Conrad awoke from his slumber with a jolt. He sat upright, reaching toward the ceiling and crying out for help, before realizing where he was. The television showed nothing but static, the hum of no signal. He looked around slowly, catching his breath. He ran to the bathroom and looked in the mirror, his shoes feeling slightly damp. He washed his face, then threw up some bloody water and hoped he wasn’t injured on the inside. I should go to the hospital, he thought. Was that all real, or was it a dream? He heard the front door click like last time he was allowed out; the sound of running water hitting the wooden floor could be heard upstairs. Conrad headed out the door to the hospital.

When he stepped outside, it was like before, with extreme fog clouding the area. Thankfully, he lived close to a large hospital just a few blocks away by the old town square, which used to be the city’s insane asylum that was converted into a regular hospital. Supposedly, the insane asylum was deserted because of the mysterious deaths of patients. The mistreatment of the mentally ill patients was well documented, with castrations and frontal lobotomies being performed without anyone else’s knowledge. He felt horrible, like he needed to puke again, but resisted the urge as he continued through the foggy streets. Where was everyone? he thought. The places were all deserted. The shop windows were dark.

He approached the front of the hospital, finally. Its large red cross sign lit up the fog to give the area in front of the door a red glow; the sun was dim and barely penetrated the fog. He pushed the large doors open and continued inside. The reception area was lit up dimly with a single desk lamp, and behind it led into a hallway that had lights on. He shouted for help and pressed the bell on the desk, but no one came. Just the hum of the air flow system and fluorescent lights could be heard. Maybe someone is in the back, he thought.

He walked through the lit-up hallway leading to a nurse’s station. The farther he went, the messier it was with stretchers and papers strewn about the floor. Even the lights had become dimmer with each passing door. When he got to the end of the hall, there was an open door to a patient’s room. The end of the hall was very dark, but the light from the open door in the room showed through into the hall. He looked inside the room and saw a journal on the bed. He went to read it. There were no dates or times written in the journal, just entries in pencil. Many pages were ripped out, scribbled over, or missing.

“The doctor and her nurse cronies decided to switch me from pills to injectables, though they were scared of what had been going on. Patients had been disappearing, along with people throughout the city, vanishing without a trace. Anyway, I’m gonna survive this involuntary psych ward visit; they still allow me pencils and my journal. They don’t know the reason people are going missing is that…” The rest of the page was scribbled over. He flipped to the next legible page.

“Sat around playing cards today with a fellow patient. It was nice until a nurse screamed bloody murder and was thrown into a wall by something invisible. Maybe she tripped? Not sure, but we were told to return to our rooms.” The rest of the page was ripped off. He flipped to the next page he could read.

“At night, I see monsters in the dim lights lurking around; it’s like they’re in a different dimension. The doctor told me to ignore them and try to relax to get better so I can be discharged soon. It’s off-putting what I see at night, lurching in the halls. Anyway…”

Conrad felt uneasy as something banged against the stretcher outside. The darkness in the hallway was illuminated by a dim white light now. He looked into the hallway and froze. It was a flesh-colored entity shaped like a human, though it had no arms. It screeched and lunged forward towards Conrad. The lights in the hallway suddenly turned red, revealing red handprints on the walls, with murals of horrific images. A malfunctioning voice clip of a nurse came on the intercom and said “Code Red” repeatedly; sometimes a patronizing laugh would play along with the sound of anguished screams.

“Oh fuck, oh fuck!” Conrad dodged to the side as the armless monster banged its head into the wall behind him, leaving a large imprint of blood on the wall. He was disoriented by the blaring, malfunctioning voice clip playing and the red lights occasionally strobing that made the area a surreal horror vision. He heard the monster running behind him as Conrad tried to run away. Before he could do anything, he felt pain in his shoulder. The damn monster was biting into my shoulder! he thought. He let out a yell of pain before reaching back and pushing it off with his other hand. The monster dropped onto the floor and made a gurgling sound. He stopped and looked around until he saw a weapon, a large metal pipe that was ripped off the wall plumbing box.

“Code Red AHAHAHA!” the voice on the intercom was now deep and raspy.

Conrad turned around with the metal pipe in hand. He aimed it like a baseball bat and waited for the monster to get up. When the monster did get up, it lunged forward, and Conrad took a swing at its head. The monster merely shuddered from the hit. He aimed again, his shoulder wound was throbbing in pain. He took one more swing at it and made full contact. The monster crumpled to the ground and let out a blood-curdling death rattle. Conrad ran out the front door. The malfunctioning voice clip of the nurse had seemed to turn more surreal-sounding; it disturbed him as he walked back to the apartment with the metal pipe.

Guess I won’t find any help there… He was pensive and held his wounded shoulder. The walk back through the dense fog was strange; something seemed to be whispering just out of his hearing. The sun had set while he was in the hospital; time had very little consistency in this place, weirdly. The streetlamps were on and created an atmosphere of calmness since the dense fog seemed to dissipate near their light. The hum from the streetlamps and the city’s electrical wires calmed him down and helped him forget the sounds in the hospital, though they haunted him.

When he got to his apartment, he washed the blood from his hands and then his shoulder wound. He bandaged the wound and headed off to lie on his bed. Slowly, he drifted off to sleep while wondering, What the hell is going on in this city?