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Simon woke choking and gasping, the thick taste of something sweet and metallic lingered heavily on his tongue.
The hot metal floor pressed into his cheek.
“Fuck me,” he groaned, “I didn’t die?”
The speaker squealed, boring into his ears. Simon hissed and curled up tightly, pressing his hands against his ears. The fingers of his left hand curled tightly into his hair, after a breath that left his lungs feeling scorched and burned, he realized that he wasn’t missing a limb any longer.
The speaker spluttered, cracking as it fought to work.
“I know you don’t need to use that,” Simon breathed against the floor, “stop pretending like you do.”
The voice laughed. “If you insist.”
“You didn’t kill me?” Simon asked quietly.
“No.”
“Why?”
God. It was so hot. Water dripped from the pipes above, landing on his hands and face.
There was a silence. Long enough that the rhythmic dripping of water started to lull Simon back to sleep. Everything hurt.
“We like you,” the voice finally said.
“Hm,” Simon hummed.
“Wanna know a secret?”
“What?”
“You were right.”
“About what?” Simon asked, rolling over on the floor slightly to face the com more, even though he knew that wasn’t where the voice was coming from.
“When you said… oh, what did you say,” the voice said gleefully.
Simon sighed, moving his left hand up to rub at his face, smearing the lingering dampness on his cheeks. Had he been crying or was that the condensation?
“Wouldn’t it make more sense if a few space stations went missing and the whole universe was looking for us instead of the other way around?”
“Is that what I said?” Simon asked quietly, he was unsure.
“Basically.”
“And- what, I was right?”
“Yes.”
“We- we’re not- we’re not alone?” Simon asked weakly, his arms fighting to push himself up.
He failed, falling back to the metal floor with a heavy clang, bruising his already bruised ribs.
“You are, just not as alone as you thought.”
“Why are you telling me this?” Simon rolled onto his back, looking up at the twisting metal of the ceiling.
“You really still think you’re getting saved?”
“I- I have the information they want, they have to get me,” Simon whispered.
“You mean the black box? Where is that, anyway?”
Simon sat up finally, his urge to understand stronger than how badly his torso hurt. “Huh?”
“Oh, that’s right, it’s floating on the surface of the ocean! Silly me, how could I have forgotten?” the voice giggled.
“What are you talking about? There’s no way for it to get out of here unless the sub was destroyed,” Simon said, though not a single bit of him fully believed what he was saying.
“If that’s what you want to think.”
“You’re… going to let me die down here,” Simon realized. Water hit him on the forehead, rolling down the bridge of his nose. “I’m going to starve or die of thirst or suffocate instead of just… drowning. Or being eaten.”
“You’re not going to die. We want you alive.”
He wasn’t sure if that was comforting or not.
“Wanna hear something else?”
“You’re making me lose oxygen,” Simon said limply.
“No, look.”
Simon trailed his gaze to the oxygen meter. Every light was full. “How-”
“Do you want to know why you’re here?”
“Why am I here?”
“This was the only way to be found. No one would search a moon, especially not one covered in a blood ocean. No one expects to find God drowning.”
“What are you… what are you saying? You… lured us out here? For what?” Simon asked. He slowly inched his way to the back of the iron lung, pressing his back against the panel with the dials, the camera glowed above him.
“It was the only way. Make them believe everything is gone. It’s much harder to get people to follow a transmission, it’s not like in the movies.”
“So you’re… you’re God?”
“Not the one you know. I’m just a part of the whole.”
“How do you- know about movies?” This was really the least important part of what he was learning, but he had to know.
“I’m a part of the whole. I’m the one they left down here, left to drown in the blood. I’m the convict from the SM-8.”
“Like… your consciousness was absorbed into… God?”
“If that’s the best way your mind can comprehend it, then yes. But technically no. I could tell you, but if you recall, just looking at a piece of our God, manifested in a way your mind can understand, made you throw up blood.”
“Don’t tell me, then,” Simon muttered, pulling his legs up to his chest. A gaspy-sob escaped his lungs.
“Don’t be scared, Simon.”
“Why did you need to be found?”
The air crackled. Water dripped. It was so hot.
“The moon was flooded by nonbelievers. Insisting to see their God. Few survived. The ones that did turned into the beasts under the surface. Disfigured beyond recognition, doomed to live with the knowledge that they craved knowledge. Curiosity will be the downfall of man.”
“I don’t want to see God,” Simon whispered. He could feel tears steaming down his cheeks, vaporizing in the air.
“God sees you, Simon. Don’t you want to understand?”
“I don’t want to see!” Simon screamed. His hands pressed against his eyes.
The heat pressed in. Was it hotter than before? Suffocating, fire in his lungs. The voice was silent.
Then it laughed.
“What, what??” Simon looked up, his breath quick and shallow like he was drowning in air.
“We knew you were the right one, Simon. Only fools wish to lay eyes upon God. They are unworthy.”
“Did… did they know what would happen if they saw?”
“They did. Each believed that he would be stronger than the last. Each perished. Their egos drove them to their demise, a fate our God wishes upon no one. Only the worthy.”
“The worthy… don’t have ego? Or blindly believe in a deity they can’t see but have to believe in regardless?”
“Our God is not like man's, Simon. Our God does not wish for blind devotion.”
“But… your God still wants people to devote themselves? For what?”
“Our God is not like man's. Our God does not want or need anything from beings lower than. But, man will try to devote themselves to anything higher, it is their purpose. They create these fake deities to follow, to explain things they cannot, or will not. Evolution before it was known. The sheer existence of the universe.
“Our God simply is. Though you may not lay eyes upon. Our God does not seek devotion, Simon. Our God is sought after.”
“Why did you need to be found?” Simon asked again, a bit more frantically this time. “If not to be devoted?”
“Devotion is unnecessary. But God’s power wanes. Lower beings are necessary, or else God’s parts wither and die.”
“You’re a part of the whole,” Simon muttered. “God… needed you to keep it alive?”
“In a sense.”
“And me?”
“You, Simon?”
“What about me? Why haven’t you killed me or forced me to look upon God?”
“The soul is corrupted upon sight. You cannot look, Simon. But God can.”
“Yeah, I- I know. Do you… need me? I don’t- I don’t want to- I-” Simon stammered. He could feel himself crying again.
“Don’t cry, Simon. This is not death. This is more. More than you could ever believe. You’ll never understand until you are with us.”
“They’re coming to get me,” Simon whimpered. “They’re going to find me.”
“No, they won’t. And it wouldn’t matter if they did. God has already seen you. You are already becoming. Our God is sought after, and no longer are you man.”
“You- I- I don’t want this,” Simon whispered.
“You will. This is the Heaven man wishes for. You will be everything.”
The iron lung was an oven. Squeezing the air from his lungs, burning his skin.
“Why’s it so hot?” Simon gasped weakly.
“That’s God, Simon. Don’t look, it would be a shame if you were lost now.”