After the nursery rhyme recital, Ash and Proxi climbed up the spiral staircase to yet another new room. Opening the unassuming wooden door to their next challenge, the pair were met with a fresh, floral fragrance that tickled at Ash’s noise. Ash had to describe the scent to Proxi who expressed a little jealousy.

The inside of the room was decorated like a meadow grove. The ground was covered in a vibrant green grass bed dotted reds and blues, purples and whites from a variety of flowers. Ash counted Lavenders, posies and roses among others. In the very centre of the room was a large, draping willow tree that was at least 3 stories tall. Ash couldn’t fathom how a tree of this size was growing inside the tower, let alone fit in one of the rooms. Hedges lined the pastel blue walls of the room creating an illusion of being outside with the open sky behind them. Strangest of all, Ash felt warmth on the bare skin of his uncovered arm. Light shone from ceiling, breaking through hanging branches of the willow.

“How?” Ash questioned.

He craned his head up to look through the mass of green. Overhead Ash spied clouds… not painted clouds but actual moving clouds. The ceiling of the room was a framework of glass like a greenhouse arboretum.

“No way…” He said, dumbfounded.

It didn’t make sense. This wasn’t the top of the tower; how could he see the sky? Ash was staring up at the sky above, another magical impossibility offered by the tower.

“Proxi, do you see this?” he called out.

His sprite companion hovered up from inspecting the flowerbeds to meet his gaze.

“Oh wow! We did it! We made it!” Proxi cheered.

for a moment Ash had thought the same.

“I don’t think so, there’s no crystals here…there’s no rewards. I think this is another puzzle?” Ash theorized.

Shaking off the sense of shock and amazement, Ash got to work, swallowing the questions that teetered on the edge of his mind.

Magic, he told himself. A magic ceiling.

He shook his head and explored the room. It was just another puzzle for he and Proxi to solve. They would climb this tower and finish this quest. Despite his intentions, Ash did feel a sense of comfort from the room. It was a sight for sore eyes. Unlike the dank and baroque rooms or the cold and sterile rooms, this one was refreshing and welcoming. He could at least enjoy the change in scenery.

--

The hedges of the botanical room covered every wall, including the door that Ash and Proxi had entered through. There was no sign of another door, nor were there any breaks in the hedges that would imply one may appear. This was becoming the norm it seemed. Proxi had managed to find a new riddle carved into the trunk of the great, billowing willow tree. Ash sighed with relief as he read the limerick out loud.

“If you break me, I do not stop working. If you touch me, I may bloom. If you lose me, nothing will matter…”

Ash repeated the verse a few times with different intonations. This riddle felt more familiar to Ash, as if the answer was on the tip of his tongue. Proxi had offered a few solutions to their newest puzzle.

“What about a rock? Those are found in nature all the time!”

“You know, even dead trees tend to stay upright and, we’ve got our own tree in this room?”

“Do these kinds of trees have acorns? Those grow from trees, right?”

Each time, Ash sallied Proxi’s questions. Letting the enthusiastic sprite down gently. They were however helpful at narrowing the options, even if Proxi did cast a wide berth of choices. With each proposition falling short, Ash tried to think more abstract. The room itself was a beauty. The flowers, the draping tree branches that cast dazzling light around the room was a sight to behold.

Ash had a gut feeling that the riddle had something to do with the feeling of the room; a positive, engrossing feeling, though one that is finite.

Plants wither after all, he thought.

The grove itself left Ash nostalgic. It reminded him of happy memories from his past, the nearby creek and meadows that he and his then girlfriend had visited. This grove brought memories flooding back. Ash had pushed those back when the relationship ended, unwanted at the time.

Wait…is that it?

Ash scanned the room again. It did offer a romantic scene, the colourful flowers and soft sunlight tinged with nature.

Could it be?

Ash broke through Proxi’s barrage of ever more outlandish theories.

“I think it… I think the answer might be love?” Ash offered awkwardly.

