Planet of Insect Abominations
“Test run number 65. D.I.N.A.A. adaptation to Prejudice, Prejudice you know what to do.” A bark sounded through the ship, echoing off the walls and making it back to the medium sized garage.
Clicks with the tinging of metal shook the garage, coating Prejudice with metal armor. Two machine guns followed, unfolding from the metal armor. Within seconds they stood on her back aiming over her head which was coated in metal except for her ears, face and snout. The yellow garage light glitched off the metal surrounding her body.
“Now that that's working…” Walter satiated rubbing the metal coating on the dog's head. “Aim and let ‘er rip.” Prejudice pulled her ears back before she barked once more, making gunshots rock the ship making dust fill the garage. Walter coughs and sputters as the guns come to a stop and the smoke slowly cleared through the vents.
Prejudice sneezes as he takes some steps towards her, careful not to step on the piles of gold bullet shells on the ground. Her tail wagged as Walter walked forward to look at the obliterated piece of wood on the ground. Decently small chunks lay on the floor coated with sawdust.
“I think I made you too powerful buddy.” He said rubbing the small fibers of sawdust off his knees. Prejudice looked at him wagging her tail as he walked past, rubbing his hand from her head down to her back. “You can turn it off now.” A bark and mechanical whirling sounds followed Walter out the door before darting ahead of him. Her nails tapped on the metal floor before skidding into the command center, the door closing behind her.
The closer Walter got to the command center he heard laughing.Until walking in and seeing Jones on the floor with Prejudice on top of him, his crutches lay beside him, his new metal leg shining in the light. M.A.R.C. grabbing onto Prejudice's hind leg to pull her off.
“How’s your leg?” Jones looked up at Walter, his smile fading.
“As good as it can be when your leg got burnt off.” There was an awkward pause as they avoided eye contact. Prejudice spun around chasing M.A.R.C. for pulling her off. Walter looked at Jones.
“Do you mind telling me why you ran off?” Jones sat up and kept looking at the ground.
“I don’t know what you're talking about.”
“Yes you do.” His voice rose and he kept looking at Jones. “After I mentioned your mom you landed on a planet, stormed off without your helmet and almost died!”
“You really want to know?! Fine!” Tears filled his eyes as he snapped his head to Walter from the floor. “She died leaving me and my sister with a deadbeat man we had to call ‘Father’, because he decided to rape her twice at the age of sixteen and nineteen!” Walter looked at him, shook as Prejudice stopped chasing M.A.R.C., both turning to him.
“She died of breast cancer and left us! At the age of nine I was fending for my sister so she didn’t have to deal with the pain from our father!” His voice broke as Prejudice walked to his side curling up beside him. Tears plopped onto the floor and he cried.
“Her last wish was to be named after a star… but that's hard to do when you are always on the verge of death…” Walter dropped to his knees and hugged Jones as M.A.R.C. followed. Minutes passed as Jones calmed down, suddenly sirens rang in the ship startling everyone. Walter shot up, running to the window and looking out.
“Houston, we have a problem.” He turned to Jones who was standing up with his crutches. On time the ship shook, making him topple over to the side with the 3 '11 dog catching his fall. He hobbled to the window and looked through, a big planet showed as the ship shook more. “Everytime!” Jones moved to his seat grabbing the steering controls and tried to pull up. The ship turned up a tad as the gravitational pull pulled them in closer to the planet.
“M.A.R.C., Prejudice!” Walter yelled from his seat. “Brace!” Prejudice ran over to a corner where a kennel is strapped down. She ran in, using her paw to close the door behind her. M.A.R.C. whirled over to the same corner using his grabbers to clamp onto a bar of the kennel.
The ship shook as it took a nosedive. Jones grunted as he struggled to force the tip forward but nothing happened. Walter squeezed his eyes shut, the ground came closer as there was a boom. He groaned as his eyes fluttered open.
Smoke and ash filled the air, slowly he sat up looking around. The ship had flames burning the metal, a grabber stook out from a pile of rubble. Walter bolted over tugging on the arm as the rubbled shifted revealing M.A.R.C. out of the rubble.
His metal exterior dented and one of his lightbulb eyes flickered before going out. He frantically looked around avoiding what is most likely a huge concussion clutching M.A.R.C. in his arms. The rubble in front of him shifted as a hand stretched out as it clawed at the rubble on top. M.A.R.C. clunked to the ground as Walter leapt up limping to the hand and moving the rubble around it.
Once enough rubble was moved Jones sat up holding the unconscious Prejudice in his arms, D.I.N.A.A. activated and dents all over the metal armor. “Are you okay…?” Walter asked stuttering to touch him, moving his hands to his bruising face then away before touching it. Jones looks down at Prejudice as he pet her head softly. He nodded as he looked around at the rubble around him.
“Holy shit. The ship…” Walter glanced at the burning ship as well, the back end of the ship stuck out of the ground while the front half of the command center lay a bit of a distance away.
“Yea that’s not good…”
“And neither is that.” Jones pointed to the forest ahead. Hidden in it was a seven foot tall rhino beetle standing on two two legs, its extra arms at its sides. It's a dark blue horn blending into the shadows of the leaves to look like a branch. Slowly it emerged from the forest into the light.
“We should go.” Walter skit forward, grabbing M.A.R.C. and swiftly stepping back, pulling Jones’ shoulder with him. Quickly Jones shoved the rest of the rubble off his legs as he clutched the big dog in his arms. It moved closer, it pulled out a long sword from underneath its exoskeleton.
“Definitely.” Jones heaved Prejudice over his shoulder as he and Walter ran around the burning ship and into the forest. The beatles wings flew out from its protective cover quickly flying around the ship and trailing them from above the trees. They weaved through trees, doing the best they could to run as fast as possible while carrying a hundred pound dog and a robot. Faint flapping of wings growing more distant as they ran until finally disappearing. “I think we are good…”Walter’s feet skidded, stopping and struggling to look through the leaves above.
“Are you sure?” Jones stopped as well, turning to him.
“Pretty positive…” Jones heaved Prejudice off his shoulder, setting her on the ground, kneeling beside her. Walter following setting his hand on her chest.
“Is she…?”
“Alive. Yes. Thankfully.”
“But you won’t be…” They turned behind them to see five giant leaf bug creatures, each having the abdomen and arms to the exact replica. They sat on two legs like a human, each had what seemed to be a metal helmet on their antenna heads. The one in front spoke.
“You are coming with us.”