Jaime POV
It was dark here still. There wasn't a lot going on around me. The 'door' that Mom had walked through disappeared and I couldn't go anywhere near where it had been. It was like being trapped in a box. Every way I went, I walked into a wall of some sort. It was invisible and I couldn't see what was in my way, even when I hit it.
There was a sort of ambient light, just enough that I could see that I was basically in a huge, black room. It looked like it was tiled. But I couldn't move more than about two feet without hitting a wall. And every time I hit that wall it was incredibly painful. More than I would think it should be.
It's also silent here. I can't hear any sounds. No music, nothing. Just... nothing really. I can hear, because I've checked. I can speak and I can hear my voice, but there are no noises in this place.
I sat in the middle of my... cage. What else would you call it? I couldn't move more than two feet in any direction, and there didn't seem to be any obvious way out. So why bother trying? It seems I'm stuck here like it or not.
I sighed. I wasn't hungry, I wasn't tired. I didn't need to use the bathroom.
I got bored, so I stood up and looked in the direction of the door thing Mom had gone through and started yelling at the door.
"Hey! There's gotta be someone over there! Let me out of this place!" I yelled.
I was answered with a long, piercing, beeping sound. Just one tone screaming in my ears.
"Jaime! I'm sorry! Please come back!" I heard over the sound.
I covered my ears. The sound was giving me a headache. I lay on the ground, curled up, with my hands over my ears, trying to block out the sound. It was so loud and wouldn't stop. I started screaming, trying to block out the sound, but I couldn't. I couldn't make it stop and I couldn't block it all the way.
"Stop!" I screamed. "Please stop!" I cried out. The pain in my head from the screeching noise travelled down my entire body. I writhed in agony. My whole body felt like it was on fire and all I could do was scream with the pain.
Suddenly the pain stopped and everything was silent again. I lay on the floor, curled up in a ball, hoping the pain was gone for good.
Another light turned on. I looked up. It was like an old movie screen. I didn't know what I was looking at. Everything was white on the screen.
Suddenly I saw Dad's face in front of mine.
"Jaime? Are you awake? Are you there?" I heard him say. He looked horrible. His hair was messy, like he hadn't washed it in a couple of days. His eyes were red and he looked like he'd been crying. He also looked like he hadn't eaten in a couple of days.
"Dad! I'm here. I'm right here!" I looked around, trying to figure out how to describe where I was and hoped he'd be able to find me.
"His eyes are moving. Does that mean he's awake?" Dad said to someone off screen.
"Unlikely," a voice off screen said. "Those eye movements, they're not processing information. He very likely can't see and if he can, he can't process anything just now. That's not to say if he wakes up, he won't be able to. We won't know if there's been any damage to his brain until he wakes up."
"I'm not asleep, asshole!" I yelled, hoping they could hear me.
"When do you think he might wake up?" Dad asked,
"I can't say. He took a lot of those pills. Enough to put out a horse. Maybe an elephant. We pumped his stomach as best we could, and we know he threw up at home, but we don't know how much of what he took got absorbed into his bloodstream before he threw up, and before you found him."
"Could he be like this forever?" Dad asked.
"He could. But honestly, if he's like this for the next three months, it's unlikely he'll ever wake up. Then it'll just be machines keeping him alive. We'll keep monitoring his brain activity, since that's our biggest concern right now, considering the amount of medication he took."
"I'm right here! I can hear you, douchebag!" I yelled. I got up and started pounding on the walls, ignoring the intense electric pain running through my body when I did that.
The scene on the screen changed. The picture was shaky and dim. Dad was gone but there were a lot of other people around shouting all sorts of instructions. I didn't understand any of them.
Suddenly, the screen went dark.
"Hey!" I yelled. "Turn that back on! What's going on? Where am I!?"
I heard a click behind me.
"You have choices to make, Jaime," a disembodied voice said.
"Who are you? And what do you mean about choices?" I asked to no one.
"Who I am is of no consequence to you. You do not need to know who I am. But you have choices to make. Your first choice is whether to leave the room or not."
"What happens if I leave the room?" I asked.
"If you choose to leave the room, you put into motion your destiny. In a way. You will, of course, be faced with more choices if you leave the room. Ultimately, where you wind up will be up to you."
"What do you mean by 'where I wind up'?" I asked.
"You chose to come here. You put into motion a set of circumstances that ultimately have changed the trajectory of your given life. Now, you must decide what you truly want."
"What does that even mean?" I asked. "And who are you? And where are you?"
A figure in white appeared in front of me. If I had to describe him, he kind of looked like Jon Hamm, the actor. In a white t-shirt and white pants and white shoes.
"I am right here," he said. "I suppose, if you need to know who I am, I am your guide. And to some extent, your guardian. It is my job to assist you. But when it comes to decisions, I can not interfere. I can not guide your decision. I can not influence your decisions. I can only guide you towards your final destination, whichever you choose."
"I don't understand," I said
He looked at me with a raised eyebrow.
"I believe you understand exactly what I have laid out for you. We know a lot about you, Jaime Clarke. And we know why and how you got here. But we can not let you leave one way or the other, unless you make decisions here that will determine where, ultimately, you will end up."
"So, I'm choosing whether I want to live or die?"
"In a very ineloquent way, yes," Jon Hamm sad.
I stared at the man in front of me.
"Would I be able to be with my mom if I choose to stay here?"
"No. Your mother is in a place where you would not be allowed."
"Why not?"
"Because her death was not her choice. If you choose to remain here, you have made that choice against those who are tasked with following your path and who are tasked with easing you here when it is your predestined time. They cannot come here, either, so you won't meet your guides. You have only me as a guide. And I'm only your guide because of the choice you made. My job is to guide people like you. Some choose to continue the path you took initially. Some return to your... realm? I have never been able to come up with a good description of where you were before you came here."
"Are you saying if I choose to stay here, my mom is in heaven and I'd be going to hell?"
"You mortals have very strange beliefs. There is no such thing as this 'heaven' or 'hell'. You are not going to find yourself sitting in some fire and brimstone hellscape, nor will you find yourself in some garden or paradise. Although, your ultimate destination is influenced by how you lived."
"But I'm only 15. I haven't really lived much of a life," I said.
"And yet, you chose to come here. You chose to attempt to terminate yourself. This is not something that is considered a particularly honourable thing. May I ask why you chose this route?"
I teared up.
"I miss my mom. My dad is mad at me for something stupid. I don't fit in anywhere anymore."
"These seem trivial and no reason to end what could have been an incredibly productive and rewarding life, had you simply given yourself the chance."
"What do you mean?"
"That is all the information I can actually give you. That is actually more than I am supposed to give someone like you. But, as you said, you are young. So I made the decision to give you some extra information," Jon Hamm said.
"What was that TV screen thing I saw?"
"That was what you were seeing in your ... world."
I didn't understand.
"But... they said I couldn't see. But I could. I saw my dad. He looked terrible," I said, more to myself.
"Humans have very little understanding of humans," he said.
"That makes no sense," I said.
Jon Hamm sighed.
"You humans have a very limited understanding of the universe. Yourselves included."
I frowned.
"So, how do I get out of here? How do I go home?"