Space Team: Return of the Dead Guy

by Barry J. Hutchison

  She took a series of deep breaths, then tapped the button that lowered the shielding, and jumped off the bike.

  Cal shrunk and grew at the same time. His fingers stopped being fingers, and instead became long thin slivers of time, each one moving at a different rate, showing him glimpses of his fingers past, present and future. His thumbs looked tiny, and he felt an overwhelming urge to suck on one. Ideally while rocking back and forth, and crying.

  He had no legs now, but that was fine. He’d never used his legs when he had them, as far as he could remember, so this was just tidier.

  His hair whispered to him, revealing the secrets of the ages. Or most of it revealed the secrets of the ages, but a small patch on his forearm told a slightly racist joke, which he was a bit disappointed by. He shaved it off using fire from his eyes, then giggled as Loren inflated like a balloon inside her bike’s energy shielding, filling the whole space until her massive face was pressed up against it.

  “I want to be a bubble, too!” Cal said, through one of the many tiny mouths that had appeared on the back of both hands. He kissed them all individually – though not with tongues – then screamed as a blond-haired monster stabbed him in the throat.

  There was… a sensation. A number of sensations, in fact. Mostly, they concerned everything snapping back into some sort of order. He was no longer an infinite number of different sizes at the same time, for example, and his fingers had all stopped aging/de-aging before his eyes - with the exception of the ring finger on his right hand, which seemed to have stuck at seven-year-old size.

  The mouths were gone, too, his hair had all stopped whispering, and Loren was no longer a partially-inflated blancmange.

  “Cool,” said Cal, then he noisily and spectacularly threw up all over the empty seat in front of him.

  Lily gestured for Loren to lower her shielding. Loren spent a few seconds pretending to be a big spider, got surprised by her nose, then slapped her hand against the button.

  Loren pointed at the ceiling, which had turned into a number of little fish, shouted, “Whoopsies!” at the top of her voice because she knew, unshakably, that it was the right thing to do, then let out a little yelp as Lily plunged a needle into her throat and injected her with something purple.

  Almost immediately, the ceiling-fish became just plain ceiling. Loren blinked rapidly for a while, shook her head, then swung her leg over the bike and dismounted.

  “OK, what the fonk just happened?”

  “Funny,” said Cal. “I was about to ask the same—”

  The rest of the sentence was lost in an explosion of vomit.

  “Void sickness,” said Lily. “The trippy mind stuff, I mean, not the throwing up. Although, that’s a common side effect. I didn’t have time to vaccinate you before, or we’d have lost the ship.”

  “The ship?” said Cal, frowning. He looked around, then a smile replaced the vomit-caked scowl on his face. “The ship! We’re on the ship! Kevin, you there?”

  Silence.

  “Kevin? Kev?” said Cal, wiping his mouth on his sleeve. “Hello?”

  Nothing.

  “Shizz, that’s not good,” said Loren.

  She led the way through to the bridge. The controls, which were usually illuminated, were in darkness. The viewscreen was black, too, aside from two words flashing off and on in a stark red font.

  CRITICAL ERROR!

  “Yup,” said Cal. “That is definitely not good.”

  * * *

  Miz slouched her weight onto one hip and folded her arms. “Alright, alright, just stop, like, bowing or whatever.”

  Donnie and the other Dwarves were down on both knees, bent low, their hands stretched out on the ground towards Miz. Carver Eighty-Three hadn’t quite gone into full worship mode, but he had dropped to one knee and was lowering his head in a gesture of respect. The wolf-creature had, after all, saved them from the ogre, so he felt a show of gratitude was deserved. Also, she could bite all their heads off without breaking a sweat, so getting on her good side probably wasn’t a bad idea, in general.

  “Seriously, just get up, already,” said Miz. She looked across to Old Man Carver, began to say something, then remembered he couldn’t understand her. “OK, does anyone here have any fonking idea what I’m saying?”

  She was met with blank looks from Dwarves and Carvers alike.

  “Well that’s awesome,” she muttered.

  “Check it out,” said one of the Carvers, pointing to the gap in the trees overhead.

