Monday, July 28, 2008

Sunday Morning

Lubic woke up, looking around wildly for a minute. His eyes found the familiar picture of his father, which always sat on the desk across from his bed. I’m home . . . he thought, trying to remember what had happened the night before. And then he wished he hadn’t. He could remember flying away from the raven cave with Elara and Jay. Not in an airplane or anything; he had simply declared they would fly home, and then they did. It had been just like he imagined Peter Pan would fly. Once home, he’d called Stevens to cancel poker, then gone straight to bed.

Was all that a dream? he wondered as the door opened and Elara rushed in.

"Uncle!" she yelled cheerily, "time to wake up!"

Maybe not, he thought, groaning as she threw open the blinds. "What are you doing? It’s 6am! And this is my day off!"

"But the sun is up! Do you want to waste the day away?"

"If the day starts at 6, then yes!" He pulled a pillow over his head, blocking out the bright rays.

She grabbed the pillow from him. "But you promised we’d go to the library!"

"Elara," he glared at her, "the library doesn’t open till 10. We can still sleep for an hour or two, then head there when they open."

"Then can you show me around a bit? Please? Everything is so strange and new, and I was only able to see a bit of it from the air yesterday. You’re up now, anyway!"

He rolled his eyes. "Alright. But you’re going to have to let me sleep in a bit more tomorrow. I have to get ready before we go. Can you give me like a half an hour?"

"Alright. Thank you!" She bounded out of the room.

Lubic groaned. No one should have that kind of energy this early! But after lounging around for 15 minutes, he hauled himself out of bed like he’d promised.

It was around that time that he became a bit disturbed: he had flown out of the raven cave? And Elara was okay with that? What the heck was going on? He decided it was too early to deal with this right now; he'd ask Elara later, maybe over breakfast.

After throwing on some jeans and a t-shirt, he headed to the bathroom. He was reaching for his toothbrush when he glanced into the mirror. Right where his reflection should have been, there was a woman with scaled, pale green skin and strawberry blonde hair. Lubic screamed.

Monday, July 14, 2008

Calling the Big Guns

"What do you mean you couldn’t pull the trigger?"

The Raven held the telephone away from his ear for a moment, wincing. "It’s exactly like I said: the Lubic guy fell for the trap. He was nicely in line. Then I go to squeeze the trigger, and BAM! Nothing!"

"The big boss isn’t going to be pleased," the voice on the other line cautioned, calming down a little bit.

"Then you tell the big boss to get his ass down here and pull the trigger!" The Raven pounded his fist on the telephone booth’s glass, startling a passerby. "I don’t know what more you want me to do!"

"Well, maybe I shouldn’t have delegated this to you. I’ll deal with this guy, or my name isn’t Ron Jambo!"

"And what about the deal the big boss has with me, huh? He claimed I could be free of this stupid bird form if I’m the one who spills this Lubic’s blood."

"Are you trying to tell me you want another shot at him? Even after you failed?"

"Look Ron, one more chance! This is my big break! My shot at a normal life! I won't blow it! Not this time!"

"Alright then, one more shot. But if you fail me it's going to be barbeque for supper. And I'm not talking about chicken."

Click.

Monday, July 7, 2008

The Trap

Lubic found himself at the mouth of a cave. He hesitated before entering the darkened maw, as he could not see more than a few feet in front of him. "If only I had a flashlight," he muttered to himself. But he knew that Elara was here, and so he entered. He took a few steps into the cave and was immediately swallowed by the darkness.

It became immediately apparent that he was in a tunnel; Lubic could feel the cave walls closing in around him. A few feet from the cave entrance, the tunnel started turning gradually to the left. He stopped for a few moments, letting his eyes adjust to the gloom. It was then that he realized that there were voices coming from up ahead.

As he slowly inched his way forward, he found that the tunnel was widening into a larger cavern. At about that time, he realized that one of the voices was Elara’s. The second one he didn’t think he had heard before.

“I honestly have no idea,” the second voice was saying. “Well, I think he took me accidentally. It seems to be you he was after.”

“Yes, he was so very happy he couldn’t contain his excitement, so he left.” That was Elara. “That makes a lot of sense, Jay.”

“Elara,” Lubic said into the darkness. “Where are you?”

“Uncle? Uncle, is that you?”

