Strange Terrains

[Mukraken]

(Author's note: This will be a series of stories following a single plot-line. The basic plot is contained within the first post, and the stories themselves are in the posts following, each story in its own post. They are not sequels per se, but rather can be read independent of one another, following the first 'plot' post. Stay posted.)

Gabriel was working late into the night. He was a scientist employed by Quinux Scientific Industries, and he was mere moments away from completing what could be a revolutionary scientific breakthrough. He had discovered parallel worlds, similar to this one but slightly different, coexisting but unseen alongside our own. If he could just invert the hyper-dimensional curve, he could create portals to those worlds.

The downside was that he could have no way of knowing where those portals would appear. They could show up anywhere within miles of his laboratory. And because his work had to be kept top-secret, for fear of the technology getting into the wrong hands, he couldn't even warn the outside world of what was about to happen. He could only hope that, if it worked, the news would spread back to him before anyone got hurt.

Finally, in the early hours of the morning, he had finished the strange-looking device and, sweating with anticipation, turned it on. It made a whirring sound, followed by a distant loud crack, like thunder. He tried to pinpoint where the sound had come from, but it seemed to echo from everywhere at once.

The next morning, he set out in search of any portals. But it seemed that they were nowhere to be found, and by the end of the day, Gabriel, exhausted, decided that the experiment must have been a failure. He headed back to his laboratory for another long night of long-winded calculations.

[Mukraken]

"Tendril Pit"

Meanwhile, for Julia, a tomboy but with a slim and graceful figure, and her clay-red hair done up in a pony-tail, it was just another day. She lived by herself a few miles away from the Quinux Scientific Industries building. She'd heard her fair share of rumors about what went on there, but most of the time, she paid it no mind.

Until the day she noticed an alien world in her living room. Not really 'in' her living room, though. It was more like there was a doorway hanging in the air, and on the other side of that doorway was a world like she had never seen before.

Being the adventurous type, she stepped through. The air was noticeably warmer, and more humid. She looked around, making sure she could still see her living room on the other side of the strange portal, and started to walk deeper into this other world, pushing aside the tall rubbery turquoise leaves that sprouted from the ground like grass.

Creatures like one-legged gazelles bounded alongside her, glancing curiously at her as they leapt past. A forest of blue pod-like plants to her left, like gigantic venus fly traps, turned towards her as though they could see her, staring at her hungrily with eyeless faces. She turned to the right, wanting to put as much distance between herself and the hungry forest as possible.

Just ahead, Julia noticed a clearing in the leaves, the bare yellowish-brown dirt punctuated by red feathery plants here and there. The strange bushes were beautiful in some whimsical, alien way, and she found herself wanting a closer look. And besides, the clearing seemed a good place to rest for a moment from fighting her way through the thick leaves.

As soon as she had walked a few steps onto the clearing, the red tendrils pulled themselves under the ground as though they sensed her presence. Startled, she tried to back up a step, but found that her foot had now sunk up to her ankle in what had previously appeared to be solid ground. As she tried to pull her foot free, she felt thin tendrils of something reaching over her foot and around her ankle. She could feel the alien tendrils moving around for a tighter grip, and as they brushed against the bare skin of her leg she could feel the thousands of tiny barbs, like a shark's skin, gaining purchase and starting to pull her down hungrily.

Julia yelped in fear, and tried to turn around so she could get back to the edge, but the tendrils tightened their grip the more she struggled, and the yellow-brown muck slowly crept up to her calves. Trying not to panic, she tried pulling with all her might on her right leg, but the tendrils held tightly, and as her left leg was pushed farther down into the mud from the force of her exertion, the web of thin tentacles in the mud crept up past her left knee and the miniscule barbs stuck tightly to her skin. Dismayed, she tried to lift her left leg out of the muck, but the tendrils stubbornly held her in place as she drove down her right knee to match her left.

