Space Runners #3

by Jeramey Kraatz

  “Yeah,” Hot Dog said. “Or basically any of the prototypes the McGuyvers brought to the mother ship.”

  Zee’s mouth dropped open, as if it had unhinged for a moment. “You have Earth vehicles?!” he asked. “Here?” His tentacles practically vibrated. “I want to see!”

  Benny turned to Vala. They were getting off track, and every minute they stood there talking was time that could have been spent doing something else. “We brought the stealth drives with us,” he said to Vala. “And Ramona’s our satellite expert. We need to get started soon, before New Apollo has a chance to launch their superweapon.”

  “Superweapon?!” Zee squealed. “You Earth people are so good at those! What is it?”

  Before Benny could answer, Vala spoke to the young alien in their own language.

  “I don’t care if I’m supposed to have lessons today,” Zee replied in English. “Why spend time reading about different cultures when I could actually experience them?”

  Vala raised her mask, staring at Zee. Zee grunted and stormed off.

  The commander paused for a moment before turning to Benny. “He is older than you all, and yet . . .” She trailed off, shaking her head and returning her mask. “Come. I know there is much to be done.”

  The commander led them to the work spaces set up near the black rocks. It was only once they were on the move again that Benny realized the rest of the Alpha Maraudi in the cavern had stopped working and were staring at them. He shoved his hands in his space suit pockets, suddenly self-conscious and keenly aware of how quiet it had gotten.

  They came to half a dozen different tables that had grown out of the stone floor of the cavern, all pulsing dully with a green light. Each one was piled high with gadgets Benny didn’t recognize. One was covered in dark rock samples in meticulously labeled clear vials.

  “You’re analyzing the minerals down here?” Jasmine asked.

  “And the great underground lakes,” a nearby alien said as Benny and the others gathered around the work space. “There are secrets beneath every celestial body’s surface. We’re barely beginning to uncover what this moon might have hidden away.”

  “This is Pito,” Vala said, nodding to the speaker. “He is the top scholar and scientist on my crew. And I would go so far as to say one of the brightest minds across our many ships.”

  “Commander,” Pito said, bowing slightly. “It is unfortunate to hear of what happened at the Lunar Taj.”

  Something about Pito was different from the other Maraudi Benny had met. A gold mask covered not only the upper part of his face, but much of his head as well, all the way to the back where, symmetrically, there should have been a second tentacle beside the single thick one that was wrapped around Pito’s neck like a scarf. There was what looked like scar tissue peeking out from beneath the gold. Obviously, the alien had been through something traumatic, but what? Benny wondered. A battle? A science mishap?

  Pito looked at Benny. “The commander told us about this ‘superweapon,’” Pito continued. “You have some device you think could be of use in tracking it?”

  “That’s right,” Benny said. “Made by the same person who developed the weapon he says is capable of destroying your species.” He nodded to Jasmine. “You can probably explain things a little better.”

  “Of course,” Jasmine said, placing two of the stealth drives on the table. “So, here’s what we know.”

  She caught Pito up on Dr. Bale’s use of stealth, the few things they’d learned about his superweapon, and their hopes that by understanding the tech in front of them, they might track down the place where the electromagnetic weapon was hidden on the Moon.

  “We’ve never had a chance to look at much of your technology up close,” Pito said. “I admit that I’m interested to see it in action.”

  “Likewise,” Trevone said. “The way your people have learned to control elements is so far beyond anything we have on Earth.”

  “It seems as though it’s not completely new to you,” the scientist said. The single tentacle squirmed from around his neck and pointed at Benny’s gloved hand.

  “Oh,” Benny said. “Yeah. I’m, uh, not that great at using it. But if you all could teach me, maybe it could come in handy.”

  “Fascinating,” Pito said. Then he turned his attention to the stealth drives. “Once we’ve unlocked these secrets, of course.” The alien glanced back at them. “Are you all scientists as well?”

  “Those three are our geniuses,” Hot Dog said, pointing to Jasmine, Ramona, and Trevone.

  Drue cleared his throat. “I kind of walk the line between being a brain and being an adventurer. I’m a man of many talents.”

