The Second Stage

A world unseen dies over and over. It shrieks at a pitch that you cannot hear. It rots with a stench that you will never quite know. It isn't a place meant for you and I, it is merely a bank for the dead and dying; a vault of visceral agony. It's function, origin and purpose are as cryptic and chilling as the vengeful spirits whose claws scratch and teeth rattle just beyond the thick, putrid mist that seeps over its endless surface. Yet, through all the horrifying and inexplicable unknowns, this place has one certainty: it doesn't take kindly to guests.

Meredith Haynes fell into The Second Stage during a routine surgery she was monitoring. She scrambled through it's empty expanses and fled from the decaying demonic mockery of a human being. With good fortune and great agility for a woman her age, she escaped with both her life and sanity, a miracle should miracles exist. Anyone of sound mind would never return, and spend the rest of their days in the company of friends and nights in the company of bright lights. However, Meredith met someone she never expected to see again, someone that might remove her from the ranks of those well advised souls that would never return. Now, in the days of silence thereafter, her mind wanders back to the one thing that might convince her to return, the one thing that will convince her to return. But what Meredith doesn't yet understand, is that the Second Stage has no windows, no entrances and no exits, for it accepts you when it wishes and releases you when it's finished.