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Luther felt sad as he and Mom waved the school bus goodbye, now it was only a small dot in the landscape.
It was unfair all his siblings got to go to school and he was left alone here. He was so annoyed.
He huffed.
“Now, Luther,” Mom said. “We’re going to have a nice day at home.”
Luther wrinkled his nose. No. No they wouldn’t. It was so boring without his siblings there. He hadn’t known how boring things could be without them.
He walked as slowly as possible behind Mom as they made their way home careful not to step on the gabs on the pavement. Klaus said that was bad luck.
“Now hurry,” Mom said and sighed taking his hand. “I’ll bake some cookies at home, don’t you want some cookies?”
Luther nodded. At least he’d get cookies. His siblings were probably not getting cookies in school.
Unless, he thought it was somebody’s birthdays. Diego had boasted that a kid in his class had given him two cupcakes when she had her birthday. Luther hoped that nobody had a birthday today.
He hoped over the next gab. No bad luck and no birthday cupcakes for his siblings.
At home Mom started baking right away and Luther ran upstairs to his room. He made sure to tiptoe past Dad’s office. Dad was working from home today and Luther didn’t want to make him mad by being too loud.
When he was passed the door he quickly ran to his room. In his room he sat down looking down at his stuffed toy.
“Pogo? What do you think can we do today?” he asked him seriously. Without the others there he had to only play with his toy.
I think, Master Luther, that we have a certain space mission we still have to attend to.
Pogo was very sophisticated. Sophisticated was a very smart and classy thing and that was what Pogo was and that was why he called Luther Master and why he talked like he did. He was a very smart ape.
“Okay,” Luther said and nodded his head seriously. “But we need to make the rocket ready first, okay Pogo?” he quickly put his monkey on his bed leaning him against his pillow. “You stay in the station and make all the maths here, okay?”
Of course, Master Luther! I will get right to it.
“Thank you, Pogo,” he said and smiled.
Then he turned around and ran out.
Last time Mom had been a little cross with him when he took the couch cushions for his rocket and didn’t bring them back but he just needed them as a seat. He wasn’t making them dirty at all and it was a real problem to bring them back downstairs and destroying his rocket.
Luther slid down and peeked into the kitchen.
“Are the cookies almost done?” he asked.
“They will be soon, darling,” she said. “Do you want to play a boardgame with me until they’re ready?”
“No that’s fine,” Luther said and then added because he didn’t want to disappoint her. “We can later, okay?”
“Okay, dear,” Mom said and smiled hugging him a little. “You’re being such a big boy, today. You haven’t even complained much about your big siblings not being here.”
“Of course,” Luther said. “I’m not a baby.”
He had cried a little yesterday when he realized that after the weekend his siblings were back in school but they didn’t need to talk about that. That was all over.
“If you say so,” Mom said and kissed his forehead before she went back to baking.
Luther grinned and snuck into the living room taking one of the smaller couch cushions. It was vital for his space mission.
Before he went back to his room he quickly ran into Klaus’ room and took a little bit of the candy he knew he hid in the drawer of his desk.
Luther knew he wouldn’t notice it because he had so much and he also didn’t feel bad about it because he knew Klaus never told their Mom about it and that was forbidden.
Now the candy would be astronaut food. Yummy and useful.
“Alright, Pogo,” he said a little breathless when he entered his room again. “Now we are ready!”
Alright, Master Luther, I have calculated all the numbers and you are indeed in a perfect position to start.
Luther nodded seriously. He was sure his siblings didn’t have a chimpanzee to calculate all the numbers. Pogo was really, really smart.
“I’m Major Luther now! Like Major Tom from the song!” he said.
Quiet correct, Major Luther.
Luther grinned and crawled into his rocket pulling the couch cushion behind him.
Five had built the rocket with him so it was very, very good. Of course, when they had started building it, it was just supposed to be a blanket fort but Luther had asked if he could use it as a rocket too and Five was fine with that. Five liked space sometimes too and played space with Luther sometimes. Though a lot of the time now he would tell him it was stupid and childish or that he had to do homework or other dumb stuff big kids did.
“But I can play space all on my own with Pogo,” Luther muttered stubbornly. “No problem.”
It really wasn’t any problem at all he pulled the couch cushion to the middle and sat down there. Perfect, here was his captain’s seat. Luther had all kinds of cool space toys and they lay all on the floor around him.
