The Space_Time Displacement Conundrum Read online

  "Steady now." Quasar narrowed his gaze as the doors swept open to reveal an octagonal training room complete with a fighting mat in the center decorated by all manner of alien geometric designs. Racks of weapons lined the walls. The implements of warfare all had one thing in common: they came in sets of four, and the blades gleamed like lethal polished mirrors.

  A solitary Carpethrian strode forward to meet them, carrying a pair of battle axes in his posterior hands. Captain Quasar felt a sudden recognition swell within him. True, the natives of this planet all looked the same, but he would have recognized this one anywhere—and any when.

  "This is Hank," said the chancellor. "He will provide your training for the contest. To the victors will go the reactor."

  "And to the losers?" Lieutenant Davis piped up, remaining at the captain's side.

  "Burial with honor." Chancellor Frank nodded gravely. "It is the Carpethrian way. We value peace above all else, but we settle our disagreements in the fashion of our ancestors who first descended from the trees all around us. Consider it barbaric if you will, but remember, you are no longer on Earth. I'm sure many things will seem alien to you here." He turned away.

  "And if we refuse?" Captain Quasar's voice echoed in the hall as the chancellor paused mid-step.

  In a low growl, the Carpethrian said without a glance back, "We will not lose our forests. And we will not willingly give those spiders the reactor. You must fight." He paused. "And you must win, Captain Quasar."

  With that, he shuffled away, joined by his two attendants flanking him on each side.

  Chief Gruber cleared his throat, keeping a wary eye on blade-wielding Hank as he approached. "I've got to second the Lieutenant here, sir. I don't like this one bit."

  "Are those axes for fighting?" Ensign Elliott jumped at the chance to be the first to advance on Hank and make his acquaintance, pointing at the weapons with interest.

  Well over half Elliott's height and stronger than Earth's extinct orangutan, Hank juggled one of the axes up to his long, superior left arm and brought the razor-sharp blade against the imbecile's Adam's apple. In the silence, the only sound was that of one stray hair Elliott never seemed to be able to catch with his sonic razor as it split down the middle, resonating against the fine blade.

  "Humph," Hank grunted in disgust as Elliott wet himself. "I've been assigned the task of picking which one of you will fight the Arachnoid's champion in hand-to-hand-to-hand-to-hand combat." He squinted one eye up at the ensign. "You're out of the running."

  Captain Quasar nearly grinned. Having Hank back for the first time in this alternate version of the past instantly buoyed his spirits.

  He cleared his throat, raising his chiseled chin. "Then I would be the obvious choice."

  Hank took a moment to size him up. "We'll see about that."

  Episode 52: First Blood

  Hank the very hairy biped took them each through their paces, testing their strength and agility as well as their manual dexterity and sense of balance. He was a hard taskmaster, and during those moments when he appeared to be the fiercest of Carpethrian warriors, Captain Quasar found that he barely recognized his intrepid future helmsman.

  "Think on your feet," Hank growled at Elliott who, among the members of the captain's team, was having the most difficulty with the concept of wielding weapons sharp enough to decapitate himself.

  "Wouldn't that be a shame," Steve appeared briefly to tsk-tsk into the captain's ear before disappearing.

  Quasar was on his last nerve with that gaseous wizard.

  "No disrespect, Mr. Hank, but I thought I was out of the running." Elliott's eyes bulged from their sockets as he did his best to rotate hand-over-hand a long staff with serrated blades at each end. "I won't actually be fighting those spider-things, will I?"

  "There will be only one spider in the arena." Hank's garbled tone sounded as though he was losing patience with the fellow. "You will be our last resort."

  "If the rest of us bite the dust, you mean." Gruber was sweating like someone had turned on a fountain under his arms and across his chest, not to mention his forehead, but he managed the weapons well for a man whose expertise lay mainly with atom rifles and pulse pistols. "You're ranking us in a starting lineup of sorts, is that it?"

  "Humph." Hank crossed his superior set of arms while the posterior pair continued to twirl a pair of axes absently. His gaze had come to rest upon Lieutenant Davis, kicking and striking her way through a series of martial arts forms while practicing with a pair of machetes he'd handed her. She appeared to be more than adept. "Looks like we have our champion."

