Tell-Tale Tower

Purgatory

***CHAPTER ONE***
~Tower Twenty-Seven~
¤First Floor¤
"HELLOOOOOO, CLIMBERS!" The voice blasted through the room, like that of a game show host delivering his opening line to the audience. It was the kind of sudden shout next to your ear that would awaken you violently and threaten to impair your hearing, as it did for the man sleeping on the couch. He sat up bitterly, and blinked a few times to adjust his eyes.The room's interior was pure white.  The floor, the couch he slept on, the ceiling, all the same shade of white. All except the other people strewn around him on the ground in lumps of different shapes and sizes, all stirring and waking up to the sound of the mysterious loud voice.
Where was he?
Who was he?
He couldn't answer either of those questions and it bothered the hell out of him.
"You're probably wondering" the game show voice continued on "who you are and how you got here. 'Why me?' You might come to ask. 'Why this predicament?'. Luckily, I have all the answers you need... but I'm not giving them to you!"
There was a low and panicked murmuring all across the room. People looked around in confusion, some of them checking their hands as though to make sure they're real, others hugging their legs like a cold child. The man on the couch went to look at his own hands, and let out a scream.
Breathing heavily, he looked down at his stub of a right arm and looked around in panic, not knowing what he expected to find. His own severed arm? Perhaps a prosthetic of some sort?
He found nothing but white and soon realized he was being stared at by the other people in the room. He could tell they were just as confused as he was. He took a deep breath and concentrated, trying in vain to recall anything he could about himself and the others around him. Until he could remember a single thing about himself, he decided to call himself Rite. The voice continued.
"All sixteen of you are now a part of my game. And to win the game, you must figure out why you are here yourself. A puzzle! Fun, right? I think so."
Rite, as he went by in his own head now, stood up and stalked slowly around the room, looking for a window, a door, or anything that would resemble an exit.
As soon as he turns around, he is astonished to find that the room stretches farther than he can see in front of him, as though they're truly in a long tunnel of sorts.
"If you don't want to play with me, and I have considered this with a heavy heart, I will let you go. The exit is there."
Rite jumps as a section of the wall to his left opens up to reveal an open road with a sign that reads "Santa Fe city limits". A breeze blew in from the outside, bringing with it an atmosphere of clear discomfort and apprehension.
"If you would like to leave, however, please do so now. You will not get another opportunity like this. I will give you a thirty second window to decide."
Silence fell upon the room, which Rite was starting to see more as a long hallway with minor luxuries. People began to exchange nervous glances.
A boy who looked to be no older than sixteen abruptly stood.
"So, what? We're all just gonna trap ourselves here? I'm getting out. This is so sick." He walked to the opening in the wall and no one stopped him. He hesitated and then stepped out onto the street, then braced himself, as though he expected to be riddled with bullets on the spot.
He turned back towards us, a look of amazement on his face.
"I remember... my name's John..." he grinned and started to laugh. "My name's John! I REMEMBER! I REMEMBER EVERYTHING! HAHAHA!"
Rite was tempted, same as everyone else, to go out there with him. But some gut feeling was stopping him.
John's laughter slowly faded and his smile with it. His expression turned into one of horror and his excited chants of "I remember" turned into quiet whispers of "what have I done...?"
John ran back toward the group but was stopped from entering by a barrier that no one else could see. He banged wildly on it, his face tearing up like a scared child's. Rite took a half step back nervously.
"Oh God no... what have I done? Let me in! LET ME IN! PLEASE, DON'T LEAVE ME OUT HERE!"
John began to scream in agony and his skin began to grow grayer and rot away, until Rite saw his muscle, and then his bone, and then... and then nothing.
John was gone.
Rite just stood there in shock. He had just watched someone die in an unimaginable way. He practically jumped out of his skin when he heard the game show voice laughing, like someone who's just heard a really good joke.
"Well, your thirty seconds are up! Whew, I always love seeing that! It just tickles me, you know?" The wall shut again, cutting off the breeze and bringing the entire room back to that pure and almost welcoming shade of white that it was before.
"Now, now, don't be sad. There is another way for you to get home, without suffering the fate that our beloved John did. And that's where our lovely puzzle comes in! To get home safely and back to your previous lives, you must get to the twenty-seventh floor of the tower you're currently in. To do this, you must go through the challenges on each floor to find the elevator to the next floor. But don't think you can cheat, now! Each elevator will vanish after taking them to the next floor up. And some may require you to find a key on that floor in order to activate them. A few disclaimers before you begin your journey. Obviously, I'm not liable for injuries or death, because what the hell are you going to do about it? You will encounter some scary obstacles, but it's nothing you aren't capable of handling; I'm at least fifty percent sure of that fact. Oh, and here's a freebie! The elevator to the second floor is all the way down the hall. Remember, climbers: the reason you're here is to find out the reason you're here. Happy trails!"
There was a click and the room was once again left in silence. Rite looked down the seemingly endless hall, and wondered if there even was an elevator and how much of what the voice said was true. He looked at the room around him and realized that it reminded him of a waiting room.
Moreover, it reminded him of purgatory.