Baaul: A Change of Heart

Chapter 15: Round 1- START

Renee let out a small, frightened sound when the second explosion shook the walls of the room they were in, sending tufts of dust fluttering from the dry walls and the electricity fluttering on and off. She would have been ashamed to have let the sound of weakness out, but compared to Mandy and a few of the other staff members, she was downright stoic.

Mandy had finally stopped screaming, but only because she was puking in a corner from her fear. The smell was god awful in the small space, but Renee seemed to be the only one who noticed it. Even Markus, who was probably the second most composed person in the room was holding onto her tight enough to be uncomfortable. She had mentioned to him to let go, but he hadn’t seemed to understand her words.

The staff men pushed any furniture not nailed down against the door and stood holding it in all in place. While they secured the door, Marianne kept trying to use the land line to call for help, but the lines had been severed. That didn’t seem to deter her. She seemed in desperate need to do something and Renee doubted things were often out of her control.

The room they were in might have been the only room in the entire building that had actual four walls and it didn’t surprise Renee that it was the janitor's office. She recognized the man who seemed to be in charge of all of the others who cleaned up after them. His back was pushed up against the metal filing cabinet that took two others to pull over.

Though her heart was racing a million miles a minute, Renee couldn’t help but worry about Baaul. It was stupid because she knew that she should be more worried about herself. Still, she worried anyway.

“DAMN IT!” Marianna shouted as she slammed the phone down. “Nothing is getting through!”

Renee wasn’t surprised. The phone lines were some of the easiest to take down. Whether it had been intentional or not, it was typical for it to be down. “No one has a cell phone?”

Marianne shook her head but looked around hopefully. That gaze soon turned to despair as everyone seemed to answer they did not have a cell phone. It today’s day and age…

Renee noticed the old radio sitting on the shelf above where the desk used to be. She had to fight against Markus to get him to let go of her as hope went through her. As she reached for the radio, Marianne asked her what she was doing. Renee just smiled and held out her hand to the phone that she held. “Hopefully getting us help.”

Marianne didn’t hesitate. She handed the phone over, entirely prepared to forgive Renee’s reason for being here if it meant saving their lives. Immediately Renee began pulling everything apart. Thankfully since they were in the janitors office, she had the proper tools to cut and strip wires so she didn’t have to rely on her teeth. Though the shocks would have done nothing more than make her tongue tingle, she still hated the sensation. It was a rather simple arrangement to turn the simple listening device into a two way radio.

Renee waved Marianne over as she started turning the dial. She could not understand spanish and it was quickly evident through the spanish speaking radio stations that they would need it. It frustrated her, because most of the stations that she found were not channels that could receive their call. If she had a computer, she’d have no problem with forcing her way into the channel, but if she had a computer, she wouldn’t have needed to build this damn thing to begin with.

Renee continued to slowly turn the dial until Marianne gripped her arm. “There! Go back!”

She did and Marianne began speaking frantically. A man seemed to answer her which earned a round of victorious cries from the men behind her and a huge grin from Marianne. She quickly told them what was happening and Renee assumed a desperate plea for help.

The door suddenly surged forward with a loud thud. The men, who had come to gather around the radio, ran to try to hold to door. The door boomed again, as if someone were using a battering ram against it. The four men who were pressing against the door struggled to hold their positions.

Haydan ran forward to add his own body against the door which seemed to snap Markus out of whatever shock he had been in. Still, six men struggled to keep the door from opening. Metal screeched as the filing cabinet scraped against the tile floor but the sound that made Renee’s blood run cold was the soft animal-like clicking. She remembered what Baaul’s had sounded like and this wasn’t that.

“DON’T LET THAT THING IN HERE!” She screamed and ran to add her own weight with the men. The addition of her strength seemed to help push the door closed a fraction, but the angry roar on the other side made some of the men hesitate and that was all the creature needed to slam the door open.

Renee fell back on the floor, Markus on top of her. Her vision sparked with fireworks as her head hit the tile, but she could hear the screams of terror. There were sounds of fighting and more screams before Renee’s vision started to clear up.

The alien’s mandibles were covered in blood as a body twitched at his feet. Renee tried to sit up, but Markus was knocked out cold on top of her and his weight pinned her down. She looked for anyone to help her, her eyes settling on Marianne and Mandy, huddling together in the corner of the room. Tears poured down their white, horrified faces. “Help me!” She screamed at them, but they didn’t hear her.

The alien did. His head whipped around to her, his thick rubbery dreads bouncing around his broad shoulders. He had the lead janitor in a throat hold, his body limp and liefless. He tossed the large man aside as easily as a child would a barbie doll. The others, Hayden included seemed to have fled out of the now open door after witnessing the brutal death of the man on the floor.

Renee pushed at Markus’s shoulders as her eyes locked on the alien stepping toward her. She screamed at him to move or wake up, but her strength was not enough to move the much larger man. Tears ran down her face as her body froze in the most absolute terror that she had ever felt before.

The alien knelt down near her feet, balancing on the balls of his own. His mandables moved, creating that clicking noise as he looked at her, studying her. He reached to touch her, making Renee whimper and try to pull away, but Markus’s weight forced her to endure the warm, almost velvety soft scaling of his fingers.

He cocked his head, giving off that chittering noise, and looked down at Markus’s body. He growled, making her flinch and whimper. The alien grabbed a fistful of Markus’s hair and tossed him aside. Renee didn’t even have time to try to run away because the alien sent her flying. At first she thought that he was planning on doing the exact same thing to her as he had Markus, but she was suddenly looking down at his backside. It took her a second to realize that he had tossed her over his shoulder.

The floor seemed so far away when he stood. It was only when he started to leave the room that she seemed to snap out of it and try to fight against him. She squirmmed, screamed, battered her fist against his back, kicked at his chest, but all that earned her was his arm circling her waist on his shoulder and his other hand pressing her thighs snuggly against his pectoral.

“LET GO OF ME!” She screamed at him. When she realized that pummeling him didn’t bother him, she desperately scanned the white halls around her. She reached for a large framed painting, hoping the glass breaking would be enough to stun him and allow her to run, but the damn thing had been nailed solidily to the wall.

The alien walked through another room and she managed to see a gaping hole that led outside. She tried to hold onto the door frame, but he easily moved passed it and it only left Renee with stinging fingers. “Please let me go! I didn’t know that thing was yours! If you want it back-”

Her words turned to screams as the alien lept nearly forty feet. When he landed on the forest floor, the momentum of the fall stole the air out of her lungs and she gave an involuntary wheezing sound from the pain. Her vision swam again and she thought that she was going to pass out again.

She felt pain explode on her side, clearing her head momentarily enough to realize that she wasn’t sitting on the alien’s shoulder anymore. She had been thrown to the floor, the roots of a nearby tree sliced into her arm. The alien in front of her tossed out his arms, roaring so loud that her ears rang.

Another roar answered him and Renee’s heart fluttered at the sight of Baaul.