I could hear screaming in the perfect darkness all around me. It took me a few moments to realize that the screaming was me. My throat was surprisingly not raw with use from my death cry. I was in that hallway again, only this time I was numb with a slight chill. The numb feeling extended throughout my body as I rag-dolled downward in this lightless well. It wasn't long before I calmed enough to stop my screaming. What followed was a profanity marathon. ‘Why me? What kind of piece of crap was I. Brothers are not supposed to murder the other. Who was I? I must have been a ripe bastard to end up like this.’ This line of introspection continued for what felt like forever. It could have been a few minutes or a thousand years. A millennium of self-doubt with bouts of impotent rage-filled screams and sadness. I didn't have anywhere to go so I just sat in place. After a while, I did spend some time walking back and forth but it was futile. The hall of darkness just continued to the infinite without a bend or corner. Time seemed to crawl forward without reference. I just sat wondering why. Why was this nothingness my final resting place? What demon god would choose me for this cold hell. I felt nothing here. No warmth. No pain. Nothing. On what I considered my millionth day I tried to kill myself. I ran as fast as I could into one of the walls that made up my prison. Headfirst. Over and over I ran full speed hoping to snap my spine or at the very least knock myself out but nothing. No blessed sleep or feelings of hunger. I couldn't even cut my skin with my teeth and nails and trust me, I tried. I felt so empty. On one of my random walks throughout my prison, the outline of a door appeared on the right side of the walls. I rubbed my eyes in shock. Could this be it? Would this be my way out? Within the doorway stood two human-shaped figures.
“Is this the right one?” said a deep voice.
“Yes, you idiot! I would not open the wrong one on purpose now would I?” replied a raspy feminine
voice.
“Do you really have to name call?” said the deeper voice.
“Do you really have to name call?” the other voice said mockingly in a higher pitch.
“See, that's what you sound like. Now to business. Little whuman, come here” the rough voice said. The word human was said strangely. As though it was the first time the woman had said it.
“Strange,” I said aloud.
“LIttle whuman please come here, you can have a treat if you do?” said the deeper voice.
Following a thud, “Ouch” said one of the voices.
“Don’t make promises, Anapiel “ said the rough voice.
Curiosity and the lack of amusement all this time made me step forward towards the doorway.
“Yes that's right, come here, we have. Umm.. what is it that Whumans like?”
“I wouldn’t turn down a glass of water if you have it,” I said.
“Excellent! Anapiel get the whuman some water!”
“Yes my mistress.” said the deep sardonic voice.
As I got closer and stepped through the door. I felt nothing. The numbness that I expected to leave me was still there. I hoped for a chorus of angels and the warmth of a summer sun beating on my face but I was sorely mistaken. In front of me was an endless expanse of whiteness with two figures and a green plastic table with some five similar chairs around it.
“Please take a seat:” said the hoarse feminine voice. Which looked like a slim older woman with dirty blond hair up in a ponytail in a white three-piece business suit motioning towards the table and chairs. Behind her was a much shorter man wearing a very similar three-piece suit but in all black. The man was holding a pitcher of water with a glass in the other hand. I went to take the seat nearest to me and the man with a smile placed the glass before me and poured water in. Then placed the pitcher within arm's reach of me. Both took seats on either side of me. The short man, I figured was called Anapiel, was what a person would look like if they had been pressed down for the entirety of their childhood. His neck was non-existent and his wide frame made him look almost like a smaller version of the rock. His short stubby legs didn't seem to touch the floor when he sat or even bent at the knee. They just dangled off the edge. To my right the older woman was the picture of good health but with the obvious markings of old age. Pronounced crow's feet and somewhat slaggy skin that seemed to glow with a good diet or something. I wasn't sure.
“So, where am I, and what's going on? … Where was I?” I said into the quiet.
“Well, those are a lot of questions. We are going to begin shortly so I guess I have enough time to answer one of two questions before they arrive.” said the woman.
“Okay then…” I thought for a moment, If I have to get one answer I guess it would be the most obvious one.
“Where am I?”
