CHAPTER 42
Hroon Again, this Time with the Dreaded Movie Police
“What can we do to pass the time?” asked Rip. This was a common question asked amongst immortals.
“What about discussing the current events?” I suggested.
“Pffft... current events,” muttered Rip distastefully. “Who can say what is current in this maddening reality of time-travelling wormholes?”
“It could be something interesting to do while we waited.”
“Don't mind him,” said Wilx. “One of the regular side-effects of space-travel, especially when combined with immortality and time-travel, is an irritating and alienating feeling that you are never quite up to date with the current events. To the immortal time-traveller, news is usually more often old than new, and it's always confusing and unfathomable. Nothing ever seems to be from your own time or consciousness anymore.”
“Let's give the current events a try, please?” I asked.
As Rip groaned over the prospect of current events, I turned on the telescreen and set it to play the most popular news program in the universe. The latest episode of Flying Grimbat Messengers Present appeared in front of our weary, immortal faces. During our time the Grimbat species had elevated themselves from useless gossiper of the Planetglomerate to celebrated inter-universal news pundits. As the chief anchor prattled on about some highly strange news he proceeded to regularly flap his wings into the lighting equipment while accidentally thrashing his gnarled body against the cardboard backdrop. Flying Grimbats should really be called Perpetually Flying Grimbats, as they can never stop flying or they die. This unfortunate condition does not mix well with attempting to contain oneself within the cramped space of a news desk, especially when one is the size of a triplet of giant vampire-bats with 3 sets of pterodactyl wings. Due to the budgetary problem of having to rebuild the set after every broadcast, the network unsuccessfully attempted to replace the Grimbats, who, because they found all the best scoops, always got final say about delivering their own news. When the cost of replacing destroyed equipment pushed the program to the brink of cancellation, someone at last had the revelation to merely do away with the generic indoor news-desk scene (which most people were sick of anyway) and instead film the Grimbats talking out in some open field where they were free to fly around. The news was also only shot in the daytime when no artificial lighting was required. After this transition in the show there was a slight drop in the percentage of viewers. It was always suspected that a group of people only watched the show for the comedic slapstick element of a Grimbat destroying a film set.
An intriguing headline suddenly appeared on the screen. It read:
“Scientists, Rational Thinkers Everywhere Baffled by Discovery of Very Old Spaceship at the Bottom of Hroon Ocean.”
“So... where are we anyway?” asked Rip.
“Ssh! I want to hear this!” I said as I turned up the volume. Rip and Wilx both quieted down as the Grimbat anchor delved into a strange tale of which we were completely responsible:
On the water-planet of Hroon, an ancient and priceless Obotron spaceship has been discovered relatively intact on the ocean floor. It appears the ship has been residing at the bottom of the South Ocean for the last several thousand years. As no missing reports for the ship were ever filed, its origin remains a total mystery. Scientists were eager to discover what secrets of the past would be contained within this sunken time capsule, so a mission to resurface the ship was immediately put into action. A great collective shock was had when it was discovered within the ship were hundreds of specters roaming about. It is clear these specters are what remains of the staff and crew.
“Hey,” said Rip, “why don't we make a detour at Hroon? Go see what our old crew is up to these days. It's not often that one of our lost ships turns up.”
“It's never happened,” said Wilx. “Not even so much as a mangled license plate has ever resurfaced from the unthinkable voids that our ships have been cast into.”
“Exactly,” said Rip. “We should check it out.”
“Why do you suddenly care about the lost crew?” asked Wilx.
“Maybe I'm trying to rectify some of the horrible things I've done.”
“I think you're just starting to dread the fact that you're on your way to collect deadly Crabbits from an even deadlier shape-shifting planet.”
“You know me well,” said Rip.
“Yes,” replied Wilx. “However I also would like to procrastinate this foreboding task. We will once more visit the water-planet of Hroon. Might as well... it's on the way to Grebular.”
We had the ship make an unscheduled stop. When we arrived at Hroon the scene was a state of complete chaos. Countless visiting ships filled with reporters, scientists and generally nosey folk were parked in orbit. Down on the surface, an epic hovering stage and seating arena for millions had been constructed for the purpose of a universally broadcast press conference with the specters. The show was about to begin.
