It’s been a long time since I last sat down and posted an update here. Maybe too long and nobody will care, which is fine, but if you do you can check out my previous entries above. I would’ve loved to have posted updates earlier, but life gets in the way. I’ve spent this time collecting more stories and at the end of this one, I’ll give more of an explanation as to why these posts are so few and far between. I wanted to start focusing mainly on stories that fit a pattern I started to see. Not to invalidate or ignore the traumas of others who’ve suffered through these same experiences but there are just so many out there that I need to narrow it down just so I at least can get a better understanding of this. As for my personal life, it’s still rocky, but on track. I won’t dwell too long on it but my training has continued as has the repair job with my marriage, yes, marriage again, thankfully. I tried to keep my story a secret from him but he found my original post and put 2 and 2 together. He’s understanding and sympathetic and that helps, but there are still the good days and the bad days. The nights filled with sleep and the ones where the backs of my eyelids are lit up with blood and terror and the darkness is permeated by screams of pain. But it’s getting better.
I digress.
Like I said before I’m still keeping an eye on headlines, news articles, rumors, I don’t know, just anything that at all resembles what Isaiah and I went through. That’s where I found Polly. I was looking through random news articles when I saw a story only a few hours away from me about a young girl who was revived by EMTs, not unlike yours truly. I was of course immediately interested. After a few days I was able to get in contact with her parents and told them I was putting together a study about what people see and experience after death and after a while, they agreed to let me speak to her. In hindsight, I feel a little bad for how I framed my interview, but I mean that was at least somewhat accurate, maybe just not the medium. But anyway I hopped on the road and made my way to the hospital she was being treated at, but her parents stopped me at the door. Not to get into it too much, basically, they had found my previous posts and thought I was exploiting their daughter’s accident.
I didn’t want to argue and push too much due to the circumstances and her still being in pretty bad shape so I tried to explain as best I could what exactly I was trying to do, but I knew they weren’t having it. I was about to leave but a small voice called out to let me in. Her parents looked at me angrily and talked to Polly, returning a few minutes later to let me in. I hesitated a bit, but walked slowly into the room to see a young girl, who couldn’t have been much older than Henry, lying there staring at me with a weak smile on her face. She asked her parents to leave and struggled to right herself. “It’s good to meet you.” She coughed out. I gave a small smile and took a seat next to the bed.
I think she saw me looking at the wires connected to her and smiled, “Is this what they had you on too? Don’t worry I read your posts after you called my parents. And I really wanted to talk to you.” I briefly met her eyes and gave another smile, but I had to turn my attention back to all the equipment that they had her hooked up to. It was quite a bit more than I had and it looked pretty serious.
“Are you sure you’re up to this? I can’t even imagine what you’re going through right now.” I asked, she was clearly in a bad way.
“I need to.” She said defiantly.
“Ok then,” I said smiling, pulling out my recorder, “you can just tell me everything you remember Polly, this isn’t really a huge back and forth.”
“It’s Dorothy actually, but ok.” She said, taking a few deep breaths. “I’d rather not get into what happened before if that’s ok?” She said quietly, looking away.
“No problem,” I said with what I hoped was a reassuring smile, “Just tell me whatever you’re comfortable with.”
-———-
Well, after the… accident, happened I was standing where you and that man were of course, the sky and the warmth and all of that. I’d just skip this part because I don’t want to bore you with the details here, but one thing was different. I never really felt the peace that you guys described. It was beautiful sure, but it never really felt right, and I certainly didn’t feel like I was “home”. I don’t know what it was, maybe I’m too young or something, but something about it didn’t feel right from the beginning.
I couldn’t even turn around before a horrible cold completely grabbed hold of me. I fell to my knees shivering and had to ball up in a desperate attempt to keep warm. Whatever brief feeling of Heaven I had was ripped away and I hadn’t even turned to face the gates. I wasn’t surprised, I just… I wasn’t surprised.
