"And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you."
-Friedrich Nietzsche
TwoNicole awoke as if struck by a bolt of lightning. Her breathing was heavy and beads of sweat slowly ran down her forehead until she wiped them away with the back of her hand. She found herself sitting upright in bed, and it took some concentration in order to get her breathing back to normal.
She also noticed that it was pitch black in her room. Even with the curtain drawn during the day, slivers of light poked their way in to make it discernable to tell day from night.
"I slept all day?"
Nicole asked herself, shaking her head after realizing that there was no one to really answer. At least her headache was gone, she thought to herself. She swung her legs over the edge of her bed and reached for the desk beside her. Normally she would be able to instinctively find the desk lamp, but felt nothing in its normal place. Then she reached for her phone until she realized that the end table itself was no longer there.
"What?" Nicole wondered aloud, slowly getting to her feet. "Where's my table? What's going on?"
By now her eyes would usually be able to adjust to the shadows of her room, but this was a different kind of darkness. It was as if she stood in a void, and no matter which direction she gazed, there was only the pitch black. If she didn't get up from her bed, she wouldn't have even known it was there.
She had been staying in her dorm room long enough to know the layout and knowing her roommate's housekeeping tendencies, she shuffled her feet a few steps forward so that she didn't trip over any discarded clothes. Turning to the left, Nicole reached her hand out to the curtain. The light posts outside always came on a half hour before sunset; they would definitely be able to illuminate the room. But she felt no curtain, or anything for that matter. She was starting to get agitated, and accidentally stumbled towards the wall, letting out a surprised grunt. Finally, her hand touched something solid, but it didn't make sense to her.
"How…?" Nicole started. She formed a fist against the surface and knocked against what felt like concrete. A solid wall stood where she knew her window to be. Her heart began to race as she frantically felt around on the wall, her breathing getting heavy again.
She had suffered through a panic attack a few years before and was beginning to relive that awful experience. Trying to calm herself down, she moved towards her bed and sat down again. She was positive that it was her bed. The fabric of the quilt that her grandmother made for her last birthday was familiar, so there had to be some other explanation. Thinking about this helped her calm down and take a few deep breaths.
"I'm dreaming," Nicole stated, "that's the only way to make sense of this."
Even if it was just a dream, it wasn't one that Nicole wanted to stay within. She laid her head back down on the pillow and closed her eyes, hoping that she possessed the ability to wake herself up. She tried to think of her room the way that she remembered it, the way that it really was. Maybe that would wake her up and everything would go back to normal. After about a minute, she opened her eyes. But there was still darkness; still nothingness surrounding her.
Nicole let out a deep breath and closed her eyes again. She began to think about being back home, in the bedroom where she grew up. She thought about the ceiling that had been littered with glow in the dark stars that she asked for when she eight, and never completely took down even as she became a teenager. She thought about Floppy, her stuffed rabbit that wore green overalls that she had since she an infant, which sat on her dresser after it was deemed too 'kiddy' to sleep with anymore. She thought about the smell of her mom making dinner, which despite working a full-time schedule, she still took the time to do every night. It seemed to be working, as Nicole swore she caught the scent of meat loaf emanating from…
THUMP! THUMP THUMP!
The noise sent a jolt through Nicole's body as she sat up on her bed, staring straight ahead, wide-eyed and almost too terrified to move. Her mind was racing with a few thoughts, the first of which being what that noise was on the other side of the wall. The second thought, which immediately followed, was that she could see an outline of her door, which was the first thing she could actually see in her room since this nightmare started. Last, she wondered what the source of the light was that spilled from underneath the door. It was bright, but with a pinkish hue. The hall lights on her floor contained no color, but that was the last thing she was concerned with.
Nicole sat there, staring straight for what felt like an eternity, but in all likelihood was probably a couple of minutes. No other noise followed after the loud banging which stirred her, despite her waiting to see what would happen. She took another deep breath, slowly but surely psyching herself up to her feet. There was no reason to be so afraid, she said to herself, it's not like this was reality. The room she woke up in was the same layout of her dorm room, so she rationalized that it had to be a dream. If the worst had happened, if she had been taken, it wouldn't have been to an identical room. It helped the courage build-up in her body so that she was able to stand, slowly making his way over to the door.
