Captain Lambda and the Empire of Evil

Chapter Two: Valley of Monsters!

SPACE CAPTAIN LAMBDA and his trusty robot companion ZIP have been sent to an uncharted star to find a crashed scientist, DOCTOR GALBRAITH. En route, his rocket ship was hit by SPACE LIGHTNING and is now spinning uncontrollably towards a MYSTERIOUS PLANET!

FEATURING: Space Captain Lambda, hero of Earth on a mission to save a lost scientist; and Zip, Lambda's trusty robot companion.

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"Get me retrorockets back, Zip!" Captain Lambda cried as he poured frantically over his half-burned control panel to regain control. The smell of burned plastic and copper found every crevice of his nose. The ship was spinning out of control and directly towards the planet ahead. "I've got to stabilise us to bring us in for a soft landing."

"Aye captain -zzp- I'm transferring fuel from the main engines," Zip replied, opening and closing valves on the wall panels by their seat.

Lambda's arms ached as he gripped hard on his control stick. The spin started to slow and the blur of stars out the porthole began to coalesce around the looming planet ahead. It was a rocky world, but with clouds and oceans indicating to Lambda it might be habitable. Not that he had a choice on where to set down. It was difficult to argue with gravity.

He tilted the rocket to drag on the atmosphere and slow his descent. The cabin shook violently. Flames licked around the porthole as the view shifted from black to brighter light. Fright grasped its fingers around his heart. But Lambda had been in worse scrapes. He steadied his beat and focused on the dials.

"Brace for impact!"

⚛

"Captain!"

Lambda groaned as he pulled up his aching neck upright. He was hanging upside down from his straps while Zip was nudging him awake, waving a medical light over his injuries.

"You okay, Zip?" he asked his friend, fondly. They nodded and closed up the last of his cuts with the light tool.

"The ship's damage can be -zzp- repaired, but we barely have enough fuel to break orbit due to the problems we had navigating through that spacetime distortion. We will need to refuel before we can -zzp- leave."

"Well, that's disappointing."

"But it's accurate. The good news is we seem to be in the right system and this is the only -zzp- habitable planet in the system."

Lambda braced himself and released the seat straps, dropping him to the side of the capsule with a thud.

"Stay here, Zip, and work on the ship. I'll see what the situation is outside and search for Doctor Galbraith."

He descended to the living sphere and pulled out a standard-issue survival suit for missions on unknown worlds. It was a skintight cerulean catsuit that covered his entire body, but left large transparent mesh panels for breathability over his chest, biceps and inner thighs. In the middle of the chest was a λ for Lambda. The survival suit was designed specifically by the Space Exploration and Friendship Agency for rescue situations and, despite being tight, had enough space for his packer.

After pulling that on, he took out the boots, belt and cape. The knee-high boots were rugged, with excellent grip and matched the rest of the uniform. The utility belt was white and contained a variety of gadgets and a weapon holster. The light red cape afforded protection from any intense rays from the local star while being light and breathable.

Finally, Lambda considered the risks of going in without protection. He eyed his trusty raygun with trepidation. The chrome ray gun was long and sleek with raised rings around its diameter. It was small but, in the right hands, very powerful; beautiful but deadly, like many of his lovers. So it was not the ideal thing to carry when introducing yourself to new people, but it was sensible when alone on an unknown planet. Into his holster it went.