  Ikumordo now filled the entire oval of sky Miz and the others could see. Billions of glinting sparkles flashed in the orange cloud, holding everyone’s attention like a hypnotist’s watch.

  “Crivvens! Fit’s ‘at a’ aboot?” chittered one of the Dwarves.

  “Ah dinnae ken,” replied another. “Bit it’s nae thing guid.”

  “We should try to find the others,” said Old Man Carver. He fiddled with a handheld device for a few moments, then held it at arm’s length, trying to read the writing on it.

  “Just in your own time,” said another Carver. “It’s not like we’re in a creepy woods filled with monsters, or anything.”

  “Yeah, yeah,” said the old man.

  “Oh wait, I tell a lie, it is like that.”

  “I was in a forest like this once,” said another Carver. “Almost choked on a squirrel’s tits.”

  “Jesus. What? How? Why?” asked yet another. “In fact, no, I don’t even want to know.”

  “I absolutely want to know,” said another, and there was a general chorus of agreement from the rest.

  “Aha!” cried the old man. He jabbed a button and a doorway opened a few feet ahead of him. “This should take us…” He peered at the gadget again. “Somewhere.”

  “Well, it’s got to be better than here, right?” said Carver Sixty-Nine, wringing his pudgy hands together.

  Miz looked around at the once-again tranquil woods, with the twitter of birds chorusing from the trees. “I wouldn’t count on it,” she said, but as nobody understood a word of it, she shrugged, beckoned them to follow, and led the way through the portal.

  The world beyond was dark, the sky thick with ash and dust. The ground had been sand at one point, Miz reckoned, but now was scorched and blackened into something like glass. It kricked ominously beneath her weight as she padded away from the door, letting the others file through.

  “On second thoughts, I think I liked the last place better,” whispered Chunky Cal.

  Despite the ash cloud covering the sky, Miz could make out a faint orange glow beyond it. Ikumordo was here, too, although it was impossible to tell how much, if any, it had grown.

  “Och, fit’s a’ this stoor a’where?” asked one of the Dwarves. Miz knew it was a question thanks to the rising inflection at the end, but had no clue what the words actually meant. Or, in fact, if they even were words.

  “Wait, why are you here? Go back, you’re not supposed to be with us,” said Miz, ushering the Dwarves back towards the door. They shuffled back in fear, but avoided stepping back through into their own universe.

  “A’ wir lives belong tae you, quine,” said Donnie, bowing his head in deference. “Wir honor-bound tae stick wi’ ye.”

  A chunk of what he’d said actually made some sort of sense. Miz was about to tell him he didn’t owe her anything when the smoggy air was filled with the sound of roaring. At first, Miz thought it was some sort of animal, but as the sounds became louder and the stench of gasoline flooded her nostrils, she realized they were surrounded not by creatures, but by vehicles.

  Several sets of headlights and spotlights illuminated, the high-powered beams burning through the dust and ash. The lights were blinding in every direction, so Miz focused on her ears and nose. The fog masked scents and muffled noises, but she reckoned there were twenty or so people out there beyond the circle of lights. A few of them were injured, and all of them were in need of a good wash. Most had blood on them, very little of it theirs.


  A short spear, the handle carved from what looked very much like a human thigh bone, appeared from the fog. Its rusted metal tip embedded in the glass between Miz and the Carvers, shattering it into a spider-web pattern.

  “Well, now.” The voice that came from the fog was slow and gravelly, and positively oozing with malice. “What in the name of tarnation do we got here?”

  * * *

  By the time Mech dragged himself free of the rubble, the Carvers were gone. Two squadrons of soldiers filled the corridor, one on either side of him. The weapons they wielded were large and mostly shoulder-mounted, suggesting explosives. Annoyingly, they were well out of his reach, meaning they’d have plenty of opportunity to rain fire on him before he could make it more than a few feet.

  The soldiers were all human, their uniforms and weapons pretty much standard, based on Mech’s admittedly-limited understanding of Earth. Or the version of Earth from his universe, at least. There were no energy weapons on display, just rudimentary projectile launchers packed with explosive charges. Crude, but judging by the way one had brought the roof down on him, effective.

