Once again, when I returned to my nightmare, the world was the red rusted hell. A strange symbol, an eye within a triangle within a circle, was scrawled on the door. I had the oddest feeling about that symbol. My head began pounding as I stared at it. I looked away, standing to peer through the glass of the door into the hallway.

The creatures patrolling the hallway looked more human than the other monsters. They would have seen like normal young girls, if it weren't for their pale skin, pitch-black eyes and stitched-up mouths. Bloody bandages were tied tight around their wrists. Their faces were framed with dark hair that hung to halfway down their backs.

The bandaged abomination from the beginning was with them. Occasionally it'd touch one of their faces like it had touched mine before, and they froze, almost like they were scared. I felt some connection to these poor creatures, obviously out of place amongst the terrors of this place. I thought it might be safe to approach them. I thought perhaps we could have some sort of kinship in our ordeals.

However, this was not to be. I set foot outside my safe room and heard their screams, even though they had no mouths they could scream with. The closest one lashed out at me with a scalpel, red tears welling up in its….no, her eyes. She was just as scared and lost as I was, but instinct told her to fight. I dodged a few slashes, putting off what I knew had to be done as long as possible. There were too many of them to simply run.

I ran her through with my katana, taking a deep breath as the life faded from her eyes. She twitched, and then grew limp as I pulled my sword from her. Wiping the blade with the torn bed sheet from before, I crouched beside my victim, gently closing her eyes. I hoped this was the last time I would have to murder these lost souls.

The bandaged creature's burning gaze sent the other girls fleeing. I was alone with it. Fear turned my legs to lead and mind to a screaming wreck. I could do nothing as it advanced, a predator with its prey locked in its sights. I made no swing with my katana. I made no movement to snatch the gun from my back pocket.

Its expression didn't change (I'm not certain it even could change expressions), but I sensed the smile it would have had as it tackled me to the floor. It paused there for a while, as if contemplating what to do with its mark. It tipped its head down, then up, then buried itself face first in my chest, relaxing its entire body. All attempts at screaming died in my throat.

I summoned what little strength and courage I could muster, wriggling a hand free to pull the handgun from underneath me. I shot it a few times, square in the face, but this seemed to do little other than annoy it. It scrambled to its feet as I pulled myself up to mine, and I ran once again from the wrapped horror. It took three doors before I found one that worked, caring little for what would greet me within.

Fortunately, nothing was there but the usual bed and bedside cabinet. It took me a moment of intent staring at the symbol on the back of the door to realize I had managed to circle back to my original starting point. A phone had been left on the pillow, waiting patiently for someone to collect it. It grew impatient and buzzed angrily as someone called it.

I answered, thinking it'd may have been the owner looking for it or a friend who was concerned, "H…Hello?"

"She's lying, you know." The voice was distinctly female, with an undertone of snide amusement.

"Who is this?" I frowned, a little apprehensive.

The voice laughed, as an adult laughs at a child who's said something funny, "I wouldn't want to spoil the surprise. By the way, try not to get caught by the Creep. He's very friendly."

Her last giggles cut out abruptly, as abruptly as the sharp knock on the door a few seconds after. I snapped out of my puzzled stupor, noticing that the walls were a more usual faded white instead of the nightmarish red of before. The symbol on the door was gone, and Rachel was standing in the doorway holding a couple of rolls of bandages.

A thought occurred to me, keeping the strange voice's warning in mind, "So, what exactly are you doing here?"

"Hm?" She frowned, handing me a roll, "I thought I told you. I'm a nurse here. I came into work today and nobody was here. I tried to find someone, but the place is a ghost town."

"And that's when you saw the monster, right?" I sighed, finding no joy in distrusting the only other person in this crazy place.

"Mon…sters?" She giggled, "Oh, that. I just heard some strange noises and panicked. I'm just worried because nobody seems to be here…not even the patients."

"But, but I saw them…the tentacles creatures and the bandaged thing…" I scrabbled at the phone I was holding, desperately trying to find the call history, "And that weird phone call I got…I'll call her, she can tell you-"

"Sweetie. There's no signal here." Rachel tugged the phone from my hand and pointed at the corner of the display, "See? There's never been any mobile signal in here."

