Chapter 2: Snooping Around

Chris Walker and the Morphogenic Engine belong to Red Barrel. Vera Nagy, Pamela Larkin, John Hawkins belong to me. Enjoy!

We quietly passed down the hallway, and crept up to the far corner leading to the administration block. Two guards in bright, blue shirts, black cache pants, and a utility belt around their waists were sitting at the middle of an elongated desk that faced the entrance of the asylum. A keycard was lying off to the side of the brown, marble surface.

"There's a keycard on that desk over there!" John whispered with a finger pointing towards the desk. We crouched down beside the corner, and I wondered how on Earth we were going to get that keycard without the guards noticing us. "How are we going to get it without them seeing us?" I asked.

"Oh that's definitely not possible, Vera!" Pammy retorted from behind me. Nice, Pammy! Way to shoot us down! I thought. We were only trying to accomplish something here, and she had to crush it with her sarcastic attitude! "Thanks a lot, Pammy!" I countered as I looked back at her. "No wait! I have an idea." She said hopefully.

Pammy stood up behind me to look out at the desk, hovering over John and me. I could feel her knees and shins against each side of my back. It wasn't uncomfortable; as a matter of fact I appreciated it very much. Call me weird, but I've always been an intimate person who liked this type of contact with people that I had become close to. It was nothing sexual of course, only comfort from a warm touch.

"Okay listen!" She proposed as she knelt down behind me, "I'll distract the guards. They'll probably take me back to my room. When we leave, you guys go get the card!" She'll distract the guards, huh? Pammy made it sound so easy, and I wondered if she took into account the possibility that they'll beat the shit out of her before they 'take her back to her room'. So, for the sake of her well-being, I had to bring that up to her.

"Pammy, you'll get in trouble! They'll probably beat the piss out of you, don't you think?" I protested. "Vera, what do you think they'll do to me that they haven't done already to the both of us? Besides, I'm not feeling up to this little quest, but I want you guys to find out what's going on around here, so I'll put myself in harm's way for you both. You guys go ahead!" She said.

"Are you sure, Honey?" John asked in that gentle, awkward manner of his. "Yeah, sweetie! You know I'd do anything for you both! Just make sure you guys don't get caught before you find out what's going on. Good luck!" Pammy reassured as she stood up.

John and me watched as she stepped around the corner, and skipped-literally skipped over towards the front doors. She carelessly hummed a tune, and tilted her head from side to side as she went right past the guards. Man, Pammy knew how to up the setting on her crazy meter when she needed to!

The dumbfounded guards did a double take in her direction as she passed before clumsily rising to their feet. "Hey! Hey, what do you think you're doing?" One of them shouted. They both carefully moved towards her, pulling their PR-24's out from the holsters on their hips.

Pammy stepped right in front of the door, and turned around to look at the guards. "I just want to go for a stroll!" She answered innocently with a shrug. "Oh, I don't think so, Sweetheart! Now get back from the door!" The other one commanded. The guards continued to advance until each of them were on standing in a direction diagonal to each side of her. With their PR-24's in hand, they waited for her to make her next move.

In an instant, she dashed towards a nearby desk, picked up a thick folder full of papers, and chucked it at the guard on her right. "Here's an idea! How about you both fuck off!" She taunted as she picked up another folder, and threw it at the other guard.

In a matter of seconds, both men rushed over to the Pammy who was victorious prancing around the front entrance. The one on the right reached her first. He grabbed her arm, and forced it behind her back with the baton pressed against her joints.

She was forced to the ground, lying flat on her stomach with the guard's knee pressed on top of the back of her hips, and the baton entangled with her arm. "Here's another idea, Bitch!" The other guard countered as he knelt down next to her.

Without warning, he took his PR-24 and jabbed it right into her ribcage. "Ugh!" She grunted in pain. Pammy raised her head off of the ground, and turned it towards the guard who lowered his head to her ear. "How about you watch who the fuck you're talking to!" He growled. "You, Dick!" Pammy remarked back through heavy breathes and gritted teeth.

"Wow that was unnecessary!" I spoke softly in dismay. Truth be told, I can't really say that I'm surprised. That's just the kind of treatment that us patients get from the guards on a daily basis. I mean God forbid that us mentally unfortunate souls should ever take a crack at these asshole's egos! "She took one for the team, Vera." John sighed in admiration, "We owe her."

Finally, the guards pulled her up to her feet. "Alright, get up!" The one on her right demanded, "You're going to the hole!" They barely gave Pammy a chance to move her feet as they dragged her towards the small door on the left. "Now's our chance!" John said, "Let's go!"