  Quasar frowned, pausing his practice with a heavy broadsword which he'd wielded to perfection, thrusting and parrying his invisible opponent, imagining—as Hank had advised—fighting an adversary able to scurry back and forth on four legs while whipping weapons around with four arms.

  Hank nodded as Davis approached him. "You make up for your stature in skill."

  "Captain?" She glistened with sweat, but not in a gross, middle-aged way like Gruber. There was nothing remotely disgusting about her standing there in a black tank top that hugged the curves of her bosom, while the muscles of her toned arms rippled as she twirled machetes the same way Hank did his axes. "Do you mind?"

  "Of course n—" Quasar stopped himself. She knew him well enough. "As captain of the Effervescent Magnitude, I will be the one fighting this Arachnoid. No disrespect of course, Lieutenant."

  "None taken, sir." She nodded, that blonde ponytail of hers bobbing seductively.

  Hank's axes stopped spinning. He held each one in a firm grip. "She will fight if I say she will, Earth Man."

  Quasar broke into a grin. Hank had never spoken to him in this fashion before, and he found it quite entertaining.

  "Is that so? Well look here, Carpethrian." He advanced to stand toe-to-toe with the very hairy biped. "It's my cold fusion near-lightspeed reactor at stake here, so I'll be the one calling the shots. Thanks for the training and all, but it's going to be me in that arena. No doubt about it."

  "Thank goodness," Elliott gasped, returning his weapon to its place on the wall. Gruber nodded and followed suit. Davis remained on the mat looking uncertain of the situation.

  Hank glared up at the captain with deep-set black eyes that burned with bridled fierceness. "Take a look around you. You're not on Earth anymore. You're in my dojo now."

  Quasar smirked at the Japanese word as it came through the translator in his uniform's collar. He couldn't help but wonder what the Carpethrian word for dojo might have been.

  "You think that's funny?" Hank leaned into the captain, blades gleaming at each side of his girth as he pressed his fur flab against Quasar's knees. "You think losing acres of our jungles is funny? There's more at stake here than your reactor, Earth Man."

  "The name is Captain Bartholomew Quasar." He narrowed his gaze down at the feisty Carpethrian. "Best you remember that."

  "Humph." Hank stepped back and started twirling the axes again. "At least I'll know what to put on your gravestone."

  Quasar blinked. "What?"

  Hank beckoned with one of his free hands. "Show me what you've got. If you can best me, I'll let you face the Arachnoid. If not," he shrugged his superior set of shoulders, "I'll take one of your limbs."

  Quasar's jaw drooped. "What?" How could this be Hank? Maybe it was some sort of evil twin...

  "To save you from yourself. There's no way an Arachnoid champion would face an opponent missing an arm or a leg. And if you can't best me, you won't stand a chance against him."

  "He's saying the dismemberment would be for your own good, Captain," Chief Gruber piped up.

  Quasar gave him a withering look. "Very well. I'll beat you, and then I'll face the Arachnoid in the arena." He raised the broadsword to ready position, gripping the hilt in both hands. "So what would you say counts as a victory in a situation like this? On Carpethria, I mean."

  Another shrug from the very hairy biped. "First blood."
r />   "Ah yes, of course." Quasar swallowed. "Very well, my friend. Prepare to trickle."

  The Carpethrian frowned. "Huh?"

  "He doesn't plan to make you bleed a whole lot," Gruber explained, cringing at another direct look from the captain.

  As Quasar prepared to meet Hank in hand-to-hand-to-hand-to-hand combat, Lieutenant Davis looked on with overwhelming concern swelling her bright turquoise eyes.

  Episode 53: Gruesome Intruders

  The Carpethrian advanced on Captain Quasar with both axes weaving figure eights in front of his rotund midsection, the blades glinting as they sang through the air. Hank's superior pair of arms remained folded across his chest while his posterior set, in no way less muscular, did all the work. It was a peculiar sight to behold, as if the very hairy biped was leaning back to survey the fight while at the same time being in the very thick of it.

