Zorgoochi Intergalactic Pizza : Delivery of Doom (9781250008459) Read online

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  For Sue.

  Finally.

  CONTENTS

  Title Page

  Copyright Notice

  Zorgoochi Family Lineage

  Dedication

  Prologue

  Part 1

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Part 2

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Part 3

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  How to Make a Zorgoochi Intergalactic Pizza!

  Acknowledgments

  Copyright

  More Than One Thousand Years from Today

  EARLY MORNING

  Deep in the Mezzaluna Galaxy, in one of its lesser spiral arms, on a tiny gray planet called Industro12, seven-year-old Luno Zorgoochi placed his small hand in his father’s as they walked through the herb garden behind the family pizzeria. It was Luno’s favorite place to be because it was so different from the rest of Industro12. Quiet and lush, with a maze of babbling brooks running through it, it was the only spot on the entire planet that wasn’t covered in concrete, metal, or was the site of a factory belching smoke.

  They strolled past rows of oregano, basil, and Erba Zorgoochus, the secret herb that made Zorgoochi Intergalactic Pizza the tastiest in the entire Mezzaluna Galaxy and possibly the entire universe.

  At least that’s what Luno’s father, Geo, believed.

  “You know, son,” Geo said, looking down at Luno as they walked into the greenhouse, past basketball-size tomatoes and zucchini as long as canoes, “your great-great-great-great-great-grandfather Solaro planted the garden and built this greenhouse about two hundred years ago.”

  Luno looked down as his space boots walked over the ornate mosaic imbedded in the tile floor, then squinted up at the sun streaming through the greenhouse’s geometric latticework. He nodded and smiled. Sure, his father had already told him a million times, but Luno didn’t mind hearing it again. And again and again and again. He liked listening to his father tell him how Solaro got up every morning before dawn to make the whitest, smoothest, lightest dough along with a big pot of his ancestor Nonna Prima’s secret tomato sauce recipe that Colono, one of his forefathers from the remote past took with him as he escaped Earth before it was destroyed. Since then it was passed down from generation to generation.

  Solaro also spent years perfecting the Zorgoochi Pizza Toss, his own special way of spinning dough in the air, which made his pizza crust crunchy on the outside, soft on the inside, and like no other pizza in the galaxy.

  Solaro was known for his famously keen sense of smell. Not only did he know if a pizza was done just by its aroma, but he could also smell a pizza three light-years away and identify its toppings.

  When Solaro was a young man, he left home for Planet Formaggio to train with the legendary Mozzarella Monks, a band of devout cheese artisans, who taught him the ancient secrets of how to make the finest mozzarella in the universe. With his training complete, Solaro returned home to Industro12, opened a little pizzeria, and called it Zorgoochi Intergalactic Pizza. Soon word spread throughout the galaxy about Solaro’s perfect pizza and sentient beings of all kinds came to have a slice.

  Because he only used the freshest ingredients, Solaro grew his own vegetables, ground his own wheat, and fished for his very own anchovies for his pizzas. One day while fishing in the Sea of Tranquility, he spotted an anchovy that was different from any one he’d ever seen.

  “Why was it different, Daddy?” Luno asked, even though he already knew the answer.

  “Because it was golden”—his father bent down and leaned in close, his eyes bright—“and it glowed.”

  Even though he had heard it many times before, Luno’s eyes grew wide as his father described what happened next.

  “Solaro placed his palms in the water and the little fish swam right to him,” said Geo. “And when he touched it, Solaro had a mystical vision.”

  As with every telling, Luno gasped, even though he still didn’t know exactly what a “mystical vision” was, but knew it must’ve been pretty important.

  “That anchovy reached deep down into Solaro’s soul and showed him his life’s true purpose: to make the greatest pizza in the universe!” Geo looked around, and then whispered, “One with Everything.”

  Luno listened agape as his father recounted what his father told him and his father told him and so on: Not only did the Golden Anchovy reveal Solaro’s life’s mission, but it also guided and protected him as he fulfilled his vision.

