by Matt Beimler
And then I am falling back inside. The walls split open like black wings and pull me into the depths. The floors flicker past and I go deeper and deeper. More floors than have ever been. Could ever be. I crash to my hands and knees onto the stark black and white tile of the basement. Shapes fill the darkness around me. I can’t see them, but they are there in the dark. The Wild Ones. Terrible and real and worse than anything that kept me awake before they brought me here.
That’s how I got to Bedlam. At first I just couldn’t sleep. Did you know that after a while, if you stay awake, things start to look different? They tell me I was hallucinating when I started the fire. I think I might have been seeing the real world. I am pretty sure I don’t want to see it again. Either way the fire cleaned the monsters away.
It was supposed to be short, my visit. They just wanted to Observe me. It was supposed to be 48 hours. No more. Just enough time to get me sleeping again. I guess I didn’t do what they wanted me to.
It’s been so long, I am not even sure what home was like.
It wasn’t bad then. The nurses and orderlies mostly left me alone. I got fed regularly and had a safe place to sleep. At least until the Last Shift. That’s when everything changed.
It started a bit before that. One night the Beast got loose from the secure cells. He had been trying for a while. He got all the way to the kitchen before they caught him. He did something terrible to a cook. A man. At least he was before the Beast got him.
The screaming was what alerted them. The orderlies and nurses knocked him to the floor and injected him. He relaxed a bit after that. In fact, he kinda looked dead. I wish he had just died.
The police came. They questioned everyone on the staff and even a couple of patients. Then they left. One of the orderlies, Mike, was in charge of the keeping the monsters in the dungeon that night. He wouldn’t say what he was doing instead of checking the patients and the doors. It didn’t matter who asked, the officers or Doctor Ben. So he was fired. He stormed out shouting that they hadn’t paid him in a month anyway.
Apparently Nurse Sheckles had provided a more interesting distraction. She lasted longer than most. Maybe out of guilt.
His abrupt termination was a spark that lit the fire. The orderlies stopped showing first. Maybe it was solidarity. Maybe they just got tired of not being paid. The nurses lasted a couple of weeks longer. The Last Shift was just a pair of them. They emptied their lockers and we never saw them again. No one ever showed up to relieve them.
Meds stopped a few months after that. The hospital had a few medbots that kept dispensing the patients’ prescriptions even after the doctors stopped writing them. For a while. The deliveries became erratic. Then the pharmacy supplies ran out of medication. The ‘bots kept trying to dispense them, but nothing came out. Many of the patients had begun to act out. The medbots started to disappear. The Wild Ones got them. They ripped them apart trying to get the last few pills out. Some of the pieces are still around. There’s a wind catcher in the tv room that is made out of their optics. They look like crystal drops.
Cold seeping from the black and white tiles under my hands pull me deeper into the dream. A part of me screams that this is all a nightmare. Another assures me it is not.
The Beast reclines in a throne of glass and fire in the center of a room that is bigger than the entire building. He smiles at me and for a moment I forget the icy weak feeling seeping into my gut and remember the man who talked to me as if I was just as important as anyone else. Then the face contorts into the Beast that rules this shadow kingdom of the fallen.
He leans forward. Shadows streak across his face. His giant hands reach out and pull one of the Wild Ones across the floor to him. His jaw distends and cracks open. He crushes the Wild One between his fingers before they slowly constrict around the body and draw it into his mouth. Swallowing. A deep scraping sound as his jaws drag the body in. The whole time his eyes watch me. The Wild One’s feet slip past the darkened lips. I’m next. His giant hands reach out and wrap around me.
Here. It’s here. Red is hiding them in here.
…clean smell. …still fresh. …break it. …take its home away. …make it share.
And then I am awake. A blanket is wrapped around my throat. It was choking me in my sleep. I look around as the last traces of the dream fade. The tiles here are the normal gentle shades of blue. Not the harsh black and white from my dream.
Still, I lurch to my feet before tumbling back onto the couch when the blanket cobbles me. I look around in the dim light of Dr. Ben’s desk lamp recognizing the familiar and safe shapes of my room. My pulse slows and I can breathe again. Then I hear a scraping sound. The nightmare Beast? No. It’s nails dragging on wood. Someone is scratching at the door, like a hound trying to get in. I hide in the bathroom with the door cracked so I can see out or pull it closed if I need to. The wooden office door creaks as something heavy slams against it. Again and again. There is an abrupt splintering crack.
The door falls to the floor in pieces. The Beast lurches into the room. His face is red and his stench rolls into the room. He flips the heavy desk through the air and to the floor like it’s made of paper. The terminal hits the wall and disintegrates in a spray of broken glass. Dr. Ben crackles to the floor. His permanent grin looking more like a grimace of pain. I can’t help but wince. I know he’s past it, but I still feel the pain for him.
Empty drawers. Useless crap. No pills. Nothing.
…it was here. …it had a bottle and hid it so you have to go without. …find it.
…check the couch.
