CHAPTER SIX

Fuzzy Wuzzies Aren’t So Fuzzy

KA-CHUNK! KA-CHUNK! KA-CHUNCK!

“What’s that?” Chooch asked.

“I believe it is the sound of the delivery pod’s auxiliary fan belt coming loose again, which will soon stop cooling the engine and cause the atomic reactor to overheat, then explode,” Clive said, not looking up from his device. “So you may consider locating a replacement part.”

Luno quickly switched on the radar to find a repair shop in the vicinity, but then realized he’d have to use his dad’s cosmic credit account to pay for it. Luno could just hear Dad scolding him for wasting money when he could’ve just fixed the fan belt himself. Luno would have to figure out another way, a way that would show Dad he could deal with something as simple as a busted fan belt and not blow up the pod (or himself). However, it was kind of difficult to come up with a solution with the echo of Chooch’s metal stomach constantly growling and Clive’s litany of annoying questions about absolutely everything around them.

“Hey, look!” Chooch suddenly shouted, pointing out the windshield.

Luno turned to see a massive holo billboard hovering over a lone asteroid in the distance.

 “‘Free Spare Parts’!” Luno read, squinting at the fuzzy letters. “Let’s go!”

“I am afraid that is not what is written on the sign, Mr. Zorgoochi,” said Clive. “It actually reads ‘Mold Spore Convention’ and I strongly suggest we attend.”

“No it doesn’t!” Chooch shouted. “It says ‘Fresh Baked Cookies’ and I’m starving!”

They may have argued about what the sign actually said, but all agreed that they should land on that asteroid immediately.

Luno didn’t have much time to think about how odd it was that each of them read something different, as they were touching down and scrambling to be the first one out of the pod.

“Hello?” Luno called as he swung open the hatch and climbed down to the dusty surface.

Through the greenish haze, Luno spotted a towering structure nearby, which he headed toward with Clive and Chooch trailing behind.

“So where are all the cookies, Luno?” asked Chooch, looking around.

“We must locate the convention center, Mr. Zorgoochi,” said Clive. “We do not want to miss the mold spores.”

It didn’t take Luno very long to figure out that there were no free spare parts, let alone a mold spore convention or cookies. The place had an air of desolation and emptiness. Luno moved forward with a feeling of dread in the pit of his stomach, but knew he had to fix the pod, even if it meant facing mortal danger. Or worse, a disappointed dad.

The closer they came to the strange jury-rigged mess of metal beams, engine parts, and various space junk, the more Luno’s head throbbed. Hovering above was the massive buzzing holo billboard.

“What is this thing?” asked Chooch, touching a metal girder.

“I think it’s a transmitter that beams out the signal for the sign,” Luno said, looking up at the 100-story-tall words “Free Spare Parts” flickering high above them. At least that’s what Luno saw. He rubbed his eyes. His head pounded along with the strange whirring pulse the structure seemed to give off.

“Actually, this somewhat ramshackle assemblage is not only a transmitter,” said Clive, “but a receiver as well.”

In the far-off distance, Luno spotted what appeared to be a small ship and three dark silhouettes. He waved at them through the mist, but they didn’t wave back. Strange.

As they cautiously walked toward the figures, Luno thought that maybe they could help him find a replacement fan belt.

Of course there was always the distinct possibility that they would kill him.

“I’m scared, Luno,” said Chooch, hanging on to Luno’s arm, dragging him down. “I changed my mind. I don’t want cookies anymore. Let’s go!”

“Pardon me,” Clive said, approaching one of the figures. “Can you direct us to the mold spore convention?”

Luno walked up and saw that Clive was talking to an empty space suit.

“I say,” said Clive, “which way to the convention?”

“It’s just a suit, Clive,” said Luno. “There’s no one in it.”

The ship, like the space suits, appeared to have been abandoned for junk a long time ago. Luno walked around to the ship’s engine panel. It opened with a long squeeeak.

“Hey! Just what we needed!” said Luno, yanking out a fan belt and examining it. “I guess there were spare parts after all. What a break!”

As Luno happily hurried back to the delivery pod to replace the part, Clive and Chooch followed him.

“We are going to miss the convention, Mr. Zorgoochi,” said Clive.

“Don’t you get it?” said Luno. “There is no convention!”

Luno climbed to the top of the delivery pod. The ship and the space suits were probably dumped there years ago. The galaxy was full of space trash. And the billboard, well, it was probably just malfunctioning and no one had bothered to fix it. Besides, none of this mattered because he had found a fan belt, so now he could repair the pod and make his next delivery.

