[original fiction] Zodiac, by Dixie Walters
I intended to go to bed a while ago, but instead got caught up in archiving a relic of true genius. Maybe it's in honor of my new and rather ridiculous love for Star Trek, but ladies and gentlemen, I give you a work of science fiction goodness by me, age nine. And by me obviously I mean Dixie Walters, because that was my pen name. Oh yes.
Totally unedited, and presented in all its original glory:
Zodiac
by Dixie Walters
"Lyna! Where are you?" My energy tank was running low. Even in Xeeksor's low gravity, it's no fun to run out of energy. That would mean I couldn't talk to my friend. If I took off my lycron tank to try and talk to her that way I would die from lack of air. "Lyna! We have to get to the energy charger! I'm running low!"
Lyna nodded. She barked for me to follow her. We bounded quickly in Xeeksor's low gravity. Lyna had seen an energy charger. Dogs on Xeeksor have much sharper eyes than Xeeksornians. One of the best (such as Lyna) can see a grain of sand two miles away!
I checked my bank again. Oh no! It said I had five minutes! The closest charger was six minutes away. Luckily, I remembered about light speed. I switched it on fast. So did Lyna. We zoomed to the charger. I charged up and we headed home. Phew! That was close!
1.
"Karita!" Mom yelled for me. "We are going to Aynstoin to visit your grandmother! Come help me mix up the Xeekdivite!"
"Coming!" I yelled back through my voice transmitter. Oh, I'm sorry! I forgot to tell you what Xeekdivite is. Well, you mix up Ueikdivite, Mchytite, and Solitite together and add Grodimite. Shake well, and you have Xeekdivite. Simply pour on the surface of a gas giant, and it freezes to a hard, asphalt-like surface that you can land a shuttle on.
"Karita! Come on! The shuttle leaves in five days!" (A day on Xeeksor lasts only 26 minutes.) I raced for the door.
"Come on, Lyna, go through the dog door and unlock the door! It's locked!" Even though Lyna couldn't speak Xeeksdal, she could understand it. She leapt through and stuck her paw on the button. The glass retracting door opened and closed when I stepped on the pad. Then I typed in the combination (51249109) and a second retracting door opened, into my house.
"Mom! Here I am!" I raced into the cymbly. (Oh, whoops, my English is slipping. I learned to speak English after I learned Xeeksdal, our native language. Cymbly is our word for kitchen.)
"All right, Karita, what have you and Lyna been doing?" She glared at me.
"Nothing, Mom! Lyna and I were playing outside. I had on my heated clothes and everything!" I decided not to tell her that I had forgotten to refill my energy tank before we went outside. If I did, she would ground me. Yuck!
"Well, go to the chemical holder and get the solitite jug. Hurry! Dad wants to leave in three days! It has to sit for two. We can finish in time if you hurry!" I brought back to the solitite. She poured it and said, "Well, that's all. It can sit for two days. You go sleep. You'll need your rest for your grandmother on Aynstoin." When she says something there's no arguing. I went to sleep.
When I woke up, three days later, I heard screaming in the background.
"Get a fresh lycron tank, Karita!" I heard my father yelling. His voice was sharp.
"Sure," I said groggily, not quite awake yet.
"Make it fast, Karita! Remember that your grandmother's planet, Aynstoin, is in the Andromeda. That means five days in the spaceship!" Mom had to add. (Don't remind me of the five day trip from Xeeksor in the galaxy Taukana on the farthest, newest corner of the universe; hang a left at the Youaka Nebula about six billion light years back and keep going for six billion light years . . . you can't possibly miss Taukana galaxy.)
Okay, okay! Mom's tapping her foot; I can hear it. The fact that I'm an Xeeksornian really helps; my hearing is 3.5 million times better than a humans, I can spot a red grain of sand on the ground from a mile away . . . you get the point.
I scrambled across the room. Then I picked up a few things: my collar (yes, my collar, you heard it right: here on Xeeksor, we all have to wear a collar with ID tags on it whenever we are leaving the planet and reentering it. It's a sort of a passport, as you say.), my heating pads (Aynstoin gets very cold; the only real reason Grandma moved from her home on Fysont in the Wiyita galaxy where she'd lived for 37 years was that her doctor said that the heat of Fysont was damaging her nervous system slightly and that she needed to move to a colder planet, which Aynstoin most definitely.), my telescope (oh, I do just love to gaze into the lens and look at Earth, on the way other side of the universe, and see how stupid the people on it are (no offense to the readers, of course!) and how tiny their miniature solar system and galaxy really are, compared to our solar system, centered around the star Latrocis, and our galaxy, Taukana), and a present for Grandma: a new invention from Xeeksor, the fold-up house! It folds up to 2 ft by 1 ft by 5 inches! She'll love it for going on vacations to Aynstoin's moon, Makaya.
