CHAPTER THIRTEEN
GALAXY QUEEN
The twins stepped into the beam of light and re-entered the world of Conner’s handwriting. The words the universe stretched around them, and before they knew it, they were floating through an endless galaxy. They were surrounded by thousands and thousands of stars—it was a breathtaking sight, and the twins had never felt so small in their lives.
All gravity disappeared, and the weightlessness gave the twins a falling sensation in the pit of their stomachs that didn’t go away. They moved their arms and legs and tried swimming through the emptiness, but there was absolutely nothing to swim against.
Conner barely caught the corner of his binder before it floated out of reach, and tucked it safely into his backpack with the flask of Portal Potion.
In the distance, Alex and Conner could see a large white planet with multi-colored clouds, but they were still thousands of miles away from its atmosphere. The planet looked delicious—like a large piece of candy floating in space.
“What’s that?” Alex asked.
“That’s Jawbreakeropolous,” Conner said. “I had a sweet tooth when I wrote this story.”
It was difficult to make out at first, but the twins saw a small light traveling toward the planet. It orbited around Jawbreakeropolous and after the eighth or ninth rotation it shot out a green laser that engulfed the planet. In a matter of seconds, Jawbreakeropolous shrunk and vanished from the universe.
“What just happened?” Alex asked. “Why did the planet disappear?”
“It didn’t disappear, it was uploaded,” Conner explained. “That thing circling Jawbreakeropolous is the BASK-8, the Cyborg Queen’s spaceship. She travels the galaxy looking for habitable planets in other star systems’ Goldilocks zone. When she finds a planet she likes, her spaceship uploads it into its hard drive, and then she takes it back to her home solar system.”
“What’s a Goldilocks zone?” Alex asked.
“It’s the area of every solar system that’s not too hot and not too cold to host life,” Conner said. “That’s actually what scientists call it—I swear I’m not making it up!”
“Why does the Cyborg Queen need so many planets?”
“The Cyborgs have outgrown their home planet and need more room,” he said. “The queen travels with an army aboard her ship in case she runs into any trouble. We need to get aboard the BASK-8 and convince her to let us borrow her soldiers.”
Conner opened the binder and aimed the beam of light in all directions around him, like a busted lighthouse, to get the BASK-8’s attention. It must have done the trick, because the spaceship zoomed toward the twins and within a few seconds was hovering just a hundred yards away from them. The BASK-8 was the shape and size of a cruise ship. It was made from red steel and had wings like a plane. A cluster of satellites and antennas near the top made the spaceship look like it was wearing a crown.
“Whatever happens, just follow my lead,” Conner told his sister. “I’m not going to tell them I’m their creator—I learned that lesson in ‘Starboardia’—but I think I’ve got something up my sleeve that will work.”
“You’re the boss,” Alex said.
Large speakers stuck out on both sides of the BASK-8 and someone aboard spoke to the twins. The voice was very proper and sounded awfully familiar, but Alex couldn’t tell who it reminded her of.
“Attention, unidentified life-forms,” the voice said. “Please state your name, species, and home star system.”
“I’m Conner Bailey and this is Alex,” he announced. “We’re human beings from the planet Sycamore Drivious of the Willow Crestian system.”
“What are you doing in the middle of space?” the voice asked.
“Our spaceship was hijacked by Orphianotics,” Conner said. “Would you mind giving us a lift back to our planet?”
Conner was confident the tall tale would grant them admission to the BASK-8, and he gave Alex a thumbs-up. She hoped whatever plan he had cooking was going to work. There was silence from the speaker as whoever was on the other end considered the request.
“Any enemy of the Orphianotics is a friend of ours,” the voice said. “Please, come aboard.”
A large compartment door opened and two steel claws reached out of the BASK-8 and plucked the twins from space like stuffed animals in an arcade prize machine. They were pulled into a large hangar where several smaller spaceships were kept. The BASK-8 had artificial gravity, so the twins hit the floor as soon as they entered.
