My original story that takes place after the one-shot "After the End" I made—it MIGHT be an OC x Randall paring, but I'll have to think about it, if you don't like that idea, just don't read. R&R
Disclaimer: I do not own Pixar, Randall (though I wish I did) or Monsters Incorporated. I do, however, own Angela/Nyoka and the other Angela, and any other characters not part of the show.
+Chapter 3+
Angela had spent hours practicing before she left; she had finally been able to master her new ability. She could go invisible.
Since that last attack, she found that this task was remarkably easy, like she had always had it. Even though her body hurt, she found she was more agile and quick, but every movement hurt, so she had to be careful. And even the mental capacity it took to make her invisible was enough to wipe you out, so she couldn't do it for long periods of time. Which meant this had to work out perfectly. No mistakes at all.
She rubbed her hands, she felt cold, but it wasn't cold at all that night. That attack had definitely made her feel…different. Some ways she was stronger, and in many she was weaker. She wasn't warm enough, she was feeling an ultimate need for a scorching sun, but it wasn't happening. Not for at least five hours, and in any case, she had to find this world beyond a child's closet door. And she was nearly to her destination, almost…
She watched with the door to the little girls room, whom she now knew as Mary. The creature named Mikey was still there, talking to her and making her laugh. Suddenly, the green one-eyed monster stood up, waving goodbye to Mary. Angie saw her chance, her body completely disappeared; she held her breath and made her way to the side of the room where the Mikey was headed, following him she slipped through the closet door completely unoticed.
The sight that greeted her was one she couldn't have imagined in her lifetime. And it nearly caused her to loose her bearings and return to visibility. In a swift movement, she was behind the door which she now found lead to nothing, finding behind the door a perfect hiding place. She became visible and surveyed her surroundings very curiously.
The room was very modern and unusual in its features; the walls would have been blindingly white if they had not had contrast from the numerous pillars that curved in an archway to the ceiling. Between each pillar there was a wide, slanted window with numerous latches that suggested obvious separate openings. Why they'd want windows that opened when no one could reach them was an unanswered question to Angela. Over in the corners, there were strange yellow canisters roughly 5ft high and not quite a foot wide. What they were filled with, Angela couldn't possibly guess; not like she had any time, suddenly the doorway behind her was lifting her away from the ground. She grasped the frame and attempted to stay hidden. As she was swiftly carried away, she watched the rows of doors on the cold smooth floor open and close first housing then releasing those she never knew existed, one's just like her…monsters.
She realized suddenly that she was in a short daydream, she snapped out of it as she was carried through a tunnel of sorts before entering a great and spacious room 1, and boy was it great and spacious.
From her stand, or air, point, she couldn't see the floor; the open space seemed to go down for miles. A complex array of steel-covered wire leads coiled around the room like a giant snake. On these wires, there were doors, everywhere; they zipped along these paths, some coming out and going in similar tunnels Angela had just exited, others were neatly stored in endless rows along the walls. Angela guessed that the sidewalls were at least 100 ft away from each other or more. The room was all white, aside from the number of colorful doors, the cables and their steel coverings, not to mention the number of steel walkways that rested around the room. It was also void of life, which was a good thing in Angela's case since she obviously stood out. The door she clung too finally found its place in an empty spot next to a yellow door.
As she continued to be amazed, she heard a irritating creak. Looking down, the brown reptile saw a doorway by one of the nearby walkway's open to reveal a very tall blue monster. He was covered in fur and purple spots; he had two horns, a tail and black claws. Across his back was a line of blunt, plate-like purple spines, they looked almost like those you'd see on the back of a stegosaurus, only smaller and less than half as sharp. She suppressed a giggle at the strange monster, wondering if she could even call him a monster, regarding that he looked like a huge over stuffed teddy bear rather than a frightening beast.
Of course, she wasn't so good at being frightening herself, but more people were afraid of reptiles anyway. Not that she was entirely reptile, more like reptilian as she was warm-blooded and less likely to sit in the heat of the sun to keep herself warm. Personally, she liked a cool breeze once in awhile.
She returned her attention the blue monster. He looked around and suddenly stared directly at where Angela was; she froze and turned invisible as quickly as she could. She watched him, painfully aware that she was overdoing it by turning invisible this much, and she couldn't handle the mental strain much longer, she begged to herself that he'd turn away and leave. Unfortunately, he seemed to be all to entrance with the white-flowered door she held fast to. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, he opened the door, taking one more look at the door before he disappeared back from whence he came 2.
Angela returned to her normal state, but it had been too long. Her head felt like it weighed twice as much as her body and she fainted, plummeting down toward wherever the floor may be in that endless room.
