I Am Aqueous

I Am Aqueous - Chapter 3

Chapter 3

My thoughts mainly wandered around about how I was so close to being publicly exposed. If I were seen on TV then I would have so many people trying to stalk me or study me or even capture or kill me! I would have no safe place to go, because there would be people everywhere. I guessed that I wouldn’t mind the attention and I would appreciate not being so lonely, but I would constantly have people taking pictures and poking me, and scientists sampling my liquid. I could even have the police or even the army after me, just because I’m not human anymore. I was just so lucky, that only about a hundred people saw me.
Since only a hundred people saw me and since there was no video evidence, I was a rumour. I was an urban legend that little girls would talk about to scare each other. I was the monster that got people committed to the mental asylum, because no one would believe them that I was real. I was the figure you saw in the corner of your eye and never again until you die. In a way, that was how I wanted to be, mysterious, but non-threatening. I knew that some might say I’m peaceful, because I didn’t hurt Allan, others may just be afraid and hate me, because I’m different.
I also remembered how I even got into that situation in the first place; I had mysteriously appeared on the freeway. I still had no clue why or how I could just appear on a freeway, when I was standing in a back alleyway on the other side of the city a millisecond before hand. I thought that perhaps I also had a teleporting ability, but I doubted that idea was true. I thought that maybe has some sort of sort term amnesia and I simply forgot walking to the freeway and suddenly started remembering from the point I was in the middle of the road. I didn’t believe that one either, because how could I get across town without anyone seeing me and not follow me afterwards? Then I thought that maybe I was actually given this body by some meddling alien who is controlling my life from up above with some sort of advanced technology? Then the obvious thought that was fading fast was that maybe I was just dreaming this whole thing, but that idea was established days ago. I decided that this daydream would do me no good and that if I had a brain it would be pounding now with all these questions, no normal person would ever ask. So I stood up.
I saw no heat from the sun, so I figured it was night or late in the evening. Then I heard activity on the street and some activity above me besides the cars. I wanted to see what was happening, but I also didn't want to stick me head out in public just after all that work on trying to avoid just that. I heard men talking and pictures being taken, I even heard a long scratching noise as if two rocks were being rubbed against each other. I guessed that there was a police investigation and that I wouldn’t mind taking a look.
I searched around the alleyway a little and noticed no way to spy on the commotion in the streets and on the freeway, except for an almost reachable way of getting on top of a roof of a one-story shop. There was no ladder, but the wall was shorter than a normal one. I figured that if I could go on top of this roof that I could lie in puddle form near an edge and have an antenna popped over the side to see what was going on in at least infrared.
But the challenge was that the wall was still at least a foot higher than my reach even when jumping. Since I lost height in my transformation I had no hope of reaching the top unless I learned a new ability about myself. I thought that since I was liquid, I could shape myself to be taller by stretching myself. I held my hands out and wiggled my eight fingers. I concentrated on stretching as anyone would, trying to reach something distant. I felt myself stretch a little, but I didn’t get the elongation I needed. So I had to rearrange my molecules and reshape myself to be slimmer and taller. This process was easier than my stretching one and I soon was able to reach the top of the building. I got my whole arms on the roof’s surface. Then I started losing balance, because my body was out of proportion. I couldn’t hold onto the ledge and I eventually fell down and splashed.
I reformed and I thought about how I could achieve more size, but keeping my proportions. In other words I’d have to create more of myself or at least achieve that effect. So I looked at the wall and thought for a moment. As I thought, a draft came around the corner of the alleyway and brushed against me. It was warm and fast, but I felt an abnormality in myself after the wind had passed by. I looked and felt in the area around my arm and noticed one of my best friends, and air bubble.
Such a simple phenomenon was my answer. I could fill my body with some air around me and that air would, essentially, be new “me.” The hard part was figuring out how to fill myself with air and how to evenly disperse it through out my entire body. In actual truth I had no idea how or where to start. I was stumped.
