"I could have sworn....What could I have sworn? I can't remember. What can't I remember? OH. I died. So this place is...-"

"-Not heaven actually."

I stand in a room that seems like my childhood bedroom. Everything is in it's place, put away, even though nothing was ever in it's place until long after I moved out. But the window is a massive aquarium built into the wall, and all of the clothes in my closet fit my body which is younger than what seemed like just moments ago, but far older than the last time I lived in my parents house. I'm maybe twenty five now. And there are all these strange...Sphere with words I cannot read, but I can understand them.

"Those are bubbles. They represent your greater mental state, but, let's deal with all that later. My name is Kai, You'll be living here, so we're like roommates. I'll show you around."

An outstretched hand. A quiet ache in their eyes. Such ancientness. It smells like parchment, it tastes like the colour yellow. Gentle, present, watching. I feel silly in front of this seemingly ordinary person, with such an intense aura to them, like if Gordon Ramsey made beans on toast.

"I...Y yeah. Thanks."

I barely pay attention to the tour, looking at the bubbles floating around Kai. The biggest is helpful. But it's red. Deep. Like a scar. An angry note, like wringing freshly baked bread between your hands. Little bubbles that seem like thoughts, or maybe something smaller than that, unconscious nuggets of partial thoughts, but I can barely keep up with them as Kai gives me a tour. I only notice they've turned around after slamming into them and toppling over, but they catch us both easily.

" Whoah there, You okay? Careful."

They pause and set me back on my own two feet with a gentle smile at my flustered embarrassed apology.

"Anyway, there's not much in this common area, but if you wander down a corridor or two you can get lost pretty easy. This place is infinite after all. I mean, what else would you expect from what is essentially purgatory."

WAIT. WHAT?

"So yeah, that's the tour, let me go get the others, There are only four others right now, you're the youngest, and I'm the oldest right now. Kara is only two hundred, and she's from your near future I think, so you two might have some fun things to talk about so you don't slowly go insane. We don't want anything bad to happen, haha!"

WAIT. WHAT?