Out of Bedlam Read online

  Chapter 1

  The Hunt

  I haven’t come this far before. The halls in this area should be empty. None of the rooms on this floor were for patient use. Up ahead there is a dim rectangle of light. The light is coming through a ventilation grate from the room below me. A quick glance reveals it as a small locker room connected to a tiled shower room. Nothing moving or breathing down there.

  The grate yields to my push. I’m careful to catch it before it slams open or falls to the floor. I can’t let it make any noise. Silence is Safety. If they can’t hear you, they won’t look for you, and if they don’t look for you, they don’t find you.

  I drop with relaxed muscles to the bench affixed to the floor in front of the bank of lockers. I land with a soft thump, it’s hardly louder than an exhalation of breath. Reflexes force me to freeze. Stop and assess danger. Still no noise. No one coming to get me. It’s ok to ease up a little. Sighing out my held breath, I turn to the lockers and begin to scavenge through them.

  Most of the lockers are missing their locks. I ignore the few that still have them and begin scavenging through the rest. I ease each open with slow gentle pressure. The only sound they make is a quiet susurrus of metal sliding against metal. Most are empty. In one I find a tablet that is missing its power cell. I touch the screen and confirm. No Power. Might as well be a cutting board. I almost toss it. Then I reconsider. Might be able to trade it for something. It goes into my sling bag.

  I am rather proud of my slingbag. It has several pockets and even a drawstring to keep it closed. It was worth the crappy nutrient bar I traded for the materials to make it. I made it from a worn pair of patient pants. I think her name was Lacey, the woman I got them from.

  She said she didn’t want them anymore. She said they were rubbing her the wrong way. She had a skin thing, or maybe it was a fashion thing. Said something else about never being able to properly dress for the occasion anyway, or something like that. The last time I saw her, she was just a pale and bare shade disappearing down a murky half lit hall. That was quite a while ago. When everyone had just started to realize no one was coming back to Observe. Just after the Last Shift.

  Rooting through another locker reveals a pair of worn paperbacks. A Harlequin romance and a thriller by Robin Cook. Better than gold. I slip them into my bag. No time to check them out here. No way to tell how much time I have. They could come. The Wild Ones are loose now. That thought almost drives me out of the room. I’ve already been here too long.

  Another part of me argues that everything has been fine so far. I can push my luck a little farther.

  The next bank of lockers is almost empty. Just some scraps of lint and old wrappers. Stuff that might fall out of your pocket. Until the last one. It holds a pair of treasures that make the expedition worth the time and risk.

  The first is a clean set of scrubs neatly hung on a hook inside the locker. A loose shirt top and drawstring pants in a nice deep shade of red. Amazing. No scent at all. Maybe just a hint of disinfectant.

  I strip on the spot and let the rags fall to the floor. I’ve needed something new for a while. The clothes I have been wearing are starting to make me smell like the Wild Ones. They were a pale blue when I got them. Now they are a mottled grey. They have picked up the dust from the vents and stains from everywhere else. Cleaning them in the sink has kept them bearable, but only just. They should be burned.

  The clean red cloth of the new scrubs, on the other hand, slides softly on my skin and sends a soft, almost electric, shiver through me. So distracting I almost miss something potentially more valuable. Something hiding in the back of the locker’s top shelf.

  A small orange vial. Like a drugstore pill bottle. I looked at it for a moment. No label. It’s probably empty. Who would leave something worth so much behind? Can’t help but wince at the rattle as I pick it up. I swear it echoes back and forth in the empty rooms. Not full, but more than a few tablets left in it. I glance around for new threats. Someone might have heard that.

  No one is there, of course. No one but me has opened these lockers or taken a shower in a long time. I pop the top and shove in a scrap torn from the rags I was wearing to keep the pills from rattling around. Safety first. And Silence is Safety.

  My last acquisition pushes me out of my comfort zone. Time to leave. I look up at the vent. Only now realizing how high it is. Still open and inviting but so far up. I try climbing up on the bench, but still out of reach. A quick jump confirms it. Only the tips of my fingers brush the opening. I need to find another way out.

