And then he saw that her eyes were not looking at him, but beyond him.
Her scream was not a scream of pain, but of warning.
And at the same moment he became aware of a noise: the sickening slow squelch of something soft moving over the dry ground. And now he saw something else besides his face reflected in the surface of the green pods.
Behind him.
Something looming and monstrous.
Something, in its slow, slippery movement, unfathomably sly.
‘Melvyn,’ he hissed.
Melvyn looked at him, his face still drained of life, of light, of colour, of hope.
‘Your gun. Get it ready. On three, we turn and shoot.’
Melvyn’s eyes opened wide, and he nodded, although it may have been nothing more than a tremble.
Alexander mouthed the words one and two, and then screamed, ‘THREE!’
Melvyn joined in on the scream, simultaneously a sudden release of pent-up tension, an animal yell, a savage war cry.
The two boys leaped in the air as they spun, their fingers already beginning to squeeze the triggers of their modified ray guns.
It was lucky that they were. The sight that confronted them was so appalling, so astonishing, so hideous that they might never have found the triggers if their fingers were not already in place.
It was, of course, the Borgia assault team. Eight undulating, throbbing sacs of viscous malevolence, oozing their way towards them.
VEEEEUUUUMMMMSPPPPPUTTTTTZZZZZZZXITTTTTTOUEEEEOUE EEOUEEE!
The wall of noise from the ray guns was deafening in the confined space of the crypt.
The Borgia warriors froze, then seemed to stagger back for a moment. A tiny fragment of hope cut through the horror in Alexander’s soul. The guns were working, they were really working. Uncle Otto wasn’t just sane, but, like Einstein, he was a genius!
Alexander fired three more blasts – UMMMMSPPPPPUTTT UMMMMSPPPPPUTTT UMMMMSPPPPPUTTT – going for the centre and either flank of the assault.
But something had changed. The shots did not have the same staggering impact. The creatures were not thrown back, not so much as a centimetre. They came on.
The guns were useless. Alexander hurled the worthless piece of junk at the nearest creature. It was no more effective as a projectile than it had been as a ray gun. The hard plastic was absorbed into the soft body, sucked and gnawed, and then spat out.
This was it. The last of the FREAKs were about to end up inside these monsters.
And then, from behind the line of giant slugs there came a roar.
‘SUPERSTRONG!’
‘No, Jamie, stop!’ yelled Alexander. ‘Run for it! Run for your life!’
But Jamie was already throwing himself forward, and he could no more stop than an army of rampaging medieval knights could pause in the middle of a charge and decide to have a cup of tea.
The Borgia had time only to shuffle half round to meet the new challenge. Jamie reached the enemy line, drew back his meaty fist and punched the first soft body with all his might. His fist plunged through the flesh of the Borgia like a hammer hitting a plate of jelly.
For a second Jamie’s face registered satisfaction – joy, almost. Then it changed. He tried to withdraw his arm – which had disappeared up to the elbow – like a bear taking its paw out of a honey pot. But it wouldn’t move. He tried to push against the Borgia with his other hand. But that also sank into the jelly. Jamie was stuck. A second Borgia now slithered over and began to engulf the parts of Jamie not already swallowed by the first.
‘Hurts,’ Jamie cried out. ‘Hurts a lot.’
Alexander tried to reach him, his soul aching with the knowledge that he’d let his friends down – not just Jamie, but all of them; the knowledge that he had led them to their doom.
And then he felt nothing, as a blast of gas from the Borgia leader hit him in the face and knocked him clean out.
BORGIA REPORT, SENT IN TRANSIT FROM EARTH TO THE BORGIA FLAGSHIP:
Muffins, celery, newt poo, newt poo, athletes’ foot powder, chicken grease, sausage roll, chemical toilet on a badly maintained campsite.
