What the Hell? - Final Part!

First part of this story is here. Please do read before you continue this!

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With that, he fell silent. His enthusiasm slowly started dissolving. He felt even stupid for wanting to stay here longer. The meaning of ‘hell’ that he learnt when he was alive slowly started a feel of him.

“You can see the future of your loved ones and the mistakes that they are committing day by day. You’ll know when your son will fell down and break his arm, but you can do nothing to stop that. You’ll feel the pain that he feels when he sleeps. When your wife has a headache and takes a tablet, you’ll have a headache when she sleeps. When your daughter falls in love with a total psychopath, you’ll know what plan he has for her. When you watch your dog hit by a car or a bus. When you watch your best friend getting divorced. When your sister gets a cancer. You’ll feel happy when your son tops his class. You’ll never be able to see your loved one’s faces – just the image of them that you saw before you died. You’ll see your son at the age of 18 and you’ll still see his 8 year old face. Pain or gain – whatever you loved ones go through during the day time in their world, you’ll feel the same in their night time.”

Tears started flowing in his cheeks and he shouted “Why? Why? WHY?”

His father, reduced his flying speed, took a glance at his son with a face full of emotion – one that says ‘sad’ all over it – said “Because this is hell, son”.

For the next twenty minutes or so, he was just following his father and let his mind go blank. He now understood why they call it hell. He now understood that the super power he has here is not a power, but a curse. He now wants to get the hell out of it as soon as possible. All he wanted now was to meet God and beg for his sins. And if he doesn’t forgive, atleast, he’ll have his father’s company here – he should be here as long as he would be. His father, after reading his thought stopped short in the mid-air.

“Son, there’s two more things that I’ll have to tell you.”

“What more is there?” he said so assuming nothing’s worst when you almost watch only terrible things and feel terrible pains.

“This is the last time I would be talking to you. After I leave you at the gate of the God, we would not see each other. You’ll be spending your time here – alone. Although we share loved ones, we would not be together. You’ll not see me and I’ll not see you. We share pains.”

Now he understood why he said “use this one precious hour” earlier. He also understood that this is a world, mostly filled with regrets and pains. Ofcourse, there’ll be pleasures too when their loved one has, but he will not have anyone to share pain or pleasure.

“One hour is all I got with you? Is that the last thing you want to say?”

“It’s down to ten minutes now – we’re almost here at Argentina. The last thing is – you’ll be meeting all our relatives who departed earth and are still here in hell. You’ll be meeting them at the gate of the God – your mother among them. This would be the second time I’m meeting her here. You’ll have less than ten minutes – you can’t talk to them as you are doing with me now – you can just see them. Remember when I said you can only see the image of your 8 year old son’s face when he’s growing up? You can see his actual face only when he dies. That’s the sad part – the utmost punishment a soul can get – to wait for your beloved one to die to see their face.”

Those last words of his father felt like the accident that caused his death sometime before – terrible pain. With utter silence, he saw his father descending and followed him to what looked like a dense forest. They reached the gate of the God and he could see his mother, uncles and aunts, his best friends. Tears were flowing in all of their eyes – some of them waved and he waved back. There was a big tree which stood like an Eiffel tower. They were standing just in the banks of a river for which he didn’t know the name.

His father said “It’s time son. Good bye to you. May you see a happy future and reach heaven.”

“There’s one last question before you go” he asked his father “Who is God?” 

He pointed at the Eiffel tower like tree and said “He is”. And then, one by one everyone disappeared, waving their hands towards him.

The gates opened up and the tree started talking. “Can’t say welcome to hell – do you know why you are here?”

“I died and came to hell”

“Yes. Do you know the sins you committed?”

“No”

“Pollution of the very earth you lived upon and for cutting down trees”

“You mean Gods?”

“I’m not a tree if that’s what you mean – I’m just a representation of nature.”

“Nature is God?”

“I know, right? The world once believed nature is God!”

“Why do we have Jesus and Allah and lot of other gods like Shiva, Vishnu?”

“They are my messengers. You can’t blame me for your belief”

“What is a heaven and where is it?”

“You’re standing in one!”

“Who goes to heaven?”

“If you ask current statistics, only babies come to heaven. People are rare, not very rare, but they do come.”

“Why do you make us born again if you think we’re polluting the earth?”

