Synthetic Reality

Dead Planet

Everyone had fallen asleep. Zandar Vandar Blunt slouched in the pilot seat, his broad head folded at an impossible angle across his pink striped belly. The Gila Monster in leather pants snored ever so slightly.

Sprawled on the chairs behind him were the green Komodo Dragon Mox and a Zorr/human hybrid woman who referred to him as Uncle. Mox was shoved into the far corner of the curved barcalounger in a position only a Varan could call comfortable. Zorpia was splayed out across both chairs with her head on the opposite armrest, one hand dangling to the floor, and both legs flailed across her uncle. A slight gleam of drool was doing its best to escape the corner of her pouty sleeping lips. The flight deck of the Brick was utterly peaceful.

A rusted robot called Styx sat in the co-pilot seat manning the controls. The tubular matchstick man rotated his cylindrical head as he focused on the navigation panel. At the back of the room, the equally rusty but much larger and squarer Sentinel droid stood in its alcove. Mox's ancient robot bodyguard appeared powered down, but continually scanned the room and received tactical updates from Styx via the ship's computer.

For the last three weeks, they'd been following secret coordinates to an uncharted mythical planet. The instructions were hidden in the hilt of the Dead Sword, the symbol of the Captain of the Dead Barge. Zorpia had inherited the sword and the title from her now deceased boyfriend Bobby, known to most as the infamous pirate Blue Beard. His remains were destroyed along with the last ship to call itself the Dead Barge by the Klandar Authority.

Zorpia had been grieving in her own way while hiding out on her uncle's ship. She just needed to get Bobby's jacket and maybe a little closure.

The Brick's sensors picked up a small rogue moon and Styx locked on the signal. Zandar opened one eye and confirmed the object matched the description. Sitting up in his seat, he ran a quick system check and dropped into a holding orbit.

Mox uncoiled his body. "Is that it?"

Out the front window was a dark planetary object. It had a nitrogen-heavy atmosphere and almost primordial readings. There seemed to be a biomass covering most of the surface.

Mox pinched one of Zorpia's little brown toes. "Is this the place?"

She kicked him, wiped the drool off her chin, and stretched. "Great nap. How long was I out?"

Zorpia rubbed the sleep out of her eyes and looked out the window. "Umm? Spin around to the other side of the planet."

Blunt looked back at her.

"Trust me."

He moved the ship. In the murky darkness below, a colossal image of a skull and crossbones came into view. The skull had hollow dead eyes, horns on its head, and long pointed teeth. The large scale earthwork was carved from space by someone seriously skilled with a laser cannon. Though old and fading, it still had a vicious and intimidating presence.

"This is the place. Meet the first Captain of the Dead Barge, Old Snaggletooth himself."

"He didn't like trespassers much." Mox thought about the ego of someone who would tag a planet with his own face. "But way to leave your mark."

Zorpia stood up and leaned on the back of Blunt's seat. "The fortress is on the south pole."

She thought about what Bobby had told her the first time he brought her here. "Ok, here's the lowdown... Don't eat the mushrooms or you'll suffer a fate worse than death and don't go outside the main compound unarmed because there are, well, zombies."

Mox was intrigued. "Get a projected trajectory on the planet's orbit. See what systems it passes through and if it repeats. We found it easily enough. Run a million year simulation and teach the computer how to pinpoint its location at any given time frame. In case we want to come back."