PrologueA Chapter by Henry Back story to the main villains, describes their lives, how they came to be traveling together, and their journey to Earth. Prologue Grand Palace, Pisquiht
May 15, 1573 (General TimeI)
“Dad, why do you have to leave so often? It gets so scary here, alone...on the planet!”
Mistinor, the lad’s father, was lord of Pisquiht, if now only in title by heritage. Ever since the evacuation due to major erosion and consequently crop failure several years ago, he and Bobin, his six-year-old son, had been the only ones to choose to stay because of his title and the fact that he didn’t feel like shipping his castle piece by piece to Ugglimowa, Pisquiht’s sister planet which everyone had ended up flocking to, or buying a new one on the planet. Obstinately he chose to stay on his home planet and had to fly to Ugglimowa for everything.
The man, who was, in fact, 369 years of age (though that was barely middle-aged by Pisquihtian standards), gave his son a comforting smile. “Oh, come on, Bobin, you won’t be completely alone. You’ve got Arsken and Lobylliah to keep you company.” Arsken was the palace’s butler and Lobylliah the extremely obese chef, as all good chefs are.
Bobin groaned. “Arsken is too old to be fun, and Lobylliah always smothers me with her hugs!”
Mistinor smiled reassuringly one more time as he prepared to leave. “I’m sure you’ll have a good time. Anyway, maybe you could make a welcome home banner or something for Mom. She did say tomorrow, so it would be good to make something today if you’re going to. See you soon, Bob! Try to have fun!”
Bobin smiled weakly and waved good-bye. Mistinor’s wife, Irstelli, was actually a prisoner-of-war at the time, the war between the Tepstopphians and the Kyraglians, the Tepstopphians being her captors. As it happened, the two peoples had been at war for reasons that aren’t relevant enough to cause a need to thoroughly explain and bore you for five pages straight. Instead, you can be content with the fact that they were at war. Lady Irstelli had been on a diplomatic tour of the neighboring galaxy to the west, the Bueratong. After five weeks (one for each inhabited planet), she had made her return journey, which was supposed to take two days or so. Her timing, however, was very unfortunate, and only about an hour into the trip she ran into a mass of Kyraglian shuttles fleeing from the Tepstopphians, and subsequently was abducted by the observant and quite malicious Tepstopphian leader who was delighted with his lucky find.
As the queen of Pisquiht, though now all but a ghost planet, the Kyraglians, allies of both Pisquiht and Ugglimowa, would feel heavy contrition winning at the price of a royal ally. Therefore, they gave in to the demands of Shargralth, the Tepstopphian king, and consequently became Tepstopphian slaves in addition to watching Mistinor’s queen die by Shargralth’s malevolent and obviously quite treacherous hand.
Now, Shargralth and his forces made it quite overt that no one was to inform the Lord Mistinor or any other Pisquihtians or Ugglimowans, under penalty of Irstelli’s immediate death. Thus, it was only after being passed on by Ugglimowans who had to hear it broadcasted on international radio by the cackling villain himself that Mistinor heard of it, and though he had worried himself halfway to insanity already, when he heard of his wife’s death as a definite fact, he was completely devastated. Bobin, if possible, reacted even worse.
But, life went on. One month passed, two months, three months, and Mistinor got over it. With his faith and his wife’s in the Lord Jesus Christ, he didn’t have anything to worry about. Bobin, on the other hand, was another matter entirely. He held onto his mother’s death long after he should have-- one year, two years, five years. Even when he understood the concepts of Christianity after hearing it explained at church and by his father, he completely rejected it, yelling about his mom and how he was more powerful than anything else, any kind of deity, could be. For, in fact, it did seem so. The lad, as well as his father and all who immigrated to Ugglimowa, were utterly powerful. Their size could change at will, to any size, any size at all. Bobin knew what fleshly power was. He couldn’t imagine anything could be higher.
Even so, life was peaceful, and remained so for a good long while. A century passed, then two, then even three, in placid bliss. Still Bobin, even as a grown man, kept hold of thoughts of pride, of vengeance, of self-deification. He had been through school, all the way through university, in fact, and was not lacking in knowledge in the least--- just in wisdom. He would never be wise like his father.
By the 1920s, Mistinor was getting old. Not ancient and frail, but still a senior citizen, to be sure, in his 720s. Bobin, at nearly 350, built his own house on Pisquiht several miles from the palace grounds, living now independently of the father he had such contempt for. In this manner, inarticulate pleads exchanged for spiteful animosity, passed the 1920s, and the ‘30s, too. Mistinor had his fair share of friends on Ugglimowa who he spent time with more and more often, lonely with no wife and in a way no children. He never even considered remarriage, especially by now at his somewhat elderly age, so simple companionship did him for several years.
Then, in the 1940s, the peace ended. Shargralth, now in his late 500s, decided he wanted to kill Mistinor and all the rest of his family before he himself died. So, one night in 1943, he sent out men to murder several of Mistinor’s close family members, such as his two siblings, two nephews and four nieces, in their sleep. After finding out about this, all of Ugglimowa became irate (as did Mistinor and his chef and butler, you can be sure, in addition to Bobin), and a very fierce, bloody battle took place, the Pisquihtians (as all were of Pisquihtian blood, if not born on the planet) with their amazing powers, the Tepstopphians with recently-purchased insanely good technology as well as fair abilities of their own.