Once the compartment door was shut behind them, a pair of automatic doors on the other side of the hangar opened. A lizard the size of a man walked in with two Cyborgs on either side of him.
The lizard had big yellow eyes and red slimy skin and wore a gray jumpsuit with several buttons. The Cyborgs were half human, half robotic in a variety of combinations. Some were human with robotic arms and legs; others were split evenly down the middle. They all wore red goggles and held guns with barrels that pulsated bright blue light. They also wore vests that monitored their heartbeat and/or remaining battery percentage.
Alex and Conner quickly got to their feet and the Cyborgs raised their weapons toward them. The lizard man cautiously looked the twins up and down.
“Neither Sycamore Drivious nor the Willow Crestian system are registered in the intergalactic database,” the lizard man said with the same voice they had heard outside.
“Oh…” Conner said. “That’s because we hate solicitors.”
The lizard man stepped toward the twins to inspect them further.
“You’re awfully young to be traveling through the universe by yourselves,” the lizard man said. “Were there more in your crew?”
“We had an android chaperone, but the Orphianotics stole him, too,” Conner explained. “Darn those filthy creatures!”
The lizard man nodded to the Cyborgs and they lowered their weapons.
“I’m Commander Newters,” the lizard man said. “Welcome to the BASK-8. You may remove your helmets—this ship is equipped with oxygen.”
The twins unscrewed their helmets and shook Commander Newters’s hand.
“Thank you so much for rescuing us,” Conner said. “We would have been goners if it weren’t for you.”
“I’m sorry to hear about your unfortunate encounter with the Orphianotics,” Newters said. “The Cyborg Queen has made many exhausting requests to the United Universe Council to ban them from our quadrant of the galaxy, but they won’t listen to her.”
“What are the Orphianotics?” Alex asked, forgetting to go along with the story her brother was describing. “They stole our ship so quickly, I didn’t get a good look at them.”
“They’re a terrible species,” Newters explained. “They destroyed their home planet, and now they travel through the galaxy stealing resources from other star systems.”
“But isn’t that sort of what the Cyborg Queen does, too?” Alex asked.
“That’s exactly what the United Universe Council said,” Newters said. “Never mind that, we would be happy to escort you to your home planet. The queen loves traveling to new star systems—I’m sure she’d be delighted to see Sycamore Drivious in Willow Crestian.”
A loud alarm suddenly went off, startling the twins. The hangar was filled with flashing red lights. Commander Newters and the Cyborgs looked around in panic.
“Oh no!” Newters said. “This is terrible!”
“What’s happening—are we under attack?” Alex asked.
“Worse,” Newters said. “That alarm means the queen has awoken early from her charging slumber! She’s always in a terrible mood if she doesn’t get a full twenty hours. I must get to the Command Bridge before she arrives!”
Newters and the Cyborgs bolted through the automatic doors and the twins ran after them. They ran through the spaceship, passing several hallways full of frantic half-human, half-robotic men and women. The alarm was even louder outside the hangar and was accompanied by a voice that repeated, “The queen is awake, the queen is awake, the queen is awake.”
They finally reached the Command Bridge in the center of the ship. It was a wide room with a gigantic set of windows that had a view of the galaxy ahead. The walls were covered in screens with information about different parts of the spaceship, the queen’s location, and the universe around them. There were dozens of control stations scattered around the Command Bridge like desks in a classroom. Each station was covered in hundreds of blinking buttons, dials, and levers.
In preparation for the Cyborg Queen’s arrival, the Cyborg crew throughout the Command Bridge lubricated their joints, tightened their screws, and polished the steel covering their bodies.
“How close is she?” Newters asked the nearest Cyborg.
“She’s descending from her chambers now, Commander,” the Cyborg said. “The levels of her emotion chip are off the charts—she must be upset about something!”
