"I'm on another planet." Douglass decalred as they got off the little shuttle.1
"Ye blud!" said Chrome with a limp hand gesture which made his companions just stare at him with worried looks.2
"I think he's broken." said Douglass.3
"Aye! Doug, lad!" Chrome was now, apparently, a pirate. "There be a fault with my me voice unit. I be an old dog at three-hundred-and-sixty and coun'in'." Milo quickly overcame the initial shock.4
"I'll get him looked at. You-" Milo pointed to Douglass "go register the human race. I'll show you where to go."5
They made their way towards a bustling crowd on a narrow street. It was mostly stone and with a street market baking in the evening sun. Rows and rows of of brightly coloured stalls selling anything and almost everything. Passing through the multi-species crowd (some how with relative ease), Douglass caught glimpses of the stalls. Spice stalls, bead stalls, butchers stall selling the guts of something. Milo led Douglass to a clearing in the forest of people. They stood in front of a huge, grey (in both senses of the word) building.6
"This is the registration office." Milo said, gesturing to the building "Just tell him where your from and your name." He then grabbed Chrome by the hand and pulled him into the crowd again. Douglass looked up at the colossal building, it was a bit intimidating (as all skyscrapers should be).7
He entered through the double doors to find a cramped grey room that didn't suit the size of the building. Douglass let out a well needed "Huh?" as he had been subjected to a lot lately. Everyone needs a good release of confusion now and again.8
"Yes! Yes!" said an old man, his voice wizened, in the point of breaking and frankly bored. "The rooms too small! The rest of the space is for storage of records. Yes, I have had to say that a lot!" He bellowed at Douglass with fifty years of built-up agitation, clearly intending to insult with his croaky, squeeky voice. Like being berated by a mouse. He was as grey as the room he inhabited with a white beard that covered most of his face and draped over the desk he was sitting at so it almost touched the floor. His white hair as long as his beard, covering him like some sort of robe. There was a brief thought of whether this man was wearing anything that was quickly removed. He breathed a sigh of remorse and got out a piece of paper and a blue 'pen'.9
"Name and planet?" he inquired.10
"Douglass Spears. Two S's on Douglass. Earth."11
This last word seemed to cheer up the old man. Douglass couldn't be too sure as the man's face, for the most part, was obscured by his beard.12
"Finally being sociable after over 2000 years of evolution and hacking each other to bits! Took your graking time if you ask me." The man said filling in the paper as he spoke. "Not that anyone will." he added under his breath.13
"And why have they sent some eyeties teenager to represent Earth, ay? I'm surprised its taken Humans this long to find the rest of us! Are they really as lazy as I have heard, boy?" Thrown off a bit by the random question in the middle of the constant abuse, Douglass answered.14
"What do you..."15
"Please! I'm still talking!" The man interrupted. "There supposed to be cleaver and they've been hypocritical, thieving, and darjeeling! And they only eat kidneys. I heard it, so it must be true" Douglass didn't know it, but he was seeing an idiot in full till idiocy to the best of this man's ability. This office was the safest place for him.16
"Your done! Next!" he said, hitting a small bell on his desk with a smaller hammer.17
"No-one?" He said looking around the room, despite there being nothing in it besides him, his desk and Douglass. His next move was to fall instantly asleep. His head banged on the desk violently but the man remained in slumber.18
Milo was outside when Douglass left the small room, ready to meet him.19
"Don't worry. He's horrible to everyone. Poor man. Anyway. We need to meet a friend about getting you home." Douglass perked up at hearing this.20
"Cool."21
"There sending a ship to Earth to welcome them to the K.U. We can go with them." So they dived back into the crowd.22
They were headed for the Shrine of Telephos. Built on a large hill with steps leading up to it. Three huge arches acted as doorways. Apart from that it was surprisingly square, as though the architect couldn't be bothered to make it interesting or be creative in anyway at all. Just three arches slapped on the front. It still resided over the buildings surrounding it. Making your way inside makes you forget about the exterior. It was a vast library that seemed to climb towards the extremely high ceiling forever. Indoor skyscrapers.23