“A chance and risk I’m willing to give or take”

“I was able to talk to my father a little more than an hour before. Why can’t I talk to my father afterwards? Why do we have to suffer this much in hell?”

“Every time before someone dies, one of the relatives or friends will be chosen for them to guide the new leaf to me. As for the suffering, it’s the punishment for your past crimes”

“Why do you make us forget this suffering and knowledge that we gained here before we born again? Don’t you think the memory will help us avoid polluting earth again?”

“You not only gain suffering and memory here, you gain another lifetime experience. With that memory, I know you can live without polluting the earth, but the experience will only make you a better person than you were destined to be. The mistake that you commit during your lifetime becomes an experience – imagine you commit no mistake at all – where’s the fun in that and what do you learn? Believe me, if you were born again with the memory of this world intact, you’ll wish you let me forget!”

“I don’t understand!”

“I don’t expect you to.”

There was some awkward silence and finally when God spoke, “You lived for 40 years, 2 months and 26 days. You spent 15 years, 8 months and 8 days in sleeping. You planted trees which benefited the earth – that gives you 15 months. You once volunteered for channeling a river – which went on to fertile a village. That gives you 2 years and 16 days. You’ll spend the rest of your 21+ years here in hell. Your knowledge will be updated with the approximate figures shortly.”

He now knew that he had to spend 21 years and 3 months in hell.

“What should I do to end up in heaven?”

“That doesn't depend on your actions. It depends on how the world changes as you progress these 21+ years. Know that I cannot completely erase your memory when you leave this world and born again. Some of your memories will become your dreams. That’s why most of the time you don’t remember a dream! It’s when the world starts to understand their dreams – when they realize the potential danger that awaits them – when they stop polluting the world, slowly, everyone will come to heaven.”

With that, God stopped talking and he realized why he called this place a heaven. When you start planting trees, you’re actually giving a soul a heaven. He then was left alone in hell with his prayers for a greener planet.

The End.

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The 'hell' thoughts described in the story were inspired by Dan Brown's "Inferno" book - the 'visual' he describes of Dante's "The Divine Comedy" (Not a copy from the book. You can check both Inferno and The Divine Comedy books!). The "God" character is inspired by the 'tree monsters' in the Lord of the Rings movie.
Honestly, I had a lot of questions that I could ask "The God". The thing is, when I started making the second part of this story, I felt like it was going on and on and the end was no way near my thought reach. I'm not a novelist or a mega story writer - I decided to end it somewhere. So, I had to reduce the questions for the God. Please input your comments about the two parts!

What the Hell?

This is a fantasy story that I'm trying my hand for the first time. It became a little lengthy than I expected, so it comes in 2 parts. This is the first part. Comments and Critics are welcome.

It all happened within a second. There was absolutely no time for him to take that turn – the idiot who drove behind him hit him so hard that his car’s glasses shattered and some of them even came flying and hit him on the back-head. Bewildered, he tried to take a left turn, but as I said before, it was too late. The car automatically gained speed despite his break attempts and started falling from one of the biggest bridge in the city. The recent drought added insult to the injury – the car, with its wheel still running, landed as shown in most of the ‘hero-entry-in-Tamil-cinema’ and immediately started dropping most of its parts. His head banged the steering hard and immediately, the happy blood rushed out having found the freedom from his body. The car ran a few more meters before the weird shaped wheel came to a halt. Smoke was coming out of almost all parts of the car and it looked like he was still alive. He thought about the good things happened in his life – his wife, his 8 year old son and 6 year old daughter. And then, everything was blacked out and he died. Or, atleast that’s what he thought.

With a sudden burst, he woke up as if he had a bad dream and saw his father in front of him. Well, his father died years before and he was absolutely shocked to see him. He now thought that he’s definitely dead and believed he was in heaven as he considered his father to be the good person and that he would’ve reached heaven for sure. When he started to talk, he couldn’t. He could clearly think, but could not speak. He saw his father and he seems to be observing him and not speaking as well. His father was surprisingly calm and showed no emotion on his face. It was then, he saw the surrounding and found that he’s still in Earth – lots of people crossing him with utter silence. The place looked to be the same – the water-less-river where he believe he was killed, but this time there were a lot of people who were walking around.

“Wow, you look much older than I thought you would be. By the way, you’re dead, son” – said the father his lips not moving.

