Yay for the third chapter! I don't think it's anything too terribly special, but we shall see…I suppose it's still necessary to the story. Thank you, all who are reading this, for taking your time to do so. I really do appreciate it!
Disclaimer: The characters are mine, but the town Silent Hill belongs to Konami. Yay for Konami! Also…review, review, REVIIIIEW! –rolls over- Peasie?
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Where was a damn map when you needed one? Raephin had been wandering around this place for what seemed like two and a half hours (Only counting the half because he stopped to examine some scattered papers that had been dropped in the hall—which were, not surprisingly—nothing special), and time was what he truly needed right now. Odd and vile creatures like the one before were lurking everywhere, and he had no time to fool around—only to get out of here, where he could find someone who would be able to help.
Every now and then the lights would go out, and his hand would have to clutch one of the many forks hanging at his belt for safety. Or perhaps he would come across a light bulb, dimming, flicking, off, on, off, on, off…this place really freaked him the hell out.
The hospital was silent. A sudden crash and a short yet shrill scream caused Raephin to jump in a startled motion, eyes widening as they darted around to search for the source. Stillness once more, though this time he felt as if there were some sort of…thick presence in the air. An existence one can only feel through fear and intensity and everything that makes up the shaking edginess of a person's mind. Was there something to see? Something to find? What if he ran into one of those…those things again? He was unsure of his decisions…there was something there, and perhaps there wasn't and it could have most likely been a nasty play of trickery on his own part.
Gradually, he made his way towards the room where the noise had come from.
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"E-Empty! What do you mean empty!"
"What do you think I mean?" Roth growled back impatiently to the sharp question his sister had spat. "I mean just what I said. Empty. Bare. Not there. Get it?"
"How could it be gone?" The worried female rushed up beside him, peeking over the edge of the now-large hole that her brother had dug. Inside, the scruffy man was bent over once more—as he had been when hauling dirt over his shoulder—and was examining the thin lid of the long, white box inside. "That's supposed to be his coffin, right?"
"Shitty coffin, but yeah, this is it," Roth replied slowly, thoughtfully. He turned the wooden lid over in his fingers. No dust…no blood, nothing. The whole coffin held an appearance of cleanliness, as if the dirt had made way and let the box stand on thin air. But that wasn't their problem, or at least at the moment it wasn't.
"But we must have gotten the wrong grave, then! There's nothing there, Roth! No body, no bones…not even a damn hair," Ryland fell to her knees and hesitated to say the rest of her sentence. She was very doubtful that they had chosen the wrong place to dig. But if that was so…than why wasn't there anything? The boy hadn't died a terribly long time ago…she had suspected there would be worms and maggots all over the inside, but there was absolutely nothing living. What would the others say about this? Would she and her brother get in trouble? What would be their punishment…?
"Well," her brother's yawning voice interrupted her anxious thoughts. "Better be going, then. There's nothing else to see here."
"What do you mean, 'we better get going'?" Ryland eyed her redhead sibling with surprise. "You can't be serious…aren't you worried about what's going to happen to us? Shouldn't we at least try to find another type of clue or maybe—"
"What's there to find?" Roth shrugged lightly. "We came here, did our job, found nothing. It's not our fault the body's not there, is it? We didn't take it out of its rightful place. Our leader will know what to do."
Ryland shifted uncomfortably. She wasn't sure the one who sent them out to do this would have any other plans…the leader wasn't exactly the trustworthiest of people, but then again, underestimating meant skipping ahead and putting yourself in danger. She didn't want to do that. "If you say so."
"Look, Ryland," Roth's eyes rolled up into his head in what seemed to be slight annoyance. Couldn't his sister ever lie back for once? She always had to be the one in front, or the one on top. There was no use in doing so. "We did what we had to do. The Beginning requires patience, as it made us wait for too many years to count. It's finally here, Sis, but that doesn't mean we can rush it. Let it flow, Ry, let it flow. Our time will come soon enough."
"Let's go back," Ryland sighed. "Maybe the Boss will know what to do."
