Another blast sped dangerously close to Greebol’s antennae. He ducked down behind the table in the centre and dragged a startled Charlie down with him. Then they heard the voice.
“YOU… ARE… THE… UNWELCOMED… YOU… ARE… IN… BREACH… OF… LAW… 717… YOU… WILL… BE… DISMANTLED.”
“Oh balls!” Greebol gasped from behind the table. Loud, clanging footsteps were heard as whatever approached began to climb the steps to the electrical.
“Do you know what that thing is?” asked Charlie, his voice high-pitched like a little girls.
“Not really,” Greebol responded. “It attacked me just after my electrical was hit by that strange golden light in space. That thing is the whole reason I crashed on Earth in the first place! I had no idea it had followed me here!”
Charlie and Greebol slowly peered over the top of the table and saw their attacker approaching the door.
“My God,” whispered Charlie, “that’s a robot!”
“A what now?”
“Robot… a machine! Surely you have robots where you come from don’t you?”
Greebol paused to think. “No,” he answered, “we do not have anything like that in our galaxy. How confusing… you and your planet appear where there was nothing previously as does this strange machine! There is some unnatural force at work here!”
The robot had almost reached the door. Greebol jumped forward, closing and locking it. Instantly the robot began to smash into the electrical’s hull. It even began to shoot at the metal ship, causing everything inside to rattle and shake terribly. Charlie almost threw up. It felt like his stomach was going to shake out of his mouth. This was the reason he never went on rides at fair grounds. It wasn’t because he was scared like everyone said as they laughed in his face calling him a coward. He was showing them now! It was because he was sick! Who was having the last laugh now?
Them probably as he was about to be killed by a giant robot.
There was an almighty CRASH as part of the outside hull tore and the robot began to rip and slash at it.
“What are we going to do?” Charlie screamed.
“Lift off!” shouted Greebol, jumping to his feet and flicking a number of switches.
“Lift off?” yelled Charlie as he too got to his feet, although almost toppling back over again. His nose stung. “I don’t want to lift off anywhere with you! I want to go home!”
“That robot will get inside this electrical and do the same thing it did to my old partner!”
“You mean the one that came to a ‘fishy’ end?” Charlie questioned. “Are you saying the robot killed him?”
“Not killed exactly.”
“Then what?” Charlie glared.
Greebol opened a hatch. “It turned him into a fish,” he said with a frightened laugh. The fish in the hatch gulped and head butted the glass tank. It blinked then did the same thing all over again. And again.
Charlie did not want to be a fish. Of all the things in the world that he would not like to be, a fish was at the top of his list. Or at least near the top. He wouldn’t like to be a snail or a slug. Thinking about it, he also wouldn’t like to be a rat or a pigeon or a hamster stuck in a cage. The thought of being any form of insect disturbed him. And small furry animals. They brought him out in rashes. He wouldn’t want to be anything that he was allergic to. That would just be unfortunate. Actually properly thinking about it, a fish wouldn’t be quite so bad after all but he still didn’t want to be one.
Actually properly, properly thinking about it, he realised that this was the wrong time and place to be thinking about it at all.
“I don’t want to be a fish!” Charlie bawled. “Let’s get the hell out of here!”
Greebol went to work instantly. He hit a number of buttons and something similar to a steering wheel, although it was square in shape, emerged from the wall. Also emerging from the wall were several large levers and a number of foot pedals. Greebol jumped onto the pedals as the electrical rocked once again. The robot was determined.
Greebol pulled on one the levers and inserted a key pulled from his tight shorts into a keyhole under the steering square. At once the engines began to roar and the electrical shook again – this time from the ship beginning to rise.
It got no more than five feet into the air when the electrical fell back to the ground with a thump! Charlie was once again reminded of those fairground rides. His stomach actually did leave his mouth for a second but he managed to swallow it back down. Tasted like chicken.