  Mech’s hydraulics whirred noisily as he got to his feet. “Where are the others?” he demanded.

  “Never mind that. Who - what - are you?” asked an older soldier. He was more decorated than the others, and sat astride one of the horned beasts. The turret on the rhino’s back was aiming squarely between Mech’s eyes.

  Mech didn’t like the man. There was something about the way he had arranged his features into a calculated sneer – not to mention the tone of his voice - that instantly put Mech right off him.

  “I’m the guy who’s looking for his friends,” said Mech. “And who is going to snap every one of you in half until you tell me where they are.” He narrowed his eyes and flexed his robotic fingers. “So, I’m gonna ask again, then I’m gonna count to five. Where are the others?”

  A few of the closest soldiers shifted their weight onto the balls of their feet. Mech shot them a very deliberate look. “One.”

  “I ask the questions,” snapped the rhino-mounted officer. “What are you, and where did you come from?”

  “Two.”

  “Are you connected to that thing in the sky? Is that it?”

  “We’re trying to stop it before it kills everyone,” said Mech. “Three.”

  “Prepare to fire!” barked the officer.

  “I wouldn’t,” said Mech. “Four.”

  “Company… f—” the officer began, before the floor beneath both platoons suddenly shot upwards, slamming them against the ceiling, rhino and all.

  The floor fell away, letting everyone drop for a moment, before smashing them upwards again at blinding speed, taking the remainder of the fight right out of them.

  When it dropped away again, the floor began to shrink. It changed color and texture, going from a flat, dull gray to a vibrant blobby green. Splurt rolled over to Mech, stopped at his feet, then twisted around the cyborg’s body until he was sitting on his shoulder.

  “Uh, thanks,” said Mech. He gave Splurt a tentative pat on the head (or, more accurately, ‘the top bit’), then looked around at the groaning, broken, semi-conscious bodies littering the corridor. “Any idea where they took the others?”

  Splurt grew a hand and pointed along the corridor behind them. “You sure?” Mech asked. Splurt’s hand gave a thumbs-up, then went back to pointing. “OK, then,” said Mech. “I guess we’re going this way.”

  Several twists and turns later, Mech heard the cheering of a large crowd. Splurt pointed to a heavily-barricaded set of double doors, but Mech no longer needed directions.

  Raising a foot, he kicked open the doors. Wood splintered and metal groaned as the barricades were torn off their hinges and toppled, slowly, into a bowl-shaped arena beyond. Carvers ran from the thundering feet of more armored rhinos. Riders on the animals’ backs cracked whips, waved tridents, twirled nets above their heads and whooped loudly, as an audience seated in high tiers around the perimeter clapped and roared their approval.

  “Yaha!”

  Mech turned in time to see a spear come flying through the air towards him, tossed by a rhino-rider who had steered his beast into a charge. The spear plinked harmlessly off Mech’s chest. He watched the rhino barreling towards him, waited for just the right moment, then felled it with a single punch to the side of the head.

  The rider tried to throw himself clear, but failed. He screamed as the full weight of the animal landed on his leg, rolled upwards over his groin and stomach, then popped him like a spot.

  “Yaha yourself, motherfonker,” Mech spat. He cast his gaze across the arena. Nine rhinos and riders were bearing down on the Carvers. None of the Carvers had fallen yet, but only because the riders were toying with them, making a show for the audience to enjoy.

  Well, if it was a show they wanted…

  Splurt flopped down to the ground and rolled between Mech’s feet. Mech looked down in surprise as he was lifted into the air by a rapidly growing shape. It was not unlike a rhino, but not exactly like one, either. It was bigger for one thing, and had twice as many horns – although this was largely on account of having twice as many heads.

  Its feet ended in colossal bear-like paws. Its hide was dark, but fiery, like cooling molten rock, and as it bared its teeth and roared, a jet of blue flame erupted from one of its throats.

  The beast’s tail retrieved the spear from the ground and presented it to Mech. The cyborg’s metal jaw curved into a grin. “Oh man, I am liking this,” he said, then Splurt lowered both heads, twitched his kangaroo-like back legs, and charged.

