Young Writers Society

Planet Hindagon, 3045 AD

The two men sat at their table in the Hindagon Bar, a bar for government officials only. These two men in particular were higher up government officials being Commander Lalian and Second-to-the-Top Researcher Masichus, but the Bar was open to anyone employed by the government including Postal Workers and Bank Tellers.

Lalian and Masichus huddled, quietly whispering in their corner, discussing something quite under cover.

“So, is it ready?” Lalian whispered leaning over the table, which was quite difficult for him since he was a rather husky man. Masichus eyed the table nervously as it sighed under the weight. Mind thought, he eyed almost everything that way.

“Yes sir. Everything is finished.”

Lalian sits back and rubs his chin in a thoughtful sort of way.

“Good, Good. I’ll send them out tomorrow then.

Planet Hindagon, Military Headquarters, 3045 AD

A tall, muscular man, about 32 walks down a hall made completely out of chrome to a doorway at the end that slides open with a “whoosh” as he walks through it. Once on the other side the man finds himself in the office of Commander Lalian. They salute each other for a moment then, when Lalian gives the signal they sit down.

“Klinko, my boy, the time has finally come,” he boomed.

The younger, better looking man, apparently called Klinko, fidgets slightly betraying his cool military composure by showing his excitement.

“We’re sending you on a mission. Tomorrow. Meet your ship, the War Coordinator .004, at the dock at 8:00 A.M. It’s not going to wait for you.”

Klinko mouth stretched in a smile so big that it appeared to almost rip his face in two.

“Yes, yes you’re dismissed, go gather Dr. Armenia and First Mate Selenzio.”

Now Captain Klinko rose, saluted, and left the room.

Military Docking Facility, 3045 A.D.

A shuttle had to be talked from the Planet’s surface from something like an airport to the Military Docking Facility. The M. D. F. was a huge chrome (the metal usually used by the military in those days) platform with several chrome, hangers coming off of it. Inside the hangars are many, many ships, but the largest shiniest one was the War Coordinator .004. It was being loaded with a crew of about 10 people-a very small number for such a mission as that but no one seemed to notice.

Captain Klinko, First Mate Selenzio, and Dr. Armenia walked onto the dock slightly after their crew arrived.

“Wow . . . “ Selenzio stared at their new vehicle in awe.

“HAHAHA! It’s ours! All ours!” Klinko yelled while he turned and jogged away; did a bit of a jig.

“He’s happy,” Selenzio said.

Armenia rolled her eyes and walked ahead. “Come on, let’s go.”

Selenzio shrugged and sprinted to catch up and they walked the rest of the way with her. At the door of the ship, Klinko poked his head out with and said is a mock-serious tone, “First Mate Selenzio, I will not tolerate this lateness. Another innocent like this and I’ll have to remove you from my ship.” Abruptly he laughed and bounced down to the ground. “Did you hear that my ship. HAHAHAHA.”

The first mate laughs with his captain until Armenia comes out of the ship, looking rather angry.

“Come on dough heads it’s time to go.”

“Dough heads!” Klinko and Selenzio exclaimed together.

“Ohhh! Just get on the damn ship!” She yelled furiously.

Selenzio bows his head and mutters a, “Yes ma’am, before boarding.

Klinko points at her with a grin. “You can’t give me orders. I’m the Captain. You’re only the Doctor.”

She moves in very close to his face. ”Alright, Captain Klinko, It’s time to board the War Coordinator, 30 seconds to launch.”

“Oh, crap!” Klinko bounded into his ship. Armenia followed behind smiling.

A few minutes later the ship takes off.

War Coordinator .004, later that night

The three of them were given the largest most lavish cabins with carpet. Not many military issued space vehicles had such luxuries as carpets.

These carpets; however, did some strange things. After all the lights were off and the ship set on auto-pilot and everyone in bed, nasty greenish fumes rose up out of the floor in each of the three rooms.

War Coordinator .004, the next morning

Klinko rose in quite different mood. His grin wasn’t kooky like the day before it was rather maniacal, insane even. He abruptly sat up in bed with a white and taut muscle shirt over his rippling pectoral muscles and let loose an evil little giggle.

Only a few minutes later . . .

Selenzio and Armenia arose from bed in quite the same way; the wrong side.

The scene in the War Coordinator .004 was purely and simply, chaos. Klinko was waving around a huge gun at the prisoners (who were actually the crew) with one hand and holding a yelping Armenia in the other.

Her yelping was the only sound though. The crew was completely silent as Klinko and Selenzio jeered at them. Suddenly the Captain erupted into laughter.

“Take ‘em to the Detention Cells.”

Selenzio grinned and nodded, causing his floppy hair to bounce. His green eyes lit up at the thought of making someone his prisoner. “Follow me.”

The crew bumbled along as if they expected this to happen. Selenzio followed with a sneer and a gun almost larger than him.

Once they were out of sight, Klinko threw Armenia on the floor and ignored her sobbing. He plopped down in front of the ships missiles, pegged a satellite and laughs about it. Then almost indecipherably mumbled, “Damn government scoundrels.”

In the Detention Cells,

Selenzio happily drove his prisoners into their cells with a bit of a dance. They went into the prison without a fuss, then the cells detached and they all got away.

He yelled loudly and pushed his hair back frantically like he thought it was clouding his vision.

“WHAT?!!? WHERE ARE YOU GOING??!!?? COME BACK??!!??”

He took off back up the deck to find Armenia, distraught and scarred, pinned to the wall by an advancing Klinko.

