by Don Cook
“Wow!” Svetlia said happily. “Ultra! Does that mean I won’t have to shove my wake-clock in your faces anymore?”
“That’s the idea, Svettie” Isokk said.
“It’s about time!” Svetlia said.
“Me, too!” Aleeta said, in sisterly agreement,
“Me, three!” Shurrah said, with exasperated gratitude. “So, Mom and Dad, is that 19-point-99 in Kannatikan or Amkerian Barters?”
“It was on Zulamon’s Amkerian shop-site,” Khraa said, “but it’s still pretty cheap, even after adding the money-change rate and Blended Sales Tax on importeds.”
“Why do we have to pay that dumb BST anyway?!” Svetlia teen-girl sneered.
“BECAUSE POT-TRUDIERRE MADE THE BST PAN-NATIONAL AND IMPOSED IT ON IMPORTEDS, EVEN IN ALBASKIA!” Khraa practically screamed as she snapped in outrage over the recent rigged Kannatikan Common Assembly Election while she glared in grouchy contempt at Isokk. “THAT’S WHAT YOU GET FOR VOTING OUT A GOOD MAN LIKE STEEPH-HARGAN AND VOTING IN IRON-HANDED, TOTALITARIAN, MORALLY MALFUNCTIONING, DEAD-BRAINED JUVENILES LIKE POT-TRUDIERRE AND HIS LIBERALISTS AS —!”
“WIFE!” Isokk said, gently placing his right hand on his wife’s right hand to calm her down.
While Khraa had vehemently and publicly campaigned hard for incumbent ex-Minister-In-Chief Hargan in the controversial recent Kannatikan election, Isokk blindly voted for Trudierre, and their kids saw the young brash anti-Yeshvahnite Liberalist leader as being “hip” and not the freedom-hating villain-king their mother saw in Trudierre. As a result, there were still star-freighter-loads of issues Khraa and Isokk had to work on.
But to keep peace in her household, Khraa took her man’s loving hint.
Isokk said to the kids, “As for the wake-clock, my younglings, it will fly into the star system on the very next supply-cruiser.”
“But Daddy!” Svetlia teen-girl-whined. “The news-scribes on Tele-Kannatika, KMC, Kosmik, Tele-Skandario, and Fredgers all say the Merchant Starfleet strike has set inter-star shipping within Kannatika back by 90 days, and the strike isn’t settled yet!”
“Well, then,” Khraa said, “I’ll just have to go to the Base-Town repair depot and get it repaired.”
The kids groaned in disdain.
“That’s no way to act towards your mother!” Isokk paternally asserted.
Everyone kept eating their first-meal before Khraa said, “We’ll just have to keep repairing it, my offspring, and wait until the next supply-cruiser makes orbit in 90 days.”
Everyone continued eating, until Khraa asked, “Svettie, are you going to work out at the school tonight for the All-Base-Towns Swim-Match in three Seven-Day-spans?”
“You bet!” Svetlia said, just before she ate a few bites of first-meal, drank some fruit juice, then set her cup down. “We’re going for Platinum, and I’ll take the 1,000-span swim-dash!”
“Well, it takes lots of hard practice, girl, to win Platinum. Lots of it.”
“Mom,” Svetlia said, brimming with teenage girl overconfidence, “that’s why we practice, practice, practice and practice some more right up until Match-Day!”
“Well,” Khraa said, “with all that practice and enthusiasm, you girls will nab Platinum for sure!”
A patter of feline feet playfully announced itself from atop the food-preserving pantry-and-fridge-like stasisator, prompting the family to turn and see their lovable tailless pet tabby-calico-furred wing-cat Flitty perched up there. Flitty, a member of a cat species with oversized ears and a wingspan similar to a bat’s — and which could also soar like a raptor bird — leapt onto an unsuspecting Khraa’s right shoulder, playfully licked her right cheek from behind, and meowed meekly… and repeatedly.
“Alright, Flitty” Khraa said, with maternal playfulness. “You want your meaties and baby-milkies, don’t you, you little wing-catty-girl?”
Flitty sheepishly meowed again.
“Alright. Time to pay the player.”
Flitty took the cue from her “mommy”, jumped off her shoulder, and glided down backwards six feet, as Khraa walked over to the stasisator, opened the left door, and lightly pressed the panel that displayed a picture of “Flykits” brand wing-cat food.
The panel opened upward, and Khraa removed a small can of Flykits from the pantry-like stasis-based preserver/storage stasisator. Khraa pulled the ring-tab back and took out a small dice-like morsel.
