The wind was knocked out of me. What an awful way to die: screaming for my life, only to be eaten alive by some alien lion. Alion, my mind said and I probably would have thought that was pretty damn clever if my back wasn’t just then being torn open by the alion’s giant claws.

  I could feel its head pressed against my back. I imagined it tearing me open and then greedily digging into my open back and chowing down on my innards. Any second I expected my back to break and have my spine ripped out like some sub-zero fatality that I pulled on Buzz hundreds of times. I started laughing. That was it. It must have bit into some nerve or something in my spine that told my brain that it tickled. Now it was just humiliating.

  “Stop!” I cried out but I couldn’t even hear my own words over the rushing water. “Stop! It tickles! It tickles!”

  And then it did stop. I swallowed. This was it. It ripped something out of me, something important because I lost all feeling in my body. I couldn’t even feel its weight on me. Couldn’t feel its head, nor its claws tearing into me. I imagined myself ripped in half, bleeding out on this alien ground. I was crying and scared. Expecting any second for my vision to darken, to fade out, to meet my maker, as they say— something kicked my foot. I rolled over.

  “Holy shit!” I yelled.

  The man standing there looked at me strangely.

  “Who are you?” I yelled.

  Another strange look and then he pointed to his ear and shook his head. International sign for: I can’t hear over all this.

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  Beside him the Alion sat, nearly to the man’s elbow, looking up at him. The thing’s tails (or tentacles) swooshed on the ground just like a cat's or dog's tail would. Just like a cat or dog that had about four tails.

  I sat up. Felt my body. Felt my legs. I was in whole. And alive.

  The man only looked down on me. By the green fatigues he wore, and the buzz cut, I could tell he was military. He looked to be in his late fifties, maybe early sixties. Slung around his body was a weaved basket. I then saw he was missing his right arm. The sleeve of the faded button up shirt he wore was folded up nearly to his shoulder. In his left hand he held a spear.

  He moved the spear to the crook of his shoulder and extended his hand to me. I took it, helping me up to my feet.

  The Alion cocked its head at me. The face looked more like a dog than a cat but the giant mane of smoky fir gave it the lion characteristic.

  I eyed it wearily.

  The man went past me, and the alion bounded ahead.

  The man turned, rocked his head to side. International sign for: follow me.

  I followed him through the tall grass and into one of the decaying buildings. With his foot he slid away a covering made of sticks. Below were a set of stairs. The alion squeezed past me, nearly knocking me over, and trotted down the stone steps.

  The man stared at me, waiting. He wanted me to go first. Other than the alion that just went down, I had no idea what else was down there. I didn’t know this man. But I made a bunch of bad decisions that day, what was one more? I nodded, and went towards the hole. The man stopped me. He patted my helmet and made a motion with his fingers. I didn’t understand. He mimed something growing from his head. Jesus Christ was there some sort of parasite down there? He must have seen my confusion. He again patted my helmet, this time knocking it quite a bit harder, and spread his fingers out. Jazz hands.

  “Oh,” I said. Thanking God it wasn’t a head parasite. “My flashlight. Right.”

  I turned on my headlamp and descended down the stone steps.