Space Girls

by Arthur Saxon
meganeura@hotmail.com

Pamela Smith bounced her little racing car from The Angel Islington round to Vine Street. “Bother!” she said.

“Rent please,” said her husband Edgar gleefully. “Six hundred pounds please.”

Pam sighed as she was forced to sell Mayfair back to the bank. “Well,” she said, “that seems to be it.”

“You’re conceding?” asked Edgar, crestfallen. “You’ve still got hotels!”

Pam looked at her watch. “We don’t have time to finish, dear. And I think the result is a foregone conclusion at this point. Well done – as usual.”

Edgar shrugged and started gathering property cards together. “Ah well. Shame Diana went bankrupt so quickly.”

“Yes, it’s certainly a lot more fun with three,” Pam agreed.

Ten minutes later, they were ready to leave. Pam went to the foot of the stairs. “Diana?”

A round, bespectacled face appeared. “Yes Mum?”

“Dad and I are just off – you going to be all right?”

Diana rolled her eyes. “Mum, I’m sixteen – old enough to get married! I think I’ll be all right here on my own without my parents.”

“Well good. But no getting married while we’re out, do you hear?”

Diana snorted with laughter, the way she did. Pam had hoped her daughter would grow out of that little quirk – she was sure that Diana got teased at school because of it.

“And no wild parties!” said Edgar as he opened the front door.

“I’ll try not to throw any of those,” said Diana with a smile.

“Very good – bye then!”

“We’ll be back late – don’t wait up,” said Pam. “Bye!”

“Bye Mum, bye Dad,” said Diana.

As Pam and Edgar climbed into the family car, Edgar remarked, “You know, sometimes I wish she would throw a wild party instead of staying at home studying – just so I’d know she had some friends.”

“She has friends!” retorted Pam. “There’s that Maria – the Spanish girl.”

“Whom we see less and less of,” Edgar reminded his wife. “Now that Maria’s English is improving, she’s spending more and more time with the ‘in’ crowd.”

“Well I don’t think you should look a gift horse in the mouth,” said Pam. “Diana’s excelling academically and headed for a glittering career in science – she’ll be the boss of all those popular girls in ten years time.”

“I wish I could believe it,” said Edgar. “But you need social skills as well as brains to be a leader.”

“She’ll develop them,” said Pam. “Give her time.”

Edgar nodded, and said no more on the subject.

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

As soon as the car disappeared from sight, Diana let go of the curtain and hurriedly excitedly to her bedroom, where she slipped off her shoes, socks, jeans and t-shirt. Clad only in her bra and panties, she left her room and entered the bathroom, where she lifted the lid of the toilet and sat down, her heart pounding. She took off her glasses, leaned over, and placed them on the edge of the basin. Then, almost as an afterthought, she removed her bra and tossed it towards the door.

Looking down at her hated breasts almost made her lose her resolve. Ever since she had been one of the first girls in her class to develop, she had been teased mercilessly on account of her blossoming chest. If she had been less fat, and more attractive facially, she would have perhaps received more positive attention. But the truly pretty girls in her class, jealous of her breasts, had made her life a misery and ensured that the boys did too.

She had so looked forward to the time when all of the other girls had breasts too. But even when that happened, matters were no better. All the girls had breasts, certainly, but none to match her own G-cup monsters. And so the relentless teasing and persecution had continued … though lately things had been admittedly a little better, particularly since she had skipped a year. She was even beginning to get some positive attention from the nicer boys. Her shyness and natural distrust, however, had prevented her from letting any of them get too close.

She closed her eyes, so that she would not have to look at her awful, huge blobs of fatty flesh. Soon, she vowed, she would have them surgically reduced. Then maybe she would feel like less of a freak. And perhaps she would have the confidence to wear something other than shapeless, figure-concealing tops. She sighed.

Taking a deep breath, she started to strain. Slowly, her anus began to open as a large poo pressed against it from within her rectum. She grunted with effort – it was another big, thick one. Somehow all of her turds seemed to be large and thick and knobbly … probably because she liked to hold them in for as long as possible. This one had been four days in coming, and she couldn’t wait to see how big it was.

For this was her guilty secret – she got a huge kick out of pooping into her panties. Since then she had taken every opportunity of filling her panties with several days’ worth of poo. Most of the time it was in this bathroom when her parents were out, but she had done it elsewhere, too: twice in her bedroom, once in the kitchen, several times in the living room while watching television, and once, while in a particularly daring frame of mind, in the back garden.

It had all started when Douglas Bradley, an obnoxious bully in the year above her, had jumped out at her from behind a tree while she was walking home two years ago on the day before Halloween. She had been lost in thought, and totally unprepared for the unpleasant shock of seeing Douglas suddenly appear before her wearing some frightful monster mask. At her scream, he had burst out laughing, pulled off his mask, and then run away, leaving her shaking and angry.

But her anger had quickly been replaced by alarm, for she realised that in her shock, she had let loose the contents of her bowels into her panties. Beneath her skirt, a large soft lump of poo was nestling against her buttocks, held in place by a thin layer of cotton. Disgusted, she had walked very slowly back to her house, cleaned herself up, washed her panties and skirt, and taken a shower. But that night, she had been unable to get out of her head the memory of how it felt – warm, and squishy, and soft … and squelchy… Almost before she realised what she was doing, she had rubbed herself to orgasm and was basking in a surprised but rather delightful sexual afterglow.

After that, every defecation into her panties had been deliberate, except for one – a frightening moment four months ago when she had absent-mindedly stepped into the road, only to hear a squeal of brakes and the honking of a car’s horn as a white van came to an abrupt halt just a few feet away from her. She had quickly jumped back on to the pavement, but then realised that once again her panties were full of poo. A mixture of anxiety and delight filled her mind, and she fled home, slipping past her mother and retreating to the bathroom to clean up … but not before bringing herself to a knee-trembling orgasm.

Now, with hours of alone time in front of her, she was free to fill her panties and play with her poo for as long as she wanted … within reason, of course. It would not do to stink up the house so badly that the smell was still lingering when Mum and Dad returned. But there was plenty of time for a lot of fun…

Her mobile phone rang. Her eyes snapped open. Damn – who would be calling her at this time? And why now, when two inches of poo were protruding from her anus and starting to tent her panties away from her buttocks? She sighed. In theory of course she could talk on the phone while filling her panties, but it would not really be the same. She wanted to be alone to enjoy it.

She had just made up her mind to go and answer it, when it stopped ringing. With a dejected frown, she sat back down on the toilet seat. Then it began to ring again, and with a curse of annoyance she got to her feet and stomped through to her bedroom. Unfortunately this made her anus clench, and thus a small chunk of poo broke off and dropped into her panties, all lonely by itself.

It was her friend Cindy on the phone. At least, Cindy was her friend insofar as Cindy was everybody’s friend. In truth they hardly knew each other, but at least Cindy was nice to her, as she had been ever since Diana’s first day at secondary school. A year older than Diana, Cindy was one of the popular crowd, but unlike most of them she did not let it go to her head, and was nice even to the unpopular boys and girls. Even to Diana.

Having skipped a year, she was now of course quite often in Cindy’s classes, particularly since both of them were doing physics and chemistry at A-level. Having initially struggled a bit to catch up to the rest of the class, Diana was now consistently at the top, a fact which was not lost on those who were having trouble with their homework…

“Diana!” came Cindy’s breezy voice. “What are you up to?”

Diana smiled to herself. If only Cindy knew! “Oh, not much,” she said. “Just studying.”

“It’s still three months before A-levels, babe,” said Cindy. “You should relax and enjoy yourself once in a while.”

“Mm-hmm,” said Diana noncommittally, amused at the thought that in fact this was exactly what she was doing.

“Anyway, I was rather hoping I might pop round so you can help me with this homework,” continued Cindy. “I’m really struggling.”

Diana sniffed the air, and her stomach knotted. Already there was quite a strong smell of poo, and Cindy was only five minutes’ walk away. “Tell you what,” said Diana, “I’ll come to you. My bedroom’s in a bit of a state, I’m afraid.”

“Suit yourself,” said Cindy. “See you in five?”

“Make it ten,” said Diana, figuring five minutes for the clean-up. She was rather annoyed at having her nice evening’s panty-pooping interrupted, but she really did like Cindy and was not about to pass up an opportunity to cultivate one of her few friendships, even if it was only a sort-of friendship.

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

Not far away, in a rather posher neighbourhood, Blair Wainwright was also wearing just a bra and a pair of panties. With one elegant hand on a shapely hip, she flipped through the skirts in her wardrobe, looking for the one that would make Lenny Norton putty in her hands. Finally, with a smirk playing about her lips, she pulled out a very short silver number with a slit up one side.

Silver skirt, pink halter top, pink high heels. Her dangliest earrings. Eye-liner, mascara, and her shiny lipstick. Admiring herself in the mirror, she nodded approvingly. Putty in her hands.

At eighteen years of age, Blair had a very clear idea of what she wanted out of life. People often assumed that she was like her mother – a princess type, a gold-digger, with her sights on marrying the most eligible bachelor around and living a life of luxury. But that simply was not the case. What Blair valued more than anything else was her independence. Naturally she wanted to marry someone rich and handsome, but she was in no hurry. First she wanted to be a success in her own right.

Never particularly gifted in most academic subjects, she had nevertheless discovered in herself a certain ear for languages, and had consistently done well in French, then in German, and most recently in Spanish. These, therefore, were her A-level subjects, and she intended to get at least a B in every one of them … perhaps even an A in German. Then it would be off to London University, where her new goal would be obtaining the best degree she could … while attending all the best parties and meeting all the most eligible bachelors, of course.

She tossed her red hair and looked at herself askance. Her bared midriff was well-toned, her legs long, slim and perfect, and her breasts … a little small, perhaps, but appropriate for her slender physique. Padded bras helped. She turned and looked at her bottom, only barely concealed by her microskirt. Pert, she noted, yet pleasantly round and un-boyish.

It was not easy, being so perfect. She watched her weight very carefully, and although she had a weakness for chocolate she held it in check pretty well. Plenty of exercise at the gym helped, as well as frequent games of squash or tennis with Cindy (who always beat her, to her mild chagrin). It was hard work, but it paid off in spades – every boy in her year wanted to be her boyfriend, or at least wanted to sleep with her. Some of them had (she had gone through a few boyfriends in the last couple of years), but despite this earning her a bit of a reputation for being an ‘easy lay’, she had not found this to be a hindrance in her pursuit of the sexiest boys in the school (or out of it).