The Cyborg pointed to the queen’s private elevator in the back of the Command Bridge. All the Cyborgs stood at their control stations just as the elevator doors opened. There was a collective hiss as their mechanical bodies compressed into bows. Alex and Conner followed their example and bowed, too.
The Cyborg Queen was more robotic than anyone else aboard the BASK-8. She was only humanoid from the chest up, and even that was questionable. Her nose, her chin, and most of her forehead were covered in metal plates. Her left eye was a camera lens, and instead of hair, her head was covered in wires that wove through a beehive of gears like the film in a projector. On the top of her head, above the wires and gears, was a steel crown. The word QUEEN blinked on it like the numbers on a digital alarm clock.
The queen had thin metal arms, and her steel body was shaped to look like she was wearing a gown. She had wheels instead of legs and rolled out of the elevator and into the Command Bridge. The twins could tell she was mad because her lens was twitching and a few of her wires snapped and stuck straight up.
“Your Majesty,” Commander Newters said with a deep bow. “We weren’t expecting you to wake early. Did you have a restful charge?”
“Someone left the gravity on in my chambers while I was charging,” the Cyborg Queen said sharply. “Not only did it prevent me from a restful charge, but when I awoke, the human side of my face was puffy!”
With this, Alex realized why the “Galaxy Queen” was so familiar—she was embarrassed it had taken this long to click. Without a doubt, the Cyborg Queen was based on Red Riding Hood, Commander Newters was based on Froggy, the Orphianotics were based on the orphans Red despised, the BASK-8 was a clever play on basket, and the Cyborg Queen’s passion for collecting planets was based on Red’s passion for real estate.
“You didn’t,” Alex whispered to her brother.
Conner knew exactly what she was referring to by her smile.
“Yeah, I did,” he whispered back.
The Cyborg Queen rolled through the Command Bridge and glared at her Cyborg crew, waiting for one of them to step forward.
“Well?” she said. “Someone better claim responsibility or I’ll take away battery privileges for the entire ship!”
The smallest Cyborg in the Command Bridge became so nervous, he began short-circuiting. Sparks flew out of his mechanical neck and his head started spinning. He fell to his metal knees and pleaded for forgiveness.
“I’m so sorry, Your Majesty!” the small Cyborg said. “I was inspecting the artificial gravity generator and forgot to adjust the pressure in your chambers!”
The Cyborg Queen rolled her human eye and her lens pointed upward.
“Commander Newters, please have this Cyborg re-started before he catches on fire,” she ordered. “And have him re-programmed to remember the priorities of his assignments.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Newters said, and nodded to the Cyborg soldiers. “Take him to the Upgrade Center.”
Against the small Cyborg’s will, the soldiers escorted him out of the Command Bridge. The Cyborg Queen rolled to the center of the room and the bottom half of her body transformed into a throne. The Cyborg crew took it as a cue to be seated at their control stations.
“Was Jawbreakeropolous uploaded successfully?” the Cyborg Queen asked.
“Yes, Your Majesty,” Newters said. “It’s been safely added to the hard drive and will be a wonderful addition to your home system.
“Then why are we still in this solar system?” the queen asked. “Shouldn’t we be at Gumdropida by now?”
“We were en route to the next planet when we answered a distress call,” Newters informed her.
“A distress call?” the Cyborg Queen asked. “From whom?”
Newters cleared his throat and gestured for the twins to come stand beside him. Alex and Conner cautiously approached Newters and the Cyborg Queen. Her lens popped several inches out of her head to examine them.
“Who are you?” she asked.
“Hello, Your Electronicness,” Conner said. “My name is Conner and this is my sister, Alex. We’re human beings from the planet Sycamore Drivious of the Willow Crestian system.”
The Cyborg Queen squinted her human eye at them. “I’ve never heard of such places,” she said. “What are you doing in this part of the galaxy?”
“We were stranded and left for dead after our ship was stolen by Orphianotics,” Alex said. “Your commander kindly saved our lives and brought us aboard.”
