Chapter 28: Rattling Cages

Paulie spent the majority of the next two days playing with the alien television and browsing the channels it had to offer. He was impressed by the amount of media it seemed to give access to, seemingly having an infinite amount of movies, shows and musicals. The latter he had found the most oddly appealing. The strange coruscating harmonies and warbling tritones of the alien music at once hauntingly beautiful and jarringly complex.

He supposed that with ten thousand years of working on it, there must be an absolute glut of fundamental theory and music history to catch up on. And he was willing to sit there all day long just browsing the tube as one might have said when the door knocked loudly.

Paulie grunted in mild annoyance and spoke, “TV, Pause. Bookmark program and standby.” It did as he had ordered and then the screen turned a dark green as it went into low power mode.

He pushed himself up to his feet and nodded with a wide yawn. “I'm on my way, who’s there?”

A voice answered and he moved to grab the door, “It’s Mack, let me in already will ya?”

Paulie walked tiredly over to the door, his feet dragging on the carpet. He hadn’t been sleeping well and his diet had also been a bit on the less than fortunate side making him feel a little nauseous after a breakfast of strange greenish gummy fruits that hadn’t sat well with him.

He opened it and Mack pushed past him with a grateful nod and a glance back over his shoulder. As he entered the center of the room he turned and Paulie was able to get a better look at the man. He was surprised by what he saw.

Mack’s generally neat and tidy clothes were rumpled and creased. His long greatcoat was stained with what he would have assumed was coffee if not for the alien surroundings around them. Had the man possessed hair then it likely would have been mussy and unkempt too. As it was, there was a wild gleam in the miriam’s large grey eyes as he nodded to Paulie and launched immediately into a tirade of words.

“It’s incredible really. Paulie, it is everything I have been looking for for the past thirteen years of my investigation into the organised crime rings of Gike. And here’s the kicker, it goes so much further than just this one planet..” Paulie had to put up his hands to slow the man’s ranting.

“Hang on, hold on.. a little slower. What are you talking about, Mack?“ He asked the overexcited alien detective.

Mack’s neck-spines chattered against each other as he shook his long neck and stepped towards Paulie imploringly. “No, you need to listen. You made this possible, you and that zen’kkalkian you talked about..”

“Krissh’shanibe.” He prompted. Mack nodded absentmindedly and Paulie ignored the man’s lack of apparent respect. He was just excited and likely far too focused on his own discoveries to pay much attention to anything he was saying to him.

Mack waved both hands now, seemingly totally engrossed in his own narrative. “You would not believe the information that I found on that data crystal. Names, dates, locations.. it has everything I could have needed to pin the deeds directly on Ooounoo herself and put her away for good. It took me almost a full day to decrypt it, but with some help from Flurn and Rozz I was able to crack it open like a gakk nut. And oh the meat that I found inside.” He chuckled, neck quills clattering together like dry bones.

Paulie nodded. “Okay, that’s great. So, when do we make a move on her ass?”

Mack lurched. “Make a move?” he asked.

Paulie nodded again, much more exaggeratedly this time. “Yeah. On.. her.. ass!” He enunciated every syllable.

Mack turned away, his head motionless as his flexible neck didn’t move with his lower body. Mack glanced at him and then towards the simulation screen that took up the majority of the far wall in the dimly lit room. The alien man muttered angrily, “I can’t do anything. Not yet anyways.”

Paulie stepped closer to the man who took a step back defensively as Paulie used his extra twenty-three centimeters of height to loom over the other man. “What the hell do you mean you can’t? Do all the innocent lives she and her criminal ilk have ruined mean so little to you? You and your Greater Galactic Intercession may see us humans as dangerous savages, but I assure you.. nothing you have seen could possibly prepare you for just how savage we can be.” he growled low in his chest as he said it, the anger and rage he had been suppressing for the last few days surfacing once again.

In the back of his mind he thought he heard a cackle and he had to shake his head to force the rage back down. He straightened and saw Mack, the man was looking at Paulie with an expression somewhere between terrified awe and abject horror.

He raised a hand and tried to apologise as the man seemed to gurgle or cough. “Oh, shit.. sorry Mack. I-I don’t know what came over me there. I just got so angry..” He stopped as he realised that the other man was actually starting to laugh. The sounds he had initially mistaken for fear were actually pained amusement.

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Mack leaned forwards on his longer front legs for a moment, his stubbier rear legs taking up the slack as he tried to regain his composure. “It’s okay Paulie. I can understand a little of what you may be feeling at least, I am just thinking of how much trouble Ooounoo and her criminal underlings are in once we get the okay to go ahead on her.” Paulie cocked his head and laughed a little cautiously along with the detective.

Mack wiped an eye with his sleeve. “But seriously, you about made me lay an egg, and I'm not even going to get into the impossibilities of that. No, before I can get any kind of task force put together I am going to need to run things by my superior, Major Alloen Mauk. And he isn't exactly well known for his love of efficiency. Damn bureaucrats.” He muttered it again, and not for the first time that Paulie had noticed.

No, it seemed like anything that was going to happen was going to be awhile. He shrugged and took a few steps towards the kitchen. “Okay, well I guess you have done all you can up till this point. Would you like a cup of iced frubble juice? A slushice maybe? Jakiikii showed me how to use the acoustic emulsifier. It’s a pretty nifty little..” Mack interrupted his speech with a waved gesture.

“No.. no. I have to be going again, I am sorry to just drop in on you like this unannounced, but I was just too excited and needed to tell somebody I trust.” Mack paused as Paulie frowned.

“What, you don’t trust your mates over at the complex?”

