HEART of EZDAR

“How would it be if we discovered that aliens only stopped by earth to let their kids take a leak?” - Jay Leno, 1997

Pink.

All I could see was pink. It wasn’t a pink sky, or a pink wall. I was saturated in it. I was drowning in the color pink.

Bluish shadows suddenly dotted the pink, looming larger as they approached. They stopped and floated near me, but remained undefined. I sensed something reaching toward me, a dull notion until the image focused and formed into blue hands. Hands with flowing fingers – more like tentacles, really – hovering over my chest, toying with something.

I suddenly felt… disconnected… hollow. I strained to lift my head. Gazing down, I witnessed the flowing hands holding a heart. A beating human heart, pulsing and writhing within the grasp of the blue tentacles.

My heart!

I tried to scream, but I couldn’t breathe! I fought to suck air into my lungs, straining my chest as I consciously fought to create the vacuum to feed needed oxygen to my body before I…

Something broke; something gave. In an instant I was inhaling cool air, wheezing shrilly as I gasped and quickly filled my starving lungs almost to bursting. Now I was gulping oxygen like a man breaking the water’s surface just before giving in to drowning. My chest heaved as I panted audibly like an old, abused accordion.

My eyes snapped open. Gone was the pink. I was on my back in a dark room fragmented with streaks of light that appeared to shoot off in every direction while my ears were assaulted by a sound that I felt as well as heard; a bizarre blend of the whooshing of a jet, the whipping thumps of helicopter blades and a body-numbing buzz saturating the air around me.

I suddenly realized I was in my bedroom and sat bolt upright in my bed. To my right, the entire length of the windows that fronted my bedroom was splashed in a bright, white light from what appeared to be a string of headlights at window level, split repeatedly with horizontal shadows by the blinds against the panes.

And then it all stopped.

As if a switch had been thrown, there were no more bright lights, no disorienting sounds. When my eyes adjusted again, the still room around me was painted with a palette of grays and indigos borne of night; my ears now hearing only my own labored breaths and the muted barking of a dog somewhere in the distance. I chanced a glance at my bedside clock; 2:05 a.m.

I was bathed in sweat. It rolled off my face and trickled down my bare chest, while still more droplets traveled down my back. My sheets were soaked with my salty excretions and clung to me like a second skin. I gingerly peeled the fabric away and turned to climb from my bed.

A static spark snapped sharply when my feet touched the carpet. Knees shaking, I stood up weakly and padded the few steps to my window. Slipping my fingers between the blinds I scanned the night sky before shifting my gaze to the vacant street below, but found no activity anywhere outside my window.

My second-floor window. My second-floor window where lights had pierced into my room only moments before as if they had been parked just inches from the other side of the glass.

“The fuck?” I muttered aloud, actually startling myself with the sound of my own voice. Speaking revealed a metallic taste in my dry mouth.

I withdrew my fingers from the blinds and turned away from the window, looking about the darkness for any sign of… of what? What was there to look for? What wasn’t there that I should notice?

What the hell just happened?

I’ve had some fantastic dreams before, but never one that so completely involved every one of my senses. Even my sense of smell was engaged as the faint odor of my sweat drifted into my nostrils... the scent of fear.

I felt dizzy and nauseous. My heart was still pounding wildly, refusing to slow or soften as it thudded in my chest, my head throbbing in concert with the ferocious pulse. I imagined the blood pressure numbers I had to be putting up at that moment would have been off the scale.

Prompted by a pang from my bladder, I attempted walking again. Moving past my bed with slow and cautious steps, the floor felt unsteady, as if the carpet had been laid over a pond or pool. Even the linoleum of my bathroom floor felt like it had been cast over soft mud, making every step feel as if I were on the edge of falling over. It was as if my apartment had been relocated to a carnival fun house, only there was nothing fun about the unsettling feelings it left me with.

Standing at the toilet I bent down to lift the seat when it felt as if my heart had suddenly exploded, and then – BAM! – Vertigo City. Looking down into the bowl was like gazing into a deep abyss while the walls around me turned fluid. My legs gave out and I crashed to the floor, banging my head on the porcelain top of the toilet tank on my descent. I found myself again on my back while my head ached, my heart strained to pump inside me, the room swirled around me, and I peed all over myself.

Minutes later – hell, it could have been a freaking hour; I didn’t know – I came to. I strained to again assess my surroundings, combating the urge to panic. But I was dying. I had to be. I writhed on the floor in my puddle of piss until I was on my stomach, then crawled from the bathroom like a drunken crab until I was alongside my bed.

I clawed at my nightstand until my fingers found the cord to the phone. Pulling it down, it bounced off my head before landing beside me. It was bad enough that I was injured, but I was obviously determined to heap as much insult onto it as possible. I snagged the handset and punched in the numbers. A crackling on the other end, then:

“Nine-one-one operator. What is your emergency?”