Razing Pel (6 page)

"Good Kaj!"  Phos yelled over
as he was reloading his pistol.  "Keep going!"

Kaj listened to Phos and proceeded
to climb to the next platform.  As he did, the swarm of
creatures dove at Kaj.  One creature disbanded from the group,
snatching Kaj up.  The creature held onto Kaj from under his
arms as he flew over the dark hole.

"Ahhh!" Kaj yelled.  "Phos!
 Help me!"

Phos turned his attention to the
distressed Kaj.  He was squirming and kicking as the creature
was flying around.  The creature flew by over the dark hole,
releasing Kaj. He screamed as he fell, holding his dagger tightly
against himself.

He didn't know what to do.
 Phos could only think of one thing to save the young Daj.
 He aimed his pistol carefully at Kaj.  Once he got the
right shot, he fired.  The laser bullet struck the blade of
Kaj's dagger.  The force of the bullet pushed Kaj out from
under the dark hole, slamming him against the cave wall.  He
fell on his stomach, lying there motionless.

"Kaj!" Phos yelled from across the
cave.  "Kaj!"  He was wondering if he was alive.
 Phos continued to fire at the winged creatures.

Kaj squirmed around on the ground,
holding his stomach as it was in pain.  He slowly lifted up
his shirt and saw that an imprint of the blade burned itself onto
his skin.  Kaj slightly touched the burn mark, feeling that it
was still warm.

As Phos continued to fight off the
winged brutes while trying to make his way over to Kaj, a familiar
screeching sound filled the cave.  It echoed off the walls,
stunning the winged creatures.  Phos lowered his weapon as the
flying enemies flew off.  He looked around, trying to find
where the sound was coming from.  Peering down the dark hole,
Phos could hear the sound at a greater speed.  Phos instantly
knew what creature they were about to face.

"Kaj!" He yelled across the cave
again.  "Kaj!  You have to get up!  You have to get
out of here!"

Kaj slowly rose from the floor,
putting one hand one the cave wall as he struggled to fight through
the pain.  He watched as the winged creatures flew off.
 The screeching appeared again.  Covering his ears, he
tried to remember where he heard that sound before.
 Pin-pointing the sound of the screech, he recalled hearing it
just before his shuttle crashed.

"The Oce!"  Kaj yelled out
from across the cave.  He knew they were both in trouble.
 Looking over at Phos, he motioned Kaj to continue to climb
and to escape out of the cave as quickly as possible.

He leaped up onto the next
platform, not taking his time like he was before, leaving his
dagger behind.  Kaj looked over to see Phos scurry up the
platform as well.  As he continued to climb, Kaj found a
smaller sub-cave.  He went inside to explore, not finding
much.  Waving his hand out the cave entrance, Phos knew where
to stop.

The screeching returned, prompting
Phos to hurry up.  He quickly made it up to the sub-cave that
Kaj was hiding in.

"Get back," Phos whispered.
 They both headed towards the back of the sub-cave, still
being able to see out into the larger area they were just
in.

Both with their backs on the wall,
they waited.  Kaj was frightened as he would face the same
creature that ruined his first plan at getting to United City.
 The screeching sound was heard again, this time louder than
ever.  They both watched in horror as a single long giant
black leg emerged from the dark hole.  It rested itself on one
of the platforms.  Five more similar legs rose out from the
dark hole, each also resting on the cave platforms.  A large
single head with six white eyes appeared from out of the dark hole.
 Both Kaj and Phos tried to see the creature better, but it
was too dark.  The creature twirled its head around the whole
cave, not spotting the two.

Phos then quietly reached into his
bag and pulled out some kind of drill.  "Watch the front,"
Phos instructed Kaj.  "I'm gonna dig us out of
here."

He turned on the drill, the blade
spinning silently.  It was glowing a faint blue color.
 Touching the blade against the rock, it ripped through it
like it was nothing.  As he forcefully pushed the drill
against the rock, he busted through to another cave hallway.
 He turned off the drill and placed it back in his
bag.

"Come on Kaj," Phos said as he
went into the cave hallway.  "Let's go before it spots us."
 Both darted down the cave hall, the Oce not paying any
attention to them.

"There," Kaj pointed as he saw the
cave exit up ahead.  They both sighed out in
relief.

Running out the cave, the taste of
sand filled their mouths again.  Taking off their glasses,
Phos put them back in his bag.  They both stood there for a
few seconds, letting all the fear they just went through escape
them.

"Where does the map say we go
next?"  Asked Kaj.

Phos didn't answer.  He
simply started walking forward, with Kaj following right
behind.

CHAPTER EIGHT

THE TRUTH BEHIND IT ALL

"If I'm right, United City should
be right behind this hill," Phos said, inspecting the map as he and
Kaj slowly traveled up the hill.  "I can't believe we made it
with so much time to spare."  The two headed up the hill,
digging their feet into the sand each step they took.  Phos
couldn't wait to see the city.  The excitement that he held in
him was overwhelming.

As they made it to the top of the
hill, Phos expected to see a blooming city.  But instead, lay
the remains of a Galactic Soldier's ship.  Different from the
shuttles that they transported Kaj in, it was a fully fledged ship
that Galactic Soldiers would use for space travel and
combat.

"What is this?" Phos whispered to
himself.  He held the map up to his face.  The location
that they were at was exactly where the picture of Untied City was.
 "The map is wrong.  It's too late."

Kaj slowly followed up as he was
just finishing conquering the hill.  He heard Phos going on
about how the map was wrong.

