The Paella That Saved the World (The Paella Trilogy Book 1)

by Elle Simpson

  “Yes,” Colin said, obviously puzzled at the relevance, “why would that matter in particular?”

  “Cause it’s Deeke,” I told him. “She’s the one with High Compulsion.”

  I saw the second realisation hit. Colin’s eyestalks flattened back against his big scaly head. “Oh, of course,” he said slowly. “Oh, that poor, dear child…”

  Horrified silence was the soundtrack of the moment. And it was also the soundtrack to the sci-fi movie cutscene going on outside. Because now that the stolen saffron mountain was condensed into a crystal dinner plate, we had our view back.

  And the view? Creepy Bob’s ship, pretty much level with us now, still scooting back and forth.

  “What’s it doing?” I asked.

  “Searching for us,” Colin said.

  Uh…“And is it going to find us?”

  “Not until I want it too.”

  “Until?” I echoed. “Don’t you mean unless?”

  “No.”

  “Col,” I said warningly. “Colin.”

  But Colin wasn’t having it. “B’oab will detect our presence shortly,” he said, “because getting the crystal aboard B’oab’s ship without first uncloaking my own is impossible.”

  “No it’s not!” I yelped. “Like, is so totally isn’t! Just do the beamy thing. Seriously, beam me over where I need to be. I’ll plug in the saffron air freshener and we’re good to go. Boom! Bunch of sleepy alien whackjobs.”

  But we were back to that thing where Colin tells me every idea I come up with won’t work. “B’oab’s ship has its own protective mechanism, which I cannot simply ‘beam’ you past. In order for me to transport you aboard, B’oab must first drop the terraformer’s shielding.”

  “As if she’s gonna do that, Col. C’mon, she’s so not.”

  “Exactly. So that is why we must trick her into doing so.”

  I choked out a laugh. “What are we gonna do, then? Ring the intergalactic doorbell and run away?”

  “In a manner of speaking,” Colin said, and then didn’t speak in any manner even slightly at all.

  I fought a vaguely hysterical eyeroll and the eyeroll won. “How about in the manner of speaking where you actually explain your plan?”

  Then I totally wished I hadn’t asked, because Colin said, “Shortly, I will hail B’oab and offer myself as a hostage in exchange for the safety of Planet Earth. B’oab will lower her shields to allow me to dock. When she does so, I will beam you aboard, whereupon it will be simple enough to make your way to the environmental control panel and install the crystal.”

  Another hysterical eyeroll, nothing vague about it. “Okay, let’s say Creepy Bob agrees – and like, no idea why she would – what happens if I can’t get the crystal where it needs to go? Or if I do, and it doesn’t work? Couldn’t Creepy Bob just kill you, kill me, kill everyone else, and then terraform the frick out of Earth anyway?”

  “Yes,” Colin said. “Undoubtably.”

  “Colin! That is not a plan! That’s pretty much, totally a suicide mission!”

  “Hannah.” Colin reached out two pincers, took me by the shoulders, and scrunched down low enough to look me straight in the eye. “We have but one option before us and none other. We either try, or Planet Earth will fall within the hour. There is no other way.”

  “We’re certain about that?”

  “We are utterly certain.”

  I thought of Mum and Toni, and Nan, and Little Buckford, and all my family and friends.

  I thought of Kal and Deeke.

  I thought of everyone down there on Planet Earth who had not a single hope left but me and Colin and our bumtonne of saffron.

  “Then we try,” I said. “We have to at least try.”

  35

  “Then hide yourself,” Colin said. “And watch here.”

  I hugged the crystal dinner plate to my chest and hunkered down where he pointed, hidden away behind the console. A little holographic screen popped into life in front of me.

  “Disengage the cloak,” Colin told the console, “but disguise all lifesigns barring my own. Open a communications channel when you are ready.” The console gave an affirmative beep, then Colin spoke. “This is UIC Research Vessel Peregrination hailing the ship of B’oab Baakatarin. Please respond.”

  Nothing happened for a horrible long second or two. Then my little screen fizzed and settled, and I could see what Colin was seeing – Creepy Bob standing in the empty bridge of her creepy ship.