Anyway, I finally managed to turn myself and I was surrounded by snow. Like, feet of snow all around me and more being blown in through the wide-open gate. I didn’t feel some force pulling me in, I didn’t feel dread or sadness, I didn’t even really feel fear. I just felt cold and confused. Maybe this insane cold had just overshadowed all those forces, but whatever it was, I only able to just sit there shaking, staring at the wall of snow flowing in through the open gate and beyond into what looked like an unending desert of white.
My body would numb and then heat would jolt back through me over and over every minute or so until I finally mustered up the courage to get up and walk through those gates. I knew I was dead, so I really figured there was no more waiting. Whatever was waiting for me was going to be there whether I went now or delayed it. The movement at least seemed to eliminate some of the numbing of my body so I just had to deal with the cold that was like knives on any of my exposed skin. It was something that I knew would have killed me.
My eyes stung and teared, the tears froze to my face, only making things worse. It hurt to blink as I could feel my eyeballs freezing over. I took a second to stop and look around after realizing I had just been wandering for a while. I wish I could describe anything more than the cold, I really do, but there was nothing. The snow fell lightly from the sky but the intense winds made it swirl violently, blocking my vision for anything more than a few feet in any direction. There were small mounds here and there that I could see, again, I assume, from the snow being pushed around. But besides that there was white. I didn’t see or hear anything… I didn’t hear anything. The winds were silent. It was like what I imagine being in space is like, you see all this stuff happening around you but it’s completely silent. I think it only made things worse.
I turned to even potentially go back through the gate, regretting the decision to trudge through this wasteland, but the gate was gone, or at least not visible to me anymore. The silence was surreal and for a while I forced my way forward again, knowing there had to be something, someone out here, and then I stopped dead in my tracks. I couldn’t tell if I was hallucinating or if the swirling snow was fucking with my vision, but I swear I saw a shadow through the white out of the corner of my eye. I shot around, or I thought I did, but I was so frozen that it probably took me a few seconds to even move. I squinted to desperately see anything through the snow but spun again seeing the same shadow out of my other eye. My heart was racing now, which actually warmed me up a bit, but I started hyperventilating and panicking.
I fell to the ground, deep into the snow, and broke down. I sobbed uncontrollably in my hands, each tear freezing and sending a shot of pain through my body. I don’t know what came over me, but the situation was pretty overwhelming. The numbing/heat cycle returned, each change making my body twitch with pain. I thought I was done. The snow flowed over my back more and more, the numb feeling started lasting a little longer than the heat, and I was ok with it. I gave up too quick and I hate myself for it I really do. I barely gave myself a chance to find anything out there before accepting my second death.
Like I said I was fine staying there, I was overwhelmed and in pain, but out of nowhere an ear-piercing whistle rang through the silence and seemed to melt the snow and ice that was slowly claiming me. I shot up, actually fast this time, and looked around, but still saw nothing through the snow, and the silence was back. I shakily pushed myself to my feet and tried to continue on in the direction that I had been going, but everything looked the same and my footprints were gone as soon as I created them. So I guessed and pushed through the thigh-high snow, straining my eyes for any shadows and my ears for any glimpse of the whistle.
I was focusing so little on where I was going that I didn’t even realize when I stepped on a particularly strange piece of ice. I felt something snap and jumped back, looking down to see a man curled up in a ball with his head between his knees, not moving. I stood there in horror realizing this was almost what I had accepted for myself and had to hold in my vomit when I saw a severed foot a few inches away from him, knowing I had just done that. I quickly continued on my way, not checking if he was alive or whatever death looks like here, but not being able to stomach looking at him or the foot any longer.
I paid much more attention to the ground as I went along and realized some of the mounds that I assumed were snow, were people buried, unable to go on anymore. I caught the eyes of a head that was sticking out of a mound. I was paralyzed looking at the pain and clear confusion behind them. They also followed me as I walked and that sent an extra chill down my spine. I couldn’t break eye contact with them but as soon as I did I stopped in my tracks again. Up ahead of me was a giant shadow. If I had to guess it was some kind of bear, but something was clearly off. First, it was gigantic, probably elephant size, and second, the way it moved just wasn’t natural. It almost seemed like the body was new and it had to get its footing. I don’t know if that even makes sense or if it was my frozen mind making things up.
