I woke with a start, my eyes snapping open as I gasped for air. I was in a bed. I didn't remember how I had gotten home. No, I couldn't be home. This definitely wasn't my bed, and I only had one bed.Groaning like an old man, I tried to sit up, but I could hardly move. My head spun, and the room felt like it was moving, like being on a boat in large waves. I took a deep breath and closed my eyes, waiting for the sensation to pass.

The air smelled fresh, with a pleasant tinge to it... almost like flowers and wood smoke. Lavender? My brain felt like mush. I remembered being injured. I hurt my arm walking home. Didn't my car break down? That was going to suck. I really didn't have enough money to deal with unexpected repairs right now. I just bought new tires for the thing.

It didn't pass.

As the minutes ticked by, I felt like I had to do something. I started to move my body, carefully testing which parts of me worked and which were broken. I remembered learning somewhere that you always start from the bottom, so I started to wiggle my toes, feeling the rough, warm sheets above and below me. The sheets were scratchy. They felt like they were made out of some sort of wool, but they felt good in the cool, damp air of... wherever I was. I pumped my feet, causing a sharp pain to shoot from my right foot into my leg. I sucked in air, trying to manage the pain, which subsided a moment later.

I tried to move my legs, but my right knee screamed at me and refused to budge. My torso hurt everywhere, but at least I could move it a bit. I twisted and bent as much as I felt able, which wasn't much. My right arm felt fine, probably better than any other part of me, but my left was numb and wouldn't move no matter what I did. I reached over to touch it. There were strips of cloth or bandages sticking to my arm. They felt like they were stuck to my skin. I moved my head side to side, slowly so as to not trigger the vertigo. I got hit with the spins again, so I stopped. Once I had limbered what muscles I could, I slowly opened my eyes and took in the room around me.

Where the hell was I?

I found myself in a dimly lit room, the air heavy with what I recognized was incense. The room was made from stone, with large blocks stacked one on another, separated by kind of dark grey mortar. The walls were sparsely decorated, with only a few small paintings of people I didn't recognize and a symbol I had never seen on the wall opposite my bed. It was an eight pointed-pointed star with a golden circle in the center. The star was gold with a blue background. It was simple but nice. Sunlight filtered through a small window to my right, falling directly on the star.

I peered outside the window. The bright light outside the room caused my eyes to blur at first until they slowly adjusted to the sunlight. I could make out simple shapes outside the building in what looked like a field. They were small brown blobs that slowly clarified into... sheep? A number of high pitched voices were calling to one another further out in the field, and small heads poked out here and there from the tall grasses, or possibly crops, on the far side of the field. I realized they were children, playing some game.

Did some Amish people find me in the street and bring me here?

Oh yeah, I passed out outside. There was a storm. That was crazy.

Using my good arm to sit up a little more, I enjoyed the simpleness of the fields outside for a while. My brain was mush, so this was the best I could do. The sheep were slowly munching on grass, and the laughter of the children was nice. After watching and smelling and listening for a while, I looked around the room a bit more and saw the floor was covered with a simple blue and gold woven rug, the same colors as the symbol on the wall. There was a small wooden table with two chairs in the far corner of the room, where I saw the incense burning. It was all so chill. I couldn't remember the last time I was somewhere this peaceful. It sure as hell beat being at work today.

"Oh shit, Work!" I reached under the covers to pull out my phone, but there was no phone. Or pants. Or underwear.

I was naked.

At that moment, the events of the previous night rushed back into my head. My Pathfinder fell into a sinkhole! And I got struck by lightning! Twice?! My heart raced as all the memories hit me, hard. I should be dead. One hundred percent dead. D. E. A. D. Toast. Charcoal in my driveway. Not sitting in some idyllic pastoral heaven filled with incense and sheep.

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Wait...

...I fucking died.

Was I in heaven?

That had to be it. There were sheep outside. Sheep for the shepherd. God was a shepherd, right? Something something lambs and the meek and all that.

A gentle knock sounded on the door. I froze, not knowing what to do, but before I could think anything through, the heavy wooden door swung open. A large matronly women with heavy, tired eyes and a wide, professional smile entered the room, her greying hair pulled back in a bun. Her ample body was covered in a blue and gold robe of some rough-looking material. Probably wool.

She didn't look toward me at first, merely going through the motions of entering the room and performing her duties. She walked to the incense burner, lit another stick, then turned to walk toward me. Her eyes opened slightly, and she spoke in a melodic language I didn't recognize: "Ho, vi estas veka! Bone. Tre bone. Sankte." Her eyes lifted to the ceiling, and she clasped her hands in front of her very large breasts. I mean, the things were like watermelons. An amulet rested on her chest. It was lined in silver with a diamond that almost seemed to glow in the dark set into a large blue stone.