“Catch!” Khraa said, as she tossed the morsel to Flitty.
Flitty jumped up high with her powerful hind legs that were surprisingly small for a housecat-like animal. She caught the morsel with her hand-like paw at the tip of her right wing in mid-air, before Flitty glided down to the floor in a cute spiral and munched merrily on the morsel.
When she was done with the meaty tidbit, Flitty meowed for more as Khraa took another morsel from the wing-cat food tin, tossed it to an eagerly-awaiting Flitty, and repeated, “Catch!”
Flitty repeated the playful feat, this time with the paw on her left wing, glided to the floor and devoured the morsel with kittenish enthusiasm before she meowed again.
Khraa took one last morsel from the tin and said, “Now, this time with your mouth, kitty-baby!”
Khraa tossed the morsel to Flitty and, just like Khraa asked, Flitty caught it with her mouth, glided down gently and ate it. Khraa then resealed the cat food tin and returned it to the stasis-pantry, took out a can of some matter-to-energy-to-matter-duplicated baby formula prepared during Aleeta’s infancy from the refrigerated section of the stasis-pantry, and opened it.
“And to wash it all down…” Khraa said, as she walked with the bottle containing the formula to a corner of the kitchen and poured the liquid into the custom-decorated saucer marked “FLITTY.” Khraa returned the infant formula back to the cold storage stasis-pantry, while the family flying feline playfully hopped kangaroo-style to the saucer, and drank from it with kittenish abandon.
“Sweet-love…” Isokk said in mild consternation, “We all love Flitty-puss to the ends of the stars, and I know you’ve had her since long before you and I ever met. But at the risk of sounding crude, why give her baby-milkies?”
“It’s perfectly safe, love-lord” Khraa said, with mild maternal lecturing. “Besides, with this stuff, we’re more likely to get our Flitty-puss to fly vast distances for our survey-overflights. You know how much data we’ve accumulated from our working wing-kitty.” Khraa turned to Flitty and said playfully, “Right, girlie-puss?”
Flitty briefly faced up, meowed once in “agreement”, and drank more “milkies.”
Isokk, mildly miffed, said, “I know, Khraavie, but come on!”
“You know what they say about wing-cats, my husband” Khraa said, with a cat lover’s playful condescension. “Pamper her a little, she’ll give back a lot.”
“But love-lady —!” Isokk said, before he gave in and said, “Arrgh…! Oh, well.”
The family continued eating. Khraa paused, and then asked Svetlia, with maternal concern, “Svettie, there’s something important we want to talk to you and Shurrie about.”
“And by ‘we’,” Isokk said, “your Mom means she and me, and all the other parentals here on Rubiaar IV. And that goes for all the teensters here. And Leeta, you’d best take mind-note about this.”
“Why, Daddy?” Aleeta asked.
“Because we don’t want you making the same mistake your siblings and their friendlies were planning to make, that’s why, Leeta!” Khraa said, with mild sternness.
Aleeta took the hint as Khraa continued, “All us parentals, and I do mean every last one of us — well, we had a mass-mind psych-conference about your plans for next Six, Seven, and First-Days. We all agreed, especially in light of the Expedition’s Tri-Levelers’ sinking school-standings, no parentless camp-out for anyone!”
Shurrah and Svetlia whined, “Aww, Mom!”
Khraa asserted, with maternal sternness, “None of us approve of your so-called ‘sexual encounter retreat’ where you all r
un around naked with your loins, chests, and gluties free and bare for all the Universe to see!”
Svetlia said, “But mind-professor Tymm-Leer-Stupeydunk at Learon said —!”
“I don’t care what that elixir self-injecting fool-scholar said!” Khraa said in righteous maternal anger. “He’s light-decades way over on Turannya. We’re here on Rubiaar IV. And so, dear daughter, it’s thousands of scholars here on this planet to one over on… well, wherever the Perditia that drug-headed mind is! You do know that one major reason why Rubiaar IV’s native peoples are extinct? It’s dead-brained fool behaviors like that that led to its downfall and its peoples’ extinction. And I, for one, do not want history repeating itself here because of some elixir-shooting junkie quasi-scholar who must have gotten his doctorates from the bottom of a Chocotrits box!”
Svetlia asserted with infantile teen girl whininess, “But Mom —!”
Khraa stared down evil-eyed at her teenage twins and, using a stern telepathic suggestion, psychically immobilized Svetlia and Shurrah’s vocal cords promptly, instantly silencing the pair and causing tense silence in the kitchen.
