"We’re going to crash!" The ship lost power rapidly. Alarms rang loudly, dials spun madly. The ship fell, the pilot and copilot could do nothing. The vessel skimmed over a forest, careened across the razor-sharp treetops and smashed deep in the woods.

The two Thundercats were knocked, tumbled about the cramped interior of the control room to unconsciousness. Tygra was the first to come to. "Are you all right?" he asked Cheetara. He shook her head gently and she opened her eyes. The cheetah looked around: most of everything in sight was broken.

"We should get out and check the ship over," she said, she stood up a bit too quickly. She swayed, her head felt hot, felt sweaty. "We need to know just how bad the damage is. Do you think we’ll need to wear the space suits?"

Tygra peered out one of the control room’s windows. "The planet is quite similar to Third Earth." He ran some tests on air samples. "Yes. It’s fine. It’s fine."

She opened the hatch door and went outside. The whole front of the ship was ruined. "We won’t be able to fix the ship with the tools we have."

"What do we do now?" He whispered under his breath. "What do we do now?" Tygra stood outside. He closely eyed the surrounding wilderness. Something he found he did not agree with but said nothing yet she sensed his tacit foreboding.

"We were sent to explore this world," Cheetara reminded him. "It seems we’re going to have a whole lot of time to do that. It could be weeks before anyone back on New Thundera misses us."

"Then we should see what grows here, what life forms there are here but first the supplies."

With that word the two Thundercats went back into the ship. Together they cleaned the cabin, they took stock of the miscellaneous inventory and they rechecked the supplies. At the end, at last, Tygra and Cheetara lay down to rest. Neither spoke until Cheetara broke the silence. "Some of out cartons of food were destroyed. There’s only enough food for three days."

"I think we should familiarize ourselves with the planet," Tygra began, "to see if there’s anything we could eat."

The two cats walked into the woods. Trees and bushes surrounded the ship. The bushes were small -- small enough to almost fit into the palm of the hand -- the trees themselves were not higher than ten or twelve feet. Here and there were vines with red berries on them.

Cheetara worried. "These berries aren’t any larger than grapes. Even if we can eat them we’re going to need much more and there isn’t enough for one meal."

"This is the only food we’ve found," Tygra said. "But we should test them out back at the ship just to make sure." He looked around the sky. "It’ll be dark soon."

While the two walked back to the downed ship Cheetara stopped several times. "I hear something, Tygra," she whispered into his ear.

Tygra paused: "I don’t hear anything," he said though his own face contradicted him.

In the ship he ran tests on the red berries. "The computers couldn’t find the trace of any known toxin. Should we try them?"

"Why don’t you go fist," she said.

Tygra ate one, he smiled, "Good."

The two Thundercats dined on the red berries.

The next morning Cheetara said she had heard strange noises that night yet Tygra insisted that there was nothing, nothing, nothing to fear. "Forget it," he said. "Let’s go get more berries."

"For breakfast?"

They opened the hatch door and they saw that there were three huge piles of red berries before the ship.

"Forget it? Then where did this come from?"

Tygra looked surprised.

"I bet it was the noises I heard all along all last night. There might be natives around. Friendly natives. And these berries are our gifts." Cheetara desperately tried to explain the unexplainable.

"I don’t know, I don’t know, Cheetara, if we should take gifts from strangers. If we have friends why don’t we see them?"

"But it’s so obvious. They want to know if we’re friendly too." She sat on the ground betwixt the piles of red berries. "Come down. Let’s have breakfast."

While the two Thundercats began to eat Cheetara turned her head back in sudden awareness. She whispered to him that she heard the noises again and Tygra had to admit the fact that was no longer deniable.

"I hear them too," he whispered to her so softly, so softly to keep even himself from hearing the words.

A nearby bush rustled and out came a small creature that looked exactly like a Third Earth human but only eight inches tall. The creature carried a red berry in its arms. Tygra and Cheetara watched as it walked toward them, as it put the red berry down in front of them.

"Thank you," Tygra said. He smiled. He slowly reached for the fruit. More squeaky noises came from the bushes and just like that twenty creatures appeared. The one closest to the tiger uttered something to the others and all ran to the two Thundercats, squeaking wildly, dancing, playing fitfully around the sitting Thunderians. "So they are friendly."

Over the next few days the creatures brought food for Tygra and Cheetara. They carried the huge red berries in their little hands one at a time. It took hours to bring one meal. Sometimes the two helped the natives, other times they explored the forests, yet they also often tried to speak to their hosts.

On the morning of the seventh day Tygra called to Cheetara. He stood near the ship’s hatch. He frowned. He looked terrified.

"What’s the matter?" She asked.

"We’ll never be able to leave this planet," he said quietly, resignedly.

"What are you taking about?"

He pointed up to the hatch of the ship. "When we first landed here I had to duck to get through the hatch. On the third day my head just barely touched the upper rim of the door frame. On the fifth day I noticed no problem at all coming into or getting out of the ship. Today -- this morning -- I clear the opening by half a foot." She was stunned, she looked down on herself, on her clothes that suddenly seemed looser, far looser than ever before. "Don’t you see? It’s the berries, Cheetara, it’s the berries. We’re shrinking!"