The Lost and the Damned

by Dennis Liggio

  I tapped the door, hearing an obvious metal sound. I gently touched the rust, trying not to cut myself on it. I can’t remember the last time I got a shot, but lockjaw was not appealing. The rust felt real, the metal strong, probably heavy. Steel?

  “So we have a big metal door standing in the middle of whiteness,” prompted Katie.

  “That sums it up,” I said, staring at the door.

  “You plan on opening it or just staring at it?” asked Katie.

  “I figured that we might want to check it out first and…”

  “So when there’s nowhere to go, you are all gung-ho about walking, but once we have a place to go, you get cold feet?”

  I rolled my eyes, but I knew she was right. I just had a bad feeling about the door. But at the same time, where else were we going to go?

  I wrapped my hand around the handle which was thankfully free of rust. I took a deep breath and pulled. The door was much heavier than I expected, but not too heavy I couldn’t move it. I had to lean back to pull it open. At first I didn’t think anything was happening. Then with a squeal of metal, the door began to slowly open. I continued to lean back, taking a step back so I could lean more and more. As I pulled it open, Katie looked inside.

  “Whoa,” said Katie, staring through the door.

  I gave the door one final pull, then stood up straight, wiping the sweat off my brow. The door was wide enough for us to comfortably get through, even if it wasn’t completely open. I walked around and stood next to Katie, looking through the doorway.

  We looked into a dark dimly lit passage. It was similar to a steam tunnel, pipes lining the passageway. It disturbed me to see that pipes seem to travel from either side of the door from our side down the hallway. The passageway was dark and dank, lit only by hanging lights in metal cages. Much of the metal in the tunnel was rusted. Water leaked from many of the pipes. The floor was covered with a thin layer of murky water. The air that spilled out of the door was thick and musty. It looked like we were going to go from a white nowhere to the dark bowels of a building or sewer system.

  “Do we have to go in there?” asked Katie.

  “Do you want to stay here?” I countered.

  “Good point,” she said. “Still…”

  “What?”

  “Maybe the whiteness isn’t so bad,” she said.

  “I thought you hated it?”

  “No… well, yes. It’s just that…”

  “What about it?” I said.

  “This just looks like the set of a horror movie.”

  I admitted she had something there. I didn’t like it either. Still, one of us needed to be brave. That meant convincing her of it. “It’s just a steam tunnel,” I said, “Lots of buildings have them. Disney World has them, and that’s the happiest place on Earth.”

  She immediately waggled her finger at me in air. “I don’t want to even start with how many things are wrong with that statement.”

  “Okay, forget Disney. But lots of places have them.”

  “And this is just like those?”

  “Yes,” I said.

  “How many have you been in?”

  “Well, none,” I admitted.

  “And so you see my point,” she said.

  “Then this will be my first,” I said, stepping forward into the passageway. The water splashed as I stepped in, murky water sloshing around my shoes. I turned around and stared back at Katie.

  “Fine, fine,” she said, “I’ll go in, I’ll go in. But ask me to split up and search the place, and I am fucking gone.”

  She walked to the doorway, then took a very slow tentative step over the threshold to the passage. Murky water welled around her foot.

  “Eww! Eww! Eww!” she said, her face twisted in disgust. She saw my doubting look. “I’m in a fucking slipper! It’s like a thin piece of rubber and then fabric. Eww! I can feel the water between my toes! Eww!”

  I began to walk forward, peering forward in the corridor. Behind me I heard Katie making further sounds of disgust. I knew she was having a tough time, but I also knew it was just dirty water. I tuned her out and concentrated on figuring out what laid ahead.

  The steam tunnel went straight. I didn’t see any intersections. I saw at least one hatch on the ceiling, but it seemed pretty rusted. There had once been a ladder that went up to it, but the ladder had also rusted and broken into pieces. I alerted Katie to the pieces, then went onward down the hallway. The air was very humid. In some places, steam spewed forth from a pipe, almost obscuring the way ahead. By the time we reached the door, we were both having very bad hair days.