Seeing that struggling was only pulling her down faster, Julia fought to stay calm and keep still. She felt the moving tendrils tickling the length of her calves as they adjusted and readjusted their grip on her, slowly but steadily pulling her downward.

"Help!" she cried out, hoping against hope that there was some kind of humanoid species in this strange place that might hear her and help her. "Somebody please help me! I'm sinking!"

The strange, discolored mud was up around her thighs now. The impulse to panic overcame her, and she manically worked her legs up and down in a futile attempt to free them. Soon the shifting mud touched her crotch, and she grimaced in discomfort as the hundreds of tiny shark-skinned tendrils gripped and slithered over the area between her legs.

As the muck crept over her hips, she put her hands down into the mud as she continued to fight to free herself. Immediately her hands were caught in the web of moving tendrils under the surface and held down tightly. She tried to lift her hands back out of the goo, but the more she pulled up on her hands, the deeper into the muck she drove her torso. She pushed downward with her hands again, trying desperately to worm her way up out of the muck, but she was now buried up to her stomach, and all she accomplished was to push her arms into the goo past her elbows. The shark-skinned tendrils caught against the fabric of her shirt, and she was sinking faster and faster as they gained more and more purchase on the textured cloth.

"Help!" Julia screamed again, knowing it was pointless but not knowing what else to do. "I'm sinking! If anyone can hear me, HELP!" She could hear the fear and despair in her own voice, and she started to sob bitterly as she felt the slithering mud pull her down past her breasts, and within moments the tendrils had wrapped themselves over her shoulders.

She tilted her head back, feeling the grasping filaments pulling at her hair. She flinched as she felt the rough sandpaper of the tentacles pulling at the edges of her face, still barely visible above the yellowish mud. She narrowed her mouth in an attempt to keep breathing as long as she could, as she continued to be relentlessly pulled under the surface. Finally, she took one last deep breath as she started to feel the tendrils grasping at the corners of her lips, and the shifting muck rose up over her to envelop her completely.

After a few moments, the ripples of her continued thrashing faded away into nothing as she continued to be pulled deeper, and before long the surface of the mud was still. A series of bubbles slowly oozed to the surface and popped, as the whimsical-looking, feathery red tendril-plants slowly unfurled themselves from the mud once more. The remaining tentacles shifted slightly underneath the surface of the mud, absorbing slight amounts of moisture from the top-most layer, rendering the false appearance of solid ground. With no trace remaining of Julia's struggle, the bizarre alien creature patiently waited for its next helpless victim.

[PM2K]

Cool! I love the combo of perils.

[Mukraken]

"Tunnel of Lights"

Meanwhile, for Becky, an energetic and spunky girl with light brown hair, it was just another day. She lived by herself a few miles away from the Quinux Scientific Industries building. She'd heard her fair share of rumors about what went on there, but most of the time, she paid it no mind.

Until the day she noticed an alien world in her living room. Not really 'in' her living room, though. It was more like there was a doorway hanging in the air, and on the other side of that doorway was a world like she had never seen before.

Curious, and never one to turn down a chance for an adventure, she stepped through after only a moment's hesitation. Although it was day in her own world, it seemed to be night here. The sky was dark, with hints of purple at the horizon, like a fading sunset. The ground, however, was lit up by strange plants, like trees, but like no trees Becky had ever seen before. They were shaped like normal trees, birches perhaps, but with electric-blue points of light where the leaves should have been.

She pressed on, deeper and deeper into the otherworldly starlit wood. Ahead, she could see a thinning of the strange lighted trees, a clearing. As she drew nearer, she could soon make out an upturned ridge that rose up around the perimeter of the open space. The elongate pile of loose rock and debris blocked her view into the clearing, but as she reached the incline, she began to climb.

She reached the top, and beheld a strange and bewildering sight. It was a crater. About fifty feet across, it looked just like the pictures the astronauts took of the moon. And right at it's center, there was a circle of bright green. The area was glowing faintly, casting an eerie green glint upon the rest of the crater.

