Disclaimer: I… own… NOTHING! Haha, fooled you again!
8. Lost in Space with Loonies
Liz considered herself to be a very levelheaded young lady. But this was just too much. Aliens, women with tails, green blobby squirrel people, and now this.
She was standing in the middle of a tree, literally inside the tree. Or was she the tree? Frankly, she didn't know, and she didn't really want to either. She just wanted to get back to her own body and--
Where was her body? Was she dead? No, she felt distinctly alive, if a bit confused. The rings, the bright light… Maybe I am dead, she thought with a stab of horror. Oh, Morrick… Now you'll never survive…
She felt a sharp pain at the back of her neck as she was pulled backward, through the tree, through the wall, out through space, and into another ship. And then back into her own body, at last.
The other alien, Kou'al, stood over her and clucked like an old mother hen. "Can't have any astral projecting here, m'dea'. Very dangerous in space, you see, and you'll forget where your body is again."
"Any what?" she said, and then fainted.
"Speaking of, who is this serious black man you seem to think I am?" he asked me, popping his neck oddly. "I'm Roger Covenant, in case you didn't know. One of the world's greatest mages?"
Oh. So he wasn't Snuffles. Fine by me: Sirius always creeped me out a bit. "Um, Morrick Evans. Have we met?" He seemed… strange.
"Met? No, oh no, certainly not. We've never met. I've only tried to kill you several times." He propped his head on his hands. "You're very good at avoiding me. Why is that?"
"Um…" Oh, alright. They've locked me into a room with a crazy man. First off, I know who this guy is. He's known as the Darkmage, due to his dabbling with Avalon - the girl, not the Isle - and his inability to remember to shave. He's been struck by lightening a record forty seven times, and despite that, he's still alive. Why he's in space, I have no idea.
I went to what I thought was a door, and began scratching and howling crazily at it. "That won't do you any good. I know, I've tried. I've tried everything."
"Yes, well, I'm pretty, so I've got advantages you don't."
"That's it!" he cried, eyes ablaze. Literally, he was on fire. I mean it, he'd actually caught fire, and he didn't seem bothered by this at all. "That's how you evade me, your prettiness clouds me gaze, and I can't find you. Brilliant!"
"Uh huh, is there any way out of here, wise guy, 'cause if there ain't, I'm afraid I'm gonna have to sic the evil side on you." See, see, I'm good at false bravado.
His fires imploded on him. Not pretty. "Little boy, you have no idea of what I'm capable of."
"Yeah, and you have no idea how many Madonna songs I have memorized," I said. He went pale and made a gagging noise.
"M- M- Madonna?" he asked. "You- you wouldn't d- dare."
"Papa don't preach--"
"NOOO!" he screamed. "The off key-ness! Argh, it hurts!"
"Let me out. I'll stop singing," I said.
He ran at the door thing and crashed into it. It caved, and he rushed it again, knocking it down this time. I stepped daintily over his prone form, and said, "Well, nice to meet you. Bye."
The small blonde woman who used the needle on me last time was waiting in the corridor. "Ah, I see I won't be needing to sedate him after all. Good. If you'll follow me?" She grabbed my arm and dragged me with her.
"No more needles!"
"What? Oh, yes, your partner informed me that you've been given all the necessary inoculations, so no, no more needles." She looked up at me with a suspicious expression. "You do remember this, don't you?"
"Er, probably. She's as fond of needles as you are."
She smiled. Yay. "I doubt that. We have a more pressing issue, however. We've lost your Earth."
I blinked. "You, er, lost the Earth?" I tried to turn my laugh into a hacking cough, but it didn't work. "I'm sorry," I said as she glared at me, "but it is kinda funny if you look at it from my point of view."
"Yes, well. We need you to find your correct Earth and Time, and not just because you need to be returned." She closed her eyes and sighed. "I do beg your pardon. I've already started giving you orders, and I don't even know your name. I'm Dr. Aeryole Galintha. And you?"
