The Greenwich Interplanetary Society

by Stuart Boyd

Chapter 13: Sharptooth Whitefur

  The force of the spaceship flying away knocked Stella to the floor. Helix was the first to reach her and began worriedly sniffing at her, to check that she was all right.

  “I’m okay, Helix,” Stella said, which wasn’t true, she felt bruised and had twisted her ankle. The physical pain, however, was nothing to the horrible empty feeling in her stomach. Doctor Dodds reached down to help her to her feet.

  “It’s gone,” she said simply, picking up the broken chain that had once held her pendant. “Tom as well. He’s been helping the Greddylick all the time. He brought me here and took my pendant.”

  “Willingly?” Dodds turned her to look straight into his eyes. His gaze was avidly searching for something. “Think clearly, Stella. Did the Greddylick tamper with his mind?”

  Stella wasn’t sure, in the face of the disaster, why her uncle was intent on knowing the nature of Tom’s betrayal. “No. That’s what makes it worse. Tom knew what he was doing.”

  “Worse? I think not,” Dodds said.

  He pulled out the pocket light that Stella had seen him check her parents with and began examining her in the same way.

  “Stella Mayveader, you okay?” Grandas said, as he stomped over. He was dragging the struggling figure of Jerbil-Din with him.

  “We got here just in time. It looks like you had a close run-in with a particularly powerful mind-squeezer, but no lasting damage,” Dodds said.

  “No lasting damage?” Stella pulled away from Doctor Dodds, who was trying to look into her ear. “Didn’t you hear me? My crystal has gone. Tom has given it to him.”

  “Tom can’t use it. Neither can the Greddylick. I think we can be pretty sure of that now.”

  “How come?”

  “We’re still here. If the Greddylick was able to wield the power of Parhelian’s flame, none of us here would possess any skill to thwart it. I’m sure it wouldn’t have run from us.”

  “What if it learns to use it?”

  Dodds gave a sigh. “It is you it needs to unlock the power of that star. Although, I wonder how much it is aware of that yet. You are correct, though. We don’t have the luxury of time. If, in fact, we ever did. The Greddylick has shown its hand. We must now reach it before it becomes so desperate that it’ll do something to hurt Tom.”

  “It was Tom who helped him!” Stella spat. “Why should we care what happens to him?”

  “As I told you before, the Greddylick manipulates through fear. Tom’s grandmother was attacked by the Greddylick. The same as your parents. You could hardly expect him to abandon her.”

  “You knew!” Stella said. “You knew that the Greddylick sent him with us.”

  “I tracked the Greddylick’s movements back to when he arrived on Earth. After its run-in with Slimeface, it had managed to trace where the star had last been used. This naturally led him to Tom. Patience is not normally an attribute you’d associate with a Greddylick, but this one seems to have been especially cautious. It used Tom to follow your movements until it perceived that you were too weak to be a threat. Once it had been thwarted in its first attempt to get the star, it sent Tom to your house, presumably with instructions to follow us and wait until it made itself known to him again.”

  “So how come you didn’t say anything? You could have left him at home.”

  Dodds seemed to crumple at Stella’s question. When he answered, his voice was unsteady. “I knew it was a terrible risk, but I felt it was our best chance of locating the Greddylick. I thought Tom would be safe if he stayed with us and we could capture the Greddylick when it tried to contact him. Tom needed to be kept unaware of any suspicions I might have. Any change in behaviour and the Greddylick might have picked up on it. It was also for this reason that I couldn’t let anybody in the crew know, especially you, Stella. I now realise this was an unforgivable conceit on my part. I should have listened to Doctor Nostromus and left him at the Society. I was glad when you told me that Tom had decided to stay in the Attic. I thought he’d be safer there. The Greddylick must have got past the Cragulons and contacted Tom there. Also, I didn’t expect him to use poor old Jerbil here as a diversion. The Greddylick must have seen his arrival as a bonus. It just took a well-planted idea in his mind to have me chasing at shadows.”

  “Poor Tom!” Wendell said.

  Stella rounded on him and snapped, “He still had a choice, hadn’t he? My parents’ minds are in that machine too!” Stella shuddered, remembering the ghostly figure of her mum that she had seen, always searching for her, never to find her.

  “He should’ve trusted us,” she said adamantly.

  “Yes, he should have trusted us, and now he is in awful danger because he didn’t. I also wonder that if perhaps I had trusted him with the truth of what I knew, this may have been prevented. I take a crumb of comfort in that the Greddylick has kept Tom’s mind intact. This suggests he still feels he has use for him. I can only hope that this means that Tom is safe for a while.”