Like we said, Khraa mentally spoke into her teenage twins’ minds with parental firmness, no parentless campouts on this planet! End of epic!
“And since we overslept,” Isokk said, “eat at lightspeed, or we’ll miss the vans.”
SCHOOL HOVER-BUS PARKING/BOARDING ZONE,
COMMON SQUARE, BASE-TOWN ALPH, RUBIAAR IV
“That’s what they always say!’ said Level-2 Commander/Dr. Velbya-Koyne ven-Kylae, the Expedition’s Chief Health Officer, as Flitty, with a small yet high-capacity multimedia scanner-device strapped to her belly, flew out of the wing-cat exit in the Elheem home’s roof. “Out for her combined morning constitutional-and-survey-flight.”
“But isn’t Khraavie overdoing it with her wing-cat?” asked Velbya’s platinum blonde exobotanist-husband Dr. Torakk-Kylae, mildly miffed at the regal treatment the Elheems gave Flitty, while the Base-Town’s other parents and their children stood with them, waiting impatiently for the Elheems to arrive.
“Flitty’s post-first-meal morning flights after her baby-milkies have actually given the Expedition a far greater amount of information than the KERC Expeditionary average” said long-haired brunette Velbya, who, like Khraa, was a telepath, wife, mother, part-time teacher, and rotating school hover-van driver.
“But really!” Torakk moaned his envious disdain.
“Shhh! Here they come!” Velbya said, as Khraa, Isokk and their brood quickly ran from their dwelling to the parked and already mostly boarded hover-vans, with Svetlia and Shurrah having an all-too public squabble with their parents.
“It’s about time they got their gluties into warp-jump!” angrily snarled tall dark-haired crew-cut metallurgist Level-2 Lieutenant/Dr. Hemm-Xu, who was also a father of two teenage girls.
“Wonder what the bosses’ excuse is this time?” said Hemm’s grouchy red-headed exozoologist wife Ensign/Dr. Flamica-Rylar ven-Xu. “Hemmy, look! Looks like we’re not the only family with teenster-troubles!”
“Yes” Hemm said. “Looks like Svettie Elheem’s really giving Khraavie and Sokky the whiny-girlie workover!”
“But Mom!” Svetlia yelled childishly, as she and her family approached their neighbors. “Tymm-Leer-Stupeydunk said such parentless campouts were good for teensters! They really do help teensters explore their sex-selves —!”
“But I’m still your Mom!” Khraa asserted with parental boldness, just as she and her family arrived at the parked hover-vans, “your Dad’s still your Dad, and we still say no campout!”
“Finally, the family Elheem shows itself!” Velbya said as Khraa and her family approached. “So, what kept you?”
“We overslept, Herbs,” Khraa said, calling Velbya by her nickname, “no thanks to that dead-brain wake-clock, which we’ll have to take into the Base-Town repair depot yet again!”
“So, Khraavie,” Velbya said, “are you finally going to order a new wake-clock?”
“We ordered one of those perpetual constellation-resetting Khronnar wake-clocks from Zulamon’s, and it’ll be in on the next supply-cruiser. It will be a 90-day wait, Herbs, but the clock’s a-coming.”
“It’s about time!” Velbya said, relieved. She then turned to Svetlia and told her with concerned aunt-like firmness, “And as for you and your fellow teensters, Svettie, I totally agree with your parents about the campout. I’ve read all of Stupeydunk’s research papers, e-scrolls, and seen all his viddies. Take it from this HD. He’s full of khrung.”
Svetlia, who respects Velbya almost as much as she does her own mother, sighed. “Well… Okay, Mom, Daddy, doc. You parentals win.”
MID-LEVEL/ATTACK ORBIT AROUND PLANET RUBIAAR IV
Mephistula’s unfathomable multitudes of space-fighters, led by Mephistula’s sinister squid-like fighter, swarmed out from the multitudes of pore-like side-hangars of the red force shield-sheathed gargantuan starship like angry hornets, and swooped downward with lethal grace to attack the planet below.
SCHOOL HOVER-BUS PARKING/BOARDING ZONE,
COMMON SQUARE, BASE-TOWN ALPH, RUBIAAR IV
“Remember, sweet one,” Isokk said, “Daddy knows best.”
“And your Mom,” Khraa said, rightly feeling vindicated, “and Herbs, and —”
You were saying, Khraavie Dearest?! Mephistula telepathically cackled into Khraa’s mind, as well as to those of the other telepaths of the expedition, and mentally laughed maniacally. She then psychically sent Khraa, Velbya and every other telepath in the Expedition into falling, madly terrifying spastic convulsing fits!
