On to chapter 4. Now we're getting somewhere with the story. I know it's a little late to put this out there, but if you haven't played The Evil Within and want to play it with no idea as to what happens in the game's story, you may want to turn back now because there are some major spoilers from here on out. I realized I never put it in the beginning of the story, which I will make a note in the prologue in the near future. But if you played the game and know what happens or you're cool with spoilers, please continue.


I was standing in the archive room, but I wasn't alone. Sebastian was standing right next to me. The lights were out and the only thing lighting up the room was his lantern. For some reason, the light cast everything in black and white.

"What the hell?" he said. He saw me next to him. "Élan? You're here, too?"

I nodded. "This isn't the first time I've been here."

"Me neither," Sebastian said. "But I haven't appeared here before."

I got out the map fragment I just picked up and turned to the map. The fragment, like the others, shot out of my hand it took its place, this one on the top row in the second space.

"I guess you're the 'she' the nurse was talking about before," said Sebastian. He looked at the different folders on the desk.

"There's clues about everything that's happening all over the place," I said. "The more I find, the more I know. Maybe this will help us in some way."

"You put these together?" Sebastian asked, opening one of the folders. It was the one with the newspaper clippings in it.

"Yeah."

"Learn anything from what you found so far?" asked Sebastian.

"Yeah, but I don't know how helpful it is," I said. "The village we just came through was dealing with a serial killer and there weren't any leads. At least that's what the newspaper clippings I found said. I found a couple missing posters. And then there's the one note I found about the lighthouse."

"The lighthouse?" Sebastian repeated.

"Yeah. Sounded like whoever wrote it wasn't sure when the lighthouse had appeared, just that it was suddenly there and that the light made them feeling like it was going through them."

"Yeah," said Sebastian. "I felt it, too. Did you?"

I shook my head. "Something about the light put me on edge. I always hid when it came around."

"That was probably a smart move on your part."

"And then there's the audio tape."

"Audio tape?"

"I can't remember what it all said," I told him. "But it was about some whacked out experiment. I won't forget the voice on the tape though."

"Let me know if you find any more of those," said Sebastian.

"Keep an eye out for them yourself," I added. "It might help you, too. You just really have to look. I found a few keys hidden in odd places."

"Keys?" Sebastian repeated.

I took one of the old locker keys out. "There's some lockers over there. The keys go to them. I found ammo and matches in there earlier. I've been finding them mostly in these little statuettes of a woman."

"The lockers are right here. Let's get the stuff out of them," said Sebastian. "And then I need to find that nurse."

We went over to the lockers. I handed Sebastian a couple of keys and went to use the other keys. I found a syringe and a jar of green gel.

"Uh, got any use for green gel in a jar?" I asked Sebastian.

"As a matter of fact, I do," said Sebastian. He took the jar from me and handed me some matches in return.

We went to find the nurse together. We used the door that led behind her desk and found she wasn't there. The lights on the desk were on, but everything was still in black and white. Sebastian went to the door leading to the cells. He pushed it open.

My watch went off. The compass needle was glowing and pointing off to my left. I followed Sebastian into the hallway and saw the first cell on my left open. Laying on the floor was a map fragment.

"Sebastian," I said to get his attention.

He turned around.

I stepped into the room and picked up the fragment. "Gotta keep your eyes open," I said, holding the map fragment up for him to see.

The nurse was staring into the mirror at the end of the hallway.

"No, no . . . Not that way . . . No . . ." a man's voice moaned. It came from one of the other cells.

Sebastian was just about to get the nurse's attention when she turned around.

"So many new admissions and not a single discharge," she said, walking back up the hallway.

"Hey, I want to talk to you," Sebastian said.

The nurse ignored him.

We began to follow her, but a cell door opened on its own. I noticed this one had multiple crosses drawn next to the door.

"Let go of me!" someone shouted from inside, but it sounded very distant.

Sebastian and I looked at each other and decided to investigate. The room was totally dark. Sebastian's lantern did light it up some, enough that we could see the sink.

The room warped slightly. When I looked at the sink again, there was another map fragment sitting on it. Sebastian picked it up and handed it to me.

