Another Story: Part Two

     "Thank you for the welcome." The Blumaroo who appeared to be the leader announced, "This station is now under the control of Doctor Frank Sloth." As soon as the word "Sloth" was out of his mouth, Milo knew what was up. He had done his sixth grade Villain report on Sloth.

     "Round them up, soldiers!"

     "Wonderful..." he mumbled under his breath, before realising he should scream like a tomato Chia at a Lupe Day party and run away from the giant Blumaroo soldier rushing to him.

     He hadn't gone more than two feet before it grabbed the hood of his vest.

     "Get away from me!!!" Milo screamed. "HELP!!!"

     The room was full panicking, screaming, crying, running people, soldiers blasting guns, a panicking Kacheek running into a wall. Milo might've laughed at that, had he not been in the clutches of a mutant minion to the most horrid creature ever to live, holding a blaster bigger than the jumbo hotdog Cameron had once ordered at Hubert's.

     Just after the poor Kacheek fell unconscious, someone must have thrown something hard at the back of the aforementioned minion's head, because his grip on Milo's hood fell with his body to the floor. Milo actually did laugh when he saw his Kougra friend standing behind the limp soldier, an apple on the floor beside him. All those years of playing catch actually did something productive.

     "We've gotta find Jackie!" Cameron shouted over the commotion.

     "Let's go over by the window! That's where she was last!"

     After sprinting across the room, dodging gun blasts, soldiers, and civilians, the boys' attentions were drawn to a dark corner, where, upon closer inspection, blue Xweetok girl was beating one of the mutants with it's own blaster.

     After pulling her off the shrieking Blumaroo, the three children were still left with quite a few problems.

     "We need to get out of here!"

     "Where will we go?!"

     "What the heck is going on?!"

     "Where's Fredrick?!" Jackie's voice was louder than her friends.

     Milo looked worried. "He was over on the other side of the room, where I was, but he was caught in a group of people and was shoved somewhere else."

     "Well, then," Jackie replied, "We just have to track them down."

     "Here goes nothing!" cried Cameron as they ran back to where Milo remembered catching a glimpse of a screaming group of pets.

     The largest Blumaroo, who the pets would later learn was Commander Garoo, turned off the alarm that had been adding to the noise, while one of the soldiers handed him a megaphone.

     "Quiet down and sit!" the horrific mutant yelled with his newly amplified voice, shooting at the ceiling for emphasis.

     After a moment or two everyone sat down, forcing Milo, Jackie, and Cameron to put their search to a halt.

     The commander began to scream again, "We are awaiting orders from the mighty Dr. Sloth."

     More like cowardly, Milo thought, noting the fact that none had seen hide nor hair of the Doctor since the invasion began, sitting at his spot huddled next to two of his friends near the middle of the large, magnificent, metallic room.

      ~*~

     Well, Jackie thought, this isn't exactly the vacation we expected...

     Those disgusting soldiers had received word from their despicable leader, and now Jackie and her friends were in line behind a family of Cybunnies to get on the transport shuttles to Who-Knows-Where so Who-Knows-What could be done to them.

     She was reminded of Milo's sixth grade villain report on Sloth.

     Just as she was remembering a comic strip from "The Kiko Enquire" from when she was little about Sloth and his teddy bear, even more pets burst through what seemed to be a vent, only she had a sneaking suspicion they were good, as they were shooting at shocked, mutated Blumaroos.

     "Great," she mumbled as she was dragged over, through the blasts and the soldiers and good guys and average Joes, to an open door under the escalator by Cameron, herself dragging Milo, "Another battle. With blasting. Fantastic." Even though the fight was over in less than two minutes, the young pets were long out the door by then, heading to the Petpet shop.

      ~*~

     Fredrick was not happy.

     He was not happy at all.

     First, his peaceful day of fun and space food with his young friends was interrupted by some very rude, extremely tall Blumaroos.

     Fredrick was pretty sure they were mutants, because when a Blumaroo's taller than a Lupe, chances are it isn't natural.

     Then everyone who had been in the room lost their minds and started running around, causing him to loose Milo, and making it impossible to find Jackie and Cameron.

     There had also been an insane young Cybunny trying to climb over everyone.