  The door was another large metal door like the one we had entered the steam tunnels in. That at least provided us some continuity. It didn’t look quite as rusted as the other door, so I had more confidence in it opening than the last one. Without a word of discussion, I grabbed the handle and pulled. While the door moved easier, I was still leaning back in a puddle of water. I slipped at first, but after much effort I pulled the door open enough for us to get by.

  The room beyond was strange. That might not be the right word to use. At this point in my journey, strange had lost all sense of meaning. The room was different and confusing. I had not seen a room like it, though I had no great knowledge of steam tunnels and the inner working of utility systems. It did not make sense to me, but without knowing its intended function, I couldn’t say if it was pointless.

  The room was round and made of metal. I could see the rivets, knowing that the room seemed constructed of sheets of metal. The ceiling was flat. It was the bottom of the chamber where things differed. There was no floor of the chamber. Instead, the floor sloped down like a funnel, growing ever narrower to a three foot wide circular hole disappearing into darkness. The room had only two doors; I could see the other door across from us. Between the doors was a bridge made of a metal grate, like a catwalk. The bridge was about thirty feet long and about three feet wide. The metal grate had a very wide pattern, each hole in the grating two inches wide, giving a very good view of the funnel below. Above the catwalk hung three large lamps enclosed in cages, each over a different section of catwalk. The lights were currently off, but there was enough light from the corridor to give a dim view of the room.

  I walked forward into the room, pausing before going over the bridge. I took a step onto the bridge, putting my weight onto my foot. Then I shifted my weight. The bridge shook a small bit, but overall it seemed to stay in place. Katie peered around the door before coming into the room. “What do they use this room for?” she asked.

  “I’m not sure,” I said, shifting my weight more. The bridge still seemed pretty secure. “Access room? Overflow?”

  “Sure,” she said, not convinced, still clutching the door and peering from behind it. “How’s that bridge look?”

  I jumped up and came down hard on the bridge, a loud clank echoing through the chamber. “Seems pretty stable.”

  “I guess so…” she said, not moving.

  “Come on,” I said.

  “I just don’t know about this room,” she said. “I have a bad feeling about this room.”

  “I have a bad feeling about this whole damn place; I’m not sure how you can say it about just this room.”

  “I just…”

  “Come on, there are as many chances of monsters behind you as in here.” Oh how I regret these words.

  “I guess you’re right,” she said, stepping around the door to join me at the start of the bridge.

  Behind us, I heard the noise of metal sliding against metal. I spun around quickly, just barely seeing a new door slide down in front of the door, ceiling off our exit. This also cut us off from our light source, plunging us into darkness.

  I heard Katie shriek while I twisted around, looking for anything in the darkness. I tried not to move; I couldn’t remember how close I was to the bridge or its edge. I hoped that Katie would do the same, but all I could hear was her shriek. She was closer to the door so she should be safer.
A moment later, the thought sparked in my head: someone knows we’re here!

  Suddenly I heard a siren. Not a police car siren, but more of a red alert siren. Below the bridge at the opening of a hole, a red light turned on. This was more similar to a police siren light, causing red light to spin around the bottom of the room as the siren blared. It wasn’t bright enough to illuminate the whole room, but the red light spilled up through the grate holes in the bridge as it spun. I watched as the light spun and revealed portions of the metal walls – rusted metal walls stained with something very dark.

  My thought was very clear: We’re fucked now!

  I looked down through the grates. Something was moving near the hole. It was right near the light, so every time the light went my way I was blinded again. It was something pale white, dyed red by the light. Something moving. Writhing. Were those arms? Legs? I was confused. I couldn’t get a good look at what was there, but something was coming out of the hole. Maybe somethings. I just wish I could get a good look at what was down there.

