~~~Superstes~~~UNDERGOING MAJOR EDITING

The road to recovery

The second he entered the night air, he folded forward and puked onto the platform. His chest heaved with the effort of ridding itself of whatever substance it had, and his muscles went taut from the extortion of straining. 

But Neteyam faced another problem. The more that came up, the less that went back down. The contents of his stomach remained stuck in his upper body, refusing to be swallowed. Neteyam fought for oxygen, choking and suffocating from the inside-out. He reached out to support himself, despite finding nothing to hold his weight. 

Neteyam's features contorted into a desperate grimace, and tears streamed down his cheeks. He pulled his chest in and out, frantically trying to suck oxygen into his lungs, but his airways were being blocked by a solid thickness.

 Neteyam gasped and sputtered, collapsing onto his knees. With a strangled sound, he called, "Dad, please. I need--I need help..." 

The attempt for his father's rescue was feeble, since Neteyam could hardly use his vocal cords. His cry for help sounded like a kicked puppy, though the panic was too overwhelming to feel embarrassment. 

Then, he heard footsteps. Through his blurring vision, he saw Jake kneeling beside him, his eyes wide and his muscles strained. "Neteyam," He began, placing his hand on his son's shoulder. "Neteyam, what's wrong?" 

Neteyam grabbed Jake's upper arm and held onto it, gripping it like it was a tree branch hanging over a mountaintop, a life-or-death decision if he let go. "I can't--I can't breathe."  he gasped, losing the energy to keep his head up. 

 Jake was breathing heavily, searching every inch of his son, looking for any physicality's of the injuries. But his eyes failed to land on a certain thing, because there wasn't anything to see. "Okay. Just calm down, alright? We'll go get Norm." 

Neteyam hadn't even noticed his mother, Neytiri, standing in the opening. Her ears were pinned to her skull, and her back was stiff. "Jake, what is wrong?" 

"Go find Norm, Neytiri," Jake ordered, "And quickly. Tell him Neteyam is having trouble breathing."     

Neytiri sprinted off in the direction of Norm's mauri and left Jake and Neteyam to their own devices. Neteyam was being held up by his father by now, still unable to pull air into his lungs. He looked at Jake, desperate, his vision being clouded by white spots. Jake, not really knowing what to do, turned his son around and slapped him across his back as if he were choking. 

More liquid came up from Neteyam's mouth, but the thickness inside his throat vanished along with it. His eyes widened as he sucked in a long, deep gasp of the salty reef oxygen. 

Jake just laughed, a little shocked himself. "It worked!" 

However, their celebration was short-lived when Neteyam crumbled to the ground with his chest heaving in steady, rhythmic patterns, which looked normal, but the angry wheezing sound that came with it made Jake's heart palpitate. He picked up his son in his arms and tilted him upward, hoping the position would be enough to keep him from going unconscious. "Dang it. Stay awake, alright? Just stay awake." 

Neteyam nodded between the coughing and choking. 

After what felt like hours of this unbearable tension, Norm came rushing to Neteyam's side, Neytiri not far behind. Spider was standing at the entrance of the marui, clearly worried for his brother. Norm brought a bunch of gadgets and portable machines that Neteyam didn't recognize, but with every second that passed by, he was growing weaker and weaker. 

He didn't even know what Norm did. His eyes had slipped shut and his mind was taken far away into a pit black abyss. Vaguely, he heard voices calling his name, before he was oblivious to the world around him.

He thought he was dying again.      

*Psalm 41:3-The Lord sustains him on his sickbed, in his illness you restore him to his full health.