27 Apr The Room

Posted at 11:00h in Strange and Unexplained by CreepypastaStories.com 1 Comment

📅 Published on April 27, 2020

“The Room”

Written by Kevin David Anderson
Edited by Craig Groshek
Thumbnail Art by David Romero
Narrated by Otis Jiry

Copyright Statement: Unless explicitly stated, all stories published on CreepypastaStories.com are the property of (and under copyright to) their respective authors, and may not be narrated or performed, adapted to film, television or audio mediums, republished in a print or electronic book, reposted on any other website, blog, or online platform, or otherwise monetized without the express written consent of its author(s).

🎧 Available Audio Adaptations: Scary Stories Told in the Dark – Podcast (Standard Edition) | 🔑 Podcast (Extended Edition) (feat. Otis Jiry)

⏰ ESTIMATED READING TIME — 6 minutes

Rating: 9.27/10. From 11 votes.

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A man awoke to find himself laying on the floor. Dazed and confused he was somewhat relieved to see that he was not alone. At least a dozen more people were waking up as well; women, men a few children, including a little girl perhaps seven. She must have woken before everyone else because she was already standing.

The man got to his feet and helped others to theirs.

“Thank you, sir,” an elderly woman said with a toothless smile.

While holding her hand, the natural instinct to introduce one’s self, rose in him, but as he opened his mouth to speak, he realized he did not know who he was.

Listening to the chatter around him it became clear that no one knew their own name. That by itself was unnerving, but what sent a chill up the man’s spine was realizing that they were all in a square room, pale white walls not much bigger than an office lobby or waiting room. And the room seemed to have no windows, and no doors.

Confusion moved like an infection from face to face as the realization that they were all sealed in and spread around the room. Some started looking for a way out, exploring the walls and the corners, the youngsters began to cry, and a few others tried to take charge, giving orders. One looked to be a priest. No one really listened.

Then suddenly, the room was plunged into darkness, pitch black, cold. There was a moment of deafening quiet. No one moved. The silence was shattered by a bone-chilling scream. The lights came one with a blinding suddenness. Looking around, the man noticed that the elderly woman he had helped up was gone. And in her place, blood pooled in thick circles.

Terror moved through the room, like an unencumbered wind. People began to shout and claw at the walls. A moment later, the lights went out again. A scream, deep, shrill, boomed in the darkness. The lights snapped back, bright and unforgiving. The man looked to his right where a young boy had stood moments ago. Now there was only blood.

Several people began to sob. People moved to the walls, looking for some kind of protection from the thing in the darkness. A moment later the light was gone. A high-pitched scream echoed in the blackness. When the lights returned a woman, who had been pressed up against the wall was gone. The blood on the floor showed a partial outline of where her bare foot had been.

The man did his best to control his fear. Difficult to do in a room filled with dread. But one other figure was as calm as he wanted to be. The little girl he had noticed earlier stood in the middle of the room, no panic, no fear, and she didn’t seem interested in finding a way out. She was different in another way as well. Her skin was olive-colored, Mediterranean if he had to guess. A stark contrast to everyone else in the room, who were all black. Everyone but him. He looked at his hands pale, sweat matting the blonde hair on his arms. When he looked back over at the girl, she greeted him with an unnerving smile.

She stepped close to a trembling boy not much older than her.

The lights went out.

The child screamed. When the lights returned, he was gone.

Shuddering, the man met the little girl’s gaze. Her smile persisted, joyful and unafraid.

She stepped toward a woman huddled in a corner. The lights vanished, and when they returned the corner was empty.

“It’s her,” a burly woman from the other side of the room shouted, an accusing finger thrust toward the little girl. “She is doing this. I saw her go to those that had disappeared right before they vanished.” The woman lunged at the girl. The girl did not move or attempt to defend herself. The woman grabbed her by the throat. “Why’re you doing this? Who are you?” The little girl smiled even as she choked.

The man grabbed the woman by the shoulder and wrenched her from the little girl. He pulled harder than he’d intended and the large woman tumbled to the floor. He felt horrible and reached out his hand hoping she would take it, but before she could, the lights were gone.

There was a bloodcurdling scream.

When he could see again, the man found himself holding out his hand to a puddle of blood. The woman was gone.

