Black Hole Battle
For Lucy Hirst, the real Peabo’s friend
~ L A C
For Lyzi ~ J D
CONTENTS
Title Page
Dedication
MEET THE SPACE PENGUINS...
INTRODUCTION
1. TIDY UP TIME
2. THE TROUBLE WITH MAPS
3. THE SUPER DOOPER STARTROOPER
4. FUZZ GOES SHOPPING
5. COLD SOUP
6. ROBOT REVOLUTION
7. YOU SENT THE MESSAGE
8. WHAT A RIDE!
9. THE FINAL SHOWDOWN
10. A SUPERDUPER PARTY
About the Author
Copyright
CAPTAIN:
Captain T. Krill
Emperor penguin
Height: 1.10m
Looks: yellow ear patches and noble bearing
Likes: swordfish minus the sword
Lab tests: showed leadership qualities in fish challenge
Guaranteed to: keep calm in a crisis
FIRST MATE (ONCE UPON A TIME):
Beaky Wader, now known as Dark Wader
Once Emperor penguin, now part-robot
Height: 1.22m
Looks: shiny black armour and evil laugh
Likes: prawn pizzas and ruling the universe
Lab tests: cheated at every challenge
Guaranteed to: cause trouble
PILOT (WITH NO SENSE OF DIRECTION):
Rocky Waddle
Rockhopper penguin
Height: 45cm
Looks: long yellow eyebrows
Likes: mackerel ice cream
Lab tests: fastest slider in toboggan challenge
Guaranteed to: speed through an asteroid belt while reading charts upside down
SECURITY OFFICER AND HEAD CHEF:
Fuzz Allgrin
Little Blue penguin
Height: 33cm
Looks: small with fuzzy blue feathers
Likes: fish fingers in cream and truffle sauce
Lab tests: showed creativity and aggression in ice-carving challenge
Guaranteed to: defend ship, crew and kitchen with his life
SHIP’S ENGINEER:
Splash Gordon
King penguin
Height: 95cm
Looks: orange ears and chest markings
Likes: squid
Lab tests: solved ice-cube challenge in under four seconds
Guaranteed to: fix anything
My circuits suddenly feel as fresh as Saturn’s best socks. My networks work! My operating system is operating! I would jump for joy if I had legs. But I’m a computer, so I can’t.
My name is ICEcube. I wasn’t designed to be eaten by metal-munching space beasts. I was designed to speed the Space Penguins safely through the universe aboard their ship, the trusty Tunafish. By the time that hungry Flogisaur was finished with us in our last adventure, the Tunafish was little more than a pile of rusty fish bones. Our ship’s engineer Splash Gordon was responsible for the Flogisaur in the first place, so he worked extra hard to repair what was left of me. He mended everything aboard with the metal the penguins collected from the planet Flogiston. Now all that’s left is the tidying up. It could take a while.
Splash isn’t the only one around here who’s brilliant at his job.
Captain Krill is the bravest leader a team of Space Penguins could wish for. Zero gravity? More like hero gravity.
Rocky Waddle flies like an eagle with a stubby tail and long eyebrows. (Only when he’s behind the controls of the Tunafish, of course. Everyone knows penguins can’t fly by themselves.)
And with his cooking and his karate, Chief Security Officer Fuzz Allgrin is… What’s the word I want? I’m not used to my new circuits yet.
Oh yes. Small.
Everything’s new and shiny now. These things make computers happy. But I have one tiny problem.
The penguins picked up a piece of metal on Flogiston that’s making me nervous. I am one hundred per cent certain that it’s meganesium. Meganesium is the most explosive material in the cosmos. Just get it wet and BOOM! Splash picked up enough to destroy this whole ship. I’ve tried warning the penguins, but they can’t hear me – my speech-converter chip hasn’t been fixed yet.
I hope Splash hasn’t mended this ship just to wreck it again.
The Tunafish was a mess. Piles of metal shavings and wire clippings lay on the floor. Crusty cloths, grimy goggles and smouldering soldering irons hung out of drawers. New saucepans stood in jumbled heaps. ICEcube was right. Splash’s miraculous Tunafish makeover was going to take a LOT of tidying up.
