NOTE: There will probably be grammar mistakes which I will fix later.
WARNING: Disturbing and graphic content in this chapter. Rated M just to be safe.
St. Sebastian's Retirement Center
October 31, 2018
The young receptionist lazily chewed on her bubblegum as she played Candy Crush on her iPhone. She didn't even notice a man walk in through the front doors, and before she could even look up, the phone started to ring and she quickly answered. "St. Sebastian's Retirement Center, how can I help you?"
From the corner of her eye she saw a figure standing at the counter. "I'll be with you in a minute, sir," she said without looking up and continued to speak on the phone. "I'm sorry, what was that?" As she listened, her eyes widened in shock. "Oh, my god. Miss Penny? That's horrible. Okay. Okay, Craighead Baptist Hospital." She quickly jotted down the name and address of the hospital on a small piece of paper. "Thank you so much. Bye."
She hung up and lifted her head. "Can I help-?"
The stranger suddenly grabbed her by the throat and lifted her off her seat. She let out a strangled scream as she looked into the black empty eyes of her attacker. He slowly squeezed her neck until it snapped in half, instantly killing her. Her limp body was dropped onto the desk and it slipped to the floor.
Michael picked up the paper and put it in his breast pocket before he headed down the halls.
...
He turned on the lights and stepped into the room, looking around at Penelope's possessions. The marble crucifix, the Minion pumpkin, the yellow roses that were now in a vase, and the Old Testament Bible that lay on her pillow.
He spotted several framed pictures that stood on the window sill and looked at them more closely. He picked out the small portrait of Gabe when he was a child and held it in his hand. As he stared at it, his breathing became heavier and angrier and then he suddenly smashed the glass with his other hand. His knuckles bled but he didn't feel any pain. He dropped the broken frame and crushed it with his foot.
The sound of a wheelchair squeaking caused him to slowly turn his head. An elderly bald man with large glasses stared at him puzzled as he squinted his eyes.
"Phil?" the old man rasped, inching his wheelchair closer toward the doorframe. "Philly, is that you?"
Michael just stared back at him, standing very still.
"Mister Goldmire," a woman's voice called out to him from down the hall. "Leave Miss Penny alone."
But the deluded resident remained where he was, staring at Michael. "Why don't you ever call me, Philly? You never call. Not even on my birthday."
A middle-aged nurse walked up to him and grabbed the handles of his wheelchair. "Alright, Mister Goldmire, time for your meds." Just as she was about to wheel him away, she glanced up and was shocked to see a masked stranger standing in Penelope's room. Was he a robber? And more importantly, did he have a gun on him?
She let go of the wheelchair and slowly raised her hands. "Al-Alright," she said nervously. "We don't want any trouble. Just take what you want and go."
But Michael slowly and ominously walked toward her. She backed away as he got closer and turned to make a run for it. But he was much quicker and grabbed her by the collar of her shirt, pulling her into the room with him as she screamed and struggled to free herself. He slammed the door shut, leaving Goldmire alone in the hall. A sickening thud was then heard and the nurse's muffled screams suddenly stopped.
...
"Cripes," Officer Walker muttered in disbelief as he and his partner Miller looked at the mess.
The unlucky nurse lay dead in a pool of her own blood with her chest ripped open, like a wild animal had attacked her. Her head had also been split open, apparently with the vase which now lay in pieces next to her body, but the roses were gone. Not even a petal had been left befind.
Another employee came back from her lunch break about an hour ago and found the bodies, but Michael had already left. The police arrived less than ten minutes later and investigated the crime scene. Unfortunately their only witness was a senile old man, whose credibility was questionable.
Walker sighed as he rubbed his temples. "Sick f**ks get crazier every year, I swear to God."
Miller shook his head. "I know, right? Whoever this guy is, he's mad at someone." He then held up an evidence bag that contained the broken picture frame. "Any idea whose picture this is?"
"The other nurses said that this room belongs to Penelope Wilson," Walker said, "a retired nun who used to work at Smith's Grove Sanitarium. That's a picture of her son when he was a kid."
"Wait, isn't that the same nun who looked after that Myers guy? You know, the Halloween babysitter killer?"
"Guess so. And guess what? A bus that was transferring some patients from Smith's Grove to Glass Hill crashed last night. And can you guess which one of those nutcases is still on the loose?"
"Oh...you gotta be sh**ting me."
"I'm gonna ask our witness a few questions. Keeping looking for any else out of place." Walker stepped out of the room and leaned against the wall for a moment, trying to process all of this.
Two women were murdered, each in a brutal manner. One had her neck snapped in half. The other had her skull split open and her heart had been ripped out of her chest. What kind of monster would do that to innocent people? No wonder this Penelope left him.
He proceeded to Goldmire's room, and the old man was sitting on his bed with a nurse next to him. "Mister Goldmire, I'm Officer Walker. I want to ask you about what happened to that nurse. You say you saw the guy who did it?"
Goldmire nodded. "It was Philly."
Walker raised an eyebrow. "Philly?"
"His son," the nurse softly told him. "But he lives in San Francisco, and he hasn't paid a visit in years." She then mouthed the word as she nodded to Goldmire, "Alzheimer's".
"I see," Walker nodded. "And, uh, what was...'Philly' doing in Miss Penny's room?"
"I don't know," Goldmire said as he shook his head. "But he walked out of here with some flowers. Yellow roses. They were beautiful."
"Roses? Did he take anything else?"
"No. I don't think so. He didn't even say goodbye," Goldmire added sadly. "He didn't say anything at all."
Walker took out a notepad and wrote down everything that the elderly man had told him. "What was he wearing?"