Before she knew it, her hand was on the doorknob and slowly turning it. Be brave, she challenged herself. Despite how cold the bronze felt against her hand, it was still not real. Whatever was on the other side of that door couldn't harm her. With that thought, she turned it as far as it could go, and pulled.
In contrast from the room she was in, the light's intensity blinded her temporarily. She shielded her eyes with her left hand, then averted them towards the ground as she took a step forward. An unexpected cold sensation shocked her bare foot back into the room from where she came. It took her brain a few seconds to register what her eyes were seeing on the ground.
"Oh my God!" Nicole exclaimed.
Where a navy blue rug should have been in the dorm hallway, it was replaced by steel, or definitely some kind of metal. It appeared to be a grating, with small squares that couldn't have been more than a centimeter in area. Much like the room which she was emerging from, only darkness could be seen through its slots.
As her eyes adjusted to the light, Nicole slowly raised her head. The walls were dotted with small, white tiles, and about a quarter of them were stained by some kind of dark red substance. A long smear of red ran across the wall directly in front of her, where the door to her neighbor would normally be. She saw the source of the light in front of her close to the ceiling. It was an uncovered light bulb with red stains enveloping it, cascading around the bulb and occasionally dropping the red liquid into a small pool below. Nicole didn't need to touch it to know that it was blood. She could practically smell the iron.
"Ok Nic," she started, taking in a big gulp of air before letting it out, "keep it together. Just figure this out, and you'll be back in your room."
Despite her surroundings, she was doing a good job of remaining calm. The belief of her false reality was indeed spiking her courage. She stepped out onto the floor again, with both feet and shut the door behind her.
It wasn't the most comfortable surface to be walking on, but she forced her feet forward. The hall to her right seemed to stretch on forever, and was devoid of anything other than a trail of blood on the floor that disappeared past where she could see. To her left was a shorter hall that wrapped around to the left. There was a plain brown door straight ahead, and the area seemed to be cleaner and absent of any substance that didn't belong. Nicole saw this as the better option.
She turned and headed towards the door with a quick pace. She reached down to grab the handle but came up empty. Looking down, there was nothing there. No way to open it. A hard push was to no avail as well. It was time to consider another option. Nicole turned to look down this new hallway, and saw that the first impression of a friendlier setting was merely an illusion.
Everything was in disarray. The blood was there, on the floor in front of her, on the walls and even the ceiling. A few chairs and a table were overturned, manila folders and papers were scattered everywhere, showing the familiar stains that were covering everything. There were pieces of something black on the floor around her feet. Nicole knelt down to discern the scattered debris, which felt like a hard plastic. Standing back up straight, she took a few more steps down the hallway, and spied what looked like a bed with wheels on it tipped over on its side. It was a gurney.
"A hospital." Nicole wondered out loud. "Why am I in a hospital? And whose blood…"
Nicole's thoughts were interrupted by a faint noise. It sounded like it was coming from farther down the hall. It was steady and rhythmic, a dull thud that rang throughout the hallway every few seconds. A combination of the sound and the frosty environment sent chills down her spine, but she slowly pushed forward.
She was careful to look down every so often to make sure she wasn't stepping into blood. As she inched farther down the hall, the sound got louder, and was accompanied by another, faint sound that Nicole couldn't quite discern yet. Running water maybe, she thought to herself. Passing the gurney, Nicole looked down to see a silver tray flipped upside down on the floor, with a few instruments scattered around. She knelt down and quickly snatched the scalpel that she saw. It wasn't the most imposing weapon, but just having it made her feel safer. Nicole clutched it tight and continued down the hall, seeing a dead end ahead, with only a left path to take. Considering the increasing volume of the sound, she was preparing herself for what she might find.
The first thing Nicole saw as she prepared to turn the corner was a crack in the floor just around the turn. She hugged the wall, still clutching the scalpel close to her body. The thudding was now intense, and the other sound which had been faint was now clear, almost like someone was pouring sand or another granular substance on the ground. She took a deep breath and peeked around the corner.
