The Slug Inception

by Matthew Pelly

  Chapter 10 - Mutual benefit

  The Cyborg

  I had recently been physically forced into the fight between 15 Slugs and 9 Cyborgs, and although my chances of survival were relatively satisfactory, I still had to ensure that I did not incur any major damage.

  The particular Slug which had pulled me in - whose 3 hands were coated with Metal Slug - struck the side of my head before turning to defend itself against an attacking Cyborg. While I was lucky that it was a rough blow, and not a sharpened attack such as Matthew's rapid slime shifting was capable of, the beating caused me to slightly stagger, and hence required me to divert some processes to preserving my upright posture rather than focusing on the battle as I should be doing.

  I predicted that Boy would need approximately 20 seconds to make his way over to me and assist me in this dangerous situation. Until then, my safety was solely up to me. Although I had a vested interest in stopping the fighting and preventing any other deaths that may occur, I judged that I could not ensure the lives of everyone at once; for this reason, I abandoned my thoughts of the others, and concentrated only on my own simple goal.

  As I was the only one in the group wearing clothes, as old and worn as they may be, my fellow Cyborgs did not have trouble distinguishing me from themselves, and likely had already concluded that I would not join in the fighting. As such, they offered no assistance to me, as I would offer none to them in return. It was a reasonable course of action, and yet it contributed to my unfavourable circumstances.

  I was currently towards the middle of the conflict, and picked what appeared to be the most effective direction to escape in. As I made my way there, however, two Slugs from that bearing became aware of me and turned towards me. I quickly changed directions, allowing them to become reabsorbed in their own battles before they could consider me further.

  As I tried to decide the next best route, a Slug swiftly deviated from its own problems to deliver a strike to my back. The force of this blow was sufficient to cause me to drop to my knees; while the two-legged Cyborg form was effective and efficient in many ways, the relatively high centre of gravity it imposed was not conducive to keeping one's balance. The Slugs, in their basic 3-armed and thick-base form, did not share this issue.

  I attempted to regain my feet as quickly as I could, but another Slug took the valuable time to strike down upon my head, causing me to sprawl forwards. Looking up from the ground, I saw that the Cyborgs were outnumbered, as I knew before, but also outmatched. It was clear that these were not young Slugs, at least not a significant amount of them, but much older ones. 9 Cyborgs should be able to defeat 15 younger Slugs, albeit after sustaining heavy losses; such was not the case here.

  I could easily ascertain that the Cyborgs were losing, even from my vantage point on the ground. Lying there, I thought back to a similar occurrence on Earth, when I had lain helpless and broken as a battle raged around me. It appeared that the same event was happening again, with some notable differences.

  In this case, I managed to quickly get to my feet - luckily, Slugma's low gravity made falling represent a low risk of harm and getting back up relatively cost-free - and began another analysis of the best way for me to escape this predicament. To lose focus on my ultimate goal here - that of escape and survival - could prove to be the reason that I fail to achieve that goal. So I continued to search for a way to live. I had Ethan and Rosetta to get back to, after all.

  As I swiveled to search, 2 Slugs, who had to have been in contact in order to execute such a synchronised feat, attacked me from the same direction. I fell over once again, and they bounded past either side of me to assist one of their allies on the other side of me. As it went past, one of them struck my side, causing me further harm. The probability of me surviving this encounter continued to decrease.

  Struggling to stand upright again, I concluded that to force my way through the engagement was not an effective strategy. I needed to find another way.

  Just as I considered the possibility of simply surrendering, ineffective though it may prove to be, a hand reached out and hauled me up. I quickly turned my eyes away from them in order to protect the sensitive viewing implements, but no blow came. Instead, a familiar voice said, "Phil! It's me!"

  I turned to look at him and happily recognised Boy. "I am glad to see you", I said, my hand still in his. I recognised it as a Human gesture, and so did nothing to disengage from him. "I was in a significant amount of danger."

  "Well you're out of it now", he said. "Follow me." Still grasping my hand, he led me through a side of the fray dominated by the Slugs, which must have been the additional reinforcements that arrived with him. "This one's with me!" he announced as we passed them, in response to the several of them watching me warily. It was fortunate that they heeded his request, or my life may have ended at that moment. After we passed, they proceeded to launch themselves at the dwindling number of Cyborgs.

  As we made our way to safety, I decided that my new experiences made this a good time to contemplate Pauline's final words to me, the last thing she had told me, privately, before we left Earth. 'Don't forget this place', she'd said in obvious reference to my previous explanation of my short and long-term memory. 'Don't forget your friends', she continued, and then concluded with, 'Don't forget yourself'.

  It was an obviously Human farewell, meaning that it had so many possible interpretations so as to be considered almost worthless. I had regarded it so then, but had also stored it. Now I chose to recall it, as it seemed that perhaps what had just happened may alter my perception of the statement.

  Considering how Boy had just saved me, perhaps saved from from my demise, Pauline's statement seemed to be a function of the three things I was not to forget: it was the combination of where I am, who I am with, and who I am that determines my general happiness. Although, at this moment, I was not entirely pleased with where I was, nor with my current damaged state, Boy's presence easily made up for these deficiencies.

  Was this what Pauline had meant to tell me? That my satisfaction was made up of those three aspects, and by considering them separately and then combining them I could come up with an overall level? I could not know for sure, and so decided that I would perhaps never know Pauline's true message, had there actually been one. Was that the purpose of the message all along? That I could never decipher its true meaning? In any case, I ceased contemplating the issue, as I judged that further considerations would not provide any discernible benefit.

  "It seems that this fight cannot be averted", I told Boy, after diverting my processes back onto more relevant matters.

  "Unfortunately not", he replied, the both of us now safe from the fighting. "All of these Slugs are the Honour-bound, and wouldn't be likely to stop fighting even if I, an older Slug, tried to stop them. Of course, they'd be justified in saying that they were too engaged in the battle to have listened."

  "Perhaps", I replied. "For us, we need to regroup with the others. Matthew, Frank and Carmen were separated from us owing to factors beyond their control, and then I too was split up from Ethan and Rosetta. Our entire group has been fractured."

  "Where would we go to find them?" asked Boy.

  "I left them at the closest Cyborg landing site towards the Slug side", I said. "We would do best to head there."

  "Agreed", he responded. "We should leave this group behind, or they will just attract more attention to us." I silently concurred, and we both began to walk in the relevant direction. The previously erupted volcano was still notably visible, and so our course was clear.

  Unfortunately, the damage I had sustained while in the battle had left me injured, and I could not travel at my usual pace; both my head and my side had taken extensive impairment, and the side damage interfered with my leg movement. As such, I was forced to move in a fashion akin to a limp, although the fault did not lay with my actual legs.

  Regardless of my physical state, however, we still needed to find the others, and then formulate a plan from th
ere. Once we were all together again, then we could decide on what to do next.

  The Slug

  Rabadootime and I had been walking for a while - he in front of me, I still not taking any chances - when he asked me, 'What is your relationship with the Human.'

  'His name is Ethan', I corrected him, 'and I don't see how that's any business of yours, anyway.'

  'It doesn't concern me', he agreed, 'but the information may become useful. You chose to stay on the Human world even after your race found you. Why is this.'

  I thought about how to say it in an ambiguous, mysterious way. 'Let's just say that I had developed some connections there.' Yep, that sounded ambiguous and mysterious enough.

  'You developed a relationship with Ethan', Rabadootime said, cutting through my intrigue with the frightening clarity that he was not known for. Maybe. 'What is the nature of this relationship.'

  I sighed, resigning myself to the fact that he wasn't going to give up on it. As for why he wanted to know so much, I didn't have a clue. Maybe he was just curious, maybe he was actually jealous of me and my friends, or maybe he wanted to understand my motivations. Maybe he wanted to confirm that, if it hadn't been for Ethan, things back at Earth would have gone very differently indeed. I can't tell for sure what would've happened without Ethan, but I do know that I probably would have been dead long before Boy came for me.

  'Well', I began. 'It started when I first met him. I actually met him long before he met me, which is a nice little tidbit which I never told him, or else he'd think I was some kind of stalker. Which I was. Because I stalked him.

  'This was some time after I'd landed on the planet, when I was still living in a nursery home, feigning myself as a small child. When I was officially three, although by that point I'd been on the planet for six years, I left the home - run away, actually - and tried to find something else to do in the world.

  'As you can imagine - well, maybe you can't, I don't judge - I was very depressed. My race was lost to me, I didn't think that they'd ever be coming back, I thought that I'd live the rest of my life on that measly world, and die a nobody.'

  'A difficult frame of mind', the Cyborg surprised me with his understanding. 'You could have announced yourself to the Humans.'

  'I could've, but I was terrified', I answered. 'I'd heard some horrible stories about what they do to aliens that have crash landed on the planet. Of course, I had no idea if they were true or not, but they were there, and I heard them. I actually spent a lot of my time watching movies - at drive-in theatres and such, as nobody would kick out a three or four year old - which are a good insight into Human culture. And a lot of them too depicted aliens that had a bad time after arriving at Earth.

  'So I was left alone, with nothing to do except go on living. And I'd go on living only to have more nothing to do. I couldn't connect with any Human, as they couldn't communicate with slime like us Slugs do, and to a Slug, nothing is as close, personal, or emotionally-bonding as that. I knew where Phill was, but I still hated Cyborgs at that point, and had no intention to ever see him again. As I said, quite depressing. I would have killed myself long before then, but my Honour kept me going; I didn't want to die for nothing, just a lone Slug on a lone world who died for no reason.