After six hours of bloody warfare, fourteen Pisquihtians had died, and so had nineteen Tepstopphians. Though the number was small, the Pisquihtians had the tendency to lose a lot of blood from changing size and all without dying from normally grievous wounds, so it was in fact probably more bloody in a literal sense than World War II, which was actually happening simultaneously on Earth. But of course after six hours the battle was still far from over. The Tepstopphians were losing, but not by much, and still hadn’t used a lot of attacks other than with their bodily abilities. Some of the Pisquihtians who had rather strategic minds, such as Mistinor, were becoming suspicious, when suddenly their opponents rallied their forces and retreated as a whole.
This aroused high suspicions from a select few who didn’t have enough time to persuade all the throngs and multitudes of Pisquihtians that this was too fishy to be real, as all those intelligent enough to be suspicious were also intelligent enough to realize the trap was too obvious not to be sprung quickly by the equally intelligent Tepstopphians. Thus, a miniscule group of thirty-two departed from the battle field, hasty although gloomy with the knowledge that their race was doomed. Sure enough, five giant missiles soon came down and wiped out all the thousands still in the general battlefield area. The thirty-two remaining Pisquihtians were laden with heavy grief for a long time. In fact, many of them were so immersed in their sorrow that they were completely oblivious to anything that was happening in the reality of life, which would be the downfall of many of them.
The downfall, in fact, came a mere two years later, in late 1945. The Tepstopphians, having heard about the few survivors, decided they had to wipe out every last Pisquihtian before their hate could be satiated. Thus, they came upon the mourning people much as they had done with Mistinor’s family, mercilessly and giving no chance whatsoever to their victims. Mistinor, Bobin, and five others, still alert, tried to warn those who hadn’t yet been slaughtered, but in vain. The mourners would have nothing but their mourning, complaining unjustly to any that tried to lead them elsewhere. Consequently only seven were left, and those became fugitives, rarely sleeping and only stopping in the most secluded places.
One by one, they were hunted down. After Spiera, the only female of the seven, was murdered, Mistinor, Bobin, and the only remaining member, Chalgortz, could see there was no hope left for the Pisquihtian race. It would die with the three companions.
Still, they evaded the Tepstopphians quite deftly for a long time. From 1948, when Spiera was killed, to 1959, they avoided all attacks and managed to survive. Then, in the summer of ’59, Shargralth, old and tired, led a few hundred of his men and all his Kyraglian slaves to Ugglimowa to stay. Mistinor, Bobin, and Chalgortz made a plan to steal one of the Tepstopphian shuttles and fly to Pisquiht. While the entirety of the plan would be too long to accompany this already lengthy prologue, basically the three got caught in the final stage, Chalgortz died protecting the king and prince, and the two were merely captured after swearing to serve Shargralth, who was bedridden and delirious and never told of the matter, and swearing also never to attempt to escape or anything of the sort. They both did so not in cowardice but in an attempt to preserve the race. Okay, Bobin really just did it to save his own hide, but Mistinor did it for preservation. Either way, it proved effective. A decade passed, the ‘70s came, and still the two were locked up, docile but well-treated. Both seemed content, but Mistinor was joyful while Bobin seemed always to be brooding.
In the mid 1970s, the Tepstopphians realized there had been some intermarriage between the Pisquihtians and Kyraglians, so a surge of massacre came again until, in 1977, it seemed all trace of the Pisquihtian bloodline was gone, other than Mistinor and Bobin, who had basically been placed on the back burner.
The 1980s came and went. Mistinor, though fit for his age, knew he was growing elderly at nearly 800 years of age. The 1990s brought with them a much-deserved freedom, at long last, from the malicious, relentless Tepstopphians with the death of Shargralth and the rise of a new army from a northern galaxy. In 1992, the Goralkeran army, by name, came from the Goralker galaxy, one bordering the Spalkzig to the south, which borders the Shagglar (which contained the twin planets, Kyraglia, and Tepstopph, among others) to the south, or rather, to Shagglar’s north.
The Goralkerans came to Tepstopph unexpectedly and ambushed it, within two days conquered it, and moved to Ugglimowa to make it a completely free world, which they did with ease. You see, Halastrom, king of Torovhe (a planet within the Goralker galaxy) had brought along with thirty million troops thirty million flamethrowers, which was completely unexpected in the realm of any Shagglarian warfare, and therefore caught the Tepstopphians off their guard. Of course, with such good, high-tech armor, they thought themselves invincible to such primitive technology and so only toyed with their opponents. Unfortunately, mere steel, which made up the majority of their armor, had a lower melting point than the superheated flames of the Goralkeran flamethrowers were hot, and consequently nearly three-fourths of the population had scalding metal welded to their skin for life. The rest, after witnessing this, gave in. These the Goralkerans took prisoner, along with those on Ugglimowa, who greatly feared a similar fate.
Thus, Kyraglians, now renamed the more fitting term Ugglimowans, ruled the planet in the Tepstopphians’ stead, and Mistinor and Bobin, the last surviving Pisquihtians, were free to do what they pleased once more. While Mistinor went once more to his castle on Pisquiht, Bobin quickly bought a good, expensive shuttle and headed to the Olfannoe galaxy, specifically to Girramon. No one quite knew why, but Mistinor suspected it had something to do with a plan he had been formulating during his thirty-three years of almost complete silence in imprisonment. Little did the lord of Pisquiht know...
Alavnia, Neptune
February 7, 1942 (GT)
“Your Majesty, come quickly! A strange object has appeared at your doorstep!”
The king gave an amused smile as he brought himself up from his throne. “All right, Raelek. Try not to excite yourself too much. It’s probably just a space rock or something.” Nevertheless, King Hakkirse didn’t hesitate to follow his royal messenger out of the palace. In the exact center of his doorstep, seemingly placed by an expert, lay some type of high-tech equipment of the kind that Neptune hadn’t even begun to think up. And since, in the Milky Way galaxy, the farther the planet from the sun, the more advanced it was, this was something indeed.
