Chapter 71: Runaway

Captain Shinir was a pale white-skinned young female with the same color eyes. Her big baseball size eyes had no iris or any pigmentation at all, a vast snowy field. That is how beautiful and cold were her eyes.

"Captain there is something I found out and you need to know about," Safo explained the situation of the Green Lord leaving out the part where he ate the fruit of plant's work.

As expected she didn't believe him, and Safo had to introduce her to his new vine friend. She spent half an hour listening and talking to a plant. All of her subordinates waited for her commands patiently. Safo Nur on the other hand hurried his team to leave the surface of the planet and teleported to his ship.

Just when he entered the deck of a ship, the Green Twinkle received an incoming call.

Instead of the appreciation and gratitude that Safo kind of anticipated getting from the Captain, she lashed out at Safo accusing him of all kinds of crimes against the sapient creature.

"Return every single animal, right now. This planet is closed for hunting from now on. And you must follow us for the procedure of extraction of fruit." Shinir's furious face was somehow tenfold more charming than before. But it didn't work on Safo.

The crew of the ship and Safo's team looked at him in confusion. They knew that he ate a banana but didn't expect the event to be so important.

Shinir continued her assault. "Did you even know what you consumed? It is an accumulation of the brain matter of thousands of creatures. You will simply die, your unevolved brain wouldn't be able to apprehend the volume of data that the fruit holds. Let us help you."

"I'm fine so don't worry we have to go. With this planet being close we should find some other place to hunt. Goodbye Captain." Safo didn't feel overwhelmed by any data or even a slight discomfort in his stomach. With everything being fine, he assumed that the Green Lord failed to collect and create perfect offspring.

"You can't go. This is important! Stay there and let us in. Or else..." Shinir paused as she wasn't the person who threatens people. She was the researcher hired to look after the planet. She was the head of the regulation department.

It wasn't a rare occasion for the inhabitants of the planet to reach intelligent level 5, but it was never only one individual. It took thousands of years to develop a brain and to create the next generation and losing one of the species was a disastrous thing for the planet and her career.

"I'm sorry Captain Shinir, we do not have time for th--"

"They will rob you. Yes. If I announce that you have 100 green apes, which are no more available due to the planet being closed for hunting. All of the hunters will set upon you. The last 100 apes will cost no less than five hundred thousand each. Do you want that? Think, you have ten seconds." Shinir sneered at Safo, knowing that it will be suicide to go against hundreds of ships of hunters.

"Captain Seaghoul," Safo looked at his Captain and nodded, "let's get out of here."

Shinir was about to yell something but the line was cut off. The Green Twinkle started to ascend to the open space to make a jump through the Track when several ships followed them. Another two dozens after those several. And very soon hundreds of various ships were tailing the big green ship.

"Kutch, can we keep this butterfly on the ship?" Safo gently held something in his hands.

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"Where did you catch it? We can put it inside the glass cage if you like." Kutch asked Safo to show him the butterfly that fascinated Safo.

Safo slowly opened his hand and... there was nothing. Kutch stared at Safo in confusion.

"Isn't it cute?! I want to keep it."

Luna from inside Safo and Kutch, both said almost simultaneously. "There is nothing in your hands. I think we have to check you up."

Kutch led Safo to the medical room but he felt sick from the worry. Safo was walking slowly, his every step was heavy and he even trumpeted sometimes as if he was imitating an elephant.

When finally they reached the room, Yon, Achraf, Dost were there waiting for the results.

The monitor showed some alien matter in Safo's blood and brain. The simplest explanation that the AI doctor gave to the audience was that Safo consumed a high concentrated hallucinogen.

"That fruit! Shinir was right, we have to go back." Yon couldn't imagine fixing the issue without professionals. Achraf and Dost were also on his side. Kutch felt reluctant, he didn't want to part with his fortunate catch.

"No! We are not going back. It is nothing, it took a couple of hours to kick in, so I only assume that the effect will last for six to twelve hours, I can bear it. It is not my first time. Look at the monitor, it won't kill me." Safo didn't want to dwell on his dark past, especially while under the drugs that could give life to one's imagination. He knew the rules of consumption.

Hearing Safo thinking and speaking thoughtful words the team felt at ease. Before any of them could say their counter opinion Captain Seaghoul broke into the room asking them to decide further actions.

"Those worms are following us tightly, we took over fifteen Tracks by now without any result. We cannot keep teleporting across the universe in the hope to tire them up. We have a cargo worth five million after all." Seaghoul understood that he could put the course to New Tenga. There was no place to hide from pursuers.

"Kutch, please tell this talking chair that if he cannot run away or hide, he has to go where others won't follow him. Go into the rabbit's hole, chair." Safo saw four chairs in front of him, and only Kutch was still a huge green lion to him.

"Surprisingly, he has a point. And I know the perfect place. Thank you, Safo." Captain Saghoul paid no heed to Safo's strange remarks. He hurried to execute not direct order.

That day Kutch, Yon, and Dost were Safo's babysitters. Not once he acted strangely or told odd things. Kutch caught Safo mocking apes and laughing at them. To his question of what was so funny, Safo answered that all of the apes wore red Turkish fez.

Yon caught him watching cartoons while looking at the wall. Dost had put on his force field after Safo's attempts to sexually abuse him thinking that the robot was his girlfriend.

After 30 sleepless hours, Safo was free of the influence of drugs. Senselessly he slept the next 20 hours and ate a ton of food upon waking up.

"I'm so sorry guys that you saw what you saw. I'm so embarrassed, especially in front of you Dost. Please forget if you can." Safo remembered most of his actions, he couldn't see any similarities between Dost and his girlfriend.

"I'm afraid that is impossible." Dost was an immortal soul that lived for many tens of thousands of years, and his current body had perfect memory.

Kutch couldn't hold his laughter and soon Yon and every member of the Green Twinkle followed his example. Safo stood with a red face.

"It is okay, Safo. And we didn't expect that you had a past like that, you told us about yourself way too much for the past days." Kutch patted Safo and they moved to the deck of the ship.

Safo had a memory of talking to them about the time when he had to be the rat for the drug dealers. Rats - were the people who would hide the drugs in discreet places. One time young people caught him doing his dark deeds and made him eat all of his LCD marks after making sure that they beat him up nicely. It was his first meeting with the drugs.

'Well, I did what I had to.' Thought to himself Safo Nur, he didn't want to sink in the past events. He worked for the drug dealer gang only to help his girlfriend with her debt.

"Where are we?" Safo tried to change the subject. He didn't see any ship following them.

"We are at the border between our livable universe and the restricted area. No one came after us because they are afraid of being caught or attacked by White-Blacks." Kutch was happy that the apes were still in the ship, despite the danger of being attacked.

He explained to Safo that the "Blacks" were the creatures of space. It was hard to call them animals, they could survive without oxygen.

There were different types of Blacks, starting with the weakest White-Black and ending with the creatures able to destroy galaxies - the Dark-Black.