Ken gazed out in her direction from the bottom of the boat that he pulled himself onto. "Suichi! Swim!" He was frantically waving her on from his prone position on the boat.

Things did not make sense, Aegir had sought to unbalance her and by the looks of it he was doing just that as he kept her distracted with images through sorting out what was real and what wasn't.

The prongs of the taser had still been in her leg which took on an irritated red coloration with all the jolts she had been receiving. So far he noticed nothing occurring with the serum but figured it just needed time to flow through her body.

He waited into she was near the capsized vessel before jabbing her with the cattle prod and holding it against her abdomen for a few seconds the only insulation she had against his attack had been her top. For a few seconds he continued.

Then something grabbed her and pulled her out of the water onto the bottom of the ship, grunting in pain as electral current surged through her into him but vanished once she had been out of the water and plunked down. Ken's doing though he thudded back down, eyes still opened as he gazed into the heavens and breathed heavily.

When Suichi finnally reached the boat, Ken helped her to get onto it, but while she was getting out of the water she felt an intense pain in her abdomen, she would have felt down back to the water if not for Ken who holded her since all her muscles stopped working during the few seconds of the shock.
The girl couldn't figure out the real source of the shocks, if she had, she would be more scared, given her natural fear for electricity, but since she wasn't facing it before the actual jolts, her fear wasn't showing off yet.
"Thanks Ken, what are you doing here anyway? or are you just another illusion like Ruby?" Suichi said with defiant eyes, trying to be strong in this strange situation. The pony tailed girl hadn't taken control of her body back yet, she couldn't believe the bite of an eel could be so incapacitating, at least she was safe from the electrical creatures by now, either if Ken was real or not.

"Ruby? Who?" He seemed baffeled as he repeated her name and looked at her with a blankness in his face. Ken seemed to be confused with what she said. He shock his head as he didn't understand what she was asking.

He looked to the water. "Eels, a school of them I think. Strange that their acting this way, strange that there are so many," he muttered more to himself before glancing back at her. "Your serious? You don't remember me asking you to sail with me ... did you see it? The orca that hit the ship?"

Ken's reaction was genuine, which confused Suichi more. For an instant the girl forgot about the recent events and believed in Ken. "Really? yeah of course i remember" Suichi was puzzled, maybe the attack of the eels had some effect on her short term memory she thought, the shock was rather painful though.

The little instant that Suichi's mind gave up on fighting was enough for her to be trapped in the ilusion again. In the real world Suichi was sweating, and her breathing had gotten faster, maybe it was a reaction from the serum injected.

"Ken, i don't feel good, i need to go back to the shore"

"The only way back is through them," he gestured to the water around them as if in disbelief. He had thought that an orca over turned their ship but to encounter electric eels as well ...

Off in the distance the surface of the water was crested by an orca who took a gulp of air through it's blow hole before vanishing from sight again as it sank beneath the cold waters.

Ken gazed around in the water as if he had been looking for anything floating in the water nearby that he could salvage for assistance. Something they could use but he saw nothing as they drifted in the waters. He then looked back at Suichi.

"Unfortunately that's not likely to happen any time soon."

On the real Aegir watched her for a moment. He had sensed Suichi's reasoning skills taking over, trusting in what he had created. He considered mixing this up deliberately but not yet ... not yet. He lifted up her shirt to look at the flesh scarred a reddish purple from the cattle prod.

He watched the rise and fall of her chest but could see the gradual fading of these marks causing his mouth tendrils to whip about excitedly as he witnessed these results. He glanced to her leg then noticing that the irritation that had been there was mostly healed which pleased him.

Sitting down the cattle prod he took up another object ensuring that he had covered all of the basics.

Suichi looked at Ken with hope, but after he analyzed the situation and explained it to her, she lost herself in thoughts again. Somehow her body felt weird, even while she could move well in the illusion, she felt some pressure in her wrists and ankles. Actually her brain was ordering the movements she did inside the illusion and she just saw her limbs move. In the lab, one could only see as if the girl was trying to break free.

Beneath Suichi’s shirt, her swimsuit was covering her belly, the creature easily melted it away in order to check the girl’s damaged skin, and it looked satisfied with the results.

Back in the illusion, Suichi had regained her self control, also feeling somehow recovered from the shocks she had suffered. She checked her leg to find the bites, but she found nothing. As for her belly, the only way to check it would be taking off her swimsuit, which she wouldn’t do in front of Ken. “Ok, if we want to get out of here, our only hope is to use the eels against the orca, although I don’t know how yet, maybe using some of the wood from the boat, but its wet… or do you have a better idea?”

"The only thing I can think of is trying to flag down a passing plane for help." He had no idea what, if anything, could be used to assist them with the orca. He recalled how orca would swim towards an iceberg and dive beneath the waves before colliding with it.

The action would cause water to flow out over the iceberg and cause seals on it's surface to be swept into the water so they could get at them with ease. It was a technique that parents taught their kids, actually.

But the orca did not return displaying that their was a reason why it was being so distant. Perhaps it was shocked by the eels as well, Ken did not know for certain but if it was in distress he doubted that it would seem so calm.

Maybe the eels provided a buffer zone against it, he could not say though he remained quite as to his knowledge not wishing to spook Suichi.

"The whale's keeping it's distance so it's safe to say the eels aren't out near it."

Aegir's tentacle retracted. He had used it to pull aside her bathing suit to gaze at the wound beneath. Though as he released it the material sprung back into place. He had considered a few things, saw her struggles and realized what they actually were given the constant telepathic "scam" that he was performing.

As a contrast he dulled her reception to pain for a moment, took up a scalpel then cut her arm. It was a small cut but he watched as it closed up near instantly, she healed quicker from that then from electrical attacks it seemed or perhaps the serum kicked in at last. He set the scalpel back down, took up the controls of the taser again while he held a stun gun in the other.