We continued forward into the dark. The cell was much longer than it should be. A pulsation of dim light came toward us.

"Fine . . . fine . . ." repeated a voice over and over. It was Leslie's voice.

We kept pushing forward.

I began to wonder if we would get to the other side of the cell. Just as I thought that, I noticed Leslie's voice was getting closer. The pulsations got quicker, happening with each word Leslie spoke. We then saw Leslie. He was curled up with his back to us and holding his head. He stopped talking and the pulsations continued. There was a new sound, a creaking, squelching sound that made my skin crawl. Then everything stopped; the pulsations, the sounds. All that could be heard was Leslie's breathing. Leslie slowly began to look over his shoulder. Before we could see his face, we were back in the reception area looking at the nurse. The world was back in color now.

"You don't look well at all," said the nurse. "Do take care of yourself."

Sebastian looked like he was going to say something, but instead signed the log book. He walked for the upgrade room.

I thought was that was smart move as well and signed my own name in the log book. I then went to pick up the newspaper and the missing poster. The newspaper had a large blood splatter on the lower left quarter.

MISSING PATIENT FOUND.

CARETAKER WORRIED SICK.

PSYCHIATRIC PATIENT MISSING SINCE LAST TUESDAY FOUND HIDING IN PHOTOGRAPHY STUDIO. PHYSICIAN VALERIO JIMENEZ SAYS "GOD'S WILL."

I went to the bulletin board and took down the missing poster. It was of a heavyset man with a mustache and similar features to Dr. Jimenez.

MISSING: DR. VALERIO JIMENEZ.

OWNER OF THE ELK RIVER HOSPICE. LAST SEEN DRIVING INTO THE CITY.

I walked into the hallway leading to the upgrade room and saw Sebastian in the chair. I went back to the archive room to add the collectables. On the desk, I found the paper that Sebastian had taken off the door earlier.

FEBRUARY 2005

MYRA WAS ALMOST KILLED THIS AFTERNOON – SHOT BY A SUSPECT WE WERE PURSUING. THANK GOD I WAS THERE. SHE'S GOING TO BE OKAY.

BUT SEEING HER BLEEDING LIKE THAT, THINKING I WAS GOING TO LOSE HER WITHOUT TELLING HER HOW I REALLY FEEL, WAS UNBEARABLE . . . I THINK SHE FEELS THE SAME WAY. THERE'S SOMETHING UNDENIABLE BETWEEN US.

IT'S AGAINST THE CODE OF CONDUCT, BUT I HAVE TO LET HER KNOW HOW I FEEL ABOUT HER. I HOPE I'M NOT SETTING MYSELF UP FOR EMBARRASSMENT.

I quickly organized everything into its proper folders and turned to the map. The next two pieces went into their places.

My phone chimed and I jumped. I took it out of my pocket and unlocked the screen.

COLLECTABLES FOUND.

AUDIO TAPES 1/10.

DOCUMENTS 3/16.

KEYS 6/45.

MAP FRAGMENTS 7/28.

MISSING POSTERS 3/15.

NEWSPAPERS 4/21.

PERSONAL DOCUMENTS 3/16.

"Good to know."

The map lit up and I was pulled back into the shed with Sebastian beside me. He looked at me like he wasn't sure if we just experienced the safe haven. I didn't say anything to him. Instead, I opened the door to see Jimenez on the other side of it.

"We must find my patient, Leslie," he said impatiently.

"We're coming," I said.

Sebastian took the lead and we walked up to the hospice. Sebastian carefully pushed the door opened and scanned the area before walking inside. I followed behind him and Jimenez followed behind me.

The hospice was trashed.

"What could have happened in here?" Jimenez wondered aloud.

"A whole lot of things," I replied.

"Clear," said Sebastian, checking a room with his pistol drawn.

We moved onto the next one.

"Hush, hush . . ." I heard a man say from another room. "Don't you fret."

Sebastian turned in the direction of the voice. He walked into the room he just checked. I followed behind him and through another doorway. The next room had a couple beds and a giant medical diagram of the inside of a person's torso.

"Peel away," the voice went on. "No tearing."

