They also had a great need for cuddles. Pipes was always up for sitting on a crewman’s lap, and his silky fur and gentle purr soothed many a distressed spirit. Enigo had even heard that some ships had multiple creatures just for comfort. Of course, he knew Gel’s plans for the unsuspecting katt had nothing to do with petting and muttering sweet nothings.
Gel had coaxed Pipes to stay still with a bowl of kibble. The katt stood with his back to the security officer, content and nibbling as Gel adeptly absorbed and expelled a rock, then a wire basket, then a bag of rocks…
When Gel wrapped a gooey pseudopod on the katt’s tail, Pipe’s head jerked away from his bowl. His low growl became a howl of rage as the Globbal raced up his haunches and over his stomach. Too late, Pipes tried to scramble free, claws flexing and scrambling for purchase. His flailing upset the food bowl, spilling kibble, which were pulled into Gel’s bulbous form. Gel’s slurp cut off Pipes’ screech.
Frozen in shock and indignity, his eyes wide and his limbs still splayed for flight, the helpless katt seemed to travel across Gel’s body as he pushed him through his system. Around him people were at once laughing and scolding him.
As Gel’s commanding officer, Enigo forced himself not to guffaw. Besides, he knew the kind of effort and skill it took to absorb and expel a living creature alive. Not to mention all of Pipes’ fur and those razor-thin claws. On top of that, he had to extract the kibble from its claws, some of which had been ground to a fine dust…
“Computer, halt program!”
“Oh?” the Bowflex taunted, “had enough already, babimann?”
“Shut up, and let me down.” As soon as his feet touched the ground, he shoved open the door and ran to his minion. “Gel, spit out that katt and come with me. We need to talk to the Captain!”
***
LaFuentes, Gel, and a mollified Pipes emerged from the turbolift onto the bridge.
“We have to talk to the Captain!” LaFuentes declared.
“Enigo!” Doall said. “The captain told you to – oh!” She took in his gym attire and sweaty…everything. And he had a jar of dirt. Then her eyes traveled to Gel, who didn’t wear gym clothes or clothing of any kind, but was still worth a gander because he was cradling the ship’s katt, who had apparently decided to forgive him in return for snuggles. Pipes blinked sleepily and purred.
“Okaaay,” she said.
Smythe turned in his seat just enough to make eye contact. From the lack of surprise he showed, one would think the two – three – bursting in was nothing unusual. And to be frank, stranger things had suddenly appeared on the bridge of the Impulsive; it was just they were usually unknown aliens. “The Captain is in negotiations and cannot be disturbed. I take it, however, you have an idea?” He tapped a quick message to the captain on his console: Keep stalling.
They descended to the main floor. The entire bridge crew set their consoles on “distracted user” and turned to watch. This setting directed the computer to alert them if anything on their consoles needed their attention and allowed them to take part in the drama that made bridge duty so desirable while ensuring the ship didn’t get invaded or blown up because someone wasn’t focused on their jobs.
“Pretend Pipes is Loreli. So the big deal is that they don’t want us making off with any of their oh-so-sacred dirt, right?”
“Rather sarcastically put, but essentially correct.”
“And we can’t transport her without some kind of protection for her roots because she’s too fragile, right? Not to mention her roots are thin and tangled in the dirt.”
“I assume you are stating the obvious for the benefit of the bridge crew who have not been part of the planning session.”
“Yeah, sure. Oh! Right. I’ll get to the point. Watch.” He opened the jar, got his hand dirty and then petted Pipes, leaving a brown streak on his sleek tortoise-shell fur.
“Go ahead, Gel.”
Gel ran a pseudopod over Pipes’ dirty back. He lifted his arm, pulling the fur up with him to show he had enveloped it, soil and all. Then the substance inside his pseudopod began to shift. Little by little, the dirt flowed off of Pipes and out the back of Gel’s pseudopod until he held a clean katt and a ball of dirt. He put it back in the jar, and gave LaFuentes a high five. His pseudopod surrounded his boss’s hand, and like before, drew off the dirt. This, too, he deposited.
