I awoke to wet hands all over me, pulling.
Chapter 2
Of course I tried to scream, but the hands were expecting that. One pressed tight over my mouth, near suction. I tried to throw it loose, to bite it, but its saltiness surprised me long enough for other hands to pull my arms and legs delicately but harshly away from Taylor, so as not to wake him. They didn’t; he slept on even though my screams didn’t amount to nothing, they came out tight and constricted but high and frantic.
Once all my limbs were far from Taylor the hands lifted my legs and span me about my butt so I was facing overboard. It was still too dark to see anything but hands, though.
My legs would have dangled over the water if the hands didn’t hold them tight, and if they didn’t hold my back up forcefully I’d have fallen backwards, as they’d taken all my balance away. With my feet already out of the boat, it was an easy matter for them to tug on my shoulders, hard. I struggled even harder when I fully realized what was going on, but one of the . . . things was perched right on the edge of the boat, so it had leverage. It was uncoordinated and clumsy, but within thirty seconds they had me off the raft and . . . underwater.
The hand at my mouth didn’t leave until my head was fully submerged, and as I was still trying to scream I nearly inhaled a mouthful of sea. But the hand was immediately replaced by something else, and I managed to swallow most of the water and expel the rest, instead of sending it to my lungs. I coughed and spluttered without thinking about how air and breath was necessary for these things.
As I coughed and felt my stomach turn in distaste of the saltwater, I could feel that I was going deeper. Water flowed up past my ears, which were starting to hurt, bad. Then we stopped moving altogether. My ears still ached, but I found myself breathing. The air tasted a little funny, but it was air and how was I breathing? I had to guess that the thing over my mouth and nose now was an oxygen mask, like what scuba divers used. It clamped tight to my face and felt like flexible rubber.
A light came on. Underwater. It was bright. Too bright. It blinded me, so I still couldn’t see my attackers. I had to close my eyes against the light, and only once I closed them did I realize how much they stung. I should have clenched them shut from the beginning, but the salt had been the last thing on my mind.
I couldn’t hear anything. I felt the things’ movement, though. Even when they didn’t come in contact with me, I felt little currents of water swirl around me softly as the things swam past with ease. Several hands still held me tight, and I had to marvel at how they treaded water so perfectly, so unmoving, when we were nowhere near the ocean floor.
The source of light wasn’t huge, it was like a large flashlight aimed from far away, as opposed to the spotlight it had originally felt like. As it moved closer, it wasn’t in my eyes anymore. I could open them now and see what was going on, but I didn’t. The salt water was my excuse.
The light roved over me, and as it did I felt more of the hands go with it. They felt like human hands, if a bit slippery and cold. They felt around my ankles, thighs, wrists and shoulders. Fondled my stomach quickly, feeling its flat structure. Poked at my back. Felt my breasts like a doctor would, with a cold and firm grip that still would have made me indignant if I hadn’t been so terrified. Forced one eye open and shone that light in, for only a second before I pulled away and jammed the eye shut. I felt the thing moving back a bit, and the light found my whole body again; trolled up and down once, quick. Then I could only wait, and I had the creeping sensation that the things were talking about me, though I heard nothing.
The air I was breathing tasted a bit different, all of a sudden. Not just stale or thin like it had been before, now it was a bit chemically. My struggling slowed as I took a moment to try and figure out what that taste was. I ended up breathing deeper, inhaling nice big lungfuls to try and determine that unusual quality.
A series of sharp, burning heats around my collarbone distracted me from the funny air for a second, but it wasn’t enough to worry me unduly. And I was rising! I felt water slowly coursing down across my body, which meant I was going up, right? Good. Everything was turning out okay . . . so I could go back to sleep, now.