Either way, I couldn’t take my eyes off the silhouette. I backed away as quickly as I could as it raised itself onto its back legs, but I stumbled and took my eyes off of it for a second, and when I looked back it was gone. My heart raced as I sat in the snow scanning the vacuum around me, the only noise my panicked breathing. I heard the whistle again from behind me and took off running toward where the silhouette had been, assuming the bear or whatever the hell that thing was had gotten behind me when I fell.
My feet pounded through the snow, ice stung my eyes as I flew through, not knowing where I was going or when to stop. The knee-deep snow made it almost impossible to really run, but I knew I couldn’t stop. After much too long I started to finally feel tired from the pushing through the snow but as I slowed down I glanced to my side to see a shadow keeping stride with me and sped up again. I didn’t hear the bear breathing or running but that was worse because I had no idea how close it really was with my limited view. I swung my head to the other side to just potentially change course and saw another massive bear-like shape even with me. Tears streamed from my eyes again as my legs began to burn and I knew I couldn’t keep up the running much longer, but as far as I knew it was the only thing keeping me alive. I swung my head back around to look at the first bear but as I did my foot caught something and sent me flying to the ground.
I looked back, knowing I’d see a body sticking out of the powder. It was a kid a little younger than me, but I didn’t have time, I feel like shit but I didn’t have time. I looked around desperately looking for the shadows, but they were nowhere to be seen. Suddenly, seemingly out of nowhere one of the bear shapes appeared in front of me, accompanied by the same whistle, louder than ever. I could feel it rattling around my head as I jumped to my feet and went to run back to where I had been but stopped dead.
Between me and the frozen kid was a little girl smiling curiously at me. A chill ran through my body, a different kind of chill than what the weather provided. I stood there frozen, staring at her and for a second completely forgot the bear. I shot around, but there was nothing. Slowly I turned back and she was only about three feet away from me. I could get a good look at her face now and I wish I hadn’t. Something about her just wasn’t right. Her entire face seemed to shimmer and twitch slightly as if something was glitching and I honestly couldn’t tell if she was 12 or in her mid-80s. That little smile never left her face, nothing malicious or even warm, just a curious smirk.
“Hello,” She said sweetly, “I’m Talaaq (I hope I spelled that right), what’s your name.”
I was too stunned and uncomfortable to speak and just continued to stare. The girl didn’t seem affected though and just continued to smile. She stepped closer and I gasped as I realized her eyes were a bright shade of red. I’m not sure how I missed it at first, maybe the whipping snow or shock, I don’t know. Her smile wavered so slightly at my gasp that if I hadn’t been hyperfocused I probably wouldn’t have noticed it.
“I know a place that’s warm.” Again as sweet as can be as she reached out a little hand for me to take. I hesitated. Not sure what kind of trick this was, but I didn’t have much more choice and she seemed confident. Also, the disappearing and reappearing bears weren’t something that I was too keen on dealing with by myself. I took her hand gently and tried to pull back but her hand tightened around mine in an almost bone-breaking grip. Her skin wasn’t the smooth, soft skin I was expecting. It felt cracked and broken and dead, for lack of a better word or description, it’s what you’d expect a zombie’s skin to feel like.
I let out a yelp as she squeezed, but she didn’t seem to notice or care as she joyfully turned around and skipped merrily over the frozen boy, whose eyes I tried desperately to avoid. Now with her back to me, I could see 2 shriveled, black wings fit unevenly onto her back ripping through the back of the tattered rags that she wore. I immediately averted my eyes. Her grip was vice-like so I knew there was nothing I could do right now. I just wanted to get where we were going and not have anything else to scare the shit out of me about this kid. She moved too easily through the snow and I tried as best I could to follow her path as it got deeper and deeper until it was well past my waist and up around Talaaq’s chest, not that she seemed to care of course.
I decided not to focus on her anymore and kept a lookout for the bears. The winds seemed to be getting worse though there was still no sound and I could feel myself constantly looking back and forth until in front of me I heard, “There’s no need for that Dorothy.” I stopped but felt myself being dragged by the little girl a few feet without breaking stride before I continued walking myself.
