A viscous liquid, faintly sweet and reeking of chemical preservatives, enveloped him. Icy cold, bone-chilling cold, was the first and only sensation it brought. He was suspended within it, his vision blurred, his eyes only a hazy, faint green glow. The metal barrier, reflecting a faint, cold, hard sheen in the light, felt like the entrails of a great beast, gently yet cruelly imprisoning him.

A monotonous, regular ticking sound emanated from an invisible instrument, like some eternal metronome, marking the imaginary time. Occasionally, there was the gentle gurgling of slowly circulating liquid and the distant, muffled, indistinct hum of machinery, muffled by the thick walls.

He couldn't feel the concrete presence of his limbs, only a diffuse, dull numbness. Every time he tried to think, his consciousness felt like it was sinking into a quagmire, heavy and slow. Who am I? Where am I? These questions were like bubbles on the bottom of the water, bursting silently as soon as they surfaced, leaving no trace. There was only a primal, instinctive feeling—existence. And with that existence came a boundless coldness and a suffocating confinement.