The ride was smooth and serene. The purple planet and its turquoise rings glowed exquisitely. Even though she wasn’t thrilled they were en route to exterminate bugs, Alex couldn’t deny how amazing it was to be gliding between a massive spaceship and the atmosphere of an alien planet.
“I have to admit, this is pretty cool,” she said.
Conner didn’t respond. Alex turned to check on him and saw tears glistening in his eyes. He had seen so many things from his imagination come to life, but seeing an actual planet was surprisingly emotional.
“Are you okay?” she asked.
“I’m fine,” Conner said. “Just allergies.”
“In space?” She laughed.
“Yeah, I think there might have been a cat in here before us.”
Alex just smiled and didn’t press it further. “Well, whatever you’re reacting to, thanks for sharing it with me. This is an experience I would never have had without you.”
The tender moment was interrupted by a loud beeping sound. The twins looked around the spacecraft nervously, afraid something was broken. The beeping was followed by an automated voice.
“Five… four… three…” it said.
“Conner, what are they counting DOOOOWN—”
The 2999 Moon Jumper Express blasted toward Lollipopigust with the power of a thousand rockets. The twins were slammed back into their seats by so much force, it felt like invisible elephants were sitting on them. Their teeth rattled and their cheeks rippled. They were moving so fast, they couldn’t breathe, let alone speak or scream.
The spacecraft zoomed under the turquoise rings, shot through Lollipopigust’s atmosphere, and headed straight for the purple surface. They were moving thousands of miles per second and showed no sign of slowing down. Right when the twins were convinced the spacecraft was going to crash, it suddenly jerked upright and pointed its engines to the ground. The 2999 Moon Jumper Express made a surprisingly gentle landing on the Lollipopigustian surface.
The spacecraft door opened automatically. “You’ve arrived at your destination,” said the same automated voice. “Enjoy your visit to Lo-lee-pop-ee-gust.”
Alex’s and Conner’s hearts were racing so fast, they felt frozen in one perpetual beat. When their bodies finally caught up with their minds, they both let out a long, terrified, and overdue scream.
“Alex, I think I peed a little.…” Conner said.
“Me too,” she said.
The twins climbed out of their seats and stumbled off the spacecraft. They had a look around the planet’s surface as their hearts returned to normal and feeling came back to their arms and legs.
Lollipopigust was covered in rolling purple hills and had a bright pink sky. The planet’s turquoise rings arched above them and cast a shadow over the ground. The gravity wasn’t as high on the planet as it had been on the BASK-8, and the twins felt stronger and lighter in their space suits.
They retrieved the weapons out of the spacecraft’s compartments and ventured onto the planet. Conner glanced between the compass and the land around them, but there wasn’t a sign of life anywhere.
“What kind of bugs are we looking for?” Alex asked. “Ants? Beetles? Flies?”
“The ones we have to find are called polycrabs,” Conner told her. “They’re a spider, scorpion, and wasp combination.”
Just the description of the insects made Alex gasp and choke on the air.
“What the heck is wrong with you, Conner?” she asked. “How could you even think of something so terrible?”
“Sorry, it was in one of my nightmares,” he said. “I thought it’d make a great alien monster, so I put it in the story. It’s not like I planned to meet any of the villains in my stories.”
“If that’s what’s crawling around your subconscious, you need deep psychological help,” Alex said. “What’s the plan to exterminate them?”
“It’ll be simple,” Conner said. “All we have to do is find the entrance to their colony, drop the Omega GDD inside, and then take off!”
Alex shook her head. “You and I both know it’s never that easy,” she said. “Who would have killed these bugs if we weren’t here?”
“The Cyborg Queen would have been so desperate, she would have teamed up with the Orphianotics,” Conner explained. “They would have exterminated the polycrabs but would have had to share Lollipopigust afterward.”
“Then we make a nice plot twist for her,” Alex said. “By the way, I’ve been meaning to ask, what is Commander Newters’s deal? How did he end up working for the Cyborg Queen?”
