ZOGS! (c) 1989 N.D.Davies
The everyday story of a race of poeple who open tins with laser pistols.


CHAPTER TWO: Freightal Error.
=============================

  The massive space cruiser powered towards the idyllic green planet with it's
mighty engines rumbling ever so loudly. [ RUMBLE ]
  In space, no one can hear a damn thing due to the inconsiderate law of nature
asserting the inability of sound to travel in a vacuum. So how can you hear the
engines then? you ask.
  Hah ! Easy !
1: We here at the Zogs! radio sound effects department have spared no expense
and have installed an Omnicorp etheral remote microphone in the engine room of
the Nosferatum ( for that is the name of the vesel in question ) to give you
the full stereo effect.
2: Silence is boring. You can't see the cruiser so we bring you effects !
[ RUMBLE, RUMBLE, RUMBLE  Thhhrrrzz  kup kup crrrchhhht  spattt ........ ]
Shit!

Errm...
3: The Nosferatum has such powerful engines that during the last few seconds it
has moved so far away that you wouldn't be able to hear it anyway. Yes! That's
it!

  The Nosferatum is not a Biopharm deep space probe. i.e. it is on official
urgent company business and is thus equiped with really powerful engines, but
you already knew that didn't you? It is delivering the company president's
brand new luxury model road cruiser to his home.
  The less urgent deliveries in the hold are 5000 gross of designer bullets
from the planet France due for the Biopharm trouble-planet colonisation
operatives - whose official recruiting slogan is 'Colonisation with concern'.
  Amazingly enough, these colonisation operatives always seem to land on
completely unpopulated worlds and they always appear to prepare a planet for
the arrival of pioneers by half erecting thousands of houses and setting fire
to them - at least this is what the colonisation operatives insist happens, and
nobody really wants to argue with them.

  Not neccessarily any less urgent, but definately less official, is the final
delivery. This is a large enviro-crate containing the latest 'genetic anomoly'
from the Biopharm zoological genetic research laboratories.
  Over the 35 years they have been in operation the laboratories have not
produced one single worthwhile genetic product, but boy have they had their
share of mistakes.
  Previous 'genetic anomalies' had been dealt with on site but these days the
labs are attracting quite a bit of attention - much more, in fact, than the
colonisation operatives are - primarily because lab assistants are much less
prone to shoot investigative journalists than colonisation operatives are.
  Even the hoard of company legal geniuses had run out of legal loop holes and
the court of creature rights had said that if any evidence of the destruction
of life forms was found anywhere near the labs, they would be closed down.
  Which is when some enterprising company clerk at the research filing section
hit upon the idea of dumping future 'anomalies' on the planet Testra - because
he thought that nobody much ever goes to Testra and because he knew for certain
that no one had ever come back.

  Arnold Bartle is the name of the freight manager at the research labs. Arnold
was many things. Amongst these things he was slightly succeptible to bribes -
which is why zoological offcast G-Five was in the hold of the Nosferatum.
  In addition to this, he thought he was a comedian - which is why the French
bullet cases were labelled 'Ammeau'.
  He was also too lazy to write zoological offcast G-Five on his docket, so he
scrawled 'ZOG5' instead.
  Most of all, he was nearly illiterate - which is why the enviro-crate had the
word 'ZOGS' emblazened on it in large red letters.

  Where were we ?, Oh yes, forward to the other side of the quadrant!
The Nosferatum drew close to Testra. As instructed, captain Fenton opened the
cargo bay doors and hit the jettison button.
  This he did with zeal aplenty, for life as a freight ship captain is
uneventful to say the least, mainly due to advanced-comprehensive, user
friendly autopilots.
  Once the autopilot was set, there was no stopping it, but it would tell you
that no course change was possible in THE most friendly of voices. It's not
exactly what you need to hear when your ship is up for a head on collision with
an incoming comet which is "..not on the navigation database for this sector.",
but it must have seemed like a good idea at the time.
  Ultracorp have never since released another product anywhere near as lethal
as the comprehensive autopilot. The reason is that talent like the guy who
invented it is immediately spotted and promoted to a job at head office -
Omnicorp.
  " The course is clear. Have a nice day. Bong! " are the last words that many
a captain ever heard.
  Thus, one of the chief pastimes of frieght ship captains was: let's find a
new way to shut the autopilot up. Yep, life as a cargo captain was, in fact,
downright boring.
  Fenton even watched the crates fall down to the planet surface in graceful
arcs with their pretty, flame red vapour trails stretching behind them. Then
the autopilot said "Mmff mfff uurrf waar urrg ooffletuurb" and blasted off on
course for the next delivery as Fenton squirted another tubefull of toothpaste
into the speaker grille.
  Life, did however become more eventful for poor Fenton, just about the same
time as when he reached the latest Biopharm target planet for colonisation.

  It's not really fun trying to explain to a bunch of colonisation operatives
that all their artillery isn't in the hold because it was accidentally placed
on the jettison platform, and how it's actually all the fault of that jerk,
Bartle, ( even if they did contribute to the best firework display Testra is
ever going to see ) - but boy does it make a change from the hum drum drudgery
of life on the bridge.
  That is of course until the colonisation operatives plug up all of your
orifaces ( with your severed limbs ) and throw you into a vat of hydronucleic
acid for a nice quick, agonising, slow death.

  It still remains a mystery to this day what happened to the president's road
cruiser after it got to the emerging colony - A planet colonised by experienced
pioneers who had already used all the good place names years ago, and amongst
the imaginatively named roads that were later constructed - such as Burnt Out
Hovel Street and Pile Of Rubble Road - was one called Twisted Mangled Pile Of
Metal Avenue.


-- 
 ____/ Hywel Williams \______  \_O_/  .-----------------------------------.
|University  College  Swansea|   |    | Janet	: cs9h7hhw@uk.ac.swan.pyr |
|Third  Year Computer Science|  / \   | UUCP	: cs9h7hhw@cybaswan.UUCP  |
 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~         `-----------------------------------'