Astrosaurs 12

by Steve Cole

  “Maybe it is confused,” Teggs suggested.

  “How did the Explorers find out so much about the horrible things without being fried?” asked Gipsy.

  “Luckily, they discovered that solawurms are easily hypnotized,” Teggs revealed.

  Serras frowned. “Hypnotized? What do you mean?”

  “Oooh, I’ve read about this!” said Noss. “When you hypnotize someone, you soothe them into a sleep-like state. Then you can make them do whatever you want them to.” He picked up his calculator and peered at it through his thick glasses. “Mind you, there is a twelve-point-three-four per cent chance that the hypnotized person will start coming to his senses, and—”

  “Anyway,” said Teggs quickly. “The Explorers were trying to get past two solawurms in a shuttle, zipping from left to right, looking for a gap. Before they knew it, the solawurms were hypnotized! They stayed nice and quiet and did whatever the Explorers asked for several days . . .”

  “All very interesting, Teggs,” said Rosso gruffly. “But Serras is right. The solawurm is a deadly threat. I’ve scanned this part of space and found a trail of half-eaten suns stretching for billions of miles.” Serras stamped two of her large, woolly feet. “If that monster eats any more of our suns we are finished!”

  “We are putting our finest crops into special greenhouses for now,” said Noss, tapping at his calculator. “But if the sunlight gets even eleven per cent dimmer, nothing can save them. We will all be doomed.”

  “And where else might this solawurm strike?” Serras added. “All the Vegetarian Sector is in danger!”

  Rosso sighed gloomily. “I can’t take any chances. And so, I have summoned the entire DSS fleet here to Hawn.”

  Teggs frowned. “All five hundred ships?”

  “Every last one,” Rosso agreed. “Their mission will be to drive away that solawurm – or to destroy it!”

  “But, Admiral,” Teggs protested, “solawurms so rare. They are endangered animals—”

  “They are endangering us!” said Serras shrilly.

  “They are incredibly powerful,” Arx added. “If attacked, there could terrible bloodshed.”

  “Admiral, let me go after the solawurm and try to hypnotize it as the Explorers did,” Teggs pleaded. “Maybe I can get it to leave in peace.”

  Rosso looked unsure. “You will be taking a big risk, Teggs.”

  “I will be taking a big supply of snacks too,” said Teggs with a crooked smile. “Come on, Admiral! Risks are all part of an astrosaur’s job.”

  “Very well,” said Rosso. “The fleet will not arrive for another forty-eight hours. You can have until then to find this solawurm and tackle it in your own way.”

  “But the Sauropod isn’t repaired yet,” Iggy reminded them.

  “I’ll take a shuttle, just like the Jurassic Explorers did,” Teggs declared. “A small ship will be harder to hit if things get a little . . . heated.”

  “I’m coming with you, Captain,” said Gipsy firmly. “Perhaps I can help you communicate with that solawurm.”

  Teggs nodded. “I’ll be very glad of the company too!” Then he jumped up from his chair, sending it flying. “Arx, Iggy, stay here and hurry along those repairs to the Sauropod. Gipsy, you come with me.” He saluted Rosso and the woolly rhinos, then dashed from the room. “We will see you soon!”

  “I hope so,” Arx murmured sadly. He knew that Teggs and Gipsy had just left on the most dangerous mission of their lives – and that they might never return . . .

  Chapter Four

  THE SOLAWURM STRIKES

  Teggs and Gipsy fired up Shuttle Alpha, the Sauropod’s fastest mini-ship. “Dung-burners set to maximum,” Gipsy reported. “We have stink-off!”

  Teggs whooped as the smelly engines sent them hurtling through the planet’s atmosphere and out into space, in search of the solawurm.

  “How are we going to find it?” Gipsy wondered.

  “Something that big will be hard to miss!” said Teggs. “Let’s see if we can pick up its trail.’

  It wasn’t long before they saw signs of the solawurm’s savage star-scoffing spree. Frozen planets spun about halfchewed suns. Scorched moons and asteroids hung in space like burned coals. One star had been split open like a grapefruit, its fire spilling out through space for thousands of miles.

  Teggs gazed out on the destruction and nervously switched on the shuttle’s solar-shield for added protection.

  “That solawurm is the scariest thing I have ever seen,” Gipsy declared. “I shall never forget the way it screeched when it saw the Sauropod.”

