An old man, clutching his throbbing head, opened his blurry eyes. He felt extreme pain in his head and roared in pain, "Stop it, fucking stop it! Arrrghhh!"
After a few seconds of torture, he finally opened his teary eyes and looked at his surroundings.
"Where... where am I? What is this place?"
He found himself inside some kind of hall, but the only difference was the size of the hall. He saw pillars that could easily surpass the mountains, each pillar adorned with unrecognizable symbols and patterns. He couldn't make out the clear symbols as his eyes were still paining from something in the air. He could only see blurry images of his surroundings.
Suddenly, he felt something cold, like water, and when he looked down, he found the floor was submerged in water—a dark black water which reached his ankles.
"What is this place?" he asked himself as he started walking in one direction. He couldn't make any sense of where he was because of the darkness and the constant pain in his eyes and head. He just trusted his instinct and walked in one direction, wherever his legs could take him.
After a few minutes of walking, he reached nowhere. He could not make out the direction, because anywhere he looked, he could only see darkness and these huge pillars. He could not even see the upper ceiling of this place.
"Hello? Is anyone here? Can anyone hear me?" he shouted, but he only heard his own echoes and nothing else. There was an eerie silence in this place. Only his ragged breathing and the sound of water when he moved could be heard. Apart from this—nothing. It's as if he was alone in this place.
Slowly, the complete silence started to creep in.
"Hello? Anyone, please! Anyone is here!! Please reply to me! Where am I? Please, anyone?" he started to shout in desperation, but still, he only got silence in response.
After who knows how much time later, he finally collapsed on his knees and started to cry and shout out of sheer desperation, because he started to even forget who he was. Slowly and steadily, he realized that his memories were getting erased. Not wanting to forget everything and wander aimlessly here in this space, he shouted in desperation.
After his few minutes of desperate cries, suddenly in front of him, five bowl-carrying snake statues appeared. Each bowl was on the head of four snakes facing four directions. The length of the statues reached the height of his waist. Finally, seeing something happening in this eerie space, he felt happiness. The general reaction would be fear, but for him, who had been wandering in this place for who knows how long, this little activity was like a hope—that he was not alone.
"Hahahaha, finally! Finally, someone is here, right? Someone is here! Please, please, let me out of here! Please! I'll do anything! Please, please let me out of this godforsaken place! PLEASE!" he cried again, hoping someone could come and put him out of this misery. He, who knows how many times, had tried to kill himself in this place, but every time he opened his eyes, he found himself exactly where he killed himself. So, he knew dying would not help him escape from here. Because he felt nothing here—no hunger, no thirst, not even the need to pee or poop—nothing. It was as if his body was just frozen in time. He wasn't even aging here.
So now, seeing these statues meant someone was here, and it must be the owner or the residents of this place. So he tried to agitate them, so they could kill him and let him out of this misery.
But again, a complete silence followed after his voice. This time he wanted someone to shout. He madly started to hit his own head on those statues because this silence was becoming more and more overbearing for him. He wanted some noise, or else he would go mad.
The blood splattered everywhere. His flesh pieces scattered everywhere—on the statues and in the water below—but he kept on laughing and bashing his head because he didn't want the silence to come. After a few more hard bashings, he finally collapsed, but when he opened his eyes again, he found himself in front of those same statues.
Why did he think it was the same statues? Because the blood and pieces of his flesh were still on the border and in the bowl. Seeing this, he started to laugh madly. For some reason, seeing this blood and flesh gave him comfort—that he and this silence were not alone. He and this water were not alone. He and these pillars were not alone.
"Haha! I am not alone! Haha! I am not alone!" saying this, he again started to bash his head on those statues, and the same thing repeated for who knows how many times. Slowly, the bowl on which he was bashing his head filled with his blood and flesh, but the man didn't notice this. For him, this bashing was his new hope—a weapon from which he could escape this silence. This haunting silence.
When the blood reached the upper border of the bowl, the snakes below the bowl vanished, and the bowl started to float itself in the air. The old man, after bashing his head, collapsed. As he was collapsing, he noticed the snakes that had disappeared from below. Before he could react, a loud voice rang in his ears.
The noise—which he now didn't recognize—
"The patient is showing signs of movement. Call the doctor, now!"
"Mr. Flake, can you hear us? Mr. Flake, can you hear us? Please try to open your eyes, Mr. Flake!"
Suddenly, hearing these unfamiliar voices, the old man opened his bloodshot eyes and immediately sat straight. He looked at his surroundings and did not find the same dark, damp, silent place where he was.
Seeing the bright light room and some humans like him, he immediately asked, "Where... where am I? Who are you?"
His voice was ragged, his body sweating from dread. The nurse, seeing this, immediately tried to calm him down.
"Mr. Flake, please calm down. You are in a hospital, sir. We are doctors."