Heretic – A Recollection of Vanish Pt. 2 – Violent Death

Below is a Recollection–this is not a review, but rather a full spoiler walkthrough of the author’s experience in The Parallel/Heretic’s V A N II S H Part Two (Death). This is only one experience out of many that can occur when you flat-line, so all Deaths are expected to be different. Death is also one part of the larger narrative of V A N II S H, which spanned three distinct nights and two separate DEATH experiences. As each experience is separate and distinct, they will be split into individual Recollections. Please read Part One, Part Three, Part Four (Death), and Part Five to get the full narrative. In this experience, the author did not die during Part One of V A N II S H, but instead, purchased a separate ticket to the event, and thus, his memories may be slightly different from those of the main narrative. Please remember, there is no safe word, only an ease up word. 

 

 

 

 

Be warned: I am an unreliable narrator.  I don’t truly know who I am.  My memories may not be my own.  I may have killed.  Most certainly, I have died and gotten a glimpse of the nightmare realm beyond before returning.

 

V A N II S H, related in many ways to the previous VANISH, exists in The Parallel, where there are choices with consequences.  Many of these choices lead to death, often in ways that are not immediately obvious.  V A N II S H encompasses three separate nights, in three different places.  Each night, if you die, you must return for a separate experience exploring the world beyond death.  If you are lucky, you may return to life and proceed.  While the Death experience is deeply tied to the V A N II S H story, I was privileged to experience it on its own after the first night of the simulation.  While it lasted only 15 minutes, according to the clocks the living use, I am convinced time passes differently in this realm.

 

 

Finding the entrance to Death is a fascinating journey in its own right.  By phone and walkie talkie, I am directed from one location to another until finally I am faced with a door.  Taking one last deep breath, I slowly enter.

The room is dark and hot.  As the door closes behind me, I hear a woman keening in pain.  I start to make out dark figures all around me.  A couple of them are converging on me.  I am grabbed, easily lifted, and thrown to the floor.  From there, someone else shoves me hard up against the wall.  My hands are bound.  One of my tormentors kneels down and whispers in my ear, “Now things are about to get intense.”

Death is an extremely physical experience, but it offers tantalizing insights into the way I must have died, and what I might have done in life.  Through much of it I feel like a human pinball as my tormentors throw me around expertly; in the pauses, I have visions…

A woman staggers toward me, gasping in agony, and dies, her dead weight bearing me to the floor.  I am pinned underneath her for a long few moments. Who killed her?  Was it me? My memories are so conflicted…

A woman in a devil mask slowly and deliberately approaches as I stand frozen.  She caresses my cheek mockingly.  Surely this is proof of my damnation.  She places a skull mask over my face…

A man kneels on me.  The mask prevents me from seeing him clearly, but does nothing to block my view of the huge hypodermic needle he is bringing toward my eyes, while saying in a singsong voice, “Here comes the needle, here comes the needle…”

A tormentor whispers in my ear, “This is how you died,” as suffocating plastic goes over my face.  Even knowing that calm is what is called for, I panic and try to claw the plastic away, to no avail…

Through a haze, I feel pain course through my body–but from where? No one is near me.  I tense up, and a second area of my body is engulfed in pain.  I look down and realize that I have been shot…

At length, as I am sprawled on the floor, I hear a soft voice urging me to focus and attend.  He has a story for me.

“There is a man who killed his wife.  Many people are looking for him.  But they won’t find him, for we are the ones making him do these things.”

I want to carry these words back to the world of the living, but surely that can’t happen.  I was strangled and shot.  You don’t come back from that.  Or do you?

My next memory is lying on my back, a breathing mask over my face.  Medical staff are around me.  My shirt is in shreds, and I am covered in blood. I am clearly at the very edge of life and death, but they eventually pull me back across the line.  When they ask if I can breathe, I find that I can.

I am alive again, but I still do not truly know who I am or what terrible things I have done.

 

 

This is the end of V A N II S H Part Two (Death). If you missed Part One, read it here. Please continue reading Part Three to further the story.

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