Then the automatic instinct took over. The same driving force that helped me form myself when I first went puddle form. Some driving force, some voice inside my head, some sort of auto pilot told me to create many, many miniature holes on every single square centimetre of my body. After I had done this, I had sort of created a pore or a semi-bubble. Then my mysterious instincts told me to close of this bubble with a thin layer of liquid, enclosing the air. Then I pushed the air inside my body. The I repeated this process as many times as I needed to, each time placing the air bubbles in a grid like pattern inside me so I kept my basic structure. I then stopped. The air inside me felt like I was ripped into pieces, which, in a way, was true, because my liquid was in a web-like structure in contrast to the bubbles being in a grid-like formation. The bubbles were also very small. They almost couldn’t be seen from the outside at all, I just looked less transparent, or cloudier.
After my little celebration was complete, I realised that my waste was at the top of the roof. It was a miracle no one saw me. I quickly rolled onto the roof and deflated myself by exploding slightly. I oozed over to the opposite edge in puddle form. I reached the edge and hung an antenna over the side and watched and listened.
It was a police investigation. There were a few police cars and there were a few heat sources walking around a cold boarder. The scene was closed off with, what I guessed to be, police tape and squad cars. The heat sources moving around were policemen and a few idle heat sources weren’t moving; I guessed those to be detectives or forensic scientists investigating and writing down what they saw. I saw a cooler circle in the center of all attention, perhaps a chalk circle indicating where I had splashed. It then heard voices.
“Describe to me again what you saw.” A male voice asked.
“Well,” Replied a lower toned male voice. “It was made of water, a bluish-green water. It was as tall as a little kid. It had eight long fingers in a plus shape and it had the same thing with its feet. It had two tentacle things coming from the back of its head and a long tail! It seemed nice to that little kid, but I wouldn’t trust it with my daughters ever!” The voice became scared. “What was that?”
The first voice answered, “That’s what I want to get out of you! I think you’re all nuts, but since that many people saw it; I’m forced to sketch it for the news. Now is there anything else about that person?”
The second voice was serious, “That wasn’t no person. That was something else and I don’t know if I want to know what it is or what it wants. The kid’s arm went right into it and it didn’t even move.”
“Is there any more description of its appearance, sir?”
“No. That’s all that I could see.”
A third voice came and talked to the officer questioning the civilian. It asked, “Are you done with him yet? I have a few questions for him.”
The officer didn’t object and I saw his heat moving away and the new heat source moving in its place. The voice was very low, as if it were a black man speaking, “Hello, sir. My name is Inspector Charles and I have a few questions about what you saw.”
The civilian protested, “I’ve told the officers everything. A million people saw it. Why are you asking me?”
Charles replied, “You were in the front row and you didn’t complain about your rights when we started interrogating you. Now please tell me, where did it come from? Did it just suddenly appear? Or did it climb on to the freeway?”
The civilian struggled and got a little scared. “I don’t really know how it got there. See I was driving along in my car when suddenly something raised from a puddle like that guy in the 2nd Terminator movie. I swerved around it, all most hitting it and I slammed on my brakes and got out. Then I saw it look all confused and then suddenly not move at all. It just stood there while everyone else stood there too, looking at it.”
“Did you notice this puddle before the suspect rose from it?”
“No! How could I? I was going 80 and watching the road, not no puddles.”
“Sorry, just wondering where it might have come from.”
Then Inspector Charles’s radio went off. I couldn’t hear it, but I heard Charles answer, “I’ll be there.”
The civilian complained, “Is that it?”
Charles assured, “That’s it, for now. The station may call you later. I have to go and inspect a crash. You’re free to go.”
“Thank you.”
I heard a car door shut, an engine starting and a cold rectangle move away. Then I saw the civilian drive away as well. I peered at the scene a little longer and I heard a lot of officers in disbelief and the ones who did see me were getting angry about how no one believed them. The scene closed down eventually, because there was no trace of me left to follow up on. The tape was collected and the road was clear again.