  Taking in the room, there are two exits. An open industrial doorway leading into what appeared to be orange tiled room with showers and a closed wooden fire door with a small wired safety glass window. If my bearings are right, that fire door leads out to hallway, but anyone or anything could be out there. The Wild Ones hunt freely now.

  I shake off the involuntary shudder that comes with that thought, turn away from the wooden door, and walk into the tiled room instead.

  The room is much larger than it looked from the locker room. Industrial orange and brown tiles covered every surface; the floor, walls, even the ceiling. The left wall is filled with a series of curtained alcoves with rusted silver metal shower heads arching over them. The right wall has several metal sided toilet stalls. Directly across from the doorway is a built in tub and next to that, a wooden looking cabinet.

  I open the cabinet first. The doors open easily. Inside are some cleaning supplies, a couple of folded towels. Some smaller wash clothes. A towel and several of the wash clothes make it into my bag. I’d have to stop adding things soon though. I was running out of space. Might be hard to drag it through the vents.

  The showers yields a few more delights. A wrapped bar of soap and a small bottle of shampoo. Definitely going to have too much to drag through the vent.

  At first I thought the stalls had nothing of interest. Then I noticed something sticking out of the metal boxes mounted next to the toilet. Soft white paper. They still had rolls of toilet paper! Sweet Jesus! The cover of the dispenser came off after some rough encouragement and I added a couple of rolls to my bag. Now I really had too much stuff. Time to go.

  There is no way out from this room except the one I came in. I spend a few moments confirming it. Out into the hallway it is.

  It hurts…

  …shut up. …it’s your own fault. …you took the last one.

  They stopped giving it to me. To everyone.

  …they just keep them now. …not sharing.

  It hurts…

  …do you smell that? …something… …clean… …near…

  No. It hurts. Are you sure you don’t have any more? Maybe just one more?

  …what was that? a rattle… a rattle… relief waiting in a plastic bottle… …so close … through that door. go!

  No good. Door won’t open. Locked out. No key. Can’t get through. Can’t see anyone inside.

  …but they’re there, aren’t they? …keeping it for themselves… Mother says you’re supposed to share…

  Maybe there is another way in?

  …no. …behind that cart. …the lights are out over there. …they won’t see you coming…

  The small window in the door with its crisscrossed wire mesh offers only a limited view of the hallway. The lights that work flutter on and off. The shadows move and jump. Creepy but probably nothing. The only thing out there is an abandoned supply cart a few yards down the hall.

  The breaker bar eases softly in and makes only a slight clank as the door’s locking mechanism pulls from the socket in the wall. Still dead silence from the hall.

  A quick glance to either side. Most of the lights are out in the hallway only the center track is lit. Must be evening. Or maybe this hall i
s just low priority. Everything looks clear. I slip out into the hallway. I ease the door closed. It slides shut with only a minimal amount of noise.

  I start down the hall and make it about twenty yards before I hear it. I’m stuck twenty yards from the locked door I can’t go back through and in an unfamiliar part of the building. Dammit.

  From behind there is a sharp grating squeak. I freeze and assess. The cart is moving and something is coming out from behind it. A thick smell of unwashed skin and other more subtle flavors make me gag. An icy chill slides down my spine. My heart is already hammering against my ribs.

  I am out in the open and one of the Wild Ones is hunting me.

  Chapter 2

  The Chase

  The Wild Ones used to be locked in rooms in the basement. They kept them down there. In locked cells, behind locked doors.

  Now, they’re loose.

  And one’s right behind me.

  Hurts.

  …shut up. …one of them is coming out.

  So young. Such a pretty red.

  …they’re holding. …you can tell. …mother says you gottah share.

  I’ll just ask for it. They’ll see how much it hurts me.

  …just take it away. …they won’t share. …unless we make them.