  “Where is she?” Creepy Bob said, not so much as a how d’you do.

  “The human child is dead,” Colin told her.

  Creepy Bob laughed – a mirthless, creepy little chuckle. “Oh, of course. How convenient.”

  Colin’s voice was blank. “I have disengaged the cloaking mechanism upon my ship. I am not blocking your instrumentation in any manner. I am sure you are able to scan for lifesigns.”

  Creepy Bob’s head turned away a sec, then, “One. Just you.”

  (She actually had the cheek to sound disgruntled. And legit, I still can’t figure out if that was because she’d thought Colin was lying, or because she was just straight up disappointed she wasn’t getting another chance to kill me.)

  “How did she die?” Creepy Bob asked, creepily invested in my apparent tragic demise.

  “The young hatchling was injured by the plasma blast. I caught her and carried her aboard, but I could not save her. The injuries were too severe.”

  “Then I must thank the seven moons,” Creepy Bob said. “For never have I met a more meddlesome creature.”

  “Feeling’s mutual, buddy,” I whispered through my clenched teeth.

  But Col was more diplomatic. “I hailed you because I wish to speak to you, B’oab Baakatarin, and not of the young life you have taken.”

  “Then what an honour it is that one of the Wise deigns to speak with so lowly a being.” Creepy Bob pulled a little mocking bow. “What may I do for you, oh Wise one?”

  “I offer myself in exchange for the freedom of this planet. Take me prisoner,” Colin said, “and release the Humans of Earth.”

  “And why would I do that?” B’oab said. “Why would I do that when I could just as easily aim a pulse cannon at your engines and let you plummet to your death.”

  “You will agree to my terms,” Colin said steadily, “because I am worth far more to you alive than dead.”

  Creepy Bob laughed, creepily delighted. “Are you? And why is that? Will you impart the wisdom of the ages upon me, oh Wise one? Will you tell me of the beauty and the majesty of our eternal, unknowable universe?” Her voice went hard suddenly. “Or will you meddle where you are not needed nor wanted, and leave nothing but a desolation in your wake.”

  “B’oab,” Colin said, weirdly gentle, “I am only myself and none other – no matter whom else my appearance may call to mind.”

  Creepy Bob cocked her head away, then back. Her forehead scrunched just the once, and when she spoke again, her own voice was weird too. Calmer, maybe. A little intrigued. “Colin, is it? I do believe I heard a panicked scream directed so.”

  Colin inclined an eyestalk. “You know the name the young Human of Earth gave to me. You do not know my true name.”

  “Oh,” Creepy Bob said, obviously humouring him. “And what is that?”

  Colin made a sound. It was all clicks and skitters and crunching whines. My ears could barely make sense of it.

  But it meant something to Creepy Bob, because her eyes flared wide – wider than I thought was possible – and she said, sudden and biting, “Then you are right, Colin. Your life is worth maintaining. For the moment, at least.”

  “Do we have an agreement then?” Colin asked.

  “We do. Begin your approach. When your ship is docked, I will end the compulsion upon the Humans of Earth. That is the only allowance I will make.”

  “It will suffice.”

  The screen went black. I scrambled to my feet. “Who did you tell her you were?”

 
“Simply myself.”

  “Colin—”

  “Hannah,” Colin said, “there is no time. No time.”

  I’d never seen him looked so freaked. It was enough to freak me out all the more. “Sorry,” I said. “What do I do? Tell me what you need me to do.”

  Colin took the saffron crystal from me with a careful pincer, pressed something, pinged something, and then slatted straps appeared out of nowhere, like from Kal’s magic flight suit. “Affix this to your person, if you would.”

  I yanked my hoodie off my arms and up round my neck, flashed Col with some sexy sports bra action, and then slung the crystal on like a backpack. Another magic strap appeared out of nowhere and clamped tight around my waist.

  I pulled my hoodie back down. “Ready.”

  “The dispersion device is cloaked in much the same manner as my ship is cloaked,” Colin told me, tapping at the console. I could feel the subtle shift of the ship changing tact, the thrum of the engines doing something different. “It is hidden from Akanarin eyes but will not be from their touch.”

