raVen Speaks:
Gotta warn you guys… the first part is kinda bloody and gruesome… Thanks for the reviews, and replies are on the bottom!
Note also, that this chapter was supposed to have a quick scene about 426 in the beginning… but it turned out to be a whole Galactic Federation-based chapter… so sorry for the delay of having you discover Nani's job! D
Breathe
Chapter 4
© by raVen
Editor: Kenjaje
Somewhere, hundreds of light-years away, there was an explosion that sent twelve percent of the space station into vacuum. The rest of the base was sealed by emergency blast doors that quickly sealed shut where they could. This was the scientific base, Aguda, orbiting a giant green/purple gas planet. The station was eight floors from bottom to top, and each floor was roughly the size of nine football fields placed in rows of three, except, of course, on the floors with the large jagged half-sphere blown out of the station's one side. On board, one word described everything. Chaos. What had exploded was one of the capacitors on floor three, in the power plant.
"Where is it?"
"Damnit! I don't know! It was over there!"
"Screw this! I'm outa here!" the front soldier, a tall and muscular brown creature with withered and dry skin yelled, dropped his plasma rifle, and ran back past the other three soldiers. They were facing a burning column of fire that was spewing from a broken door to the side. They were on the edge of the closed-off vacuum section, as beyond the door on the other side of the flames, there was only the emptiness of space.
"It's in that room…" the, now front guard, said. It was an enforcer (the red lizards in white suits, remember).
"Hah! Then it's surely dead-" the second in line spoke. A purple creature with a elongated head and tiny eyes with a nasty set of teeth where some slime was dripping from. Its limbs were unusually skinny as well as its body which had a natural hunched back,
"Haven't you been listening to the news? Not even a direct hit with a plasma-ball at point-blank can kill it!" the enforcer replied. The purple alien rose one of its clawed hands to cover its face.
"How can it survive? We are twenty foot from that fire and it's burning my-" The next moment there was a very loud thud from right next to them, and all three of the soldiers aimed their weapons at the spot in the wall… Another thud and the metal dented a bit.
"What the f-" the purple alien started, but he never finished his sentence. The next moment, with a burst of fire, the bulge broke open and something slammed into the purple alien with tremendous force, causing him and whatever had hit him, to slam into the opposite wall. He screamed and yelled as if he was being tortured in unthinkable ways. On top of him, holding him to the wall, was a hideous demonic creature… what little could be seen was the blood-red fur and the black horns protruding from its head. With both upper claws raised, it struck, the left paw cutting four hideous gashes down the side of the purple alien's long head, and the right paw destroying its face, and taking its jaw along with it, yellowish blood spurted over the creature and the floor. Through the horrified screams and screams of pain, the creature then slammed its claws into the purple alien's upper torso and pulled outwards, along with its bottom set of arms that was pinning the purple alien to the wall. With a sick 'shlirk' sound, the purple alien's upper half was torn in two. The last soldier fell over himself as he ran, and the enforcer, with the tower of flames behind him, and this horrible monstrosity in front of him, aptly decided to blow his own head off. A blood curdling howl later and-
426 fell off the crate from where he was laying with a pathetic, whimpering yell and struck the floor with an 'oof'. He quickly got up and fell back against the crate, hugging his knees to his chest. He started crying softly. He didn't believe these 'dreams' to be true… even after one such a dream he 'woke up' surrounded by dead bodies and burning wreckage. Usually he woke up on a ship headed somewhere, but that one time it was different… it was like waking up from a nightmare, to a worse nightmare. He denied it. He fought it. He failed to admit it. How could it be him? He would never hurt anyone! Even in self-defense! He sobbed loudly and bit his lip, wiping his nose. He was in the cargo-hold of a freight ship bound for a distant system. He was a tall experiment… or at least taller than Stitch. About three inches taller, but also much skinnier, not in an unhealthy way, but more in a type of physical build. The fact that his vital organs were less and smaller gave his body a slight 'hourglass' effect; large chest/upper body to a thin stomach to larger hips again. He had rabbit-like feet and his small Sparky-like ears were permanently in a downwards angle backwards. He did not have the ability to move his ears like Stitch. His head was also more egg-shaped, much like 625. His primary fur color (back/legs/head) was red, and his secondary fur color (stomach/chest/under chin) was a very light orange (On an RGB scale it would be R: 255 G:150 B:100). He had a rhombus-shaped patch of darker fur (RGB: R:200 G:0 B:0) on his elbows and three on his back, running down his spine. From the centre of each of these, a small spike protruded. The spikes on the elbows were slightly curved upwards, and only the upper set of arms had them. Also, behind each ear, a similar small white horn protruded. His claws were smaller than Stitch's. His ability was to increase his strength over a period of time but the stronger he made himself, the shorter he could stay that way.
