“There’s… There’s other dangers,” he said simply.
“What other dangers?”
His eyes had this far off look, like he was remembering something or doing a math problem in his head. “It might be nothing. Just something I saw in Observation Room Six once. With drugs, it can be controlled. But with those drugs wearing off, it might be an issue again. It has been controlled with lower doses.”
“So how about an explanation for those of us without context? Something not so cryptic.”
“No,” he said, “It’s… It’s probably nothing.”
“Nothing, huh? Somehow I’m not convinced.”
“I don’t want to talk about it,” he said.
“Great,” I said, “I’ll be sure to keep my eyes out for the nothing that can kill me.”
He shrugged.
“Kate’s in Wing D, right?”
“Yes, in the female patients ward. Second floor. Room 212. If it’s still there,” he said.
“If it’s still there,” I repeated gloomily. “Care to show me?”
He shook his head vigorously. “No, I’m not leaving this bathroom.”
“Why?”
He looked in the direction of the door for a long moment. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
“You’re a great help,” I said sarcastically.
“Tell you what,” he said, fumbling with his ID clipped to his coat. “You don’t mention that I know anything about what Dr. Ashborn was doing, and I’ll give you my passcard.” He pulled the card from the clip behind his ID. “This should get you into the patient wings if the power is restored everywhere.”
“And if the power is not restored?”
“Then they’ll just be open,” he said dismissively.
“And you’re not going to need this passcard?”
He shook his head. “I’m not going into the patient wards.”
“Why not?” I asked, intrigued.
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
Before leaving the Men’s room, I took a moment to use the facilities. I spent another minute splashing water on my face and staring myself in the mirror while the doctor looked on disinterestedly. I pulled my flashlight back out and stopped at the door.
“You sure you wouldn’t rather come with me?” I asked. “There’s strength in numbers.”
“No,” said Merill flatly. “I’m not moving from this room. As far as I’m concerned, this is the safest place in the hospital.”
“Suit yourself,” I said. A second floor Men’s room in a crumbling building wouldn’t be my ideal sanctuary, but it was his risk to take. I clicked on my flashlight and pushed the door open.
The hall was about the same as I left it: dark, uninviting, empty. I heard the door swing shut behind me and the sound of him barring it again. The good doctor wasn’t taking any chances. I’m not sure if I could even talk him into opening it and letting me in again if I wanted.
I started down the hallway. My mind went over what I knew in my head. For all the conversation I had with Dr. Merill, I had few answers and now I had more questions. Something foul had gone on in this hospital, but I pretty much knew that before. I knew it involved Dr. Ashborn and experiments, but I had no clues to what he was actually doing. It probably involved those five monsters. Yet even knowing they left the hospital, Merill refused to leave his bathroom. What else was dangerous here? Patients? Yes, there could be homicidal maniacs here, but Merill was their doctor, surely there was no more risk now than usual. What was he afraid of?
I reached the end of the hallway uneventfully. The last door on the hallway was a stairwell, reminding me of my floor with a big “2”. This stairwell was much bigger than the previous. While the first was just a within-building access stairwell, this one linked the two buildings. I could take stairs down to find doors to the first floor corridors in Wing B or the Main building, or I could take a set of stairs upwards. Since I was on the second floor of the admin building I could go only go up or down. I climbed that stairs just to the next landing and saw it was another locked and gated roof access. It seemed Wing B could only be entered from the first floor. I guess if you were trying to keep people in, you’d want to limit access. With a cautious reluctance, I opened the door and entered Wing B.
Six
TRANSCRIPT: INTERVIEW ROOM 5. PATIENT 457. ATTENDING PHYSICIAN: DR. MERILL
DOCTOR: Let’s talk about the past.
PATIENT: I don’t want to talk about the past.
DOCTOR: Why not?
PATIENT: That’s where all the pain is.
DOCTOR: So let’s talk about the present then.
PATIENT: Yes?
DOCTOR: What do you think of this hospital?
PATIENT: It’s wrong, very wrong.