  Quasar held his broadsword at the ready, doing his best to shake the feeling he was at a severe disadvantage. Two arms and one blade against four arms and two blades? But he'd stood toe-to-toe against greater odds before—he could not remember exactly when—and he had the distinct feeling that this was not the worst combat scenario in which he'd ever found himself.

  For one thing, this was Hank. True, the Carpethrian didn't know yet that the two of them would spend the next five hundred years or so as fellow officers, allies, and friends. And true, the first time he and the captain had met in a far different version of the past, they had never gone up against one another with blades swinging. But Quasar had a sense that things were going to be all right. He usually tended toward optimism that way.

  When the doors to the training room suddenly blew open with a cloud of dust and debris under concussive weapons fire, things all too quickly went awry. Hank's eyes darted toward the intrusion, and in that moment, Quasar's blade swept the ax out of the Carpethrian's furry left hand, sending it spiraling off to the side. Ensign Elliott was standing far too close to the padded practice ring for his own good, watching the combat like a wide-eyed infant enraptured by his own toes. Hank's ax seemed to rotate end over end in slow motion, and Elliott's eyes widened as the inevitable became all too clear to him.

  There were shouts and screams and more weapons fire as a squad of well-armed Arachnoids barged inside through the massive doorway, but no voice was louder than that of the captain who grasped in vain after the errant ax and who grimaced in horror as the blade buried itself into the young ensign's chest.

  "Uh-oh…" said Elliott, staggering back beneath the blow and staring down at his impaled self. Davis and Gruber were instantly by his side to steady him, and with surprising speed, Hank reached the helmsman before Quasar could force himself to move.

  "One down, one to go." Steve materialized at the captain's side. "Do you still think you can alter the past? Save them both? Because I really have my doubts."

  The Carpethrian's four hands quickly inspected the wound his blade had inflicted. He darted a look over his shoulder at the captain. "We can still save him, but we must get him to the infirmary now."

  "No one is going anywhere!" the garbled voice of an Arachnoid cried out. "What is the meaning of this outrage? We agreed to no such training sessions!"

  Quasar found himself facing half a dozen angry Arachnoids. They were much bigger than they'd looked on his viewscreen. Standing a full meter taller than the captain, the leader of the pack stooped to glare down at him with its twitchy set of eyes, mandibles clacking and salivating great gobs of yellow slime onto the padded sparring ring.

  "There's been an accident," Captain Quasar managed, finding his voice. He didn't like looking up to anyone, particularly these terrifying creatures. They resembled something from a child's nightmare, standing on four thick, wiry legs and wearing ragged maintenance jumpsuits with their upper legs sprouting outward like arms—two holding large rifle-spear weapons and two writhing as if feeling the air for a change in the wind. Were all eight of their limbs truly legs, and had they learned to walk upright and wear these suits as a way to appear more humanoid? "One of my men—"

  "I do not care about your crew, Earth Man," the Arachnoid spat. "We are here to meet you in combat for that near-lightspeed reactor. Let us begin!"

  As the dust settled behind the intruders, Quasar could make out a handful of Carpethrians lying face down and motionless in the corridor outside. Whether they were dead or unconscious was unclear, but it was obvious they would not be able to intervene.

  "The contest will take place in the arena. Not here," Hank growled, half-turning with two hands remaining on Elliott. The Magnitude's young helmsman had lapsed into unconsciousness, but Davis and Gruber still held him upright, perhaps worried the blade in his chest would sink deeper if he were laid on his back. "This man needs medical attention—"

  "Here. Now." The Arachnoid leader tossed his rifle-spear to a crewmember who might have been its second in command; they all looked the same to Quasar. One of its upper limbs shot to the mat to pick up the ax abandoned by Hank. Whipping it side to side expertly, the creature advanced on the captain. "The sooner we decide this, the sooner we'll get our reactor."

  Quasar clenched his jaw. "Take it."

  "What?" Steve gasped, astounded for the first time. "You're going to let these monsters have the power of a cold fusion near-lightspeed reactor? Do you have any idea what they'll be able to do with that sort of technology? They'll overrun the galaxy!"

  Quasar's gaze remained unwavering as he stared up into the Arachnoid's bulbous eyes, which he couldn't be sure were looking back at him. "Take it. And let us be on our way."

  Episode 54: A Spider's Prey

  The Arachnoid loomed over Captain Quasar with gobs of acidic saliva hissing as they drooled down its chest and struck the floor. "It is not our way to take something without a fight. You will meet me in combat to the death, or we will slaughter you all—including that inept Carpethrian trainer of yours with the butterfingers." The creature seemed to chuckle, its mandibles click-clacking wildly. "Couldn't even hold onto his own ax!"

  Hank glowered. "If we don't get this man to our infirmary—"

  Ensign Elliott's skin had lost all color while the chest of his uniform became sopping wet with blood. Chief Gruber and Lieutenant Davis stared at the captain with little hope. It was clear to Quasar that if Elliott had been on the Magnitude, he would have already been pronounced dead. But these Carpethrians with their camouflaged rock fortress / shipyards and cold fusion near-lightspeed reactors and other forms of alien technology—perhaps they possessed some sort of magical ability to bring Elliott back to the land of the living.

  "Is that what you really want?" Steve the hallucination spoke into Quasar's ear. "Isn't he the stupid kid you wanted to kick out of the nearest airlock on more than one occasion?"

  Quasar narrowed his heroic gaze in the face of the horrific spider-creature. "Allow my injured man to be cared for, and I will fight you."

  "You are in no position to make demands, Earth Man!" The Arachnoid signaled one of its minions with a twitch of its upper limbs, and it stomped forward with a rifle-spear to briefly take aim and fire. A crimson pulse of energy burst forth from the muzzle and struck Elliott dead-center, dissolving him instantly. Gruber and Davis stared wide-eyed as the ensign vanished from their grasp, transforming into a small pile of ash on the bloodstained floor.

  Quasar let out a strangled cry and lunged at the Arachnoid leader only to be thrown down to the training mat and pinned beneath two of the creature's feet. Gruber and Davis had reacted in like manner, charging for the nearest Arachnoid with every intent to tear it limb from limb, but Hank held them back, gripping each of them by the arm with a slow shake of his furry head.

  "Don't," was all he said in a low growl.

  Both seemed surprised by the Carpethrian's strength, and they obeyed him for the moment.

  "A wise choice." The Arachnoid pinning Quasar to the floor drooled some more of its acidic saliva, and the captain jerked his head out of the way to keep hi
s stunning complexion from being eaten alive by the stuff. "Listen to your hairy pet. He knows better than to trifle with us." More click-clacking followed. "His kind are little more than walking carpets. They allow my kind to walk all over them."

  Hank lowered his head but said nothing. Quasar knew the very hairy biped well enough to tell that he was seething right now. As was the captain himself. How stupid of him to leave the Magnitude without his pulse pistol! What had he been thinking? Obviously, he'd had no idea the situation would go south so quickly, but even so, the fault lay with him alone that one of his crew had been reduced to a smoking pile of ash.

  "Do you still believe you'll be able to save her?" Steve squatted beside the captain and leaned on his oaken staff. Of course he meant Lieutenant Davis. "Pardon my saying so, but primitive lust appears to be the only reason you've kept her around, hoping that one day you'd have the opportunity to take her back to your quarters and—"

  "Get on with it!" Quasar shouted up at the spider-beast. "If this is your idea of a fair fight, then kill me now. But if you intend to best me in combat, I suggest you let me up so we may begin."

  The Arachnoid chuckled. "We have already begun."

  It swept Hank's ax downward, aiming to cleave the captain's head from his shoulders. But Quasar still held the broadsword in one hand, which he brought upward just in time to block the blow with a resounding clang of steel blade upon steel.

  "Not bad." The creature pressed down with the ax, the weight of its body firmly behind the weapon, and Quasar struggled to push back with his sword.

  Ideally, he would have had the use of both arms, gripping the hilt in both hands, but his left arm lay pinned to the mat beneath the monster's fuzzy leg. The creature chattered something the translator in Quasar's collar couldn't comprehend, and one of the salivating minions tossed it an Arachnoid rifle-spear.

  "Foul!" Hank shouted. "Carpethrian weapons alone will decide this contest."