"Karita! Now! The shuttle is already heated up!" Mom's voice shattered my daydreams.
"Coming!" I screamed. I raced around, collecting things . . . yanking on boots . . . making sure I grabbed a tail warmer . . . I'll explain about that later.
"KA-RI!" Mom exploded. "NOW!"
I gulped. "Yes, ma'am. Coming," I said meekly. I raced down the stairs and rocketed into the shuttle.
I plopped down next to Lyna, who looked at me saying, plainer than words, "What took you so long?"
You see, Lyna and I have our own sort of language. We understand each other so deeply that if I simply make up a mind message, "Well . . . I had to get Grandma's folding house . . . and everything else," Lyna nods her head in reply and I know she's gotten the message. When I glanced at her, her head was tilted at an angle, a sure sign that she was concentrating hard. I'm getting the message now . . . "Yeah . . . , I understand. You sure came speeding into the ship! I wouldn't be surprised if you lost half your energy on that sprint. Better check the tank." I nodded my reply and checked the tank.
"No, Lyna, still have almost all of it!" I grinned. She started panting and gave me one of those defeated but still spirited looks that said, "You may have won this time, but you just wait, girl! You just wait!" She laughed. Or it looked like she was laughing at least.
Mom said, "Oh, you two!" Mom didn't understand us and our language. Neither did Dad. And I'm glad they don't. Really glad. Maybe Lyna would be able to make them understand in an emergency, but it hasn't happened yet.
The spaceship coughed and sputtered. "Oh no! The stupid machine's running out of fuel!" Mom screamed, and then we both looked at Dad, who laughed nervously.
"I hope there's a planet nearby, or at least a moon." Dad gulped.
As it turned out, it wasn't a planet or a moon that saved us. It was an asteroid, and a little help from Lyna's supereyes. She barked excitedly, and jumped all over the seat. I cooled off and got to concentrating. Through my thoughts I said, "Lyna, what is it?"
"Oh, Karita, don't you see?!?! Off far in the distance, the big gray asteroid! It'll save us!" Lyna was very excited. So was I!
"Dad, Mom! Lyna saw something that'll save us! Bag gray asteroid two miles away!" By now, both Lyna and I were bouncing off the walls.
"Are you sure?" Mom, always cautious, was at it again.
"You bet, Ma!"
"Okay, but . . ."
"Learn to trust Lyna and Kata, Mom." Dad to the rescue.
"Are you sure it's safe?" Mom's always worried.
"I'll listen," I volunteered. "Absolute silence, please."
"Sure, silence," Dad grumbled. I didn't answer. I was hearing nothing from the asteroid. It was hollow, and had several bedrooms, and and aircraft landing pad. Super! Lyna was concentrating, and I was receiving something . . .
"It's great, Kata, great! But do we have enough fuel to reach it." The last part sounded sad, far off.
"I'll check, Lyna." I went to the front. "Dad, how many miles of fuel left?"
"2.157, Kata. Enough?"
"Yeah! Great!"
"That's a relief! Phew!"
We landed on the asteroid two minutes later. But as soon as I stepped onto the asteroid, I sensed that something wasn't right. Lyna apparently sensed this, too, and I could tell because her left front paw was lifted in the air, which I knew was a signal. Luckily Mom and Dad were so preoccupied with fixing up the craft that they didn't notice.
"Lyna . . . something's wrong with this picture. I just can't figure out what." I was really nervous.
"I don't know, Ka, I don't know." Lyna only calls me "Ka" when she's really nervous.
"You know, I almost feel like I'm being WATCHED."
"Ka, that's it! You've hit it! Somebody's . . ." Lyna stopped in the middle of a sentence, stuck her front left pay up in the air, and began to emit ultrasonic sound. (Ultrasonic sound is 20,000 Hz or above.) Apparently she'd learned what she wanted to know, because she put her left front paw down and lifted her right front paw, the "universal" sign that DANGER IS NEAR. She threw her head back and began to "howl," this time in infrasonic sound. Unforunately, Xeeksornians can't use "echolocation" like Blue Labradors can.