In the middle of the chaos, the Space Penguins stood in a puzzled circle around a shiny red piece of metal on the table.
The metal was flat and round like a biscuit, and glimmered ominously.
“What is it?” Captain Krill asked.
“The strangest metal I’ve ever seen,” said Splash. He wiped his oily forehead with an even oilier cloth. “I tried to melt it down to make a new handle for one of Fuzz’s saucepans, but it wouldn’t melt.”
A tear of happiness rolled off Fuzz’s beak. It landed on the table, dangerously close to the meganesium. “That’s the nicest thing anyone’s ever done for me,” he said.
“But he hasn’t done it, Fuzz,” Captain Krill pointed out.
Two more tears. Splosh. Splosh.
“It’s the thought that counts,” Fuzz sniffed.
Splash shook his head. “I’ve heated it. I’ve cooled it. I’ve hit it with everything in my toolbox. I’ve stressed it and shaken it. I’ve even bounced it. And it still looks the same as it did when we picked it up. I’ve never seen a metal like it.”
Rocky admired his reflection in the meganesium’s shiny red surface. “Maybe we could use it as a mirror,” he suggested.
“I’ll keep it in my toolbox,” Splash decided. “It might come in useful in the engine room.”
Lifting his belly, the Ship’s Engineer opened the egg-shaped toolbox nestling on his feet and popped the circle of metal inside.
“Right,” he said, looking around the messy flight deck. “Time to tidy up.”
Rocky started whistling. Fuzz wiped his eyes and stared at the ceiling. Captain Krill studied his flippers.
“Any volunteers?” said Splash.
“I’m setting the flight coordinates,” said Rocky. “Sorry.”
“And I am making cosmic cod cupcakes.” Fuzz picked up a brand-new cupcake tray from the floor and waddled into the kitchen.
“Sorry, Splash,” said Captain Krill. “I have a lot of … captainy things to do today.”
“Why am I the only one who clears up around here?” Splash demanded.
“It’s your mess,” Rocky said. “And you’re the one who brought a metal-munching monster on board the ship in the first place.”
“He has a point,” Fuzz shouted from the kitchen. “Anyway, I never ask you to clean my oven.”
“Perhaps you should invent a cleaning machine,” Captain Krill suggested, patting his Ship’s Engineer on the back.
Splash stomped off to fill up a bucket. As he dunked his mop in the soapy water, the water slopped over his feet. Luckily for the Tunafish, his toolbox was waterproof.
The intercom suddenly gave a high-pitched whistle. A squeaky voice crackled through the spaceship.
“Help!” it whispered. “Help us!”
“What’s that?” Captain Krill asked in his most alert voice. “Did someone say something?”
Rocky twiddled a couple of dials on the control panel. “It was a message, Captain. But I just lost the frequency.”
Captain Krill jabbed a button.
“ICEcube,” he said, “can you adjust the frequency?”
“Don’t ex
pect an answer,” Splash said, mopping the floor extra hard and sloshing water everywhere. “I haven’t fitted ICEcube’s new speech-converter chip yet. I won’t manage it until the end of the day now, with all this clearing up to do.”
The intercom squealed as the voice returned. It was a little squeakier, and a lot more scared.
“Help us!”
“I recognize that tune,” said Captain Krill, at the sound of jolly music in the background. “It’s ‘Starstruck’, by Veezli Measly!”
He sang a few lines, tapping his feet to the rhythm. “Starstruck, bad luck, being hit by a star can really suck. Feet on fire, ears ablaze, dazzled by your burning gaze…”
“Cheesy,” said Splash.
Captain Krill stopped singing and cleared his throat. “Any idea where the signal’s coming from, Rocky?”
“I’m getting a faint reading from section V of the universe, Captain,” said Rocky.
“Zoom in on that section,” the Captain commanded.
Rocky turned another dial. The voice returned, but even fainter and more squeaky than before.