“She saved his planet from being sucked into a black hole,” Conner said. “Newters was so thankful, he devoted his life to working for her. Also, it’s helpful to have someone aboard the BASK-8 who’s not connected to a battery, in case of a power outage.”
The Bio-Mat Compass suddenly lit up and an arrow appeared on its screen.
“Looks like we’ve got our first catch of the day,” Conner said.
The compass guided the twins through the purple hills to the edge of a deep, wide hole the size of an empty swimming pool. The compass pointed to something with biological material at the bottom of it. Alex and Conner held their short-range blasters tightly with their fingers against the triggers and cautiously peered into the hole.
Instead of a polycrab, they found a teal worm the size of a small dog. It was chubby and had several rolls like a caterpillar, but was shaped more like a jelly bean than a noodle. It had big black button eyes, no nose, and a wide mouth that was naturally shaped into a smile. The worm merrily rolled around the hole without a care in the world. It laughed and talked to itself like a happy baby.
“That is the cutest thing I’ve ever seen,” Alex said. “What is it?”
“A Blissworm,” Conner said. “They’re a species of worm that’s always happy, regardless of the situation they’re in. The Blissworms are one of the few remaining species left on this planet. The polycrabs have hunted all the other bugs.”
“What’s it doing at the bottom of the hole?” she asked. “Does it live there?”
“No, the polycrabs dig holes to trap prey,” Conner said. “The poor little guy must have fallen inside.”
The Blissworm certainly didn’t look like it had fallen into a trap. It giggled as it somersaulted across the hole. It looked up at the twins and waved with one of its four tiny hands.
“Oh, let’s rescue it,” Alex said. “It’s too adorable to be eaten.”
The twins lowered their weapons and slid down the side of the hole. The Blissworm was so excited to have company, it curled around their feet and purred like a kitten. Alex petted the friendly bug. Its body felt like a gummy bear.
“I think it likes us,” she said. “Would it survive on earth?”
“You want to take it home?” Conner asked.
Alex leaned down and the Blissworm crawled into her arms. It pressed its mouth against the glass of her helmet and gave her a big, slobbery kiss. Alex was filled with a warm fuzzy feeling, and she hugged the Blissworm like it was a long-lost pet.
“You know, maybe we should re-think this extermination thing,” she said. “Maybe instead of killing all the polycrabs, we could just set traps and release them on another planet. The polycrabs are really no different from this Blissworm—they never asked to come to Lollipopigust. Let’s be humane about it.”
The Blissworm crawled to the ground and curiously circled the Omega GDD. It stretched its mouth over the top of it and swallowed the bomb whole. Since the detonation device was bigger than the Blissworm, its body stretched around it like a sock over a soda can.
“That worm better cough up our bomb or it’s about to have some really bad heartburn,” Conner said.
“It must be hungry,” Alex said. “What does it usually eat?”
“Space weeds and stuff,” Conner said. “Which is really strange, because polycrabs don’t eat herbivores—they prey on other predators.”
Suddenly, the twins and the Blissworm were
eclipsed by a large shadow. Alex and Conner turned around and saw an enormous creature climbing into the hole behind them. It had big red eyes, fangs, two claws, eight legs, and three tails like a scorpion. At the tip of each tail was a long, sharp stinger. The creature’s fangs dripped with saliva and it snapped its claws as it approached them.
It was easily the most terrifying thing the twins had ever seen and they both froze. The Blissworm waved at the monster and blew it a kiss.
“And that’s a polycrab,” Conner said.
“It has ten limbs and three tails,” Alex noted. “That’s thirteen appendages—why would you name it a polycrab? Poly means seven.”
“Oh,” Conner said. “That explains why I failed that geometry quiz.”
Alex thought making sense of the creature would somehow make it less scary, but it did the opposite. The more she realized how little her brother knew about the alien insect he had created, the more frightening it became.
“Now I get why the worm was in the hole. It wasn’t prey—the polycrab was using it as bait!” Conner said.
