The Ones Where I Cheated: Part 1 of 4 (May 2020)
The Stairway
A skeleton in undertaker's garb opens the door, and bows solemnly as she enters the room, somehow conveying mournful respect with nothing to work with but a grinning skull and the appropriate clothing. She is touched by the gesture.
The room itself is enormous, sheer black walls forming a circle, unbroken but for the doorway she has just passed through. The ceiling is beyond the range of her sight. A single staircase spirals into the darkness above and she cannot tell if it has been crafted from ivory, pearl, or bone.
She pauses. Then, seemingly untroubled, she begins to climb. I originally wrote this as a standalone, in the same vein as everything else posted on here. Once I finished writing and sent the completed thing to Rick I realised that I wanted to find out more about what was going on, as I didn't know at the time. More to follow.
The skeleton is loosely based on (or a rip-off of) Death from the Terry Pratchett books, and Jack Skellington from A Nightmare Before Christmas. The protagonist is her own creation.