  'One lonely day, I was strolling through one of the country's cities, once more contemplating the state of my purgatory and having thoughts of suicide, trying to convince myself that it wouldn't be so disHonourable to take my life when I had no opportunity to die a better way. That it would be better for everyone involved; I could even give my body to the Humans if I so felt like it, so they too would profit from my death. In addition to me profiting, this was.

  'As I was thinking this - and I wouldn't have convinced myself yet, I don't think, but I probably would've eventually, I do think - I saw a young Human. He couldn't have been more than six or seven, similar to my fake age of six by that point. That is, I'd been on Earth for nine years now.

  'Back to the Human; like me, he appeared to be alone. He wore tattered, old clothes, and I found him eating some scraps of food he must've scavenged from somewhere. I too found my food wherever I could get it; I actually had a few restaurants that would give me their scraps that would otherwise have been thrown out. It was a pretty sweet deal.

  'Back to the Human again though. He fascinated me, perhaps because he was in a similar situation. It was obvious that he was alone, as I was. From the looks of him, it seemed as it he was on his own and without his home, as I was. And yet, there he was, going on living; as I was.

  'I wanted to know why, I wanted to understand how a person who had nothing could go on living like that. Maybe because I too had nothing, and yet I kept on going. But I had my Honour to sustain me, to keep me sufficiently away from suicide for at least nine years. This Human had nothing. I knew that they had no Honour beliefs, and that they feared death, but they also feared a pointless life. Questions such as who they are and why they're alive, questions which were obsolete to Slugs who are there to die for the Empire and no other reason, seemed to plague that race.

  'And yet this didn't answer the question - why he didn't simply kill himself, and end his miserable existence. I didn't know; but I had to know, maybe to justify my own continued life, maybe because I had nothing better to do, I don't know. So I followed him around, everywhere, never losing track of him.'

  'You did not reveal yourself to him', said Rabadootime, and I guessed that he meant it as a question rather than a statement. Which was a guess.

  'Not at the time', I maybe-answered. 'I was terrified that he'd reject me for who I was, shun me for being like him maybe, perhaps just deny me because he was so used to being alone. I was scared of losing the symbol of life that I'd found, the motivation that if he could go on living with nothing to look forward to, just existing day-by-day in an effort to survive for no particular reason, then so could I. The anchor for the preservation of my life and my mind.

  'And so I followed him, for a long time. He saw me many times, of course, but never took much notice of me; he was alone, so far as he thought, and didn't pay much attention to others. It was fine by me, as I enjoyed merely watching him. Years passed of our lives, years went by, before he finally found a free school that he could attend and get free food from. I likewise enrolled in this place, having determined that I would finally introduce myself as a fellow student. As a new student, he would naturally be drawn to me, so I figured. We could become friends.

  'So there I was, on my first day a few days after he starting attending, trying to figure out a way to approach him and befriend him. It had to be done perfectly, so it did, as I couldn't afford for him to not like me. I'd just ignored everyone else, as I cared little about them, but this one specific Human I did care about. I was racking my brains, trying to think of a witty first line that wouldn't sound too strange or arrogant or rude or manipulative, desperately trying to think of how I would go about talking to him, when he came straight up to me - he straight up to me! - and asked what I was looking at!'

  I laughed to myself at the memory. 'I couldn't believe it! I very nearly froze from the shock, but eventually started randomly talking about clouds, which was where I happened to be looking. For some obscure reason, he seemed pretty interested in clouds - I still don't get why - and we got talking. I soon found out his name was Ethan, and we kept on talking. We haven't stopped since.'

  'You kept him around to remind yourself that there was more to living than assisting the greater purpose of your Empire', Rabadootime stated.

  'At first', I told him, 'but we became good friends soon after meeting, and then I just liked being friends with him.' I paused for a moment, and then added the last important part. 'In truth, I'd forgotten all about my Empire and my people. I still thought of them, from time to time, and in a fond, reminiscent way, but I don't think I ever expected to see them again. I had Ethan, and I felt that he was enough for me. When I eventually died on Earth, I wouldn't consider my death wasteful, but rather..
. fulfilling.' I paused again. 'Of course, a Cyborg found me there, my old friend Boy found me soon after, and you know the rest.'

  Rabadootime didn't respond, but continued walking. I remembered that I'd forgotten to include that part where I'd given Phill his radio and started making day trips to alter his appearance, but didn't think that it mattered. Besides, that was between me and Phill, and definitely didn't concern Rabadootime. Unlike everything else that I'd told him. Which also definitely didn't concern him.

  I wondered what the Cyborg was thinking, after I'd just spewed my life story to him. At least, the part of my life that really mattered. Indeed, without Ethan, I very likely would have killed myself long before Boy came to rescue me. And if that had happened, everything would have changed.

  Ethan would've gone in living as usual, at the school, perhaps with other friends. Boy would be proud of me for a time, and then move on with his duties, as all Slugs do. The Empire would assume that I'd died of causes beyond my control, and all would remember me with Honour. Phill would rot in his cave for the rest of his life, without his radio and without any point or purpose. The Slug's abomination of life would continue, each member craving their own deaths more than anything else in the world. The Slug-Cyborg war would continue on its pace, for perhaps another twelve thousand years, perhaps until the equilibrium of the war broke and one side was finally defeated. The Humans would perhaps join the war, on one side or the other, perhaps be consumed by it, or perhaps be ignored by it.

  All of these events, all of these people and the different paths their lives would have taken; they would have all been changed if Ethan had not tried to go on living. He was the symbol of Humanity, and all that they stood for; the continuation of life, the attempt to go on, to keep on going on, to live no matter how bleak that life may look.

  The Slugs could learn much from them. Could learn much indeed.

  The Human

  So there we were; Rosetta and I standing in front of Slob and his two Cyborg friends (who were yet to really do anything) and before the oncoming group of nine or ten Slugs. The plan was to try and stop a fight from breaking out - as for me, I severely doubted my pacifist abilities, but I'm sure Rosetta has lots of experience at this kind of thing. Right?

  "I hope they're not Honour-bound Slugs", she said softly to me.

  "If they weren't, why would they be heading towards us?" I asked. I knew there were a hundred newborn Slugs on Slugma, and something like eighty older ones on the surface. So, if you follow the laws of probability, then more than half of the Slugs coming to us should be newborn, yeah? Except I doubted it. I would guess that the two sides stuck in their own groups, rather than mixing with the other. Which didn't bode well for us.

  When it looked as if they were close enough to hear, I shouted out, "Hey! Can any of you guys talk?"

  At first no one responded, but then one of them called back, "Yes!"

  "Phew", I said in an aside to Rosetta. "Imagine if we couldn't even talk to them!"

  "I'll be right back", she replied, and took off towards them. Once she was at the nearest one, she touched it. After a moment, she disengaged and went to go touch another. I interpreted this as her asking which Slug in that group was the oldest, and the Slug she was talking to directed her to it. See? I don't need the super-intelligent side of my brain for everything.

  I had a slight hope that Rosetta was older than this Slug, but I doubted it. In fact, I'd never been told just how old Rosetta, Carmen and Frank were (nor Jason and William, for that matter), but I guessed that they were young, probably just one or two.

  Slob and the others were still standing a few metres behind me, and I was in between the two groups, all on my lonesome. Yeah, it kind of sucked.

  After a few moments, Rosetta came back to my side, and the Slugs continued their advance. "They've no intention of stopping", she said. "They see three Cyborgs, and are planning to kill them."

  I sighed. "That's just great. I guess we'll have to distract them while Slob runs away, right?"

  "And get separated from him, so he can run into trouble elsewhere?" she asked. "I have no idea what we should do, but perhaps that should be a last resort."

  "Hey, these Slugs are all Honour-bound, yeah?" I asked, an idea having been formed in my mind.

  "Yes", she answered. "They told me all the newly-formed are mostly together in one huge group somewhere further down the valley. It's only the ones which still follow the Honour system that have fractured into small parties and are travelling around looking for a fight."

  "In that case", I said, "I got an idea. Go stall them for me, I need a few minutes."

  She gave me a questioning look (a feat I wouldn't even have thought possible for a Slug many months ago - had it been a year yet since I met them?), but I didn't stay to explain. I ran back up to Slob, so I could tell him my hastily-thought out plan.

  "Hey Slob", I quickly said. "This is what I'm thinking. The only reason these Slugs want to fight you - oh, by the way, they want to fight you - is because they're hoping that you will end up killing some of them. That's more or less the only reason. So what I'm thinking is this: make it clear to them that you have no intention of hurting them, and that you won't be fighting back at all. Just stand there and do nothing. You might take a few hits, but once they realise you're no threat to them, they'll give up. I think."

  "You propose that we bet our lives on their restraint", he half-asked after a moment.

  "Well, you got a better idea?" I asked back. "You can't just run off, cause they'll just chase you and there'll be more trouble down the line anyway. I think that this is the best way to get out of this, even if you end up taking some damage."

  Slob and his two Cyborgs launched into a volley of clicks (probably asking why they'd decided to even keep me around), while the Slug group was getting closer and closer. They were within hearing range now, despite Rosetta's attempts to slow them.