  “None of us are safe. The Dreadful One must not have the Key to the Doom Gate!” a voice intoned.

  Stella looked down to see that it was one of the little men, which she had mistakenly supposed were Helix’s dog toys, that had spoken. It looked like the orange one that had first sprung from her bag. Its voice was far deeper than she would have expected from something that struggled to reach her knee. It seemed to have been injured in the fight with the Greddylick and was limping.

  “You can talk?” she blurted out in wonder. “But I thought you were…” She felt she couldn’t finish the sentence with the words ‘dog toy,’ whilst she was having a conversation with one of them.

  The small figure seemed to find this amusing. It gave a wry smile. “I think there have been misunderstandings on both sides,” it said. He glanced at Helix, who looked as surprised as a husky can look.

  “Let us start anew,” the figure said, giving a dignified bow (a little hampered by his limp), and then exclaimed, “I am Prince Fawcus, of the Telallamorphs.” He indicated the group of his kind behind him, who were principally involved in returning back to their original shape or reacquainting themselves with their limbs. “These are some of my people, who came to my cry of need.”

  Those that could gave Stella a deep bow.

  Stella felt embarrassed in the face of the polite formality of these Telallamorph people, especially as she remembered chucking so many of them out of her window.

  “Err, I’m Stella,” she said, attempting a curtsey. “Pleased to meet you. Thanks for saving me from the Greddylick. If you hadn’t been there, I would have been in big trouble.”

  Stella didn’t like to dwell on how close she’d come to having her mind erased.

  “The Telallamorph people?” Doctor Dodds said, with a touch of awe in his tone. “I have heard of the planet Telallamorph, Your Majesty,” he bowed to the prince, “but it is always spoken of as if a myth.”

  “We do not usually make ourselves known when we journey abroad. We have found it… safer this way. You are Doctor Dodds of the Greenwich Interplanetary Society?”

  “I am, sire.”

  “Your work is known to us, and if the circumstances were less dire, it would be my pleasure to offer an invitation for an audience with my father, the king. He has often spoken of his desire for you both to meet. However, we stand at the moment of greatest peril. I fear that fast actions are needed if the Dreadful One is not to open the Doom Gate.”

  “This Doom Gate? I’m not familiar with the term. Will you tell me what connection it has with Stella and the Greddylick?”

  “We do not have the time for discourse, Doctor. My father must be told that the Dreadful One has what it seeks and the last battle will soon be upon us. Also, my kin have taken grievous wounds and need the attention of our healers, as I fear they will be needed to fight once more.”

  “Last battle? You mean with the Greddylick?”

  The Telallamorph prince sat wearily down, and he spoke in a tone of someone who was very
tired. “The creature you name Greddylick, we know as the Dreadful One. It became known to us some months before. When I, myself, was investigating reports of whole families going missing around the Doom Gate, I found the cruel answer to the disappearances: our people were somehow enslaved, their minds made completely blank except to some foul whim of a strange beast. I managed to escape and give a description of the creature to our scholars. The etchings of our ancestors match the disgusting creature exactly. Our sacred texts warn us of its coming. They tell us to beware the return of the Dreadful Ones, as they will try to open the Doom Gate. They also say that if the Doom Gate is opened, we will face a great evil, bringing with it the destruction of our world. My family has pledged that we will fight to the death against this fate. Though we have little hope of triumph.”

  Dodds squatted down, lowering his head almost to the floor. Until his eyes were level with Prince Fawcus. “We can help you with this menace.”

  “You?” For the first time, a hint of bitterness entered the Prince’s tone. “You could not stop it taking the Doom Key. You cannot stop it now.”

  “What is this Doom Key?” Stella asked.

  “The seven-pointed star you carried.” Fawcus said plainly. “Long has it been the bane of our people. The symbol of the ruin that awaits us. That is why we did not make ourselves known to you, Stella Mayweather. The pendant you wore was that of the doom of Telallamorph. Until I witnessed your fight with the Dreadful One, we could not tell if you were friend or foe.”

  “I am a friend,” Stella said desperately. “If you know where the Greddylick is, you must take us there.”

  “Your Majesty, maybe there still is time to avert the disaster,” Dodds said. “If I can confront the Greddylick before it reaches this Doom Gate, I think I can retrieve the seven-pointed star.”

  Fawcus pondered a while. “The reputation of Doctor Dodds is known far and wide throughout the galaxy, for truth and the fight for justice. I believe that my father would wish your assistance. I warn you, though, that the task you assign yourself is a hard one. Even absent, the Dreadful One has placed lethal defences around the Doom Gate. Since I escaped, further attempts by our people have been made to get past them. None have been successful.”

