Episode 14: Dragon Ass

After a lengthy retrace of steps pilot Cameron Scott and Staff Sergeant Malcolm “Malibu” Brand reached the Victorian era carriage amid the desolation desert. Upon immediate arrival they could tell that someone had added to their unpacked carnage, things were slung everywhere on the ground. With zero breeze nothing had been swept away. At least yet!

“She’s been here.” Cameron pointed ahead of schedule. “I don’t remember leaving that passenger side door open. I know for a fact it was locked from the inside, now it’s dangling from its hinges. We only entered this door over here.”

Rubbing an intense perspiration from his face onto his shirt sleeve, Malcolm nodded and looked about at the ground around them. “Still no footprints outside of the ones our boots left last visit. At least none smaller than our feet. How is that possible?”

“I got no clue, Bubba.” Cam offered, dragging his backpack from his shoulder. Unpacking it something caught Malcolm’s attention.

“You brought the diary box back?”

“Yeah! It felt too personal to keep now that I know she’s still alive. I figure we should leave it here as a sign of trust. Maybe that bit of good intentions will stop her from being skittish and come out of hiding again.”

“Sound plan! You should have brought that top hat back too. It sure doesn’t look good on you, Buddy. I’ve seen you shuffle cards; your magician days are bust. Pick a card, any card off the floor.” HA!

“We never did tease Elle and Ruby with those cotillion dresses.” Cam shook his head! “Sabbath might need those back too. Damn! I wasn’t thinking.”

“They’re there when she comes back. You should leave her a note.”

“As if I have a pen and paper.” The pilot rolled his eyes. “I left it back in my room.”

“There’s paper in that diary.”

“I’m not going to intrude on her personal life. If she ever wants to talk about it, I’m all ears.”

“Doesn’t sound much like you. All honorable!”

“Aiming for respect!” Cam expressed with a sigh. “Don’t judge me!”

Malcolm reopened the magician’s box and found a bottle of dried ink and a quilled pen.

“Here! Fill it with a little spit and you have ink. This Primross guy had flyers for his magic shows. Write her a note on the back of one.” Approving the idea Cam did just that, climbing up onto the buckboard to use the carriage seat as his desk.

“Dear Sabbath! I had no idea you were still alive. I’m returning your diary like a gentleman. I swear to you, I never read it.” More saliva was added to the ink to liquify it. “There is no need to fear us. I hope to see you again. If not, please take care of yourself. Hope to be your friend ... Cameron.” He then read it to Malcolm for clarity.

“Nice! Make’s my eyes all misty.”

“It is pretty dusty out here. Wanna borrow my Visine?” Cam laughed! He always carried a a couple bottles as a pilot.

“Let’s check out something new while we’re out here. No reason to waste our trip. Who knows she might be hold up in one of these boats.”

“Never know, I guess. Lead the way!” Fingers crossed!

Their first stop found a World War 2 Flying Tiger. It was an attractive easy survey to an experienced pilot like Cameron. “It’s angle of landing left it mostly intact. Only the rough skid on Terra Firma left the landing gear all busted up. Weld job might fix those. Small tears in its left wing. Patch it this Tigger could fly.” The windshield was still in its frame only webbed from the rough impact in the dirt. Even the Tiger’s trail left in the sand was still evident after however long it had been since it came down.

Up in the cockpit was the decayed corpse of a man wearing an Army issue uniform. This included aviation goggles. Dog tags dangled around the disks of his spinal column. A pretty nifty leather bomber jacket was still in good shape. Cam carefully reached in and saluted the man before removing the tags. The jacket was too small for his size. Again, respect hit his gut.

“Rest well, Vincent.”

Malcolm also saluted the man from the outside. “1942.”

“Looks like the right year. Too bad this baby couldn’t be detailed. Little fixing up I might be able to fly this KITEy Cat.” Until he looked over the engine. “Scratch that! Parts we don’t have. Besides, I’d need a shop to clean this baby up. Pipe dream!”

“Maybe we have a tow truck hiding in our house.” Mal chuckled! “We could bury Vince all proper and borrow his ride.”

“Something to consider. Place as humongous as that spaceship, it has to have a hangar. A shopping mall that size has room for everything.”

“You know I’ll help you tune it up. It might be cool to use on short scouting missions.”

“Question is, can anything with power fly? I mean look at all the crashes. I totally lost power once we ended up here. Electrical went all kablooey!” Cam acknowledged! “Same for that starship apparently!”

“Nerd boy has those gravity drones flying. If he can get those up and running it might be possible.”

“True! Let’s bury Vince in a shallow grave and move on.”

“Blood, sweat and beers!”

