Twin Earth
Chapter 25

I turned back to the look at the humanoid alien, still shaking Rachel’s arm in some vain hope she would wake up and save us both. I could barely breathe with all the water vapour in the air and my eyes were increasingly becoming too wet to blink clear. Groaning in frustration, I tried to wipe my face to see around me, but my bio suit had not been designed for excessive water exposure, it was a space suit, not a diving suit and it only seemed to make things worse. I had never felt so vulnerable and my heart pounded in my chest as I tried frantically to see where the man was or whether he was even still there. Panicking, I realised I was beginning to lose consciousness.

Then I felt hands touching my body, pulling me softly, yet forcibly to the ground. I tried to claw at them, to push them away, in some vain hope to protect myself from whoever it was, but it was hopeless. The energy was draining from my body and a strange cooling sensation came over my head as the hands began to tether some kind of fabric around the back of my neck.

‘Is he choking me?’ I thought helplessly. ‘Is this how I die? Miles away from home on some god forsaken planet? This was not supposed to happen. Not like this. Not now.’

Strangely a bizarre thought popped into my mind. It was of my mug, the Super Hiro one I had so apathetically dumped in my bathroom only days previously and it made me feel an overwhelming sense of sorrow that I would never see it again. It surprised me how painful a realisation that was. Then it struck me, ‘I can breathe!’ I thought in pure relief as moisture free, oxygenated air began to fill my lungs. The water torture was finally over, ‘but why? Why was I not dead?’ I asked myself, although I still couldn’t open my eyes. The colourful water droplets I had slowly become accustomed too were no longer filling my vision. Everything was black, but it was more than that. I couldn’t even pull my eyelids apart. They were stuck. My heart raced, and my breathing quickened as I struggled to free my eyes.

‘What the hell is happening to me?’ I screamed in my head. ‘Why can’t I open my eyes?’ Then the hands were on me again, running up and down my arms and legs as if they were looking for something. ‘What is happening?’ I panicked as my body began to tingle painfully from my toes upwards. Whatever this thing was doing to me it was making my skin twist and tighten, as if I was going into a full body cramp and I realised I was slowly becoming paralysed. Breathing heavily, I tried to focus on staying alive. ‘As long as I can breathe, as long as I can breathe,’ I cried to myself. ‘Please do not take my breathing away,’ I pleaded to whoever was now dragging me across the jungle floor to where I didn’t dare think about.

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