Star of Fantasy

by Jacky Qian

  "Uh…Oh!" He stammered, "What're you doing here?"

  "I came to see the beautiful moon, and…" She stroked her hands and continued. "I see that Runt and Hicks still dress too heavily, so I want to modify their clothes so that they won't feel so hot."

  She picked up her work: The trousers had been converted into shorts, the sleeves of their jackets had been neatly shortened and the collars removed. She even removed the shirt buttons and stitched them into pull-overs.

  "Good work!" said Silverstar. "Girls are always ingenious!"

  "Nonsense!" said Catherine with a roll of her eyes. Then she took his hands in hers and said, "So, how about these wounds?"

  "God knows!" Silverstar pretended that he didn't see anything. He gently pulled his hands free and turned. He walked away, whistling a tune.

  "Hah!" Catherine laughed, "You're funny like that at school!" Then, after a pause she asked, "So, you really don't care that we can't go back?"

  "Whoever said that!? Yeah, I'm worried! But you know, I've had many adventures, so I know we should never give up. That's the spirit of an adventurer! I definitely believe we can go back!"

  "Good point!" Catherine said with a grin.

  "Aha! I'm flattered!" Silverstar replied.

  Catherine made a mysterious smile, then wrapped her arms over Silverstar's shoulders and kissed him on the cheek.

  Silverstar was dumbfounded. His face turned red as an apple.

  "I…Uh…I…Oh!"

  She gave Silverstar a knowing look and said, "Don't tell the others, okay?"

  "O . . . okay!"

  Catherine ran back to the campsite, and Silverstar half-whispered, "Wow!"

  The "Silver Angel" Luxury Car

  Drops of water spiraled down the plant as if free of the normal rules of gravity, reflecting bits of sunlight toward the sky.

  Those seeking food the day before departed again toward the huge forest near the campsite, except Catherine. Still trapped in a critical situation, they must strengthen their defense.

  "Hey!" Hicks said, "Guys, something new, look!"

  "You're not so arrogant since beaten," Runt pat him, then saying, "Oh, my God!"

  "What happened?" Silverstar came over, only to find a human skeleton on the grassland, which could be identified as a burly man with obvious bite marks on his cervical vertebra, suggesting that he might be bitten to death by so predators as man-eating insect.

  "It gets rot so quickly!" Runt gazed at the skeleton in confusion. "Look," He turned to Silverstar, "It's not stinky around, and there's obvious sign of battle, so…"

  "So boring!" Hicks yawned, "I'd look around elsewhere." However, Nicholas seemed interested.

  Runt rolled his eyes and continued, "So, it only suggests that there are scavengers feeding on prey killed by hunters."

  "Then why there's human here?" Mandis asked. "Human beings hadn't emerged then, had they?"

  "You know," Silverstar replied, "We're not the first to arrive here in this era. Our friends in masks yesterday are humans too."

  "Oh!" Nicholas asked, "Do you think Captain is still alive?"

  "Of course!" Mandis assured, "Simons is strong-willed; he couldn't have died."

  "And," Runt took a close look at the bite marks, "I've seen this kind of mark before…"

  At the same time, Hicks pushed through the bush, followed by a scorpion as big as a hyena. The creature seemed docile.

  Hicks said, "Wow! You scared me! Ha! You're still small, unlike those I've met previously."

  "What I've seen… is…" Runt tried his best to recall, and shouted out suddenly, "It's la ultrarrápida cazadores, skorpiovenator!"

  The little scorpion proved that it wasn't friendly as it bit Hicks' arm hard. Hicks screamed in pain, knowing he now had a broken bone. The others heard the noise and knew something had happened.

  Silverstar took the lead, running toward the sound; Runt said while running, "Skorpiovenator is the fastest-running creature, and it's numerous on earth. They hunt collectively and stay where they hunt for a while. Hicks is in trouble!"

  Hicks, bleeding profusely in the grip of the creature's claw, struggled to hit its head. Mandis landed a stiff blow, but it was painful due to the scorpion's exoskeleton.

  Nicholas kicked it over swiftly like the legendary martial-arts wizard Bruce Lee, much to Silverstar's amazement.

  "I lived in China for three months," Nicholas said as he helped Hicks to his feet. "Well, if you want to know, I was studying martial arts."

  "Are you okay?" Mandis asked. Hicks answered, "Definitely not! Holy crap, that hurts! Ouch!"