  I can hear a scraping along the tile. Must be him. Before the Last Shift I helped prepare and deliver meals to the Wild Ones. He was very polite then. No hair on top, even back then. Just a long fringe that hung around his head. With pale green eyes that darted to the right whenever he talked. Before the meds ran out, he told me he would drag his nails along the tiles to keep them sharp. The nurses called him a Problem. The orderlies called him the Beast. Before he was brought here he had a penchant for collecting teeth. When I heard that, I asked if he was a dentist. He was not.

  I have survived so far by avoiding all of the Wild Ones. Another safety rule. Know Your Exits. If they can’t catch you, they can’t hurt you. In this case, I have really screwed the pooch. I don’t know where the nearest grates are. Need to make it to one, before they get ahold of me. Slip deeper in than they fit. The vents are a good exit and a place to hide. Safe.

  I have to get away and find a grate. My toes grip the cold tile and launch me down the hall. I run thirty feet straight and then take a hard right. A few more feet and I see an opening in the wall. I might make it. And it’s not like I have a choice.

  He was waiting for me to run. I hear him lurch after me. His bare feet slap down on the tile behind me. It’s him. The Beast is right behind me. I can smell him, almost taste him this close. Sour sweat and fresh crap. I gag on the smell and push everything I have into getting a little farther away.

  I might be fast, but the Beast is proving to be faster. He is catching up.

  Almost make it to the grate when I feel his clawed hand clamp down on my wrist. His nails are long, yellowed, and jagged. They cut into my skin like shards of broken glass. Beads of blood form where they make contact with my skin. I barely have time to notice before he tries to drag me down to the cold tiles. Still not sure what he wants to do to me, but I’m not going to give him the chance.

  Rather than fighting his feverish strength, I surprise him by relenting and allowing him to pull me down. I use his strength to hurl my body into his legs like a rag-doll battering ram. It works. He doesn’t suspect anything and gets his legs tangled around me. One minute he’s running and the next he is flipping over the top of my limp form and crashing into the floor. He lands face first with a satisfying crunching noise and a gasp of pain. But I also misjudge. The floor rises up too fast and he doesn’t release my arm. I see a flash of red and feel a pop as something separates in my shoulder.

  He isn’t moving yet, but that doesn’t mean he won’t. I scramble over him and to my feet, pausing just long enough to plant a solid kick into his gut. He wheezes out a gasp of rancid breath laced with a fine spray of blood from his broken nose. It fills the area with a malaise of rotting flesh. Again, I fight the urge to vomit. My shoulder is starting to throb and complain, each step is accompanied by a bolt of pain through my torso. I don’t hear him moving behind me anymore. It doesn’t matter. I reach the grate and pull myself up and in.

  The arm betrays me before I can make it all the way into the crawlspace. Red hot pain. The world shrinks around me into a dark tunnel. I can’t risk jarring it again. It refuses to move the way I want it to and I can’t lift it up at all without the darkness creeping back. Finally, I manage to brace a knee in the opening and leverage myself the rest of the way in. This is not good. Not good at all.

  The vents are tight and dark. And filled with webs and dust, spiders and other less savory characters. Dimly, I think about how with the doors locked and no one coming or going into the building, all the dust must be human skin. Gross. I scoot in a little farther putting as much distance between myself and the Beast as possible.

  As if he can hear my thoughts, a wet burble and a growl echo behind me. Not dead then, but I bet he’s not enjoying that broken nose. There is a scratching, scrabbling sound as he tries to climb in after me. I risk a look back and we lock eyes momentarily as he attempts to climb into the shaft. His eyes are dark and yellowed, bloodshot. Nothing human there, just the Beast. Terror rips through me and I scramble back a little faster. My shoulder drags against the duct and a fresh shock of pain reddens my vision. I press against the cold metal of the duct and try to keep the sawdust ration bar I ate for breakfast from making a break for it. He’s still right behind me. I can’t stop yet.

