The Witness
There were three or four of them, I'm not sure, I didn't stop to count. I froze up for about two seconds as they slowly approached, detecting my movement, the sudden charge of nerves as everything in my head suddenly shut down and reboot instantaneously. It smelt like burning cotton. I gave a small gasp as my brain shot into gear and I teetered around the side of the desk, the wood squeaked against the floor as my thighs knocked the sides.
"Hey! Hey!"
Fuck! I sprint to the front of the room, stumbling as the image in my visor flashed and flickered. No! No-no-no-no! My camera survived a two hundred foot fall, and when against all odds I managed to retrieve it, it fizzles out and dies! No! Don't do this!
The image cleared in time for me to spot the counter with the shattered glass. I vault over it as the patients call after me, shrieking profanities along with the promise of excruciating demise. Something whizzed by, inches from my head and clattered into the distance. I never saw what it was.
I swung around the sharp corner, stumbling as I regained traction and my camera flashed static. Damn! I lowered it enough to see the dark punch of the doorway, contrasted against the soft glow in the windows. I shot through the doorframe into the next room, jerking around the gleaming shelves that swept into my path. The camera's image failed as I bumped and fumbled my way through the room, white flashed through my eyes as my hand struck the sharp metal edge of a shelf. I heard a deafening crash as one of the patients in hot pursuit, smashed dead into a shelf and the whole line of them erupted at my back. I glimpsed over my shoulder to evaluate the damage, and saw two of my pursuers at my heels.
I passed by a door but didn't bother to slam it shut on them, I was already charging through the open cafeteria where the patients gazed into oblivion. A flash of light filled the room, I felt a hand sweep against my collar as I picked up speed, rounding the counters on the rooms left. Where was it I came from? Doors! Big doors, right by the counters. The hall took another left, just around the corner was a rolling table on my left. Without a thought I snared the handle and wrenched it behind me, the wheels squeaked up until a painful crash sounded when the half blind lunatics ran into it.
A viscous "FUCK YOU!" echoed behind me.
Maybe that was a mistake, too late to regret it. At either side of the hall locked doors lined my path, for once an asset. My progress had been linear enough, I couldn't recall hallways that I might've overlooked. Find the light, the lockers, then closet. Don't stop, never stop till I'm dead!
The next corner took a hard right, I stumbled and hit the opposite wall and pushed off, keeping myself headed in what was the only direction. The hard footfalls of the patients echoed around the corner, they would catch up. They were still upset with me, I'm sure.
Another left, I'm blinded as I tear through, still staring in the nightvision as the lamp overhead blazes down. I barely blink as I stuff the camera strap between my teeth. Almost there. I lunge over the bed frame panting hard against the Velcro strap, concerns of where my hands have been and where the cameras been far away in a place that no longer existed. It feels like the patients are right behind me shrieking. Any moment I'd be yanked back, my throat slit, skull beat to a pulp. No. No-no-no-no-
A sharp right and I'm in the locker/closet. Yes! Here! This was it! Home free! I leapt, catching the roof of the lockers and dragged my body up.
The obnoxious drone of drumming water greeted me, blocking out the curses of the men below struggling to scale the locker. I exhaled a sharp breath, not bothering to care how much my ribs ached, or the blood now coating my hand. I'd deal with it all later, what mattered was I'd gotten out with my life, and my camera. I wanted to appreciate the small accomplishment, reuniting with my invaluable piece of hardware, and the small pride I felt in the escape.
Let me get out of this washroom first, I just couldn't enjoy this with the fuckin white noise aggravating my head. I took the camera strap from my teeth and moved toward the other side of the room, reminding myself to remain cautious despite how well these events turned out. I needed to put this room behind me, in case the variants managed to stay focused long enough to get up into here. There was also the point that I was in a relatively good mood, and something terrible must happen to spoil that. It always seemed too happen. It was a curse of the Asylum.
Try not to think about getting grabbed from behind and drugged with a giant needle. That was a prime example, as it was a massive insult to my pride.
I reached the other side of the showers, from which I first entered the room, and crawled under the interior frame work of the wall. I remained huddled in the shadows for a moment to reassure there was no one waiting, that I was alone. The hall was empty, on the far right I could now see was a doorway at one point, but those of Mount Massive had fixed that.
