Chapter Five: New You

  Wherever I am now, at least I have a body again. Although, as I take a moment to look around, I find that the body in question is surrounded by some kind of green slime. The substance slides against my open eyeballs as I try to look around, it’s thick enough that I can only see a few inches in front of me. I reach my arms out, and have to basically swim through the thick slime to do so. With a little exploration, I find myself in a circular coffin-esk space only a little larger than my body. I can’t make out much through the slime, but I seem to be encased by a smooth metal like material.

  Ok… so trapped in a slime filled box, the alarm sound is still there, but muted thank god… or thank Axiom? I am more than a little horrified when I trace several different tubes that lead from the walls behind me into my mouth, nose and to a connection point in my stomach. I start to gag now that I am aware of the tube going down my throat, and I had to suppress the urge to rip it out right then, forcing my panicking instincts to understand that it is the only thing keeping me from drowning in here. I run my hands around the rest of my body and find that, aside from being totally naked in here. Actually for the first time in my life I seem to be in pretty good shape, toned, fit, and slimey.

  For some reason my goo filled world shakes every now and again, rattling me about. The alarm probably has something to do with that... I swim up to the walls of my cage and notice that the material is some kind of fogged glass, and now that I am pressed up against it I can just barely make out a room beyond. It’s still blurry, but it looks dully lit, and metallic, and whatever kind of thing I am in, there seems to be a lot more of them out there, hanging from the walls. I try, but I can’t actually see the floor of the room outside from my vantage point.

  One thing is for sure, every part of my being is screaming at me to get out of this slime filled death trap!

  I reach out my hands, pressing my back against the pod, mushing the tubes a bit, which sends shivers up my spine, and I push against the glass with all the strength I can muster. The force I am able to exert is pathetic, the slime prevents me from making any quick movements or any real transfer of momentum. The glass holds firm against my efforts, forcing me to give up on getting out this way... I take a moment to breathe, which is made pretty difficult by the damn tubes in my mouth and decide this is as good a time as any for introspection?

  Is this the evolution server? What was the point of the light at the end of the tunnel if I wasn’t meant to reach it? Honestly, It seems like I didn’t make it to where the login cosmic horror show was taking me… But then again, Axiom didn’t actually promise me a safe trip.

  The pod shakes again, this time it is harder causing the slime to jiggle like jello, distracting me from my thoughts. Annoyed, I try again to explore the pod, this time I use my nails to try and find a seam or something in the metal, hoping that I could find a maintenance hatch or manual release or something. As I explore the bottom of the pod, my feet fully extended since the tubes limit my movement, another violent shake throws me at the side of the pod, causing me to hit my head against the glass. Great, because I really needed an awesome headache to help me get out of here…

  A wholly unnatural metallic shearing noise shatters the space around me, vibrating my bones, the noise brings with it a huge lurching rumbling which knocks me around the pod some more, gaining me a few bruises. Then suddenly I am free falling, my little world is falling from wherever it was hanging. Luckily, the slime helps to cushion the blows as the pod crashes into multiple things as it makes its way to the ground. I take a moment to myself before I reopen my eyes, the pain of being shaken like a cocktail just washing over me. When I do open them though, I am pleasantly surprised to feel air against my eyes rather than the thick slime.

  I can now make out that the front of my cage had been smashed open in the crash, and the green ooze is now steadily pouring out from the new cracks. Honestly, of all the things that had happened so far, I counted this a win for me, as operation “escape the goo” had been going pretty poorly. I take a moment to enjoy the little victory, right up until my ears are uncovered, then everything is horrible again.

  The siren now has a clear path to my eardrums since its slimy obstacle has been removed, and is therefore able to slice through my brain and dance with its headache roommate. I just barely manage to catch the ending of some sort of announcement, “...landfall is currently scheduled to occur in thirty-one minutes, good luck everyone.” Hmmm… the word landfall really sticks out to me, because, why not say landing? Ok so, now I really have to find out what is happening outside of this damn pod thing I am in. The cracks aren’t large enough for me to get through, but now the slime was drained down to my waist, giving me better mobility.

