It was heading straight for them.
âCall me crazy, but that looks like the universeâs biggest water bomb!â Kip yelled.
CHAPTER 3
Back on Earth, Kip had seen a water bomb in a museum. It was a small balloon that kids used to fill with water and throw at each other for fun. Of course, in the year 2354, no-one on Earth had water to waste.
MoNaâs system confirmed it. The blobby object was definitely a water bomb. But it was enormous! And the sub-zero temperatures of deep space had completely frozen the water inside. Now the bomb was full of solid ice!
An ice chunk that big would destroy MoNa if they collided.
âDo something, Kip!â Finbar howled, ears flat against his head. Although Finbar had many wolfish qualities, he was still prone to panicking.
There wasnât time to pilot MoNa out of the way. Kip would have to destroy the water bomb â fast! Desperately, Kip flicked through MoNaâs range of guns on his holographic console.
Foam gun⦠No, that was fun, but only really useful for cleaning dirty starships.
Ray gunâ¦That would explode the ice, but the debris would still smash into MoNa.
The emergency light in the bridge turned red. The giant bomb filled MoNaâs windscreen. Finbar covered his eyes with his paws. Kip was almost out of time!
Then suddenly, Kip found just what he needed. MoNaâs SunGuns!
A double-barrelled SunGun was mounted on each side of the starship. As soon as Kip stabbed the âEngage SunGunâ button, the bright yellow guns powered up.Kip squinted through the gunsights and aimed at the giant water bomb.
âCover your ears!â he yelled to Finbar.
SunGun
Then...
KA-BOOOOM!
The SunGuns fired, and in a nanosecond, a wave of 6000-degree heat hit the water bomb.
The water balloon exploded in red, rubbery shreds. Steam hissed everywhere. The SunGuns had melted the ice on impact. The water inside was now boiling hot!
There was a roar as millions of litres of boiling water slammed into MoNa. For a moment, the world went white.
The full force of all that boiling water sent MoNa plunging off-course. Away from the wormhole!
At once, Kip grabbed the controls and switched them from auto-pilot mode. Bashing his holographic steering controls, Kip spun MoNa back towards the wormhole.
âItâs about to close!â yelled Finbar.
The swirling clouds were getting thinner and thinner. The wormhole had shrunk to practically nothing.
âWeâll make it!â said Kip.
With a determined stomp of his space boot, Kip engaged warp speed. MoNa jumped forwards so fast that he almost lost his lunch of powdered pepperoni pizza.
The wormhole sucked them inside like a vacuum cleaner. Kip piloted MoNa safely through until they popped out the other side, where everything was calm.
Kip wiped his sweaty face with the sleeve of his spacesuit. Phew, he thought to himself. Made it .
Ahead of them lay the planet Yufe. Comets streaked across the sky around MoNa. Kip wasnât worried, though. He switched MoNa back to auto-pilot. Her hazard perception systems would detect and avoid the comets.
Kip and Finbar went down to the landing bay. There, MoNa would transport their particles to the surface of Yufe using her Scrambler Beams.
The beams worked by splitting their bodies into tiny particles, sending these through space, and putting them back together on the surface of Yufe.
As Kip ran, his mind ticked over.
Did the aliens on Yufe send that water bomb into space? If they did, there must be a lot of water on their planet. That could mean it had Earth-like conditions.
But why would the aliens be throwing water bombs through wormholes ? thought Kip. Either that was an accident, or theyâre not as friendly as they seemed!
CHAPTER 4
Kip and Finbarâs particles whizzed through space and reformed on the surface of Yufe.
When Kip was in one piece again, he looked around and noticed it was early in the evening. Above them comets shot
Jill Churchill
Michael Lewis
Kage Baker
Stina Leicht
John Kiriakou
Theresa Romain
Jade Lee
H. P. Lovecraft
Rachelle Delaney
Elizabeth Harmon