  “I only ask for the chance to try,” Dodds replied.

  Fawcus got to his feet. “Very well, you shall have that chance.”

  “It’s true, then? What the stories say?” Dodds asked.

  “What stories?” Stella said.

  There wasn’t much that she had understood in the conversation that had taken place. She didn’t see how her pendant could be the key to this Doom Gate on some distant planet, but Fawcus and Dodds clearly seemed to believe it.

  “According to the tales I’ve heard, the inhabitants of Telallamorph have the gift of teleportation. Admittedly I did hear most of them from spacefarers who had drunk more Venutian rum than is considered safe,” Dodds said.

  “The rumours you heard are true, although we need a point that we recognise in order to reach a place. For instance, my people came to my aid by using me as a marker. I can return to the throne room of my father’s palace by thinking of him.”

  “Can you take us with you?” Dodds asked.

  “We can carry a certain amount of weight with us,” Fawcus said.

  The rest of the Telallamorph people had all managed to get themselves more or less complete and were gathered around their prince. Some of them looked at Grandas and couldn’t help giving a groan. The Telallamorphs all got together in a huddle, where they started whispering to each other furiously. Eventually, Fawcus turned back to Dodds.

  “There are not enough of us here to carry you all,” he said, looking significantly at Grandas.

  Grandas noticed this and began to growl ominously. “You call Grandas fat?” he said balefully. “Grandas is lightest Cragulon, but hits the hardest. I vill not leave Doctor Dodds and Stella Mayveader.”

  If Fawcus felt intimidated by Grandas, he didn’t show it. “We are not even sure whether we can carry any of you. It has been years since any of our people has attempted to transport aliens. Doctor, you must come. So must the Key holder. I feel confident that I can bring the gas infant on my own, and although it’s against my better judgement, we have enough numbers to bring Sharptooth Whitefur.”

  At the sound of that name, many of the Telallamorph people cried out loud in dismay.

  “Sharptooth? Whitefur? Oh, you mean Helix,” Stella said in realisation.

  Helix gave a whine of displeasure.

  Fawcus said, “I’m afraid those of my kin who returned from their Doom Key vigil in your bedroom, Stella Mayweather, gave lurid accounts of the dangers on your planet. The reputation of Sharptooth Whitefur’s strong jaws is now nefarious on Telallamorph. I hear that parents have started to threaten their Telallamorphlings that if they do not behave, Sharptooth Whitefur will come and chew them up.”

  Helix hid his face in his paws, embarrassed with the realisation that he had spent the last few months chewing the Telallamorph royal family.

  “I’m afraid you can’t come with us, Grandas, but we really need your help in getting the Attic to Telallamorph as soon as possible,” Dodds said.

  Grandas was about to argue, but Dodds cut him off. “Please, Grandas, if we run into any trouble, we’re going to need the ship. You best take Jerbil with you as well.” Dodds indicated the professor, who was gibbering softly at a wall.

  Dodds turned to Fawcus. “Sire, thank you for your help, I hate to ask for more, but could you ask one of your people to stay with my crew. It might be invaluable to have them as a marker, so we can teleport back. Besides, Telallamorph isn’t on our star charts, and we need directions to your planet.”

  “Our people are no navigators, but it shall be as you say,” Fawcus said. “Ilka.” A blue Telallamorph stepped forward. “Out of all of us here, you have studied our star charts the most. You must stay here and be a guide.”

  Ilka saluted before vanishing, only to reappear on Grandas’s bulky shoulder.

  The Telallamorph people broke into groups and started to huddle around Stella and the others, although it was noticeable that the group that was to teleport Helix looked very nervous. At an order from Fawcus, they began to leap into the air. It felt to Stella as if she was being pelted with something soft as the Telallamorph people stretched themselves over her.

  “Are you sure this is safe?” Stella asked.

  “The Sacred Texts give accounts of our people providing this service for aliens long ago,” Fawcus said, from his position sitting on top of Wendell. “They tell of great riches we received in payment and the treasury still holds many marvellous jewels and precious objects from that time.”

  “Why did they stop?” Dodds asked.

  “We do not know. The latest records on the subject are merely requests for refunds from the passenger’s next of kin.”

  “All I want to know is whether it’s like going through space?” Wendell asked.

  “No, the effect is almost instantaneous.”

  “At last! A civilised way to travel,” Wendell said.

  That was the last Stella heard before she felt as if she’d been turned upside down.

  ***