Tonight Lenny Norton, an enterprising young man seven years her senior, was taking her to the theatre to see Phantom of the Opera. She had seen it before, but had told him otherwise. The show didn’t matter – it was the company she was interested in. Lenny had started his own business, and it was doing rather well, judging by the Lotus he drove. He had taken her for a ride in it – such a sexy car! Not much room in it for having sex, but they had managed.

Downstairs, she channel-surfed in front of the television while she waited for Lenny. Ten minutes passed, then twenty, then half an hour. Irritably she pulled out her mobile and dialled his number for the third time. Again she got through to his voicemail. “Where the hell are you, Lenny?” she yelled at the phone. Then she hung up, fuming.

Five minutes later, she was tired of waiting, and she knew where he lived. She grabbed her car keys and stormed out of the house, slamming the door behind her. Squealing her tyres, she swerved into the road and floored the accelerator, reaching fifty-five before she had to slam on the brakes for the stupid speed bump. “Argh!” she yelled.

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

A considerably more stable relationship was being enjoyed by Alice Carpenter and her beau, Peter, who were quietly snogging in the living room of the Carpenter residence. Peter, with his arm up the inside of Alice’s top, had just slipped his hand underneath the right-hand cup of her bra, and was gently kneading her breast. She broke off from their kiss.

“All right, enough of that,” she said softly, with a smile to let him know she was not annoyed. “Remember my sister’s upstairs.”

“Oh yes,” he replied, nodding, and he tugged her bra cup back into place over her breast. Withdrawing his hand, he started kissing her again, and when she responded warmly, he started sliding his hand up her skirt, stroking higher and higher along her inner thigh.

She broke off again. “You’re incorrigible!” she said with a chuckle.

“Surely we’ll hear if she starts coming down the stairs,” he said, as he began to caress her pussy through her thin silk panties.

“Probably,” she admitted, and when he kissed her again, she let him pull her panties aside, even spreading her legs slightly to allow him to worm his middle finger into her vagina. She shuddered as he began stroking her g-spot, and after a minute she left out a little moan.

Instantly her cheeks turned crimson and she pushed his arm away. “That’s enough!” she whispered. “You know I can’t keep quiet for that.”

Peter pouted. “Are you so worried about what she’ll think? She’s not a child, Alice.”

“No she’s not, and she’s quite capable of teasing me rotten about any noises she hears, or thinks she hears. Anyway Peter, you’d better get going or you’ll miss your train.”

“It’s not for half an hour!”

“But you don’t know how bad the traffic is going to be. There are those roadworks on Pevensey Street, and the spur can get quite congested at times. Come on – I’ll make you a sandwich while you’re getting the car packed.”

Peter unfortunately did not go to the same university as Alice. It would have been much more convenient for them both if they did, but their long-distance relationship was nevertheless working very well. During term-time each of them was free to focus undistracted on their studies, and they made the most of their holidays and occasional weekends together.

Alice had not been looking for romance when she met Peter in an internet chat-room, but the two of them had clicked instantly. Peter, attracted to her intellectual maturity, was amazed to discover that she was only nineteen years old. He himself was in his third year at St Andrews, but he often felt like he was chatting to an older woman. At least, he did when he was chatting with her on-line … in person, it was hard to ignore her obviously young and very pretty face.

Despite falling so quickly into an unplanned relationship, Alice remained firmly focused on her studies. An average student throughout her school years, she considered herself very lucky to have been accepted to read economics at Bristol, and was determined to make the most of her time there. Unlike her sister, she was not much of a party girl, though she had acquired a fairly wide circle of friends, partly because she had joined no fewer than six different clubs, including a photography club and a creative writing club. She soon realised she would have to give up one or more of these – her studies took up too much of her time – but for the moment she was enjoying the breadth of experience that she was gaining.

Peter was smiling at her. “I love you,” he said.

She blushed. “I love you too,” she replied, and she kissed him again, but briefly. Then she got to her feet. “Cheese and chutney?”

“Yes please,” he said, nodding. “All right then, I suppose I’ll pack the car.” He sighed. “I’m going to miss you, Alice.”

A fizzy sensation started at the back of Alice’s nose. “Oh don’t make me cry,” she said, poking him in the chest. “I’ll never hear the end of it.” She blinked several times to stop her eyes from tearing up. Then she hurried through to the kitchen to make Peter’s sandwich.

The doorbell rang. “I’ll get it,” said Peter.

When he opened the door, he did not recognise the dark-haired, very short, and slightly plump teenaged girl standing outside with her arms folded protectively across her chest. Her shoulders were hunched forwards in an attempt to de-emphasize her breasts, but despite this and the knitted sweater she was wearing, she was obviously quite a buxom young girl. She looked startled to see him, her eyes opening impossibly wide behind thick glasses, so he smiled warmly to put her at her ease.

“Hi,” he said. “You must be one of Cindy’s friends, I’m guessing?”

Diana nodded. “Yes,” she said in a small voice. “Er, hi.”

“Well do come in,” said Peter. “Cindy’s upstairs. You know where her room is?”

Diana nodded again. Then she ducked past him and trotted up the stairs. Peter looked after her in amusement. Shy little thing, he thought to himself. Rather sweet, really.

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

Upstairs, Cindy was dancing to the music of Muse. With the volume this high, there was little chance she would have heard any of Alice’s moans, even if her sister had been climaxing just outside her door. She did not even hear Diana knocking on the door, and she started in surprise when the door opened and Diana’s magnified eyes peered hesitantly into the room.

Cindy killed the music with a deft flick of the remote, and smiled at Diana. “Come on in, babe,” she said. “Grab a pew. Hey, nice jeans – have I seen them before?”

Diana bent over slightly so that she could see past her breasts to her jeans. “They’re quite new,” she acknowledged. “Maybe you haven’t seen them. Thanks.”

“So what’s new with you?” asked Cindy. “I saw you chatting to Josh Bennett today. Are you and he…?”

Diana blushed. “Don’t be silly,” she said. “He’s a bit out of my league, don’t you think?”

Cindy swatted her on the shoulder. “Babe, we’re seriously going to have to work on that self-esteem issue you have. You’re a very pretty girl – if you and Josh were together, he’d be the lucky one, and don’t you forget it!”

Diana smiled. This was why she liked Cindy. “Thanks,” she said awkwardly. “Anyway what about you? I heard you’re going out with Robbie?”

Cindy nodded. “Yes, for a week now,” she said. “He’s awfully funny.” She giggled. “He told me this crazy joke today…”

“Oh yes?” said Diana.

Cindy shook her head. “Oh, it’s just too gross. And I wouldn’t remember it right anyway. But yeah, Robbie’s fun.”

Diana could not help smiling as she watched Cindy giggle again. She wished she were more like this bubbly, pretty, athletic blonde, liked by absolutely everybody and apparently without a care in the world.

Actually, not quite everybody liked Cindy. Her unrelenting cheerfulness occasionally set her sister Alice’s teeth on edge, particularly when it was misplaced. On past holidays with their parents, Alice’s job had always been to look after Cindy, but this was frequently difficult because Cindy had a habit of going off on her own without telling anyone, chatting to strange men, and generally getting into all kinds of scrapes from which Alice invariably had to rescue her. A few months ago, having just passed her driving test, Cindy ‘borrowed’ Alice’s car one evening and promptly crashed it into a tree. Since Cindy was not covered under Alice’s insurance, their parents had had to foot the repair bill, and Cindy was still paying them back out of her waitressing wages. Not that this had stopped her from borrowing Alice’s car again from time to time, of course.

And so Alice, ever practical, often wondered if either she or Cindy were adopted, because it was hard to believe that they were related by blood. To anyone else, on the other hand, the resemblance was obvious – they were a similar height, had similar facial features (although Alice was a brunette), and had almost identical voices, such that even their parents sometimes could not immediately tell who was on the phone if one of them called home.

Another source of frustration for Alice was that Cindy, while putting hardly any effort into her schoolwork, managed to achieve the same grades as Alice had in most subjects. Alice, by contrast, had worked hard all through high school, and she sometimes privately thought it highly unfair that Cindy should be smarter, more athletic, prettier, funnier and more popular than she ever was. And yet Cindy wasted her talents by not applying herself as she should, and going to far more parties in a year than Alice had been to in her life.

Cindy, for her part, could be a bit of a brat in Alice’s company, but to most other people she was about the nicest person you could hope to meet. Always upbeat, she never had a bad word to say about anyone. The teachers loved her, despite occasionally giving her a hard time over her academic laziness, and she regularly graced the school magazine, demonstrating this activity or that. Keen on sports, she was captain of the girls’ soccer team, and seemed equally adept at tennis, squash, hockey and volleyball.

This past year, however, Cindy had to a certain extent turned over a new leaf. Finally getting the idea that her future might just be determined by the quality of her A-level results, she had dropped some of her sports, left the school choir (if truth be told she was not the greatest singer anyway), and she had really begun to apply herself to her A-level subjects. Unfortunately, she had left it rather late, and a strange feeling of unease was beginning to permeate her veneer of cheerfulness.

Fortunately, she had some very clever acquaintances who were only too happy to coach her. And the cleverest of these was Diana. “All right then babe,” she said. “Let’s talk physics. Explain Fleming’s left-hand and right-hand rules to me again – I can never remember the difference between the two.”

Diana carefully explained first the left-hand rule, then the right-hand rule. She was a patient teacher and, because she was keen on the subject, imparted a good deal of enthusiasm into her tutorial. Cindy smiled as it finally clicked for her. “I see!” she said. “Thank you! All right then, what’s next…?”

There was a knock on the door, and Alice entered. “Hi,” she said, a little glumly. “Hi Diana – nice to see you.”

“Peter gone?” inquired Cindy.

Alice nodded, and sighed. “I won’t get to see him again for three whole weeks.”

“You could always drive up and surprise him next weekend,” suggested Cindy with a smile. “Oh, but wait – that would require you to be spontaneous and impulsive.”

Alice glared at her. “If I did, whose car would you steal when you wanted to go shopping?”

Cindy grinned. “Mum’s.”

