Danger Magellan's Invasion of Earth

Chapter 16

Chapter 16

I glanced out the window shortly after takeoff and caught a nice view of the Red Planet as we flew away. The surface was still quite clear, but the skyscrapers of Moerjing were nothing more than a few bright lights on the surface that soon disappeared altogether. Before long, Mars itself was just a tiny red dot in the distance.

Danger hit a few buttons on the dashboard, and the spaceship realigned itself. "In about three days, we'll reach the edge of the solar system," Danger said.

"That's a long time," Raquel said.

"It's not my fault that your system is so big," Danger said as he took off his harness and floated around the Eclipse. "Just be glad that we have a jump drive. Otherwise, we wouldn't be able to leave the system at all."

I took off my harness and decided to explore the spaceship. After all, I was going to be stuck here for at least three days. I had to find some way to entertain myself.

I opened my bag and took out my Hamilton poster. Then, I stuck it on the side of the spaceship. "Nora, was that necessary?" Danger asked.

"Yes!" I said. "Hamilton is amazing, and I thought that the musical's awesomeness would rub off on the Eclipse if I put this poster up."

Danger rolled his eyes. "Hamilton's not that great, Nora," he said.

"How could you say that?!" I exclaimed. "Hamilton is the greatest musical ever!"

"I thought you said that Wicked was the greatest musical ever," Raquel said.

"They're both fantastic," I said.

"Anyways, does anyone want to test out the Checkers Bot?" Raquel asked.

"Sure," I said. I entered the other room, where Raquel had set up a checkers board and the Checkers Bot. However, most of the pieces were floating around the room. This is going to be difficult to play, I thought as I watched Raquel attempt to find all of the pieces.

"Arthur, do you want to play after Nora?" Raquel asked.

"No thanks," Arthur said as he frantically wrote something down in his notebook. "I'm kind of busy right now."

"Let me know if you change your mind," Raquel said. She fiddled with the Checkers Bot for a few minutes and then said. "Okay. The robot's ready to go. You can go first."

I slowly slid one of my pieces into a new position and then held onto it to ensure that it wouldn't float away. "Your turn, Checkers Bot," I said. The robot paused for a few seconds and then attempted to move a piece, but instead knocked it off the board. Raquel picked it up and placed it back in its proper position.

As it turned out, I beat the Checkers Bot easily. "Can I try?" Danger asked.

"Of course," Raquel said.

By the end of the day, each of us had beaten the Checkers Bot multiple times, but we were getting tired. Thankfully, Danger had set up four cots in the room with the Checkers Bot. They weren't terribly comfortable, but I drifted off to sleep anyways.

The last thing I saw before I fell asleep was the view out the window: the dark black expanses of space.

I woke up the next morning to the sound of a record playing backwards and the smell of my dad's blueberry pancakes. "I packed a few pancakes before we left Earth," Danger explained. "I'm just heating them up now."

I grinned as Danger passed me a plate of pancakes. "Thanks," I said as I devoured them. "Arthur, where's the noise coming from?"

"First of all, it's not noise," Arthur said. "It's The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars playing backwards. Second, I can't hear the subliminal messages if you're talking."