Becky shivered slightly with nervousness, while at the same time she couldn't help but to be curious about the strange sight, and so she stepped forward. But the ground under her wasn't as stable as she thought it was, and so her feet suddenly began to slide down the slope. She tried to stop, but as she continued to skid downwards she sent more and more of the loose rock tumbling, and before long a small landslide was carrying her straight towards the center of the crater.

She fell on her back, and scrabbled for purchase against the sliding rocks as she drew closer and closer to the strange glowing spot. She watched helplessly as the first few rocks dropped into the lighted area and vanished with a series of plunking sounds, and she suddenly realized with horror that she was looking at a pool. She stuck out her feet in front of her to catch herself as the rockslide deposited her into the glowing pit. The glowing goo quickly swallowed up her ankles as she righted herself, and she desperately hoped that the stuff wasn't radioactive. She didn't feel ill, but she had no idea what radiation poisoning felt like, so she couldn't quite fully reassure herself that it was safe.

Her fear of radiation was replaced by another fear, however, as she continued to sink in the sticky goo up to her calves. She began trying to pull her right foot out, but it was held tight by the suction, and she quickly buried her left leg up to her knee as she struggled. She shoved her right foot down into the goo, trying to pull out her left, but she only succeeded in burying herself up to her thighs.

Realizing she was quite thoroughly stuck, she cried out, "Help! If anybody can hear me, please help me!" But it was no good, of course.

Becky tried to remain calm, realizing that struggling was only making her sink faster. But even unmoving, she was still slowly sinking. As the goo rose up over her hips, she noticed a strange sensation against her feet. A breeze? She tried moving her feet, and encountered no resistance to that movement at all. Not like moving through goo, but rather, like moving through air. That was strange. There seemed to be a bottom surface to the layer of sludge, like a force field that she could pass through.

As the glowing green ooze began to engulf her stomach, and her calves entered the unseen air pocket, she suddenly realized that the air below her posed a problem. As more and more of each leg dangled freely into the air, the weight of her body in the air beneath her was pulling her down. If the ooze had just continued down like a normal liquid, she might be buoyant, whereas with air beneath, she would eventually fall through. "HELP!" she cried out again as she kicked her feet at the air, trying to swim up through the ooze even with nothing at all to push against. "Get me out of here, help me!" Her knees fell through into the air pocket as she thrashed, pulling her deeper into the goo.

She pressed her hands down into the sticky ooze, trying to lift herself out. But the goo grabbed hold of her hands and the suction held tight as she tried to pull her arms back up out of the bright green muck, and each pull on her arms thrust her chest deeper, until the goo began to engulf her breasts. Her legs were exposed to air up to her thighs, and as she kicked in panic, every movement of that weight pulled her down more and more through the goo. As her hips emerged into the air beneath, her shoulders were engulfed under the sticky green surface, and the goo surrounded her neck. She tilted her head back to try to keep breathing as long as she possibly could, hoping desperately that whatever air was beneath her would be breathable somehow.

Becky's face was just barely still visible, and the glow was close enough now to hurt her eyes with its brightness. She narrowed her lips, trying to keep the thick green slime out of her mouth as it rose up her face, and took one last deep breath before she fell beneath the surface.

She held her breath as she struggled. Failing to make any headway getting back to the surface, she reversed tactics and tried to thrust herself downward as quickly as possible. Her eyes were closed, but the light pressing in all around her face shone red through her eyelids. She felt the air, if that's what it really was, climb up her stomach, and soon her hands were free of the goo, and as more of her torso emerged into the air she fell faster and faster as gravity won out against suction, and eventually her head was released from the goo with a thick sucking sound.