“Computer, how much dirt did we lose?” La Fuentes asked.
“Just like the last three times, there’s no discernable difference,” the computer obliged.
This time, the security chief and his minion gave each other a real high five. It made a splotchy, wet sound, the sound of victory.
“Impressive,” Smythe admitted.
LaFuentes grinned his mad, I-got-this! grin. “Even better, we don’t have to uproot Loreli at all. Gel can just infiltrate the soil, surround her roots, and extract the dirt. Then Dolfrick can zap them out together.”
“It’s no problem, Captain,” Gel added. “I can wrap myself around our ship’s sexy easy.”
There were a few sighs and some jealous mutterings among the bridge crew.
Smythe ignored them. “Gentlemen, you may have saved Loreli’s life and earned yourselves some extra leave. Now get cleaned up and prepare for another demonstration in case the captain needs to convince the GONs. And get Pipes some milk. He has been a good kitty.”
* * *
Jeb’s momma used to tell him, “You’d better corral that temper of yours, boy. Stampedes don’t do anything but damage.”
Jeb’s dad used to say, “Stampedes are what cattle do. We’re men, not cattle.”
It took him a few years to figure out what his dad meant, but he’d learned there was a time for temper, and a time for damage – or at least the promise of damage. He was at that point now.
When Wylson had called with his “good news,” Jeb had dismissed his officers with the order to “Get me an answer – and prep a stealth shuttle with Wikadas shields in case you don’t.”
Next, he arranged for Smythe to listen in on his negotiations through a private com link and gave him a “go” phrase. He would stall as long as he could, but if he said the phrase, then Smythe was to launch whatever rescue operation they’d managed to come up with.
Then he’d gone to his ready room and contacted Wylson and the GON who’d come up with the cockamamie idea of chopping down his xenologist. He sat at his desk so his frustration didn’t show in physical activity. If he had to stampede, it would be with words…and phasers, if need be.
He’d tried to reason with them. He’d shown them medical records and the Loreli’s health readings. He’d even tried to compromise to uprooting and a power wash, though the Botany Department wasn’t sure she could survive that. He was getting dangerously close to a stampede.
“Tell you what, Whoosh-chit-chit-kreee. How about if you come to my ship, and I cut off the bottom half of your thorax with an ax?”
Wylson’s frontal features fought for neutrality, but his right-side face stifled a snicker. Apparently, it was fed up with the GONs as well. Whoosh-chit-chit-kreee, gasped.
“Are you threatening me?”
“I think,” Wylson cut in, while his side face put a tentacle to his mouth and pretended to cough, “that Captain Tiberius is drawing an analogy to the injury such an action would do to his valued officer.”
“Though if a threat works…” Jeb added.
The GON waved a leg. “Nonsense! She’s a vegetative life form. A plant! Get her into a fertilized bath and she’ll be fine.”
“Maybe if we’d done so immediately,” Jeb agreed. “Maybe if you’d let us heal her injuries. But she is perilously weak, bleeding internally –“
“Plants don’t bleed.”
“Vegetative life forms do. She is a living, sentient creature. She’s not some orchid you can take a cutting from.”
The GON did an admirable job of pretending to roll his eyes.
Jeb opened his mouth to give the “go” phras
e and to hell with diplomacy, but a message appeared on the bottom of his screen. Keep stalling. He grit his teeth and corralled his temper. He needed to give his people more time.
***
Captain’s Log, Intergalactic Date 676797.50
Hottdam if my security officer didn’t come up with an elegant solution to our conundrum. Never underestimate the inspirational power in a good workout.
We performed our little demonstration for the GON botany team, and after some careful measurements and a virtual sampling of Minion O’Tin’s bodily matter, they declared themselves satisfied that our plan will respect their requirements for environmental purity while letting us get Loreli out alive. The Impulsive’s own botany team has worked with Doctor Pasteur to create an optimal strengthening fluid for Loreli. Minion O’Tin has absorbed some of this into his own body so that he can share it with Loreli once he has enveloped her root system. He’s also absorbed some quantum trackers so that our teleporter chief can lock onto all of Loreli’s roots for teleportation.