  “It’s incredibly scary,” Teggs agreed. “But if the DSS fleet attack it, there will be a big battle and many astrosaurs could be killed. We have to try to stop the solawurm peacefully if we can.”

  They flew on and on, into the fringes of the Vegmeat Zone – the no-man’s land between plant-eater space and the Carnivore Sector.

  “Captain, look!” cried Gipsy. “Over there!”

  Teggs squinted at the distant stars – and then gulped as a familiar, wriggling shape uncurled from behind a planet. It started sniffing at the remains of a once-bright sun, now reduced to cinders.

  “We’ve found the solawurm,” Teggs breathed. “Let’s just hope it’s happy to be hypnotized!”

  Slowly, carefully, he steered the shuttle closer to the super-sized sun-swallower . . .

  Back on Hawn, Arx was sitting in the Shaggy Palace with Noss, watching the news on TV.

  None of it was good.

  Serras was giving brave speeches all over the planet, urging the woolly rhinos to stay calm and promising warm jumpers for everyone. But the population was in a panic. Their lush fields of buttercups were dying in the cold, or being washed away by heavy rains. Seaside towns stood deserted because no one wanted to go on holiday – there was nowhere warm and bright on the whole planet. The rhinos’ woolly coats were wet not only with the rain, but with tears.

  Noss sighed. “According to my calculations, your Captain has only a ten per cent chance of even finding the solawurm, let alone hypnotizing it.”

  “There’s more to life than just calculations!” said Arx stiffly. Suddenly, Iggy burst into the room, his scaly hide filthy with oil. “The repairs are coming along too slowly,” he growled. “Arx, that rewiring you did has fixed the computers a treat. But two of the engines still need to be rebuilt from scratch.” He clomped over to the window, scowling at the miserable day outside. “This was such a sunny, happy place. Now look at it – dismal as a dung heap!”

  “At least thirty-two per cent more dismal,” Noss agreed sadly.

  Just then, Arx’s communicator bleeped. “It’s a space message from Shuttle Alpha!” the triceratops announced. Iggy bounced over. “What does it say?”

  “It’s an update from Gipsy. They’ve found the solawurm sniffing about the Vegmeat Zone and they’re going to try and hypnotize it.” Arx smiled at Noss. “See? Beating the odds is what astrosaurs do best!”

  “I hope so,” said Noss, turning anxiously back to his calculator. “Because the chances of Teggs and Gipsy surviving a solawurm encounter are just two per cent!”

  “Of course they will survive!” snapped Iggy. “And they will soon stop that solawurm eating any more of your suns. Won’t they, Arx?”

  “Wait a minute . . .” Now Arx was staring out the window too. “If the solawurm is being hypnotized in the Vegmeat Zone . . . what is that thing up there?”

  Arx and Noss ran over to the window in alarm. Snaking through the sky, the sinister shadow of a solawurm was circling the remains of Hawn’s suns!

  “Bless my head-frill!” Arx gulped. “There must be TWO solawurms – one in the Vegmeat Zone with Teggs and Gipsy, and one right here!”

  Noss’s calculator blew up. “We’ve had it!” the woolly rhino wailed, and fainted.

  Iggy stared helplessly at the twisting terror in the gloomy sky. “Somehow we’ve got to scare off that solar scavenger, before all Hawn freezes over!”
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br />   “With the Sauropod out of action, there’s nothing we can do,” Arx whispered. “It looks like the whole planet is doomed – and us along with it!”

  Chapter Five

  SHOWDOWN IN SPACE

  Out in the Vegmeat Zone, in their tiny shuttle, Teggs and Gipsy were drawing ever nearer to their deadly destination. They were so nervous they barely dared to breathe. The blazing solawurm was still hanging there in space with its spiky back to them, sniffing at some solar cinders.

  “It’s going to see us at any moment, Gipsy,” said Teggs. “And when it does, I’m going to have to swing the ship from side to side in front of its eyes – like hypnotists swing a pendant to put people under their spell . . .”

  But suddenly, as if it could hear Teggs’s whispered words, the solawurm turned round to face them!

  “Captain!” Gipsy gasped. “Look at that face, those eyes . . . Don’t you see it?”

  Teggs frowned. The solawurm looked just as terrifying as before, except . . . there was something slightly different about it. Its eyes were not red, but a deep indigo, glittering like the stars it fed upon. It had longer spikes on its head, and its golden, smoking jaws were marked with deep red stripes.