She took a deep breath, and another, gulping the air, grateful to be breathing again, and even more grateful to find that it was actually air that she was still breathing. She looked up to see the glowing green goo above her, looking like a cave's ceiling with stalactites of dripping ooze hanging down. She squinted at it, wondering why it stayed in place, when there seemed to be nothing holding it there. She looked around, and saw that the walls were the same glowing green color. Even her skin seemed to glow faintly, although she didn't know if that was because of the sickly green light reflecting from the walls, or because she was covered in a thin layer of slime.

It was then that she realized she was standing on something soft and yielding. She slowly and fearfully looked down, and groaned in terror to see more of the glowing green goo beneath her. "No, no, not again," she wailed as she watched her calves disappear into the goo for a second time.

Once again, Becky pulled on her feet to try to free herself, but even if she got free, she had no idea where she could possibly go. She sobbed with hopeless fear as she struggled in vain, pathetically trying to free her trapped legs as they sunk up to her knees. She wiggled her toes from time to time, checking for more air pockets, and as the goo rose up around her hips, she suddenly felt her feet break through into the air. "No, no, no," she moaned, wondering desperately how many of these layers there could be. Would she be doomed to sink beneath this goo, over and over again, for all eternity?

"Help!" she called out again, to the unresponsive liquid ceiling above her. "Someone, please, HELP!" She watched helplessly as the bright green ooze rose slowly over her stomach and climbed up her chest. She reached her arms up ineffectually towards the ceiling as the goo rolled over her breasts once more, and she tilted her head back in preparation to go under, as she felt her legs fully emerge into the air beneath. Gravity took over, and she gasped a deep breath as she fell beneath the surface and the bright ooze closed in around her face.

Becky twisted her body frantically, as her lungs burned for air, trying to thrust herself low enough to reach the air beneath her. Once again she picked up speed as she fell through the ooze, falling through the air pocket as the sticky goo reluctantly let her go.

She coughed and gasped, only barely able to hold her breath long enough to make it through the layers. She was no longer surprised, only disappointed, to see another layer of goo beneath her feet. This time, she tucked her legs in close to her body, hoping that she could float in the goo so long as she didn't touch the air underneath her. It was a desperate gamble, she knew, and it might cost her life if she was wrong about buoyancy, but it was her only hope.

As she curled up into a sitting position, the goo quickly enveloped her ankles and her hips at the same time, slowly rising towards her upturned knees. She was crying, her tears drawing dark lines down her face where the moisture washed off the bright glowing ooze that coated her skin. She hugged her knees close as the goo rose up her chest, wrapping itself around her. It enveloped her breasts as it flowed up to cover her knees.

She sighed with shaky relief, as she realized she was sinking slower and slower, her body buoyant in the goo. "Thank god," she breathed, as she knew she wasn't going to die after all. The goo slowly inched up to her shoulders, then finally stopped rising altogether.

Becky simply sat there, buried in the glowing goo, for several long minutes, just shivering and breathing and sobbing. It was occurring to her that there wasn't much she could do to get out of her current situation. She couldn't hardly climb back up through the two layers of sludge between her and the surface, and she was far beyond any hope of rescue. So, what now? Would she just sit here until she starved, or died of thirst, or ran out of oxygen in the enclosed space?

But, maybe, there would be some way out, farther down. A side passage to the surface, a solid floor, something. It was a long shot, and perhaps a wishful one at that. But she could see no third option. It was either sit here and die a slow death of thirst or starvation or slow suffocation, or at least die looking for a way out.

She began trying to unfold her legs, so that she could reach the air below and fall through. But it was difficult, the thick sludge resisted her every attempt to move. She squirmed back and forth, stretching out her legs a little more with each restrained wiggle.

As her feet touched the air, she realized she was still about halfway curled up, and with a start it suddenly occurred to her that she might drown if she sank too slowly through the layer of goo, which was a distinct possibility if she couldn't unfold her legs. She started thrashing wildly, trying to push her trapped legs farther out into the air below. But she was also pushing her torso backwards with each panicked movement, until she was lying diagonally backward in the goo. Suddenly and fearfully realizing that her tilted position would slow down her descent even more, she pushed and struggled, trying to right herself.