He pulled out his book with pretty space pictures, his maps, the small click camera that showed pictures of space as his navigation – he had to adjust it by clicking the little button on top to get to his favorite to start on it was a picture of earth far, far away and he groaned when he missed it and had to click through every sing one again to get back to it - , a kaleidoscope for his outlook, a pink microphone Allison used to play with before it broke as his communication device and of course the small robot who he had gotten from Ben as his loyal companion.
He put the candy next to him and nodded. He was ready to go.
The MoonROCKET 1 ready to go in 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
The start shook the rocket ship greatly and Luther had to hold onto his seat.
It always was beautiful and Luther had to hold his breath for a moment as he used his outlook all the wonderful colorful stars… he sighed. But of course he wasn’t here to enjoy the view this was a very serious, very important mission he was on and he needed to get in contact with the space station quickly.
“Luther to space station, space station, please come in!”
“Major Luther!” Pogo’s voice came over the comm. “We have a problem! Creepy Aliens have kidnapped your siblings.”
Luther gasped. His siblings weren’t astronauts like him. Just boring students, in a boring school, which meant that they had no way to overpower them.
“We suspect the aliens are after your amazing technology. They thing they can make you give it up by holding your siblings hostage.”
“Oh no!” Luther yelled. That was really bad. “They aren’t going to get through with that! I’m going to save them!”
“But Major Luther, remember you also have to do your mission,” Pogo over the comm got quiet. “Maybe it’s the best to give them up… they aren’t astronauts anyway.”
Luther considered. It was true really. His siblings weren’t astronauts but… “No, Pogo. I can’t. They’re still my siblings. And besides I guess Five did help a little building the rocket. I have to save them from the aliens… and get my mission done!”
“Are you sure you can do both?”
“I will have to!” Luther said and sighed deeply.
“You are one brave boy, Major Luther,” Pogo said and yes, Luther guessed he really was, wasn’t he?
“It’ nothing,” he said and commanded his rocket to turn course. He really was doing great.
“LUTHER! The cookies are done, dear!”
“Getting signals from the outside,” he told his robot. “Can you analyze them?”
Beep Booop, made the robot. Only Luther could understand the robot and maybe Ben because he’d gotten him it.
“I see. A friendly alien!” Luther nodded seriously. “Friendly, but she still might have information on my siblings!”
“Luuuuther! Darling!”
There was the clack, clack of heels on the stairs.
“Friendly but not allowed near the rocket!” he decided and grabbed his space helmet. “Ready for contact!”
“Be careful, don’t upset her!” Pogo said.
Luther quickly got out of the rocket and launched himself out into space.
“Oh, there you are dear. Why do you have the carton on your head?”
“Mom, it’s my space helmet! I’m an astronaut,” Luther said. Really. Didn’t she see the little buttons he had drawn on it?
“Oh, of course, darling. Does the astronaut want his astronaut snack?”
“Yes, please!” Luther said and hopped down the stairs with her.
He had to be real stealth now. Find out everything she knew about where his siblings were held without the alien noticing.
“Luther dear, sit down won’t you? And take off the helmet… I’m quiet certain the air is safe here.”
“ ‘kay,” Luther said and put the helmet down.
He had of course ran a test before. He didn’t just listen to any aliens. Even though this one was very nice.
“Thank you, darling,” Mom said and put a plate with a few cookies and different fruit and a glass of milk in front of him.
“Thank you!” Luther said and smiled wide.
He stealthily held a hand over the food the alien queen (she must be the queen, Luther decided, only alien queens welcomed astronauts) had presented him with.
“Save for consumption,” he whispered.
“What was that?”
“Nothing!” he said and took one of the cookies starting to eat it. “Mom, when are the others back?”
“Oh, darling I’m afraid that will still take a little bit,” she told him.
“Hm,” Luther said. “What are they doing right now?”
“Oh, let me check,” Mom told him and looked at the fridge where his siblings time tables were pinned. “Five has math right now, same for Vanya, Klaus is having English class and Allison has her spelling test right now I think! For Ben he has his science class now and Diego is learning the alphabet.”
“When’s Diego gonna know how to read?” Luther asked.
“Oh, I’m sure it will take a little,” Mom said. “He just started school.”