  “Good grief!” Teggs breathed. “This isn’t the same solawurm we tackled at Hawn. It’s a different one altogether!”

  “I thought you said they were rare?” said Gipsy.

  “They are rare,” Teggs insisted. “But we will wind up well done if we don’t start hypnotizing it fast!” He turned to the thrust controls. “Stand by to activate the shuttle’s side jets – fire them for two seconds one way, then two the other.”

  “Firing now,” said Gipsy, and the shuttle lurched to the left.

  “And again, the other way!” cried Teggs.

  Gipsy hit another switch with her hoof and they swung back again in a semicircle, this time to the right.

  “Left again!” Teggs ordered. “Good – now, right again!”

  The solawurm watched them swinging from side to side.

  “I’m getting space-sick,” groaned Gipsy, her head-crest flushing green.

  “Keep going,” Teggs urged her. “I think it’s working!”

  The solawurm’s eyes were rolling from side to side as it kept the shuttle in sight. But its gaze was getting glassy. Its enormous eyelids were starting to droop.

  “Now what?” hissed Gipsy.

  “Let’s go into reverse and hope the solawurm will follow us,” Teggs suggested. He hooked his spiky tail over the reverse jet controls, and the shuttle started moving backwards as it swung from side to side. “Keep steady on the side jets!”

  “It’s working,” Gipsy squealed, as the sleepy solawurm started wriggling after them. “But where can we lead it to – and can we ever get away without it waking up again?”

  “One ridiculously large problem at a time, Gipsy,” Teggs told her firmly.

  But they were so intent on leading the mesmerized menace away, they didn’t notice a small, scorched asteroid float into view behind them – until it was too late.

  CRUMMMP! The back of the shuttle bashed against the sooty space-rock, and Teggs and Gipsy were flung forward onto the controls. Teggs’s beak hit a switch and the ship lurched to the side, spinning around in a wild circle.

  “Oh, no!” he cried, frantically twisting dials and pulling levers as they spun about. “We must get the shuttle back under control!”

  Gipsy batted some buttons with her hooves. “I’ve shut down the dung-burners,” she reported. ‘But look! The solawurm’s woken up!”

  Teggs saw that she was right – the shuttle’s jerky movements had snapped the monster out of its light trance. Its glittering eyeswere open wide, and its face was twisted with anger. It opened its jaws, and a ball of blazing white light began to form there, growing larger and fiercer with every passing moment . . .

  “Time we were going!” cried Teggs. He tried to restart the engines – but they only spluttered and coughed. “Oh, no! The dung-burners won’t switch on again. That asteroid we bumped into must have damaged them!”

  By now, the dazzling white flame-ball in the monster’s throat was the size of a small moon.

  “I’ll try to communicate,” said Gipsy desperately, switching on the shuttle’s space-speakers. “Solawurm, try to understand me,” she called in a shaky voice. “We mean you no harm. Please don’t fry us to a frazzle!”

  But the giant monster only snarled and opened its giant jaws wider. Flames and smoke were gushing from its mouth.

  “I can’t get through to it!” Gipsy’s head-crest flushed neon blue as she clutched hold of Teggs. “Goodbye, Captain – it looks like this is the end!”

  Chapter Six

  A MEETING OF MINDS

  In the gardens of the Shaggy Palace, Admiral Rosso watched helplessly as the solawurm nibbled the surviving scraps of Hawn Sun Two. From this distance, millions of miles away, the solawurm looked more like a tiny tadpole in the sky than the most dangerous animal in the universe.

  Fresh back from her whirlwind tour of the planet, Prime Rhino Serras sat shivering beside him. “You star-swallowing menace!” she bellowed up at the sky.

  “Just you wait till my fleet arrives!” Rosso added. But until then, he knewhe was utterly helpless. There was very little of the second sun left. Only Hawn Sun Three still shone fully in the grey sky, and alone it wasn’t enough to warm and light such a large planet.

  Suddenly he saw Arx and Iggy running towards him.

  “Admiral!” Iggy panted. “We’ve heard from Teggs. He’s tackling another solawurm out in the Vegmeat Zone!” Serras’s bobble-hat shot up in the air. “You mean there are two of them?”