*
Tragically, there ends the tale! Whatever happened to Karita and her telepathic Blue Labrador BFF? The world may never know.
Totally unedited, and presented in all its original glory:
Zodiac
by Dixie Walters
"Lyna! Where are you?" My energy tank was running low. Even in Xeeksor's low gravity, it's no fun to run out of energy. That would mean I couldn't talk to my friend. If I took off my lycron tank to try and talk to her that way I would die from lack of air. "Lyna! We have to get to the energy charger! I'm running low!"
Lyna nodded. She barked for me to follow her. We bounded quickly in Xeeksor's low gravity. Lyna had seen an energy charger. Dogs on Xeeksor have much sharper eyes than Xeeksornians. One of the best (such as Lyna) can see a grain of sand two miles away!
I checked my bank again. Oh no! It said I had five minutes! The closest charger was six minutes away. Luckily, I remembered about light speed. I switched it on fast. So did Lyna. We zoomed to the charger. I charged up and we headed home. Phew! That was close!
1.
"Karita!" Mom yelled for me. "We are going to Aynstoin to visit your grandmother! Come help me mix up the Xeekdivite!"
"Coming!" I yelled back through my voice transmitter. Oh, I'm sorry! I forgot to tell you what Xeekdivite is. Well, you mix up Ueikdivite, Mchytite, and Solitite together and add Grodimite. Shake well, and you have Xeekdivite. Simply pour on the surface of a gas giant, and it freezes to a hard, asphalt-like surface that you can land a shuttle on.
"Karita! Come on! The shuttle leaves in five days!" (A day on Xeeksor lasts only 26 minutes.) I raced for the door.
"Come on, Lyna, go through the dog door and unlock the door! It's locked!" Even though Lyna couldn't speak Xeeksdal, she could understand it. She leapt through and stuck her paw on the button. The glass retracting door opened and closed when I stepped on the pad. Then I typed in the combination (51249109) and a second retracting door opened, into my house.
"Mom! Here I am!" I raced into the cymbly. (Oh, whoops, my English is slipping. I learned to speak English after I learned Xeeksdal, our native language. Cymbly is our word for kitchen.)
"All right, Karita, what have you and Lyna been doing?" She glared at me.
"Nothing, Mom! Lyna and I were playing outside. I had on my heated clothes and everything!" I decided not to tell her that I had forgotten to refill my energy tank before we went outside. If I did, she would ground me. Yuck!
"Well, go to the chemical holder and get the solitite jug. Hurry! Dad wants to leave in three days! It has to sit for two. We can finish in time if you hurry!" I brought back to the solitite. She poured it and said, "Well, that's all. It can sit for two days. You go sleep. You'll need your rest for your grandmother on Aynstoin." When she says something there's no arguing. I went to sleep.
When I woke up, three days later, I heard screaming in the background.
"Get a fresh lycron tank, Karita!" I heard my father yelling. His voice was sharp.
"Sure," I said groggily, not quite awake yet.
"Make it fast, Karita! Remember that your grandmother's planet, Aynstoin, is in the Andromeda. That means five days in the spaceship!" Mom had to add. (Don't remind me of the five day trip from Xeeksor in the galaxy Taukana on the farthest, newest corner of the universe; hang a left at the Youaka Nebula about six billion light years back and keep going for six billion light years . . . you can't possibly miss Taukana galaxy.)
Okay, okay! Mom's tapping her foot; I can hear it. The fact that I'm an Xeeksornian really helps; my hearing is 3.5 million times better than a humans, I can spot a red grain of sand on the ground from a mile away . . . you get the point.
I scrambled across the room. Then I picked up a few things: my collar (yes, my collar, you heard it right: here on Xeeksor, we all have to wear a collar with ID tags on it whenever we are leaving the planet and reentering it. It's a sort of a passport, as you say.), my heating pads (Aynstoin gets very cold; the only real reason Grandma moved from her home on Fysont in the Wiyita galaxy where she'd lived for 37 years was that her doctor said that the heat of Fysont was damaging her nervous system slightly and that she needed to move to a colder planet, which Aynstoin most definitely.), my telescope (oh, I do just love to gaze into the lens and look at Earth, on the way other side of the universe, and see how stupid the people on it are (no offense to the readers, of course!) and how tiny their miniature solar system and galaxy really are, compared to our solar system, centered around the star Latrocis, and our galaxy, Taukana), and a present for Grandma: a new invention from Xeeksor, the fold-up house! It folds up to 2 ft by 1 ft by 5 inches! She'll love it for going on vacations to Aynstoin's moon, Makaya.
