The flashlight beam revealed a dusty abandoned lobby. "Hello?" He walked up to the counter. "Anybody here? I need to know if you take my HMO."

"What are you shouting about?" Ash turned, startled, to see a man in a suit appear from the darkness of a nearby hallway. "Well? Who are you yelling at?"

"Oh...uh...I wasn't really expecting anybody to be here."

"Hmph. Well it's good to see there's another person here, even if you are as crazy as everything else going on. Dr. Michael Kaufman." He offered his hand.

Ash shook it. "Nice to meet you Chief. So you've seen all the weird shenanigans going on outside?"

"The monsters in the fog? An idiot couldn't miss it."

"That's a relief. Have you seen a pretty college aged girl? Head possibly unattached, but that won't stop her from dancing. I was sent here to find her and put an end to this."

"College aged girl? What are you talking about?"

"Some old broad gave me this paperweight to stop the Evil that's spreading across Silent Hill, but I need to find my possessed ex and...uh...use it on her I guess."

Dr. Kaufman smirked and let out a chuckle. "Is that what she told you? You can't trust the old woman. I've worked up a chemical that can solve the problem with Silent Hill."

"And what exactly is that problem?"

"That old lady and her cult. You'll find your answers in the basement, I'll get you a key. Follow me to my office."

Ash followed Dr. Kaufman down the hall and through a small exam room to a door labeled Dr. Kaufman - Director of Staff. Inside the office a mess of papers, news clippings, medical charts, and other miscellaneous clutter covered the entire surface area of the desks, tables, and floor. "You ever think about getting an assistant or something?" Ash stood to the side as Dr. Kaufman pulled open one drawer, then another.

"I've got a key around here somewhere...ah!" He handed Ash a nondescript key. Ash followed him back to the larger exam room. "Just go right once you enter the hallway, you'll see the stairs on the left. I have something to check on at Annie's Bar in the resort area north of the lake. Meet me there after you've checked out the basement."

Suddenly the exam room door burst open. "Dr. Michael Kaufman! Put your hands up. You're under arrest for manufacturing and trafficking narcotics."

Dr. Kaufman stood up and raised his hands, his face turning beet red with anger. "Lies!" he spat out.

"Cybil! This is a bad time," Ash stepped between Cybil and the doctor. She joined them.

"Ash? How did you get out of that cell?"

"I just remembered I wasn't arrested or lawfully convicted by a jury of my peers and left. I'm sorry, Cybil, you can't have this guy. He's seen the monsters outside and I think he might be able to help stop it."

Cybil kept her gun pointed at Ash. "There are no monsters, you nut! The town's probably like this because this asshole addicted everybody to White Claudia. He's been under investigation by the DEA in Silent Hill and Brahms for years."

"Fine, we can deal with that later, I need him!"

"Ash, get the hell out of my way! This piece of shit has ruined thousands, if not tens of thousands of lives over the years."

"There's more at stake here. Whatever's happening here is going to spread to the rest of the world. Whether you believe me about the monsters or not, do you really want all the small towns of the world to look like an S-Mart opened nearby?"

"For the last time, you psycho, there are no monsters! Now move or-"

The door behind her burst open violently inward, knocking her aside to the floor and sending her gun clattering across the tiles and office debris. In the doorway standing perfectly still were two nurses wearing pillbox hats and traditional nurse dress. Also, they were holding big ass knives.

One advanced on Cybil, the other towards Ash and Dr. Kaufman. Ash was temporarily mezmerized by their movements, the way they robotically slid from pose to pose as they made their way towards their prey. Thankfully they didn't have absurdly pandering cleavage busting out of their outfits to distract him further, and Ash was able to shake it off and go on the offensive. He revved up his chainsaw and waved it threateningly at the nurse.

Cybil had recovered a bit as well, rolling onto her back just as the other nurse descended on her. She grabbed the nurse's knife-arm and struggled as it inched closer to her face.

Ash made quick work of his nurse, kicking her back as she closed in on him and driving the chainsaw's blade straight through her sternum. Her threatening swipes ceased the moment the blade broke through her back. While Ash struggled to extricate the blade from the slumped corpse, Dr. Kaufman had worked his way around the outside of the small room and made for the door.

"Wait, you asshole!" Dr. Kaufman slammed the door behind him. "Coward!" Ash finished removing the blade, and went to assist Cybil. This nurse had something enormous and insectlike growing on its back, writhing and squirming while the nurse struggled to stab Cybil in the face.

"Hurry!" Cybil screamed, straining against the close knife. Ash revved the chainsaw and plunged it into the back growth. The nurse's agonized screams were muffled under the bandages covering her entire face. Ash removed the chainsaw and the nurse fell limp onto Cybil.

Cybil pushed off the nurse before Ash could help and sat up. "You...you killed them," she panted.

"I'm just glad you can see them too. They're just monsters. Relax."

"There is no such thing as monsters!" Cybil declared, exasperated. She stood up and attempted to locate her pistol in the dim flicker of fluorescent bulbs.

Ash laughed. "Come on, don't be that guy." He found her pistol on the floor near a shattered test tube, laying in a puddle of a mysterious red substance. At first Ash assumed it was blood, but on further inspection the color wasn't right. "Hey, that doctor guy said he had figured out some kinda chemical to stop the Evil from spreading. I bet this is it." He handed Cybil her gun. "I'm gonna scoop this goop into a jar or something."

