Space Team

by Barry J. Hutchison

  “Man, you did not make that clear at all,” said Mech. “Yeah, left pedal, right foot. Hard down, now!”

  Cal slammed his foot on the pedal. As he did, another pedal came springing down from the console beside it. It slammed into Cal’s shin, making him cry out in pain.

  “Argh! What the fonk was that?”

  “Sorry, should’ve warned you. Left foot on the other pedal…”

  Cal slammed his left foot on the other pedal. His eyeballs were almost fired out of their sockets as the ship screeched to a stop in mid-air.

  “Not yet!” Mech cried.

  The ship began to fall. It wasn’t even the uncontrolled descent of the last drop this time, but a full-scale plunge towards the ground below.

  “You told me to put my left foot on the other pedal!” Cal protested.

  “I hadn’t finished the sentence!” Mech cried.

  The ground spun in looping circles towards them, the landing pad now filling almost a third of the screen. Cal pumped the pedals as Mech frantically pressed any buttons his fingers weren’t too big for.

  “Nothing’s happening,” Cal pointed out. “Why’s nothing happening?”

  “Pull up!” Miz cried. “We’re going to crash!”

  “Yeah, we noticed!” Mech bellowed. “Ain’t my fault!”

  “It’s totally your fault!” insisted Cal.

  Behind him, Loren groaned and flickered open her eyes. She gazed at the screen for a few seconds, her eyelids slowly scraping up and down. She jumped suddenly upright. “Second left, third from bottom, top panel!”

  Cal reached up for the top panel. “What? Second…?”

  “Left! Third from bottom!”

  Cal found a small, unassuming white button. “What about it?”

  “Press it!”

  “Now?”

  “Yes, now!” Loren yelped, gripping the armrests as the landing pad spiraled closer and closer. “Press it now!”

  Cal pressed the button. There was a roar that rumbled the whole underside of the Shatner, vibrating them all through the floor. The spinning slowed, then stopped. The ship tilted until one of the ingot buildings loomed right ahead of them.

  There was an impact which, while jarring, didn’t turn them into a crater on the ground. With a hiss and a billowing of gray smoke, the Shatner touched down on the landing pad.

  Loren and Mizette both relaxed into their chairs. Cal swiveled to face them. “What was that?” he asked. “What did I press?”

  “Auto-pilot,” Loren croaked, rubbing the top of her head.

  Cal shifted his gaze to Mech. “Auto-pilot? There’s an auto-pilot?”

  “Hey, how was I to know?” said Mech. “We’re alive, ain’t we? It’s all good.”

  Cal stood up. “Well, there’s a very high chance I’ve soiled myself, so I wouldn’t say it’s all good, would you?”

  Miz sniffed the air. “I don’t think you have.”

  Cal’s nostrils flared. He grimaced, just briefly. “Well, that’s a relief. Thank you for checking.”

  “Any time.”

  Loren unclipped her belt. “The important thing is that we’re here.”

  On screen, an enormous door on the closest building slowly swung inwards. Loren stiffened. “And here comes the welcoming committee.”

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Cal, Mech, Loren and Miz strode along a raised walkway leading towards the door which had rumbled shut once the welcoming committee had emerged. Splurt rolled alongside the rest of the Shatner’s crew, leaving a thin, glistening trail in his wake.

  The group who had come to meet them had turned out to be large in one sense, and surprisingly small in another. There were twenty or more of them, and none of them over three feet tall. They wore long green ropes that covered them down to the knees, and hats made of blackened twigs all tied together into witch-like points. The hats covered them down to below the nose, allowing only glimpses of their wide yellow eyes through gaps in the twigs.

  The little creatures surged behind Cal and the others, herding them along the walkway. They chittered in a way that sounded one third excited, two thirds threatening. Try as he might, Cal couldn’t make out a word of it.

  “What are they saying?” Cal asked.

  “Nothing,” said Loren. “They don’t talk. At least, not in a way anyone’s been able to translate.”

  “I’m hungry,” said Miz, licking her chops and glancing over her shoulder as the tiny figures hurrying along behind. “Anyone else hungry?”

  “Don’t you dare,” warned Loren. “Kornack would kill us.”