"Now we find Kantar." said Milo as though Douglass knew who Kantar was. Milo began to talk to the many bystanders in the library with questions. Normally a dangerous thing. Milo's pestering of random individuals paid off when a bald man in a blue uniform and a exaggerated white handle-bar moustache pointed across the row to a large door at the end. They made there way to the door to discover raised voices from the other side.24
"I will not allow it!" the voice was deep and angered.25
"What motive could you have for imprisoning me here" said a second effeminate but distraught voice.26
"Your safety is our concern and prison would stop your life from being lived." said the first voice.27
"Day-to-day life can be a prison too." With that came the sound of footsteps towards the door. Milo steeped away from the door as a galion in a dazzling white gown burst through the door and ran past Milo and Douglass, out of the building. Afterwards came a clearly elderly galion. He had large areas of concrete-colour fur and dressed in an elaborate robe. He noticed Milo.28
"I don't believe it!" He cried.29
"Hello, Paxal!" Milo said back.30
"Who is your friend?"31
"This is Douglass from Earth."32
"Glad the humans are being sociable." Paxal began shaking Douglass' hand as vigorously as Milo had before.33
"I prefer just Doug."34
"Fine by me Doug." He then turned to Milo. "What brings you here?"35
"He may be the.....one." Said Milo.36
"Oh my!" Paxal's hand stopped shaking Douglass'.37
"What evidence do you have?" Paxal said.38
"He said he was related to the King." answered Milo.39
Clearly, Douglass was on the inside looking in. What are they on about?40
"Eh..OK. Let's give it a shot. Come with me, dear boy! This is urgent. I can't begin to tell you!" His mood went from welcoming to indifference to excited in a matter of seconds. Paxal led Douglass through the door and down the corridor behind it.41
"I'll stay here then." Milo said. He felt unwanted in Paxal's excited moment.42
The corridor was bare and dark with the only light coming from the doorway behind them. They then stopped, Paxal hit a panel on a wall that was invisible in the darkness. A light came on above a glistening sword set into the ground.43
"If you can pull the sword from out of the ground, then it is yours keep." Paxal said.44
"What? Like a test-you-strength machine?" Douglass said.45
“Sure, fine. Whatever.” Doug grabbed the handle of the sword and pulled. It didn't budge. He tried again. Nothing. He tried again and again and again.46
"It doesn't want to move." Douglass said, puzzled by the sword in the stone-paved ground.47
"Maybe you should..." Paxal trailed of when Douglass had another go. After, about twenty seconds of grunting and heaving, the sword....was still in the ground.48
"Douglass, I think you should..." Paxal began.49
"Wait! I think I've got it..." Douglass interrupted. Then the sword seemed to just lurched free from the ground. Paxal stood amazed as Douglass compensated for the fact that the sword was now free.50
"Douglass! You've done it! You've..." Paxal cried but Douglass whites out before hearing the rest of what he said.51
Grumbling, Douglass picked himself off the floor. He was in a bindingly white room. It was so white you could practically taste the shine everything gave. There was a predictably white four-poster bed to Douglass' side. A girl, blonde in a white nightie, was staring at him with white eyes. Nah! I mean hazel.52
"Hello, sir Knight." She said. Douglass had to look for someone else before he figured out it was him she was talking to. Did knights wear jeans?53
"Hi! How are you?" Douglass said. He couldn't think of anything else to say.54
"Quite. Its time for you to assume your role as the hero of the tides. To cross the stars to where ever you are needed. You will never be alone. I will be beside you all the way but first, what is the date?" Douglass tried to make sense of what she was on about before being caught off guard by the question.55
“What? We've just met...”56
“Sorry? All I want is the year.” The girl said.57
"Errrr......... 2009?" He said. He had no idea what was going on right now.58
"Sorry? Could you repeat that?"59
"Two thousand and nine." The girls expression of general well being plunged to a look of horror.60
"What! Oh my! This isn't right! I've been asleep for too long! I should have known. You don't look anything like the son's son of Arthur. Damn!" She slammed her fist on the bed61
"Damn!" and again.62
"Damn!" and again.63
"Hey!" Douglass stopped her. "What the hell is going on? First I land on an alien planet and now I'm talking to some girl in a room after pulling a sword out of the floor! I'm not tripping am I?"64
"What do you mean by tripping? Your not even moving."65
"I mean doped up. Out of it. Drugged. Am I imagining this or not?"66
"I definitely hope not."67
"Good. So who are you?" The girl looked hurt.68
"Don't you know who I am?"69
"I wouldn't have asked if I did." You couldn't fault that logic. She crawled to the other side of the bed and stood up.70
