It took a few seconds for us to regather our senses. Jim pushed the boat on its side and groaned rubbing his neck. I rubbed my ankle and winced feeling the dislocated part of my ankle. I grabbed a couple of metal branches we took down with us and put them on either side of my ankle and tied my jacket around it to secure it. It's not much but it'll have to do and it won't be the first time I had to move through a dislocated body part. "You okay?" Jim asked as I finished tying. I nodded. "I'm fine," I said and stood up but almost fell having trouble. Jim grabbed my arms and helped me up. "Oh my goodness. That was more fun than I ever want to have again." Doppler said as he stood up.
"Not one of my gossamer landings." Amelia said standing up and then moaned in pain and fell to her knees clutching her side.
"Captain!" Doppler said and rushed to her side. Both he and Jim help her stand. I held onto the boat to keep balance. She pushed my brother away and stood. "Oh, don't fuss." She said and leaned to the right. If Doppler weren't there to catch her then she would've fell again. "Slight brushing that's all. Cup of tea and I'll be right as rain." She said and adjusted herself. "Mr. Hawkins." She said looking at Doppler, after squinting at him and realizing it's not Jim she turned to us. "The map if you please?"
His eyes widened and he pulled out the map and sighed in relief to see it. The map floated off his hand and turned in a pink blob laughing hysterically. "MORPH!?" We yelled at the same time. "Where's the map?" Jim asked. Morph turned into a pile of rope and a mini map and moved the map into the rope pile. My mouth dropped in shock. "Are you serious it's back on the ship!" Jim yelled. I sighed in frustration. Great. We tried to grab the blob but he kept moving out of our reach. He thought this was a game and I wished it was. "Stifle that blob and get low. We've got company." She ordered and I began to hear the sound of a longboat and Jim caught the blob. We hide behind our broken longboat. I looked up and saw them heading to the direction of the busted engine which left a trail of smoke.
"We need a more defensible position. Mr. Hawkins, Miss Emma, scout ahead." Amelia ordered handing Jim the handgun. "Aye Captain." He said and took it. Unable to ignore the pain any longer, Amelia gasped in pain and fell to the ground. She tried to use her rifle to hold herself steady but, it was a useless attempt. "Steady, steady now." He said and gently holds her. "Now let's have a look at that." He said as we walked away in the jungle forest biome of the unknown planet.
A few minutes into the walk my ankle couldn't handle it and I hopped for a little. Jim saw my makeshift splint and gave me a piggyback ride as we slide down a tree root. I couldn't focus on the sight of seeing the mix of large mushrooms, moss, and fungi and my thoughts could only focus on Silver. I tripped my injured ankle over a root and I don't know if it's because of the pain or my emotions but, I started crying. "What's wrong?" Jim asked kneeling down besides me.
"S-Silver! I-I thought I could trust him but I was wrong! I can't trust anyone!" I sobbed and.
"I know, I trusted him too and you can trust people you trust me right?"
"Yeah but what's going to happen to us? I can't handle another one!" I said feeling more tears fall thinking about what punishment I am getting.
"Hey you're not going to get hurt, okay? Don't worry about it okay, we'll be alright." He said helped me up to my feet. I heard a rustling noise and quickly turned my head in it's direction it looked like I got whiplash. "You heard that?" I asked. He nodded and I shushed Morph as he pulled out the gun and powered it on. He glanced into the bushes and there was silence for a few seconds. Then, out of nowhere a robot jumped out of them and yelled whiched caused us to scream. If then tackled Jim to the ground, excited. B.E.N! I thought looking at him.
"Oh this is fantastic! Two carbon-based life forms come to rescue me at last! I just wanna hug you and squeeze you and hold you close to me." He said hugging my brother. After a few failed attempts to get him off him he yelled. "All right okay. Would just let go of me!" Then B.E.N latched onto me. Since I was shorter than him I was swung around like a rag doll. "Let me go!" I said not wanting to hurt my ankle more. "Oh, sorry, sorry." He said and put me down.
"It's just that I've been marooned for so long. I mean, solitude's fine, don't get me wrong but for heaven's sake after a hundred years, YOU GO A LITTLE NUTS!" He yelled and his eyes went wild. While he was talking he unwittingly leaned against Jim. Once he realized that he was touching him, by Jim giving the robot a glare, he backed away immediately. "I'm sorry. I'm, uh, my name is uh..." He said and rubbed his head as to search its memory. Morph turned into a mini version of B.E.N with a cuckoo clock bird coming out of the top. I softly giggled and Jim smirked and shut the 'lid' on his head, turning him back to normal. "Morph. That was really good." I said and giggled. Jim gave me a stern look and I avoided his gaze.
"B.E.N! Of course I'm B.E.N, Bio-Electronic Navigator." He said and tapped the compass like piece on his chest. It started to fall but he caught it. "Oops. And you are?"
"Jim." He said and reached for the gun he dropped. "Emma," I mumbled shyly. B.E.N took our hands and shook them vigorously. "Oh, what a pleasure to meet you, Jimmy and Emmie." He said.
"It's Jim." He said and yanked his hand away. I gently peeled his hand from mine. "Anyway..." B.E.N said and leaned on Jim. "Look," Jim said as he shoved him off, "we're kind of in a hurry. We've got to find a place to hide and there's pirates chasing us-"
"Oh pirates! Don't get me started on pirates! I don't like them. I remember Captain Flint, this guy had such a temper." B.E.N said. We both whipped our heads around in shock hearing his sentence. He knew Captain Flint. "Wait, wait, wait you knew Captain Flint?" Jim asked.
