Star Cat: Exodus: A Science Fiction & Fantasy Adventure (The Star Cat Series - Book 5) Read online

  “Your mommy is no patriot, believe me. You were born here. She wasn’t. What about your father?”

  “Don’t talk about my father.”

  “I thought as much,” the third guard offered with a great deal of flippancy.

  Lydia screwed her face. She didn’t know what the guard had meant with that statement, but knew it was far from complimentary, “What did you say?”

  The second guard nodded at the disappearing vessel on the ocean, “I’m guessing your family is on the boat right now. Mom’s going back home?”

  “You took her away from me.”

  He looked at the first guard and back to the girl, affecting a bizarre sympathy with her, “You’re not going to shoot my friend, are you?”

  “I will blow his head off if you don’t turn the boat around.”

  “Ha. Amaziant,” the second guard pinched his name badge and attempted to gain her attention, “My name is Keller.”

  Lydia kept the gun aimed at the first guard’s head, “I don’t care.”

  “Oh, you will care, Lydia,” Keller said. “You tried to break quarantine by sneaking a cat on board. Now, you’re aiming a gun at my friend’s face. Do you really think you’re going to get away with this?”

  “Yes.”

  “Where did a stank misfit like you learn to hold a gun?”

  Lydia threw her oppressor a look of evil, “I’m an American and so is my mother. We’ve always lived here.”

  “You stupid, misguided child.”

  The crowd stepped back as Keller tried to approach the girl, “Put the gun down, Lydia.”

  “Don’t come any closer.”

  “I said put the gun down.”

  “Turn the boat around and let me and my mom stay and then I’ll put the gun down.”

  “God damn it, you little misfit bitch,” Keller stopped in his tracks, fully aware that he was losing both the stand-off and face in front of the others, “How about this?”

  “How about what?”

  “Did you know the transport units are equipped with tons of C4?”

  “What’s C4?” Lydia asked, never tearing her attention away from the first guard.

  “For God’s sake,” he roared. “Just turn the boat back.”

  Keller lowered his gun and cleared his throat, “C4. Explosives. Hey, I have this great idea. I’ll get my friends in the tower to blow the boat up and kill everyone on board.”

  “You w-wouldn’t.”

  “Including your stinking, misfit of a mother,” Keller spat before a smile streaked across face, “Are you willing to bet her life on it?”

  Lydia kept the machine gun aimed a the first guard’s face, “Turn the boat back and I’ll let your friend live.”

  “No dice, I’m afraid,” Keller pinched his mouthpiece and signaled the control tower with his thumb, “This is Keller on ground control. Be advised, prepare for incendiary on E-23.”

  “What are you doing?” Lydia yelled. “Tell them to stop doing that.”

  “Understood, engine fire on E oh-two-three,” came the response. “Ten seconds till detonation.”

  “What?” Lydia asked. “What does that mean?”

  Keller chuckled and folded his arms, “You’ve got less than ten seconds to drop the gun, Lydia.”

  The announcement came through Keller’s headgear just loud enough for Lydia to hear. A tinny, tiny countdown to doom.

  “Ten, nine, eight—”

  “You won’t do it. I’m not stupid.”

  “—Seven, six—”

  Lydia’s jaw opened as she turned to what was now a tiny white dot on the ocean horizon.

  “Lydia?” Keller asked. “Drop the gun. Save your mother and all the other misfits on board the ship.”

  She turned to the first guard’s face. He squeezed his eyes shut and prepared for his execution, “Please, don’t kill me.”

  “—Four. Three. Two—”

  The civilians in the crowd froze still in the hope that the girl would do as instructed.

  But she didn’t.

  Lydia shook her head and pointed the barrel of the machine gun at the guard’s forehead.

  “No. Turn the boat around or your friend is dead.”

  “One,” confirmed the voice through Keller’s headset. “Incendiary activated.”

  Lydia wasn’t fooled. She took in a lungful of air and screamed her final order.

  “Do it. Turn the boat around and—”

  A deafening silence cut her off mid-sentence.

