BOOK PREVIEW - JOH-PEAH'S SECRET

50,000 segmarqks (km approx.) above the planet Gizmok - Gizmok space - Earth year 2042.  

Gizmok Date; 27th of the month Tuu-kei, year (79)885 - hour 15

PROLOGUE

Joh-Peah stared out through the tiny viewport.  She couldn’t understand it.  Their entire invasion fleet, as well as the floog chasing them, were suspended in the black void, dead, unable to further their mission.  Not that she minded it so much.  She was only along for the ride to get to Gizmok.  But, she shook her head as she thought, This may not go as I originally planned.

Her mind went back to how it had all started.  Out one night, she was just trying to relax with some friends, a little difficult, considering they lived on an ice planet.  In spite of the fact that Joh-Peah was a kribbldabler, who should have been well adapted to the harsh climate of her home world, she hated the cold.  The ice, the snow, and the constant biting wind penetrated her hard outer shell as nothing else could, and it seemed to freeze her very essence.  Encouraged by the few friends she had, she tried to make best of things.  But, it just wasn’t working.

On this particular evening, after a time inside their favourite meet-house deep inside the ice cavern built in the centre of town, someone new came in who captured everyone’s attention.  He seemed to be enthusiastic about whatever it was he was clicking on about, and Joh-Peah edged nearer to where he was sitting.  Out of curiosity she began to listen, to find out what was so exciting.  

Nothing dramatic ever happened in these parts unless the Struulkor, those beasts from the neighbouring planet, Kruptaar had been at it again.  They’d come through periodically, into the planet’s outer regions, rounding up the more daring citizenry who thought they’d never get caught.  The Struulkor were arrogant beasts, and people were glad to see them leave the planet when they were done.  Citizens were well aware that Kruptaar’s dragons used the people from Friggerkeld  as slaves. For them it meant that there was safety only within the town’s limits.  Step out of it at your own peril.

She listened with interest as this kribbldabler clicked about a beautiful planet they could take.  There was a plan afoot that allied them with the Struulkor, and gave them a chance for a better life in a more agreeable climate.  There was a planet in their own system that could give them that.  Gizmok, with its perfect position relative to their sun, Loo, was ideal, and beautiful as well.  The Struulkor had promised they could all live there in comfort.  

As a bonus, the Struulkor had also guaranteed that kribbldablers would no longer serve as slaves for them, if they’d help capture Gizmok.  The floog who lived there now, were weak and puny creatures, doing nothing with their world.  It was a waste of a planet full of resources.  The taking would be easy.  All one had to do was sign up to be a soldier and help in the invasion.

She signed up, in spite of having reservations about being a soldier.  Fighting wasn’t in her nature, but she was desperate.  She hated living on Friggerkeld, hated the cold, and everything it entailed.  

“I’ve made up my mind.  Where do I sign?” she approached the speaker, along with so many others.  

“Here, just tap this spot right here, and sign with the stylus.” he instructed them, holding out a flat, square device and a pen of some sort.  A small shiver of apprehension tickled up her spine as she signed.  

*****

She’d barely made it through training at novice camp, barely learned to hold and shoot a weapon, and avoided making friends with any of her squad mates.  She didn’t plan to stick around with them once she got to Gizmok.  

Afterwards, the recruits, along with the entire fleet of beautiful, newly-built, Attackorbs had relocated to Kruptaar for a little more drilling, practice and manoeuvres. Their summer season was far more pleasant.  Were it not for the Struulkor, she would have stayed there.

Inexplicably, on the morning of departure to begin the grand invasion, everything seemed to go wrong.  More than half of the Attackorbs would not start.  The engines were dead.  Fire-Breth, the Grand Dragon, insisted that, with his additional Battlespheres, they were still easily able to overpower those weakling floog. The Kruptaar Leader ordered everyone to press forward. 