He stood up and steeled himself. It was usually the same thing over and over; he would wonder if someone was flying the ship and then go to check only to find…
Moving through the various crates in the rectangular room, he jumped and hit the button, cringing in advance at what he might see; surely enough, he gasped and looked away. The cockpit had a large red blood-splatter to the side of the deep-sleep chambers and these smeared off to the side of the cockpit, ending at the door to the outside. Biting back vomit (afraid to see what he'd eaten should he barf), he wondered what happened to that poor soul. He jumped over the blood and climbed up onto the chair to gaze at the controls. He was headed for a small water-covered planet that had only one Federation outpost on its entire surface. Desperately, he tugged at the controls, and slammed all the buttons he could see… but to no avail… the three deep gashes across the front of the circuitry below the control-panel had disabled the entire operating system. He wept again, this time for the people on the small water planet, who were about to die, and soon fell asleep in the pilot's seat.
Somewhere on a nearby planet in the same system called Turo…
The Grand Council Woman sat in her private quarters, surveying the data-pad she had in her hand with a morbid expression as she quickly scanned over the details it was scrolling through at five pages a second. The depth of her frown would only deepen the further she got, and then the list of names of the deceased started, and the worried frown turned to that of shock, and she dropped the pad when the names had finished scrolling.
"No…" she mumbled with a quivering voice, one hand slightly holding the place on her chest where the ache was originating from. She stood up and walked to her window that had a beautiful view of Turo. The sun was setting to this part of the planetary city. She placed her hand on the window, feeling the cool glass underneath her fingertips and bowed her head, saying a silent prayer for the 32000 that had died on that station.
There was a buzzing sound from behind her.
"Vangelis?" Her eyes opened and she turned to the voice, placing her hands together. In the holographic projector beacon in the corner of her room stood another creature like the Grand Council Woman: An almost near replica, except for the skin color, which was beige, and the two protruding ridges on the top of his head, as well as the slightly broader shoulders and small difference in height.
"Andotar…" she said and quickly made her way to the projector. The expression on the male's face made her draw in breath.
"A-a ship… a ship was seen leaving the station before the explosion… it was a freighter…" he spoke and searched the Grand Council Woman's face for some reply or a solution. But her features were frozen in anticipating shock.
"A freighter belonging to a Shatchull… who died in the explosion…"
"Then-"
"Yes, Vangelis. And it's heading to my system! Its destination is the aquatic planet Mournall… do you know how close that is?" he said in a mere whisper, his voice dripping with liquid fear.
"Andotar-"
"Less than a minute's worth of hyper drive! After what he did to Strajor-; his death-toll is over 70-billion! By failing to contain that monster, you have sentenced us all to death!"
The Grand Council Woman gave several steps back, almost stumbling over herself, at the accusing ferocity of the words.
"He'll be here in two hours! I cannot evacuate an entire planet in that time, Vangelis!" Her expression changed from terrifying shock to a determined anger and her pose also changed.
"Enough!" she said loudly. Caught off-guard, Andotar did a double-take and frowned.
"What-?"
"Do not blame me for your inability to defend yourself, Councilor," she stated, suddenly formal. She was slipping in behind her mask… the façade that gave her strength. Instinctively trained military protocols that drives out all emotion and brings forth only strength and determination to rule and lead. She walked forwards till she was right in front of Andotar.
"Strajor can be restored; just as Turo was over a millennium ago."
"But what about all those lives…" Andotar said in a hopeless, barely audible voice.
"The universe is full of life… we were caught of guard on Strajor, Andotar… but not this time…" She paused. "You have two hours to prepare your defenses, while I visit the Elder's Enclave." She turned and walked for the door while Andotar's brow furrowed.
-Elder's Enclave…- he thought in his mind. He had heard those words before… long ago. Why were they causing him such distress? His eyes darted across the room as if he was searching for a visible answer.
-Elder's Enclave… It's been so long… Elder's Enc- - His head shot up, his eyes wide. The words finally hit home. She just walked out the doorway.
"Vangelis! No!" he shouted after her and the door slid shut.
"It's suicide!"