"Mr. Morrick Evans, Hobbit at large."
"O…kay. Nice oxymoron action." She pushed me down into a chair-thing. You know, the usual dealy with lots of wires and prongs to poke me with. "Now, I'm just going to hook you up to this nice little machine, and you're going to scan the Universes for your Earth, and when you find some that fit your criteria, I'll unlock the Time function."
"Has anyone ever died in this thing?" I asked slowly.
"I… I'm not at liberty to discuss it."
"Let me out."
"Can't. Sorry. Now, lets get to work."
"Mother."
K'ata surveyed their trophy room with a mix of envy and revulsion. Rather than taking just bones or teeth or recognized things like that, they appeared to have ripped off random bits and preserved them in jars. Badly drawn Crayon sketches of battles decorated the few spaces not filled with jars. Foreign bloodstained weapons were strewn haphazardly on the floor and in corners.
"Nevertheless, it's pretty full," Mart'am, the child they had adopted - their word for killed his parents and stolen - said cheerfully. He wasn't suffering, but not benefiting from their care, if you could call it that. Respect for ones elders seemed to be a lost concept to him. For now, until they went back to Earth, she had to look after the miniature Yautja. She'd be lucky if she didn't kill him before then.
"Shut up, midget," she said, imitating Morrick's treatment of his sister.
"Hey, I'm not a midget!" he said, outraged. "I can beat you at fighting," he boasted. "I'm a wizard."
"Ha, I could beat you in combat with a thought, midget," she said.
"I am not-- Hey, why are we speaking English?"
"Because, I like it better than the jumped-up indigestion sounds we call a language." She examined one particularly nauseating specimen: a bony, black hand with razor-sharp claws a foot long. The green blood on those still glowed.
"Gave Kou'al a lot of trouble, he did. He was an Amnion scientist," Mart'am explained, seeing her questioning look. "Kou'al went to retrieve him, and he brought Turi back with him as well. Something about her saving his life, or some such." He clicked, annoyed. "They won't tell me, of course. I have to hack into their logs to get what really happened, and they didn't even write it there."
"Mmhmm. Yes, that's nice. When are we going back to Earth, midget?" He was getting on her nerves.
"I dunno. And I ain't a midget."
"Yes, you are, midget."
He roared a very laughable roar and stalked off. "Bye bye, midget!" K'ata said and waved farewell to him. Maybe he'd eject himself into space. She, in the meantime, was going to take a nap.
"Wake up, lazy human," Liz heard as she was poked in the ribs. It was that woman, Turi. "Gerrup," she said.
Why bother? she wondered. There's no point.
"Ack, it hasn't even been a day yet and you're already despairing? Lord Foul would love you," she said gloomily. She placed a glass of some warm, blue drink in Liz's hands. "Drink that."
"Poison?" she asked hopefully.
"Not quite. It'll keep you from fainting any more, so that's good." She nodded as Liz drank. It was tasteless, like hospital Jell-O.
"Where's Morrick? And K'ata?" Liz asked, fully aware now.
"We can dance, we can dance, everything's out of control," she sang, unhelpfully. "Yes, the safety dance." She spun about the room on her toes.
"Great. I'm in another mental asylum," Liz said.
"No, ya ain't. Asylums have padded walls. We got metal," she said, butchering the language. "You call that butchering? I ain't done did no butchering yet."
"You're from the ghetto, aren't you? I swear, I've heard you on the radio… Thomson, right?"
She stopped spinning. "How'd you know that?"
"My god, I live near an alien. I'm from Raydenville, you know, out near the lakes?"
"Those crazy home-schooled kids? Yeah, you look the type. Are y'all really a cult?" she asked, seeming interested but probably not.
"Some of us. The Poundses are Catholic."
"Hmph. Same difference. And are you the ones who leave disemboweled sheep carcasses in the woods?"
"Er. The fake sheep, yeah."
