“Take your time, why don’t you?” Jelly’s voice whirled out of Alex’s earpiece.
“Don’t get impatient with me, Anderson,” he snapped as he angled the drone over the head of the ship. “It doesn’t suit you.”
“I hate it in here,” Jelly said. “It’s too small. I feel like I’m going to freak out.”
Alex slammed the lever forward, “That’s the third booster.”
The drone bolted forward and lowered in front of the wolves as they took their ropes in teeth once again.
“Okay,” Alex’s voice beamed through the drone, “This time you’re all going twice as hard.”
WHINE.
The wolves buried their claws into the ground and prepared to lift back.
“On three, two—”
GRRRUUUSSSSHHHH.
The three blasters ejected a hurricane of fire across the ground, barbecuing a nearby tree.
“—One, and pull.”
WREEEENNNCCCHHH.
The hounds yanked back, this time lifting the top end of the ship up at a forty-five degree angle.
Jaycee placed his hands on the pilot’s controls for balance as the room spun around.
“What’s going on, Hughes?”
“Nearly there, Nayall. Hold on,” Alex responded.
Jelly, meanwhile, suffered the trauma of her body shunting against one of the hyper-sleep pods, “Ugh.”
“Hang tight, Jelly,” Alex said. “We’re nearly vertical.”
“I’ll hang you when we’re finished,” she screamed in pain and hugged the hyper-sleep pod for balance.
Her feet lifted away from the ground as the room rotated onto its side, “Gaaah.”
“Hold on.”
“What do you think I’m doing, dickhead?” she wailed as her feet punched their way up the wall, propelling her against the pod, “Damn it.”
“Nearly there,” Alex said. “Jaycee, how are you holding up?”
Jaycee reached behind his head as K-BOLT spacecraft leaned back. He pressed the end of his K-SPARK II barrel/leg against the flight deck, securing his behind in the chair.
“Bad idea to have us in here, you know.”
SCOOOOCH.
The armed pod in the Motary rocked off its housing and barreled along the ground towards the K-BOLT.
“Ah, jeez,” Jaycee yelped as the pod’s glass frontage smashed across the ground and tumbled towards the craft, “That thing is gonna hit us—”
THWACK.
The pod bounced off the K-BOLT and careened toward the door to the Motary.
CRUNCH.
“Damn it, Hughes,” Jaycee screamed for his life and gripped the head rest, “Your great idea is gonna destroy the ship.”
Alex observed the wolves yanking their ropes between their teeth.
The tip of Opera Charlie lifted perilously close to the ninety-degree angle he had hoped for.
“Got it,” he screamed, “We’re nearly there.”
His voice beamed out from the moving drone. One by one, the wolves averted their gaze to the moving object in the air and snarled at it.
“More, more. Keep pulling,” Alex’s voice flew out from the drone.
HOWL.
The first wolf dropped the fiber from its mouth, jumped in the air and tried to swipe the white ball.
SWIPE — SCOWL.
The rest of the wolves dropped the ends of their tethered fiber and clambered over the first row of wolves with the intention of killing the drone.
GROAA-NN.
The lack of pull rendered the ship to tilt away from its vertical point.
“Oh, no,” Alex stepped back from the live feed and gripped his headgear, “No, no, no—”
“What’s going on, Hughes?”
“They’re trying to attack the—” Alex halted his explanation and grabbed the joystick on the flight panel. He yanked it back and to the left, moving the drone back around Charlie, “Goddamn it, get away from the thing—”
WHIPP-PP — SCHWIPP-PP.
One by one, each carbon fiber rope whipped away from the wolves and slapped around the ship.
“No, no—”
“Hughes, what are you doing?” Jaycee’s voice punched through Alex’s ear hole.
“They’ve let go. Brace yourselves for impact.”
GROOOOOAAAAAAN-NN.
The thrusters fired into the ground, blowing chunks of Opera Charlie’s back end across the rocky terrain.
The wolves hopped away from the chunks of burning lava and screeched at the top of their lungs.
