Xonarphian Ship

When they woke up, they were standing in the middle of a great room made completely out of dull metal. To their left was a huge window. Jade and Peter saw that they were quickly sailing away from the planet. It was colored very similarly to the earth, but had a large band of orange, green, and blue rings around it. Within a few minutes, the planet was out of sight, carrying Jade and Peter off to some unknown destination.

One of the rooster-men walked up to them. He was carrying with him a small container, which housed a goldfish identical to Bob. The alien stopped and looked into the container, and then looked back up and faced the pair.

"Jade," said Peter, "this alien's talking to us too. He says that the planet we just left is ruled entirely by that Lont guy, but they're rebels. Their people have gained a lot of area on Lont's planet, so they're pretty familiar with it. They rescued us and some of their partners from Lont. Those huge machines that were outside were stolen from their home planet, Xonarph. That's where we're heading now."

"Well, tell him thanks, and ask him how long it'll take to get there."

Peter concentrated for a moment, then waited and turned back to Jade. "He says it will only take a few hours, and then we'll land and meet his ruler. Xopnarph has three countries on it. They live in Lakoskagog, in a city called Angkhar, but the countries are at peace with each other. Once we get there, they'll take us back home on a smaller ship."

The alien then turned and left the room out an elliptical hole in the wall.

Jade and Peter explored the room. There were an assortment of small indentations in the floor, in which there were contraptions that looked like guns about half the length of Jade's arm. There was also a long slab of metal exactly like the type that the floor was made of. There was an assortment of objects on it. Many of them looked like exotic fruits, but some were similar to the blobs they had feasted on when they first arrived at Lont's palace.

"I bet this is food," said Jade.

"Probably. I'm pretty hungry. It looks a lot better than what we had before. Let's eat!" Peter lunged at a small fruit-like thing that looked like a small melon. It was green on the outside, but had the texture of a cantaloupe, and had red fruit inside. Peter picked it up and stuck his teeth into it. "It tastes really weird, Jade. Sort of like an orange, but not quite."

Jade instead went after a large brown chunk that looked like meat. He grabbed the outside of it and tore off a piece. "I think this is meat, Pete. Let's find out." He put it in his mouth and chewed. "Yeah, it's meat. And it doesn't taste like chicken. It's more like roast beef. This is good!"

They all feasted for a while. When Peter came across something that tasted like shrimp, he tore it into tiny pieces and tossed it into Bob's bowl. He quickly swam toward it and gobbled his food.

However, the entrance of another rooster-man soon interrupted them. This alien, like Lont, knew how to speak English, and even seemed slightly better at it. "I would like - to know - your names."

Peter took up the response. "My name, "he said slowly, "is Peter. This is Jade."

"He - hello, Peter - and Jade. I would like to know - the name of your other."

Peter turned his head to Jade and whispered, "what's he talking about?"

"Maybe he's talking about Bob."

"Oh yeah. Maybe he is." He turned back to the rooster-man and said, "this is my goldfish, Bob."

"We have - creatures like - Bob - here. We - do not name - them goldfishes. They - are cubzakas. I came to - to tell - Lont attacks us now. Come with me." The alien left the room followed by Jade, Peter, and Bob. They traveled a system of corridors until they reached another room. The instant they were in this room, the gravity that they had been so used to suddenly ceased, and they floated through the air. The room was very wide, but not long. All along the wall in front of them were closed doors. The alien turned right and went down the hall. He led them into the second to last door on the wall and opened it.

Behind the door was a small room. It looked like the cockpit of a high-tech airplane, but with more screens and no dials. The entire room had clear walls except the one in which the door was. There was a single chair in the middle of the room, with something that looked like the supporting structure for a dentist's tool table next to it. At the end of this, rather than a table, was something that looked like a complex computer joystick. Out the clear, curved wall in front of them, Jade and Peter saw stars and small spacecraft flying around them. The tiny ships were attacking the ship they were in, shooting blasts of opaque yellow light towards it. From the other rooms to their left emerged a barrage of red beams. As each one collided with its target, an explosion formed, and sparks flew off into space. The alien spoke again. "Sit - and help - Jade. Put on - the thing above. Come, Peter." The alien left the room and led Peter to the room directly to Jade's right.

Jade sat down, pulled the control over his lap, and looked up. Hanging from the ceiling was a pair of glasses. He put these on, and they suddenly extended small structures from their sides, latching onto Jade's head. He saw through them perfectly, but also saw a small, red and yellow set of concentric circles. When he moved the joystick, these circles moved with each other. Although there was an assortment of knobs on the base of it, there were only two buttons on the joystick. One was under his index finger, on the back of the stick itself. The other was on the base. He laid his hand so that the second button was under his left index finger. Suddenly, he saw two spacecraft zoom into his view. He instinctively pressed the button on the stick. He then saw a flash of red light, which instantly condensed into a glowing, opaque cylinder, shoot directly where his circles were. He did not hit anything, so he quickly jerked the stick and followed one of the ships. However, before he got the circles on top of it, it sped out of view. He moved his head up to follow it and caught it with the circles. He pressed the button, firing, but missed. He held it down and followed the ship. The red beams continued to shoot out, and no longer seemed to obstruct his view as they were produced. He soon caught the ship and blasted it with four shots. Although the ship still flew, it was out of control and went much more slowly. Jade followed it again with his target and shot a continuous stream. The ship exploded in a huge fire, though it was quickly extinguished.

