Civilizations don't begin with computers and microwave ovens and dentists. They begin with staring at fire and raw food and stinking, rotting mouths.

They don't begin with telephones and printing presses or even quills, parchment and donkeys...so spreading news and gossip was once very difficult on every planet at one time. Secrets were easily kept, murders easily overlooked, scandals averted and birthday parties often missed. Oh, but how things change.

Within one hour of Vrume T'cha T'cha's capture, the news was not only on every set of lips on Lyme Node (or various alien lip equivalents), but that news had made its way to Squambog, Barbohd, all the inhabited Vexes, and even as far as Hephmote, where Vrume's army of rescued assistants and prisoners trained, and awaited the overtaking of The Node.

The news even made its way to Chagrin, although only to one adorable Pelican Teddy Bear that had found an old antique iWatch on a crashed ships' time capsule, which it then connected to the signal of a dead Blankton's mostly-destroyed ship that was floating in space near the planet. It used half of a swamp potato and a pet eel to keep it charged.

On Lyme Node, a human named Dak Floodman was already planning a rescue. He had been training to be the very next assistant, and was practising his fake death when he heard the news. He immediately contacted his wife Jev, who was still in the Lyme Node prison awaiting her go at tank-suit manicure education. They had both been thrown in jail without a trial for complaining to The Node Middle School Board for losing their daughter.

The (then) thirteen-year-old Breva Floodman had gone on a school trip to visit The Node Museum Of Node-Approved Node History and Awesome Node-Inspired Wax Museum. She never made it back to the school.

As a student of the Machine Detailing and Beauty School, Dak had access to the prisons and it only took an additional half hour to rally every prisoner (not guilty of a Tractos-level crime) to attempt an escape. Vrume was their hero, he was in trouble, and he needed them now.

With the entire population of the third most heavily attended school on Lyme Node, and the most heavily populated prison on the planet, things were about to get nutty. The Node Guard was the biggest army in the galaxy, but many of them were off patrolling the universe for Potto and Aye.

The Node Guard may have been the biggest army in the galaxy, but prisoners made up the biggest population in the Node-run universe. Prisons were everywhere. There were so many laws to be broken that as far as The Node was concerned, anyone not in the Guard was merely a prisoner that hadn't been processed yet...mostly due to a lack of time and the necessity of practical services. Garbage needed to be collected. Ships needed to be fixed. Bounty hunters needed to bounty hunt. Office workers needed to office work. Torturers needed to torture.

The fact that this particular prison was Lyme Node's largest spoke volumes to the sheer volume of the prison.

It started as a prison riot. Complete with chairs thrown, (faked) fights started, and everyone yelling and being ridiculously unruly. The Node Guard easily kept this at bay by simply not unlocking any cell doors. It was much easier to sit back and let them all kill each other and clean up the mess later than to engage.

However, those doors didn't stay locked. The entire Machine Detailing and Beauty School came down on the Guard Patrol, rioting on their side of the cell doors as well.

Many shots were fired, many lives lost. Dak and Jev Floodman were thankfully not among the corpses. Many guards were slaughtered, many prisoners as well, and quite possibly many students, though it was hard to tell with them because they had become so good at faking their deaths.

They now had their own army, but that army would be no match for the much bigger army of guards that were already being called in to surround the outside of the prison. They would all still have to escape the prison complex unseen, and keeping an entire army unseen would be like hiding an elephant behind a dead fern.

Vark Burk was one prisoner that didn't take part in the riot. He was old and had been living in his cell for longer than he, or anyone else, could remember. He had his own, much safer, escape plan on the go. Although he did see some merit in the safety-in-numbers approach, he had spent the last twenty-five years digging a tunnel, and with that amount of work, it was hard to abandon. He got the idea from every prison movie he had ever seen from every planet he'd ever been on, and had been digging it with a rusty potato peeler, a soiled oven mitt and a lot of elbow grease. Luckily, he had several elbows. He kept it hidden behind an old motivational poster of a kitten shitting into a saxophone.

Vark's tunnel was widely known by other prisoners. Now, much to his dismay, he had an entire army climbing, single file, behind his terrible poster and through the small tunnel. Once out they would go through Torture Tower's understaffed underground parking garage, and climb up the narrow ladder of an elevator shaft-in-repair.

This was going to take a while, and there would be many more deaths. Some from the Node Guard, and some from clumsiness.