The Grand Council Woman, known to her Councilors as Vangelis, made her way down the corridor to her reception hall. Her official robes had pieces of kite-shaped cloth that hung from her arms, and these, along with the tail of her dress, dragged behind her as she walked. The automated door slid open and she entered the top of a large hall. The metal walls were decorated in a royal golden hue, and the Grand Council Woman's royal insignia hung in the form of tapestries at even spaces along the top of the oval room. She entered at the centre of the top of two bending stairways that led to the bottom floor. The front of the room had two massive blast-doors, also tinted gold, that served as the front doors of the building. In the centre of the room, right below her where she looked over the railing, was a circular table with one lone creature manning the terminals and computers there. Vangelis made her way down the left stairway, and walked up to the desk. The alien there was smaller than Stitch with an abnormally large head in comparison to its body, and two tiny eyes. It had a tan colored body with teal markings across its bald forehead. No hair was seen anywhere, and neither ears. The creature wore the royal colors of the Grand Council Woman's personal employ, as did all the personnel that worked in this part of the building. Only when Vangelis cleared her throat, did the creature look up and gasp. It immediately looked down again in an attempted bow.
"You're Excellency…!" the alien, a female, said.
"I apologize, I- I did not notice you enter-"
"Perhaps it is because you are working so hard?"
Realizing she had just been complimented on her productivity, the alien shyly lowered her gaze and shrugged.
"Well… I try, Your Excellency." Vangelis smiled in return.
"I need more people like you in my service."
"Thank you, Your Excellency." She gasped. "Uhp- how may I be of service, Excellency?" She added quickly, realizing that the Grand Council Woman would not have walked all this way from her personal quarters to have a pleasant chat.
"Cancel all my appointments for the rest of the day, Shana. And take a break."
"Yes! Of course, Your Excellency!" and she started typing immediately. Vangelis walked past the table to the back of the room to under the doors she had emerged from previously. The doors there slid open to reveal a small, dark room with two glowing white circles on the floor, and a tinted window to the right. Against the ceiling were two cone-shaped devices right above the white circles. There was also a light mist covering the floor, coming from four venting holes in the ceiling. These were disinfectants. A speaker crackled to life somewhere in the room.
"Please step on one of the circles and let's take a look at you…" Then there was a gasp.
"Your Excellency! Please forgive me, I'll open the doors immediately!" A quick static burst, and a moment later, the hydraulics on the strange door hissed and it split open horizontally in the middle. She smiled and nodded at the tinted window, then stepped through the door into a massive control room.
"Her Excellency!" a creature to the right of the door announced, and everyone in the entire room stood up. Vangelis motioned for them to be seated and walked down the stairs to the lower control area. (They were in the room from the first movie, where she ran in and screamed "Where is he!")
"Bring up Jumba's monster…" she said as she stood behind one of the front controllers.
"Yes, Excellency." She closed the programs she was working with and typed a few commands. They zoomed in on what seemed empty space… but soon, the floating debris of the recently destroyed space station.
"Where is… Aguda?"
"That is Aguda," Vangelis replied. There were several gasps and screams all around.
"Where are the survivors?" came an informal shout of a nearby tall, purple alien as it stood up.
"There are a total of 44 survivors. She was not one of them."
"…NO!" The creature lunged at the Grand Council Woman and she turned to face him just as several people restrained him inches away from her steady and calm face.
"It is a time of great despair we are in; a time of darkness."
"She was my life-mate!" the creature snarled into her face.
"Then take some time off to reflect on your pain. If you feel you cannot return, then take a cruiser and chase this creature in your blinded hatred of it." She closed her eyes. "Remove him." The alien did not resist as they dragged him from the control room.
"Where did he go?" Vangelis questioned as if nothing had happened. Wide eyed, the little alien quickly turned around and typed.
"There!" she said after a few seconds. A purple trail of particles led off into the distance.
"Trace it."
"Yes, Excellency… Aha! There's the moving continuum breach… that means the ship… must be only several kilometers ahead of the camera's current position."
"Where is this?"
"Calculating… the closest body mass is the Medium Blue T dash 7313 star… Uthxixa system."
There was a pause as Vangelis mulled this over.
"How far is he from Mournall?"
"Mournall, Your Excellency? As in, Councilor Andotar's system?"
"Yes."
"Calculating…" There was another pause.
"An hour and fifty-three minutes, standard time…" The little alien frowned and tilted her head.
"Yes?" Vangelis questioned.
"That seems to be the planet he's heading to, as well. How did you know, if I may ask, Your Excellency?"
"You know how paranoid Councilor Andotar can be. He was probably keeping a closer eye on Aguda than its own security systems."
"Oh… why… why didn't we act, Excellency? We knew the rogue experiment was heading towards to station after what happened at Strajor… Why didn't we evacuate the station?"