"No, the real ones." Liz shook her head. "Hmm. I think I have another bounty on my hands. Don't worry, we probably won't blow anything up," she said as Liz objected.
"I wanna see Morrick."
"What, I bore you? Oh, very well, we'll go see your little pet."
The staggering variety of the Earths surprised me. Not only did I have to find my Earth, I had to find my Time as well. And the Earths differed from each Time to the next. And then when I thought I'd found my Time, the Earth changed abruptly. Al Gore was the president, and Bush was an Iranian dictator. You know I ain't staying there! And the good little doctor's constant murmuring was hardly a help.
"Now, I'm sure we've found it. Yes, see, I'm sure that's Australia there."
"Australia isn't pink, nor does it look like a kangaroo. Will you please just shut up for a few minutes? How do you expect me to find my planet with you telling me about all this other nonsense?"
"Well, I don't know. I'm Alturian."
"Shut up! I think I almost had it."
"Did it have four main continents?"
"Shut. Up. Mine has seven. Look, maybe we can narrow it down to just one galaxy? You know, mine is the Milky Way, there are others…"
"Uh, yeah, that's what we've been doing. We're in your Milky Way galaxy."
"Wow. It's… big."
"Uh huh. Now you know why everyone else calls this thing "the Devil Chair".
"Out. Out, I want out now, please."
"Aw, man, I ain't that bad," the chair said. "Say, you feel like sacrificing any chickens on me?"
"Mommy."
Dr. Galintha yawned. "I think we need a break. This thing doesn't normally talk if we're alert. It's sneaky, you see."
"Good. Please let me out."
"Mmm… Chicken, oh yeah…"
K'ata was close to killing Mart'am. Annoying little git. He was making strange noises, and they weren't remotely like what children normally sounded like. Not only that, but he was on the ceiling.
"Come down, now," K'ata ordered evenly.
"Nope. You didn't respect this dangerous wizard, so now he's mad." He laughed and pointed a stick at her. "Behold, the wand, the instrument of destruction that you, insignificant female that you are, do not possess."
"Yes, nice twig. Now, come down before I come up there and harm you." She didn't like the slur to her significance, but that paled in comparison to the insult of her gender. The little brat would be punished, that much was certain. Nails and a cross would be involved. And a spear. She growled happily as she imagined the screams of fear and pain…
"Never, never shall I come down!"
"Oh, and how do you plan to eat? Salvage bologna from the ceilings?"
"Why yes, in fact-- What's bologna?" he asked.
"Oh, something I'm sure you wouldn't like, especially if I told you what was in it."
He dropped down a few inches, hovering. "What's in it?" he asked, showing his childish curiosity.
"Processed… something. I'll tell you if you're standing on the floor."
He thought it over. She could practically see the little hamster running on its wheel in his head. (Morrick had taken her to Alvin's house, where the walls were nearly covered by the hamster cages. A strange experience, to be sure.)
Mart'am fell off the ceiling onto the floor with a dull thud. K'ata would've pounced then, but the doors whooshed open and revealed Turi and a very jittery Liz.
"Hi. Caffeine. Very. Awake," was the limit of her communicative abilities.
"Oh, come off it, I didn't put that much in it. 'Sides, if there was anything really wrong with you, Leira, our AI, would tell us, wouldn't you, Leira?" Turi waited a moment.
"We are sorry, but the Leira Artificial Intelligence System is currently offline, making minor repairs. We will return…" and a series of dates and seemingly random numbers followed.
Turi looked over at Liz. "Er, oops." She returned her attention to K'ata and said, "We're going to see Morrick. Wanna come with?"
"Yes," K'ata said. "Need we bring him?" she asked and pointed to Mart'am.
"Yes, we need to bring me. And you have to tell me what bologna is."
"She'll tell you what bologna is if you get rid of that dirty little stick," Turi told him. Evidently, she was regretting letting him live.