As they passed the Kármán Line from their atmosphere into outer space, fifty-eight of the one hundred Battlespheres simply could not go any further.  Her orb-mates speculated that some sabotage had been carried out.  Someone didn’t want them taking Gizmok, and they wondered who.  Still, Fire-Breth insisted they continue on, and they entered the utter black cold of infinite space, positive that those floog creatures would be no hindrance to their mighty forces.

*****

Watching their fleet hang dead in space, her Attackorb Lead-Soldier, LS Fendu-Wat clicked furiously at them, “This is only a small setback! This is normal.  Stay the course soldiers!”  He stared hard at the three of them, and then continued looking out the ports at what was going on.

Common-Soldier Premdor-Tok turned and raised his fist. “We are strong, we are the mighty kribbldabler detachment.” he spouted, trying to bolster his own resolve. All three soldiers began to click on about what their brave acts would be in the upcoming conquest.

One teammate with the rank of Common-Soldier, whose name she’d forgotten, also stood taller, and boasted he’d personally blast any floog that stood in his way.  “I will overrun their villages, round them up and present these carssinfiem to the Struulkor for disposal!  They will recognize my bravery and promote me to Lead-Soldier in no time!” he announced. 

“Not without the help of my great leadership!” Lead-Soldier Fendu-Wat laughed, “But you can try!  If you can do that, I will personally recommend it.” 

Acting engineer, CS Premdor-Tok clicked his own boast, and then turned to CS Joh-Peah, “and what about you, Common-Soldier?  What will you do to further the great cause?”

Joh-Peah stood frozen for a moment, so unexpectedly put on the spot that her mind was suddenly blank.  What could she do, or say? She opened her mouth and began clicking at them, while imagining anything she could think of that might be appropriate.  

“Yes!  I will … I will … run them down … burn their hovels … my laser will … will … burn through everything!”  She swallowed hard, hoping she sounded like them, all united as one.  She hoped fervently that they could not detect the falseness of her statements.  She had many plans in her head, but none of them included burning and pillaging.

CHAPTER 1.

Like a spring wound too tight, Supreme-Captain Tikkard-Ka did a slow, controlled burn, as his kribbldabler fleet valiantly tried to coax their orbs to respond.  Nothing was working.  They were suspended, helpless in space.  He’d already ordered his engineer to examine the drive again to make absolutely sure no more tampering had been done.   Of the mighty fleet that had arrived on the Struulkor planet a week ago to practice, only a paltry twenty-eight orbs were left untouched.  Whoever had done this had also managed to disable fifty-eight Struulkor Battlespheres.  

The internal comms were down.  He couldn’t even message any of the orbs to pass commands or instructions.  He hoped that the others had followed suit in checking their drives, and somebody could come up with an answer.  It was imperative that some solution presented itself.  

He couldn’t believe that after all the effort, the training, and the dedication of his troops, their war machines were not only decimated in number, but now also hanging here, helpless, unable to go farther. Unbelievable!  The only comfort he had was that the five floog Ketters and a very small Runner, that had been following them from Kruptaar, were also hanging there dead.  That, at least cheered him a bit.

He could see Gizmok in the viewport, a beautiful glowing purple and turquoise sphere just waiting for them.  As he looked longingly at the planet, willing his fleet to move again, he saw something that chilled him.  The rest of the floog fleet were headed their way from the planet.  He could see them now as far away glints heading in their direction.  Unless they could get the weapons arrays back online, the invasion was over before it had even begun.

A voice clicked from the other side of the orb.  “SC Tikkard-Ka!  I see some movement …” there was a pause, and Tikkard-Ka waited to hear the rest, “… but it is not one of ours!”

“How are they moving?  They were just as disabled as we were!” exclaimed the captain, as he moved to look out the opposite viewport from where he’d been standing.  He stared hard, willing some answer to come to him from out there.  He could see that it was the little Runner, and it sidled up to a Ketter.  They were docking with each other.  Somebody on the little craft had found an answer!  He turned to the engineer again, just as the kribbldabler rose up from the conduit under the floor, where he’d still been poking around.  