He dropped the illusion for 2 seconds, showing her the white room and the objects that he now held before the illusion restored itself. She and Ken still had been on the underside of the boat, sensations to pain restored as Aegir looked on ...

“We are not that far from the shore, we may have cellphone signal” Suichi instinctly searched her pocket, which wasn’t there since she was just in swimsuit in the illusion, and suddenly the memory of Ruby searching for cellphone signal in the cave came back to her, puzzling her again.

Then for a couple of seconds she was strapped to a table in a white room, with a strange creature in front of her, holding two devices she had only seen on movies. She screamed, and suddenly she was back in the boat again. “Damn! what was that?” she said. Ken put his arm on her shoulder saying “What happened Suichi?”
“I just need some rest” she said calmly, all these changes of reality were giving her a headache, she just tried to relax for a moment, if she was truly inside an illusion, just sitting there doing nothing but resting would be good for her, and if, indeed she was with Ken in the boat, maybe some rest could bring stability to her mind.

He shock his head, his cell phone was somewhere beneath the waves now and he saw Suichi reach instinctively to her hip for a pocket only to realize that her's had been gone too.

But when she screamed Ken had been shaking her shoulder, asking her what had gone on, what was wrong. But he seemed incapable of working out anything.

Sitting there calmly he pondered what to do, then looked back towards the damaged ship. He assessed the puddle of fuel as his hand fumbled through his pocket of his shorts coming up with 59 cents in change and a receipt from a gas station. He pulled out a red bic lighter as well then glanced to the heavens again before glancing back at her.

"We can light the fuel floating on the wire on fire when planes go by as a signal to pilots. No chance that they would miss that. But we'd have to worry about the water or rather what's in it."

Aegir could sense Suichi's confusion at what was transpiring. He did nothing yet gauging her reaction and letting the illusion play out.

Suichi was about to say “Ok go ahead, just let me rest for a moment”, but as she actually understood what was Ken going to do she said “No wait!, that’d be too soon to do now, let’s wait for some motor sound can be heaerd to lit the fire, by now let’s just have everything ready”. And with that thought Suichi was completely brought back to the illusion.

They didn’t have to wait long, since the monster was controlling the scenario, when they heard a loud motor which seemed to belong to a helicopter. “Do it now Ken!” And in seconds a large flame raised as they started moving their arms in order to get the pilot’s attention if he looked to the flame’s spot.

The helicopter made a soft turn and started approaching them “I hope he saw us, let’s wait and see…”

Ken nodded. "I didn't intend on lighting it until we saw something."

But soon enough there had been a copper that turned towards them as it flew through the sky. Ken figured that there was no way that the pilot could miss the dancing flames and the pilot circled around their position twice to assure them that he saw them. He took off back the way they he came as if he was getting assistance.

"I think it worked!" Ken exclaimed as he watched the helicopter grow smaller and smaller in the distance. He turned towards Suichi, smiling he pressed his own lips to Suichi's as he kissed her out of the prospect of being rescued.

Suichi felt some relief when the chopper circled around them and then left, then while still trying to remember what she was doing there and why?, she felt Ken’s lips in her mouth in a kiss that lasted several seconds.

Suichi was shocked, but not electrically this time. It was so natural she didn’t resist, and that made her think they had been dating for some time. Maybe they were, given the circumstances that may be possible too.

“Wow, that was unexpected Ken” The pony tailed girl said as she turned her back to Ken, she didn’t want him to see her blushing.

And also there was Ken, staring at Suichi’s well formed body, resalted by the tight and wet swimsuit, her well formed rear, her slender back, partially exposed with the X shaped strap of her suit and her hair, tied in a single pony tail which covered her long neck, her hands seemed to be holding her heart. Ken decided to give her a few moments for her own, since she looked all confused recently.

She didn’t remember kissing a boy in years, and now this… maybe she had actually suffered some kind of memory disorder because of the eel’s attack. But then again, she was not alone, even if she had forgotten the recent events; there was someone who cared for her in that moment. Suichi turned her face to him again and with a smile said “We are going to get out of this, thanks for being here with me”

"No need to thank me," he answered. A hand descending to her shoulder feeling the softness beneath it against the warmth of his palm as he turned her to face him. His eyes were upon her own rather than elsewhere on her shaply figure.

He smiled. "Yeah ... we'll make it out of this. I ... I don't know what came over me just then. Maybe it takes being in a near death situation to draw out the truth in me, what I really feel." He shock his head slightly. "Bad timing ..."

Aegir played with the illusion a little. He figured that he had an outline set in place for things though of course free will would make adapting to things necessary seeing how his victim took to this or that.

Suichi, while still trying to remember the recent events, felt more comfortable now. She looked at the eel’s swarm and said “Dumb eels you won’t shock me again you know!” and let a small laugh after showing her tongue at them. Ken patted her head.

Back in the labs, Suichi’s body had stopped sweating and was breathing normally now.

Aegir was monitoring her as she relaxed in the lab. Still she had been caught up in the illusion and while he had thought things through she had busied herself with sticking her tongue out at the eels. He had been done with them for now calculating on using bigger things though not yet ... soon.

Ken glanced into the water, he turned back towards her, grinned, then calculated in his head how long rescuers would take to get back to them. The helicopter would have to go back of course they would radio in what they had uncovered and rescuers would be dispatched either by copper or boat. Ten, fifteen minutes, rescue workers were seldomly instant in responding.

Ken took her by the hands, his thumbs caressing the backs of them. "Before the rescue workers get here ... before the commotion I just want to tell you ... that I love you."