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You briefly think about climbing a tree to get away from whatever these roots are, but ultimately decide that climbing a tree will accomplish nothing. The trees are two sparse to try to move from tree, so eventually, you’ll just have to come back down, and you’ll be right back where you are now. So, you opt for moving on, and with redoubled resolve, you keep moving decisively to the south.

You continue on for approximately a mile, and things don’t get any worse, but they don’t get any better either. Every five or so minutes you stumble over a wandering root, catch yourself, and keep moving. Eventually though, a root trips you up and before you can quite regain control, a second root closes in, trapping on of your ankles. You regained your balance, and began trying to free your ankle, but much more quickly and methodically than you would have guessed, a third root had moved in to position to get a unbreakable grip on your foot. The roots had also shifted, so that instead of two parallel lines holding you, it was a triangle. Whatever was going on, the roots were acting with some degree of primitive intelligence.

Moving very slowly, so as to maintain their grip, the roots were pulling you. At first, you managed to stay standing by pivoting your foot as you moved along, but in short order, you stumbled over another root and fell backwards. You were aware that you had lost control now, but you hadn’t gotten this far in the bounty hunter game by losing your cool in tight situations. While you were underwater, you tried to get a view of whatever was going on down there.

It appeared as though the roots were spreading out from the base of a variety of pods, which sat at the bottom of the swamp. The pods were quite spread out, so you weren’t all that surprised that you hadn’t stumbled over one yet. The roots were very long and tangled, and it was generally difficult to tell what roots belonged to what pod, but you were pretty sure that you knew which one you were being dragged towards. It wasn’t the closest one, but you were being pulled directly in its direction. Not at all panicked you first focused on keeping your head above water so as not to drown. Occasionally, you dipped below just long enough to see where you were going.

Your arms and your free leg were frequently grabbed at by various roots, but since you didn’t have to focus on walking, you were able to keep them free. You were quite glad for the tightness and sturdiness of your jumpsuit, because if it were any looser it would probably have been snagged by now.

After a few minutes, you’re finally pulled up to the pod until you’re straddling it horizontally. You try to slowly stand up, but the roots have your ankle gripped firmly, and at an angle that makes it impossible to stand. You’re comfortably able to extend yourself up to breath when you need to, but you mostly keep your eyes on the pod.

You can see that the pod as a five slits that run almost from top to bottom, and once you’re situated at the base of the pod, the top starts to open, and a number of long thin tendrils start writhing around in the water, randomly at first, and then slowly moving towards you. At first the tendrils start feeling around your feet and legs, then they move up your legs towards your hips and pelvis, and finally move up your abdomen and chest. Since your entire body up to your head is covered by your jumpsuit, the pod seems to lose interest in you, and you can feel the grip on your ankle start to loosen.

Then, at the last possible second, one of the tendrils reaches out and makes contact with your cheek and the roots tighten once again around your ankle. The eight tendrils move their way up your body to your face, and start lightly feeling around your face and neck. One of them seems particularly curious about your lips, and is simply floating back and forth along them. You’re somewhat distracted by the tendrils, but not so distracted that you don’t notice a couple of inch thick tentacles emerge from the pod surrounding a two inch thick fallic “trunk” in the center.

As the word “tentacle” forms in your mind, you start to feel the adrenaline kick in, and it occurs to you that now might be a good opportunity for “panic”.