"I think he suffered from mood swings personally, I'm not a therapist in anyway but I- you let me know when I'm rambling." B.E.N answered.
"But that means. Wait! But then you must know about the treasure?" Jim mumbled.
"Treasure?"
"Flint's trove?"
"The loot of a thousand worlds." I added. Morph turned himself in a wooden treasure chest full of riches to emphasize our point.
"It's well, it's all a little-little-little fuzzy." B.E.N replied. "Wait. I r-r-remember. I do. Treasure! Lots of treasure! Buried in the centroid-centroid-centroid of the mechanism! And there was this big door opening and closing and opening and closing. And Captain Flint wanted to make sure nobody could ever get to his treasure so I helped him," he got cut off by sparks sputtering from his head and making sputtering sounds. "Aah! Data inaccessible! Reboot! Reboot! Reboot!"
"B.E.N! B.E.N! B.E.N!" I yelled. His voice have been rising in volume and pitch as he tried to get loss information but, it's causing him to malfunction. It became clear he won't be able to respond to us so Jim slapped him and his head spun around. "And you are?" He asked.
"Wait! What about the treasure?" I asked.
"I wanna say Larry."
"The centroid of the mechanism, or-" Jim said trying to jog his memory. I sighed knowing it wouldn't be useful.
"I'm sorry, my-my-my memory isn't what it used to be. I've lost my mind! Ha-ha! I've lost my mind. You haven't found it have you?" He asked pushing Jim against a tree and patting him down. He reached to do the same with me but I shoved his hands away. "Don't." I said putting my hands in front of my body.
"My missing piece? My primary memory circuit?" He said pointing to the mess of wires from the back of his head.
"Look B.E.N, we really need to find a place to hide okay? So, we're just gonna be, you know, moving on." Jim said.
"Oh, uh, so, well then... I guess this is goodbye, huh?" B.E.N said sounding depressed. "I'm sorry that I'm so dysfunctional. So, uh, go ahead and... I do understand. I do. Bye bye." He dropped to his knees on the ground in a pitiful manner, and people say robots can't feel emotions but B.E.N is pretty sad about this. I gave my brother a pleading look and Morph gave him a sad look. He sighed. "Look if you're gonna come along you're gonna have to stop talking." Jim said. B.E.N leaped onto his feet happy.
"Huzzah! Hahaha! Oh this is fantastic!" He yelled leaping in Jim's arms hanging on to him. "Me and my best buddies out looking for a—" He cleared his throat seeing Jim glaring at him and realized he was talking too loud. "Being quiet." He whispered and zipped his mouth shut and continued to hug Jim. I giggled.
"And you have to stop touching me." He insisted and the robot jumped out of his arms.
"Touching and talking. Those are my two big no no's."
"Okay, now I think we should head—"
"Say, listen, before we go on our 'big search'." B.E.N said making quotation marks with his hand. "Um, would you mind if we made a quick pit stop at my place?" He asked moving some plants out of the way to reveal an odd shaped building standing tall in the distance. "Kind of urgent." He said standing like he was desperate to go pee. I didn't even question if robots could do that.
"B.E.N I think you solved our problem." I said smiling wide. For now... I thought.
"Uh, pardon the mess, people." B.E.N said as we entered his home. Earlier we went and brought Amelia and Doppler and he was carrying her since her injury made it hard for her to walk. I noticed he wrapped her arm in a bandage. Climbing up that vine thing was too painful for me and Jim gave me another piggyback ride. By the time we brought them back the sun had started to set. "You'd think in a hundred years I would've dusted a little more often but, when you're bacthin' it, you tend to uh, let things go." He continued. I laughed as B.E.N threw a chess set off a barrel and picked up an old pink polka dot patterned underwear and hiding it behind him. "Aw, isn't that sweet!" He said seeing Doppler carrying Amelia like a groom carrying his bride.
"I find old fashioned romance so touching don't you think? How about drinks for the happy couple?" He asked holding two big cups full of grease, oil, and who knew what else. One had a gear on the side like a lemon or lime piece and the other had a wrench sticking out like a straw or one of the little umbrella things. "Aw, big brother helping little sister." He said looking over at me and Jim.
"We're not related. Why does everyone keep saying that?" Jim said mumbling the last part.
"That is brand new information." I mumbled.
"Oh, uh, ooh, uh, no. Thank you. We don't drink and we're not a couple." Doppler answered taking his jacket off and looking at the captain. She gave him an interesting smile. "Look at these markings." He said looking at the roof and changing the subject. He adjusted his glasses as he looked around in awe. "They're identical to the ones on the map. I suspect these are the hieroglyphic remnants of an ancient culture." He said.
My brother and I look at the roof inspecting the markings curiously.
"Mr. Hawkins, Miss Emma stop anyone who tries to approach." She said and winced in pain. She leaned back to ease the pain. Doppler folded his jacket up to make a pillow for her.
"Yes, yes. Now listen to me. Stop giving orders for a few milliseconds and lie still." He told her.
"Very forceful Doctor. Go on say something else." She urge him. I couldn't help but smile watching the chemistry between the two.
"Hey look! There's some more of your buddies! Hey fellas! We're over here fellas!" B.E.N yelled outside giving away our location.