"Because I ordered them to stay until the experiment had arrived, and then evacuate after activating the station's self-destruct option … but the experiment destroyed the escape pods' launching procedure control center after impacting with the station… The only survivors were the 44 members of the survey team who were taking samples on the planet below. They managed to send an alert signal to battleship Servos, who was patrolling with Defense Fleet 21 in the asteroid field nearby."
Everyone had been listening intently, and when Vangelis stopped talking, the furious typing suddenly started up again and everyone pretended to be working.
"But why not simply set the self-destruct to a certain time and then evacuate?"
"Because then the experiment would not have landed on the station. Remember that it has the mind of a supercomputer… and as we have seen with those that fled Strajor… the experiment had gunned down all the escaping ships that it could find after the destruction of the planet. Aguda was not a planet, and had everyone started fleeing, they would have run straight into the experiment's firing range."
"What are we going to do, Your Excellency?"
"I have an idea. It's a long shot… but worth a try…" and she walked back up the stairs where she paused and turned around. Everyone was looking at her, waiting for her to explain what she was planning. She gave them an annoyed look and waved them off.
"Go on, then! Back to work!" And with wide eyes, everyone quickly turned around and continued working. The Grand Council Woman smiled and left the control room.
"Shana?"
"Yes, Your Excellency?" the tan alien at the receptionist's desk answered, alert.
"Please have Experiment 600 come to my personal quarters immediately."
"At once, Your Excellency…" She moved to do what was asked of her.
"And I need your advice on something."
The little alien almost fell off her chair.
"My advice?" she stuttered. "You honor me, Excellency! But surely, what could I possibly know?"
"This might be a long shot… but I've thought about it before and checked up on several historical accounts… do you know the great archivist Ishnea?"
"…Why… why yes, I do… She is an ancestor of mine… believed to have been in the service of the Sentinels… millennia ago…"
"Then did you know she was a personal assistant to Sentinel Taloria, whose blood flows through my veins?"
It took a few moments for the importance of this information to sink in.
"Wow… so, I'm fated, in a way, to serve you now, as my ancestors served yours then… forgive my confusion, Excellency, but… does this have anything to do with the fact that you have been chosen as Grand Council Woman for over three centuries?"
"That is just it, Shana. I was not chosen. Do you know how old I am?"
"No, Your Excellency… but it is a well known fact that Dweanor have been known to age to well over five hundred standard years…" The Grand Council Woman smiled and bent forward.
"Taloria was my mother…" she said softly and looked into Shana's shocked lightning-blue eyes with a chuckle. She stood back up as the massive blast doors opened. Soon, a very fat, scaly and green alien with three eyes and tentacles all over its head, came waddling in… it was wearing a cheap tuxedo and its hands were covered in jewelry.
"Aha!" it bellowed and the Grand Council Woman tilted her head in disgust.
"May I help you?" Shana asked and looked as helpful as she could.
"In a moment, dear. Grand Council Woman! Very rarely are you seen outside your quarters, or not busy with some important task…"
"Are you implying that I am not doing my work?"
"Hardly. Just saying that you spend most of your time in your personal quarters… and then you appear at important meetings without actually leaving the building…" The Grand Council Woman glared at the alien.
"Have you dipped so low, Spieyev? Spying on the Grand Council Woman… I could have you incarcerated for-"
"Have your scientists developed teleportation, 'Your Excellency'? How else can you explain being in your office one moment, and the next, appearing on television on the other side of the planet with-?"
"Enough!" Vangelis had clenched her right fist and lifted it in front of her chest as he spoke, and then waved it back to her side as she spoke for emphasis
"You walk a thin line, Spieyev… I'm watching you …" she said in a threatening tone. The fat alien smiled back.
'And I've been watching you for some time, my darling…' he thought to himself, not dare saying it out loud.
"I expect her in my room, shortly," Vangelis told Shana and proceeded up the stairs back to her quarters. Shana quickly pressed a few buttons and a few seconds later, a confirmation beep was heard from the console.
"So, how may I assist you?" she tried again. He chuckled and stated his business.
raVen speaks:
Surprise! I gave the Grand Council Woman a name! And revealed some of my plot.
HeMeleNoLiloLover: You'll have to wait for the next chapter D
Ri2: 628 isn't a normal experiment… but yeah, that's what everyone's aiming for.
Ecliptic: I can only picture how embarrassing it was ; Wait for the next chapter for the new job.
Lauren: Leroy and Stitch! Etto… nandeska?
Thanks for reading everyone! And stay tuned for chapter 5!
-raVen