Chapter 16: What's the Plan?

Chapter 16: What's the Plan?

Paulie and Jakiikii were led through the outer cordon of the PDF forces and to a small medical tent at which they were promptly asked to remain outside by the heechian paramedic stationed by the doorway, the lanky purple skinned alien wrinkling her nose as she rolled all six eyes. If he smelled bad to himself, he must smell absolutely awful to her with her powerful senses.

“They are here to see the wounded.” Commander Slallm said gruffly, waving a boneless arm at Paulie.

Commander Slallm bid them farewell just after as he and his troops moved back towards the edges of the area, he promised to talk to them more later, maybe tomorrow. Paulie and Jakiikii waved to the sillo’an and turned back towards the heechian woman standing near them.

Paulie watched as she turned her head and spoke into the tent loudly, “Nurse Teeluy, can you step outside please?”

Presently there was a strange call, like the creaking of timbers or the whoosh of wind through an old barn, then the tent’s flaps pushed open slowly. Paulie’s eyes widened as some thing stepped out into the brightly lit night.

It looked at first like a bush with legs. But as he looked closer he saw it was actually a cheg, the first one he had seen up close in fact. His eyes went wide in fascination before he could help it, he realised he was staring, but he had never seen anything like the strange alien before. The alien’s skin was thick and gnarled like bark, their head a mess of branches with tightly curled leaves that normally would have been opened to catch the light of the sun. All across its body were small, luminescent flower-like growths that moved slightly as if each was aware of themselves. Aware and observing the thing’s surroundings.

The cheg’s root-like foot tendrils made a dull scraping sound as they slowly moved out into the open, their body swaying slightly from side to side as they did so. Their main body area had little identifying features, no face to speak of and no eyes. But those little glowing flowers seemed to turn to regard first Paulie and then Jakiikii as if observing them.

It spoke, a small lipless hole that he had not seen before opening on the lower part of what he had to assume was its front. From this issued a low and almost hauntingly melodic voice that was translated to recognisable speech via the parasite living in his skull. “Yes? More patients for me?”

Nurse Teeluy stepped toward Paulie and reached out with a long arm, the fingers of which were articulated almost like the joints of an insect while still looking like the branches of some alien plant. They stopped though short of touching him as the heechian shook her head, lips peeling back slightly to bare her short, rending fangs.

“No, at least not to my knowledge. They wanted to know the medical status of our other patients.” The lanky alien shuffled a bit farther from them, her nose still wrinkled against their stinking forms.

“Ahhh.. you wish to know how they have fared. Well, I could not save the worst off. It was simply beyond my ability to bring life to those deceased before I arrived, but many of those that were wounded less grievously should recover fully.”

Paulie could not help himself from blurting out, “What about Sergeant Aril? She was hurt badly last I saw her.”

The cheg didn’t move, but gave the impression of a human cocking their head regardless. “Your friend, the nerivith? If I remember correctly.” He nodded slightly, a little annoyed at the alien’s slow speech. Jakiikii stepped to his side and gripped his upper arm too as they awaited the response. The alien still talked with annoying sluggishness. Their every word was low and measured as if spoken with great care. “She will be fine after she is done with her graft. She needed minor surgery to remove necrotising tissue, a very severe burn. Nothing to worry about. She will recover with nothing but scars to add to her already impressive collection"

Jakiikii’s arm squeezed his as she leaned into him and prompted, “What about the others? Were there many injured?”

Paulie watched as the heechian’s face fell. She spoke out of turn, her six bright predator eyes squinting as she nodded toward the other medical worker. “As Nurse Teeluy said, we saved the ones that we could. But, yes. Many were injured, including innocents caught in the terrible crossfire. Some died, but there is nothing to do but wait and see if those that still bear life continue living.” She nodded one final time and then walked away around the edge of the tent with shoulders slightly slumping.

Paulie could have sworn the woman’s eyes had been full of tears and a part of him wondered if she had perhaps known any of the dead.