  This was also where the ancient phrase “hold the anchovies” actually came from. It originally started off as “hold the Anchovy,” meaning the Golden Anchovy, as a kindly greeting from one pizzeria owner to another, but over the centuries the uninitiated unknowingly changed the singular into plural.

  Solaro kept the Golden Anchovy in a flask tucked safely inside his space suit, close to his heart when he traveled to the farthest reaches of the galaxy on his quest to gather the ingredients for this perfect pizza.

  Finally, after many years, the One with Everything was complete. He decided to cut it into three slices to resemble a peace symbol.

  The first thing Solaro did was brave a dangerous space battlefield to deliver slices to each side. With the soldiers’ stomachs full of pizza and their hearts now full of love, the Thousand-Year Space War ended. There was peace in the galaxy at last!

  Keeping the Golden Anchovy close, Solaro delivered his One with Everything to heal the sick, raise the dead, and feed thousands with the single pie. There was always enough since the slices regenerated themselves.

  “Once word got out about the Golden Anchovy,” said Geo, “everyone wanted it, but there was one who wanted it most of all.”

  “Vlactron,” Luno whispered with a mix of fear and scorn.

  “That’s right.” His father nodded.

  “Did he want to make a pizza, too, Daddy?” Luno asked.

  Luno’s father smiled and sat on an overturned tomato basket, then pulled another over and patted it for Luno to sit down.

  “No, son, he didn’t,” Geo said. “He wanted the Golden Anchovy for its power. Your great-great-great-great-great-grandfather, he used it to help others, but Vlactron wanted to use it for himself. And that’s the difference between a good guy and a bad guy.”

  Solaro hid the Golden Anchovy, well knowing that Vlactron would do anything to get his claws on it. He hid it so well, even his son and grandsons, great and otherwise, couldn’t find it. Maybe he was just trying to protect them from Vlactron. Maybe he was waiting for the right Zorgoochi to find it at the right time.

  Years later, Solaro handed down his pizzeria to his son, Vulcanelli, the mechanical genius who built the kitchen’s volcano-powered ovens. Vulcanelli then handed the pizzeria to his son, Infinito, who created a pizza box so strong it could w
ithstand the most extreme gravitational pressure. And then he handed it to his son, Tomino, who calculated the mathematical formula for every pizza to be sliced into eight identical pieces, so there would be no arguments about who got a bigger slice, then to Forza, who designed the first four-dimensional pizza, then Pomodoro, who created a pizza that could travel at the speed of sound without disintegrating, and finally to Luno’s dad, Geo, who invented a zero-gravity delivery box, so the pizza wouldn’t get stuck to the bottom or the top.

  Along with the family’s secret tomato sauce recipe and the famous Zorgoochi Pizza Toss, Zorgoochi Intergalactic Pizza was handed down from father to son, decade after decade, improving the pizzeria and perfecting the pizza with each generation.

  “Then it was handed down to me from my father,” Luno’s dad said with a twinkle in his eye. “And someday, Zorgoochi Intergalactic Pizza will be handed down to you.”

  They walked in silence, until Luno stopped and looked up.

  “Is the Golden Anchovy for real, Daddy?” he asked suspiciously, cocking his head.

  “Of course it’s for real!” Geo Zorgoochi smiled, then knelt down and held Luno’s tiny shoulders between his big calloused hands. “Maybe you’ll be the one to find it! Do you remember the little rhyme I taught you?”

  Luno nodded, then they both recited:

  “When you touch the Golden Fish

  You fulfill your truest wish.

  It will guide and keep you free from harm

  In Mezzaluna’s spiral arm.

  And when your vision has been done

  Give it to a special one.

  Or release it into the starry stream

  For others to realize their dream.

  But if you steal it, you hereby

  Cause the Golden Anchovy to die.”

  “Geo!”

  The back door swung open and Mom appeared.