  "Stop the bleeding, quickly!" Runt took out a handkerchief, "The aorta has been punctured. If we don't deal with it, you could bleed to death."

  Hicks was in extreme anguish, falling into dizziness.

  The group was at a loss, but suddenly the masked ones appeared. They screamed again, just as they had done the previous day. They descended from the sky, among which one came in front of Hicks and spread some transparent sticky liquid on his right arm. Miraculously, he stopped bleeding. His wounds healed, right before their eyes.

  The skorpiovenator stood again, growling. Several mask men rushed toward it and sprinkled a handful of pepper, which caused it to cough. They signaled Silverstar and the others to escape, and then disappeared after pulling up the rope to the huge tree.

  The skorpiovenator leaped toward them again, but just then it was struck by a sleek roadster. It was Catherine at the wheel, saying, "Come on!"

  "Do you even have a driver's license?" Silverstar asked.

  "No," she said with a smile, "but there's no driving license in this age. By the way, I took first place in the Las Vegas Championship!"

  "What? You're a racer!?" Everyone asked at the same time.

  "So what?" she replied. "Haven't you ever played holographic 'Asphalt 18'?"

  "No," answered Nicholas, shaking his head.

  "Hey!" A sailor sitting behind shouted, "Chasers are coming!"

  A skorpiovenator took the lead, followed by thirty or forty more. Catherine put on her blue sunglasses and spoke directly to the steering wheel: "Auto-drive, full speed!"

  Basin Chasing

  "How . . . how did you find the car?" Silverstar shouted, "And . . . could you slow down a bit? The wind is too strong!"

  "We found it among the wreckage of the ship!" One sailor replied. The car was still hurtling toward the pier, followed by skorpiovenators, which lived up to their reputation as "speed predators." One skorpiovenator leaped to make a catch, but it failed because Catherine gave the wheel a good yank. The Silver Angel's automatic navigation system sent out an alarm, with the holographic image displaying "CLIFF."

  "Guys!" Catherine yelled out, "Hold on!"

  Before reaching the edge of basin cliff, Silver Angel took an abrupt turn, stirring up myriads of dusts. The leading skorpiovenator stabbed its clump into the ground to slow down, then used all the six legs to turn a sixty-degree angle and accelerated to catch up with the car.

  "They're so clever!" Nicholas was amazed.

  "Skorpiovenator is very strong!" Runt said, "Their high intelligence is out of reach for human beings!"

  "Ouch!" Two skorpiovenators failed to hold themselves and plummeted seventy meters off the edge of the cliff.

  "We need to get rid of them!" Silverstar said, "Get down to the basin!"

  "There!" Nicholas pointed toward a mild downward slope.

  "Okay!" Catherine replied, making another sharp turn and rushing toward the basin.

  The basin was spectacularly immense, without people or houses. "This is a natural basin!" Silverstar opened his arms and exclaimed.

  The Silver Angel, a vehicle obviously not made for rough surfaces, jostled and jolted violently. The skorpiovenators did their best to keep pace. Two of them scrambled into the car, and each bit into a sailor's arms.

  "Help! Help!" The sailor cried out in pain. The skorpiovenator cut off the safety belt with its sharp claw and pulled the sai
lor out of the car. The speedometer indicated ninety miles per hour, but it was slow in comparison to what the skorpiovenators could do. So Silverstar shouted, "Speed up to 120 miles per hour so that they can't catch up!"

  "No!" Catherine objected, "We can't stand that kind of speed, and…" She paused, and then continued, "The Silver Angel has another function!"

  It was at this moment that another skorpiovenator jumped into the car and was about to attack Nicholas. Silverstar stabbed its eyes desperately, but it closed them and turned to attack. Mandis hit it hard, trying to knock it out of the car. Once Catherine switched on the holographic projection and clicked "ROOF," the car window began to glitter and myriad metal balls gradually rose up to form a roof. The roofless car had turned into a roofed one.

  "It's molecular recombination," Catherine explained, "Now it's quiet, right?"

  "Great!" Runt exclaimed, "That's incredible!"

  "There's even such a thing on the ship…" Mandis didn't finish, though, because another skorpiovenator jumped in and beat the window, which became a spider web of cracks. Catherine resolutely shifted into top gear and said, "Hold on, guys!"