  Pito looked at Drue for a few seconds before turning to Jasmine and Trevone. “If the future of my people is truly at stake, then I’d like to begin at once.”

  “Of course,” Jasmine said.

  Trevone nodded. “I’ve been itching to take these apart and better understand how they work since I learned about them.”

  Benny stuck his thumb toward Ramona, who’d been silently eating an energy bar and looking at her HoloTek most the time, occasionally glancing at some of the alien instruments on the tables around them.

  “This is our tech wiz,” Benny said. “We need to get in contact with the people who are now in charge of Earth’s Moon.”

  Ramona lifted her chin into the air in greeting.

  “Oh,” Pito said. “Unfortunately, our methods of communication are far more advanced than what you generally use, and the two aren’t necessarily compatible.” He paused, drumming his four fingers on the table. “Perhaps I could upgrade some of your systems—”

  “I’m good,” Ramona said.

  Benny and the others all turned to look at her. She shrugged, holding up her HoloTek.

  “Already mapped out new coding,” she said. “What do you think I’m doing all the time? Playing games?” She shook her head. “Newbz.”

  She reached out and snatched a red metal tool from the workbench and held it up. It had half a dozen prongs sticking out of it—Benny thought it looked like some kind of multitool.

  “This’ll work,” she said. “Ash didn’t bring near enough supplies.” Then she turned away from them and headed for the stairs, shoving the rest of the energy bar in her mouth.

  “That’s, uh . . .” Benny started. “Ramona.”

  He bit his lip, but Hot Dog nudged him. “Don’t worry,” she said. “I usually have no idea what she’s talking about, but she does always get stuff done.”

  “If you’ll excuse me,” Vala said. “It has been a long flight, and I require time to recuperate. The focus it takes to land my ship can be draining. My crew down here will assist you in any way they can.” She nodded to the stairwell. “Or you can return to the ship if you like. Shall we reconvene in two of your Earth hours?”

  “Sure,” Benny said.

  Vala turned away from them, disappearing into one of the cavern hallways as Jasmine and Trevone began to take apart a stealth drive alongside Pito.

  “So what do we do?” Hot Dog asked. “I feel kind of out of my league here.”

  “Well,” Drue said, drawing out the word. “We’ve got some time to kill . . .”

  “What are you up to?” Hot Dog asked, narrowing her eyes.

  “I just think it’d be a good idea if we take stock of all the cars we brought up from the Taj.” He shrugged. “And make sure they’re working all right.”

  Hot Dog’s face lit up. “Wow. Okay. I actually agree with you. Plus, you know, we don’t want our skills to get rusty.”

  “Guys,” Benny said.

  “I’m sure we could teach each other a thing or two,” Drue said. “It’s for the good of humanity!”

  “I am one hundred percent on board with that,” Hot Dog said.

  “We’ve got more important stuff to be doing,” Benny said.

  “Like what?” Drue asked. “Come on, Benny, man. Blow off some steam.”

  “Think of it as
a training exercise,” Hot Dog said. She grinned at him. “You’re not a bad pilot, but you’ve still got plenty to learn.”

  “First one there gets a Star Runner,” Drue said. And before anyone could say anything else, he bolted toward the stairwell.

  “There’s more than one, you idiot,” Hot Dog yelled, chasing after him.

  “But . . .” Benny started. He looked around the cavern. The commander was gone. The stealth drives were being inspected. Ramona was working on the satellite comms. He tried to think of what else he could do.

  “Go,” Jasmine said from behind Benny.

  He turned to face her. She shrugged and continued. “Take a break.”

  “We’re fine down here,” Trevone said, pulling his goggles down over his eyes as he inspected an Alpha Maraudi tool. “Trust me.”

  Jasmine’s nosed twitched. “Besides, it’s making me very nervous that Hot Dog and Drue are getting along. Those two should always have a third wheel.”

  Benny couldn’t argue with that. “Okay,” he said. “But I’ll be back in a bit. Let us know if you need anything.”

  “Go,” Jasmine said again. Then she turned to Pito and Trevone as she held up a stealth drive that she’d pried the casing off of. “So, I figured out last night that the power source appears to use gel capacitors.”