  “Yeah, pretty sure avoiding getting felt up by the creepy evil aliens is top of my list, Col.”

  Colin pulled up another hologram: an overhead floorplan of some kind. “I will endeavour to transport you to this cargo bay here,” he said, pointing. “From there you should progress along the corridor outside. You will find the Engineering Section roughly twenty human metres aft.”

  “Which way is—”

  “Turn left upon exit,” Colin said. “Your left, which is in no way right.”

  “Left left,” I muttered, fixing it in the brainbox. “Not right left. Left left.”

  “There is a large panel on the far wall as you enter, behind a cluster of little-used utility consoles. Open it. There, you will find a collection of control crystals. Remove the nearest crystal to hand, replace it with the device. The process will enact automatically from there.”

  “Okay, sounds doable,” I said – like, as doable as me winning a Nobel Prize in physics but whatever. Apparently you’re allowed to exaggerate for dramatic effect at the end of the world.

  “Do you remember the Akanarin I spoke of before?” Colin said. “The ones likely heavily under compulsion?”

  “The peeps who aren’t helping Creepy Bob out of their own creepy free will?”

  “Indeed. They will be the folk on duty in Engineering. They will also be so deeply in the compulsive state as to be unlikely to notice your presence. Move swiftly among them and with seeming purpose. They will pay you little mind. B’oab’s underlings, however…”

  “Different story, yeah. Avoid the psychopathic henchmen. Will definitely be doing that, Col.” I scooted away from the console and stood, feet planted, where I knew the beam liked to do its beaming from. I clapped my hands. “Let’s hustle. We’ve got a planet to save.”

  “Then…” Colin began, and I had to close my eyes, just so I didn’t see the awful, agonised look on his scaly face for one single second longer. “I can only say as you once said to me: good luck, my dear little hatchling.”

  And then—

  The thing about Col? He’s not brilliant at the whole molecular reconstitution beam malarky. He’s kinda like the giant cockroach-scorpion hybrid from space version of when your nan tries to drop the little orange man on Google Maps.

  He’ll get you somewhere. It just won’t always be the somewhere you were planning on going.

  So yeah, Colin beamed me straight onto Creepy Bob’s ship. He managed that just fine. But the problem? When the flare of the beam faded away and I opened my eyes, I wasn’t in the cargo bay.

  I was, in fact, in the corridor outside the cargo bay.

  I was also not alone in the corridor outside the cargo bay.

  Because Creepy Bob was in the corridor outside the cargo bay too.

  And Kal – who was also in the corridor outside the cargo bay – lifted his barcode scanner gun and shot me straight in the head.

  36

  (The barcode scanner was set to stun, though. How’s that for luck?)

  I woke up in a cell – I guess. This big semi-circular room anyway, with some kind of forcefield across the open doorway. It didn’t hurt to touch, just tickled against my skin when I pushed my fingers to it.

  “Colin?” I whispered. “Col, can you hear me?”

  No reply. So either Creepy Bob was blocking his brain phone calls somehow or…or…

  No. I wasn’t going to think about that. Col had said it himself: he was worth more to Creepy Bob alive.

  But that was the thing – Creepy Bob knew I was alive now, which meant she knew Colin had lied. Which also meant all she had to do was throw a High Compulsion at him to find out exactly why I was here.

  Then she’d know all about…

  “Oh my god.” I reached around, scrabbled up under my hoodie – and the crystal was still there. “Oh, thank god.”

  And like, cool that I still had it and all, but also? Not much help when I didn’t know where I was, let alone where to find the ship’s environmental controls, let alone how to even get out of my creepy evil alien jail cell in the first place.

  I scrubbed my hands through my hair, pulled hard enough to give myself a face-lift. “Oh, not good. So not good. So, so not—”

  A noise outside. I hustled backwards just as the forcefield blipped out of existence.

  Creepy Bob strode in, Kal and his barcode scanner bringing up the photoshopped, cheekboned rear. “Your associate resists my compulsion,” Creepy Bob said. “So you will tell me instead. What did he send you here to do?”

