Space Pirates 3: Russel's Revenge by Amber Riel (sad books to read .txt) 📕

          “Okay.”

          “You can try,” Olivia said.

          “Yea,” John agreed, “Zelda.”

          “No.  None of you can make me change my mind.”

          “Oh come on,” Ben said.  “You never let Gregory stop you before.”

          Zelda thought about Ben’s statement and had to agree.  “Okay.  Fine.  I’ll do it, but if Gregory says one thing to me, then I’m going to snap.”

          Ben kissed Zelda’s cheek.  “That’s my girl.”

          “Well, John, me, and my crew got to get back to the Black Velvet.”

          Zelda held Ben’s arm.  “Okay.  See ya’ll.”

          John and Olivia left the room.

          “Benjamin.”

          “Yes, honey.”

          “Can you please tell Riley to stop on Pluto?  I don’t remember telling him exactly where we were going.”

          Ben gave her a kiss, then moved his arm from around her.  “Yea.”  He went to leave when he stopped and turned to face Zelda.  “And you should relax.  Lay down until we get to Pluto.  Don’t stress so much, it won’t be good for you, or the baby.”

          Zelda smiled and shook her head. 

          Ray knocked on the door to the captain’s office.  “Come in,” he could barely hear Ben say.  He walked into the room.

          Zelda was lying on the bed.  Ben sat in the chair which was next to the bed.  Max was lying on the floor.

          “We’re on Pluto, captain,” Ray told Zelda.

          Ben looked at Zelda.  He knew that she hadn’t heard Ray because of the fact that she was out cold.  “She’s sleeping,” he whispered.  “You can go.  I’ll wake her up.”

          “Okay,” Ray whispered.  He left the room, closing the door as quietly as he could behind him.

          “Honey,” Ben said, shaking Zelda, “wake up.  We’re on Pluto.”

          “But I’m in the middle of a good dream,” Zelda replied in a sleepy voice.

          “Come on.”

          “Not now, man.”  Zelda rolled over.  Her back was now facing Ben.

          “Okay.”  An idea popped into Ben’s head.  “Hey, Max.  Come and wake up mommy.”

          Max jumped onto the bed and began licking Zelda’s face.

          Zelda couldn’t take it.  She sat up.  “Okay.  I’m up.”  She got out of the bed.  “Let’s go get Olive Oyl and Popeye.”

          Ben laughed.

          Zelda, Olivia, John, and Ben were walking toward the ice palace.  Zelda noticed a wanted posture of herself taped to a window of a little bookshop.  She walked over to the store and took the posture off of the window.  “Every time we come here, there’s a new posture of me….” She read what was written and was confused.  “Ben, read what Gregory wrote.”

          Ben took the posture and started reading it to himself.

          “What’s it say?” Olivia asked.

          Ben was just as confused as Zelda.  “It says, ‘Zelda Samara Skull wanted for….’” He had to pause.  He was trying to make since of the last part.  “‘Kidnapping?’” he read the last part as a question.

          “I didn’t kidnap anyone this time.”  She didn’t understand.  She was now ticked off.  “Gregory just likes to blame me for everything.”

          “Look at the bright side, at least, he used your new last name.”  Ben tried to get Zelda to smile.  It didn’t work.

          “That didn’t help much.”

          Ben placed an arm around Zelda.  “I tried…. Let’s go talk to the princesses, and if we see Gregory, I’ll talk to him.  Okay?”

          “Okay.”

          “Let’s go you two.”  Olivia was ready to go into the palace.

          “Okay.”

          They arrived at the palace.  Ben was still holding the posture.  They walked inside and ran into Saphire and Alaska.

          “What are you four doing here?” Saphire asked, politely.

          “We know what the bounty hunters are going to do,” Zelda stated.

          “Yea,” Olivia agreed.  “And Magma’s going to help.”

          “She’s trying to prove that she’s more eviler than her brother,” Saphire replied.

          “We have to tell Gregory,” Alaska jumped in.

          “No.”  Zelda didn’t want to talk to Gregory.  She was ticked off at him and she was going to kill him.  She pointed to Saphire.  “Why can’t we tell her husband instead?”

          “Daniel isn’t the head of the police,” Alaska reminded Zelda.

          “I know.  But I can’t talk to Double D.”

          Gregory walked in followed by Jason and Daniel.  He noticed that the four pirates were there.  “Zelda.  Okay, where is he?”

          Zelda turned around.  She eyed Gregory.  “Where’s who?”

          “My brother?”

          “Which one?  You have three and two of them are here.”

          “Larry.”

          “Larry boy?” Zelda asked, confused.  “I don’t know.”

          “Yea right.  Stop lying and tell me where he is?” Gregory was convinced that Zelda had kidnapped Larry and nothing was going to change that.

          “I told you, I don’t know….” Zelda thought about the posture.  “Wait a minute.  You think that I kidnapped him, don’t you?”

          “Actually, I do.”

          “Well, guess what.  I didn’t this time.  I haven’t even been on this planet.”

          “She’s telling the truth,” Ben added.

          “You’re just covering for her because she’s your wife.”

