Chapter 2| Purgatory

The behemoth carefully opened the door. The first thing I noticed upon entering the room was the faint smell of something burning. The room was lit up by an orange-ish light, seemingly flickering and emanating from a singular source on the floor. 

"Yo"

A raspy, seemingly robotic voice greeted us as we entered the room.

Sitting beside what looks like a crude campfire on a hollow oil drum was a rusty old humanoid robot wearing tattered formal attire.

"So he's the new guy eh? Wall?" He said with a laid back tone as he casually took a sip from his run down tobacco pipe. Wait, how does he even do that with a robotic body?

"I know you have many questions you'd like to ask, but first let's start with the ol classic introduction shall we? I'm originally called R-055 by god knows who made me, but you can call me Ross if you like" 

He grabbed and tossed what seemed like firewood and other combustible stuff in the fire while talking.

"How about you me boy?" he added.

Me? Now that he mentioned it, I still don't even know who I am to begin with? Why am I here? What am I-

"Alright, alright, my bad, your face says it all. You probably don't even know who the hell you are, dontcha?" said Ross as he amusedly observed my perturbed face.

He took another sip on his tobacco pipe. The beast on the other hand, went to the corner of the room and sat down on an old, seemingly antiquated metallic crate. 

"Take a seat lad." Ross said as he offered me a seat near the campfire which was in front of him. 

I took up his offer and sat on a rough dusty metallic crate, one that is similar to what that beast is sitting on. I placed my hand on the surface near one of its edges and noticed a faint texture. I glanced and saw some texts covered with dust and other dredge on the surface. I gently wiped it off and saw the text say "WESC-0516". 

"Ehem," Ross clears up his throat and makes eye contact with me.

"Let us get straight to the point, you're dead and this place is the afterlife you humans called "Purgatory"" He spouted casually. 

Me? Dead? What kind of sick prank is this? This is ridiculous. I mean I am still standing here am I not? I can see, feel, smell, and oddly enough taste my surroundings.

"I know it's hard to take in, but it's the truth whether you like it or not. This place you stand on is the very manifestation of the concept of purgatory you humans believe in." he said as he looked at my perturbed face again.

"Stop messing with me! How is that even possible?"  I replied furiously. 

He let out a noticeable sigh and said. "I don't know how I'm going to explain this to you, but think of this place as the final frontier. The end of all civilization and life as you know it."

He paused for a while to stare at the crate that I'm sitting on. He then continued talking. "Here you'll see tons of outlandish stuff that may even look alien to you. This place is the gathering point of everything that contains the concept of the end. Which is why everything you see here evokes the feeling of despair and loneliness."

He then points at the crate. "You see that crate you are sitting on? WESC stands for "Word End Supply Crate", and that number signifies the date on which it was distributed. The first two digits signifies the month and the other two for the day. There's not much information about the year but you get the idea. That crate was distributed to the remaining human population at world's end; the post apocalyptic earth. Though its purpose was to sustain life, the idea of having such a crate implies that humanity has already fallen. This notion was embedded in the pitiful humans who survived and lived at world's end. Which is why it was added here in purgatory as part of the concept of "the end". As for how their world ended,"

He took another sip from the pipe and answered in a laid back tone. "I don't know, whether it's because of some unavoidable natural extinction calamity, or by the hands of their own foolish arsenal of world-ending weapons. We may never know. All that is certain is that their world has ended. And now it is manifested here in this accursed purgatory."  

No I don't, I still don't understand. Like what I said earlier in that room, this is a lot for me to take in. All of these just sounds unrealistic and stupid. Purgatory? World's end? What do they even mean?

"Still not believing it lad?" He added. "Just look at me and that big fella over there. Do we look like something you'd normally see in your world?"

"But, I don't even know who I am or where I originally came from." I replied.

He paused and stared blankly at me for a moment before letting out a joyous laughter that was accompanied by a clunking metal sound at set intervals.

"Hehe… HAKHAKKKAKHAHAH! Of course, how could I forget HAKHAKAHKKAHA?"

He stopped his metallic laughter and cleared his throat once more. "Don't worry about your amnesia, I forgot to explain the most crucial part. It's normal for newbies like you to not know a thing or two about themselves. Some even came here fainted because of the panic stricken fear that the big guy over there unintentionally caused them."