  Miz’s snout wrinkled. “I was kidding. Wow. Relax. It was funny. Right, Cal?”

  “It was hilarious,” Cal agreed, flashing her a double thumbs up. “Good job.”

  A pale, slightly ill-looking sun shone down on them, yet the whole planet seemed to be cast into shadow. The cool air prickled at Cal’s skin. On the other hand, it seemed perfectly breathable, so he wasn’t going to hold the temperature against it.

  “So, what’s this place called?” Cal asked.

  “Kornack,” said Loren.

  “No, not the guy, the place.”

  “Kornack,” Loren repeated. “He named it after himself.”

  “That’s actually pretty awesome,” Cal said. “I mean, imaginative? No. But awesome? Hell, yes. If I had a planet I’d one hundred percent name it after myself, too. I think me and this Kornack guy are going to get along just fine.”

  “Let’s hope so,” said Loren. “That’s the whole reason you’re here.”

  “Exactly!” said Cal. “Wait, what?”

  “Those stories he’s obsessed by? The cannibal stuff? You’re his favorite. He knows everything about you.”

  Cal felt a creeping sensation of dread tingle up his spine. “He does, huh?”

  “President Sinclair thought having you make the drop would help sweeten the deal,” Loren explained. “Which, I must say, I think was a genius move.”

  “Genius,” Cal agreed. “Definitely. Genius.” He cleared his throat. “When you say he knows everything about me… what do you mean by that, exactly?”

  Loren shrugged. “Just what I said. He knows everything about you. Everything you’ve done. Everyone you’ve… you know. Eaten. He’s a big fan.”

  Cal swallowed. “Great! This should be fun, then,” he said. They stopped outside the towering metal entrance to the building. Miz’s nostrils widened as she sniffed the air.

  “OK, now I think you’ve soiled yourself,” she said.

  “Thanks,” Cal told her. “I noticed.”

  The door edged inwards. The tiny aliens chittered behind them. Cal took a deep breath. “Well, I guess we should get this over with,” he said, then he stepped over the threshold and into the shadowy darkness beyond.

  The inside of Kornack’s headquarters reminded Cal of some of the sleazier clubs he’d visited over the years. It was dimly lit to the point of being almost not lit at all. Shapes lurked in the shadows, getting up to a whole range of things he’d rather not know the details of, but which the squelching and panting made pretty easy to guess.

  Music blared out from somewhere up ahead. At first, the crashing volume level made it impossible to recognize the sound as music at all, but as Cal’s ears adjusted his eyes went wide.

  “Wait, I know that song,” he said. He hummed along with the intro, trying to place it. “It’s… argh. What is it?”

  The intro finished and the first verse blared along the corridor. Cal clicked his fingers. “It’s 9 to 5!” he realized. “That’s Dolly Parton! What the fonk is Dolly Parton doing in outer space?”

  He hurried ahead, following the sound, his boots scuffing on the cave-like stone floor. He knew the chances of him finding country legend, Dolly Parton, herself had to be billions to one. Then again, the chances of him hearing her most famous track being played by an alien species trillions of miles from Earth had to be pretty astronomica
l, too, so he wasn’t completely writing the possibility off quite yet.

  The music grew louder as he pressed on through the wide passageway, to the point that when the chorus kicked in, his teeth rattled in time with the beat.

  Cal turned a corner and was almost blown off his feet by the volume. He took cover behind the wall, jammed his hands over his ears, then peeked out. An enormous egg-shaped door stood fifty or so feet along the passageway. It towered three or four times Cal’s height, and shone like gold in the flickering glow of the fiery torches fixed to the wall on either side.

  “Jesus, who is this guy?” Cal bellowed, as Mech and the others caught up, accompanied by the crowd of hat-wearing little dudes. “The King of Space?”

  “What?” shouted Loren, who also had her hands clamped over her ears. Mizette’s teeth were clamped tightly together, like she was trying very hard to ignore the pain, while Mech seemed completely unfazed by the whole thing.

  Down on the floor, Splurt’s blobby surface rippled along with the song’s bass line, and his eyes bobbed from side to side in time with the beat.