Had I told her my name? I didn’t think I’d said anything this whole time, but I was so cold and confused and scared and a million other things that I didn’t know what to believe anymore. “No need for what.” I finally blurted out.
“The bears won’t bother you while you’re with me.” She said matter-of-factly. Another of those weird chills went through my body. For some reason the way she said that wasn’t very reassuring.
“W..where are we going,” I asked, still looking for the bears.
She took a second to answer. “Somewhere warm. My brother Nanouk is very excited to meet you.” She glanced back at me and for a split second I swear to god her face was completely sideways on her head, but then it was back to its normal glitchy self. That split second of even thinking I saw that was enough for me to go completely numb and unable to walk, though she had no problem dragging me further until I could see what looked like a small igloo up ahead.
There were hundreds of the little mounds of snow surrounding the igloo and everything in me was telling me to kick her in the back and run, but as I was working up the nerve one of the giant shadows flew past us and disappeared behind the igloo, Talaaq didn’t say anything, but I thought I was going to have a heart attack as I waiting for it to re-emerge on the other side. But it didn’t. Instead, a smaller, human-sized shadow came into view and then entered the igloo, a bright red glow now emanating from within.
I was shaking now, and not from the cold. I tried to wriggle my hand out of her grip as she calmly walked along but it was no use. I pulled back as hard as I could but was only met with a searing pain in my shoulder as the bone began to pull out of its socket. She didn’t even turn to acknowledge my escape attempt. I was like a baby squirming in the arms of an adult, but like, an adult gorilla, that’s how strong she was. There’s nothing I could’ve done and now my arm was completely useless so what little hope I had was even more diminished.
We got to the mouth of the igloo and I could feel the warmth and smell of fire billowing out. It felt amazing. My body thawed before I was even inside and something calming and familiar seemed to take me over. I all but floated down through the entrance guided by Talaaq and wasn’t shocked or afraid to see the young ragged-looking red-eyed boy sitting by the fire staring at me with an expression that I could only describe as hungry. Talaaq guided me down to a spot across from who I assumed was Nanouk in a daze. I dreamily stared at him as he returned my gaze without speaking.
We sat in silence as Talaaq positioned any oversized pot over the fire. Finally breaking the silence she began, “Please ignore Nanouk. He’s just hungry.” I glanced over to her, still in a haze. “We haven’t gotten much fresh food since coming back to this place.” Thinking back, that sentence should’ve upset or alarmed me, but something about this place just made me not even question it for a second.
I just contently looked back to Nanouk whose eyes were still fixed and narrowed on me through the flames. I met his eyes and wasn’t alert enough to look away. His red eyes seemed to hypnotize me further with whatever else was happening in this place was. I distantly heard Talaaq continue, “I am sorry that we had to meet up here and not at our former home. We had to change our diet a bit coming up here.”
“That’s ok,” I said with a smile, the words not really meaning anything to me as I continued to stare into Nanouk’s eyes, my gaze only broken every so often by Talaaq adding more ingredients to the pot.
“You’re a sweet girl and I wish you could’ve seen this place before the fall. We ruled here and only had to feed because we were trapped on Earth. It…changed us. This whole place used to be Elysium, it was paradise before our brothers and sisters forced their way back. Elysium was just another place like Niflheim or..um… I don’t know, Canada since that’s where we were on Earth.” She finished with a small sigh and a chuckle.
Nanouk and I continued our staring contest in silence as Talaaq finished up whatever preparations she was making. My vision began to blur, but for a few seconds, Nanouk’s face was completely sideways on his head. I narrowed my eyes and tried to angle my head to meet his. I wasn’t startled or afraid at this change, just more curious with a sort of drunken confusion I guess. We continued at this new angle for a bit before Talaaq smacked her brother in the back of the head and his face returned to normal. I felt a small smile creep across my own face as I returned to my original position. It seems fucked now but I think at the time I thought it was some kind of game.