     But anyway, he only got a moment's rest from all this, sitting down on the ground, awaiting his turn to get in the transport shuttle, before some pets came in and caused blaster shooting and people running, which is very hard for an old Lupe to deal with.

     So he did what any logical person would do.

     He ran up the up escalator as fast as his old legs would carry him and made his way to the bedroom he shared with Cameron and Milo.

      ~*~

     The three pets rushed into the Robo-Petpet Shop, into the back room, and into a coat closet.

     "Why... Are we... here?" an out of breath Jackie asked.

     "Because when I was here earlier, I gave one of the workers Milo's Kiko Fudge to show me the employee/storeroom place, and I noticed a coat closet. I figure no one will look for anything in a coat closet at a time like this, so we can hide until we figure out what to do."

     "Dude, I think that's the smartest idea you've ever come up with," Jackie said, reaching into the backpack she'd been carrying and getting out a bottle of water.

     "Why, thank y- wait, what?"

     Milo interrupted, "How do we find Fredrick now, though?"

     "I don't think we can, Milo. If we go out there to look for him, we'll be found for sure, and who knows what those people would do to us then? Anyway, Fredrick's really smart. He'll find a place to hide." Cameron looked upset.

     "Well," Jackie began, "first things first, we have to find a way to get home. Maybe I've got something in my backpack..."

     Milo sighed.

     Cameron dug an apple flavoured candy out of his pants pocket.

     "Let's see... I've got my notepad... House keys... Hey! How'd you get in there?!"

     When Jackie's hand reappeared from her backpack, a rock was in it.

     "You packed Rocky?" Milo asked.

     "I didn't! He must've jumped in there before I zipped it up!" Her mouth was agape, staring at the stone that was her pet.

     "Jackie," Cameron said, swallowing his candy, "it's a rock."

     "I know!"

     Amidst all the confusion, Milo set his hand on the wall.

     Well, he meant to set his hand on the wall, but he actually set it on one of the coats, causing his hand to slip and pull the coat to the ground, where a small package toppled out.

     "What's this?" Milo bent down to pick it up.

     Just then, a shadow Grundo dressed in all black opened the door to their closet.

     Her eyes opened wide. "Uh oh..."

      ~*~

     Finally, Fredrick was in his room. He lay down on his bed, exhausted.

     After a few moments of simply breathing, he had the energy to contemplate how to find the kids he was supposed to be chaperoning, and how to get them back to Kiko Lake safely.

     This was not an easy thing to contemplate.

     He thought he had seen them run somewhere, while he was stuck in yet another wall of civilians, but he didn't remember where.

     That meant either they were hiding somewhere, or that they had been captured by evil Blumaroos.

     "I'm getting too old for this..."

      ~*~

     Cameron was freaking out.

     One of his best friends had a rock that could move.

     They were stuck on a doomed space station being invaded by weird Blumaroos.

     His candy didn't taste like apple, it tasted like chokato.

     They found a mysterious package, and a Grundo just walked into their closet.

     "Why are you in here, and what are you doing with that package?" She asked.

     Cameron tried to speak, "We... Hide.... Chokato... Coat... Evil Blumaroos... Rocky..."

     "What I think he means is," said Milo, translating the Kougra's gibberish, "we were hiding from the invading army, when I accidentally knocked over this coat," he pointed to it, "which the package fell out of."

     "Well, that makes more sense than what he said," the ash colored Grundo replied. "I suppose you should come with me." She walked over to the closet's vent, pulled a screwdriver out of her pocket, and began opening it up. "I'm Zarlin."

     "Why are we going through a vent?" Cameron managed to ask as they all crawled into it.

     "Because it's the safest route right now, and I know the way to HQ from here."

     "I'm not going to ask," Jackie said, obviously frustrated enough by her stowaway rock.

     After crawling through and out of the vent shaft, they went through an area with lot's of large machines and wires. The children suspected this was where workers kept the Station running.

     Finally, they reached a door with what looked to be a red, mechanical eye and green panel beside it.

     Zarlin put her hand on the panel, which in response made some beeping noises, and then let the strange machine scan her eyes.

     "Retinal scan accepted."

To be continued...