Greebol screamed. “The engines have cut out!” he shouted. “Useless pile of junk… wait until I get hold of my brother...” He checked a number of dials then turned and grabbed Charlie by the shoulders. The large, grey, three fingered hands were clammy and moisture seeped into Charlie’s stained and creased shirt. The alien smelt slightly of cheese.
“You will have to get down to the engine room Charlie,” Greebol said slowly and carefully, staring into his eyes, “you need to restart the engines.”
“What? Me? How?”
“You need to go through that door,” he pointed at the door with the nipple button, “the engine room is through there. Once inside follow the largest of all the pipes on the ceiling. It will lead you to a panel on the wall, which you must open. Inside there is a large red button. Don’t press it. Press the small yellow one. Have you got that?”
Charlie had not. But Charlie said he had.
He rushed over to the door as the robot, now on top of the electrical, began to bounce up and down; it’s solid, heavy feet bending deep dints into the roof.
“This door leads to that… other room,” said Charlie. He glanced around to see if there were any doors he may have missed but could see none.
“Press the button twice!” said Greebol as he tried to repair a hatch that had fallen open, spilling wires like intestines from a gutted woman in a horror film. Only without the fake blood.
“Are you sure?” Charlie cried over the noise.
“Press it twice now!”
Charlie rubbed the tip of the nipple button with his finger and pressed it twice. The door slowly slid open. He expected the dark room with the three sleeping aliens to be revealed to him. It never came. Instead there was a large room, full of smoke. It was dirty, very dirty, with oil on the walls and the floor. The main bulk of the room was taken up by a huge engine that coughed and spluttered as though it had a cold.
This seemed impossible to Charlie. This room had not been behind this door. His mind was baffled. Tonight his mind was constantly baffled.
What had Greebol said? Follow the large pipe on the ceiling. Charlie found the large pipe and reached up, touching it to enable him to follow it through the smoke. He withdrew his hands quickly as the pipe was scolding hot! He checked his fingertips, which were red raw.
As quickly as he could, but slower then he should, he stumbled through the room, following the pipe with his eyes, which stung with the smoke. He eventually arrived at the panel on the wall and painfully pulled it open. Two buttons… there were two buttons. A red one and a yellow one. Which had Greebol said to push?
The yellow one!
No… the red one. Definitely the red one!
Charlie pushed it. Instantly the electrical groaned. The lights went out. All of the flickering lights died. Every electrical item onboard the ship shut down. Including the lock on the main door! Charlie could hear it opening. Charlie could hear the robot beginning to ascend the steps once again.
Shit!
It was the yellow button. Charlie slapped himself on the forehead. How could he have been so stupid? Why did he have to ruin everything? He felt rage boiling up inside him. Anger filled his mind. Charlie Pinwright saw red.
He was annoyed at Greebol for kidnapping him. He was annoyed at Geoffrey George for getting himself killed. He was annoyed at this stupid electrical for being such a God damn pain. He was annoyed at the robot for wanting to turn him into a fish. Most of all though, he was mad at himself for
being such a stupid idiot! He was going to blow… he could feel it.
Luckily for Charlie, if you could call someone in his current position lucky, Greebol was even angrier than him.
“What have you done?” the grey skinned alien shouted. “The yellow button! I said not to press the red button but to press the yellow button! Are you colour blind man?”
Greebol’s anger calmed Charlie down. He never fully understood it but he could never be angry at the same time as someone else. Like the time the burglar had broken into his flat and tried to steal his television. His ex-girlfriend had been so fuming that Charlie couldn’t feel angry in the slightest. In fact he was so calm that he actually gave the burglar the television.
“Sorry,” said Charlie, with a very sheepish face. Charlie never understood that expression. Did sheep look like they were apologising all of the time? He didn’t think so.
“Sorry? Sorry is not going to help us right now! Pull that lever Charlie… the one with the green handle.”
Charlie grabbed a lever and began to pull.
“The green one Charlie!” Greebol screamed. “Green! Not brown! Green!”
Charlie pulled the green lever. He looked like a sheep again.