Right before the guards made their way through the door with Pammy, John and me quietly ran towards the long desk. I stopped five feet five away, ducking to make sure that no one else was here. At that moment, right as the guards emerged through the door, they said something else that briefly stool my attention away from the keycard.

"Hey, wait a minute! Forget the hole, Man! Let's give her to Gluskin for the day. You know, give him a new bride." One of them suggested with a sinister tone. "Yes! Great idea, Mike! That twisted fucker's been acting up lately. A little pussy might calm him down!" The other one agreed with a chuckle.

"Gluskin?" I uttered to myself. Oh shit, something bad was about to happen to Pammy, and we were the ones who got her into this in the first place! And who was this 'Gluskin" guy? "John, who's Gluskin?" I asked as I went up to him and tugged on his arm. John dashed over to the spot where the keycard was, and snatched it off of the surface.

"What?" He responded.

"Who's Gluskin, John?" I asked once again in a small panic.

"Don't worry about that!" He answered as he grabbed my arm, "let's go, okay? Before they come back!"

"But…!"

With strength that outmatched my own, John pulled me over towards the opposite hallway located diagonally to the desk. We stopped at the corner of the entrance. The frame was encased with glass surrounded by a wooden frame forming rectangles over the doorway.

Dying light bulbs faintly brightened each section of the hallway, shining from the middle of the ceiling. John stayed in front of me, and he didn't seem to mind my hand resting on the back of his shoulder.

"Okay, the coast is clear!" He announced. We stood up, stepped around corner, and ventured into the vacant hallway. As far as we knew it was vacant, but there were still many doors on the side that could've had people behind them.

As we moved down the corridor, we hovered over the ground and took light steps, ensuring that anyone who might have been behind those doors wouldn't hear us. With my right hand still resting on his shoulder, I kept looking behind us. To our luck, no one was there.

By the time we reached the middle of the corridor, we immediately stopped at the faint sound of heavy chains rattling together. "Someone's coming!" I loudly whispered. John spotted a wooden door beside us on the left that was cracked open; allowing a small ray of light from the hallway to barley radiate the dark, narrow space.

"In here!" He beamed. His bony fingers circled around the brown fabric on my arm. With a brash push on the door, he pulled me into the dark room. John pivoted around a corner, and swung me around behind him.

I quickly looked around the room. There was nothing but an unoccupied desk placed cattycornered along a wall where a bay window was built into the middle. It faced the doorway, running parallel to the wall that we leaned against.

Black metal bars were built in front of the glass, which seemed to block any route of escape from this asylum, or possibly preventing someone from killing themselves. Either way, this place was locked down pretty tight all together, considering that you wouldn't find a single window without bars over it.

The moonlight shined in through the bars, forming a group of tiny, luminous squares over the ground in front of the window. Rattling from the chains got louder, which stole my attention away from the room. A shadow of a man began to appear, stretching out along the far walls of the corridor and coming closer to our room.

He was a huge man with a baldhead, massive arms, and a large, round belly. Heavy chains hung from his neck, wrists, and ankles with orderlies on the ends of them. They walked alongside the man, seeming to watch his every move, and holding the large links in their hands.

Finally, a guard appeared around the corner. With a PR-24 in his hands he walked backwards, keeping his eye on the man that shuffled alongside of four orderlies around the corner. Making soft, grunting noises, he slowly strolled in a stupor between the apprehensive orderlies. He was well over 6'5. From this distance his round face was a blur of red, smeared spots, and a wide grin full of teeth.

It wouldn't take a genius to determine that five averaged-sized men would clearly not be able to restrain a man of that size. No, they must have drugged him with fairly large doses of some powerful sedative. Otherwise those meek looking men would be in trouble.

"Oh, shit!" John softly exclaimed in dread, "It's Walker!"

"Who's Walker?" I asked over John's shoulder. "He's ex-military, served in Afghanistan. One day he decided to tear off his own face! Word is he thinks it helps him see better or something. The guy is fucking intense! Wouldn't ever want to be on his radar!" He quietly explained as he looked back at me over his shoulder.

"He tore his own face off? How…oh!" I stopped in surprise as I looked over his shoulder. He was now close enough for me to see the mutilated features of his face. The pink flesh on his forehead was shaped like a tiny, distorted balloon. There were no lids that could close over his ripped, saucer-shaped sockets. I guess you could say that the man slept with his eyes open-if he even slept at all.

