Chapter 17: Settling In

Mack turned in a slow circle as he reached Paulie’s side. His longer front legs and little stubby back legs scuffing softly on the hard carpet of the floor.

Paulie nodded as he made a gesture towards the large nearly floor to ceiling screens. “Oh, you have ‘bark-cough’. Do you want me to set them up for you? I can turn them onto audio input mode, that way you can control them without having to try and rush learning yuuvian.” The man chuckled as Paulie shrugged.

“Sure. Not sure what a.. whatever it was you just said was. They look like TV’s to me though. I guess the parasite will pick it up and translate now?” He felt a teensy squirm in his brain that caused him to grunt.

Mack chuckled. “Your.. parasite.. as you put it, is not a dumb unthinking animal, Paulie. They are a part of you now, they live as you live and will die if you die. You might as well get used to having another resident in your skull.” He paused as Paulie cocked his head. “And yes, the phrase TV should translate across now. It is a shame you were not given a jargon worm at first molting. You would have been far beyond the majority of this discomfort already.” He muttered something as he turned that not even Paulie’s superior hearing could pick up.

The detective moved to the wall and seemed to mess with a control panel inset into the side of one of the large screens before the gloom was brilliantly lit.

Paulie covered his eyes with an arm and exclaimed aloud, “Ack, what the hell?” As his eyes adjusted to the new ambient light, he began to make out strange new details. Where the wall had once been was now the most flawless simulacrum of a windblown grassy plain he had ever seen. He stood, mouth agape as he saw a gentle breeze stir the long grass, and then shivered as he felt a light breeze across the exposed hairs of his wrist and face in return.

He stepped closer, the gentle sigh of the wind and the rustling of the green stalks was accompanied by the vaguest hint of crushed heather and damp soil. So complete was the illusion that despite the knowledge that it was a simulation his own mind was telling him that should he just reach out a hand he would not feel cold unyielding glass. But soft feathery grasses and the thick loamy soil.

He breathed out as something tapped his shoulder insistently. “Hello human? Gike to Paulie, hello? Are you with us?”

Reality snapped back to Paulie like a straight punch to the jaw, his pale brown eyes snapping to Mack’s much larger grey orbs as he lurched. “W-what? Huh?”

The detective gave him a look that could have meant anything, but Paulie felt like it was exasperation. “I set it to verbal command mode. It may not always understand exactly what you are asking. But you can play around with it a little to find what you like. There is nothing dangerous about it so you can’t possibly hurt yourself with it.” He paused. “Now, the kitchen?”

Paulie nodded and followed the man. His stubby little rearmost legs scuffed on the carpet quietly as he and Mack entered the small yellow walled room. Paulie felt the desire to start playing with things nearly overwhelmed him as he looked at the profusion of dials, switches and buttons. Not for the first time he remarked that the GGI’s technology seemed oddly anachronistic in comparison to what he may have expected from a widespread technologically advanced star empire.

He reached for a large blue button when Mack barked, “What are you doing? That button turns the element off with an emergency reset!”

Paulie withdrew his questing fingers. “Oh, it does?”

Mack dropped the mask of concern and laughed. “No, that’s the reset switch for the autocleaner.” Paulie scowled and the alien simply laughed harder, the barking chuckles mixing with the clattering of his neck quills to generate a unique cacophony of noise.

He folded his arms. “Not funny. What if I had actually hit some sort of bad button? What then, huh?”

Mack blinked and ignored his petulant retort. “Okay, so look here. This large unit is the autocleaner. You can stick soiled dishes and the like in there to have them recycled back into the autoracks. Over there you have a cold-storage unit and freezer. You can put things in there if you want to stay cold.”

Paulie nodded again. “Yeah, so far seems pretty standard. Is there an oven or stovetop?”

Mack nodded again. “I forget that your people are more advanced than you look.” The slight insult implied by the words stung, but Paulie couldn't really hold it against the man. He had gone his entire life knowing for a fact that humans were uncultured savages. It was no wonder that the man still held a few less than stellar stereotypes.

Putting it out of mind, Paulie watched the man describe the rest of the kitchen to him. Most of it seemed to be pretty straight forward, the guided tour ended at the bathroom. Mack pointed to the stall and continued speaking unabated, “As you may have noticed, the stall is highly configurable to body shape, weight and even body covering. You have no fur, no scales and no hard exterior plates. So you may want to set it to the lightest setting.” he paused and then seemed to reevaluate. “Actually, with your apparent toughness you would probably be fine with the intermediate setting it’s already on.”

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Paulie gave the man a thumbs up. “Got it. So turn the knob till the water feels right, that’s what I got out of that.” Mack rolled his large alien eyes but a small grin cracked his otherwise impassive features.

“Yea. Well, if there is nothing else that you require then I guess I should leave you to it.”

Paulie stopped the man with an outstretched hand just barely grasping his shoulder. The miriam detective turned his head on that impossibly flexible neck to look at him. “Yes? What is it, human?”

Paulie tapped his hands together for an instant and then just belted out the last issue he had been stressing over. “What if I need to get a hold of you or Jakiikii? Can I get a phone or something? I lost mine when I was abducted.”

He wasn’t really expecting the alien to acquiesce, at least not in the manner he did. “Oh yea, I almost forgot. Here.. have my spare communicator. It already has my alternate number and Jakiikii’s in it. When we get you assigned some more permanent guards then they will be able to give you theirs too.” He pulled something from inside his coat and tossed it underhandedly to him. In the low gravity it seemed to almost float in slow motion towards him.

As Paulie caught the small device he gave it a closer look. It looked like a small watch, the screen no bigger than that of a small mobile phone. He glanced at the man and motioned towards his wrist. Mack raised his, showing that he wore a device just like it under the sleeve of his suit.