“I got his one Rizoel,” said the shorter of the two. Using his thick arms to swing himself partly my way he continued.
“We are in a meeting space, many of these are custom-built for situations such as yours. It is what you would call neutral ground. No one can harm anyone here even if they tried and it is a place we come to when a conversation of great importance needs to be had since it is outside of space and time. It is also possible to spend as much time as needed without a loss of time on the outside.” He said in an even tone.
My next question was probably the more important of the two but I figured I needed a reference point.
“Where was I ? Before I was here…”
“Rizoel?” said the man with an eyebrow flick towards her.
“Well dear, you were in what is called Limbo. That is why we are gathering at the moment. Beings such as yourself aren’t supposed to spend as much time as you did there. Usually when a mortal dies. They spend a few moments there while their deeds and sins are quantified and measured. This is a complicated and foolproof system that is based on a Whuman's memories, which are attached to the soul inside. In your case, we seemed to have come up empty. Normally a being like yourself is sent straight to recycling to be reborn but since you were not a newborn or mentally challenged to such a degree that memories could not be saved onto your soul echo. We kind of had to go on a scouting mission to get you and your last saved backup file. You see this is somewhat unprecedented and it seems that someone or something has tampered with you in a profound and unsettling way. I would have just chucked it up to Anapiel losing your file or somesuch.
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“Hey! I have never!” said Anapiel with a frustrated huff.
“ Oh hush Ana, I am just pulling your leg, haha get it. Cause he barely has legs,” said Rizoel with a ragged laugh.
Anapiel simply crossed his almost tree trunk arms in response with his face becoming slightly red.
I was unsure how to react. I’m sure my face showed a sense of shock but the gears in my head could not stop spinning wildly. Soul echoes, limbo, recycling. All of this seemed like something out of a movie or poorly produced anime.
“So what…” before I could continue with my question, three beings popped into existence and each took a seat on the other side of the table. From left to right was a woman, a man, and another man. The first woman was red-haired and wore a lacy dress with black and gold accents over it; much of the clothes barely concealed her well-endowed chest and slim figure. Her lips were blood red and her eyes the color of burning embers. When she saw me looking at her. Her lips parted to reveal rows of sharp shark-like teeth. Beside her and directly in front of me was a man with a tropical floral print shirt. The man had a long grey beard that ended at his lower chest. He had thick wrap-around sunglasses that had a neck strap dangling behind his head. The man had a gold chain dangling from his neck and his build was thick like an aging bodybuilder. Everything about this man said he was a fighter or was accustomed to fighting. To his left, the last man was tall and slim. He wore a simple animal fur over his body. His hair was thick and long and fell way below his shoulders. His forehead was slightly pronounced and his chin seemed… Come to think of it. He looked like what a neanderthal from the discovery channel would look like, bone necklace and all.
“ Hello everyone,” said the man in the tropical shirt.
“Thanks for coming on such short notice. For the sake of Micheal here we will go around the table and introduce ourselves.”
Motioning to the man beside him, the caveman started. “ I am Adam.”
Turning towards the woman on his right, “ I am Lilith,” She smirked at me and made a come hither motion with her fingertips.
“And I am, of course, Yahweh. We are here to determine the fate and final resting place of a… where is that file at…”
The man began to look around the table and the floor when with a snap of Lilith's fingers a file appeared before Yahweh.
“Ahh… let's see.” The man took off his glasses and let them hang from his neck as he scrunched up his eyes to look through the vanilla folder before him. Going from page to page mumbling to himself all the while.
“Well this is strange”...Turning towards Anapiel he asked. “ Is this the most up-to-date file we have?”
“Yes my lord” Anapiel replied with a chagrined look on his face.
Turning to Rapiel “And you are certain his echo is empty?”
“Yes my lord” she replied again.
“This is most unexpected.” Turning to face me, the numbness I had running through me suddenly seemed to melt away. His attention made hair stand on its end and not in a good way. Suddenly as the feeling came it disappeared and the numbness reappeared.
“Wha... what.. what is it?”
