Pete(11)‘Intervention Plan’ (Young adult; adventure/sci-fi) — Peter S.Wall
February 21st 2008 00:35
EIGHT
'Missing in action'
Borgz warrior Septo Zan was sprawled out on the suspensor-track inside his habitat when the Daxian agent and his human master passed overhead. The habitat's matter-beams concealing his alien signature from detection. No sooner had the two earthlings left the vicinity, than Septo Zan navigated the vent back to the surface and began scanning the area for a suitable female dog to assimilate.A Borgz bio-scanner works in much the same way as Earth radar, only instead of a dot-location on a screen, the user is given a full biological species-analysis of a target and exact coordinates. Septo Zan found three possibilities immediately, two not far away, the third down near the ocean. This last dog, a robust female of a breed known as Labrador, had him moving fast. The animal was ideal, and not far from where the scanner detected the Daxian agent and his master along with seven other human children engaged in some kind of Earth game.
Septo Zan—now Libby the Labrador—shook his new body. For an experienced shape-shifter, it took just moments for the strange sensation of cellular-assimilation to disappear. In thirty Earth seconds, he was bounding down the yard of fourteen Haig Street, heading straight for the oval.
Moss grew on the drainpipe interior creating a slippery mat-cover, and Bluey skittered and splashed through the paw-deep water. Then he burst out of the darkness into sunlight with the scent leading him on. More rock climbing. In through another pipe under the rail line. Then he stopped. He’d over-ran the scent, it headed left, up the embankment. In two bounds, Bluey was right back in the coal mine grounds again.
"Woof."
Bluey jumped in surprise. There was Libby the Labrador standing beside one of the vents to the mineshafts. 'I knew it was her!' He congratulated himself. 'But what is she doing here?'
Bluey trotted over with tail held high and hair raised-up on his back. Something still didn’t feel right, but unlike the rabbit incident, Bluey didn't notice the alien’s black eyes.
As planned, Septo Zan waited until the Daxian agent drew close enough to ensure success…closer…then, he lunged, delivering a sharp bite to the rump.
"Arrr!" Bluey yelped, jumping away.
Septo Zan waited for his current form to dissolve and invade the agent. Only nothing happened! Then he realised, the same Daxian signature that made the agent so easy to locate with the bio-scanner, must also be blocking his cells from invading the animal. He reacted with lightning speed and in one mighty bound, had leapt past the shocked agent and dived straight down the vent.
Bluey's initial surprise quickly turned to anger. 'Why did she do that!" But as he spun around to confront Libby, he was just in time to see her tail disappear down the vent.
Bolting over and jumping up to rest his paws on the vent-lip, Bluey barked, "arf arf, woof, arf arf, woof?" Which in anxious dog language, meant: Libby, what are you doing? When Libby didn’t reply, he was reminded of the strange rabbit that dived down this very vent after it took a nip out of Scruffy. Then there’s the mind-map that showed a scary red-dot and blue dome-thing—all down in these mineshafts! Bluey realised then, if he wanted answers; there is only one place to find them.
He jumped down and trotted back several feet to get a clear view of his target. Then in two bounds, flew through the air and dived straight into the vent mouth. No sooner inside, than Bluey found he was hurtling down a pitch black near vertical slippery-dip, gaining speed with each passing moment. Then 'whoosh', he was flying through the air again…and then 'splash'. Landed back first in a pool of muck, yelping as his backbone connected with the hard coal-shelf below the water.
Quickly regaining his paws, Bluey froze in fear at the sight before him. Outlined from the glow of the blue-thing he’d spotted the day before, was an animal unlike anything he’d ever seen. In one of its four arms, the alien held a small object the shape of a box. As Bluey stared transfixed, the box was levelled in his direction. The last thing he recalls is a beam of light striking his chest.
It was night-cycle on Dax when the second distress signal was received. Dax's two moons Gana and Nazeem, in full-cycle dominated the eastern sky, casting a golden glow over the city of spires—Caz renowned for its myriad of tall, needle-shaped structures—as Lord Xen donned the black and red-trimmed robe of a Daxian noble. Zin summoned him the instant a second message was delivered into royal hands. As Xen boarded his Qaan—a small, bubble-shaped transporter—for the short journey to the Palace, he was struck by the unsavoury feeling that he would soon be traversing the stars, back to that beautiful, yet increasingly troublesome planet called Earth.
The Qaan is a fully automated craft, one merely sits in its glove-like seat, punches the coordinates into the nav-pilot, then sits back to enjoy the ride. In a few parsecs, the transporter had covered the distance and landed with a ‘whoosh’ on the Palace grid.
The Emperor's private rooms occupied the top level of the Palace. Two black-armoured warriors of the elite death-squad stood guard at the shield doors leading into the royal chambers. Both pounded their chest in salute as Xen strode past, heading to the corridor that would take him to the royal staterooms.
Emperor Zin was seated in his favourite high-back chair with woven gold-inlay. Before him, an ornately carved fireplace radiated heat as two large Birr logs crackled, licked by flames. At his feet lay Goldor, the Emperor's royal tragg, a dog-like animal that in place of fur, had blue scales covering its trunk-like body. Dressed in evening attire of dark blue robe with silver trim, the Daian ruler was sipping a coffee-like substance called leet from a golden mug, when Xen strode up behind and saluted with a 'thump' of his chest.
'Your Highness!"
"My lord Xen. Please, take a seat." The Emperor gestured to a similar chair—minus gold inlay—opposite his, then clicked his fingers. From a side entrance, a yellow-robed female servant appeared holding a sheaf of paper. The Emperor gestured for the servant to give it to Xen, and then waved her away.
Xen studied the signal data. It was a dual-stream transmission same as the first. And from the same agent. ‘This is a concern’, he thought. If the signal had been from another agent, then it might, like the one before it, be due to a one-off fright anomaly. No, this agent has experienced two moments of extreme fear, possibly under threat of death. It needed to be investigated.
"My Lord," Xen stood, holding the signal data before him. "If it is your will, I'll have my starship prepared immediately for the journey back to Earth." He figured there was no use delaying the inevitable.
The Emperor's handsome silver-face creased in a smile of impeccable white fangs. "This is why I made you Royal Adviser Xen, you always devise an agreeable course of action."
Xen bowed low, he didn't know about agreeable, more imperative. The last thing he wanted was for the Pixar 28/0 mission to fail, that would not look good for a candidate of the upcoming Planetary Elections.
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