CHAPTER SEVEN
Ice Chamber, Man
I.
Once again, I led the way through the twisted corridor laden Behemoth. We were still on the third level, needing to find a way to the fourth. I walked slowly with my laser phaser held out in front of me. I was taking advantage of the new sight scope these things were now equipped with. They were sweet.
I could hear Chuck following close behind; he hadn’t said anything for a few minutes so I knew he was still upset about me dragging Phil along. Oh well, when we got back to Earth I wanted to ask Nog if Phil could be part of my team officially. And if he was, this was a good introduction to the field.
Phil was third in line. He kept grunting and his normal quirky personality had completely disappeared. I could tell he was nervous. But hey, ya gotta do stuff!
“Scout, do you even know where we’re going?” Chuck finally asked. I looked around to make sure the coast was clear and then we ducked off into a room to my right where the door was open.
“Not really,” I responded. “I was just walking around looking for some way to get up to the next floor.”
Chuck rolled his eyes. “Nog?”
What did Chuck think he was doing? Talking to Nog on my watch, on my mission!
A few seconds later, Chuck told me what Nog had said in his head: “He said there is a ventilation system on this floor somewhere and we can use it to climb to the next level.”
“Good work,” I said, encouraging him.
“He said that the vents should be marked with green vent covers.”
I looked around the room we were in but didn’t see any green vent covers. “Okay, we’ll split up and look for them.”
“Split up?” Phil nervously questioned my authority.
“Yeah, it’ll make everything go quicker. Chuck head back down the way we just came from, Phil, check a couple of these rooms that the doors are open to, and I’ll keep heading down the hall. Yell if you see one of the vents.”
I made the plan and everyone reluctantly scattered about.
I moved slowly down the hall, taking quiet steps along the metal flooring. I kept my finger on the trigger at all times. You never knew when another Slimeborg would pop out of nowhere.
Right then, a door up ahead opened and I quickly ducked behind a large metal crate in the hallway that was conveniently placed there. I looked behind me to see if Chuck or Phil were in sight, and I could see Chuck still walking down the other direction. I was hoping that fool wouldn’t do anything to make noise.
I poked my head over the metal crate and saw a Frooginite – beefed up and covered in their space armor like they had on Bethani – carrying two of the green butt aliens by their necks.
“TRAITORS WILL BE DEALT WITH,” the Frooginite spoke in an echoing mechanical tone. It stopped in front of a solid black door with a window on it and dropped the squirming aliens.
The Frooginite pressed a button on the wall and the black door opened. I could see a light fog emerge from the chamber, almost like it was a refrigerating device. The more I looked at it, I was right. It was some kind of freezer, pumping out ice-cold blasts.
The Frooginite grabbed the aliens by their heads and tossed them into the chamber one at a time and then pressed the button to shut the door. There was a beeping sound that began, and beeped once every second. The Frooginite turned around and walked back through the door it originally came out of. I waited for the door to shut and then I stood up and ran for the ice chamber.
I looked through the window and saw the ice-cold blasts were from vents on the wall and were freezing the two green butt aliens. Within seconds, they were solid ice, stuck in the awkward positions in which they were frozen in. The beeping noise caught my attention and I looked right above the button that opened and closed the ice chamber. It was a countdown, and it had already made it to three.
Two…
One…
I looked into the chamber and watched as the back wall opened and the two frozen aliens were sucked out into the darkness of space. The back wall closed back up and my jaw dropped. Holy crap!
I turned and looked down the hall and saw Chuck rushing my way. He was about halfway to me when doors on either side of him opened. A total of six Slimeborgs poured out from both doorways, and Homeless Harry followed. Chuck stopped dead in his tracks.
“Drop the gun, Chuckles!” Harry shouted. I ducked back behind the metal crate in hopes that the bad guys wouldn’t see me. I peered around the side of it and watched the situation unfold.
The Slimeborgs surrounded Chuck and he set his P2 phaser down on the ground and put his arms up. I watched as Harry reached behind his back and pulled a laser pistol from under his shirt. There had to be something I could do.
I scoured my utility belt for anything that could help me. I lifted a latch and pulled out a can of mace. Really? Mace?