After several minutes of close scrutiny, the king announced, “I have no idea what this is. But, whoever can pry it open” (for it was sealed tight though it seemed there was some sort of deliberately crafted crack in the middle) “will receive the rank and duties of my right hand man.” Hakkirse’s old right hand man, Wirkick, had died in the line of duty only the previous day by testing wine sent thoughtfully from Pluto. Unfortunately, Neptune didn’t stand a chance in open battle against Pluto, so all the king could do now was resolve not to drink any Plutonian wine and hire a new right hand man. Hopefully, today.
As it turned out, Grullerax, Neptune’s champion, had opened it, not surprisingly. Thus, he became Hakkirse’s right hand man, though the king regretted it, for the man was always flirting with Lavyah, his wife. At least now they could see the inside of the contraption, though. When Hakkirse saw it, he was shocked. Inside was a light tan-skinned boy with three eyes and extremely bulky muscles, connected to an oxygen tube, a water tube, and a feeding tube, all collected from storage reserves within the container that took up the rest of the space.
The lad had skin like that of an Earthling, the king noted, but he was a giant by their standards and also had three eyes. Obviously, this was no Earthling. However, in compassion and because they didn’t yet have any children of their own (though Lavyah was pregnant at the time), he decided, if they could detach the boy from the device and bring him to consciousness, that he would raise him as a Neptunian.
To make a long story short, they did detach him, and he did gain consciousness. After realizing the child had most likely been brainwashed, as he didn’t remember anything of a past life, Hakkirse and Lavyah decided to name him Karrah, after her grandfather. Not Karrah Yelsin, as the king and queen were of the royal Yelsin line, but simply Karrah. It would be too controversial among the civilians of Neptune if they gave him everything of a noble. So, Karrah went to school for several years in Alavnia, disdained by all of the extremely rich kids because he was only adopted into a financially gifted, not to mention royal, family (though they neglected to add that inheritance was just as bad). Even so, Karrah went through classes with focus and diligence, bringing his mind only on getting through school and being able to earn his keep as a noble with a good job, since he knew he wouldn’t succeed Hakkirse. Even though his parents had never told him that Skirrek, his younger brother by ten years, would be the next king, he knew. No foreigner could ever become king of Neptune.
So, this went on through elementary school, middle and high school, and on to college, where he finally learned that, with his muscles and height, sports teams and bodybuilding programs would be the only places that wanted him, not exquisite companies of academics. Every job he got there only brought him contemptuous and derisive comments. After awhile, just to put bread on the table, he gave in and starting posing for Neptunian bodybuilding and exercise programs, even though he had to paint his skin green to look somewhat native. The only thing he liked about that was all the hot chicks he got to work with, who all complimented him and asked him if he wanted to get a bite to eat with them some time. Though they bored him after about two days, he eventually married more than half of them and lived in monotonous, though still existent, wealth.
For years he lived this way, bored out of his mind but quite well-off and surrounded by beautiful women and myriads of children he cared nothing for. Finally, when King Hakkirse turned eighty, he gave up the throne to Skirrek, his immature, belligerent son. Subsequently, Karrah decided he was fed up with Neptune, so he left, moved to Titan, and legally changed his name to Drostath O Faskille, or, in English, The Living Strength, breaking all ties to his family. Here he lived in serene contentment as a high school teacher for five years. But what was to come, he couldn’t have even begun to know...
Outskirts of Deity City, Girramon
June 23, 1982 (GT)
“Mommy! It’s the ice cream truck! Can I get some, please?”
“Now, Ellith, you know we can’t afford that all the time. We just got ice cream three days ago!”
Ellith sighed in despair. “I know, mommy, but...I wish we had more money. I am a princess...”
“We’re all princesses, darling. All those who abide by the law, anyway. All of us good folk.”
Girramon did have quite a strange culture, though built around a strange population. Let me explain. On Girramon, for some reason or another, 99.8%, or 499 out of every 500 people, were females. With a low population of only about 20,000 people, that left only about forty males. Now, the king, who was always selected as the closest living male to age eighteen after the current king dies, was the only one, by law and by religion, that any female was to have child by, though that was completely ridiculous. The reason for this was that the traditional religion of Girramon stated that the king was the one and only deity, and all were to worship him, and only by him could any good Girramonian child come forth. Accordingly, any child borne from another father, though that rarely happened, was deemed illegitimate, even though by the true God’s standards all of their “pure” children were in fact illegitimate.
Another crazy thing about Girramon was the names. No female name was good unless it had at least ten syllables. Ellith’s full name, for example, was twenty-one syllables and forty-nine letters long, though to put it here would be rather tedious to type and to read as well as virtually superfluous. Instead, I’ll tell you that Ellith and her family were deemed eccentric by their culture as they had a part of the .2% of the population; in other words, Ellith’s mother, Jandren (for short, of course) had had a second child that was male. Howrnicunnez, which, because most males were considered incompetent, was his full name, was only two at the time, while Ellith was already six (both going by General Time).
This was a strange thing, besides the fact that Howrnicunnez was a boy, because with 19,960 females, and nearly 12,000 sixteen or older (the age they were to start trying to have kids), most got a chance to try to have kids only once in their lifetime. I mean, if all goes according to plan, that’s another thirty-three years before you can try again. And, as the age to stop is usually forty, at forty-eight (at the very youngest) it’s not very likely you’ll still be in the rotation. Jandren, that lucky dog, had been picked at random at age twenty-three to take the place of a sick seventeen-year-old, and, lucky again, had successfully conceived for the second time.
