“Call Zura from the Thorolf Pack,” she said, feeling a stab of alarm.
Nothing happened.
“Call Madok from the Thorolf Pack. Call…call Lukan from the Wor-Lan Pack.” Lukan was the Reginar of the Wor-Lans, and also another owner of Starcrossed.
Nothing happened.
“Call Treffon from the Thorolf pack,” she said desperately, and stabbed at the button with her finger again and again.
Dorcas tried the same with her comm bracelet, with the same results.
Violet hurried back over to the silver-scaled guard. “I’m trying to use my communicator and it won’t work. I need to make a call,” she said.
“There’s a dampening field here.”
“It’s extremely urgent,” she protested. “How can we get back to Donnelle? When’s the next bus?”
He scowled at her. “That is not going to happen until you have had your identification confirmed and been scanned for viruses.” He glanced at the main building. “Scanning is closed for the evening. Come back in the morning.”
“But…but I came on the volunteer bus!”
He looked at her in annoyance. “I don’t see a volunteer badge.” And he walked away without another word.
Great. They were trapped there overnight with hundreds of surly, barely supervised aliens.
She went to tell Dorcas the bad news – but Dorcas was gone. Again.
“Seriously?” she said in exasperation. Then she heard Dorcas yelling in anger. She followed the sound, pushing her way through thick purple and silver underbrush, into the woods.
She burst through into a clearing – and wished she hadn’t.
There was a cluster of about twenty of the cutest creatures she’d ever seen – knee-high, with short blue fur and enormous black eyes and purple hands and feet. A creature that looked like a miniature dinosaur, perhaps ten feet high, loomed over them. Dorcas had placed herself between the furry creatures and the alien that was menacing them.
Violet ran over, tripped over Dorcas’ cane, and fell flat on her back. “Run!” she screamed to Dorcas. “Take those furry things! Run!”
The creature opened up its mouth to reveal thousands of pointy teeth, and let out a horrifying screech as it plunged its head towards her.
