An Unlikely Hero:

Chapter Two

Author's Notes: One more chapter up for the story, one more round of practice writing. Let's see, I am starting to write this at 6:35pm on April 2nd. And I finish writing this…..

It would be nice if I could write a chapter a week, or something like that but I cannot commit myself to this because real life sets the pace. I'm working five days a week, and going to school full time, so the only time I will have to do anything is on Saturday and that will probably be used for studying or spending time with friends. But I can quit my job in May and start filling my schedule with more important things such as internet time (and writing stories). I also have a very bad wireless connection where I live (sometimes it goes out for days) which can delay publishing time. I hope the writing itself makes up for real life interference, but you be the judge.

*** ***

She put her car into park after she pulled it into the lane next to the injured Poleepkwa. She got out of her car and went around. Once she got to the alien she squatted down next to it and looked at the unconscious alien. She wondered how she was going to get him into the backseat. The problem was not size, because she could fit him into the backseat if she bent his legs. But Poleepkwa were large, often at least seven feet tall and easily over 200 pounds. Melissa was an athlete, a marathon runner, which would make the task easier. However she was only 120 pounds and had lacerations and a whiplashed neck. She looked at the backseat, at the alien lying in the street, and tried to come up with a plan.

She had a plastic crate in the back she had been using to transfer items and documents from one place to another in the past few days and decided that if she could use it as a stool and position the Poleepkwa on it she could then get into the car herself and then pull him up using all the muscle she had until his torso was in. From there she could simply fold his legs in and close the door.

"You know I wouldn't normally suggest for a patient to be unconscious, but it would be really nice if you stayed knocked out for the next few hours."

She got the plastic crate out of her trunk and put it in front of the opened backseat door. She then placed all her mechanical equipment and anything she could place inside the crate and under the car behind the crate so that it would not slip out of place (she hoped). She then looked at the scene and tried to think of a way to put the alien onto the crate. She couldn't bodily lift him onto it, so she wondered if she could get into the car and pull him onto the crate, but all she could see was that she would be shaking the crate out of its unstable foundation. She then decided on a way she could lift him onto the crate and snapped her fingers. She frowned because she would have to get close and personal but there was no other way she could think of that could accomplish the task.

She pulled up the Poleepkwa into a sitting position, "sorry for manhandling you but you aren't moving yourself. I have to get you out of here somehow." She knelt down and put his left arm over her shoulder, and wrapped her right arm around his waist. The skin of his exoskeleton felt hard and knotted, but she expected it to be cold. For some reason she didn't think they would be warm-blooded, nor did she have a sense of what kind of metabolism they had to maintain their body temperature. She should have read the medical text MNU gave her to get a sense of the details, but then again she never thought such a situation would have arisen. 'Okay, get out of medthink.' She clasped onto his left hand and tightened her grip around his waist and slowly rose to a crouching position. Her breath came in painful gasps as the arm cut into her neck and she strained her muscles to lift him. She took a step backward, and another, then slowly lowered him onto the crate. She released her grip and let herself fall, her back colliding into the side of the car. She let herself feel the pain lace itself from her neck to her shoulders and along her upper spine for about two minutes. But she had to complete the task, which meant she couldn't rest yet.

She went to the other side of the car and went into the backseat. She placed her left foot in between the backseat and front seat on the door jam to give her leverage in the lift. She then scooted up behind the alien and put her arms under his armpits. 'Isn't this great! Out of the entire class I'm probably now the doctor with the most experience with Poleepkwa!' She thought sarcastically. She then took a few breaths and pulled him up, pushing back against the car. She strained and almost had him fall for a moment but she pulled him far enough that he was in the car, only his legs dangling out and touching the concrete. 'Okay, now I need to get home fast, and treat him before he wakes up.' She put the crate and other materials back in the trunk and then pushed the Poleepkwa's legs into his chest before she shut the door.

As Melissa drove home she kept whispering, "I'm insane, I've lost it. What am I thinking?" But she knew the truth. If she called MNU then he could end up being interrogated, or not treated, imprisoned or suffer some other horrible fate. To willingly comply with such protocol would have haunted her for the rest of her life. But to not follow protocol was also risky. She could lose her job, receive a black mark on her record and that was aside from the unpredictability of the Poleepkwa himself. If he woke up he could panic or go into a rage and disembowel her and set her car or apartment on fire.

She drove the final two miles home and found it much easier to drag him out of the car and into her living room then it was to lift him into the car. She laid him out on the living room floor and pulled out the MNU medical text. The text was an extensive tome of alien anatomy. It was over 1500 pages laid out with colorful maps of alien anatomy and schematics of different systems from exoskeleton to neurological to digestive. Details of each system were given along with possible ailments and symptoms for each system and the best method of treatment they had. The knowledge was the best available, built up over the past 20 years, much of it acquired through experimentation and analysis of cadavers.

