"Drywall and Wiring"

"I need to step out for a second, it'll only be a minute."

The lab coordinator, my boss, had merely given a cheery "Okay" and left me to my business, peering through her glasses at the glass pipette she was using to draw up the ammonium hydroxide for her test. The fume hood hummed softly and the flask sonicator buzzed like a cicada as I left the laboratory, walking through the rows of delicate instrumentation. An aged Gas Chromatograph whirred as it ran its samples; the steady heartbeat of the HPLC machine pulsed as pressurized liquid ran through its tubing. That is the thing about a laboratory - nobody realizes how noisy it really is, how even voices are contained and echo inside the cream-colored walls.

This is what I heard every day at work, what I came to every morning and what served as a soundtrack for the samples of milk I tested. It was present even as I wandered into the hallway leading to the front office. It wasn't a big laboratory building by any means, with a single building and just three departments - microbiology, chemistry, and the specialized milk chemistry laboratory, all consisting of maybe two rooms each and all connected directly to each other via hallway. And in this hallway was the lunchroom, to the right, and two bathrooms, to the left. This was my destination.

I knocked on the door of the first bathroom, then, finding it occupied, proceeded to the second. The door shut and locked behind me with a soft click, and I went about my business.

I was about midway through washing my hands when I looked up at the other door, a holdover from when the lab was merged from two adjacent buildings into one. The door was aged somewhat, its wooden door frame well-worn and its silver-tinged hinges beginning to rust, but otherwise a fairly average door, with a small metal grating at the bottom for ventilation and a smooth, silver, orb-like handle. I had never opened it, assuming it was glued shut or something, and never asked about it, since I figured it likely probably just contained drywall and wiring anyway. But as a scientist, (and as someone with a curious mind in general), I wasn't satisfied with assumptions. Even if I knew there was probably nothing but a closet behind it, I wanted to see for myself. So, drying my hands with paper towel and shutting off the sink, I walked over to the door.

My first surprise was that the knob actually turned at all. I'd been sure it was totally unable to move, and yet it swung open just fine.

My second surprise was that the hallway I'd just entered from was behind it.

Confusion marred my brow as I peered into the hallway. Wasn't this where I just came from? Was there more to the building I didn't know about, and the hallway simply appeared to mirror the other one? There was more space to the front of the building, after all, space I'd never been inside let alone seen. Maybe this lead to additional storage, although I thought it was a pretty weird place to put a door leading to it. Why had I never been asked to obtain supplies from this area of the building before? To be honest, it was strange, and more than a bit unnerving...

I threw my reservations aside and wandered into the hallway, the door closing behind me with a soft click. I was instantly bewildered to notice the door to the lunchroom in front of me, still closed, still with a box of doughnuts setting on the table visible through the window. As I looked down the hallway to my right, I saw the chemistry lab, and to my left, the front office. Nothing hummed, nothing whirred, and nothing buzzed.

I blinked in confusion and looked again. Wasn't this where I had just come from? But it couldn't be, the hallway to the labs was through the other door in the bathroom! Was this an additional, adjacent laboratory to my own? If so, where was everyone?

"Rick?" I asked, calling for my coworkers as I wandered down the cream-colored hallway towards the milk lab. "Alicia? Rob? Anyone?" I gained no response, and felt chills creep down my spine. Where was everyone? For that matter, why couldn't I hear talking, or instrumentation working, or even the simple hum of the fluorescent bulbs above my head? It was completely quiet, unnervingly so. The kind of quiet that made one feel very alone, and very watched, all at once.

I entered the chemistry lab and immediately felt as if I'd stepped into a foreign world. The room wasn't oriented the same way - the boss' office, normally off to the right, was now off to the left, and the door to the milk lab now resided to my right. It was like the room had been totally flipped. Even the benches where the HPLC, Gas Chromatograph, and Karl Fisher Titrators rested was flipped, mirror-image style. It was like walking into a reflection. And nothing was making any noise, at all, despite everything being plugged in. This concerned me, because if the instruments weren't running it could mean they'd been turned off, or it could mean a power failure - and both could mean invalidated test results. I quickly checked the bench of instruments, but all were running properly - the HPLC pumped its liquid medium, the titrators mixed their fluids, and the Gas Chromatograph silently injected itself with samples as its green prep light blinked. But no sound came from any of them, nothing but pure, utter silence.

Creeped out, I walked around the bench, back the way I came, but as I did, I took one look at the outlets behind it and stopped.

Nothing was plugged in. Not only that, there weren't any cords running from any of the instruments at all.