Wait, doesn't that imply that I'm not the only one who appeared like that in this place? Well of course, he said it's the purgatory after all, other deceased people may probably have come here. I may find some useful information from those guys. But still, none of these explain who I truly am.

"Wait, does that mean that I'm not the only one who woke up there?" 

I curiously asked to which he answered. 

"Not particularly in that place, we usually find folks like you scattered around the campus. That big guy over there just helps me locate and bring you people here because of his keen sense of searching for entities"

Ross stood up and stretched his back and let out a noticeable exhale as he did so. Wait, do robots even need to stretch their back?

After letting out a huge yawn, he begins to speak "Anyways… Just have that big fella guide you to the next room. I doubt what I'm saying would even help further answer your questions." 

"Wait, one last question before I go." I asked.

"Yes, what is it lad?" He replied.

After taking in a deep breath, I asked "Who are you? Why do you know all this? And how long have you been staying here?" 

"I can't really answer most of those questions, but just know, we are merely vagabonds like you who just wanted a place to belong." He answered as he partially covered his face with the tip of his fedora. 

▃▃▅▅!

The beast stood beside me, seemingly urging me to get ready.

With no other choice, I guess I'll just have to follow him. 

"Good luck, oh and, be careful out there!" Ross waved as he watched us leave.

We went outside the room and again, walked through the dilapidated corridors. Be careful? That line quite disturbed me. I mean it's the afterlife, what could be dangerous out there? Oh yeah, I remembered that there was that weird monster that this big guy eliminated. Come to think of it, I still don't even know its name, if he even had one...

I hesitated for a moment but eventually got the courage to ask it. 

"Umm…"

▅▅▅■■?

I got the behemoth's attention. It looked back at me while moving forward. 

"U-um so I still don't know what to c-call you and yeah I forgot to thank you back then for saving me from t-that weird thing, um, mister…?"

▅▅▅…

The behemoth pointed at the dilapidated walls with its thumb.

"Outside?" 

▅▅!

The beast growled and shook its head. Again it pointed its thumb on the wall to the right.

"The wall?"

▅▅■■…

The beast growled again, but this time it sounded more agreeable. It resumed looking ahead again.

Wall huh… So that's why Ross mentioned something about a wall when we arrived.

We arrived at the ruined junction where the beast devastated the weird looking entity. A strip of cold wind entered from the collapsed site and gave me a rather chilly sensation. It seems like we are heading to the left side of the junction where that shadowy monster probably came out of. Wall continued to move forward without wasting any time. I followed and once again stared at the ruined landscape outside. It looks exactly the same as how we left it. Dark gloomy skies, rather strong winds blowing across the land, and various ruined buildings and objects just lying around together with the debris.

As we delve deeper into the corridor, we reached another area where not even a single speck of light illuminates it. Like before, Wall entered it without any hesitation. I then soon followed him. Without any light to guide the way, I instead followed the thundering footsteps that he made so I won't get lost in the dark. This situation persisted for a few minutes before finally seeing a faint light in front. 

We arrived at the site of the light and were met with another weird looking door. It was identical to the one in Ross' room. Wall opened it and it made a slow metal creak. He crouched and held both sides of the doorway as he entered. I guess it's not that easy to be that big huh. What I first noticed was the darkness inside the room. Not even the light from the corridor could illuminate it. Seeing how Wall reacted to every dark place, I assumed that this was just another normal lightless place and proceeded to walk towards the looming darkness. 

This time oddly enough, Wall slightly raised his arm 60 degrees from his body to block me in my path. He stared intently into the darkness.

