The Dead Planet (2 page)

“Rruuuuhhhhhh!” The crewman looked at me with that desperate hunger I saw just a short time before.  I don’t know how, but even the crew had changed.  I pulled my pistol and fired at its chest.  The great bolt of energy knocked him to the ground, but he got back up and kept coming.  “What the hell, that should’ve killed you!”  My mind flashed back to Gækob firing at the Terran’s eating Mævin.

I fired again, and again, and again, but he just kept getting up and coming.  He was hungry, and I was on the menu.  He grabbed me and worked his mouth in anticipate of that first scrumptious bite.  I jabbed the pistol to his head and pulled the trigger.  His eyes turned red and exploded in my face as the electrical energies caused a cerebrovascular feedback.  To my relief, he dropped to the ground in a fit of spasms, never getting up again.

The control panel signaled that it had connected to the ship and a portal opened.  I didn’t waste a second; I jumped through the portal and was grateful to be standing on my ship again.  I shut down the portal immediately, making sure nothing could follow me through.  I then ran to the navigation controls and set an autopilot course for Kælty. 

After catching my breath, I moved to the communication’s systems and encoded the following message:

Planet Terra, called Earth by its autochthonous species, of the Sol Star System within the Galaxy of Milky Way, is hereby designated quarantined code red.  Terran life is in extinction.  Avoid at all cost.

              I sent the message on a wide beam message relaying it through the comm systems in our observation stations and set them to auto repeat the warning.  I then released a coded message to Command back on Kælty, who would forward it to the Galactic Council.  At some point, an extermination fleet will come handle this Terran threat.  What the hell have these people done to themselves?  It had been my job to uncover that, but the planet was too hostile for such an investigation.  Maybe another team will figure it out before the extermination fleet is dispatched.  Probably not.

              I watched the small stellar dots move past as the ship’s speed increased and translated into hyperspace.  The ship would now take me back to Kælty where I can give my report to the Kælty Council.  In the meantime, I needed to hit the sanitation shower.  If whatever happened on that primitive backwater world hit a metropolis like Kælty, the galactic devastation would be paramount.

              I removed the remaining parts of my environment suit and disposed of them in the incinerator.  I stepped into the shower and felt secure that the pink liquid was detoxing my system.  After stepping out of the shower, I looked in to the mirror and my heart sank.  NO!  My eyes!  They’ve turned opaque grey!  How?  No!  The sanitation shower should’ve stopped it!  With the autopilot set, and being in hyperspace, I couldn’t stop the ship.  I had one option left; the self-destruct.

              My feet were moving slower than normal.  Where had all my speed gone?  That jump earlier didn’t wear me out that much.  It then dawned on me; whatever had happened on Terra had become airborne.  I had been exposed to it after my helmet broke and it incubated in my system while I was unconscious.  The sanitation shower was too little too late.

I finally reached the controls, but I could barely see them.  My hands fumbled around not hitting anything of consequence.  I was hungry for meat.  I tried typing in the self-destruct code, but couldn’t!  “Well, Fuuuuuuuhhhhhhhhh.”