On the fourth floor of a large hospital devoid of movement, a young man suddenly stirs awake…
Tony slowly sat up and rubbed his forehead with his right hand as a sharp pain threatened to rip away his consciousness once more. The sneering smile of Dr. Evans’ assistant slowly formed in his mind as his eyes flew open and he scanned the room he was in. White padded walls, an iron bed frame with softened edges, and a student desk with chair combination bolted to the floor. Brows furrowing, he patted himself and realized something else was wrong immediately. What happened to his clothes? Where was his wallet and keys?
Swinging his legs over the bed side, he set his feet down on the soft rubber floor and felt himself sink slightly. The sensation reminded him of bouncy houses mixed with shag carpeting from his grandfather’s house. It was neither uncomfortable nor comfortable and distracted him slightly from the soft light overhead and oddity of his situation. Tony turned to the desk and noticed a colorful drawing in pastel colors of a man’s face. There was also his name clearly printed across the far end of it in bulky bold lettering, Tony Daniels.
“Erg, just what did they do to me?”
Tony muttered out loud to himself and shifted his attention to the partially open door. The man’s face had an odd smile and was completely unfamiliar, but more importantly, he couldn’t remember drawing it. A strange coldness ran along his spine at the thought of being manipulated so easily as he pushed aside the door and stepped into the hallway.
Standing in the hall, he was stunned in place by the expanse of wide-open doors with square observation windows and numbers drawn in red letters. There was something seriously messed up about this situation and it was really beginning to unnerve him. More than the oddity of the opened doors, the silence of the world was even worse. It only hit him when he stood here that nothing was making any noise, no beeping sounds of monitoring systems, no soothing hospital music to calm patients, nor the slightest buzz of emergency exit lights. It was so quiet that a pin dropping would be clearer than a bomb.
Turning back to his room door, he noticed the same red bold number and a particularly conspicuous fresh handprint whose paint was running, at least he hoped it was paint. His feet suddenly felt cold as he followed the streaming paint to the floor where red footprints littered everywhere. He felt his eyes cross several times trying to follow the different paths as the other person seemed to wander sporadically around every door with two rooms having a particularly high number of prints, his own and another down the hall. The entire path ended at the elevators with the floor number sitting at 7.
Taking in a deep breath, Tony ventured forward cautiously to the other room where the prints gathered. He had seen more than enough horror movies to know it was a bad idea, but this was his only clue to finding someone else. Even though he told himself that, he had seen enough horror movies to know it was also a very bad idea, not like had many options though. His steps felt heavy as he walked past and peered into the open rooms that were, thankfully, devoid of humans and monsters alike. When he reached his destination, his steps paused as he felt his resolve waver greatly. Tony reminded himself that he had martial art training and he shouldn’t be so timid; at worst, he would simply run the other way.
Stepping into the doorway and peering inside, he regretted his decision immediately. The room was like any other room he had walked past, as long as one ignored the middle-aged man pinned to the wall with steel chair legs. He had one leg in each wrist and two protruding from his forehead at diagonal angles as though they were horns. The portrayal had an unnatural sense of morbid beauty to it that was completely lost on Tony whose brain shut down after considering the physical strength required to break off the legs and puncture them into bone and padded walls. Shifting his vision off the corpse, he scanned the surroundings and noticed the drawings and notations of the life stages of a butterfly up to the point it gets pinned in a display case. Turning back to the corpse, he felt the eerie similarity of the man turned butterfly displayed for all who came into the room. The realization sending another wave of shivers down his spine.
Cautiously, he removed himself from the room and moved to the elevators, passing a visitor restroom on the left and an empty nurse’s kiosk with paperwork scattered across the floor. His feet moved on their own as if he was still in a daze from the previous sight and he didn’t even notice the head peering out from the side of the kiosk.
Standing near the pair of elevators, Tony turned slightly and stood next to the elevator without footprints before pushing the Up button. While leaving a clearly abandoned hospital where a mentally ill patient with unnatural strength was the most logical idea, Tony’s instincts told him the hospital was still the safest option before he found a weapon and he would also need to find medical supplies. His right leg thumped anxiously as he watched the elevator floor numbers light up one by one again and he was reminded of the other trial participants. Where were they now? Did everyone get thrown in this hospital and he was simply the last to wake up? Questions kept floating in his head as he waited and almost tripped rushing into the elevator once the doors opened.
Tony jabbed the highest floor number possible, Floor 9, then the Close Doors button repeatedly. His heart finally settled down as the doors began to close and the hallway of red footprints began to disappear from view. Just before the doors closed completely, a pair of eyes and long black hair appeared vertically in the open space. Tony could feel his heart nearly leap out of his chest and run away on its own from the frantic beat.
Tony backed away from the door and leaned against the handrail farthest from it as his mind whirred into action. Options, he needed to think about options in case someone or something ambushed him when the doors reopened. His hands reflexively patted his waist and chest for anything to defend himself with, even the flashlight app of a phone before he remembered that he was dressed in a tight fitting hospital shirt and pants with no pockets or belt. His head jerked up to the elevator ceiling looking for a second exit and felt his legs crumble beneath him as he saw a grinning bald headed man’s face staring back at him while licking his lips. A silent scream echoed from his throat as he closed his eyes and waited for death, regretting that he signed the paperwork without reading any of it. Seconds passed that felt like hours and then the ding of the elevator doors opening rang and he opened his eyes.
Looking up at the head once more, he realized that it wasn’t attached to a neck and he was still alive. Taking in a sharp breath, Tony rushed out of the elevator without any hesitation and while throwing caution to the wind. His mind was so focused on the empty nurse station and normal hospital rooms with open windows and visible beds that he missed the hand with purple nail polish reach out from the side and snatch his arm in mid-stride, pulling him into a soft embrace.
“I have been waiting for you, darling,” a soft voice whispered in his right ear before his brain caught up with the sensation of a syringe entering his neck and coldness sliding across his veins.