But now she was sinking again, and the goo was already up to her neck. She had to tilt her face upward for a third time as she tried to keep breathing, and then, with her knees only just starting to emerge into the air below, her face was slowly sucked beneath the surface.

Becky was only halfway through the layer of ooze when her lungs began to burn for air, and she had to fight the growing urge to inhale. She tried to tilt her head downwards towards the air as she felt the goo release her torso, waiting in yearning anticipation for the chance to breathe.

She counted down the seconds before her face would emerge into the air, her lungs spasming desperately to breathe. Preparing herself to take that much-needed breath.

But she miscalculated, and in her desperate urgency to breathe, she inhaled a fraction of a second too soon. The goo filled her mouth and her throat lurched shut as the thick ooze coursed into her larynx.

She coughed and gagged as she finally fell into the air, slime erupting from her throat with each straining breath. She felt the thick ooze inside her throat, sticking to the inside of her trachea and slowly and uncomfortably trickling down into her lungs. She gasped and hacked and retched, but she couldn't draw a decent breath through the ooze inside her windpipe.

When she finally managed to breathe enough to be able to get her bearings and think straight, she had already sunk through the next layer of ooze up to her hips. Still unable to fight the urge to keep coughing, she started to panic, realizing that if she went under again while only barely able to catch a breath, there was no way she could hold that breath long enough to reach the other side. She tried to fold her legs, as she had done before, but they were already immersed in the thick sludgy goo, which held them nearly immobile. She squirmed and thrashed, trying desperately to pull her legs up out of the air below, but there was nothing for her to gain purchase against, and all she ended up doing was to push herself deeper. She felt her knees slide out of the goo on the other side, as the ooze rose over her chest. She desperately sucked at the air, fighting the constant impulse to cough up each painful breath, as the goo claimed her breasts. She pushed down with her arms, trying in vain to swim through the thick ooze, as her shoulders were pulled under. She kicked her legs in the air that waited beneath her, trying to lift herself back up into the slime layer, but each kick pulled her downwards with the motion.

As the ooze crept up her neck, she tilted her head back, and the misting spray of ooze that still came up with each struggling cough, would float down to land upon her face after every hacking breath. This was it, her luck had run out, she thought as she took a shaky breath and sank below the surface. She fought to hold onto that air as long as she could, but her lungs were fighting her. Her chest spasmed, desperate to cough up the ooze inside her. And with each tiny cough that escaped from her, another bubble of air oozed up to the surface.

She was halfway through the ooze when she lost the battle. Her lungs almost depleted of air, she inhaled the glowing green sludge, and one last bubble rose to the surface, while her lifeless body continued to fall.

[Mukraken]

"Caught in the Web"

Meanwhile, for Sandra, a caring but easy-going dusty-blonde with full-bodied hair and a curvaceous body to match, it was just another day. She lived by herself a few miles away from the Quinux Scientific Industries building. She'd heard her fair share of rumors about what went on there, but most of the time, she paid it no mind.

Until the day she noticed an alien world in her living room. Not really 'in' her living room, though. It was more like there was a doorway hanging in the air, and on the other side of that doorway was a world like she had never seen before.

She considered for a moment, whether or not to go through it. She didn't know why it was there, and it could be a dangerous place. But this was an opportunity to explore a new world, and an opportunity like this might never come again. Thinking of all the good this discovery could do for the world, she stepped through.

The vista that unfolded before her was a strange, desolate place. Even though it was vegetated, with dark green wiry plants and fork-pronged grass, the dark grey rock underneath was still plainly visible, giving the place a creepy and haunted air.

Sandra shivered, and glanced back at the portal. After a moment's consideration, she shook her head. "I'm no coward," she told herself, and hearing the sound of her own voice calmed her nerves somewhat.

