' in the 'Glycier' district.
"More drinks elicited the information that the stones had been scattered across the galaxies by the first RAVE Master several hundreds of thousands of centuries ago. So the 'Shadow Stones' are like those golden 'dragon balls' that those asinine Saiyaans and their dipstick friend Bulma Brief are forever hunting. Now if you'll excuse me I am going to visit my grandmother and grandfather before we leave." said Zoe Morton and the Master dismissed her with a wave of his hand.
"Zoe darlin', ain't there some sorta prophecy about that 'dark sword' and those stones?" drawled Han Solo who had calmly strapped on his blaster and picked up a plasma laser rifle. Zoe shook her head and suggested that Doc MacDougal might know. Then she headed after the rest of us who were already hurrying to the transporter room.
Angie was walking in front of me and Suzy. She was trying to read a star chart superimposed over a Southern Pluto airways map. Our own Templar gal was convinced that her knightly ancestours had colonized this dark cold world where temperatures could descend the thermometer all the way down to minus 800 degrees Kelvin which is like minus 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit!
To prove her theory correct she had to locate at least one Templar temple and to hasten the search Sister Trish had agreed to scout out the terrain from the air if that is she could still fly in this dense atmosphere. If she couldn't fly on her own she would have to use jet pack wings or rocket boots or both. Most of the rest of us were wearing our jet pack wings and rocket boots and since the Boss had made wearing the darn things an order with no exceptions I guess we were all joining in the hunt.
The Master had allowed Angie carte blanche authority to search for the temple because he had reasoned that perhaps the Knights Templar had left some clues to the hiding place of the 'Decalogue' even if they probably had no idea where the old RAVE Master had hidden the 'dark stones'. We were just glad for some shore leave even if it did mean more work. The air was dark and dismal and Rio demanded to know when the sun was coming out.
"On Pluto there are no suns, Rio. The entire planet is under a dome somewhat like the one over Moravian City back on Mars. We must manufacture our own heat and light. This is summer; wait until winter when it gets really dark." chuckled Zoe.
"Aha! I found it, children. That 'Decalogue' prophecy I mean. When we stop for luncheon I will translate it for you. It is written in an ancient Terran language called Chaldean. May I suggest we get a wiggle on to quote my dear friend Sister Rosette of the Terran Magdalene Order. I am quite chilly, indeed I am. Most unusual for a Scotsman to be cold. By the by, does anyone know the temperature?" asked Sir Hiram MacDougal while he was pulling on another pair of thick gloves.
"It's balmy today, Hi. About minus 200 Kelvin, that's minus 600 Fahrenheit. I've adjusted our air temperature under the dome to 65 Fahrenheit. Just looking at that sky though makes you shiver, Hi. I'll kick it up a notch to 72. Hey! Where are those skysleds Natasha was supposed to beam down here? Damned if I'm gonna walk sixty kilometres (45 miles) to the Basalt Mountains!" replied Zoe who looked snug as a bug in a rug in that heavy hooded fur parka, heavy boots and fur gloves.
Swathed across most of her face was another piece of fur. We all had something like that around our faces too because despite being under a dome the wind still howled at close to 90 kilometres an hour (75 mph) and was forever threatening to knock us on our keesters or faces depending on its direction! Oh and did I mention that even under layers of coats, sweaters, parkas, mufflers, hoods and the like we were still freezing our buns off!
Then I caught sight of our transports or rather I think I saw them. The snow was so thick I couldn't be certain what they were. Suzy whispered to me that to board our skysleds we would have to leave the dome and trek overland about 300 metres. You see Suzy had been deployed here with the Brigadier and Zoe many times in the past so she knew the lay of the lands.
A moment later I felt a blast of very frigid air that was so cold I shivered. The next blast coated my skin with a thin coating of ice! Even under my garments I felt ice crystals forming on my skin. Han and Blue had forced open the portals at the end of the long domed corridor we had been walking through. Three hundred metres doesn't sound like a long way, does it?
I mean in golf terms that is just a super long drive or an average length par 4, right? Well it took us the better part of an hour to traverse it in that ice fog and raging blizzard! I was never so glad to get into one of those cramped sleds before in my life than I was when I got into the lead sled's rearmost right seat and had to sit on Sir Hiram's lap! Miss Donovan was on Han's lap and the Brig was sitting on Blue's lap. Most of us gals were perched on the guys' laps but I could only see our seats.
Even inside this contraption we could not see anything but white outside. I asked Miss D how in the nine worlds Mr Zero would be able to see where he was flying. As always she had a glib reply.
