The Dark World (2 page)

Kip soon spotted MoNa’s pointed nose cone and gleaming black thrusters.

‘If you drop me here, I’ll spacewalk the rest of the way,’ Kip suggested to his mum.

He wanted to avoid the embarrassment of turning up for a mission with his mum! But Mrs Kirby insisted on taking Kip to MoNa’s landing bay door.

Kip groaned. MoNa would never let him live this down! Teasing Kip was her favourite thing in the galaxy.

MoNa’s door slid open.With his helmet and spacesuit on, Kip leapt the short distance from the SnapDragon to the landing bay. When he boarded, MoNa’s laughter was echoing all around.

‘Don’t worry about her,’ said a friendly, growly voice. ‘Space Scouts do whatever it takes to get the job done.’ It was Finbar, Kip’s second-in-command.

Finbar was tall and covered with white fur. He was half-human, half-arctic wolf, but his personality was more like a teddy bear’s.

Together, Kip and Finbar headed for the Bridge, MoNa’s command centre. There, Kip could pilot MoNa using the holographic console as well as download his mission brief.

While Kip prepared, MoNa would fly herself out of the Hoverport and into deep space on auto-pilot.

Kip settled into his captain’s chair, engaged his holographic console and began to read.

6.34pm? That’s only a few seconds away!
thought Kip.

Through MoNa’s massive windows, Kip and Finbar scanned the sky for the wormhole.

Wormholes were shortcuts between galaxies. Usually they glowed with light shining through from the galaxy beyond.

But this time, the only thing visible in the night sky was a faint, murky black patch of cloud.

If that’s the wormhole,
Kip thought uncertainly,
it must be super dark on Neron.
There’s no light shining through.

Pushing a button on his console, Kip switched off MoNa’s auto-pilot and took the controls. Flying through a wormhole took Kip’s advanced skills. Especially when the wormhole was pitch-black!

With a deep breath, Kip flew MoNa into the wormhole. The entire Bridge was plunged into darkness.

Kip was in luck. The wormhole might have been dark, but at least it was calm and easy to fly through. MoNa popped out the wormhole into Neron’s galaxy completely unharmed.

Neron’s galaxy was so dark that Kip could hardly see a thing. Up ahead, though, he made out a dull, black ball of a planet.

Kip and Finbar strode to MoNa’s landing bay. It was time to travel to Neron via Scrambler Beam. Scramblers separated their particles, beamed them through space and rearranged them on the surface of Neron.

When they arrived on the surface, Kip heard an eerie moan.

‘Finbar?’ he whispered. Finbar hated travelling by Scrambler!

But the moaning was the wind, whipping wildly around them. Kip analysed the air. According to his SpaceCuff, it was safe to breathe…but freezing!

Kip and Finbar carried limited oxygen. To save supplies, it was always best to breathe a planet’s own air if possible. Kip took a deep breath, not looking forward to taking off his helmet. He made sure his HeatCheeks balaclava was switched on.

HeatCheeks had heating elements woven through the fibres. When switched on, they glowed as red as a hotplate.

They allowed Kip and Finbar to go without helmets in freezing conditions.

Finbar was especially keen to protect his new WhiskerMic from the cold weather. The WhiskerMic was a wire-thin microphone disguised among his whiskers. It recorded everything within a twometre radius. If Kip and Finbar needed to check back on any details of their mission afterwards, they had a permanent record.

Once their helmets were off, Kip and Finbar had a look around. High in Neron’s sky was a tiny blue ball of light.

Neron’s sun,
Kip guessed.
It must be light years away. No wonder it’s so cold and dark here.

As his eyes adjusted to the dark, Kip saw they’d landed on the edge of a city.

Neron’s buildings were made of cubes stacked on top of each other. They looked like massive kids’ building blocks with flat panels on top.

Kip recognised them immediately.
Spinifex wind panels!
he thought. They had been invented by the aliens from the windy planet Spinifex, and were the most efficient wind-energy tech available. Kip knew they were incredibly expensive.

Suddenly Kip was struck by how quiet Neron seemed. He could see a spaceport in the distance, but it looked deserted.

Guess those rumours about Neron being a busy trading planet were wrong,
he thought.
But then, how can they afford Spinifex wind panels?

Kip was about to mention this to Finbar when his 2iC yelped. The ground underneath their feet was moving! Was it an earth tremor? A deadly quake?

Finbar toppled over, landing on his furry backside.

‘Are you okay?’ Kip said. But Finbar didn’t answer. With his excellent wolf vision, he’d spotted what was making the ground move.

They were standing on a giant rotating disc! A shallow, curved groove in the dirt stretched into the distance in both directions. The entire alien city was slowly turning. At the same time, Kip felt the wind change direction.

The city must be turning to catch the most wind!
Kip thought. He knew that the Spinifex wind panels could turn. But an entire rotating city would cost a bomb!

Suddenly, there was a shrill cry.

An alien had sneaked up behind them! And he had a group of friends with him.

The aliens were tall and rubbery. They had huge flapping ears and long, fleshy snouts with deep black nostrils. Their eyes were tiny black dots.

Kip knew that animals that lived in darkness underground on Earth were often almost totally blind. He guessed these aliens wouldn’t have much need for sight on such a dark planet. Maybe their other features were bigger than normal to make up for it.

Also, Kip couldn’t help noticing the aliens were covered with deep scars.
They look like something out of a horror movie like ‘Awful Aliens Attack IV’!

The group of aliens came closer and closer. Then the lead alien shrieked something right in Kip’s ear. It was so close, Kip could feel his icy spit through the heated balaclava.

EEEEEEEEEEEH!

Startled, Kip quickly flicked his SpaceCuff to Translate mode.

Kip nearly laughed in relief. Shrieking was this alien’s way of being polite!

But when Kip looked into the alien’s grinning face, he couldn’t quite shake the feeling that the smile didn’t reach his tiny eyes.

Still, Kip’s Space Scout training had taught him to keep an open mind about all aliens. It was important to be polite until he knew more about them.

The lead alien shook Kip’s hand energetically. His fingers felt like sloppy seaweed! But they still had a firm grip.

The alien grinned wider, just a bit too hard. He reminded Kip of dodgy spacecraft salespeople back on Earth.

Stop being so suspicious, Kip!
he thought sternly.
They’re perfectly friendly.

‘We’re from planet Earth,’ Kip said. His SpaceCuff started screeching, translating his speech into the Neron alien’s language.

‘Brilliant! Love the place,’ the alien shrieked, grinning again.

But he knows nothing about us,
Kip thought warily.
There’s been no contact between Earth and Neron!