The mention of the Orphianotics’ name infuriated the Cyborg Queen. Two exhaust pipes shot out of her shoulders and steam erupted from them.
“I HATE Orphianotics!” she yelled. “I’ll admit there are few alien species I can stomach, but the Orphianotics are extra-terrible extraterrestrials! I’ve begged the United Universe Council to do something about it, but they refuse! They had the audacity to tell me collecting planets is no different from the destruction those scoundrels cause! But I don’t steal resources from other planets, I just move them into a better neighborhood!”
Conner waited for the Cyborg Queen to let off all her steam before he said another word.
“You know, the Orphianotics aren’t allowed in our solar system,” he said. “They were kicked out eons ago. If you wouldn’t mind giving us a ride back to Sycamore Drivious, we’d love to give you a tour of the Willow Crestian system.”
“No Orphianotics, you say?” the Cyborg Queen asked. “Perhaps I should move my planets to your system. What type of star does Willow Crestian revolve around? White dwarf? Blue dwarf? Yellow dwarf? Red giant? I like knowing I have at least two hundred billion years left in a new system before making such a big commitment.”
Conner wasn’t sure how to answer. “It’s a seventh dwarf,” he said. “Yup, seven white dwarves from the Milky Snow White Galaxy combined into one and boom—the Willow Crestian system was formed.”
The Cyborg Queen nodded as she gave it some thought. She had never heard of stars combining in such a manner, and the impossibility intrigued her.
“I’d like to see this Willow Crestian,” she said. “We’d be delighted to give you a lift to your home planet. Unfortunately, there are a few stops we need to make along the way. There are a handful of planets I need to inspect and collect before the Orphianotics get to them. I hope you don’t mind waiting.”
“No worries,” Conner said. “We’d be happy to accompany you!”
“Marvelous,” the Cyborg Queen said. “Commander Newters, take us to Gumdropida, please.”
“Full speed to Gumdropida!” Newters ordered the crew.
The Cyborgs went to work pressing buttons at their control stations. The BASK-8 shot through the galaxy at light speed. The powerful jerk almost knocked Alex over and she screamed. The Cyborg Queen gave her a funny look—surely this wasn’t her first time experiencing light speed.
“She doesn’t get out much,” Conner said.
The BASK-8 whizzed through the stars and then slowed down as it approached the new planet. Gumdropida was bright orange and covered with snowy mountain ranges. The spaceship orbited the planet, and information about Gumdropida loaded on all the screens in the Command Bridge. A detailed hologram of the planet appeared in front of the Cyborg Queen’s throne.
“Gumdropida,” Newters read from a screen. “It has a diameter of three thousand four hundred seventy-eight miles. Surface temperatures range from negative ninety degrees to positive thirty degrees Fahrenheit. Atmosphere is made of helium. Currently there is no life on the planet, but forty percent of it is habitable for a Cyborg population.”
“It would be perfect for that ski resort I’ve been itching to build,” the Cyborg Queen said. “Upload the planet!”
The green laser shot out of BASK-8 and surrounded Gumdropida. Just like Jawbreakeropolous had, the orange planet shrank and disappeared from the universe. The words Upload Complete appeared on all the screens in the Command Bridge.
“The upload was successful, Your Majesty,” Newters said.
“Splendid. Please proceed to the next planet,” the Cyborg Queen ordered.
The BASK-8 raced through the galaxy in a different direction and arrived at the next planet. It was green and had white clouds spiraling through its atmosphere. Whatever sweet tooth Conner had when he wrote this story was contagious, and suddenly Alex had a strong craving for candy.
“Mintune,” Newters read from the screen. “It has a diameter of fifty-four thousand six hundred thirty-two miles. Surface temperatures range from five degrees to two hundred and three degrees Fahrenheit. Atmosphere is made up of sulfuric gases. The planet is home to an alien species known as Gas Whales, but only five percent is habitable for a Cyborg population.”
“Pass,” the Cyborg Queen said. “Five percent isn’t worth an upload—and I loathe neighbors. Proceed to the next planet.”