  “How many times have I told you not to fill Luno’s head with that silly anchovy nonsense,” Luno’s mother, Connie, scolded.

  “Uffa! Gimme a break, Connie. I’m only having a little fun with the kid,” said Geo. “Besides, my father told me the same thing.”

  “And those stories about that Vlactron character have been giving him nightmares!” Connie shouted, and then turned to Luno. “Daddy’s just making those things up, aren’t you, Geo?”

  Geo reluctantly nodded, but when she turned away, he gave Luno a secret wink.

  “Now come into the kitchen, sweetheart,” Connie said to Luno. “You look hungry.”

  As he bit into a hot slice of pizza, Luno thought about the Golden Anchovy and the day he would take over the pizzeria, and learn the famous Zorgoochi Pizza Toss just like his dad and every other Zorgoochi before him.

  And maybe even be the one to find the Golden Anchovy.

  PART 1

  CHAPTER ONE

  Six Years Later

  “Vake up, boy!” Roog shouted, smacking Luno on the head with his metal claw as he tried to toss pizza dough in the air.

  “No good enough!” barked Roog. “Again!”

  Just like every morning, Luno tried to perfect the famous Zorgoochi Pizza Toss, and just like every morning, it was far from perfect. At least this time it didn’t stick to the ceiling.

  “I have trained all Zorgoochi for last two hundred year,” barked Roog, “and you are vorst of all! Again!”

  Even though he could barely feel his arms, Luno tried again.

  And again and again and again and again.

  Luno began to think he wasn’t a Zorgoochi after all. Maybe there was a mix-up at the hospital and the real Luno Zorgoochi went home with another family and was out there somewhere tossing pizza dough perfectly.

  And what would Dad think? How could Luno ever take over Zorgoochi Intergalactic Pizza with a crummy pizza toss?

  In his zeal to master the Zorgoochi Pizza Toss, Luno went as far as to invent a pair of Memory Gloves, which he had his father wear when he tossed pizza dough. Once the microscopic circuitry recorded the movements of Geo’s nimble fingers, then all Luno had to do was slip them on and the gloves would do all the work.

  Unfortunately, the Memory Gloves malfunctioned and tried to strangle Luno.

  “Your fazzer, he master Zorgoochi Pizza Toss vhen he vas ten!” Roog growled. “You cannot take over pizzeria unlezz you do Toss perfek!”

  Roog shook his head in disgust. He had helped train every generation of Luno’s family to make pizza since Solaro hired him, and from then on, he sort of came with the place. Luno had no idea how old Roog was, where he came from, or anything else about him other than he had a prosthetic metal claw from being wounded in the Great Pizza War of Deep Dish vs. Thin Crust, and liked to yell at him.

  Every morning before school, Roog trained Luno in the basics of pizza making, including the dozens of hand signals, like baseball catchers used, to identify the different kinds of pizzas, as well as how to hold your breath underwater long enough to pick a bushel of Sea Garlic in the kitchen tank without drowning.

  Every day after school Luno wrestled Cosmic Calamari, deflated Plutonian Pufferfish, and shucked giant snapping Space Clams, which was bad enough, but he also had a seafood allergy and had to wear a protective suit to handle them or he’d swell up like one of those Pufferfish he popped every day.

  However, Luno still wasn’t entirely sure how dodging flying pizza cutters, walking across hot coals, or taking apart and reassembling a pizza oven blindfolded had anything to do with making pizza.

  “You call dis meatball, boy?” shouted Roog as he pelted Luno with meatballs with microscopic imperfections. “Your grandfazzer Pomodoro, he made perfek meatball no vun could bear eet, they ver so beautiful! Again!”

  As Luno attempted to make perfect spheres of ground meat, he daydreamed about what it would be like to play sports, be in the school band, or just not have to work at his parent’s pizzeria every morning and afternoon, and now that school was over, for the entire summer. But his reverie was cut short by a strange feeling on his leg.