A toast with bottled water and a short speech after digging a 3x4 hole next to his plane, they lay Vincent Burgotti to rest. Tags were left on his flight controls to prove who owned the sky.

Back at the Ganthorian Hyatt!

Colonel Ruby Goddard and her ward James Ian Pryce raced across the ship’s upper hull to see why James Ian’s pup Xander was so agitated. As they reached the sandy ridge the ship rested up against, they peered out over the rocks and dunes to see Xander in the distance. He was darting about as if chasing empty air.

“Has your pup gone crazy?”

“It looks like he’s chasing a dust storm.” James squinted against the sun’s glare, shading his eyes with his right palm. As they continued to observe the strangeness, their attention switched to a newcomer. “Greta’s going for a ride.” James pointed out the Kansas cowgirl on her horse approaching to their right. In Ruby’s case it made her smile, it was nice seeing something normal for a change. She missed her younger days riding horses on her uncle’s farm. That was about the only thing Ruby had in common with Wichita down there. Outside of both women having red hair that is.

“HERE BOY!” James whistled at the highest pitch his lips could audibly make possible. “COME ON BACK.” The telepathy chip in Xander’s skull was too far away to be useful.

Greta galloped up on her horse Quiver to about thirty yards of their side. “I’ll ride on over and coax him back.” An affirmative nod on Ruby’s behalf Ms. Winston encouraged her steed into a run. One that would not last long!

As Ruby and James stood by watching her ride off Ruby shot a glance over at James. “So, what were you really doing pointing that notebook at me?”

“Nothing!” James expressed a glimmer of guilt, “I was checking the area is all.”

“So, that pad has the ability to survey over distances? I’m not locating any camera on the ship’s hull that could assist that type of mode.”

“The telemetry pad picks up movements like its own camera. Senses body temperature. That kind of thing.”

“Uh huh!” Ruby frowned with a doubt that quickly faded as she checked in on Greta’s jaunt. While out on the desert landscape Greta moved closer to Xander’s darting about. At fifty yards her horse came to a bone jerking halt and reared up, forcing her to hold on for dear life.

“What the devil’s wrong with you, Quiver?”

Her eyes scanned about as Greta managed to get her horse to stay on all fours yet stepping in a backward stride of nervous retreat. Xander dashed about as if trying to lure something away. He would have been great during cattle drive she thought. It was then that she spotted something odd. The desert floor was leaving odd creases in it. It reminded her of the gigantic footprints back at her oasis. Only much bigger! They were coming right at her.

“I gotta be seeing things.” Yet her horse reacted fearfully once again. Spotting Xander yelp and act as if he was nudged aside, the German Shepard took a tumble onto his back before rolling right back up on his paws. The dust cloud increased as if something large was stirring up the dry sand. That large something was charging her, she could now feel the ground trembling under a massive weight. It reminded her of a seismic cattle stampede. Greta’s eyes couldn’t grow any wider. Turning Quiver in step she boot heeled his sides into a run, followed by a loud, “YAWWWWW!” Quiver was up for that! About time Lady!

On the ridge Ruby narrowed her eyes at Greta waving them away. “She’s acting like she’s running from something.”

“Xander’s giving chase! Ummm! Why is Greta motioning us to run?”

Ruby instinctively pulled her Glock from her waistband and held it in a tentative defense. “That mini dust storm is following her. How can the ground be that intelligent?”

Turning pale James pulled out his Ganthorian telemetry pad and aimed it toward the oncoming horse. Still in x-ray mode he overlooked Greta’s naked body in favor of what was trailing her. Programming it to monitor movement and a full spectrum of anything oncoming he realized the shape giving chase. With a look of terror in his eyes he couldn’t speak, only blindly reach out to grab for Ruby’s arm. Sadly, it was her right breast as she turned toward him. Swatting his ignorant hand away she snatched the pad from his grasp to take a look for herself. In his horror she knew his grope was accidental.

“HOLY FUCK!!!” She gasped as the pad showed Greta being pursued by the outline of a giant lizard the size of a school bus. They were headed right at them and closing in fast.

“James! Move!” She shoved him along. The unfortunate side had them in a dilemma, the only place close was the ship’s hull. Inevitably they had no choice but to travel the hull in hopes to escape.

“Head for the sunroof area. Maybe you can drop down onto Jack and Elle.” She hurried him along.

“No! The sunroof glass is too thick. They don’t completely open up. All we can do is try to confuse that thing and get behind him where we can escape over the ridge.” Gunshots echoed around the area as Greta rode at top speed utilizing her Winchester to fire backwards at her adversary. Only audible hisses from the lizard were heard.

“Invisible lizards do NOT exist.” Ruby kept telling herself as they moved past the antenna array. “That sure as hell isn’t a chameleon.”

“It looked more like a Komodo Dragon.”

