It was late November and Alexa had one of the worst flu cases of her life. For the last week, she’d been unable to keep any solid foods down, and had survived off tea and tomato soup. Lying in her queen bed, she'd awake covered in sweat, stumble to the bathroom, take a shower, and then find herself shivering with cold and diving back under her comforter. Worse, her body ached all over. Even her skin hurt.
As such, she was unprepared for the apocalypse.
In the middle of the night, she crawled downstairs in her grey t-shirt and plaid pajama bottoms. She felt something was wrong, a pressure in the air, but after days of being ill, Alexa paid the sensation no mind. Instead, she grabbed a cool glass of milk from the fridge and sipped it. The back of her throat was raw and the cool liquid soothed it for a moment.
Outside, the moon blazed, full and silver. Its pale light reflected brilliantly off the thin covering of snow on the grass and bushes of her backyard. Alexa tugged open the kitchen’s sliding glass door and stood barefoot on the cold wood of the deck. Puffs of steam slipped from between her lips as the sweat on her forehead and lower back cooled.
The icy air felt heavenly against her burning cheeks.
[Suitable host located. Shift initializing…]
Alexa shook her head. Her half-conscious mind rejecting the message. The cold air, the white moonlight shining off the snow, and the scent of winter entranced her.
Around her, reality softened and began to unravel, but the experience was gentle. Dreamlike.
Her milk was gone but Alexa was still thirsty. As if responding to her desires, a pool of water formed beside the deck. The full moon hung perfectly in its glassy, black depths, and Alexa moved towards it on instinct. She fell to her hands and knees beside the fresh water, her pajamas quickly getting damp. Scooping some of it into her hands, she sipped. It was sweet and bubbly on her tongue. After one drink, the horrible thirst left her mouth. A second and her fever broke. A third and the ache left her muscles and joints.
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Alexa stared at the pool, water dripping from her lips.
[Condition ‘Respiratory infection’ Removed. Heath restored.]
The rational part of her mind told her something was wrong. That she should stop and understand the situation.
Instead, she leaned ever more foreward and continued to drink. If three sips had restored her, why stop? Alexa drank deeply. She tasted the darkness of the pool and the moonlight within it. She tastes the living stone it had bubbled up from. The more she had, the more she wished to drink. It filled her with serenity. Alexa had lived a simple, mundane life, and this tasted like magic.
Soon, her belly ached. After the last week, it was delicate. She didn’t want to stop but familiar cramps told her she was close to vomiting.
Peering down, Alexa realized that there was no reflection of her her within the waters. Her eyes were clear and sharp, and the night had acquired a pale luminescence. The tips of treetops and the star-filled sky shown in the pool were so perfect, it was as though she looked through a window.
She reached for the impossibly close moon and slipped into the pool, submerging itself in its freezing darkness. As she floated, the very rocks around her glowed. The sensation of up and down had left her.
Opening her mouth, she inhaled, unafraid of drowning. Desiring it. Desiring that her body, mind, and spirit might merge completely with this water.
A small part of her rebelled. A deep-rooted instinct flared, sensing the danger of her situation, and panicked. Her body flailed, legs and arms jerking in an uncoordinated mess.
It was nothing impressive. Had she been in a lake or river with moderate current, it would have been futile. But her head broke the surface with a gasp and she slithered onto snow-covered rocks. Alexa coughed and black water tainted with the coppery taste of her blood gushed from her lip.
A dog barked, a car alarm went off—these sounds were distant and echoed up from the waters, not from the landscape around her. Her head spun and trees danced with stars in her vision.
It dawned on her that something terrible had happened. Alexa had been ill and now she was immersed in freezing water, outside in the cold. Her house was gone from sight and replaced by shimmering forest. Pulling herself from the pool onto the bank, Alexa flipped on her back, trying to steady her thoughts and catch her ragged breath.
Above her, the moon was a perfect silver disk hanging in the sky.