The Gas Chromatograph's green prep light continued to blink.

I nervously proceeded to the milk lab, finding once again that the room had been mirrored from the one I knew - the fume hoods now were off to the right, and the counter with the sonicator was to the left. Despite everything being on, nothing made sound, and nobody was there. My forgotten flasks rested in the fume hood as before, but otherwise it was as if the entire lab had been abandoned. Maybe everyone was in the back?

I walked through the silent laboratory and towards the back doorway, which I knew lead to the room with our scales and NMR instrument. But as I reached the door, I saw that everything inside was black, as if the lights had been turned off. That was odd, why was it pitch black in broad daylight? There was a window in that room, surely it would have been lit up by the sunlight since it was already noon. I tried to open the door, but to no avail - the door was completely stuck. Confused, I turned around - and nearly jumped out of my skin. My flasks were sitting on the countertop, still corked as if waiting for me to shake them. But that was impossible, I'd left them in the fume hood and nobody was supposed to touch anyone else's tests while they were running! Besides that, there was nobody in here... so who had moved them?

Unnerved, I decided it was probably best to find my boss and try to figure out what was going on. This was certainly not normal, and it was creeping me out. I left the milk lab, the door shutting noiselessly behind me, and walked down the hallway towards the front office.

Only, there was no front office. In fact, there wasn't a microbiology lab, front office, or even a second bathroom. There was only a dead end, a single cream-colored wall barring off that area - along with the only door out of the building.

I broke into a cold sweat. Was this some sort of weird nightmare? I was sure I'd driven here this morning... but was I positive I was really awake? I pinched myself to be sure, and jolted back. No, this was real... and as I ran my hand along the smooth, cream-colored wall, I realized that this couldn't be a dream...

I ran towards my boss' office in the back of the chemistry lab, and furiously began pounding on the closed door. "Tracey!" I cried, bewildered and hoping for some answer from my boss. "Tracey, it's me, Jennifer, are you there?" No answer. I tried to open the door, but it was locked. I pressed my ear to the door to listen for any sign of life, but the sound I heard... the noise... it... It sounded like tinfoil being crushed and glass being broken. It sounded like destruction. And it was getting louder by the second.

I looked up again in horror and backed away from the cream-colored wall. No office. No front door. Nobody, nowhere to go... I was trapped. I didn't know by what, and I didn't know why, but this was clearly not my workplace and I had to get out of here, immediately.

I ran towards the bathroom as if possessed, flinging the door open and shutting it behind me. The crunching noise followed me, I could hear it outside of where the lunchroom door used to be, I could hear it behind me, all around me...

I slammed the door noiselessly shut behind me and ran towards the other door. I have to get out. This is a nightmare, this isn't real, I have to get out!

My hand grabbed the smooth, silver doorknob and turned, the door flinging open.

There was nothing behind it. No hallway, nowhere to turn. Only drywall, interspersed with old wiring.

I laughed coldly.

The crunching behind me started to sound like grinding, like chewing. I backed against the white wall where the other door had once been, unable to stop the tears flowing down my face as I sunk onto the floor. The walls began to crackle and the mirror over the sink shattered. The door began to slowly rot.

And all I could see in front of me, as the room began to implode around me, was a doorway that lead to nothing. Nothing but drywall and wiring.

"Witch Hunt at Swanton Creek"

It all started, the town whispered behind his back, when the sickness took his sons away. Left his wife crippled, turned him into a shell of a man. First he found the bottle, then the draft found him.

Most men left for the War in one piece and came back broken. Arnold Corbin left a broken man and came back as something more. With his bible in one hand and a Purple Heart medal in the other, Reverend Arnie took to the park and began preaching his sermon to anyone and everyone who would listen. After a couple of years, he found a tiny little church in need of a minister. Every Sunday he preached to his flock in a thunderous voice that shook the rafters. His daughter played the organ for hymns that were at first quiet but soon challenged Reverend Arnie in volume.

Soon after Reverend Arnie came back from the war, there was something the townsfolk only referred to as “the incident.” Lily Corbin went out dancing with Billy Weston one night. For a time after, she was terribly pale and withdrawn. Most folks attributed it to the fact that Billy Weston disappeared the next day; skipped off with his last paycheck and her heart to boot.

Lily went “to visit family” which didn’t fool much of anybody, especially when she came back with a red-faced child and dressed in widow-black. The kindly people of Swanton Creek let the Corbins keep their little secret. There was no real harm to it.

In fact, by the time they found Billy Weston’s body, most people didn’t even remember his name. Much less the dubious parentage of one wee bright-faced tot.