"Easy. Zoe's home is at the foot of Mt Ziggarand. That's the tallest mountain in this sector of Pluto. That's it right out there, the big blue peak, see it? (I nodded) All Zachie will need to do is keep that mountain right in front of him and he cannot possibly get lost. I sure hope Segovia and Axelian have a fire going and have repped up some hot cocoa and soup for us when we get there! Oh they're Zoe's Mom and Dad well not her real ones. Zoe's adopted but she doesn't like to tell people about it." explained the violet-maned minx vixen.
"Yeah so why she bothered to tell you is a mystery to me, Airhead. Everybody knows that you can't keep yer big trap shut." chortled the Boss Lady from her seat on Jon Harlock's lap. Miss D bristled but said nothing.
"It's not quite smooth sailing, kids. Zach, be sure you keep us within those aerial lines on the nav screens. Deviate by as much as a centimetre and we are violating Tycordian airspace. They won't hesitate to fire on us if we step outta bounds. I figure that we should reach home by dinnertime at 1700 that's 5 o'clock PM for our visitors." said Zoe.
I checked my wristchromo and blinked. It was only a little past 0900 or 9 AM. The Boss must have anticipated my next question because she quickly responded without being asked.
"Although we are only about a hundred and fifty kilometres from Zoe's place I told our drivers to keep their speeds down because these winds could easily throw us into those mountains at a G force of fifteen or sixteen hundred." she growled.
"Ja! Ist better by far to be safe than sorry, mein Fraulein!" shouted Fritz Von Dekker, the Green Baron whose voice was right beside my ear! Sitting on his lap with a pair of heavy earmuffs over her ears was his captain and Jon Harlock's niece Emma Emeraldas.
"You don't have to yell, Fritzy! That damned storm's outside not inside! I'm hungry. Anyone got any candy with 'em?" complained the master of the 'Emerald Queen' and Rio tossed her a candy bar.
"Where'd ya get candy, Rio? That machine of Harvey's took my 3 credits and didn't give me a bar!" howled our 'Blonde Bomber', Minnie Mae 'Kitten' Hopkins bouncing up and down painfully on the Casterlain's old knees.
"It took my 3 credits too 'Kitten' so I kicked it until the door popped open. Then I just stocked up my knapsack. Anyone else want some?" giggled Dio DelCroix and of course everyone was suddenly famished. I confess that I too wolfed down a couple of Galaxy Chokky bars. Now it was ten hundred hours and Mt Ziggarand didn't look like it was a kilo closer than it had been the last time I'd checked my wristchromo at 0930.
"Where are we gonna stop for lunch, mum?" Rio wanted to know at eleven hundred and we all looked at the poor kid like she'd just escaped from a lunatic colony!
"Do you see any 'Asteroid's 'R Us' pizza palaces out there, kiddo? There ain't nothin' out this far in the boonies. We'll have a big dinner tonight. Eat some more candy why don't ya?" chuckled Zachary Taylor Zero, easing the speed up a fraction which threw us sideways violently. He quickly dropped back to 35 kph and the sled righted itself.
At 1500 (3 PM) I had my first glimpse of Mt Ziggarand close up and it made Terra's Mt Everest look like a mushroom! The entire mountain was a deep cobalt blue and nestled at its base was a strange looking group of buildings. Nyssa's voice cracked in my ear through my comm link earrings.
"That's where Zoe lives with her foster parents. Axelian Morton built it himself well that's what he tells everyone anyway. Truth is it's one of Bulma's dad's Capsule Corporation building edifice capsules. Axel liked the haciendas in old Terran Mexico he saw in the vid films so Mr Brief designed this place just for him. Brr! It's getting colder and Jamie won't put the window up! Oh well Mrs Morton's a great cook! How much longer, Dog Boy? Two more hours? OK thanks. Guess I'll take a nap for awhile. Nyssa out."
Dog Boy was the big hanyou kid InuYasha. Sango had refused point blank to sit on Miroku's lap so Kagome was on the amourous monk's lap while the demon slayer gal from Terran Japan was perched on Kouga's lap. The only guys in our group without a lap passenger were the drivers of the skysleds. Harvey had offered to use his TARDIS to enclose the Morton homestead but that idea was nixed because of the terrifically high speed winds and because directly above the house was a gravity well. These were the same reasons why we had not simply 'beamed' over to Zoe's house.
Haru Glory and Elie looked glum because they both knew the chaos and destruction that could be wrought with the 'Decalogue' Shadow Sword and neither Natasha Ranee nor Harvey Master had been dissuaded in the least from their foolhardy idea of finding the dumb thing. Harvey said it was to be a threat weapon only but if that was his only intention then why was he so adamant about finding all of those powering stones? None of us really trusted the rogue time lord and none of us trusted the rogue time lady one little bit!
