The Challenge:
Charlie vs. The Afterlife: Part 2
The Verdict:
"Pitch black" fell short of desribing the degree of darkness in the tunnel. Charlie closed his eyes, then opened then, but couldn't tell a different. With each step, a fierce pain gripped his torso where he had been wounded, as if the would was reopening. Ever so often, the tunnel narrowed causing Charlie to scrape his already huge head on the rocky ceiling. Soon, he saw a pin-hole of light in the distance. Filled with excitement, Charlie sprinted toward the light. Before he had gone far his face slammed hard against something wooden, knocking him down. With his hands groping the darkness he investigated the object and found that he had run into a door, and the sliver of light was coming from a doorknob. He peered through the keyhole and saw a room where the Sickly One, Jeremy Mason, sat in the center. Before Jeremy laid a golden box. Charlie turned the knob and entered the room.
"I am not Jeremy, but am his spirit sent to guide you out of Mystias."
"Yes! I took the right path!" Charlie exclaimed.
"Actually," Jeremy's spirit said, "you took the wrong path. That's why I'm here. Didn't you read the signs, regard?"
Charlie performed a series of karate moves to impress the spirit before him, but the spirit was not moved. Charlie hyperextended his back and had to sit down. Jeremy opened up the box in front of him and a green fog came out of it.
"These are ashes of burnt cows," the spirit said. "All you have to do is eat a handful of these ashes and you will be returned to life."
"I can choke down that whole box in 2 minutes flat," Charlie said. "But, why should I trust you?"
"I'm your buddy," Jeremy's spirit said.
"Well, aren't you just DAMN special," Charlie said with hostility.
Jeremy's spirit gazed at Charlie for a moment. "I knew you'd say that" He pulled out a can of refried beans from behind the box and poured a handful of ashes into the can. "Here, have a taste of this."
Charlie devoured the can of beans in just under a minute and then let out a slight beany burp that the spirit shuddered at. The room started spinning and Charlie was frightened.
"You tricked me!" Charlie exclaimed.
"No, this is the resurrection process," the spirit said calmly.
"Liar!" Charlie removed the lid of the bean can and sliced the spirit's neck.
"Charlie, no! We're buds!" the spirit cried, but it was too late. Charlie had cut the spirit's head half off. The box of ashes started shaking violently, followed by a vacuum of wind. Everything in the room started flowing into the box. Soon, there was nothing left for Charlie to hang on to, and the box swallowed him. He heard the lid of the box slam shut and awoke in a familiar classroom. He saw himself covered in blood, and then heard a second loud bang as Mr. Boyd threw his desk against the wall.
"Look, he's alive," someone screamed. The room turned and saw Charlie sitting up, covered in puke, blood, and piss.
"Charlie," Mr. Boyd exclaimed, "I thought I'd killed you."
"No, Mr. Boyd," Charlie said with tears in his eyes. "I'm quite alright."
Charlie was carried home in an ambulance, and become thoroughly irate when the ambulance had a flat tire on the way to his house. He screamed, "Shit," at the top of his lungs. As the ambulance drivers fixed the flat, Charlie was turning the day's events through his mind. He thought of all the friends he betrayed; through selfishness he had regained life, but he had turned his back on the friends that loved him most.
His head became to ache, and then burn. He smelt burning flesh and realized too late that it was his own. A man stood over him wearing a black t-shirt on his head like a ninja mask. As the thermite burned through his brain he saw a vision of all the friends he'd been an ass to; humbled, he asked for forgiveness and then closed his eyes forever.
