Breathe Under Water [P]

Age : 28 Posts : 488

Breathe Under Water

Here comes another fall from grace / I'm always falling on my face
This attitude that I embrace / for the love I'm trying to replace
I try to kill the song / 'cause the melody's all wrong
and there's a fever coming on

Research was one of Uzumaki Ophelia’s favourite habits. She liked looking into things, seeing how they worked and functioned, for what was better than exploring the world in which she lived, trying to understand it better? Because knowledge was power, and power was something that she desperately needed. Being a medical Shinobi Ophelia knew pretty much anything about the human body, its organs, systems and even all the complex names that sounded like they came from another language; or world, even. They first had seemed impossible to learn for her, though she later looked back in amusement at that thought. Everything came so easy to her now; she guessed the hard times were only until the knowledge had been sucked in by her brain. Now that she knew most things, she was feeling comfortable with herself, being able to name every bone, every organ every blood vessel existing in the human body, as well as in some animal’s. Things she couldn’t explain, she always strived to reach a conclusion for, through scientific research and experiments. Lots of experiments. And lately, she wasn’t able to figure out one thing that concerned herself, more or less. Why could she breathe underwater?

Dressed in a light dress and wearing a bikini underneath it, Ophelia exited the hotel. She approached the receptionist and left her keys there, because she feared to lose them. Just as she was going to turn around and leave, she remembered that she had to ask for information before she could do anything. She turned around, changing the shoulder on which a large and heavy bag was hanging. “Excuse me, is there any remote hot spring here, that is not very well known? I’d like to have some peace of mind.” She slowly said, a smile gracing her lips as she looked deep into the receptionist’s eyes. He wasn’t anything out of the norm; just a normal person with an everyday face. Oh, God must love the common man, for he has made so many of them she thought and chuckled. The receptionist blushed and mistook her laugh for a playful gesture which made him blush even more furiously, if that was even possible, and tried to work up an answer. “Uh, y-yes, Madam. There, there is one in the higher mountains of Yuga-ga-gakure, it’s a large one, you wouldn’t p-possibly miss it-t.” he said while stuttering his answer together. “Thank you very much,” she said and glanced at his name tag, “Takeshi-san!” and left the building. At the mentioning of his name, the male quickly pigeonholed that he was actually wearing a name tag and that was why Ophelia knew his name in the first place, and he started imagining instead wild scenarios where she was his secret stalker and wanted to spend her life with him forever and ever. How cheesy.

Walking for several hours, Ophelia finally found the Hot Spring she was searching for. It truly wasn’t possible to be mistaken or even overlooked, for it was huge, and really warm too. Steam was coming out, which would later prove helpful in her inquiry. Ophelia took in the landscape. The Hot spring was placed comfortably on a protrusion of a mountain covered in grass. Its green was something else, for it seemed so young and full of life; a real contrast to what the female was used in Kirigakure, where the grass had a more greyish colour. But this one here, looked like you could make juice out of. Notwithstanding its high altitude, the air was still very fresh and clean compared to the one in the city or Kirigakure. Kirigakure’s weather was damp and heavy; when you breathed, you inhaled half the ocean which made it only much more difficult to keep the oxygen circulating in your body. Even the environment of Kirigakure was hostile. Maybe that’s the reason everyone’s so aggressive there. A little bit of sunshine would surely do them good. She figured as she let her bag slide onto the soft grass. For a moment she turned around and looked at the view spreading before her eyes. How marvellous. She could see the whole Hot Springs country from where she was standing, even a bit from the sea if her eyes weren’t playing tricks on her and the blue she was seeing was actually still the sky. She closed her eyes and took a deep, deep breath, getting used to the fresh and light air that was now filling her lungs. “There are some days when I think I'm going to die from an overdose of satisfaction.”