Unless, all this time the patients have been the ones to block doorways and cram furniture into the halls. Interesting thought. Made a little sense too, but I doubt it mattered anymore.
The opposite side of the hall held another door, presumably that led to the showers and other venues. I didn't bother to try it, though it was clearly blocked. I took it slow into the next room, the vivid memory of shapes and faces watching my progress fresh in my mind. I winced as the image rolled in the visor, it knocked me from my brooding, though I was partially blind for the spell.
I continued, constantly glancing over my shoulders, twisting as I thought some sound came from a desk or table. Despite the cameras return I was still paranoid about this room, the static didn't help either. Occasionally, the lightening burned through the atmosphere with a thick rumble, I stopped to listen and make sure I was hearing over the sound of silence. I felt alone here and it was beginning to frighten me more than the patients. Sometimes I preferred being alone, many of the people I worked with were generally assholes, so I preferred it. But I needed people now, I was too deep and craved normalcy, a tether to something reliable. The sound that followed me was deafening, I needed to get out of this crushing silence.
Reaching the upper floor was no longer the challenge. The room was as it was left, no longer crumbling into ash. I stepped over the charred wood by the wall and jumped to the edge of the remaining upper floor, and pulled myself up. The floor was settled and had no longer any intention to crash, and scatter the camera or me across the checkerboard tile. The doorway was still here, welcoming me with its swirling dark and its secrets and the promise that through it, I would reach my destination. Whatever that was anymore.
Thus far it had been misleading truth, along with one disappointment after the next. I was done with it, but there was still much in store for me. Nothing could ever be easy. I would never be done with this. There would always be something unsettling and dark locked in the back of my mind, nesting in my doubt and feeding on my fear.
The hall to my right lead to blocked doors, dead end. I turned to my left, first seeing the rupture in the floor before taking the leap. I will forever have this unreasonable fear that I will fall and lose my camera. And I will always clutch it tight in my right hand, until the bone is worn down into my skin. It hurt like a bitch when I did that.
Due to my paranoia I saw it fit to shut a door with a large gaping hole behind it. I don't know, maybe a patient will wandered through here, break down the door and fall to his death. Seemed like a reasonable assumption.
Beyond the doorway was a segregation gate on my right, possibly leading to one of the floors I visited earlier. Or maybe the stairway where I found the Walrider folklore file, it was locked and therefore a dead end. Another door tempted me on the left but the latch was jammed.
The floor creaked under foot as I moved towards the lit doorway ahead. I tried not to rest my full weight on one board for too long, and listened as the wood spoke of its pain, long wretched moans as it shifted. It was getting tricky to anticipate which portions were trustworthy but I was cautious. I stepped through the open gate at the halls end, even from a distance I could see the fires consumption. Nothing remained of the room I was in, a few pieces of wood that had not fallen away. Below, I took note of the doorway 'Father' Martin had hailed me from. He said I could find a way across on the upper floors, but he was on the lower floor the whole time. Damn that guy.
As I moved out further onto the charred ledge, the floor crocked and gave out. I threw myself backwards into the doorway, as the wood snapped away, timber crashed down until the supports locked and held it in place. Holy crap. My breath came in short gasps, I nearly thought the floor was just going to fall out. Weakly, I laughed.
I needed a way down that didn't involve a too dangerous stunt. Most of the floor had fallen away, I wasn't about to take the leap, even if I didn't doubt the wood could hold my weight. From this height the least of my worries would be a snapped leg.
Through the NV I spied a small portion of the wood on my left, still intact, and it wasn't too short I had to shuffle along. I hopped over and judged my footing, trying not find the one loose board that would—
I staggered back when the wood under me fell out, and I sat on my butt staring at the small space that at one time felt solid. Step lightly, take your time. I carried on, jumping across a short gap to the far wall and moved to the edge of the walkway that remained after the fire. The smell of charcoal was getting to me, not to mention whatever else was reduced to ash in the blaze. Bodies, plastic, chemicals, cotton.
Across from my position, pieces of the floors support held tight to the wall. I jumped over snagging the burnt wood and used it to lower myself to the small pace below, and then dropped. I glanced around my new surroundings, and took in the patient standing at the end of a fully lit hall. My head buzzed with the realization but I tried to keep calm, think clearly. I lowered my camera and straightened up from my crouch.