“Our drive is completely intact.  Even the thicacitrate is still locked in place.  There should be full power to all arrays!”

“That may be, but whatever is stopping us,”  Tikkard-Ka indicated the enemy outside, “.. they have the same problem!  And it looks like they have found an answer.  What is it?”  The engineer could only stare helplessly at his captain.

They continued to watch, as one by one, the Ketters began moving again.  The Runner had docked with each one in turn.  They had the answer to the mystery, but the captain was pretty sure they wouldn’t be sharing it with the invading fleet.

One of the kribbldablers was beginning to gasp, fighting to suck air into his air-sacs.  Was the atmospheric module also not working?  He hadn’t even thought of that yet, so focused was he on the approaching enemy.  

“Quickly, check the Atmod!  Is it still on?”  He commanded the bridge monitor.  The monitor checked, tapped a few keys and pulled a toggle.  

“No!  We have diminishing atmosphere!  We are slowly running out of air!  Those rotten floog!”  

Tikkard-Ka knew then, it was over.  He began to feel the effects of the compromised atmosphere now as well, and slid to the floor, breathing heavily.  There was a good chance they’d die before any floog ever reached their orb.  Maybe it was better this way.

Before long the large fleet of Ketters approached, and began docking with and boarding the Attackorbs and Battlespheres.  There were more than enough to round everyone up.  It was just a matter of time before his own command would be breached.  The three other soldiers that were with him began making plans.  Their hand weapons still worked, at least they thought so.  It was hard to check, since firing a weapon inside a small orb was a little dangerous.  But, once the floog came on board, air or no air, they’d fight.  There would be nothing left to lose.

Eventually, it was their turn, as a boarding tube was attached to the outside of the airlock.  The captain was not sure how they’d been able to fit their tube to the configuration of his orb’s opening, but it didn’t matter now.  They been able to do it and invade his space.  He, and the others lay on the floor, weak and gasping.  Two had pulled up their weapons, vowing to die before they’d be taken.

As the first floog trooper entered wordlessly, they both fired their lasers, without result.  Even the weapons would not work.  Tikkard-Ka began to laugh weakly at the irony, as he lay there, waiting to be picked up like so much garbage.  He continued to laugh all the way through the boarding conduit, as a trooper carried him through to wherever it was they’d dump him.

He found himself on some sort of pallet, and something was placed over his nose and mouth.  A sweetish-tasting air flowed into his air-sacs and he sucked at it greedily.  The enemy were kinder than he would have been under the same circumstances, but they weren’t so foolish as to let him keep his weapon.  That was gone, and he wondered if it would work, now that it was away from his Attackorb.  No matter.  This weakness of being kind could work to his advantage.  Fire-Breth had taught them well.  Kindness was weakness, and they could exploit it.

*****

In his own Attackorb, it was getting harder for pilot Dakka-Teev to breathe.  Oxygen was getting thin because even the Atmod had stopped working.  Everything had shut down at about fifty-thousand segmarqks from the planet Gizmok.  The mystery was so far unsolvable, and they now lay helpless. 

They had seen the floog fleet coming a while ago.  By the time they arrived, rescue would be a blessing because he, along with the other three kribbldablers with him in the orb just wanted to breathe.  He could only guess at what would happen next.  It wasn’t anything like the plans he’d had in his head when this all began.  

Then the floog were suddenly on board.  When had that happened?  He must have blacked out for a while.  Someone picked him up.  It was strange, being carried.  His eyes rolled a bit as he tried to focus on the ceiling passing overhead.  It made him dizzy and he closed them, not caring anymore what was happening to him.  Maybe they were going to push him out into the cold death of space.  His body would float, frozen forever, orbiting around a planet he had at one time been willing to overrun to get for himself.  It would somehow be fitting, he thought.