“I am what? What did he just say?” he thought.

“I said you’re dead. You can’t talk – you can only think. I can read your thoughts, and so can you” he said, lips still not moving.

“What the… you can read my thoughts?”

“I can, and you are reading my thoughts now”.

“How is this possible?”

“In our world, it is the only way we communicate?”

“Our world?”

“Yes, the world you’re in now”

“But it looks like I’m on Earth. Where the hell am I?”

“You’re right, you’re in hell!”

That last word really hit him in the head. “I’m in hell? Why the hell am I in hell?”

“Well, to start off, you say hell-a-lot-of-hell!” his father smiled, pleased by the sentence he formed. He thought about the life he lived so far – the moments before his death – his wife and children – all the good deeds that he did – why am I still be placed in hell?

“To know the answer to that, you need to meet God” said his father.

“I can meet God?”

“Yes, every dead leaf meets the God”

“Leaf? But I’m a man – err… atleast I used to be a human”

“Let’s just say you’ll understand when you meet him”

“That’s weird! So, where is he? Is he here in hell?”

“Well, the answer is somewhat difficult – he lives in hell as well as in heaven”

“What? OK, he’s a God, so he’s everywhere eh?”

“Nah, he’s not everywhere. I think he used to be, not now!”

“Oh, that’s even maddeningly unhelpful!”

“Still quoting Jack Sparrow?”

“Whoa, how the hell did you know that?”

“I was dead before you, remember? Let’s go meet God, shall we?” said his father.

“Ok. Do we have a transport system in this world of yours or just God appears out of nowhere?”

His father smiled, amused by his rookie son’s question. “Remember, this is your world too, so you might wanna consider saying ‘ours’ instead of yours”

“Oh yes, I keep forgetting that I’m dead! So, how do we go?”

“Think ‘Fly’”

“Fly?”

And then it happened. As if he was in the outer space, he started floating. “Whoa, what the hell?” he said and started seeing his hands and legs – the usual response we do when something amazing has started happening. “We can fly?”

“Oh yes, how do you think we’re gonna reach over 3000 miles from here?”

“3000 miles? Is he in Africa or what?”

“Close, but now he’s in Argentina”

“Ok, do you know the route?”

“I do, follow me” he said and started flying. Knowing nothing to do, he just thought, ‘follow him’ and he automatically started following him – at his pace.

“This is cool – how come we fly?”

“Because, you don’t have a body now – all you have is soul. We have about an hour time before we reach Argentina – I know you’ll have a lot of questions – use this one precious hour.”

“How-”

“Don’t ask me how I know the duration – just ask some important questions. Questions that you want to know the answer for, desperately” said his father, cutting him off.

“Ok, what happens after I meet God? Will he decide if I am to be sent to heaven or hell?”

“Oh, you are in hell as I said before and you will be for the rest of your soul-time”

“Why is that and how long is that ‘soul-time’?”

“God will tell you why – I guess you’ll know why when you see him. To answer the other question, you spent about 40 years alive, is that correct?”

“Right”

“So, your soul-time is about 20 years”

“20 years? OMG! Why am I spending half of the lifetime in hell?”

“It’s for the sins you committed during your life time”

“What sin?”

“You’ll know when you meet God”

“Err… ok, why half of the life time?”

“Why do you think there’s day and night and why God lets us sleep? Just because we can relax? No. That’s the time you don’t commit sins.”

“What?”

“You lived about 40 years and slept about 20 years. It is during the other 20 years – all the other activities you did when you were not sleeping – those are the time for which you’ll be accounted for.”

“Wow, every dead people spend half of their lifetime here?”

“Not dead people, leafs. And no, not everyone spends half of their lifetime here. Some gets lesser.”

“Ok, you’ve been here for sometime now – do you think staying longer here helps or get out as quickly as you can help?”

“The latter part”

“Hmmm. I like flying, so I might consider staying longer! What happens after our lifetime here ends?”

“God will decide that after your soul-time here. He has two choices. He may let you born again with no memory of you being here or in your other life. The other choice is what everyone here wants – send you to heaven”

“Wow. Heaven sounds promising! What will I do during these 20 years?”

“You’ll spend your 20 years or so here by watching your beloved ones back in the earth”

“Cool. Would they feel my presence? Can I talk to them?”