Alice rolled her eyes. “I’ll bet you would, too,” she said. “But I doubt you’d…” She broke off as the doorbell rang. “You expecting someone else?”

Cindy shook her head, and got to her feet. “I’ll see who it is.” She trotted downstairs and opened the front door. “Blair!” she said. “Come in babe – what’s up? You look a little upset…”

“Upset?” seethed Blair. “Upset? Yes, I jolly well am upset!” She threw her purse into a chair. “Bloody fucking Lenny!”

“Ah,” said Cindy. She put an arm around her friend. “Sit down, sweetie, and tell me everything.”

Blair slumped into a chair. “Well…” she began. Then she stood up again. “He stood me up!” She began pacing. “He wasn’t answering his phone, and he hasn’t returned any of my calls! I drove around to his place, and he wasn’t there!”

“I’m sure there’s a good explanation,” said Cindy reassuringly. “Perhaps his mother got ill, and he had to take her to the hospital, or something.”

“Or perhaps he crashed his Lotus!” said Blair suddenly. “Oh heck, I hadn’t thought of that. I do hope he hasn’t – that’s a lovely car.”

“Nice that you have your priorities straight,” chuckled Cindy.

Blair had the grace to blush. “Well I hope he’s all right too, of course,” she said. Then she added fiercely, “Unless he’s really stood me up – in which case I hope he’s in terrible pain!”

“Well babe, I suppose you’ll just have to wait until he calls,” said Cindy. “He’ll have to, sooner or later.”

“What if he doesn’t?” demanded Blair.

“Then go round to his house, and if he’s there, throw a brick through his window.”

Blair brightened. “Would you do it with me?”

Cindy laughed. “He’s not my boyfriend!” she said. “But okay, what the hell.”

“In the meantime,” said Blair, “I feel the need to let off some steam. Come out with me?”

“Oh,” said Cindy. “Hmm. I’ve actually got Diana upstairs…”

Blair wrinkled her nose, as if she had just smelled something bad. “Why?”

“Oh, homework, you know. She’s not a bad sort…”

“But she’s Diana!”

“Hush, babe – she’s really quite sweet…”

“Boring, you mean. Look, can’t you just ditch her and come out with me?”

“Well…”

“I’m emotionally fragile!” said Blair, aggrieved. “I need cheering up!”

“All right,” said Cindy. “I’ll go and talk to her. Just give me five minutes.”

Blair nodded, and flopped down into an armchair. Cindy headed back upstairs and went into her room, where Diana was playing with a Rubik’s cube.

“Ta daa!” said Diana, handed the completed cube to Cindy.

“Nice!” said Cindy, impressed. She put the cube down. “Blair’s here. Downstairs.”

Diana visibly stiffened. “Oh.”

“She’s pretty upset, and, well, she is my friend,” said Cindy. “She wants me to go out with her…”

“Oh,” said Diana, deflating a little. “Okay – I suppose I’ll go home then.”

Cindy bit her lip. “Hey, why not come with us?” she suggested, brightening. “Live a little – let your hair down. Come dancing with us.”

Diana shuddered. “Ooh no,” she said. “I’d feel very awkward and out of place. Besides, they wouldn’t let me in anyway – I’m only sixteen.”

“And I’m only seventeen,” said Cindy with a shrug, “but that doesn’t usually stop me.”

“Yes, but you’re you,” said Diana ruefully.

Cindy smiled. “What if I could persuade Blair to go somewhere else? Somewhere you could go too?”

Diana shook her head. “No, it’s really okay. I don’t think Blair likes me that much.” This was something of an understatement – Blair had been quite cruel to her in the past.

Cindy leaned down and gave Diana a hug. “Well I’m sorry to have brought you here for such a short time,” she said. “Thank you for your help – you’re a great teacher.”

Diana smiled. “Any time,” she said.

Cindy followed her downstairs. “See you in school on Monday,” she said.

Blair emerged from the living room and, ignoring Diana, pulled Cindy by the arm as she determinedly strode upstairs. “Let’s get you dressed for clubbing,” she said.

Cindy chuckled and waved over her shoulder at Diana, who smiled half-heartedly back, wishing she could somehow have Cindy to herself. Though, she hastened to add to herself, not in that way, of course. With a heavy sigh, she turned towards the front door, and opened it.

A large, dark grey, monstrous being was standing on the other side of the doorway. Six tiny yellow eyes peered at her from the centre of a hideous face, which contained several orifices whose purpose was not immediately apparent. Tentacles emerged from the being’s torso, and reached towards Diana…

She screamed and slammed the door, terrified. She turned and began to run up the stairs, only to discover that she had just filled her panties with poo, and it was still coming out of her anus. For a moment the thought crossed her mind that her life would be over if Blair and Cindy were to find out she had crapped in her panties. On the other hand, her life might be literally over if that hideous creature were to break in and catch her.

She stopped halfway up the stairs, and pinched off her poo. On the other hand, if she rushed into Cindy’s bedroom with a story about a huge hideous monster, and then she was unable to provide any evidence of said monster’s existence, she would be a laughing stock on two accounts instead of one. After all, who would believe a crazy story about a giant, grotesque creature with six yellow eyes, multiple mouths and tentacles? And now that she thought about it, it did seem rather crazy. Was it possible she had imagined it?

She turned, and took a step back down the stairs. The front door flew off its hinges, blasted inward, and the horrible creature stepped across the threshold. More poo burst out of Diana’s anus, and she trotted, wailing, up to the top of the stairs where she hammered on Cindy’s door.

Alice was the first to appear, however. “Was that you screaming?” she inquired.

Blair, looking annoyed, emerged from Cindy’s room, from which loud music was blaring. Cindy followed, currently wearing just a t-shirt and panties. She looked in concern at Diana. “What’s up babe?”

Blair sniffed. “Oh … my … God! Did you…?”

“There’s a monster downstairs!” Diana gibbered. “I’m serious! Call someone! Anyone! It just broke in through the door!”

Blair held her nose and waved her hand in disgust. “Go home, you freak,” she said. “Nobody’s interested in your delusions…” Then her eyes widened as she stared past Diana. “Oh shit!”

Diana turned to see the creature lurching up the stairs towards her. She screamed again, but all of her poo was now in her panties. She followed Blair and Cindy into Cindy’s room, and Alice followed behind, closing the door after her.

“What the hell is that thing?” screamed Blair.

“I have no idea!” yelled Cindy. “Alice, do something!”

Alice pulled out her mobile phone and quickly dialled 999. “Police!” she yelled.

The ceiling was abruptly ripped off from without. All four girls screamed in unison as a bright light shone down upon them. A long black tentacle descended, making straight for Alice. She screamed and tried to fight it off, but it managed to wrap itself around her, beneath her armpits. Cindy rushed to her sister’s aid, but as she struggled to unwind the tentacle, Alice was lifted off the floor. Screaming and kicking her feet, the hapless girl was pulled up towards the light.

“Let go, Cindy!” exclaimed Blair, frightened. Then she screamed as another tentacle came down, this one heading straight for her.

Diana tried to help Blair, but soon she was fighting a tentacle of her own. She tried to escape through the door, but as she pulled it open, it was pulled shut from the other side. Then she found herself being lifted up, and the floor receded from her. Looking around wildly and screaming, she saw Blair’s feet just next to her, and looked up to see a white thong between Blair’s flailing legs. A pink stiletto-heeled shoe detached from Blair’s left foot and fell away downwards.

The bright light was abruptly switched off, leaving them in comparative darkness. Diana blinked a few times, trying to adjust, and dimly saw the roof of Cindy’s house, about thirty feet below, with a perfectly circular hole in it. Then, with a low hum, huge black doors came together from either side, cutting off her view. Now it was pitch dark, but still she was being pulled upwards; her feet occasionally bumped against a vertical surface. Her frightened gasps, and Blair’s screams, echoed loudly as if they were in some kind of tunnel.

Then, abruptly, she was sliding horizontally. She tried again to uncoil the tentacle wrapped around her middle, but it was like trying to bend an iron bar. Light was coming from somewhere up ahead, and she could now see that she was indeed in a tunnel, though its walls were not metal or plastic, but soft and dark green, and rather slimy. Then she passed through the tunnel’s mouth into a large cylindrical chamber, about fifty feet wide. She was dropped unceremoniously, whereupon she landed in semi-liquid gloop. It was hot in here, and very humid – she began sweating at once. She got to her feet, and found the gloop was just knee-deep.

The others were standing nearby, wiping the dark green gloop from their clothing. “What … the hell … just happened to us?” shrieked Blair.

“It looks like we were abducted by aliens!” said Alice, looking around fearfully. “I’ve never believed in them before now, but can you think of another explanation?”

“Wow, aliens? You really think so?” said Cindy. “So this is a space-ship?”

Blair looked at her askance. “You think this is cool??” she demanded.

“Well, no – obviously we’re in quite a fix … but still, proof of alien life! That’s pretty major.”

“But they might dissect us!” exclaimed Blair.

This was a sobering thought for them all.

“We have to figure out how to escape,” said Alice. “Can we get out through the tunnel we came in by?”

Diana was closest, and checked it out. “It’s sealed up, and too high to reach,” she said. “But maybe one of us could stand on another’s shoulders, and maybe force it open?”

“Force it with what?” yelled Blair. “We don’t have any tools!”

Alice waded over to beneath the sealed mouth of the tunnel. “Cindy, see if you can climb on my shoulders,” she said.

“Ugh, there are worms in this muck!” wailed Blair. “Or maggots, or something! Ugh! They’re climbing my legs!” She slapped at her legs, brushing off little dark shapes. “Get us out of here, Alice!”

Diana looked down at her own legs, and sure enough saw little worm-like or slug-like creatures making their way up her jeans. They varied in size, with the largest being about two inches in length, and they slithered in a sinuous motion, like that of snakes. They were not hard to brush off, but more kept climbing out of the gloop all the time.

Alice, lifting her skirt, found plenty on her thighs, and she swept them off in disgust. Cindy, with nothing but panties on her bottom half, was also busy clearing her legs of the creatures. “Blair’s right, we have to get out of this muck,” she said. “These little buggers might have a poisonous bite, or they might be trying to get inside us, or anything.”