I checked another one and pulled out a small spherical object that said ‘Gernog’. Gernog?
“Nog,” I whispered.
What?
“What’s a Gernog?”
It’s a grenade, you idiot, designed by me. It’ll give you a good explosion if that’s what you’re looking for.
I smiled, “Indeed, brotha.”
I armed the Gernog by holding down a button on its side and looked around the metal crate again. I had to make a move fast otherwise Chuck was a dead-heap.
Leaving my finger on the Gernog button, I lifted my laser phaser with my other arm and stood up. I looked down the sight scope and got the back of one of the Slimeborgs head in target. I figured if I killed the one that was standing in front of Chuck, he’d get the hint when the things’ head exploded and take cover.
I drew my arm back and prepared to throw the Gernog. That’s when time slowed down and everything felt like it was in slow motion.
I pulled the trigger once and watched as the single bolt of laser pierced the air and traveled down the hallway. To the right, I noticed Phil slowly emerge from a room that he was investigating. The laser buzzed by him and he turned his head and followed it. The laser connected with the back of the Slimeborgs head, shattering it. The Plexiglass shell of the borg exploded into hundreds of little pieces as the green slime inside sprayed towards Chuck. He squinted and turned his head while holding his mouth shut so none of it got in there. The slime splashed onto Chuck’s face and made him stumbled backwards into another borg. Homeless Harry turned around, dodging some of the slime and saw it was me who committed the deed. I threw my arm forward and released the Gernog into the air. It flew down the hallway like a spiraling football as Harry lifted his laser pistol in my direction. I noticed Phil had turned back to look at me, but when he saw the Gernog flying down the hall; he turned his head and followed it again. By now, all of the Slimeborgs had turned in my direction. I could see Harry grit his teeth in anger as he aimed his laser gun at me and pulled the trigger. A beam came flying towards me, passing the Gernog in mid-air. The Gernog hit the metal floor and bounced a couple times before coming to rest at Harry’s feet. Harry looked up and to his left where he saw Phil standing in a doorway. Harry looked back at me and bent down and picked up the Gernog. I hit the deck as the laser beam from Harry’s gun buzzed over my head and hit the wall behind me. I rolled over and looked back down the hall to see Harry in mid-throw. He had thrown the Gernog, like a baseball, towards Phil. Phil dove back into the room he’d come from and the Gernog followed him in. That’s when the slow motion stopped and everything became intense.
The room exploded ferociously. Chunks of the wall blew off and the lights in the hallway flickered. Flames roared from the room where Phil had taken cover. I stood up fast, “PHIL!!!”
I lifted my laser gun and began opening fire on Harry and the Slimeborgs. I made contact with Harry’s arm and he dropped his gun, clutching his fresh wound. Chuck stood up behind the line of Slimeborgs with his P2 phaser and only had to pull the trigger once to blow them all forward; slime, wires and Plexiglass rained down in the hallway. The blast also flung Harry back against the wall and then he hit the ground hard.
I ran up the hall and Chuck ran in my direction. We stopped at the room where Phil was and had to shield ourselves from the burning wreckage. We tried looking in, but couldn’t see much. Everything in the room was on fire.
“What have you done, Scout!? What have you done!?” Chuck kept yelling and shoving me. I was in shock…what had I done. Phil could be dead in that room and it was all because of me! I forced him to come along. It was my fault.
My heart began to race and I felt flushed in my face. I thought I was going to be sick.
Chuck tried looking through the flames in the doorway and he spotted something. “He’s in there,” Chuck said, pointing. I didn’t want to look. Phil was bound to look like a complete mess. “I have to get him. I have to see him,” Chuck said. I was seeing a side of Chuck that I’d yet to see – brave, dedicated, reliable.
With all of his heart, Chuck ran through the flames that were blocking the door way and into the room. I looked in and saw Chuck kneel down over Phil on the floor. It was too smokey to actually see what he looked like. Chuck stood up and ran back over to the doorway.
“Scout, I need to get Phil back to the Frog Hopper. You need to go and take care of business, like, really fast, bro. Then meet me back at the Frog and we need to get Phil back to Earth as soon as possible.”
I nodded, still in shock.