  What the hell. I decided to just act like Slob had agreed with me. I mean, it can't hurt, right? I stepped in front of the Cyborgs again, and tried to ignore their clicking noises and the nagging suspicion I had that they were gonna smash my head in from behind for suggesting such a stupid idea. Well, a stupid idea's better than no idea at all. Especially if it works.

  "Attention", I said to the Slugs. They didn't stop coming forward, but they all turned to look at me with their eye holes, so I took it as a good sign. "You may be looking for a fight with these Cyborgs here, but I have some bad news for you. Unlike many of the Slugs who landed on Slugma, these guys remember the reason that they came here in the first place. They didn't forget the reason that their King sent them here." I know that the Cyborgs don't have a king like the Slug King, but I was betting that these guys didn't know that. If mentioning their King, the oldest and most superior Slug, had any effect on them, I couldn't tell. I still thought it was a great card to pull though.

  I trudged on. "They're here to try for a peace, which was the very reason we even met on this ill planet. Well, the planet's not really ill, but you know what I mean. With the volcano and all." I took a slow breath, aware of the fact that the Cyborgs had stopped clicking and were listening to me.

  "So this is how it's going to go down", I continued. "You may think there's a battle about to happen here, but you'd be wrong. These Cyborgs won't fight back against you. They'll take everything you've got to give, and give nothing back in return. They're here for peace, not war, and they won't be dishing out any death today. What I mean to say is, none of you will die from these Cyborgs. You got that? If you're looking for death, you won't find it here."

  I took another deep breath, waiting for their reaction. Did they even listen properly to what I was saying? And if they did, did they believe me?

  Well, they answered that question themselves when they spread out and surrounded Slob and the other two. A quite understandable feeling of dread came over me. Would this be the last time I saw the living Slob? Rosetta was still in contact with who I presumed to b
e the oldest Slug, hopefully frantically trying to convince him of what I was saying. Of course, if any of the Cyborgs decided to lash out, it would be the end of all three of them. Well, I'd already thrown the dice; all I could do now was watch and hope that they landed where I wanted them to.

  At first, nothing happened, which I hoped meant they were thinking about it. Then one of them lashed out and struck one of the non-Slob Cyborgs in the chest. It staggered a bit, regained its footing and posture, then did nothing. Another Slug struck the other Cyborg. It too did nothing. Then a third and fourth both hit Slob, and he very nearly fell over. But he got back to his feet and didn't retaliate. Good Cyborg.

  That was when I figured it out. They were trying to provoke the Cyborgs into retaliating. They were trying to anger them or something to fight back, so they could justify the battle! Because otherwise, if they just attacked without the Cyborgs trying to defend themselves, none of the Slugs would have any chance of dying. Well, good luck to them - if these guys were anything like Phill, they were way too cool-tempered to be incited by something like that. I hope.

  Another another couple of hits - which looked completely non-fatal, luckily - one of them stepped (well, rolled really, since they had no legs) right up to Slob and stood (sat) directly in his face. It looked up at him with its eye holes, and just stood there, waiting. When Slob simply looked back, it reached out its two forward arm-tentacles and started to slowly wrap them around Slob's body. Man, these guys were going all-out!

  Slob peacefully watched as the slime oozed across his body, feelings its way along. And he'd better; if that first Cyborg I'd seen could get his head ripped off by Matt's bare hands (which actually happened, believe you me) without so much as wrinkling his nose, than Slob could certainly keep his face passive right now. And he did, too.

  After a few more moments of this, the Slug pulled its arms back and stood back in its circle. His slime shifting seemed to be a lot slower than normal, and I had a brief thought that maybe Slugma's gravity had something to do with it until I realised that I was just used to Matthew's shifting.

  The (assumed) older Slug, still in contact with Rosetta, spoke up. "There are more Slugs there." He didn't point anywhere though, so I was kinda confused at that. "Those Slugs don't want to fight." Then he broke off from Rosetta, and started to move away. The other Slugs all followed him.

  We stood there, silently watching them, until they were out of hearing range. Then I let out a loud sigh of relief. "That was a close one!" I said. "Good job, Slob and you Cyborgs. I'm sure that wasn't easy to do."

  "It was easier than dying", Slob replied, and the statement had a truthful simplicity to it.

  "It told me which direction the newborn Slugs are in", Rosetta said. "That way", she pointed further down the valley from where we were, closer to the Cyborg side than where the Slugs had landed (The Slug side being closer to the volcano).

  "That's further away from were Phill expects to find us", I warned her.

  "We have no idea where Phill is", she said. "And I'd rather be in the company of those Slugs than find another group like that. That Slug was three cycles old, and nothing I said had any effect on it." Ah, so that meant she was younger than three, so my guess from before was right.

  "Your strategy proved effective", Slob complimented me. At least, I think it was a compliment. Well, it made me feel good anyway. I wasn't going to tell him that I had no idea if it was going to work or not. No need to spoil the mood.

  "Right then", I said. "Let's get moving. We've got some more walking to do."

  The Cyborg

  Boy and I travelled towards the last known location of Ethan and Rosetta. My handicapped condition hampered the maximum speed of our movement, but it was a problem we would have to endure.

  Reflecting my current thoughts, Boy asked, "Are you sure that they are still there?"

  "No", I answered, "but they are more likely to be there than any other direction we would otherwise arbitrarily select."

  "I suppose so", the Slug answered, and said no more.

  We continued walking. At one point, approximately 9 minutes and 47 seconds after our previous conversation ceased, I looked behind us to observe the progression of the volcanically-emitted cloud. As I noted that its progression across the sky had dramatically slowed, relative to my last viewing of it, I noticed 2 figures. They appeared to be moving in our direction.

  "Look behind us", I informed Boy. "There is someone there."

  The Slug turned to look were I had indicated, and nodded his head in a gesture of agreement. "There is someone there", he said. "2 people, it looks like. What do you think we should do?"

  Taking into account my current inability to flee should the need arise, I decided that we should examine the distant figures further before formulating any conclusion. "We should wait for them to come closer", I advised. Boy gave no response, which I took to mean 'agreed'.

  As they came closer, I began to be able to discern details of the pair of life forms.

  I considered;

  I noted 2 important facts:

  1st, the figures were standing upright. This eliminated the possibility of either of them being basic Slugs, which I had so far not observed in their standing form. Although there was the possibility that I simply hadn't seen a Slug in this form, or that they'd changed while on Slugma, I still judged this to be unlikely.

  2nd, one of them was walking in front of the other. This eliminated the possibility of them both being Cyborgs, as I had never seen them walk in such a formation; they usually travelled side-to-side, with any leader in the group in the approximate horizontal middle of that line.

  The fact that these people travelled one in front of the other led me to the assumption that it was not a trusting relationship, where they can walk together without the need for caution.

  I therefore came to the conclusion that the two figures were someone from our group and a Cyborg, most probably Slob.

  "They are friendly", I informed Boy.

  "How do you know that?" he enquired.

  "I deduced it from their appearance and walking", I said, "most notably their standing height and the way that they are travelling." He didn't reply, which I inferred meant that he understood how I had come to my determination.

  Soon, the two figures were close enough for identification. I recognised the further one as Matthew, and the closer one as... Rabadootime? I was not aware that he was on Slugma. It was an important note, of course, but the knowledge did not have much effect on my current plan; to regroup as soon as possible, and find a way to save our mission here.

  "Greetings!" I called out to my friend and old enemy. I still retained the memory of my last encounter with CB-2681:B, where he had beat me to almost the point of death. It seemed that a similar occurrence would not be happening this time. That was good.

  "Yo, Phil! Boy!" came Matthew's answered shout. "What brings you out here?" As he got close enough to see us better, he asked, in a perceptively darker and more worried tone of voice, "Where's Ethan and Rosetta?"

  "We were separated", I told him, as his proximity now negated the need for shouting. "Boy and I were reunited just recently, and we are heading back to where I last saw them."

  "I found Phil in some trouble, and managed to help out", Boy said, underestimating the significant impact he had, which could have very well saved my life. Of course, I could not be sure of that as I was not privy to the knowledge of what would have happened to me had he not been there, and never would be; one of the few pieces of information that time would never reveal to me.

  "You seek to unite your group", Rabadootime spoke.

  "Correct", I replied, knowing that the simply affirmative comment would be enough to satisfy his confirmation-seeking statement.

  "Matthew wishes likewise", he responded, and then fell silent.

  "Well then", Matt said, struggling to control his voice. "We'll just have to go look for them, then, hey? I'm sure that Rosetta has everything under control...
unless she too had to separate from him..."

  "She'd never do that", Boy tried to assure him. "Come, let's go. Phil last saw them this way."

  He began to walk in our previous direction. After a slight hesitation, Matthew followed him. He grasped Boy's hand as they walked.

  That left Rabadootime and myself to take up the rear of our procession. It appeared that Matt's distrust of him - evidenced by the order that they were walking in before - had disappeared.

  As we followed, I asked the Cyborg, "Why did you come to Slugma? Surely it wasn't for the purely sentimental reason that you knew we were the party responsible for organising the event?"

  "Partially", he answered. "I received the message from the leader designated Slob of the planet designated PDN, or the Cyborg Archives. He explained the situation, and the evidence he had gathered to both confirm the need for the meeting and to discredit it. I took the viewpoint that a simple meeting was likely to produce either positive or no results, and so decided to add my presence. I was not aware of the internal tendencies of the planet."