Phos violently crumbled up the map
and slammed it on the ground.  The wind kicked the map over to
Kaj.  He slowly bent over and retrieved it. Unraveling the
map, Kaj inspected it, making sure that Phos was reading it right.
 He studied at the location that they were supposedly at.
 Nothing seemed to be wrong with that.  He looked around
the corners of the map, trying to see if any dates or marks were
present.

"What's this?" Kaj whispered to
himself.  He saw, at the top of the map, a very faded date.
 A date which was far behind the date today.  "Phos, look
at this."  Kaj walked over to Phos, showing him the date that
was on the map.  "This map is old.  Very old.  No
wonder that Daj never made it to United City.  He was
constantly walking around in circles."

Phos snatched the map out of Kaj's
hand.

"So, like that Daj was, we've been
circling around here as well," Phos said to Kaj.  Kaj nodded
his head.  "Dammit!  Dammit, dammit, dammit!"  Phos
stomped his mechanical foot around in the sand.  He did not
hesitate to rip up the map into little shreds, tossing it into the
air.  He turned to Kaj.  "Now what?"

Kaj looked over at the crashed
Galactic Soldier's ship.

"Why don't we search the ship,”
Kaj suggested to Phos.  "Those Galactic Soldier's in that ship
were probably heading to United City.  They must have been
using a current map to get there."

"Yes, we'll search the ship," Phos
said.  "Hopefully there are supplies in there to help us out."
 He headed down the hill, with Kaj following right behind
him.

"I wonder what happened here?" Kaj
said to himself.  Smoke was still escaping from the top of the
ship.  Sparks were popping around the exterior.

They both approached the
triangular ship.  Walking around it once, trying to find the
door in, they paid attention to the constructive detail.  As
they approached the door, Phos tried opening it.  Locked.
 He pulled out his pistol and fired one shot at the handle.
 The door flew open.  They both headed inside.  It
was very dark.  Inside, the ship was huge.

"This is extraordinary," Kaj said,
looking around the ship.

"Yep, this is what I used to drive
almost every day," Phos said, walking around the ship, bringing
back memories from when he served with the Galactic Soldiers.
 "This sure brings back a lot of memories for me.  I miss
it."

While walking around the ship,
Phos gathered supplies that they might need - water in containers,
a few pistols, some stale food.  He stuffed the supplies into
his bag without letting Kaj know.

"Find anything Kaj?" Phos yelled
over to him.  Kaj was opening up some chests that were stored
in the back of the ship.

He knelt down, opening the first
chest.  A green light came on, letting him see the contents
inside the chest.  As he looked around, it appeared as though
the chest was filled with armor plates.

"Not really," he yelled back over
to Phos.  He stood up, finding his way over to Phos.
 "What do you think happened to the pilots?"  

"That's what I wanna know," Phos
said, continuing to search through the ship.  "Come, let's
head into the pilot's room."  Kaj followed close behind,
trying not to get lost in the dark.

They headed up to the pilot's
room.  A tall silver door stood in front of them.  The
door was locked also.  Again, Phos shot off the handle,
letting the two of them enter the room.

In front of the two were two pilot
seats, which were facing forward, and a large windshield with weird
symbols displayed all around it.  Kaj and Phos could see the
top of two Galactic Soldier helmets sticking up from the seat.
 Both of them walked over to one seat, spinning the chair
around.

Both of them jumped back from the
frightful sight.  Two Galactic Soldier's sat in a bloody mess.
 Blood was present all across their chest plates.

Phos pulled out a little light,
turning it on, inspected the two soldiers.

"Hold this," Phos said, handing
Kaj the light.  Phos went up to one of the Galactic
Soldiers.

"Gross," Kaj said as he shined the
light on the human face. "What's wrong with him?"

The face of the human was
disfigured.  His mouth hung open, letting his tongue droop
out.  Dried blood was present under his nose.  As Kaj
moved the light up, he expected to see eyeballs.  Instead, Kaj
was shining the light through the empty eye sockets, revealing the
back of the human's skull.

"Where are his eyes?" Kaj asked
Phos.  "What happened to him?"  Kaj shined the light
further up, showing that the human's short hair was very patchy.
 Phos hovered his hand over the soldier's head, grabbing a
chunk of hair.  It came off his head with ease.

Phos went over to the other
Galactic Soldier.  He had the same effects as the other
soldier.  Phos again grabbed the human's hair, resulting in
the same outcome.

"I don't understand what happened
to these men," Phos said, walking around the chairs, inspecting the
dashboard.  He then went back around to view the pilots again.
 "There doesn't seem to be any struggle.  As for the
blood, it looks as though they threw it up."

As the two were still inspecting
the bodies, they suddenly heard something scurry around.  They
both snapped their heads in the direction that they heard the
sound.

"What was that? Kaj whispered.
 He shined the light over in the direction of the
sound.

Phos snatched the light out of
Kaj's hand, slowly walking away from him.  He peered out the
doorway, making sure nobody was hiding around.

Turning back to Kaj, he said,
"Let’s find the map and get out of here as quickly as possible."
 He tossed the light back over to Kaj.  Phos pulled out
another one for himself.  "You search the downstairs part of
the ship.  I'll search up here."

They both headed off.  Kaj
walked to the back of the ship, finding a small pair of stairs that
led down.  He followed them down, hearing the scurried sound
again.  Stopping midway on the stairs, he shone the light
around.  Still nothing.  Kaj continued down the steps,
into the lower part of the ship.  Shining the light around, it
was a very short hallway that seemed to lead into a larger room.
 He slowly walked down the hallway, keeping the light in front
of him.

Kaj then heard something fall down
in the room ahead of him.  "Who's there?"  He said out
loud.  No response.  He continued forward, anxiously
waiting for something to pop out and scare him.