The queen was served hot oil in a teacup as the BASK-8 traveled through space to the next planet. However, when the spaceship arrived, they found nothing but a field of crunchy-looking asteroids.
“Oh dear,” Newters said. “It appears Granolia was hit by a comet and this is all that remains. Shall we continue ahead, Your Majesty?”
At first the Cyborg Queen slouched with disappointment, but her attitude quickly changed when an exciting idea popped into her head. The twins knew she had had an idea because a flashing lightbulb stuck out of her crown.
“You know, our solar system could use a belt,” the queen said. “Upload the asteroids and we’ll place them between Blousery and Skirturn when we get home.”
The Cyborg crew did as they were told and then proceeded to the next stop. The back-to-back light speed was making Alex a little nauseated. The subsequent planet was a russet color and had a rocky surface.
“Nutfugdus,” Newters read from the screen. “It has a diameter of two thousand seven hundred seventy-nine miles. Surface temperatures range from fifty degrees to three hundred degrees Fahrenheit. Atmosphere is very thin and made of carbon monoxide. Fifty-six percent of the planet is habitable for Cyborg life. Nutfugdus once hosted an alien species known as the Desert Ferrets, but they’re extinct.”
“Wonderful!” the Cyborg Queen said. “I love a good dry heat. Upload!”
Once again, the BASK-8 crew followed their queen’s instructions. When the upload was finished, the spaceship zipped across the galaxy to the location of the following planet. Alex pulled her brother aside as it traveled.
“How much longer until we ask the Cyborg Queen to borrow her army?” Alex asked.
“Soon,” Conner said. “There’s only one more Goldilocks zone left with a planet the queen is going to go nuts over. We’re going to help her upload it in exchange for the use of her Cyborg soldiers.”
“Did you intentionally base a story about a queen who steals things from Goldilocks zones on Red Riding Hood?” Alex asked. “I can’t decide if it’s brilliant or brutal.”
“Oh, I never thought about that,” Conner said. “Red is going to kill me if she ever finds out.”
The BASK-8 arrived at the next planet. It was purple with turquoise rings and by far the most beautiful of all the planets they had visited so far. The Cyborg Queen was enchanted by it. Her throne transformed back into a gown and she rolled over to the hologram to take a closer look at the majestic world.
“What’s the name of this beauty?” she asked.
“Lollipopigust, Your Majesty,” Newters read from the monitor. “It has a diameter of three thousand ninety-nine miles. Surface temperatures range from twenty-five degrees to ninety degrees Fahrenheit. Atmosphere is made of pure oxygen, and ninety percent of the planet is habitable for Cyborg life.”
“I LOVE it—it’s meant to be!” the Cyborg Queen said, and clasped her metal hands together. “Upload it immediately! I’ll share Jawbreakeropolous, Gumdropida, and Nutfugdus with the Cyborgs at home, but I want Lollipopigust for myself!”
The green laser engulfed the purple planet. But as Commander Newters read more information about Lollipopigust, a grave expression came over his red face. The commander bolted to a control station and pulled a red lever to abort the mission.
“What are you doing?” the queen demanded.
“Forgive me, Your Majesty, but I just read some troubling information,” Newters said. “One thousand years ago, scientists from another planet sent a vial of insects to Lollipopigust to see if it would sustain life. The high oxygen levels in the atmosphere made the insects grow to enormous sizes and now they dominate the planet. If we upload Lollipopigust, it would be like uploading thousands of tiny viruses into our hard drive! The entire ship would crash.”
The flashing lightbulb reappeared above the Cyborg Queen’s crown. “Can’t we send the army to Lollipopigust to terminate the insects?” she asked desperately.
Commander Newters shook his head. “The BASK-8 has been traveling for so long, it doesn’t have enough power to charge the soldiers’ battle batteries,” he said.
The queen’s lightbulb went off again. “Can’t they use their solar panels to charge their battle batteries?” she asked.