“Mutiny aboard the Superduper Startrooper! Save us! Before the black hole gets us!”
The Tunafish fell silent as the voice faded away.
“I’ve heard of the Superduper Startrooper,” said Fuzz, popping his head out of the kitchen. “It’s in my Corking Cosmic Cruiseliners annual.”
He fetched the large book from his sleeping quarters to show the others.
“Well, well, whelk,” said Captain Krill, as they stared at the pictures in Fuzz’s book. “That’s a very big ship.”
The Superduper Startrooper could accommodate five hundred passengers – from the largest to the smallest alien species. It was one of the most luxurious cruiseliners in the universe. Long and sleek, the ship resembled an overstretched shark with a pointed transparent fin.
“Tickets cost zillions of space dollars,” said Fuzz excitedly. “They built a special robot chef called Marin-8 to cater for the passengers. His galactic gazpacho is famous throughout the universe.”
“Gas what?” said Rocky.
“Gazpacho,” said Fuzz. “Iced soup.”
Everyone made “Yummy!” noises.
“I would love to get my flippers on the recipe,” Fuzz went on, “but it’s a closely guarded secret.”
“The distress call mentioned a black hole,” said Captain Krill. “ICEcube, can you confirm whether there is a black hole in section V of the universe?”
“Ahem,” said Splash.
The Captain looked over at the silent computer. It was amazing, he reflected, how much they normally depended on ICEcube.
“We’ll have to do this the old-fashioned way,” he sighed. “We’ll use a paper map.”
“I love maps,” said Rocky excitedly. “But I have no idea how to use one.”
The map covering section V was extremely large, with lots of folds. When the penguins had opened it out, it filled most of the flight deck.
“Look, there’s a black swirl in the middle,” said Rocky. “Is that a black hole?”
The penguins turned the map over with difficulty. The key was marked with thousands of tiny symbols.
“Star,” read Captain Krill, following the key with his flipper. “Comet. Asteroid field. Footpath. Supernova. I have no idea how astronauts used maps like these in the old days… Aha! Black hole!”
The symbol for a black hole was indeed a black swirl. Captain Krill exchanged a triumphant high-flipper with Rocky.
They started folding up the map again. It proved a lot harder than unfolding it.
“Set the coordinates, Rocky,” panted Captain Krill, as he tucked the crumpled map back under the pilot’s chair some twenty minutes later. “There isn’t another moment to lose!”
Rocky set the Tunafish to full cruising speed. With its brand-new thrusters, tail fin and booster engines, the fish-shaped ship was soon tearing through space like its gills were on fire.
Fuzz served up his cosmic cod cupcakes for tea and Splash finally set to work on ICEcube’s speech-converter chip.
Captain Krill gazed out of the windscreen, thinking about the five hundred helpless passengers aboard the Superduper Startrooper and humming the chorus to “Starstruck”.
He loved a good rescue mission.
Five hours and one unexpected asteroid belt later, the Tunafish drifted to a halt in a wide stretch of deep black space.
“We’re here, Captain,” said Rocky. He brushed his eyebrows out of his eyes. “At least, I think we are. We’d better check that map thing again.”
“Is ICEcube fixed?” Captain Krill asked Splash hopefully.
Splash wiped his forehead. “Yes, Captain. Give it a go.”
“ICEcube?” said Captain Krill. “This is your Captain speaking. We need to know about an asteroid belt in section V.”
“Kore wa kinkyū jitaidearu,” said ICEcube.
“Sorry,” said Splash, waddling over to ICEcube with his spanner. “I must have fitted a Japanese speech-converter chip by mistake. Give me another half hour and we’ll be sorted.”
“You’ll have to do that later, Splash,” the Captain sighed. “We need your help to unfold the map again.”
Even with everyone helping, it took fifteen minutes to unfold the map.
“Ah!” Rocky stabbed at the map with his flipper. “There is an asteroid belt, but it’s a lot closer to the black hole than I was expecting.”
“Does that mean we’re a lot closer to the black hole than you were expecting as well?” Splash checked.