My concentration was broken for a moment by a dull, pinchlike pain in my left arm. I dreamily looked over to see Talaaq crouched next to me, holding a knife dripping with something red. I smiled at her and looked down at my arm to see most of the skin gone from my inner forearm as Talaaq tossed it into the pot. I focused on the arm for a second longer, knowing I should be feeling something, knowing I should be in pain or afraid, but there was nothing. I just smiled at Talaaq again who was looking at me with an expression I didn’t quite understand. A mixture of sadness and curiosity I guess.
“Is this Heaven?” I asked her in a daze, ignoring the distant tickle of blood running down my hand.
“It used to be.” She answered with a sad smile followed by another pinch as I knew more skin was gone, but I just kept smiling as something heavier splashed into the pot and the tickle was gone.
Talaaq opened her mouth to say something when she stopped and swung around. I hadn’t heard anything but that may have been due to my condition. The 3 of us sat in silence for another moment when out of nowhere a too long and too skinny arm shot in through the entrance of the igloo and began swinging its massive clawed hand around the space wildly. The fingers had to be over a foot long with another foot for nail at the end. The pot and Nanouk were violently thrown against the wall of the igloo as Talaaq tackled me to the ground just as one of the nails dug into my chest and tore a line from shoulder to shoulder.
I let out a bloodcurdling scream as all my feelings flooded back and all the pain I had experienced hit me at once. I fell to the ground and hugged my chest as blood seeped out and upon seeing my lack of a left hand for the first time let out another scream and could feel tears bursting from my eyes. I lay there sobbing and could hear Talaaq yelling at Nanouk in a language I didn’t know. I was spun onto my back with her over me and she began repeating something that I again didn’t understand in my ear. My pain began to fade, but it wasn’t like before. I could still feel the pain and everything else it was just like a blanket had been thrown over the top to mask it. I calmed down and my tears eventually dried up and I was left staring at Talaaq’s sideways face smiling at me as she pinned me to the ground.
She let me go enough for me to sit up and see that the clawed hand and Nanouk were both gone. I knew she thought I was numbed enough again so I tried as best I could to play into it and gave her another smile which caused hers to grow bigger and warmer.
She leaned in and kissed my forehead and I tried with all my remaining might to not shudder from the feeling of that vertical mouth on my skin. She pulled back, “I’ll be right back, warm up by the fire some more.” She said with a smile, before standing and hurrying out of the entrance.
As soon as she left I heard a roar and sickening crunch and squishing sound followed by the sound of a struggle. I forced myself, shaking, to my feet and made my way to the entrance, hesitating as I felt the cold coming in, breaking through whatever Talaaq had done to me. I took a few more deep breaths and then climbed down through the entrance and out into the cold.
I heard the scuffle to my right and without looking took off the to left as fast as I could get my body to go. I could feel the cold stinging my body just like before as I ran, but I didn’t care I just needed to get far away before the pain that I knew was coming back returned to my hand and chest. Against all better judgment, I shot my head around as I ran to see what was happening and saw an impossibly tall, skinny figure locked in a fight with those 2 polar bear creatures. The figure had to be close to 20 feet tall with arms that hung down almost to the ground. I assumed the polar bears to somehow be Talaaq and Nanouk or related to them in some way but I didn’t have time to think as the figure sent one flying through the igloo with a sweep of its arm. I just turned back and ran.
I could slowly hear the commotion behind me fade away, but I knew it wasn’t enough as a dull pain was already beginning in my chest. Then just like that, I was thrust back into silence, the only sound my own pants and small cries of pain as my feelings returned slowly.
A scream left my throat as pain exploded into my left arm and I fell to the ground, but I had to keep going. I grabbed my left arm with my right and squeezed as hard as I could, trying to do anything to somehow cut off the pain as I got back up to speed. Faintly and getting less faint at a startling pace I heard grunting and panting that sounded like a bear, accompanied by a heavy gallop. Terrified I turned my head to see the elongated figure charging at me on all fours through the snow like it was nothing. I turned and ran, knowing it was fruitless as the hungry grunts and heavy steps grew nearer and nearer. And when I thought it was right on top of me the grunts were replaced by a high pitch…laugh? I couldn’t focus on it though as pain shot through my body and I looked down to see a long nail sticking through my back and out the front of my chest.
