Play@YSDC

"No chemical known to man makes monsters magically appear on the tv. If you inhale it sure, but no chemical spreads by tv cable, now does it?" Jason replies as if he was coldly reporting this weekends cricket scores "That, or I'm crazier than a coconut..."

"As for the chains, you did that. Same with the polyfillthing." he says as he studies the polyfill on the main door "To protect us. From that crazy batshit fog. You were in zombie-mode somehow."

"And the other kids? Drugged, I guess. So much the better, right?" he says as he turns to face Jill.

"I, well, I ..." Jill slowly lowers herself to sit on the edge of the nearest bed, careful to not disturb the sleeping child. "Hold on, everything is a little confused."

"Take your time, it's not as if we're going anywhere." Jason says as he sits down with his back against the wall. He pulls his sketchpad out of his backpack and starts to draw. Somehow his subconcious mind keeps pushing him to draw what he saw on the television screen. Slowly he gives in. Afterall, aren't kids in psychiatry usually encouraged to draw what troubles them?

Jason sings a little as he sketches, humming over some parts of the song and sometimes using his pencil as a drumstick.

"A groan of tedium escapes me, startling the fearful.
Is this a test? It has to be. Otherwise I can’t go on.
Draining patience. Drain vitality.

But I’m still right here, giving blood and keeping faith. and I’m still right
Here.

If there were no desire to heal
The damaged and broken met along this tedious path I’ve chosen here,
I certainly would’ve walked away by now.

I must keep reminding myself of this...

If there were no rewards to reap,
No loving embrace to see me through this tedious path I’ve chosen here,
I certainly would’ve walked away by now.
And I still may..."

(Tool - The Patient, 2:00 & on)

The room grows somewhat darker as the electric lighting has to take up the burden of keeping the room well-lit. The curtains no longer glow with sunlight. There is the sound of people rushing about outside, voices being raised and lowered. The handle on the Children's Ward double doors dips, then rattles, as someone from outside tries to open it. Then there is the sound of beating hands and fists.

"Alice! Alice!" a strained male voice cries.

"And so it begins." Jason says theatrically, probably to coat his own fear.

He then turns his attention back to his sketchbook, where slowly a toad-like head takes shape. It seems less threathening now than before, with it's eyes averted.

Jill jumps when the man starts banging on the door and rushes over. "Don't worry! They're safe in here. You should ... you should go take care of yourself. I'll watch over these kids." She wipes tears from her face. "Jason? Do you have a phone with you? Could I borrow it to call my husband?"

Jason digs up his cellphone from his backpack.

"I already tried to call the police, didn't work. But you're welcome to try." Jason says as he slides the cellphone over to Jill.

Horns bleat outside. Someone on the inside of the hospital screams, followed by another, and yet another. A chorus of screams wail, tearing at the air. Footsteps can be heard running past the ward. The man continues to bang on the doors. "Alice! Alice!"

"They're safe inhere, for now. Look after yourself. We're taking care of the kids." Jason says through the door as he puts his sketchbook into his backpack "Maybe the toilets at the end of the hall are a good place to hide."

He then walks to the beds and starts looking for patients with a chart marked 'Alice'.

The man screams, his screaming hitting a fever pitch, drowning out all thought, followed by a terrible crunching sound and the wet smack of something hitting linoleum. Both manage to keep calm under the onslaught of screaming that echoes down the halls outside. A terrible buzzing can be heard.

Alice is a four-year-old girl with her leg in a cast. Her brown hair lays smoothed across her pillow, her little brow furrows in her sleep.

Desperately Jill punches in her husband's phone number. As the sounds in the hallway reach a nightmarish level her knuckles turn white and she has to conciously keep herself from smashing Jason's phone.

A crackle of static erupts as the person on the other end picks up. "Hello dear," says her husband's voice, flat and emotionless. She can hardly hear him over the buzz of static. "When are you coming home?"

Jason walks on, checking the other patients' charts for anything interesting. Maybe a strange condition or two, but looking for contagious stuff in particular.

Jill is thrown by the normality of the question, especially in contrast to the nightmare she can hear in the hallways. "I'm with the children at the hospital. Honey ... are you all right?"

"Yes dear. When will you be coming home? I miss you."

"Just as soon as I can, dear. But, haven't you noticed what's going on outside? The dark cloud? The chemical accident?" Jill moves toward the balcony windows, checking to make sure that this wasn't some strange dream afterall.

It's so dark outside, it could almost be night. The fluorescent lights in the Children's Ward flickers, casting garish shadows across the walls.

"I'm outside, dear. Open the door. Open the door and let me in."

Jason finds that the ward contains three asthmatics, one childhood leukemia, a kid in a leg cast, one sickle cell disease, one duchenne muscular dystrophy. There are more charts to look at, but this is as far as he has gotten. He also finds the message Jill had read earlier.

----

The loopy handwriting on one of the charts seems nonsensical, a list of odd lettering and numbers. However, in the familiarly tight, condensed script of a doctor's handwriting, he can see written at the very bottom:

I stole your consciousness away with drugs but only to keep you safe, without fear, as what can't be stopped comes into this world.
Don't wake up.
Doctor Bernard Scott.

Jill turns and takes a few shaky steps toward the door. "You are? You can't be! I ... the doors are chained shut. And sealed. To protect the children. Don't make me open them." A silent tear slides down her cheek.

Jason picks up on Jill's side of the conversation and turns to her.

"Whatever was out there got creamed, you heard it yourself." he warns "If he is really out there, tell him to lock himself in the toilets down the hall, it's the best he can do."

He then went back to reading the patients charts.