“I have to reboot the entire system!” Greebol said, panic filling his voice. “Get into the main compartment… when I tell you, turn the ignition key, hit the right foot pedal, that’s the right one now, and pull up sharp on the steering square! Have you got that?”
Charlie nodded.
“You had better,” Greebol continued, “for if you make a mistake this time we will be in as much trouble as fish out of water. Literally.”
The main compartment was unusually quiet. The lights were all out. The main door was open and the wind that whipped through the forest trees blew into the room. Charlie shivered. He felt uncomfortable. He could no longer hear the sound of the robot.
He carefully stepped up to the main control panel and searched for the ignition key. It was no longer in the key hole!
Charlie turned to look for the key and saw it dangling before his eyes, held in the tight grip of the robot! The other hand reached up quicker then Charlie could see, grasping him by the throat.
“No…” Charlie gagged, “please… you’ve got the wrong man! It’s… it’s Greebol you want… not me!”
The robot cocked its small round head and the red eyes dimmed slightly.
“PERHAPS…”it boomed in its metallic, emotionless voice,“YOU… ARE… STILL… IN… VIOLATION!”
“Violation of what? Who are you?”
“MY… DESIGNATION… IS… X7421… WHAT… IS… YOUR… DESIGNATION?”
“I have a name,” cried the strangled man, “and it’s Charlie! Charlie Pinwright!”
The robot, apparently designated X7421, seemed to be thinking, at least Charlie thought it was. It could have fallen asleep… or possibly doing some sort of robot poo.
“THERE… IS… NO… CHARLIE… PINWRIGHT… ON… FILE… THAT… DESIGNATION… IS… NOT… MECHANOID!”
“Of course it’s not,” Charlie squirmed, “that’s because I am not a…Mechanoid! I am a Human being!” Without even realising he was doing it, Charlie stretched out his hand and grabbed a small metal wire that stuck from under the robot’s round head. He pulled at it as hard as he could and it snapped! The robot instantly let go of Charlie’s throat. He fell to the floor in a heap.
Sparks flew from the robot’s neck like a sparkler at bonfire night, although sparklers don’t make the sound of an electrified shrew or burn holes into solid metal. Except for the one Charlie had as a child. He really was quite an unlucky fellow. However at this exact moment he felt like the luckiest man alive. Although he knew it wasn’t just luck. He knew that, even on this high-tech alien robot, pulling out a wire causes any electrical item to break. Something Geoffrey George had told him during his training.
The robot was already beginning to recover. Tiny, thin metal rods with fingers were reaching up out of its neck and beginning to repair the broken wire.
Charlie had to do something and quick. He grabbed the key from the robot’s grip and stared around for something… anything he could use to smack the robot, pushing it back out of the door.
“YOU… ARE… NOW… IN… VIOLATION… OF… LAW… 002… PUNISHABLE… BY… NOTHING… LESS… THAN… DEACTIVATION!”
This thing thought that Charlie was a robot too! Charlie felt a little disgruntled. It was not the first time he had been called a robot. Only earlier today before he had been fired, Geoffrey George had called him a robot. His ex-girlfriend used to call him a robot all of the time. Said he was unemotional and stiff. Charlie liked to think of himself as collected and calm. Perhaps he was wrong. Still… he was nothing like this robot.
Charlie’s hand had found the closest thing to him and, with a strong arm, threw the small metal box containing Geoffrey George’s wife’s voice. It hit the robot between its two red eyes and in doing so, activated the box.
At once a shrill, high-pitched, squawking voice emitted from the cube.
“What the devil are you doing here? Who are you? Get out of our house you fiend! Get out! Get out! I’ll call the police… you just watch me! Here I am see… I’m calling the police! You’re going to get arrested! You’ll be arrested and sent to jail! You’ll be sent to jail and bummed! You’ll be bummed in jail! I’ll make sure of it! You leave my husband alone! What do you want with him? Don’t you fiddle with him he’s very delicate! No… keep away from me! Don’t you be fiddling with me! I’ll bite you in the nuts! Keep away! Keep away! Keep away you son of a-”
Charlie slapped his hands over his ears to block out the dreadful sound but that didn’t work. He stuck his head inside his shirt but that didn’t work. He took a scrap of tissue from his pockets and wedged them in his ears but that didn’t work. He put his head inside the fish tank but that didn’t work. Plus the fish-that-once-was Greebol’s partner in crime, bit him on his already swollen nose.