“Yes,” Luther said. “Until my birthday?”
“Probably longer.”
“Until Christmas?”
“I think maybe a little longer even.”
“Until FIVE’S birthday?”
“Maybe, darling. We’ll have to see. It’s important that everyone takes their time.”
“I wanna learn how to read faster than, Diego,” Luther muttered and finished his last cooky.
“Well, maybe you will, maybe you won’t learning how to read isn’t a race. Now, don’t forget to eat the fruit too.”
“Hmmhh…”
The fruit were less save for consumption but the alien queen wouldn’t be as willing to give him information if he wasn’t eating it. All Luther could hope was that the astronaut food’s anti poison ability also worked for alien fruits.
Luther chewed on a piece of banana carefully and took a grape.
“Do you want to play a board game or maybe a card game when you’re done?” Mom asked.
The alien queen had given him a challenge. He had to be careful now.
“Mmh, yes, okay,” Luther said and nodded taking the last apple and quickly putting it in his mouth. “I just gotta do something in my room really quick!” he chugged the glass of milk and was about to run off when Mom held him back.
“Let me just quickly clean your mouth… there we go. All nice and clean.”
Luther made a face but at least this way he didn’t forget his helmet.
That would have been very dangerous, Luther thought as he put it on. Probably the poisonous fruit starting to take it’s action. He needed to get the astronaut food quickly!
He flew back to the rocket quickly getting inside of it. He had to get the food.
“I think it was probably just a mistake she made,” he told Pogo over the comm as he bit down on the gummy worm. “She didn’t know the fruits were dangerous for humans.”
“Probably. I think you should make the robot keep running scans anyway,” Pogo told him.
“Yes, I will,” Luther said storing the astronaut food away.
They played Uno and Monopoly and Pairs until Mom clapped her hands
“I need to prepare dinner now, so your siblings have something to eat when they come back home.”
Luther nodded and let himself fall down from his seat.
He had bested the alien queen in some of her games and he would soon be able to free his siblings. That was good. Now he just needed to get his rocket to his siblings.
Luther hopped upstairs.
“Dear, you’ll bring the sofa cushion back downstairs when you’re done playing with it, right?” Mom told him.
“Yeah, sure!” Luther said and tried to roll his eyes like Five sometimes would but he hadn’t quiet mastered it yet and just sort of got crossed eyed. He sighed and walked upstairs.
Back in his rocket ship he sat down on his captain’s seat.
“Pogo. I have the position of where my siblings are,” Luther said over the communication system. “I’m on my way to them now!”
“Alright but be careful, there are many very aggressive and evil aliens in that part of space,” Pogo let him know.
“I know,” Luther nodded his head. “I’ll shoot at them, Pogo. I’m a really good shooter.”
Luther sighed as he steered his rocket through space to get to his siblings fast.
“Activate super speed!” he shouted and hit the button.
He had to hurry if he wanted to safe his siblings from the aliens.
There were mean green space aliens flying at him and he had to shoot them all. They were evil and they had his siblings and so he needed to kill him.
He shot at them with his laser canons.
Satisfied he watched as they fell together as little space alien ash piles who were blown away.
(There were no winds in space of course but the part of it Luther was in had special space winds).
To congratulate himself he took another bite of his astronaut food before he continued shooting at them.
The doorbell rang.
“I believe your siblings have been freed from their cages by the aliens,” Pogo said.
“You’re right!” Luther said.
“Major Luther I advise that you go and check on them at this point.”
Luther crawled out of his rocket and ran downstairs.
His siblings were getting out of their shoes and jackets.
“Hey,” he said and hopped down the last few stairs watching them.
“Hi,” Vanya said and waved.
“How are you, darlings?” Mom asked walking in from the kitchen and let Diego hug her. “How was school?”
His siblings went in to describe what they had done in school and Luther felt a sting of jealousy.
Luther took to his comm and send a quick message to Pogo.
'I think they got their memory wiped!'
“You’re right, Major Luther. Better not make them aware of that fact. That might greatly upset them.”
Luther nodded and smiled as he walked into the kitchen with the others. Mom had made dinner.
“Hey, Luther,” Five said and ruffled his hair. “Wanna play in your fort when I’m done with my homework?”
Luther smiled and nodded.
Mission accomplished.