"I am the lady of the lake." She waited for the moment when he would come to his senses and knee before her.71
"Uh huh. And I'm the king of China." It obviously didn't come. The lady of the lake gave Douglass a slap for being so rude. He brought his hand to his cheek.72
"What was that for?"73
"Maybe you'll show me more respect next time we meet."74
"What are you o........."75
"Douglass! Welcome back." Milo was kneeling next to him. "Hey the welcoming crew have arrived!" Milo helped him up. They made there way out of the corridor and into the rest of the building, clutching the sword.76
Funny five minuets doesn't cover the last few events.77
"Milo!" said as a galion in a large mane walked towards Milo with outstretched arms.78
"Sagittarius Sparks!" Milo said as he ran over to great his old friend. The bonded in one of those man hugs I've heard so much about.79
"Glad to see the old walking encyclopaedia. Who's the friend?" Milo turned and gesture to the left out Douglass as he spoke.80
"This is Douglass, the new owner of Excalibur." Sagittarius gave him such a hand shaking the blood in his hand would have been separated into the cells and the plasma. Odd idea but I thought it would sound better on paper.81
"Well done Douglass! Had to got to someone! Good to see Earth being sociable. Meet the crew." he said gesturing to the row of people lined up and standing at attention. Sagittarius guided him to the fist of the line. Douglass thought she was pretty for a galion. Her mane/hair was tied back and with a few stands of hair falling in front of her face. She was covered in a light yellow fur but strangely had purple hair. The rest of her was in a similar uniform to Sagittarius. Blue lined with yellow. It made them look like air-hosts. A nervous smile formed on her face surrounded by white.82
"This is my new second-in-command: Cassandre."83
"Its a pleasure to travel with you Lieutenant Commander Sparks." she said with that first day optimism.84
"Please call me just Sparks, everyone else does. You'll wear yourself out with all the 'Lieutenant Commander' stuff."85
She smiled back slightly with a small, acknologing nod as Sparks moved to the next in line.86
"This is my head of engineering: Reurith."87
She was more confidant and comfortable than Cassandre. Her mane/hair was untamed and with most of the fringe was sticking up. She resembled a fox with her orange fur but the black hair contrasted against this. Her uniform was the same but it had two badges on the front. Douglass guessed they were the Galions' equivalent of medals.88
"She's been decorated for bravery. She's my go-to-gal usually.” Sparks said, clearly proud of his officer. He seemed to be picking a small amount of dirt on one of the medals.89
"When are you going to stop parading me around? Its embarrassing now!" Reurith hissed, slapping his hand.90
"Moving on." Sparks pushed Douglass lightly to get him moving. They stopped in front of a hulking galion that barely fitted in the uniform. The could only just see his face over his chest.91
"This is one of our engineers: Teillitanks Obst. He prefers Tank." Tank looked down and smiled at them. It was one of those that you would only return so he wouldn't eat you. The smile revealed the rows of perfect teeth. His chestnut fur was cut back into a neat, regulation cut on the top of his head. Not that you could see that. They moved along to the last in the line.92
"This is the other engineer: Alli." It was a sort of chinchilla that's gotten really big staring back at him. Its white furred face stared back at him. Large feet and long ears that looked like the could pick up signals.93
"What are you looking at?" said Alli. His voice was to high to be intimidating. Then again, you could hug him rather than beat him up. Douglass saw the opportunity to answer back.94
"I don't know but its looking back." Douglass said. He'd heard that one at school once. The little guy smiled.95
"He's quick. I like him." he said to the rest of them.96
"That's everyone. We need to board the ship before sundown. Everyone move out. " He said. So they made there way to the exit and through the crowds to the ship.97
While no-one doing anything worth telling you about, I'll talk about Galion's. Galions are the natural translators of the universe. They are able to learn a language in seconds when they shake hands. Its thought that Galions came form a single ancestor, the Psy-wolf. A creature with psychic abilities that could learn communication patterns so avoid being eaten by the few predators that could eat them. It was able to be used at range but the link with any creatures brain was always stronger with contact. As the Galions came to be, the psychic abilities became limited to learning a language and only through contact. Galions have recovered there powers but not all of them. The retrieval of the abilities takes years. It would take three lifetimes to get back to the Psy-wolf level. The best the Galions have done is a Galoin that can read the mind of a someone a meter away from him. And even then, the only information he could get was whether he had had breakfast or not. Plenty of evidence has been found to prove the existence of the Psy-wolf but no evidence has been found of a creature before the Psy-wolf. A prize will be given to the first one to find evidence that the Psy-wolf evolved and to bring what it evolved from. 98