The DipCorps has released the All Stop on my ship, and the GONs have stood down their planetary defenses.
The GONs have even set up a platform where we can beam down and oversee the process without stepping on their soil. Apparently, they are going to have some dignitaries there to talk about how this is a great step forward in Union/Keepout relations. Wylson will speak remotely on behalf of the Union, which is only fair since I did suggest taking an ax to one of said dignitaries.
So, it’s looking like All Systems Go for a nice, easy conclusion. Which is why the ship will be on Yellow Alert, and I’ve authorized Lieutenant LaFuentes to join us, and we’ll all go armed. I don’t want to say this has been too easy, but…
In the teleportation room, Lieutenant Enigo LaFuentes handed the Captain a weapon. Jeb checked the charge, ignoring his security chief’s frown. He’d authorized only energy weapons; they looked cool and ceremonial when paired with the formal dress uniform, and he didn’t want to chance spilling any blood. This close to the end of the mission, the last thing they needed was to mess things up by contaminating the soil, after all.
The doors slid open and Minion First Class Gel O’Tin oozed, slug-like, in. His normally green skin was more aquamarine due to the nutrient fluid he’d absorbed. Right behind him, the botany team trundled a vat containing the same fluid mixed with potting soil. It smelled vaguely of manure. Jeb felt a touch of homesickness, but all the same, he was glad his Globbal crewman had not absorbed the smell with the substance.
“I am so bloated!” Gel declared to the room at large. “I haven’t felt this full since Union Day.”
“That was a party!” La Fuentes agreed. The annual celebration usually included a great deal of alcohol and sometime well into the festivities, someone had suggested “Gel shooters.” Gel had obligingly absorbed an entire vat of tequila and offered teaspoonfuls of himself to the daring and adventurous. He’s even submitted to being salted so folks could lick him beforehand.
Then LaFuentes laughed. “Who’da thought it would be training for today?”
“Never waste an experience,” Jeb agreed. “Are we ready?”
The chief botanist said, “As soon as you zap away, we’ll set up the vat to receive Loreli.”
Chief Dour said, “Auxiliary teleporters are ready with Plan B.”
“Excellent. Let’s do this.”
Jeb led them to the teleporter platform, but Dour called for them to wait. He fixed LaFuentes with narrowed eyes. “Did you ‘go’?”
“What?” LaFuentes sputtered. “You’re seriously asking me that now?”
“I respect the GONs’ quest to preserve their purity. And your bladder is notorious.”
“Whoa, man! Personal!” Yet a couple of the botany team grimaced in agreement with Dolfrick.
“But he has a point,” the captain put in. “There are going to be several long-winded speeches.”
“Captain, I’m fine.”
“I can inspire you, boss,” Gel said. “I’m carrying almost two extra gallons of fluids. I am the perfect balance of biological and technological requirements for this mission.” The Globbal stretched and lifted the bulk of his girth up in a simulation of sticking out his chest.
“Seriously, Captain. I’m fine.”
“Dolfrick, take us down.”
The three dissolved as Gel was saying he didn’t get paid enough to hold something LaFuentes couldn’t hold himself.
The teleporter chief’s aim was as true as his devotion to his Mistress of Teleportation, and they arrived solidly on the platform, close enough to Loreli that Gel could stretch himself to her without ever touching the planet itself.
When Jeb saw her, he bit back curses the universal translator would have had to summarize as “expressing deep concern and alarm.” In the past few hours, her situation had gone from serious to critical. She had folded over, with what would normally be her knees on the ground and her seat on her heels. She was slumped, her fronds wilted in front of her face. She wasn’t even trying to make an affectation of breathing.
She was still surrounded by the force field.
Jeb gave a quick glance at his Security Chief, but LaFuentes was in mission mode, channeling his rage toward finding and cataloguing targets. Gel was subtly inching toward the edge of the platform closest to Loreli. Good.
He turned to the knot of GONs who were politely gathered to one side next to the projection of Wylson. The face toward the GONs expressed calm neutrality, but the one Jeb could see most plainly had his thin mouth compressed in fury. The GONs had decorated themselves with jewels and metallic ribbons on their carapaces and had a teleprompter in between them. They showed no concern at all for the alien dying only feet away from them.