A section of the room was cordoned off with partition panels. Through the gaps, I could see someone moving around.

"Hush, hush, don't you fret," the man cooed again.

Something wasn't right here.

Jimenez strode by us.

"Doc, no, don't," Sebastian tried to stop him.

Jimenez ignored him and walked around the partitions. "Valerio, it's me!"

"The good doctor is here . . ."

Sebastian and I followed after Jimenez.

Jimenez looked over his shoulder and introduced us to his brother. "This is my brother, Valerio, Leslie's original doc . . ." he trailed off, realizing something was wrong.

Sebastian and I ran over and saw Valerio. He had his back to us and was doing something to the body on the operating table.

"Peel away . . ."

Several pieces of bloody flesh were thrown carelessly onto the floor, along with a pair of forceps.

"Expose everything."

"Hey, what are you doing?" Sebastian asked firmly.

Valerio turned around. His eyes were glowing and the skin from the side of his head had been ripped away. He held up a curved knife that he had been using to cut the body on the table.

Sebastian whipped out his shotgun and blasted the Haunted's head off.

The room began to shake. Bottles rattled and the pendant light swayed. The walls seem to pulse around us. A high-pitch ringing started. Sebastian groaned and covered one ear. Valerio reappeared, standing over the body on the table and looking like a normal human. Well, a normal human who was about to cut a body open. He cut into the torso with the knife. He shook his head a few times before reaching up with a bloody hand to scratch.

"So . . . itchy . . ." He scratched at his skull. He then brought the other hand up to scratch, too. "It itches. So itchy. It itches!" He tore at his flesh.

The ghost disappeared.

The room went back to normal.

"How could he have done that to Valerio?" Jimenez said quietly. "Impossible . . . couldn't be Ruvik."

I gasped. Ruvik: the mastermind behind all of this, the one pulling the strings. Or was he? He was the main antagonist and the one to beat if we wanted to get out of here. He was so much more as well. A twisted man with a twisted past. So many horrible events that made him the way he was. And I couldn't remember what they were, just knew they happened. Ugh, why did my memory have to unreliable in this dream?

A scream startled me out of my thoughts. Sebastian was standing over the body Valerio had been dissecting with his hand in its chest. The body was now sitting up and hanging on to Sebastian's arm. Sebastian let out a yell and pushed it back down. He stumbled and landed on the floor.

"You okay?" I asked, looking at the now still body.

"Yeah." He got up. In his hand was a locker key.

My watch vibrated.

KEY 7/45.

Jimenez had gone back to the other part of the room, away from his brother's corpse. I followed him out. I tripped on the step down and stumbled. Someone caught my arm.

"You okay?" Sebastian asked, setting me back upright.

I nodded.

There was a scream from outside.

"Leslie?" Jimenez questioned.

"That came from outside," said Sebastian, moving for the door.

"Y-yes," Jimenez stuttered, not wanting to leave the house.

The three of us ran outside and around the back of the hospice. There was a large fire burning in the middle of a lot.

"Help! Help!"

A Haunted was carrying a woman over its shoulder and heading for the fire.

Sebastian pulled his pistol and fired a shot. The Haunted dropped the woman and she ran off into the dark. Sebastian put another bullet in the Haunted's skull, blowing it to pieces.

"Where did she go?" Sebastian asked me.

"I don't know," I replied, looking at where she had run off.

"Come on. Let's find Leslie." Sebastian turned around and touched my arm to follow him.

We walked back out on the dirt road to continue searching houses.

"Let's check this house before that one," said Sebastian, gesturing to the house next to the road before the one up on a hill.

The door to the house next to the road burst open and I nearly jumped out of my skin. The ghostly apparition of a woman on fire came screaming out of the house. She collapsed in the road and disappeared.

"That scared me," I panted.

Sebastian and I entered the house the ghost came out of. Like the others we had been in, it had been trashed. The front room was mostly empty, but there was a bookcase blocking the door to the back.

"Can you fit back there?" Sebastian asked.

I climbed through the gap with little effort. It was a bedroom.

"Élan." Sebastian held out his knife to me.