“Uh, they’re seriously pissed off,” Alex said. “Hold on tight—”
Jelly kicked her feet against the ceiling and pressed her body against the hyper-sleep pods, “What the hell is going on?”
“Prepare for impact,” Alex said. “Grab hold of something.”
The top of the ship slowly tilted away from its vertical hold and tipped over, throwing the occupants against the wall.
Alex slid over to the flight deck and scooped Furie - and his jacket - into his arms.
“Quick, come to me.”
“Miew,” Furie yelped and fell into his hands as he slammed against the flight deck.
“I’m gonna kill you, Hughes,” Jelly screamed at the top of her lungs as the gravitational pull rumbled away from the wall and slammed to the ground.
KEEERRR-AAASSSSHHH.
Opera Charlie slammed to the ground, squashing dozens of wolves to death.
SCHWIP — WHIPP - SWISH.
The remaining beasts jumped back as the lassoing fiber ropes hurtled to the ground.
WHIPP — SPLATCH.
Whipping into a frenzy, the scores of ropes whipped through five wolves as they launched away from the vessel, dicing them into several pieces.
HOWL.
The nearby wolves turned to the ship with a blood lust in their eyes. They bolted towards the closed Motary door and smacked their paws against the toughened ceramic.
Jelly’s ass smashed against the ground as Charlie fell back into its original, horizontal position, “Gaaoowww.”
Jaycee unfastened his seatbelt, dazed and confused. His head had suffered major trauma, having slammed against the deck.
He held his jowls in his hands and lifted his head back into place.
CROITCH.
“Urgh, that feels b-better.”
Jelly pushed her way through the comparably small door frame and into the K-BOLT exit, “That’s it. I’m done. I’m not going to die in this undersized coffin.”
“Jelly, where are you going?” Alex asked. “Stay where you are. It’s not safe out there—”
SLAMMM.
Jelly palmed the panel and opened the K-BOLT’s staircase. It hit the ground and allowed her out.
“It’s not safe in here, Hughes. If I’m going to get smashed to death in a tumble dryer, I’d rather it be in Charlie, thank you very much.”
Jelly descended the staircase and stormed toward the back door of the Motary.
Jaycee hopped out after her, “Jelly, come back.”
“Leave me alone.”
“We’re not done, yet. It’s not safe.”
“I don’t care,” Jelly fumed as she reached the door. “You can stay in that tiny piece of crap and knock yourself out.”
“Jelly, but—”
She turned over her shoulder and threw him a look of sheer evil, “Hissss.”
“Whoa.”
Jaycee held out his hands in defiance. Her eyes meant business. If he were to follow her, it’d be curtains for him.
“Easy, tiger.”
“Leave me alone. Murderer.”
Jelly opened the Motary door and stormed into the level three walkway.
SCHWUMP.
The door slammed behind her, leaving a thoroughly discombobulated Jaycee trying to catch his breath and calm himself down.
Chapter 9
R.A.G.E. Arena
Laguna Vista, South Texas, USA
Jamie and Leesa sat side by si
de and looked out at the Gulf of Mexico. The giant holoscope towered behind them, pushing out like a cocktail stick into the sky.
“Happy birthday, Jamie,” Leesa said, taking Jamie by surprise.
“How did you know?”
“Everybody knows,” she giggled and reached into her pocket. “You’re famous, after all.”
“I guess so.”
“Ooh, wait. I got something for you.”
She pulled her hand out of her top and produced a withered, old dandelion. The stem appeared worse for wear, as well as the majority of white seeds fanned out around it.
“Make a wish.”
“Wow, where did you find this?”
“Over there, where Remy is.”
Jamie watched Remy scoop up a handful of rocks and throw them into the Gulf shore.
Jamie looked up at the new, small sun sitting millions of miles to the left of the bright moon.
“There’s a new star in heaven, tonight,” he turned to the dandelion and thought to himself for a moment.
Leesa took Jamie’s hand in hers. A risky move. She didn’t know if he’d throw her hand away in retaliation.
