Andy, Efof- 'Flames getting higher'

Who: Andy, Efof
Where: Andy's subconcious
When: Unknown time after previous post
<SNIP>
Then suddenly they weren't in a burning Parrotts bar anymore, they
were in a burning orphanage in Australia. Adults and children were
screaming all around them, their clothes and hair aflame.
"Dude!" Shouted Efof in shock at the scene created within Andy's
mind. "You're disturbed! Where are we?"
<END SNIP>
The blazing inferno was slowly creeping up into the roof. Years of
children handling flammable liquid had not been kind to the wood work
which now began to pulse an angry glowing red.
Ironic that now those same kids were caught on fire themselves. In the
midst of this insanity (which technically did not exist) were two men
that happened to be extremely out of place in the current madness.
Efof the blue, four armed, pacifist alien and Andy, the intergalactic
toilet scrubber.
Efof stared at the shaking mess before him. The suddenly Parkinson's
disease inflicted cleaner had yet to answer the multi-limbed hominid's
question about what the heck was wrong with him. However he was
beginning to get a rough idea. "Andy, where are we?!" Efof finally
formulated words as an emblazed nun ran past. A few seconds later he
almost withdrew the question. He knew where they where, in Andy's
mind. A very, very sick mind he might add. Who would ever have the
picture of a burning orphanage going through their mind?
With a groan and a drunken lurch Andy fell forward and onto the
smoking ground, unconscious.
The alien gave a heaving sigh as he kneeled down to pick up the
comatose cleaner. He easily swung the man over his shoulders and
walked toward what he could see was the exit. Efof did nothing to
assist the burn figments. There was nothing he could anyway, and even
if he trued, it wouldn't help any.
The detail of the place, the reaction of the sleeper and the
unrealistic mildness of the heat meant only one thing. This wasn't a
thought, it a memory.
The Alien gave a swift kick and the weakened front door of the
orphanage shattered open.
It was the odd thing about a mindscape; things that are powerful in
real life are only imbued with as much strength as the mind allows it.
Something that the mind fears is all powerful while that the mind does
not fear is indefinably less `dangerous.'
Efof shrugged the man off his shoulders and laid him back upon the
ground. Staring back at the orphanage he beheld an inferno that had
almost doubled in the height of the building. It was only now that the
Ffionian could feel the intense blaze, even though he was obviously
further away from it.
"… You weren't meant to see this." An Australian-accented voice
stated. Efof let out a sharp yelp as he noticed that Andy was now both
standing and conscious.
"Where are we… is this Earth?" Efof inquired as he looked around,
which took a surprising amount of will power considering the inferno
in front of him.
Andy took a moment to look around the Australian countryside, lit only
by the roaring fire. The spindly, twisted and utterly wretched foliage
was only slightly improved by the cleansing fire.
"Yeah… it's close to mount' Isa." The cleaner's tone was consistent
and unwavering. "I'm not too sure about how much you know about Earth-
but just so you know it's in Australia."
"Oh," Efof replied. "Well, I learnt a bit about Australia when Blue
Dwarf stopped over on Earth for some R&R. I didn't realise that it was
so… well, ugly."
Andy remained silent as he numbly watched the orphanage burn to the
ground. "…What happened here? Someone play with matches or something?"
Efof ventured at the man's silence.
The cleaner opened his mouth to respond, but closed it before giving a
pause for thought. "To be honest… I don't know. I wasn't here when it
happened. I had snuck out- head off to Mount Isa for some reason… I
can't even remember anymore. I've pushed it so far back. No one made
it out alive, except for me."
The multi-limbed humanoid raised an eyebrow, giving the man a sideways
glance. "You have to admit, sounds kind of suspicious; you heading off
in the middle of the night. Everything burns down while you were gone."
Andy let out a morbid chuckle. "You and everyone else in the country.
It took fire-fighters 6 hours to get there. By then everything in a
hundred metre radius was ash. The Matron, Ms. Hattie Jacques, her
assistant nuns and all my friends were dead. And there I was; a lone
fourteen year old boy, terrified, shivering from the cold and utterly
suspicious. I spent three weeks in jail pending the investigation
before they decided that I wasn't guilty."
Efof brought one of his many hands to his chin and began to stroke it
thoughtfully. "So that was it? They just let you go?"
"Yup, hello, goodbye, sorry for your loss, here you go- new parents."
The Ffionian shook his head incredulously. "I get the feeling that you
didn't care much for them- did you?"
The cleaner looked back at the Alien with a ghost of a smile. "Was it
that obvious? You have to understand what it was like for me. I went
from a sheltered life in the middle of nowhere; to under the
spotlight- and the microscope. Everyone thought that they knew me and
what I had done. Everywhere I went was either condescending stares of
pity or angry glares of accusation. And my so-called `parents' where
the worst… after a years time I simply couldn't take it anymore. So I
got out. I was a run away- hell- I probably still am."
Efof paused, having a reflective moment of his own. He could remember.
Remember his home world. Sure it was boring and was nothing compared
to Blue Dwarf or Earth… but it was still home- right? All his friends
and family from there were all gone, never to return.
The cleaner gave a throbbing cough to clear his throat. "I was the
only one who survived… and I just didn't want to think about that. In
the end, no one understood how I felt. And I don't think anyone ever
will." Andy turned from the blaze and walked off into the Australian
brush.
Efof about-faced and joined the man. "That…" The Alien began softly.
"-is where you could be wrong."
Andy gave the Ffionian a long stare before what he said actually began
to dawn upon the cleaner.
The cleaner looked back up from the ground and noticed that something
wasn't quite right. It could be the fact that where it was once night,
it was now the middle of the day. It could be that they where once in
the middle of nowhere and now in a heavily populated area. It could be
that they where once alone and now they were surrounded by children
playing and laughing.
Or it could simply be because the children were blue-skinned, four
armed freaks, the building where alien in structure and the sun was
well… Andy didn't really know how to describe it.
"Where the… hell." Andy mumbled before turning back to Efof, who was
now frozen like a statue.
It was then that Efof realised that he wasn't dipping into Andy's mind
at all. He was unconscious too and this place was-. "…Home…"
"…Hey… where's all the billboards and stuff?" The cleaner asked,
giving the place a quick look over.
Efof groaned this guy was about to get culture shock in a BIG way...