The Node was untouchable. He would be nowhere near his Torture Tower. This was a good thing. If he were there, there would be no way to get past. Not only did he keep an even bigger army around him, but he, himself, was an indestructible killing machine. Now with an unruly comb-over.

~~~

Clover sat nervously next to Potto, who really wasn't nervous at all.

They were crammed together in the tiny, modest Shiv escape pod. It was a pod only made for one. Clover was not claustrophobic by any means; this is not what was bothering her. She was bothered, nervous and downright terrified at the idea of being shot out of the ship while it was grounded.

The plan was simple. They would be shot out in the vague direction of Krank City, hopefully taking out at least eight of the sub-par Jorge Jorge Jorges that surrounded the ship, while escaping the rest of them.

Teeg had promised them that the pod was shielded, which was true. She didn't tell them that the shielding was weak and very temporary.

Once the pod had stopped, they were to eject themselves from it and run. Any direction would do (except back towards the ship, which Potto probably would have done if not instructed otherwise) and they were to stick together and hideout until (and if) the Shiv or any of its crew survived and came looking for them.

Teeg had her doubts about that last part. Gekko had her doubts as well. Clory had no doubts, she was certain they would not be back, but she kept it under her bark.

"Are you ready? Here we go...countdown from three," Teeg told Clover through the transmitter.

"Ok. Be safe. And thank you," Clover said, her voice wavering.

"Do you want us to pick you up something nice while we're there?" Potto offered. "A couple of bungalows? They now come with more ants!"

Teeg didn't countdown. She just fired.

The pod shot out of the side of the ship and immediately took out the planned eight Jorge Jorge Jorges, and set another two on fire. They patted themselves out as they watched the escape pod do what it was made to do: escape.

Sparks, flames and chunks of asphalt and dirt flew out everywhere as they moved at a speed close to Mach One. They skidded directly into the residential outskirts of the city like the fastest wheel-less race car imaginable.

They took out fences, garages, fire hydrants, front porches, garbage bins, a high-end clothing boutique, a take-out pancake joint, and countless small economy cars. Clover closed her eyes and gritted her teeth so hard they didn't even feel like teeth anymore through her cramping jaw. Potto screamed like he was on the best rollercoaster ever made.

When they finally came to a stop they sat for mere seconds before Clover snapped out of the shock, and hit the eject button. They were both hurled out and immediately smacked into the ceiling of the living room they were in. Stunned for a moment like birds that had hit a window, they lay on a bright puce shag carpet with a family looking at them, suitably, and justifiably stunned as well.

Bisher Donut, his wife Faridelle, daughter Grezzy, and sons Moof and Cranstin all surrounded the smoking pod with gaping mouths full of half-chewed stroganoff.

Bisher had just had a long day. His job installing sliding frosted shower doors on pre-made moulded tub surrounds had not been as exciting as it had sounded, and his supervisor was cruel and unnecessary.

This was his time to eat his dinner and relax. This was his time to ignore his children and complain about the government. It was his time. Not "intruders that have interrupted my stroganoff, destroyed half of my used bungalow and maybe killed Grandpa" time.

Bisher Donut's face quickly went from stunned to violently furious. "Moof, get my gun. Grezzy, let the dogs up from the basement."

"What about me, Poppy-pop?" Cranstin asked.

"Call my insurance broker and then see if you can find Grandpa." Bisher barked as Faridelle started whacking Potto with a rolled-up copy of "Mediocre Seats and Benches" magazine.

As Clover and Potto jumped to their feet, Bisher was already firing shots with his laser-ball fun gun. Ferocious dog barks, growls and snarls could be heard quickly approaching.

"Run!" Clover yelled to Potto as she darted out the huge burning hole in the side of the Donut residence. Potto was just about to run when two Vexian grub hounds entered snapping at him. A third took off after Clover.

"Adorable! Are these bungalows?" he asked excitedly, "Are they haunted?" he followed up with in a hushed voice.

A laser-ball shot hit a faux-brass lamp inches from his head. He shook the dogs off and ran for the undamaged backdoor. He quickly made his way out and down the back steps into a fenced-in back yard.

As the door swung open, the Donut family (and their vicious pets) came out yelling threats, but Potto was already gone.

He found himself under the backdoor steps in a hole. He had been dragged in by his dog-chewed pantleg by a rat-like Yaygher clone.

"Shhhhhhhh!" the Yaygher whispered.

They sat quietly as an angry Bisher and his angry family checked their poorly painted lawnmower shed. They made their way through a gate at the far end of the backyard and into the alley beyond.

"Thanks! Those bungalows have quite a bite!" Potto finally said, smiling at his new friend, who he couldn't help but notice was chewing on his arm.

"Don't freak out 'r nothin'...I gots no teeth. I just wanna taste ya. Mix my spit around with yer flavour and make a little arm soup in mah mouth," the Yaygher mumbled quietly with his mouth full of elbow.

"Sure," Potto laughed.

They sat under the back porch for an additional ten minutes before Potto started to get sore and uncharacteristically annoyed."Can you switch arms?" he politely asked wincing.

"I was just about to ask..." replied the Yaygher.

"Yaaaaay!"

~~~

Clover watched the flaming Donut abode for almost an hour from the tree the grub hound had chased her up. She hadn't known that grub hounds could climb trees, and it sat on a branch next to her getting a good behind-the-ear scratch.