He nodded again, this time mostly to himself. “Ok, cool. Alien smart-watch.”

He looked up but the man was gone. His communicator beeped at him insistently as he took a step towards the door. Upon its face was a small green arrow and a blue square. Using his earlier experiences he just assumed that the green arrow was not the right button and jabbed his thumb into the blue square instead. He was rewarded with a small shaky image of Mack appearing on the screen before him.

The alien looked to be walking down the steps they had used to reach his room. “Oh good, you figured out how to answer calls. Why am I surprised, you have shown yourself to be just as capable as any other person. Sorry, it may take me a little longer than I had originally anticipated to get used to talking to another apocalypser. I just wanted you to know, if you need to navigate the commie with voice, press the small blue circle on the side of the device three times in quick succession. That oughta be it, I am going to retire to bed now. I will be there to check on you in the morning.” he stopped, catching his breath for a moment as he leaned in close to the screen. His tone changed from conversational to serious in an instant as one of those large grey orbs gazed at him. “And human? Don’t leave your room under any circumstance lest it to be to escape imminent danger. I have stuck my neck far out onto the block for you.. don’t fuck me.” And with that the picture went dark. The device's default screen flashing back as the link was cut.

Something the man had said tickled his brain, but he lost it as the tiredness that was creeping through his bones. “I need to get some sleep.” He muttered to himself.

With that final declaration Paulie felt the bone deep fatigue he had been ignoring creep back over him. His knees wobbled as he had to support himself against the nearby wall. He pushed the front door closed with a click, making sure he had the lasercard in his pocket still. It wouldn't do to leave it somewhere and get locked out.

Paulie pulled off his shirt as he wobbled over and then sat heavily on the bed. His hands went to the yellowish discoloration that had only hours before been dark bruises. Whatever it was the little oniuh had given him, it was certainly doing the trick. He fingered the patch on the side of his neck, but he had been told to leave it in place. So he did.

He reached down and untied his shoes slowly, taking them off and his socks as he sighed heavily and let the low gravity of the world pull him backwards into the bedding. It was soft, almost like what one might have expected from a cross between a conventional foam mattress and a giant beanbag. It wasn’t too dissimilar from either, a round pillow and thin blanket sat on the floor near to the wall and he grabbed them too. If he was going to sleep then he might as well get comfortable.

He undid his belt and kicked off his pants, now clad in only his undergarment. He pulled the blanket over himself as he tried to settle into the bedding as best he could. He closed his eyes as he got comfortable finally, but sleep didn’t come immediately as he might have otherwise hoped. No, instead he felt his mind abuzz with new questions. New questions he had no answers for.

Why had the universe seen fit to deposit him here? He had gone most of his life believing that everything happened for a purpose, but even he was struggling to make true sense of the last few days. He had been abducted, prodded, shot and left to die. Nearly dissected and arrested, attacked again and then finally given his own place to stay. It had been a wild roller coaster of emotions to say the least.

He shuffled around under the sheets as he tried once more to put the lingering doubts out of his mind. No, everything did happen for a reason. He just hadn’t found the reasoning for it yet. But he would, given a little more time and resources.

His eyes grew heavy, the thoughts whirling lower and lower as his mind slowly recognised his desperate need for rest.

**********

Paulie awoke feeling much better than he had the day before. He rolled sideways off the sleeping mound and stood to his feet so quickly that he bounded nearly a dozen centimeters into the air. He chuckled as he regained his footing, he would need to constantly remind himself of his own agility under the moon’s weaker pull.

“Woops.” He uttered under his breath as he nodded to himself. He regained the same slightly shuffling gait he had learned to adopt the day before. One that allowed for rapid movement without sending himself flying all over the place. Paulie walked over to the bathroom and after taking a quick piss, he checked himself out in the mirror.

His mouth dropped open as he looked at himself. The nasty bruises that had faded to a dull yellow were nearly nonexistent now, the various cuts and scrapes looked like they were weeks old and the web of buns that had spidered across his chest were simply faint lines instead of the angry red rash they had been the previous night.

He reached up and felt the miraculously healed skin expecting some manner of pain. But there was none, no tenderness, not even the feeling of tightness that came with newly healed wounds. It was as if they had happened to someone else entirely. He breathed heavily as he realised just how far ahead medically speaking these aliens must truly be.

It made sense, they could manipulate the very bounds of spacetime to travel hundreds of light years in less time than it would have taken him to drive to Nebraska. But still, to see it so starkly evident upon his own flesh. It was nearly impossible to grasp at first and he found himself turning around and around in the mirror as he tried to find some trace of his earlier injuries that had not undergone the transformation.

He heard a knock on the door that made him jump. Paulie started to rush to it when he realised he was still in only his boxer shorts. He turned a bit red as he frantically pulled his clothing back on while calling out, “I’ll be right there. One moment.”

Paulie nearly tripped over his own pants as he fumbled with his belt and then straightened his shirt. He reached for the door handle and then stopped. What if it was another trick?

He paused and then stepped out of the direct path of the door as he asked, “Who is it?”

The voice that answered made him smile. “It’s Flurn and.. damn it. She did it again, Jakiikii is around here somewher.. EEK!”

The voice cut off followed by the sound of air being released from some manner of container. Jakiikii’s voice spoke, “You should have seen the look on your face, Flurn. Paulie, let us in. The good doctor has made the atmosphere out here quite disagreeable.”

He smiled to himself as he threw the door open, the two aliens seeming to stare at each other, two of Jakiikii’s petal-eyes turning to look at him without the rest of her head moving. Flurn in mild anger and the termaxxi with a look of clear pride. He covered his mouth with his arm as he coughed a little and waved for them to enter the room, stepping aside as they did so.