When he next came to, Dakka-Teev found himself lying on a gurney with a conveyer of some sort fitted over his nose and mouth, and he was sucking at air that was sweet to breathe.  It was different even from what he was used to on Friggerkeld.  A floog stood next to him, squeezing something near his nose and mumbling something unintelligible.  So, it was not the frozen expanse of space he’d be facing after all.  Cold comfort, since the next obvious thing would be prison.  Well, at least he’d be firmly planted on Gizmok, just not quite the way he’d imagined.

*****

Joh-Peah did not want to arrive on Gizmok like this.  Living as a prisoner of war on a planet she’d long desired to be a part of was not the way she’d intended it to be.  She noticed the engineer, Premdor-Tok exiting a conduit, finished with his fruitless hunt for anything amiss, and made a sudden decision.  

“Leave that cover off.  I intend to hide in the conduit.  I will not be a prisoner of the floog!”  

Premdor-Tok stared at her, “You will die like an ikkor in its burrow!”  The others agreed.  

“Do you really think that they will not destroy our entire fleet, the moment they have us on board their own vessels.  Our magnificent Attackorbs will be blasted into a cloud of metal dust, and you with them!” they clicked at her in fear.  

Joh-Peah did not back down.  Better dead than living as a prisoner of war on a planet where she longed to be free.  Finally, LS Fendu-Wat allowed her what she wanted, 

“Very well, do what you wish.“ he shook his head,  “We will all die eventually.”  But all of them promised not to reveal where she was.

It was getting harder to breathe.  Oxygen was getting thin now, so she needed to hurry before she passed out.  She pulled off her military tunic and flattened her wings up against her back.  Pulling the article of clothing back on over them, she crawled into the conduit and pulled the cover in after herself.   It was a tight fit, but her small, slim body managed to clear most of the pipes, wires and fittings that jutted out into the passage.  She was happy that she’d thought to cover her gossamer wings before crawling in here.  They would have been ripped to shreds by all the protrusions around her.

CHAPTER 2.

‘THE INVASION THAT NEVER WAS!’ screamed all the headlines.  The story broke on the news feeds of every communicator and public monitor in the city of Awatto.  The inhabitants, the floog stared at them in disbelief.  Some had previously had an inkling of something very disastrous coming, but the panic of it all had been successfully managed by the government.  

It was confirmed, the Struulkor, along with a large recruitment of kribbldablers had attempted to take their planet.  Indirectly, the hu-man, Lewis had a hand in uncovering the plot.  Lewis himself down-played it.  Sheer coincidence, was all he would say.  But it did bolster the admiration the floog already had for him and his Grandfather Ethan, who’d been a hero to them in his youth on Gizmok.

At the spaceport, Lewis watched as line after line of Struulkor, and  kribbldablers shuffled past on their way to the hastily constructed units that would serve as their prison.  More solidly-built housing was underway nearby, but until they were done, the invaders had to be incarcerated somewhere.  Thank heaven for forcefields, thought Lewis.  They come in handy.  

He watched with interest as the kribbldablers came into view, and wondered if the one that he’d caught in the field between the spaceport and the Strekkem Cliffs was among them. But he finally gave up looking; they all looked the same to him.  The only difference he could see was that some of them had long, thin wings.  

He turned to a trooper who stood by, monitoring the line, and asked, “What’s the difference between the winged and the wingless kribbldablers?”

“The winged ones are their females, young hu-man.” The trooper replied.  Lewis nodded and thanked him.  Of course.  The ice blue coloured creatures still reminded him of a praying mantis/lizard cross.  He noticed that the winged ones had a slightly different cast to their colour that leaned more to a mauve or pale lilac. And then he noticed something even stranger; the blue ones, the males had two pairs of arms instead of a single pair like the females. It was another thing to add to his knowledge of this fascinating galaxy.