  “No good,” Trevone said. “We can’t track something like that.”

  “Interesting. And what’s the composition of this ‘gel’?” Pito asked. “Perhaps that could be helpful.”

  Benny took one last look at the three of them as they continued to discuss things he didn’t understand at all, and then let out a long breath. Before he could find an excuse to stay, he was at the staircase, starting the long climb back up to the ship.

  7.

  When Benny finally made it back to the hangar—sweaty from the many flights of stairs—he was wholly unprepared for the scene he walked into. On one side of the room, Ramona sat on the ground beside a gold Star Runner. Both its doors were open and various electronic components were on the stone floor around her. It looked like she had disassembled the entire interior dash. Drue stood nearby, staring at the craft with a look of horror on his pale face.

  A few rows of cars away, Hot Dog chased after Zee as the Alpha Maraudi child darted around the hangar. The alien stopped at every vehicle he passed, opening the door with a tentacle and shoving his head inside. Hot Dog was talking quickly, looking exasperated.

  “You can’t just come in and go through all our stuff,” she said as Zee slid into the driver’s seat of a laser-mounted Space Runner. “If Ash were in here right now, she’d freak out. Hey, get out of—”

  The SR’s engine powered on.

  “Oh, no, no, no, you don’t,” Hot Dog said as she basically threw herself into the passenger side of the car, smashing buttons until it turned off.

  “Everything okay?” Benny asked, coming around to the front of the Space Runner.

  Hot Dog crawled back out and blew a curl out of her face. “What does it look like?”

  “Uh, hi, Zee,” Benny said.

  The alien climbed out and stared at Benny. “You seem to be the leader of the Earthlings up here, right? Great. Remind this human that you’re . . .” Zee paused. “Not hostages, but . . . there’s another word.”

  “You’d better be looking for guests,” Hot Dog said.

  “Sure. You’re our guests, which means we’re helping you out and you should pay us back by letting me fly one of these things. I’ve read all about Space Runners. This will be a perfect way for me to find out why your planet is so obsessed with them.”

  “This sounds weirdly familiar,” Benny said. He glanced over at Drue, who just kept shaking his head as he stared at Ramona and the Star Runner.

  “What have you done to her?” Drue asked. “Do you have any idea how fast this thing could go? It nearly blew the skin off my face. It was amazing. And you’ve stripped it down to component parts.”

  “Cry somewhere else, flyboy,” Ramona said.

  “Wait, the gold one is faster?” Zee shoved past Hot Dog, heading toward Drue. “I want to try that one! Put it back together!”

  “How did he get up here?” Benny asked as Hot Dog came to his side.

  “Must’ve been while we were all talking to that scientist,” she said. “We’re just lucky he didn’t fire off one of these lasers and accidentally blow up an SR or something.”

  “How fast does it go?” Zee asked Drue, bouncing on his toes as he inspected the Star Runner’s hull.

  Drue shook his head. “Faster than anything humans have ever created, I think. I drove one yesterday and it pinned me to the back of my seat. I thought my brain was going to come out of my ears. It was the greatest feeling I’ve ever experienced.”

  Zee let out a high-pitched squeal. “That’s what I want to do!”

  “It’s too much engine for you,” Drue said.

  “Like your”—the alien paused—“your spleen could even process the speeds that my people can travel.”

  “I think you mean brain.”

  Tentacles whipped in the air. “I’m speaking an alien language my mouth can barely stormulate! I don’t hear you talking in any intergalactic tongues.”

  “Formulate,” Drue said with a smirk.

  Zee let out a long, wheezing groan.

  “Oy!” Ramona said, pointing the sharp end of the red metal tool she swiped at the two of them. “Mute yourselves! Spam someone else. This is top priority.” Then she used another end to open a soda and started tapping on her HoloTek, muttering to herself.

  “Well,” Drue said, “I guess we do have two more.”

  Zee scanned the room until he spotted another of the gold vehicles. “Mine!” he shouted, and then he was darting over to the Star Runner.

