Evil Star (3 page)

Otto pointed the electro-prod at Diesel’s chest. ‘We need to overwhelm them with force!’ he yelled.

‘It’s the Mezzoka Clan.’ Diesel laughed. ‘The whole IF couldn’t overwhelm them – you’d have to obliterate the planet in one go.’

Diesel grabbed a sonic-trident from the rotating arsenal and lunged at Otto but narrowly missed. Otto swiped back with the electro-prod, but Diesel dodged it and leapt on to the Meigwor’s back. Peri ran to the control panel. There was only one way to separate them now.

‘Get off, space-monkey!’ Otto boomed. He twisted violently. Diesel went flying across the Bridge, then he stood up, his fan of hair turning as red as a Martian sandstorm.

Peri flicked a button on the control panel.
Suurrpptt-Clunk-Clunk-Clunk-Clunk!
Diesel’s Expedition Wear boots became magnetically glued to the deck, then whisked him across the floor, away from Otto, as if Diesel was skating on Saturn’s ice rings.

‘Enough,’ said Peri.

‘What are you doing?’ Diesel yelled, struggling to move his feet. ‘We need to sort out this weapons issue. Now is not the time to sit around chatting.’

‘Diesel’s right, electro-boy!’ boomed Otto. ‘Stay out of our debate!’

‘You’re both wrong,’ Peri snapped. Diesel and Otto glared at him. ‘We barely made it off Haven alive. If we want to find Daxx and stay in one piece, we need to use our brains this time. Selene, what can you tell me about the planet?’

‘The planet’s shields are still too powerful,’ Selene said. ‘We need to be in a close orbit to get any useful readings.’

‘Isn’t that a bit risky?’ Peri asked.

‘The
Phoenix
has the most sophisticated cloaking device in the universe,’ Selene said. ‘We should be able to avoid being spotted while we take pictures.’

Jaxx shook his head. ‘You’re forgetting that the Mezzokas’ scanners will pick up anything unusual in the space-time fabric. They’ll shoot first and not bother to ask questions later.’

‘That’s why we’ll do it at speed,’ said Selene. ‘By the time they spot us in their sensor readings, we’ll be long gone.’

‘That might just work,’ Jaxx said.

Peri realised this was the best idea. He demagnetised Diesel’s boots. ‘Strap in. We’re going to do a supersonic fly-by.’

Otto and Diesel raced to the gunnery station. Selene and Jaxx made frantic adjustments to the sensors. Peri decided that the best route to the planet was to follow Daxx’s path as closely as he could.

Peri started warming up the thrusters and the main engines. His astro-harness snaked around him as his chair tilted into the flight position. ‘Get ready . . . Three, two, one . . . Go!’

Peri slammed down the pyramid-shaped button and the
Phoenix
roared forward.

Eeeeeraaa! Eeeeeraaa!
Sirens erupted across the Bridge. Peri saw a blur of red light hurtle at them from the Astro-Void. He tried to steer the
Phoenix
away from it, but the light was too fast.

Blaaaaaaam
!
The red blur smashed into the
Phoenix
. Peri strained against his astro-harness, while Selene and Jaxx were knocked to the floor.

‘It’s a cosmic-catapult!’ shrieked Otto from the gunnery station.

Peri looked out of the 360-monitor. The
Phoenix
had been scooped up by a massive red laser net. Peri turned to see where the laser net was aiming. He felt a hot tingle run through all his circuits when he saw the black hole at the edge of the Astro-Void.

Chapter 3

Peri slammed on the dodge mechanism and yanked the anti-drift levers, but the
Phoenix
simply juddered and made a terrible grinding noise. It couldn’t break free from the cosmic-catapult.

‘Hold on, everyone!’ Peri shouted.

‘We’re going to die!’ Otto roared as the black hole filled the 360-monitor.

Chaaaa-Boiiiiiiiiinngg!
The catapult flung the
Phoenix
past the black hole and out of the Astro-Void at unbelievable speed. Peri pulled the Nav-wheel, but nothing happened. He yanked more levers and slammed more buttons, but he couldn’t regain control of the ship. At least the UpRighter mechanism was keeping the Bridge stable as the rest of the ship spun.

‘Look out!’ Selene shouted, pointing at the 360-monitor. ‘Moon!’

The
Phoenix
was on a collision course with a huge chunk of rock. It would have been too late to avoid a direct hit even if they had had control of the navigation systems.