“Then get on my shoulders!” said Alice impatiently. She stood with her back to the wall, clasped her hands together, and squatted slightly. Cindy put one foot in Alice’s hands, then climbed nimbly up until she was standing on her sister’s shoulders. The circular opening of the tunnel had sealed up from all sides, sphincter-like.

“You know, I’m not sure this is a space-ship at all,” said Cindy. “I think we’re in the alien itself – we’re in its body.”

“Ugh, that’s gross!” exclaimed Blair.

“I’m not sure about that,” said Diana. “Living things aren’t so symmetrical. Look at the shape of this room – a perfect circle. And the lights above us – all the same distance apart. And why would a living creature need lights inside its body?”

“But the stuff it’s made of,” said Alice, “does look rather organic.”

“Maybe the aliens have used organic technology in their constructions?” suggested Diana.

“Who gives a fuck?” shouted Blair. “Can you open it, Cindy?”

Cindy shook her head. “It’s extremely strong – I can’t move it an inch.”

Diana looked around at the other entrances to this chamber. There were four, and all were similarly sealed. The walls of the chamber were all vertical, and about twenty feet high. There seemed to be no way to get out of the gloop. Somehow, the poo in her panties felt almost comforting. Sweating profusely, she took off her sweater, and discarded it in the gloop beside her. It stayed on the surface; she would be able to retrieve it later.

Cindy climbed down from Alice’s shoulders. “What’s that over there?” she asked. She waded across the chamber to where a silvery thread was glinting. “It’s water!”

The others came over to where Cindy was. Sure enough, a trickle of water was dribbling down the wall from some orifice near the ceiling. Alice gathered some in her hands and sniffed it. Then she tasted it experimentally. “You’re right, it’s water,” she said. “At least we won’t die of thirst, I suppose.”

“Great, so we’ll die of hunger?” said Blair, ridding her thighs of worms once again.

“Maybe the worm-things are edible,” suggested Diana.

“I’m not eating worms, you freak!” snapped Blair. “Don’t think I’ve forgotten you’re standing there with shit in your knickers. I’m scared too – we all are – but at least we didn’t shit ourselves.”

“Shut up, Blair,” said Alice. “Leave her alone. This isn’t her fault.”

A deep sound, like a groan almost, came from somewhere above them. “What was that?” Blair whispered.

“No idea,” said Alice. She sighed. “God it’s hot in here.”

Cindy nodded. Then her eyes widened. “Look!”

On the other side of the chamber, one of the tunnels had just opened up, and a tentacle was emerging from it. The girls watched fearfully as it approached them. Blair ducked behind Cindy. The tentacle, however, made straight for Diana, who squealed and tried to run away from it.

Alice rushed to her aid, but the tentacle was soon wrapped tightly around Diana’s waist. She screamed as she was dragged backwards through the gloop. Alice and Cindy tried to follow, but by the time she had reached the other side of the chamber, Diana had disappeared into the tunnel, and the tunnel had closed up.

“What do you think it’s going to do to her?” asked Blair, wide-eyed.

Cindy turned and glared at her.

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

After being dragged through a hundred yards or more of tunnel, Diana found herself being forced into what she could only describe as a kind of chair, but angled so that her back was flat and her legs were about forty-five degrees to the horizontal. Smaller tentacles grabbed her wrists, ankles, knees and elbows, and held her fast, so that despite her desperate struggles, she was unable to move her limbs more than an inch in any direction. Her head, however, was free, so she was able to look around and get a sense of her new surroundings.

This chamber was smaller than the last, and it was more brightly illuminated. Aside from the now familiar tunnel-sphincters, it had two larger, un-sphinctered exits, leading presumably into other rooms. The walls were a brownish green and glistening with slime. The floor was covered in gloop of an unknown depth, and wormy things wriggled in it. Occasionally something larger, like an eel or snake, surfaced briefly before diving back into the muck.

But the most interesting part of the room was behind Diana’s head. Only by craning her neck as far as possible could she get a good look at it, but it was worth the effort. Standing proud from the slimy wall was a large panel, which looked dry and was made of some kind of hard substance like plastic or metal. The panel bore several screens filled with diagrams and indecipherable symbols, some of which remained static while others changed periodically. A computer! she thought to herself.

Then she noticed something standing in the doorway to her right. It looked like the creature that had chased her up the stairs in Cindy’s house. She froze in terror, and watched helplessly as it approached her, walking on two legs that appeared to have no joints, bending instead in smooth curves. Diana started struggling violently, and the creature hissed softly. As it approached, it reached out with tentacles that emerged from its torso, and grasped her head firmly.

It took up a position behind her, and abruptly she felt a burning pain in her scalp. She screamed – it felt like the creature was cutting into her head. When she could scream no more, she burst into tears. The pain in her head subsided a little, but it still hurt a lot.

It felt like half an hour, but it may only have been five or ten minutes later when the burning pain stopped as suddenly as it had started. The creature moved around to stand by her side. To her astonishment, when a string of hissing sounds came out of its mouth, Diana found that she could understand them.

“Can you understand what I am saying?” hissed the monster.

“Yes!” cried Diana. “Let me go! Please!”

“Listen, and do not talk,” said the monster. “You and your friends will not be harmed. I am taking you all to a zoo on a planet many, many light-years away from your home world.”

“You can’t!” gasped Diana. “Take us back home … please!”

“First, however, I wish to enjoy you a little. It amuses me to violate intelligent beings such as your species. I like to subject them to the worst degradations that their minds can devise. I have done this to the premier species on many worlds, but not so far on yours. So tell me … what disgusts you? What can I do to you that will fill you with horror and shame?”

Diana listened to this with mounting fear. “No – please don’t do anything to me!”

“Tell me! What can I do to you that will make you feel sick inside?”

“I won’t tell you any such thing!” wailed Diana. “Why would you want to do such horrible things!”

“For pleasure, of course. Ah, it enlarges my slogumbaw that you are becoming so agitated. Clearly even the discussion of such topics is bringing about the desired effects. I must tell you that it does not matter if you choose to withhold this information from me – I can extract it from your brain with no effort at all.”

Diana thought quickly. “Well, we humans hate having our knees touched. It’s really horrible to us. Having our knees stroked is just sickening – I can’t bear it!”

“Interesting!” hissed the creature. It wrapped a tentacle around her head, pressing gently against her temples. “So, you attempt to deceive me! This is going to be a great deal of fun, I can tell already. Hmm, let me delve into your subconscious for one moment…”

Diana’s stomach knotted in fear as she tried desperately not to think of the worst things she could imagine happening to herself. Rabbits! She thought of rabbits, playfully hopping about on a grassy hillside … munching on grass and other little plants … chasing each other around … mounting … no, not that! The Titanic … hitting an iceberg … water slowly flooding in … people drowning … oh God no, this was a stupid idea. How about books … a dictionary … reading it from the beginning … ‘a’, the indefinite article … just how did one define that? Aardvark … an ant-eating mammal in Africa … a member of the order Tubulidentata, if she recalled correctly … an evolutionary offshoot…

“An amusing little place, your mind,” said the monster. “So, apparently you fear forced reproductive activity! I see that your species has two genders. I wonder, did I manage to sample both? No, apparently not. That is unfortunate.”

“Maybe you could take two of us back,” suggested Diana, “and pick up two others? Males?” If she could just save Cindy and Alice, that would be something.

“Altruism! Intriguing. You are indeed more complex than I had imagined you to be.”

“Yes, we’re very complex!” said Diana. “So don’t you see that it would be very wrong to abuse us?”

“Very wrong, yes,” said the monster. “But I like doing things that are very wrong. Now, take off your clothes so that I may abuse you.”

“You’re crazy!” said Diana. “I’m not going to help you!”

“Oh but you are,” said the monster. “You are going to help me abuse you … then you are going to help me abuse your friends.”

“No way!” exclaimed Diana.

“It seems that you need a lesson in obedience,” said the monster. “You will soon learn that I will have what I want from you, whether you cooperate or not, and it will be better for you if you cooperate.”

“Well I can’t take off my clothes with all these tentacles holding me down,” said Diana. She hoped that maybe if she could just get free of the tentacles, she could make a run for the next room and perhaps find a weapon of some kind.

“There are no weapons here,” hissed the monster. “And you will certainly not be able to escape. This vessel is populated by thousands of tentacles, all intelligent enough to stop you in your tracks immediately, should you succeed in doing something I have not sanctioned … such as running away.”

All but one of the tentacles released her. The remaining tentacle, wrapped around her elbow, effectively prevented her from fleeing. She sat up and turned towards the monster, swinging her legs over the side of the chair. “Well?” she said. “I’m still not going to take off my clothes for you.” She glanced to her right, at the computer panel, and realised that she could now understand some of the symbols.

“I see,” said the monster. “Then…”

But it got no further, because Diana chose that moment to kick it hard between the legs. Four tentacles immediately grabbed her ankles and knees, while the monster took a step back. “That was a poor choice of action,” it said.

Diana was pulled and pushed back into her original position on the chair, while tentacles got to work on her jeans. They slithered up inside the legs, then apparently produced cutting tools of some kind, for the denim began to split apart from her ankles all the way up to her waistband. The torn garment was then pulled off her and hoisted into the air, where it was shredded into tiny pieces.

The monster gargled. “Now you will be unable to cover your legs,” it said. “I know how you are embarrassed to show them. Well now you will have no choice.”

Diana was crestfallen, but this was hardly the worst thing that could have happened to her.

“Now,” said the monster. “Are you going to remove the rest of your clothes voluntarily, or should I have them all ripped to pieces?”

Diana’s lip trembled, and she burst into tears. “Why are you being so horrible? Just take me home – please take me home.”

“Ah, how I love to see the emotion of despair,” hissed the monster. “It manifests itself in so many different ways. The ulvargus of Bladropaar eventually undergo muscular lock, whereupon their gleunars can be squished without resistance. And believe me, they really hate having their gleunars squished.”

Diana forced herself to calm down. The monster was right – she had begun to despair – and it was such a stupid emotion. She had to think. Think!

“What planet are you from?” she asked suddenly. “I mean, what star system? Is your star visible from Earth? How far away is it?”

“Do not try to distract me,” said the monster. “Answer my question.”

“What question?” asked Diana, playing dumb.

“Are you going to take off your clothes?”

“No,” said Diana stubbornly. Then, as the tentacles gripped her t-shirt, she said, “Wait! All right – I’ll do it.”