Goldmire's brow furrowed and his nose wrinkled as he tried to remember. "Some kind of blue...jumpsuit. Like a...mechanic's. But that's odd because Philly's a math teacher. At least...I think he still is." His lower lip began to tremble and he turned to the nurse, visibly distressed. "Why doesn't Philly ever come to visit? Why doesn't he call?"
The nurse gently shushed him and soothingly rubbed his back. "It's alright, Mister Goldmire."
Just then Officer Miller came running into the room, his eyes big and his face sickly pale. "Walker?" he panted. "You need to look at this."
Walker quickly followed his partner back to Penelope's room. "What you got, Miller?"
Miller pointed to the Minion pumpkin on the dresser. "Look inside and you'll see," he said with fear in his voice.
Confused, the other officer approached the dresser and peeked into the small pumpkin. What he saw made him cry out in horror and jump back. He clamped a hand over his mouth as he doubled over and started to retch and cough.
Inside was a human heart, presumably the nurse's.
"Sh**!" Walker gasped. "Sh**! That motherf***er!"
"And there's something else," Miller said. He closed the door and revealed what had been written in blood on the wood:
SISTER
Smith's Grove Sanitarium
1972
"SAM!" Penelope shouted as she slammed the door open.
The sudden intrusion caused Dr. Loomis to jump with a startle and nearly fall off his chair. "Good Lord...! What on Earth's gotten into you, Sister?"
The nun walked up to his desk and angrily slapped her hands on the wood. "What's this I hear about you asking the board to deny Michael his freedom?" she demanded.
Loomis straightened up in his chair and cleared his throat. "Michael is clearly too dangerous to be left out of captivity. He's a danger to society."
Penelope's glare hardened. "Sam, you said I could count on you," she sternly said. "And you're giving up on him."
"There's nothing we can do for him, Sister," Loomis calmly told her. "It's pointless to keep on trying."
"I know what's going on," she hissed as she leaned in closer. "You're afraid of him. Because of what happened with the rabbit. Well, that was your fault, Sam. Michael was doing just fine. He was getting better until you decided-"
"He is evil, Sister!" Loomis suddenly shouted.
Penelope staggered back a little, taken back by his sudden outburst.
Loomis closed his eyes and took a deep breath, exhaling long and slow. "Listen, I've looked into the eyes of psychopaths before, and I could at least see their souls. But in Michael's, there is nothing. Only pitch blackness and emptiness. They're the Devil's eyes."
The nun's brow furrowed. "Are you...suggesting that Michael is possessed by a devil?"
He shook his head. "He is a devil, Sister."
She scoffed. "You're crazier than your own patients." She turned and was about to walk away.
But Loomis stopped her. "Sister!"
With an exasperated sigh, she turned around to face him.
His expression softened. "I've always admired you for your compassion and dedication to your work. And I think of you as a friend. So believe me when I tell you, I am only trying to protect you from him."
"I don't need your protection," Penelope said bitterly.
"He'll destroy you, Sister."
"He won't. Michael loves me. I know he does."
Loomis paused, feeling pity for the nun who had come to love Michael so much, even though that love was unrequited on Michael's part. "Regardless of how you feel, he is not your son. And he does not see you as his mother. Your motherly love has blinded you. I'm sorry, but it's true. You need to let him go now before his hold on you becomes too strong."
Penelope just stared at him with her mouth slightly open, shocked and appalled by his bold statement about her. Then her facial expression slowly twisted with growing anger.
"F**k you, Loomis," she whispered.
The doctor blinked. Did he hear her right? "What was that?"
"F**k you!" the nun repeated louder. "You're a quack and a quitter!" Then she stormed out and slammed the door shut behind her, leaving him completely stunned.
Smith's Grove Sanitarium
October 31, 1978
On the morning after Michael's escape, Dr. Loomis followed a nurse to the patient's room, the former chewing out the latter as they walked down the halls together.
"Who was watching him?"
"I don't know."
"You don't know?! What do you mean, you don't know?"
"Well, it was supposed to be Bernadie."
"'Supposed to be'?"
"Well, he wasn't here at ten. I don't know what happened."
"Where was he?!"
"Well-"
"Bernadie," Loomis scoffed as he opened Michael's door. The room had been completely trashed, with the table lying on the floor in pieces, the mattress torn up, the paint on the walls peeling off in shreds, and the large window having been shattered.
Another nurse was picking up the debris. "He must've broken the window with his hands."
The first nurse nodded. "He came down the hall, breaking through all the doors, pushing all of the patients outside."
"What was it you wanted to show me?" Loomis asked her.
She closed the door and stepped aside to let Loomis read what have been written in blood on the wood:
SISTER
Upon reading that word, the doctor's face became very grim. There could only be two explanations for him leaving such a cryptic message. One was that he intended to find Sister Penelope, who had recently left the hospital. The other...
Judith Myers.
"Dr. Loomis, have they found him yet?" the second nurse asked him.
Loomis shook his head. "No. But I know where he's going."
Haddonfield, Illinois
October 31, 1978
The alarm bell continued to ring as he searched throughout the hardware store for supplies. He ended up taking some rope and a few knives, and he was about to leave when something caught his eye.
Hanging on a hook in the Halloween aisle was a simple pale mask with dark brown hair. The black eyes and white complexion reminded him of her. The colors of her nun attire.
There were other masks in the aisle that were much more intimidating and frightening, but this was his mask. This would be his new face. The face of the Shape.
He gently took it off the hook and pulled it down over his face, his heavy breathing now muffled.
The part where Loomis finds the word SISTER on Michael's door is based on a deleted scene that was only shown on the TV-version of the classic 1978 Halloween movie.