  The ground lifted into the air and punched her in the face.

  Knees dropped to the floor, covered by giant black shadows from behind.

  Firearms hit the floor and scattered in all directions.

  The ground socked her in the forehead once again and twisted to the left, offering a vertical rendition of the watery horizon, followed by a sudden appearance of what looked like daytime.

  WEEERRRR-WHAAAASSSSSH.

  The bolt of light came from the ship, reducing it to smithereens.

  “Nooooo,” Lydia grabbed her face and rolled over the dropped machine gun. She felt a tightening sensation on her upper left arm. It closed into her muscle and lifted her into the air.

  Keller’s mouth moved to within an inch of her earlobe. A muffled voice flooded her ear canal in what seemed like slow motion.

  “See what you did, you stupid little girl?”

  Her body rocked back and forth as if to underscore a point. The dampened sound bled into crystal-sharp clarity as the fire roared from the ship.

  She tried to wriggle free from his clutches.

  “No, no, no—”

  “—See that barbecue over there? That’s your mother and countless other misfits cooking into the night sky. All because of you.”

  “Nooo—” Lydia squealed through her tears, “No, no, no—”

  Keller pushed her into the third guard’s arms, “Take her away and have her dealt with.”

  Lydia kicked and screamed as the guard dragged her away from the line.

  The remaining civilians rose to their feet in sheer horror as they witnessed the inferno light up the night sky.

  A voice accompanied the spectacle from the tower, “Anyone else wanna get smart?”

  Everyone looked at the tower.

  “Any and all defiance will be met with extreme measures. I hope this demonstration has made that clear. Misfit Soviet scumbags.”

  ***

  Squiffy breast-stroked his way towards the roaring inferno a mile away in the distance.

  He stopped swimming for a moment and waded in the freezing cold water.

  So cold, it should have frozen his body by this point. He should have succumbed to the beyond-freezing temperatures.

  But he didn’t.

  The reflection of the roaring fire folded across his green pupils.

  “Meow.”

  He licked his mouth and threw himself forward, ducking his head below the surface and continued to swim.

  CHAPTER TWO

  A Planet Near Saturn

  (Presently)

  One hundred wolves surrounded the bizarre Colosseum made of broken spacecraft parts. Their master, Mastazita, lay dead with a gaping wound in his chest in the middle of the makeshift arena.

  Defeated by a much stronger entity.

  The remains of his heart lay a few feet away from him.

  Very few saw the battle take place but they knew who’d won the war.

  Her name - Jelly Anderson.

  The tiger-faced war mage sat in the discarded pilot’s seat at the head of the Colosseum.

  In her hands lay her newborn, Furie - assumed princess of the stars.

  Mother shifted in her makeshift throne and stared into her daughter’s beautiful eyes.

  Saturn’s light reflected in the newborn kitten’s pupils.

  Enceladus - the moon that contained the answers to why they were there - continued its fiery trajectory toward the ringed planet. Orange track marks screeched across the dar
k blanket of space.

  Alex Hughes and Jaycee Nayall arrived to see the quiet serenade between mother and daughter.

  The slain beast told them everything they needed to know without spelling it out.

  Jaycee had seen better days. He’d survived the merciless pummeling Jelly had dealt him. She believed in her heart of hearts that he was responsible for the death of her youngest.

  Nothing would change her mind.

  His chest had broken apart through his exo-suit. The blue lights indicating that his vital organs were still running bled through the cracks. His right leg seemed beyond repair, battered out of shape.

  Walking proved to be a challenge for him.

  Alex dared not question why the wolves sat in reverence for the monstrous half woman, half tiger protecting her one remaining child.

  Until now, the beasts had been her enemy.

  Alex only had the slightest glimpse of the much bigger foe since they’d arrived on this planet. Now, in the eerie wilderness of the unknown terrain, it lay dead before him.

  It didn’t take a scientist - rocket, or otherwise - to put the pieces together.

  “My God,” Alex whispered.