Oh yeah, she thinks I’m her uncle. “Um, yeah, it’s Lubic. Are you okay? Where are you?”

“We’re okay. Jay and I are just chained to the cave wall.”

“The bird man brought us here and then left,” Jay added.

“Okay, well, let’s see if I can free you two. Then we can get out of here.” Lubic walked cautiously forward. About two steps in, he felt his foot trip some sort of mechanism on the floor. He stopped moving forward just as the ceiling in front of him collapsed, missing him by several feet.

“UNCLE LUBIC?” Elara screamed.

“Gee, not so loud! I can hear you just fine!” he said, coughing a little. “The cave-in missed me by several feet. I knew this place was supposedly trapped, but I thought the traps might be a bit less obvious than that! Are you two alright?” He moved cautiously around the collapsed ceiling until they were in view.

“Yes, we’re fine. The ceiling collapsed a good ten feet in front of us,” Jay said.

“Alright, I’m coming, but I’m going to be careful. I don’t want to set any other traps off.” It took several tense minutes, but Lubic made it to the two of them without incident. He examined the chains as best he could in the darkness. “I’m not entirely sure how I can free you two without any . . .” he trailed off. What the heck? “Chains . . . release them!” he commanded. The chains instantly released the two captives.

“How did you do that?” Jay whispered in awe.

“Apparently in my dreams, I can do whatever I want,” Lubic said, pulling Jay to his feet. “Let’s go.”

All three of them cautiously made their way out of the cave. “What a stupid trap,” Lubic laughed as they got to the mouth of the cave. “With all that effort, you’d think he would have had something better than an obvious cave-in!”

*

The Raven stood, stunned, watching the three of them leave. He was standing in the secret passage he had meticulously carved out beside where his prisoners had been chained to the wall. He was holding an extremely powerful sniper rifle that was still aimed at Lubic’s back. Yet no matter how hard he tried, he could not will his finger to press the trigger. It was only after the three of them were gone that he blew a hole into the opposite wall, right at the point where he had last seen Lubic.

Tuesday, July 1, 2008

The Human Enigma

The emerald waters shivered as a large shape cut through them, marring the glass-like calm. Powerful flippers pulled Ba’laironshantinlavydalar’s bulk quickly forward through the unusually calm S’seeleyar Sea. The Spacelord headed steadily south, away from his latest obligation, deep in thought. He had been busy over the last few days since the meeting with Mikala: he was in the middle of important negotiations with the Gartraxin, and had been overseeing a few other projects that had recently come up. Finally, he found himself without anything pressing to do, and so he swam with no real destination in mind, puzzling over the human enigma.

Throughout the last three days, ever since Lubic’s power had manifested itself, Ba’laironshantinlavydalar had wondered how it was possible: how could the vermin have a Spacelord? How?

Ba’laironshantinlavydalar had known Jared since he had become the human Starlord over two millenia ago. He was reasonably certain that the humans had not left their planet under their own power in all the time Jared had been Starlord. Well, other than their little jaunts to their moon, but those do not count. Otherwise Jared would have become a Spacelord long ago. So if this Lubic became a Spacelord as soon as he came into power, the humans must have only recently left. But Ba’laironshantinlavydalar was not aware of any recent human activity in space.

Ba’laironshantinlavydalar knew that Jared had never been a Spacelord; he had remained a Starlord to the end of his days. But what if Jared was supposed to have been one?

“Spacelord,” a voice said, startling him out of his thoughts. Ba’laironshantinlavydalar was surprised to see his second in command, Kai’rowandel, casually floating in front of him. Kai’rowandel was smaller than Ba’laironshantinlavydalar, and leaner; the younger Lavydalar was streamlined, and designed to be one of the fastest swimmers. But Ba’laironshantinlavydalar knew the younger Lavydalar was only acting. None were faster than the Spacelord; Kai’rowandel must have swum very hard and fast to catch him.

“What is it?” Ba’laironshantinlavydalar rumbled.

“Sir, the Gartraxin send word: their swarms will support us when the time comes.”

“This is most excellent news indeed. And are they willing to help with the experiments as well?”

“Yes sir. Even now we are transferring some of the subjects.”

“This is good news indeed. I will go to the Gartraxin and finalize the treaty.” He sighed inwardly. This human enigma would have to wait once again.