Clover had been around since the beginning of everything. She had learned a few things about animal taming along the way. Most animals only needed a quick bit of eye-contact with her before trusting her, submitting to her, falling in love with her and wanting to make her arms their forever home.

From their branch she could see the long, still flaming pod trail leading to the huge hole in the front of the house. She watched as Bisher, Faridelle, Grezzy and Moof wandered around with the other two dogs, searching for Potto. Searching for her.

By their idiotic expressions and ever-building rage, she was quite confident that he had escaped. Once they finally gave up, she would find him. He was the only Quarol (and the only Quarol with albinism) on the planet; he wouldn't be hard to spot amongst the blue-skinned Vexians. Hopefully she found him before the Donuts did, or the authorities once the Donuts eventually reported it.

Cranstin came out of the house, looking for his father. He was holding a smoking boot.

"Poppy-pop! I found grandpa!" he hollered.

~~~

Perhaps part of General Eppie's complete lack of empathy was due, in part, to extreme privilege. It was easier to hurt someone when one didn't know what it felt like to be hurt, and had always been feared by everyone (including one's parents). Eppie had never been hurt by anyone physically or mentally. He had only been annoyed and angered by others.

He was very surprised to find out that, not only did punches to the face really hurt, but they hurt more and more as they progressed. A punch to healthy skin was painful, but a punch to already-punched skin was unbearable.

There he sat, tied to a chair, surrounded by prisoners, students and dead guards as Jev Floodman punched his smug face over and over again. It was Vrume that stopped her.

"We have to go..." he said softly, relieved and flattered they had gone to so much trouble for him.

"But where?" Dak asked. "We hadn't really thought past this part."

Eppie laughed at this through swollen lips. "There's nowhere to go, you idiots. More guards will come. All of you are going to die. I will be eating multi-coloured macarons off the bare ass of my handsome toady, safely back in my flat, within the hour. Perhaps while gazing out my window at the huge bonfire of your burning bodies as I get ready for a well-deserved nappy-nap."

"Perhaps if we took him as a hostage and then killed him," Dak suggested.

"No. Leave him here. I don't want his life to be over so quickly. That's too good for him," Vrume said, limping towards Eppie. He leaned in, his messed-up, tortured face only inches from the General's battered mug. "Kenny Kenny Kenny Kenny Kenny Kenny Kenny Kenny Kenny Kenny," he said, not caring if he sounded childish.

Eppie went from smug to furious by the time the second "Kenny" was out. His face matching his small curl of fuchsia hair.

The rescue party (or at least the parts of it that fit in the room) had not taken into account that The Node loved his hidden doorways and passages. They were built into every room. He loved surprising people. Such a door opened up directly behind Vrume, and a laser pistol was now at his temple, a guard at his back.

"This one is coming with me or I shoot him. And untie General Eppie. He's coming with me as well!" shouted the guard loud enough to cause a temporary din in Vrume's ear, even through the guard's armoured mask.

"Thatta boy!" Eppie cheered, getting over the infuriating name calling and wishing he could throw his arms up in the air.

A shot was heard and the guard fell dead, again freeing Vrume. Another guard, much shorter, stood where the first had been. The second guard's helmet came off.

"Breva!!" shouted Dak as tears exploded from his eyes. He and Jev ran towards their daughter and held her tight.

"I was kidnapped on the school trip by an unusually not-ugly Sammolite. He was going to sell me into the sex trade, but I escaped. By that time, I discovered you were both in prison. So I joined The Node Guard, which is actually surprisingly simple to do..." she recounted. "My intent was to break you both out. Maybe leave Lyme Node forever."

"Oh fer the love of..." Eppie complained, his eyes rolling so extraordinarily they made a sound.

Vrume's shoulders dropped the tiniest bit. He didn't feel quite so bad for murdering that fancy Sammolite.

"I found out something quite remarkable and top secret. Did you know the prison was actually a ship? It was first built as a huge planetary escape pod for The Node and his devoted followers. All the higher-ups. But his own Chamber Tower later became that. A much nicer one. So, they made that old one into a prison!" Breva continued.

"How do we engage it? How do we fly a building?" Vrume asked, surprised he did not already know this. It was one piece of information The Node had not trusted him with while he worked on that magnificent chassis.

"I've also been learning about that. And you as well, Mr. T'cha T'cha. Can we take it away from here? Can we go to your secret planet?"

Vrume smiled widely at Breva.

"Ugh. Of course you have a secret planet. You. Are. The. Worst." Eppie snarked.

Vrume smiled a very different kind of smile at Eppie.

~~~

Vark Burk had just put his stupid shitting kitten poster back up when it was torn down again from behind. He sighed heavily and rolled over on his mattress as an army of prisoners and students broke back into prison, single file.