I figured that not too much of an investigation or any different type of investigation would be being taken on the freeway. I also didn’t see a way for me to get on top of the freeway with out growing and no one seeing me, so I didn’t bother to investigate up there. I flowed off the opposite ledge, back into the alleyway. I fell off and reformed myself.
I paced slowly up and down the alleyway thinking. My thoughts remaining some urban legend were out of the question now. I had caused enough commotion and I had enough witnesses to almost prove my existence. I had the police hunting me down now and so I would have to keep a low profile for a while in order to remain alive. Now, I guess, I am some sort of stalker or a mysterious murderer watching you wherever you turn, in the eyes of the citizens in this town.
As I was thinking about where I could stay, while the city calmed down, I heard a loud noise very far away. I felt the vibrations of the noise, they were high pitched and were moving very fast, but since it was far away, they were weak. I interpreted that it was a scream. I heard the scream again and it was weaker than before. I stood there wondering what to do, but I did what I thought was right so I ran towards the noise.
I crossed two streets quite quickly, because I had gotten the hang of running and not losing balance. I swept across five streets with out leaving a trace. I heard the scream once more and then I heard the sound of two bodies hitting the ground with great force. As I crossed the fourth street, I saw two figures in front of me and to my right down an alleyway. I ran to the wall alongside the opening and placed my back against the wall. I sidled my way across and peered down the alley. I saw a dirty looking old man in a leather trench coat sitting on top of a woman dressed in some sort of uniform. The man was hitting this girl violently and the girl was screaming, crying and kicking. The man started to take the girl’s clothes off uttering noises like an animal. I knew the girl didn’t want this man touching her and she didn’t like being hit like that, so I decided to help.
I swung around the corner and raised my arm. I decided to modify my new learned skill to try and save this poor girl. I pointed at the man and filled one of my fingers with air in order to elongate it. I got the proportions and the placement of my air bubbles right and I did them both with amazing speed, which only had to be result of the adrenaline that would be rushing through my body. The tentacle travelled about 20 feet before it wrapped around the wrist of the old man’s left arm. He was very startled and so was the girl.
Even though the man had no idea what I was or how I was doing it. He retaliated and shook free, breaking my finger and then it crashed to the floor. I shot another finger at him and I got his upper am. He struggled a little, but didn’t break free. I shot another finger at him and wrapped it around his waist. He wasn’t going anywhere now, so I decided to give him what he deserved. I spun around, breaking the holds I had on him and whipped my tail across him at amazing speed, faster than I had ever done before. I didn’t wrap it around him; I hit him across the face. He felt the pain as if a fast moving, wet soccer ball hit him. He smacked against the wet concrete and yelled in pain.
I paced towards him and the girl. The girl looked at me, frozen in fear, but the man was screaming and started to run off. I didn’t think he had paid enough, so I shot a finger at him. As the tentacle travelled towards him and I filled my liquid with air, I started to feel one of my restraints of my new body. Gravity was pulling my appendage down, but the main factor was since there was so much air in my tentacle I had little to no control over it as a part of my body and it was extremely weak and could very easily be broken. Eventually my appendage was so weak that it fell down and splashed before it reached the man running away for his life. The man eventually turned a corner and I never saw him again.
I peered at the girl as she got used to my presence. While she was putting her clothes back on, I reabsorbed my spilled liquid in through my feet. With the regained liquid I was able to reform my tail and the three missing fingers.