Alex was afraid to even ask. “Bait for what?”
“Us.”
The polycrab vaulted toward the twins with its claws and stingers raised. Alex dived behind her brother and used him as a shield.
“Forget what I said about being humane!” Alex yelled. “Kill it! Kill it! Kill it NOW!”
Conner pointed his short-range blaster and shot at the creature seconds before it tackled them. A bright blue blast hit the polycrab and it exploded into slime and guts. The innards rained down on the twins, and they almost became sick at the sight of it. Alex tried wiping the guts off her helmet, but they only smeared over the glass.
“Next time, I’m going to need a full itinerary before we travel into one of your short stories,” she said.
“You got it,” Conner said.
The Bio-Mat Compass started flickering more than ever before. The arrow spun out of control as something made of biological material approached the hole aboveground.
“We’ve got to get out of here!” Conner said.
The twins didn’t have time to pry the Omega GDD out of the Blissworm, so they each grabbed one of the worm’s hands and carried the Blissworm and weapon out of the hole as one. The Blissworm happily swung between them like it was on a trapeze.
Alex and Conner’s problems only became worse aboveground. A dozen polycrabs surrounded them and there were even more running in from all directions. The twins set the Blissworm-covered Omega GDD on the ground and stood back to back. They raised their blasters and pointed them at the approaching polycrabs.
“Ready?” Conner said.
“Ready,” Alex said.
“It’s exterminating time!”
Alex and Conner opened fire on the polycrabs. The purple hillside was consumed in bright blue blasts and pieces of exploding alien insects. The Blissworm swayed and grooved to the sound of battle like it was a song with an electronic beat.
A polycrab in the twins’ blind spots knocked them apart with one stroke of its claw. Alex and Conner tumbled onto the ground in different directions. The polycrabs were even harder to shoot at from the ground. The twins had to quickly roll back and forth to avoid being stepped on or stabbed by a polycrab’s stinger.
No matter how many they killed, the monstrous insects kept coming. The polycrabs sprayed webs out of their center stingers, and the twins and the Blissworm became entwined in it. Alex and Conner struggled to break free from the sticky restraints, but their arms and blasters were confined against their torsos. The Blissworm rolled onto its back and tried to make snow angels in the web.
The polycrabs scooped up the twins and the Blissworm. But instead of eating them, the polycrabs carried them off into the distance, scurrying over the purple hills like a school of crabs across the sand.
“Now what?” Alex asked. “Where are they taking us?”
“To their colony to feed us to their queen,” Conner said.
The Blissworm clapped giddily, as if they were being taken to an amusement park.
“The worm is right—this is actually a good thing,” Conner said. “The deeper we get into the colony, the more effective the Omega GDD will be.”
The herd of polycrabs arrived at a huge mound that looked like an anthill the size of a mountain. They crawled into the entrance at the top and then down a long tunnel that snaked deep into the ground. It reminded Alex of the time she and Conner were kidnapped by trolls and goblins and taken to their underground territory.
They entered the largest cavern of the colony. Every inch of it was covered with polycrabs. The insects crawled across the dirt floor and the walls and hung by their tails from the ceiling. The polycrabs snapped their claws, rattled their tails, and hissed in celebration as the twins and the Blissworm were brought inside. The Blissworm waved and pointed at the creatures like it was the front-runner in a polycrab election.
The twins spotted the polycrab queen in the back of the cavern. She was a giant compared to her offspring and shared all their features. The queen also had tall horns protruding out of her head and a pair of wings she wore like a high collar. Under her tails was a thick, long abdomen that curved into a corner of the cavern where she laid eggs. A massive spiderweb hung behind her like a national flag.
Alex noticed the queen bore a slight resemblance to Trollbella. She had a sneaking suspicion the Troll and Goblin Territory was the inspiration behind the polycrab colony.
“Conner, is that supposed to be Trollbella?” Alex asked.
“Of course it is,” he said without shame. “She’s the biggest pest I know!”
