Really Wild Things

Chapter 18

As the lift rose, Joon kept shooting glances around for attacks. It never came. Every time a guard noticed them, he would see Norman and give them a friendly wave.

They finally reached the platform for the uppermost level. Vinnsh stood at the edge of the platform with his arms crossed. Several large guards stood behind him, all brandishing weapons.

"Uh-oh," said Norman. "I never gave him a fairy cake."

"No, you didn't," Vinnsh snapped. "And I haven't forgotten it. Where do you think you're going?"

Ford pulled the strap of his satchel onto his shoulder. "Well, old lads, I thought I'd just pop out for a quick pint. Care to join me?"

"I don't drink alcohol," Vinnsh sneered.

"Well, there's your problem right there."

Vinnsh made a gesture with his hand.

The guards charged at them, weapons raised. Joon frantically tried to operate the switch to lower the lift, but it was locked. Joon tried to climb the rock wall beside her, but found no purchase for her hands or feet. Ford glanced behind him at the roaring inferno looming behind him, cutting off all hope of escape.

It was surely the end for Ford, Norman, and Joon. Fortunately, at that moment, the cavern exploded.

Ford awoke to find himself swaying. That didn't strike him as too odd, except for the fact that he wasn't walking at the time.

He was tucked under Norman's arm like a sack of potatoes. Ford could see Joon under Norman's other arm, hanging limp. Norman carried Joon and Ford up the staircase to the exit.

The last thing Ford remembered had been the armed guards advancing on him in the cavern. The guards were now gone. That same cavern still surrounded him, but substantially altered. The domed roof had been replaced by a gaping hole that showed a grey and cloudy sky. The boulders and soil that made up the roof had fallen into the flaming core, extinguishing it. Rubble scattered all over the chamber, along with the remains of guards and prisoners alike. The screams of the damned were now the screams of the survivors.

A platoon of surviving guards rushed at Ford. He braced himself until the guards ran past him and down the stairs into the cave. They had more important things to deal with, like the surviving prisoners who found themselves broken loose of their chains and made for the exits en masse. Some of them had found weapons in the form of chains or shafts of metal or sticks. Others just hung back to let the first wave of attackers take the brunt of the assault and hoped to slip by in the confusion.

"What the photon happened?" Ford groaned.

Norman carried Joon and Ford out of the mouth of the cave. "We're under attack."

"Attack? Who would want to attack a complaints department?"

As if in answer, a starship shrieked over their heads. At first, Ford thought the ship was shaped like a gigantic tooth. On closer examination, Ford realised that was exactly what it was shaped like. The ship spat lethal Ultra-burn Neutrino cannons at everything in sight, leaving a trail of destruction.

Ford threw himself at a nearby boulder for cover. Since he was still under Norman's arm, he ended up twisting out and falling to the ground in a heap. Ford could only cover his head as dirt and shrapnel rained down on him.

The fire had apparently woken Joon as well, because she lay sprawled next to Ford. Her long hair lay in tangles around her head that Ford found annoyingly sexy.

Joon looked up at the starship roaring over her head. "Is that a tooth?"

Norman stood over them with his hands in his side-pockets. He hadn't so much as cringed at the onslaught. He calmly looked up. "No, it's a starship shaped like a tooth. A molar, to be exact."