Through the smeared, red circled on the middle of his face, you could see two, small holes in the space where his nose should have been. I tried to force myself from gaging as he came close enough to show his large, grotesque smile that only comprised of his yellow teeth and gums.

Oh God, his gums were so discolored! They were no longer pink, and as a matter of fact, I couldn't really tell which color they were now. Hard to believe, right? But no, this was real all right. I was actually staring at a man who had literally ripped his own face off! How could he function and perform essential activities on a daily basis, you ask? Like eating for example? Well, that's a really good question.

We hid behind the corner of the room as they passed by. All we could hear were the heavy breathing from the tense orderlies, rattling of the chains, and deep, grunting sounds coming through Walker's exposed teeth. "Easy boys!" One of them said, "We still got a long way to go!"

My God, I would never ever want to run into him! I'm sure that he could swallow someone of my 5'4 stature whole. Could at least tear someone's arms clean off with ease if he wanted to. Man, I hated to imagine what he was like when he wasn't sedated!

"You're fucking right, John! I would not want to be on his radar either!" I muttered with a soft chuckle. "Fucking right, Honey!" He responded as he looked back at me over his shoulder. Nevertheless, I had a feeling that it would not be the last time that we would ever see Chris Walker.

I rested my chin against his shoulder right beside my hand. With a heavy sigh of comfort, he reached around and placed his hand on mine. The rattling of the chains got softer and softer with each passing second, which made me hopeful that they were reaching the end of the corridor.

"Do you think they're gone?" I innocently asked with my chin still resting against the top of his scapula. "Let me see!" He whispered as I lifted my head up. John carefully glanced around the corner, looking left and right to make sure the coast was clear. "Yep, no one's there! Let's go!"

We stood up, stepped around the corner, and silently dashed into the hallway. The light briefly strained my eyes for a moment from being in that dark room. It caught me off balance, but I adjusted quickly after a few seconds. I stayed behind John as we came upon a corner, and ducked down beside it. A much shorter corridor was revealed.

It was darker with one dimming florescent light bulb that barely brightened up the murky spaces. A metal door stood thirty feet away with an electronic lock on the side. "The keycard should get us through the door, right?" I asked hopefully. "Hope so." John said as he stood up, and pulled the keycard out of his pocket.

I followed him as he approached the door, and held his right ear against the cold metal. "Sounds like no one's coming. Here goes!" He announced as he held the card up to the reader.

At the sound of a loud beep, the small glowing bulb on the top switched from red to green. John pulled the heavy door open, went through, and held it open for me. I noticed that his arm quivered against door's weight, so I passed through quickly. As I squeezed my way through, the cold metal brushed against my bare arms, and the brown fabric zipped over my breasts.

Once I was completely through he let go of the door. It made a soft clank that echoed along the walls of a steep staircase. The walls were as white as snow, and a bright, florescent light illuminated the square-shaped space on the bottom of the stairs. Unfortunately we couldn't see beyond that.

We silently went down each, metal step, mindful of the possibility that there might be someone down at the bottom. By the time we reached the last five steps, John spotted two people standing outside of a door made entirely of glass. He stopped with an arm held out in front of my waist.

Luckily, they didn't spot us. They were standing together staring down at a clipboard before they stepped through the door. A wide, white hallway lay before us, with many sliding doors made of glass, which provided views into small labs. Two yellow stripes ran parallel to each other on each ends of the floor all the way down the hall. The air was brisk and cool, and it felt like being in an icy cave.

My concern was how this place was constructed. How open everything was, and how little cover we had to hide from personnel down here. "Judging by the looks of this place, we might be seen." I whispered to John. "Probably, but I didn't come all of this way to quit! Let's make a run for it! We'll be quiet and swift." He said with determination.

As I stated before, John usually talked in a meek, awkward tone, but now he had a new confident attitude that I'd never seen before. He knew that we might get caught-hell I knew it too! But no matter what he wasn't going to back down.

John wanted to get to the bottom of it and so did I. His confidence continued to empower me. We were both on a mission-a dangerous mission, but an important one nonetheless. At that point, there was no going back.

So we decided to make a run for it. We hovered over and lightly jogged down the hallway, trying to be light on our feet. I kept looking from side to side to see if anyone in the labs saw us, but John kept his eyes ahead.

A couple of people turned their heads in our direction, probably spotting us as we passed by. "I think a few people saw us!" I urgently brought to his attention. "Just keep moving! Don't mind them right now!" John encouraged.

I kept heaving from running through this cold, heavy air. Running just wasn't my sport, but at the same time, I didn't want to get caught just yet. Not after we've come this far.

