Illion

Three variants of unidentified organisms are crawling somewhere aboard this ship, and it’s my job to shoot them out the airlock before we dock on Osticara!

I don’t even know how they got onto The Marillion; we haven’t made any stops since the Capitol planet. Maybe they spawned out of the lower pools, the bacteria there can be pretty nasty sometimes. But who knows, the world is going positively bananas these days!!

Or maybe Dust-V-Peggle is seeing things again. Cryosleep hasn’t done any of us good, but he seems to be the most affected. That one massive eye of his must be playing tricks (I really hope it is), because I seriously don’t enjoy hunting down extraterrestrial organisms at 2am in the morning, thank you very much.

“Any sign of life on the scanners?” I turn to Lolli-N, but she only waggles her head at me.

The smiley suns painted onto the baby blue walls of the corridor grin down at us; almost tauntingly.

“Well, this is just peachy.” I groan, “what a perfect way to spend my first waking hours.”

“Sorry Captain, but we haven’t detected anything unusual. Perhaps it’s hidden somewhere in the engine room? The walls there are thicker; scanners can’t penetrate.”

I stare deep into her googly eyes, trying to make out whether this is an attempt to ditch earlier or not.

“Kuno and Jem are on shift.” She adds, to solidify her authenticity.

Kuno and Jem are brilliant mechanics but couldn’t tell you the colour of an orange – let alone spot an alien organism crawling in their midst. They wouldn’t even see it, even if it were to bite them on the ankles.

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“Fine.” I huff, “we’ll check the engine room.”

Lolli-N swivels a few paces back on her roller feet, “we? I have cafeteria duty in five minutes.”

“Nobody is going to be eating at two in the morning.” I say firmly, “and you have the most accurate scanner. We will go to the engine room first, and after that you can go to the cafeteria.”

I can see the resistance in those giant bauble eyes of hers, the urge to serve fresh milkshakes is strong. But a Captain’s order is stronger (obviously).

“Okay, alright, whatever.” She sighs, and rolls behind me as we trudge deeper into the belly of the ship, “but what if there’s nothing?”

“Then Dust is going to the doctors for his fifth appointment this week.”

“But he checked out fine every time.”

“Clearly the tests are missing something. Maybe they aren’t quite fit for Arithians.”

“Or maybe you’re missing something.” Lolli-N slows to a stop and bends down over a ventilation duct, “look!”

“What’s the boggle?” I lean over her shoulder, peering at the metal grate. It looks like any other metal grate. Grey, and metal. “Yes, Lolli, this definitely is the unspecified organism we’re looking for.”

“I’m serious!” She wraps a robotic hand around the bars, and tugs. There’s a snap, a groaning of screws, and the grate pops off. “See that?”

“It’s dark.” I push up my crimson glasses and narrow my eyes at the hole. “I don’t see anything.”

“I do, and it’s moving.”

“Moving? Is it a cybernetic? Lab disbanded those before we set off!”

“It not one of ours.” Lolli-N wriggles closer to the open grate, stretching her hand into the darkness. In a blur of silver, she reaches in and snags a whirring device. “Got you!”

I flinch at the sight of the ugly little beast. It resembles a demented bird of sorts, with a squashed beak and weepy eyes. It struggles in Lolli-N’s grip, screeching and retching and clawing at her fingers.

I don’t really know what it is, but it’s missing body parts, and the face is mashed beyond recognition. Disgusting.

“Ohh, that’s nasty.”

Lolli-N shoots me a grin, but then she’s rolling down the hall on her wheely feet, still clutching the squirming cybernetic.

“Take it to the airlock and blast it!” I yell after her, and at once there’s a squeak of fright from within the walls. More cybernetics; eavesdropping.

I put a hand to my forehead as Lolli rounds the corner, “good gracious goodness, please don’t tell me my ship is teeming with these things.”

Then I rush after her before the cybernetics in the wall decide to eat me.