  "Nor were we", I assured him. "We knew that it was a volcanically active world, that much is true, but we had no information on the frequency of these disruptions. Surely, Matthew would not have picked Slugma as the negotiations site if he knew such things."

  "Surely", Rabadootime replied. "Do you have a further plan."

  "I do", I told him, "although I'm not certain if Matt has thought so far ahead. I hope, once our group has been reestablished, to find some way to reclaim the purpose of this visit, and enter into the peace negotiation as we were originally meant to."

  "I do not believe such a course is now feasible", he responded. "If that is so, we should leave here, and organise a similar event at a less volatile location."

  That was not good. To leave Slugma, to leave everything undone, and to simply hope that we could try another attempt somewhere else? Was this a wise choice? Rabadootime has already said that he would prefer such a solution, but would the Slug king be willing to do so? I did not know, and I did not want to risk the future of the 3 races to find out.

  "Would it not be better to attempt to regain some form of order and ceasefire here before moving on?" I asked. "I fear that to leave things as they are would signal to all that a peace is not possible, and hence halt any further attempts at this goal."

  "Perhaps", Rabadootime said. "In contrast, to attempt to regain control of this situation will likely have a greater chance of failure. It will then serve to do the very thing which you fear."

  I took a moment to consider this. Afterwards, however, I was still unsure as to what the optimal plan would be. I simply mimicked the Cyborg's response with, "Perhaps", and decided to engage in further discussions with my group when we were together again.

  First, however, we had to find Ethan and Rosetta. Ahead, I could see the ships that I had left them at. In theory, they were still hidden behind them on the Slugs' side of the vale, and once they heard our familiar voices they would present themselves and rejoin the people they belonged with.

  The Human

  "Man, we must be ages away from where Phill left us by now", I said to Rosetta. "I hope he's not going to be free to look for us anytime soon."

  "I'm sure he's still busy romping around with his new group", she told me. "Besides, we're better off finding the group of Honour-less Slugs anyway, so we can regroup with them. I'll be the oldest one there, if there are no other Slugs, and I can easily tell them what we should do."

  "What will you tell them to do", asked Slob. Well not really asked... you know what I mean.

  "Well", she replied, "I don't really know. But I'll start with, 'these Cyborgs here are friendly.' We can come up with another plan after that."

  "Sounds good to me", I told her. Slob said nothing (nor did his two companions, but you already knew that), so we just walked for a while in silence.

  Some time later, I was eating another of my food bars, munching away and minding my own business, when we crested a hill and came across a huge pack of Slugs. And I mean huge. It must've been most of the newborns, since there looked to be about a hundred there and there was only a hundred of them on the planet. It was like towards the end of our original PDN excursion, when we'd encountered a large army of Slugs (although those ones were mostly in the upright, combat form that I hadn't seen since). It looked to me like there was more here than there was on the Cyborg world, but that was probably just the recency of my memory making me biased or something.

  In any case, there sure was a lot of them. "Check that out!" I said to my travelling partners. "There's tons of them there."

  "That's a lot of Slugs", Rosetta agreed. "Maybe too much. Let's go down and have a look."

  Slob still said nothing. I hoped he wasn't nervous or something. Surely these guys wouldn't attack him - for one thing, they weren't Honour-bound, and for another, he was friendly. Kind of.

  We ran (more like bounced) down the slight hill and moved towards them. A bunch of them turned towards us, and Rosetta walked up and touched one of them. I thought about talking to one of the others, but decided against it as I would rather avoid the awkward conversation that would entail. Slob was enough for me, thank you.

  Unlike Matt, who usually closed his eyes when in contact with another Slug, Rosetta's eyes remained open. After a moment, she relayed the information she was receiving to us. She wasn't looking at us though, but was staring straight through the Slug she was in contact with, which I bet would've been kind of disconcerting if it were me she was looking at.

  "Some of the Slugs here are older ones, not the newborn ones we were expecting." I saw some of them eying - well, eye holing - Slob, and didn't like that distrustful look that I imagined they were feeling and then psychologically imposed onto their alien faces.

  Rosetta went on, "These Honour-bound ones actually came from the ships, still in orbit." I drew a breath and went silent. You should too, as this seems to be pretty important. I didn't know how anyone had managed to land a ship through the ash cloud, but hopefully I was about to find out.

  My Slug friend continued, "They landed atop the widest mountain surrounding this valley that they could find, which was above the ash, and came out." See? - I just found out. "There was only ten of them, but that was enough. They brought Slug communicators that are stronger than normal ones, because they'd integrated some output parts from the ships' communication devices to them. Oh, I see..."

  I waited patiently for more, and was rewarded. "The Cyborgs had landed some ships as well. They met up, and worked together to get into contact with us. The Slugs left one of their number at the base of the mountain they'd landed on, with one of those communication devices inside them, as low to the ground as it could get inside its body. A Cyborg stayed with it, as both of them could speak language. The rest moved onwards.

  "The remaining nine Slugs and the Cyborgs encountered this group of Slugs, and spread the rest of the communicators around. The devices need to be as low in the Slug's body as possible, to reduce the interference from the dust and ash as much as it can. The signal travels along the ground to the Slug at the base of the mountain. The interference is very thin at this point, so from the base, the signal bounces up to the landed scout ship, and from there up into space and the rest of the ships. The Cyborgs have a similar setup."

  "Wow", I said. "So they've arranged a way to get some of the Slugs into contact with the orbiting ships, by going around the ash cloud?"

  "A plausible scenario", Slob said, which might have been some kind of agreement.

  "Doesn't that mean that the Cyborgs need to have whatever outputs their network signal lying on the ground as well?" I asked.

  "Presumably", Slob answered. Come on, even Phill would've said more than that!

  "I'm surprised that the Honour-bound Slugs managed to coordinate with the Cyborgs without any assistance from us", Rosetta said, still in contact with that Slug which was giving us so much useful information.

  "
They were able to communicate", Slob told her. "Working cohesively for mutual benefit was inevitable." I think that what he meant by that was 'They could talk together, so they were bound to help each other out sooner or later'. Brought to you by Ethan's Cyborg-english translation services.

  "So what do we do now?" I asked. "It's time to come up with another plan."

  Rosetta told us, "It seems to me that we should simply stay here. Some of the Slugs carrying these communicators will surely find the others eventually, and we'll be able to get into contact with them like that."

  "I don't know about that", I said worriedly. "What if they can't find them, or they take too long? What if someone gets in a fight they can't avoid, and they end up needing our help?"

  "You think we should proactively search for them", Slob said.

  "Yes", I replied, although I wasn't sure if I was confirming his statement or answering his question. Maybe both - who knew?

  "Hold on then", Rosetta said, "I'll see if there are any of these enhanced communicators left. Hopefully, the Slug holding it is younger than me, and isn't under any specific orders from someone older than me to keep it. Otherwise, we'll be stuck here."

  "Don't want that", I mumbled to myself as I looked around at the Slug group again. Man, was there a lot of them! Well, if everything went the way I wanted it to, we'd quickly get our hands on one of these devices (luckily we had Rosetta, who could use one), track down our missing friends, and everyone would be happy.

  The way I saw it, we'd had some pretty impressive bad luck already on Slugma; what are the chances that yet more things don't go our way? That would be against the laws of probability, and, as everyone knows, stuff like that just doesn't happen. Of course, I purposefully didn't ask for Slob's opinion on this - God only knows he'd find some logical and perfectly correct way to make me feel depressed about everything. I'll pick blind optimism over that any day, thank you very much.

  The Slug

  'What?!' I asked, astonished. We had just checked the last of the landed Cyborg craft, to find a grand total of no Ethans and no Rosettas. Not even half of one, not even a quarter; no, zero of both. 'Where are they?' I asked.

  'Indeterminable', Rabadootime decided to answer me. Which didn't help one bit.

  'They may have come across a group of Slugs and elected to follow them', Phill suggested. Which didn't help either. Not one bit.

  'We're wasting time just standing here', Boy said, 'let's go looking for them.' Not one bit.

  'I suggest that we search in a straight line directly towards the Cyborg end of the valley', Phill suggested. OK, a little bit.

  'Come on', Boy urged me, and I followed him numbly.

  Rosetta wasn't there. Ethan wasn't there. Once again, and not for the first time, the Human hadn't stayed where he was meant to be staying, and once again, and not for the first time, we were frantically trying to look for him. This had happened again! He could be long gone by now, or captured by Cyborgs, or by revolting Slugs, or maybe even killed... Maybe even killed! I didn't know where he was, not at all!

  'Do not worry', Rabadootime shocked me by saying. 'If he is with a Slug, they will do their best to ensure his safety.'

  'Of course she will', Boy told him, confused by the Cyborg's saying that. As I was. 'We'd all do our best, and we all do.'

  But Rabadootime had been talking to me. I had, after all, just been telling him Ethan's and my life story, so it was understandable that he would understand my understandable distress. And I understood that.

  But Ethan was still missing. Missing! In this large area, where anything could happen - for all I knew, another damn volcano could go off right in front of him!

  However, the Cyborg was right. Stressing out about it would be helping no one. So I willed myself to stop my worrying - and even with my considerable will, it wasn't so easy - and to focus on deciding which direction the two wanderers would have been likely to go in.