“WIFE!” shouted Isokk in fear, as he helplessly watched in horror while Khraa, Velbya, Aleeta and several other telepathic neighbors simultaneously underwent the trauma unique to a telepath being mentally “screamed at” by Mephistula!
An emergency pulsing sound came from Isokk’s smartphone-like comcorder strapped around his waist. He answered it.
“Commodore Elheem” Isokk said into the comcorder. “Yes? Yes? Oh, the god! Ready the emerge-com system and get back to me fast!”
Just as the call ended, the telepaths instantly stopped convulsing. First Khraa, then Velbya, and finally Aleeta rose slowly.
Isokk helped Khraa and Aleeta off the tarmac while Torakk helped Velbya get up. Khraa tugged desperately at her man’s shirt and told him with terrified verbal quivering, “Husband! It… It was Mephistula! Her forces… have arrived… to attack Rubiaar IV and our Expedition!” She regained her composure and straightened herself up to a military posture before she said, “Commodore, we’ve got to get every non-military expedition member and the children into the vans, and send them off to the disaster-havens!”
“I know, Captain” Isokk said as Khraa let go of him. “I just got off the com with DefWatch. Mephistula’s ship just materialized on their scopes. We’re going to Red Alert!”
Isokk’s comcorder sounded again with the same tone-pulse. Isokk took it from his belt again and answered it.
“Commodore Elheem...” Isokk said. “Thanks.” Isokk began his fateful announcement to everyone in his Expedition over his comcorder, “Attention all personnel! Attention all personnel! This is Expedition Commodore Isokk Elheem. The planet is under attack by Mephistula’s forces! Her marauding hordes have evaded our defense screens and will arrive at any moment.
“All non-defense personnel are to go with the children as chaperones to your assigned disaster-havens immediately!” Isokk announced. “All defense and military-trained personnel are to report to their Air Bases! My wife Captain Veh and I will join you! May the god be with you. Commodore Isokk Elheem out.”
Isokk ended the announcement and put his comcorder back onto his belt.
“Gootie,” Isokk shouted to tall, thin, and slightly-graying blonde frontier astronomer Level-1 Lieutenant/Dr. Goota-Yall, “take the Primers and their shelter-chaperones to the disaster-havens.”
Goota nodded as she said, “Yes, sir!�
��
Isokk turned to Velbya and ordered, “Herbs, get all the Mid-kids and their shelter-chaperones on board and drive them to the disaster-shelters!”
“Yes, sir!” Velbya said, and carried out Isokk’s orders.
Isokk turned to Hemm and ordered, “Hemm, you and Flammy get all the Tri-levelers and their assigned shelter-chaperones on the hover-van and drive them!”
“Yes, sir!” Hemm said to Isokk.
Isokk clapped his hands three times rapidly as he shouted, “Let’s go, people!”
“C’mon, Primers!” Goota said to all the children of grammar school-age and younger, waving her right arm in a circle towards the “Primers’” hover-van. “Get in! I’ll drive you to the haven! Go! Go!! GO!!!”
The younger children and their assigned shelter-chaperones piled into the Primers’ assigned hover-van.
“C’mon, tweensters!” yelled Velbya to the mid-level schoolchildren not on board the Mid-Level hover-van, including Aleeta. “Go! Go!! GO!!!”
The pre-adolescents and assigned shelter-chaperones piled into the Mid-Level hover-van. When the Mid-Level children were all on board, the Klyaes dashed into the hover-van.
Hemm waved his right arm circularly towards the Tri-Level hover-van as he shouted to all of the adolescents, Svetlia and Shurrah included, “C’mon! Mephistula is coming! Wanna get fried by that ol’ devil-girl?! C’mon! Go! Go!! GO!!!”
Adolescents and assigned shelter-chaperones piled into the “teenster” hover-van, after which Hemm and Flamia speedily did likewise.
When all the children and chaperones were on board their respective hover-vans, Hemm got on his hover-van’s loudspeaker and said, “All younglings aboard and accounted for, Commodore!”
Isokk waved his arms toward the ancient roadway as he shouted to Hemm, Velbya, and Goota, “Move out!”
“The god speed, Sokky!” Hemm said to Isokk through the loudspeaker, not realizing he gave had just given all of his colleague-friends and their children his final goodbye as the fleet of school hover-vans sped off to the disaster-havens.