I took the knife and kept it out to defend myself. I didn't need to worry because the bedroom was empty. I checked the bed itself and found a note laying on the quilt.

"Anything?" Sebastian asked.

"Yeah." I walked back with the note in my hand. "'They got Norman. His cries for help just cut off. I can hear screaming every night. If I don't stay hidden I know I'll be next.'"

I looked at my watch and saw a new alert.

DOCUMENT 4/16.

I put the note in my bag and climbed through the gap. I gave Sebastian his knife back.

We left the house and started up the hill to house on top.

"Help! Help!"

I caught a glimpse of Leslie as he ran inside the hill house. It didn't look like anything was chasing him; he was running blindly and trying to find somewhere to hide.

"What is with this kid?" Sebastian asked as he ran up the hill.

We ran inside and looked around. We couldn't see or hear Leslie anywhere.

Sebastian checked the rooms. "He's gone down there."

I found Sebastian standing at the top of a staircase. He went down the stairs and I followed after him. The stairs went deep below the house. We were definitely in the hill the house was built on. Sebastian took a side trip into a room. He came back, tucking something into his pocket.

At the end of the hall was a door cast in red. There was a little window where the red light was coming through.

Sebastian kicked the door open and entered the room.

It was a dark room used for developing photos.

"Why would he come down here?" Sebastian asked quietly.

I remembered what the most recent newspaper clipping said: PSYCHIATRIC PATIENT MISSING SINCE LAST TUESDAY FOUND HIDING IN PHOTOGRAPHY STUDIO.

"Because this place is familiar to him," I answered. "He was found here before."

Sebastian looked at me like he was going to question how I knew that, but didn't.

"Help me . . . Help me . . . Help me . . ." came Leslie's chanting on the far side of the room.

Sebastian led the way to the back behind some hanging sheets. He parted them and I heard Leslie let out a scream.

Jimenez ran around us and grabbed Leslie to keep him from running off again. "Leslie. Oh, thank heavens."

Leslie struggled against Jimenez.

"Dr. Jimenez is here! Settle down."

Sebastian heard something and turned back to the door. "Wait, doc. I think something's coming."

The door was kicked open and bounced off the wall, but there was no one there. I saw something flicker, but it was too quick to make out what it was. Then I saw it again, this time closer.

"Sebastian, shotgun," I said, keeping my eye on where I thought the thing was.

A bottle rolled across the floor.

"There!" I pointed to where I saw a shimmer and the kicked bottle.

Sebastian fired the shotgun. It hit something. The Haunted appeared and staggered back. It didn't have a face, instead its facial area was made up of red tentacles.

"What the hell!" I screamed, seeing what the Haunted looked like.

Sebastian fired again and the Haunted dropped to the floor.

"Is it dead?" asked Jimenez.

Sebastian leaned over the Haunted with the shotgun ready in case it got up again. He gave it a nudge with his foot. It was dead.

Sebastian stepped back behind the sheets.

"This place is a death trap," he stated needlessly. "Is there anywhere safe at all?"

"I think that's unlikely," Jimenez answered. He steered Leslie for the door.

"Can't get out," Leslie chanted.

"We must be going," Jimenez told us. "This way."

"Can't get away, can't get away," Leslie whined.

They left the room.

Sebastian reloaded his shotgun. "Good eye there, Élan."

"Thanks," I said. I looked at the Haunted on the floor. "That thing is freaky!"

"Let's hope that's the only one," said Sebastian. "Or I have you around if they show up again."

I gave him a playful nudge with my elbow. I looked at the wall and noticed the photos all tacked up on it. The people in the photos all had their faces blurred. I walked over to take a closer look.

"What is it?" Sebastian asked.

"Sebastian, look at these," I said, pointing to the wall.

Sebastian walked over and looked at the photos. "This guys shouldn't quit his day job. They're all blurry."

"No, only the faces," I said. "Sebastian, isn't this one you?" I pointed to a photo a man dressed like Sebastian, but the face was blurred out while the rest of the photo was crisp.

"Yeah. Here's more." He pointed to another photo.

There were several pictures of Sebastian on the wall.

"This is creepy," I said. "Let's get out of here."