  Just as I agreed with Phill's initial judgement, that they'd probably headed straight down the valley away from the volcano - the real one, not the hypothetical one that blew up in Ethan's face - that same Cyborg, the one and only that I'd just agreed with in my head, said to us, 'I see people coming.'

  'Confirmed', Rabadootime stated.

  Too lazy and thoughtful to look up right now, I grabbed Boy's hand and he showed me what he was seeing. Yep, two peeps had just come over the top of a small hill, and were quickly heading towards us. They looked to be upright to me. I wondered to Boy who it could be, but then remembered that we had non-Slugs in this party. 'Who could that be?' I then wondered aloud.

  'Upright figures', Phill began to analyse them. 'They are rapidly running towards us, meaning that they ran in this direction as soon as they saw us. If they were hostile Cyborgs, they would at least pause to consider their options in attacking us. The fact that they headed over with no hesitation lends evidence to the hypothesis that they could very well be Ethan and Rosetta.'

  My head jerked up at this, and I surveyed the newcomers with my own eyes. After a short pause, I sighed. Nope, not Ethan; those figures were running too fast for him, he'd get puffed out way too quickly to be moving at that speed. I looked down again.

  'I recognise them!' Boy shouted. 'That's Frank and Carmen! What are they doing here?'

  I looked up again. And yes, I did kind of recognise them too. It was Frank and Carmen. I grinned and started towards them. Maybe they'd seen a certain Human somewhere.

  Pretty soon, though, I stopped. Because another group came into our view from the other side of the hill. And promptly began to chase the two Slugs towards us. I didn't need to guess that these were Cyborgs, and that Carmen and Frank had been running from them not towards us. Another fight for us to defuse, when we should be looking for Ethan and Rosetta. I wondered why I even bothered with any of this.

  'Can you contact them?' Phill asked Rabadootime, obviously also deciding that they must be Cyborgs.

  'No', the leader answered. 'The interference is still too strong to get a decipherable signal through.'

  Now that they were closer, I counted seven Cyborgs. One more than us, although I was pretty sure that if it came down to a fight, Phill and Rabadootime wouldn't be participating. The latter may even be working against us. Well, I'd simply have to kill him too then.

  I sighed again. 'Alright, you guys ready for peace chats?' I asked everyone.

  Before any could respond, which may or may not have happened within the next few seconds, I heard Frank call out to us, 'They have no intention of stopping! They're here to kill, so be ready!'

  We were silent after that for a moment. Eventually, Phill said, 'Rabadootime, I request that you withdraw yourself from the battle, so as to avoid having to choose a side.'

  'Agreed', he said. 'I will go and establish contact with them first.' And with that, he took off and strode towards them. In the interests of planning for the worst, they now had eight Cyborgs to our group of five. And Phill didn't look like he was in any condition to fight. Not that he ever was - heh.

  'Get ready', I warned everyone. 'It looks as if we've got a brawl coming up.' The best part, or perhaps the worst part, was that I was kind of in the mood for it too. Some time ago, I'd begun to have had enough of Slugma, and these two blasted races which I more or less despised - excepting certain individuals within those races - and just wanted to leave and put all of this bad history behind us. And we would be leaving, as soon as we could, and I had no desire to ever return to what the Slugs call a 'society'. Perhaps getting into a fight now would calm me down somewhat, and help me figure out a way to find Ethan and Rosetta and then get off this planet. Get off this damned planet.

  'Phill, look after yourself', Boy warned him. 'Make sure you don't take any more damage than you already have.'

  'Without me, the sides comprise of four Slugs against seven Cyborgs', he answered, not taking Rabadootime's imminent betrayal into account. 'My assistance shall be required.'

  Boy looked at him in resp
onse, but didn't say anything. He didn't need to; I may be able to take on multiple Cyborgs at once, but I couldn't look after everyone in my group. And four-v-eight was a big ask.

  Frank and Carmen reached us then, Carmen latching onto me and Frank onto Boy. She quickly told me how they'd split from their Slug group once their duties were done, spent most of the time looking for someone, anyone, and then been ambushed by this group of Cyborgs not far away. They'd run away from them and towards the nearest Cyborg craft, which they knew to be here and which they planned to somehow convert into an advantage, when they found us and brought the fight here. She also warned me that these Cyborgs had given no response to their pleas for negotiation, and that they seemed to only want to kill whatever Slugs they could find.

  I acknowledged her, and then detached our slime. 'Rest up', I told the two of them, 'as much as you can. Absorb as much oxygen as you can, as this battle is about to begin and you're going to need it.'

  They said nothing, which was a good sign, as they were concentrating on cycling the air in and out of their breathing holes. 'You ready for this?' I turned to ask Boy and smiled.

  He laughed. 'We're always ready.'

  'I'm not', Phill said.

  'Pfft', I told him, 'you never are. But just do what you can.'

  'I intend to', he replied.

  Meanwhile, the Cyborg group was just about right in front of us. I heard Rabadootime trying to attract their attention, but they were ignoring him. To do so went against my idea of how Cyborgs behaved, so I took a guess that none of them could speak. That would also explain why they had ignored Frank and Carmen's pleas.

  'Here we go!' I called out to my front, and ran forward to meet the approaching enemies. I was usually the first one into battle, and for good reason; my ability to heal damaged slime faster than the others meant that I should be taking the first hits.

  I launched myself at the closest one - which wasn't Rabadootime, but his turn was coming up - and thrust my arms straight at it. Behind me, I heard the others bounding in to join me.

  The fight had begun, and while I was concentrating on it, as I should be, I was also trying to come up with an idea for where Rosetta and that pesky Ethan might've gone off to.

  The Cyborg

  The battle commenced. As per usual, Matthew was the first one to engage the enemy, no doubt a result of his lack of precaution. I noticed that the Cyborgs had disregarded Rabadootime's attempts at communication; however, there was no time to consider the implications of this right now, so I abandoned those processes and focused my attention on the events unfolding in front of me.

  Matt had lunged at the foremost enemy, his arms extended in front of him, ostensibly intending to penetrate that Cyborg with his sharpened, Metal Slug covered hands. Unfortunately, that Cyborg foresaw the attempt and sidestepped the attack. Matthew missed, landed on the ground, and then sprang at another nearby Cyborg. By this point, Boy, Carmen, and Frank had entered the fray, and were attempting to prevent the Cyborgs from spreading out.

  I made visual contact with Rabadootime, standing at the far end of the Cyborg side, and made my way over to him. As I skirted around the warring group as fast as my currently injured form would allow, I struck one of the Cyborgs in order to assist Carmen.

  Reaching Rabadootime, I told him, "I must help my friends".

  "Yes", he replied. "These Cyborgs cannot speak, and so cannot listen to my guidance."

  "We will be doing our best to kill them", I warned him.

  "Yes", he said, and did not elaborate.

  With that conversation complete, I turned back to the battle to lend my aid. Matthew was currently engaging 2 Cyborgs at once, which left 4 of them to occupy the other 3 Slugs. It was this latter group that I chose to help.

  Doing my best to prevent any backlash against myself, as my mechanical form could not biologically and automatically heal itself as the Slugs' could, I chose the optimal moments for me to strike out against any nearby Cyborg. After several of these attacks, one of them turned to face me, leaving one Cyborg to each Slug, including Matthew who had incapacitated one of his opponents.

  I knew that I was incapable of defeating an enemy focused on me, or perhaps even defending myself from it. With this in mind, and knowing that it could outrun me should I attempt to escape due to my previous injuries, I decided to try an unusual strategy in the hope that the effort would afford me a greater benefit than the risk involved. I feigned a charge at the Cyborg, which I hoped confused it as it knew that such a strategy would prove ineffective on my part. Before I was too close, however, I skirted to the side and instead tackled Boy's opponent to the ground.

  As I fell, my processes went back to Pauline's final words. 'Don't forget this place. Don't forget your friends. Don't forget yourself.'

  In contrast to my previous thoughts, the phrase seemed to mean that while I should consider my own life, the lives of my companions around me amounted to an equal or greater value, signified by their position before myself as the thing which I was not to forget.

  Was this what she had meant? That my friends' lives amounted to a greater value than my own life? That I should therefore assist them without regard to my own safety, as I was now, assaulting Boy's opponent? Once again, I simply couldn't know.

  In addition, I could attribute no meaning to Pauline's decision to place 'Don't forget this place' first in the list. Going by my current theory, that means that she meant for me to recognise that Earth was more important than my friends, who were more important than me. A not so inaccurate belief to hold.

  Whatever the truth of it may be - a unique truth that time was unlikely to reveal to me - I ceased my considerations of it. I already knew that my friends were as important as me; that was why I was here, risking my life.

  I crashed to the ground, no doubt taking further damage from the fall, although it would be marginal due to the low gravity of Slugma. The Cyborg which had turned to face me struck me as I lay. I attempted to roll away, but it struck me again before Boy pounced on it to distract it.

  Meanwhile, the Cyborg which had also fallen attempted to assault me in its prone position. Before it could, Matthew landed on top of it. I observed a glimpse of his head, completely coated in Metal Slug, as he brought it crashing down on the Cyborg's neck. The speed of his fall in addition to the thrust of his neck, which seemed to be elongated past its usual length, lent strength to the blow, which crushed the fine metallic parts of the Cyborg. It would have trouble with the mobility of its head now. That was good.