“Go, Scout!”
Chuck tossed me his P2 phaser over the flames and I looked cool catching it with one hand. I wanted to smirk, but it might have been too soon given Phil’s situation.
Wait, no it wasn’t! If there was ever a time to be heroic, awesome and save the day, it was now – in honor of Phil. I wanted to make him proud. I turned around in the hallway and saw Homeless Harry was no longer on the floor. I looked around the hallway, and noticed him back down where the ice chamber was. He was knelt down on the floor messing with something against the far wall.
“Oh, no you don’t!” I yelled and dashed in his direction.
Harry turned around quickly and stood up as I approached him. I forced the barrel of the P2 phaser in his face and looked on the ground behind him. It was a green colored vent cover. That was my way up.
“You killed my buddy,” I said angry.
“You left me stranded!” Harry yelled back.
“You lived in a dumpster, bro! You can do that anywhere!”
“Lord Radar the Great isn’t going to let you off this ship alive. He’s going to kill your uncle, he’s going to kill your Chuckles, and then he said something about giving you a cosmic wedgie before using you as a human piñata.”
Cosmic wedgie? I didn’t like the sound of that.
“He must mean business if he’s talking cosmic,” I said.
“He’s all business. He tested the cosmic wedgie on a few of the Norfits. They didn’t make it.”
“What are Norfits?”
“Those weird green aliens with the butts. Remember those butts, Scout?”
I remembered the butts too well. Those slick green cheeks were forever plastered in my mind. I shivered just thinking about them, tight and bubble-like.
Right then, Harry charged at me and forced all of his weight into me. I stumbled backwards and swung my gun at him, connecting with this cheek. He grabbed the side of his head and leaned up against the wall.
“God that hurt!”
“Well,” I said, “I’ve only begun to rearrange your face. Need a new nose location?”
I forced the butt of the laser gun into his face, busting his nose. He grabbed it, obviously in major pain.
“Did your chin get a new job? Cause it’s being relocated to the wall!” I slammed the butt of the gun into his chin from the side and his face hit the wall. I heard something in his face crack.
He stumbled across the hall and leaned up against the ice chamber, knocking into the button and opening the door. I smiled because this was all working out better than I thought it would. Actually…I thought of something; something on the fly, and I knew everything felt right. It was the perfect line to say.
“Am I crowding you?” I asked. Harry looked at me, his face all battered up. “Then here…” I began, my voice deepening with suspense and intensity, “let me give you some space…”
I felt goosebumps erupt all over my body as I was finally able to deliver an epic line. I kicked Harry into the chamber and shut the door behind him. I watched through the window as the ice blasts froze him from head to toe. The countdown began and I watched it drop from ten seconds all the way down to zero when the back wall to the chamber opened and Homeless Harry was sucked out into outer space. The back wall closed back up and I sighed.
One down, two to go.
II.
I sifted around in the air vents for nearly ten minutes before I was finally heading in the right direction. I was doing a lot of banging and clanging around up in here, so I was really hoping my location wouldn’t be given away.
I crawled my way down the longest of all vents and came to a junction that split off into three different directions. I knew I had crawled up a vent for a bit, so I assumed I was on the right floor. I just didn’t know which direction to go from here.
I took a wild stab in the dark and went left. I crawled my butt off for another few minutes until I came to an opening in the vent. I peered through the slits and saw a room that appeared to be what I was looking for. It looked like a room built for a king. There was a large, over-sized throne, a long red carpet that led out to giant metal doors and there were two Frooginites planted at the door, one on each side.
This had to be Radar’s room.
I tried to quietly jiggle the vent to see if it was loose or anything, but I must have been too loud.
“THERE! THE VENT IS MOVING!” a Frooginite cried out.
Crap.
Both the Frooginites dashed in my direction. I let go of the vent and shuffled back a little bit hoping this wouldn’t amount to anything. The Frooginites arrived and knelt down, tearing the vent cover off in a quick swoop.
I tried to shuffle back a little further, but one of them reached in and grabbed me by the backpack and pulled me out and tossed me onto the floor. When I hit the floor I rolled purposefully and leapt up to my feet, drawing Chuck’s P2 phaser.