In other words, she was one of the select few with multiple kids and one of the select few with a son. For the former, she was envied, and for the latter, shunned. Thus, the only reason she was even on the outskirts of Deity City was because of her still young age. The king put all of his wives in rising age order from the palace grounds and out. All those who grew during a former king (which, as the current king was fifty-five, was not altogether too many) lived apart from everyone else, scavenging for themselves. Jandren was thankful, at least, that that hadn’t happened to her yet. She had enough to deal with as it was.
But, as the years passed, Jandren, like everyone else, was pushed farther and farther away from Deity City to raise her children. By age thirty, she was in the midst of one of the smaller suburbs, Centertown, by name, because it was centrally located between Deity City and all of the very rundown, grubby cities, mostly for women from thirty-eight to forty, close to the end of their chance for a part in the rotation, and also for any grown men who decided to live with everyone else. Howrnicunnez, now nearly ten years old by General Time, already understood that this was to be his fate.
Surprisingly, he accepted it without too much sorrow or ire, but Ellith was quite indignant. She, for one, saw the culture for what it was: ridiculous and completely stupid. The thirteen-year-old girl, however, at an uncanny 5’11” and with no lack of muscle at any point, went about addressing it the wrong way: through violence. She was stronger than virtually everyone on the planet, including the king, who was weak and frail; because of the amount of sperm he had to release from his body, the body put all its efforts into producing it, which left him no energy for anything else. Consequently, he was vulnerable to any attacks, but he had so many priests guarding his palace that he had nothing to worry about. Ellith, knowing this, made no attempt to ambush the king, only to persuade other people. However, after being severely scolded several times and once even incarcerated for a few days after breaking someone’s leg, she subsided and became, at least in action, somewhat more docile.
Surreptitiously, on the other hand, she talked to her brother a lot, telling him how many more opportunities there were outside of Girramon, how boys were so much more respected, even more so than girls. She found that hard to believe herself, but once, her sixth grade teacher of geography, who was the ambassador of Girramon before the old king died, when he was too frail to do anything almost at all, told her of this. Treahva, that was her name, and she hadn’t said anything about male or female preferences except once when it slipped out during a brief history of a certain planet that had originally placed women equal with men, but had ended up stripping away women’s rights. When she embarrassedly told the class to forget about what she said, most of them obliged, all except Ellith, who had approached Treahva after class and asked about the forbidden subject. After prolonged begging and finally a bribe of seventy-five stralcaloorts (about forty-two dollars), which was her life savings, Treahva finally gave in enough to say that most cultures favored the males and gave them more opportunities. Ellith had thankfully given her seventy-five stralcaloorts the next day.
When Howrnicunnez found that she was in fact telling the truth, he thanked his sister over and over each day, never failing to do whatever she wished him to. Unfortunately, the only shuttles belonged to the king, and were as heavily guarded as he was. Howrnicunnez, forever patient, decided to wait until the right time arose.
During Ellith’s time in girlhood, it never came. Two and a half years passed, and the girl, grown beautiful beyond belief, drop-dead gorgeous to any male that caught sight of her, was not only, with her sixteenth birthday approaching, to live on Deity Castle grounds and soon get her chance to give child, but she was to be the king’s personal mistress, as his old one was thirty-nine and no longer as pretty as she had been twenty-two years ago when she had first been taken. Ellith was shocked, not only because the king was sixty-five and old enough to be her grandfather, but also because of the repulsive culture that she would have nothing of.
Therefore, the night before her sixteenth birthday, she snuck out of her temporary cottage, which was as close to the castle grounds as you could get, agilely climbed over the palace wall, and snuck into the palace grounds. Though the whole account would be too long for a mere prologue, she successfully stole a shuttle and flew off the planet with nothing more than a deeply gashed left arm. Howrnicunnez, she silently hoped to herself, would make it off someday, too.
Going at top speed, Ellith was able to evade any pursuit that the dazed and bewildered Girramonian guard might have given. After several hours of flying, she finally found a planet and landed, though not very well, on the surface, several yards from a building. The words over the doorway were foreign to her, but she stopped inside anyway, weary and hoping for a bed or some soft mats or something. What she found was a diner. With slightly exaggerated effort she plopped herself down on one of the stools in front of the counter.
“Hey, beautiful, can I get you somethin’?” a worker, in fact, the only one there, as it was very late at night on that particular planet, asked her.
Too tired to be annoyed by the flattery, she nodded. “Yeah, whatever’s the strongest drink you have, I want a lot of it.”
The worker, somewhat surprised but not stunned, got to work on that order. Meantime, two men, the only other customers in the diner, kept looking over at her and pointed occasionally, though trying to be inconspicuous. The man with his back to her nodded several times, though at first somewhat dubiously, and eventually the one facing her, wearing a hat and a gloomy-looking cloak, smiled, though the feature was almost indistinguishable to her, and squeezed the other one’s left shoulder. By the time her drink was put in front of her, the one with the hat and cloak had begun approaching her.
Ellith groaned. Did everyone have to think she was that beautiful? She hoped this obnoxious idiot wouldn’t be too much trouble.
The cloaked figure pointed to her giant mug. “You’re not going to drink that.” It was a statement, but the tone, in fact, sounded rather friendly.
Ellith looked into the mug and decided he was right. “No, I’m not,” she concurred.