The older man took a hard look back into the folder and asked me, “what is the last thing you remember?”
I caught the man up on the eternity I spent in limbo and without hesitation spoke about trying to kill myself and the various strategies. His face turned into a deep frown when I said that part but he stopped me mid-sentence.
“I mean what do you remember before you died?”
Oh! I could almost laugh at how stupid I must have looked.
“I was laying on a hospital bed when the person I was told was my brother killed me. I’m not exactly sure what he did but my best guess was he used my pillow like in the movies or pulled some plug. I don’t really know how it happened. He was a bit faster than I could register at the time.”
“And before that?” he said as he leaned in a bit.
“I guess more time laying in the hospital bed. There was a woman there, she was very nice but very sad. I felt bad about her crying so much. She seemed to be my wife, I think.” I replied.
“What about further back, before the hospital?” he said while squinting his eyes at me.
“I dunno,” I said with a shrug, “I spent most of my time watching tv or movies that happen to run on there since I couldn’t move my arms and whatnot. I spent half the time watching sappy romance tv shows with vampires or cheerleadersand the other half watching films with people using beams of light like sworrds and using magic.
“That's some of his best work! The laser swords that is…. “ the man with the beard seemed to contemplate that while stroking his beard.
After a pregnant pause the woman to his right, Lilith said, “ Father this is ridiculous, just read the file, he is destined for my realm. The file is rife with sin and evil. His brother was justified in his murder.”
“I disagree, father,” said Adam in a slow but steady cadence. “ This person before us is clean of all these sins. Just looking at his aura shows this. The man in the file is no more the soul we see seated before us. I would not claim him to our side but I would hesitate greatly to consign him to the abyss. Especially considering the undue torment he has already suffered. With a mere glance I can see the taint of limbo still lingers on his soul, would that not be punishment enough for any damned one?”
“Yes… you both make excellent points.” Yahweh said while still stroking his beard in contemplation…
“What of you two? Razoel and Anapiel, what are your thoughts on the matter?”
Anapiel began to stutter something unintelligible when Razoel cut him off. “ This is the most strange, my Lord, The Whuman is neither touched by sin nor graced with goodness but still has the mind of a man of many decades. I would suggest recycling”
“NO!” I shouted at the top of my lungs causing everyone in the room to turn to face me. My face was still numb but I figured I might have been blushing for all the smiles and smirks I saw growing on their faces.
“Look I don't know what I did to deserve this but I don't want to die. I really don't want to go back so if it's a choice between the limbo of death I guess death would be the answer but I barely had a chance to live. Can’t you just send me back without resetting me like an etch-a-sketch?”
Yahweh seemed to take my words in wIth a frustrated sigh as he stretched his arms behind him. One pulling the other back and then doing the other side.
“This is most strange..” he said.
Next to him Lilith seemed to come to a conclusion. “ Father, how about a wager of sorts?”
Yahweh’s furrowed brows seemed to relax as he faced her.
“What if we did return this whuman back to earth but instead we gave it the body of a greater Jinn?”
Adam seemed to facepalm at this.
“To prove what?” Yahweh asked.
“Well as Razoel said, ‘He has not been touched by sin or graced by goodness,’ a newish soul without the influence of either. If we were to give him a grand body I bet he would turn to evil quite easily. Then when his soul inevitably returns to us. I would have been justified in taking him to my realm.” she said excitedly.
“And if he is not turned to sin but rises to grace?” said Adam with his head sitting on his bent elbow on the table.
“Then I don’t know, I’ll return something… what of Picasso, you much liked his work Adam?” Lilith replied.
“What about me?!” I said with exasperation.
“Well of course you would go to where all the goodie goodies go obviously,” She said.
Yahwah seemed to like the idea and bobbed his head as she spoke while stroking the end of his beard.
Did it just grow a bit while we were talking...
“Yes! I will take that wager. What do you say my boy! Willing to give this whole thing a try?”
“Sure as long as it's not Limbo or whatever recycling is… but wait what's a Jinn?”
Before I could get a response the world once more blanketed me in darkness.