Age : 28 Posts : 488

It's hard to reconcile / What I've become
With a wounded child / Hiding deep inside

Really, she didn’t need anything more. A nice view and fresh air was all she ever wanted to be satisfied. But Ophelia knew deep in her heart that not even that would satisfy her, that not even these simple things would be enough for her. The Uzumaki constantly felt dissatisfaction with everything; humanity, the world, herself. She felt like something was always missing, something always felt off. Something was wrong with the world, she could feel it, but she didn’t know what it was. Her gut was telling her to be careful, for things were about to turn drastically around which could end badly for her. At any rate, she hadn’t come here to ponder about the world’s problems, though this place would certainly have been very helpful, with all its serenity and peace. No, she had come here to think and research about herself and herself only. Her body, more specifically.

Ophelia grabbed her dress and lifted it over her head, taking it off. She folded it together and laid it on top of a rock. Turning around, she squatted and opened her bag which at last revealed its contents; there were medical instruments in it. Anything she needed to conduct her experiment was inside that bag, along with a notebook in which she would write down her observations. It was a notebook made of a hard cover, which was however soft to the touch because it was cushioned from the inside. Ophelia had embellished it with poems and quotes she liked from famous people that had had an influence in the world history, as well as pictures of paintings of famous artists. She opened it and revealed its contents; it was brand new. She had never used it before, for this was the first time she was doing an experiment. Also, this notebook was her personal one, something she would use only for herself and not for other experiments or documentations.

“Day 1.
a) Jump into water to observe whether I have to breathe with my lungs or not.”

She wrote down, and let the pencil inside the notebook, closing it and laying down on the ground. She stretched her limbs as a mean to relax herself, moved her shoulders from awkward position to awkward position until she took a deep breath, and jumped. Her body dived into the water, water rushing inside every pore of the girl, her eyes, her ears, her nose. The Hot spring was rather deep, reaching a good seven meters before the bottom. Ophelia found herself in about the middle of the depth and opened her eyes, the hot water not burning them. She looked around to reassure herself that she was really alone, and then took a deep breath, sucking all the water into her lungs. Waiting for a second she noticed that she wasn’t drowning or coughing like normal people would have done. Nor was she gasping for air. She swam up to the surface. When her head was out of the water, she proceeded to cough up all the water that she had inhaled, without any success. The water wasn’t inside her lungs anymore. But she had felt it; she had felt that the water was filling her lungs, so why was it gone now?

“a) Comments;
While inhaling water seems to fill my lungs with water, when I come to the surface it just has vanished and all that is left in my lungs is oxygen.”

She scribbled down on her notebook with her wet hands, still inside the water, trying carefully not to make the paper sheets wet as well. She let the pen and notebook next to the hot spring so she could reach it later, and swam again to the center of the hot spring. Now she dived once again into the water, this time without taking a deep breath to fill her lungs with water. While her heart was beating faster and faster for she thought that she would drown and was anxious about it, she did not feel any change to her oxygen need. She glanced at her watch; fifteen minutes had passed. Ophelia returned to the surface and took a deep breath only to find that she wasn’t longing for it. It was as if she was breathing the past fifteen minutes like she was breathing when she was ashore.

“a) Comments;
While inhaling water seems to fill my lungs with water, when I come to the surface it just has vanished and all that is left in my lungs is oxygen.

I do not need to breathe through my lungs to survive inside water. This leads me to the conclusion, that my body gets the needed oxygen from somewhere else.

HYPOTHESIS 1;
Body takes needed oxygen from pores.

--------------------------

b) Connect the machine to brain to register brain waves behaviour.”

She wrote down and pulled herself out of the water, rubbing her hands dry with a towel. Then, she opened again her bag and pulled out two cables which originated from a strange machine with a screen display and placed them on the side of her head, next to her eyes. She switched the machine on and made some regulations. It started beeping in a steady pace. The female returned into the water.