But most importantly, his father would be proud of him.

Luno yanked on the pod’s engine panel and thought again about how weird it was that each of them saw something different on the sign, something each of them wanted, almost as if the holo billboard could somehow project their thoughts. But before he came to the conclusion that it was kind of eerie, the panel popped open with a p-twang!

“This’ll just take a few minutes,” Luno’s voice echoed from inside the engine.

Starved for intellectual stimulation, Clive scanned the asteroid’s surface with his device to determine its molecular composition. Starved for cookies, Chooch wandered around looking for some, wondering why anyone would be so mean as to advertise fresh baked cookies when there really weren’t any.

Chooch meandered aimlessly until a small noise caught his attention. It was a bit like a squeak combined with a giggle. He looked around, and out from the craggy ground right below his feet popped a fuzzy little critter.

Squeak! Giggle giggle. Squeak!

It was the cutest thing Chooch had ever seen! The little fuzzy creature looked up at him with saucer eyes and cheerfully squeaked some more. Charmed, Chooch bent down and gently offered his giant metal hand. After giving it a few sniffs, the critter trustingly climbed into his palm.

Chooch held the little fuzz ball and it affectionately rubbed against his cheek, making a sort of purring sound. This got Chooch so excited, he almost started clapping his hands in delight, but remembered he was holding the critter and that would not have been a very good idea. He called Clive over to see his new little friend.

By the time Clive arrived, there were several darling fuzz balls climbing all over Chooch, gently pawing him with their tiny raccoon-like hands and purring loudly, which seemed to summon even more of them from underground.

“Look at all the Fuzzy Wuzzies, Clive!” Chooch said. “That’s the name I just made up for these little guys!”

“Hmmm,” said Clive as he scanned the creatures with his device. “Carbon-based life-form, mammal, most likely sentient, quite possibly intelligent.”

“And they’re cute!” Chooch said, giggling as they nuzzled his face.

“Define ‘cute,’” said Clive as a critter climbed up his leg.

“All set!” Luno said, striding up to Clive and Chooch, now both crawling with the darling downy soft creatures. “What are those?”

“I believe Chooch has named them Fuzzy Wuzzies,” said Clive. “But I have decided to categorize them as Bellus creaturus. I will present a full report of my findings in twenty-four hours, Mr. Zorgoochi.”

Chooch asked, then begged Luno to let him bring a few of them home. He promised he would feed and walk them and Luno wouldn’t have to do a thing. Really!

Luno couldn’t deny they were cute and began to actually consider taking a few home as a critter rubbed against his neck and purred.

“They look hungry!” said Chooch. “What do you think they eat?”

“According to my readings,” said Clive, brushing a critter off his device, “these creatures are the only living organic matter on this entire asteroid, which means there is no sustenance for them here.”

Luno thought this was rather odd as one of them crawled up his leg, which wouldn’t have been so bad, but it was from the inside of his space suit!

As Luno shook his leg to get it out, more critters climbed on the three of them and giggled and squeaked, which seemed to cause even more of them to pour out from the ground. Soon Luno, Chooch, and even Clive were wriggling around giggling, looking like they were wearing living fur coats.

Luno rolled around on the ground to get them off, but then found himself rolling down a hill into a massive crater. He got up, still crawling with them, and saw something very strange.

“Hey, you guys!” Luno shouted. “Look at all these ships—ouch!”

One of the critters nipped him. Covered in creatures, Clive and Chooch lumbered down the hill and saw a vast expanse of abandoned spaceships, some partially disassembled. Luno wondered what they were all doing there. Soon more critters were nipping at him, some actually biting! Ouch!

“Naughty, naughty Fuzzy Wuzzy!” said Chooch, yanking one off his finger. “Ow!”

“Yes,” agreed Clive. “Please refrain from biting me. It causes me to experience what I understand to be a sensation called pain.”

“Yee-ouch!” Luno cried. Several critters bit down hard and it really hurt! “Let’s get out of here!”

As the three of them ran to the pod covered in cute, but increasingly vicious creatures, Luno tripped. He got up and saw what he tripped over: a shredded space suit!

“Help!” Chooch cried. Luno turned to see that he tripped, too, but not over a space suit. It was an alien skeleton!

And it was stripped to the bone.

Luno quickly helped Chooch to his feet and they desperately hurried toward the ship. A steady stream of the adorable little creatures poured out of the ground and were in hot pursuit!

