They say when you deeply love someone, it keeps you going; I understood it after I found out that Cris is alive!
Before that, since the night Cris disappeared, I laughed, I smiled, I threw puns to keep my only friend from sinking, but inside I was crumbling, brick by brick. Since I glimpsed that light of hope, I've lived on the edge of my nerves—awake, twitching, sleepless.
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Moonlight spread across the wall in front of me. I slipped out, carefully, down the stairs.
The running footsteps again. They come and go every night, always before I reach the door behind the reception.
Did I forget to tell you? That door behind the reception—the one I could never touch before—I can open it now. Not the entrance we first used. That one never opens. I doubt it ever will.
I've been trapped here ever since. A ruined hospital, top windows shattered, lower ones sealed shut, a night that refuses to end. The creatures return the moment they're killed—or when I kill them. I don't know if my friends are still alive. If they do, do they remember me? Do they know I'm alive?
Maybe they escaped, and I was left behind. I tell myself I'm not alone, because if I don't, the last threads of my sanity will snap.
I did find a shotgun, though. One pull of the trigger scatters the monsters into raw meat. Then I run, before the next one crawls into the room.
Let me repeat my last sentence with a spark of truth. I found a shotgun—beautiful, heavy, powerful. One shot could tear a monster apart… if only I had ammo. I never did.
So I use the gun Maddie left me. One bullet to the skull makes the creature convulse, then fall. That gives me just enough time to run before another one is born. Sometimes I swear they don't die at all—they just respawn.
It doesn't matter. I've accepted I'll never escape. A year has passed, yet every morning I wake to the same day.
How do I know? There's a TV in the waiting room. It plays the same broadcast, the same news of an old tragedy, stamped with "Live." I don't even watch it—I only track the date. It never changes.
And how do I know it's been a year? The register. Every day, I must sign it on the reception desk if I want the door to open, if I want ammunition or medicine. That's how I learned the rules here.
The strange part is, it doesn't matter what you write. A curse, a song, your darkest thoughts—it all works. The moment the pen lifts, a woman's voice whispers behind my ear, clear and close: "You can come in now."
There's never anyone there. No woman. No man. Nothing. After that, the door yawns open, and I have fifteen minutes to take whatever I can carry before it seals again.
Food, ammunition, medicine—whatever I can carry—I drag it upstairs and lock myself in the same room, praying to outlast the ghouls and wraiths that come hunting, for some reason, they never come inside this room.
Strange, how it feels like a twisted game from childhood. That old mission—switch off the light and race to bed before the ghost catches you. Only now, the ghost is real, and it never tires.
Still, some good news. I found a sniper today. Silent. Clean. So now I get to shoot enemies from above, *Yay!*. For a moment, it almost feels like victory.
But then comes the part I dread. Every day, at the same hour, when the mist creeps across the ground, the monsters gather in one room I can see from above. They circle, writhing and squealing, as if in torment.
That's when the shadow comes. It glides between them, heavier than smoke, darker than the dark itself—pure absence, pure void. Wherever it moves, the creatures collapse, shrieking, their bodies twisting in agony. Some are devoured. The rest are left twitching on the floor.
I've never seen it leave the building. I don't want to know what it does down there. But each time it appears, the hair at the back of my neck bristles, dragging ice across my spine.
Speaking of hair, I've grown a beard now. My hair's longer, dishieved. I barely recognize myself anymore.
Like every night, I sat against the left wall, clutching the gun until sleep pulled me under. To silence the dread, I imagined a beach with my friends, laughter on the waves, a perfect world.
We played volleyball. But then it shifted. Cris walked toward me in a floral frock, radiant, alive. She reached me, slipped her arm into mine, and whispered, "Walk with me. I need to talk."
Her voice trembled. "I don't feel good about this place."
I forced a smile. "Why? We're with friends, we're fine."
Her eyes darkened. "Not the beach. The oblivion."
I froze. Her hands were warm, her grip real. "Cris… are you alive? Are you here?"
The sky blackened, the sun plunging unnaturally fast.
"I don't know where I am, but it's dark. There are things—things I don't want to see." Her grip tightened until I swore I felt bone. "Help!"
Her scream tore through me. My eyes snapped open. Her face lingered, trembling, then shattered into air like glass breaking.
It was the first dream that felt real. Too real. And it drove me to madness. I crept to the window, lifted the sniper, and saw something I had never seen before.
The monster in my sights had a strip of human skin across its forehead. That was when it struck me—every one of them had once been human. Lowering the gun, I noticed the skin beneath my smallest finger had turned black.
I tested a thought. I aimed at another, one completely black, pulled the trigger, and watched it collapse. The others swarmed the body, tearing into it. My wrist began to itch. I shoved up my sleeve—black spots appeared across my arm.
The truth hit me. They weren't just killing to survive—they were transforming, piece by piece, into what they are now. And with every kill, I was becoming one of them.
Then I saw it. The one with the human skin still clinging to its face wore something around its neck. I squinted through the scope. A locket. Maddie's gold locket.
My breath caught. She wasn't lost—at least, not completely. I told myself I would not kill again. I lowered the weapon. *I will save her.*
The next day, I signed the register with two words: "Screw you." The door opened, the voice whispered, and I rushed inside, grabbed food, ignored the ammo, and took the shaver to the bathroom.
I cleaned my beard.
A screech echoed.
*Shit! I ran out of time*
I rushed, but before I reached the stairs, I heard something new. Something I had never heard in this place before.
The newscaster spoke a name that froze me—Samantha Willow. I turned toward the TV.
"Grace Willow, daughter of Samantha Willow, disappeared after today's blast at Willow Medical Center. Multiple chemical detonations have been reported. No survivors confirmed. Doctor Samantha Willow, how are you holding up?"
Samantha's face filled the screen, her eyes swollen red with grief. "I was knocked out by the first blast in the lab. But I know—whoever did this, they wanted my daughter." Her voice cracked into sobs.
The reporter pressed, "How can you be sure it wasn't chemical? Several explosions have been confirmed."
Her gaze hardened. "Because I was there. There was no chemical accident." She wiped her tears with trembling hands.
"Do you have a message for the victims' families?"
"I am sorry for your loss. You are not alone—I suffer as you do. They weren't only my patients, they were my family. I'm donating fifteen million dollars to their families." She paused, swallowed, then leaned closer to the microphone.
"And to the kidnappers—if it's money you want, take it. Just release my daughter. But if you took her for another reason…" Her voice dropped to steel, her eyes blazing. "I swear on my daughter's life—you will not escape me."
I froze, realizing this was the same hospital Grace vanished from. Heart pounding, I rushed back to my room and yanked open the drawers. Papers were scattered across the floor. Tilting my head, I noticed something wedged beneath—a small sketchbook, deliberately hidden.
On the first page, scrawled in colored pencils, was a name: *Grace Willow.*
I turned the pages. Unicorns. Flowers. Childish doodles. But deeper in, the drawings changed. A shadow with a tail. A child shackled, a leash around his neck. More pages, the sketches sharpened, clearer. The same child again, but his lower body dissolved into smoke.
*Poor kid* I thought.
My gaze drifted to the wall. The word *Artheming* carved into stone, Roman numerals etched beneath: VII, VIII, V, IV, IX, VI, II, I, III. I rearranged them in proper order, writing the letters above their numbers.
When the sequence aligned, my breath caught. The word spelled itself out—*NIGHTMARE.*
It was never about a place. Never about survival. It was about surrender. Giving in. Letting go of yourself, your mind, until you become the prey of the nightmare itself.
The only way out was simple, brutal, impossible—
*Wake up.*