Angela awoke with a distinct pain in the side of her head, her ears were wringing (or whatever you could pass as 'ears'). If that wasn't bad enough, her side ached as if something had knocked the wind out of her and she was freezing. Well, she was freezing; no…it was a slight chill from a breeze, and then she was enveloped in warmth.
She remembered the fall suddenly…she had watched things fly by at an alarming rate, finally she could see the ground, it hadn't mattered, she knew she would die. She then heard someone yell something, then the floor came, but not before the door and a few more steel runways. She tried to sit up and realized that was impossible, her back hurt way too much and not only that, but she was weighed down by whatever was keeping her warm. Then she felt something warm and wet on the side of her head, she attempted to reach up and managed to touch the spot of where the warmth was coming from. Feeling the gash, she managed to hold back her nausea at realizing how badly she was hurt, and pulled her hand back under the warmth. She tried opening her eyes, but found that she could only see sparks and lights, there was nothing, she closed them again letting darkness cover her vision.
"Thank monstropolis your awake." A voice said, it sounded as if the person had lost their voice and could hardly breath, she heard them clear their throat and continue, "You scared me."
She knew that voice.
"Randall?"
She couldn't see him, but she felt his presence near her, he actually smiled a bit and looked rather glad that she was awake.
"You okay?"
"I don't know, my body feels numb, what happened to me, how…how did you find me?"
Randall sighed, "it's a long story, first, let me get you some new bandages."
He surveyed the wounds, they were pretty bad, but she would be fine. She had a severely broken arm that looked like the bone was on the verge of ripping out of her skin, her other arm was sprained; she had twisted an ankle and cracked three ribs. The gash in the side of her head was pretty bad, she had gained that from hitting the moving doorway on her cascade. It was deep and he could see her pale skull beneath the blood, he was thankful he had cared so much about injuries and such when he created the scream extractor that he knew how to deal with things like this, or to be correct, these. She also had an array of other bruises and scratches, but nothing any more serious that what was mentioned.
"You suffered a bad concussion to your head and you should be able to see again shortly, lucky for you, your vision isn't fully damaged." He unwrapped the bandage on her head and carefully cleaned the wound, after which he replaced the bandage.
Angela felt a tingling as her feeling was slowly returning, she moaned at the pain she began to feel, "Where are we?"
"Underneath Monsters Incorporated."
"What?"
Randall sighed, "Monsters Incorporated, the place where you were…this is like a basement so to speak, nobody knew about it while I was here until that nosy Sullivan had to interfere, it looks as if it's been forgotten again, they attempted to seal it off, luckily for me, I had several entrances."
Angela groaned, "whoa whoa whoa, Monsters Incorporated? You? Sullivan? What?"
Randall sighed, "Don't worry about it, I don't want to talk about it right now!"
She shivered, the way he said it was cold and in translation it meant, 'Part of my past, non of your business, shut up.' She sighed, was it so awful to be curious.
The silence lasted for an eternity; finally, Randall finished his job and covered her again with blankets. She realized how cold it was down here, not just from temperature it felt as if something went on down here. Something that some people thought of as a sin while one person thought of it as their greatest accomplishment…there was something about this room, and Angela intended to find out. What happened here that Randall was so intent on hiding? Was it his accomplishment, or was it his sin? She didn't fully comprehend the feelings she got, but something had happened, and it had to do with Randall…something…bad.
"I don't know Randall, something about this room is awfully unusual." Lights danced in front of her eyes, her vision was returning, "no, not unusual, I can't tell. Randall, what happened."
"I said I don't want to talk about it." She could feel that he was getting rather irritated, well why should he? She was his friend and she deserved to know.
"No Randall, I can't keep shrinking away from this, were friends, now tell me!" She opened her eyes and was surprised to find that the light was very limited in this room. She glanced over to her left; there he was…standing there.
It was then she got a chance to look at her surroundings, and she was quite literally surprised.
The room was much bigger and more spacious than she expected, the walls were smooth concrete and the floor was cool and smooth material that she couldn't quite guess. She wasn't the manufacturing type. There were columns that rose to the ceiling and behind them numerous gaps in the wall; Angie wasn't sure what they were. She looked to Randall and saw a less…perfect sight. A large and strangely shaped machine was smashed against the wall, in front of it was what looked like a control bored and across the room from that was a strange round chair. On the floor, an overturned yellow box and a carriage with a number of yellow canisters sat as if forgotten for years. Randall stood behind the control station lightly running one of his four hands over the keys, knobs, and other things while he stared sadly at the machine behind him.
He looked sad…no…confused.