  The backing music was deafening, but it was Dolly’s voice that was the real problem, and the thing most likely to do lasting damage. Cal waited for the all too brief instrumental break before the second verse, then lowered his head and broke into a run.

  Halfway to the door, Dolly let rip with verse two. Cal hissed in pain. He staggered, but pressed on, eyes watering, eardrums trembling, and a dull ache radiating upwards from his testicles.

  The door swung inwards as he approached, and the song hit him like a targeted shockwave. His skeleton rattled from his toes to the top of his skull. His heart skipped erratically. Colorful darkness spasmed before his eyes. Dolly was already building towards the chorus again. If she hit that “crazy if you let it” line, Cal was done for, he knew.

  He stumbled into a round room with bumpy metal walls, hoping to find a large speaker with a visibly obvious power switch. He saw nothing even resembling one, and the only thing that caught his attention was a tall, thin male figure standing in the middle of the room, his hands folded crisply behind his back.

  The figure’s mouth moved, but Cal couldn’t catch a word.

  “Too loud!” Cal cried. “Turn it down!”

  The figure raised a quizzical eyebrow. His mouth moved again. Dolly’s voice raced towards its ear-shattering conclusion.

  “TOO LOUD!”

  The figure frowned, then produced a small remote control from behind his back. He tapped a button and Dolly Parton echoed away into blessed, merciful silence.

  “Pardon, sir?” said the figure, in a voice that made Cal immediately think of both an old English butler and the rustling of Autumn leaves at exactly the same time. “I’m afraid I didn’t quite catch that.”

  “I said stop it!” Cal said, the ringing in his ears still making him shout. “Too loud!”

  “It has stopped now, sir,” the butler pointed out. He didn’t just sound like a butler, he looked like one, too, albeit one who had an unhealthy fascination with cosmetic surgery.

  His head was tall and narrow, with shrub-like gray eyebrows located both above and below each eye. His nose was barely a bump in the center of his face, the nostrils puckered tightly closed, just like his mouth several inches below.

  “Well… I know it’s stopped now,” said Cal.

  “Would you like me to play it again, sir? I’m informed it’s your favorite.”

  “What? No!” said Cal. “That’s not my favorite.” He turned to the rest of the group, who had now entered behind him, followed by the chittering throng of hats. “Seriously. Dolly Parton’s 9 to 5 is not my favorite song.”

  “Really, sir? Oh,” said the butler, all four eyebrows raising in surprise. “Perhaps I was misinformed.”

  “Perhaps you were, yeah,” said Cal. “Now Karma Chameleon by Culture Club – that’s a song.”

  “I’m not familiar with it, sir.”

  Cal patted the butler on the chest of his black, largely featureless jacket. “My advice? Get familiar.” He jammed his little finger in his ear and waggled it around, trying to stop the ringing. “So. Are you Karnock?”

  “Kornack, sir,” the butler corrected. “And oh my, no. My name is Mtsing Dtsgadston. I am Master Kornack’s most humble servant.”

  He bowed his head with such a sudden jerk that Cal let out a little shriek of fright. “My apologies, sir. I did not mean to startle you.”

  “You didn’t startle me,” Cal laughed. He glanced back at Loren and the others. “He didn’t startle me.” Cal faced the butler again. “So… Gadston, was it?”

  “Dtsgadston, sir.”

  “Yeah, there’s no way I’m going to get that,” said Cal. “If it’s OK by you, I’m just going to go ahead and call you Gadston.”

  “As you wish, sir.”

  “So, Gadston,” began Cal, putting his hands on his hips and scanning the room. “Where’s this Kornack guy?”

  “Master Kornack shall be joining us momentarily, sir,” said Gadston.

  He swiveled sharply on one foot, revealing a row of four chairs positioned further into the room. They looked like they had once been grand, leather-covered affairs, but time and a full scale galactic war had both taken their toll. Now they were Swiss-cheesed with holes, where springs and stuffing poked through, and at least one of them had had a leg snapped off at some point, and was now propped up on a broken breeze block.

  “Well, let’s go make ourselves uncomfortable, shall we?” Cal suggested. He led the crew over to the chairs, Miz pausing to sniff the butler on the way.

  “Whoa, you’re old,” she said, prowling past him.