Anyway! On with the show.99
BOOM! I like to start things of with a bang *ba-dum-chish* And a large mushroom cloud that everyone came to investigate. The Welcoming Crew would have ignored it and carried on if it wasn't for the fact that every single device with a speaker was calling for the carrier of the sword, Douglass. People were cursing and dropping there devices in annoyance. Since who ever was sending the message had gone to so much trouble with the evil ventriloquism act, they decided to see what the fuss was about.100
"Why are we going? It'll be sorted out sooner or later." Alli complained on the way there. He was generally ignored though. Eventually he was told to zip it as the reached the scene of the destruction. There was a man in a long leather coat and a large hat. His boots were visible between the bottom of his coat and the flying platform he stood on.101
"I call forward the new owner of the sword Excalibur. Who ever he may be." The voice from the figure was artificial. Fake. Like a call centre voice but more menacing. Clearly he was calling the shots and would have shot anyone that said otherwise. Reluctantly, Douglass was shoved forwards from the crowd. Douglass wasn't used to having aliens staring at him. Most of the staring was aimed at the sword in his grip though. The man in the coat and hat landed on the ground, stepped of the platform, walked over to Douglass. The face that greeted him will haunt him for the rest of his life. A gas mask with shutters on the eyes for a face. There was a faint noise of bellows being squashed and prised apart again in a rhythmic pattern. Underneath his coat was a metal chest plate and armour-plated legs, moving towards him.102
"It is an honour to finally meet the welder of Excalibur." His voice was digital, muffled by the speakers it had to come out of. "So I going to ask you nicely. Hand over the sword and all these people live." Feel free to boo and hiss him. Douglass couldn't see why he wanted to give this guy the sword.103
"Should have known that it would be harder than that. Never mind." the man turned and stepped back on the platform. He rose into the air.104
"Is that it?" Alli whispered to Tank.105
"Fine, boy. If you can stop me from destroying your planet, you can keep the sword. Fail and the sword is mine." And he flew off leaving Douglass staring at him as he departed.106
"Is he serious?" He said.107
"I don't want to wait around to find out." Sparks said. "To the Palisade." The Galions, Human and small gerbil/mouse-thing ran from the scene, fighting to get through a bewildered crowd.108
The Palisade is a "welcome wagon" ship. A ship only needed to get from A to B. these are usually very comfortable to travel in and have only a medium fire-power range of weapons. It looked a great ship, filling the crew with confidence with this mission. It was state of the art and very agile. The corridors were silver and clean. The sleeping quarters were carpeted and comfortable. The crew were impressed with the ship even if the constant grey might irritate them and they had to double up on sleeping quarters.109
Douglass walked through the doors to the bridge. He couldn't help thinking everything was so sci-fi. Sparks was in front of a computer console in a swivel chair that complimented the grey of the room. Milo was at computer fiddling with something. Douglass walked over to look at his screen.110
"I'm changing the desktop theme. I've always liked maroon better than the trashy blue." he said. He pushed a button and the screen turned a bright red. Douglass looked round the bridge. The only other person here was Cassandre, the rest were else where in case of emergency. She was showing her nerves slightly but otherwise fine. She handed sparks a clipboard then sat down. Douglass found a seat too. The twin-engines of the Palisade roared to life. Two jets of blue flame pumped out of them to give the ship the thrust it needed. The hanger door opened as the landing gear was retracted. Gently at first the ship crawled forwards. Gaining momentum, it flew out of the doors and over the city rooftops. The aerodynamic craft pulled up and within a few minuets, it was clear of the planet's atmosphere.
Author notes
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