"I still don't know what the other button's for," Jade thought aloud. He pressed it. The yellow circle separated from the red one and flew around his field of vision. When he saw this, he released the button. The circle returned to its red partner. He pressed the button again, this time holding it. Suddenly, he saw another craft sail in front of him. It fired, and the yellow beam impacted Jade's window. When it did this, there was a small explosion. Then, the window was covered with branching yellow light. It slowly faded away. Jade held down the button on the base, and the yellow circle again went around his view. However, when it came in contact with the spaceship in front of him, it stayed on it. A copy of the yellow circle then emerged from the original one and flew around his view. Jade let go of the button, and the copied circle disappeared. However, the other yellow circle stayed with the image of the enemy spaceship. Jade held down the button on the stick. The stream of beams shot towards the yellow circle, rather than the red one. The ship was quickly shot down. Unfortunately, the ships continued to come. Jade used the button on the base to shoot as many as he could, but it seemed that he and the other fighters were losing their battle. Jade also found that he could shoot many different fighters at the same time by using the copies of the original yellow circle. After a while, the fighters seemed to retreat. Jade relaxed and leaned back in his chair, removing his glasses.

No sooner had he done this than the fighters returned in a huge group. It seemed that they had caught all of the Jade and Peter's comrades. They all fired at the ship, slightly below where Jade assumed Peter was. The blasts all impacted at the same time, rocking the ship. Jade saw the stars scattering the blackness behind the tiny fighters start to move to his right. The fighters quickly turned and flew back towards their planet of Lontanius.

Meanwhile, the stars accelerated. The blasts had disabled the main left thruster of the ship, causing it to turn slightly to the left. Inside the largest part of the ship, navigators attempted to set it back on course, but were unsuccessful. One of the navigators shouted to the captain. The captain shouted back orders. The navigators attempted to turn the ship around so that it would coast towards Xonarph, but again, they could not. Their attempts did turn the ship, and, as they were turning, Jade saw a huge planet in the distance. It quickly spun out of view, and was soon in the views of the navigators in the front of the ship. Suddenly, the ship stopped turning. The stars no longer moved in the windows. The navigators continued to turn their controls and press buttons, but they had no effect. Another navigator spun around in his seat and faced the captain, yelling something to him. All the engines had suddenly stopped. The ship now sailed through space on a collision course with the gigantic planet in front of them.

Since impact with the planet was inevitable, the entire crew of the ship prepared for a crash landing. The captain soon discovered that the communications system was also disabled. All attempts to launch escape pods also failed. It seemed that the Lontanians possessed more complex and powerful weapons than they seemed. The lights in the ship also flashed and died, plunging the entire ship into darkness. Jade leapt out of his seat and opened the door behind him. Peter was already outside his door and floating down the long room. "Pete!" yelled Jade, "wait up!" Peter stopped and turned. Jade walked towards him. "What do you think is going on?"

"I don't know. Did the lights go off in your room too?"

"Yeah. I don't know what's going on, but I think we should find the door to get out of here." Pointing to his right, he said, "it's on this side. How many doors are there?"

"That's the problem. It's so dark, I can't find any doors. We need to get out of here. Do you think there's any other way out?"

"Probably not. I say we just keep searching this wall until we find it. Doors don't just disappear." They floated towards each other, slowly dragging their hands along the wall. Every so often, one would say that they had found the door, causing an excited rush to the site by the other party. Every time, however, it was a false discovery.

Mounting fear clouded Jade's mind. He wandered aimlessly about the long hallway and something dawned on him. "We don't need to find the door!" he shouted down to Peter.

"What?"

"We don't need to find the door!"

"Why not?"

"If this thing got shot down, the aliens inside will know to come looking for us. Maybe you can only open it from inside!"

"Sure, Jade."

"No, really. I bet someone will come back here any minute."

Jade was right. Not more than five minutes later, a flood of aliens came through a door that had somehow come into being on the side of the hallway. One of them looked at Bob, and then pushed off the wall down the hall.

"Jade," Peter said, "the alien says we're gonna crash."

"Huh?"

"An alien said that we're gonna crash! The fighters disabled all the systems on the spaceship. We're headed straight for some huge planet called Wompostigget."

"Well, I guess this is the best place to be. When we crash, this will be the farthest place away from the ground."

"The alien said that we need to go out the door."

"Why?"

"He didn't say."

"Well, I guess he's only trying to help us. Let's go." Jade and Peter, who still clutched Bob, resisted the torrent of aliens and exited the hall through the door. Jade, who forced himself through, fell flat onto the floor once he was through the door.

"I guess I should've been more careful about this."

"Yeah, probably."

"Well, let's see… why are we out here?"

Peter saw another alien who was standing outside of the door as well. He was the only alien not rushing through the door into the crowded hall. He held an unusual contraption that looked like a shiny silver sphere with an assortment of metal extensions protruding in every direction.

"That one over there's just standing there. We're probably supposed to go see him."

Jade and Peter walked over to the alien. Peter thought to Bob, "ask him if he's waiting for us."

Seconds later, Peter turned to Jade and said, "Jade, the alien says that we have to be adjusted to be able to breathe the air on this planet. He says to come with him."

The alien led them away from the crowd stuffing themselves into the back hall. He came into a room in which the walls were lined with tanks of yellowish liquid. They were built into the walls; thin plates of a transparent material held up by large black bars contained the liquid, which was separated in tanks by even more clear material, going back to lit walls. The alien led Jade next to one of these.

"The alien says that he's going to knock you out for a few minutes. You'll come out feeling fine, but you'll be able to breathe the air on this planet."

"Okay. How about you and Bob?"

"Well, I guess he'll do us next."

The alien came over to Jade and pressed one of the extensions of the sphere up against his skin. Jade's view of his surroundings suddenly froze. The still images he saw slowly seemed to fade away and become distorted at the same time, as if they were being poured out of some invisible bowl. Jade stopped remembering things.