As Greta Winston reached the hull, she literally drove Quiver across the metal in a symphony of alloy thumps. “Ya’ll need to run the other way. I’ll try and keep him busy.” Greta called out at the top of her lungs. Between Xander nipping at its heels and Greta’s darting about, there was a deafening thud of monstrous bulk that shook the proximity. The lizard had set foot on the hull.

James stopped running, forcing Ruby to turn back in order to grab him. He swiftly pulled his backpack from his shoulder to dig inside. “They need help before one of them gets killed.”

“Or we get killed. What are you doing?”

He produced a softball sized drone in his palm. “You haven’t been formally introduced. This is D.R .1!” Activating it, he tossed it into the air. In flight it began to gravitate and find altitude. James reclaiming his telemetry pad used it to send out a program instructing it to defend against the biggest living object out there. Thus, making certain it didn’t attack Greta’s horse. Once the signal was initiated the orb flew off at breakneck speed to zigzag around the lizard. Tiny ports opened up on the drone’s shell that began absorbing sunlight and firing laser beams at the lizard. Loud screeching of effectiveness appeared to be the result. Dramatically!

“Look! Your toy just forced that lizard to go visible. Now we know what we’re aiming at.”

Greta continued shooting from awkward angles as Quiver tried to keep them safe. In the horse’s stride Quiver didn’t realize yet that he was racing to the far edge of the vessel. Nor its multi-story suicide drop to the ground below. Greta panicked at looking over the edge as Quiver managed to follow the rim instead of leaping off. “Too close for canyon comfort, Q.”

“Its attention is divided.” Ruby pushed James along, “Let’s run for it while we can.” The two charged toward the sandy ridge over a block away. Xander having had enough of scale nipping chose to dog their heels to escape as well.

The drone bombarded the lizard from various angles encouraging the beast to retreat back toward the desert. The chase went on for a tenth of a mile before the orb’s range grew dim. It then changed course and returned to follow James.

D.R .1 whizzed by Greta’s head like a bullet as she and Quiver were catching up to Ruby and James. In the breeze by she freaked out and nearly lost her hat. She was terrified enough without more technology boggling her mind.

“Let’s get indoors just in case that thing comes back.” Ruby reacted to Greta trotting beside their pace.

“What about my cows? That critter is probably after them.”

James paused to await D.R .1 as it zipped back to his hand. Halting precious seconds from his palm the orb allowed his fingers to pluck it from the air. Warm to the touch but hardly burning him, he looked it over then kissed its gleaming shell. “Good job! Better than R .2.D .2 any day.” He then returned to running. Xander wanted to play ball. Bad timing!

Their feet carrying them down to level ground they narrowed the gap toward the cattle pen. Greta having reached the pen already had jumped off of her horse in favor of racing over to the ramp of the space craft. Jack and Sophia were at the top dragging more metal out saw them looking shaken.

“Now ya’ll show up.”

Jack looked back over his shoulder at her. “Meaning what?”

Before she could say another word Ruby joined Wichita with a gasping James. “Big lizard. Invisible lizard.” Ruby growled at Jack! “You couldn’t hear us on the roof?”

“This boat is pretty insulated. Obviously not! Everyone alright?”

Unified the trio barked, “NO!” then hurried up the ramp. All except for Greta. She looked back at Quiver then the pen.

“I left the door open. Where’s my calf?” Panic set in! “BETSY!!!”

“Betsy got out?”

Sophia Ridge took the metal frame that she and Jack was hauling right out of his hands and nudged him aside with it. Squinting at the General’s daughter he thought to himself that she could have carried that outside on her own all along. As could he, but he chose teamwork. Sucking up their fear of the dragon the group joined Greta back on the desert floor. Medic Elle Franklin had finally caught up to them from indoors out of curiosity.

Tossing the metal sheet ten feet away from the ramp Sophia spotted tiny hoof prints and eyeballed their distant trail.

“She took off this direction.” Sophia marched after the calf increasing the speed of her sprint. Greta returning to her horse Quiver mounted up to follow but spread out a bit.

Jack scanned the area with his amplified eyesight, but the enhancement was not quite enough to see Betsy. He needed stronger vision. “James? Go get me a pair of binoculars.”

The boy pulled out his all-purpose keypad. “Right here.”, then activated a telescopic mode before passing it off to Jack. As he did Ruby creased her brow at James, convinced of his x-ray mischief. She too saw Greta riding naked when she used it to scan the dust storm earlier. Swallowing dryly, James hurried to follow Jack back up the ramp for weapons rather than deal with Ruby’s scrutiny. Ruby always followed her intuition. That boy had a secret. As she studied the searchers Elle Franklin stepped down beside her from the ramp.