The girl got up and from what I saw with my true vision; she wasn’t a girl at all. She was a full-grown young woman. She looked to be around 19, 20 or 21 and she had long, straight brown hair. He skin was the slightest bit brown, as if her great grand mother was from India. She had a larger, pointer noise and long thin lips, as well and deep brown eyes. Her uniform looked like a secretary’s or an office worker’s. She wore a small, dark blue skirt and a thick shirt with many golden coloured buttons on it, with a white shirt underneath. She was watching my every move. I turned around to face her directly and she flinched. After I looked at her for a while and we both said nothing, I decided to leave, because my deed was done. I turned around and waved my tail as to say good bye as I walked away.
But after a few steps she spoke in a very cautious, but gentle voice. “Thank you.” She said.
I stopped. I flung my antennae over my right shoulder and turned my head to a human maximum (I could’ve turned it all the way around, but that may have scared her). I stared at her. She stared back. I wished I could speak or at least give her a facial expression to explain to her that she needn’t fear me and that she’s safe now.
She spoke again, this time, much calmer, “Thank you, whoever you are. That man was going to rape me if you hadn’t have stopped him like you did.” She paused. She stuck out her hand, like she was asking for a handshake and explained, “My name is Rachael.”
I turned around a little. I nodded my head slowly to tell her that I understood her.
She asked politely, “What’s your name?”
I turned around again and let my back face her. I hung my head and shook it slightly.
She puzzled, “You can’t talk can you?”
I shook my head again.
“But you can listen and understand?”
I nodded. I started to walk away, because I didn’t want her to learn too much about me, just in case she was from the press.
She stopped me, “Hey don’t go! I want to talk. You have to be that liquid thing that was on the freeway earlier this evening weren’t you?”
I nodded. I turned around and walked towards her.
She backed off a little and feared that maybe I wasn’t so nice. She asked in nervousness, “You’re not going to hurt me or anyone else are you?”
I shook my head.
“So why are you here? What are you even?”
I shrugged.
She pondered for a second. Then she asked, “Can I touch you?”
It seemed that everyone was curious about my anatomy. She was just like Allan, but she talked a little more with me. So I nodded and stuck out an antenna for Rachael to touch. She grabbed it like a rope and squeezed. She was astounded by the thick liquidy feel, but squeezed too hard and half my tentacle fell to the ground.
She gasped and covered her mouth. She exclaimed, “Oh my gosh! Your tentacle! I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to! I…”
I stopped her by grabbing her arm and pointing down with my other antenna. She gazed down at the puddle that was left. Then she actually noticed me absorb the liquid in through my feet. Then she saw me regenerate my severed appendage. She covered here mouth again as she watched something she’d only see in movies happen, right before her eyes, in real life. I would have smiled and said, “Tah-dah!” But I couldn’t. So I only released her arm and waited for her to say something.
She said to herself, “So it is true.” She spoke a little louder, “You are living liquid!”
I nodded. I wanted to tell her who I actually was, but I couldn’t talk.
She fixed up her clothes a little more and told me, “It was nice meeting you. If we see each other again, I want you to learn how to talk in the mean time.” She looked at her watch and exclaimed, “Whoa! It’s 1 am. I better hurry home.”
I waved and she waved back. Then she walked out of the alley and on to the streets. I followed and watched her walk down the sidewalk from behind the alley wall. I would’ve kept watching her, if I hadn’t have heard a car in the distance. I quickly went back in the alley and the driver of the car didn’t see me.
I decided o find a new alley, because this one may get busy if anyone heard the screams. I walked across a few more streets and then I saw a TV store. There were TVs playing the late news inside a display case. Since I saw no human heat all around me, I decided to see what was happening in the city.
The news anchor was explaining today’s events, so couldn’t help but listen. The news anchor said, “…And that’s what’s happening tomorrow for sports. In other, more local and drastic news, a military plane has crashed just outside the city boarders. There are ten confirmed casualties and one in a coma. Police have not yet determined the cause of the crash, but there certainly seems to be much internal damage created before the crash. Police are guessing either there was some explosive cargo inside or there was a gunfight. More tomorrow.