Age : 28 Posts : 488

Ophelia dived into the water without the machine causing an electrical shock that would pretty much end her life, for it was water resistant. She didn’t breathe nor did she move in any way so the results wouldn’t be manipulated. She also freed her mind from any thought so the noise on the results would be reduced. For a bout fifteen minutes Ophelia stayed inside the water when she figured that it was enough time to process information for the machine, so she dived out and removed the receptors from her head. The machine had printed several sheets of paper with data on her brain waves during the time she was inside the water. She dried her hands and took the sheets of paper, laying her eager eyes on them. While she was reading, her expression from dead serious was changing gradually to surprised and shocked. The data showed that, while she was inside the water, the brain cells that usually sent signals to the pores to process oxygen, got stronger and sent signals more often, which resulted in a faster working of the pores taking in oxygen as well as opening more. So, basically, Ophelia didn’t need to breathe because her skin was absorbing all the oxygen she needed to survive from the water around her. And not only that, she needed a minimum amount of oxygen, for it was all used up in her blood and organs, so nothing got lost, in contrast to breathing air. Because when you breathe air, the lungs can’t absorb it all and you exhale some oxygen again along with carbon dioxide. This, the fact that she was using oxygen more efficiently, resulted in her having a higher endurance inside the water, and she could move faster because the energy needed for oxygen was now used in the muscles. What a great discovery.

“b) Comments;
Pores dilate and absorb just as much oxygen as is needed from the water to survive. The energy saved is used for things such as speed, endurance and strength.

HYPOTHESIS 1 proved to be correct.”

Having written down her discovery Ophelia put back the pencil and the notebook on the ground. She turned around and looked at a stone protrusion. It was sunny all day, so why not? She grabbed her towel and spread it on the protrusion, laying down on it. She was going to sunbathe. Her wet fair skin sparkled in the light of the sun just like diamonds, while her red hair seemed more like a wildfire now. Ophelia supported herself from her elbows and looked up at the sky, closing her eyes because of the intensity of the sun. She wasn’t used to climates like this, and back in Kirigakure the sun rarely shone. This climate matched her personality perfectly for everyone knew that Uzumaki Ophelia was sunshine condensed into human form. She let the sun shine on her skin, making it darker and darker as every second flew by. Of course the results couldn’t be seen instantly, but Ophelia could feel how her skin was sucking up every ray of light, like a desert the much awaited rain. She could feel her melanin working, which was responsible for turning her skin into a darker shade. It was true that humans looked better with darker skin; so a lightly tanned skin would make Ophelia even prettier. However, she didn’t really know if that would look bad with her red hair. To be honest, she didn’t really care either, for when was she going to enjoy again such a marvelous sun? Enjoy it while it lasts, Ophelia, enjoy it while it lasts.

Age : 28 Posts : 488

After some hours sleep had taken Ophelia to the land of dreams; or was it nightmares? At any rate, she woke up bathed in sweat and looking at the end of the cliff, into the vastness of nothing. The momentum of her standing up had driven her to the edge of the cliff, almost falling down if it weren’t for her hands that stopped her from moving forward. She breathed heavily trying to regain her calmness which she had lost due to her sudden near-death experience. Wiping the sweat off her forehead, she felt a stinging on her skin; had the receptors damaged her more than she thought? He eyes darted towards her arms. No. They were all red as well as her legs and belly and pretty much the rest of her body. She lifted her upper bikini part a bit to look at the skin lying underneath it. White as milk. She had gotten a rather serious sunburn. Now her hair wasn’t the only thing that was red on her. She chuckled. This was going to hurt. A lot. Standing up, trying hard not to touch anything so her skin wouldn’t hurt, she realized that even the soles of her feet had gotten a sunburn. She had obviously slept in an awkward position, allowing for them to burn in the rays of the sun. She sighed. This was going to hurt.

