Off-Worlding 2 – Excerpt 1
Off-Worlding Book 2
Chapter 1
“You know something,” said Alex Dandridge as he gestured toward the dozens of large, hornet-like creatures menacingly circling around them. “I think it’s possible we underestimated them.”
Some of the two-foot-long insects repeatedly stabbed their stingers into the Prijatel shield that surrounded them, while many others waited patiently for their turn.
As they attacked from all sides, Hathiant nodded his head. “I’d agree with that assessment. After all, this planet isn’t named Horrible for nothing.” Panic caused the Amorphicine’s coloring to lighten from his usual lime green to a shade more reminiscent of weak tea.
Silence pushed on the side of the bubble with her lower right hand, reflexively removing it when a Horribalian jabbed its posterior at that spot. “Can you at least make this stupid bubble bigger? I’m way too close to you two.” The Vex warrior pointed from the human to the Amorphicine. “I can’t tell which of you smells worse.”
Manipulating the controls of the handheld Prijatel, Hathiant brought up data and moved it around before taking a quick moment to glance over at Silence. “You’re one to talk, Si. Your odor isn’t pleasant either.” Holding up his hands, he quickly added, “No offense.”
“Sorry, but I gotta side with Hath,” added Alex as he smoothed down his messy blonde hair. “I had no idea rock sweat could be so pungent.”
Silence glared at the human. “As you well know, I’m not a rock, though you keep saying I look like one.”
Holding up a finger, Alex corrected, “Technically, I said you look like a large snowman made of rock.” When he saw her snarl intensify, he quickly added, “Sorry. Snow woman. Though honestly, we humans use the word snowman as a non-gender specific sorta thing.”
“Uh-huh, sure.” After holding her intense stare for an extra moment, the Vex warrior turned back toward the protective barrier and once again pressed a hand against it. “Seriously, why do you have this shield so tight? I can barely move inside this thing.”
Frowning, Hathiant replied, “The Prijatel is not expanding. In fact, it’s beginning to retract. I don’t like this.” Hathiant examined more data, his scowl intensifying. “We need to vacate this area immed-iately.” To Alex, he added, “Contact Grumm for an emergency extraction.”
Removing his cell phone from his pocket, Alex pushed the newly installed app to call Grumm. “I still can’t believe you guys didn’t already have a com-munication device. I’m using an Earth cell phone to – Oh hi, Grumm. Say, can you come rescue us, please?”
Back on the ship, Grumm released a chuckle. “I wondered how long it would take for you to call me. They’ve been beating you down for a while now. Have you even seen the human you’re there to rescue?”
“Nope,” said Alex. “He’s still at least a half mile away from us, but we can’t make any progress toward him. So, we’re giving up. Come get us, already.”
Silence shook her head slowly. “This is so embarrassing, being saved by a little green Amorphicine. How about you let me out of this shield so I can tear a few of them apart before we go?”
As Grumm descended from above, bringing the ship to within range, Hathiant examined the Prijatel data. “I cannot, Si. I fear that if I try to decrease it enough to release you, the field may collapse completely. Plus, those stingers of theirs are a lot more durable than you’re giving them credit for. I doubt even your skin could survive such an onslaught for long.”
Alex, eyes wide, looked over at Hathiant. “What’s going on with the Prijatel?”
“We will discuss it on the ship.” Panic further lightened Hathiant’s skin tone.
Parking the lime green space vessel next to the landing party, Grumm increased the ship’s own Prijatel to encompass them, being careful to place the shield between them and the enemy. The Horribalians seamlessly moved their attack to the new shield bubble as Grumm lowered the ramp and opened the door. “Your chariot awaits.”
Hathiant turned off the handheld shield and quickly slithered his snake-like body toward the ramp as Alex jogged behind him.
Before heading up the ramp herself, Silence turned and lifted her upper right fist, shaking it at the angry insects. “You haven’t seen the last of me, you ugly bugs. You just wait.”
“Way to strike fear,” said Grumm. “That one guy almost stopped butt stabbing the shield when you said that.”
Back on the ship, Grumm retracted the ramp, closed the door, and lifted the ship skyward.
As they hovered a few dozen feet above the ground, Alex turned to Hathiant. “What’s going on? Why couldn’t you expand the shield?”
Instead of answering, Hathiant moved next to Grumm, displaying the data from the handheld Prijatel for him to see. “Is what I think’s happening actually happening?”
Grumm pushed the data around for a few moments, then winced. “Crap sandwich.”
“What?” asked Silence.
Grumm patted the handheld Prijatel medallion that was attached to the back of Hathiant’s two-fingered hand. “This baby’s almost out of juice.”
Alex’s brow furrowed. “Huh?”
Hathiant released a heavy sigh. “Take a look at this.” He brought up a display that, to Alex, looked a bit like the silhouette of a battery. It only showed a tiny slice of red at the bottom. “The power supply is nearly depleted. Just a couple percent left.”
“Power supply? This thing has a power supply?” Alex asked.
“Well, duh,” replied Grumm. “Energy doesn’t just magically appear. I know we’re super intelligent and you equate us with a god-like status, but we still can’t create matter out of nothing.” He turned to Hathiant. “Though I thought we were in better shape than this.”