He was clothed, only half of my brain screamed warning. I took slow, calm steps toward him, aware of the high drop at my backside. He watched me, occasionally throwing his eye to the gate he stood beside. It looked horrible the way his face had been stitched, and the ear on his left was completely gone. I paused when he gave a short gesture with his hand, towards his eyes, then looked to the door again.
"Only one way out. Only one way."
I looked from him to the door, then back to him. He looked like he could just throw me in. Rather tempt him I stepped by, through the doorway and looked back as he swung it shut. "How do you know you're not a patient?"
For some reason, and I can't explain why, this question jarred me to the core. Why? Rather rebuke such an insulting inquiry, I began to doubt my own presence here. Who was my mysterious contact, exactly? David Annapurna? He never made it out of here, did he? Murkoff… couldn't have been in the dark about his mutemail account, could they? The company was always on top of those sort of things. "The experiment is still happening" yelled someone. That had been forever ago.
Through all the evidence I had seen, Murkoff was finished. Weren't they? Or was someone still alive running this place, while I scrambled about prodding at the surface, in the meantime the real evidence was hidden away in vaults I would never access.
I suddenly felt like the biggest idiot in the world. I had already established that this was the worst mistake of my career. But one question from some lunatic has caused me to doubt everything I had been through. I pressed my forehead into my palm, ignoring the thick smell of charcoal or the fact I was probably rubbing it into my bloody scalp.
What was I here to achieve? What was I to gain from this job? Expose Murkoff? Or did ulterior plans await in the woodwork, that I had not been made privy to yet?
I crouched under a jungle of shelves and cabinets that had been crammed into the hall, the short plush carpet now under foot filled me with a warmth that I had missed.
Whatever was happening, it wouldn't happen to me. I'm not a part of this process the patients had been put through, I've never endured this 'therapy' the doctors implemented on their MKULTRA subjects. I was going to get out of here, with all the evidence on this camera, the one I risked my life for! And Murkoff will be buried so deep Satan– no, the Walrider, would be insulted by the company. There goes the neighborhood!
Light filled the hall, momentarily blinding me through the NV feed. I took note the cheerful curtains hung along the windows on the left, and I could see the rain falling against the heavy grade chicken wire stretched outside. No thick, rusted bars, no moldered, outdated wood. The droplets clung in thick globs along the crisscrossing squares, the image flashed causing me to lower the camera and rub at my eyelids.
It was at this point I finally noticed my camera, or the visor, was cracked. That explained the short glitches, but it still worked.
To be certain I leaned on a bookcase and played back some of the recent footage to make sure it was recording. I didn't realize it, but when the patient had related to me there was only "one way out," someone had muttered a soft "thank you," and listening to it, I realized that had been my voice. Huh. I don't remember that.
I might, should've been a little more concerned, but there was a lot lately I was missing. I took it as shell shock, it would be weird if I was unaffected. For months, maybe years, I would be reliving this nightmare. But at least I'll be far away from it, and living. That was more than what Murkoff's staff had accomplished.
A few new marks were etched up the cameras plastic casing, a large crack now along the side where it must've hit the board before falling through the floor, or where it came down on the floor below. It was holding up and recording, if not, it still provided my light source. Char was smeared all over its sides where my fingers pressed into it. The soot had clotted much of the bleeding since my recent mishap, at least until I hit them on something else sharp and painful.
More shelves and desks had been lodged into the hall, I pushed out one of the chairs that was between the stack and continued on through easily. The dull throb in my ribs was overshot by the buzzing in my bones, like I'd been shot with a Taser but without the seizing and screaming. Just the hammering in my skull.
I cleared the gap a little more and listened. Nothing. Cautiously, I moved forward keeping eyes focused on my direction. The modern side of the Asylum was almost more unsettling than the outdated section. Almost. With the clean walls, the lack of furnaces, and the fresh carpet. The initial appearance was such a major deception. I moved through another broken segregation gate into the bright gleam of a lamp, on the wall to my right a plaque hung labeling directions. Chapel, Cafeteria, Recreational Hall, Library, and Lobby. Was I on the third floor? I was losing focus, couldn't figure where I was. Father Martin had mentioned where I would wind up, I doubt I was keen on listening to his preaching at the time. This hall would lead somewhere.
As I turned holding my head, a shape moved at the halls end, beyond a glass door. I zoomed on my camera and heard the crack of wood, before the shadow ducked out of view.
