The Beauty of the Night

Beautiful Awakening

When Morgan opened her eyes again, she thought for a moment that she had dreamed the entire thing: the promotion, talking to her parents, the crash. All of it. Her eyes felt so, so heavy, and required more will than Morgan had ever exerted before just to open them.

She tried to sit up, but then realized that she couldn't feel her body. In fact, she couldn't feel anything.

Is this what death feels like?

She struggled for a bit, but it felt like she was little more than the thoughts that occupied her head. A sense of rising panic threatened to close her throat and suffocate her.

Breathe. This is just a night terror, she told herself, trying to steer her brain away from thoughts of horrific things; of being paralyzed after the crash, of being trapped in this in-between for the rest of whatever life she had left. Before the panic could rise again, a bright light flashed sharply, rippling through her vision. She closed her eyes against it, but it penetrated beyond her eyelids, deep into her brain. It was light, but it was something else, too. Something with weight, a heavy, prodding weight that settled over her body like an anchor around her neck dragging her down. It had a taste. Metallic, tangy, forcing a feeling of nausea that rippled through her. Then, pain. A deep, searing, sharp pain, that made her cry out, though no sound emerged from her lungs. A pain like a hot poker ripping through her eye, deep into the back of her skull, pushing aside delicate brain tissue. A pain that brought bleeding with it, bleeding from her nose, her eyes. A pain so deep and all-encompassing that she no longer existed, all she was, had been and ever would be was this searing, burning, sharp...

It was gone.

All of it. The light, the taste, the pain. It was all gone. Something like a sob and a sigh of relief tore its way through her. Then, she fell asleep.

When she woke again, she could feel her limbs. In fact, she could feel everything, more than she ever had before. She could feel that she was submerged in some sort of a liquid, too thick and heavy to be water, too thin to be anything else. She could feel every cell, every fibre of every muscle as she stretched it. She opened her eyes and saw. Not in ways that she had ever seen before, but in ways that were overwhelming, all consuming, too much for her brain to ever process. She saw the details, the way each molecule of fluid captured the light and cast it about. The color of her honeyed skin, now made richer through these eyes. The shades of blue and purple within the jet black of her hair, which swam around her head. It was too much. She closed her eyes again. She was submerged in something, floating in some sort of tube. She reached her hands to her face, and as she'd expected, a mask was secured firmly around her head, feeding her the oxygen that was essential to her survival. From there, her hands traced down her neck, then her shoulders, then over her breasts and stomach. She was naked. Entirely naked. But more, she was smooth. Smoother than she'd ever been. Gone was the scar on her knee from riding her bike into the fence that divided her yard from her neighbors. Gone were the faint scar lines at the side of her breast, where a suspicious lump had been removed. Gone were the faintly raised lines within a tattoo she had gotten on her upper arm when she'd turned 19. She opened her eyes to confirm that the tattoo itself had also been erased. She wanted to panic, to be afraid, but she couldn't. It was like something beyond her was forcing a calm into her mind, her muscles. 

Then she heard it. A low-pitched hum that reverberated through the fluid and turned her bones into jelly, made her muscles languid and calm, made her thoughts slow and still.

Where was she?

She tried to look past the glass cage of her surroundings, but it was dimly lit, and the components of the fluid were just opaque enough that she couldn't make out more than shadows. Was she in a lab? Was she in a hospital? Was this a new technique of healing that she hadn't heard of yet? How much time had passed?

Almost as if sensing her questioning, a sound clicked in her ear. It hummed, and then, a gentle feminine voice followed.

"Hello, Morgana. We are so honored to have you."

Morgan tried to speak, but found she couldn't. Not because of the mask, but because her vocal cords, her tongue, felt foreign and stiff, like they didn't belong to her.

"Do not worry, Morgana. Your voice will soon return. You must have many questions. I am your guide, and I am happy to answer them for you. You have arrived on the War Planet Zix. You have been selected for this honor by our Council Scientists. We have traveled a long way to find you, and are happy to have rescued you from your perish. When you awaken again, we will answer all of your questions. But for now, I wish you a good healing sleep."

The sound in her ear clicked again, and Morgan was again left in silence. Where in the hell was War Planet Zix? Why did they bring her here? What did they want?

And why in the world did they keep calling her Morgana?