‘Full power to the shields!’ Peri yelled as his astro-harness tightened again. ‘Brace yourselves!’

Slaaaam-Boooiiinnng!
The
Phoenix
smacked into the moon, but the ship’s shields flexed and tossed the ship back out into space. The whole Bridge lurched as the UpRighter mechanism failed.

Suddenly, the ceiling was below them, then above them, and then off to the side. Peri was thrown against his astro-harness. The Bridge and the 360-monitor spun wildly in different directions. He clutched his stomach and groaned. He had never felt so space-sick before.

An astro-bucket sprung from the arm of his chair and Peri grabbed it. He glanced at the rows of swirling metal teeth inside that would chew anything up if he puked. He looked away, trying to take his mind off his space-sickness. As the ship spun, Selene and her dad held on to Peri’s chair and each other while space-wrenches flew out of her pockets.

Crrraaasssh-Boiiinnng!
The ship ricocheted off an asteroid, then rebounded off a comet before zipping across a planet’s atmosphere and spinning away in a new direction. Only the
Phoenix
’s defence systems were keeping Peri and the crew from being smashed to pieces.

Groans were coming from the gunners’ chairs. Diesel had his head buried in an astro-bucket. Peri could just see his limp green hair plastered against his head, blue sweat dripping off it. ‘Make it stop,’ he moaned, his voice echoing from the bucket.

Peri’s stomach churned as the
Phoenix
flipped and bounced through space. He pressed his hand over his mouth and wished his bionic circuits could prevent him feeling sick.

With a jolt, the UpRighter mechanism started working again and the Bridge stopped spinning. The drone of the engines became less urgent and Peri realised that the
Phoenix
’s speed was decreasing. The ship bounced gently off another asteroid and came to a halt.

Diesel lifted his head from the astro-bucket and looked around. ‘Where are we?’ The half-Martian gulped and tried to put his hand over his mouth, but he was too late. His neon-green vomit splattered into the astro-bucket.
Whirrrrrrrr!
The bucket whizzed into action.

Peri didn’t want to see any more of that! He punched a button on the control panel and a map appeared on the 360-monitor. ‘I can’t believe it – we’re half a galaxy from our last position!’ He placed his palm on the smooth red section of the control panel.
Click.
It slid open and he punched in the coordinates. ‘Stand by! I’m going to use Superluminal to get back to where we started.’

Peri flicked the switch. The
Phoenix
leapt forward faster than the speed of light. It was a smoother ride than their catapult-fuelled trip halfway across the galaxy. The
Phoenix
dropped out of Superluminal speed to reveal the vast emptiness of the Astro-Void.

The blue planet was gone.

‘It’s not here,’ Otto boomed. ‘You’ve made a mistake!’

Peri rechecked the coordinates. ‘It was definitely here . . . But now it isn’t.’

Diesel pulled his head free of the astro-bucket and wiped his mouth. ‘How can you lose an entire planet?’

Peri glanced at Selene and Jaxx to see what they thought. Jaxx was standing up and dusting himself off while Selene sat slumped on the floor, smirking.

Peri narrowed his eyes. ‘Something funny?’ he asked. ‘We’ve just lost our only lead to clear your dad’s name!’

Selene’s grin got wider. ‘Who said we’ve lost the planet?’

‘For Neptune’s sake,’ Diesel yelled. ‘It doesn’t take a wastoid to look outside and see that the planet is GONE!’

Selene rolled her eyes. ‘You don’t get planets in an Astro-Void,’ she said. ‘So whoever owns that planet must have fitted it with engines and flown it here –’

‘Which means,’ Jaxx interrupted, ‘that they can probably move it wherever they like.’

‘Genius,’ Diesel said sarcastically. ‘But
we
still don’t know where it’s gone.’

Selene smiled again. ‘As soon as I realised it was mobile, I used a hypodermic laser to inject a tracking device into the planet’s stratosphere.’

Jaxx helped his daughter up and gave her a hug. ‘Smart thinking! I’m very impressed.’

Selene’s hands moved over the engineer’s console and made adjustments to the tracing scanners. ‘It only has a range of one light year, but it should be enough to track down the planet.’

Zeeeeeee-Zaaaa-Ping!

A bright orange light beam appeared on the
360-monitor. ‘
Tracking the signa
l
,
’ the ship announced. The light began to snake across the Astro-Void, swirling and dipping through the emptiness. Then it stopped and the line faded away, leaving a bright orange dot on the screen.

Selene pointed. ‘There! One missing planet found.’