When his first mate ran in, he pulled away and cleared his throat loudly,

“Yes, M’boy.” He said straightening his back and lifting his chin in an attempt to regain his authority.

“Captain . . . I . . . the prisoners . . . have escaped.”

Klinko jumped to attention wit a look and mixed anger and surprise.

“What! All of them??!!”

Selenzio hung his head in shame. “Yes Captain, all of them.’

Klinko shook with anger and confusion. The two others flinched as if some giant alien monster was going to implore its wrath.

“How the hell did they ‘escape’?”

Selenzio’s smaller frame twitches violently with fear before he can bring himself to answer.

“I—I—I don’t know. I put them in the cells like you asked and when they were in, the cells . . . detached . . .”

Confusion falls over both of their faces. The captain rubs his chin thoughtfully.

“Detached, eh?”

While they were looking thoughtful, Armenia tried to slink off somewhere. Klinko grabbed her by the neck and pulled her under his arm.

“Where do you think you’re going?” Her long curly blond hair falls over her face.

“I just thought I’d . . . “She gave up and went limp.

“That’s what I thought.”

He let her go; she went off in a corner. Klinko gave his attention back to Selenzio, who is only a few feet away not reacting at all to Armenia and her behavior. Klinko continues with a finger pointed.

“Anyway, the only person who would dare cross me is Georgio,” he throws in a pause for effect, “the damned president of the Walnut System.”

Selenzio appeared confused once again. “Forgive me Captain, but the cells detached, please explain.”

Klinko points his finger again. “Ahhhh . . . but you see, Young First Mate, he has ways. Little people! He got a hoard of little people to break into our ship and tamper with our Detainment Cells.”

A look of understanding fell over Selenzio’s face and a grin appeared. “Are we gonna get him?”

Klinko laughed and hit him on the back—hard. “Do pigs fly?”

They both threw their heads back and laughed.

The War Coordinator .004 drifted nearer and nearer to a purplish planet.

Klinko prepared to land; laughing sporadically.

Selenzio was hanging of the side of the ship on a bungee cord, dressed in space gear, painting a skull and crossbones. He was laughing and because of it the inside of his helmet was getting all fogged up and he couldn’t see, but he kept laughing anyway.

Klinko put the sip on auto-dock and turned to Armenia. She cowered against the wall; he walked toward her still.

“It’s time Armenia, time to take the bastards out.”

He pinned her to the wall; she began to cry, but Klinko only laughed at her.

“Would you like to be my queen, Armenia? You would make a beautiful queen.” He laughs hysterically again.

Doctor Sanemiss, a short stub of a man with neatly trimmed contained gray hair and black, round wire rim glasses with thick lenses, wearing a tie-died lab coat entered a messy laboratory. He was pushing a chalkboard and laughing good-naturedly.

“I’ll bet you’re wondering what that was all about!” He exclaimed in a slightly Romanian accent.

He laughed some more, picked up a piece of chalk, and said, “Well it’s all very simple.”

Abruptly he broke into a tangent of writing complicated equations and explaining very quickly as if he didn’t really want anyone to understand but felt like he had to say them anyway. Slowly he stopped, put the chalk down, and clapped the dust off his hands.

“Alright, now your explanation.”

He started rummaging through some shelves in a corner. After a moment he pulled out a sheet, a projector, and a box of slides. He threw the sheet over the chalkboard kind of askew; a puff of chalk dust followed. Then he popped a slide in the machine. Suddenly he yelled out, “LET THERE BE DARK!” clapped his hands, and the lights went out, then he giggled.

“I love that. Anyway, it all began with this . . . “

On the sheet covered chalkboard, a can that clearly reads CARPET ADHESIVE appeared.

“Yes that’s what it says, Carpet Adhesive.” He giggled again. “The government wasted some kind of new chemical warfare that not even I,” gestures to himself, “know about. Sooo they hired me to devise it. I don’t normally like to take jobs that kill people but this one had good pay so I took it.” He paused to take a deep breath. “To test my wonderful creation they put it in the carpet adhesive into the cabins of Klinko, Selenzio, and Armenia, sent them to a non-existent war, and, well, all this resulted.”

He flipped a switch on the projector and a playback of Captain Klinko shooting down Satellites and laughing about it emerged. Sanemiss looked at it and sighed. “Well I guess you’re wondering if the title of this piece rings true.” A morbid look comes upon his face, and then he started laughing.

“No, no, no. President Smith is sending troops to collect them at this very moment before they invade the Walnut System and assassinate ‘President Georgio’,” he used air quotes when he said President Georgio, “who is a ferret. I don’t know where they got it from but Georgio is President Smith’s pet ferret.” He shrugged. “and I know what you’re thinking and the answer is: yes everyone is fine.” For a moment he paused and thought, then he giggled, “The only real damage done was to my benefactors. Twenty-one government satellites were shot out of space.” Sanemiss laughed and sat up on a counter next to a vile of bubbling goo. “Let me tell you they won’t be doing any experimenting on fully equipped warships any time soon.”

He jumped off the counter—nearly upsetting the goo all over the floor, picked up another slide and placed it in the projector.

“Everything turned out hunky dory so I’ll leave you with this. . . “

He flipped the switch and GOODBYE appeared on the sheet.

Two burly men dressed all in white carried a scraggly looking Klinko through a completely white hallway with bright florescent lights over head, into a padded room. Our dear captain is laughing hysterically and struggling against his captors.

“They can’t keep me here forever, Georgio! I’ll get you!!!!”

Dr. Sanemiss walked into the hallway from somewhere, shrugged, and let loose a deep sigh.

“So I was mistaken.”