Below is the original story version (1.1) followed by a collection of others from brainstorming ideas for the ever evasive middle bit.
Story Version 1.1
Shortly after her birthday, the little girl is leaving her
Grandmother's house with her parents. The drive home is long and the sky is
growing darker. Her parents are murmuring softly as the car quietly pulls up to
a junction, waiting to turn left.
Bright piercing lights explode through the cabin as the car is
slammed forward. Metal crunched and screamed and glass laughed as it flew
forward through the air, glittering in the headlights like fairy dust. White
mushroom clouds bloomed around her, bloomed and disappeared.
She felt the breath being squeezed out of her lungs, the back of
her seat pushing her forward against her jammed seatbelt. She hurt a lot, and
she was tired anyway so she closed her eyes. Her mum would put a plaster on it
in the morning, she told herself as she fell asleep.
All is black and with noises of paramedics, sirens and emergency
resuscitation procedures, fading to the sound of a machine screaming dead line.
Then absolute silence descends.
In a place where dusk dwells, over a garden of gravel and paved
paths, with low lying hedges and shaped bushes, wild grass and a dry dusty
fountain, a little girl is playing hopscotch. The sky glows a perpetual saffron
and amber.
At the end of her trail, the little girl looks up at the building
nestled in the middle of the garden. It seems to stare back at her dully with
its many windows, rows and rows of windows, but no doors. She blinks and moves
onto the next part of her game, seemingly involving her moving around the
garden and checking behind things, though whether she is the one being chased
or the one doing the chasing is unclear.
A wind blows, whipping through her hair. Perhaps she hears some
words in the wind, perhaps only murmurs. She scowls and turns away.
Meanwhile, a middle-aged woman is arguing with a younger man. She doesn't
like his self-assured attitude or his careless brassiness. She finds it
unsettling, and she has things to protect from him.
"Please doctor," She pleads. "Even considering such
a thing is preposterous."
He looks at her with bored eyes, smirking. "There has been no
change in her condition for a very long time. Please, we cannot keep her as she
is. It's a waste of resources and there is nothing up here anymore - " he
tapped on his temple, " - for her to be kept around. I understand she is on
the donor register, too."
It isn't the first time this conversation has happened. She had
been spoken to about this occasionally for many years, but recently this new
doctor was really pushing for her consent. Now, she was asked every time she
visited, and sometimes twice or more each time.
"My answer is no," she insisted.
"We can't keep this up forever," the doctor said,
cocking his head to the side. "It's not fair on her, either."
Anger flashed up, by was quelled immediately by guilt.
The doctor smiled when she looked away. He knew he'd won. Now all
he had to do was kill all hope and get consent. There was an operation he was
aching to do; the only missing piece was one fresh heart. He'd already checked
- it was a match. And if he did the operation - if everything went well - he'd
get a pay rise, a promotion, better respect and influence. Maybe he could even
be accepted by one of the better private health care services. At least, it
would be the beginning toward that.
"I'll give you a week," he informed her. "I'll get
the paperwork together. You'll have to sign a few forms and such. Then you'll
have to say goodbye."
He turned on his heel. Just before he walked out he tossed the
final blow over his shoulder like a barbed grenade.
"Although, really, she is already gone."
The little girl looked around uneasily. She felt nervous and she
didn't know why. It annoyed her. She hopped from foot to foot, clenching and
unclenching her fists, considering. There was nothing in the garden to scare
her. It wasn't too dark, either. She was being silly, she decided.
All the same, she wandered back onto the main garden path with the
rows of cone hedges to her right and the fountain to her left. She started
walking toward the main building.
[Skip to the end]
Emily ran, searching for the door. The way out. She
knew it to be close. But she couldn’t find it.
“We are going to shut the machines down now,” the
doctor explained. “Have you said your final good byes?”
She ran along the never ending maze of corridor. The
door had to be in here somewhere.
“Yes, doctor,” the woman sniffled. She placed a hand
tightly on her husband’s shoulder. He reached up and squeezed her hand. “We’re
ready.”