Up ahead she noticed a clearing in the strange and forbidding plants, and headed towards it. The floor of the clearing was lined with fibrous white grass, like tufts of cotton, but underneath that the ground was a dark earthy brown, more like dirt than rock. The ground here was much more flattened than the surrounding jutting outcroppings of stone. Thinking to herself that that was probably a good sign, she stepped towards it.

As she stepped down from the surrounding rock onto the flat earthy surface, her foot immediately fell through what she had assumed to be solid ground. Her other foot was still on rock, and she tried to step back from the pit, but her trapped foot was held tightly. Even though she had only sunk to her ankle, and even though she was pulling with all her strength, her foot was held in a vicegrip that stubbornly wouldn't let her go. She could feel thousands of tangled fibers wrapping around her ankle in the mud, tightening around her foot the more she pulled. It felt vaguely like those chinese finger traps she used to play with as a child, those toys where you could easily slip your fingers into the sleeve, but the moment you started pulling to free yourself, the trap suddenly tightened and held you in place.

As she thought about that comparison, it occurred to her to try pushing deeper to try to free herself, the same way you would get out of the toy version. So she reluctantly and hesitantly pressed her foot down into the fibrous ooze, until it was up to her calf, and then suddenly reversed direction and pulled with all her might. But, again, the fibers tightened, firmly holding her in place.

Sandra tried rotating her leg, trying to loosen the mud's grip on her that way. The unseen fibers held her leg in place as she tried to adjust her position, rendering her efforts useless. The difference in height between her legs was quickly becoming uncomfortable, and her free foot was gradually losing purchase on the tilted rocky surface she had been standing on, as she pulled and yanked on her trapped leg.

As she struggled, she suddenly twisted too hard on her trapped leg, and with a surprised yelp, her other foot plunged down into the ooze. With both feet in the mud, she began to sink deeper, her heart racing as she realized that the more she sank the more hopeless any chance of escape would become. She looked around frantically for something to grab onto, but nothing was within reach. She leaned over backward to try to pull herself back onto the rocky surface that lay just inches away from her, but her hands slipped over the smooth stone, unable to find purchase, and she kept sinking.

"Help!" she cried out vainly, hoping that someone would be there to hear her, even though she rationally knew there wouldn't be. "Please, someone, HELP!"

Sandra watched helplessly as her knees disappeared into the ooze. She kept trying to pull her legs out, but each time, the web of gripping filaments tightened and held her down as she pushed herself in deeper and deeper, and soon she was up to her thighs.

She realized that, as long as she stayed calm, she was only sinking very slowly. She took deep breaths, trying to make herself be still, wondering how deep this pit would go. Logic told her that she wouldn't sink all the way, but how would she ever get out?

"HELP!" she called out again, thinking that rescue, though a very dim hope, would be her only chance to escape. "If anybody at all can hear me, please HELP ME!" She could hear the fear and desperation in her own voice, and she had to choke down a sob as her hips were engulfed by the muck.

She reached back again towards the rock behind her, twisting her torso around to lay her hands on the solid surface and clawing desperately to pull herself out of the trap. The tips of her fingers hurt from scraping against the hard rock, and she began to leave faint traces of red against the dark grey stone.

As she panicked, she started thrashing her legs without realizing what she was doing. And each upward movement thrust her body deeper into the ooze, as the insidious net of hidden webs continuously tightened their grip and held her down while she worked her way deeper.

The muck rose around her stomach, and she began to have difficulty breathing as the fibrous netting tightened around her chest. Still she scrabbled against the rock, the solid ground inches from her body seeming almost to taunt her.

As the fibrous muck rose to her armpits, Sandra lay her arms down on the blood-streaked rock and sobbed. She was trapped here, there was no way she would ever get out of this terrible place, and no rescue was coming.

"Oh god, please get me out of here," she desperately begged. "Don't let me die in this place."

