Lethal Planet (15 page)

Brandon’s expression was bleak. ‘We’re far from safe. But let’s take one thing at a time and get as far away from Corroza as possible.’

As they rose higher and higher into the stratosphere, they watched the jungle below transform: new fires were breaking out in patches all over the planet surface as explosions within the core made their presence felt at the crust. The
Majestic
pointed upwards, a towering skyscraper once more, and rocketed into space. By the time they were high enough that the full circle of the planet was visible, the jungle was more red than green.

Kat entered the cockpit and stood beside Jason without a word. Doo returned, too, and took his hand. They all watched on the monitors, unable to take their eyes off the small round disc as it pulsed and flickered angrily.

Corroza got smaller and smaller, until it was just a bright red dot. They stared at it in silence for a few more long minutes.

‘Come on,’ Brandon said, and led them all out into the main control room. This vast chamber was at the very top of the Majestic. It was here that, back on Earth, they had faced the Thanamorph Prime and the robot assassin known as Saoirse. Brandon went to a control panel and pressed a switch that rolled back the blast shields from the windows. Now, the vast emptiness of space surrounded them almost completely, and they could see the dying glow of Corroza with their own eyes.

‘I just needed to see it for real,’ Brandon said. ‘One last time. My home planet. ’

‘And mine,’ Doo said.

‘Well, we’re all homeless now,’ Jason said. ‘So much for the idea of starting a new life on Corroza.’

‘That place was rotten to the core like a bad apple,’ Kat said. ‘I’m not sad to leave.’

And as if in answer, Corroza exploded, expanding to a ball almost as large as the nearby sun, swallowing whole its orbiting moons, and turning every corner of space blood red for a few brief seconds. There was no sound, and only a slight vibration from the shock waves, and then as quickly as it had blown up, Corroza winked out of existence.

And the universe returned to normal as if the planet, and all of its life and struggles, had never existed.

20—
SUPERLUMINAL

Jason loaded two twenty kilogram plates onto either end of the bar, ducked underneath it and hefted it onto his shoulders. The total weight, including the bar, was one hundred kilograms. Jason took a deep breath and prepared to squat.

He wasn’t even wearing his bionic arm; he had disposed of it now that its job was done. Just looking at it had brought back too many memories of its former owner, Saoirse; and of smashing an elderly villain several times in the face.

He didn’t need it for this particular exercise anyway. The squat was all about the strength in your quadriceps (also known as your thighs) and the stability of your abdominals. Jason lowered himself until his bum almost touched the floor, then stood up again with an explosive exhalation of breath.

He was in the
Majestic’s
gym. Through the mirror on the wall opposite, he could survey all the activity around him. Two massive balaks were alternating bench press sets. Across the other side of the big open space, a group of zelf girls were laughing at some hilarious joke as they pedalled side by side on the exercise bikes. The President’s two daughters were on the rowers; they had smiled and waved at Jason as they came in, seemingly having no bad blood for the fact that he had defeated their father in a fight to the death.

The gym doors swung open and Kat came in, dressed in a leotard and luminous yellow sweatbands. She strolled over to her brother and helped him complete his fifth rep by adding the power of her little finger to the underside of the barbell.

‘Thanks,’ he grunted.

‘No problem,’ Kat said. ‘How’s it going, anyway?’

‘Pretty good,’ Jason said. ‘I think my arm is growing back.’ He waggled his shoulder stump in his sister’s face.

‘Hmm. Maybe by a millimetre,’ Kat said. ‘Here. I brought you some beef jerky from the stores.’

‘Yum. Protein,’ Jason said, grabbing the snack and scoffing half of it in one bite. ‘How are things with you,
Deputy Captain
?’

Kat was in charge of the day to day running of the ship. ‘Not so great,’ she said. ‘Food supplies are getting low. Most of what’s left is beef jerky, and the balaks are not too happy, them being vegetarian and all.’

‘They’ll change their ways before this voyage it over,’ Jason said, lowering himself into another squat.

‘
If
this voyage is ever over,’ Kat said. ‘There’s still no sign of any habitable planets worth making for. Tensions are starting to run high: some zelfs and balaks got in a fight in a bar last night.’

