Beep, beep, beep. It wouldn't stop. Beep, beep, beep. He's been listening to this for what seems like days now. Beep, beep, beep. Maybe even longer. Beep, beep, beep. Just an eternity of that annoying - Beep. Beep. Beep. Zack sleepily tried to reach to rub the sleep from his eyes, only to be met by resistance when he attempted to move his arms. Beep, beep, beep. That seemed rather odd to him. Beep. Beep. Beep. Why would he not be able to just reach up and rub his eyes?
Zack reluctantly opened his eyes, or tried to, at least. Everything was dark. Dark, and... wet? He could just barely see a blinking red light off in the distance, pulsing in timing with that ever-so-annoying Beep. Beep. Beep. He was feeling frustrated. Why couldn't it just stop so he could go back to sleep? He was so tired...
A few hours later, Zack slowly regained consciousness. There was that annoying beeping and pulsing red light, still there. Couldn't he just get one good night's sleep? Wait... how long had he actually been sleeping? Zack started awake, but when he attempted to jerk his arms and legs, they felt so heavy and met with some sort of resistance as if he were encased in rubber cement. It wasn't worth the trouble figuring out though, he was just so tired... His vision started to darken... No, that wasn't quite it, it was already dark. His mind started slipping back to slumber...
What day was it? Wasn't there something he had to do? Zack thought to himself as he slowly regained consciousness yet again. A rapid "Bip bip bip bip bip" rang in his ears. A flashing red light left an orange hue to the fluid surrounding his entire body. His heart began pounding almost as fast as the alarm. He didn't quite understand what was going on, but it felt incorrect somehow. This wasn't supposed to be happening, he knew that much, at least. After what seemed like an eternity but may have only been a dozen heartbeats, his vision went dark as the light shut off, and a steady "Beeeeep" sound echoed through the chamber along with a slow hiss and the sounds of fluid slowly being drained. A cold wetness was felt against Zack's bare skin as the chamber finished draining. Moments later, a series of metallic clicks and clangs could be heard. Zack's legs almost immediately gave way and he started to fall to the floor, only to bang his head and knees on a hard surface only inches from his body.
He tried to exclaim "Ouch!", but when he opened his mouth to shout, only a muffled gagging sound came out as he started to cough up some foul tasting liquid. Yuck! Whatever this was, he felt it was definitely worse than vomiting. Leaning against the wall in front of him, he slowly brought his arms up and pushed back with his hands to brace himself. The cold, smooth surface of whatever was in front of him was slippery with whatever had been in Zack's lungs, as well as whatever had been filling the chamber moments before. He flailed around helplessly, still coughing, slipping against the wall, wanting to just fall to his knees but not having enough room to do so.
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After what felt like several minutes of flailing around, a loud clang echoed throughout the chamber and the wall in front of him collapsed, revealing a blindingly bright light. Zack tumbled forward and fell on his face, groaning in pain and at the sudden brightness. He tried to get a measure of his surroundings, but everything was just so bright. He weakly lifted his arm to cover his eyes from the blinding light and lay on the ground, looking utterly miserable. He took a moment to collect himself and contemplate his current situation.
He now realized he was naked. He was completely soaked head to toe in some strange, foul-smelling, liquid. He just got thoroughly banged up flailing around in some sort of metallic chamber before one of the walls collapsed. He collapsed with the wall and was now laying on top of it. His muscles felt so sluggish and tired. He barely heard the strength to hold his arm up covering his face. While he lay there, he started to dry and he felt the welcoming warmth of sunlight on his skin. He guessed it wasn't that cold after all, it's just that whatever he was soaked in was cold. It was only a matter of time as the warm sunlight was drying him off that he started to drift back to sleep. He was so very tired.
Some time later, Zack slowly came out of his slumber as he heard some voices., though he couldn't make out what they were saying. His entire body was still so very weak. He didn't have the energy to bother to try to listen. As he laid there in a half asleep stupor, the voices grew louder and more urgent. At some point, he had the sensation of being surrounded but didn't quite care enough to bother. Whatever entities were crowding around him seemed to be discussing something, though he still couldn't understand their weird manner of speech. After much deliberation, one particularly feminine voice shouted something angrily and everyone else quit talking. Shortly after, he felt the sensation of a soft blanket of some sort covering his nakedness.
Just as he started to drift back to the land of unconsciousness with the aid of the soft blanket, he was sprung back awake as the metal plate he had fallen on was lifted. He was jolted around as the group started dragging the makeshift litter he was laying on off into some unknown direction. Opening his eyes, he tried to get a look at the people carrying him off, but the harsh sunlight was just too much.
"Um, hey, hello? I'm sorry, there appears to be something wrong, I can barely move or see. Hello? Where are you taking me?", Zack asked in a weak voice. His voice sparked further conversation with the people carrying him, but he couldn't understand a word of it. He was no polyglot, but he felt like he could identify most languages by sound. This language, he had no idea. It was kind of sing-song with varying tones and inflections, but didn't sound like anything he heard before.
He weakly lifted his arm out of the blanket covering him and reached up towards the nearest silhouette of a figure he could make out against the blinding light. "Excuse me, where are you taking me? Who are you?" he asked again. The figure gently clasped his hand and brought it back down to his chest while whispering something softly. A wave of soothing warmth enveloped his body from where his hand was held, and before he knew it, he was drifting back to sleep.