All words and responses died in my throat. I'd heard the woman's voice. I was certain I had. The monsters, that bandaged thing, they had to be real. Rachel couldn't have just bypassed all the creatures, she couldn't have ignored the rusted red hell this place became sometimes. Her playful smile softened into a concerned frown as her eyes flickered to the bottle of pills beside the bed, "Are you ok? How many of those did you take?"

"As many as I needed." I caught on to her implications immediately and wasn't keen on them, "I read the label, they're just sleeping pills."

She snatched up the bottle, reading the label with unparalleled thoroughness. Satisfied, she smiled nervously, opening the door to leave again, "Well, if you're sure you're ok…the door to one of the main supply closets is jammed. I'll need some help opening it."

I followed her down the corridor, unable to get my head around what had just happened. I barely heard her questions, and mumbled replies I hoped would make more sense than they had any right to in the situation. It sounds preposterous to claim I was going mad within my own dream, but I couldn't help but doubt myself. There'd be no reason to lie. There was no reason she shouldn't have seen what I'd seen.

She pushed through a set of double doors, and I tried to follow. However, as I reached out to the door, red blossomed from my hand and spread across the door, spilling outwards until the entire corridor was transformed into the realm of nightmares. I pushed the door, but something was jamming it. I was truly alone now. My only ally was trapped on the other side of the door, while I was trapped in what seemed more and more like my own delusions.

There was no time to lament my problems. A gorilla creature had appeared behind me. I turned just in time to swipe at me with its fists. I dodged, less than gracefully, slicing at it with my new weapon. I cut through its arm as if it were made of paper. The arm floated gently to the floor, with no blood to accompany it, nothing but the arm was there. I sliced it three more times, until the monster lay as a tattered mess on the floor.

I took ten steps before I came across a message scrawled in blood on one of the doors. It said 'Give me my precious'. The blood looked fresh. I spent a while just staring, trying to comprehend its meaning and attempting to supress how creepy it was. One of the girls coaxed me out of my thought with a frightened shriek. I didn't want to hurt her. Or her friends.

Eventually, I ducked into a small storeroom to hide. A single light bulb flickered above, but it was better than standing outside waiting for more assailants. A couple of small brown bottles labelled 'Health drink' sat on one of the shelves. I put one of them in my bag, along with the roll of bandages I'd been holding all this time like a goon, and drank the other one. It was syrupy and sweet, with a hint of strawberry. I couldn't be sure of its actual medicinal properties, but I did feel a little better.

A doll on a lower shelf caught my eye. On its back was scrawled in a black substance 'Precious'. It didn't take long for me to remember the door's message and, with a lack of anything else to do, I returned to the door. When I got there, I knocked hesitantly and said, "Um, I think maybe you were looking for this doll I found…"

The silence that followed was almost unearthly. I didn't understand, until I looked properly at the message on the door. It had changed. Where before it had demanded Precious, it now read 'Don't want precious any more', which was difficult to interpret into what to do with the doll. In hindsight, it would've made more sense to just put it back where I left it and find another route out.

I can't tell you why I did was I did. I felt some compulsion from an unknown force, like a flash of twisted logic or sudden inspiring madness. I broke a leg off the doll. A woman screamed behind the door, but I kept breaking, until the doll was in pieces at my feet and some sticky black substance leaked out from under the door. The lock clicked. The door wasn't locked anymore.

I don't remember anything after that. I don't know what was behind that door. I'm sure I returned to the town in my dreams a few times more. How I know or what happened there, I can't say. It's all a blurry mess from there. All I can remember is unstitching the mouth of one of the girls, and her smile of gratitude. Her smile was beautiful.

I've since named all the monsters. I've named all of my monsters. I'll post lists between chapters, so that it's easier to keep track of them all. I apologize if my names are uninspired or otherwise not so good, but I named them as I went and calling them anything else would seem unnatural to me now. They're my monsters, so they're my names.