  Beneath the all-seeing gaze of Ikumordo on high, Mech drew back the spear, took aim, and so began what witnesses would later refer to as, ‘The Imperial Stadium Massacre.’

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Loren was kneeling on the floor, her head buried inside a terminal, her fingers rifling through a ridiculous number of wires. Cal stood behind her, offering the occasional word of encouragement, and trying not to look at her butt.

  “Anything?”

  Cal tore his eyes from Loren’s butt long enough to look at the screen. “No, still the same.”

  “Fonk it!” Loren spat. She emerged from the tangle of wires and stood up, much to Cal’s disappointment. “Then I don’t know.”

  Lily entered the bridge, a handheld scanning device in her hand. She had taken it from her Void rig – or possibly built it using bits of her Void rig, Cal wasn’t quite sure – and then vanished into the bowels of the ship with it.

  “System shock,” she announced. “The Void can do that if the shielding isn’t properly configured. The systems depend on conventional physics to work, and here we’re shizz out of conventional physics.”

  “But the Untitled’s shields are awesome,” Cal protested.

  “The back door was literally open the whole time,” Lily pointed out. “The shields might be awesome, but only if they’re switched on.”

  “Shizz, yeah, good point,” said Cal. “So you’re saying… What, exactly?”

  “That we’re drifting,” said Lily. “That we’re drifting out of control through the Void.”

  “But you can use the jumper things, right?” said Loren. “You can still jump us out of here.”

  Lily shook her head. “No. Wait. Yes. Maybe.”

  “Well, that covered all bases,” said Cal. “Good job.”

  “The clamps need power, which they’d normally draw from the ship,” said Lily, pointedly ignoring him. “If we can somehow hook up the Void rigs, maybe we can use their power source to trigger the jump. No saying how far we’d get, or where we’d end up, but as long as we get out of here.”

  “Agreed,” said Loren. “What can I do?”

  Cal stepped between them. “Wait, wait, hold your horses,” he said. “What about the thing?”

  Both women frowned. “What thing?” asked Lily.

  “The thing. You know. The thing that’s supposed to be able to stop Ikumor
do. It’s in the Void, right?”

  Lily looked annoyed. “Again, it’s a legend. Also again, even if it wasn’t, it’d be impossible to find, and – making this point for the first time – we’re stuck aboard a lifeless ship drifting aimlessly, completely out of control. Even if it A, did exist, and B, we knew where it was, we’ve got no means of reaching it.”

  Cal raised a finger and opened his mouth to speak, but Lily pre-empted it. “Void rigs are short distance only. They’ll barely have enough charge to jump us out of here, as it is. If we try going anywhere on those, we’re stuck here forever.”

  There was a sniggering sound. Cal and Lily both looked at Loren.

  “Something funny there, Loren?” Cal asked.

  Loren blinked. “What?”

  “No, it’s just Lily said we’d be stuck here forever and you, you know, laughed.”

  “No, I didn’t,” said Loren.

  The sniggering came again. Cal frowned for a moment, then raised his eyes to the ceiling. “Kevin, have I ever told you you’re a complete fonking shizznod?”

  “Not in so many words, sir,” said Kevin, his voice positively giddy with the giggles.

  Lily looked around for the voice. The warning text on screen vanished, and the blackness was replaced by a view of the Void. As it was also black, no one really noticed that bit.

  “Just his little joke,” explained Cal.

  “Just my little joke,” confirmed Kevin. “Oh, you should have seen your faces. Wait, you can!”

  The darkness was replaced by a still image of the bridge. In it, Loren was on her knees, rummaging around in the circuitry.

  “Hey, were you looking at my butt?”

  “What? No!” said Cal. “That’s just the angle.”

  He gestured for Kevin to remove the picture. After a moment, the darkness returned.

  “OK, so this is good,” said Lily. “This is great. We can draw power from the ship to activate the clamps, and jump us out of here.”

  “Or…” said Cal, jumping into his chair. “We could go find the thing.”

  “For the third time, it’s a legend. There is no thing,” said Lily. “There never was a thing.”