The roaring of water almost like a toilet flushing awakened her. Her eyes snapped open and darted about frenetically.
Where…? What…?
She found herself lying within a slick tank-like chamber. Her tanned limbs were quivering and the blast of cold that blew into the chamber on her naked skin only increased her reaction to the icy temperatures.
She began to cough, heaving violently small traces of a strange blue fluid. She didn't have time to wonder at the substance, or do anything but lie there listening to herself struggle to draw breath in her lungs and stop whimpering from the painful throbbing in her limbs that felt boneless.
Footsteps all around her, strange people in white lab coats speaking in hushed tones and crowding round her.
A man about the age of forty, with a distinctly stern face stared into her eyes. "Rain… Rain, can you hear me?"
Rain?
A pain like a hammer struck her head and a bright image of a eyeless, mess of flesh and membranes opened it's mouth of long yellow teeth, snaking out a ten foot long tongue…
"Rain?"
Another pain struck her and people were screaming, there were sounds of gunshots blaring through her brain. A woman with short strawberry blonde hair and earnest blue eyes was shouting, her words muted.
"My—I—ne…?" she managed to murmur.
"That's your name," the stern faced doctor said quietly. "Your name is Rain."
Rain peered curiously at the doctor, her eyebrows creased in confusion.
Another scientist, this one a short blonde haired-male knelt down addressing the doctor, "Sir her memory is diminutive at best however spontaneous recovery could occur as with Al—
The doctor turned away from Rain to quickly cut off the scientist's words. "She's not going anywhere, her groggy state will last another six hours at the least, she is no threat at the present time. Relax." He looked back at Rain hearing her dry retching.
Two research assistances came forward covering the young woman to calm her shivering and shield her exposed form.
She was lifted into the arms of another scientist and her head began to reel, spinning, everything was spinning, she felt her stomach muscles tighten and the need to vomit took her again but all she could do was lie limply in the arms of one of the strange men hoping she would just die.
The head doctor lifted her chin, squeezing her jaw with two fingers to force her mouth open and listen to her breathe, he withdrew his stethoscope and lightly pressed it to the subject's chest.
"Miraculous," the mad doctor remarked watching the labored rise and fall of Rain's chest.
All around her poking and prodding her, all of these strangers…
And all of these images…flickering, shifting, racing through her, like a movie stuck on fast-forward. Some contained her, some didn't. All were unfamiliar but some were constantly rewinding as if to jolt understanding, instead she was rewarded with deeper confusion and pain.
"Heart rate increasing, blood pressure
Another nurse came forward examining Rain's trembling fingers. The tips of them pale, almost blue. "Even so she's not getting adequate oxygen. Her lungs will need forty-eight hours to stabilize now that she is off the respirator."
Indeed Rain's breathing was coming in even shorter, rasping breaths… Her heart threatening to burst from constantly crashing against her chest…
More images…
That woman again screaming, "Rain! Rain!" Her hair drenched and she shivered hard and in those eyes Rain could see it was not from the cold but fear, her heavily bruised arm reaching, reaching—
A face, oozing…the flesh peeling from the man's temple like cheap paint. White suit blackened with blood hanging from his body, one eye hanging from the socket, pumping sickly yellow pus from the iris, a horrendous moan came from the abscessed and rotting mouth…
"AAAAHHHHHH!"
The image of the rotting man left her and was replaced by a man about the age of twenty-four and he was grinning despite the sound of screams rolling through her brain. He ran his hands through his short, dark hair, dropping his rifle. "76 to 62, which proves as I've suspected I'm a better shot than you any day of the week. So pay up."
The same man, crying her name desperately as he disappeared into the vise-like grips of desperate hands and more rotting men and women…
A sharp stab that had the effect of a well-placedknife jabpenetrated her ribs.
Three men held Rain firmly as the nurse delivered the injection into her side. As the sweet numbness came Rain quieted, only barely registering the screams had not been inside of her brain, she had been the one screaming.
"Okay, she's calming, she's going under…"
Rain felt herself drift off into nothingness.
"Allow her to rest, all tests will be done in 48 hours."