The robot that went by the designation of X7421 also seemed troubled by the terrible screeching. Its head started spinning around on its neck and its eyes flashed on and off. As it backed away from the awful noise, it began changing into the sphere and back again. Sparks flew. It was having a massive robotic fit. It was similar to the effects of metal in a microwave.
When Charlie finally got the fish from his nose and his head from the tank he looked over to the robot (after of course giving his most menacing scowl to the fish, which actually looked more like he was concentrating on a bad itch at that point on your back that you just can’t reach). X7421 was hovering dangerously close to the doorway and more importantly the steps that led down to the ground.
Charlie screamed and rushed towards the Mechanoid like an ancient warrior rushing to battle. Realising he had no weapon to bash the robot with, he instead foolishly lowered his head as though charging like a bull or a rhinoceros. Only he had no horns.
His head collided with the robot’s chest with a sickening crunch. Charlie dropped instantly to the ground, his world now blurred with stars and swirls and little yellow birds flying around his head tweeting.
As painful as it had been for him, his attack had actually worked. The robot, caught off guard, slipped on the top step and fell, crashing down, onto every single step until it landed on the forest floor with an almighty crash!
Charlie slowly staggered back to his feet, clutching onto the side of the large metal table as though it were dinner for a fat man. His head still spun. His legs felt like jelly. His head hurt. Really hurt. By the time he had composed himself he heard the sound that he did not want to hear. The robot was already climbing the stairs again!
“Greebol!” Charlie shouted. “We need that power back on!”
“Almost got it!” came the distant response.
The robot was almost at the door once again. One of the flaps on its metal head had broken and was dangling wildly in front of its face, looking like feral hair hiding an evil vision below.
And the face did look evil. Angry was a good word for it. Really pissed off would be a better one. Even though its face was made of metal, therefore none of it ever moved, it still somehow managed to look pissed.
“A… SECOND… VIOLATION… OF… LAW… 002… DEACTIVATION… IS… IMMINENT!”
The robot raised its weapon, which now glowed a deeper shade of orange. Charlie was spent. There was no way out of this one now. He was done for.
All of a sudden the lights flashed back on, the control panels lit up and began to beep and, much to Charlie’s relief, the main door closed and locked. There was only a moment of panic as the robot attempted to open the lock and get back inside but that subsided when the giant rubber hand fired out, slapping the robot in the chops and sending it back down the steps once again.
“You did it Greebol!” Charlie cheered.
“I know, I really did,” the response was shouted from the engine room.
A rapid thunder of weapon fire hit the hull of the electrical. The robot was firing randomly at the ship in a mad hope to blast a hole through one of the walls. And it was succeeding.
“Get us out of here Charlie,” Greebol yelled, “no time to waste!”
Charlie stuck the key into the ignition and turned it. At once the engines began to rumble. Charlie grabbed the steering square. His hands were sweating. He had never been a great driver. In fact he had only ever taken three lessons. On the first he ran over a cat. On the second he ran over a dog. On the third he ran over his driving instructor. So his hopes at this being a smooth ride were not high.
He looked down at the foot pedals. They were designed for large Gumthar feet not Charlie’s size nines. Which pedal did Greebol tell him to press? Left? Right? Middle? Charlie didn’t want to make another mistake. He didn’t want to be the person that you can count on to do everything wrong.
He made a decisive decision and chose the left pedal. However, as he took a big leap, ready to land on the pedal and push it down, another blast rocked the electrical, forcing him to trip. His foot, instead of landing on the left pedal, landed heavily on the right.
Intergalactic Terrorist (New Dimension Book 1) Page 7