The hallway itself was much like the ones she had went through thus far, with smears of blood along the walls and ceiling. The one thing that was different was the confirmation that she was not alone in this place. The source of the sound was a mere ten yards away, and was discovered to be a hammer, that was being driven into a wall and causing bits of cement to fall to the floor. Holding the hammer was a figure that was a good foot taller than Nicole was, and dressed in what appeared to be black scrubs, complete with a surgical cap and mask. Curiosity got the better of Nicole and caused her to lean out a little more, seeing something else at the feet of the masked figure. It was the same thing that polluted the rest of the area, and was gradually growing in size to the point that it was surrounding the figure's feet. With every strike of the hammer, a little more cement fell, and little more blood dripped from its head.
It came out suddenly and reflexively. Nicole had accidentally pressed the scalpel against her too hard, and nicked her arm. She pulled herself back around the corner and covered her mouth, but she knew that it was too late. The banging had ceased, and had been replaced by another rhythmic pattern, that was drawing ever nearer. Nicole began to breathe heavily again, and it took all of her will power not to completely hyperventilate. The sound drew closer and was accompanied now by heavy breathing that was not her own. There were two options that she could think of, and she didn't know if she could outrun whoever was now coming for her. She slid down the wall onto her butt, thinking that maybe she could slow it down.
She kept her eyes on the corner, so that the second she saw its foot, she struck out with the scalpel and jammed it in. It let out an almost inhuman cry and retracted behind the wall. Nicole took this moment to hop to her feet and bolt back down from where she came. She didn't take a second to look back and see if it was following her; the stomping behind her told that story. Rounding the corner, she slid on some blood and slammed her left shoulder into the wall, but was fortunate to bounce back upright. She did her best to ignore the pain and kept moving, passing by the dark room and starting down the way she hadn't gone before.
"Shit!" Nicole exclaimed while stopping in her tracks. There was a gap in the floor about five feet wide, and darkness below. She couldn't tell how far down it was, nor did she want to risk it. Her pursuer was closing in on her. It was about to come around the corner, and considering that her scalpel barely stopped it, she knew that she was no match for it.
Taking a few steps back, Nicole caught its shape out of the corner of her eye before she ran forward. She wasn't a great athlete, but managed to clear the gap. However, she landed awkward on her left ankle and stumbled to the ground. She began to pull herself forward and turning around as she saw the figure come at her. It didn't break stride as it raised its hammer. Nicole raised her right arm in front of her, closing her eyes and preparing for the inevitable.
She heard another one of those cries for a few seconds, and then nothing. Cautiously, she opened her eyes to see that it was no longer there. All she saw was the black surgical cap that it had been wearing, on the floor right in front of the gap she had leapt. The thing must have not seen the hole, and all that remained of it was the cap. Nicole laughed uneasily, not believing her luck and that for the moment, she was safe. She slowly got to her feet, posting on her left arm and being reminded of the pain her left arm. She winced as she now used her right arm to support herself back standing.
So much for trying not to get any of the blood on yourself, she thought. It was all over her clothes, on her hands and her feet. She felt a sharp pain her feet when she began to walk. The surface on the floor was not conducive to walking on barefoot, and lifting her right foot confirmed that there were small scrapes all along the bottom. Nicole began to walk a little more gingerly down this new hallway, noticing that there wasn't nearly as much blood or grime compared to where she just was. She also noticed an open door at the end of the hall, and something familiar caught her eye. It was her backpack.
Finally, Nicole let out a sigh of relief. This whole encounter had been stressful, and she looked forward to just laying down in her bed and closing her eyes again. Hopefully once back in her room, she would wake up, and have the rest of the night to look forward to.
Nicole staggered to the front door, peering inside to see that everything was as normal, except that Hannah wasn't inside. Why would she be in my dream, Nicole thought to herself, smiling after stepping onto the carpeted floor. It was much more comfortable on her sore feet. Nicole turned around and shut the door, resting her head against it and closing her eyes again. She had made it back.
Suddenly, she felt a tug against her throat, followed by a light breeze. It was strange to feel that in such a place, she thought. It was accompanied by something dropping onto her hands, and her eyes felt heavy. She struggled to keep them opened as she looked down, not realizing just how much blood she had gotten on her skin. It was when she saw more droplets hit that she realized her situation, and brought her hand to her throat. She staggered back while looking at her hand, seeing it covered in dark red. Her legs gave out from under her and she slammed back first onto the ground. She tried to cry out for help, but the blood pooling in her throat prevented it from happening. Everything started to fade, and tears began to form in her eyes. It all felt so real.