‘Let me guess,’ Jason said. ‘Over religion?’

‘No. Over a game of monopoly. Hewson had to lock them all in the brig. Oh, and down in the zoo, one of the catrons—’

Jason’s eyes widened. ‘Escaped?’

‘No,’ Kat said. ‘One of them’s got a splinter in her paw. But no one dares get too close because of those deadly claws. I’d get Brandon to go check it out, but he hardly ever leaves his room.’

‘How are things between you and Bran?’

Kat’s expression darkened. ‘Nothing much going on there. The other day, when you and Doo went on that romantic picnic down in engineering, I suggested that me and Bran go on our own little adventure. He just wasn’t interested. He prefers to sit in his room all day and read his astronomy books.’

She sighed. ‘I think it’s over, Jason, but neither of us has the guts to admit it.’

‘Do you want me to go and talk to him?’ Jason said, standing up and putting the weight back in the rack.

‘Not now,’ Kat said. ‘Well, not unless you want to tell him to man-up and break up with me properly!’

* * *

Jason showered, then got dressed in his Adidas tracksuit and matching trainers. The top had the Chrysler logo over the left chest and across the back: the old nineteen sixties
Forward Look
logo, two intersecting chevrons that gave the impression of a rocket ship. The
Majestic
was stocked with hundreds of the tracksuits, but Jason didn’t care that every other person on board (especially the balaks) seems to be sporting one: he had the rarest colour. There was only one black tracksuit aboard the entire ship.

He walked through the dark-wood-panelled corridors. It was funny, but all the art deco stylings made the
Majestic
seem more alien to him than the futuristic skyscrapers of Corroza. The fact that there were balaks and zelfs walking around, saluting him as they passed, made the ship seem even less human.

Hewson collared him as he passed through the shopping lobby. ‘I need your help tonight at a zelfs versus balaks football game, Jason,’ he said as they walked.

‘Oh, come on!’ Jason said. ‘Can’t you and Brug handle that yourselves? Sign up a few more guys for security detail, if you need to. There’s this balak dude I met in the gym who was asking about joining up.’

Hewson laughed. ‘I’ve got security covered. But we need a referee for the game, and Brandon told me that you’re probably the only person on board who knows the offside rule.’

‘So that’s why everyone voted me captain of this ship,’ Jason said. ‘Because of my specialist knowledge.’

‘Yes,’ Hewson said. ‘But seriously, Jason, the more you can do to help keep everyone’s morale up, the better. At least until Brandon and his team of boffins figure out a destination for us. You have the respect of the zelfs and the balaks—
that’s
why we made you captain.’

‘I know, I know,’ Jason said. ‘But whoever wins the match tonight, nobody’s going to be very impressed by the party afterwards. We are going to have to seriously ration the food out.’

They had arrived in the residential quarters. Jason walked up the Brandon’s door, but Hewson beat him to it and knocked.

‘How did you know I was going to see Bran?’ Jason asked.

‘I didn’t,’ Hewson said. The door opened and Brandon’s aunt, Rana, appeared.

‘Ah, here’s my date,’ she said. ‘Good afternoon, Lieutenant. I’m glad you’re here. My brain was about to explode from calculating galactic navigation. You need a map that’s turned inside out, and a clock that goes backwards.’

‘Bring her back as soon as the film finishes,’ Brandon shouted from within. ‘I reckon I’ve almost solved it.’

Rana pulled the door shut behind her. ‘I don’t care if he’s solved the Theory of Everything. It can wait until the morning.’

What film are you going to see?’ Jason asked.

‘They’re showing a matinee double bill of
Alien
and
Aliens
,’ Hewson said. ‘Go grab Doo, and we’ll double date.’

Jason was tempted. ‘Next time,’ he said at last. ‘I need to catch up with Brandon.’

Hewson clapped him on the shoulder and walked off with Rana. Jason pushed on the door and walked through.

Brandon’s room was piled high with papers and books from the ship’s library. A big map of the galaxy was rolled out on the floor, covered with coloured marker-pen lines and squiggles. Brandon lay on a leather couch, his hands behind his head. A pen and notebook hovered in the air above him, and the pen was scribbling away.