DOCTOR: What’s wrong with it?
PATIENT: It’s built with madness, painted with unhappiness, and populated with monsters. Anywhere would be better than here.
The lights were on in B Wing. Banks of fluorescent lights shined down, unbroken, unmarred. The lights revealed white walls and spartan hallways. This place was designed to be as inoffensive as possible, and it pulled that off well. Too well. It was numbing how generic the walls and floor were. I guess if you were planning to keep the mentally disturbed anywhere, you should keep an environment that only the most mentally imbalanced room designer would be agitated by.
Rather than long hallways of offices like the administration building, the entrance of B Wing was taken up by a nurse’s station and a large glass wall. I knew it wasn’t really glass, but that’s what it looked like. Probably some form of high durability clear plastic. Within the glass wall was a door with a pass card reader. There were some black scorch marks on the glass wall, but otherwise it looked unharmed. How had the Five gotten through here? They seemed to have burned their way through as far as I’d seen so far.
To my right was a door, which, according to the map in the stairwell, opened up to a long access hallway which would take me in a straight line through Wing B to where it connected to Wing D. It faced the back of the building, so it would not be facing the Army. I grabbed the door and pulled. Securely locked. I looked for anything to use the keycard on and found nothing. Just a regular key lock. The door looked reinforced, so no chance of busting it down. Just my luck.
Immediately to my left was a lounge. The door was ajar. Just turning my head toward it gave me a whiff of a horrible burnt smell – the kind of smell that does not come from burnt building materials. I had never smelled anything like it, but I knew what the smell was by the shiver in my bones and the nausea in my stomach. I looked toward the nurses' station and saw no nurses. I looked back to the ajar door. It all clicked in my head, as horrible a thought as it was. The lounge was where they must have been when that pyromaniac found them. On the other side of this door was… I reached over and reverently closed the door. Not much I could do for them at the moment.
I walked toward the glass enclosure and saw movement. Near the door, resting against the wall was someone I hadn’t noticed at first. He was wearing a bathrobe and looked dazed. A patient. I froze, arms hovering at my sides, ready for trouble. I still held my flashlight; I knew it would make a good club.
It took him a moment, but he eventually saw me. He broke out in a goofy smile and said, “Hi!” with a wave.
I paused, watching for any other reaction. When I saw none, I said, “Hello,” in a not particularly friendly tone.
He smiled again and then padded across the floor toward me in his slippers. When he was a few paces away, I stepped back, causing him to stop moving. I looked him over. Brown hair, pale skin, light blue bathrobe, white and brown checkered pajamas, brown slippers. I’d guess him in his thirties, maybe forties. Shorter than me, and with his weird looking face, I didn’t think he was a fan with the ladies. His eyes were glazed over and he had a stupid grin on his face. Drugged, I guessed. They must keep him on some pretty heavy prescriptions.
“Hi,” he said again, goofy grin
in place. “I n-need to get back in. I n-need to get back in my room. Buh-buh-but I c-c-can’t get through the door.”
That’s one wicked stutter. “Okay…” I started, trying to think of something inoffensive to refer to him as.
“M-Max,” he said.
“What?”
“M-M-Max,” he said, “my n-name is Max.”
“Okay, Max,” I said, “How did you get on this side of the glass?”
“Nuh-nuh-nurse Chambers brought me out.”
“Where’s this nurse now?” I hoped there was a nurse around that had not encountered the pyromaniac part of the Five.
“I don’t nuh-nuh-know where she is. I don’t nuh-nuh-know where any nuh-nurses are. Everything was d-dark and I was in my room. Buh-but I realized I hadn’t gotten my m-meds. It’s very important I get my m-meds. I heard D-doctor Ashborn c-clearly tell the nuh-nurses I have to get them every f-four hours. Dr. M-m-merill made it very c-clear to them that if anything, I should get my m-meds more often. It’s very important I get my m-meds.”
“Yeah, got that,” I said, “you need your meds.”