Or: ‘As anticipated, the remaining Earth warriors attempted to free their captured comrades. It was a simple matter to surround them, as their attention was focused on the storage drones. There was one major surprise, which could have resulted in a serious setback. The Earthlings were armed with sonic disruptor weapons of the kind we had not expected in such a backward civilization. The modulator was set very close to the frequency most fatal to the Borgia. Had the oscillations been increased by two microns, then our mission would have ended there, with our protoplasm splattered over the walls. However, although the frequency was unpleasant, it was not disabling, and we were able to resume our attack. To give the Earth warriors credit, one of them did manage to launch a surprise rear assault, but that was soon repulsed and the last of the Earthlings made captive. We return immediately.
‘I, Under-general Tuuuuurdo Slm, sign out with fidelity.
‘Death to all enemies and potential light suppers of the Borgia!’
Now probably isn’t the best time to tell you about the progress of Asteroid c4098. But it’s still coming, still on its way, still ready to wipe out millions of years of evolution.
The only question is: will life be annihilated by the asteroid or by the Borgia?
CHAPTER 36
AMONG THE BORGIA
ALEXANDER EMERGED BACK into consciousness at the precise moment he was being expelled by the Borgia storage drone. He felt like toothpaste being squeezed out of the tube. He landed on the floor with a thump, and squirmed. He was covered in a thick grey-green slime, which looked and smelled like the combination of duck poo, mud, dead frogspawn and decaying weed you’d find at the bottom of a neglected village pond.
He tried to stand, but his legs were jelly. He strained to see, but his eyes were dim. He could hear a sound like gas bubbling through water, and a complicated series of smells filled his nose, one after the other, some foul, some sickly sweet.
He could not see because his eyes were full of slime. He wiped them as best he could, but his vision was still blurred, and he could only make out hulking and distorted shapes and a luminous throbbing green coming from the darkness around him.
If he could not see or walk, he could still think. Was this another of his dreams? Would he soon wake to the sound of his duck clock quacking? Or would his mother touch him on the arm and put a nice cup of tea on his bedside table?
But this was no dream. He remembered Felicity’s horrified face. He remembered Jamie and Melvyn, succumbing to the brute force of the . . . the things. The things his uncle had warned him about.
So everything Otto had said was true. For the first time ever, Alexander wished his uncle really had been a lunatic.
His mind came back to Felicity’s face. Where was she now? Where were Jamie, and Melvyn . . . all of them?
He felt sick. He was sick. And once he had finished being sick, he wept. The tears washed his eyes clean. He blinked and he saw.
The place was dark, lit only by flickering red lights and that sickly green glow that penetrated Alexander’s skull like a migraine. There were intricate banks of equipment, with jagging spikes and jawlike gripping structures. The skeleton of a creature, species unknown, hung from chains. Other bodies, at various stages of decay, dangled from the ceiling and walls, gripped by tentacles that seemed to occupy an intermediate stage of existence somewhere between machine and beast.
Towards one side of the room there was a curious device, about the size of an armchair, with a number of funnel-shaped projections at one end and a metal grille at the other.
But neither the strange mechanical objects nor the mutilated remains in the room held Alexander’s attention. For Alexander was not alone. Now that his eyes had cleared he could see the vile, shuffling forms of the Borgia, who had gathered to observe their captive, their victim, their supper. But even these ogres were dwarfed by the gro
tesque and monstrous figure before him.
Alexander was in the private torture chamber of Thlugg, and the admiral was there to undertake the interrogation personally.
As terrifying as the other Borgia were, nothing could have prepared Alexander for the horror of being in the presence of the enemy leader (although of course, at this point, he had no inkling that this was what confronted him).
First there was the stench. It was like being trapped inside the decomposing body of a whale found rotting on the beach. The odour was thick enough to coat his tongue with an oily film. The looks went with the smell: Thlugg’s vast, distended body looked like a green, pus-filled bin-liner. The cosmonaut body parts had by now been almost completely digested by the admiral, leaving only a trace on the wattled skin. But Alexander could still just make out the poignant shape of the fingers, the melancholy curve of a buttock, the horrific suggestion of a blind human eye.