She was released by all but one tentacle, which was around her waist. With a sigh, she took off her t-shirt, then her bra, then her shoes and socks. “Can I at least keep my panties on?” she asked.

“Of course not,” said the monster. “But what is that substance inside them? Is it food?”

“Yes,” said Diana. “Try it – it’s delicious.”

The monster put one of its tentacles around her forehead again. “Ah, excreta. This is something you enjoy doing in your panties, yet it is taboo in your society. Interesting! I seem to have found an example of deviant behaviour in your species. I wonder if your friends know that you do this?”

“They know,” said Diana, but her stomach knotted nervously.

“They do not know that you do it deliberately, even though on this occasion it was unplanned. Fascinating! Your excreta seems to be considered highly disgusting in your society. I shall enjoy extracting it from your friends and making them eat it. Or perhaps I will make them eat yours.”

“Ugh, no!” cried Diana, knowing they would blame her for this.

The monster gargled. “Ah, this is going to be unusually pleasurable! Now take off your panties.”

Reluctantly, Diana removed them. She was surprised at how much poo they contained. She dropped them over the edge of the chair, and they settled on the surface of the gloop.

“Now lie back – I am going to rape you,” said the monster.

A chill ran down Diana’s spine, despite the heat in the room. She pressed her left hand between her legs, covering her vagina, and then she squeezed her legs together. With her right hand she covered her breasts.

“Aaaah,” hissed the monster. “I can’t wait to see how you feel about this…”

Tentacles grabbed Diana’s wrists and elbows, pinning her arms to her sides. Her legs were pulled apart, and the monster extended one of its tentacles until its tip was snaking over Diana’s pussy. She clenched her eyes and held her breath as the tentacle began sliding into her virgin vagina, and she whimpered as she felt herself being stretched.

“This is wonderful!” sighed the monster, as it caressed her temples with another tentacle. “You are really loathing this experience. You wanted a kind and handsome human male to be the first being to penetrate you, and now a hideous, evil alien is violating your most intimate … this is beyond my greatest hopes!”

Diana sobbed uncontrollably as the monster thrust its tentacle in and out of her vagina, gargling ecstatically.

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

Alice, Blair and Cindy were getting very tired of fighting off worms by the time Diana was tossed, naked, back into their chamber. They crowded around her, helping her to her feet. “What happened?” asked Cindy in concern.

Diana burst into tears, and sobbed on Cindy’s shoulder for several minutes, while Cindy stroked her back and Alice kept worms from climbing too high up her legs. Eventually Diana made herself calm down enough to talk.

“It’s evil!” she sniffed. “It gets pleasure from our misery. It read my mind and found out that human women hate to be raped, so, of course, that’s what it did to me. In all kinds of horrible ways!” She dissolved into tears again.

“God!” exclaimed Alice, horror-struck.

“It’s going to do the same to you,” said Diana, between sobs, “and not just rapes. It will find whatever you think is most disgusting and awful, and it will do it. It … it put worms inside me!”

“You poor thing!” said Cindy.

“Did you see anything we can use against it?” asked Blair. “And is it alone?”

“Blair!” snapped Cindy. “Have some sympathy, will you?”

“Oh, I’m sympathetic and all,” said Blair, “but let’s not forget the same thing’s going to happen to us.”

Alice sighed. “Blair’s right. Diana, I know you’re still fresh from your ordeal, but try to think of something that could help us kill that bastard.”

“I tried k…kicking it between the legs,” sobbed Diana, “but it had no effect. I suh…suppose other body parts might be more vulnerable, but I don’t know.” She wiped her eyes, and took a few deep breaths, trying to calm herself down. “It read my mind by putting a tentacle around my forehead, and when the tentacle wasn’t there, it didn’t know what I was thinking.”

“Good, that’s useful,” said Alice, nodding.

“But it can read your subconscious,” added Diana, “so it’s no use trying to keep something from it, if it wants a particular piece of information.”

“What was the place like, where this happened?” asked Blair.

“It was a room – the floor was pretty much like this, but there was a computer panel on one wall,” said Diana. “Oh, it did brain surgery on me, or something – and afterwards, I could understand what it said. I could also understand the words on the computer displays.”

“Excellent,” said Alice. “Did the monster give you any clue as to its long-term plans for us?”

“Oh yes,” said Diana. “It’s taking us to a zoo on a distant planet.”

“I don’t fucking believe it!” exclaimed Blair, throwing up her hands. “We’re never going to get back home, are we?”

“Not with that attitude,” said Alice sternly. “Now, Diana, can you think of anything else that might help the next one of us that gets taken to this monster?”

Diana thought for a moment. “Try not to give it the satisfaction, I suppose,” she said. “The more distressed you are, the more it likes it, so try to blot out of your mind what’s happening. That’s what I eventually managed to do, which is pretty much when it got bored and threw me back in here. How long was I gone, by the way? It seemed like hours.”

Blair glanced at her watch. “It was. Three and a half hours.”

Diana’s face started to crumple again, but she managed not to cry. “Oh,” she said, “if it asks you to take off your clothes, just do it – it’ll rip them to pieces otherwise. It did that with my jeans. I don’t know whether I’ll ever get the rest of my clothes back, but at least if I do, they should still be intact.” Then she suddenly realised that she was standing naked in front of the others, and she covered as much of herself as possible with her arms.

Cindy put an arm around her. “Well I think you’ve been very brave,” she said. “Thank you for being so strong, and giving us useful advice instead of going to pieces, which I’m sure must have been tempting.”

Diana managed a small smile. “Thanks Cindy, that means a lot,” she said.

Then another tentacle came, and it grabbed Cindy.

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

Pinned down in the chair, Cindy’s heart hammered in her chest as the monster approached her. She managed not to scream as it performed the expected brain surgery upon her, though it hurt like hell. She was shocked, though not surprised, when she found she could now understand its sibilant language.

“You understand me?” it hissed.

“Yeah I understand you, six eyes,” said Cindy. “My God, you’re ugly! I’m surprised your mother didn’t drown you at birth. Or maybe she was as ugly as you. Perhaps you’re just an extremely ugly species. Maybe that’s why you like taking out your frustrations on other species. Is that it? You’re just terribly insecure about your appearance?”

“Be silent!” said the monster. “Why are you not afraid, like the other?” It wrapped a tentacle around her forehead. “Interesting! You are indeed afraid, but covering it up with false bravado. It will avail you not at all.”

Cindy snorted. “Then I don’t think you’re all that good at reading minds, turd-face. I don’t give a crap what you do to me. You think I’m going to get all weepy just because you rape me? Think again, shit-for-brains. Bring it on! I’m sure it’ll be unpleasant, but you’ll find you’ve underestimated the ability of humans to switch off their emotions. You caught Diana by surprise, but she eventually worked it out, and she taught the rest of us. So I’m sorry, but your fun has all been had, you armless freak.”

“Be silent!” the monster hissed, slamming one of its tentacles down on Cindy’s bare thighs.

She winced – this had hurt a lot. “Oh, so you’re going to beat up your zoo specimens now, are you?” she said. “Will they pay you for damaged goods? Good grief, it’s easy to rattle you, isn’t it? This is going to be fun, I can tell. Did I mention I get a big kick out of pissing off stupid aliens?”

The monster gargled. “My intelligence is vastly superior to yours,” it said.

“Not from where I’m standing,” said Cindy. “Or lying, rather. Oh sure, you have the more advanced technology, and you’re in the position of power, but that says nothing of your intelligence, which as far as I can see is rather limited.”

The monster said nothing, but massaged her temples with a tentacle. “Your thoughts do not accord with your speech,” it said. “I will be most intrigued to discover whether you feel as sickened inside by being raped as Diana.”

“Prepare to be disappointed,” said Cindy. “Well, are you going to release me so I can take off my clothes, or what?”

All but one of the tentacles released her, and she stripped naked while humming a cheery little tune. As she lay back, she said, “Give it to me, big boy.”

The monster, it turned out, was disappointed by her reaction, and after only ten minutes it dumped her back in with the others. She grinned at them. “That’s the secret!” she said, as she hugged her sister. “Just blot it out – don’t give it the satisfaction of seeing you be miserable.” She laughed. “It was very disappointed in me.”

Blair was impressed. “Nice going!” she said. “I figured you’d hold up better than that wimp.” She indicated Diana, who was slouched against the far wall, crying.

“Hey!” said Cindy, annoyed. “It was thanks to Diana that I was able to do what I did.”

“What did it do to you, exactly?” asked Alice.

Cindy shrugged. “Raped my vagina, my bottom, my mouth … made me eat Diana’s poo…”

“Ugh!” exclaimed Blair, aghast. “How could you stand that?”

“I told you – I just blotted it out.”

“Oh my God, I hope it doesn’t do that to me!” said Blair. “I couldn’t take it!”

“Try!” said Cindy grimly.

But it was Alice who was grabbed next.

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

As she took off her clothes, as slowly as possible, Alice tried to read the displays on the panel to her right. Where there had been incomprehensible symbols before, now there were English words and numbers. She saw a heading of “Hull Temperature”, with a table of numbers beneath. Next to it was “Shield Status”, with a diagram of what she imagined was probably the ship. It looked like a misshapen potato in outline. She wondered how big it was.

“Hurry up – or I’ll rip the rest off myself,” said the monster.

Alice lay back, naked, and tried to think of nothing as the monster raped her vagina and anus. It was not easy. Then the creature read her mind again. “Ah, so you’re deathly afraid of being operating on whilst awake? Well, that sounds like something I can arrange.”

Fear gripped Alice, though she tried not to show it. The monster gargled, and left the room. When it returned, two minutes later, a thick, pen-like instrument was fixed to the end of one of its tentacles. It placed against her sternum the tip of this object, which began to glow bright orange. As it travelled down the middle of her belly towards her pubic bone, it left behind a widening bloodless gap in her flesh. Two other tentacles pulled her belly wide open, and Alice screamed at the sight of her internal organs, including her intestines which welled up and spilled out of the gap.

The monster gargled. “Ooh, yes, you really hate this, don’t you? This is even better than rape! Look at your guts, Alice!” It scooped up a great shapeless mass of her bowels and clumsily juggled them. “Oops!” it said, dropping a long loop of small intestine over the edge of the chair. It gargled again.