“I have formulated a theory on how the Bellus creaturus, or the more colloquially known Fuzzy Wuzzies, acquire nourishment, Mr. Zorgoochi,” said Clive. “Since there is no actual sustenance on this asteroid, they must attract food to it.”

“Wait a minute—ouch!” said Luno, pulling them off his head. “You mean we’re their food? How?”

“The reason we each perceived something different on the billboard was due to the fact that the structure is both a transmitter and receiver,” Clive calmly explained. “These creatures cleverly constructed a device that received our deepest desires through our brain waves and then transmitted them back to each of us through the sign in order to attract us to this asteroid.”

“So these cute-looking little things actually made that transmitter/receiver harvested from the ships back there?” Luno asked, climbing the delivery pod’s ladder.

“I assume by ‘cute,’” said Clive, peeling a few critters off his glasses, “you mean cunning and bloodthirsty.”

Chooch asked what happened to the pilots of all of those ships, but before Clive could deliver his homicidal hypothesis, Luno cut him off and told them they were all off finding a snack for the Fuzzy Wuzzies.

Luno shook off as many as he could as he climbed up the pod’s ladder, opened the hatch, and jumped in. In a moment his head popped up and he tossed out a few frozen pizzas from the onboard freezer.

Immediately, the critters swarmed off Clive and Chooch and all over the pizzas. They quickly climbed into the pod and Luno slammed the hatch, but had to open it again to toss out one last critter.

Squeak! Giggle giggle. Squeak!

As he fired up the engine, Luno saw that the evil Fuzzy Wuzzies had already consumed the pizzas (and the box) and were turning their hungry attention toward the pod. As they swarmed all over it, the sound of thousands of tiny nibbling teeth echoed as Luno ground the pod into gear and turned on the windshield wiper to brush a few of them off.

“I don’t want to call them Fuzzy Wuzzies anymore,” said Chooch, rubbing his arms and legs. “From now on I’m calling them Bitey Whities.”

No sooner did the pod lift off and the last Fuzzy Wuzzy drop off, laser fire was pinging off the sides of the delivery pod!

P-twang! P-twing!

Luno looked in the rearview screen.

“Quantum delivery ships at six o’clock!” Luno shouted, dodging their fire.

“I believe you are incorrect, Mr. Zorgoochi,” Clive said.

“Yeah!” said Chooch, pointing at the control panel clock. “It’s only three o’clock!”

Using every bit of his driving skills, Luno evaded Quantum’s fire; spinning, turning, loop-the-looping, zigzagging. He’d never driven like this before, but somehow at this very moment he just knew how. It was a lot like playing his favorite electro game, Asteroid Dodger, except he couldn’t pause it to go to the bathroom and if he blew himself up, he couldn’t just start over again. He’d be dead.

“Quantum Pizza is quite ruthless,” said Clive.

“Yeah,” shouted Chooch from underneath the control panel. “They don’t have Ruth! Whoever she is.”

Luno knew Clive was right. Quantum wasn’t going to give up, but what could he do?

He had no weapons.

No ideas.

And no choice.

Luno did the only thing he could think of: hide in the asteroid belt dead ahead. Maybe the Quantum ships would be satisfied they ran him off the main spaceway and go back to their deliveries.

Luno gritted his teeth, slammed his foot down on the accelerator, and aimed the pod toward the relative safety of the dangerous mass of deadly sharp-pointed floating asteroids.

Then he looked in the rearview.

They were still chasing him.

It was hard enough driving at top speed dodging massive rocks and laser fire, but it was that much harder with Chooch blubbering buckets of tears and muttering, “There are several emergency exits on this aircraft. Please take a few moments now to locate your nearest exit…”

Drawing on the many hours he had clocked playing Asteroid Dodger, Luno zipped through the maze of planetoids and, much to his surprise, didn’t kill himself. If his mother could see him now, she’d never complain about him playing electro games ever again!

After gaining a considerable lead, Luno managed to hide the pod in the center of a cluster of asteroids and land on one. The Quantum ships passed overhead a few moments later, buzzing around like angry space hornets looking for him.

As they sat parked on one of the asteroids among the giant rocks, Luno held his breath and he held his hand over Chooch’s mouth to keep him quiet. Clive, on the other hand, was entirely unaware of the life and death situation they were in and calmly pecked away at his device.

It felt like an eternity, but the Quantum ships eventually gave up and returned to the main spaceway.

Whew.