Sebastian and I left the room and found Jimenez and Leslie. Standing next to a wall. Jimenez was pressing against it.

"The stairs are gone," the doctor said, horrified. He took several steps back.

"We must be collectively losing our minds," said Sebastian as we approached them.

"Losing our minds," Leslie muttered quietly. "Losing our minds . . . Losing our minds." He startled all of us when he threw his head back and started yelling. "Losing our minds! Losing our minds! Losing our minds!" Then he stopped.

I heard the high-pitched ringing.

"Oh god," Jimenez breathed in terror. "No."

Sebastian and I turned around to see what Jimenez was looking at. Behind us was a man dressed in a white robe with a hood splattered in blood and the sleeves and bottom hems burned and torn. He wore light gray pants that were burned off at the knees. His body and face were covered in wicked burns and scars and the top right part of his cranium looked like it was exposed. The unmarred skin was pale. He looked like a walking cadaver. Pale gray eyes stared at us, the same pale gray eyes that flashed in my mind before.

"Ruvik . . . it is you," said Jimenez, stepping back.

Leslie dropped to his knees and screamed.

"Leslie!" Jimenez knelt down to help him.

I stepped in front of Jimenez and Leslie.

"Who the hell are you?" Sebastian said to Ruvik.

Ruvik turned his attention to me. It was almost like he was trying to look through me.

"Laura," a raspy deep voice echoed in my head, the same voice from the audio tape I found.

Laura, the name Jimenez called me, whose face I now wore in this dream. Ruvik's beloved sister.

Ruvik turned and walked away.

"No! Don't follow!" Jimenez told us.

Sebastian was already taking a step forward.

"Wait!" I called, grabbing Sebastian's arm.

The lighting changed and everything was bathed in orange.

"What the?"

We turned around and Jimenez and Leslie were gone.

"Doctor? Leslie?" Sebastian called. "Fuck. Come on, Élan."

We kept walking to the door that would have led us back into the photography room. Every step we took caused the lighting to change. Sebastian reached out for the door, but the door and the wall both disappeared and the tunnel continued. There was a heavy thunk and the rushing of water. A river of blood was flooding the tunnel. Sebastian grabbed my arm and we were both submerged in the crimson current.

It receded and we were no longer in the tunnel, but waist deep in blood in a pit. We looked to be in a basement of some sort. There were a couple of metal chutes pointing down from the ceiling and large bins in the pit filled with mutilated bodies.

"What is going on here?" said Sebastian.

I gagged on the horrible smell. "Oh, what fresh hell is this?"

Sebastian waded over to a lever and gave it a pull. The blood drained out, revealing several dead bodies. We picked our way over them and climbed out of the pit. There was another lever and Sebastian gave it a pull. A buzzer went off and a body fell out of a chute. He walked away.

I checked my watch and saw the compass was pointing to a different chute. I pulled the same lever again and a statue dropped out of that chute.

Sebastian looked at me like I was crazy.

"What?" I asked. "I wanted to pull it, too." I know I sounded juvenile, but I couldn't help it. I needed some sort of humor, sick and twisted as it may have been, to lighten the situation.

I went to retrieve the statue. As I reached down to pick it up, I saw a tripwire running in front of the chute. I carefully picked the statue up and brought it over for Sebastian to see.

"Careful over there. There's a tripwire," I told him. I held up the statue. "These are what I was talking about." I smashed it on the ground and picked the key up.

"Looks like there's a way out," said Sebastian, pointing to some steps to a door.

When we reached the steps, blood began to spread from the door and formed fleshy growths, sealing the way out. Ruvik flickered into existence. Bloody insects came off of his lower half and spread over the railing and into the pit. The bodies that were laying there rose up as newly awakened Haunted. Ruvik then disappeared again. There must have been a dozen Haunted crawling over the railing!

"Stick with me," Sebastian started to say.

"You still have that grenade?" I yelled over him.

He got the hint and pulled it out. He tossed it into the group of Haunted and pulled me back. I covered my ears and the grenade exploded, taking out a bunch of them.

"Come on!" Sebastian grabbed my hand and dragged me away.