Alice screamed and screamed. Then, mercifully, she passed out.

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

When she awoke, her first thought was, ‘What a horrible nightmare!’ Then she opened her eyes, and saw six tiny yellow eyes looking down at her.

“You are awake!” said the monster. “Good!”

Alice looked down at her belly in a panic. She was intensely relieved to see that it was whole, with no sign of having been cut open.

“Yes, I put everything back,” the monster said. “But my tentacles were filthy, being covered in all kinds of bacteria-ridden substances, including Diana’s excreta, some of which I put inside you. You’re sure to die of nasty infections.” It gargled as Alice’s sense of panic increased. “Now watch this!”

It grasped one of Alice’s nipples with the tip of one, very slim tentacle, and lifted it up so that her breast stood up in a tall cone. Then, with the pen-like instrument, it sliced through the base of her breast, cutting it completely off her chest. Alice screamed again. Then another tentacle forced its way into her vagina, and yet another buried itself in her anus, and both began thrusting.

“No, no, stop, please!!” screamed Alice, her ability to blot out her abuse now shattered. She thrashed wildly in her bonds as her other breast was surgically removed. Then she passed out again.

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

“Back again?” said the monster. “Well, I just wanted you to know that I’ve had a lot of fun with you, and I can’t wait to do it again. But for now, you might as well go back and rejoin your friends.”

Alice looked down at her chest, and was relieved to see that both breasts were perfectly intact, having been reattached with no sign of a join. Then she was dragged from the chair and pulled into a tunnel mouth on the far wall. Moments later, she was falling into the gloop next to Cindy.

“You’re back!” cried Cindy, hugging her. “Whatever happened to you? You were gone for five hours!”

Alice burst into tears. “It cut off my breasts!” she sobbed, “and pulled my guts out of my belly! And it said it put Diana’s poo inside me before it sealed me up!”

Cindy’s blood ran cold. “Hush,” she said, “your breasts look okay to me. It’s over now.”

“Is it?” wailed Alice. “I’m likely to die of an infection!”

Diana was wading over. “Why would you die of an infection?” she asked.

“Because it put your poo inside her!” said Cindy angrily.

“Inside her … vagina?” asked Diana. “I don’t think that would cause…”

“No, you idiot!” said Blair, sounding hysterical. “Inside her body, with her internal organs! The monster opened her up!”

Diana’s face turned ashen. “Oh God … oh Alice, I’m so sorry…”

“You should be!” said Blair. “If you hadn’t crapped yourself, it wouldn’t have had the idea!”

“It’s not her fault,” muttered Cindy.

“But I don’t get it,” said Diana. “Why would it do something that would kill her? I thought it wanted us all for a zoo?”

Cindy shrugged. “It likes to make us suffer.”

“Mentally, yes – but it didn’t do any lasting damage to you or me.”

“I’m really not interested in the whys and wherefores,” said Cindy sharply. “Obviously it didn’t show Alice the same consideration.”

Alice looked up. “It did heal me though. And I mean perfectly – not a mark to show where it had cut me.”

Cindy’s brow furrowed as she looked down at her sister’s breasts. “And you saw it put Diana’s poo inside you?”

“No – I told you, it told me it did that,” said Alice miserably. “I didn’t see it happen – I was unconscious.”

Diana let out a deep breath. “Then I think we can probably assume it was lying,” she said.

Alice looked up hopefully. “You think so?”

Cindy nodded. “I think she’s right. It’s feeding off our emotional distress – it doesn’t seem to want to cause us any permanent damage. It probably told you that to make you more upset.”

Alice shuddered. “Well it worked.”

Cindy hugged her. Then she looked up at Blair. “Looks like it’s your turn,” she said. “Remember: just blot it all out. Don’t let it upset you.”

“How can I not?” demanded Blair, taking off her clothes. “I’ll do my best, but fuck! How can I blot out my belly being cut open? Or being forced to eat Diana’s shit?”

“Hey, clever move,” said Cindy, indicating Blair’s fallen clothing.

“Thanks,” said Blair shortly.

Ten minutes later, she was snatched by a tentacle.

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

Blair screamed at the brain surgery, screamed at the vaginal rape, screamed at the anal rape, screamed even more loudly at having her breasts cut off, threw up when forced to eat Diana’s poo, and finally passed out when her belly was opened up and her guts pulled out. It was all much, much worse than she had imagined. When she woke up, the monster told her that it had been so much fun that he was going to do it all over again. And he did. By the time she was finally thrown back in with the others, she was practically catatonic.

“We have to kill this thing!” whispered Cindy urgently to her sister. “This is going to drive Blair insane, if she isn’t already.”

“But how?” asked Alice. “I agree with you, but how can we do it?”

“Well, it’s Diana’s turn again, right? What if we grab hold of her, so that we get pulled with her up the tunnel? Maybe we can overpower the monster, if there are three of us.”

“Cindy, just one of those tentacles is enough to overpower one of us,” said Alice. “It’ll just take three to hold down three of us, and there are far more than three tentacles in that room.”

“I know,” fretted Cindy. “But there has to be a way!”

“What are our assets?” asked Alice.

“Assets? I don’t know – Diana’s brain, I suppose.”

“Her brain, your athleticism,” said Alice. “Blair’s clothes.”

“How will Blair’s clothes help?” inquired Cindy.

“I don’t know. But maybe Diana can think of something.”

They called her over. “I’m hungry!” she complained.

“We all are,” said Alice. “But we need you to think. Before we’re all driven insane by this monster, we need to come up with a plan to kill it. Our current assets are your brain, Cindy’s athleticism, and Blair’s clothes. Tell us what we can do with those things.”

Diana thought, and thought. “Not much,” she admitted. “Unless we can somehow fashion a rope out of Blair’s clothes, and strangle the bugger before the tentacles can stop us.”

All three of them considered this for a moment.

“Worth a try,” said Alice. “It’s a big bastard, but its neck is no thicker than a man’s. Cindy, you’re probably the strongest of us … do you think it will be possible for you to strangle it?”

“I doubt it,” said Cindy, “but I’ll give it a go.”

They had dressed Blair upon her re-entry; now they had to take off her pink halter top. She did not resist at all as Alice untied the back, unwrapped each side, and pulled it over her head. She opened it out and nodded. “This’ll do. Don’t hold the strings when you do it, because they’ll just rip off.”

Cindy nodded. “All right,” she said.

“I have another idea,” said Diana. “Blair still has one stiletto heel, right…?”

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

Diana was captured, raped, mutilated, put back together in one piece, and returned to what the girls were now calling the ‘prison cell’. Then it was Cindy’s turn. She readied herself, wearing Blair’s top (tied only loosely at the back), and prepared to be captured again.

The tentacle returned … and grabbed Alice. “No!” she shrieked.

“Here Alice!” cried Cindy, whipping off the top and giving it to her sister, along with Blair’s shoe. As Alice was pulled into the tunnel, she struggled desperately to put the top on.

When the monster came out to abuse Alice, it found her lying naked but for the halter top. It gargled. “You were naked when you left here,” it said, “but Blair was naked when she came in. This is her clothing?”

“Yes – she lent it to me,” Alice replied, her voice trembling slightly. “I wasn’t expecting to be next, or I would have taken it off before being grabbed.”

“Ah yes – Cindy was not much sport, so I went straight on to you,” said the monster. “Take it off.”

“Okay,” said Alice, feigning reluctance. The tentacles released her, and she sat up. Slowly taking off the halter top, she noted with a sinking feeling the distance between her and the monster. It was too far away – she would never make it.

She gasped, and fell back on to the chair, her arms and legs twitching violently. Her eyes stared straight up at the ceiling, and she made gargling, choking sounds.

“What is this?” hissed the monster. “What is the matter with you?”

Alice made no reply, but continued to jerk spasmodically.

“Are you ill?” demanded the monster. It approached her, and its tentacle reached out for her head.

Alice lunged at it, looping the halter top over the creature’s head. As soon as it was behind the monster’s neck, she crossed her arms and pulled them apart with as much force as she could muster. This was not as much as she would have liked – she could not pull as hard with her arms crossed as with them uncrossed, but she did not dare let go in order to switch her hands over.

Tentacles grabbed her immediately, and pulled her with great force away from the hissing alien. She did not let go, however, and so the monster came with her, falling over the chair and inadvertently adding an extra loop of material around its neck. As the tentacles holding Alice continued to pull her backwards, the noose rapidly tightened … and still Alice did not let go.

The monster lashed back at her with a tentacle that, to her horror, was tipped with the pen-like operating instrument. She knew this could easily slice her head clean off, and fear welled up inside her … but if anything her resolve strengthened and she pulled even harder.

All the tentacles suddenly went limp – even the ones that did not belong to the monster – and it fell to the floor. Alice, fearing a trick, took the opportunity to brace her feet against the monster’s back and pull for all she was worth. She strained and strained, keeping the pressure up as long as she had the strength to do so. Two minutes passed, then three. Finally she could keep it up no longer, and she let go.

She was not yet done, however. She turned the creature over on to its back, then she retrieved Blair’s shoe from where she had dropped it upon entering the room. Placing the stiletto heel against one of the monster’s eyes, she stamped on it with all her strength. The creature’s head sank into the gloop, until it hit solid floor, whereupon the heel sank into the creature’s head. She repeated the process, this time on the side of its head. Again the heel sank deep. Finally, for good measure, she jumped up and down on the monster’s head for five minutes until it no longer retained its original shape, and purple fluid poured from its eyes. Gloop oozed in from all sides until it covered that hideous face.

Exhausted, she collapsed in a heap next to the monster’s body. For ten minutes she sat there, getting her breath back, and then she got up and turned her attention to the tunnel mouth through which she had come. There seemed to be no means of opening it – for all she knew, the monster had controlled it telepathically. Therefore, it would have to be opened by brute force. She needed a sharp implement.

Walking through into the next room, she found a number of bizarre objects, but most of them were soft and squishy. Their purpose was unclear, but none of them was remotely sharp. She tried another room, and this time she was luckier. A metal pole, fifteen feet in length, was sitting in a long, shallow depression by one wall. It was an inch thick, but tapered to a very sharp point at one end. Not a great cutting tool, but if she needed to make a hole, this would certainly do the job.