He made a very rude face and returned to the ceiling. "It is not a stick, a twig, or a shish kabob skewer. It is a wand, and I can do deadly magic with it."
Turi put her finger and her thumb in the shape of an L on her forehead, and then pointed at him. "Don't tell him what bologna is, then. C'mon, Morrick's probably dead by now. We left him on the Med Deck with Doc G," she explained. And off they went.
"E six." Kou'al and the guy in the Kull warrior suit were playing Battleship.
"How dare you sink my battleship!" He had a vaguely Italian accent.
"Hey, war's war. Get over it."
"Fine. G nine."
"Haha, loser."
"Bother."
"C seven."
The Kull guy, who we'll call Tino, even though he has no name, stared blankly at the screen. "I've been beaten by a man with less wit than a gym sock."
"Oh, and how do you know how much wit a gym sock has?" Kou'al asked as he got up and turned off his screen. "Look, we've done this fourteen times in a row, and you've lost every time. Don't you know not to play with anyone with telepathy?"
"You-- That has to be in the rules somewhere."
"It ain't. The makers of these games don't believe in telepathy."
"Hmph. Idiots."
"More so than you'd think."
"I was referring to you people."
"Ah. Hey, do me a favor?"
"What?"
"Stuff your head in the engines."
The intercom bleeped. "Commanders Kou'al and Diablo?"
"Huh? Oh, that's me. Yes?" Tino asked.
"Yes, Ensign?" Kou'al was always a bit more formal with junior officers. Gave a better impression, it did.
"Sirs, there is another ship approaching our position." The girl paused as if wondering how to state her message. "It appears to be one of the Gou'ald vessels we destroyed two weeks ago."
"One of Siva's?" Commander Tino asked.
"The very same. Sirs, Commander Saka asks permission to arm the cannons."
"No, you idiot cat, don't arm anything." This was Kou'al. "We can take prisoners. Information, you know," he said as Tino looked at him oddly. Hey, Tino was into the slave trade, not him. "We'll gut it for weapons, how's that for a reason?"
"Yes, sir. Commander Saka says you're a dodgy old git."
"Tell her she's a fur-brained amphibian spawn," he said fondly.
He then heard a lot of exclaiming and cursing and thumping. Poor girl.
The doors spun open and Dr. Galintha entered with a cross look on her face. "You're on ship-wide, boyo. My, er, patient is currently cowering in the corridor talking about 'voices' and 'big people' coming to get him."
Tino retreated hastily. Rows between the two main leaders of their little armada were not enjoyable, especially when the sanity of patients was involved.
"Well, that's what you get for putting him in the Devil Chair." Kou'al shuddered and growled empathetically. "Does strange things to people, that."
"You helped steal the designs and you helped jury-rig it, so don't go blaming me for when your little pets get caught in the wiring!" she said. "And, as I remember it, it was your bright idea that gave us the need for it anyway, and stranded me on this ship you acquired, as you call it, illegally."
By this time, Kou'al was backed against the wall. "Um… Pie?"
"You! I should…" She lost her train of thought as pie took over. "What kind?" she asked suspiciously.
"Any kind you wish, m'dea, any you wish," he said, clucking evilly.
Oh. So, this doctor lady has the mystical pie fetish too, eh? I'll be needing that knowledge later, I'm sure. The offer of pie had diminished my fear of giant flesh-eating chairs, and I walked calmly along with them and listened as Kou'al lulled Dr. Galintha into a false sense of security with his decorative pie descriptions. Well, he was lulling me into a false sense of security too. It's odd how I know it's false, but that doesn't bother me. Maybe I should've been a blonde.
I tried to ignore the scraping sounds I heard above me, the ones that sounded almost like a chair being dragged - or, dare I say, dragging itself - across the floor. I also tried to ignore the mad calls that sounded suspiciously like "Gimme chicken! Gimme chicken!"