She did a visual examination, noting that he was probably over 200 pounds and stood at about seven feet. His exoskeleton was a greenish-blue, and he seemed to be an older individual, perhaps 30 to 50 years old. He was still unconscious and his breathing was labored. Two injuries stood out, one on his right leg, where the exoskeleton was badly cracked and twisted and another crack ran vertically on the left side of his chest. There were other cuts and scrapes, especially along the head but they seemed to not be bad enough to need treatment. She looked through the text to see about what visual diagnostics she could do to check for internal bleeding and other risks associated with accidents. She was grateful to find that nothing seemed to be out of order and then looked at how to treat the cracked skin.

When it came to skeletal anatomy Humans and Poleepkwa were complete opposites. Poleepkwa had an exoskeleton much like an insect where the skin was hard and armor like and the internal muscle and organs were anchored to the skin. The skin acted as the skeleton, and made Poleepkwa difficult to fight because injury was much more difficult to inflict upon them. Humans had interior skeletons, where the organs and muscles were anchored outside them, with some areas of anatomy, such as the ribcage and braincase parts of the skeleton protected the most vulnerable organs.

The Poleepkwa was still bleeding, and needed the wound to be sealed before she could be confident that he would heal properly. She looked at the text for handling wounds and was surprised at the suggestion for handling wounds to the exoskeleton. "Glue?" she murmured. She got out her medical kit and cleaned up the wound. She then used some superglue to seal the wound and some gauze tape to keep it sealed. She then looked at the wound he sustained on his leg. She sighed deeply, it was hopeless. The leg was twisted sharply and the skin was shattered in several places and bleeding heavily. She got the bleeding to stop, cleaned the wound and sealed it, but she didn't see how she could do more than that. Maybe she would have to call MNU. She just graduated from med school and never performed surgery on a live patient before. She did not have the experience, the right equipment or the assistance such a surgery would require.

But that would wait until tomorrow morning. It was already past midnight, and she had to be in class at seven. She called her supervisor and told him she had gotten in a car accident and would be late the next morning because she would have to handle the claim on the car and get another rental. She then called the car rental office to inform them that she hit a large animal on her way home and needed to report the accident. She felt ready to sleep for the next week, but she couldn't with the alien in her living room. He could sneak in and break her neck if she didn't remain diligent. She went into her bathroom and took the shower rod down to use as a weapon, and then she got a chair and set it on the other side of the room to sleep in. While the Poleepkwa were strong if he rushed her and she bashed him in the leg she could probably take him out. She sat in the chair, hugged the shower rod to her chest and fell asleep.

*** ***

He woke up to heavy banging on a door. Where was he? Banging meant the MNU was trying to get to him, and he needed to go the opposite way. Bang! Bang! Bang! He tried to move, to get up and start running but pain seared through his body as he sat up. Where was he? In a human's house! And there was a human on the other side of the room. He was trapped and injured, incapable of running. He got up anyways, he would run as much as he could. He let out a gurgled growl at the human as he tried to find a way out into the open. She backed away a bit but stood her ground, "Stay there!" She said, as she held up a metal rod and a grimace on her face. The banging continued, and started to get louder.

"MELISSA! MELISSA! OPEN THE FUCKING DOOR! IT'S EMMIE!!"

The human went to the door and opened it, "What the hell are you doing? Don't bang like that!"

He saw a sliding door on the wall to the left of the couch and tried to open it.

"The teacher got your call, and we were worried. We tried calling you over and over again and got no answer."

"Okay, that's a good reason to come to my place, but not a reason to bang on my door so hard that the hinges come off!"

"I was worried!"

He tried to open the lock, but there was something else locking it in place. He looked around, trying to find the obstruction.

"Oh no! The rental car company rescheduled!" What was she talking about? The alien wondered.

Melissa looked at her phone and saw the message the car company left, stating that they would not be able to look at her car until 4pm. "Look, I'm fine Emmie. I hit some animal on my way home and I probably have some whiplash which just means I need a bit of rest."

Stupid human! She hit some animal? She hit him! They probably thought all Poleepkwa were just animals. He let out a snort. Maybe he should just break the glass door and escape.

"Man, you should come back to the hospital and get it examined. You could have damaged your collarbone or spinal column." Emmie stepped closer to Melissa, and could see the living room from the doorway. "Can I look at it? We might be able to rule out the bad stuff right here."

"I'll go with you to the hospital. I already missed a lot of class anyways and need to copy someone's notes."

Melissa tried to get Emmie to turn around and go to the door, but Emmie saw something move in the living room. She tried to push through Melissa to get out of the door way to the living room but Melissa blocked her. "Door's that way."

"There's something in your living room." Emmie whispered, "let me see."

"Is a ghost, let's go."

Emmie tried to push Melissa out of the way, but Melissa pushed back. Emmie then went through the kitchen to get a full view of the living room. Emmie saw the alien and let out a loud, piercing scream that seemed to shake the entire apartment.