Then she slapped her forehead. “The pen thing!” she exclaimed. She hurried back through to where the monster lay dead, and found its operating instrument still attached to the end of one of its tentacles. She gave it a tug, and it came free without difficulty. It had a hole in the non-lethal end – apparently the monster had used it like some kind of finger-puppet. But how was she to make it cut? She tried putting her finger in, but the hole was too deep and her finger too short. Also, she had no idea how to switch it on. Sighing with frustration, she threw it down and went off to continue her search.

Three rooms later, she found a dimly-lit chamber in which the floor descended until the gloop was about four feet deep. Alice struggled through it, not wanting to think about the wormy creatures that might even now be slithering into her vagina. On the far side of the room she had spotted a cabinet of some sort, and she was determined to take a look inside it. As she approached it, the floor rose up, and was only at crotch depth when she finally stopped in front of it. She could feel a wriggling sensation inside her vagina, and she shuddered.

The top of the cabinet was easy to flip open, but unfortunately it was empty. She gave up on it in disgust, and waded back across the room. Once in gloop of only knee-depth, she reached two fingers into her vagina and started pulling out worms, of which several dozen had apparently entered her. She felt no pain, though – it did not seem as if they were harming her. Still, it was thoroughly disgusting.

The next room she tried was full of what she assumed were ornaments of some kind. Some of them were vaguely animal-like in appearance, with identifiable eyes and legs even if some of the other body parts defied description. One creature, if creature it was, had what appeared to be ears, though they were halfway along its back. Possibly they were fins. Either way, they were made of metal, and their edges were sharper than anything else she had seen. She tried to snap one off. She failed. She grabbed one of the smaller ornaments, which was nevertheless fairly heavy, and smashed it against one of the ‘fins’.

The fin broke off and fell into the gloop. Alice retrieved it, and was delighted to see that the broken edge was jagged and sharp. Excitedly, she rushed back to the room she and the others had come to refer to as the ‘torture room’. Attacking the tunnel-sphincter with her new weapon, she succeeded in scoring it, then gashing it, then ripping a hole right through it. At this point the sphincter relaxed and opened up wide. Alice climbed in and hurriedly crawled down the tunnel. When she reached a fork, she stopped uncertainly. Which way was it?

She took the right fork – she was pretty sure she remembered being dragged this way. Soon she reached the end, and another sphincter. She started hacking at it, and, sure enough, this one too opened up. She stuck her head through, and was thrilled to see the other girls looking up at her with widening eyes.

“I did it!” she exclaimed. “I killed the bastard!”

“No way!” cried Cindy, overjoyed. “Alice, well done, well done!”

“Well done!” echoed Diana, her huge breasts bouncing up and down in her excitement.

“Blair, the monster’s dead!” said Cindy. “Come on babe, get up out of that muck – you don’t know what might be crawling inside you.”

Blair listlessly got to her feet. She looked up at Alice. “It’s dead?”

Alice nodded enthusiastically. “Yes, Blair, it’s dead.”

“Good,” said Blair.

Cindy clasped her hands together for Diana. “Climb up babe,” she said. “Alice, pull her up when she’s high enough.”

“I’ll try,” said Alice. “My arms haven’t much strength left, but I’ll try.”

And she tried. Fortunately, it seemed that the artificial gravity in this ship was rather less powerful than gravity on Earth, otherwise she would never have managed to haul Diana up into the tunnel. As it was, it was quite an effort, but soon Diana was lying next to her, and both of them were holding their arms down for Cindy and Blair to grab.

Blair, who was recovering quickly now that she knew she was not going to be taken away and carved up again, climbed on to Cindy’s shoulders. She was rather lighter than Diana, and was soon pulled up into the tunnel. Getting Cindy out was a bit more problematic. With nobody to climb on to, she could not reach her sister’s outstretched hands even when she jumped.

“Diana, hold my legs,” said Alice. “Blair, get behind Diana and hold on to her.” Then she slid forward until her hips were at the tunnel’s mouth, and her upper half was pointing down towards her sister.

Cindy jumped again, and this time caught both of Alice’s hands. “Pull, Diana!” gasped Alice.

Blair pulled, and Diana pulled, and Alice pulled, flexing her arms so that they provided a step for Cindy, who clambered up using the small amount of friction provided by the soft walls of the prison cell. Finally all four girls were in the tunnel. They crawled along it until they came out in the torture room.

“Wow, you really killed it!” said Cindy, staring at the monster’s corpse.

“Yes, I did,” said Alice proudly. Then she sighed. “But we’re still in big trouble. We have no food, and no idea of how to pilot this ship, and no idea how to find Earth again even if we can control the ship.”

“I’ll work on studying those computer panels,” said Diana. “Maybe I can find some controls.”

“Yes, well, I hope you can find some controls that aren’t operated by tentacles. I tried using that device it cut us open with, but my fingers aren’t long enough.”

“I’ll see what I can do,” said Diana.

“Cindy, perhaps you could go on a quest for food. I hate the thought of eating those worm things, but we’ll do it if we have to. We’ll need as balanced a diet as possible if we’re to survive, so let’s try everything that looks edible. Some things might be poisonous, of course, but we’ll have to rely on taste tests.”

“Aye-aye, cap’n,” said Cindy with a grin, and Diana laughed. Even Blair smiled a little. The mood was generally upbeat, despite their desperate predicament – they had slain the beast, and that was cause for celebration.

“Is this my top?” asked Blair, tugging on a piece of pink fabric emerging from the gloop. Of the four of them, she was the only one currently wearing clothes – she had her skirt and panties on, having left a shoe back in the prison cell.

“No Blair!” said Alice urgently, but it was too late – Blair had pulled the monster’s head up out of the muck.

She screamed and fell backwards. Alice unwrapped the top from around the monster’s neck, and pulled Blair’s stiletto-heeled shoe out of its head. “You’re welcome to wear them if you like,” she said, “though they’ve been put to a rather grisly purpose.” She tossed them to Blair, who flinched, though they both fell short. After regarding them with suspicion for a minute, Blair picked up the top and put it on.

“I suppose the rest of our clothes must be around here somewhere?” said Cindy.

“I imagine so,” said Alice. “I’ll take a look. Blair, do you feel up to finding a water source for us?”

Blair finished tying up her top. She was still barefoot, but was otherwise fully dressed. She nodded. “I’m not going to run into any other monsters, am I?” she asked.

“I don’t think so,” replied Alice. “I went in a lot of rooms, and didn’t see a sign of any others. I think this is a spaceship for one, despite its large size.”

“Hell of a weird spaceship,” muttered Blair. “Full of mud and worms and fucking slimy walls.”

“I’m guessing it came from a swampy planet,” said Alice.

“Whatever,” said Blair. “I’ll see you later.”

After some searching, Alice found a pile of clothes stashed in a round, squishy dome that she had at first assumed was some kind of seat for the monster. But when she stuck her fingers into a hole in the side of the dome, the top opened up, and there were all their clothes. She put on her skirt, panties, bra, t-shirt, socks and shoes, after which she felt a lot more civilised. She gathered up the rest of the clothes and carried them through to the torture room.

“Hey, Diana,” she said, “your clothes.”

“Oh thank God!” cried Diana. She took her bra, panties and t-shirt from Alice, and put them on, feeling a slight pang of regret that there was hardly any poo left in the panties. And what was left was getting rather dry and crusty.

“Hmm – didn’t you have a jumper?” asked Alice.

“Oh bother – I took it off back in the prison cell,” said Diana. “Never mind – it’s way too hot in here to wear that thing anyway.”

“Maybe you could make a skirt out of it, though,” said Alice. “Since your jeans got torn up. I didn’t find any of the bits, incidentally.”

Diana thought about this. “It would be nice to have something on my bottom half,” she admitted. “But I don’t want to go back in the prison cell if I can help it. Unless we can find a ladder or something.”

“We’ll work on that,” said Alice. “Meanwhile I’ll go and find Cindy.”

She continued through to the next room, and to the one after that, and then she followed a wide tunnel until it forked. “Cindy?” she called.

“Here!” came a reply.

Alice followed the voice, and entered a room in which her sister was staring at a row of screens. “I brought you your clothes,” she said. “Oh, what on Earth?”

“It seems our prison cell is not the only one,” said Cindy, taking her clothing. She pulled on her panties, bra and t-shirt.

Alice looked nervously at the three occupied cells. “What do you think we should do,” she asked.

“Free them,” said Cindy. “They’re prisoners, like we were. Who knows what awful things the monster did to them?”

“I knew you’d say that,” said Alice, “but what if these aliens are evil too?”

“They might be,” admitted Cindy. “But what else can we do? Leave them to starve to death?”

Alice sighed. “I suppose not. But I doubt we’ll get Blair to agree to set them free.”

“Blair might not, but Diana will. Three against one.”

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

Sure enough, Blair was dead against the idea, but Diana sided with the sisters. With great trepidation, therefore, Alice and Cindy crawled into the tunnel entrance in the torture room, and made their way along to the fork. This time, they took a left, and before long were facing another sphincter. Alice glanced worriedly at Cindy, then she began to hack at the rubbery flesh. A moment later, it opened up.

The occupants of this cell were Alice’s least favourite of the three species she had seen on the screens. With spiny head-bodies and eight spindly legs, each of these creatures looked like a huge cross between a porcupine and a spider. Eyes on stalks swivelled around to face the girls.

“Hi!” said Alice, in an attempt at brightness. “Um, can you guys understand me?”

“What on Vlothlil are those things?” clacked one of the creatures.

“Other zoo specimens, perhaps,” suggested another.

“Yes!” said Cindy. “But we escaped, and killed our captor!”

“Are those sounds they are making some kind of language, do you think?”

“Can’t you understand us?” asked Alice desperately.

“If they were captured after us, it is possible that we have not been programmed with their language. But they will probably have been programmed with ours, if so. Creatures! If you understand what I am saying, wave an appendage.”

Cindy and Alice both waved their arms frantically.

“You see? They can understand us. Now for some questions. Since they are free, I am guessing that something happened to the Hojabess. Tell me, creatures – the vile thing that captured you … is it dead? Wave your arms if so.”

Both girls waved their arms excitedly.

“Well this is good news indeed! Did you somehow kill it?”

They waved their arms again, and Cindy pointed to Alice.

