[Galaxy Of Fear] - 08(5)

The thing flapped up into the darkness of the tree. But a moment later it plunged down again.

Zak threw himself to the ground as the beast swooped over him again. He grunted as the diving creature struck his back, then flapped away again.

“Help!” Zak yelled, but he could barely hear himself over the creature’s weird shrieking noises.

Panicking, Zak felt around for something he could use as a shield or a weapon. His fingers wrapped around something dry and hard. A stick. A second later Zak nearly dropped the stick as he felt something sticky crawling along the back of his hand. He tried to shake it off, but it held on tight. It was the beetle.

The flying creature screeched and dove again. Desperately, Zak swung his stick around, hoping it would scare the creature away. His eyes were closed, but he felt the creature slam hard into his stick, snapping it in two. The shrieking stopped instantly. Then something fell to the ground with a thud.

Zak opened his eyes. He looked up. The creature was not there. He got to his knees and looked around, scanning the area until his eyes came to rest on a dark lump quivering on the ground.

“I don’t believe it,” he muttered as he tried to catch his breath. “What a lucky shot!”

But he knew it wasn’t luck. The creature had swooped right into him, almost like it wanted to attack the stick, or his hand.

Zak got to his feet and stood over the creature. At first he’d thought it was some kind of bird, but now that it was still, he could see that it had no feathers. Instead, its body was covered with a layer of soft bluish hair except for its tail, which was thick and smooth like a dianoga’s tentacle. Its head was long and narrow, and two rows of tiny, razor-sharp teeth stuck out from its mouth. The creature’s wings were outspread, and its chest rose and fell rapidly as it panted for breath.

A second later, the panting stopped. Zak leaned closer-the creature wasn’t breathing. It was dead.

“Oh, no,” Zak groaned. The first thought that passed through his mind was, Uncle Hoole is really going to be mad, at me! Hoole had warned them not to touch anything in the garden.

But his second thought was for the motionless creature. He hadn’t meant to kill it. He was only trying to scare it away. But he wasn’t going to waste time mourning. The creature had attacked him, after all.

Zak felt something tickle his fingers, and he glanced down in time to see the beetle hop off his hand and dart into the tall grass beneath the trees. “I don’t blame you,” Zak said, imagining Uncle Hoole’s stern expression. “Maybe I should look for a place to hide, too.”

Something stirred in the branches. Zak looked nervously up into the trees, wondering if there were more flying shriekers. Deciding that he didn’t want to stick around and find out, Zak turned and hurried back the way he had come.

He found Tash just where he’d left her, admiring a patch of multicolored flowers. But Tash had been joined by a S’krrr. From the distance, Zak thought it was Vroon, but as he drew nearer he saw that this S’krrr was a few centimeters taller than the caretaker, and his hard shell was a darker shade of green. Still, this S’krrr’s face looked exactly like Vroon’s, and Zak wondered if all the S’krrr looked alike.

“Zak,” Tash said, “this is Sh’shak.”

“Greetings,” said the S’krrr in an elegant voice, accompanied by the soft skrrrr sound as his small wings fluttered. “I am pleased to make your acquaintance.”

“Hello,” Zak answered as naturally as he could manage. He found it slightly uncomfortable talking to the S’krrr. Their hard-shelled faces were impossible to read. Zak could see his reflection in Sh’shak’s large black eyes.

“Sh’shak is a celebrity here on S’krrr,” Tash said. “He’s a famous poet.”

“Really? That’s prime,” Zak said without meaning it. He hated poetry.

Tash, however, loved reading, so it didn’t surprise Zak when she asked the S’krrr, “Could you recite one of your poems?”

Sh’shak’s dark eyes stared blankly at her. “I’m afraid you would not understand,” he replied. “The poems are all in wingsong.”

“Wingsong? What’s that?” Zak asked.

In answer, Sh’shak fluttered his wings. As he listened, Zak heard the soft skrrrrrrrr sound change its tone and pacing. By moving his wings at differing speeds, now rubbing them together, now fluttering them apart, Sh’shak created a series of intricate tones and humming noises. Even Zak had to admit that it was beautiful.

“That is wingsong,” Sh’shak explained. “It is the traditional language of my people, a language we use to speak to each other. Of course, offworlders don’t understand it and can’t imitate the sounds, so we of S’krrr have learned the Basic language of the galaxy. But we still use wingsong, especially in writing poetry.”