Big fucker! I dashed to the nearest door at my left, exhaling with relief to find it unlocked. He was already bashing another door somewhere, I ducked inside and shut myself in.
The room was well furnished with couches set up in one half of the room, above them a cheerful lamp blazed forth. The carpet sounded strange to my ears after I had become accustomed to the rickety wood floors, and charcoal. In the furthest right corner desks and monitors, beside them a fireplace. On the wall to my right sat a bookshelf filled with encyclopedias, among other texts whose labels and a few files. I didn't care for how homey the room was made out to be, or how pleasant it felt to stare at something other than bloodied floors and puss coated walls. Out there Chris Walker had not given up on his personal vendetta. I slipped down beside a desk and watched the door, listening for the trademark sounds of big fucker demolition.
Where did I need to go? First floor should be my new objective, those doors would lead to the front grounds of the Asylum. I never unlocked them though.
Don't think that far ahead! Have to get by the big fucker first, then worry about finding the way out. If he corners me, I will be dead. Think. There has to be a way out of this area. A door, something! Where did he come from?
Meanwhile, I felt the tremors as Chris pummeled another door into oblivion. Three earsplitting crunches, followed by the earth splinting tremor as the wood gave, allowing the big fucker to hunt new ground. I had to think carefully, if he couldn't enter a room he would tear his way in, by whatever means. But I wouldn't be completely trapped if he found me here, a second door was set a few feet down from where I entered.
After some careful consideration I came to a decision, not one I was particularly fond of, but it was better than waiting for him to burst into the room. I had maybe one chance, unless I could find another room to hide in before he saw me.
I made sure I had a firm grip on the camera, then loosened myself from the desk I was crouched beside and crossed to the door at the other side of the room. Both needed to be open, this room was my plan B if the other plan went to shit.
I leaned on the door frame to check out, the light failed to reach this end of the hall forcing me behind the NV feed once more. It set me to ease, I was less likely to be seen poking out with my camera scanning for the big fucker. I felt the trademark crunching of oak, before I caught the movement of his work. I felt the wall quake with a final crash and the large shape slipped out of sight.
I dashed across the hall into a joint corridor filled with dark shadows, but to my disappointment discovered the end was a blocked by a grate and some office chairs. Nonetheless, I climbed over the chairs to test the handle and myself, that there was no way through here. I returned to the main corridor and knelt by the corner to check. Chris was coming this way!
My visor flashed, and I slunk back as the feed cleared. The sound of chain twitter drew closer and closer, oddly reminiscent to the noise I thought I heard. It was unbearable in this place and time, I pressed myself into the wall struggling to block it out. The whole time I'm half ready to bolt or half working to rub down the nerve to keep still until the absolute last second. The sounds give way to splinting and a crack as the big fucker threw himself against another door. It was enough to drown out the tremors in my muscles.
Until the door gave a final snap and shattered. I poked my head out to confirm he had entered a room, somewhere. My next target was a door across from me, the hairline crack of light shone through the dismal hall. I couldn't make out where Chris had gone, I only wanted to get into that room and out before I was cornered there. My worst fear was that it would be another tiny broom closet.
I swatted the door open and entered, it wasn't a tiny closet, it was a tiny lounge. A long table ran parallel to the back wall, some chairs pinned behind it, high on the wall to my right was a large screen splattered with dry blood. What caught my attention was a vent that cut through the room overhead, dust or condensation spilled across the ceiling. The flue above the table had snapped partially and hung sideways by two screws.
I slammed the door shut and dragged out one of the chairs and braced it under the handle. That might buy me some time. I doubt I had much time to work, in the past ten seconds I had not been discrete with my activities. The screws didn't look sturdy, they were tiny and the vent looked ready to fall off. But when I climbed onto the table prepared to wrestle it off, the screws held tight.
No thank you, I was not going to roll over and take this. Once securing the camera in its pack, I reached over and pulled up another chair. They were light enough I could get one above my head with minimal pain, I braced myself as I swung the legs out across the grate. It echoed and bent, but held. A second attack caught the chairs leg in the grating, and I wrenched ripping one screw loose. The cover fell and I dumped the chair in order to clamber into the opening/exit.