He didn’t have time to speculate on it as Nurse Teeluy waved at them slowly. “You must depart. Go back to your guard, I have been notified that there is yet more work to be done.” The alien turned away, then stopped. Those small flowers all over their body seeming to close slightly. It spoke once more, that deep and melodic voice asking, “Would you like me to tell them you asked after them? I am sure it would do them good to know you two yet live.”

Paulie nodded. “Yes, please do. Tell them that we are fine, and wish them well in their recovery.” He watched as the cheg turned and then disappeared back inside the tent. The flaps of the structure closing behind them and leaving him alone in the street with Jakiikii still clinging to his arm.

“So, you made it.” A synthetic voice spoke from just behind him.

He and Jakiikii turned, a smile lighting up his face as Paulie recognised the creature standing behind them. It was Mursk, his armoured looked damaged. At least a few new burn scars and a long scratch that crossed the lens of one eye. But he was alive and well from the looks of it.

He stepped forward and before the medagoonian man could so much as protest he wrapped the big bug in a bear hug that saw him lifted bodily off the ground for a moment. The alien’s arms and legs flailed impotently as he did so, a startled clicking exiting the royal guardsman’s suit speakers.

“Oh it is good to see you are alright!” Paulie exclaimed as he did a little half spin, crushing the insectoid alien against his chest heedless of his protesting injuries.

After a moment he set the fully shook alien down, the royal guardsman shuffling for a second as he found his footing again after another moment. Their face was impassive under their helmeted head, but Paulie smiled widely as he could tell the man was a little flustered.

“Well, yes. It is good to see you as well.” They chittered slowly. Their translator spoke with the cold, robotic precision that Paulie had come to know. He could hear the inflection in the aliens clicking speech however, he had started to get better at recognising the patterns in it that indicated stress.

“What’s wrong?” He asked immediately, his smile dying on his face to be replaced by a look of concern.

Jakiikii cocked her head at him as if to speak, but he waved at her to listen.

Mursk shuffled and then motioned the way he had come from. “We will talk on the way. Please, follow me.”

Paulie and Jakiikii fell in alongside him as they walked down the street, stepping around and through security checkpoints. Each raised a hand to stop them but thought better of it as they saw the giant human walking together with a fierce looking mendagoonian royal guardsman commander. In such a manner they were able to walk unopposed towards the apartments that they had departed only hours before. It felt like days had passed in all that had happened since.

As they walked Mursk fidgeted and then spoke quietly. “Mennt was grievously wounded by some type of new anti-armour weapon we have never encountered before.” Paulie frowned and Jakiikii gasped as two hands flew to her chest in a sympathetic gesture.

“Oh no! Is he going to be alright?” She asked, prompting the man to tell them it would be so. Hoping that it would be so.

Mursk chittered, low and sad sounding. “I do not know. It..” He made a strange gurgling sound and shook his head. Suddenly he reached up and unclasped the helmet he almost always wore. As it came away Paulie could see the man was in distress. The color has gone from the flesh around his large compound eyes, those great jewel-like orbs themselves seemed at once dimmer than they had been before.

Mursk shook his head again. “I don’t think he is going to make it. There was just.. too much damage. His suit sealed around the wound and kept him from bleeding out, but I don’t think..” He trailed off again, mouthparts working silently as he made that same gurgling sound again.

Jakiikii rushed to his side and hugged the alien as they stopped in the street. Paulie had no words. He hadn’t known the other guardsman well, but he had gotten hurt to protect Paulie. Maybe even died on his behalf. He felt his fists clench as the rage seemed through the cracks in his fractured mental armour, he waited for the mental prodding that always accompanied such losses in control lately. The subtle manifestation of horror that the damned parasite would hit him with to try and make him lose control.

But there was nothing. No mocking laugh in the back of his head, no painful pressure up against the underside of his subconscious. His mind was quiet and it made him pause even as he gritted his teeth.