  Luno looked down and his spine froze. A Saturnian Sausage with a hungry look in its eye was slithering up his pant leg!

  “Vhat are doing, zilly boy?” Roog bellowed. “Dat zausage iz about to keel you! Dere is no time to be afraid!”

  Luno pulled the sausage off and whipped it into a massive bubbling pot of Zorgoochi special tomato sauce.

  “Maybe I forget to lock cage, eh?” Roog chuckled. “It vas accident, I tink.”

  Roog seemed to have lots of “accidents,” but only when no one else other than Luno was around. No matter how many times Luno complained, his parents never believed him. Once, Roog “accidentally” knocked Luno into the laundry dryer and he was left spinning for an hour until his mother discovered him tangled up with the aprons. Another time, Roog “absentmindedly” locked him in the walk-in cryogenic freezer for two days. Luno had to keep moving or he would’ve been frozen solid. It took a whole week for his eyebrows to defrost.

  Luno had the sneaking suspicion that Roog was trying to kill him.

  One thing Roog didn’t yell at Luno about was his sense of smell. In fact, Luno was his school’s Smelling Bee champ five years in a row.

  Roog threw Luno into a chair and blindfolded him. Then he passed different herbs under his nose.

  “Basil!” Luno said. “Parsley, sage, cayenne pepper—ah-choo!”

  Then Roog waved another leaf under Luno’s nose.

  “Erba Zorgoochus.” Luno smiled.

  Roog pulled the blindfold off.

  “Not bad. You inherited nose from great-great-great-great-great-grandfazzer Solaro,” Roog grunted. “A nose like his only happens every six generation. You are lucky, boy.”

  When Luno was younger and Roog told him that, he thought Roog only meant that he had a nose that was as super-sensitive as Solaro’s, but now that he was thirteen, it was starting to look like he also inherited a nose as big as his ancestor’s.

  It also had its drawbacks. No matter how hard they tried,
his parents were never able to successfully throw him a surprise birthday party because he could always smell the cake before he saw it.

  “Okay, boy,” Roog said. “Time to make de pizza.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  Surprise (But Not the Good Kind)!

  Luno sat on an overturned tomato basket and breathed in the dozens of aromas in the garden behind the pizzeria. It still was his favorite place to be—and to get away from Roog. He closed his eyes and let the rays of the three suns warm his face as he leaned against the greenhouse.

  “Luno!” his father barked. Luno wheeled around with a start and saw his parents ambling toward him.

  “We need to talk to you about something,” said Geo.

  The last time his father said that, he had to start working in the kitchen every day before and after school and on weekends and in the summer.

  “I still don’t think it’s a good idea,” Connie said, “but your father thinks you’re ready.”

  “For what?” Luno asked, his stomach flip-flopping.

  “To be Zorgoochi Intergalactic Pizza’s new delivery boy,” said Geo.

  Luno suddenly forgot how to blink.

  “So?” Geo asked hopefully. “What do you say, son?”

  Luno didn’t know what to say. Sure, he was happy about not spending another summer down in the hot kitchen with Roog, wrestling angry sausages, getting shocked by electric olives, or being bitten by wild mushrooms. But driving around the galaxy delivering pizzas—all by himself?

  Luno’s parents never allowed him to leave the planet, but he always dreamed of going out into the cosmos ever since he turned twelve and got his galactic driver’s license. He’d been begging his parents to let him drive on his own and now it was actually happening!

  GULP!

  Luno was about to ask why William10, the Zorgoochi’s outdated robot delivery autopilot, couldn’t do the job, but then he remembered. Sporting a major dent in his side, most likely from a particularly dangerous delivery, William10 was so old and banged-up, they retired him to Rusty Acres on Planet Rur, a planet for old robots, when he could no longer control his radioactive gas emissions. The Zorgoochis couldn’t afford another robot, so not only did his father make the pizzas, he delivered them, too, which was probably why he was so tired and grumpy all the time.