  All three hanging lamps began to flicker and then turned on. I could finally see the chamber more clearly. Metal sheet walls, attached with rivets. The walls were covered with rust and dried blood splatters. The entire funnel section was completely covered with dried blood. It was very clear to me; blood dripped down into the funnel. That was the function of this room.

  I looked down at the hole. I saw the most disturbing thing I had seen so far since I entered the hospital. Scrabbling up from the hole was a monstrosity. Multiple monstrosities. These were beings of pale flesh and mockeries of the human forms. One form was a human-like torso, stopping at the waist, with two arms and a head. The head had a gibbering human-like mouth with sharp teeth. The worst part was its eyes. Instead of eyes, it had blank, smooth flesh. It didn’t even have eye sockets that skin had grown over. This thing was conceived without eyes. No two of these creatures looked alike. Another was a set of legs attached to a torso, armless with eyes peering out from its chest. Another was a head, torso, but no limbs. All were weird amputee mockeries of humanity.

  I watched them all pulling themselves up with whatever locomotion they had, hauling themselves over the lip of the hole to the bottom of the funnel. The walls of the funnel were steep, so I thought at least that would keep them down in the funnel. What were they waiting for? Was this some sort of feeding mechanism? Were they waiting for blood to drain into the funnel?

  “What the fuck are those things?” I heard Katie scream.

  I looked back at her, not knowing what to say to her. I shook my head, lost. I looked back at the creatures in the funnel. Those that had heads raised them toward us, appearing to look at us, even if they didn’t have eyes. Those that had mouths gibbered and chattered, the sound barely audible over the siren which continued. I looked back at Katie. She clung to the new door that had dropped down, keeping herself as far from the bridge as possible.

  Looking down at the creatures, my skin crawled. There was a very powerful wrongness about them. They mocked the human condition, gibbering half-formed parodies of what man is. I saw some of them had red blood trickling down their pale skin. Some banged their limbs against the metal sheet walls, making a reverberating sound that probably indicated they wanted their food. When the creature in question had no limbs, it banged its torso and head against it. I was thoroughly freaked out, but I was kept from panicking by the fact that they were down there and I was above them. They couldn’t reach us.

  There was a thump and I turned my head to see what the two-armed no-legged creature was doing. The thump was from the creature clawing its arm into the metal of the wall. It was using its long fingernails to grip a rivet and was trying to pull itself up. As I watched, it pulled its torso up, then its other hand clawed and gripped at where two sheets of metal connected. It was pulling itself up! I looked around and the other monstrosities seemed to take its example. Using whatever body parts they had, they tried pulling themselves up, the writhing mass now pushing itself up the walls.

  “Oh shit,” said Katie, seeing the same thing.

  “We need to get across the bridge!” I said to her, shouting to be heard above the siren.

  I looked at the door across the bridge. It was a heavy metal door like we had seen previously, but it had a handle and could open. I prayed that once we reached the other side that another door did not slam down in front of it.

  I began to step across the bridge. Since the creatures were clutching and banging against the walls, the bridge was vibrating as well. I could still get across it, but I did not trust myself to go quickly. I took a few steps, looking down to see limbless monsters below me sneering up with drooling mouths, their limbed compatriots still climbing the walls slowly. I saw the one with two arms and no legs the highest up, but had a small bit of relief when it lost its grip and slid down to the bottom. Then I watched as it began to climb again, this time with greater speed.

  I turned around and looked at Katie. “Come on!” I shouted. She still stood clutching the door. “Come on!” I repeated, but she still stayed. Keeping my balance the best I could, I walked back to her and took her hand, gently pulling her away from the door. “We need to cross the bridge before they get up here!” She finally began to walk with me toward the bridge.

  I stepped forward across the bridge. I looked anxiously at the monsters climbing around us. While some of them slipped back down to the bottom, others were actually making their way up. Behind me, Katie was slowly making her way, edging one foot in front of the other. I wondered if it would be fast enough.