Before I could heave myself up into the flue, I paused to glance one last time at the static filled screen. The mist swirled around the pulsing light of the screen, but there was something more. Some… sort of image? The crackle filled my skull as I gazed, senses lost. The distant recollection that Chris still hunted for me was there, but…
I reached for the camera, but decided against it. For one, the image was overlapped. I raised my hand against the bright screen and the image was still clear, unobstructed by my hand. I leaned back as it fluctuated and squirmed, just like the thing I saw in the dark. It's face—
Without a thought I clambered up into the vent, my head throbbing. Just keep going. The way out, it can't be much further. This vent must lead back to the main room, if not, wherever I wound up I could navigate somewhere more tolerable from there.
One side was bared shut, I didn't need to bother with it either. I struggled to get my camera out of its case, then turned and shuffled in the opposite direction, to where dead eyes gazed at me. At some distance I had to stop and stare back. A sharp pain bore its way into the back of my skull, and I pressed my forehead into the cool metal and held out as the pain pulsed. I'll get through this. Need to keep moving.
A draft moved from my right, I crawled into the connecting vent trying to bear with the throbs beating my brain. A short ways in and the vent twisted further to the right and opened into another office. I shut off the NV to rest my eyes and pulled forward, to drop gently onto the sticky flood.
Blood trickled beneath the only doorway, I didn't want to imagine what might lay on the other side. A book shelf had toppled spilling files and psychology volumes across the floor, a desk was beside the wall with another shelf that remained upright and stacked with more boxes and files. Bottom line, it was another dead end.
Some of the files I sifted through mentioned some of the shady work of the Asylum, with some of the patients BEFORE Mount Massive was shut down. There remained current files, and many of the lower level staff expressed the usual concerns and confusion with the lack of progress their patients made with standardized treatment.
From: .com
To: .com
subject: Patient WILLIAM HOPE
Heya Cindy~
Another "interesting" conversation with Billy this morning. He says he's been talking to Dr. Wernicke again for his therapy "in the white place." I'm disturbed by the fact his delusions have only gotten worse with medication, (which isn't in the literature for benzodiazepine.)
In any case, his dead doctor friend is filling his head with German folklore. Apparently the only thing that can kill the Walrider are vampiric butterflies vomited from a demon called "Horerczy." the butterflies suck the breath from people's lips and drink blood from their nipples. They can also take the form of emaciated upright pigs, or sick dogs. So Billy's got that going for him.
You'd mentioned Billy talking about his mother's tattoos before, are any of them by chance tattoos of butterflies? Next time I get outside of the Murkoff firewall, I'm going to look online and see if there's any actual basis in German folklore, or if Billy's making this garbage up from whole cloth.
Would love to compare notes sometime. Wouldn't mind doing it over a glass of wine. ;). Gets lonely up here on Two.
– Kurt
Billy Hope. I'm sure I've heard the name mentioned a few times before.
I sat on the desk and pressed my fingers over my brow, hoping to steady the pain.
What was his connection to the Walrider? He was one of the failed experiments, but like all the other patients he was apparently having dreams about the dead doctor. "Wernicke's waiting for me there." I shuddered at the recollection. None of them had ever… seen Wernicke. I had to remind myself, he had not lived long enough to reach the Asylum. They knew about him through their dreams. A sort of mass hallucination, more of Murkoff's tampering and conditioning, the H therapy. "Blood dreams," Billy reportedly called it. He was dead to them because they only encountered him in dream. That was how the dead doctor performed his experiments on the living patients. What a chilling epiphany.
Vampiric Butterflies.
I snorted out a laugh as I flopped back onto the desk. I wonder if there was a Horerczy in the area I could rent out.
The vent seemed colder this time, the floor too painful to touch with my bare hands. I curled my fingers into my coat sleeves to ward off some of the chill as I crawled back into the section with the stiff corpse. I pushed my face against my collar and made an effort not to breath in the thick fumes of flesh, fetid in the tight walls about my shoulders. It only made matters worse that his dried out eyes were fixed on me while I moved closer. God, he looked awful. He needed to be out of my way. I stuffed my camera into the pack and pressed my hands against the fabric of his greasy shirt. Ugh.
There was so much wrong with this, I couldn't begin. His neck and spine gave a gruesome crack as his body tumbled out of the vent, and a dull Thwack! came from below when he hit. Sounded like a rotten watermelon I dropped out of a tree once. A few of the insects nesting in his corpse took flight and hummed about, dazed and agitated. I gazed down and braced myself to drop, didn't need to go trampling his corpse too.