Smiling, the stranger grabbed the mug and chugged the drink down. “Now, how much is that? Five wrackos?” The worker nodded. “Here’s six, buddy. That’s for the excellent quality of the...what was it I just had?”
Despite herself, Ellith couldn’t help but let out a giggle. The stranger continued like she never had.
“It’s spring ale, it is,” the worker put in.
“Ah, yes, I don’t believe I didn’t recognize it. I have to say that was the best spring ale I’ve ever tasted. Not that I’ve ever had it before, but still. It’s nothing to be sneezed at, to be sure it’s not.”
The cloaked man pulled his hood down to reveal a fuzzy, pink head. With him, though, it didn’t look cute in any way, shape or form. If anything, it made him look more menacing, somehow. Still, his personality did seem rather amiable. He brought a gloved hand out from the billows of his cloak and extended it to Ellith. “As to names, you may call me the Changer.”
Ellith almost laughed, but managed to keep her face for the most part stolid. She grasped the hand and gave it a firm shake. “I’m Ellith,” she responded.
“Ellith. Such a lovely name for a lovely girl. But now, I’m not here to give you the paltry flattery I’m sure you hear at all hours of the day. I approached you purely for business reasons. You are, I presume, Girrimonian?”
Ellith nodded. Obviously, this guy was from far away.
“All right, good,” the Changer continued. “Just the person I wanted to talk to. Now, I’ve got just a few questions for you here...”
The girl yawned. “I’m sorry, sir...Mr. Changer...but I’m a bit drowsy for an interrogation just tonight.”
The Changer nodded sympathetically. “Of course, of course. You do have a place to rest, I presume?”
“Well--”
“Say no more. You can stay on my ship with me for as long as you need to. I have plenty of room for two. I rarely sleep anyway. I can easily pull out a spare mattress for you.” He gave her a hospitable grin.
Ellith smiled back wanly. “That would be okay, I guess.” She attempted to hoist herself up from her stool, but only succeeded in giving her posterior a harsh blow as she fell to the ground.
The Changer now grinned with a touch of mock adventure to the expression. “Have no fear, my dear! The Changer has no trouble in carrying those whom he needs for things!” He brought his arms up and carried her out of the diner with no effort at all.
Already falling asleep, Ellith smiled. If nothing else, this guy was hilarious. It wouldn’t hurt to be around him awhile longer.
She woke the next morning to see Changer in his armchair reading a novel. Momentarily, he noticed her and put the book down. “Good morning, Ellith! I hope you slept well. Would you like any breakfast?” He motioned to a table covered with bacon, eggs, pancakes, waffles, doughnuts, coffee, orange juice, milk, etc. “Or we could go back to the diner. I hear they’re marvelous for breakfast.”
The girl smiled. “Here would be fine,” she said cheerfully.
“Well, then,” said the Changer, when she didn’t get up, “there’s no need to be hesitant! By all means, eat as your heart desires!”
“But, don’t you...”
The Changer contradicted her with a wave of his hand. “I’ll eat whatever is left, or go to the diner if I have to. Don’t worry yourself about saving extra, though; I’ll be fine one way or another. You are a growing girl in the flower of your youth. These old bones of mine are never going to do any more growing.”
As she got up and walked to the table, Ellith couldn’t help but ask, “How old are you, Mr. Changer?”
“Please, the Changer is fine, but as to your question, I’ll be 424 tomorrow, General Time.”
Ellith gawked at him for a long while until Changer motioned to the table once more and she ate. After her appetite was quite sated, she sat on her bed. “It’s all yours, Changer,” she said invitingly.
The much older man smiled. “Now you’re talkin’ my lingo.” And with no further adieu, he proceeded to devour everything edible or drinkable still on the table. When he was through, he returned to his armchair.
“Okay, Ellith, now onto business,” he began. She looked at him intently as he continued. “I myself, being Pisquihtian by blood...” he paused, and then, as he saw no recognition show on her face, continued. “Yes, I thought you might not know about us. In fact, there are only two of us left: myself, and my father. But now, I didn’t come to tell you my heritage and its history. I’ve come to ask you for information about your planet.
“Now, I have a plan for the rest of my life going on in my head, and when I set out from the Shagglar galaxy, my destination was your planet, Girramon. This was (and still is) to be the first step. Girramon, I had always learned in my schooling, was a planet of power, and of vitality. A planet where the king was like a god. Now that I’ve journeyed here, I have received something of a rude awakening.”
Ellith nodded. “I’ll bet you have. The king is a frail idiot who everyone worships because they’re idiots, too. And power and vitality? I’ve probably got more of both of those than anyone else on my planet, excluding the derided males, of course. Those such as my brother. They may be good for your use if you’re looking for power.”
The Changer looked doubtful. “Well...I’m sure so, but brawn isn’t exactly what I was looking for. I’ve got something else in mind there. And intelligence I believe I’ve got covered, too, as well as power. What I was looking for here was a touch of...something just on the boundary of the extraordinary. I figured with all the females on one planet, I would find someone with just that power-filled, extremely rare female touch, that...oh, I’m not sure exactly. But I scoured your planet for such over the last three days, and found no one. It wasn’t until last night that that happened.”
Ellith glowered at him. “Enough with the flattery, Changer! I know I’m pretty. That’s obvious to me whenever I see a guy. What is it you really want, man? Out with it!” Ellith was getting pretty angry and upset.
