Earth Fathers Are Weird (Earth Fathers #1) - Lyn Gala Page 0,49

So he focused on his job. In the corridor outside the filtration room, one yellow and one blue dot blinked. That implied the computer was tracking different species rather than intruders and people who should be on the ship. Two dots were in the corridor by the medical room and two were outside the lower storage decks. The cavernous rooms were empty.

That was four more enemy in addition to the leader. One yellow and one bluish-green dot were still in the “control” room.

The medical corridor was the closest, so that was Max’s first stop. Time to figure out the weapon. He urged James to move, so James curled his strong walking tentacle around his neck as Max dashed for the service shaft.

With every step, he expected to hear an alien voice shout or a weapon discharge or an alarm sound. So far the invaders were as tactically oblivious as Rick. Once he was far enough away from the filtration room that any noise he made would draw invaders away from the children, Max pulled out the triangular weapon and studied the short part of the triangle where the aliens had held it.

It had long grooves, and Max ran his finger along the indentations. He felt the slightest seam. He pointed the weapon away from the filtration room and pressed it. Nothing happened.

All the work on the translation computer had taught Max to seek creative work-arounds, so he switched to using his thumbnail. He ran a finger forward over the seam and then backward. He feared the weapon had a security lock, but then he drew a circle over the seam. The last-ditch effort paid off when energy gathered along the sides of the triangle and then discharged with enough energy to send the deck plates exploding up into the air before they clattered back to the floor in a twisted heap of rubble.

“Win,” James said. He waved two long, slender tentacles.

James might be right. They might win. However, Max had to keep in mind that the other side had the same weapons, so Max had to play this smart. Time to move fast.

Chapter Seventeen

There was so much tactical information that Max wished he could ask for. However, he had never programmed certain words into the translator. He would frustrate James if he asked whether the weapon he had scavenged could breach the ship’s hull. Max could only try to avoid weapons fire unless necessary, and then make sure that the energy hit the invaders and not the ship. Or at least not to hit the ship again. He hoped Rick would forgive him for the mess he'd made out of the decking.

Max stopped by one of the access vents set high into the wall and used the indented handhold to lift himself high enough to pry the cover off. He had done this dozens of times when he’d been exploring, but never with little tentacles in the way.

“Careful with tentacles,” Max said.

“Careful with enemy,” James replied. Either James had a wicked sense of humor or the translator was glitchy. It was a little hard to know which. Max gave James a little push to get him to slide back farther so he wouldn't interfere with arm movements. James shifted. That allowed Max to haul himself up into the service shaft before he started shimmying down to the level below.

He had hoped that he would be able to locate the enemy from within the shaft, but he couldn't hear anyone. For a time, Max considered doubling back and having James check the internal scanners again, but they didn’t have time. Then in a wild tangent, his brain conjured an image of an ex-boyfriend.

At one point he’d had a brief but torrid affair with a man who wrote children’s books. Bobby had always said he loved that for children, cliché didn't exist. An author could have the most clichéd, stereotypical villain, yet children would soak it all up because it was new to them. At the time, Max had thought that Bobby was a little too cynical to write children's literature.

But Bobby's words haunted Max as crawled back up the vent shaft.

“Max win enemy, query?” James asked.

“Watch and learn, young padawan. Watch and learn.” Max had snagged several small chunks of metal from the exploded decking, and now he took the two smallest and dropped them down the shaft. He ran like a demon for the next shaft. This trick was so old that even cartoons considered it too clichéd to work.