Death to someone with Thanatophobia is a concept that, even the mere thought of, can send such a person into a spiralling fit of anxiety and panic.

I was one of these very lucky people.

So it's of little surprise that as I died, I wasn't the most coherent or accepting of my current circumstances. As things began to fade out and my mind slowed and halted, I was certain that if I had still had the capacity to speak I would have been crying, screaming and begging to whoever might have been listening to not let me die.

Imagine my surprise when instead of the unknowable state of non-existence that I had long feared would follow my death, I was apparently still hanging around.

It... threw me for quite a loop.

Once my panic mostly subsided, sensation thankfully began to return.

I felt weak. Warm. I could do little more than shift my extremities slightly, and even that felt wrong; somehow stretched and twisted. Things didn't react like I was used to and it was worrying.

How badly had I been hurt? Was I crippled? Certainly a better fate than death, but not something I was looking forward to dealing with; as selfish as that sounds in my current circumstances.

My train of thought shattered as the world around me began to shift. The warmth and a previously unnoticed pressure became almost crushing and a strange panic seemed to well up inside, making me thrash harder than before. Desperate attempts to draw in air sent me into further panic when I realised there was none.

As I once again began to panic at the possibility of dying not long after my first close call, I was vaguely aware that my panicked gasps were now beginning to pull in air.

I tried to call out, an instinctive response to my panic and fear, but all that could push its way past the lump in my throat was a harsh high-pitched warbling cry. My hands slapped weakly against some unknown surface and I struggled. Desperate to get somewhere. Anywhere. So long as it was away from whatever my mind was painting as a threat at the time.

A whirlwind of sound and smell and sensation cascaded through my head and overwhelmed me, battering any attempt at rational thought to the deep recesses of my mind.

I open my eyes, only to be faced with a blindingly harsh light that fades into large harsh shapes of varying shades. Hazy figures with too many limbs seem to draw near with terrifying speed and I cry out once again in that same strange warble.

My body felt wrong. My legs felt simultaneously missing and as if there were too many of them. Where was I? This wasn't a hospital! What was happening!?

It all becomes too much and as I struggle against my unresponsive body and the unknown assailants, I feel the energy slowly drain out of me. All I can do is cry and let out pathetic hiccuping sobs as I'm dragged into the air by large hands and held against something soft.

Warmth settles back over me again as I am wrapped in something and a scent that seemed to convey comfort and safety falls over me, dragging my drained mind back into the black.