  Jaycee’s vocal cord box produced a whiny rendition of the voice Alex and Jelly were used to. It sounded as if someone had dunked it in water. An amusing discrepancy between his looks and the sound that came out of his mouth.

  Jaycee pushed his slanted jaw into place, “You might not be wrong about that.”

  “Huh?”

  “Nothing.”

  The wolves whined and howled, yet remained still.

  Jelly lifted her head and growled at the last two remaining crew members.

  Alex swallowed hard, “Look at her. D-Does she want us to do the same thing?”

  “I think so,” Jaycee got down on one knee and tugged on Alex’s sleeve, “Best not to piss her off.”

  Alex lowered himself to his knees, never tearing his eyes away from Jelly and her daughter.

  “Wh-what do we do now?” Alex asked.

  Jaycee tilted what remained of his head up at Saturn, “I doubt we have much choice,” he said as Enceladus disappeared once and for all into the planet.

  WHUMM-MM.

  A bright, yellow spot blasted upon Enceladus’ impact with Saturn’s surface.

  “What’s going on up there?” Alex asked.

  “You’re asking me like I know more than you—”

  GROWL.

  Jelly grunted at Jaycee and pressed her weight to the soles of her feet.

  “What’s she doing?” Alex muttered.

  Jelly stood out of the pilot’s chair and squeezed Furie’s waist in her hands.

  A peculiar offering took place.

  “Miew,” Furie’s top half shuddered in Jelly’s right hand, which still resembled that of a human adult.

  Jelly lifted her head back and raised her daughter towards the blue planet.

  GROOOOOWW-LL.

  Her prolonged grunt scared those who were watching the perverse serenade taking place in front of them.

  Furie’s body rose into the air as her mother lifted her above her head and shoulders.

  As her arms rose, the full extent of the damage she’d sustained from her battle came into view.

  A torn, bleeding chest.

  Scratch marks, cuts, and dried, bloody wounds adorned her arms. A thoroughly battered exo-suit clung to her limbs. Parts of it fell away from her elbows as she extended her arms to full height.

  It seemed Jelly hadn’t much longer to live - a mess of a part-cat, part-tiger, part-woman.

  “Miew,” Furie yelped and writhed around in her mother’s arms.

  “So help me, G-God,” Jelly coughed and licked around her mouth.

  Alex held his hand over his brow and nudged Jaycee in the ribs. He’d seen something.

  “Look, up there.”

  “What?”

  Jaycee looked up at the sky. Saturn had turned orange. It appeared to be breathing. The revolving rings slowed to a halt and sunk into the planet’s surface.

  The rumbling stopped and produced a colossal silence that filled the air. The smallest movement from either of them would echo around the Colosseum and potentially upset Jelly, or what was about to happen.

  “I think we should get out of here,” Jaycee said.

  “You want to be the one to run first? Good luck with that,” Alex whispered. “Besides, where are you going to run—”

  WHVOOOOOM.

  The waves rippled out from the nucleus of the planet and turned the blue light into an orange hue.

  The giant ball threw light on all who watched before a God-like hum rocketed in all directions.

  “My G-God,” Alex covered his face, “It’s so bright—”

  Jaycee squinted at the event and eventually gave up looking at it.

  BLAAASSSSTTT.

  A stream of pure orange and pink energy rocketed from the center and blasted towards the shivering Furie.

  Each infinity claw that surrounded Jelly’s daughter sparked in preparation for the connection.

  “Be still, my beautiful child,” Jelly screamed into the sky, “Let them take you.”

  SCHLAAAAMM-MM.

  Furie writhed around and squealed in anguish as the beam seeped through her chest. Like a broken faucet, Saturn’s gift fountained into Furie and flooded her entire body.

  No overspill.

  Without mercy, the energy consumed Furie’s head, body, and limbs, forcing her to shudder around in her mother’s clutches.

  “Wh-what’s happening?” Alex shouted over the wolves as they howled and jumped around on the spot.

  “Silence,” Jelly growled in her low-pitched voice as Saturn’s constant stream flowed into her daughter’s chest.

  BLAST — SHRIIEEEEEEKKK-KK.