Ash found a small petri dish in a cabinet in Dr. Kaufman's office and used a folder to scrape the viscous substance from the floor. Cybil worked on cleaning the slime from her gun. "What the hell is growing out of their backs?" she asked, staring at the crumpled dead nurses.

Ash noticed that the first nurse had a parasitic growth on her back as well. She must have died as his chainsaw made it through her chest and stabbed it. "I dunno, some kind of evil parasite I guess."

As Ash snapped the lid on the petri dish the lights went out, leaving Ash and Cybil in complete pitch blackness. In the distance, a siren blared.

"What's happening?"

"I don't know, relax for a second." Cybil gave a startled jerk as Ash's hand found her shoulder. "It's ok, we just need to..."Ash was suddenly overcome with dizziness. "We just...we...I'm...I think I'm finally having that stroke."

Ash woke up on the ground of Dr. Kaufman's office. Much like the jail before, the room looked like it had been the set of a crappy Tool video then abandoned for ten thousand years. He sat up and tried to get his bearings. The sirens had thankfully stopped, and the lights were back on, but everything was dreary and rusted.

"Wake up Officer Sleepybuns!" Ash shook Cybil's shoulder insistenly until her eyes slowly blinked open. As soon as she recognized Ash's face, she pushed him away and stood up.

"How did this happen? How long were we out?" She asked, near panic.

"That's the same thing I asked the first time this happened to me. I don't think any time has really passed, we've just shifted into some other world," Ash said matter-of-factly.

"I'm done arguing with your insane bullcrap. I'm going after Dr. Kaufman. You're still under arrest, stay here until I come back for you."

Ash laughed. "Sure thing, officer." Ash gathered his gun and ammo and made sure he had the red goop and Flauros. Cybil furiously struggled with the door to the entrance hallway.

"Door locked?"

"Shut up and stand back!" Cybil backed up and leveled her gun at the door lock.

"I wouldn't waste any ammo on this."

Cybil fired two shots. The door looked like it could be disintegrated by a well aimed fart but was completely unaffected by the bullets. Cybil turned furiously at Ash. "How did you know that wouldn't work?"

"It was a hunch. Lady, I'm sure you're a great cop and the last thing you want to do is take advice from a chainsaw-handed, slightly-overweight-yet-still-good-looking-for-his-age, apparent psychopath."

"I just would like to know what the hell is going on, and why you seem so calm about this!"

"Why don't you clean your damn earholes and listen to what I've been trying to tell you. I doubt police academy doesn't prepare you for entering alternate demonic planes of existence, that's something you only learn about with real world experience."

Cybil didn't look any happier but she finally said, "Fine. I'm either crazy or having a nightmare, either way you seem more at home here than I do. What do we do?"

"Uh, I dunno. Dr. K and the old cult lady wanted me to check out the basement, I'm afraid of what's down there but I think it will have some answers. I saw a map of the hospital posted in Dr. K's office, hopefully it survived whatever happened during the sirens."

Armed now with a map of the building, Ash and Cybil exited through the exam room's south door into another hallway. The hallway was pitch black but Cybil had a flashlight as well. The walls were covered in grime and various markings. Parts of the floor were replaced with rusted chain link fences, suspended over an apparently bottomless pit, that strained and creaked under the duo's weight.

"Keep an eye out for more of those nurses," Ash warned as he stepped onto more secure flooring.

"Don't worry, they won't get the jump on me again." Cybil joined him on the other side. "I'm...I still don't know what's going on, but I'm sorry I didn't believe you before. Everything about this place...it's just so wrong."

Ash grinned, "You didn't believe a chainsaw-handed maniac telling you about otherworldy monsters? I'll give you this one as a freebie." They continued further down the hall. "Okay, these are the only stairs to the basement," Ash announced as he verified with the map. Cybil followed him slowly down the dark stairs.

"So what's going on with that doctor anyway?"

"He's quite a chemist. He's found a way to refine this local flower, White Claudia, into a powerful narcotic. PTV. It's not really big outside this part of the country so it flies pretty low under the DEA radar."

"You seemed a little extra pissed though."

"I wasn't assigned the case or anything, it's outside my jurisdiction, but I've been following it. He's been working with this weird town cult, they help distribute it and get people hooked. Those that can't afford another fix end up joining the cult. A lot of people who join the cult are never seen again."

"He's working with that old lady? I get the impression the honeymoon might be over."

"I'm not too sure. I know Silent Hill PD had assembled a pretty good case against him but he had disappeared for a few days. I figured if nothing else came of this visit at least I could bring that asshole to justice." They turned at a landing and continued downstairs. "Anyway...they got to somebody I cared about." Cybil fell quiet.

"If we survive this resort town vacation I'll help you track him down. He can't avoid the long arm of the law if it has a chainsaw attached to the end."

They finally reached the bottom of the stairs. A few discarded wheelchairs and gurneys were cluttered around a large door. Ash and Cybil shone their lights to reveal an ornate metal door, covered in demonic carvings and runes. There was no door handle, only four keyholes arranged in a square around the middle area.

"Oh for fuck's sake..." Ash muttered as he pushed and then kicked at the door.

"It's no use, we're going to need the key."

"Keys! Dr. Dumbshit didn't say anything about needing four keys." Ash looked closer at the door. Each keyhole had a carving next to it. The upper left was next to a tree, the upper right had an eyeball, the lower left a hand, and the lower right a woman's head. They all looked familiar somehow, but Ash couldn't quite place them. "Well?" He turned around to face Cybil. "You up for an abandoned hospital scavenger hunt?" Cybil held up her red marker and nodded.