For reasons we did not at all understand, the finding of our Obotron ship was a very big deal. We were likely experiencing Rip's 'current-event syndrome,' a total confusion of the grand picture caused by wild and continuous leaping about through time and space. Thousands of years had passed. The finding of this ship was likely as exciting, bewildering and important as the feeling felt by humans when they first discovered dinosaur bones or the tomb of King Tut, or those dead scrolls. That or the standards of what is deemed groundbreaking or newsworthy had been drastically reduced to nothing in this particular part of this particular universe.
We left the ship floating in the water, parked far away from any visible congregation of sketchy spider-like creatures and found ourselves a few discreet seats in the back row. Worried about being recognized, Rip was now wearing an incredibly poor Specter costume that he had just minutes ago fastened together from various junk that was lying around in the broom closet. The specter costume wasn't much better than the generic human costume for a ghost, consisting of a white sheet draped over one's head with a few eye holes cut into it, depending on how many eyes one has. In his gait, Rip even attempted to imitate the ethereal sliding motion of a Specter's movement, but only succeeded in looking like a lunatic or something performing a 'silly walk' sketch.
“Why are there seat-belts on the chairs?” I asked. “Is this whole platform going to start flying around?”
“I would put that seat-belt on right away,” said Wilx. “Or the force of the wind might whip you right out of your chair.”
Just as Wilx said that, a nearby creature who had neglected to put on his seat belt was suddenly launched several hundred feet straight up into the air as if pulled by a rope. The creature yelled a surprised and sustained “Whoa!” as he uselessly flailed. The “Whoa!” could be heard echoed long after the creature vanished into the clouds. This now-famous final last word happened to be recorded by a lucky sound-technician with a top-notch recording device, who in turn sold the sound effect to a major film studio, who in turn used the sound-effect over and over in thousands of well-known blockbuster movies, making it the staple, 'go-to' sound-file for any time a character needs to yell “Whoa!” in surprise. It has been used in more movies than the legendary Wilhelm Scream.
Suddenly an alarm announced the Specter-Grimbat press conference was about to begin. Everyone in the seating area quieted down as an important-looking Grimbat approached a podium. No one onstage could be seen by most of the audience (considering the amount of seats in the seating area ranked in the millions) so their images were displayed on a backdrop screen roughly the size of 23 combined IMAX screens.
“What is your name?” asked the important-looking Grimbat to the specter that was currently on stage
“Janet.”
“And what did you do aboard this ship?”
“I was a lowly room attendant. It was my job to fold linens for the guests.”
“So your ship was a housing vessel of sor
ts?”
“Yes, except we never had any actual guests.”
“Not very popular with the cruise market, were you?” asked the reporter.
“Our whole fleet of ships had been assembled merely to enhance the status image of the leaders who occupied Obotron 1, our primary fleet ship.”
“So your leaders were great at wasting resources?”
“Yes.”
“Who were your leaders?”
“There was a Dr. Rip T. Brash the Third, and his sidekick the Astrospeciologist Wilx. They had with them a reformed Greeg they called Krimshaw. We have come to know their names and faces well. And to loathe them.”
“Interesting. Why did your leaders bring you to Hroon?”
“We don't know. Our ship was programmed to fly wherever the leaders wanted. We were rarely in contact with them and weren't allowed to ask questions about our mission if we were.”
“And what exactly caused your ship to sink?”
“The hurricane wind force of the Hroon atmosphere threw our ship into a 100 foot tidal wave. The ship remained intact, but the engines died when fuel tanks of Investment Banker were flooded with ruinous seawater. As dead weight we sank into the abyss.”
“Exciting,” said the reporter. “Did you see any monsters? There are supposed to be a lot of them swimming around in the Hroon Ocean.”
Janet didn't answer this question, but the frightened look upon her face suggested she had seen her share of ocean monsters. The reporter moved on.
“How long were you alive at the bottom of the ocean?”
“It varies,” said Janet. “I only lasted about 9 years, but some of the other specters will brag about lasting nearly 5 decades.”