I aimed it right at the Frooginites who stopped and stared.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you, tool bag,” a boys voice said from behind me. I turned around slowly, building anticipation, and I couldn’t believe what I was looking at.
A neon red mohawk, a long black cape with a red velvet inner lining, a cape collar that wrapped all the way around the back of his head, a soul patch…it was Radar. Dang, even Radar had facial hair.
“Put down that weapon, Scout,” Radar instructed. I did as I was told and quickly tried to think of a plan, a way out of this mess. “Do you like my space base? The Behemoth? It’s called that cause it’s huge.”
“I get that,” I said. “So what’s your plan, Radar?”
“That’s Lord Radar the Great to you, Scout.”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“It matters to me!” Radar squealed. He took a couple steps forward and stood about three feet away from me. “When you left me stranded on Bethani, the locals could sense my anger and hatred towards you dorks. Over the next year, I became their leader, their boss. I found Harry, who could sympathize with me, I was in communication with Jakon, who hated you guys too – everything conveniently fell into place pretty nicely.”
I nodded along, already knowing this story from when Harry explained it to me back home. Either way, Radar continued:
“You took everything from me, Scout. My life, my band, my family; what ever happened to my parents?”
“They moved after the police called off the search.”
“No one told them what happened?”
“We couldn’t. The E.I.A. is a secret organization, dude. It wouldn’t be a secret anymore if everyone knew about it.”
“So you all just let my parents leave?” Radar started to get slightly angrier. “Did my band at least win the battle?”
“No. The Acidic Chickens did.”
“Friggin’ Chickens,” Radar huffed, looking down and to the left. He looked back up and faced me again. He reached under his cape and slowly extracted a long, shiny sword.
“What are you going to do with that sword?” I asked, taking a step back.
“I’m going to slice you all up, Scout. But first,” Radar snapped his fingers and the two Frooginites were instantly on me, lifting me off the ground.
“What’s all this then?” I shouted, kicking my feet around.
Radar reached into his pocket and pulled out a small remote. Upon pressing a button, a small portion of the ceiling opened and a hook was lowered into the room and stopped about four feet off the floor. I was hoping this wasn’t what I thought it was…
“Are you prepared for a wedgie of cosmic proportions, Scout?” Radar maniacally laughed.
“Oh God, no!” I yelled as the Frooginites tore a hole in the back of my jumpsuit and attached the hook to the rim of my boxers. “No!”
“This should be fun,” the fifteen year old Space Lord continued to laugh.
The Frooginites let go of me, and I was just hanging there. I could feel my boxers getting tight in the crotch and I howled in pain. Radar hit another button on the remote and the hook was then retracted back towards the ceiling, lifting me with it, giving me a cosmic wedgie.
I squeaked as I was approaching the ceiling. I squinted hard as the tightness I was feeling in my boxers only constricted more. I looked down at Radar below me. He was pressing buttons like crazy on the remote; it seemed to not be working. The hook I was on lifted all the way into the ceiling and the small hatch closed. The hook stopped and I was able to loosen myself and hop off.
I was in the ceiling – talk about a random escape! I ducked down slightly because I only had around four feet to deal with. I got on my hands and knees and started to crawl around when I heard Radar start shouting.
“Come down from there, Scout! I mean it! That wasn’t supposed to happen!”
“Never!” I yelled back.
“C’mon!” he whined.
I didn’t respond this time. I needed to figure out my next move. Before I could do that, the Frooginites began blasting their guns at the ceiling. Up ahead of me, the ceiling blew off and crumbled to the floor below. It happened again behind me and then once more off to my left. I stayed still, hoping they would think they got me. It was nerve wracking up here. The juices in my stomach started gurgling again.
“Scout, if you’re not dead, show yourself!”
I then heard multiple and frantic knocks on the metal doors to Radar’s room. A heard Radar walk over to them and open the doors.
“Lord Radar the Great, look what I happened to find stashed away in a room,” a man’s voice said with a lisp. It had to be Jakon.
“Well well well!” Radar announced. “If it isn’t Scout’s uncle and what appears to be a traitor!”