“Yeah,” he said dazedly. I watched his eyes while he talked. He was pretty zonked out on whatever he was on. When he started to talk again, I cringed internally. His stutter was bad, but worse with his desire to tell me everything. “S-so it was time for my m-meds. I tried nuh-knocking for a nuh-nurse, but none came. The d-door was unlocked so I went outside. It was d-dark, but no nuh-nurses. It was d-dark, but I remembered the way. I looked for a nuh-nurse at the nuh-nuh-nurse’s station, but there were none. But the d-door was open, so I went to look. There’s a cabinet with the m-medicine, but it’s l-locked. I went to go back to my room but the lights went on. The d-door l-locked itself and I was on this side of the glass.” He nodded to himself. “I sh-shouldn’t be on this s-side of the glass. Patients go on the other s-side of the glass unless escorted.”
“So this nurse you mentioned didn’t actually bring you out?” I said.
“N-no,” he said, pausing. “Buh-but I was looking for them.”
I looked over at the door and noticed metal rods imbedded in the plastic. It was a powered door. So when the power was out, it shut off, and with the power on, it locked itself. The power outage let Max out. So if Max was able to get out, then… I stared over Max’s shoulder at what I could see of the hall. “Max,” I asked, “Did anyone else get out of their cells? Rooms, I mean.”
“It was d-dark,” he said simply.
“I know it was dark, but did you see anyone? Maybe hear something.”
“I think I heard something,” he said with a frown. “C-can you get me my m-meds? Are you a nuh-nuh-nurse?”
“No, I’m not a nurse. And I can’t get you any meds,” I responded.
“That’s too bad, d-doctor,” he said. “I think the m-meds are wearing off.” He paused, staring at his slippers for a long moment. Then he looked back up at me. “D-doctor, can I go back to my room?”
“If I can figure out how to get through the door…” I said, looking over his shoulder at the door.
“I think I sh-should really get back to my room.”
“I know, Max,” I said, relaxing. He seemed harmless. He was drugged to high heaven, so even if stabby, I think I could deal with him. Besides that, he seemed like someone who fanatically obeyed rules, which could be a problem. Sometimes the fanatics played ball, other times they were the first to go crazy. Whether he was truly fanatical about rules or not, he seemed to really want to get back to his room, which I had no problem with. The fewer mentally disturbed wandering about, the better, as far as I was concerned. “I’m a new doctor here, Max, so I don’t know where everything is. Bear with me.”
“Oh!” he said, perking up. “I can g-give you a tour then.”
“I don’t think I need a tour, but I do need to get to Wing D.”
“Ah, Wing D!” he said, surprisingly flawlessly.
“Been there?”
“N-no.”
“I see,” I said.
“Wing D is f-female patient rooms. I’m not a-allowed in there.”
“Understandable,” I said, feeling like I was talking to a child.
He stared at his slippers for another long moment before looking up again. “I nuh-know how to get to Wing D.” He had this puppy dog look, as if seeking some kind of recognition, some gold star.
“Maybe I’ll let you show me there,” I said, passing by him and crouching at the door, looking at the mechanism, “if I can get through this door.” Max was behind me and my back to him, which was already showing more trust than I probably should. I was honest when I said I’d let him lead me to the next wing. I hoped that his presence might dissuade some of the others patients from bothering me. I’m not sure why I thought it would work, but it was better than nothing.
The door had a keypad as well as a scanning pad. I didn’t know any codes, so I’d need a keycard. I began fumbling around in my pockets, finding lint and keys, wallet and phone. I went from pocket to pocket, trying to remember which one I put it in.
“You n-need a k-keycard,” said Max, leaning over my shoulder to look at what I was doing.
I rolled my eyes as I continued to fumble in my pockets. In my inside jacket pocket, I found the keycard that Dr. Merill gave me. I waved it by the keycard scanner. There was a beep, followed by a loud ka-chunk as the bars disengaged. Without its locking mechanism, the door pushed open easily. We walked through and I let go of the door, letting it swing back into position. I took a step forward, wincing midstep as I heard the ka-chunk of the door locking behind me. Sure I had the keycard, but it was still a very tangible barrier. Now I was on the inside, the patient side.
