On to Phase 2!

“Be there in a second, Mark,” you reply as you and Doe try to wake up and untangle yourselves from each other. After several moments of aerobic stretching, you grab a baggy pair of shorts and a T-shirt, not wanting to risk any of your good clothes, just in case. Meanwhile, Doe pulls up her now incredibly rumpled dress, making sure that she is at least modestly covered.

The smells of sex and adrenaline drift around you as you arrive at Doe’s pod. To your surprise, Tony and Bob are there with Mark. Mark and Tony gasp at your scratched and disheveled appearance, and even Bob gives you a look of concerned surprise. You chuckle. “I’m fine, guys.” They nod, not quite sure whether or not to believe you. You look at Tony and Bob. “You two sure you wanna be here for this?”

Bob moves towards Doe, taking a protective stance by her, as Tony answers. “We wanted to be here, you know, in case…”

You nod solemnly, understanding. With that, look at Mark. “Let’s get started,” you tell him, as you undress and step into pod. You can’t help but chuckle as Doe blushes and the men gasp at all the scratches and bites on your flesh. The pod seals completely around you. Oxygen is pumped into the confined quarters so you can breathe. You can barely hear Mark say something, but the sealed pod muffles his voice so you can’t make it out. Sleep slowly starts to overcome you as an anesthetic is introduced in with the oxygen.

“No!” You scream. “Turn off the anesthetics!” Pounding at the pod hatch, you struggle through the exhaustion to get Mark’s attention. He nods, turning it off as he yells something about a “bad idea.”

You close your eyes tightly, digging your fingernails into your palms, focusing all your strength and determination. Despite your mind telling you how stupid you are, you’re determined to stay awake through this. You might need to have Mark make adjustments as the procedure goes. And you can’t help but feel that it might be your will alone that will keep you together.

A blast of light slams against your eyes, overloading them. The sun leaves the sky and joins you in the pod, its light **** your eyes while its heat and energy violate your body. You can feel every piece of skin, every nerve ending in your fingers and toes unravel. Every bone in your legs and arms snap, break, and disintegrate. Every muscle fiber and tendon tears itself away from you. For some stupid reason, you suddenly remember James O’Barr once writing about knowing pain at the molecular level. This is what it must feel like, you think as every cell in your body is cut in two and put back together incorrectly. You try to scream, but your vocal cords were ripped out millennia ago.

The sun cascades into a nova, the explosion throwing you into what feels like a concrete wall with jagged glass sticking out of it. Suddenly you realize the glass is being woven into you as new tendons and nerves wrap around your consciousness. The concrete lightens and morphs into bones for the muscles and nerves to wrap around. Your ears suddenly hear EVERYTHING in the room – screams, yelps, people rushing in, glass breaking, the pod rupturing. Your nose is flooded with the smells of someone’s vomit, of fear and excitement screaming from every pore, of dust and blood and urine and semen and Doe…lovely lovely Doe…you hear her trying to call you over the screams…the noise must have alerted everyone else at the station. That’s why they’re here. That’s why they’re panicking and vomiting and running in terror and trying to stop the machine. But it’s too late. The process is done.

You think you see Bob and Tony trying to heard everyone out to safety. And you’re not sure, but that looks like Mark standing there, trying to decide whether to shout in victory or soil his pants.

Then Doe screams at you! “John! FOCUS ON ME! LOOK AT ME! SMELL ME! BLOCK THE REST OF IT OUT! PLEASE, John….Please…you’re so close…” Is…she crying?

You stumble out of the pod and over to her, collapsing into her arms. Carefully she helps you to the floor, placing your head in her lap as she strokes your face. A tear from her eye drops on to your cheek as she smiles widely at you. “You stupid fool,” she half curses, half teases you. “I was so afraid that you had died. I could not live with myself if this ended up killing you.”

“I’m sorry,” your new vocal cords growl at her tenderly and apologetically. Doe smiles down at you, love and understanding in her eyes “How do I look?” you ask, trying to grin.

“Like the man I love. That’s all you need to know.”