Chapter twelve

This nothingness differed from those other nauseating nothingnesses in which I had suffered so often before.

Always, so it seemed to me, I had been snatched away by the blue-limned radiance of the scorpion, caught up, whirled through nothingness, spun through an achingly cold void, smashed down with a hint of the red fire of Antares, slapped head over heels, all naked like a newborn infant, sent toppling helplessly into a new world.

But, this time...

A difference.

I was stark naked, and that I expected.

I was no longer in the voller and that, too, I expected.

I tried to open my eyes and realized they were open. I could see and yet, seeing, see nothing.

The hint of echoes, as of the rushing of a distant torrent far below ground, pent between eon-……