Yet it was neither the smell nor the appearance of the giant Borgia that so dismayed Alexander. It was the pervasive sense of evil that emanated from the monster. This was a creature, Alexander sensed, that took immense pleasure not just from defeating its enemies, but from the suffering this caused; a creature that relished mental and physical anguish in the way others might enjoy a good book or a stroll in the park.
And then there were the terrible table manners.
Thlugg was sitting in his dinner. The dinner was in a large metallic bowl the size of a double bed, and the Borgia was squatting on the top. With dismay Alexander saw that the dinner was moving.
And it was furry.
Oh yes, Admiral Thlugg was squatting in a giant bowl of rabbits, squirrels, puppies and kittens, brought back for him by the assault squad that had captured the FREAKs. They writhed and squirmed, they mewled, they squealed, but they could not escape. They were hoovered up, engulfed, slurped, dissolved. When there was nothing left, Thlugg flopped out of the bowl like a morbidly obese man getting out of a bath.
And suddenly Alexander realized what must have happened to his friends. A choking wave of disgust and horror filled his soul.
‘You beast,’ he said under his breath. ‘You filthy, filthy beast.’
CHAPTER 37
A HOPELESS HOPE
HE TRIED TO get to his feet, determined to reach the monster and exact some kind of revenge, however feeble. But his legs were still useless, and all he could do was grovel and flap about on the floor like a landed fish.
And then there was a foul wet sound all around him, and the room filled with sulphurous emissions. Alexander was so focused on the repulsive leader that he had forgotten about the other creatures in the room lurking like glistening sea anemones around a rockpool. They were shaking, and the gas squirted out in little puffs from fissures in their skin. A sound came from the metal grille at the front of the strange machine Alexander had noticed.
Ha. Ha. Ha.
A staccato laugh.
For a second Alexander thought it was the box that was laughing at him. Then he realized that it wasn’t the box but the creatures that were laughing. In a flash he deduced that the box was a translation device, and that what it translated was the rich language of smell wafted out by the aliens.
The massive Borgia leader shuffled closer to one of the funnel-shaped projections and sent out a puff of gas. There was a delay of a few seconds, and then a voice emerged from the grille. The voice was eerily mechanical. Although perfectly understandable, the words were a little muddled.
‘This hear, worm. Thlugg I am, Admiral Borgia Fleet, Consul of the Empire Borgia, Shredder of Men, Eater of Mice and Rabbits. You will information me now of Earth defence shield base stations the co-ordinates. Then you will speak precise mega-tonnage of warheads in defence shield. Then you will announce me correct frequency for jamming communications of Earth defence force radio machines. And then, only and then, will you tell me secret of good pizza.’
Alexander felt waves of confusion batter him, hurling the fragile boat of his brain about on violent seas. As far as he knew, there wasn’t an Earth defence shield, or base stations, or any of that stuff. Humans were too busy fighting each other to look up and fear the heavens. And even if there were such things, how the heck would he know all about codes and mega-tonnage? He couldn’t understand any of it. He wanted to be at home with his mum and dad. He wished he’d never had an uncle Otto, never got involved in this stupid mess.
Except that there was another realization. Staying at home with Mum and Dad wouldn’t help. These monsters were going to destroy the world.
And he was the Earth’s last hope.
A hopeless hope.
‘Or speak die,’ came the voice, harsh and grating and annoyingly ungrammatical.
What could he do? What should he say? He put his hand to his head. And there he felt not his hair, as he’d expected, but Einstein’s underpants, still damp with Borgia goo. And suddenly his thoughts gained a new clarity. His hatred and his intelligence came together, diamond-hard and bright.
If these things – Borgia, they’d called themselves – if they really thought Earth had some kind of lethal defence shield, then maybe they’d just go off and bother some other planet. Venus, maybe, or Uranus. Because that was the thing about bullies, wasn’t it? That they always picked on the dweeb, the weakling without a decent defensive shield – or at least without a big brother who was known to be a bit of a psycho and used to be in the army. He knew it was his chance to really be a hero, to sacrifice himself for the good of all humanity.