I quickly crawled over to one of the blown out holes and looked down. I saw Jakon standing in the doorway with Uncle Jones and Blorf. There was a team of five Slimeborgs behind them.
I poked my head through the ceiling: “Uncle Jones!” I shouted.
Uncle Jones, oblivious, looked around for me, but couldn’t find me. Everyone else looked directly to the ceiling.
“Radar! You touch my uncle OR Blorf and I’ll make sure you pay -” I was interrupted by the ceiling cracking below me and shattering. I fell to my death and hit the floor hard.
Thank God I didn’t die. I stood up and dusted myself off and raced to the P2 phaser, but before I could get to it, one of the Frooginites stepped down hard on it and snapped it in two. I stopped and stared at it, bummed out. Chuck was going to be so mad.
I could hear laughing so I turned around and saw Radar and Jakon laughing at me. Blorf and Uncle Jones stood there with their hands tied out in front of them, hanging their heads.
Then I remembered I still had the Mini Frog. Maybe I could use that little genius to my advantage.
“Bring them in here!” Radar ordered Jakon of Blorf and Uncle Jones. Jakon shoved them both into the room, the Slimeborgs followed them in, and then Jakon made sure the doors were shut and locked.
“Scout,” Radar said, walking up to me with his sword out, trying to intimidate me. “Let me ask you a question. Where are your friends? Chuckles McGee and Philly Cheese Steak?”
“I’m not telling,” I said, standing my ground.
Radar put the sharp point of the sword to the front of my neck. “Tell me.”
“I’d rather die.”
“Well, that’s a given. I plan on blowing up the entire universe anyways.”
“The whole universe?” I asked, confused by his logic.
“Yup.”
“Well, then you’ll die too. You know that, right?”
“Ha! The jokes on you, Scout,” Radar said, holding his sword back down to his side. “We’ll blow up THIS universe, but we will have escaped to another one. We’ll be harmless.”
“There’s only one universe, man! And you mean free of harm, not harmless,” I said. “You’re thinking about galaxies.”
“I know what I’m thinking about!” Radar snapped. He turned and looked at Jakon. “Am I wrong, Jakon?”
“Yes, Lord Radar. You mean galaxies,” Jakon said.
“Why didn’t you correct me before? You’ve been making me out to look like a fool!”
“I just figured it didn’t matter,” Jakon shyly spoke.
“It matters to me!” Radar flipped out. He calmed down just long enough to ask Jakon, “Where’s Homeless Harry?”
Jakon shrugged.
“I gave him some space,” I chimed in, reliving the epic line delivery in my head with a smile.
“What does that mean?”
“I froze him in one of your little ice chambers. He was sucked out into space.”
Radar’s eyes widened and he lifted his sword into the air and rushed me. I ducked and he flipped over me, falling face first into the ground. His sword skipped across the floor and over by his unnecessarily large throne. I stood up and ripped the Mini Frog from my front jumpsuit pocket and aimed it at Radar as he slowly stood to his feet.
“Scout, watch out!” Uncle Jones screamed. I swung around and saw Jakon running at me, drawing a laser pistol from his pocket. I fired a shot at him but missed, and it hit one of the Slimeborgs. The other borgs lifted their gun-arms and opened fire on me. I ran behind the throne and took cover. The floor was being torn up all around me by the heavy onslaught of lasers.
My laser phaser was still strapped to my back so I armed myself with it and aimed around the throne, firing like mad at the army of borgs. I took a couple more out and noticed Radar fleeing the room, pushing Blorf and Uncle Jones down to the ground as he left.
I watched Blorf carefully as he seemed to acquire some sort of super-human strength. He screeched some sort of battle cry, which I’ve seen him do before, and tore his way out of the chains his hands were tied up in.
The two Frooginites saw me and started firing at me. I took cover again and all I could hear was a bunch of racket and commotion. There were a lot of grunts and banging sounds coming from out in the room. I noticed one of the Frooginite’s guns flew past me and hit the wall, shattering on impact.
I heard a couple of the Slimeborgs shatter as well, and heard the splashing sound of the slime on the floor. There was the sound of a small explosion and everything calmed down.
It was quiet.