Jeb didn’t bother to ask why the shield was still in place. He just demanded they lower it.
One of the GONs, some chief muckety-muck Jeb had not spoken to, stepped forward. “Welcome, crewmen of the Impulsive.” He did not sound sincere. “I’m Click-click-kritta-chitter. I’m the elected leader of this province. I’m sorry we didn’t speak earlier; I was attending the hatching of my larvae.”
“Congratulations. Now release my crewman.”
“Thank you. I’m afraid I’ve assessed the situation myself and I cannot allow it. These are dangerous times for my constituents. You’ve seen for yourself what the terrorists are capable of, and they have the philosophical backing of the majority, even if we do not agree with their methods. It’s a difficult situation.”
“Release her!”
“I cannot lower that shield. We will dig her up and transport her to a secure facility where we can carefully extract her under controlled situations.”
“She’ll be dead by then!”
“But my planet will live contaminant free. You see the greater good here, yes?”
Gel spoke up. “Captain? What if they lower the shields partway, then I can get in and coat her? Their scientists already agreed that’s safe.”
“No!” another GON shouted. “It’s a trick. Look at him. He’s not green anymore. He’s almost blue! They want to poison our land.”
Beside that one, another reached into his pouch and pulled out a weapon. “To arms! Eradicate the contaminants. Keep Breeze-rustle-chitter pure!”
“The Ship is Family!” LaFuentes retorted and shot the gun out of the GON’s hand.
Some days, I hate being right. Jeb activated his personal body armor just in time. He felt a slight warmth on his back as the energy beam someone shot him with was deflected.
So much for the easy solution.
Captain Tiberius crouched down to make himself smaller, but, stuck on the platform, he nonetheless made a tempting target. Fortunately, the terrorists seemed to think everyone in the gathering should be shot. Energy streams and projectiles flew at the GON dignitaries from all angles. The insectoid beings were dashing about, seeking cover, clinging to each other and generally panicking and getting in the way of the few security officers they’
d brought, just in case. Both GONs and ammunition passed through the holographic image of Wylson, whose neck twisted about while all three heads tried to get a handle on the situation. Finally, he tossed six tentacles in the air, mouthed, “Stay on the platform!” and disappeared.
“Tiberius to Dour. Plan B!”
Lieutenant LaFuentes was in his element. As soon as he’d made his war cry, he had started taking out assailants, some of whom he’d already seen from the trees. (Later, he’d tell the captain he didn’t fire on them right away because it seemed undiplomatic.)
Moments after Jeb called for Plan B, several barriers materialized on the platform. Jeb wedged himself between two that gave him the best protection, while LaFuentes used them to dodge behind, jump over and shoot around. He’d tossed a weapon to Gel, who was also doing his share of damage.
Jeb was, too, of course. He couldn’t let his crew show him up, but his mind had to be on the real goal of the mission.
“LaFuentes!” he yelled to be heard over the zaps and ploiks and screeching and other sounds of pandemonium. (Use your imagination or recall Starship Troopers fight scenes.) “Make a hole in that shield and cover Gel!”
“On it, Captain! Dour, Gel, get ready for thrilling heroics. For Loreli!” La Fuentes spun to his left and fired at a small box that had been humming away, completely unmolested by the terrorists or the law enforcement. It went up in a shower of sparks. All around them, a wail rose, as if friend and foe (or in Jeb’s point of view – foe and more foe) screamed, “No!”
“Gel, move out! Dolfrick, count of twenty-five!”
The Globbal coiled himself like a spring then bounded toward Loreli.
Jeb counted. One, two…
Gel’s body stretched then snapped back to its usual blobby shape, wiggling as it arched through the air.
Three, Four…
A stray bullet smacked into Gel at a shallow angle, knocking off a bit of his ectoplasm. It spun away at an oblique angle. Almost in deep slow-motion, Jeb could hear a second scream, “Noooo!”
Hold My Beer Page 9
