"Not my babies. Oh god..." the Variant rasped in a wheezy voice.
Miles was frozen in fear as the Variant walked towards him, wielding an officer's baton. Miles breath shook as he tried to back away, but his feet felt rooted to the ground. The Variant's eyes glinted with malice, sending a shiver down Miles' spine.
Miles carefully moved around him, finding himself in front of an elevator and two staircases, one going up, the other going down. After a moment of thought, Miles went downstairs first, just to see if he could find anything that he might need. Miles stepped further into the room, seeing two batteries on a desk, freezing, when he saw a Variant standing in a corner with his back to him.
Miles slowly reached for the batteries, hoping to grab them without alerting the Variant. As he inched closer, he kept his eyes on the Variant, ready to bolt at the first sign of movement. The Variant remained still, unaware of Miles' presence, as he grabbed the batteries and quickly retreated back up the stairs, relieved to have avoided a confrontation.
Miles ran back up the stairs, and ran up the second set of stairs, skidding to a halt when he noticed the large gap in the stairs. Miles looked at it for a moment before looking at the place where he wanted to go.
"Can I jump that?" Miles wondered, feeling a surge of adrenaline as he contemplated the risky move. With a deep breath, he took a few steps back and then sprinted towards the gap, launching himself across it with all his might. After landing safely on the other side, Miles couldn't help but smile at his own daring feat.
"Nailed it," Miles muttered to himself, feeling a sense of accomplishment wash over him as he ran around the corner, only stopping when he heard Father Martin's voice call out to him.
"Nearly here. You can cross from the upper floors," Father Martin called unhelpfully from somewhere in front of him, and Miles groaned.
"Of course, I can," Miles sighed before going down a different hallway.
Shortly after, Miles found a locked-up key that hung on the body of a dead officer that he needed in a laundry chute, so he started searching through a broken part of the asylum for the three fuses that would unlock the chute. As he searched, Miles couldn't shake the feeling of unease that lingered in the air, making him quicken his pace. The urgency of finding the fuses grew with each passing moment, pushing him deeper into the asylum's dark and eerie corridors.
After a moment, Miles passed a sign that said 'Pray for Revelation' in blood before opening a door, and stopping, his heart pounding in his chest as he faced a room filled with flickering candles and a Variant standing over a dead body, a cleaver in his hand. A glint caught Miles' eye, and he gasped when he saw the fuse he needed.
"Okay. Nice and easy," Miles whispered, his voice barely audible as he slowly walked towards the fuse.
Miles quickly grabbed the fuse, and the Variant immediately started cackling madly, and slowly walked towards him. Miles quickly rushed out the door, swerving out of the way of the second Variant, who swung at him with a baton. Miles ran down the corridor, into a different room, and slammed the door behind him. He quickly assessed his surroundings, fist-pumping when he saw another fuse. He pocketed it, and quickly left the room, sighing with relief when he noticed the Variants weren't there.
A few minutes later, he saw a Variant surrounded by food underneath the elevator shaft between a couple of floors. A dead body at the bottom of an elevator shaft, surrounded by food. He barricaded himself in someplace safe, someplace nobody could reach him. It didn't work, Miles thought as he took in the sight before him before continuing on. Eventually, Miles found the third fuse, and went back to the laundry chute, putting the fuses in.
Miles pressed the button that would allow him to grab the key and groaned when the body to which the key was attached dropped down to the lower levels of the asylum, out of his reach. "What? No!" Miles yelled, and growled in frustration.
"Laundry room, here I come," Miles groaned, dreading that something might have happened to the key before he could retrieve it. He dreaded the thought of having to search through piles of dirty laundry or body parts to find it.
Miles quickly found the laundry room. and he internally cheered when he saw the key. After opening the gate, Miles grabbed the key and ran back the way he came, used the key, and got up to the upper floors. Once there, Miles saw a sign on the wall that said 'Follow the blood' and another one that said 'Lies' and both were written in blood.
I recognize the handwriting. Father Martin killed a man here. Are the 'LIES' he's talking about all the missing files from these boxes? The facts? The records? They look like government agency material, at least thirty years old, probably older. I start thinking MKULTRA, CIA. Mind control. The buzzing won't stop, Miles thought, thinking of all the files he had found lying around the asylum and read before he ran forward and let out a shout when the floor gave way below him.