Abduction

  It was cold when he woke with a start. The room around him was unfocused and blurry. A light shone brightly down at him from somewhere up above, blinding him. His head felt as though something had knocked him hard in the temple.

Though he was squinting from the light above him he could just make out the silhouette of a man standing at the far end of the room. The man was unnaturally tall and thin and seemed to not be wearing anything. A panel in the wall slid open and the tall man slowly left the room through it. He tried to reach out; to say something, but nothing could come out. A smile crept across the tall man’s face and the panel slide closed leaving him alone in the room.

His eyes slowly focused and he could make out his surroundings. The room he found himself in was very sterile looking. Everything was the same dull grayish-white color and there was very little in the way of furnishings. The only things in the room were the bed he was sitting on and a table against the wall to his left.

A chill racked his spine as he got up from the bed. The floor was cold against his feet; giving his arms goose-flesh.

“H �" h �" hello?” he found his voice wasn’t all there yet. It was hard for him to speak.

…

…

“I �" is anyone there?!”

…

…

There was no response. Shivering, he made his way to the table in the hopes of finding something, anything, that could possibly help him make sense of what was happening to him. He tried the topmost drawer and found that it wouldn’t budge, the middle drawer opened but was empty, the bottom drawer contained only what looked like a small glass orb with a metal base. Frustrated at not finding anything of use he moved his attention to the wall opposite the bed he was just in where the thin man had exited the room from.

He ran his hands along the area where he had sworn part of the wall ha slid open but couldn’t find any sign of where the door was. There were no seams, no lines, nothing that would imply that a door had opened there only moments before. He tried to bang on the wall in the hopes that someone would hear him and get help but to no avail. No one was coming to help him. He slumped against the wall and slid to the floor in dismay. Confusion, fear, anxiety, hopelessness; his emotions reached a fever pitch as he sat there slumped against the wall.

Where was he? Why was he here? Who was that man earlier and why was he so damn thin? What was he going to do next? The more he questioned his surroundings the more the dread set in for him. He paced the room trying to figure out what to do next.

Nothing came to him.

The fear began to rise in him, much greater than before, as small circular holes opened along the walls of the room and some kind of gas flooded in. He began to panic; he didn’t know what to do. He desperately tried to find something to cover his nose and mouth with but could find nothing.

His vision began to blur and the room started to spin. The holes that had appeared in the walls closed and the gas slowly dispersed. His head was swimming as he fell to his knees. He tried to hold himself steady but fell over onto his side. With heavy eyes he saw the panel in the wall opposite the bed open once again and the thin man appeared, standing in the doorway. The last thing he saw was the thin man slowly approaching him before slipping unconscious. The thin man slowly knelt down and picked up the unconscious man from the floor and placed him back onto the bed across from the door. The thin man adjusted the blinding light above the man and began to work.

It was cold when the man woke with a start but this time he was lying back in his own bed; in his own home. There were no grayish-white room, no weird panel in the wall, and certainly no tall and unnaturally thin man. Was that all just a bad dream? If so then it was definitely the most real feeling dream he has ever had.

The man got out of bed and walked to the bathroom to splash water onto his face. He mindlessly scratched at his stomach and noticed something odd under his shirt. It felt as though there was a ridge under his shirt on his belly. He slowly lifted his shirt, a strange sense of dread rising in him, and saw with horror a scar spanning the length of his abdomen. One clean line going right across his belly button. He let his shirt fall back down while panic surged through him as the reality of what had happened to him hit home.

“Oh, god… I �" it was real…” he whispered to himself. He felt weak; his legs were having trouble bearing the weight of the rest of his body.

He raced towards the phone next to his bed to call someone for help. Stumbling, he tried his best to get across the room. He fell into the night stand next to his bed and fumbled with the phone, dialing 911 as quickly as he could. The phone rang once and he was able to pull himself to his feet again. The phone rang twice and he noticed something outside his bedroom window from the corner of his eye. By the time the dispatcher had answered the dropped the phone when he finally figured out what it was he was looking at.

Across the street, standing under a streetlight was what looked like a man but something was wrong with him. That man was tall, too tall, and was so unnaturally thin. He fell to his knees once more and wretched onto the floor. “Hello? Is there an emergency? Hello?” He slowly picked the phone back up and tried to get back onto his feet twice before he finally managed to stand up but when he looked back out the window all he saw was an empty street.

Author's Note

Any critique is welcome. This is one of the first short stories that I've put together so I'm sure there is some rough parts to it. If there are grammar mistakes please let me, a lot of the time I miss when I've made a mistake.

Reviews

[hullab]

Hello Newt read Abduction and was disappointed as the end came long before I would have liked, your short story pricked my attention as i have Sci fi leanings, I was a little tired tonight and read your story through the post you left in the introduce youselves forum, I hope you have continued to write and am a little disappointed that I was unable to read more stories. I made an error by starting to read Abduction without looking at the title and in a strange sort of way this helped with my enjoyment of the tale, I found it quite imaginative and exciting. I did notice a few small errors ( the dropped the phone} can't see other one now but it was a missing letter! Anyway Newt it was a fine effort and anything that encourages me is a good thing! Thanks