"Hey, what are you two doing down here?" I heard someone call from behind. Naturally, I stopped to look behind me, but John grabbed my arm and pulled me along. "Don't look back, Vera! Keep going!" He scolded. "Call security!" I heard someone say as we swung ourselves around a corner on the right.

"We are now officially in trouble!" I muttered in urgency. A surge of adrenaline rushed through me, and I picked up my pace to a full sprint. I almost passed John as he acquired a speed that outmatched mine. "Through this door!" John called, pointed to a pair of doors forty feet away at the end of the hall.

We reached the end of the corridor and stopped in front of the steel door, hoping that it would open from some motion, activating mechanism. Of course, nothing. "Try the keycard!" I suggested. With a quick swipe of the card, the door slide open and we rushed inside.

We stood on the top of another high staircase, which snaked around a long metal pole that reached 100 feet high with three platforms built into the case after every ten steps. John and me knelt down in front of the railing.

From the top platform we could see a laboratory with a machine planted in the middle. On each side of it were large, spheres made of glass. Each of them faced a large flat screen with abstract images swirling across the screens. They were so bright that you'd get a headache just by looking at them.

"Holy shit!" John exclaimed as he anxiously clenched the railing so tightly. Inside of those spheres were people-male patients hooked up to many tubes that went into their arms, legs, torsos, and even into their mouths and noses.

They were positioned so that their spines were bent backwards so much that their limbs reached far behind their heads. With terror growing inside, I instantly wondered what kind of fluid they were pumping into these guys. It looked so uncomfortable, and it was so unsettling to look at!

So this was what they were doing? These were the crude experiments that made these patients look so disfigured? My God, it could happen to John, Pammy, and me! We could be next! "This is what they've been doing? How do they get away with this?" I ranted in shock and disgust.

"I don't know, but they ain't doing it to me!" He gritted his teeth furiously. "Hey, you two!" Someone called from behind us. John and me shot up to our feet, and turned around to look at a pair of guards standing in the doorway. They looked at both of us with fury in their eyes.

The empowerment that we felt before was fully replaced with terror. We then knew what was really going on in this place. We understood the horror that other patients were going through, and we knew what awaited the both of us. Soon to be forced to participate in these horrifying experiments.

And for what? For the purposes of science and discovery? For some sick, demented, common interest of the company? Or was it for profit? Perhaps these sick bastards were doing it to get rich-all at the cost of the mentally ill. Either way, these bastards deserved to rot in hell!

"Stay right there, both of you!" One of the guards snarled with his baton pointed at us.

Suddenly, John grabbed my arm so roughly, and thrashed me towards the steps. He stayed behind me making sure that I was out of reach of the guards. "Get back here!" The guards shouted. "Where are we going?" I asked.

At this point, I couldn't tell if he was trying to protect me or take me hostage. The way he grabbed me-a manner that wasn't the least bit gentle-took me completely by surprise. "Down these steps!" He said pointing ahead of me, "Hurry, I don't want them to catch you!"

John threw me down five flights of stairs and unto a platform. I hit the surface so hard that my pelvis jammed against the metal. As I looked up, I noticed a door on my right with a card reader built into the wall beside it. It was a convenient escape route, which would hopefully help us to lose the guards.

It was a long shot of course, but it would be one worth taking. "John, over here!" I called as I scrambled to my feet. John looked back from above, and tossed the keycard down towards me.

"Go!" He demanded quietly.

"But…"

Then, the guards advanced on John and tackled him to the ground. One of them violently jabbed him in his side with the PR-24 while the other forced his arm behind his back. In a frenzied manner I picked up the keycard, dashed over to the card reader, opened the door, and pulled it close. If anyone decided to go after me, it would take them longer to unlock the door with a keycard and pull it open; therefore I used that to my advantage.

Desperately hoping that there was no one pursuing me, I decided not to waste a single second, and immediately took off into the dark hallway. I kept looking back to see if the door would open with another guard coming through it. To my luck there was no one, but regardless I quickened my pace to a full sprint, and headed into the blackness of the unfamiliar hallway.

Oh God, John was back there, and lord knows what they were doing to him-what they were going todo to him! I got us in this mess-all three of us, and I was the only one fortunate enough to slip through their fingers. At least for now anyway, but there were no good feelings about what we accomplished here. Only dread in knowing what awaited us. We finally uncovered the ugly truth about this place, and there really was no going back!

Don't worry, it doen't end there! There's more to come and the third chapter is underway. Please review and share your thoughts.