  “No way,” Benny said, sprinting and cutting the alien off between rows of cars.

  Zee skidded to a stop in front of him. His tentacles braided together and swung through the air back and forth like a pendulum. “I get it. I’ve read all about your people. You don’t trust me because I’m different from you. That’s the way you work, right?”

  “This has nothing to do with you being an Alpha Maraudi,” Benny said. “And humans aren’t like that.” Despite saying this, he couldn’t help but think of all the times that people in cities had looked at him and his family in disgust just because they belonged to a caravan. “Well . . . not all of them, at least. There are a lot of good people on Earth.”

  “Yeah?” Zee asked. “Prove it.” He smiled, eyes looking past Benny and at one of the Star Runners behind him. “No one else even needs to know! What do you want? Alpha Maraudi secrets? I can show you weird stuff on this mother ship you probably didn’t even know existed.”

  “You can’t go out in a Star Runner because if something happened to you, I’m guessing Commander Vala would never forgive us,” Benny continued. “And that’s kind of the opposite of everything we’re trying to do here.”

  “Plus, you are part of a group wanting to take our planet,” Hot Dog said, catching up to them. “Don’t think we forgot that.”

  Zee let out a frustrated growl. “I’ve been stuck on this moon with nothing to do but study and help scientists for so many sleeps. All I want is—” The alien stopped, staring at Benny’s hand. “Wait. Where did you get that glove?”

  “Oh,” Benny said, crossing his arms and shoving the glove into his armpit. “Uh, I kind of took it from someone on Commander Tull’s ship.”

  Zee’s two red-pupiled eyes went wide. “You met Tull. And you’re still alive?” One of his tentacles rubbed his chin. “Okay. Maybe I am undressed.”

  “Undressed?” Benny asked.

  “Impressed,” Drue said, coming up behind Zee.

  “So,” the alien said, ignoring him. “Do you even know how to use that thing?”

  “Sort of,” Benny said. “I got us on this ship with it.”

  “It’s powerful,” Zee continued. “Or at least, it can be in th
e right hands. If you know what you’re doing.”

  There was a bump in Benny’s pulse. “Can you teach me?”

  “Sure!” Zee said. Then, he grinned, baring rows of gleaming gray teeth. “If you let me take one of the Star Runners out.”

  “Ha. Nice try. Not happening.”

  The alien snapped his jaw shut and turned away from them, heading toward the door. “Fine. I’ll get Vala to command you to let me do it. I need to train! What if I could learn something about making our own ships better by flying one of yours? It’s for science!”

  When they were gone, Hot Dog let out a sigh. “Just what we need. An alien Drue.”

  “I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that,” Drue said. “Because the more time we spend fighting, the less time we spend in the drivers’ seats of these SRs.”

  Benny shook his head, taking a few steps away from them and turning his attention to Ramona. “Hey. What’s the situation here?”

  “Too many users,” Ramona said. “Hangar over capacity. Processing speeds radically reduced.”

  “Right,” Benny said. “So, that means . . . ?”

  She looked up at him as she used a piece of silver wire to tie back some of her frizzy strawberry-blond curls. “I did this before back at the Taj, but I def work better in silence, B-Man. Gimme that, and I could have some gonzo uplinks for you in an hour.”

  Benny looked at the parts lying all around Ramona, and then back at Drue and Hot Dog. “You heard her. This takes priority. And we can’t really open a hole in the wall for you to fly out of while she’s working here.”

  Hot Dog snapped her tongue, her shoulders slumping. “You’re right.”

  “Yeah,” Drue agreed, but there was a sly grin on his face. “We should take two of the Space Runners parked in the lower hangars instead.”

  Hot Dog’s eyes lit up. “I forgot about those!”

  “I’ll race you down there!” Drue said, already bolting toward the door.

  “Not so fast!” Hot Dog shouted, darting after him.

  In a flash they were gone, but Benny stayed behind, looking around the giant room, taking in the sight of so many of Elijah West’s creations sitting unmanned on an alien ship. What would Elijah say if he could see them all now? What would his family say? He had so many stories to tell his brothers already. He just had to make sure he got the chance to.