With Max in the lead, we walked down the hallway. Under the hum of fluorescent lights, everything was as generic and inoffensive as on the other side of the glass. White doors lined the hallways, the only distinctive features the number painted on the door and the mini-door covering a window where a nurse could look in on the patient. Light reached everywhere, banishing all shadows from the hallway and bleaching out all the colors. White pervaded the entire hallway. It had a numbing effect.
As I feared, the hallways were not empty. Max was not the only patient who had decided to wander. I saw an old man in a bathrobe standing on one side of the hall. He looked to be in his sixties, his skin wrinkled, his head almost completely bald. He stared at me as we passed in the hallway, his expression unidentifiable, the left side of his face twitching. As we walked by, his head turned to watch me, his dark eyes staring. I wondered if he was going to say or do something, but he kept on staring. I looked at Max, who seemed unconcerned as he walked by. Even after we passed the old man, I turned my head and saw him still staring at me.
“So, Max,” I said, hoping conversation might defuse some of the tension I was feeling and maybe make me seem not so out of place to any who might be watching. “How long have you been here?”
“In the h-hospital?” he said, confused.
“Yeah, in the hospital. How long have you been a patient?”
“N-not long. Less than a y-year,” he said.
“Oh,” I said, surprised. Somehow I figured he had been checked in for a long, long time.
“It’s not the fuh-first time I’ve been in the h-hospital,” he said.
“Ah, I see,” I replied, distracted by an ajar door. A pale face stared at me from the door. As we got closer, the door slammed shut. “When were you in the hospital?” I asked, not caring for the answer.
“W-when I was a tuh-tuh-teenager,” he said. I stared at the recently closed door as we passed.
“It’s too bad you’re in here again,” I said, turning my head to look at the door, which opened again as we passed, the same face staring at me.
“Yes, t-too bad,” Max said glumly.
We walked in silence for a short while. I’m not sure what went through Max’s head, but I was growing paranoid. I kept looking at every door, wondering who was behind it. Every face
we passed stared at me. Sure, I was the new person, the new “doctor”, so I should expect to get stared at, but I was feeling something beyond that. Maybe it was only paranoia. I knew I was uncomfortable trapped in this hospital and even more uncomfortable being in a patient ward. I realized that few, if any, of the patients were violent. That didn’t keep me from the fear that any of them could be the one that was violent, or the one that’s about to become violent for the first time.
“Th-this is my room,” said Max, proudly, breaking me out of my thoughts. I turned and looked at the door he gestured at. It looked the same as all other doors, with the number 127. It was still ajar from when Max had left. I nodded to him curtly, unsure of what response to give. He was proud of his room, but I could honestly give a damn. I just needed to get to the other end of this wing. Max led on down the hall.
“So what did you do before you came to the hospital, Max?” I said, trying to make conversation again.
“I was a re-research scientist,” he said. “A tech-tech-technician,” he added, having great difficulty with that word.
“That’s interesting,” I said. My eyes were now on a group of patients congregated on one side of the hallway. There were three, each in a bathrobe. They looked like they were having a conversation, or had been, until they saw me. After that, they all stared at me. The one nearest the center of the hallway was the youngest, probably in his early twenties or late teens. While the others had stares that were hard to guess, maybe ominous – maybe not, the younger man’s stare was a pure glare. There was malice in him.
“So what type of research did you do, Max?” I asked, trying to continue conversation. The glare of the young man unnerved me. I wanted my conversation with Max to mask my presence, maybe defuse some of the malice. Max was one of them, maybe by talking to him, I could show that I was okay or at least undeserving of their glares.
Max had normally been prompt in responding, just happy to talk. But this time he paused for a long moment before responding. “I c-can’t tell you that, d-doctor. It’s see-see-secret. I’m probably already in t-trouble for what I already t-told to D-doctor Ashb-born.”
The Lost and the Damned Page 10