Their kitchen-y place was huge. And it was a technological marvel too, with all its computer operated microwaves and toasters. I had fun with cake mix and a very aggressive waffle iron.
Reclining in a fluffy, stain-proof chair, I watched the other two pig out. K'ata must just be weird, because there wasn't anything odd about Kou'al's eating habits, except maybe that he would hold a piece of pie with his mandibles and talk and gesture wildly as he ate. (You know, everyone in this story except me is a ham. Odd, eh?) And Evil Doctor Lady must have a really good metabolism, because I think she ate more than him.
The doors opened, and everyone else - Turi, Liz, K'ata, and a strange little Yautja midget (What? He was only half as tall as K'ata; he looked like a midget next to her.) with a stick - entered. "Lovely," said Turi. "Now, will we be rid of these Earthies soon? Because Commander Saka informed me that we have a potentially valuable ship to gut."
Kou'al groaned. "Just like her to go around me to you. Alright, alright," he said as she began denying that. "Aeryole, have you found their planet?"
"Not yet, but we're close." She looked over at me and asked, "Aren't we?"
"I'm not getting back into that thing. I ain't. It's gonna eat me!" I said by way of an explanation. "I don't wanna be some chair's din-din!"
Liz snickered. "Are ya scared, Ricky?"
I glared at her through narrowed eyes. "Why no, Lucy, I'm not scared. I'm terrified!"
"Aw, poor wittle Wicky is scared," she said, laughing. Okay, they'd been messing with her brain or something.
Doctor Lady thought so too. "Kou'al, that sounds strangely like a Wraith."
"Oh, gods, I can't deal with this," he moaned. "Why, why is it that you people are all so… weird? What gods of happenstance, coincidence, and conspiracy brought you together, and which of them pulled me into it?" He put his head on the table and morosely said, "Kou'al is not here right now. He's vacationing in the Caribbean, and he won't be back until someone else deals with this. Don't leave a message, it's futile."
Turi glared at him, and then looked over at Liz, who was beginning to look a bit like the girl from The Exorcist. Liz gave a gurgling laugh and began trying to climb the wall. "Okay," Turi said slowly. "We need to get rid of you people. You too," she said to K'ata. "You, boy, are going to do whatever Dr. Galintha says, no matter how demeaning and debasing you may think it is. She's older and smarter than you."
"Thanks everso, Commander," she said.
"It's true," she said with a shrug. "Commander Diablo?"
The loudspeakers crackled to life as he answered hesitantly, "Yes?"
"We have a Wraith-possessed girl that we need you to restrain for a while. Get down here immediate--" She stopped as the doors slid open and revealed the tall guy in the freaky suit.
"I was listening next door," he confessed.
"Well, you know what's to be done then. Hop to!" she yelled as he gave her a reluctant look.
"Aye aye, Madame. No need to snap my head off."
"C'mon," Dr. Galintha said. "We're not going to hear anything more pertaining to us." And again I was dragged back to the Devil Chair's room. I like to think I made a very profound statement by clinging to the doorframe for dear life.
"What in the world… Oi, my head," Roger Covenant groaned. He popped his neck and looked around blearily. The first thing that registered coherently in his jumbled head was that there was a piece of wall missing.
It's a door, you imbecile, said a voice. You go through it and escape.
Escape. That too registered, but not coherently. He didn't know why it sounded like such a good idea, but the Voice was not to be refused.
Get the others.
What others? Oh, the boy and the two females. Yes, they would do. Do for what? Summoning the Lord of Lions, he thought.
You idiot, you're a Covenant, not a Brisby. You're going to kill the boy, and then you're going to use his blood to remake the Sunbane, which I will then feed off of and regain my strength. Is that at all confusing to you?
Yes. But alright, he would comply. He would serve his master, Lord Foul, the Despiser.
Now you're getting it. Get to it.
A/N: Okay, I know I'm a bit of an idiot, but I've found a hobby, and I plan to force it upon, well, everyone. Ha.