  Two more beams exploded through Saturn’s surface and flew into the distance behind Alex and Jaycee.

  “What the—?”

  BOOM.

  The connection pounded the ground, lifting the muddied detritus into the air like the contents of an angry lava lamp.

  The two beams couldn’t connect with their target, and so folded back onto themselves and sank into Saturn’s surface.

  GROWLLL.

  Jelly roared in pain and caught her breath. She looked at Jaycee and scowled at him.

  He didn’t know how to respond.

  “I’m s-sorry?”

  “Grrrr,” Jelly grunted as she kept Furie held in the air.

  The last of the intense beam funneled into her daughter and whisked away with a tiny bwup sound.

  Saturn’s surface resembled a bright ball of fire.

  Night-time turned to daytime for everyone.

  The entire planet lit up, exposing the beautiful green foliage and trees that surrounded the Colosseum. Even the white, broken sections of the ship seemed less dirty than they had thought.

  The ground felt a lot hotter than it did just a few minutes ago.

  The wolves howled at their new sun as Jelly lifted her daughter back to her chest.

  “My girl,” she whispered at Furie. “Look at you. So beautiful.”

  Furie shimmied around in her mother’s human hands. Jelly kept her daughter in her palms, careful to avoid injuring her on the imprisoning effect the claws provided.

  Furie’s eyelids fluttered and eventually opened. Her pupils dilated in the intense sun. Her eyes had turned brown.

  The shadow created by Jelly’s head blanketed over her daughter’s face, protecting her from the harsh light.

  “Hello, honey.”

  Furie blinked a couple of times and spluttered, “Muh—Muh—”

  “—It’s okay, honey,” Jelly whispered. “Breathe in and try again.”

  Furie shut her eyes, stretched her front paws out and accidentally brushed her mother’s face with her paws.

  “Heh,” Jelly smiled. “It’ll take some getting used to, honey.”

  Furie relaxed and shook the fatigue from her he
ad once again. She opened her eyes.

  “Muh-muh—” she tried. “Mommy?”

  Jelly ran the side of her huge face along daughter’s tiny body and head, “Yes, honey. It’s me. Your mother.”

  Furie cleared her throat and pressed her paws against Jelly’s face, “Mah.”

  Jelly turned to her audience and took a step forward. The wolves shifted back, hoping she wouldn’t snarl at them.

  Alex and Jaycee rose to their feet.

  In a bizarre act of overconfidence, the latter held out his arms, “J-Jelly?”

  The house cat had grown so much since he last saw her, which wasn’t all that long ago.

  A towering mess of a woman, she must have grown to twelve feet in height - possibly more.

  “Jaycee?” she asked, expecting no more conversation.

  He scanned the orange horizon and took a final look at the wolves, before returning to her. He went to point at Furie but had second thoughts about what he wanted to say.

  “I, uh—” Jaycee tried. “What—what do you want us to do?”

  Jelly approached the men with the wolves in tow.

  A wondrous and perplexing sight for the two remaining crew members.

  “We want to go home,” Jelly said.

  Jaycee held out his arms in a wry attempt at peace, “Where is home, Jelly?”

  “Silence,” Jelly snapped at him, “Murderer.”

  Alex came to his rescue, “Jaycee didn’t kill your daughter, Jelly—”

  GROWWWLLL.

  The wolves backed up, afraid of her venomous outburst.

  Jelly found the idea that Alex might try to negotiate the life of his colleague pathetic.

  Lily-livered at best, and downright stupid at worst.

  She hugged Furie tighter and stomped forward, causing Alex and Jaycee to back up and consider running off.

  “Where do you think you’re going?” she snapped.

  “Uh, over there?” Alex whimpered.

  “Without us?”

  “Um, no?”

  “Damn right um, no. Dickhead,” Jelly snapped.

  “Oh.”

  Jelly moved between the two men. She purposely barged Jaycee out of her way and continued walking.

  “Where are we going, Jelly?” Alex chanced.

  “Back to Charlie. We’re going home.”