  “At least two,” Arx confirmed. “I’m sure that’s the first one we saw up there. We thought it had flown far away – but it must have hidden behind the third sun, waiting to strike again.”

  “If only the Sauropod was repaired,” cried Iggy.

  “A single ship can do little against something so powerful,” said Rosso. “We must wait for the fleet to arrive, and hope that five hundred ships can handle two solawurms at once . . .”

  “Hey, look!” called Arx, pointing to the sinister shape in the sky. “He’s off!”

  Leaving nothing but a few blazing specks to mark where the second sun had been, the solawurm wriggled away, twisting back out into space.

  “I wonder where it will go now,” said Serras gravely.

  Arx’s communicator beeped. He held it to his ear as a cheepy-chirpy noise came out. “It’s Sprite, on the Sauropod,” the triceratops explained. “He says the solawurm is heading straight for the Vegmeat Zone at five thousand miles an hour . . .”

  “Then . . . it must be going after Teggs and Gipsy!” Iggy buried his face in his claws. “One tiny shuttle against two of those monsters at once? They won’t stand a chance!”

  Unaware of this fresh menace now streaking towards them from Hawn, Teggs and Gipsy were clinging onto each other, waiting for the star-fire to burst from the solawurm’s smoking jaws.

  “Wait! There’s just one tiny chance!” cried Teggs. “Gipsy, that screech that the first solawurm made . . . can you do an impression of it?”

  “Why?” asked Gipsy.

  Teggs shrugged. “If this one thinks we speak its language, it might not burn us to a crisp!”

  “OK, I’ll try,” Gipsy agreed. “Now, how did it go . . . ?” She cleared her throat, ran to the communicator, threw back her head . . .

  And performed the most incredible, howling, hooting shriek that Teggs had ever heard! It was so loud and screechy that his ears nearly popped. On and on it went, until at last Gipsy ran out of puff and sank gasping to the floor.

  Teggs helped her back into her seat. “That was an amazing impression,” he told her. “And it’s made an impression on the solawurm – look!”

  Through the shuttle’s windscreen, Gipsy saw the last of the star-fire was being sucked back down inside the solawurm’s throat. It stared at the little sh
ip with a curious look in its deep blue eyes.

  Then, quite suddenly, the astrosaurs heard a low, booming voice. They seemed to hear not with their ears . . . but with their minds.

  “Help?” The big voice inside their heads sounded puzzled. “Did you just call for help in my own language?”

  “Who said that?” Teggs demanded, looking all around.

  “I did, you silly dinolings!” said the deep voice in their heads. Through the shuttle windscreen, they saw the solawurm wave to them! “I am communicating with you through the power of thought. My name is Heelum.”

  “Captain,” Gipsy gasped. “Do you know what this means?”

  Teggs nodded. “It means the solawurm can talk with us using its mind.”

  “Of course I can!” said Heelum, looking very lofty. “I can hear your thoughts and send you my own as easy as solar pie!”

  “Then why didn’t you speak sooner?” asked Teggs. “Why try to fry us?”

  “Because you were trying to hypnotize and trick me, and I lost my temper,” said Heelum sharply. “I don’t listen to anything when I’m angry.”

  “Captain, do you know what else this means?” said Gipsy excitedly. “It means that the first solawurm we met wasn’t shouting in anger . . . it was shouting for help!”

  “And that is the only reason I am not roasting you right now, puny dinolings,” boomed the echoing voice in their heads. “Because if you know any of my language you must have met my little brother!”

  Teggs frowned. “Your brother?”

  “His name is Grakk, and we are the only solawurms in this part of space,” said Heelum. “He’s got red eyes and is slightly less spiky than me.”

  “We’ve met him all right,” said Teggs grimly. “If he’s not stopped he’s going to wipe out all life on Planet Hawn by eating its suns, one after another!”

  “YOU LIE!” Heelum spoke so loudly that Gipsy and Teggs thought their heads might burst. “We solawurms never eat the suns of living worlds. We are peaceful creatures – unless we are provoked.”

  “Well, perhaps Grakk has forgotten that,” said Gipsy. “We thought you were a danger too. That’s why we tried to hypnotize you.”

  “I remember,” said Heelum, with a distant look in his eyes. “The Jurassic Explorers hypnotized us, many centuries ago. Using the power of thought, they sent us far, far away from this part of the galaxy . . .”