| Consciousness came back slowly, along with cold and the smell of dank earth. And utter darkness. With it came a rising explosion of pain that knifed through his head, his joints, his whole body. His cheek was resting on moist dirt. He tried to turn his head and could not. The slight movement caused a scrape of dirt along the raw side of his face. |
| Above the blood-pounding of pain in his head, he heard a faint sound, dull and whispery, somewhere at his back. |
| He lay very still now in the total darkness. That smell of dank earth was all around, filling his senses. Underground. He was down in the earth somewhere. Buried alive? |
| He tried to think, but nothing was clear in the awakening sludge of his brain. The slicing pain dulled even a first edge of panic. In spite of the damp cold, his throat and mouth felt like a kiln. He tried to form sound with his lips. Nothing. Not even a parched whisper. |
| Christ... the thirst. His tongue was furred, without sensation. |
| Again, in an exploratory way, he tried to move. It touched off fresh bursts of pain here and there, all over him, but knifing hardest against sore ribs. Then he realized he was trussed up like a hog, hands and feet. Whether ropes or thongs, they were tight as hell, digging into flesh that had no feeling. Pain, except for the chill dankness and a gritty awareness of dirt against his face, was his only feeling. His hands and feet were like frozen clumps. Slowly he shifted his legs, pulling his knees up to his belly. |
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