          “Yes, she is my wife.  And I stand beside her no matter what, but ask yourself this, how is it possible that she kidnapped Larry when we weren’t on this planet until today?”

          Gregory didn’t answer.

          “Oh yea.  Don’t yell at her, she doesn’t need the stress.  It’s not good for her and the baby.”

          Gregory was now the confused one.  “The baby?”

          “You heard him right,” John agreed.  “We’re going to be uncles.”

          “And, I want the baby to get to know all three of its uncles,” Ben added, then started talking to Zelda and Gregory, “and I want you two to try and get along.  Gregory, for whatever reason why you hate Zelda, I want you to forgive her.”

          “She’s the reason why these two have to babysit me.”

          Zelda and Olivia both started laughing.

          Ben tried not to laugh.  “And what did she do?”

          “She framed me a long time ago.”

          Zelda started laughing even harder.  “I remember that day.  You were so easy to trick.”

          “When did you do that?” Ben asked.

          Zelda took Ben’s hand and smiled at him.  “It was the same day that I met you.”

          “Oh.”

          Zack, Austin, and Jeremy were hanging out in the wine cellar of the White Rose.  Zack and Jeremy each sat on a box.  Austin took a bottle of rum.  “This is awesome.”

          “Austin, what are you doing?” Jeremy asked.  “That’s the captain’s rum.”

          “She won’t care.  Heck, she can’t drink rum anyways.”

          “Why not?  She loves rum.  She’ll drink it all day.”

          “She hasn’t told you?”

          “Told me what?”

          “Never mind.  Just forget that I said anything.”

          Austin and Zack knew that Zelda was pregnant but for some reason Jeremy was the only one in the crew who didn’t know.

          Larry slipped and fell against some of the boxes.  “OW!” he exclaimed, then covered his mouth as soon as possible.

          Austin, Jeremy, and Zack looked around in confusion.

          “What was that?” Zack asked.

          “I don’t know,” Jeremy answered.

          “Maybe,” Austin said, “a bounty hunter snuck on board back on Blaze.”  An idea popped into his head.  “Hey, let’s go upstairs and let the rats roam around.”  He winked to let Jeremy and Zack know to go along with it.

          “Okay,” Zack agreed.

          All three of the guys made it sound like they were leaving the room.

          “Good they….” Larry began as he moved out of hiding and realized that they were still there, “Oh snap.”

          “Hey, Larry,” Austin said.  “Dude, I thought I was going to have to shoot you.”

          “Come on out of there, man,” Jeremy told the kid.

          Larry climbed over the boxes.  “Okay.  Hey, can you guys please not tell Zelda or Ben that I’m here?”

          “Why not?” Austin asked.

          “Because they might bring me back to Gregory.  I kind of ran away from home.”

          “Oh.”

          “Then, what are you going to do?” Jeremy asked.  “There’s no food or water down here for you, and you’re too young to have rum.”

          “I got it,” Austin said.  “He’s like a stray dog.  We’ll sneak food and water down here and give it to him.”

          “How do we do that without making it look like we’re up to something?”

          “I’ll take care of that.”  Austin was the master mind of devious schemes.  

          Gregory, Zelda, Ben, John, Olivia, Daniel, and Jason were in the battle room going over the battle plans.  They were sitting at a round table.  Gregory had a map with the planets on it to help them.  He pointed to Blaze on the map.  “I think that we should have all the cops and pirates surround Blaze.”

          “I have to disagree with you on that.”  Olivia shook her head.

          “Why?” Gregory looked over at Olivia.

          “Because there’s bounty hunters stationed on different planets,” Olivia pointed out, looking up at Gregory, “and if we do it your way, then we won’t be able to stop them.”

          “You’re right.”  Gregory agreed with Olivia’s point.

          “I disagree with the both of you,” Zelda jumped in.

          Gregory glanced at Zelda.  He didn’t want to listen to what she had to say.  He figured that it was going to be something ridiculous.  “Shut up.  No one cares, Zelda.”

          Zelda was ticked off.  “What?”

          Gregory looked at her.  “You heard me.”

          Zelda went to go say something but….

          “Don’t start you two,” Ben told them, stopping Zelda.  He didn’t want to hear them two get into an argument.  “Gregory, Zelda has something to say, now let her say it.”

          “No, she’s going to say something about rum.”

          Zelda stood up, feeling offended.  “That’s not true.”

          “My bad.  You weren’t going to say anything that has to deal with the battle plans,” he paused, “because you’re dumb.”

          Zelda exploded at Gregory’s words.  “That’s it.  You’re dead.”  She went to attack Gregory, but Ben stood up and held her back.

          “Calm down, Zelda,” Ben told her.  “He didn’t mean it.”  He turned his attention to Gregory.  “I want the two of you to call a truce.”

          “A truce?” Zelda asked.

          “Yes.”

          “We can’t call a truce.”

          “Why not?”

          “Because then….” Zelda had to think about what she was going to say next.  “Then you’ll destroy our relationship.”

          “What relationship?” Ben was confused.  “You two hate each other.”