G̸̢̨͙̙͆͌̄̅͗̋̈́͝R̴̦͈̯̭̊̒͐͒̀̊ͅA̵̳͍͓͈͊͒̾A̷̹̰͇̪͌͆̈̂Â̶̱̗̫̫̬̚̚Ä̴̟̩̔̄̍͝A̴̘̪̝͈̻̭̳̍͆̒̿̏̌͘A̴͙̼̟̲̲̙͈͛̒̽̄Ä̷̞͍͙́͜ͅA̷̡̮̬͍̣̝̱͊̐̒͛̌A̷̧͙̣͔̠͂͐̋͋͗A̸̧̩͚͙̟̞̰͆̽Ả̴̡̰̺̤̦̫͇̜͌̑̃̈́͂̂͠A̶͎̗͎̳̤̪͌̌̈̏̊͆̕ͅÄ̴̡̜͈̱̗̦́͌̍̔̒͐̂̚͜A̵̜͎͓͂Ä̶͈̙͔̜͕̱͎̙̊̐̒͊̉͝Ȁ̴̢̫̯͕̗̭͍͍̃͒A̷̼̟͐̕A̵̞͍͚̘͈̥̹̞͒̍̎͘!!!!!!!!!!

Suddenly, we heard a sharp high pitched scream coming from a distance in front of us.

We then caught on small but quick steps seemingly heading towards us at a really fast rate. I began to notice a faint figure shaking in the dark. No, It's a humanoid thing scrambling towards us! Wall looks like he's urging me to stay behind him as he stands in front of me. 

The humanoid beast had shriveled up pale skin, seemingly long razor sharp nails, and bloodshot eyes. It ravenously ran towards us on both its limbs like a rabid dog.

Wall tightened its fist and prepared to engage the monster.When suddenly, the monster got seemingly knocked far to its right.

"Another one eh, we're really getting a lot of visitors lately." A soothing soft voice echoed through the darkness. 

Wall lowered his guard and faced what seemed to be another humanoid figure walking towards us from the darkness. He stepped into the light as he moved closer towards us, revealing his appearance. It was a man with a tall stature and a rather fit body. He was wearing a shabby military jacket with a faded gray color. He had black polarized shades. The lower part of his face starting from the nose was covered by a tattered cloth wrapped around his neck. On his shoulder was the strap that helped him carry a seemingly deteriorated wooden rifle. The rifle had a dull bayonet attached to it. 

"I assume this person here probably is fogged out right?" He said as he walked towards me. 

"Fogged out?" I replied.

"Yeah, we call the people who don't know a thing or two about themselves "fogged out". We usually use this room to help fogged out people recall 

their past memories." He answered as he wrapped his arms around my shoulders. 

"So… This place will help me know my identity, right?" I asked while looking at his hand on my left shoulder. 

"Well, technically yes if you passed the test" He answered. 

Test? Will there be some sort of puzzle here? My brain immediately thought of many possible puzzles from simple jigsaw puzzles or maybe even math problems. Oddly enough, I seem to be quite confident in my mathematical abilities despite not knowing anything about myself. 

He let go of me and said: "You just have to move through that dark space over there and the room will do its magic." He then pointed towards the darkness which seemed to close in on me. Maybe it's just my imagination. I stared at it for a while and felt nothing ominous nor strange about it. Unlike a while ago during that incident in the junction.

Before I knew it, Wall was already outside the room. The mysterious person followed him and exited the room as well, leaving me alone beside this looming darkness.

"Anyways, I wish you the best of luck. Hopefully this helps you remember a thing or two about yourself." He cheered in a chill voice as he slowly closed the creaking metal door. 

▅▅■■… Wall, despite looking like he's devoid of emotions, felt like he was also cheering for me.

The door slammed leaving me alone again in a desolate dark void. He said I just have to go through this darkness, so I did. I walked aimlessly hoping to find something. All I could hear was a faint sound of roaring winds which probably was from outside, and my apparent footsteps on this metallic floor. I continued doing this for the next few minutes. The darkness was unchanging. My footsteps were already starting to sound like a goddamned metronome. I'm slowly beginning to feel drowsy all of the sudden. My footsteps weakened and my body felt sore. I think I just fell to the ground. I'll just lay down here for a few minutes. Maybe take a short break? I felt extremely fatigued for some reason. My consciousness begins to leisurely slip away as I close my eyes. It felt really comfortable for some reason… 

I hear water dripping from god knows where. The room is cold but my body feels comfortably warm. It's like I'm in a trance-like state where I'm both awake and asleep at the same time. The ambience feels so cozy for me. The hypnotic sound of the waters dripping alongside the serenade of the roaring wind just helps me relax better. Resting my fatigued body here doesn't sound like a bad idea.