Proxi chirped loudly, unphased by the interruption.

“Aww, that is very cute Ash. Are you a romantic?”

Ash felt his cheeks go hot, flushed at the accusation.

“I ugh… I mean, maybe? I think that’s the answer though” he stammered.

“How do we check if it’s right?” Proxi queried.

“I have an idea.”

--

Ash plucked 3 roses from the various flower beds spread throughout the spacious arboretum, picking only the most vibrant and fully bloomed of the flowers. He waltzed back towards the tree and held them in front of his body.

“I.. Love… you” He proclaimed with a hint of hesitancy before kneeling and placing the roses by the base of the tree.

The words of the carved riddle began to glow a soft, warm pink as Ash stood up. He could hear a crunching from inside the tree, like snapping branches and crushed leaves. Cracks in the surface of the wide tree began to appear, the same pink glow emanating from within them. Slowly, the cracks formed into a larger-than-life love heart and with a flash, the trunk turned hollow. Inside the empty trunk were a set of stairs that trailed upwards. There was no way a staircase could fit inside the tree itself, but that’s magic. Ash wondered if this room wasn’t located ‘inside’ the tower but simply connected by magic from elsewhere.

“So…” Proxi began as they stepped through into the next set of stairs.

--

For Ash, the next set of stairs was more painful than any of the puzzle rooms. Proxi had taken it upon themselves to interrogate Ash about his romantic history, asking a slew of probing questions that Ash attempted to deflect with one-word responses. The next door provided a welcome escape from the cross-examination. Ash hurried them both through the clean, bare metal doorway, not taking notice of the reflective, clear crystal door handle.

Inside, Proxi’s attention was diverted to their new environment. It was a room at odds with itself; Ash raising a brow at the oddities decorating the expanse. The chamber contained a carefully curated dining room; the floor was made of a dark, oak stained hardwood separated by an animal skin carpet laid to the right-hand side of long, intricately detailed dining table. The dining table was laid out on the left side of the room, with a set of 6 chairs on either side and 2 at each end.

The table was decorated with a long purple cloth inlaid with gold thread as well as two large candle holders that sat to either end. Ash was amused to see more purple. The candles were lit, the warm ember wicks glowing softly. There were two oversized chandeliers that hung from the ceiling with a circlet of candles that provided light. On the other side of the room was a long, luxurious couch flanked by two armchairs positioned around the animal skin rug. There was a round knee height table anchored in the middle. This table held a series of books of which one was laid open to the world.

The walls of the room displayed framed artworks that lacked any connecting theme. There was a port city, a headshot of an old moustached man and a scene that depicted a party of dogs sat around table. Ash chuckled lightly at the sight; he hadn’t expected to see the card table dog trope here. What stood out though, was the far wall directly across from the entrance. The entire length of the wall was one long sheet of reflective mirror. To Ash, it felt like a house of mirrors had been mixed with an old wealthy castle dining hall.

--

Ash felt strange in the room. He was caught off guard by a sense of uncanny valley at the sight of himself. He looked strange in the fantastical get up, like some NPC character. Something felt…off though.

Ash walked slowly, hesitantly towards himself. He recognised his face, the angled jawline and nose that his mother had described as aquiline. His cheeks were still textured by freckles that had begun to fade with age. His eyes were still the deep-set pale blue, framed by the darker hue of purple tinged eyebags he never could seem to get rid of.

As Ash looked on, his mouth twisted into a frown. Something about the sight was off, wrong… uncanny. He ran his right hand through his wavy mess of hair, pushing it back and out of his face. He drew closer to the mirrored wall, the strange feeling in the pit of his stomach rising to the fore.

“What…” Ash murmured quietly, his face falling white; blanched of colour.

Where were his scars? The white, faded lines that should have marked his forehead and left cheek were gone. He knew his arm scars had disappeared but hadn’t expected the face. That wasn’t the only troubling sign though. The peppered grey hair that had started growing out from the sides of his temple, a common cause of playful teasing from his friends, was gone. In its place lay the thick chestnut brown of his teens.