  Keeping my balance, I walked across the bridge. Every step was agonizing, hearing the chitter of monsters, watching them leer at us with sightless faces from below the bridge and feeling them bang on the metal sheet walls. I made my way farther and farther. I felt relieved when I made it to the other side of the bridge, then was tense again when I saw how far some of the creatures had gotten. Without a further thought, I grabbed the handle of the door. I prayed that the door had not rusted shut. Not now. I pulled with all my might and was rewarded with a squeak and the door opening just an inch.

  I looked back and Katie was almost halfway across the bridge. “Hurry!” I said before clenching my teeth and pulling harder on the door. It opened a few more inches and I kept pulling. I clenched my muscles and made one big pull, pulling the door another foot open. It was not completely open, but it was open enough. Beyond the door was complete blackness, the light from this room not even penetrating. I didn’t care. Even blackness was better than this. We could go through and pull the door shut behind us.

  Turning around, Katie was still at the halfway point. She had made the mistake of looking down, seeing the monsters in the hole watching her. “Katie! You need to come across!” I shouted.

  She looked up at me, her wide eyes filled with fear, and nodded, taking a step. Midstep the two lights on either end of the bridge shut off. Only the light in the middle of the bridge remained. The siren light still turned, flashing the room with red. Behind Katie there was now darkness. In front of her was me, standing in the darkness. Only the middle segment of the bridge where Katie stood was lit.

  “I can’t see the bridge!” she said.

  “Watch the red light!” I said. “When it touches the bridge it lights it!” Every time the siren light spun, she could see the bridge in front of her. The problem was it took two or three seconds to make its revolution, so she was still looking at darkness most of the time, then there was a single moment of it being lit.

  “I can’t!” she said. I saw tears in her wide eyes. She was frozen in place.

  “You have to! I know it’s dark, but you have to!”

  She was still crying, and I saw her head turn toward where the two-armed no-legged creature was climbing. It had climbed the farthest and it was nearly horizontally level with the bridge.

  “Katie, I need you to walk!” I shouted.

  Her crying eyes looked at me and I could clearly see that she didn’t th
ink she could do it.

  “Katie, you can do it! Just walk forward. It doesn’t matter if you can’t see! The bridge is wide enough!”

  She looked back at the creature, which had swiveled its sightless head and had opened its mouth to growl at Katie, displaying black teeth and a long tongue covered in drool.

  “Katie!”

  She didn’t react to me. She kept staring at that thing. The thing appeared to “stare” at her with its sightless face. It licked its lips. Katie and it kept staring at each other.

  I fumbled in my pocket and pulled out my gun. I clicked the safety off. I knew this might be our only chance. With shaking hands I aimed at the sightless creature. I pulled the trigger twice, the gun lurching in my hand. The metal sparked near the creature’s head, but the second bullet struck true, a red hole appearing where an eye socket would have been. It held on for a second before falling down the funnel. When it slowed to a stop, the other creatures leaped upon it, biting and tearing at it.

  Katie broke gaze from creature and looked back at my direction, trying to find me in the darkness. “Katie, now!” I shouted.

  She nodded, sniffing up her tears. With new energy, she stepped forward, taking a number of quick but still tentative steps toward me. While some of the creatures had turned on the fallen one, there were a few that were still climbing quite high on the walls. I trained my gun on some of the other creatures, but knew she needed to get across quickly. I couldn’t depend on shooting them all.

  I stepped a few steps out on the bridge and waved her past me. Another creature with two arms, two legs, and no face was coiled like a spring high enough up. If it jumped… I fired a bullet at it. I missed, but the sparks from the ricochet were large enough that they distracted the creature, causing it to fall below.

  Katie was at the door. “It’s dark! I can’t see anything in there!”

  I felt a thump and below me I saw another two-armed legless creature holding onto the bottom of the bridge. Its mouth snapped at the grate under my feet. “Just go! Now!” I said, jumping back.

  In front of me, Katie disappeared into darkness. Breaking into a run, I followed her, slipping past her into utter blackness.