So Alexander spoke, aiming his voice at the same grille that translated the Borgia language into his own.
‘You will never defeat the inhabitants of planet Earth. We have weapons of great power. We are a peaceful people, but we fight fire with fire, meet force with irresistible force. We will never submit to aggression. Our mighty defence shield will annihilate your ships, leaving nothing but smouldering wrecks to drift back to your homeworld to tell of the catastrophe that has befallen your race. And, by the way, you stink.’
‘Brave smells,’ said Thlugg, after Alexander’s words had been translated into malodorous puffs. ‘I was hoping that there would be some fight in you. Means live longer under torture pain, make more big laughs for Thlugg.’
Then the admiral moved away from the translation device and vented some instructions. A little of the gas seeped towards the funnels and some of the words were translated. It was enough to let Alexander know that he was about to set off along a dark path; and at the end of the path, the darkness deepened.
‘Prepare . . . ordeal . . . ready . . . equipment . . . torture . . . Earthling . . . pain . . . ha . . . ha . . . ha.’
CHAPTER 38
TORTURED
THE GUARDS FORCED Alexander onto a low table. Metal bands enclosed his ankles, wrists, neck and forehead, so that he could do nothing more than wiggle his toes and fingers.
He was looking straight up, and watched as a wet fissure opened in the ceiling, dropping cold dollops of slime on his face. The crack widened, and a piece of equipment began to descend towards him, suspended by a thin strand of mucusy cord. Alexander quaked to his very soul.
The device stopped a few centimetres from his face. There was a pause of a couple of seconds. Alexander sensed the evil Borgia leader drawing closer – not for any practical purpose but simply, Alexander knew, so that he could breathe in some of the fear emanating from the captive human.
Two prongs slithered from the end of the device. Alexander whimpered, too petrified to scream.
This was even worse than being snotted by Murdo.
The prongs, like two fat green earthworms, wriggled towards his nostrils. Alexander was convinced they were going to bore into his brain, sucking out the knowledge that the Borgia wanted.
The prongs entered his nostrils.
Alexander wanted to sneeze, but it seemed that even the sneeze was too frightened to emerge. He prepared himself for the agony he would surely feel as the prongs burst up into his brain. A mo
ment later he heard a faint hiss, and immediately a foul smell filled his nose. He flinched and tried to pull away, but his head was too securely bound.
Acid, he thought. Or poison gas. Something terrible. Something that would kill or maim, or drive him insane. His mind searched desperately for something – a life raft, any scrap of hope.
He had nothing.
Except for the pants. Einstein’s underpants.
Please, Einstein’s underpants, he prayed. Help me. Come to me in my hour of need.
Another nasal squirt jolted him. The smell was pretty bad. Cabbage, with a hint of egg. Pretty standard fart smell, in fact. The sort of thing The Hurricane could churn out in his sleep. Was that it? What about the acid?
Suddenly Alexander felt the urge to giggle. But he also felt the glowering presence of the Borgia admiral, and the almost equally evil crew.
But that wasn’t all he could feel. There was a tingling sensation. The pants were answering his call. The pants were working their magic. Ideas, fizzing and zipping.
This ordeal by stench was obviously considered the most terrible torture by the Borgia. The Borgia worked on smell. That’s where they were most sensitive. Perhaps for them, he mused, this was the equivalent of red-hot needles stuck into your eyeballs, or having your fingernails pulled out. No, maybe more like the most terrifyingly loud noise blasted into your ears. And his captors thought it would have the same effect on him.
Right then. He knew what to do. It was time to put on a show. His eyes opened wide, he began a high-pitched keening, growing into a full scream. He strained at the bonds securing him. He arched his back, as if he’d been jolted by a massive electric shock.
And all the while he sensed the lascivious pleasure of the creatures around him. They were like gluttons watching a doner kebab revolve on the spit.
Thlugg vented, and ‘Speak, slave!’ said the mechanical voice.
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