“Wow,” said the reporter. “Even 9 years is incredible. I can't fathom anyone surviving in that environment for up to 50 years. How did you not perish right after the sinking?”
“We were lucky to have certain educational survival literature stored within the ship. Two books that were of particular use were entitled 'Cannibalizing Your Crew After Sinking in an Alien Ocean' by Horaticus Neil Travensenzel, and 'How to Have a Long Life, Volume 219: Maximizing Your Use of Airlocks While Shipwrecked at the Bottom of an Alien Ocean.' We also had a collection of VHS tapes with a copy of 'The Poseidon Adventure.' We took great inspiration from the courageous exploits of those characters.”
“VHS tapes?” asked the reporter.
“They were a method of watching movies. Do you still have movies?” asked Janet.
“Yes. But jumpies are more popular. They're more realistic.”
“Oh,” said Janet.
“Why did you not transcend into the dimension of the dead? Why did you remain on Hroon in your spectral state?”
“We have been prisoners of the Limbo Projection Mode.”
“Refresh my mind on what the Limbo Projection Mode is,” said the Reporter. “Try to remember that everything from your life became obsolete thousands of years ago.”
“The Limbo Projection Mode was a powerful method of trapping someone in a spaceship. Say somebody stole your ship, the on-board computer would automatically recognize the intruder and thus enter a state of Limbo Projection, an existence in which exit from the ship is completely impossible under any circumstance. Then all you'd have to do is find your ship and you'd have a pre-captured criminal.”
“Why did the ship go into this Limbo mode? The ship was not stolen, you are the rightful crew, am I correct?”
“There was a malfunction, probably during one of the monster attacks. The computer entered an unprecedented high state of Limbo, causing the system to affect not only living creatures, as it is supposed to, but to also have the power of trapping specters, spirits, elementals and other non-living entities.”
“After all these thousands of years you haven't figured out how to turn it off?”
“No, there is no way to turn off Limbo Projection Mode.”
“What about when the power died? Wouldn't it turn off then?”
“The power never died,” replied Janet. “Within our ship's cargo was several thousand years worth of battery cells. It was only the flight-engines that needed IB. Besides, the ships power had no relevance here. The Limbo Projection operates under rules of its own voodoo mysticism. Escape is only possible with help from someone outside the ship.”
“Ah,” said the reporter. “I'm glad we've reached that part of the story. Everyone is wondering about your rescuers. It seems the Grollers, one of the longest running jokes in the universe for being a non-swimming creature on an all-water planet, went ahead and evolved into swimming creatures while no one was looking these past years. A Groller is what swam to the bottom of the ocean, discovered your ship and freed the trapped specters.”
“Yes,” said Janet. “We believe their evolution into an aquatic creature was directly caused by our presence on the planet.”
“Why would you think that?” asked the reporter.
“They knew we were down there. The spark of the inevitable next phase of their evolution was their intense curiosity to find us.”
“How would the Grollers know you were there? Isn't it likely they never knew about a single event that ever occurred off their measly 3 acres of rocky conglomerations?”
“There is an explanation for this,” began Janet. “Aboard our ship is a device which enables the entire population of a planet to simultaneously watch the same movie, by way of having the image of the movie projected onto the entirety of the sky. It is simply called Sky-Projection Mode.”
“There is that word 'projection' again,” said the reporter. “We all find your descriptions of technology fascinatingly crude.”
“Yes,” said Janet. “Anyway, we were prone to re-watch the movies in our VHS collection rather frequently, so we decided to have the image of the movies projected up through the water and onto the sky. Might work out as a great rescue signal. Over time the Grollers evolved to worship the mysterious flickering images in the sky. Yet they were not content with mystery. Their curiosity to peak behind the curtain is surely what prompted the Grollers to learn how to swim. The projection leaves a trail of luminescence in the water. They would have known the picture originated from in the ocean.”
“How do you know what the Grollers feel?”
“Specters, being nothing but pure consciousness, have the ability to sense what speechless creatures would wish to say. A sort of drifting into their minds.”
“Telepathy? With those beasts?”
