Drown (MXM)

Therapy Session 1

One month before open ocean research trip...

"Dr. Arden, in order for this whole thing to work, I need you to be honest with me about what exactly you think you saw." The voice of the counselor, Dr. Scott, broke through my daze.

"Then being here is a waste of my time, because I already told you, I have no idea what I saw." I spoke slowly, never taking my eyes away from a bird that was pecking at a tree outside the window.

I heard a sigh escape the man's lips, hoping he was going to give up on this whole thing, but luck has never really been a friend of mine.

"Let's just go back to the beginning then. You were with your team, but then you saw something curious a little ways away, so you followed it. What happened then?" He asked me, still maintaining that annoyingly patient tone of voice. So I decided to humor him, turning my gaze to meet his eyes in a silent challenge.

"I didn't really see much of anything the first time, it was its speed that really interested me; a speed unlike any creature I have ever studied, not in textbooks nor in the field. I swam towards where I thought I had seen it, but I instantly knew that something was... off." I trailed out, allowing myself to turn and face the window again. The bird continued tearing at the tree, more than likely hunting for an insect.

"Off how? Do you mean there was something off about you, or with this creature?" The doctor pushed further, genuinely sounding interested in what I had to say. It took me a moment to really think about the question, because it was one that I didn't really know how to answer. I subconsciously smoothed my fingers through my hair, scratching my scalp in a manner that removed some of the tension from my body.

"Both maybe?" My answer being more of a question, with undertones of annoyance finding its way into my voice. "I was afraid before I even began to hypothesize what species of animal it was. My body didn't respond to me, and I became overwhelmed with this feeling, like I was going to die." I listened begrudgingly as he scribbled stuff down in his stupid little notepad.

"You say you felt like this creature was going to kill you, but if that was the case, then how do you think you managed to escape. No doubt the whole thing was a terrifying ordeal for you, but are you sure this thing you saw was even real?" The doctor's voice was filled with skepticism and it was beginning to make anger swell in my chest. I pinned him with a sharp glare, ready to tell him how much of an asshole he is and leave. Yet he simply put his hands up in a defensive way, as if he were trying to calm a wild animal.

"I'm not trying to discredit what you saw, or say you made the whole thing up Dr. Arden, I'm simply trying to come up with a logical explanation for what happened down there. Have you ever heard of hypoxia?" He asked me the question, getting just a light shake of my head in reply.

"Well, it is a condition that occurs when there is not enough oxygen to support life. It causes all sorts of symptoms from an increased heart rate, to hallucinations if allowed to persist. So, I ask again, are you sure the things you were seeing were real, and not a result of oxygen deprivation?"

I allowed his words to sit in the back of my mind for a minute. The doctor's explanation made sense-- if I was low on oxygen, I could have imagined the whole thing. There were just a few technicalities, that caused doubt to gnaw at my brain. One, when I had first seen the little flash of light in the water, my oxygen was still at a safe level. Secondly, and most important to me, it didn't feel like something I could just conjure up, it felt too real to have been a byproduct of reduced oxygenation.

"I know what I saw" was my short reply.

The doctor hummed, continuing to jot down notes as if his life depended on it.

"Which brings us back to my original question, what do you think you saw down there with you?"

The bird scratched at the tree one last time, finally pulling out a fat, green worm from the dense bark. It grasped the wiggling creature in its firm beak, not allowing any room for it to escape its impending demise. The bird flexed its wings, stretching them as far as possible on either side of its small body before taking off. It left nothing in its wake but an empty hole, and a black feather floating slowly down until it rested on the abandoned branch. I moved my body so I was facing the doctor head on, my eyes dead serious and beckoning him to listen closely to the answer he was about to receive.

"A hunter"