The White Hall

         A pair of eyes blinked open. Vision poured in and revealed a painfully white room. Upon looking down, loose white clothing was revealed with the absence of shoes or socks. The floor of the blinding room was, to the bare feet, warm and metallic. An arm, the left, raised slowly and felt itself move. The fingers grasped and played in the air as the eyes watched in unstable consciousness. Then they jolted straight forward; a man had appeared. He was sitting at an obsidian desk twenty-five yards away. He was dressed in all black; a suit jacket, dress shirt, vest, tie, leather gloves, slacks, and dress shoes. His arctic eyes stared a piercing cold stare back at the eyes staring at him. A fearful feeling of wonder came from behind the white clothing.

         "What are you doing here, Vincent?" spoke the dark-clothed man. In an instant, memories flooded the brain of this thing called "Vincent". A birth, a death, and life between were absent. What Vincent had experienced was not a life. It was a passing into and out of being. "Are you finished? Have you been sent to go back into sleep?"

         Sleep. The familiarity of the word had only just returned to him.

         "I... don't know..." The conversation was already too much for Vincent to handle. His mind was occupied with gathering sensations from the surrounding area. His mind was occupied trying to find itself.

         The man had appeared to recognize Vincent's predicament and smiled a warm inviting smile, a nice change from the previous icy gaze. "You will regain yourself if you sleep," he said, eyes warming up. His gloved hand extended to Vincent's right. Vincent looked to his right and saw that the room extended to an unknown end curtained in pitch black. His eyes drank in the sight of the floor, walls, and ceiling slowly fading into nothing and he felt dread, as though it echoed back at him from the deep darkness. His face screwed up in terror.

         "No. There's something down there. Something's waiting for me at the end of that hallway."

         "Now, Vincent, I thought we all were far beyond childish fears. There are no monsters in closets or under beds and light definitely does not frighten off the paranormal. If something was down there, it would've come and taken me long ago," the man chuckled back, reassuringly.

         "I can feel it. Something's going to happen to me."

         "All that's going to happen is you are going to feel sleep come upon you. You need to rest. You've had a long day, trust me." The man was still extending an open palm to the dark. His face was old and kind, even more so now, it seemed to Vincent. The old man seemed to read Vincent's frozen expression even further. "The dark makes us drowsy. We fall asleep once we get to the end of the hall. You are perfectly safe, perfectly. Please, do not worry. Just walk." His voice was encouraging and even a little shaky, perhaps with old age.

         Vincent looked back into the darkness and the darkness looked back at him. He himself was not sure why he feared the hallway so much. The old man had said some very rational things and he seemed to know a lot more than Vincent knew about the room. Nevertheless, fear gripped him from beyond the blackness. Something was not right. He could feel it in every fiber of his existence.

         Vincent turned to the kind old face smiling pleasantly in front of him. "No," he said.

         The old man's eyes lost their warmth. His smile twisted into a deep and practiced frown. "What are you saying, Vincent? Walk. You need rest. You need sleep."

         Vincent was unpleasantly surprised at the change of atmosphere the old man's expression made. It chilled him, yet he stood firmly upon his decision. He was much more frightened by the unknown source of dread emanating from the dark. "I said 'No', sir. I am not going." His decision stood firm.

         The old man had stood up now. He was just as tall as Vincent, but his stature and style of dress was intimidating. Slowly, he walked around to the front of his desk and began to approach Vincent, who was starting to back up now. "I said," the old man snarled, "walk!" Closer now, he attacked, swinging the back of a gloved hand, knocking Vincent's face to the side and causing the newly injured man to stumble. Vincent tasted blood in his mouth, which he spat to the floor. The dark red contrasted greatly with the blinding white, making the blood almost black.

         Caught in a sudden vengeful rage, Vincent swung back and hit the man's face, who spat his blackened blood to the floor and jumped on Vincent. Now both were on the floor, both struggling to beat and tear and spatter more blood on the clean white surface. Vincent caught the vigorous old man in the face again, who responded by jabbing a knee into Vincents ribcage and then kicking him off, only to have him back in the fray moments later. The battle raged on and blood was smeared and speckled onto the floor and walls. The two men's faces were beaten and each were now trying to clutch at his own injuries and keep a watch on their foe at the same time. Now five feet apart, the old man and Vincent both tried to catch their breath. Vincent saw that the old man was rubbing a wound on his left arm and trying his best not to wince. Vincent chuckled a bit at this and could feel a sharp pain in his ribs, which made him cough and retch. One of his ribs had been broken in the scuffle, obviously. When the pain subsided, he looked back up at the man, just in time to see him draw a large gun from his suit jacket and raise it to Vincent's head. The old man's eyes were an inferno.

