Chapter Twenty-Three – Oootoon Everywhere
Gavin scrabbled over on his spiderlike legs. The box they had opened was empty except for a thin layer of oootoon the bottom. The rest of the contents were spread out over the floor in a large puddle.
“Whoops,” said Carrie.
“Is that an expression of regret?” asked Gavin. “There is no need to apologise. You have made an interesting discovery. We must examine the other boxes. I do not know why the idea did not occur to me.”
They opened four boxes, each in different areas of the entrance bay. All were filled with oootoon. The liquid didn’t dry up under the dim red emergency lighting as it had in the strong sunlight on the planet surface.
“Perhaps this will help us convince the oootoon to release its hold on the ship,” said Gavin.
“I don’t see how,” said Belinda. “It’s hardly going to make the oootoon less belligerent to the placktoids if it knows they’ve been removing it from the planet and keeping it here.”
“It must already know it, or parts of it do. That’s why it’s attacking,” said Carrie. “When enough of the oootoon knows or decides something, it acts. We’re surrounded by the oootoon that knows exactly what the placktoids have been doing, and there was enough of it to break away from the planet and attack the ship.”
Carrie smacked her forehead. “Of course. I was wrong. The oootoon is responsible for the missing placktoids. It captured them while they were siphoning it up. Then the placktoids started bombing it in retaliation and to try to beat it into submission. When the Transgalactic Council inspected the settlement process, the placktoids knew the oootoon would be a poor witness for what had been happening to it. Talking to the oootoon is like talking to individuals of an angry mob. Each has a different story to tell of what happened where, when and to whom. All most of them know is that something bad happened to some of them and they’re angry about it.”
“Yes, yes. I see we may have been interpreting this conflict incorrectly,” said Gavin. “The Transgalactic Council report was perhaps inaccurate.”
“Because the oootoon can’t communicate well,” said Carrie. “And no one ever really took the time to listen to it, all of it.”
“There have certainly been difficulties, yes, which is one reason why I dispatched you to the oootoon planet, to gather more information.”
“Hmpf.” Belinda was looking at her with a scornful smirk.
Carrie’s elated smile faded. She had acted irresponsibly and failed the victimised oootoon. If only she had investigated the contents of the handbag and seen the briefing device. If only she had taken the job seriously, or just refused to do it when she realised what it was about. Who did she think she was? She was just a mediocre nobody who couldn’t even work in a call centre.
Dave touched her shoulder and smiled.
A massive bang shot through the air. The floor shook, and they stumbled.
“What the hell was that?” said Belinda. “Did we hit something?”
“I don’t think so,” said Dave. “It came from over there.” He gestured to a blank wall at the far end of the entrance bay. The metal wall was misshapen, though earlier it had been perfectly straight like the rest of the ship. Another huge crash sounded and the wall buckled towards them. “Whatever’s coming through, I don’t think it’s friendly.”
“I am in agreement with you,” said Gavin. “I think it would be expedient to leave.”
“But what if it’s come to attack the oootoon?” said Carrie. “We have to protect it.”
“I do not believe it is attacking the oootoon,” Gavin replied. “Whatever it is, it has had ample opportunity to do that. I do believe it intends to attack—”
A third ear-splitting bang rent the air. Carrie staggered.
“—us.”
At a fourth boom the wall gave way. A large, rectangular, metal object rolled into view, its wide, toothed maw glinting red. The placktoid commander.
“What the...How did we miss that?” shouted Dave, as the four ran towards the door. Gavin had been right. The shredder zoomed directly at them.
Carrie looked over her shoulder as she ran. For a large item of usually stationary office equipment, the commander was surprisingly fast. It was gaining on them, and it was heading straight for her. “Watch out,” she shouted. She veered off to one side. Dave, Gavin and Belinda swerved to the other and not a moment too soon as the placktoid zoomed through the place they had just been. It began to turn, but though it was fast it maneuvered badly. It could only turn in a wide circle. As it did so, it cut a path through the stacked boxes, overturning and crushing them. Oootoon oozed over the floor.
They were forced to run in the opposite direction now that the commander was between them and the door. Gavin made it to the other end of the entrance bay first, and the others soon joined him. They stood at the wall the placktoid had driven through, as the machine completed its circle. Behind them, the secret room was dark.
“I suggest we withdraw through here,” said Gavin. “There may be an exit.” He scrabbled over the remains of the wall and into the shadowy room. But there was no door. It was as if the commander had been sealed in a tomb at the departure of its crew.
A high-pitched whine told them the placktoid was bearing down on them again.
“Run,” Carrie shouted, but they needed no warning. As the alien’s caterpillar tracks carried it over the torn wall and into its former hiding place, they scattered left and right and ran down the room again, outmaneuvering the clumsy machine.
They met at the door, which was closed. Without the influence of the magnetic field neutraliser, it had slid shut behind them after they entered the entrance bay. Carrie felt for the neutraliser in her pocket, but she couldn’t find it. Dave and Belinda watched anxiously as she checked her pockets again and again. The neutraliser must have fallen out while she was running. Her eyes searched the floor.
“Where’s the neutraliser?” asked Belinda.
At the other end of the room, the shredder had completed its turn and was bearing down on them once more.
“I don’t know,” said Carrie. She scanned the mess of shattered boxes and oootoon, run through with the tracks of the shredder and footprints. Finding the neutraliser in this chaos would be hopeless.
“What? You mean you lost it?” exclaimed Belinda.
“I think it fell out of my pocket.”
“Run,” shouted Dave, as the commander drew uncomfortably close.
Dave and Carrie darted down one side of the entrance bay and Gavin and Belinda ran down the other, sheltering behind stacked boxes of oootoon. The placktoid immediately turned to follow. It swerved towards Carrie and Dave, but the maneuver cost it speed and it couldn’t reach them. In its journey it took out more boxes of oootoon, splashing the yellow liquid over itself.
The cycle repeated, this time with the shredder pursuing Belinda and Gavin. Once more their ability to turn more quickly than the alien was the means of their escape. But they could not run forever. Dave was already puffing hard, and even Carrie was starting to feel the pace. The placktoid commander seemed to have an inexhaustible power supply.