"Seventeen years ago." He said quietly as he turned around and looked across the room blankly at the chair.
Angela pushed herself up on her elbows only to fall back from the pain in her arm, "Excuse me? What do you mean?"
Randall stared for a moment longer before continuing, "I would have been the top scarer…but that no-good Waternoose just had too pull me aside that day and ruin my career."
"Randall, who are these people, Waternoose, Sullivan…who's this Sullivan, I'm so confused."
"You saw him didn't you." It wasn't really a question, more like he was daring her to contradict him.
"Ummm, I guess so."
He sighed, a sullen look on his features, "That pathetic excuse for a monster…he wasn't meant to find out, no one was. The battle between Waternoose and I was a secret; the rivalry between Sullivan and I was no secret. If only that idiot hadn't gotten in the middle of things, and hadn't met that stupid kid…" He slammed a fist onto the control board.
Angela was speechless, "Randall I—"
He held up a hand to silence her, "No…I'll tell you."
Looking up at the ceiling he closed his eyes for a moment, finally after a few minutes he opened them and started.
"Like I said before, it was seventeen years ago. I was a well-known employee of Monsters Incorporated, top scarer actually; I was the best Monster around. My stealth and my reptilian countenance was just the tool for scaring children, nobody loves a reptile, that's why I was on the top of being the worst, and metaphorically speaking I guess. It wasn't long before I was pulled aside by our top boss, Mr. Henry Waternoose…he asked me if I wouldn't mind coming into a little scheme of his to help the scream team produce more, since Monstropolis was on a scream shortage that year, I wasn't sure if I liked his tactics, but I agreed. I needed that job more than anything, especially since my life wasn't going so well…and I wanted to impress her. So I began constructing the scream extractor, which you have already seen." He motioned behind him.
"The scream extractor was designed for the sole purpose of collecting the screams from young and old children all around. It was quite harmless, a little frightening and left you breathless for a while, but I never intended to harm a single child. That was when Waternoose brought Sullivan in, who happened to work as a Janitor at that time for M.I., Waternoose told me he intended to make Sullivan top scarer and keep me one step behind…only because he didn't want it to seem like I was too perfect and a bunch of other riff raff he said. So I obliged, only because my life was well enough and I would have to suffice with second best even though I knew I was the best. I had a wonderful girl who I cared about and I had a boss who knew that I could do things…or at least I thought so."
He tinkered with the scream extractor for a moment.
"I love inventing, my whole life that was one of my favorite things to do, so creating the scream extractor, I felt I had accomplished something that people would remember me for…that people would remember me as someone who made a difference and they could for once stop hating me for my countenance. And it would have worked out; I had chosen my first victim, a little girl by the name of Mary, I was simply going to take her that night and extract her scream quickly then return her home. And it would have worked out. News got around quickly that a child was on the loose in Monstropolis; I suspected that overgrown teddy bear the whole time, I just didn't have the proof I needed. When I had finally gotten the girl in my grasp and hastened to capture her screams, Sullivan had to play hero and rescue her from the evil nemesis, which was me. I never usually go overboard, but I nearly killed the stupid guy, after which I was illegally banished. Not that it mattered, I had no family, shortly before that, Nyoka, the only girl I had ever cared about back then had died, I don't know what else mattered. Nobody cared about the evil "Lizard Boy", who cares if he died or whatever. He was a bad person, and they were all better off without me."
The room was silent.
"…Nobody understood anything, I was an idiot and I followed a false prospect of a future career from the true monster. The true monster was my stupid train of thought, I could have turned Waternoose down, but I was selfish…"
He slammed his fist on the board again.
"I didn't want to hurt anyone!"
Angela didn't know what to do, she had never seen Randall cry, but he was shuddering now, leaning over that control board, a memory of the selfishness that controlled him. Now she understood…his cold hearted attitude, his aloofness…he was scared to care about anyone…because he knew he would loose them, it happened to Nyoka…it happened to…to the Angela that she was so privileged to be named after.
She shuddered; Randall had a dark past…it was horrible and painful for him to even think about it. To think that he had come here to rescue her because she was too curious for her own good? He came to the place with the most terrible of memories and saved her life.
It hurt, it hurt like death, but Angela forced herself to stand, pushing herself up with her better (yet still sprained), arm. Limping over, tears rolling down her face, she came to his crying form and embraced him, it hurt, but he needed it. She would have been selfish to not come to him when he came to her.
He somehow lost the dignity and hugged her back, leaning on her and crying. Leaning herself against the cold machinery of the Scream Extractor for balance…she let him weep and continued holding him.
Because that's what friends are for, even if there's only one.
© and shiat :3 I like this chapter