         "You just - wouldn't - fucking - listen to me. YOU COULDN'T JUST WALK DOWN THAT FUCKING HALL LIKE I TOLD YOU TOO!" he shouted in horrifying anger. His face was raging. His shoulders heaved. "All I asked of you was to take a little stroll, but no, you COULDN'T. LITTLE PANSY FUCKING FAGGOT COULDN'T BECAUSE HE WAS AFRAID OF THE DARK!" He whipped Vincent in the face, who let the blood spill out. Vincent was horrified at the sight of the man who, ten minutes ago, was a kind face, the only comfort in the room.

         He reacted on an instinct. Vincent ducked and threw himself onto his oppressor, who pulled the trigger. A loud burst filled the air and echoed down into the abysmal nothing. The bullet struck the edge of the light on the ceiling, which now sparked and sputtered, threatening full darkness. The two wrestled once more, Vincent making for the gun and the old man trying to push him off. Two more shots rang out, but they hit the ceiling and the wall, where they left black scars. Vincent could feel the old man losing his grip on the gun and pried the gloved hand open with his left fingers. Now he had the weapon and the power. He slammed the barrel to the old man's head. All was silent for one split second. The man's expression reshaped into one of surprise. Vincent could hear absolutely nothing for that tiny moment in time. He pulled on the cold black trigger. One loud BANG! shattered the silence. There was a thud as the man's head dropped to the floor, and dark red blood seeped through the hole in the side of his skull onto the snowy white. Vincent let go of the body and let it lie in it's crumpled shape. He hurried over to the desk and shuffled through its drawers. A pair of night vision goggles lay alone in the top left right drawer. Vincent put them on and, with apprehension, peered down the long hallway.

         "Fuck. FUCK!" He almost dropped the gun to his feet. Not far beyond the pitch black lay at least twenty bodies dressed in loose white clothing, all freshly dead and strewn about the floor. Bloodstains darkened the wall liberally. He could also see occasional bullet holes where it was otherwise a clean wall. Then, the goggles dropped and smacked against the metal floor. Vincent's knees buckled. He fell and heaved bloody vomit onto the floor in front of him. Twenty people dressed just like him, all shot in the head, masked in the darkness. He would've made twenty one.

         Composure regained, he rushed back over to the old man's body. From the black slacks he pulled a wallet, which he tore through nervously. An identification card fell out and he picked it up.

         Oliver Gordon
         E33259-754B8
         Dept. of Inoculations and Last Rights
         Grace National Hospitals

         "Grace National? The fucking government hospital?" It was clear to Vincent that he had absolutely no idea what was going on or why it was happening to him, especially at the local government-run hospital. "Inoculations...?" Vincent couldn't remember the man ever giving him a shot during the ordeal. He searched the man's jacket feverishly and found the answer to his question. From the jacket he pulled out five syringes which looked as though they had been modified to act as darts loaded in a gun clip. Each was filled with a clear, light yellow liquid. He turned one over until he found a warning emblazoned in bright red: WARNING! Contents will cause both permanent and temporary memory loss and unconsciousness. Accidental injection cannot be reversed. Use restraint when injecting unruly patients. He slipped the clip of darts and ID card into his pocket and ran back to the desk.

         After a few more moments of searching, he found a file with the name "Vincent Faust" written on it, which he rolled up and put in a pocket for later; he also pilfered another clip of bullets for his gun. He couldn't believe what was happening to him, nor did he even know what was going on, but all he could do for now was escape. This was not the time for questions. He needed to focus.

         Finally, after ransacking the desk, Vincent scanned the top for anything he may have missed. A small bump stood out and underneath it was the word "door" etched in white. Silently praising his own luck for being so quick to the save, he pressed the button in and ran to where the door opened, pressing himself against the wall in case anybody had seen it open in passing by. Hearing nothing but the sound of the venting system, he threw himself into the semidarkness beyond the door, gun raised and fully loaded, ready to meet resistance to his impending escape.