Picking up a shard of green glass from the desk lamp the Beast slashes my couch. His back is to me. Totally engrossed in the ecstasy that destruction brings him, he hasn’t notice me. He methodically rips the padding from inside the couch and carefully piles it on what remains of the desk. I sneak through the cracked bathroom door, pull my bag tight to my chest, and slip past the destruction into the hall. Emm flits past the Beast and heels after me down the hallway.
Chapter 6
Into the Woods
Too easy to hide in here anyway. Too many leaves.
…burn them. …clean them away.
I head to the Atrium. It’s the only place still alive in the building. Great growing vines sprawl across the ceiling and on the catwalks so thick you can’t see through them to the floor. The plants flower in a rainbow of colors. It’ll be nice to…
An acrid familiar smell assaults my nose as I get close. The room is darker than it should be. Maybe it’s storming outside? There is a haze in the air.
He’s already been here. It’s been burned. Nothing left.
The windows are smoke stained and all the plants that are left are blackened. Even the vines that climbed the spiral metal stairs of the catwalks before spreading to the ceiling are shriveled or burned away completely. My eyes sting and my vision blurs.
I find myself on the ground. Hot tears trickling down my face as my fingers are sifting cooling mud and ash through my fingers. Nothing left. Emm is resting on the ground beside me quietly whirring.
A soft foot step behind. I glance back.
The Beast stands in the doorway. He’s been waiting. His chest is heaving as if he has just finished a marathon. He scents the air like a hound before slowly deliberately fixing my gaze.
I lurch to my feet. He darts across the room faster than I expect or am prepared for. I barely get back in time to avoid the clawed tips of his swiping hands. Emm is not quick enough. She lifts into the air just in time to be swatted from it. My guts cringe as she slams into the ground with the sound of crushing coke can. In that moment I know I have to get Out. Out of his kingdom. Out of Bedlam. Out of Hell.
He’s right behind me. I am not going to leave her here, but I can’t let him catch me either. I’ll have to come back. Through the door in front of me, then up the stairs. The stairs continue up to the roof, where patients are not allowed, but I stop the landing before that. The landing opens out onto one of the c
atwalks. He is right behind me as I force the door closed on him. I manage to block the door with a battered and soot covered trash can that sits nearby.
He hammers on the trash can with the door. It’s already bending and isn’t going to hold long. I lean over the edge trying to spot Emm. She’s still lying crumpled on the ground. No LEDs. Crap. She might not even be repairable. With a shrug I launch myself down the spiral stair closest to her. She’s all I have left. The pounding on the door stops the same moment I step off the catwalk. I make it to her and scoop up the cold still metal form and slip her into my bag. I try not to think about how still she feels.
I can’t get distracted here. The Beast comes through another door that opens on the catwalk. He takes a moment to slam the door and pick up a chair. Luckily I am already heading out of the room. The chair crashes into the door and breaks its safety glass window as it swings shut behind me. I take the same stairs I ran up the first time. This time I take the stairs two at a time and I don’t even slow down on the landing that leads to the catwalks. He is right behind that door. I hear the trash can crash to the side and the door slam open. I don’t look back. It’s just a few more stairs.
The last flight of stairs lead to a rusty door. Rough stenciled letters spelling out ”ROOF” in bright red paint. We aren’t allowed up there. There are even signs. I have already passed two of them. No patients beyond this point. I can hear him coming up behind me now. His footsteps echo up from below. I push against the door. It doesn’t move. I hurl my body against the door panicking. I am stuck inside. I try again and again. It starts to give. The hinges creak and I work my fingers into the crack and give one last push.
The door gives with a retched rusty roar. I stumble out and look up into a clear blue sky. The air is clean. Not thick with humanity, disinfectant, and crap. Just clean air. Maybe a little salt and fish. I swear I can see the ocean. Maybe it’s the ocean. It’s blue and clean looking. Then I hear the Beast coming up the steps behind me.
The only way off the roof, beside the door is all the way across on the side. A rusted iron ladder arches over the edge. It looks frail. Like it’s going to fall apart if I look at it too long. I head over to it anyway. It’s the only way I have left. Unless… No. I sprint the last couple steps.
The world tries to spin away as I look down the ladder and over the edge. So high. So, so high. Maybe I can turn back. Let him take me back inside. Maybe he won’t hurt me too bad.
A hesitant chirp comes from my bag. Relief floods me. It also reminds me that I am not just making the choice for me. I have no choice.
The door thunders into the wall. He is coming across the roof for me.
I make the only choice. Out. I lean over the edge and trust the ladder.
Halfway down, not trusting myself to look down, I look up. He is at the edge, glaring and spitting down at me. He tries the ladder and the first rung breaks with an angry clang before he can even put his full weight on it. He scrambles back onto the roof and I realize for the first time, I am Out. He can’t get me anymore.
I take my time. Negotiating each step carefully, avoiding the rough bites that the elements have burned through the ladder. Each step down is like that first shaky gasp you take when you dove down too deep and barely made it to the surface in time.
Eventually I step down and my bare sole presses painfully into gravel.
But I don’t care.
I let go of the ladder.
I am out of Bedlam.