“Have you ever felt my presence when you were alive?”

“I thought I was the one asking questions. Hmmm. No, I never felt your presence”

“They’ll not feel your presence or hear your thoughts. It’ll just be like watching a movie – except that you can hear them thinking as well”

“Well, that sounds like a boon!”

“Believe me, that’s curse. Watching them do sins and hearing them thinking dirty is one of the worst time that you’ll spend here. Worst of all is the moment you see when they die. Like the way I watched you. Painful.”

---To Be Continued.

2nd & Final part is here.

Movie Marathon - A Lone Long Weekend

Due to unforeseeable circumstances, I didn't plan a trip home last Thursday. My room-mates did and I was the only poor soul left alone in my room for Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Thursday night. I returned home from office at around 8 PM and found my room-mates had already left for their hometown. The only companion during these times – my laptop – was brought to life and I connected my 1TB HDD full of movies and series. I decided to take the Movie Marathon.

I’d been a little busy at work these days, so I couldn't spend my usual times to watch movies in the recent times. Nevertheless, I never stopped downloading them, you know – you never know when you’ll get the time!  So, I’d been personally making a list of films that I should be watching whenever I get free time. “Inglorious Basterds” was at the top of the list which I downloaded about 6 to 8 months back. I liked the director of that movie – Quentin Tarantino – (his name kinda rings a bell in your mouth [---tin ---tino], you know!), so decided to give it a shot on Thursday night. About a 2.5 hours movie, which I finished watching in about the same time, without any breaks. The movie didn't disappoint me – lived up to it’s expectation. A different Brad Pitt I saw there!

Friday. After breakfast, I saw some songs and bit-by-bit movies in the TV and decided to continue from where I left the marathon. Before lunch, I watched “12 Angry Men” – another top on my list film which I downloaded almost a year back! The movie’s about 1.5 hours length and was taken inside a hall for almost 95% of the movie. I’m not a fan of old films – hell, I even hesitated to watch The God Father some years before for the same reason. This movie released at 1957, absolutely shattered my view about the old films – I ended up watching it twice on the same day. If you are reading this and haven't watched it or have the same view as mine, go watch it! I bet your views will be changed too!

After a lot of recommendation from my friends over the years, I decided to include “The Lord of the Rings” in the marathon. All I heard about this movie is positive, Good, extraordinary and so on and so forth. I gave a try on this movie earlier once on a sleepy day, and failed to watch more than 1/2 of the film. So, Friday night, with me not getting any sleep, I decided to give it another try. A whopping 3.5+ hours movie – “The Fellowship of the Ring” I managed to finish it off on the early morning of Saturday. I should say, I took a lot of breaks in between the movie, phone calls and water and what-not. After watching the movie, I somewhat felt a difference towards the opinion I had about the movie. So, I continued “The Two Towers” Saturday afternoon, after waking up late and skipping breakfast and having lunch directly. Another 3.5+ hours movie, changed my entire view about the series. It was late in the evening when I finished watching it – I had a quick tea and decided to skip dinner and continued “The Return of the King“. It was worth it and I ended up giving 10 out of 10 rating for all 3 movies in the series in IMDB.

It was pretty late in the Saturday night when I slept after watching the Lord of the Rings trilogy. I woke up late on the lazy Sunday almost-afternoon, impact from the movie I saw last night, intact. I was too lazy to go out and decided to cook Maggie  As soon as I finished eating the awful Maggie that I cooked, I powered my lappy on. Infact, my lappy was the only thing which was active during this long weekend. One of the other movies which had been on the list for a very long time – “Scent of a Women“. When I finished watching this 2.5+ hours movie, I felt like why on earth I haven’t watched this movie earlier? Al Pacino, as usual, was outstanding in this movie.

My plan was to end my marathon right there – but, I got greedy and decided that whatever the movie I watch during this marathon, it’s going to be awesome! I wasn't wrong – I extended my marathon 1.5 hours more – watched “The Lion King“, the musical animation and now, “Hakuna Matata” is my motto (if you know what I mean [if you don't know, Google it]!) In the end, I quite enjoyed the lone long weekend. Hell, I could probably do the same this weekend too!

If you have watched all the movies that I listed above, you’ll know how good of a marathon that was!

Image Courtesy: Google.