As she had stopped struggling, she noticed that she wasn't sinking anymore. Carefully, she tried lifting one of her legs, but the fibrous net caught it and the slight motion pulled down the rest of her body a few inches deeper into the ooze. She sobbed again, knowing that even if she didn't struggle at all she was still trapped and there was nothing she could do about it.

She sat there for many long minutes, her head leaning against her arms as she stretched them out over the rock. Her torso was still somewhat uncomfortably twisted, but there was nothing she could do about that now, the fibers were holding her body tightly in place, and every attempt to untwist herself only caused the net to tighten around her again.

As Sandra lay there in the mud, she shivered. The forest around her was darkening as night fell, and she didn't want to think about what kinds of strange creatures might stalk the night in a place like this. With that terrible thought suddenly filling her mind, she tried again to pull herself out. Her panic grew as she realized how helpless she would be against a predator, and without even thinking she thrashed and kicked her legs in her desperation to escape the trap she was in. The net unresistingly allowed her to kick downward through it, but with the upward movement of each kick it grabbed her and held her down as she drove herself deeper.

Soon the mud flowed up over her shoulders. As she felt the threads around her neck like a noose, she couldn't help but to try to resist, plunging her arms down into the mud as she tried to fight her way out. The fibrous web wrapped itself around her arms, and as she tried to pull them back out, each effort pushed her deeper as the threads tightened and held her down.

Shaking, she forced herself to remain still as she tilted her head backwards to breathe. It took every ounce of her mental strength, but as she stopped struggling, she just barely managed to stay in place where she was, her face poking up through the surface. The grass-like tufts of cottony fuzz sticking out of the surface of the mud now seemed almost to tower over her.

She focused only on breathing, trying desperately to steer her thoughts away from the terror of her situation. If she so much as moved, she would die. For several long minutes that stretched into hours in her mind, she just lay there, fighting the feeling of claustrophobia, having her entire body encased in the thick mud, with those fibrous webs wrapped around almost every inch of her. Barely able to breathe.

She shivered slightly, and even that slight movement tightened the net around her, and the muck rose another slight millimeter over her face. "Help," she cried out again, her voice reduced to little more than a sob. "Please, somebody help me."

Night had fallen around her, and the only light was from the pinpoints of stars that she could see above her. It was strangely comforting, the sight of that night sky, just the same as it looked on earth. Or, in her own dimension. Whatever this place was. A tear rolled down her almost-submerged face as she thought about her home.

Her ears under the mud, she still thought she heard a muffled sound from the nearby trees, suddenly startling her out of her thoughts. Her mind turned back to predators, and she tried to lift her head to get a better look at whatever it was. But as she tried to move, the inexorable web gripped her head and held it in place. Her thoughts racing, she shifted in the mud to try again to lift her head, and buried herself another few millimeters deeper. As the mud crept up her face, she narrowed her lips to keep her mouth clear. She could hear her own heart racing in her submerged ears as she fought to keep still, but already the mud was slowly flowing into her nostrils, and she desperately resisted the urge to sneeze as the ooze tickled her sinuses.

Sandra was sure she heard the sound again, and flinched in panic as her nerves frayed. Her startled twitch sent her another few millimeters down into the mud, and she spat it out as the earthy taste flowed into her mouth. She was able to gasp for breath, between spitting out the mud that constantly trickled into her mouth, but only just. Instinctively she thrashed to fight her way to the surface, but the fibers around her tightened their sinister grip around her and forced her to pull herself beneath the surface. The mud caved in around her, as her face vanished beneath.

Fully immersed in the thick mud, she struggled more and more, quickly sinking deeper and deeper beneath the surface. She held onto her last breath as long as she could, but when her lungs burned, she inhaled and choked on the fibrous ooze.

A small creature, almost like a hairless cross between a rat and a monkey, paused from noisily chewing on its branch. It watched curiously from the starlit darkness as Sandra's last breath bubbled slowly up through the mud.

[PM2K]

I am really enjoying these!

[Mukraken]

Thanks! I really appreciate the comments, and I'm glad you like my stories!