“Yup,” said Rocky.
“Cool conga eels!” said Fuzz. “Black holes don’t scare ME.”
The penguins peered out of the windscreen. Starlight seemed to curve around a big expanse of nothing directly in front of the Tunafish. The black hole was there all right, silent and deadly and very, very dark.
“Black holes should scare you, Fuzz,” said Captain Krill. “The pull of gravity from a black hole is so strong that it crushes everything it touches. Even penguins.”
“Not this penguin,” said Fuzz. “Who wants the last cosmic cod cupcake?”
No one was hungry. Fuzz popped it in his beak. Splash went back to fixing ICEcube’s voice chip.
A familiar-looking long, sharky spacecraft was floating a little way ahead of them.
“That must be the Superduper Startrooper,” said Rocky.
“Have we had another message in the past five and a half hours, Rocky?” asked the Captain.
Rocky shook his head, making his eyebrows flap. “Not a winkle, Captain. I’ll try them again if you like.” He leaned towards the intercom. “Superduper Startrooper, this is the Tunafish. Does anyone read me?”
There was no answer.
Captain Krill studied the immense spacecraft through the windscreen. “Poor souls,” he said. “A mutinous crew turning against its Captain and taking over a spaceship is a terrible thing. Haddock knows what they have done with the passengers.”
“Do you think we’re too late?” said Fuzz.
Splash eyed the black hole. “Maybe we should go home.”
Captain Krill frowned. “The Space Penguins have never left a rescue mission uncompleted.” He pointed through the windscreen with one flipper. “There’s a docking pod underneath the Superduper Startrooper’s belly. We’ll board her that way. Everyone must put on their spacesuits. Oh, and take a weapon.” He paused, then added grimly, “We don’t know what we’re going to find.”
Rocky docked the Tunafish beneath the Superduper Startrooper. The penguins put on their suits and grabbed their weapons.
Splash twisted one last screw on ICEcube’s casing and patted the computer. “See you later, calculator,” he said.
“Warning!” ICEcube said, in English this time. “You are taking meganesium aboard the Superduper Startrooper. I repeat—”
But the airlock had already clicked shut.
Stepping aboard the Superduper Startrooper felt like stepping inside a luxur
iously carpeted cloud. Apart from the low hum of the cruiseliner’s thrusters, the ship was silent.
The Space Penguins clanked up the narrow flight of spiral stairs that led from the docking pod. Fuzz led the way, his belt bristling with stun guns, pulse pistols and zap-o-blasters.
“Come out, come out, wherever you are!” Fuzz shouted.
“We’re the only ones who can hear you, Fuzz,” said Splash, turning down the volume on his helmet.
“And this isn’t hide-and-beak,” said Rocky, his flippers wrapped tightly around his bazooka blammer. “There are dangerous mutineers on board.”
“COME OUT, WHEREVER YOU ARE!” Fuzz shouted, even louder.
The lights suddenly went off. Ghostly back-up lights flickered on, casting greenish shadows. The low hum of the cruiseliner’s thrusters spluttered and died. Now it really was quiet.
The last time Captain Krill had felt a prickling sensation like this, he had just stepped on a sea urchin. There was something creepy about this ship. He didn’t like it one bit.
At the top of the stairs was a long corridor, stretching from left to right. It turned sharply at the corners, so the penguins couldn’t see what lay ahead in either direction.
“We need to find the flight deck and start the thrusters again,” said Splash, looking around. “Or we’ll drift into the black hole.”
The penguins tried to remember the layout of the Superduper Startrooper from Fuzz’s annual.
“The docking pod was directly underneath the ship’s belly,” said Captain Krill thoughtfully. “So we must be in the middle of the ship. If I remember rightly, the Superduper Startrooper’s flight deck is aft.”
“Who’s daft?” said Fuzz.
“Aft means the back of the ship,” the Captain explained. He looked at the corridor. “Those spiral stairs have confused me. Is aft left or right?”
“Left,” said Fuzz and Splash.
“Definitely right,” said Rocky. “I can feel it in my flippers.”