FicWad

Rank and filthy hospital walls with patients that had been abandoned during the fire still in beds. The stench of dead flesh had not yet gone from the Asylum halls and here they were walking through it trying to determine what had happened. Fire makes flesh smell strange. First of all it smells like pork, like really well done pork and then later there is a smell like charcoal and badly done BBQ as the fat settles.

It's not like they had faced it before either. They had been asked in to identify one body, one of theirs. He'd been brought in from the streets kicking and screaming. Swore blind he knew one of them. Told them he could pay for the medical care too but they'd sedated him and wanted him to calm down first.

Some people told him that smoking embalming fluid would be a good high. You could steal it from places or you could buy it from dodgy chemical firms. It was like a cheap PCP, gave you hallucinations. Gave you a thrill.

"I feel sick." The first young man admitted as they walked in.

"It's okay we don't have to touch anything we just have to find him, see if there is any way to identify him... go." The other said calmly. There were some things people didn't want to see. This was one of them.

They hadn't really been told what had happened save the patient that they had admitted and how they'd got their numbers from the listed accommodation on his patient's notes. They moved through the first set of shattered hallways and in to the Asylum's more internal areas. The place was darker than expected too.

The guard with them had his torch as they wandered through the halls. They couldn't get the generator to work. The fire had shorted and melted most of it. The security doors had to be manually opened. The patients, those that tried to run, were in the halls pushed to the sides casually like dolls once bigger brothers had burnt them.

The guard opened a side door. The braver of the two men walked first, arms casually swinging as they headed inside. The guard let them both through and they moved towards the holding cells. The one behind stumbled over something. The other lad stopped his fall and looked down. He wished he hadn't as a sloppy wet sound came from the newly crushed and brittle skull.

"Oh god." He whispered immediately pushing his weaker stomached companion to one side. The hollow skull of a dead patient toppled over, grey brain matter spilling out like mouldy coffee on the floor. Some of it liquid, some of it partially solid.

The guard looked a little green in the face as they proceeded on. The braver man wondered if he shouldn't have just come alone but the other insisted. Their footsteps fell heavy on the empty ward corridor. He looked back as they moved along, aware of the clingy darkness. When they moved forwards he became aware of a flashing shorted cable ahead.

The guard moved to another door, an observation room and put his torch down. The one way glass was filthy and smoke stained. He took a swig from his hip flask and offered it out. The meeker young man took it and downed a large mouthful before wiping his mouth with his sleeve.

"Through the side door. Just tell me if you can see anything that makes him a resident." He said as the hip flask was passed back.

The guys walked in to the room as directed. There was a flash of light from a cable in the observation room. The body they had been asked to identify was on the table covered in a dusty sheet. Water dripped from above hitting a metal bucket and a tinny echo filled the room.

Behind them the meeker guy pointed as the window started to run with blood. It started as a slow dribble which soon started to look like a waterfall. The other guy looked at the wall. They were both engrossed in that as the security guard suddenly appeared pressed again the wall his face contorting in pain. They both stepped back.

The more confident of the two found his hand on the sheet behind him and on what he presumed to be a body's leg. He moved his hand shakily. The other one was trying to brave heading to the other half-green stained room and get to the torch but the security guard looked like he was being attacked and then the scream hit the air and he stepped back away from the door.

"Okay you stay here. I'll get the torch." Said the other one and the meeker man nodded. He flung the door open and went to get the torch. The lights flickered again and the security guard's corpse lay on the floor.

Whatever had attacked the security guard was already gone but not before it had ripped the body up. The security guards torso had slid propped up against the wall and one leg was violently bent in the wrong direction. The other leg was half out of the door; a bloody smear took the witness to its resting place.

"Oh shit!" There was a scream from behind and the body on the table sat up.

The sheet fell loose, the eye which had melted in the fire hung on a shrivelled cord from one socket. The other eye was in tact but the skin around it had folded back in the heat. The nose had been burnt away exposing more brittle white bones of the nasal cavity and it moaned loudly.

White liquid from the muscles and sinewy tissue rolled over the exposed fleshy arms as it grabbed at the weaker stomached man. The body rose slowly, the ribs holding the exposed organs in tact. There would be no need for a Y incision here. The mouth opened, the jaw slack and opening in a disgusting fake smile. There was a thud as the meek man fell to the floor, he fainted.


"Cut!" The director sighed, the lights came on. "If you can't get past the first bit without him fainting how are you expected to finish the damned film."

The redheaded braver man sniggered and picked up the torch and pocketed it. He wandered over to his friend and checked he was okay. The young man stirred as he was touched.

"I told you when you cast us he was weak stomached." He laughed.

"Do you think we can try again?" The director sighed.

"Sure." The other guy said taking in a deep breath. "Sorry."

"Okay started from the entrance to the room." He said and the lights went back down.