“In more recent news, there was a disturbance on the freeway this afternoon. Although no video evidence was achieved, at least a hundred witnesses were completely brain dead at the sight of what people have called the ‘Aqueous Monster,’ who is a being made out of some sort of living liquid. According to our sources, the creature rose from a puddle in the middle of the freeway, causing a massive traffic pile up and stood there with little movement for approx. 15 minutes. Just as news cameras arrived at the scene, the creature jumped off the freeway and exploded on impact to the street below. Although the event seems unlikely and forensics say this monster doesn’t exist, the numerous witnesses say otherwise. One little boy, whose name has not yet been released, actually went up to the monster and interacted with it. That, in my opinion, is real enough for me. We’ll have actual interviews with witnesses at 7. Also there have been a few school disturbances in the Middle East…”
I walked away from the TVs and pondered to myself. “They called me the Aqueous Monster. Hmm… I like the aqueous part, but I’m not a monster.” From that day forward my name was no longer Ozzy Belway, my name, for this new body was Aqueous.
I had had an eventful day and I really wanted to sleep, but knew I couldn’t. I just wanted time to pass a little more quickly, so I decided to wait until light and maybe I would show my face.
I managed to daydream my way through the rest of the night and amazingly right into around noon. All the while practising my technique of filling my appendages with bubbles in order to make them longer. I had learned that the more liquid I have the more control and strength I have. I learned that the more I alter myself, the weaker or more out-of-control I would feel. Although, if I alter myself I am able to do certain things that I wouldn’t normally be able to do in my idle form, such as reach for something far away or squeeze though a small hole. It seemed that I would have to find a balance and a proper situation to use each ability and that I should master its strengths and know its weaknesses.
I decided to spy around the area of the city I was in and see what was going on. Perhaps I would see Rachael again. I peered around the corner of the building I was between and I look upon the street. I saw many cars go by and only a few people walking. Judging by the location of the biggest heat source of all, it was just about lunchtime for everyone and the streets were filling up with commotion slowly, but surely.
As I was looking at the life on the street, my vision was blocked by a vehicle parking right across the alley opening. I stepped back in hopes that I wouldn’t be seen and so far it didn’t seem like I had been. The vehicle was a large black van. The door was to the other side of the van, but on my side there was a large “7” painted on. The “7” was stylish as if it were a logo and then with the help of noticing antennae sticking out from the roof, I guessed that the van was a news van. Though I wondered why it stopped.
I turned into my puddle form and oozed underneath the van. The van shook and two figures came out of the van. The door slammed shut.
I heard one voice speak. It was very loud and was a female’s. She shouted, “What’s going on Tony? Why do we have to stop? We’re missing the story!”
The second figure’s feet paced quickly, as if they were very nervous. The voice from that figure was deep. It replied nervously, “I’m sorry, but we have a flat.”
The female voice rose, “I need this story! Can’t we drive there with the flat?”
Tony replied, “Sorry Miss Pauline, but what ever popped the tire almost ripped it right off. If we drive any longer with this tire we’ll soon be driving on the caps.”
Miss Pauline pouted, “Well then get at it! If we make this story, I promise you’ll get a fair cut.” She got back into the van and I could hear her yell and scream from under the van. Tony rushed to the back to get the spare tire.
I decided to follow the news crew to this “Big story” and see what was so important about it. Although I wanted to go, I was in a dilemma on how I would follow them without being seen. The obvious choice was to hold on to the bottom of the van and ride that way. But the problem was how to do that without any appendages scraping along the road until they were gone.
I needed to try a new technique. I needed to create appendages, smaller ones, but many, in order to grab onto the many parts and have a very good grip, whilst still being in a puddle-like form. I tried to find my mysterious instincts and get them to help me. I managed to make six where my arms, legs and antennae would be, but that wouldn’t do it. I concentrated on moving molecules from my mass and feeding the tentacles growing from my sides. The process was very slow and confusing on myself, because whenever I’m not in my idle form It gets very confusing, cloudy and deranged inside my mind and the more I change, the worse it got. I eventually made myself probably another 12 tentacles, but the worst was yet to come. Now I had to control them all to wrap around and hold onto each one’s structure hard enough to keep me from slipping off. I felt the heat rush through the pipes and I heard the engine roar and I saw that they were ready to go. So I held on, despite all the complications in my mind, I held on.