“We were,” Hathiant replied. “I don’t know why the power drained so quickly. I’ll have to research that.” Hathiant held up the silver dollar sized Prijatel medallion. “In the meantime, we can’t use this anymore.”
Alex took a step toward them. “Wait, can’t you just find another power source? It can’t be that tough.”
“Sure thing,” replied Grumm. “We’ll just run to Space Walgreens and pick up an eight pack of AA batteries. That oughta do the trick.”
Alex tilted his head to the side. “I mean, if it’s just earth batteries we need, couldn’t we just go to regular Walgreens?”
After glaring between Grumm and Alex for a moment, Hathiant shook his head. “Unfortunately, the Prijatel is hard wired to use a specific power source, only available on Amor.”
“Ooo,” said Alex, rubbing his hands together. “Does this mean I get to see your home world? That’s thrilling. I’d love to see a planet filled with lime green worm creatures.”
“I wouldn’t,” said Silence as she used her lower right hand to cover her nose. “I can’t imagine that smell.”
While Hathiant’s coloring lightened further, Grumm’s skin tone went chartreuse with annoyance. “First off, we look nothing like worms. Second, we smell pleasant, like a fresh meadow after a rainstorm.” He calmed himself back to his usual lime green.
“And third,” added Hathiant with a grimace, “we can’t ever return to Amor.”
“We’re fugitives, remember?” Grumm’s color-ing morphed toward mint as his own panic took over. “We’d be arrested and tried for theft. Not to mention … murder.” His line of sight fell to the floor.
Alex nodded. “Yeah, I know. So, are you sure we can’t get this special power source anywhere else?”
Shaking his head, Hathiant replied, “No. Batteronium is only found on Amor.”
Alex released a boisterous laugh. “Wait! Wait just one second here. You’re telling me that this super rare power supply is called Batteronium? Seriously?”
Hathiant sighed. “Why do we keep having to go over this? The translator device that is in your head, the Blueb, will interpret what I’m saying into words you can understand. I’m telling you that this rare element is called Batteronium. I have no idea what you’re hearing.”
“But it is funny though, right?” asked Grumm. “I always thought Batteronium was a goofy word too.”
“Humorous or not,” said Hathiant, “without it, we can’t power the handheld Prijatel.” He moved over to the main console and brought up the specs for the ship’s Prijatel. “Fortunately, the main shield is holding up well enough, though we are lower than I’d like.”
Alex pointed at the ship. “Is the ship wide one also powered by …” He paused, stifling a chuckle. “Batteronium? I thought the ship used, like, star stuff for power.”
“While the DarkLight engine uses a combination of dark matter and energy siphoned from a star’s corona,” replied Hathiant as he pointed a finger in the air, “the Prijatel cannot be powered by that. It too requires Batteronium. You have to understand – it’s not just the power source. It’s an integral part of the operation. It simply cannot function without it. What we currently have will keep the ship’s Prijatel running for the foreseeable future, but it will eventually fail as well. It’s been in use for over a decade now. It stands to reason.”
Silence tossed all four of her hands in the air. “You all rely too much on hiding behind that stupid shield. It’s not befitting a warrior. Just drop me off on that planet down there, and I’ll fight my way to that soft little human of yours. I’ll bring it back to you, one way or the other.”
Alex tilted his head. “What do you mean by ‘one way or the other?’ What do you consider ‘other’ to be, exactly?”
“Well, I mean, is it really all that crucial for him to still be breathing?”
Grumm chuckled. “I believe the humans have an expression – breathing is fundamental.”
“Well,” said Alex, “actually, we don’t. But we should.”
Hathiant pointed at the front window. “Be-sides, even if you did have a weapon, which you don’t, and you could reach the human and keep him breathing, the Horribalians aren’t about to make it easy.” Over a hundred of them surrounded the ship, repeatedly flying around them, stabbing their stingers at the impregnable shield.
“These guys are like hornets,” said Alex. “We’re in a cloud of murder hornets.”
“Good analogy,” said Grumm. “Or maybe killer bees. Either way, they never seem to give up.”
“We will have to regroup and return later. For now, we can go rescue one of the other humans who the SessRall have abandoned on a foreign planet. I’ll activate our IBM.” Hathiant moved over to the Interdimensional Biometric Manipulator and powered it up.
As Grumm lifted the ship into space, leaving the Horribalians behind, Hathiant brought up a list of planet names. “Here are the four humans in our IBM that we still need to rescue. Skipping the one on this planet, we still have the one on planet Blah. It’s only about an hour from Earth. It’s probably our best choice.”
A smile curled Alex’s lips. “Blah, Huh? Sounds super exciting.”
Grumm brought up planetary information. “Boring name, sure, but it’s not run by a bunch of death bees, so that’s one for the plus column.”
Nodding, Hathiant added, “In fact, the inhabitants aren’t space faring at all. They’re in early development, so even if they saw us, they’d probably fear us.”
Silence flexed her lower arms. “Especially me.”
“Especially you,” agreed Alex. “So okay, let’s go to Blah.”