The Intergalactic Space Cadet League

By: Jennifer McKenzie

Chapter 3

          Kethlain awoke with a start. "Yipe," he thought, "today's the day the shipload of humans arrives!"  He had heard that their skin was pink or brown and soft and that they had multicolored fur on the top of their heads, and their heads were round! "Gosh," thought Kethlain, "what a strange race!  But I shouldn't think bad things about them.  Their home has been taken over by MURTH."

          Kethlain definitely wanted to see them today, the first day they were officially able to participate in League activities.  He slipped on his white uniform with the ringed planet on it, admired his long, horse-shaped purple face in the mirror, and stepped out of his cabin and into the artificial forest outside.  He walked down the path, admiring the brightly colored grasses and flowers.  He bent to sniff his favorite, the woan flower. It came from the Rarenfo planet, and looked like a flower with strings instead of petals. Every five seconds, the flower would change into another color of the rainbow. It reminded him of the ring his father wore and of the identical one he had on one of his three fingers. Kethlain's dad and brother were in the war, and Kethlain had been at the league since he was 3.

          Finally, he came to the artificial lake.  Mama Wominoz was standing there, talking to many different creatures, in the lake and out. "I just want you to know," she began, " that if you meet a human, be kind to them. They might still be a bit shaky from their journey.  The same goes for you in the lake, if you meet Natilinia, be especially kind to her. She...she is the last of her kind, and will need some time.  She might want to be alone."

          "The last of her kind? Oi, that's rough." thought Kethlain as he slowly slipped into the water.  Even though Kethlain could breathe in the air better than he could under water, he preferred to swim in the lake.  He felt his tail splitting and his gills surfacing through his skin.  He normally went through these transformations when he got in and out of the water.  It took a minute, so he couldn't just jump in, or he could get tangled between gills and lungs.

          Suddenly, he remembered! The humans! He pulled his legs out of the water, waited for them to become land-able, and then jumped away from the lake, splashing everyone in his path as he hurried to get to docking bay #19. He peeked through the bay window and saw humans swarming about the ship, or what looked like them from what Kethlain had heard. He smoothed down his small ears and gathered up the courage to enter the bay. The humans looked soft and weak. They didn't seem too friendly looking, either.

           Kethlain walked into the bay. He stepped up to a human who seemed like the person in charge. "Hello?" said Kethlain."Um..how are you?"

           "Please do not interrupt me." said the human. "I'm making repairs."

            "I just wanted to ask if-"

            "Would you please leave me alone?!"

         Geez, thought Kethlain, I don't like humans! They're so  irritable! He walked out of the bay, muttering to himself.

                               *******************

Jao walked silently down the banks of the river, fingering his sore arm, where he had just endured twelve shots. He was just wondering where Morri might be when suddenly, a loud bell rang, and a stampede of students came flying out of the hall in front of him. Jao moved to the side, trying to let them bypass him, but he was getting bumped around quite a bit. He was tripped twice, probably by accident, but each time he fell to the ground, hundreds of feet would step on his hand.

    Finally, the relentless storm slowed to a stop as the students went into their cabins. "That hurt!.....Hey!" Jao yelled as he noticed that his ID chip was floating in the water.  Man, he could not lose that chip! Every single one of his shots and blood samples were entered into it.  He reached out to get it with his metallic arm before it drifted away. "Almost.....come on....AHHHH!" Jao screamed as he plummeted into the water below. "Aw, man! My clothes are ruined!" He thought. He started to swim upward to stop him self from sinking, but...hey! He could only feel one arm! He had to swim! Come ON, arm! As he reached out to touch his metallic arm,

                    KAZAP!......Everything went black..

   Natilinia was trying to do her morning chants. Morning chants  were now not just for the gods, but to clear the horrible dreams of  the night out of her head.

" I will love my family, my neighbors, my enemies, my planet..." She stopped, falling to her knees. Why? she thought, hot tears trickling down her face.  How could she  be....The door buzzed.

Natilinia stepped out of her cabin, and to her surprise, found a  box on her door!  The box was bright green, and it opened with a button.  As Natilinia opened it, she heard a high pitched "litt..litt!"

"Aww," said Natilinia as she saw a little Inower looking up at her with big green eyes.  She was so perfect! Her tiny pink body was squirming, trying to get out.  As she gently plucked it out of its box, she noticed its ears.  They were a least six inches long, and were a light yellow. " Litt, litt! Reow! Litt!"  Slowly, Natilinia lifted it out of it's box. "I'll call you Clapi! " Natilinia said, cradling it in her arms.

"Reow!" Clapi barked loudly.

"What is it..?" Natilinia said looking up. "What in the name of Yase..." There was a human, sinking towards the bottom! 

 Humans couldn't breathe underwater!  This human wasn't moving!

                    She had to help it!

        She swam forward, pulling the human....wow! This human was heavy! She had to help it! Get help!

                    "Help! Help! Someone! Help!"