Finally, he turned away, ready to return to the haven of Torkon’s home to join his grandfather and great-grandparents.  It was all behind them now; the theft charges for Great-Grandfather Xerix’s taking of the saucer to come to Earth to get his Grampa Ethan out of trouble, the attempted kidnapping that had inadvertently brought Lewis to Kruptaar, and become a prisoner of the Struulkor, the escape and rescue, and everything in between.  It had been a difficult and, at the same time an exhilarating week.  He was pretty sure that Xerix and Qantuu, his mate, who were still staying with Torkon, Grampa’s friend, were more than ready to go home.  Torkon had successfully defended his great-grandparents at their trial.  For them it was time to leave.

Luckily the town of Rix was fairly close to the capital, Awatto, where they were now.  Before going home Qantuu had insisted, she wanted to show off her capital city to Lewis, the way she’d shown Grampa around as a kid, while Xerix was on a mission.  He could tell that his Krikkel-na was very proud of her capital.  So, to please her, a tour was next on the agenda for tomorrow.

*****

Joh-Peah shifted her body carefully in the narrow maintenance conduit of the orb.  There was only a very constricted space between the inside bulkhead and the outer skin of the machine.  But it was enough for her needs.  She hoped she wouldn’t have to stay there long.  The other three fighters who’d occupied the orb with her, decided to take their chances with the floog, but she was thankful of their promise not to disclose her presence.  

From the movements and sounds, she’d heard the floog troops coming on board, and from the receding voices, followed by silence, she knew that the orb was empty, save her, hidden in the conduit.  Suspended in space she’d waited for the impact of lasers or cannon to hit the orb to destroy it.  She’d prepared herself for that with steely resolve.  It never came.  What did follow was the silence and a gentle pulling sensation.  The orbs had been tractored to Ketters, and taken to Gizmok to be impounded.

Now, on what she presumed was a flight field or flat area of some kind, she waited, wedged in her space.  She didn’t know what she’d find when she could finally emerge.   There had been voices passing by where she lay hidden, floog, excited about what had happened, Struulkors cursing, kribbldabler’s whining.  She was waiting for quiet, so she could make her escape.  For a while now, sounds had filtered in to where she lay, telling her that there had been lots of activity around their landed craft, but finally it grew more and more still.  She would wait until she heard nothing for a good stretch, then extricate herself from the conduit and check to see if it was dark yet.  

She really had no idea what part of the day it was on Gizmok,  she’d lost track of time at some point.  But, she thought that leaving the orb while it was dark would give her the best chance of getting away without being seen.  She only hoped that there wouldn’t be a lot of outside lights on where she was.

While Joh-Peah waited, she mulled her options over and over in her head.  She still knew so little of what the situation was outside, but she was ready for anything.  For now, the big thing was getting away from here.  The rest she’d have to deal with as it came.  

Finally, after what seemed like hours, she edged out of the space like a glippafle squeezes out of its cocoon, and peered out of the viewport.  It was pitch dark outside, and that cheered her to no end.  She needed the dark for cover.

Very carefully, she cracked the exit door and looked around.  No one in sight.  Good.  Without fully opening the hatch, she slid out and dropped to the ground.  Still in the clear.  Looking around, she gauged which way she should go.  She could see the spaceport’s lights in the distance, at one end of what looked like a side landing strip, where she found herself.  In the opposite direction there was only darkness, and she headed for that, keeping low to the ground.  Her feet felt the pavement end and then, some sort of growth under them.  She knew that she’d reached the outer edge of the spaceport facility.  She kept going, running now, towards whatever future she could find for herself.

*****

Lewis and Grampa Ethan, with Grampa’s adoptive parents Xerix and Qantuu acting as tour guides, strolled leisurely through the streets of Awatto. Xerix pointed out the more well-known sites as they came into view.  

“See that?” Xerix stopped at a statue of a strange looking thing that Lewis couldn’t make head or tail of.  “That is the Great Awattor, the one that has given our capital city its name!”

“The Great Awattor?” Lewis looked at the effigy.  “What kind of an animal is that?”  

