The winter air crashed hard against my face as I stood there. It was cold and hard for me to keep myself warm with a basketball tucked under my arm.

This is what I did every day. I would wait at the basketball court and watch for some strange Providence aircraft to fly overhead. It would hover above me and lower down some kind of basket or ladder and I would be brought to the main Providence base. Rex would be waiting there for me and the two of us would hang out and do whatever we felt like at the time. Then I would get brought back here and go home. It was the same thing every day, like an unwritten rule.

I heard something coming and looked to the sky. It was a white helicopter today.

A net was lowered and a Providence officer climbed down to me. He takes my ball and helps me grip onto the ladder while I watch the land get farther and farther away.

Usually, Six would have an officer pull me up or he himself would give me a boost, but right now I was hanging a couple of hundred feet above the ground and there was no Agent Six to catch me this time. But, with some aggravated encouragement from the officer, I slowly made my way up.

There was no one else in the cabin, besides the two of us. The silence made me uncomfortable, but not enough so that I would try to break it with conversation. These officers often had a habit of being condescending, sarcastic jerks. I'd learned that the hard way, multiple times.

The landing was fairly rough, enough so that, had I not been belted in, I'd have fallen onto the floor.

I stepped out of the helicopter, the slowing blades blowing my hair in my face, and retrieved my ball from the officer.

"Rex and Agent Six are currently dealing with a disturbance in Seattle," he explained. "So they will not be returning for some time. I will be escorting you to the gym area, where you will wait for them."

"I know my way," I said. "Thank you though." I walked quickly through the hanger doors and followed a long hallway a few paces before taking a left. Providence was a big place, filled with twists and turns and an infinite number of rooms. Anyone who took even one wrong turn could find themselves lost in no time.

I finally reached the gym and noticed the intently polished floor and the saturated smell of disinfectant.

It was quiet and the air was still. Being alone in that room made be feel a little uncomfortable.

'What am I doing,' I thought. 'I really need to give those horror movies a rest.' I walked to the bleachers and removed my coat before making my way over to the half court line. 'I wonder how many free throws I can get in a row.' I picked up a ball from the rack and counted.

1...2...3...4...

It seemed like a good way to kill time. The guard did tell me it would take a while and depending on the situation, it could take them anywhere from one hour to twelve, maybe longer. But either way, I could get a good amount of practice in.

5...6...7...

My heart rate seemed to increase and my hands started shaking.

8...9...miss.

There was a hard pulsing pain in my skull, like blood was pooling there, filling in and crushing my brain. My vision became blurry and I started to lose my balance. My eyes burned and when I closed them, I completely lost my footing, falling hard and bringing the basketball rack down with me.

Breathing became difficult and my joints ached. I could feel my muscles contracting and my blood started to feel hot, like it was boiling and burning my veins. I tried to scream but all I could muster was a low, pained groan.

I could feel my organs twitching...moving...rearranging. I tried all too hard to make it stop, pressing my arms impossibly hard into my gut, but I could still feel them; moving like restless maggots. I started gaging, the sensation making me feel utterly nauseated, and choked on my own regurgitation.

My body was forced into a curved position, dragging my face in my warm stomach contents, while my spine stretched and curved away from my body. I clenched my teeth as hard as I could, hoping to distract myself from the pain. Then, just as suddenly as it all started, everything stopped.

My muscles relaxed, my blood cooled, and the pulling on my spine stopped. I laid there for a while, breathing hard and keeping my eyes fixated on the droplets of sweat littering the floor around my head, before forcing myself to sit up.

The room was silent, unaffected by my fit.

'What the heck was that, I thought, panting too hard to even try to speak. I stood on quivering legs and dragged myself to the locker room. Slumping over the sink, I ran my head under the faucet, the chilling water weaving between my hair strands.

It felt so wonderful, being able to get the vomit out of my hair, and I held myself there as long as I could stand before the ice cold became too much.

The face in the mirror looked so different that what I normally saw. My eyes were blood shot and puffy and select strands hair were sticking to my flushed cheeks. I looked slightly hunched over and my stomach seemed to be curved in below my rib cage. When I turned myself to the side, I could see my vertebrae protruding significantly through my t-shirt. I stood there for the longest time, staring at myself and examining every inch, before my legs finally gave out.

The floor felt so cold against my skin. It soothed the burning and I wished that I could have laid there like that forever.

I heard a strange noise echo throughout the room. I didn't know what it was at first, then I felt my body shaking with hysterical laughter.

'Oh screw it', I thought, letting the laughter explode. I let it rack my body and increase all of my soreness. I didn't know why I was laughing, but I didn't know why anything else happened either. Maybe the fact that I didn't know was what I was laughing at, or maybe I was just going crazy.

I waited for myself to calm down, and when I did, I was definitely in more pain than before. I remembered my vomit on the floor, and mentally cursed at myself.

It took a bit of work to get back to my feet, so much so that I felt like, if I let go of the counter, which was supporting most of my weight at that moment, I would crash down again. But I had to work through this; I had to make sure I left no evidence of any of this.

Looking back now, it seems stupid of me to want to hide any of it. I don't know what I was thinking , but something told me to keep it a secret, to make sure no one would know.

I fisted as many paper towels into my hand as I could carry, and staggered out of the bathroom and back onto the court.

Looking at the mess reminded me of the awful taste left in my mouth, and I felt nauseous again. I took a deep breath and wiped up everything and quickly disposed of the saturated material.

"Noah!"

My eyes widened and I spun around on my heels. I could see Rex standing opposite me on the far side of the room, smiling.

He took a step closer, and I took one back. He looked at me strangely, his smile now a confused frown. "Are you alright, man?"

I darted towards my things and dressed myself in the layers of thick clothing I had previously discarded. I heard his footfall getting closer, and no sooner had I turned around had his hand wrapped itself around my wrist; and it burned.

"Don't touch me," I shouted smacking his had away. I hunched myself over and covered my eyes. "...So hot..."

"Noah?"

I could hear the confusion and hurt, feel it strangling me and tightening around my throat.

"I-I'm fine," I chocked out. I pushed past him and paused at the doorway. "I'll see you later, bro."

It took all my strength to open that door. And I prayed while I walked down that long hallway, I prayed that whatever it was that happened to me, would never happen again.