Sheen Rescue Squad...or...Welcome to Planet Sheen

Chapter 5-Complications in the Plan

The tour of the palace took longer than Jimmy would've liked. The emperor droned on and on about significance of each room, which would've been fascinated by if he was too focused on trying to figure out a way to get Sheen alone. Everywhere they went, people bowed to Jimmy and his friends; word had spread quickly about the emperor's new honored guests.

Eventually, the emperor stopped and pointed toward a distant corridor. "And that," he informed them, "leads down to the dungeon. I saved this place for last because I wanted all the guests to see the entire palace." He turned to Cindy. "Don't worry, you won't be down there long. Dorkus here will make sure you are very comfortable."

Dorkus bowed. "Of course, sire," he said in that same tone that continued to give Jimmy a sense of foreboding. Dorkus gestured to Cindy, and indicating the corridor, said to her, "Right this way."

Very reluctantly, Cindy followed Dorkus and the guards down to the dungeon. They opened the door to reveal a room more dank and dark than the dungeon the Yolkians had placed her in, back when they had abducted all of the adults in Retroville as sacrifices to a giant bird.

Dorkus threw her into a cell with two other inmates. One was tall, with pointed ears and only one brown eye, like a cyclops. The other one Cindy was able to identify, though she had only seen one of them once before, as a Gorlock.

The two of them eyed her quizzically, sizing her up. Cindy could sense a challenge coming. Her fists clenched when the Gorlock asked her, So, you're our new inmate?"

"I guess so," Cindy said, matching the Gorlock's intimidating tone.The Cyclops laughed. "She doesn't look so tough," he told the Gorlock, who nodded in agreement and said, "Of course not, she's blond."

They had finally crossed the line, which Cindy knew would happen sooner or later. Glaring both of them, she shouted, "Excuse me? I'll show you what this blond is capable of!"

As all of this was happening, the emperor turned to the rest of his guests. "Now that we have that taken care of," he said to them casually, "I must go making the last improvements to the plans for the ball. They'll require serious thought now that we have honored guests. I'll leave my royal adviser to get caught up with you. Okay, gotta go." And with that, he walked away from them all without a backwards glance.

While most the other aliens, including the remaining guards, followed the emperor. However, some of the aliens, the blue-skinned warrior, the chimpanzee and the slug creature, stayed behind with Sheen. Suddenly, it occurred to Jimmy that these aliens had become Sheen's friends during his stay on this strange planet.

Jimmy wasn't sure what to say to ask them to leave. They had to get Sheen alone, tell him why they were actually here, get Cindy out, and return to Retroville. But before he could think of what to say, Sheen spoke up first. "Isn't this cool or what, Jimmy?" he asked his old friend, his voice quivering with excitement, "I've always wanted you to come here. Now that the old gang's here, we can have time of our lives!" He turned around and indicated each of his new friends in turn, starting with the chimp, then the slug creature, and lastly the blue-skinned alien. "I know you guys'll get along swimmingly with my new friends! This is Nesmith, Doppy, and Aseefa!" Aseefa glared at them, while Nesmith nodded curtly and Doppy waved enthusiastically.

Jimmy, Carl, Libby and Nick all looked at the three of them. While Nick eyed Doppy and Nesmith with bored indifference, Libby glared at them, especially Aseefa. A warning bell went off in Jimmy's head, telling him that the two of them were just about to become rivals. This would not have been the first time this had happened to Libby. Once, they had met a girl named Nicole Tanner, a girl who had turned out to be a girl genius with a robot cat named Venus. Apparently, because she moved a lot due to her mother's work of trying to find Dr. Sydney Moist, now one of Jimmy's least favorite scientists, Nicole had become bitter because she could never stay in a town long enough to make friends. As a result, she had developed an unhealthy obsession to destroy as many friendships as she could. When she came to Retroville, she had made Libby her target, and for a while, she turned the entire town against Libby.