The creature carried me like that for a while, I’m not sure how long as I kept going in and out of consciousness. My body definitely wanted to pass out or go into shock but something was keeping me from doing that so I felt every step that thing took with me as its sharp nail slowly carved its way higher up my chest from my weight. Eventually, we came to a dark hole in the ground, seemingly straight down, but the creature lowered me down and forward into the darkness. I felt the nail ripped back out, which hurt almost as much as it going in as my body had already begun to heal around it, and something was tied around my ankles. Then before I knew it my legs were pulled out from under me and I slammed my head on the ground before being pulled up to hang upside down. I stayed like that for a while in the pitch black, the blood from all my wounds dripped down my face and I could hear it hitting the stone floor and soon it sounded like it was pooling.
The only other sound was the creature moving around in the darkness. It was freezing in here, not at all like Talaaq and Nanouk’s igloo. I shook violently waiting for anything to happen before a dim light started at the far end of the space and then slowly illuminated the cave or whatever. I couldn’t tell exactly what the light was but it looked like some kind of little creature or maybe a few of them, trapped in a jar? I’m not really sure, I couldn’t really take my eyes off the giant…thing, crouched next to the jar. All the breath went out of me as I stared at the thing. It couldn’t even fit within the high ceilings of the cave and watched the creatures in the jar with what seemed like a childlike amusement. The creature’s skin was a light blue and white like it was frozen and it had long black and gray hair down its back. It looked up from the jar and looked like it smiled at me, or whatever passes for a smile as it showed hundreds of needle-like teeth that sat below pale blue eyes.
I squirmed and shook trying to free myself as it basically crawled to me pushing other things hanging from the ceiling as it went. It took me a second but I realized they were frozen bodies. There were dozens of them, all with a frozen pool of red under them and their bodies looked like they were introduced to a weedwhacker. I started to panic even more as I struggled, still scanning the room to see if any of the figures were still alive. I didn’t have time though as the creature was face to face with me, looking at me with the wonder of a child looking at a puppy for the first time. It gave me another toothy “smile” and then reached up towards my midsection. For a second it started to…tickle me. I was shocked and confused, but then the nails started digging into my skin and I could feel blood pouring out of me.
I began to scream as blood ran down into my mouth and that was met with the same shrill laughter I had heard before emanating from the creature like he thought we were playing. I screamed and cried louder and his laugh only grew more and more until I didn’t have the strength to scream anymore as I began to choke on my blood.
It didn’t stop though. The laughing stopped but the “tickling” only got more intense as the thing dug deeper and deeper into my body. I can’t even describe it other than to say there’s a reason our bodies go into shock or we pass out or die. We’re not meant to feel that. The creature seemed to be almost through my entire body and I think I felt it touch my spine before I was falling through the air and landed on my back. I was looking up at the cave ceiling and in my horror realized the lower half of my body was still hanging, being “tickled” by the thing who looked angry that I wasn’t laughing along anymore.
-———-
The young girl was drenched in tears and sweat as I ran my hand through her hair trying to calm her down. “It’s ok Polly, we’re done it’s ok.” I held her and rocked back and forth until the shaking and tears began to slow. “Thank you.”
“I’m sorry,” She sniffed out, “It’s just still so real. I still hear that laugh in my dreams and those faces…I see them every time I close my eyes.”
I sat there trying to comfort her for another half an hour or so before she fell asleep in my arms.
I met with Polly a few weeks ago and luckily she was just released from the hospital with a clean bill. I assume she’s going to need therapy going forward like we all will, but at least the healing can start somewhere. I still touch base with her every so often just to make sure everything’s still going well, but for now, that’s really all I can do.
I wanted to highlight Polly’s story though because it was another mention of “Elysium”. There wasn’t anything crazy mentioned about it, but the fact that Talaaq felt it was important enough to mention at all makes me want to keep an eye on it and maybe Niflheim if I hear anything else mentioning that. This and Isaiah’s story make me think that these are going to be the places to be when we eventually bite it so I want to really only focus on stories that mention them going forward. This could be the hope we need, or not, but it’s something at least. I’ll update soon.