I wake up choking.
Not on water. But not on land either.
On air that's too thick to be air.
It presses into my mouth, my nose, heavy and sour, like rust ground into mist. Every breath tastes metallic, sharp at the back of my throat.
My lungs pull it in anyway, greedy and panicked, and I cough hard enough that my chest spasms.
Something wet shifts under me.
Cold seeps through my clothes immediately. My back, my arms, my legs,my everything sinks a little before stopping, like the ground is deciding whether to accept me or not.
I lie there for a second. Maybe more. Time didn't announce itself.
The dark is complete. Not the kind where you can make out shapes if you squint. Just black, layered and dense, like it has weight.
I try to move.
My arm responds a fraction too late, dragging through something viscous. There's a soft sucking sound when I pull it free. That gets my attention.
I roll onto my side, planting my palm down instinctively,and it sinks.
It stinks really bad.
Not deep. Not yet.
But enough.
I jerk my hand back, heart spiking, breath hitching. The movement sends a ripple through the ground beneath me. The surface quivers, unsettled.
Swamp.
The word surfaces without effort, already formed, like my brain had it ready.
I force myself up onto my elbows. My body wobbles, protesting the idea of verticality. My head feels light, hollowed out, like something important was scooped from it and put back badly.
I sit up halfway.
The ground gives a warning shift, wet and slow.
"Okay," I mutter, voice rough, unused.
It sounds wrong here. Like sound shouldn't exist.
I push myself to my feet anyway.
Big mistake.
The world tilts immediately. As if gravity itself is unsure which direction it wants me to fall. My knees buckle. My ankle twists in the mud, sliding instead of anchoring.
I stagger forward one step, arms lifting for balance, fingers grasping at nothing.
My mind is fog. Thick. Sluggish.
I try to remember... Anything.
And then it hits.
Not gradually. Not gently.
The loop.
All of it crashes back at once, like a door blown open in my head.
The missions.
The regressions.
The shrinking.
The pain of thought itself slipping away, memory by memory, sentence by sentence.
Satori's voice.
The room.
The moment I understood what was happening to me.
The realization lands so hard my vision whites out.
My legs give up.
I fold forward, the fall starting.... But not falling.
Because I catch myself.
My hands slam into the swamp just in time, palms sinking deep, wrists disappearing into cold sludge. The impact sends a wave through the ground, rippling outward.
I freeze, breath locked in my chest.
For half a second, nothing happens.
Then my stomach revolts.
I gag violently, whole body heaving, and whatever's left inside me comes up in a burning rush. I retch into the swamp, bile splattering into the dark water with dull, ugly sounds.
The smell intensifies instantly acidic, metallic, rotten.
I choke again, spitting, coughing, eyes watering. My arms tremble, muscles screaming as they hold my weight. The ground under my hands shifts more now, like it's aware of me.
No.
Not like that.
I don't let the thought finish.
I wrench my hands free and scramble backward, movements sloppy and desperate. My knees slide, my boots sinking deeper than I want them to. The swamp tugs, slow but insistent, like fingers curling around my ankles.
I kick, dragging myself away, heart hammering loud enough I can hear it in my ears.
There.
A slight rise. Barely visible, more felt than seen.
I throw myself onto it, rolling onto my side, then my back, gasping. The ground here is firmer. Still wet, still slick, but it holds.
I lie there, chest rising and falling hard.
The dark presses in again.
I don't think about fear. There's no room for it yet.
I just breathe.
Slowly, the fog in my head thins. Enough for thoughts to line up instead of colliding.
I'm… older.
The realization comes with a strange calm.
My limbs feel long again. Heavy in the way they used to. My hands.....when I lift one into the darkness....feel right. Scarred where they should be. Callused. Not small.
The regression stopped.
Somehow.
That's the part that doesn't fit.
I remember the end. I remember slipping. Remember thoughts turning simple, then simpler, words losing edges. I remember being pulled back into the loop like gravity.
So why am I here?
And where is here?
I shift slightly, testing the ground again. It holds. Barely.
I sit up fully, spine protesting. My clothes cling to me, soaked through, cold already biting.
The air hums faintly, not with sound exactly....more like pressure.
I reach up to my ear without really thinking.
My comms.
My fingers brush the familiar shape and I freeze.
They're there.
Whole. Intact.
My breath catches.
I tap them once. Twice.
Nothing.
No static. No acknowledgment. No voice.
Just silence, thick and absolute.
I tried to keep myself from panicking.
I lower my hand slowly, staring into the dark as if it might answer me.
Comms are back. Body's back. Mind's back.
Environment might be hostile, but stable enough to exist.
Conclusion: this isn't a standard regression endpoint.
I swallow, throat burning.
How did I get out?
The question circles, refusing to land. I rewind my memory, searching for the seam, the break—something I missed. A decision. An intervention.
There's nothing.
Just the loop… and then this.
The swamp shifts nearby. A quiet, patient sound.
I don't move.
If this place pulled me out, then it's either a mistake....
or a holding cell.
Either way, sitting here waiting isn't an option.
I wipe my mouth with the back of my sleeve, grimacing at the smell. My hands are shaking now, the aftershock finally catching up.
Still, no self-recrimination rises. That's good.
Just one thought, solid and unyielding, finally punching through the noise.
"I need to save myself already."
The words leave my mouth and vanish into the dark.
The swamp doesn't answer.
But somewhere beneath the silence, something shifts—as if listening.