Akiko on the Planet Smoo (5 page)

We said goodbye
to King Froptoppit and made our way down through the palace to a kind of parking garage for spaceships. It was filled with dozens of little round ships just like the one Bip and Bop had used to bring me to Smoo. Mr. Beeba was carrying a large bag along with him, groaning and panting under its enormous weight.

“Do you want me to help you with that, Mr. Beeba?” I asked.

“No, no, Akiko. I've got it, thank you,” he replied, dropping it to the ground and pushing it from behind. “On second thought, yes, Akiko. I probably
could
use a hand here.”

I lifted one end of it while he took the other, and we carried it the last hundred yards or so together.

“What's
in
this thing, anyway?” I asked.

“Why, books, of course, Akiko,” he replied as if the question didn't even need to be asked. “Can't go
anywhere
without books.”

“Are they books about rescuing people?” I asked.

“Rescuing people?” he replied with a blank expression.

“Yes,” I answered. “I mean, we
are
supposed to be—”

“Oh,
rescuing
people!” he interrupted. “Yes, of course, I see what you're getting at. No, I'm afraid I haven't
got
any books about rescuing people. These books are mainly just for my pleasure reading, you see. There are a number of useful
maps,
however. . . .”

“But you said a minute ago that you'd read a
lot
of books about rescuing people!”

“Yes, well, I can see where you might have gotten that impression, Akiko,” he replied with a certain amount of embarrassment. “The fact is, books written on the subject of rescuing people are in rather short supply here on Smoo.”

“Short supply?”

“That is to say,” he continued hesitantly, “there aren't any at all. What I meant was that if there
were
such books and I had them in my library, I'd have certainly gotten around to reading them by now.”

“I can't
believe
this,” I said, starting to feel kind of panicky again.

“But, Akiko, the whole reason we've brought you here is because of your
expertise
in rescuing people,” he said, eyeing me suspiciously. “Surely there's nothing written on the subject that you don't already know.”

“Yeah,” I answered, trying my best to sound confident. “Sure. I mean . . . when it comes to rescuing people, books are, um, you know, no substitute for real experience.”

“Undoubtedly,” Mr. Beeba replied. He didn't look entirely convinced.

Finally we arrived at the ship we were going to use and hoisted the bag into its trunk. Mr. Beeba invited me to sit in the backseat while he got behind the wheel in front. Poog, who didn't need a seat, just floated along beside us.

After we were both settled in, Mr. Beeba fired up the engines and carefully steered the little ship through a huge opening in the wall. I looked over the edge and caught a dizzying glimpse of the lower portions of the palace, which stretched hundreds of feet to the ground. Before long we emerged from the towers and flags and glided out over the desertlike surface of Smoo. Mountains and boulders of all sizes zoomed by on either side of us as we made our way through valleys and canyons and across wide open plains.

I really had no idea where they were taking me, but I figured it would look pretty unprofessional to start asking a lot of questions. After all, Mr. Beeba obviously still thought I was some kind of rescue expert, and I didn't want him to lose confidence in me. He looked pretty nervous as it was.

Suddenly there was a burst of high-pitched noise near one of my ears. For a second I thought I was being attacked by some sort of insect. Then I realized it was Poog talking to me in his weird warbly language. Needless to say, I didn't understand a single word.

“Poog says to plug your nose, Akiko,” Mr. Beeba explained. “The man we're going to visit raises Bropka lizards for a living. They are among the most foul-smelling creatures on the planet.”

He paused a moment, then added, “In fact, Spuckler himself is not exactly a treat for the nose. He really should bathe more often than he does.”

I slumped down in the seat and hoped he was just exaggerating.

Before long we
flew over a big wooden shacklike building way out in the middle of nowhere. It looked like it had been built one room at a time, hammered together from pieces of scrap wood, with no plan or blueprint. The rickety structure was surrounded on all sides by hundreds of really strange-looking two-headed lizards, most of which were lazily wandering from one patch of grass to another. Fortunately they weren't very scary looking. They actually seemed like very peaceful creatures, content to just stand there and graze like a bunch of cows. Poog was right about the smell, though. They were just about the stinkiest animals I'd ever caught a whiff of! I took Poog's advice and gave my nose a good plugging.

