Everybody Lies

Chapter 2: Hell and High Water

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He was standing on a wind-swept beach, lifting his face towards the warmth of the newly risen sun. The dawn light was pale and watery, the ocean breeze light and chilly, and it lifted the boy’s blue-gray hair off his forehead and swept it back out of his eyes. He looked out over the ocean, his blue eyes shining in the sunlight, bright and content. He had never visited the ocean before, and he had always imagined it beautiful.

He felt a tickling sensation at his feet, and looked down to see thin, minuscule waves lapping at his toes as the water began to rise towards him. He smiled at the curious feeling; the water began to rise past his feet and the water around his ankles felt like tiny hands grabbing him. The tide was rising faster now, now it was at his knees, and he thought that he should head back to the beach, before the water rose too high. He turned to look behind him only to realize that there was no beach.

There was nothing but water: a solid, smooth stretch of dark blue extending for miles in every direction. This water was not moving with waves, or sparkling in the sunlight; because suddenly, there was no sunlight. The sky had gone dark, had been drained of color, leaving the sky cold and gray. He looked out at the water, and realized he could not tell where the sky ended and the sea began. The wind picked up and seemed to claw at the exposed skin on his arms.

Zexion looked foreword again: there was something there now. Something bubbling up under the surface of the water, getting larger as it got closer. He looked down and realized that the water around him was rushing foreword… but somehow the water near him never shrank in height, and he felt the water around his knees tighten like metal clasps, keeping him rooted to the spot… he could not have run, even if had he wanted to.

He looked up and watched as the gigantic wave took form; the water seemed to pulse, leaping in time with the beating of his frantic heart. The wave rose, roaring and boiling, higher and higher still, so high that Zexion had to crane his neck to see the frothing white top of it.

He wanted to scream. He wanted to run. But there was nowhere to run to, no one but the sky and the sea and the wind to hear him. All he could do was watch as the torrent of water and foam curled towards the sky and crashed over him.

And then everything was twisting, everything was cold, everything was pain. He was being tossed, rolling over and over again under the violent surface of the water. The waves beat at him like fists, smashing him with a cold so deep it made his bones ache, and rocks jutted out from under him, tearing at his head and shoulders and chest; he curled into a tight ball, closing his eyes against the stinging salt water, feeling the freezing water flood his mouth, chocking him, suffocating him. He could not tell which way was up, which part of his body his pain was coming from, all he knew was that he wanted so badly to be smashed against the rocks… to fall unconscious… to die quickly, before the icy water forced its way down his throat and he was suffocated, slowly…

But he didn’t want to die… slowly or not… he didn’t want to die cold and alone and in pain… he didn’t want this…

I don’t want to die!

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