“Indeed. But our powers are weak compared with the great Elemental Tele-Specters of the Invisible Dimension.”
“I'm going to interrupt you Janet,” said the reporter, as a scientific looking creature materialized on the stage. “The historical biologist Dr. Julmook is here to speak to us about the evolution of the Groller. Hello, Dr. Julmook.”
“Hello,” replied the doctor.
“What can you tell us about the Groller transitioning into an aquatic creature?”
“We have deduced the Groller gained the ability to swim because of a great sacrifice that was had amongst the population. As we know, Grollers generally have only one arm and one leg each. But now they have two of each. How did this happen? The only logical explanation is that half of the population at some point amputated their own limbs and reattached them to other Grollers, thus out of two useless bodies creating one capable of life on this world. The reattachment procedures were unsuccessful for a long time, but they stuck with it and it clearly worked out in the end. All the currently living Grollers now have symmetrical amounts of limbs. As soon as swimming was possible, the ability to breath underwater naturally followed in their evolution. Just look at this Groller,” said Dr. Julmook as he pointed to a cage that suddenly materialized beside him. The crowd were in awe of the new looking life form. “You can clearly see this Groller has an advanced gill system and a more resilient exterior hide capable of withstanding the pressures of unknown
depths. We have not found any other Grollers with gills, but there will surely be more. Finding this Obotron ship was the first action ever undertaken by an ocean-worthy Groller. Until this point, all they did was drown or be eaten. It is then likely that Janet's theory is correct. They evolved so they could find out where the pictures in the sky came from. The new aquatic Groller finally found the source of the sacred movies.”
“Yes, that sounds accurate,” concurred Janet. “The only thing we are confused about is why no one else but the Grollers ever saw the movies in the sky?”
“That is easily explainable,” said the reporter. “No one ever comes to Hroon. It is a terrible place to visit.”
“Ah, I see.”
“Just one more hole in the story needs filling,” said the reporter.
“What's that?” asked Janet.
“After you lot had died, how did you continue operating the movie watching device? How did you change the battery cells? Everyone knows specters can't perform physical acts.”
“A good question,” replied Janet. “You have not yet met Polk, the last living crew member of our Obotron ship.”
“Living? How could anyone still be alive after thousands of years.”
“Prollk discovered within the cargo bay a hypodermic needle filled with a strange glowing substance. The needle was marked “Immortality Quik-Shot: Inject into Eyeball and Live Forever.”
“Prollk became immortal?”
“Yes. It was Prollk who was the one who performed all the physical tasks we needed done, such as replacing the battery cells, rewinding and playing the VHS tapes, making sure the Sky-Projection Mode was always turned on during a movie, etc.”
“We should like to meet this Prollk,” said the reporter. “Is he around?”
“Yes,” said Janet as Prollk arrived on stage with perfect timing.
“Excellent,” said the reporter. “Please sit down, Prollk.”
Prollk sat down. He promptly threw his microphone into the ocean.
“No one will be able to hear you if you throw your microphone in the ocean,” said the reporter. “Someone get him a new microphone!”
“No!” said Prollk. “No microphones. I have a loud voice. They can hear me just fine. Start the interview.”
“Actually, they can't hear anything.”
“Who cares,” said Prollk. “There's hardly anyone here.”
“Are you joking? The audience is in the millions.”
“What?” said Prollk. His disbelief was so genuine that it became apparent he was not fully aware of his surroundings. “Aren't I performing stand-up comedy right now? The crowd isn't very good tonight. Barely a dozen people, all mingling around in the back making noise with their cell phones and clinking glasses. Who can get a laugh in this dump?”
“Just look out there,” said the reporter, pointing to the endless vista of spectators. “There are millions of people gathered on this planet for the specific reason of listening to what we have to say. When you throw your microphone in the ocean you are negating their very reason for being here. Are you aware the fuel cost of coming here has bankrupted at least 20% of the crowd?”
“Doesn't matter,” said Prollk. “I won't use a microphone.”
“Why?” asked the reporter.
“To be infuriatingly random, because I do not approve of this whole scene.”