We ran around the room with the Haunted following us. I looked down and saw a puddle of oil.

"Hold on!" I cried. I grabbed a match and lit it. The Haunted came closer. When they stepped into the oil, I threw the match down. That took care of three more.

We continued to run a circle around the room. We ran through one door and into a tripwire. There was a loud beeping. Sebastian pushed me forward. Behind us, spears rained down on the Haunted that followed us in.

"Any more?" I asked.

Sebastian answered by aiming his shotgun at a fat Haunted. He fired, taking its head off. "Think that's the last one."

We went back to the door to figure out what to do next. But the door was just a door, the blood and flesh now gone like it had never been there.

Sebastian opened the door. It led into a corridor with several large pipes and blood splattered walls. At the other end was an opened door. We entered and saw a body laying on the floor in a puddle of blood.

The body burst open and a woman screamed. Coming out of the blood were four large hands connected to long spidery arms and a pale face with long hair black hair.

"Shit! Run!" Sebastian yelled.

We ran back the way we came. We didn't get far before we found it sealed off with a wall. The creature was charging down the hall on four arms and two legs, screaming. There was a door next to us. I grabbed the handle, but it was locked.

"Get back!" yelled Sebastian, preparing to fight.

I got away from the door and saw the creature crawling closer. Sebastian's shotgun wasn't going to do much to it . . . her.

The door that was locked burst open and a Haunted got into her path. She grabbed it and began tearing it apart.

"Come on!" Sebastian ran through the door and I followed behind him.

We ran down the hallway and ended up in another room. I saw a glowing red button attached to the door and slapped it. The metal door rolled down, cutting her off from us. There was a hole in the floor with a ladder. We climbed down into another corridor. There was a tripwire spanning across the width.

Sebastian pushed me down. "Climb under it. If it follows, it'll hit it."

I ducked under it and we ran. At the other end of the corridor was an elevator. I looked back and saw the creature landing on the floor.

"Sebastian! She's coming!" I cried.

"What is with you?" he yelled back at the creature.

We ducked under another tripwire and ran for the elevator. The door opened on its own and we ran in. The door closed and the elevator began to descend.

"Burn that," said Sebastian.

I looked down and saw the body at my feet. I lit and match and burned the body. We didn't need any more problems.

The elevator came to a stop and the door opened. The room was empty except for a giant pool of blood on the floor. There was a door to our left. We got off the elevator and started for the door.

The creature burst through the blood pool with a chilling scream.

We ran through the door and into a narrow hallway. At the other end, a metal door was slowly closing.

"Go! Go!" I yelled.

Sebastian was ahead of me. I could tell that I wasn't going to make it through the door. Sebastian dove and slid on his belly through the narrow gap, but door closed the rest of the way and I couldn't follow. I banged on the door futilely.

"Élan!" Sebastian yelled on the other side, banging on the door, too.

I turned around and saw the creature crawling closer. She lifted her head and I could see her face from behind her hair. It was twisted in rage, but I could see we shared the same face.

I stood tall. "Laura. Stop!" I ordered, manipulating the dream.

Ruvik's face flickered in my mind.

She slammed her hands on either side of me, denting the door. She screamed in my face and wrapped one of her hands around my torso. She was fighting the manipulation.

"S-stop," I tried again, feeling like my ribs were going to break.

She stopped squeezing, but didn't loosen her grip.

"Let go of me, Laura," I said.

She let go of me immediately. I fell against the door, gasping for breath. She backed away, choosing to climb up the wall to hang from the ceiling. Standing in the middle of the hallway was Ruvik.

"Oh, crap," I breathed, terrified.

He flickered and appeared closer, standing right under Laura.

I started to panic. There was nowhere for me to go!

Ruvik began to raise his hand.

No!

I squeezed my eyes shut and forced myself to focus on just getting out of there and finding a place to hide. And then I was falling into nothingness.


I was looking at what is all involved in chapter 5 of the game and realized it's long. I don't know when it'll be out, but it probably won't be until November. I have a grand idea for it, but I need to go over my notes. Either it's going to be great or it's going to be terrible and I'm hoping for the former.