He didn’t, and Leesa was pleased with the result.
“It’s so pretty,” she said. “Like a little light bulb in the sky.”
Jamie took in some air and blew the seeds off the dandelion. One by one, they whisked away from the stem and floated down to the ground.
“What did you wish for?” Leesa asked.
“If I say it, it won’t come true,” Jamie placed the stem on his knee and rubbed his shoulders, “It’s getting colder, now.”
Leesa shuffled her behind closer to him and threw her arms around his waist, “I’ll warm you up.”
A husky meow came from the dome’s exit, which caught Leesa’s attention.
A bundle of white fluff named Suzie Q-Two appeared to be agitated.
“Hey Suzie,” she said. “What are you doing?”
“Meow.”
Leesa knew her cat wanted something. Before she could attend to her pet’s needs, the cat looked up at the giant tree in the middle of the Gulf and squinted at the furious beam of pink light.
“Meow.”
“What’s upset you, girl?”
Suzie Q-Two sat on her hind legs and licked her lips.
“She seems to find that thing fascinating,” Jamie offered.
Sierra moved through the exit door with a keen expression on her face, “Guys?”
Jamie climbed to his feet and brushed the dirt away from his pants.
“Yeah?”
“We have something to show you. It’s pretty cool.”
***
Noyin sat in the holoscope module and peered into the visor, “It’s incredible. Look.”
Jamie, Leesa, and Sierra walked up to the console.
“Noyin, let our guests see what we’ve found.”
“Sure.”
He lifted his head and blinked a few times. Two rows of gold teeth glinted in the light from the visor as he smiled at the kids.
“Come here, take a look at Saturn.”
Jamie moved forward and sat into the chair, “What is it?”
“Seems your pet, Jelly, has made quite the impression, wherever she is. Quite an amaziant birthday gift, if nothing else.”
Jamie placed his face into the visor.
An enlarged, ring-less fireball took center stage in the blanket of space.
“Is that Saturn? It’s orange.”
“Yes.”
“What happened to it?”
“Let me see—” Leesa hopped up and down on the spot, demanding her turn, “I want to see.”
Noyin and Sierra chuckled, quietly.
“Even though it wasn’t a star, it seems Saturn went supernova. It’s now a sun.”
“A sun?” Jamie moved his face out of the visor module and blinked, adjusting his eyes to the light. “Why?”
“We don’t know. What we do know, of course, is that Jelly isn’t too far from there. She must know.”
Sierra grabbed the impatient girl’s hand and walked her to the module, “Here, sweetie. Take a look.”
Full of giddy excitement, she pressed her face into the plate and adjusted the visor over her eyes, “Oh, wow.”
“Yeah, pretty cool, huh?” Noyin said.
“What’s that pink thing coming out of it?”
“Again, we don’t know,” Noyin said as he operated the controls and panned the holoscope to the left, “Turn with it, Leesa. Look at the object in the middle of the Gulf. It has the same stream of light.”
“Oh, yeah. It does.”
Before Jamie could ask the first of a million questions he had, he spotted a downtrodden Remy enter the dome.
“Hey, Remy.”
“Leave me alone.”
“Why, what’s up?”
He didn’t say anything, and instead trundled over to the rectangular table in the middle of the room.
“Remy?”
Without a word, the boy rolled up his right sleeve and prodded around his Individimedia Ink. Jamie spotted it and put two and two together and hoped he hadn’t arrived at five.
“Miss home?” Jamie asked.
Remy launched into a mini-tirade in his unmistakable Russian accent, “They took the chip out of my Viddy Media. Now, I cannot call my mother, so what do you think about me missing home, English?”
“English?”
Jamie placed his hands on his waist and stood his ground. Leesa heard what he’d said and turned to watch the boys argue, “Hey, no.”
“I thought we were over that, Remy?” Jamie snapped. “Stop calling me by my nationality.”
“Who cares what I do? Who cares what any of us do?”
“I care, Remy.”