“I see,” said the reporter. “Nonetheless, we would like to have Dr. Julmook ask you a few questions. Is that okay?”
“Yes. But only a few questions.”
“Is it true,” began Dr. Julmook, “that you are completely insane?”
“Yes,” replied Prollk, whose words were now being shown in subtitles on the big screen.
“Is it true you are immortal?”
“Yes.”
“Where is this immortality elixir you have taken? We would like to have some so we can sell it for lots of money.”
“There isn't any more. I took the last of it.”
“Oh,” said Dr. Julmook. “Is it also true that--”
“Interview over,” interrupted Prollk. “I said a few questions. I'm going now, because I disapprove of this whole scene.”
Prollk left the stage. No one tried to stop him.
“Maybe Janet can answer some more questions,” said the reporter. “Tell us what became of your leaders?”
“We don't know, but if they were somehow still alive we would definitely try to kill them. We always took comfort in knowing that Prollk would be able to exact our revenge.”
“Wouldn't they deserve a second chance?”
“No. They were the worst leaders imaginable.”
Suddenly Rip stood up. “THEY WEREN'T THAT BAD!” he yelled.
“What?” asked Janet.
Only the surrounding thousand or so people had heard Rip, so the message was passed along through the crowd. By the time it reached the stage it had been added to with the usual string of non-sequiturs that inevitably comes with playing a game of telephone amongst millions of wackos.
“Who said that?” asked Janet.
“I DID!” yelled Rip, once again needing the majority of the crowd to relay the message.
Wilx, Rip and I were now on the big screen. Rip's identity was kept safe by the specter costume.
“It's YOU!” yelled Janet as she recognized Wilx and I.
“Uh-oh,” I said. I turned to face Rip. He was already gone. Somehow he'd found the time to write a note and leave it on his chair. It read:
Got my own ride. Stowed away with a proto-star hopper.
Meet you at Grebular. Can't stay in this place.
“We'd better get out of here as well,” said Wilx as he began fumbling through his pockets. “Where's that stupid floating elevator remote?” he asked himself.
“That was our old ship, remember?” I said. “Our new ship doesn't have a floating elevator.”
“Oh yeah,” said Wilx just as he found the remote, which was then thrown into the ocean in the spirit of Prollk.
“What are we going to do?” I asked. There were many security guards looking in our direction, all of whom were holding clubs and nets.
“I don't know,” said Wilx as he continued to empty his never-ending pockets. Piled on the chair next to him was quite a collection of unknown electronic gizmos and other strange inventions.
“What are all those things?” I asked.
“Not entirely sure,” he replied. “Most of this is highly laughable technology from a distant past. I only keep it in the off chance I must return to those pasts. But one of these gadgets might be useful given our current time-frame and dilemma.”
“You don't even know what all these things do?”
“I remember what some of them do,” said Wilx as he frantically pressed random buttons and switches.
“What's this thing?” I asked, holding up a donut-shaped microchip console.
“That is an Instantaneous Self-Destruct Remote,” said Wilx. “One press of that button and you are immediately guided into the nearest black hole.”
I chucked it away. The security guards were moving in fast. We were probably going to be banished to the Invisible Dimension. Maybe thrown into another Space-Maze if we were lucky. It was more likely they were simply going to bury us in the bottommost layer of the most particularly disgusting region of Garbotron. We still had a couple minutes before they would reach us from across the crowd.
“So, are you ever going to explain your mysterious ability to produce the amount of items that couldn't fit in the pockets of a dozen coats?” I asked Wilx. I wasn't sure if I even cared about the mystery or if I was just trying to strike up one last free conversation before being captured. Wilx evidently felt the same, for he surprised me by delving into the story instead of saying it was a bad time for exposition.
“This coat I always wear, I bought it at the estate auction of a dead genius-inventor. I didn't know it was spec
ial. I just needed a lab coat and it was going for a good price. No one else knew either, otherwise it would have cost a fortune. I quickly discovered the pockets never seemed to end, but rather extended into another dimension. A dimension I now use as an infinite storage locker.”
Just when we thought the scene couldn't get any crazier, a loud disembodied voice suddenly announced: