Sophia McDougall - Mars Evacuees

‘Darling Harbour stinks of fish,’ said Carl.

‘It does not. And there’s an aquarium. There’s a pool where you’re allowed to feed the rays. And sometimes we used to walk back from the aquarium through Chinatown and eat Emperor’s Puffs… they’re little batter cakes with custard inside…’ Noel began to look slightly mournful.

‘I have spent most of my life on ships and civilian stations,’ said Th saaa.

‘Yeah, but still,’ Carl said.

Th saaa considered. ‘I have always wished to see the city of Swaleeshashalafay Athmaral- haaa -Thay…’ (I’ve given up here but the name actually went on for much longer than that.) ‘I have only ever seen pictures, and there are many Paralashath by Morrors who lived there. The glowing towers and galleries and stairs, built of ice-blocks of every colour – and on the horizon always the steam rising from the sea, from the – the – hot, burning things under the water—’

‘Underwater volcanoes?’ guessed Josephine.

‘Yes! Volcanoes. The steam was like – like pillars holding up the sky. And red spirals of fraaraval hanging between the buildings, and amber gardens of lathmalee …’

‘Is Swarlyshash… thing – is that, like, the capital city?’ Carl asked.

‘The capital city of what?’ asked Th saaa witheringly. ‘The planet? How could a whole planet have a capital city?’

‘Can you tell us a Morror story, Th saaa ?’ asked Noel. ‘It doesn’t have to be a modern one.’

Irritable bands of orange were winking across Th saaa and I was sure they were going to refuse, but then, unexpectedly, the orange gave way to soft greens, and they actually patted Noel gently on the head with a tentacle.

‘I will tell you the story of the Bridge of Tham-thol-Tharaa. In the land of Ee- ee -Lathwama, there was a beautiful Suth- laaa who loved a beautiful Ruul. The Suth- laaa had a mane of tendrils as delicate as patterns of frost on a window and their arms flowed as elegantly in the air as weed in the water, and the Ruul’s colours changed as gracefully as theela-va in the sky. But they were alone; for the thirty turns before there had been many warm winters, and so very few Ma-lashnath had been born. The Ruul and the Suth- laaa met Quth- laaa and Thuul sometimes, but without a Ma-lashnath, the Ruul and Suth- laaa could not have children. So they set out for the land of Safwalaa- aa …’

The storytelling didn’t go totally smoothly; Th saaa soon got annoyed with us because we didn’t always know which bits were Morror society working as normal and which were magic (apparently Sufwalaa- aa was not a real place, even baby Morrors know that, but the thing about warm winters was totally true). But basically the beautiful Suth- laaa and the beautiful Ruul didn’t find any beautiful Ma-lashnath in Safwalaa- aa, but they didn’t realise it was because all the Ma-lashnath had headed for Ee- ee -Lathwama, looking for Ruul and Suth- laaa , and then there was a series of misunderstandings that were probably more hilarious if you were a Morror, but before we could get to the happy ending, or even the Bridge of Tham-thol-Tharaa, Noel interrupted: ‘What’s that?’ And we all tensed up because in our recent experience that question had not been a sign that nice relaxing things were about to happen.

We were picking our way through the Sulci Pavonis – sharp ridges and flat, narrow-bottomed valleys that streaked the land at the base of Mount Peacock – and Noel was pointing at five specks in the sky. Space Locusts! I thought at once – but before I could even say it, I realised they couldn’t be. The specks were holding a rotating circular formation even as they hurtled through the air towards us, and the light glittered silvery off their sides.

‘Those are human work,’ said Th saaa .

‘Drones – or could they be…?’ began Carl, squinting. ‘We’re nearly at Zond, aren’t we – they could be Goads, right? It could be Colonel Cleaver?’ He stood up on Monica’s back and started waving his arms. ‘HEY! HEY, COLONEL CLEAVER!’

The little robots dived down towards us from on high.

And, of course, they started shooting at us.

We bounded off Monica in all directions. I crammed myself under an overhanging rock; Josephine was crouching between two boulders on the other side of the little canyon. Carl and Noel had headed up rather than down, and were both on a ledge a few feet above Josephine’s head, flattened against the rock wall. That left Th saaa, trying to hide under Monica, but Monica was still obliviously scuttling forwards and her body was too high off the ground anyway. The drones swept up above us and then swooped back to the attack, surrounding us completely. The air blazed with energy bolts.

‘GOLDFISH!’ Noel howled, from the ledge. Carl had shoved in front of him but they looked horribly exposed up there.

The Goldfish was already doing its best, dancing in the air, shooting and darting, but it was one fish-shaped classroom robot against five military killing machines, and it was really only because the drones seemed so intent on scouring the canyon floor that the Goldfish managed not to be blown to bits itself.

‘What are they doing?’ I yelled. ‘Why are they shooting at us? They’re supposed to be on our side!’

To my horror, Josephine half rose from her crouch, making herself an even easier target. ‘They’re not shooting at us! They couldn’t have missed us all – they’re avoiding us!’

An energy bolt scorched the rock beside my head. ‘They’re not avoiding us very well ,’ I complained, shrinking back against the rock and relieved to see Josephine doing the same.

‘Sorry, Alice!’ called the Goldfish from above, who presumably had been the intended target.

‘They’re firing at me ,’ shouted Th saaa , seizing one of Monica’s legs with their tentacles and catapulting away from a volley of blasts. They landed close to the valley wall and dived under an overhang like mine, picked up six stones at once and hurled them with rather impressive precision. They knocked two of the flying drones off course – but only by a foot or two, and they soon recovered and swept back into formation.

‘Your temperature signature,’ Josephine called, as Th saaa dived out of the line of fire again. ‘It has to be. They can see we’re human and you’re not!’

But there wasn’t much Th saaa could do about that.

‘Goldfish!’ wailed Noel again. ‘They’re going to kill Th saaa !’

The Goldfish had actually managed to zap one of the drones so repeatedly it fell to the canyon floor with a thud. But the four remaining drones looked more than equal to one teenage alien with nothing but stones to throw.

‘My amlaa-vel-esh ! My invisibility gown!’ Th saaa wailed. ‘I need it!’

‘It won’t help!’ shouted Josephine. ‘You’ll show up even colder – it’ll just make it more obvious!’

‘The shockray staff !’ I yelled, suddenly remembering it. ‘Grab it!’

But the staff was still strapped to Monica, and Th saaa wasn’t anywhere near grabbing distance of her now. They were pinned against the rock wall with nothing left to hide behind.

Carl burst into motion; he took a huge leap down from the ledge, lurched for a moment atop Monica’s back, snatched up the staff, and then hurled himself up forwards again. He threw himself on top of Th saaa, knocking the alien flat, and the four drones stopped in mid-air and hovered there, confused. Carl brandished the shockray staff – which did precisely nothing, until Th saaa reached from underneath Carl and looped a tentacle around it…