“They took your Viddy Media, too, after all,” Remy turned from Jamie to Leesa, “What about you? They took yours away from you, also.”
“It’s for our own safety, Remy,” Leesa offered. “No one can know where we are.”
Remy sighed in disbelief, “I do not believe you cretins, honestly. As far as the day is long, you fail to realize we are being held here against our will.”
Sierra folded her arms and threw Remy a stern eye.
“Are you finished, Gagarin?”
“We are all finished,” he said. “How much longer you keep us here?”
“Don’t you understand what’s going on out there, Remy?” Sierra snapped, taking offense to the boy’s offense, “You wanna know something? I get the feeling you’d rather we hadn’t come to rescue you.”
“You feel correctly. Sierra.”
“Okay, so where would you be right now? You, of all people, Remy Gagarin? Huh?”
Remy turned away and refused to answer.
“Want me to tell you? The smallest province in the Russian empire, that’s where. You think the IRI and Project Exodus wouldn’t have visited you? Revoked your dual nationality? You’d be back at home in your destitute cesspit with your equally as deranged mother avoiding the media and a lifetime of hell. That’s where you’d be.”
“I suppose you think I am a misfit like all the others, correct?” Remy sobbed. “I am not a misfit. I am innocent, and I don’t care about America anymore. They do not want me. I do not feel welcome.”
Remy sat onto a chair at the table and pushed a mini-drone out of his way.
Rana and Dreenagh emerged from the tech room door wondering what the commotion was about.
“Hey, guys, we—”
Rana stopped her sentence as she saw Jamie, Noyin, Leesa, and Sierra watch Remy sobbing into his arms.
“Oh, dear,” Rana gasped. “Who died?”
Sierra nodded at the crying child at the table.
“He has,” Sierra said. “Well, he thinks a little piece of him has, anyway.”
“Not fit for the impending war, huh?”
“In a manner of speaking,” Sierra fumed, caring little for Remy’s plight. “Our little misfit, here - his words,
not mine - can clearly talk the talk, but, when it comes to walking the walk he’s nothing but a little cry baby.”
“Be quiet,” Remy bawled.
Sierra scowled at him, “Ain’t that right? Russian?”
She turned to Jamie and winked at him.
He couldn’t help but smirk in return, “Thanks.”
Sierra marched over to Remy at speed, “Come on. Get off the chair and stop crying.”
“Sierra,” Rana interjected, “Leave him alone—”
“—No,” she spat and stomped her foot to the ground, “I won’t leave him alone. This unruly little ingrate needs to learn to toughen up.”
She grabbed Remy’s arm and lifted him up from the chair.
“Where’s that famous Russkie spirit?”
“Wh-what?”
“Look at me, Remy,” she barked in his face and caught his teary eyes with her own, “I said look at me.”
He eventually did and wiped the mess from his eyes.
“We put our lives on the line for this. For you. We didn’t have to. You do know that, don’t you?”
Remy had no choice but to nod and agree - and stop crying.
“Yes,” he said with little sincerity.
“You think anyone else would have done that? Broke into USARIC’s animal compound and saved those poor little critters?”
Teardrops flung side to side as he shook his head.
“Yeah, that’s what I thought. I meant what I said, by the way. You need to be strong. Grow a goddamn spine. Jamie and Leesa are in exactly the same situation, but you don’t see them pissing and moaning about it. Do you?”
“N-No.”
“Yeah, exactly. So man up, you little fairy.”
An awkward moment flew around the room as Sierra kept up her pantomime vitriol for the boy. She grabbed his shoulders and stared past his pupils and into his brain.
“We’re the good guys in all this. A war is about to come. Do you understand me?”
He nodded and calmed his blubbering down as best he could, causing Leesa and Jamie’s jaw to drop.
“Damn, she’s fierce,” Jamie muttered.
Sierra continued, “We don’t expect you to fight, Remy. We are here to protect you, but we need you to cooperate. You and Jamie and Leesa know about USARIC. Do I need to remind you about what they did to Bisoubisou—”
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