Dust and concrete buried all four entities before each started clawing their way out of the rubble. Coughing and hissing, they looked up from the second floor and realized they had crashed down to the first.
Wiping the debris from his eyes, Dboy was the first to notice something looming where the ceiling used to be: black and purple clouds thundered together, revealing the form of an eldritch abomination with glowing yellow eyes. Eyes that wanted to eviscerate everything in their path.
Dboy spoke quietly, staring at the levitating creature. "You look just like the old man behind the walls... but we both know that's not you at all, is it?" He had a feeling that what he was seeing was cut from the same cloth... but how? He was sure of Sickness and Reverend. NailBunny too, but this?
Just how many people did Johnny infect?
Eff began to stare down the creature as well. Dusting himself off, he stood upright. "Whatever it is, I'm not gonna let it strip my skin to pieces," Eff said aloud. "You can sit here if you want, but I'd rather fight to keep my life."
Reverend and Sickness, understanding what Eff was about to do, nodded in agreement as they began to shape-shift into their own destructive forms.
Feeling the energy in the room, Dboy knew that whatever this thing was, it was going to overpower his counterparts. And Dboy would be damned if they were going to die before him. "So, for once you guys have a death wish, huh? Count me in." His eyes glowed blue as the Voice of Misery began to transform.
Cassie breathed raggedly, exhausted as she lay on the bathroom floor with her hands still tied to the toilet. After struggling for a while, the binds refused to loosen. She wondered if the voice she had heard earlier was all in her head. "A kind of fear-induced psychosis?" she thought.
"Maybe working here has made me a little crazy too," she sighed, her body going limp. She decided to try again later—until she heard the bathroom door open.
The lights flickered, then went out as whoever entered the restroom began to approach her stall. Cassie tried to suppress her screams, assuming it was the twisted man who had tied her up, returning to finish the job.
You sick fuck, I won't scream or cry to give you the satisfaction.
A pair of feet stood in front of her stall door, and silence filled the air. For a moment, Cassie could hear only her own breathing and the pounding of her heart before the door swung open, revealing one of the most special patients—Todd.
"T-Todd?" Cassie whispered, "How did you get out? A-are they gone?"
Staring down at the kindest nurse he had ever known, Todd saw how she was tied up. He crouched down and began tearing off the binds around her wrists. Cassie flinched at first, but he chose to believe it wasn't out of fear of him—rather, that something else had terrified her more.
Rubbing her sore wrists, Cassie breathed a soft "Thank you" before noticing Todd was still staring at her.
"Are you okay, Todd?" she asked.
After years of speaking very little, Todd cleared his throat and made several coughing sounds before managing to rasp, "You... were nice... go home."
Todd stood up and offered his hand to Cassie, helping her to her feet. Together, they walked toward the main entrance before she started to panic again.
"W-wait, the other people I let in—where are they now? Todd, you have to be careful, I think—"
Todd shook his head and gently placed a finger on her lips. In the dim light, he looked different: a bearded, long-haired man standing 6'7", his appearance intimidating to most. But Cassie had only ever seen a shell of a man. He had never resisted or caused a scene at the facility. Yet now, he spoke kindly and without a trace of anger in his voice.
"You go... home. I'll... take care... Goodbye," Todd said as he opened the front doors. He handed her an umbrella from the side rack. Cassie, still staring at him in confusion, stepped cautiously outside. Was he actually going to try to take them all down?
As she retrieved her keys from her pocket, the sound of rain surrounded her. There was something she had to say, something she had been thinking for years while caring for Todd. Turning around, she saw him waiting at the door, watching her.
"Todd... I knew it could never be you who killed those people. I just knew it," she shouted. As she turned toward the parking lot, she heard a different voice. Not Todd's soft, hoarse voice, but one that was clear, sharp, and wiry.
"And you'd be right," the voice said.
Cassie whipped around, only to see Todd's silhouette, his eyes glowing briefly before the front doors slammed shut on their own. Terror seized her again. Dropping the umbrella, she ran to her car. She turned the ignition, floored the gas, and sped down the lone road, praying she'd never have to see that building again.
