| Chapter 25 | Chapter 27 |
Part IV
26
Captured
Paris conurbation, September 6 2047
"Did you really think I would be that easy to catch, sir?
It took me more than half a century to escape from PUPR, did you think I would risk ever getting abducted again, by them or any other faction? Did you really think that I wouldn't take precautions?
I've escaped from the people that used my work to tear apart civilization and forced me to apply my skills to serve their greed. Did you think that if I managed to escape from a subterranean bunker six hundred metres under the ground, guarded by hundreds of soldiers and thousands of AI drones, did you fail to consider that I might have some advanced technology up my sleeve?
I am 'not' getting abducted ever again! Not by PUPR and certainly not by New Zion. It will take more than a few agents and a fancy octopod airship to get the better of me, sir.
Now tell me, big guy, how did you manage to track me down?"
As Xavier hung suspended from his one remaining leg, his leg almost fully submerged in a pitch black globe of about sixty centimetres in diameter that was hovering about three and a half metres from the ground, Xavier felt a thick stream of his own blood running over his face.
The weathered old face of a bearded frail old man, who looked like someone who had been living on the streets for decades, looked at him with determined piercing eyes.
Xavier tried to lift one, any one of his hands. His hands that were hanging down next to his face, almost touching the ground. Xavier wanted to lift his hand so he could wipe some of the blood from his face before it would reach his eyes. But after only about twenty centimetres or so, the tiny bit of strength that Xavier had felt slowly left him, and as the strength completely vanished, his arm dropped back to being fully stretched.
The blood was covering both his eyes now, obscuring his view.
"Who are you?" Xavier murmured only barely audible.
"Wrong answer!"
The old man spoke. Then, a strange sensation. Xavier felt his upside-down body accelerating 'upward'. The acceleration was thinning the layer of blood covering his eyes just enough for him to open one eye and witness his body, leg first, disappearing into the growing black sphere that had been hovering above his upside down suspended body.
"I hope you can swim, sir! Tell New Zion not to ever mess with me again or I won't be as nice next time!"
As the old man's voice still echoed in his mind, an orange brightness filled Xavier’s eye. Then an impact. Water! The taste of salt water in his mouth. Suddenly as he plunged into the body of water, Xavier felt almost all of his strength return to his arms and his remaining limb. An immense sense of disorientation overcame him as Xavier realized he was underwater somewhere. Seawater!
As he tried to get a grasp of his orientation, a huge upside down shark; a hammerhead shark, manifested before him. In a reflex, Xavier struck out hard, plunging two fingers into one of the eyes of the hammerhead. The huge shark diverted his track as a result.
'No, merde, the shark isn’t upside down! 'I' am!' Xavier realized.
As Xavier regained his grasp of what was above and what was below and as he managed to get his head above the surface of the water, his first breath of air brought some clarity to his mind.
With the blood all washed off his face, Xavier could now clearly see. He saw an orange sun rising above a wide sea. A large cloud of blood. His blood formed a huge discoloration in the clear blue water around him. Xavier was starting to see the hopelessness of his ordeal. The blood would attract more sharks!
Xavier had grown up close to shark-infested waters and thus realized how slim his chances were now. Then as Xavier turned his head, a sprinkle of hope returned. The color of a patch of sea that was a lighter, more azure color of blue. Xavier realized he was close to the shore. Could he make it? Could he live?
As Xavier turned around he realized that he was even closer to the shore than he had hoped for. A small wooden pier leading to the shore was only four maybe five metres away. Could he make it? No sharks in sight now, but he knew that at least one was very near.
Quickly submerging his head again, looking in the direction where the shark had diverted to, he saw the sharks dark silhouette coming towards him. If these waters were like the sea near his place of birth in Haiti, the shark would be no more than 20 metres away. Other, smaller silhouettes a bit further away. Five, no six!
Using his arms and his remaining leg, Xavier swam as quickly as he could towards the pier. Xavier climbed onto the pier much more slowly than he would have liked to. He had lost a lot of blood. His body didn't respond as Xavier wanted it to. It was as if he was both weak and intoxicated by some drug. Then Xavier noticed a disturbance in the water close to him. Instinctively Xavier kicked as hard as he could with his remaining leg. His leg plunged into the red coloured water underneath him. His kick apparently hit one of the sharks, as Xavier's kick managed to propel him up onto the pier.
A young boy came running towards him from between the palm trees on the small beach.
A hint of recognition came over Xavier. He knew this beach! He was home! Back home in Haiti close to the place he grew up.
Xavier had used the last of his strength fleeing from the sharks. While laying on the peer, Xavier felt what was left of his strength leave his body.
“Aide Moi” Xavier called out to the boy. He would live! A small village hospital was only two kilometres away.
He was in Paris just yet, less than two minutes ago and now he was in Haiti, no more than a thirty-minute ride from the place where he had grown up. No time to think about that now though.
Xavier pushed two fingers into his groin, pressing hard on an artery so as to reduce the bleeding. Need to focus on surviving now. I could still bleed to death if I lose focus.
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