I slowly peered out from behind the throne and saw Blorf standing on top of a wreckage pile of Frooginites and slime-covered borg corpses. He posed in a very heroic stance, and gripped Radar’s sword in his hand.
Jakon was on the floor, covered in slime, crawling in my direction. I stepped out from behind the throne and stood tall over him. All he could do was look up at me and tremble.
“Tell me where Radar was going when he fled the room,” I demanded to know.
“I…I have no clue,” Jakon said.
I lifted my leg and stepped down on Jakon’s hand. He winced in pain and started to grind his teeth.
“Where’d he go?” I asked again, getting impatient.
“I don’t know.”
I stepped forward with my other leg and stepped down on his other hand. I heard a couple of phalanges crack beneath my boot. I smiled.
“Where?” I yelled.
All Jakon could do was close his eyes tight and shake his head.
“Alright,” I said, “where’s that remote for the cosmic wedgies?”
“No! Anything but that! I’ll tell you!” Jakon pleaded. I stepped off of his hands and let him crawl to his knees. “The escape pods down in the cargo bay, near your ship.”
“Like the one at the school yard?”
“Yeah.”
“Is he going back to Earth?”
“I would assume so. He’s been swearing revenge on the E.I.A. since the day he was stranded.”
I looked up at Blorf and he was still stuck in a pose to self-proclaimed awesomeness.
“Blorf,” I said, “tie Jakon up and bring him back to the Frog Hopper.”
“Yes, sir, Scout!” Blorf hopped down off the pile and yanked some wires out from one of the Slimeborgs’ battered bodies. I jogged over to Uncle Jones and untied him.
“Scout, this is madness,” he said.
“I know,” I said as I looked into my uncles’ eyes. Our secret was out to yet another civilian. “So,” I said, “what are we going to do about this?”
“About what?” Uncle Jones asked, still standing there in his boxers.
“Now you know all the dark secrets of the universe, and that I’m involved in them.”
Uncle Jones surprised me with a chuckle. “Scout, do you realize who you’re talking to?”
“Huh?”
“I’ve been abducted before!”
“HUH?”
“I’ve told you all kinds of crazy stories about my adventures. Just imagine the stuff I haven’t told you.”
I smiled. “Like what?”
“Back in 1999, my buddy Tom Lance and I were in Chicago taking a tour of the city. We ran into a guy named Hotchkiss, and well, long story short, we ended up on the moon.”
My eyes were wide with astonishment. Uncle Jones, man! He’s done it all!
Blorf rushed by me, forcing Jakon out in front of him. “C’mon, Scout! Let’s move!”
III.
We rushed through the Behemoth trying like heck to get back to the cargo bay as soon as possible. We needed to stop Radar before he got into one of those escape pods.
My mind was clouded with visions of Phil blowing up. We needed to get him back to Earth fast if there was going to be any hope of saving him. I couldn’t live with Phil’s death on my conscience.
We took the elevator down to the bottom floor where a long corridor took us right to the cargo bay. As we turned into the bay, I saw the Frog Hopper sitting there in all its glory. I had forgotten how freaking awesome it looked! I noticed a couple of the lights were on in the ship and I could see Chuck moving about inside.
“Blorf!” I yelled, “Take Jakon to the Frog Hopper and strap him into one of the back seats. He’s our hostage now. We’ll need him of collateral damage, or something.”
Blorf did as I asked and I instantly heard something off to my right latch into place. I turned and saw a line of escape pods against the wall of the cargo bay. One of them lit up and flashing green lights outlined it. I squinted and saw it was Radar through the small glass window.
“Uncle Jones, get to my ship! I’ll take care of this…”
I ran over to the escape pod and slammed my hands up against the glass. Radar just smiled.
“This isn’t over, Scout,” he said all muffled.
I didn’t know how to respond. I noticed Radar look past me and his smile enlarged into a heinous laugh. I turned around to see what was so funny and saw an army of Slimeborgs flood into the room.
Crap!
“See ya later, Scout!” Radar said and before I knew it, the escape pod shot downwards through an opening in the floor and jettisoned out into space.
I swung around and opened fire on the army of borgs. They fired back and I ran, dodging all the lasers. We were screwed; I was under heavy fire, Phil