Finally the corridor straightened out after yet
another flight of stairs. There was the door at the end.
The doctor reached for the power switch. “Good-bye,
Emily.”
Emily’s hand wrapped around the door handle.
The doctor pushed the switch. The machine went dead.
Emily was blinded by a flash of light.
Arm outstretched, reaching for something that was no
longer there, Emily realised she was no longer where she thought she was. The
arm extended in front, though it responded, was too long to be her own. Her
hair slipped forward and she reached to tuck it behind her ear, but it was much
longer than it ought to be.
The doctor stared at her baffled. She
had sat up just as he had pushed the button. He saw her eyes open before he
pushed the button. And now she was examining her hair. What was going on?
“Emily?” The mother breathed, eyes wide
in wonder and disbelief.
“Welcome back, kiddo,” the father said
gruffly.
So it was happening. She was awake. And
he wouldn’t get the organs he needed for his payrise and promotion. He wouldn’t
get his prestige and rise to private doctor. Angrily, he turned sharply on his
heel and left the room.
Story Version 1.2
- Little girl gets into a car accident and ends up in a coma.
- Emily creates a world of her own where she plays by herself in perpetual twilight.
- Doctors feel that there is no hope for her to recover in a vegetative state and pursue getting permission to turn the machines off.
- Emily plucks up the courage to go into the dark house of voices to find the way out.
- Doctors get the begrudging permission of the parents and the machine gets turned off but Emily wakes up just in time.
Story Version 1.3
- Car accident, coma, garden world where Emily is playing.
- Nurse comes in and talks about various things that become distorted as they filter through into her dream and becomes something else i.e. character plants, quirky objects etc.
- Doctor comes in and his words filter through also, making her dream world sky dark and creates a monster.
- She seeks shelter in the house from the monster.
- Her mother’s words create a door in the house and Emily wakes up.
Story Version 1.4
- Car accident, coma, garden world where Emily is playing.
- Emily keeps her distance from the house with many windows.
- Doctor’s words create a storm in her world making Emily move toward the house to go inside.
- She sees scenes from the crash through the windows as well as the audio of her hospital room.
- Emily smashes a window and climbs through, waking up.
Story Version 1.5
- Car accident, coma, garden world where Emily is playing.
- In the middle of the garden there is a greenhouse with only a small sapling in the centre.
- The tree grows larger and more warped the more the doctors push for permission.
- The sky breaks into a storm with permission granted.
- A hollow in the tree trunk provides Emily’s escape.
Story Version 1.6
- Car accident, coma, garden world where Emily is playing.
- Various fantastical characters appear from the garden and give her various tasks to complete.
- Once complete a door appears in the building.
- Doctors finally get permission to turn off the machines.
- Emily waves good bye to the characters and jumps through the portal waking up.
Story Version 1.7
- Car accident, coma, garden world where Emily is playing.
- Doctors push for permission to turn the machines off.
- The garden constantly shifts, paths changing with increasing frequency leading Emily closer to the house in the woods.
- Doctors finally get permission to turn off the machine.
- Emily faces the house in the woods and opens the door and jumps through the mirror in the middle of the room, waking up.
Story Version 1.8
- Car accident, coma, garden world where Emily is playing.
- Doctors are pushing for permission to turn of the machines.
- The doctors’ words cause the plants to shrivel with acid rain and dry destroying her world.
- Doctors finally get permission to turn off the machine.
- Emily takes shelter in the house, finding the way out at the same time as the world outside falls apart.
Story Version 1.9
- Car accident, coma, garden world where Emily is playing.
- Doctors are pushing for permission to turn off the machines.
- Despite the sun being hidden by clouds continuously the shadows are sharp and grow larger swallowing up the whole garden.
- Emily takes shelter in the house where the only light is now coming from.
- The Doctors get permission.
- Emily finds the source of the light as coming through a keyhole of a door which she opens, waking up.
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