(Lily remembered, though. She remembered the screams, the tears, the yelling. The sharp stings, the tearing, the scraping. She couldn’t close her eyes without remembering.)

The town grew in size, and oddly enough, the population of birds boomed as well. They all seemed to be attracted to the newly-erected telephone wires. The popular theory was that the birds were listening to the town’s newest media for gossip. It was one of those superstitions that happens too often to be discounted. As soon as some secret was whispered across the wires, it would spread like wildfire through the town. Far too often, Reverend Arnie would gently pull the person into his church for a confidential talk.

While the town’s sudden boom in growth wasn’t directly attributed to Reverend Arnie, the town whispered. He’s a good luck charm. We need a man like him around to keep us honest. The holy man became something the sleepy town of Swanton Creek could be proud of.

Pride can be a crutch. The town depended on Reverend Arnie to keep them honest, but who kept watch over Reverend Arnie? It was a question most people didn’t think to ask. Slowly, the church confessionals became more common. People were being taken to task for the mildest of sins.

Sins they hadn’t even committed yet. Sins they’d only talked about. Then, sins they’d only thought about.

“How does Reverend Arnie know?” The townspeople asked Lily, who would shoot a nervous glance at the sky, then smile and shrug.

“I don’t know,” she said. Over and over again. Until that wasn’t enough of an answer. The people grew aggressive. Started shoving at her, demanding an answer that she couldn’t give. Until the final, horrible culmination that left her broken and bleeding in the streets.

Wee William Corbin saw the whole thing, perched behind a trash can. The crowd dispersed, faces hidden by the cover of a moonless sky. A murder of crows took to the air as they passed, though they left one single body behind.

William met the cold black eyes and knew in the most primeval part of his mind that his grandfather already knew about the terrible deed and would see to it that everyone paid dearly for their crimes.

The next day, Reverend Arnie stepped down from his podium and bid his congregation to follow him to the corner where he had first begun to preach.

“Come forth,” he shouted from the pulpit of the streets. “Come forth, my people.” They gathered around, people and birds alike, until nearly the whole town stood before him. “Know that there is evil among you. A serious injustice has been committed. I ask you now to answer for your crime!”

There was a moment’s pause, then the grocer pointed at the milkman. “He’s been charging you extra and pocketing the profit!” Angry mutters rumbled from the crowd while the birds fluttered and shifted.

“She’s been taking kisses from the boys under the stairwell!”

“He puts his thumb on the scale!”

“She favors my sister more than she does me!”

The yelling grew louder until there was no individual complaint, merely a sea of fear and anger. Just like they did with Lily Corbin, shouts grew to shoves which turned to blows. Blood ran thick through the streets, and above it all stood Reverend Arnie and his flock.

"A Better Place"

I saw an angel today.

It was a beautiful sight; a heavenly host garbed in a robe of shimmering white, his face shining with bright light.

He did not speak, only reached towards me, holding out a perfect hand to me. From that moment, I have served Him.

I do not see Him all the time; rather I see His work in all things, the huge beautiful works of architecture and the little things, like the pattern on the membrane of a butterfly’s wing.

Recently, I have begun attending church more frequently. I know there is a God now, and I would pray to him.

My friends do not seem to see the light. They think that I may be going a little too far in my worship, but that’s rubbish. Nothing is too much when you praise the Lord.

I can see Him again, as I walk through the street. He’s there, in front of me. I smile as I walk by, the only one who can see Him, the only one who’s seen the light.

As I pass, He nods and gestures to the road. I do not falter; my time has come, and I am ready.

Placing my bags on the pavement, I stretch. I won’t need them where I am going.

He smiles at me and nods one last time.

I run.

Not from Him, but into His loving arms.

Into the road.

I gasp as the car knocks the wind from me, as my bones crack and crunch, as my head strikes the floor, but I am smiling, for I know I am going to a better place.

The world goes fuzzy, and I see it all fading to white.

It is calm here. I hear nothing, but I am not afraid. I know my Lord will appear and lead me to Heaven.

I clutch the cross around my neck. Soon I will be there.

I can see Him, in front of me. He is indistinct, blurry, but I know it is Him. I can feel it. He stands over me.

I can feel my soul lifting free of my body, rising, ascending!

Yet what is this pain I feel? Anguish, ripping and tearing through my body.

The figure is clearer now, and I cry out with horror. What was soft white cloth before has now become an ugly grey lizard skin. His charming smile is toothier than I remember. His eyes, before shining with a holy light, now burn with unholy darkness.

As He tears my soul from its body and devours it, I close my hand on the cross around my neck and wonder if there truly is a God.