The van started moving and the initial jolt of speed almost ripped me right off, but thankfully I had many good holds on the mechanics of the van that I didn’t fall off. We seemed to be moving very quickly, it either felt that way because I was hanging from the bottom, the van was rushing or a combination of both. The pavement that was screaming past me, like a buzz saw, slowly turned to gravel and then to a dirt road. Though the road got bumper and extremely difficult to hold on to, I managed to hold on and the van managed not to crash of get a flat tire again. After about half an hour total of driving, the van stopped and turned off its engine.
The news crew darted out of the van and set up its equipment in seconds. A few seconds after, the newscaster, who was Miss Pauline, began to speak in front of the camera. Her voice was tense and was becoming fainter, as if she was walking away from the van. She explained to the people watcher her at home, “This is Diana Pauline speaking on behalf of channel 7 news. I’m here at the Charleston-North Water Treatment Plant…” She paused a little, and then continued, “Where moments ago, reports of a gun shoot out inside the facility occurred. We are not sure of the number of suspects, firearms or if anyone has been injured, but it seems idle now.”
Just then I heard many loud gunshots and glass shattering. Miss Pauline exploded, “Cancel that! You have just heard an automatic weapon fire off into the windows. There is still a fight being fought.”
Miss Pauline’s voice was fading fast so I had get off the van and perhaps follow the action of I were to know what was going on. I told myself that I could stop stressing my mind as much and to get rid of these tentacles. I plopped down a few inches to the grass below and I oozed just out from underneath the van.
From my vantage point I saw many, many heat sources, I was guessing them to be newscasters as well. I made out a large column of heat and that may have been the water treatment plant, but I needed to form my head in order to see true vision. I formed my head from puddle form with little trouble and it was confirmed that the building was the plant. It was new and had a very large sign along the top of the roof. The building was white and had a blue boarder. It was extremely large and was at least four stories high. Each story had many large windows. There was a high electric fence surrounding the side and back of the facility, it was protecting the dams and pipelines for the water from the nearby river to be filtered inside the building. Even though there were windows, there wasn’t any glass.
I heard more gunshots as I carefully crept closer to the building. I kept my head down as I snuck to the side door away from the press and away from police and bystanders. I thought I was just going in for a closer look, and in a way I was, because I soon found myself sliding underneath the space under the door and oozing into the facility. I reformed my body and took a few steps; then I paused.
I realised my mistake quickly and I turned for the door. As I was turning, an explosion occurred above me and a very thick pipe landed along the door, blocking my path. Soon another pipe fell on me. I exploded, but soon reformed myself. When I finished reforming I gazed around the facility. The facility was grid-like and four stories high. There were six very tall tanks of water surrounded by the grid-like grated flooring. There were a few machines on fire and many bullet holes in the tanks. Water was leaking out and it felt very strange against my feet, but I continued to pan along the mayhem. As I continued to search for the shooters, I heard the gunshots stop. When I found the shooters on the top floor, they were all staring right at me. They didn’t even use that opportunity to attack while their enemies were distracted; they just stared. I wanted to talk to them, but I didn’t know how.
So instead I paced to the first flight of stairs and see if I could reason with them. I stepped onto the grated step and my foot went through it. I pulled it out with some embarrassment and then tried again, but with putting as much concentration of keeping my liquid solid in and around my toes as possible. I was able to step up the steps with difficulty. Each step I had liquid spewing out of the cracks like a garlic press and I slowly sunk into each step like quicksand. As long as I kept a steady pace and a firm grip on my concentration and feet, then I would be fine.