Mr. Beeba brought the ship in for a landing, sending half a dozen or so lizards scattering in all directions. I looked up and saw a man sitting on a rock, feeding the lizards right from his hands.

The first thing I noticed was his hair, which looked like it had never been anywhere near a comb in the man's entire life. It was a very deep blue color, almost black, and it sprang from his head in curvy spikes like the top of a pineapple. His unshaven face was long and very narrow, and he smiled at me with big white teeth, as if I were already an old friend. The one other thing I couldn't help noticing about him was that he had a peg leg instead of a left foot. But as he jumped up and ran to meet us, I realized that his little handicap didn't slow him down a bit.

“Akiko, this is Spuckler Boach,” said Mr. Beeba, sounding like he was apologizing for something.

“Nice to meet you, Mr. Boach.”

“Mr. Boach?” he called out with a laugh. “I ain't never heard no one call me
that
before. Please, jus' call me Spuckler.” He grabbed my hand and gave it a few good shakes.

“Don't break the young lady's wrist, Spuckler,” Mr. Beeba said with a scowl. “She's come a very long way to help us, you know.”

“Yeah, I heard all about ya, li'l girl,” he said, still grinning. “Sounds like you done a whole buncha rescuin' in your time.”

“Well, um . . . ,” I began, feeling Mr. Beeba eyeing me suspiciously, “I've rescued a few people here and
there
, yes.”

“How's about you two join me for a little bite to eat?” Spuckler said, taking me by the arm. “I'm fixin' up some Bropka steaks that'll make you wanna live here
permanent
.”

“Gee, I don't know. . . .”

“Spuckler, I'm afraid we haven't time for your culinary escapades right now,” Mr. Beeba interrupted, much to my relief. “As you will recall, King Froptoppit has entrusted us with a very important mission.”

“Oh yeah,” Spuckler said, a more serious expression coming over his face. “
Alia Rellapor
.”

The name alone was already starting to scare me. Still, it was good to know that a tough-looking guy like Spuckler would be coming along. He looked like he'd been in a lot of fights. Actually, he looked like he'd
lost
a lot of fights. But at least I could tell he wasn't scared of Alia Rellapor.

“Hang on, then,” Spuckler said, trotting off to the rickety wooden building. “I'll get Gax.”

“Gax is Spuckler's robot,” Mr. Beeba explained in a whisper. “Now, don't expect anything too sleek and streamlined. Otherwise you'll be
sorely
disappointed.”

When Spuckler returned, he was followed by a clunky, squeaky, rusty machine that was every bit as messy looking as Spuckler himself. This robot moved around on four wheels like a child's wagon. He had no arms, and his whole body was like a big round garbage can, filled to the rim with all kinds of pipes and empty cans and other junk. His head was perched on the top of a long spindly neck, which twisted from side to side like a crooked old stick. And his face, if I can call it that, was nothing but two mechanical eyes attached to a box, with no mouth of any kind.

“
IT IS A PLEASURE TO MEET YOU, MA'AM
,” he said in a low-pitched voice that sounded kind of like a worn-down answering machine. “
DO LET ME KNOW IF I CAN BE OF ANY ASSISTANCE.
”

“Polite, ain't he?” Spuckler said, as if it were some sort of defect. “He's programmed that way.”

“It's nice to meet
you
, Gax,” I said, leaning over to get a better look at him. He was covered with dents and marks and scratches, as if he'd taken just as much punishment over the years as his master had.

“Well, that's it, Akiko,” Mr. Beeba said, directing all of us to the spaceship. “You've met everyone in the rescue party. Now let's get going.”

Even though I was supposed to be in charge of the mission, you could tell that Mr. Beeba was kind of taking over for me. I think he'd already guessed that I wasn't the rescue expert I was supposed to be. Which was fine by me, of course. I was perfectly happy to sit in the back and let the others be in charge.