Commander Newters gulped. “That would only work while the soldiers were on the surface—but most of the insects live in colonies under the ground,” he explained.
All the Cyborgs knew their queen wouldn’t take the news well, so they dived under their control stations. The Cyborg Queen was so mad, the lightbulb above her crown burst and fiery blasts erupted from her exhaust pipes. Four robot legs wearing boots emerged from her steel gown and stomped the floor. Tears rolled down from her human eye and oil dripped from her lens.
“All I want is every habitable planet within a trillion-mile radius—it’s not like I’m asking for the world!” the Cyborg Queen lamented. “Everyone put your brains and A.I. chips together! There’s got to be something we can do!”
Once the fiery blasts had finished, Conner stepped toward the Cyborg Queen and tapped her on the exhaust pipes. Alex had no clue what her brother was up to.
“Excuse me, Your Mechanicalness, but I might have a solution,” he said. “You see, my sister and I just happen to be the children of the best exterminator in the galaxy!”
“Yes, we are!” Conner said, and sent her a dirty look. “Meteor Magazine gave our father four and a half nebulas out of five in their review, and the Alien Voice gave him three appendages up! Those are the most popular publications in the Willow Crestian system!”
The Cyborg Queen’s eye and lens darted between Alex and Conner. Her eyebrows turned into tiny windshield wipers and cleaned the tears off her face.
“So the two of you could exterminate all the insects on the planet for me?” the queen asked hopefully.
“We could…” Conner said, lowering his head dramatically. “You’ve already been so kind to us by offering transportation back to our planet. I hate to ask you for another favor in exchange for exterminating the insects, but there is something else my sister and I could use your help with.”
The Cyborg Queen wanted Lollipopigust so badly, she was willing to strike whatever bargain it took. “That’s quite all right, just tell me what you have in mind.”
“It’s not for us, it’s for our friends,” Conner explained. “They live on a small planet called Fairytaletopia in the Storybookian Galaxy. Their planet has recently been invaded by a savage race known as the Literarious Villainomous.”
“Bless you,” Alex said.
Conner ignored his sister. “The Literarious Villainomous are twice as bad as the Orphianotics and ten times more powerful! The worst part is, Fairytaletopia has no way of defending itself.”
“That sounds terrible!” the Cyborg Queen said.
“It is,” Conner said. “But it’s nothing your Cyborg army couldn’t help with. If my sister and I exterminate the insects on Lollipopigust, would you lend us your soldiers to help our friends fight the Literarious Villainomous?”
It wasn’t every day the Cyborg Queen was asked to lend out her army—however, it wasn’t every day she came upon the planet of her dreams, either. She turned to the hologram of Lollipopigust and stroked it with her metal hand.
“Fine,” the Cyborg Queen said. “Wipe that planet clean of insects, and I will let you use my Cyborg army to save Fairytaletopia.”
Conner shook her metal hand appreciatively. “Thank you so much, Your Engineeredness,” he said. “We couldn’t be more grateful! Right, Alex?”
“Sure… grateful,” she said unenthusiastically.
“Sure, sure,” the Cyborg Queen said. “Commander Newters, please see that the humans from Sycamore Drivious have everything they need for their extermination plan. I’m going to my chambers now to finish my charge. Please see that the gravity is turned off, and wake me when the extermination is over.”
“Yes, Your Majesty,” Newters said with another deep bow.
The Cyborg Queen rolled into her private elevator and ascended through the ship. Alex yanked her brother aside.
“Bugs?” she asked. “That’s your plan? We’re going to kill bugs in exchange for soldiers?”
“Oh, come on,” Conner said. “We’ll get to travel to another planet and shoot at some overgrown pests! It’ll be fun—like we’re in a video game!”
Alex shook her head—she couldn’t believe she had gone into this situation willingly. There were many times when Alex was convinced she and her brother were from different planets, and this just about proved it.
“Commander Newters,” Conner said happily, “lead the way!”