"The Bringer of Life"

Long have I fought against Death.

It is part of me; I could do nothing else. Not after she left us. I was just a child when my mother fell ill; she had just divorced my father when the infection pierced her like an arrow out of nowhere.

My earliest memory is of her funeral: strange people in black, emotions contorting their faces like masks; shortly after, her remains were cremated. I never really knew her, but even then, nothing more than a toddler, I was changed by the indescribable pain inside me.

I was sent to live with an old acquaintance of hers. I never saw my father again. But the old man loved me as his own, and paid for the best possible education. As I grew older, he was more than a surrogate father—he was my mentor.

Despite all he did for me, I missed the woman I barely remembered.

Distraught at the all-too-soon decease of my mother, I decided to do what I could to help others, and to spare them my incessant grief. My life was devoted to the healing and beneficence of all men. With my mentor’s encouragement, I excelled in my learning. All fields of medicine were mine to explore, and I learned as much as humanly possible, until graduating.

After some years of working as a heart surgeon, I chose to offer my talents to everyone, everywhere, for free. I went on the road, healing anyone who asked. They called me a miracle worker.

Things went well as I cured just about everyone I came across. Until one day in a small rural town, where technology was at least a decade behind, I found something I could not handle.

A young man was presented to me, with strange marks all over his body. He was underweight and uncontrollably vomiting.

His father suggested it was bad food poisoning, but that couldn’t be right—this had been going on for weeks. I tried other ideas, such as various poisons or infections, but ultimately could find no sure cause of the illness.

The young man died.

The mayor appeared that evening on television, decrying my presence there. “We were told not to interfere with His discipline,” he said. “He told us everything would be alright once Henry learned his lesson. That if we interfered, there would be further punishment, for all of us. And what did you do? You brought an outsider to interfere! Look at what you’ve done.”

During the following days, dozens of the townspeople fell ill, with all different kinds of infections, cysts, boils, tumors. I was powerless.

But one night I had a dream. A distant silhouetted figure beckoned me toward a well. In it was healing water.

In the morning, I found it not far from the motel where I was staying. It was old and abandoned, but there was still water.

Despite what the mayor had said, some of the sick still came to me, pleading for me to help. I gave them the water in desperation, and every single person who came to me was quickly rid of their disease, regardless of what it was.

Soon a crowd had gathered around, amazed. The mayor was not happy.

“What have you done!?” he cried in horror. “He will surely kill us all now!”

A knife suddenly gleamed in his hand, and he rushed toward me.

We struggled, pushing back and forth, me trying to gain control of the blade.

“Help me,” I grunted to townspeople. “Please.”

They stood in place, uncaring. Some visibly shook their heads from side to side. Others seemed enthralled at the spectacle, as though the life or death situation was all in good fun.

At last the mayor, being a large man, overpowered me. He stabbed me countless times, blood flowing onto the grass, leaking into the well where the healing water was.

I died.

A white-faced man appeared before me, His nose tapering to a point like a beak. The rest of Him was shrouded in darkness. It was just He and I in the void around us.

“Get up,” He said. His face did not move with the words.

“Why? What’s going on?”

“Get up. We have work to do. Now you see the truth.”

He handed me a bird mask.

I awoke, breathing desperately. The mask was in my hand.

I looked at the blank faces of those around me. Those I had healed, and those who loved them.

They cared not for me.

Standing shakily, I slid the mask onto my face. I was a new person.

I knew now that I had wasted my life, but He was here to guide me.

Long have I fought against Death.

No more.

Having tasted of mortality, and of the ungratefulness of man, I choose the will of the Bringer of Death. For none deserve anything less.

"Endless Loop"

Despite what his closest friends and family thought of him, Henry Clayborne was not the CIA Operative he had lead them to believe he was. In reality he was spy that would sell his nations secrets to the highest bidder. While he had managed to avoid suspicion for quite some time, he made the mistake of creating a routine for himself.

At the end of every month he would arrive at the same restaurant, where he would sell the information he had acquired to his latest client. After about six months or so of doing this, Henry was caught. It didn't take long for the jury to realize he was guilty of treason and to sentence him to death.

On the night of his execution he didn't say a word as he prepared for his demise. The last thing he saw was a brief glimpse of static and a guard that watching over his execution, smiling as three bolts of electricity shot into Henry...

Completely shocked that he somehow still alive, Henry found himself no longer sitting in the electrical chair but hanging onto the ledge of a cliff. In the brief instance he looked down Henry saw sharp, jagged rocks below him. If he let go he was certainly going to die. Miraculously someone managed to see him in peril and desperately tried to help him.