  Time to play the epic idiot. I shrugged, trying to look casually defiant. “Doesn’t matter if you know now, does it? I was just supposed to, like, smash some crystals. Or something. I don’t know.”

  “Smash some crystals. Or something.” Creepy Bob made a disgusted noise. “How typical. The utter arrogance of it all.”

  “And you’d know all about that, wouldn’t you, you arrogant whackjob?”

  (Apparently stress makes me snippy. And not great at keeping my internal monologue internal, also apparently.)

  Creepy Bob considered me a second, her head cocked so far to the side that it was practically at a right angle. “The thought had occurred to keep you alive, that you might perhaps have been of some use to me. You have proved so remarkably resilient after all. But no, I find now that I tire of you.”

  “Well, if we’re having a heart to heart,” I said, totally trying to ignore how badly my voice was shaking. “Then I’ve got to tell you, Bob – I’m pretty freaking tired of you too.”

  Creepy Bob’s little chuckle was pure, unadulterated evil in laugh form. “Then we must do something about that, mustn’t we?” She turned to Kal and said, “Kill her.” Then, “Slowly,” she added, out the door and gone, voice already fading.

  Before I could even think about thinking, Kal was there, grabbing me by the neck with just one hand and hauling me up until my feet dangled clear off the floor.

  “Ack!” I managed, then even vague phlegmy noises weren’t an option anymore.

  I clawed uselessly at Kal’s wrist, tried desperately to pry his hand away with my suddenly jelly fingers. But he didn’t budge, not even a millimetre. It was like fighting with a concrete block.

  My brain wanted to explode out my eyes sockets. The feeling in my head, in my skull – it was like when you have the worst cold and you blow your nose too hard and everything pops and spins. All of that, but with no oxygen. No oxygen at all.

  I couldn’t breathe. Kal was squeezing too tight. He was going to kill me.

  Kill…me…

  Wait.

  With the very last, tiny bit of my brain that was still up and running, I remembered something. Something Colin had said. Something suddenly bizarrely relevant to the bizarrely specific situation I was in the traumatic middle of right then.

  …if you managed to get close enough to do so, I imagine that would be because Helmsman Kal was in the process of killin
g you…

  The control strip! Oh my god!

  I reached up. Willed my fingers to cooperate. Dug my nails into the back of Kal’s neck, right where metal met skin. Dug them in hard. Dug them in until I got a grip – which wasn’t a great one, my hand slippy with his blood, all silver – but I got a grip and I pulled.

  The control strip came squelching out with the most horrible noise I had ever heard. And instantly, Kal dropped me.

  (Then caught me by the armpits and lowered me gently to the ground – so we’ll forgive him.)

  “Bleurgh,” I managed, which I was quite proud of, really.

  Kal blinked every eyelid he owned. Shook his head. Tried a little more blinking. “You were there,” he said, “at the crash site. You’re the human. Hannah. You…you tried to help. I spoke to you.”

  I patted him on the knee in a way I hope conveyed, “Yup, that was me,” then I had to tip sideways to the floor.

  I couldn’t talk just yet. My brain needed a second to get the hang of breathing again. My throat too. Also, mainly, my lungs. Plus, the cut on my own neck had started bleeding again, and the smell of that wasn’t really helping much with my ‘be sick or have a coughing fit’ dilemma.

  “Hey, are you okay?” Kal hauled me up so I was sitting again, which very much helped with the breathing situation, but maybe not so much with the potential puke situation. Kal’s big silver eyes were wide with concern, his hand hovering over the totally undoubtable mess that was my neck. “Aww, jeez. Oh, the light of the seven moons. I’m so sorry.”

  “Ack,” I managed. Then I cleared my throat and produced a croaky, “I’ve had worse.”

  “Really?”

  “No.”

  Kal’s ridiculously attractive face crunched up in a ridiculously attractive frown. “Was that supposed to be a joke?”

  “Your face is a joke,” I muttered. “No one should be that pretty.” Then I had to stop to cough.

  (Also? Stating just for the record here? I was still a little out of it at the time. He’s pretty, but he’s not that pretty.)