  A few yards into the tunnel there is a sharp right turn. If I can get a few feet past that, I can breathe a little easier. No way he can make that turn. I slide the last few feet and slip around the corner. After a few minutes of trying to force his way in he finally gives up. Maybe on to bigger game, maybe he is going to try to wait me out.

  I take a minute to get my bearings and catch my breath. A hundred feet further down is a fan room. It’ll be chilly, but at least I can stretch out and figure out how bad my shoulder is hurt.

  It’s a long tunnel and seems narrower than most. It doesn’t help that I have to move forward in a three legged crawl. I keep my hurt arm pulled tight to my chest. Every few feet I misjudge the space and a strobe of pain flashes through my entire torso when my shoulder hits the wall or my arms get jarred. It’s getting worse. My whole body aches with each bolt of pain.

  I finally reach the fan room. A few desiccated spiders are the only inhabitants. They probably won’t mind sharing for a bit. Pale light, filtering from the openings in the roof high above, lights up the small room. The ceiling of the room is a cage. It encloses a pair of slow moving fans. Each is a full six feet across. They used to scare me. Sharp sword blades aching to sweep down and slice off a finger or two. Maybe a leg. But they never reach out of their cage. I never reach in. Boundaries accepted, no problems.

  Silly thoughts. I must be getting light headed. I lay down before the room’s spinning forces me to. The pain is getting worse. Everything has a blurred and misty quality. I pull the crimson shirt off to one side and look at the burning mound that used to be my shoulder. Deep red and purple are already leaching out under the skin. It already dwarfs my other shoulder. Lucky the scrubs I found are a little loose on me. Great. Now I look like a real freak. Quasimodo. Just need a couple of snarky gargoyles right?

  As carefully as I can, I explore the damage. It’s a lot like the pain from pulling a loose tooth only it doesn’t fade completely. The ache of wrongness is suddenly broken by the sharp hot flash of jagged lightning that tears through my brain and to wipe out anything I might have been thinking. It is pretty bad. Maybe broken.

  Better go see Maggy. She used to be a nurse. Before she got locked in with us and Observed. She might know what to do or at least what’s wrong. She is down on the second floor. Near the cafeteria. Pretty far, but I’ll make it.

  I suck in a breath and let it hiss out while I push up from the floor with my good arm. Maggy is two floors down, sever
al long hallways, and an eternity away.

  Chapter 3

  Over the River and Through the Woods

  It’s a lot harder to crawl through the ducts this way. It takes forever. But it’s still much safer than the open halls. Going between floors is the worst. The shaft is vertical and sliding down is agony. I can’t help but use my shoulder to brace and lightning burns through me the whole way down. The second floor is my goal. I’ll make it.

  More pain.

  …You let it get away.

  Now they are going to tell.

  …and they all will know how weak you are…

  It’s going to see that woman, the one who used to be a nurse.

  …it’s hurt. …mustn’t let it get away.

  The next floor has a sloped duct that follows the stairs down. Should be easier than the straight drop I just took. Just have to get there. It’s not too much father, maybe a hundred yards.

  Halfway there, I pause near the grate that’s the entrance to my room. Just want to lie down for a minute. I shake my head, I know it’s a mistake. I fight the urge and continue deeper into the endless ducts. Getting closer. There’s the slide just ahead. It slopes down a little steeper than I remember, but at least not straight down.

  I hit the bottom hard enough to dent the duct. It was too steep a slope and there was no way to slow down. Lots of dust and webs piled up but not enough to cushion the blow. More bruises and stars.

  Okay, enough vents.

  The grate pops out easily and is blessedly close to the floor. Stepping down is easy. The azure tile under my feet is cool and solid after the flexing metal of the vents. My muscles relax and unknot as I stand up and stretch. The hallway was empty and quiet.

  I reach the cafeteria and no one is there. Weird. Must be later than I thought. Most of the inmates show up around mealtime for the automated delivery. Blue cartons of Nutri-Yum bars wrapped in plastic. Mmmm… Chewy sawdust, gooey sweetness, with a lingering medicine cabinet bouquet. Actually makes me miss the cafeteria food.