| Just then, a strange looking man with birds standing or hanging all over his body appeared in the fifth seat at the table. "Ew, who are you? Get those things away from the table!" blurted Kim nervously. "I am Relgeiz," said the stranger, "and I have some information that might interest you." "Didn't you see the sign outside the door?" asked Kim, pulling up an image from her photographic memory and telepathically imposing it on Relgeiz. It was a sign that read "NO SOLICITING". "But I am here to sell nothing!" he responded with an unusual accent. "I said I have information that you want, I mean to give it to you." "Well come on then, out with it! The sooner you say it the sooner you can leave us alone!" "All right, all right, don't rush me!" He paused to collect his thoughts. "It's everything." "What? Make sense you strange little man!" "It's everything there is to know." He paused for dramatic effect, "Ultimate Knowledge." A hush fell over the table, and Willie turned bright blue with keen interest. Rox even stopped his nearly successful effort to stuff a melon through his gills. Jack was the first to speak, "everyone always thinks I'm just the 'dumb jock,' maybe if I knew everything, I'd get a little more respect." "If I knew everything, I could figure out how to keep people from pushing me around all the time," said Willie hopefully. "I could be the most powerful being in the galaxy!" Kim said, and rubbed her hands together expectantly. "Doesn't fit," said Rox, who had resumed his futile effort with the melon. "We should take Rox along," Willie proposed, "These quest things are usually better with four people." "Well who says I'm not going with you?" remarked Relgeiz, sounding offended. "Well, I just thought that was how these things worked, the mysterious person shows up and gives us the information, and then tells us how to get it, then he disappears and we never hear from him again. Do you want to go with us?" Willie turned a dark purple and sounded ashamed. "No, not really, I'm just tired of being stereotyped. Did you know I started of 5 quests this week and wasn't invited along on one of them?" "Oh, how sad for you," Jack said, sounding positively depressed. "No, it's alright, I'm used to it. Well, I might as well get on to the part where I tell you where it is and what you have to do so I can disappear and go start a group of mice on a quest for The Big Cheese." "Well, stop stalling and tell us," Kim was growing tired of this conversation, she wanted Ultimate Knowledge. "Okay, okay! I'll tell you!" Kim was telepathically imposing immense fear on Relgeiz. "it's in the Pi system, on the fourth planet, but beware the vile Nailliv!" And with that he was gone. "How did he do that?" Jack wondered. "I need to learn that trick," Willie mused. "I knew he was going to do that, I read his mind," Kim said, ruefully. "Doesn't fit!" Rox said again. Kim looked even more annoyed as she took the melon from Rox, cut it into small slices, and stuffed them in his mouth, "Shut up you simpleton, you know you're only here because there's a four character minimum requirement on this paper!" "Take it easy Kim, this shouldn't take long," Jack said, trying to soothe the very surprised Rox. "Yeah," Willie confirmed, "We're in the Ph system now, the Pi system is only a page turn away." "Well then, let's go and get this over with," said Kim as her body stood up and started to walk away. "Jack, are you going to move?" "Yes sis, whatever you say," Jack stood and threw a longing glance at the four squignot eyebrows still sitting on his plate. He turned and followed Kim's body. Willie stretched out a gooey pseudo-arm and grabbed Rox, dragging him away from the table. "Funny," he said, "I always thought a quest would start with something more cryptic, and be farther away." A few minutes later, the unusual quartet was on board Jack's ship, the Saint Parisian. It acted a little sluggish on liftoff, because of the weight of Rox, but once in space there were no troubles. With a flash, and a moment of darkness, and another flash, the ship had passed through hyperspace and back into normal space above Pi 4. They landed, and searched for several minutes and found nothing. Suddenly they heard a large booming voice, "I am the Nailliv! Bow before me!" Jack started to kneel, Rox tried to figure out (not very successfully) what bow meant, Willie tried to decide what looked most like a bow for a ball of goo, and all three were terrified. Kim did not look terrified, in fact, she looked amused. Her body made no move to bow, and she held her head high on Jack's shoulder. "Why?" she asked calmly. "Why?" mused the Nailliv. "Why?" repeated Kim. "Because, well, because I said to!" "And who are you that we should do what you tell us?" "I'm the Nailliv! Honestly I thought you were supposed to be the smart one!" "And what will you do to me if I don't bow?" "Well," he was stumped, "well, nothing really, I suppose, I just thought it'd be nice to have people bow before me once in a while." "Where might we find Ultimate Knowledge?" "Ulti-what?" He sounded confused, "Oh that," he paused, "That's on Pi 3, this is Pi 4." Willie had, by this time, stopped trying to bow, and explained to Rox that he needn't worry what it meant, and he said, "but Relgeiz told us it was on the fourth planet in the Pi system!" "And so it is," said the Nailliv, "That's Pi 3, some idiot decided that we should number the planets in this system starting with 0, so here you are, above the wrong planet." "Oh," said Jack, who had dusted the dirt off of his knees, "Well, I guess we'll be off then." "Well, alright, if you're sure you won't stay for tea." "No," barked Kim, "We've wasted enough time, I want Ultimate Knowledge now!" With that, her body was off again to Jack's ship, and the others soon followed. Another sluggish takeoff, and another hyperspace jump, and they found themselves above Pi 3, the fourth planet in the Pi system. Jack prepared to land, but Willie stopped him, "look out the window!" he said with awe, "It's the secret to Ultimate Knowledge!" All looked out the window, even Rox, though he couldn't read, and on the planet below, in huge letters was written, SECRET TO ULTIMATE KNOWLEDGE: ASK QUESTIONS AND GET ANSWERS, THE MORE YOU ASK, THE MORE YOU KNOW. Kim was too angry to speak, Rox didn't understand, Jack was in awe, and Willie, who had recovered from the shock, said, "Well, that was disappointing, wasn't it?"Back Home |