Eventually Henry managed to grab the man's hand and was about to be pulled to safety. However as the man tried helping him Henry noticed something wrong. The man had the exact same face as the security guard. Out of shock Henry let go of the man's hand and was instantly killed on impact...

Or at least he should have been because he found himself alive yet again, this time in the middle of the road where he was about to be hit by a drunk driver. As the car collided with him saw yet another flash of static and right before his eyesight failed him, he saw a crowd watch as he was run over with another man that looked exactly like the security guard calling 911.

For what seemed like years the cycle would repeat itself non-stop. He would wake up perfectly unharmed and then die with a flicker of static being the last thing he say.

On Monday, he was killed during a shootout between the police and some biker gang.

On Tuesday, he was slowly mauled to death by a lion that escaped the zoo.

On Wednesday, he was killed in a bombing in Iraq.

And so on and so forth.

Until one day right before he was about to be hit by a train he saw yet another man that looked like the security guard in the distant, waving at him. At first Henry didn't see anything different about the "man" that had followed him throughout his many deaths. But then he started noticing his horrifying appearance.

His arms were too long, almost as if they were stretched out through some sort of medieval torture device, his tongue was at the very least six feet long, and his teeth looked like they belonged in the mouth of a great white shark. But the worst part was its eyes; there was only an endless wave of static where its' pupils should have been.

At that exact moment Henry realized that his endless torture had been brought on by this creature. But why him? Was it because he had angered the creature somehow? Was the creature punishing him for his sins? Then a terrifying thought went into Henry's mind:

What if there is no reason? Perhaps the creature merely likes playing with it's food.

Henry contemplated on this idea for about three seconds before his entire body was torn apart by the train.

"Underbelly"

In the dark underbelly of humanity, a demon sits. The skin of a pale, fish-white belly is stretched thin from its relentless appetite.

It feeds on our sickness, our hunger, our hate. It feeds until the stomach splits open and pallid children wiggle out in a flood of red.

The children spread. They feed. They sate themselves on a diet of pain and misery. Like animals, they eat far past what their flesh can stand. Until they, too, split and release a flood of pale, squirming children.

They die and multiply from over-consuming our senseless violence. Not one knows the pain of an empty belly.

"Nobody Helps Me"

Stop! No! You're all making a damn terrible mistake! Don't you feel them?! Jumping! Jumping!

Ping!

Ping!

Ping!

And they scream in my ears and burrow under my skin and into my eyes! You can see the tunnels on my arms, can't you?! They're as plain as day!

You can't see them!? You goddamn. FUCKING BASTARD! No-no don't go don't go. You don't understand. So many times I've been told not to worry. I have cause to fucking worry! Daniel- fucking Danny- that shit-stealing brat of mine was the one who caused this! Fucking cocksucker brought birdseed into MY house like a dipshit!

They came so fast. So fast and so quick. I can see them if I close my eyes.

The dog had to go- it was the only necessary course of action! I had to kill him! And of COURSE I had to gut the mutt like a hog- I needed the evidence- the bugs buggies bugs gbugs.

My wife divorced me soon after. She tried taking my Danny away from me. I had to kill HER, too. Not just for me or for Danny but for the whole world- she was damn full of those buggies! And she never helpedSHE NEVER FUCKING GAVE A SHIT! I know she tried, but she was too occupied with her job and her needs and RICKY. RICKY that little manwhorefucker she was still interested in him if I was RICKY she'd go to the ends of the fucking Earth for RICKY but I'm not RICKY SO I'M FUCKING SORRY I COULDN'T BE YOUR PRECIOUS RICKY FOR YOU SARAH... she CLAIMED she never spoke to him after the proposal but I knew. Oh I KNEW. So I shot Ricky, too.

So I tried using herbal remedies- sebben dust, Cat's Claw, Bentonyte Clay and MSM, but nothing worked. So I went to the doctor fucking pharmaceutical lapdog whore and asked for help but the doctor was a dirty big bucks Pharisee whore so I killed him. And then I tried killing myself but I realized how to make the bugs stop. Forever.

I tied Danny to a chair and doused him and myself in kerosene and lit a match. I was glad the house was burning and Danny that little shithead was up in smoke for what he did to me but the cops grabbed me before I went up and they-

oh. Sorr, but that's all the scoop you're gonna get. Maybe now they'll know why and what I was feeling. Hey, is my poison needle ready, Governor? The bugs probably chewed my veins up so be careful stickin it ha ha ha ha

oh

oh God.