The Changer smiled. “What I want has nothing to do with your great looks, and then again, on the other hand much. Let me explain. I sensed your power when first I saw you. I sensed it in no other Girramonians. I am aware that, like all other of your planet’s females, you were born with long poisoned claws, as I can see now. However, I think those claws of yours were only put to the best use through you. I’m not positive, but after observing your mannerisms, talents, and features, I discerned only two abnormal things: your height, and your beauty. Your height, while somewhat out of the ordinary for your people, was no phenomenon. Thus, I deemed it irrelevant. Your beauty, on the other hand...that is, by far, the most of it I have ever seen on any creature, and I’ve never been much for the peach-skinned girls anyway. Therefore, I determined that must be the source of the power that emanates from you. In light of that fact, I thought it most likely that your power would have something to do with persuasion through deception with any males, even without much effort. Myself, of course, I am not easily fazed, but almost any race...Why, your power, I realized, must be nearly as great as mine!”
Ellith, upon hearing this, was quite bewildered. “So let me get this straight...you think I can deceive most any male into doing whatever I want, which might include stabbing them with my claws...and you want me for some kind of crazy mission that you’ve planned. And you’re much more powerful than what you say I can do. Changer, how much sleep did you get last night?”
“As much as I had need of,” he replied. “But that’s quite irrelevant. I’m not saying you have to join me in my plan. I would ask you, however, to test yourself on someone at the diner to see if my supposition is correct. If it is, your best idea would be to come with me, since you don’t have any particular destination, and any destination you do come to would result only in the empty flattery and lustful ogles you have such contempt for. But of course, I’ll give you time to think about it. You have three days from the time that, if you decide to do so, you test your power at the diner. I hope that you do soon, but only then may you have permission to use my ship. Until that time, you will be restricted to wherever else you can find. Toodeloo!” And with that, he shoved her none too gently out the exit door which he had just opened, and then promptly closed it behind her.
Ellith, dazed, decided she would test the Changer’s theory immediately. On that point, at any rate, her mind was decided. She had no power. But, if by some freak chance she had, her mind was also decided. She would succumb to whatever the not nearly sane Changer had in mind. As he had pointed out, she really didn’t have anywhere else to go. So, to make a somewhat more lengthy story fit into this paragraph, Ellith tested her power and found that, to her surprise and shock, the Changer had been correct in what had seemed to her to be an assumption. She went with him in what turned out to be a scheme to attempt domination of the universe. Gradually, her mind became corrupted by the Changer’s constant declarations of future grandeur, among other things, and by the time they went to Titan to pick up the Living Strength, she had decided upon the alias Deceiver.
The Living Strength was more than happy to join them, and the trio began carrying out the Changer’s plan in January 1993. Upon this commencement, however, there was lengthy quarreling about where to start.
“Neptune!” said the Living Strength. “Let’s overthrow the worst planet first.”
The Deceiver scoffed. “Well, then we had better go for Girramon before anything else.”
The Living Strength acquiesced, as he was too drawn in by her exceptional beauty to do otherwise. “Okay, whatever...”
He sounded so entranced that the Deceiver punched him in the jaw. She instantly regretted it, rubbing her fist and looking up at Living Strength. He just stood there, unfazed.
Before further bickering could carry on, the Changer butted in. “Actually, I thought our first goal might be the Calistiv’un galaxy as a whole. It’s close, and it will be rather annoying to get through. Might as well do that first. Any questions?”
“Olfannoe’s close. Why not go there?” retorted the Deceiver. The Changer had both muddied and emboldened her manner. She was no longer the shy, innocent Ellith. Though some of that old manner still came through at times, as the Deceiver, she was a harder person. Much harder. And she acknowledged no restraints in doing whatever she desired.
“Okay, Ellith--”
“It’s Deceiver, you fool.”
The Changer, who had been addressing her, explained his form. “When you act with maturity, I will address you by your title. When you act like a child, I will refer to you by the name of your childhood. Now, Ellith, if you wish for something so close, why not set up shop on Earth? Though outwardly they may seem an easy target because of their oblivion and ignorance, they are quite creative and inventive, in fact more so than the inhabitants of any other planet I’ve heard of. So, if you’d rather, dear Ellith, then you may establish ties there while we go about our work in the Calistiv’un. If we’re quick, we may get back to you by spring of 1999.”
“1999? It’s going to take six years--”
The Living Strength interrupted her. “If we’re lucky, Deceiver, if we’re lucky. With over 3,500 individual planets to conquer, however small they may be, it will be no easy nor short task in any way.”
The Changer nodded in agreement. “Couldn’t have said it better myself, Strength. Well, perhaps slightly; touch up on a few things, you know, but you said it pretty well. Now, Ellith? Your choice?”
“Earth, thank you. Six years away from you would do me some good, I think.”
The Changer nodded, as if he had known what she would say. “All right, good. But before you go, a few words of advice. Go to the United States, Canada, or Europe. You would fit in best in those places judging by your skin. Also, for your sake, try to dress modestly. Normally, I wouldn’t press this, but with your beauty, if you give the males anything to look at, they’ll be asking for more than I would think you’re willing to give them. I mean, I know you might have some prudence, but I’m talking cloaks and no less here, Ellith. Believe me when I say humans are very wanton nowadays. Give them a touch of your beauty, and no more. And don’t do anything stupid like get into any beauty pageants or join any modeling companies or anything like that. You’re going for as inconspicuous as possible here, girl. That’s why you’re doing a simple life among familiar-looking people, and just cloaks. Maybe a long-sleeved t-shirt and loose-fitting jeans if it gets hot during the summer. If you’re not so good at taking the heat, I suggest Canada, Scandinavia, or Iceland. You won’t have problems dressing adequately there. Now, go. Take the escape pod and set it to land somewhere remote, like Greenland or Alaska or northern Canada. Hopefully, we’ll be there by ‘99. But, until then, toodeloo.”
