The Pyle Inside

“Error.”

Jonah awoke. What?

“Error,” repeated the flat, lifeless voice. “Error.”

What is this? What’s going on?

“Error.”

Who am I? Where am I? How did I get here?

“Error.”

Jonah looked around. A white abyss stretched around him in every direction, except, as it turned out, down. What is this place? What am I standing on?

“Error.”

He glanced upwards. No sun. No sky. No clouds. Just an empty white eternity. He was confused by his thoughts. What is the sun? What is the sky? What are clouds? Why did I think I would see them, up there?

“Error.”

What is ‘seeing’? He looked at his hands. Wait. Hands? He shook them vigorously. Yep, they’re mine. He moved each finger, mystified by their compliance to his mental commands. They do whatever I want them to do! He tried to tell one to bend backwards, to no avail. Hmm. Well, not everything.

“Error.”

He looked down at his feet. Feet. Yes, feet. He started walking, keeping his gaze at his feet. They, too, obeyed his desires, but like his fingers, they had their limits.

Hmm. But I’m not just using my feet to walk. He looked down at his legs, which seemed to do most of the movement. He stopped walking, and his legs stopped. He started walking, and they moved once more.

“Error.”

He decided to get creative. He commanded his body to jump. His leg bent down at a joint –knees, he realized. His arms –the things that move my hands!– swung back, and swung forward and upwards again at the same time that his legs forcefully straightened and his feet pointed down, propelling his whole body into the air. He hung there, for some time, feeling powerful and majestic, before crashing down to the ground again.

A piercing sensation tore through his legs as they collided with infinity’s edge.

Jonas discovered two new things in the process. When I jumped, I didn’t stay up. I…fell. Yes, that was the word, he fell. But equally as strong as the feeling of discovery was his feeling of…pain. That’s it, pain. It felt really bad when he fell -no, it felt bad when he stopped falling. That feeling must be pain! Pain hurt.

“Error.”

Say, what is that sound? It seemed to be coming from everywhere, and yet nowhere at the same time. It had meaning, he was sure, but what did it mean? Wait-it’s a word! That was it, a word! And it meant “accident” or “mistake”. Though how he knew this, Jonah had no idea.

But a word spoken by…who? He listened for the sound, trying to pinpoint its location. It returned, many times, though each time left Jonas no closer to discovering the source of the empty voice.

“Error.”

“Error.”

“Error.”

Jonah began to feel irritated. Why is the voice here? Why doesn’t it stop? Why don’t I know where it comes from? And why can’t I find the answers to any of these questions? But the voice continued its unabated existence.

“Error.”

“Error.”

“Error.”

Suddenly, something else caught Jonah’s attention: A rectangular frame, standing a small distance from where he stood. What is THAT? Yet unlike the sound, it would be easy to find out; he was not too far away from it, and he could simply walk over and look at it more closely. Which is what he did. A doorway! That was it, a doorway! That was what it was!

Where does it lead? Jonah yearned to know. But again, the solution to that question was simple; he merely had to walk through. He tentatively took a step forward, and then another, and then he had stepped through.

The voice stopped.