‘What is this?’ Jason said. ‘Harry Potter?’

Brandon let the pen and pad drop to his chest. ‘Oh, hi, Jason. What’s up?’

Before waiting for an answer, Brandon leaped to his feet. ‘I think I’ve worked where we can go,’ he said. ‘Somewhere safe we can start a new colony and secure the future for the human race! For the human, zelf
and
balak races!’

‘Sounds great,’ Jason said. ‘But what about Kat?’

Brandon blinked. ‘What about her?’

‘Exactly! You’ve been virtually ignoring her since we left Corroza. You’ve hardly left your room in two weeks.’

‘This is important, Jason.’

‘Yeah?’ Well so was fighting the Arch Predicant. And I did that with Doo by my side. You could let Kat be part of all this.’

Brandon sighed. ‘She wouldn’t be interested in all this. We’re just too different, really. She said liked me cos I’m a geek, but I don’t think she realised the depths of my geekery.’

‘Whatever,’ Jason said. ‘So are you going to grow a pair and actually break up with her?’

Brandon looked more scared than Jason had ever seen him. ‘I … I can’t,’ he stammered. ‘Can you do it for me?’

‘No!’ Jason said. ‘But I
can
make sure you’re more scared of me than you are of Kat.’ He had a grin on his face as he stomped forwards, but Brandon’s eyes widened with fright nevertheless.

Jason stopped when he realised he was walking over the map and tearing it. He looked down to where his foot had ripped a hole in a cluster of space that looked familiar. Several of Brandon’s felt-tip lines and arrows were pointing to it.

‘Is
that
where we are going?’ he said.

‘Yes,’ Brandon said. ‘It’s the only place we can go. The only place in the entire galaxy.’

Jason couldn’t believe it. He slumped down on the couch. ‘No,’ he moaned. ‘Not there. It will all kick off again if we go there. I’d rather just float about in space forever.’

‘But look,’ Brandon said, grabbing a page of calculations. ‘Remember what I said about travelling through the universe at close to light speed. The distances contract around the ship, and journeys seem shorter. If we engage the superluminal drive for as long as possible until the fuel runs out, we can cover five thousand light years—but for us on board, the distance will only seem a twentieth of that. It’s funny, ha ha—they call it a superluminal drive but it’s actually only pushing maybe ninety-five percent of the speed of light. True superluminal speeds are impossible, because duh—the laws of physics. It’s only the point of view of the travellers—us—that makes it seem superluminal:
faster than the speed of light
.’

Jason’s brain was about to fold in on itself. He tried to concentrate on what Brandon had said about journeys being shorter. ‘So you’re saying that if we flog the superluminal drive for all it’s worth, we can cover five thousand light years in, what … one hundred minutes?’

‘One hundred years, actually,’ Brandon said. ‘In fact, once we got up to speed, we could travel for as far as we wanted. Fuel wouldn’t be an issue, since we can maintain a constant velocity in space. No friction, see?’

Jason may as well have been having a conversation with a banana for all the sense Brandon was making. ‘
One hundred years
of flying through space? Why so long? It only took us a few minutes to get here in the first place. Well, I guess it will be our kids’ kids who we’re going to be sending into who knows what danger. I don’t like it, Bran.’

But Brandon wouldn’t be discouraged. He was dancing around his map, pointing at the arrows and lines he had drawn. ‘No, don’t you see: it will take a hundred years because we will be taking the long way round. I can use the bionoids to put us in suspended animation the whole time, so it won’t even seem like a day has passed to us … but when we land, over five thousand years will have gone by.’

Jason suddenly started to make sense of it all. ‘The thanamorphs will all be dead by then,’ he said, sitting up straight on the couch.

‘Right!’ Brandon said. ‘And not only that, but the planet will have had chance to recover from the devastation caused by the moon’s destruction. The atmosphere will be dust-free: plants and animals will have had a chance to return.’

He flashed Jason a ridiculous cheesy grin. ‘We’re going back to Earth, Jase. We’re going
home
!’