A moment later, she dropped her hands and said, "Kiel vi fartas, sinjoro?" The woman smiled brightly, well-worn laugh lines appearing around her eyes.

I shook my head, which caused my brain to spin. I didn't understand a word of what she said. "I don't know what you're saying, ma'am. Does anyone in heaven speak English?" I tried to speak slowly so she could understand me. That never worked, but it would work this time, right?

"Pardonu min, sinjoro. Mi ne komprenas viajn vortojn." She shook her head softly, then patted my cheek. " Vi estis grave vundita kiam Naya trovis vin, mia filo. Vi sekuras nun." Her voice was strong but gentle and comforting. She moved closer and handed me a glass of water. "Trinku."

I didn't realize how thirsty I was. I downed the glass in one go. The water tasted fabulous. So pure and cool.

"Bone, filo. Vi ne vekiĝis dum tri semajnoj. Ni ne sciis se vi travivos. Naya, Renard, kaj mi resanigis vin multajn fojojn ĉi tiujn pasintajn semajnojn. Mi ĝojas, ke vi estas veka." She smiled again and took my glass. She moved across the room and placed it on the desk in the far corner, then returned to the bedside.

"Yeah... totally." I didn't know what to say. She seemed to be talking as much to herself as to me. Her words felt sincere but practiced, like an ER nurse talking to patients, or a teacher speaking to students. She must be a priestess up here in heaven. Why didn't God teach people up here English? I always thought I'd hit the pearly gates in great shape, but I guess it makes sense that our souls would have to heal for a bit. Once I met that God guy, I was going to give him a lashing for making such a shitty world before this one.

"Vi devas pli da resanigo. Pardonu min, filo. Ĉi tio doloros," she said gravely, a shadow crossing over her face. She reached down and grasped my left hand in hers. She began inspecting my hand, moving my fingers and murmuring to herself. She traced her fingers up and down my charred skin. Between the bandages, red lines snaked up and down my arm, only broken where my skin had split. The lines almost looked like lightning. The bandages themselves had browned with what I could only assume was blood.

"Um, could you maybe use gloves? Or some antiseptic? Alcohol? Wet wipes?" I didn't know where her hands had been. "At least wash your hands or something."

I knew she didn't understand me, but as the last word left my mouth, she pulled a vial of what looked like water or alcohol out of her wide belt, dripped it on her hands, and rubbed it into her skin. She whispered some kind of chant as she did. Then, she closed her eyes and began singing in a soft, melodic tone.

"I really don't need to be saved today, thanks." Her voice was nice, but this was weird. "Seriously, it's cool."

And that's when I noticed her hands were starting to glow white.

"The hell?"

Before I could stop her, she pressed her two hands onto my left one, slowly working up from my fingers to my wrist. I didn't feel anything at first, but a moment later, I could feel a slight tingling. My heart skipped a beat as I slowly felt more and more sensation as she massaged that weird white light coming from her hands up my arm and into my shoulder and neck. She dropped her hands from my neck back to my fingers, eyes closed and lips chanting, then started again. By the third pass of this routine, I could wiggle my fingers, and my arm was starting to itch.

"Ohh... that's so much better..." I groaned as my arm came back to life. My throat caught as I wiggled my fingers more. They didn't move a lot, but they moved. She kept doing this routine, and with every pass of her hands up my arm, I gained more sensation and movement. However, something else started to come back with it... pain. By the fifth pass, it didn't feel good anymore. It hurt. A lot.

"Um... that's okay. That feels great. Thank you. Really. I think we're good now." I tried to move my arm away from her, but her hands were like vice grips. She started her sixth pass. This time, I gained much more sensation, and some of the burns on my arm began to feel like, well, burns. My arm felt like it was on fire.

"Okay. That's enough. Seriously. I'm good now! Thanks!" I squirmed in the bed, then tried to shimmy out the other side. Her firm hands kept me exactly where I was laying. I felt like a literal toddler. I grabbed the mattress and tried to pull myself away, but I didn't budge. Her grip was steel.

"Pardonu min. Ne moviĝu. Vi bezonas ĉi tion," she said sternly, holding me in place. How was she so strong?

By the tenth pass, I was screaming. By the fifteenth pass, I was an incoherent blob of flesh. By the twentieth pass of her infernal glowing demon-light hands, I realized I wasn't in heaven—I was in hell.