Escape From Planet Grail

“Escape From Planet Grail” is one of the outstanding stories of the first biannual International Short Story Contest 2018 written by Shourya Vardhan, RA International School, Bonny Island, Nigeria.

Escape From Planet Grail

It was a dark, sullen night on Planet Grail. The dusty winds blew from the east, bringing miliocells along the already soiled air. Down, on the ground, were a billion slaves working in the mega factories. No one had bathed in years; they ate off Dair (a rodent type organism) skulls and did not know four times three, but they knew their ID number. This here was Stirlit, one of the biggest mixtures of factories joined into a Factoropolis. It was the biggest income area for the Space trade on the planet, producing 900 trillion x-coins per second! But on one very faithful day -- two people — Drian & Uralsk (his sidekick) planned to break out. Unlike many people, they knew stuff. A lot of it.

“See those security cameras over there, Uralsk; those are inter-linked together to know exactly where you are with intelligent AI.” Drian (a tall Gralian) spoke in Untutu (their language). ‘So how exactly are we going to circumvent those?’ Uralsk (short with a wrinkled face) replied. ‘Learn, my friend, use the slave way to merge into the Invisi-factories to then become invisible with no trace on these cameras, simple.’

Halfway to their destination they stopped for a mini break in one of the tiny little overcrowded places of free ground that was always occupied by so many slaves in it. ‘Hey, you filthy one, over here,’ a guard said, pointing at Uralsk. ‘Y-yes, sir?’ Uralsk replied fearfully to the guard.

‘What’s your ID?’

‘2418a, sir’

Uralsk said (knowing that this was an Invisi-factory ID, and fully sure the guard wouldn’t suspect such ‘dumb creatures’). ‘Fine, get a move on then; you’re not allowed to stay here more than 5 minutes to rest.’ The guard replied with absolute spurn. So off they went happily to the Invisi-factories; they had to free the planet of its slave misery.

After about 4 days of traveling and living off of moldtrentices (kind of mushroom) they reached it, the Invisi-factoriesTM. ‘I have never seen this before!’ Exclaimed Uralsk in excitement as they saw the huge mass of urban machinery before them. ‘But we still need to get the ID card from the workers to get inside, don’t we’ Drian said.

‘Oh yeah.’

That moment several things happened; Drian pick pocketed a passerby, a laser shot somewhere near them; creating a lot of commotion, both Uralsk and Drian exploded with adrenaline and tore towards the entrance, displayed the ID and went inside. With hearts pounding out of their chests they brisk walked to the collection system.

They reached there rapidly, snuck up 3 cans of InvisilatorsTM (just in case) and snuck out as swiftly as they came in. Outside they devised a plan. ‘The headquarters are on Island Resrafliciti are heavily fortified, we must reach there with underwater submersibles and then exterminate Ralg --the leader-- out from behind.’ Drian said to Uralsk. ‘It sometime baffles me how you now this stuff,’ Uralsk asked in puzzlement.

After pilfering the submersible down Craigan beach and heading off to Resrafliciti (which took about 20 hours). Down the beach they were met by many defences of guards waiting for them. They both knew that the guards were mind controlled by Ralg. ‘Ah, let us go undercover Uralsk,’ Drian said to his friend and they both jugged the can full of emerald slimy stuff. Soon they were invisible from the guards and progressed towards the huge Horcaste of Zenzoblath.

After arriving at the entrance, Uralsk took out his Meltra Sonic RPG—yes it is invisible too-- to annihilate the door but Drian commanded to take the weapon down and take out an Air Pressure Ear Splitting Pistol (APESP) instead. After all the guards were silently taken down, they moved in to the main room of controlling.

There were no guards inside; perhaps they thought guarding the door was enough. They moved like the wind and entered the one and only…Mega Control Room. Inside was the one person they didn’t want. Ralg.

‘So you guys thought you could get away and free everyone, but sorry this little dream of yours is about to get smashed.’ And Ralg prepared to step on Drian, but Uralsk was too quick for him. He pulled out his Meltra Sonic RPG and blasted Ralg off his feet, merely missing Drian. They had done it, and now Uralsk pulled the MEGA-BEGA-turn-off lever and it had been done. Everyone was free.