  “Indeed I am, madam,” Gadston agreed. “So kind of you to notice.”

  Cal lowered himself into one of the chairs, slowly testing his weight on it. Loren and Miz both eased into seats on either side of him, leaving Mech to stare down at the one remaining seat.

  “Yeah, I wouldn’t. There is no way that’s taking your weight,” said Cal. “Splurt?”

  Splurt oozed up the front of the chair and nestled himself into it. His floating eyeballs looked up at Cal, then across at Mech.

  “So… what? I’m just supposed to stand?” Mech grunted.

  “You always stand,” Cal pointed out. “You’re like, renowned, for standing.”

  “Deepest apologies, sir,” said Gadston. “I shall find you a chair at once.”

  He turned to the horde of hat-wearing things and let out a series of incomprehensible chitters. The tiny creatures chattered back, then tumbled over themselves on the way out of the room.

  “It’s fine,” said Mech. “I’ll stand.”

  “Nonsense, sir,” said Gadston. “I shan’t hear of it.”

  He snapped his head forward in a bow once more. “Now, please excuse me for a moment while I notify Mr Kornack of your arrival. He is most looking forward to meeting the famed Butcher of planet Earth. Most looking forward to it.”

  “Good. That’s… that’s awesome,” said Cal, waving to the butler as he about-turned and marched towards the door. “Take your time. No rush.”

  Once Gadston had left, Cal turned to the others and lowered his voice to a whisper. “Did you hear the way he said ‘most looking forward to it’?” he hissed. “Like, he’s not just looking forward to meeting me, he’s most looking forward to it. What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “That he’s looking forward to meeting you a lot?” Loren guessed. “Relax. Just be yourself.”

  “But four hundred percent less annoying,” Mech added.

  “Thanks for the advice,” said Cal. “Or should I say…”

  “Don’t,” Mech warned. “Don’t do it, man.”

  “The space advice,” said Cal.

  Mech’s jaw ground noisily. “That don’t even make sense!”

  “It makes perfect sense,” Cal insisted. “Perfect space sense.”

  “That’s it. You
’re dead,” Mech growled, his fingers curling into sledgehammer fists. “You’re a dead man.”

  “You can’t kill him,” Loren said. “We promised Kornack he could meet the Butcher. If we don’t deliver, this whole thing will fall apart.”

  Cal shifted in his seat. “Yeah. Funny you should bring that up,” he said. “The whole ‘meeting the Butcher’ thing. You see – and we’re all going to laugh at this - technically speaking, I’m not actually--”

  “The Butcher of planet Earth!” whooped a voice from behind them. They all turned in their seats – or out of their seats, in Mech’s case – in time to see a lump of granite in a pin-striped suit be carried into the room on a golden throne.

  Fifty or so of the hat-wearing little creatures strained under the weight of the sparkling chair and its occupant. The way he was bouncing excitedly in it probably wasn’t making their lives any easier.

  Gadston picked a path through the throng of struggling hats, then strode smoothly ahead of the throne, his feet moving so smoothly he appeared to be gliding.

  “All rise for Master Kornack, slayer of the Sh-int’ee, lord of the Ktubboth, destructor of the following planetary systems…”

  The crew all stood, as the butler launched into a list of names Cal wouldn’t even dream of trying to pronounce. They ranged from high-pitched squeaks to low, guttural gurgles, with several dozen tongue-twisters in between. It was a long list, and took quite a lot of time to get through, much to the apparent dismay of the hat-creatures.

  When he reached the end of the list, there was a collective sigh from the little aliens, but Gadston wasn’t done yet.

  “Brother of Shornack, High Murderess of the Eleven Seals, dominatrix of Qqqtzl, and destructor of the following planetary systems…”

  Cal shifted his weight and tried not to meet Kornack’s eye as Gadston launched into a list that was easily as long as the first.

  At last, the introduction came to a close and the throne carriers lowered it unsteadily to the floor. “Boom! Touchdown! Haha!” cried Kornack, firing the words out like a latter-day Al Pacino projecting to an audience made up entirely of deaf people. He jumped up, moving surprisingly quickly for something his size. “The Butcher of Earth, right here in my home! Hoo-ha!”