Grampa laughed, “It’s much like our mythical dragon or unicorn on Earth.  Although, I’m beginning to question that ‘mythical’ status our dragons have.  If the Struulkor really did come to Earth millennia ago, it would explain a lot.”  

Lewis shook his head, remembering what he’d seen during his time recently on Kruptaar.  “I wonder if they would have had the technology to go to Earth that far back in their history.  They should have been much more advanced now, if they had the ability to come to Earth already back then.”

Lewis took a good look at the statue.  It was a strange-looking beast; two heads, an oddly shaped body, a tail wrapped around itself, and one clawed appendage holding a cluster of something that looked like grapes.

He’d seen some strange things already, his first week here.  A few days ago he’d still been on another planet, Kruptaar, taken accidentally during an illicit pickup that was part of a failed kidnapping plot.  He’d seen real dragons, big ones and little ones, that seemed to be two different variations of the same species, one called Struulkor and the other, duuggars.  The duuggars were pretty friendly; not so much those big Struulkor.  They were bad-tempered and a little power hungry.

In spite of them and the kribbldablers trying to invade Gizmok, a lot of things saved the floog planet, including some new inventions, a very clever duuggar, and a lot of arrogance on the part of the Struulkor.  Lewis could hardly believe he’d been a small part of all that.  The good thing about it was that he’d made some really good friends, even the renegade duuggar smuggler, Snogger Granx.  He hoped to go back to Kruptaar under better circumstances to have a proper visit.

Lewis wondered how Snoggs was coming along.  The crazy little smuggler he’d befriended had been the one who inadvertently brought him to Kruptaar, but Snogger Granx had made up for it by disabling over half of the invading fleet.  Surprisingly, the scrappy little smuggler was quite smart, almost a genius with electronics and mechanics.  He’d also discovered an unexpected use for the mineral lumps they’d stolen from the engines of the kribbldabler’s orbs to disable them.  He discovered that the mineral,  thicacitrate, that powered the Attackorbs, allowed them a measure of protection from the floog NECCAS disrupter device that had stopped the entire fleet in its tracks.  Now he had been recruited as an engineer-in-training with the Special Security Forces, the SSF.  It was a high honour for  a duuggar, considered a lowly, worthless being on his own planet.  But SSF Head, Tempok had seen his potential, and been willing to take the chance.

Lewis found it hard to believe he’d only been here for less than two weeks.  But then he had to remember that a Gizmok week lasted ten days, not the seven he was used to.  They were longer too; there were thirty-two hours in a day here, and sometimes he’d been dog-tired well before the day was done.

Xerix checked his comm.  “I have an appointment with Tempok at hour ten.  I have told him about my little long-range communication device, the reconfigured expitran that I made for you and your family, E-fan.  They are very interested in it.”

“I knew they would be.” said Grampa Ethan.  “The minute I found out the fleet couldn’t contact Gizmok from as far out as Kruptaar, I thought of the expitran.”

Xerix left for his appointment, and Qantuu continued to act as guide through her capital city, pointing at things with pride to her great-grandson.  As they walked, they enjoyed the relaxed atmosphere.  Now that the threat of a Struulkor invasion was gone, they talked of all the new developments that had resulted from that failed attack.  

“I think I’d like to drop in on Snoggs, if that’s allowed.” said Lewis.  “I’m really wondering how he’s doing, and if he’s adjusting.  He’s a pretty independent little guy, and it might be a big change for him.”

“If you speak to your Krikkon-da, Loo-iss, I am sure he would be able to arrange something.” Qantuu assured Lewis.  After the debacle of their criminal charges and the trial had ended favourably, Xerix was again considered a valued member of the scientific and military community.  

“I’ll do that Krikkel-na, thanks.” Lewis smiled at his great-grandma, still a little in awe of the feistiness of the old floogel.  