And the Changer clasped her hand, the most affection he had ever shown to her, then pushed her towards the escape pod. “Oh, yes,” he said, almost as an afterthought, as the Deceiver was about to set off. “You’ll need to get a job there if you want to stay alive, but remember, no modeling or anything stupid like that, though I’m sure it would give you easy money for whatever you want. My advice is a college professor, which would be minimum work (if you know how to handle things), good pay, and general unobtrusiveness. Try to get an all boys school if you can. It would make for less trouble. If that fails, try to work at a bank. Then you can steal what extra money you need, as long as you can make sure none of the female workers find out. At any rate, I think you’ll be smart enough to figure out a nice arrangement as long as you steer clear of what I told you to. Now, I won’t delay you any longer. Go with all speed, Deceiver. Go!”
The Deceiver went instantaneously, and the pod was soon lost from sight, set, the Changer and the Living Strength assumed, on a course straight for Earth. And, by the word assumed, I don’t mean to try to imply some sort of secret mission-- she did, indeed, set a course for Earth, while meanwhile, the men set a course for the Calistiv’un galaxy, as they had agreed upon. That, as they had previously stated, would be quite a job.
28,000 Miles from Earth’s Atmosphere
December 9, 2004
The Changer and the Living Strength were finally returning to Earth. They had actually already done so in the fall of 2000, after successfully conquering all of the small planets of the Calistiv’un that had been officially discovered. However, upon their return journey, the inhabitants of Hyperion, the moon of Saturn’s which has an erratic orbit, proved to be very belligerent, especially after hearing of what had occurred in the Calistiv’un galaxy, and made a revolt against the two villains.
Therefore, not wanting to make their first impression on the Earthlings as those who are fought against, they quickly flew back out and faced the masses of Hyperionians, as well as several inhabitants of many of Saturn’s other moons, in addition to about 2,500 Saturanians. Of course, they won, and with ease, after the Changer forced all the troops to the surface of Hyperion and he and the Living Strength could simply fight with them instead of shoot at them from a ship.
But, completely unexpectedly, Saturn launched an attack on the duo with 30 million fully-armed troops because of the outrageous wrongdoing they had done against people that were still subject, ultimately, to Saturn and its king, Korrank.
After a surprise ambush on the Saturanians’ part, the Changer and Living Strength were caught off-guard, and the 30 million troops had the upper hand for a little while, but soon they were being killed like flies, and it didn’t seem like they had much chance, but ships came down from above and threw missiles and lasers and the like down upon their opponents, Changer and Living Strength, who were somewhat fazed, though not killed, by this attack. The Changer, in fact, went unconscious with a head injury, and the Living Strength had to fight all the troops off single-handedly while defending his ally. The next day, surreptitiously evading all attacks, he brought the Changer to a Titanian hospital to be treated, and rushed back to the battle.
The battle, becoming so drawn-out it almost seemed like a war, lasted eight months. The Living Strength, wound-strewn and weary, flew himself to the Titanian hospital where the Changer was still, he hoped, being held. This was during June of 2001. When the man arrived there, the Changer was in a coma from the head wound which appeared more grievous than it had originally been thought, and on top of that it turned out the Living Strength would have to be treated for all his wounds, too.
When Strength was healed enough for the doctors to let him go about normally again, in August, the Changer was still in a coma and didn’t look like he would be coming out of it any time soon. The Living Strength, not wanting any further delay for the mission, set off and scoured the Calistiv’un galaxy for some kind of more advanced medicine than Titan possessed. To make a very long story very short, he found what seemed would probably work after almost fourteen months, and quickly flew back to Titan.
With the doctors’ permission, he gave the Changer the medicine, which had no immediate effect but, according to the hospital’s heart readings, began to heal him within three weeks. Four months later, in early January of 2004, the Changer finally awoke. The Living Strength was ecstatic that they would finally get to begin their domination over Earth, but the Changer was nowhere near normal. The pink puffball was still recovering from some minor brain damage, and he would need to go through extensive physical therapy because he had gone without the use of his body (except for his lungs and heart) for so long. With the only physical therapist already busy with two other patients, the extensive therapy turned out to be very extensive indeed-- just over eleven months in length.
Finally, on December 5, 2004, the Pisquihtian prince was deemed fit to go, though to take things slowly for the next few weeks. While the Changer rebelled against this command without a second thought, the Living Strength, not wanting to go through such a lengthy incident again, decided to take the doctor’s advice as he drove them towards Earth, taking four and a half days instead of the ship’s time at normal speed, about three hours. The Changer protested, but the Living Strength was absolutely obstinate, and Changer, willing to spare a few days of time to keep a major ally on his good side, decided reluctantly to oblige. This brings us to December 9, 2004, right before they reached Earth’s atmosphere.
“So, finally back to join the Deceiver, eh, Changer? What was that about six years you said? Try nearly twelve.” The Living Strength grinned.
The Changer grinned, too. “Well, perhaps young Ellith has matured during that time. She would be...twenty-eight now? Yes, and near to her twenty-ninth birthday. She was twenty-four when last we saw her. She’s surely no girl anymore. Let’s hope she acts like the woman she becomes. Now, where are we going...oh, England, right! She decided on England after landing in northeastern Canada. All right, Strength, set the course straight for England; we’re beginning to be pulled in by the Earth’s exosphere. Where was it she was particularly? I seem to have several holes in my memory...”