He surprised Paulie by shaking his bald head. Large grey eyes seeming to bore into Paulie’s own. “No. I don’t. There is a leak at the complex, somebody on the inside close to me has been feeding Ooounoo and her affiliates information for years. And I think I might know who it is.” he frowned, his thin lipless mouth becoming a nearly indistinguishable line of his smooth nearly featureless face.

Paulie shrugged. “Okay, but I did have another question for you.” Mack’s head rose a little, the man turning to face him with his arms folded across his chest. “I was wondering if I could get another change of clothes, maybe a different color this time too. I just feel a little icky wearing the same clothes for multiple days in a row. Also, where do I wash the one’s I am wearing? I rinsed em off in the sink yesterday and then dried them in the shower. But I can only do that so many times before people start to notice.”

Mack smiled a little at that. The mundane worries of the common man working to ease his own anxious mind. “Well, that I can certainly take care of for you. There should be an autocleaner for the clothes in the bathroom, on the wall next to the back wall. It will look like a marked panel, but you can’t read yuuvian so it would not have stood out to you. How many changes do you want, and is there anything you want to have changed or added to them?” Paulie shook his head and glanced at the carpet.

“No, nothing I can think of now.” He paused, wanting to ask Mack another question but not sure where to start. He held up a hand as Mack took a step towards the doorway. “Wait! Mack.”

Mack stopped, “What? What is it?”

Paulie shuffled a little, his bare feet tapping on the carpeted floor as he tried to think of the best way to word it. Finally he spoke, “Well. I have been taking this whole time I have been here. And I am certain your society is not one where all is freely given, so I have to wonder.. who is paying for it all?”

Mack shook his head. “You really are not a dullard. Yes, there is a cost being incurred by your storage and feeding. It is a price I am gladly paying for the information you have given me Paulie. You don’t have to worry about me charging you rent, not for another month at least. Then eight-hundred osmir a month outta-bout to cover the cost of your room and board.” He chuckled.

Mack seemed satisfied with his answer and turned towards the door once more but again Paulie stopped him with a new idea. “Well, I was thinking. What if you didn’t have to, you know?” Mack’s head cocked in an interested manner, eyelids fluttering slightly as his sensory spines chattered. “I could get a job maybe.”

Mack straightened and was silent. He was silent for a little longer than was strictly comfortable. “Doing what? Flipping khiis patties on the corner? Not likely that you would find anything suitable given your.. unique native condition.”

Paulie took a step closer, “No, I was thinking maybe I could come and work for you? You know, at the complex. Doing detective stuff!” he finished excitedly.

“Paulie. As much as that would be the talk of the market, I don’t think that is a very good idea. I will certainly keep you in the loop on this investigation, but as for you joining the force. No, I don’t see that happening.” Mack said it bluntly, just the way it was in his eyes. But Paulie was less convinced.

He argued his case, plead it as best he was able. “Oh, come on Mack. You could use an apocalypser as you guys have been calling me. Just do it like you did for Jakiikii…” he didn’t get to finish that statement as Mack moved so fast he barely noticed it.

Before he could truly process what had happened he felt cold steel pressed against his jugular, just under his chin. It was a small pistol-sized weapon that Mack had produced from somewhere inside of his jacket without Paulie even having seen it.

“What did you say?! What do you know about Jakiikii? Who told you that she is doing work for me specifically!” Mack spat, his eyes once more a little wild and his movements jerky.

Paulie raised his hands high as he stood as still as he could, “Whoa! Hey, no need for that!”

Mack stared at him, eyes a little wild and his neck craned to stare directly into Paulie’s face. “Who. Told. You. That?” He said, dangerously quiet.

Paulie swallowed loudly, eyes fixed on the man’s rage filled features while the gun pressed ever closer to his jaw. He was sure that the man would be capable of pulling the trigger before Paulie could do anything to extricate himself from the situation, the man had consistently showed that his reflexes were faster than the average alien’s seemed to be.

Paulie spoke slowly so as not to cause alarm. “She told me herself the other day. We went on the roof and she told me about her childhood or whatever and how you had rescued her from imprisonment. I haven’t talked to anyone but her, you and Flurn for the entire time I have been here man!” He cried out, a little distressed given the current change in the room's mood.

Paulie saw the other man tense, and he cringed a little more. Was this how he was going to die? He had suffered all that he had been through, just to die put down like a rabid dog at the hands of a sleep deprived madman?

It seemed not to be as Mack nodded slightly and pulled the gun away from Paulie’s jugular making him stumble back a bit and suck in a tremendous breath he hadn't realised he had needed. Paulie breathed heavily and then looked at Mack who was still warilly holding the gun to his side.

“What the fuck was that about, Mack!? All I did was say..” Mack threw up an arm for him to be silent. And Paulie shut his mouth with a snap.

Mack seemed to look around and shook his head as he replaced the gun into a shoulder holster that Paulie had not noticed he wore. “This is neither the time nor the place. I WILL be discussing this with Jakiikii. And if her story deviates from yours in any way at all, then I will be back. And you will explain to me who you got your information from.” He turned back towards the door and stepped towards it before stopping. He looked back at Paulie and shook his head slightly. “You can’t ever be too careful nowadays, there are some dark times coming Paulie. I recommend that you learn to defend yourself, I may not always be around to do it for you.”

And with that the man opened the door and left. Leaving Paulie feeling flustered and more than a little agitated. What had that been about, Paulie had never seen Mack act like that before. There was more between Mack and Jakiikii than simple mentorship. That was for sure.

He rubbed at his throat, the phantom feeling of cold hard steel pressing into it wouldn't go away. He decided to make something to eat to take his mind off of things, and to help him think. Mack had been right about one thing for sure though. Paulie needed to learn to take care of himself instead of always waiting for others to do it for him.