  Another Cyborg hit me then, before turning its attention back to Frank, and I decided that I needed to stand up. As I struggled to regain myself, someone assisted me. Looking up, I saw that it was Rabadootime, helping me to stand. This confused me greatly, as I judged it to be dangerous for him to be in this place. However, I greatly accepted the assistance.

  Before I could fully stand, however, another Cyborg crashed into me from behind. I didn't know if it was purposeful or if they were thrown into that position by a Slug, but the force was sufficient to knock me over. As I was currently leaning on Rabadootime, he too was forced onto the ground.

  "This is not a safe place for you to be", I told him, but he did not respond.

  As I was back in a prone position, I hooked my leg around another Cyborg's causing Matt's current adversary to stumble. He took advantage of the opportunity and jumped onto its body, extending his slime to cover it and then lock it in place with Metal Slug. After a moment of sending sharpened slime probes searching, he found its CPU - this one in its chest - and either destroyed it or damaged it enough to sufficiently hamper the unit.

  I then watched as he performed a single, rapid twirl of his body. As he completed the motion, his arm extended out quickly, aided by the force of his brief spinning, and closed around the arm of a nearby Cyborg. The enemy turned to yank the appendage off, and succeeded in ripping the thin slime that held it to Matthew's body. It made a faint tearing noise as it tore, but Matthew ignored it. Wi
th that Cyborg momentarily distracted, Carmen stepped in and attacked it with an advantage.

  As the battle drew to a close, I counted the bodies that were on the ground. Rabadootime was still prone and still, but there wasn't time for me to consider this now; as with most things, there would be time for that later. I also saw Frank laying on the ground, and noticed that Boy had a perceptible disproportionate look to his slime, as if it had been damaged and he was just now shifting it back into place.

  As for the Cyborgs, only two of them remained. Matthew was in between both of them, and was simultaneously fighting them both from the two fronts. His legs were placed widely, and he actually had a 3rd leg extending from his lower back to the ground to lend him extra support. As a result of this, and of the piece of arm that he had lost, he was markedly shorter than usual, which seemed to only give him an advantage.

  His arms were shooting back and forth, striking the Cyborgs on either side of him in rapid succession. As he was facing me, I saw him quickly whisking his head from side-to-side, in order to have a view of both sides, but I also noticed that his eyes were very widely spaced on his head, which enhanced his peripheral vision. The image, however, was unsettling, as I was accustomed to his usual Human facial features.

  Although he took many hits, none seemed to affect him or hamper his performance. With Carmen's and Boy's help, the 2 Cyborgs were quickly defeated and fell to the ground. The fight had ended.

  "I'm okay", Frank said from his position, "I just need some time. I was hit to the side of my brain, and the slime connecting it to my body was damaged."

  "Got lucky then", Matt said easily, not betraying any hint of the extensive beating I saw him sustain. The 3rd leg he had shifted was already approximately half of its previous length as it was morphed back into his body. He strode over to the arm that had been physically severed from him, and picked it up. The slime started to integrate back into his hand. I observed him gaining height as the two limbs shifted back into his slime, his currently too-large clothes starting to fill up with slime again. It was another disturbing sight.

  "I assisted as much as I could", I told him, "but I'm afraid I took some more damage. Nothing too extensive, as far as I can perceive."

  "You'll be fine", Boy assured me as he approached me. "You don't look too bad." I could still see signs of his injury, a startling contrast to Matthew, who now almost looked exactly as he had before the fight.

  As Boy assisted me to once again get to my feet, I turned my attention back to the Cyborg leader. "Rabadootime?" I asked him. "We would have avoided this fight if we could have."

  He didn't respond. "Rabadootime?" Boy asked him, verbally worried now.

  When the Cyborg still didn't respond, but simply lay still, I too began to wonder at his injuries. He had simply fallen over when I had inadvertently fallen with him supporting me. How could he be so damaged now? Had his CPU somehow been affected?

  "I know where they are", the leader finally responded. I felt a feeling of relief at his safety. How would the other Cyborgs have responded if they knew that a leader died while in our presence?

  "Who?" enquired Frank, still on the ground and breathing markedly slowly.

  "I have a weak network connection with Slob", Rabadootime told us. "He is with your 2 friends." This was unforeseen; he had established a connection, however tenuous, while laying down. I judged that his proximity to the ground minimised the electronic interference of the volcanic emissions high above us, seemingly just enough to get some kind of signal through. He had noticed this when he had fallen, and that was why he had remained there.

  There was a short pause before Matthew burst out, "He is!? Well, that's great! So they're alright then?"

  "Yes", our informant answered. "They are far to one side of the valley, with the majority of the Slug army, and are currently heading towards us."

  "Excellent", Matt said. "Get up everyone, let's go head in their direction too." He paused. "You can all walk, right?"

  "I shall do my best, as I always have", I answered. He smiled at me, but I could not discern its meaning. Frank and Rabadootime both got up.

  "This way", the leader directed us, and we followed him as he led us down the valley further towards the Cyborg end. We were travelling to be reunited with our friends.

  I looked at the Slugs, and noticed all 3 of Boy, Carmen, and Frank walking in a stiff, awkward manner. Matthew, however, was striding confidently and flawlessly, a testament to his extraordinary slime shifting capacity. I wondered if there would ever come a time when all of our group could be like that, and hence, I would not need to participate in such battles where I must live with my injuries until replacement parts are procured.

  The Human

  First we got unlucky; then we got lucky. Wondering how? Then listen up.

  Rosetta told us that, unfortunately, there were none of the Slug communicators left that hadn't yet been taken. All of them had been spread across the newborn Slugs, who went off in small groups to find the Honour-bound Slugs and connect them back to the ships, and thus, to the chain of command. I had no idea if that Slug that was older than Matthew was still around, but if he was, I'm sure he'll make himself known pretty soon.

  That was the unlucky bit. Which you probably guessed, since it came first. After that, there was really not much we could do. "Do you wanna just search around randomly?" I asked in desperation.

  "We're more likely to find them by staying still than doing that", Rosetta told me. "What are the chances that we'll find anybody if we just wander?"

  "Well", I reasoned, "that depends on how many small groups they're in. If every one of them is alone, then our chances of finding someone would be way higher than if they were all together in one big group."

  "That is correct", Slob backed me up.

  "So", I continued. "The last we saw of them, Matt was alone, Boy was alone, Frank and Carmen were alone, and Phill was alone. Therefore, our chances of finding them are - "

  "Still very small", the Slug interrupted me. How rude.

  After a short click-conversation, Slob suggested, "I could get low to the ground and attempt to establish network contact with any Cyborgs. I would then enquire if they knew where your friends were."

  Not for the first time, I wondered by he was acting so helpful to us. Were I the more cynical type, I'd guess that he was planning some kind of dastardly betrayal. As I wasn't, I guessed that he just recognised that our group had the only Slugs that didn't want to violently kill him.

  "Aha!" I told him, "so you do have to lie down to do that, just like I said!"

  He looked at me, but said nothing. I could guess what he was thinking though - 'Damn human, being right all the time. I wish I was right as often as him!'

  "Go ahead", Rosetta said, "give it a try."

  At that, Slob got down to his knees, and then laid flat on his back, his two Cyborg friends simply watching him. It was actually pretty funny.

  "Anything yet?" I asked him.

  "I am querying", he replied. So I kept silent and hoped that it wouldn't take too long.

  As I waited (I spent so much of my life waiting), I looked out over the huge mass of Slugs. And for the hundredth time, I wondered why they were all in the basic Slug form, none of them in the combat form that I'd only seen once on PDN. I asked Rosetta about it, hoping to finally get an answer.

  "It's all got to do with the type of mission that they're going to", she answered. "Terry and Kerry, as you remember" - I remember them alright, especially the one who had died - "were in the basic form when we went to PDN the first time. This was because they were on our ship, and were mainly to be escorts for us. They weren't there in a major combat role, unlike the rest of the Slugs who were in that combat form.

  "Here, on Slugma, this is meant to be a peaceful mission, only for negotiation. Of course no one came in combat form, as there was never meant to be a fight to begin with."

  "Ah, that makes more sense", I told her. "But why don't the Slugs that are r
aring for a fight just shift over into combat form now? Aren't their mental blocks designed for that?"

  "They are", she replied, "but the problem is the time requirement. You haven't seen a lot of Slugs outside of our little group, and Matthew's abilities have distorted your idea of what a normal Slug is capable of. In reality, it takes a long time for the signals sent out by the mental blocks to complete shifting the slime. As you've seen, there is a big difference between the different kinds of forms us Slugs can usually take. This extensive shifting takes a long time to finish, usually too long to do while on a mission. There may be some Slugs here on Slugma who've decided to take the time to do the shifting, but we haven't seen them."

  "OK then", I said. "Say then, it'd be cool then if we found some Slugs who'd actually - "

  "I found them", Slob butt in. As it was an important message, I decided to forgive him. This time.

  "Where are they?" Rosetta quickly asked.

  "They are with Rabadootime", he answered, "whom I am in contact with. All of your friends are together with him. We've exchanged approximate locations, and are to head towards each other."

  He got up, and I half expected him to dust himself off. "Lead the way", I told him, and he did.