Living Strength chuckled. “Well, you should, since you got a hole in your head! Now, I believe she was in Scotland, not in England. Same land mass, but...oh, that’s right! She was in England Bay, wasn’t she? That nice city on Scotland’s northern coast? They import most of their fish to their southern neighbor, hence the name. Yes, I remember now.”
The Changer nodded in affirmation. “Yes, so do I, come to think of it. England Bay it is, then. England Bay it is. A good choice, if I may say so myself. Those there speak SvortishI, or English, as it’s called on Earth, but it’s far enough north that there shouldn’t be too much of a problem. All right, quickly now, England Bay. Don’t want the ship crashing to the surface before we know where it’s landing.”
The words seemed rather wise, for no sooner were they out of his mouth then they came to an abrupt landing. Luckily, the Living Strength had already told the ship where to land, and there were no problems. England Bay lay before them, and their ship was cloaked, so nobody nearby, though the bay itself wasn’t generally very crowded, would report a UFO, which would cause problems for either the aliens, the viewer, or both. And, while two strange-looking men seem to appear from thin air was quite a sight, too, that was more likely to cause trouble for the viewer than for them. However it was would get put in the loony bin, and Changer and Strength would be apologized to by some policeman. The situation was a much better one, and, luckily, no one was nearby.
The duo walked inland, towards the town itself, while the Living Strength mused. “Where was the Deceiver living last time we visited her? It was some place...”
The Changer’s finger pointed at a dot on a screen, which caught Strength’s attention. “Oh, yeah,” he said, “I remember now. That’s how we found her last time. You’ve got a tracer placed on her. Good idea. But, how do you know she’ll be at her house?”
The Changer sighed in exasperation. “She doesn’t need to be at her house. We simply need to find her. Now, let’s see...239 West Edgar Boulevard, that’s...okay...ah, yes. The broadcasting station for 103.2 FM. The Deceiver’s workplace. A most ingenious job, if I do say so myself. Say, do you have a radio on you, Strength? It would be most amusing to call in while she’s the DJ! Oh, ho ho ho ho ho!”
Living Strength shook his head. “Naw. Not like Neptunian radios would pick up signals from Earth stations anyway.”
Changer shrugged. “Well, you never know, but I suppose we will have to purchase one.” So, marching briskly, they soon made their way to Radio Shack and purchased a battery-powered radio and batteries. After inserting the batteries and turning the knob to the correct station, they listened eagerly. Some weird Scottish metal band was playing. After the song was over, the Deceiver’s voice came in.
“Once again, that was ‘Voices and Pineapples’ by Screaming Bagpipes. Now, remember, we’re still taking requests for the next twenty minutes. The number is...” And the Changer pulled out his cell phone (which apparently was able to be used functionally on Earth) and punched in the number.
As it rang, he whispered to the Living Strength, “Any Earth song you ever really liked?” After the latter shook his head, the Changer nodded. “We’ll, I’ll...” and his voice trailed off after the Deceiver answered.
“Hello?” she said. “Northern Scotland radio, Bagpipes FM.”
“I’d like to request a song,” the Changer replied, disguising his voice.
“Sure! And what song would you like to hear, sir? And your name, please, too.”
The Changer changed his voice back to normal and answered. “Uh, my name’s Shane Gerr and I’d like to request ‘Mary Had a Little Lamb’ on the bagpipes, if you don’t mind.”
The Deceiver smiled. So they were finally back. Of course, she still had to remain professional on the air so as not to arouse anyone’s suspicions. “Oh, I’m sorry, Shane, but I don’t believe we have that one. Any others you’d like to hear?”
The Changer sounded dejected. “No, Ellith, there aren’t.” And he hung up. Ellith, he remembered, was the name the Deceiver had chosen for those she spoke to on Earth. Fitting, since it was her actual name. Ellith Macdonald, that was it. She had been adopted by a couple named Macdonald after moving to Scotland, where she had taken two years of high school, four years of college, and soon after moved to a house of her own and gotten a job as a radio DJ.
At any rate, the Changer and the Living Strength strolled up and down Stable Street, that on which the Deceiver’s house was located, until she got home. When she did, many things were discussed, chief among them that northern Scotland wasn’t a good location anymore, now that world domination would actually begin. Along with this, they discussed what story to tell the MacDonalds and where particularly would be a good location. The Changer was decided upon something in the states near D.C., and after scrutiny of several maps they decided upon a small city called Creektown between two and three hours of the White House, which they planned to take over. After this discussion, preparations were made promptly, and the trio were in an airplane on their way to Creektown by midnight. Soon, the conquering of Earth would begin!
I General Time, commonly abbreviated as GT, is a measurement of time common to almost all planets and galaxies in the universe and is also extremely close to Earth’s time. Because nineteen planets have revolutions within twelve hours of 365 days, that was chosen, and because medium-sized planets (such as Earth) tend to have days around 24 hours, that measurement was chosen. Most smaller measurements were already universal. This method was created to dissipate confusion between friends from different planets when discussing time and the like.
II Svortish- the language of the planet Svort, which is commonly spoken among other planets, and is basically the general non-dialect English. The language was given to the people of Earth, specifically on England, shortly after it was originally settled. The highest of the nobles living there at the time held a meeting with the Pope and the college from Italy, and because England has possession of it, the council decided (though it was somewhat reluctant on the Italians’ part) that the language would be attributed to the English.
© 2009 HenryAuthor's Note
|
Stats
200 Views
1 Review Added on March 4, 2009 Last Updated on March 4, 2009 |
Share This
Email
Facebook
Twitter
Read Request
My Library
Subscribe
Flag Writing