“If you could help us get out of here, then we will be able to program ourselves with your language,” clacked the creature that had been speaking to them. “We cannot climb these slippery walls, however. If you could return with something we could use as a ramp, or ladder, we would be most grateful.”

“See!” said Alice, as they hurried back along the tunnel. “I told you this would be a good idea.”

After a two-hour search, they had found nothing remotely resembling a ladder, but they did discover quite a lot of long poles like the one that Alice had found earlier. They shoved six of these down the tunnel, and the “porcupiders”, as Diana had christened them, managed to build a ramp out of them by digging the pointed ends into the soft floor beneath the gloop, and propping the other ends up against the wall.

One by one, the porcupiders emerged into the torture room, where the girls assembled nervously to meet them. The smallest of them was apparently the leader. It said, “We owe you much for delivering us from our captivity. Now wait a moment.”

It sidled over to the computer panel, and, to the girls’ surprise and alarm, wrenched off the hard casing. Beneath was a bewildering array of tiny metal objects arranged in complex patterns. Diana fretted as she watched the porcupider pull some of these objects off the wall, and press them one after another against what, for want of a better word, she thought of as its chin.

“This is it,” it announced after a few minutes. It passed the object around to the other porcupiders. Then it turned to Alice. “Speak,” it said.

“Um,” said Alice nervously. “About what?”

“That will do. Excellent – now we can understand you. Tell us – what is your plan? Will you take us back to our world?”

“We would if we could,” said Alice. “But the fact is, we have no idea how to pilot this thing, or navigate for that matter.”

“Our species has not yet explored beyond its solar system,” added Diana.

The porcupiders clacked their mouthparts in consternation. “Then how will you return to your own planet?”

“I have no idea,” said Alice. “Excuse me … but do you have names?”

“Ah yes. We are Kletellakee, from the Taknarak worlds. I am Lettar. My friends are Ketnak, Yokknat, Skettaret and Trelten.”

“Pleased to meet you,” said Alice. “I am Alice; these are my friends Diana and Blair, and this is my sister Cindy.”

“Alice, I propose that we pilot this ship to our world. You will be welcomed there as friends of the Kletellakee, and you may live among us in peace.”

“But…” began Cindy, but Alice cut her off.

“Thank you – that is very generous,” she said. “But we really would like to go back to our own world.”

“I have no doubt of that. But how will you do that, if you do not know how to find it?”

Diana cleared her throat. “I know some of the constellations visible from our world. That should help, shouldn’t it?”

“It might, if we are close enough for you to still recognise any of them. But I think you will find we have bobbed a wormhole since you were picked up. We might be anywhere in the galaxy – and almost certainly thousands of light-years from your planet. The stars visible from here are unlikely to be recognisable. But I will be happy to attempt to locate your star, if you can tell me enough about it and its surroundings.”

“Thank you!” said Diana.

“In the meantime, we have other prisoners to free,” said Alice. “There are two other species being held here.”

“I would like to see them before we undertake a potentially rash course of action,” said Lettar.

“Of course,” said Alice. “I was rather hoping you might be able to tell us something about them.” She led him to the screens showing the various prison cells. Cindy and Diana followed.

“The Folloboloi are peace-loving and harmless,” said Lettar. “We should by all means let them out immediately. I do not like to think of what the Hojabess did to them.”

“And the other ones?” inquired Cindy.

“I do not know,” said Lettar. “I am not familiar with their species. There are more than fourteen thousand intelligent races in this galaxy, and more than twice that in the Cavettal galaxy, and many others in the Harralen and Lorrok galaxies…”

“We don’t know those names,” said Diana. “What do you call the large spiral galaxy 2.2 million light years away from this one? We know it as the Andromeda galaxy, but I’m sure you have another name…”

“That is Cavettal,” said Lettar. “It is unlikely that the Hojabess ranged that far in his quest for zoo exhibits, but it is possible.”

“Well, I think we’ll just have to take the chance that they’re friendly,” said Alice. “Surely they’ll be grateful to us for freeing them.”

“Let us hope so,” said Lettar.

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

They let the Folloboloi out first – the species that the humans had christened ‘balloon-heads’ – and they turned out to be utterly charming and friendly. Even Blair was won over by them, and found herself relating her entire life story to a young Follob, which listened in rapt attention, and laughed and sympathised in all the right places. Diana learned that they were expert readers of emotions, even in other species. Their home planet was in a star system in what Diana deduced, with Lettar’s help, was the Large Magellanic Cloud (a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way).

The third species, which the girls called ‘snot frogs’, introduced themselves as Pawgadils and claimed to come from a planet called Gamp, about twenty thousand light years from the galactic centre. They were not very forthcoming about their history or culture, and Diana soon stopped trying to ask them questions, though she was fascinated by all three alien species and wanted to know everything.

For the next few hours, two of the Kletellakee worked with Diana on converting the space-ship’s controls to a push-button and voice-recognition system that could be operated by humans and Kletellakee alike, although they admonished Diana not to touch anything until she was very sure of what she was doing. She watched avidly, and learned quickly.

Alice and Cindy accompanied Lettar on a tour of the ship, and soon found a dispenser that could produce a huge variety of food products, made out of raw materials from huge reserves in the ship’s hold. Lettar experimented with the machine’s program, and soon had it producing something which he said was not unlike ‘thettalil back home’. Producing food for the humans was trickier, but after a couple of hours he had managed to synthesize something vaguely vegetable-like, though it was a rather off-putting shade of turquoise. Next he managed to create a slab of a substance remarkably similar in taste and texture to a boiled potato, and after that he got the machine to generate a protein-based product that tasted a little like chicken. He promised to continue working on it, but he was anxious to make something for the Folloboloi, who, despite never voicing a word of complaint, were close to starvation.

Blair had not been idle during this time. She had scoured the ship looking for a decent place to sleep, and although she failed to find any rooms that were not at least a foot deep in gloop, she did find some rolls of a soft, foamy material that, when spread out on top of the gloop, floated easily even with her lying on top. Since the air was so hot and humid, the lack of any kind of blankets was not going to be a big problem. Unfortunately there was not very much of the foamy material, or she would have attempted to carpet an entire room with the stuff, but there was at least enough for four beds, and the foam was certainly comfortable enough to sleep on.

The computer was able to generate a holographic map of the entire galaxy, with every star in it represented by a tiny white dot, but trying to find the Earth’s sun was like looking for a needle in a haystack-sized pile of needles.

“It’s got nine … or rather eight planets,” she said. The outer four are gas giants, and the rest are small and rocky.”

“This map does not contain the planetary details of every star,” said Trelten. “What about your stellar neighbours? Do you know the distances from your star to any of the globular clusters?”

“No,” confessed Diana. “But I know that our nearest star is actually three stars, orbiting each other. I think it’s about four light-years away.”

“And what is the colour and size of your sun?” asked Trelten.

“It’s yellow,” said Diana. “And I don’t know how big it is, but I do know that it’s not big enough to explode in a supernova.”

Trelten was pleased with this information, and pressed her for more, but Diana was not very familiar with the subject of astronomy and could not provide him with anything else useful. Nevertheless, Trelten managed to narrow down the field quite a bit.

“There are eight thousand, four hundred and twenty-seven single yellow stars residing approximately four light-years away from triple stars,” he reported. He programmed the display so that the stars in question glowed bright yellow.

“Wow,” said Diana, rather discouraged. “That’s an awful lot.”

“Considering the number of stars in this galaxy,” said Trelten, “that’s really a very small number.”

“Yes, but it’ll take us forever to visit them all!”

“If I understand your time divisions correctly, I believe it should take no more than twelve of your planet’s sidereal periods,” said Trelten. “As long as you are not interrupted.”

“Twelve years!” sighed Diana. “Interrupted how?”

“You will need to refuel regularly,” said Trelten, “and re-stock your food and water. I am concerned that you may encounter difficulties when dealing with unscrupulous species – of which there are many. But you will learn, with experience.”

Diana groaned. “I don’t suppose I can talk you into remaining with us for however long it takes?”

“My friends and I must return home, or we will soon die in this frigid environment.”

“Frigid!” echoed Diana. “It’s boiling in here!”

“Ah – you are accustomed to a colder world, I see. This temperature is like that of our polar oceans, wherein grow hardy life-forms. The equator of our planet is exquisitely dry and wonderfully warm, and that is where most of us prefer to live.”

“Well I suppose we’d better get you home first,” said Diana.

“No – we should take the Folloboloi back to their world first of all. They are singularly fragile creatures. Then, since the Pawgadils seem to be coping quite well with this climate, I think that we Kletellakee will return home next. Once you have taken the Pawgadils to their world, you will embark on your own adventure. The computer will help you with piloting and navigation, should you forget any of the lessons I have taught you.”

“Thank you,” said Diana. “You’ve been wonderfully helpful.”

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

The ship crossed interstellar space by means of a device whose function boggled even Diana’s mind. It used neither wormholes nor any kind of Star Trek-like warp drive, but instead slipped briefly into what Diana assumed must be some sort of fifth dimension, in which what she thought of as space could be resolved into a series of discrete strands, though what each of those strands represented she was still unclear. At any rate, with the training she had received from Trelten, as well as the computer’s help, she would be able to bounce the ship to any predetermined point, with an accuracy dependent on that point’s current distance from the ship. Eventually she gave up trying to understand it, and instead focused on making sure she could use it.

The Folloboloi were dropped off in their own star system, from where the Milky Way was a breathtakingly beautiful sight: a barred spiral galaxy with numerous majestic arms and a brilliant nucleus that Diana could not take her eyes off for half an hour. Even Blair was impressed, though at the same time she was rather unnerved.

The ship, it turned out, was quite capable of landing, which it did on three thick, extendable legs. The Folloboloi were ecstatic to be home, yet so effusively grateful to the humans and to the Kletellakee that they eventually had to be chivvied out of the main hatch.

Diana, operating the computer on her own, launched the ship under the watchful but approving gaze of Lettar and Trelten. Once far enough from the planet for its gravitational effect to be insignificant (this was important, apparently), she programmed in new coordinates, and conducted her first ‘bounce’. It went well, and soon they were landing on a planet in the Taknarak cluster. There the Kletellakee departed, and Diana’s next take-off was entirely solo.

By now all of the girls were exhausted. Blair had, in truth, already taken a nap on one of her foam beds, but



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