  He and his two companions, all of them now in front of Rosetta and I, launched into a clicking-conversation, so that left the two of us to talk. "So they're with Rabadootime", she opened with. "I wonder how they met him?"

  "Probably randomly", I told her, "no doubt from wandering around all over the place." I smirked at her and she smiled back.

  We walked for a time in silence. I had another drink, as did Rosetta (Slug cooties - eww), and I was a bit worried that I was down to about a third of my last bottle. Well, it was time to start rationing. And don't you berate me for not rationing my water sooner - I was in the middle of a warzone, so preserving my water supplies wasn't on the top of my priorities list.

  After a long time of walking (probably not that long, but it sure felt like it went half a minute short of forever) we began to see some very, very distant spots. "They look like little animals", I commented.

  "Do Slugs count as animals?" Rosetta asked.

  I thought about what I knew on this topic. "I don't think so", I answered slowly. "I mean, in reality they probably are, but you gotta consider the official classifications. And I think that, technically, Slugs wouldn't fit into the animal kingdom." She nodded slowly to herself, which I took to mean that she understood what I was saying. Which was a good thing, cause she could've totally taken it wrong and thought that I meant Slugs were somehow inferior to humans because of their lack of classification or something. See what happens when you don't overreact to silly things?

  As the specks turned into dots, and the dots into figures, and the figures into people, I began to get excited. Finally, it looked as if we were about to all be reunited! I had a sudden horrible thought that maybe we'd lost some people, and that some of us would never be reunited with the rest (Slob hadn't exactly guaranteed that everyone was still alive), but quickly turned my mind to other things. I didn't want to think about that at all until I had to, so I looked up and got depressed all over again at the lack of clouds (the ash cloud definitely doesn't count).

  Pretty soon afterwards, I heard someone yell out a booming, "Ahoy there!"

  I turned and smiled at Rosetta. "I think we know who that is", she smiled back at me.

  I broke into a grin as we started to jog towards them (even Slob, who must've been anxious to check out Rabadootime for some reason - or maybe he just thought he needed the exercise?), looking forward to meeting all of my friends again.

  Suffice it to say, I wasn't disappointed. Matt sprinted forward at the sight of us, a huge smile on his face which reminded me of how he'd look whenever he'd beaten me in a long-winded and completely pointless hypothetical argument, way back during our school days. Man, that was a long time ago!

  "How's it going?" I asked him once we were in talking range.

  He hesitated in front of me, and I swore that he was considering hugging me. I didn't really know why he'd want to - it's not like I was in any danger or anything - but didn't really mind either way. He'd only ever hugged me once, and while it felt kinda nice, it was also really awkward. So I wasn't disappointed when he simply clapped me on the shoulder in a human gesture that he didn't usually do.

  "It's going fine, just fine", he told us. "We were all split up for awhile, but then we all got back together and picked up a hitchhiking Rabadootime to boot. He fell to the ground, for reasons I'll probably get into later, and managed to pick up a signal with Slob. And so here we are."

  Looking at the two Cyborg leaders, I saw that all four Cyborgs were now lying on the ground, right next to each other. They almost looked like they'd died next to each other, but I knew they simply preferred to transfer information through their network than speak (and Rabadootime probably couldn't click), and that them lying down made it easier to do so. The ash cloud, while no longer deadly, was still a huge annoyance to them, it seemed.

  Rosetta grabbed Matthew's hand, and I looked behind him to see Phill, Boy, Frank and Carmen. And you know what? All four of them were limping in some form, Phill looking the worst. What on earth had happened to them? Were they in a massive brawl or something?

  "Hey guys", I ran up to them and said. "What's happened to you? You all look injured, but Matt looks just fine! Were you in a fight he missed out on?"

  "I think that Matthew actually took the most hits", Boy said, "he's just much better at recovering from them."

  "Much better", Phill almost grumbled.

  "Well", I said. "Everyone's OK, and that's good enough for me. It's nice to see you all again."

  Every one of them smiled at me, which was a pretty good feeling. "It's nice to see you, too", Carmen told me. "Now let's quickly catch up to Matt and Rosetta before we miraculously get separated again."

  "That is unlikely", Phill said, but he was the first to start moving (limping though he was - one of his legs seemed to have trouble moving properly).

  "Haha, genius!" Matthew was saying. "On top of a mountain, you say? And a Slug stationed at the base? Genius indeed!"

  "I take it she's told you what the Slugs have done?" I asked him.

  He turned to me, still smiling widely. "Yes she has, oh she has indeed, and I must say I'm pleasantly surprised at how they coordinated with the Cyborgs to do so. That is, I'm surprised, but I feel quite pleasant about it."

  "I take it you shall be informing us of this later", Phill said. Wait, was that a question? Oh no, not another Slob; I've had to interpret enough question/statements for a lifetime.

  "If I feel like it", Matt shrugged with a mischievous look. He sure was in a good mood.

  "What's the plan now, then?" Boy asked us. "Are we going to somehow try to salvage this mission?"

  "That's not for us to do", Matthew said darkly, his good mood from two seconds ago completely and instantly evaporated. "We're going to leave this place, and be done with it all. I don't know about you guys, but after what that older Slug just made us do... and what I had to try and convince other Slugs to not do... I've had enough, I've just about had enough. I want to leave here and be done with it."

  There was a long silence after that. "Well", I said awkwardly. "We going back to Slugenis then?"

  "Nah", Matt cheerfully said, his alien bipolar in full-swing, "I wanna go back to Earth. We spent a while there while we were defending it, but we never really got a chance to show everyone around." He turned to Boy. "Don't you want to see the cities? The movies? The tall bridges and long buildings. Hold on, wrong way around. But wait, I'm not done yet! The cars and trucks? The boats and planes? The monuments? The pizzas?"

  "Pizzas?" I asked, shocked into laughter. What a random thing to add.

  "I'd like to see these things", Boy said. "But I've got a bad feeling that you intend to stay there for a while."

  "Well, are there any objections?" he asked around.


  "I spent a long time on Earth", Phill said, "without ever spending time on it." Well, that was an un-Phill-like thing to say. "It would be a pleasurable trip", he finished.

  "Phill has spoken, so it's settled then!" Matt announced, completely disregarding the opinions of Rosetta, Carmen, Frank and myself. "We're off to Earth! Let's roll!"

  The Slug

  We're going back to Earth; back to Earth we're going; back to Earth, back to Earth, yep that's where we're going.

  With my extravagant and one day best-selling song complete, I set about actually doing it. That is, to walk down the Slug side of the vale and hope that the ash and dust wasn't thick enough there to choke anyone to death. Namely, choke Ethan to death.

  Before I could do so, I heard Ethan say, 'Hey, Slob and Rabadootime? We're heading off now, and from the looks of things, we probably won't be seeing each other again. So, I guess I'm saying goodbye.'

  The Cyborg leaders and two normal Cyborgs, all of which were lying down like double newlyweds in a bed made of some high quality ground, looked up at him.

  'Goodbye', Rabadootime said.

  'Goodbye, Ethan', Slob said, obviously trying to one-up his equal-rank comrade. And he did one-up him, so he won. There was really no competition in it.

  'Goodbye from me also', Phill told them, and then he strode off towards the Slug side of the landing site. I followed him, and everyone else soon followed me. Because they'd rather follow me than Phill.

  'We're going closer towards the volcano', Ethan said, now walking beside me. 'I hope there's no airborne pathogens in the ash and dust or something.'

  'Hah', I said, 'I highly doubt that there's any form of life in there. Even if there was, they probably wouldn't have any effect on us, since they weren't designed to get into our bodies and mess with us. We wouldn't even need an immune system to defend against that kind of thing.'

  Ethan nodded, then said excitedly, 'Speaking of immune systems, you've never told me how yours works! Aha, we've got plenty of time now, so you have to tell me!'

  'We will have multiple opportunities with abundant time', Phill told him, obviously having been eavesdropping on us. 'Also, he is not under an obligation to explain something simply because you brought the topic up.'

  Before the Human could give a retort - and I could tell that he fully intended to, wily guy that he was - I said, 'You're right, but I don't mind talking about it now. It's actually a pretty simple explanation, so you'll probably be disappointed.

  'Right, so here goes. Basically, we have these biological... things in our bodies. I guess that they're the equivalent of Human antibodies, so that's what I'll call them. What happens is, these antibodies regularly morph through our slime cells, all over our bodies. Because their capable of being absorbed through cell walls you see, so I imagine that they're quite small. Either that, or they have some other way to get into our cells, I don't know exactly.

  'The point is, like your antibodies, they are searching for viruses. They've got a kind of database of known virus types, and there's a different type of antibody that takes care of a certain category of them. When and if they find one, they latch onto it with a deathgrip. In reality, they probably go through some strong chemical bonding process in a specific part of the two cells, but deathgrip sounds way cooler. So deathgrip it is.

  'Once they'd gripped onto one, they morph themselves into the nearest slime cell, bringing the virus in with them. They then stretch and expand to surround that entire cell, effectively quarantining it from the rest of the body. Keep in mind that it's still actually attached to other cells, but it's been quarantined. Next, the antibody releases some chemicals that forces all of the moisture, nutrients and oxygen out of that cell, to be absorbed into the adjacent cells. The antibody has tight control over what goes in and out of the quarantined cell, and it makes sure that it's only a one-way transfer; important things that our bodies need go from the infected cell to the uninfected nearby cells.