I was walking slowly up the stairs and around the floors. I walked as if I had suction cups on my feet. Then I reach the second flight of stairs, all the while, the shooters stared. I kept looking at their heat through my head and antennae to watch and see if they tried something funny.
I reached the third floor eventually and I finally peered at them with my true vision rather than watching my feet. It seemed to be a gang war of some sort. I saw five men on one side each shaking faster at each of my steps. The five seemed Spanish looking, three had pistols, one had a sub-machine gun and the other two had automatic rifles. As I began to ascend the last flight of stairs, they all began to shake. I noticed the other heat sources move so I turned to them. They froze again. The other gang had six members and each had a small automatic rifle. As I got to the top of the stairs I saw the second gang clearer and they were of oriental appearance. I stood in between the two gangs and glanced back and forth at the two. I looked at them as if I were punishing them for being so destructive. I crossed my arms, dropped my tail and antennae and gripped the metal below me with my feet like gripping the bars of monkey bars.
As I stood looking at them, one finally stood up. He was one of the Spanish people with automatic rifles. He was short and skinny and he had a clean-shaven head and face. He wore rugged, cheap clothing that was bloody and he was shaking tremendously. The other gang didn’t move, but the Spanish man did. He lifted his rifle, released his magazine and put in a new one. He locked and cocked it, pointed it at me and screamed.
He fired every single round into my chest. The magazine was empty after a few seconds and the shooter was sweating and breathing hard. I felt warm and that was it. Since I was concentrating on being solid, all the bullets were stuck in my chest with holes in my liquid in front of them. The heat from the lead bullets spread through my entire body and it was one of the few things I could feel. I reformed the holes in my chest and horrified the gang members. I lost my balance due to the force of the blast and I fell to the floor below me, back first. I hit the grated floor and oozed through it. I swung completely upside down and held on with my feet.
The heat sources above me began to get colder with true fear. I decided to scare them more. So I crossed my arms and I let the bullets fall out of me and fall to the flooded floor below me. I heard the gang members quiver and I saw them shake, but I felt that they weren’t scared enough. I tried a new technique that I felt might be useful in the future. I turned puddle form, while upside down, meaning I turned into a blob, but instead of falling downwards to achieve the form, I was pulling myself upwards. I still had my feet formed and I held onto the grated floor. I then, from my blob-like state, I rose from underneath the floor and reformed myself like I had been doing always. I reformed myself facing the gangs with my arms crossed to show that I used no appendages.
That was the ticket. Three of the eleven gangsters risked themselves to run past me and then down all the stairs. One of the Asian ones actually jumped out a nearby window. But I soon learned that their fear was transformed into rage and anger, because the remaining gangsters cocked their guns and aimed it at me. I didn’t know what that would accomplish seeming that they had just seem that bullets don’t affect me.
They fired. They fired every round they had and made a break for it. I felt extreme heat diffusing through out my body this time, but not enough for me to call it pain. Amongst the echoes of the gunshots, I also heard the sounds of explosions and metal cracking and breaking. Infrared vision didn’t tell me what was happening, so I turned around. I only saw a glimpse of what was happening, before the entire facility ruptured as the tanks of water exploded.
Water was rushing absolutely everywhere and I could see nothing but a random array of colours and temperatures. I felt not only shock, but also confusion about how my body was feeling. I hadn’t reformed the holes in my chest, nor did I remove the bullets, but I also felt strange in the water. I guessed that I would have felt strange in another liquid because I was a liquid. Still, I felt myself separating and mixing, by the presence of water, as well as rumble and metal crushing and slicing me.