He stopped thinking and dug into the anomaly. But there it was, an absence. A lack of that old presence he had come to know. But.. he looked around at the two standing beside him. He could still understand Jakiikii, so he must still have the parasite lodged deep in his grey matter.

‘It is just some new trick! You won’t fool me that easily you worm, slug, gross flailing thing!’ He screamed into the darkness inside his own head.

He stopped as he felt a hand slip into one of his own, instinctively opening his hand to let long fingers intertwine with his. He swallowed and glanced at the others. Jakiikii was still holding a clearly upset Mursk, the man’s insectoid head shaking slightly as he leaned into her five-armed embrace. Her last arm she had saved for him, that small gesture of support meaning the whole universe to him. He smiled, and she smiled back. Her eyes crinkled even as the very corner of her dainty little mouth curled up.

The three of them stayed like that for a few moments more before Jakiikii patted the other man on the back and released him. Mursk made a sort of clucking noise and passed two small hands over his antennae in what Paulie understood to be his nervous tick.

“I.. I thank you, both. It has been a trying last few hours. And the sight of you both alive and well, it warms the valves of my central vestibule.” They shook their head slightly in a jerky, bird-like motion before waving towards the nearby structure. “We must move. The night is late, and there may be yet more assassins lurking in the dark. Please, we should continue.”

Paulie and the others started walking again. As they did he gripped Jakiikii’s hand a bit tighter making her glance up at him. He frowned, “What is the plan then? They came for us at our home. On our own turf and heedless of the security escort.” He clenched his other fist harder and imagined it was wrapped around the throat of some witless traitor scumbag.

Mursk had by this time cleared up a little, and the mendagoonian man tapped at his suit’s chestplate. “I have no plan. The plan went out of the burrow entrance as soon as the first shot was fired. I had not accounted for such an aggressive strike on you here. I will be punished for my lapse, and most deservingly so. I must regretfully resign as your protector, I have shown a lack of..”

“No!” Paulie interjected suddenly, making the royal guardsman stop mid-word.

“..of, I.. what?” Mursk said, the translator guttering out into what must have been trying to translate his stuttering clicks of confusion. “But, I failed you most directly. My lapse in attention lead almost directly to your deaths. To the deaths of multiple PDF troopers, to the death of..” They trailed off again, too distraught by the recent wound to bring up Mennt’s injuries again.

Paulie shook his head sharply, his voice a little strained with emotion as they reached the steps at the entrance of their building. He stamped a booted foot down into the duracrete walkway below as he exclaimed, “No. I will not sit here and watch you blame yourself for the atrocities of others. It was not you that decided to attack this city and her inhabitants in anger.” He waved a hand for emphasis, his eyes boring into the other man in the depths of his impassioned speech.

“It was not you that decided to start this war, you are not responsible for the terrible events of the last few hours. No, you did everything in your power and knowledge to keep me and Jakiikii safe. Your men, those PDF troopers. Okay?” Paulie was breathing heavy, his eyes staring into the mendagoonian royal guardsman’s own.

Mursk shrank slightly at first and then, emboldened by Paulie’s words, rose back up. His wings flicking like sheets of gossamer behind him as he raised three fists in salute and snapped into a stiff attention. His long and white feather-like antennae perked up straight as he did so.

“Yes. Yes you are correct.” His auto-translator buzzed. Even the emotionless machine seemingly sounding buoyed up by the words.

Jakiikii nodded her head and patted Mursk on one of his brightly colored shoulder plates. “Yes, I agree wholeheartedly with everything Paulie said. You can’t afford to blame yourself, we still need you. Mennt still needs you. The building is guarded and me and Paulie will be fine. Go.. sit by his side if you can. We will be safe for tonight.” She finished somberly with a glance toward Paulie, he nodded.

Paulie made a small gesture of agreement and told him, “Yeah. Go on man, we are good.”

Mursk nodded his head briefly and then thanked them slowly, he replaced his helmet and his wings flickered once. Then he was gone, borne away into the night.