TOC MetaStories: Ineen Aldrop's 'He Stood taller Than Most'

Part 8 -Running From the Pain-

It took Paulie’s eyes precious moments to adjust to his surroundings and he used this time to swing over the edge of the box and take off in a random direction at a dead sprint without a second thought. There was no time to think, only flight.

Paulie’s feet practically flew across the yellow tiled floor as the much lower gravity of wherever he was allowed him to use his tired and battered muscles to their fullest potential. As he rounded a corner and his eyes finally started to adjust he was able to make out more details of his surroundings.

All around him was a large yellow tiled hall, grand stone pillars holding up a vaulted ceiling upon which were inscribed the etchings of a thousand strange worlds and creatures. To describe them as ‘alien’ would hardly have done them justice. He saw bright pictures and murals in stark relief as he whirled around yet another corner in the maze-like place. The sound of footfalls faded as he stormed through that strange space, the cool floor was hard and slick under his shoes. The stylish work shoes he wore were not designed for rapid flight and with a shout of panic he felt his feet slip from under him, his momentum carrying him into one of the many strange exhibits that lined the walls and filled the alcoves in between the tall pillars.

He grunted as something wet splashed him, the large jar had held some manner of preserved curiosity and he gagged as the formaldehyde-like liquid splashed his legs and arms.

“What the hell?” He grunted as he pushed away from the large mass of quivering greyish flesh. It could have been anything, but a part of him thought it looked disturbingly like a disembodied heart. If it was indeed an alien organ then it was grotesque, Paulie scrambling back to his feet amid the stinking vapors.

The sound of shouting barks and angry clucks was drawing nearer again. Paulie looked around frantically for his next move, and then saw it. Across the hall at the end of a shallow alley between two columns sat what looked to him like a maintenance closet. But the door might also lead him out, it was a chance he was going to have to take. The small doorway being the only chance he had at that moment, he took it with gumption.

Paulie sprinted towards the door and smashed it with his shoulder, praying under his breath that it wasn’t armoured or reinforced in any way. It wasn’t.

He smashed through the flimsy portal with such force and violence that the thin metal partition was warped grossly out of shape as the hinges tore from their mortar frame in a shower of small chips. Paulie cursed as he nearly fell flat to the ground, catching himself on a low table that happened to be handy. His fist left a dent in its thin plastic surface that slowly warped back into shape as he took his weight off it.

He took a bare moment to catch his breath before looking around, the room was small. The table dominating the middle with strange stool-like chairs scattered around. The ceiling was low, but not nearly as low as the zen’kkalkian ship’s had been. Instead the white tiles seemed about the right height for a human habitation.

The walls were lined with what looked like cabinets or lockers and a few larger devices that hummed and gurgled strangely. He spied a doorway on the far side of the room and so he pushed the table aside with a clatter and arrowed for it. He wasn’t sure what he was going to find on the far side of it, but it couldn't be any worse than the crowd behind him that wanted him dead or worse.

He heard shouts coming from behind him again and swore. It was time to make a decision, either break out into the great unknown, or stay and die. A choice that was no choice at all. Paulie took a deep breath and then rushed at the door.

He burst through the doorway into a hall, the floor was thick grey carpeting and the walls seemed to be a light umber wallpapering. The ceiling was about the same distance away as the other room and had what looked like electrical light strips that ran down its length and lit the room brightly, though they were tinted slightly orange and not white as he might have otherwise suspected. All in all it seemed disturbingly familiar, as if he was simply trapped in some large apartment complex back on Earth. He looked both ways but saw nobody before deciding to go right on a whim.

He rounded a corner and then skidded to a halt as he almost ran straight into a creature he could only describe as a multicolored headless gorilla covered in feathers. He gave a small shout and then another slightly louder one as another small pair of arms appeared on the strange creature’s chest. Seemingly popping out from recesses on its sides or chest. It let out a loud screech and dived to the side as he sprinted by with a second glance at the strange oddity.

He had no time to stop and stare however, if he was to escape he needed to find a way out of this maze of bland corridors and halls. He needed to get outside.

He bounded down the hall like a bat out of hell, caution thrown to the wind as he used the lower gravity to his advantage. He may still weigh the same, inertia being just as punishing in the lowered gravity as it would have been back home on Earth. But with the lowering of the world’s pull he was freed to bound off walls and ricochet off the ceilings as he dashed madly around another set of corners.

He suddenly saw another set of doors in front of him. Once more he lowered his shoulder and smashed them asunder amid an explosion of shattered masonry and twisted metal. One of the doors was flung from its hinges with such violence that it lodged itself into the wall across from the larger room he had stumbled into.

He skidded to a halt and looked around the large open space. His first thought was that he had just burst into a bank, lines of creatures standing in front of a counter manned by a variety of strange aliens with matching insignia on the bits of clothing they wore. He saw more of those strange rainbow feathered aliens, as well as others that looked like upright dogs, blue frogs, tiny woolly giraffes and even a single one that looked like some sort of walking tree covered in luminescent flowers.