Soon the noise and colours were over and I could only hear the faint screaming of the spectators. Aside from that noise, I heard a hum. I also felt vibrations in the water from the same hum. The hum was soft, but yet seemed powerful. I saw nothing with my true vision and infrared was nothing but cold blue. I waited for a moment longer to listen. Then I felt like I was being dragged. The hum sound and especially the vibrations were getting louder and louder as I was being moved. Then I felt some of my liquid stop suddenly and then the rest of my liquid followed and then stopped. From the texture I was forming a mould over, I guessed I was touching a wall of small rocks. The water was being sucked through me and through the rocks, “filtering” out whatever may not be water, such as myself.
From that I gathered that I was in filter. I was being filtered from the water. This would have been a good thing for helping me to get out, but I couldn’t see and I was stuck, I was pinned to the wall. I knew from this experience that my liquid was not made out of water otherwise I would have been passing through the filter. Soon enough, any of my isolated particles regrouped with my liquid.
The difficult task was now at hand. I had to break free of the very powerful hold that I was in at the moment. Because of the tremendous pressure, I slowly created an appendage and I was barely able to creep it upwards. I had little idea what was upwards, but I did see a giant heat source in one direction and I figured that that was the sun and I aimed for it. I felt sudden warmth from my appendage and I saw heat sources in the shape of people and the rubble that was once the water treatment facility. I snaked my limb around for a flat surface and I eventually found a perfectly flat, rock-like surface. Now that I had a destination, I used as much strength and concentration as I could, despite all that I was doing already, and I forced every molecule in my body to travel from where they were to where the tip of my tentacle was resting. This process was a lot like travelling in puddle form, but with much greater demands on precision, concentration and strength.
I managed to get over half my mass into the puddle I was aiming for before I ran out of liquid. I rose from my puddle and I realised that I was missing quite a bit of my liquid. I looked back and forth for any remains, but I could see nothing. I then looked at myself and noticed that I looked fully formed, even though I felt like a third of me was missing. I relaxed my solid hold and saw that what seemed to have “replaced” me was water and it all fell out of me and onto the ground. The thought came to me that water could act in the same way as air bubbles, meaning I can use water to create or lengthen appendages. As well, water seemed to “co operate” more with my liquid, because they felt the same and moved the same. Al though, water was heavier, it was easier to control.
After I realised yet another ability, the though reoccurred to me that some of my liquid was in the water somewhere. My right antenna was non-existent; neither was my tail there and even a few of my fingers. I felt the liquid, I felt it all, but they were lost and I couldn’t bring them back. It was like I had lost them forever, but then my mysterious instincts took over again and assisted my struggle. I felt a patch of my liquid in the distance and then the instincts told me to move them so they built up tension, like a loaded spring or like a stretched rubber band ready to go off. So I complied and I squashed it down. Then the instincts told me to release it, as well as throw it, all in the motion of like spitting out a watermelon seed, a kind of spurt or pop. I complied again and shot my little bit of liquid into the air. The piece of goo flew and landed on my shoulder, where it feed the regeneration of my right antenna. Then the instincts told me to feel the rest of my liquid and shoot them to myself. So I obeyed and I felt the rest of myself, built tension, shot them in the air and absorbed them. Within a minute, I was fully formed and ready to go.
Then I turned around. I was so busy concentrating on my regeneration and shooting liquid into the air, that I can completely failed to sense the heat behind me, about 50 people and about 20 cameras were watching. If I still had my private parts, I would have soiled myself and wet myself and sweated out as much liquid as I am made of. I was so shy, scared and embarrassed that I actually could melt away and disappear. I had no where to go though, so I had to improvise. I jumped onto the lot of the facility and noticed it was grass. The crowd gasped at my movement. I turned back into a puddle and loosened myself as much as I could and I soon absorbed into the ground. I was now in the maze of rocks, but my instincts took over again for me and taught me how to move through the earth. I basically swam my way to a near by patch of grass from where I emerged and took refuge inside an isolated, broken down shack near the urban boarders. I stayed there until dark.

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I don't know why the indents sometimes work and sometimes don't. Hope it doesn't bother you too much.