The polycrabs carrying the twins and the Blissworm joined a line of other polycrabs headed for the queen. The creatures each presented the queen with a Lollipopigustian insect they had captured that day. The queen looked each victim over and spit green or yellow mucus on it.
“That’s disgusting,” Alex muttered to her brother. “What’s the purpose of that?”
“The queen is separating the prey,” Conner said. “Green mucus means she wants to eat the prey herself, yellow mucus means she wants it to be fed to the larvae, and no mucus…”
The twins watched as the queen inspected an alien that resembled a mantis. When no mucus was produced, the alien was dragged to the center of the cavern and the entire colony attacked it. They savagely tore the insect limb from limb as they feasted upon it. It was hard to watch, and the twins looked away.
Conner was the first prey the polycrabs in their party presented to the queen. As she examined him, her large red eyes grew even bigger and saliva dripped from her fangs. It was similar to how Trollbella looked at Conner—she wanted him all to herself. The polycrab queen covered him in green mucus, picked him up with her claw, and tossed him into the web behind her.
Just like a fly caught in a spiderweb, the more Conner struggled to free himself, the more entangled he became.
Alex was presented to the queen next. It was no surprise that the queen wasn’t nearly as impressed with her as she was with Conner. She spit yellow mucus all over her and Alex was dragged to the corner of eggs.
The Blissworm was the last in their group to be presented to the queen. The worm was delighted to see her and eagerly reached up like it wanted to hug the gigantic insect. The queen didn’t even bother inspecting the worm. With no mucus, the polycrabs dragged the Blissworm to the center of the cavern to eat it themselves.
“Shoot! They’ll set off the bomb if they eat it!” Conner said. “Alex, do something!”
Both twins were still wrapped in web from their surface encounter with the polycrabs, but Alex managed to free one of her hands and she snapped her fingers. Suddenly, the polycrab queen tilted her head back and let out a massive sneeze, and the Blissworm was showered in green mucus. When the queen looked down and saw the worm, she didn’t realize the green mucus was accidental. She picked it up and tossed it into the web behind her, too.
The Blissworm stuck to the web just
a few feet away from Conner. The worm waved at him like they were two friends running into each other at the supermarket. The queen continued separating the other prey her children had brought into the colony.
“Conner, I’m going to cast a spell on our space suits to make them web resistant,” Alex said. “Hang on.”
She snapped her fingers again and the web covering their bodies melted away, freeing their arms and the short-range blasters that had been compressed against their torsos. Conner hung on to the queen’s web like it was a wide rope ladder.
Alex heard snapping and crunching sounds coming from nearby—the polycrab eggs had started hatching. The small larvae poked their heads out of the eggs and looked around for their first meal. As soon as one larva noticed Alex, they all turned their heads to her as if they were connected on the same wavelength.
Alex pointed her gun at the newborns and Conner waved to stop her.
“Don’t shoot them!” Conner yelled. “We need to activate the Omega GDD before you cause a scene!”
“Then get to it!” Alex said.
Conner climbed across the web to where the Blissworm hung. He pulled the worm off the web with a snap and carried it down to the ground. The Blissworm was very heavy with the bomb inside its body. At first he tried pulling the Omega GDD out through the Blissworm’s mouth, but the jolly worm made a game of it and kept its mouth tightly shut.
“You stupid little parasite!” Conner said. “Just spit it out!”
He tried squeezing the Omega GDD out of the Blissworm, but it only tickled the worm. The Blissworm kept its mouth shut but Conner felt the laughter building up inside of it.
“So you like being tickled, huh?” Conner said. “I’m gonna goochie-goochie-goo that bomb right out of you!”
Conner tickled the Blissworm with both hands. The worm had never been so amused in its whole life, and so much laughter built up inside its body that the Omega GDD looked like it was covered in a teal balloon. Finally, the Blissworm couldn’t take the tickling anymore and opened its mouth to laugh. The Omega GDD shot out like a cannonball. Luckily Conner grabbed its handle before it got away.