At 1645 or a quarter to five in the darkening afternoon we finally reached Zoe's domicile. Auntie Segovia and Uncle Axelian welcomed all of us with open arms and steaming mugs of hot chokky laced with brandy for the oldsters and dotted with marshy mallows for us kids. At least it was piping hot and there was plenty of it to go around. It was help yourselves from the big tureen of blazing hot home made tomato soup and I made a pig out of myself thinking this was dinner! Three big bowls later Auntie Segovia announced that dinner was ready.
Thankfully dinner was roast beef sandwiches smothered in rich gravy, roasted potatoes and corn on the cob, nothing filling you see. Dessert was chokky mocha mousse and hot java to wash it down. Hi announced he was full after his fifth helping of everything in sight. Puffing on a fat after dinner cigar he observed that translating the Chadean runes would take him most of the night so reluctantly Harvey agreed that our expedition would be delayed until after lunch tomorrow. Uncle Axel didn't think that we were going to find any Templar tabernacles on Mt Ziggy but he admitted that he could be wrong.
We were all ordered to clean and oil our weapons and have them loaded and ready for inspection by eleven hundred tomorrow morning. Auntie Segovia had plenty of rooms so we all had our own bedrooms. Angie told us that all we could hope to find here on Pluto was a clue pointing to the next clue beyond this system. Han thought that 'the places between the stars' might mean that the blade of destiny might be concealed on a burned out 'dwarf star' between two brighter stars. Blue agreed and then observed that the number of 'dwarfs' in the next system alone numbered in the hundreds of thousands! That meant we would not be hunting quail. I mean that it was not going to be easy, not by a long shot.
A knock came on my portal and I opened it to admit Sister Trish who had changed back into habit and cornet. I repped her up a mug of cassartin tea and she sat down. I picked up my own mug of java and sat beside her on the sofa.
"Edie, I don't think I can fly on this world. For one thing I can only fly while I'm wearing my habit and cornet. Go outside like this and I'd freeze my ass off. Besides that these frigid winds don't create any updrafts. Guess I'll be using jet pack like you." sulked the nun.
"And rocket boots, kid. Don't forget them. Has Hi made any progress on those runes?" I replied and Trish shook her head.
"I wonder if I can just stay here tomorrow. After all I'm just an innocent bystander and a pacifist too." answered Trish.
"Well you did find us those ceiling clues on Shimougou so I doubt if the Boss is gonna let you stay home. You're a really useful member of our team, kiddo. Want some cookies?" I replied and Trish gathered up a dozen in her habit's lap holding it up a little and picked up her tea. I tossed her a plastic baggie and she shoveled the cookies into it. Then she took her leave and floated back down the hallway. Her flying seemed to work quite well in this artificial gravity inside the house.
I tapped my comm link earring and buzzed Angie who answered immediately.
"Yeah? What d'ya want, Edie? Make it quick. I'm awful busy here." she snapped.
"No luck huh? Sorry I bothered ya, Angie." I replied and prepared to sign off.
"That's OK, kiddo. Sorry for snappin' at ya but this Chaldean is weird. Eight different alphabets if ya can call them alphabets and everything seems to indicate somewhere around Pandora near Dike and Justitia but that makes no damned sense at all." she trilled back and I got a scathingly brilliant idea! Yeah I do have my moments, guys.
"Angie! Aren't they the Scales of Justice and ain't Librarius on the other side of 'em with Pandora in the middle?" I trilled.
"Yeah that's right, Edie. So?" she trilled impatiently.
"Didn't Pandora have a jar she wasn't supposed to open? What if our next clue is hiding in her jar? I mean what if our clue is behind Pandora? Isn't that possible?" I trilled and I heard a crash.
"Sorry. I knocked over the table in my excitement. Listen to this part, Edie! "Do ye open that which must never be opened but was opened and there ye will find the jar for that which thou seeketh" Don't you get it, kiddo? Behind Pandora is the sheath for 'Decalogue'! If it's like Haru's blade it's got power of its own! InuYasha's 'Tetsusaiga's sheath always points towards his sword when he draws the blade out of it. Maybe the sheath is the next marker to point towards the 'Dark Blade'. Good catch, Edie. I have got to tell Hi about this. 'Night now. Angie out." she trilled and then she was gone.
I yawned and got into my pajamas. I finished my java and cookies and I was asleep as soon as my head hit the pillows. Tomorrow was gonna be one tough day to be sure! "night all.
END of Chapter 1. Chapter 2 'Tip the Scales' or 'Hidden Secrets' soon. Have a nice week- Edie.