They wrapped up the excursion with a meal in one of the many eateries that dotted the business district.  Lewis ate his fill, and, being the energetic young man that he was, never gave a thought to his waistline.  Unlike his grampa, who was beginning to feel the extra weight of the stronger gravity of Gizmok.  No such problems for Lewis, though.  He had plans for tonight; a get together with friends he’d made in the last week back on Gizmok, who’d wanted to hear all about his adventures on Kruptaar.  In a strange way, they’d been envious of his exciting experiences, even though the thought of a Struulkor left them terrified.

The next day Xerix and Qantuu left for home, anxious to get back to their normal lives. Lewis and Ethan would follow later, when they’d finished seeing and experiencing all they could in the capital city.  Xerix had inquired about Lewis paying a visit to his friend, Snoggs in the barracks, and found it was possible.  He looked forward to it.

CHAPTER 3.

Common-soldier-Pilot Dakka-Teev sat in his temporary cell, wondering about the choices he’d so recently made.  He’d loved the pilot training he’d gone through.  Flying those orbs through the expanse of space had been a freeing experience.  He’d listened to speeches telling him and the other recruited kribbldablers with him about the stupid little floog creatures.  They really didn’t deserve this wonderful planet, Gizmok.  They were just a waste of space, silly little things that had no idea of what they had and what to do with their world.  

It all seemed a little off now, judging from what he’d experienced since.  The floog had been kind, and their security forces were impressive.  They weren’t stupid at all.  They’d been precise, organized, highly trained, and above all, well disciplined.  It had surprised more than one kribbldabler that there had been every effort to save lives, rather than destroy.  Those Ketters had been well able to blast each and every one of them to little bits of nothing.  He knew this now, and so did a lot of his troop mates.  Surprisingly, some of them were still more than willing to shoot a floog, had they possessed a weapon.  He couldn’t anymore, not after his experience on the Ketter they’d transferred him to.  

Finding himself looking at his enemy, desperately trying to revive him had opened his eyes, after he’d come near death through suffocation.  The alien had sat by him the whole flight back to Gizmok.  He’d had such kind eyes, like he’d cared about whether Dakka-Teev lived or died.  A real enemy wouldn’t do that, neither would a stupid, unintelligent creature.  Dakka-Teev was starting to think that maybe he’d been lied to.

*****

Lewis found his way back to Torkon’s apartment with ease now, after his evening out with friends.  At first he’d had to go with either Fudok, Torkons cook/butler, but he quickly familiarized himself with the Awatto neighbourhood near the spaceport where Torkon lived.  From a window, Lewis could watch space saucers, the flambatixii zipping in and out of the port.  He never tired of the sight.  It was like living in a real-life sci-fi adventure.  When he thought about it, he realized, there was no ‘it was like’ about it, he actually was.

Now, as he made his way home, he thought about the great young floog he’d met and become friends with.  Much like Zigmin, Grampa’s close boyhood friend, floog on the cusp of adulthood like he was, found that making friends and connections early in life always enhanced their lives.  He felt richer for it, and wondered how it would all work once he went home.  He’d miss these guys.

To his left he heard a sharp gasp, and turned towards the sound.  In the shadows, where one building didn’t quite line up with the next, he saw something, a reflection of light, coloured a pale mauve.  He peered closer, trying to make out what he was looking at.  

“Please ..” A click-whispering came from the shadows, “what are you? … don’t hurt me … ”  There was a pause, then, “.. I’m so hungry.” 

“What?” Lewis couldn’t make out what he was looking at. “Come out, I won’t hurt you.  Come …”  he said as gently as possible, and held his hand out.  Slowly the thing stepped out into more light and Lewis’s jaw dropped.  It was a kribbldabler, a female with the wings, dressed in the same uniform as the ones he’d seen at the spaceport.

“How did you get here?” he asked the creature, again thankful he’d left his translator stuck in his ear.  “Did you say you were hungry?”  

The kribbldabler nodded her head, and clicked, “You frightened me terribly with  your strange form, and I couldn’t help but make a noise.”  She again repeated the last question, “What are you?”