All right, out you go! Bananas for everyone!” Patrick Gravy opened the cage doors and the monkeys scrambled out. “Not that you deserve them, filthy monsters…”

Rufus tugged on Dexter’s hand, but he resisted and stayed in the cage.

“Earthers too,” Patrick said, stepping over to Dexter’s cage with a happy sneer. He was clutching a small bat, which he tapped on the edge of the cage. “Don’t make me get nasty.”

Dexter wondered what Patrick’s nasty side could possibly look like, considering how rotten his good side had been, but he decided not to test him to find out. He stepped out of the cage, his body sore from the cramped quarters and from holding Rufus. He had trouble sleeping the night before. Not only were the quarters tiny and dank, but every few minutes a muffled bang outside shook his cage and woke him up.

He had spent some time trying to figure out how he had possibly ended up held captive in a cage by strange soldiers, but he could not begin to make sense of it. He wondered if Sarah and Jacob were trying to rescue him or if they even knew where he was. But there was really only one conclusion to be reached: He had to escape.

Patrick and a heavily armed soldier marched the monkeys out of the bunker and into a small forest, which was surrounded by a high fence covered with several different types of barbed wire. Dexter saw some sparks emitting from the fence and figured it must be electrified. The planet’s sun was shining very brightly and intensely, and the trees looked like pine trees on Earth, though they had broad orange leaves. Dexter saw a flash out of the corner of his eye and then barely ducked in time as a huge buzzing insect the size of a small bird nearly collided with his head. It looked like an overgrown dragonfly, and Dexter could have sworn it licked its insect lips as it passed.

“What was that?!” he shouted.

“Knifefly,” Patrick said. “Watch out for those, they’ll make you bleed for sure.” He sounded quite pleased by the idea. “’Course, we officers have knifefly repellant.”

“Where are we?” Dexter asked.

Patrick laughed, which Dexter thought sounded like a taxicab honking. He elbowed a soldier next to him. “Get a load of this, Madrigal. Dirty Earther doesn’t know where we are.”

“Pathetic, sir,” Madrigal said.

“I’d like to get back to my friends,” Dexter said quietly. “Isn’t this kidnapping? Isn’t it against the law? I mean, I met the king and he didn’t seem like the type to—”

Patrick stuck a stubby finger into Dexter’s chest. “The king’s just about finished, Earther, and he’s not going to protect your stupid planet anymore. You’d do well to avoid mentioning his name around here, because as soon as he’s elected, Mick Cracken is going to—”

Madrigal cleared his throat, and said, “Sir… Your father said not to mention…”

“Yeah, yeah.” Patrick waved Madrigal away and pressed his lips together, his face turning redder than it already was. He pushed Dexter toward the forest. “Time for your bananas.”

Dexter decided he’d rather spend time with space monkeys than with Patrick Gravy and walked through the gate in the direction of the racket the chimps were making. He could see them in the distance, swinging around in the trees and eating bananas. Patrick slammed the gate behind him.

Dexter was completely unsurprised to hear Patrick say the name Mick Cracken. He had already suspected that Mick was somehow behind the entire ordeal. Kidnapping Dexter with space monkeys probably wasn’t even the most nefarious thing Mick Cracken had done that day. But even though Dexter had a strong feeling that Mick was behind it, it didn’t help the more pressing matter of how Dexter was going to…

“Psst…”

Dexter heard a noise from the bushes, and he looked around for a stick in case one of Patrick’s goons was about to attack him.

“Pssssst…” he heard again. He saw big figures hiding in the bush, and he thought they looked quite familiar.

“It’s Officers Bosendorfer and Erard,” Officer Bosendorfer whispered loudly. “We’re here to rescue you.”

“And hurry up, because we’re tired of eating bananas,” Officer Erard added.

Dexter crept over to the bush, and he could see that Officers Bosendorfer and Erard were dressed in camouflage and had even taped foliage to their helmets. They clearly had thought they would blend in, but their pink skin gave them away. Their large bodies were heaving in the heat, and there was a massive pile of banana peels nearby.