This place. I knew this place. It felt like a long time ago, but I'll never forget the window I went flying out of. Or… the place that it had begun. I was standing in the glassed in upper floor where I had first entered Mount Massive. I walked along the wall towards the stacked and crammed bookcases and desks, where the big fucker first welcomed me into the Asylum. The small gap I had entered was stuffed with broken chairs and another cabinet, it looked as though the big guy had tried to climb over the slaughter of furniture himself, with poor results. I tried to crawl over myself. This was the beginning of the nightmare, it would only be fitting as the end.
The first shelf I attempted to scale cracked, I flopped forward catching myself on my hand as the entire collection of furniture shifted, nearly pinning my arm. It did, the corner of a chair pinned my right hand with the exposed bone. A strangled yowl lurched from my throat before I slapped a filthy hand over my mouth to stifle the sound, I sobbed briefly as the nerves blazed in my knuckle. Why did I think that was a good idea? I squeezed my eyes shut and pressed my free hand against the chair's legs in order to twist my hand free, then crumpled to the floor holding my wrist. That had been stupid. My shoulders trembled but I continued to hold my hand, allowing blood to collect along my fingers.
The door to the library was open, that sickly familiar sweet decay climbed out on some invisible draft. What irony it'd be if I stumbled in to find a concealed way to the exit, the discovery would be the last nail in the coffin. I shuddered at the allegory.
The room was dark, I needed my camera out anyway. I did my best to scrap some of the blood from my hand, onto a cleaner section of my shirt. Insects invaded my space, attracted to scent of death that clung to me, and the fresh blood that spilled. I didn't have the time or energy to dissuade their persistence, to acknowledge them reminded me of the state I was currently in.
For a short while I held the camera awkwardly in my left hand, while the right continued to bleed out. Blood stains led into the room, but I expected worse awaited inside. I stood at the edge of the black veil and listened keenly for sounds, the labored snorts of a man with his face fuck started off. I don't think I could survive another toss out a window. I entered slowly, it was quiet but for a subtle trickling—
Something flittered in my vision, I sprang back against the door frame. Nothing was there, I was imagining things. The camera kept buzzing. My heart was racing.
Rows of bookshelves filled the room, it looked like they had meetings here with the two tables set together near the back, along with a dry erase board shoved into the corner. The wall was lined with windows and what little light that found its way in, washed across the papers scattered over the floor and desks. The few pages I looked over had heavy black bars censoring every other sentence or line. What shocked me most about this room was the lack of corpses despite the musty odor in the air. I recalled what lay in the rooms not far from my current position, and decided not to dwell on the matter further.
I stepped around a filing cabinet and rows of bookshelves, pausing as the feed sputtered but returned to normal. I resumed, locating the desk set before the furthest window, with two – one monitor stationed on it. The fractured lens made it appear as though there were two monitors. A few files sat on the desk, which I took up as I ventured to check the other side of the room. It was so quiet it was eerie, I could hear my heart thumping in my chest as I rounded the bookshelf half expecting some madman to lunge out at me screaming. When I focused on the NV it felt as though I had seen someone, heard them too. I had to pause and hold my head while the echo subsided. Nothing there. My nerves. My stomach twisted and I waited for the nausea to pass.
At the front of the room was a cracked door jammed in its frame, on the left a few chairs and a small table with a shriveled up plant on it. I reached out and stroked the brittle leaves and watched as they snapped under the gentle touch.
The potted plant was a metaphor for me. It was trapped in an Asylum, shriveled up and pretty much dead, yet, it still stood here in its dry potting soil. It still looked like a plant. And here I was, torn to shit, my mind scrambled, jumping at every sound, and I was using a plant as a metaphor for my life. This was a nice little reprieve, felt like things were almost normal again. But that grainy sound I couldn't shake. It had to be in the walls.
I returned to the light outside, first peering around the door frame before I emerged fully and sat beside the door. The folder was a little worn and its spine flimsy, but it carried more files than it should. Black specks had dried across the front, which I already knew to be blood. I tried to ignore the way my beat up hands quivered as I focused the camera and took images of some of the pages, I think some I didn't bother to let the lens focus enough.
