Departed Memories

Chapter 1- In the Parking Garage

The Man

His eyes blinked open to a void of nothingness. All around him, a darkness unlike any other swarmed him, attempting to suffocate him. The man blinked for a couple seconds, hoping to see anything, but did not prevail. The darkness refused to budge, denying him any chance of seeing his surroundings. He thrust his arms out, colliding with the roof of his capsule quickly. By his judgement, it was approximately six inches or so, not leaving him with very much room. The material of the top felt like a hard plastic with a texture similar to leather, something which seemed familiar to him.

He moved his arms towards his sides, feeling some sort of scratchy carpeting. It wasn't quite soft, yet soft enough to feel somewhat comfortable. Next to him were walls of a similar texture to that of the ceiling of the capsule, each roughly eight inches away. He was lying in a fetal position on his side, which was only slightly comfortable. He could kick out his feet just the slightest before they bumped into the other edge of this pod. Clearly, he was much too large for whatever he was in.

The man took a deep breath and gagged, finally noticing a rancid smell. It was similar to that of the scent of meat left in a hot car on a summer day. He definitely needed to get out. It felt constricting to be in here. Not only did a lack of fresh air begin to asphyxiate him, but the temperature felt sweltering. Easily close to one hundred degrees fahrenheit, he could feel beads of sweat trickling down the side of his face, delicately dropping into the rough carpeting below. If he didn't get out, he knew he would overheat.

His heartbeat picked up as a feeling of dread filled him. It was overwhelming, he couldn't see, could hardly breathe. He wasn't sure what he was touching. His senses felt useless against this prison. With the gradual increase of his heart rate, his mind began to race at the possibility of not being able to escape. He didn't want to die here, wherever he was. He took a deep breath and coughed, feeling a sharp pain on his side. His other side felt numb from laying in the fetal position. The man assumed he'd been here for a while.

He began to violently kick at the surfaces around him, hoping something would give way. Third time was the charm, when he kicked at the ceiling of the capsule and it gave way to a blindingly bright fluorescent glare. All he could see was a pale stream of light that felt like daggers in his eyes and brain. It disoriented him, causing him to tumble out of whatever he was in and onto a very hard surface. Another sharp pain ran through his shoulder as he collided with the ground beneath. He closed his eyes to subdue the throbbing in his mind and took a deep breath. The man took a moment to savor the fresh air, which still had a slight scent of sewage. Frankly it was still better than inside the capsule, but it wasn't like the air he loved to breathe when he was-

When I was what?

The man shook his head and opened his eyes. His corneas had finally adjusted to the brash white light of the fluorescent bulbs, but that wasn't his focus. He had a memory on the tip of his tongue, but it had just sizzled away like a dying firework. One second he saw it, then it was gone.

"When I was little? Where was it?" It was a small memory, but he felt a sense of frustration that he couldn't remember it. There was clearly a pleasant story tied to it. Why couldn't he recollect what happened? The man tried to rack his brain for answers and found none. In fact, he found nothing else there. His brain felt like a dried up well, empty of the plentiful memories which had once inscribed the story of his life. Hell, he couldn't even remember his name. Robert, John, Anthony. The names listed themselves in his brain, rolling through like the end credits of a movie, yet none of them felt right.

The man bit his lip and furrowed his brows. The lack of answers to his hundreds of questions angered him. He didn't know where he was, he didn't know who he was. From the looks of it, he was alone. All around him, a vast expanse of concrete was laid out like a wasteland. He could tell it was a parking garage, but there wasn't a car in sight, except for one. He turned around and saw the small white car from which he had emerged. Its trunk door remained wide open, revealing pools of sweat from his time inside.