"Karita! Now! The shuttle is already heated up!" Mom's voice shattered my daydreams.
"Coming!" I screamed. I raced around, collecting things . . . yanking on boots . . . making sure I grabbed a tail warmer . . . I'll explain about that later.
"KA-RI!" Mom exploded. "NOW!"
I gulped. "Yes, ma'am. Coming," I said meekly. I raced down the stairs and rocketed into the shuttle.
I plopped down next to Lyna, who looked at me saying, plainer than words, "What took you so long?"
You see, Lyna and I have our own sort of language. We understand each other so deeply that if I simply make up a mind message, "Well . . . I had to get Grandma's folding house . . . and everything else," Lyna nods her head in reply and I know she's gotten the message. When I glanced at her, her head was tilted at an angle, a sure sign that she was concentrating hard. I'm getting the message now . . . "Yeah . . . , I understand. You sure came speeding into the ship! I wouldn't be surprised if you lost half your energy on that sprint. Better check the tank." I nodded my reply and checked the tank.
"No, Lyna, still have almost all of it!" I grinned. She started panting and gave me one of those defeated but still spirited looks that said, "You may have won this time, but you just wait, girl! You just wait!" She laughed. Or it looked like she was laughing at least.
Mom said, "Oh, you two!" Mom didn't understand us and our language. Neither did Dad. And I'm glad they don't. Really glad. Maybe Lyna would be able to make them understand in an emergency, but it hasn't happened yet.
The spaceship coughed and sputtered. "Oh no! The stupid machine's running out of fuel!" Mom screamed, and then we both looked at Dad, who laughed nervously.
"I hope there's a planet nearby, or at least a moon." Dad gulped.
As it turned out, it wasn't a planet or a moon that saved us. It was an asteroid, and a little help from Lyna's supereyes. She barked excitedly, and jumped all over the seat. I cooled off and got to concentrating. Through my thoughts I said, "Lyna, what is it?"
"Oh, Karita, don't you see?!?! Off far in the distance, the big gray asteroid! It'll save us!" Lyna was very excited. So was I!
"Dad, Mom! Lyna saw something that'll save us! Bag gray asteroid two miles away!" By now, both Lyna and I were bouncing off the walls.
"Are you sure?" Mom, always cautious, was at it again.
"You bet, Ma!"
"Okay, but . . ."
"Learn to trust Lyna and Kata, Mom." Dad to the rescue.
"Are you sure it's safe?" Mom's always worried.
"I'll listen," I volunteered. "Absolute silence, please."
"Sure, silence," Dad grumbled. I didn't answer. I was hearing nothing from the asteroid. It was hollow, and had several bedrooms, and and aircraft landing pad. Super! Lyna was concentrating, and I was receiving something . . .
"It's great, Kata, great! But do we have enough fuel to reach it." The last part sounded sad, far off.
"I'll check, Lyna." I went to the front. "Dad, how many miles of fuel left?"
"2.157, Kata. Enough?"
"Yeah! Great!"
"That's a relief! Phew!"
We landed on the asteroid two minutes later. But as soon as I stepped onto the asteroid, I sensed that something wasn't right. Lyna apparently sensed this, too, and I could tell because her left front paw was lifted in the air, which I knew was a signal. Luckily Mom and Dad were so preoccupied with fixing up the craft that they didn't notice.
"Lyna . . . something's wrong with this picture. I just can't figure out what." I was really nervous.
"I don't know, Ka, I don't know." Lyna only calls me "Ka" when she's really nervous.
"You know, I almost feel like I'm being WATCHED."
"Ka, that's it! You've hit it! Somebody's . . ." Lyna stopped in the middle of a sentence, stuck her front left pay up in the air, and began to emit ultrasonic sound. (Ultrasonic sound is 20,000 Hz or above.) Apparently she'd learned what she wanted to know, because she put her left front paw down and lifted her right front paw, the "universal" sign that DANGER IS NEAR. She threw her head back and began to "howl," this time in infrasonic sound. Unforunately, Xeeksornians can't use "echolocation" like Blue Labradors can.
*
Tragically, there ends the tale! Whatever happened to Karita and her telepathic Blue Labrador BFF? The world may never know.