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…Creeeeak…
A few dark, filthy roaches scuttled from the thin crack of the slowly opening door in front of him, and the dark leaked out to flow and swallow the hallway's atmosphere. Files were scattered on the wooden, polished floor—why was it polished? There was dust collected on the cabinets and tables—and dots of red were sprinkled on all four walls. Rusted, squirming, crawling like the walls in the kitchen…he shuddered, but was thankful to see that these walls, as he looked up to notice, were merely showered in droplets of blood and did not clone the walls he was imagining. Where had the scream come from?
Nothing here was able to make the sort of shriek he had just heard moments before—and yet, he could have sworn he had heard it with his own two perfectly normal ears. His attention drifted to different things—like the darkly printed notes that looked as if they had been thrown in rage all over the room's floor. He bent his knees, crouching low and eyes squinting to see what the little handwritten and messily organized papers had to say.
Number 17's progress is unpredictable; this patient, when first arriving, had become very violent, resulting in fits and attempts of aggression when put in his proper cell. A very paranoid patient; history shows that he has attempted suicide five times in recent past; Mumbles and has breakouts, and shouting of some kind of 'New Beginning'.
Dr. Aubrey
Raephin kicked the yellowing paper to the side when he was finished reading. Did they truly think him to be some kind of maniac? They recorded his every move! And for what? What were they trying to prove? He'd had dreams—no, nightmares—of something so similar to such a present moment that it was frightening. There would be whispers, sounds of the wind mouthing of a 'Beginning', and he'd wake up screaming his damned head off because of it. It was like…like some sort of alternative world, almost. Almost like he had been flipped and plopped right onto the surface of another planet…some sort of planet that knew nothing of a word called 'mercy'. Such a world was becoming a reality, and those stupid doctors were finally getting a taste of their own medicine—or so he hoped. He hadn't seen any of the bodies since he'd left the cell. Damn them to the deepest pits of Hell for doubting him.
Attempted five suicides in the past—ah, yes, maybe so, but wasn't it clever enough to do so before the time came? They had prevented him from taking his own life so that he could suffer this kind of fate. He'd tried hanging, tried leaping from the roof, tried sticking his head in the gutters and starving himself, jumping on train tracks, overdosing himself with the strongest shit he could find…didn't work, any of them! His mother had finally became fed up with him and sent him here. Here, of all places, where the crazy people dreamed their dreams of seemingly sanity-like freedom, or a chance to breathe fresh air. It was too much to ask.
He shifted his weight onto the other foot, turning his head to read the next scribbled note.
Number 17 does not seem to be getting along with the other patients well. We've recorded several brutal or sadistic actions towards others, and therefore we have come to the conclusion that he was abused as a child. Some of the doctors have gone to investigate the mother's house, where we will be holding further questioning. Because of these cruel efforts, we have agreed that Number 17 will not get a roommate for the rest of his time here.
Dr. Aubrey
Raephin's brows furrowed. Abused as a child…they had thought he'd been abused when he was younger? His mother had tried everything in her power to control him, to make sure that he was all right. His father was of no concern—he'd left a long time ago, and had never come back. And what was this Dr. Aubrey babbling on about, anyways? He'd had a roommate for about a year now, at the most, so why did this note say differently? He looked to each one, noticing that all of them held some sort of information about himself. His eye caught one of the patient listings, where all of the people were named by number—going up to 46.
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There was a soft humming, a gentle tune which floated in the stiff air of the slowly trudging night. Fifty-Two's head rose slightly so that his eyes had clear vision of the quickly waning sky. He let in a breath, and wanted the morning to come desperately…he'd always wanted the morning to come. The night terrified him.
A two-headed beast clothed in bandages—each face producing their own, gentle snarl—trotted up to the short boy to flop beside his feet and let out a sigh of exhaustion.
"What do you have for me, hm?" Fifty-Two's eyes settled on the right head, and then the left with a small smile. "Don't tell me you've been slacking off, now…the time is almost ready, and we wouldn't want to be late on schedule." He watched the dog-like tail of the creature whack the rough dirt under it softly.
The animal—if one would call such a monster-looking canine—grunted loudly in reply and let out a hacking cough. A mixture of thick blood, yellow fluids, and a solid object poured from the creature's right jaw. A single finger lay in the vomit, twitching ever so lightly on the wet and stinking surface.
The humming went on and on. "Ashes, ashes, we all fall down."