“Right,” Officer Erard said. “Now then. Let’s get out of here. We’re under strict orders to return you to Candidate Wonderbar.”

“You talked to Jacob? Where is he?”

“I say,” Officer Bosendorfer said, looking at his watch. “It’s almost time for their blasted—”

Dexter was thrown to the ground by a shockwave and deafened by the sound of a massive explosion. The monkeys screeched nervously in the trees, and Dexter saw a fireball rise from the field nearby. He heard hearty cheering, and Patrick’s distinctive high voice yelling, “That one was awesome!”

“What was that?!” Dexter asked.

“Morning missile,” Officer Bosendorfer said. “They don’t like to go more than a few parcelticks without setting one off. They’re a bunch of crazy goons, and if I had my way we’d lock up the whole lot of them on Planet Clink.”

Dexter stood up carefully. Between knifeflies, missile explosions, and surly kid soldiers, he wasn’t sure what he should fear the most. He was terrifically relieved that the officers had come to rescue him, even if he felt a stab of disappointment that Jacob and Sarah hadn’t come with them.

The officers turned and walked toward their police cruiser, which was hovering a short distance away, covered with twigs and sticks.

Dexter turned back and saw Rufus rolling through some leaves, throwing a banana up and down to himself and having a great time, and his heart sank. If he left Rufus behind, he knew the monkeys would be locked back up in a cage and forced to go kidnap whoever Patrick’s crew decided needed kidnapping that day. He didn’t know the space monkeys very well, but it didn’t seem like a very noble life, and they didn’t seem to like Patrick and General Gravy very much.

“Hang on,” he called out to the officers. “We have to take the monkeys.”

“Allergic,” Officer Bosendorfer said quickly. “Terrible allergy. Can’t think when I’m around them. I go blind.”

“My mother was killed by a rogue band of space monkeys,” Officer Erard said. “I have never forgiven them.”

Officer Bosendorfer covered his mouth in panic. “Your mother is dead? When did this happen?! She sent me a lovely Astralday card just last week and…”

Officer Erard gave him a stern nudge, and Officer Bosendorfer’s eyes widened in understanding. He turned to Dexter and said, “It was an unspeakable tragedy. Such a wonderful woman.”

Dexter heard a distant “tweep” followed by a loud crack nearby. A small fire and some smoke rose out of the tree next to him.

“Intruders!” he heard Patrick shout. Dexter turned just in time to see Patrick take a shot at him with his blaster.

Dexter dove behind a tree nearby. Officers Bosen-dorfer and Erard gave each other a nod and then scrambled for their ship. He saw Boris up in the branches nearby, hissing at Patrick and Madrigal.

“Boris!” he shouted. “Millions and millions of bananas.”

Boris stared intently at Dexter and he knew he had his attention. He pointed at the officers’ space cruiser. “Banana now! Banana now!”

Boris screeched, and the monkeys started scrambling for the space cruiser. Dexter followed behind them, looking over his shoulder in time to see Patrick readying another shot. Dexter dove to the ground and heard a crack where his head had just been. He scrambled on board.

“Let’s get out of here!”

He ran up to the cockpit. Officer Bosendorfer was trying to take off while Rufus sat happily on his shoulders.

Officer Erard stared at a piece of plastic, and muttered, “Pick up… pick up…” He shook his head and set it down. “Jacob Wonderbar has his Telly turned off, and the spaceship Lucy says he’s not on board and good riddance.”

“Where should we take these beasts?” Officer Bosendorfer said. He was frantically checking monitors.

Dexter felt a shove from behind. He turned around to see Boris, with his hand outstretched. They didn’t have translation software aboard, but Dexter was certain what the voice would have said. “Banana now.”

Dexter tried to think about where he could go to quickly get the monkeys some bananas before they completely destroyed the inside of the cruiser. It would take too long to get back through the space kapow detour, and he knew there were no bananas on Numonia or Planet Archimedes, so that left… Dexter smiled. He knew exactly where they should go.

“Planet Royale.”