(Translated from German)
BERLIN
6 . Sept . 1938
Reichsleiter Lohner and
Dr. Med. Rogge
I have pressing news concerning the ongoing work of Dr. Rudolph Wernicke in his development of the Morphogenic Engine, expanding on theories developed during his brief but unfortunate relationship with A. Turing.
If I had not witnessed it myself, I would not believe it had happened. But beyond even the promise in cellular regeneration and guided cancerogeneration, I believe Wernicke's method has breached the spiritual realm. Something has crossed from the other side. I personally witnessed the appearance of an apparition. Briefly, but undeniably so.
Please forward my note, and invitation to witness further experiments to Dietrich Eckart. I do not doubt that the Fuhrer himself may need be made aware of our discoveries.
It is my opinion that Dr. Wernicke's successes represent an enormous opportunity for our cause and the German people, and are obviously sufficient reasons to keep him out of any sort of culling program. Regards to your family.
(signature illegible)
That shed some light on nothing in particular, other than confirming that Wernicke had begun the work that Murkoff was involved with. The morphogenic engine. It felt like everything I had seen, reading and gathering, was all being repeated back to me. But it was starting to make sense what the pages were saying. The sounds I was hearing, they couldn't really be there. I shut my eyes and for a moment lay back against the wall and focused on the hum in my muscles.
Something was in the air of this place, transmitting through the walls and reverberating through the molecules. A sub level drone of something constant, a persistent noise that never had a beginning that I could identify, something in the mountain air. As I concentrated the sound almost dispersed entirely, until it was null. If I untangled myself from the chorus, the slightest edges of it crept back into my mind until it hurt like my bones were on fire.
I gripped my camera tighter, solidifying my consciousness in this place, in my private set of molecules. The blood was drying on my hand, sticking between my fingers and the device, yet I didn't care. I sat up more and felt the tremors rolling through my muscles. Had to get up, walk this… whatever it was off. I turned myself, keeping a hand on the wall for support as I moved. There was a door I had avoided up until now, beside where I entered above from the vent. A bright red and yellowed stain had spread down the wallpaper from the outlet, where the body had bled out. Even lying folded in his ragdoll mess of spoiled muscle and skin, the dead man's eyes seemed focused on me as I hobbled by. I hid my face beside my arm as I reached for the door.
I leaned into the Plexiglas dismayed that it would be locked, until I realized it needed to be PULLED open. I dragged it shut behind me and took in this side of the room. Stairs on my right led down to the ground floor, before them at the wall was a segregation gate that I judged to be locked. Red and smeared footprints crossed from the left side portion of the room, from an elevator, to directly where I stood. They were large prints, twice the size of an elephant's foot. The big fucker could work the elevator? What next? Was he capable of learning how to open doors? Shit.
"You're him?" I hesitated from tracking the steps on the carpet. The voice called from the other side of the elevator, behind a segregation gate that jutted out onto the floor. "Yes. I'm supposed to tell you— the key to the House of God is in the theater. Behind the light."
There was some good distance between him and myself. I just stared at him, probably blankly, I probably looked stupid. "Huh?"
"In the theater," he indicated to my left with his hand, "behind the light."
I wasn't really on the same page as him. I shut my eyes and lowered the camera as the image pulsed. "B- what?"
"You have to see the movie. So that's where he left the card. Okay?"
This was not making any sense. "Did you say card?"
We glanced off in unison, distracted by Father Martin's voice hailing from somewhere distant. And far. "Friends! Children!" Not far enough from me. "I need your help, where are you?" I sighed.
"Yes! Coming. I'm coming." The 'disciple' sounded about as thrilled as I was. He gave one last wave toward the open door on my left, before turning and jogging up the stairs behind him. It looked like he was following the path indicated with a red arrow painted on the wall behind the railing.
I tried the handle. Locked. Of course, he already told me I needed the key from the 'House of God' as he put it. How was I supposed to get in if I didn't get it? Why WAS I going to find it? I don't know. I was insatiable curious to figure out this disaster and understand at long last, why I have been hunted and nearly killed by these lunatics.
I needed to know. Even if it killed me. I needed evidence of what I've been hearing, the reassurance that I was still sane despite the trauma, despite everything I had seen. There was a concrete difference between what the patients thought they had witnessed, and what I felt. I had to find the end of this, and nothing would stop me, not until it was in my grasp.