  The speedometer showed that it could reach 460 miles per hour. Catherine and the passengers were pressed into their seats by the force of that velocity, but the skorpiovenator was quickly jettisoned.

  "Wow! That's just too fast!" Runt yelled, "Slow down!"

  The roar of the engine spread over the basin into the forest, where it was heard by the mutant monsters.

  The friction of the tires against the ground sounded like cat claws scratching at a blackboard, and a whirl of dust followed the car. After circling around, the Silver Angel stopped before a gigantic volcano.

  The engine released carbon dioxide for rapid cooling, and even the tires emitted curls of white smoke. Mandis crawled out of the car and vomited. Nicholas stood up the circle, while the others exited the car in order to spit out the acidic saliva.

  "Ouch!" said Runt as he patted his head and teetered. Catherine wiped her mouth, saying, "Huh! Almost! Are you okay?"

  "I'm . . . I'm fine." Silverstar spit out some rotten fish, which was part of the previous day's lunch.

  "Anyone want to see the volcano?" Silverstar asked.

  "No, thanks," said Catherine, feeling somewhat nauseated. "I'm still . . . whew!"

  Silverstar simply shrugged and turned to begin his trek toward the mountain.

  The Entrance to Hell

  The volcano, roughly three times as large as Italy's legendary Mount Vesuvius, belched heavy smoke. The closer one got close to it, the more intense the heat would be. Wiping the sweat off his forehead, Silverstar wasn't even halfway done with his climb when that sense of exhaustion set in. He sat on a volcanic boulder and stared off toward the distance. Traces of their recent car race could still be seen in the basin, although the skorpiovenators, aware of the difficulty, had withdrawn. Silverstar didn't care to see it anymore. Meanwhile the mutant monster, red all over its body, approached.

  The monster roared, shaking the whole place, and seized the attention of all. Just as Silverstar prepared to run, the masked humanoids that had recently saved them reappeared. They were riding their flight machines. One of them – possibly their leader – gave his machine a quick jerk, whereby it withdrew its wings and morphed into a diving board. He descended on that board. Without a word, he grabbed Silverstar and did a 360-degree turn with a fluency only a professional snowboarding athlete could muster, and amid air he shifted that form into a glider wing. He shouted at the approaching mutant monster.

  "Do these guys have a death wish?" asked Hicks as he anxiously watched the monster draw nearer to the volcano crater. "Or, is it……?" Silverstar landed on a huge tree, dried and fragile, which was supposed to live beside the crater but had died amid the advance of lava. The tree cracked as the monster sprang upon the trunk, baring its teeth. The monster paused for a moment, listening. Just as it decided to give it up, the masked figure flew closer, throwing it a big bag of peppers. This completely exasperated the monster, and in response it scrambled up the tree. The trunk creaked and groaned. Then, after an instant of hesitation, the monster jumped out with its mouth wide open. One second before it could devour its prey, the masked figure took Silverstar away, leaving it to snap its jaws upon thin air.

  The monster jumped onto the tree again, shaking loose the already tenuous roots. As the behemoth structure fell toward the crater, the screaming monster teetered off and fell into the boiling lava below. Thus, the entrance to a hellish death had welcomed another guest. It was spectacular to see, but Silverstar was glad it was the monster that went.

  Heaving a sigh of relief, Silverstar landed on the ground, still panting, together with the masked man. Catherine uttered, "Who are you……," but with a sudden whoosh he opened his gliding wing and flew away. "Well, he probably won't reveal his identity anytime soon," said Runt with a shrug.

  Silver Angel shot ahead again. The mutant creature, held within the crate, crept up along its rock wall, radiating hot steam. It struggled mightily to escape the crate, and, once outside, it savored the cool air. Then its eyes opened and it roared at the sky with a fearsome, guttural sound.

  A Voyage on the Sea

  Silver Angel ran at high speed through a forest of huge trees, hurtling down the lumpy path toward a wharf. They had to find more food right away. If their base camp was allowed to run empty, they'd face another crisis.

  "Can't we go any slower?" Hicks asked, obviously miserable.

  "You know, in a way I'm a patient… …Ouch!"

  "You thought you were the only one suffering from the bumps!" Mandis said. "We can't help it."

  Catherine was sitting there quietly. So was Nicholas. Hicks moves closer to Nicholas and said "You don't feel any pain in your rump?"

