This process continued for what seemed to Darian to be an eternity until finally, the man’s eyes opened and he started coughing under his mask. As Darian watched, the man removed the mask and slowly sat up, turned his head and stared straight at him.
‘Where am I?’ he demanded, ‘What year is it?’
‘Uh...it’s...’ mumbled Darian, too shocked to speak. Alaliaq opened his eyes.
‘We are on the moon Epaphus, my brother Alalium,’ he said in his icy monotone, ‘You have been frozen for over twenty-six thousand Earth years.’ The tall, black-haired man climbed out of the sarcophagus, stood up and flexed his lean muscles. He turned around and pulled Alaliaq’s jarred head out of the terminal.
‘Alaliaq.’ he said, ‘Look at you, without that robotic body of yours you’re nothing but a pathetic head. Tell me, does our brother Alaliar still sit the throne of the Almighty King?’
‘I am afraid it is so,’ intoned Alaliaq, ‘our traitor brother still reigns on Earth. But together, me and you can have our revenge.’
‘Yes...’ said Alalium with a grimace, ‘but not together.’ and he threw the jar on the ground, glass and slimy, green fluid flying in all directions. Darian was so shocked he dropped his flashlight. Alalium looked at him, stepped forward and pressed a finger into his chest so hard Darian thought it would burst through his ribs.
‘You. I need your clothes.’ he said. Indeed, the tall, black-haired man was naked and Darian, fearing for his life now, did as he was told. After the man had dressed, he stood up and, without looking, cracked Darian across the side of the head with the back of his fist. Everything went black.
When Darian came to, all around him was pitch black. He had no way of telling if his flashlight had burnt out or whether it was stolen by Alalium. He was naked now, naked and cold. The man who was to bring him glory and put Alaliaq back in power had betrayed them both and Darian felt more helpless and hopeless than he ever had in his life. And he cried out loud, wailing like a toddler. Just then, interrupting his sobbing session, a voice spoke in that familiar robotic monotone.
‘You petty little boy,’ it said, ‘all you ever do is cry and complain.’ Darian sat up and stopped crying.
‘Alaliaq!’ he said, ‘You’re alive!’
‘Of course I’m alive,’ intoned the pale head.
‘B-but he smashed your jar...’ stuttered Darian.
‘That crionic fluid prevents my flesh from rotting, but I can survive for a time without it.’ he paused, ‘I should have known Alalium would betray me, he is the traitor’s twin after all.’ Darian sat puzzled.
‘But if your brother is also immortal like Doctor Waeko taught me, than why is it that you’re a head-in-a-jar and he is not?’
‘Ha!’ said Alaliaq, ‘That is because my father and brothers are natural immortals and I was a mere mortal who had to have his brain preserved in crionic fluid in order to live forever. But this is of no concern to you. Come, let us leave here. If we make haste, we might yet stop him.’
‘But we don’t even know where he’s going,’ complained Darian.
‘Ah, but we do.’ said Alaliaq, ‘He is going back to Earth. And there is only one spaceport on Epaphus - Namsatin.’
‘But even if I do find him,’ cried Darian, ‘how could we hope to stop him? He’ll just overpower us again.’
‘Complaining yet again, petty boy.’ intoned the head-in-a-jar, ‘If you want glory you will do as I say, otherwise you will never be anything more than a pathetic orphan boy from Earth.’
Darian quietly nodded and reached out and picked up Alaliaq, no longer a glass jar in his arms but now a slimy naked head. He made his way slowly out of the cavern, groping his way along the walls and feeling the ground carefully with his feet. When he had finally made his way back out onto the beach of the dry sea, night had fallen completely on his part of Epaphus.
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