Ash couldn’t look away. His face looked softer, less tired. The bags under his eyes were only slightly tinged with purple. As Ash poked and prodded at the skin of his face, he realised he looked… younger? No scars, no markings of age and stress. Ash felt like he looked as if he were 16 or 17 again.

“What the…hell” Ash said, stepping back, noticing he appeared to be shorter than he remembered too. Worry flooded his senses as he started to pad and grope at his body. Was this why the scars on his arm were gone? Was this why the dull pain that throbbed in his wrist and elbow had been curiously absent? Had he been spun backwards in time?

Why, Ash asked himself, why did he look so young? So different?

Ash couldn’t rationalise why he was staring at himself as a teenager. He was 25, Despite the injuries he was a fully grown man. This wasn’t him. It hadn’t been him for a long time. Cold, twisting panic rise Ash’s chest like his lungs were filling with ice and water. The last time he felt this way was…

--

Seeing the panic overtaking Ash, Proxi floated up beside him and chirped with a loud warble like a magpie at dawn. They were trying to snap him out of it.

“Are… you okay?” Proxi asked with concern in their voice.

With the downward spiral interrupted, Ash came crashing back to reality. He turned to face his sprite companion.

“I…I’m just…” He said, pausing; trying to collect his thoughts, “I don’t even know what I think.”

“What’s wrong?”

“I’ve seen so many strange, outlandish things since I woke up here but the thing that’s freaked me out the most is what’s staring back at me right now” Ash stammered.

Proxi waited, listening intently to Ash’s words.

“That’s… not me. At least… that hasn’t been me for a long time” He said, raised his hand to point at his own reflection.

“What do you mean?” Proxi asked softly.

“That’s me… from about 7 years ago” Ash forced out, his voice shaky, “Why am I younger?!”

Proxi floated up close to the panicked Ash, hovering lightly over his shoulder.

“I’m sorry Ash” They paused, “I don’t know what to tell you Ash, I’ve only known you like this.”

“Is that it? No information hidden away like before?” Ash pleaded.

Every time the strangeness had presented itself to him, he had forced it down. Swallowed it and hidden it so he could keep moving. This time, it was too much and now it was bubbling over. The shock of it all flooded to the surface.

“Please” Ash pleaded.

Proxi hummed, vibrating lightly beside Ash as if thinking.

Ash looked at Proxi hopefully, his gaze drifting between his companion and the strange version of himself reflected in the mirror.

“I don’t have much…” Proxi began, “but… from what I do know, you were brought here at your best.”

“My… best?” Ash pivoted to stare at his younger self, “What does that mean? Why would…”

His words stopped mid-sentence.

This is me before the accident. Before I gave up. Before I stopped… he clenched his jaw tight.

He should have realised something sooner. An unscarred arm? No limp? Ash shouldn’t have played it off and accepted it so readily. This was why. He had been brought to this world not as himself, but as someone he used to be.

“Maybe it’s important” Proxi interjected, “maybe there’s a reason?”

“A second chance” Ash said softly, there was venom behind the words.

He was still staring at his reflection. This was him before the accident. If he was brought here at his best, then that meant when he was still competing.

Ash swallowed hard, taking a deep breath and closing his eyes. A second chance. He hadn’t asked for this; He accepted what happened, made his peace a long time ago. This wasn’t who he was anymore.

Maybe, it could be who I was meant to be. The thought flashed in his mind.

Ash didn’t like it; the elated feeling those words gave him. Beneath the frustration and panic, beneath the fear was a small sense of… hope. Ash couldn’t remember the last time he felt that way. This entire experience so far had broken cracks in his long stupor, the accepted reality that had become his new normal. Now, this world was offering him a chance he didn’t ask for. A chance to tell a different story?

“You… might be right” Ash relented.