  "You have to rough it a little," answered Nicholas, seemingly unfazed by all the jostling. "You won't survive if you can't get past a little difficulty!"

  "Wow!" said Silverstar, clearly impressed. "Well said!"

  "It's nothing, really," said Nicholas, clearly feeling like a suave character. "I've made clothing out of deerskin in Alaska, not only because I had to but because I felt like it. I beat down a mastiff guard dog in Tibet and left after defeating a local monk of the same age in a martial-arts battle. My father once told me that the richest person in the world isn't worthy of your admiration if he doesn't have something real beside all that money."

  "You said it," said Catherine as she turned onto her side, welcome the onset of sleep. It took a while before Silverstar could close his gaping mouth.

  "Hi, guys," said Runt as he poked his head out from the passenger seat. "With all that bumping around, I thought I was going to get sick! Please, no more bumpy roads from now on!"

  The group arrived at a sunny beach, and with cheers of joy Catherine jumped out of the car. She opened up her arms in the sun, and her golden hair gleamed upon her shoulders. The waves crashed playfully onto the shore. Due to the gravitational pull of the moon, the water seemed to linger in the sunlight before splashing down, where it would break into a myriad of diamonds. "She is so beautiful and so charming," Hicks said to Silverstar, and he gave the boy a pat on the shoulder. "But I'll tell you, kid: Wake up! Don't let a girl run away with your mind!"

  "Yeah!" said Silverstar, wiping his forehead. "Well, we're going to head into the water. Want to join us?"

  Hicks answered, "I need splints for my arms. They haven't fully recovered yet."

  "Hello!" shouted Mandis. "Get onto the boat! We need to get started!"

  "I'll stay behind!" said Runt. "The sea and I aren't exactly the best of friends."

  Soon the sailboat raced ahead, and to the weary explorers it felt like a yacht. They arrived at the deep-water area in no time. They decided to go further out to try their luck. The boat surged again, moving with incredible speed.

  The horizon was getting blurred. They perspired heavily under the midday sun.

  Mandis slit his arm
with a knife and squeezed some blood onto the stinking fish bait before dropping it into the sea, as he always did.

  Mandis winked at Nicholas, reminding him to watch out for any movement on the surface.

  In the deep sea, a pair of bright eyes widened as the odor of prey was sensed. A gigantic fish slowly lifted its sharp head spike from the mud and sand of the seabed, and its tail – the size of a private plane – shook off the ruble. As the creature opened its gaping maw, seawater rushed in through the gaps among its teeth, forming a mist there before filling the cavern. Then, having wriggled its coarse, slime-covered tongue and flagged that tail up and down, it hurried forth.

  Silverstar sensed the approach of something very dangerous. He turned around, trying to grab the halyard, but it was too late. The sea monster seized the bait, shaking the boat as if it were a leaf on a tree. The iron chain that held the hook couldn't withstand such force. It broke with a loud bang, and the craft bounded out of the water before landing with a thud.

  Mandis shouted, "We've got a big one! Let's run with it…… fast!"

  The monster, with mouth wide open, leaped out of the water toward its prey. Nicholas gave the halyard another pull and dodged the monster with a turn right out of the annals of formula racing. The resulting wake splashed into the boat, soaking several. The monster pounded the hull with its body, making a metallic, clicking sound. "This beast's skin is as hard as bronze!" Catherine said in astonishment. "Look at its fin!"

  Mandis took out his pistol and fired it at the beast's fin, which protruded from the water. The bullet ricocheted like a sword off a shield.

  Thus, they called it a bronze fish.

  It seemed that the bronze fish was wearing armor that was interconnected with the spike on its head. The spike seemed to be a weapon of attack. It opened its menacing mouth and prepared to lunge. To dodge it, Mandis pulled hard at the halyard. He pulled too hard, though, and the boat veered to the left. Immediately the craft tilted and capsized. Silverstar, gasping in surprise, gulped seawater as he struggled. The water went straight to his head, causing a burning sensation. He wanted to swim to the surface, but he was caught beneath the boat, several meters from its edge. Luckily, the bronze fish was preparing to strike again, and this time the boat was set upright. The water on the deck flowed back into the sea through the drainage at the edge. They all collapsed on the deck, coughing and wheezing. As the first one to regain his senses and realize the presence of the bronze fish, Nicolas stood up and rushed for the sail. It was too late. The fish opened its mouth and swallowed the boat.