Besides him and the little girl, six others remained in the crimson spotted room; elderly, young, middle age. There was no age discrimination in this room. No immunity. One after the other the olive-skinned girl stepped toward them, the lights went out, there was a cry of pain, and then they were gone.

When only the man remained, he backed away from the little girl, pressing himself against the wall. The girl smiled and took a measured step his way.

“Please don’t,” he said.

She took another step.

“You don’t have to do this.”

She took a final step and stood at his feet. She smiled. Then the lights were gone.

He screamed.

The man sat up so fast he nearly fell from his cot. Sweat covered his brow, and he felt weak, dizzy, ready to pass out. As he slumped back down into the soiled sheets the memory of where he was and who he was flooded back.

“Dr. Folsom,” came a voice from his right. A woman wearing a surgical mask, and a CDC issued faded-blue safe suit, minus the headgear, and stepped over to his cot. She knelt down on one knee. Her mask, discolored by moisture, covered most of her face but he recognized here dark brown eyes and thick Liberian accent. Jernora was her name, a volunteer from Sierra Leone. “You’re still with us.”

He tried to speak, but his throat was unimaginable dry and felt as if he’d swallowed razors. He glanced around the tent, and at the other cots. There were twenty or more, each occupied with death, a sheet drawn over the bodies.

“We moved you to this quarantine tent four days ago. I’m sorry I did not come by. I was told everyone in here was dead.”

He remembered being moved here. He remembered thinking that it was a death sentence and judging by his current company he wasn’t wrong.

“How are you feeling?”

How was he feeling? Over the past few weeks, he had watched the epidemic move like wildfire from village to village. He watched helplessly as dying mothers held their dead children. Medical school had given him the knowledge of how Ebola killed but seeing it for himself told him just how in inadequate words in a textbook are. How do you describe how it feels when your organs liquefy? How am I feeling? He felt like going back in time and listening to his father when he begged him not to come to West Africa. “Let others risk their lives,” he had pleaded. He wished he’d stayed home and married Carrie, bought that overpriced house in Cardiff and raised a family. How was he feeling? He felt a lot of things, none of which mattered anymore.

He tried to move his hand to gesture to the room.

Jernora seemed to understand what he meant. “We haven’t moved the bodies, I know.” She shook her head, eyes full of water. “There was simply no one to do it. Everyone has been focused on the living. There’s no time for the dead.”

Folsom nodded or at least thought he did. He’d seen death move through a square tent like this. Inside its pale canvass walls, it touched each patient one after the other, systematically, as if there was an order to it. A schedule, even. Showing no prejudice or favoritism. The square tent was not unlike…And then he remembered. The deathbed hallucination. The room. The dying. The girl.

Jernora checked his vitals. Through her gloves, he could feel her shaking. Fatigue or exhaustion might have caused the trembling, but Folsom didn’t think that was it. He wanted to tell her it was okay. But something caught his attention in the back of the tent. Movement. Steady movement.

Jernora must have seen something in his face. “Dr. Folson, are you alright?” Her hands moved to his chest.

He summoned his strength, and with quivering hands, he tried to push her away. “Go,” he said.

“What is it?”

Folsom froze as a tiny figure moved in his direction. It walked past the dead with purpose. He tried again. Put the palm of his hands on Jernora’s shoulders and pushed. “Leave! Now.”

Jernora slowly got to her feet. “I let you rest. I check you later.”

He shook his head, locking his gaze on the girl with the olive skin. “Never return to this tent.”

She stood silently looking down, and Folson met her gaze seeing that look in her eye. The one that all the volunteers got when gazing down at someone’s final moments, the moment of complete irrational delusion. The delusion before dying. Folson had had that look a hundred times in the last few weeks, and each time he wondered what they must be going through, what images are conjured in those final moments.

“Go home, Jernora,” Folsom said. “Go home to those kids of yours and don’t look back.”

He watched as she turned and headed for the exit. When she left, she wiped her eyes, but she did as he had asked. She did not look back.

A wave of relief came over him, and he looked over at the little girl standing next to his cot. In this light, she looked a little different than she had in the room of the terrified and dying. Had the ebony wings protruding from her back always been there, he wondered.

The black feathers fluttered as she smiled. She stepped closer.

His mouth was dry and painful, but he managed to say, “I think I’m ready.”

She brought a hand over his chest, leaned down and said, “I know.”

Then the light was gone.