All at once the room exploded with shouts, chirps and screeches of alarm. Grumbling aliens scattered from his path of destruction as he bounded across the room towards the main doors. One alien, this one notable for the strange almost centaur-like body shape, reached towards its waist and pulled some manner of device that it seemed to speak into as he burst through the main doors and into the great outdoors.

He stopped, his already overloaded brain now quivering under the bombardment of stimuli that was assaulting his eyes. Bright flashing signs seemed to promise a thousand pleasurable things while the bright shapes of a hundred different species all seemed to bustle around in the loud jaunty atmosphere. Those nearest to him seemed to be more taken aback by the tall, ragged looking figure that had just burst into their midst. But most seemed relatively uncaring as to the events unfolding only meters away from them.

He could well understand their lack of attention. The entire street was jam-packed with life and sound and smells. A thousand different and wondrous things vied for his immediate attention and in his amped up and hyper focused state it was all he could do not to immediately pass out on the spot from total sensory overload.

Paulie grimaced and slapped the sides of his head a few times before a small yellow clam-like alien waddled over on a mass of yellow tendrils, the two halves of its shell opened to allow a single red eyestalk to poke out. It spoke, the voice gurgling from somewhere deeper in its textured shell, “Hey, you look hurt. Do you need help, friend?” it reached towards him with one of the yellow tentacles that it used to move around.

He shook his head and gasped out, “No, I’m okay. Sorry to bother you, but where can I find the police?” he was doubled over, trying to catch his breath amidst the chaos of the street.

The small eyestalk seemed to swivel and then the small alien’s lined shell moved as if they had shrugged. “I am not sure what you mean by ‘police’. Could you describe what it is you are looking for, friend?” The small creature seemed genuinely like they wanted to help and so Paulie took a few deep breaths and tried to calm himself.

He quickly explained what he meant by law enforcement and the small creature replied cheerfully, its slightly gurgling voice pleased to be of assistance. “Oh, you are looking for the adjudicator’s complex. It is at the end of the street and down three segments.” Paulie nodded but was halted as the friendly alien touched his wrist with a tendril. It seemed to recoil as if afraid he had been angered and so Paulie softened his face.

“Yes?” He asked the creature in a mild tone, or as mild he could manage while the adrenaline still thundered through his veins.

“You uh, didn’t thank me.” It said a little lamely, almost sounding hurt and he swore internally.’

He knelt to get closer to the short alien’s height and nodded his head before glancing around. “Oh my, you are right. Where are my manners? I may be in a terrible rush but I do thank you friend. Be safe, I need to run.” And with that he rushed off towards the direction he had been given without sparing a moment to hear the shelled alien’s reply.

He ran down the street, he thought he could hear shouts of anger from somewhere close behind him. Amid all the chaos of the street he couldn't be sure though. It was like trying to run through a mardi-gras parade. The aliens and bright colors simply devolved into costumed humans in his mind as it sought an explanation for the madness unfolding around him. But he let it go, he had just asked directions from a giant clam for goodness sake, surely that had to take the cake for the oddest thing he had ever done?

Well, it was either that or being compressed through an infinitely small point while trapped in a coffin. A real tossup.

He grunted in mild humour as he rounded a corner and almost ran straight into another person, or thing. He wasn’t really sure what it was as he yelled a hasty apology, not even taking the time to try and rationalise what he had seen. It had looked like a mix of green spaghetti and a bee on stilts. He shook his head again as that all too familiar squirming seemed to worsen the more he tried to listen to the words of those around him.

He stumbled to a halt and then jerked as something seemed to slap him in the side. He smacked the sensation and then jerked his hand back as it was singed. He looked down and saw a hissing purplish mist coming from a neat circle burned into his side. The skin under the charred cloth looking blistered and raw. He whirled around as a loud whapping sound echoed through the street and narrowly avoided a bolt of hissing purple light that whipped through the air where his head had just been.

The light impacted the side of one of the street stalls and blasted the wooden structural support like matchsticks. The vendor behind the small counter exclaimed loudly as the cloth roof collapsed over them, burying the strange alien in layers of brightly colored fabric.

Paulie looked left and right before deciding that inaction was as good as giving himself up, the approaching figures ran his direction as another few shots were loosed his direction. Without another thought he threw himself to the left as another shot slipped just past him and splashed across the wall behind him. With a crack he jumped straight through one of the weak walls of the nearest stall and into the darkened interior of the building beyond.

It took his eyes a moment to adjust but when they did he was at once in both familiar and alien territory. It was clearly some manner of technology depot or story, all the strange devices that he couldn't understand or recognise were lined up and on displays for sale. Many of the other patrons of the store seemed too preoccupied to notice he was out of place. Indeed with the level of commotion he had experienced in the street it was a wonder that any of these aliens could hear at all.

He rushed through the store looking for something, anything that might help him to escape. But it was a dead end. He stopped by the back wall and pounded his fist against it. Before he could come up with another option he heard a commotion by the front door and the sound of panicking civilians. The goons that were trying to kill him had caught up quickly. He looked left and then right and then stopped. He looked straight up and then smiled, a devious plan forming in his mind as he flexed his knees and prepared to make his most daring escape yet.