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  I brace myself against the back of the pod again and this time am able to launch both of my feet against the glass casing, trying to send my kick at where the cracks are most concentrated. The first two blows don't do much, but the third one connects just right, causing the cracks to spread and deepen. I take a moment to channel my inner enraged monkey and with a last kick my right leg manages to break through the glass wall and takes a large section with it. Unfortunately the jagged edges of the material slice through my naked flesh as my leg pushes through the lid, the edges have even more fun as I quickly retract my leg back into the tank.

  I choke on a scream, and the tubes, probably mostly the tubes, as the slime begins to earnestly pour out of the newly enlarged hole. Pain throbs through my leg, and I reach down to inspect it only to find that the slime was already filling the mangled cut, and is also sending a soothing sensation through my bleeding wound. I take another moment to just breathe, because otherwise I am going to freak the frak out. Ok, so, it's not that bad right? Everything is going to be fine… I let out a huff around the tube, and then take a moment to really examine the state of my leg. The cuts are deep and go straight through my leg muscles… But, as far as I can tell while being driven mostly by blind hope, I don’t seem to have messed up anything vital. The leg still moves how I need it to, and maybe it’s just shock but it doesn’t hurt too much. Yet.

  I don’t have enough space yet, need to wait for the slime to drain a bit more, then I can try again… I take the time to just really sit back and enjoy the horrible physical and psychological pain I am in, which is really just a treat. Finally my little break is over, and so I grunt and begin using my good leg to kick out the rest of the glass-like material, which, due its compromised nature, now gives way pretty easily.

  Now, with the front wall out of the way I can finally see beyond my metal cocoon. The outside world has a matte gray metal finish on everything, the room itself is round and I can see tons of what I guess are the same model of… pod? That I had just been trapped in hanging all around and above me. The pods create the impression of a hibernating beehive, though honestly the view from down here is pretty bad. The alarm snaps me out of my observations, I can’t stand to just sit and listen to it, I have to do something to try to escape that noise.

  I steady myself for a new kind of nightmare as I grip the tubes in my mouth and nose with both hands and begin to slowly pull them from my lungs and stomach. The intruding tubes come out little by little and after the first foot I can see that they are coated with a purple goopy substance which, as the substance passes over my tongue, tasted like rusty-chemical-like glue… Luckily, I am already gagging, so no worries there… and at least the purple goop seems to be keeping the tubes from scratching my sensitive internal bits as they come out. Every inch is more awful than the last, but eventually the tubes end, and I throw them to the back of the pod and gasp my first unassisted breath. I never knew what it meant to appreciate fresh oxygen until this moment. Then I throw up.

  The tube attached to my stomach is much easier to remove, disconnecting from a valve which once clear of the tube, I find is actually sewn into my body. I shiver, but hell, it’s hardly the strangest thing happening right now, so I just let that particular horror fall to the wayside. Once most of the slime is drained, I notice that there are many other wires and sensors connected to me. They must be some kind of biometric monitoring gear and maybe meant for injecting medicines? I kind of lose it a bit and begin frantically ripping them off and throwing them to the side.

  Finally clear of all connections to my egg-like prison, I really take one more moment to examine my leg. The jagged rents in my skin are totally filled in by the slime, which to my amazement, is performing a coagulative function for the wound. The leg has started to throb in pain but it isn’t nearly as bad as it should be. Honestly I was ecstatic to see that I wasn’t going to just bleed out right away.

  Ok, so, free from the slime, and free to listen to the wonderful alarm in all its glory… I stick my head out of the pod to really figure out what I should do next. Around me are hundreds of the same pods that stretch up into a distant ceiling, from what I can see only mine had fallen. I look at the spot on the wall where my pod had been and see that a large piece of the wall had folded and torn inward, cutting loose the machinery that had held me in place… The deformed wall had pierced and crushed several other pods around where mine was, and I am pretty sure I can see blood mixing with the slime that poured from the cracks.

  It's funny what hyperfocus can do, I was almost totally ignoring the blaring alarm while staring up at the damage to the room, and so, as the voice cuts in again, it startles me badly enough that I almost miss what it says. The voice is calm, robotic, and as it speaks the world begins to shake again. “Warning, a catastrophic failure in the ship's systems requires an emergency landing. All colonists are being awoken as per emergency protocol 0114, please do not exit your pods until after arrival to our destination. Your pods are your best protection against any potential dangers the emergency landing poses to you. Landfall is currently scheduled to occur in twenty four minutes, good luck everyone.”