She reached the machine, humping like she was walking on lava, and sat down, her butt being probably the only part that wasn’t hurting. She took out a syringe pondering for a moment if her burned skin would play a deciding factor which would alter the results. “Nahhhhhhhhh” she said and rammed the syringe into one of her main arteries, pumping blood into it. She cringed under the sting, more because her skin was burned than the actual punctuation, and pulled it out once it was filled. She took out a marker and wrote the word “before” on it. She closed it and put it into the machine, which started scanning and analyzing it. She then took the receptors once again and instead of putting them on her head again, she attached them right underneath her breasts, one under each. It was the only way to get them closer to the lungs without cutting her skin open. Ophelia stood up and walked, or humped, over to the hot spring. The water was steaming hot. “Here goes nothing!” This was going to hurt.

She jumped into the hot water, which, combined with her already burned skin, felt like she was being burnt alive. She landed a few meters inside the water, away from the water surface where she started screaming, air bubbles of unimaginable pain rising up only to merge with the outer air. After a couple seconds the air bubbles stopped appearing, for Ophelia’s lungs had already filled with the hot water. She was still screaming, however, unable to be heard by anyone. Silent screams accompanied by violent movements. Good thing that the experiment wasn’t on the brain, for it would have been a pain in the ass to differentiate the noise from the actual data, she thought. Everything for science, huh? Ophelia’s whole body was burning up, like it had caught on fire. This is how people feel when they are burned alive, she thought. Everything, really every inch of her body was stinging her full of incredible pain, causing her to scream like she had never done before. Ophelia didn’t really care though, for she knew that it was for the greater good. After all she was doing this for herself, to understand herself better how her body worked with the Sanbi inside. The Uzumaki would never do this experiment on another human being for she didn’t want to cause pain to anyone else rather than herself. If she was hurt then that was fine; she just didn’t want anyone else to get hurt. That was why Ophelia always searched for a pain free method to treat her patients.

After five minutes of burning inside what seemed hell itself, she couldn’t bear it anymore and pulled herself out of the water. She reached for the towel and wanted to rub herself dry, but when she did that she only screamed further in pain. All frustrated and desperate for this pain to end she ripped off the receptors from her ribs to prevent any alteration to the results. She was like an animal now, trying to find a way to make this pain end. Unfortunately, she didn’t have the means to do so right now. She was high in the mountains, the sun going down. People were returning to their hotels, nobody would hear her scream or come for help. “Fuuuuuuuck, this—hurts!!” she said, starting to cry from the pain, which only caused her cheeks to burn more, for the tears flowing down her face were salty and hot. And she couldn’t rub them dry because that would have hurt even worse; so she just let them where they were, rolling slowly and painfully down till her chin. Ophelia had meanwhile grabbed the sheets of paper that had come out of the machine to check on results. “Fuck! Nothing!” she said disappointed that all her pain was seemingly for nothing. But then an idea struck her head. She pulled out another syringe and pumped blood again only to put it up for it to be analyzed. After a couple of seconds, the results were out and she noticed that her blood from the “After” bottle was much more enriched in nutrients and vitamins essential to her surviving. They were also nutrients characteristic to water. She darted over to the water. Grabbing another syringe, she crawled over to the water and filled the syringe with it, and crawled back to the machine to analyze it. The results were exactly what she had expected. She grabbed the pencil and the notebook.

“ c) The water in my lungs disappears when I come out to breathe.

HYPOTHESIS 2
The water is being absorbed by my body.

a) The water in my lungs disappears when I come out to breathe almost instantly. My blood shows the same ingredients as the water in the hot springs.

HYPOTHESIS 2 proved to be true. Furthermore, my body seems to get all the important vitamins and nutrition from the water to fill up its chambers. This even could result in strengthening the immune system when the right ingredients are added to the water. Through the lungs, thanks to the Sanbi, the vitamins etc etc are absorbed instantly and put to use in no time, in larger amounts, covering up any insufficiencies. Much faster than through food.”

Having made the possibly greatest scientific discovery ever, she quickly realized that she could use that for herself and it could prove to be something very, very useful if she knew how to put it into use. Concurrently, however, she realized that this information was very dangerous and valuable so she had to hide it someplace safe. Packing her things, now forgetting about the pain, she returned to the hotel where she received an all around spa because they saw her bad sunburn.

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