  'Now, that cell is effectively starved of everything it needs to live. So, unsurprisingly, it promptly dies. Now you remember what happens to dead slime cells inside our bodies?'

  'Sure do', he answered proudly. 'The surrounding live cells that are bonded to them naturally shift towards the outside of your body, and they all get shed and leave the body.'

  'Precisely', I told him. 'So the cell that contains the virus or to which the virus is attached - and it can't leave, as it's held there by the antibody - is shed as well. Thus, it leaves our body. So, you see, our immune system doesn't actually kill these malicious cells; it just removes them, to live out a lonely and impoverished life on the ground.'

  'Serves them right', Ethan mumbled, and we both laughed.

  'Serves them right indeed', I confirmed. 'And that's how it works. Of course, if a virus manages to make it to our brain - and there are things like that on Slugenis - then we're in way more trouble. They can cause all sorts of problems there, and that requires a special kind of antibody. Actually, I'm not even sure that this would count as an antibody, because it pretty much takes off the chunk of our brain that's infected, and causes that to be shed.'

  Ethan stared at me as we walked. 'Your immune system cuts off your brain!?'

  I laughed. 'Yes, but it's only the surface of our brain, which can repair itself. So a Slug, every now and then, can have some problems with one of their senses, which means that their body has just expelled a brain virus. These are pretty uncommon though, and if we get in serious trouble, there are always medical procedures to save us.'

  'I'm sure there is', Ethan said absently, then fell into his own thoughts. He fell a long way too - I hope he didn't get injured from the landing.

  'You know', Phill decided to tell me, 'the Earth that we return to will be very different than the one which we lived on for so long. It has been many decades since we left.'

  I nodded. 'Yes it has. And yet, I'm still optimistic about the state of things there. Humans have a way of... preserving the past, I guess. I'm sure it'll still be very familiar to us.'

  'I hope so', Boy said, 'because it seems that we'll be spending a while there.'

  'Boy', I began, knowing that it would be easier to convey my meaning through Slug contact but wanting everyone else to hear me as well, 'I'm tired of all of this now. We've done the best that we can, everything that we can, to put an end to the war. But I've had enough, and I think that we've all had enough too. We've set them on the right path, as best we can, but now it's up to them to continue on. It will all be meaningless if we force the two races into a peace that they're not ready for. If it's time, then they'll find a way themselves. If not, then they won't, regardless of what we do.'

  'That seems true', Phill said. 'The fact that the Slugs and Cyborgs that remained in the orbiting ships actively collaborated lends credence to the idea that they must forge onwards with this purpose themselves.' He paused. 'In addition, I too am beginning to tire of risking my life for a race that seems to care little for it.'

  'Got that right', I said. 'I think that our adventuring days are over and it's time for retirement, for the time being at least. No offence to everyone else, and not counting my initial depressed years, living on Earth were some of the happiest times of my life. Imagine how much better it will be with all of us there?'

  There was a long pause, and then Frank said, 'OK, I'm convinced. I think that I too would like to see more of the world that Ethan comes from.'

  'I want to see what "pizzas" are', Rosetta said.

  The Human laughed. 'I want to eat one!' he kept chuckling. 'I've had just about enough of this nutrition food.'

  'Hey!' I cried at him. 'That food is healthy! You could probably live the rest of your life on it.'

  'Yeah, if I wanted a boring life', he threw back at me.

  'The quality of food consumed should not be the only determining factor on the entertainment value of a life', Phill stated like the logic-driven machine he was.

  Ethan and I looked at each other, and then just l
aughed. All the Slugs joined in too; but Phill didn't smile, which was his equivalent of a laugh. Probably didn't even know what we were laughing at. And that made it all the more funny. All the more funny indeed.

  The Human

  "Are we there yet?" I asked.

  "As if you ask that", Matthew said to me, "you know whenever someone asks that, the answer is always 'no'."

  "Until we arrive there", Phill added.

  After a few seconds of silent walking (which I wasn't going to let fly), I said, "You know what? If we ever go on a mission like this again, we ought to bring some big-ass machine guns with us. That'll keep the enemy in line, right?"

  "If they know what guns are, probably not", Phill told me. "There's a reason that we don't use handheld projectile weaponry in the war."

  When he didn't go on (as if he thought I was just going to leave it at that or something), I prompted, "And that reason is?"

  Matt butt in with, "Cause they're not very helpful against either Slugs or Cyborgs. Starting with our mortal enemies-turned-half friends, what would bullets really do to them? They're made out of metal, so a little bit of it can't do much damage."

  "Unless you manage to hit them in a vital place, like their CPU", Carmen amended.

  "Which is housed in a protected environment", Phill amended on top of her.

  "As for why it doesn't work against Slugs?" I asked, before someone could attempt a triple-layer amendment.

  Matt shrugged. "Simple. When a Cyborg strikes a Slug, the shockwaves sends ripples all throughout our body. If the blow was hard enough, that can practically kill most of the slime at the point of contact, and if the shockwave hits our brain hard enough, that can go from disorientating us, to crippling us, to outright killing us, depending on how badly it was hit. As for a gun - if you were to shoot a Slug, the bullet would carve a tiny path in a straight line through our slime. With no bones - well, bones not made of slime - to stop it, it would more than likely simply pass straight through. And of course, we could always deflect bullets away from our brain with a slanted sheet of Metal Slug. I think.

  "Now you tell me", he turned to me. "What's more likely to hit our brain, which is the best way to kill us? A large amplifying shockwave that spreads all throughout our slime and passes through metal, or a little bullet trailing a straight path perhaps a centimetre or two across that can maybe be bounced and shifted off course?"

  "Well", I said, "I imagine that the melee blow would cause more damage, and be way more likely to hit your brain. But that's why you use big chain guns and such, which would riddle a Slug with bullets. You're bound to kill them then."

  "You are forgetting two important points", Phill began his inevitable shutdown of what I thought. "First, that the Cyborg and Slug empires do not have unlimited resources to spend. Every bullet fired represents a large amount of resources, consumed in the physical materials of the projectile, the plant used to produce it, all of the relevant transportation resource costs, and finally, the time used in its construction, transportation, and usage. Although the exact amount depends on the economies of scale and the number of bullets produced, which is likely to be high, this will likely still amount to a considerable cost. Why should we produce, at a rough approximation, five hundred bullets which may or may not kill five hundred Slugs, when we can produce a Cyborg which may or may not kill many hundreds of Slugs over its lifetime, as well as add numbers to our population and aid in assisting all fellow Cyborgs in an immeasurable way?"

  "Cause guns are cool?" I suggested.

  He didn't even dignify that with a response (and, as I'm sure you'll agree, it didn't really deserve one), but went on with, "Second, we do not know the impact that thickened slime or Metal Slug will have on bullets. It could be that simply thick enough slime will be enough to sufficiently slow a bullet's momentum, although I think it unlikely. At the least, a quickly-formed sheet of Metal Slug should be able to deflect a bullet's path away from the brain, as Matthew hypothesised, and thus prevent any fatal damage it otherwise would have caused."

  "Couldn't have said it better myself", Matthew said, "although I didn't try to say it myself, so we'll never really know. In either case, there you go, Ethan. That's why we don't use guns."

  "Having a weapon that relies on a limited pool of ammunition would also be a problem", Boy added. Since when did he know what guns were? "What would we do if we relied on them and ran out of bullets?"

  "Same thing we do", I told him. "Die until we get some more." Matt smiled, but I didn't get a humorous response out of anyone else. Fine then, be like that.

  "I guess that firing a weapon in space would also be a bad idea", Matthew added, "if the fight were aboard a spaceship. Speaking of which, there they are."

  I looked up ahead, and saw the bunch of scout ships that we'd landed in. I hadn't died from deadly volcanic gas poisoning yet either; so far, so good.

  "It's gonna take ages to get back to Earth from here, isn't it?" I groaned.

  "That depends on your definition of an 'age' ", Phill helpfully told me.

  "He means 'yes' ", Rosetta said. "That means 'yes'." Great.

  "Don't fret, my young friend", Matthew said cheerfully. "I'm sure there'll be plenty to do. Besides, you'd better get used to the lack of excitement, cause I plan on living a long, sedate life on Earth. Like, lots of walks on beaches - "

  "Pass", I quickly said. Don't look at me like that for being rude, I got no interest in beaches. You know how when your clothes get full of sand, you just wash them and change into another set? Well I don't have that luxury.

  "Perhaps some depressed sitting at bars", Matthew kept going, "I may even sunbathe on a rooftop. The world will be our oyster! Except for Phill, the world will be your clam instead."

  The Cyborg looked at him, but didn't say anything. I didn't blame him either.

  "Are you ready for a long haul and a serene life full of non-life threatening events?" Carmen asked me.

  "Meh", I said. "You'd be surprised at how good I am at living a non-life threatening life. Few ever believe me when I tell them this, but before you guys showed up, I actually lived the majority of my life without ever almost dying once. I know, pretty crazy, right?"

  "Crazy indeed", Matt said absently.

  I didn't know what he was thinking of, but I knew what I was - after we got home (home home, as Earth would ever be to me), I was going to thoroughly enjoy detailing every aspect of human life, culture and anatomy that I knew to all the Slugs and Phill, just so I could see their reactions as they're hit by the full realisation of just how weird an alien race is to everyone else. And trust me; it was going to be great.