The East PacificBoard

It is said that when you are on the verge of death caused by trauma, or are in a place of extreme mental stress, such as the side of a mountaintop, your brain will often try to trick you into believing there is an unseen presence near you that will guide you, protect you and save you. It could be a spirit, a daemon, or in some cases... a third man.

This phenomenon was first reported in 1919 by explorers in Antarctia who were stranded for a period of two years in the ice, their leader explorer writing of the ordeal after that "...during those long and arduous days out there in the cold and unforgiving desert of the south, it felt like a fourth man had joined us three intrepid explorers."

It is definitely a strange quirk of the human mind. We are so inherently designed to be a social animal that if we don't have a real partner to be with in our hour of need... we will make one out of the folds of our own minds.
...

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Harry's ankles feel like they're about to pop out through his skin. His feet shudder and shake with every step he takes up the mountain to wherever the hell their commander is taking them.

His platoon has been walking up this mountain for upwards of four days now. He only knows this because of the sun and moon. He has counted in his mind the amount of times the moon has shown its pale white face in the murky black of the sky above.

Not once has the platoon stopped to take a break. If any one of them slowed down or cried out in pain to beg the commander to stop walking, he would shout and berate them back into form. All of their bodies hurt in a way that they didn't even know was possible before now, and not one of them liked it at all. If this was their punishment for being terrible cadets, then it has definitely driven the lesson at hand into their minds. Not one of them will ever forget this wretched experience.

The commander has not spoken once to them in a casual manner. He just keeps trudging forward, his eyes dreary and his face forever locked in a look of pure contempt.

What is he even trying to achieve with this exercise?

All of a sudden, the commander shouts.

"COMPANY! HALT!"

Like clockwork, the entire platoon lifts up their right legs for the last time and plant them firmly into the ground. Harry does the same, but then...

Underneath his feet, he can hear rocks tumbling. The dirt beneath his shoes begins to erode rapidly. Without any further warning, and with a loud shriek of fear, Harry suddenly falls as the path underneath him crumbles away into nothing.

With this section of the mountain, the path is separated from a near-vertical drop with a slope that is filled with small bushes and trees.

And Harry is rapidly approaching the end of the slope.

The rest of the platoon immediately try to help him, but the commander shouts at them to get back into form and to ignore him. Why?

...

Harry falls off the side of the cliff and begins to fall to his death.

So this is how it ends, huh?

He closes his eyes as he slowly comes to terms with the end of his life. Suddenly, a strong jolt yanks his left arm.

He looks up.

A hand is gripping hard on his wrist. A voice then calls out to him.

"I've got you man, I've got you! Don't worry!"

It's Andy.

It's Andy's voice.

"A-Andy?! How'd you get here?!"

"Don't worry about that now, mate, just hold on, alright? And don't let go!"

The hand begins to ascend up the cliff face. Eventually, it has pulled back far enough that Harry can now touch the side of the cliff with his feet. He begins to walk his feet up the side, like a mountain climber does.

With a final heave, Harry is pulled back onto the surface. He collapses on the ground with exhaustion, and screams out in joy.

"We did it, Andy, we did it! Oh my God!"

Harry's platoon mates run down to him and help him up to his feet. He can hear them asking inane questions like "Are you alright?" and "How the hell did you survive?"

It was Andy.

Andy saved him from death.

But where is he? He's nowhere nearby, hell, he isn't even trying to break through the swarm of cadets to him.

"Where's Andy?"

One of his platoon mates ask back, "Who the hell is Andy, mate?"

"M-my friend, where did he go? He saved me, he pulled me up the side of the cliff, I saw him..."

"Dude, nobody was there. You literally just came back up."

"No, no, somebody was holding my hand..."

Another cadet speaks up. "Harry, nobody was there."

All of them seem to be in unanimous agreement of this. Harry is trying to convince himself that this is just a sick joke they're trying to pull on him, but the longer he tries the more apparent it becomes to him that they are being sincere.

So, if Andy wasn't the one who pulled him up...

Then who, or what, was holding him by the wrist?