A Personal Inferno

Chapter 6

As you step through, you are thankful you didn't fall over yourself like the last time. Your eyes are hazzy from stepping through. As your eys adjust, you are met with a wide open area, thick with freezing mist and smoke that chokes your lungs. Your lips go chapped with the cold. Your nose turns red. "Ffffuck me, I thinkkk my bbbballs have gone back inside me and are ttttouching the back of my throat," you say while your teeth chatter.
"Really? I don't feel the cold at all, my friend, " virgil replies.
You turn to look at him with a look of concussion. But instead of being confussed, you're baffled. Virgil is wearing a lavish large fur coat. He wasn't wearing before any of this nit even when you were awake. "Well no fucking wonder! You're wearing a big fur coat you cunt. How the fuck have you got that?" You ask.
"Remember, I'm not actually here. This is your mind, therefore somthing in your subconscious doesn't want me to be cold, so you imagined it for me. So thank you, my friend. I think I look rather dashing, " he says with a smile on his face.
"Yyyou look like a mmmmammoths ball sack in that. Hhhhow the fuck ddddoes my own mmmmind want to keep only you wwwwarm and not mmmyself?" You reply as your teeth chatter like a typewriter. Virgil shrugs to you. You shake your head with disbelief, uttering to yourself, "fffuck sake, mmmy own mind ffffucking hates me." You both start to walk through the think mist and smoke barely able to see. Your eyes tear up from the sting of the smoke, and then your tears go ice cold, almost freezing.

As you both walk deeper and deeper, you turn to talk to virgil, but as you turn, you can barely able to see him. The mist and smoke is so think you can hardly see his face even though he is but arms length away from you. You go to speak, but you find it difficult as if the breath from your body has been taken from you. As if the smoke is choking your lungs and the mist is freezing them. You drop to your knees, grasping at your throat, trying to breathe. Virgil comes to your side. "Take your time, my friend. You are okay. You are not choking. Take sloooow deep breaths. In from your nose iut through your mouth," he says in his calming voice. You grab him by the shoulder while the other hand is holding your throat. "Breeeeeaaaaaathhhhee" as he gestures and does what he is asking me to do, as if to copy him. You follow his instructions and do what he says, trusting he knows what he is talking about. Your eyes are tearing up, stinging in pain, and your lungs choking with the smoke and almost frozen. You close your eyes and take a massive deep breath in through your nose. You hold it for a couple of seconds and let it out slowly. It worked. After a while, you are able to get on your feet. "Thank you, virgil," you say with gratitude in your voice. Virgil smiles, but before he can say anything, a noise catches both your attentions. It sounds odd as if it was rope being pulled tight. You couldn't put your finger on what it was, but that what it sounded like. Just like in any movie you have seen, if someone was squeezing or tightening a rope. You realise it's coming from above you both, and you slowly look up. What you see is something you have never seen before. Ropes above you like vines on a tree spreading out everywhere like a spiders Web in all directions, and what was hanging from them gave you a sinking feeling in your chest. Nooses, everywhere. But all different shapes and sizes. But all in that very recognizable shape. You saw ropes, cables, football scarves, ties and belts. A vast canopy of slip knots. "Hhhhollyyy fuuuuuuckk," you say.
"I think I know what you have to face next, my friend," Virgil replies.
"Mmmhmm yeah, mmmme too." As you look all around you.

As you look above, you see something. Lights, flickering on and off in the distance. You raise your hand and point in the direction you see them. "Tttthat way," you say. Virgil looks in the direction of where you are pointing and agrees by nodding to you, and you both start walkinging. As you both get closer to the mysterious light, the air starts getting thicker and harder to breathe, and your eyes become even more irritated. As you pause for a moment to catch your breath and rub your eyes, virgil turns to you and asks. "Are you okay? Are you still cold? Do you want a hug, my friend? It might warm you up." You turn to look at virgil, tears still in your eyes and quickly reply "Hahaha fuck of ya walking talking scrotum, am all good. my eyes are stinging like fuck and i feel like i can't breath". Virgil chuckles patting you on the shoulder. "Shall we carry on my friend?" he says. You both continue to walk, your lips are frozen and chapped. Your eyes glazed over with tears. You are getting colder and colder as you get closer to the light. Becoming more out of breath with each step. Then you see it, the mysterious light.