Speaker 1: I sat in my car in the hospital parking lot,
clutching a pre road joint like a lifeline. The strain
calm Horizon was my favorite, and Indica Hybrid perfect for
easing my nerves, and today I needed it. I was
scheduled for a routine surgery to remove my appendix. Routine
for the doctors, maybe, but not for me. I hated hospitals.
The sterough smell, the fluorescent lights, the cold efficiency, it
all put me on edge. The idea of going under
anesthesia was terrifying. Just a little hit, I muttered to myself,
sparking a joint just to calm down. The first puff
was smooth, the earthy, sitry smoke filling my lungs. I
leaned back and closed my eyes, letting the familiar haze
of relaxation wash over me. By the time I walked
into the hospital, I felt like I was fl The
checking process was a blur. I smiled at the receptionist.
Her words are jumble of sounds. The bright lights seemed
softer now, the stertle smell less offensive. I was guided
to a pre op room, where a nurse handed me
a gown and explained the procedure. I nodded along, though
I wasn't entirely sure what she said. You seemed relaxed,
the nurse said, raising an eyebrow. Yeah, I I guess
I'm just ready to get it over with, I replied,
chuckling nervously. The nurse smiled and left, promising the aneste
giologist would be shortly. When the anestesiologist arrived, I was
still riding my high. Doctor Marlowe, a tall man with
a calm demeanor, explained the process. We'll give you a
little bit of oxygen first, then administer the anesthetics. You'll
be out in no time, he said, holding up a mask.
As the mask was placed over my face, I noticed
something strange. The edges of my vision began to blur,
not in the usual way, but as if the room
itself was warping. The fluorescent lights above seemed to twist
and pulse, their hum growing louder. Just count backwards from ten,
doctor Marlowe said. I obeyed ten, nine, eight, by seven,
the room dissolved into darkness. When I opened my eyes,
I wasn't in the same operating room. The walls were
no longer white, but a deep, pulsating red, like the
inside of a living organism. The surgical lights above glowed
in an eerie green, casting unselling shadows. The doctors and
nurses were still there, or at least they looked like
they were. Their faces were distorted, their features elongated and shifting.
Doctor Marlow's calm voice was now a gruttal growl, his
eyes black voids. I took the Marlow said, his voice
reverberating through the room. I tried to move, but my
body was paralyzed. I felt the cold steel of a
scalpel against my skin, followed by an intense, searing pain.
I'm awake. I wanted to scream, but no sound came out.
As the pain intensified, my surroundings shifted again. The red
walls melted away, replaced by an endless black void. The
surgical team was gone, replaced by shadowy figures with glowing eyes.
They encircled me, whispering in a language I didn't understand.
Their voices were low and hypnotic, pulling at the edges
of my mind. One figure stepped closer, its hand extending
towards my chest. I could feel it probering, not physically,
but inside my mind, peeling back memories and thoughts, like
the layers of an onion. It hissed, what door, I
thought desperately. The door bit words, it replied, its voice
echoing in my skull. Suddenly I felt a jolt, like
being yanked backwards through a tunnel. I gasped and opened
my eyes to see the real operating room. The walls
were white again, the lights normal. The surgical team was
working diligently. Welcome back, Miss Parker, doctor Marlow said, his
face back to normal. I blinked, disorientated. Was was everything okay?
The surgery went perfectly? Marlow replied, you'll be in recovery shortly.
I nodded, but as the anesthetics were off, I couldn't
shake the feeling that something was wrong. Back in my
hospital room, I noticed strange things. The shadows in the
corners of the room seemed darker, deeper. The clock on
the wall tickedyr regularly, the second hand pausing and jumping.
As I reached for a glass of water, my reflection
in the window caught my eye. For a moment, it
wasn't my face staring back. It was one of the
shadowy figures, its glowing eyes piercing into me. I dropped
the glass, shattering it on the floor. You opened the door,
the figure's voice echoed in my mind. I realized with
chilling clarity, whatever I'd seen during the surgery hadn't stayed behind,
It had followed me back. I couldn't shake the eerie sensation.
Every time I closed my eyes, the figure with glowing
eyes appeared, its whispering voice filling my mind. You opened
the door, The words seemed to echo, becoming a mantra
that bent my perception of reality. The hospital room seemed
normal at first glance. The stough walls, the ivy drip,
the consistent beeping of machines were all as they should be.
But when I looked closely, I noticed that things didn't belong.
The shadows moved in unnatural ways, stretching and twitching, like
they had a life of their own. A nurse entered
the room, her smile too wide, her eyes a little
too empty. She handed me a tray of food, but
when I looked at the plate, it seemed wrong to
shifting the food, no longer solid, but floating, as if
suspended in the dark mist. You're doing well, the nurse said.
Her voice sounded muffle, as if coming from underwater. I blinked,
and in that brief moment, the food on the tray vanished.
The nurse's eyes flashed with a knowing glimp. She left
the room without another word, her footsteps echoing unnaturally in
the hallway. It wasn't until I stood up to use
the bathroom that I truly understand how deep the rabbit
hole had gone. The reflection in the bathroom mirror was
in my own. At first, it was just a flicker.
My reflection seemed to move before me, a momentary distortion.
But then it froze. My reflection wasn't smiling. It was grinning,
its eyes wide and grazed, a twisted expression of malicious glee.
I took a step back, heart pounding, but the reflection
didn't move with me. It stayed there, staring, its smiled
stretching white, until it cracked the surface of the mirror,
Rippling like water. The reflection raised its hand to the glass,
as if to touch my real hand, but I was
too horrified to move closer. Suddenly, the figure and the
mirror reached out through the glass, its fingers slipping into
the world of the living. I screamed, stumbling backwards. I
hit the wall hard, my pulse racing. As the reflection withdrew,
The mirror cracked, a spider web of jagged lines spreading
outwards the glass, trembling as if alive. The voice came again,
whispering from the cracks ewen. As the night dragged dawn,
my perception of time became distorted. Hours passed in what
felt like minutes. I tried to sleep, but every time
I closed my eyes, the shadows grew longer and deeper.
My mind was slipping, unable to separate the hallucinations from reality.
I stood in the hallway, unsure of how I got there.
The lights above flickered and buzzed, casting long, distorted shadows
on the walls. The hallway seemed endless, stretching on both directions.
The doors to the other rooms were all shut tight,
their numbers flickering with the red glow like an emergency sign.
As I walked, I began to hear whispers, low, gruttal
voices like the ones I heard in the operating room.
They came from every direction, swirling around me. I spun
in circles, trying to locate their source, but all I
saw was darkened doorways, flickering lights and empty rooms. Suddenly,
one door at the end of the hall creaked open.
I hesitated, but the pool was too strong. Something was
calling me, urging me to step inside. With a trembling breath,
I walked towards the door. The room was small, the
walls lined with old, yellowed photographs of people I didn't recognize.
They were all blurry, their faces distorted in ways that
sent to shiver down my spine. The room smelled of decay,
and the air felt thick, as though the space itself
had absorbed centuries of suffering. In the corner of the
room there was an old chair, a single bulb hanging
above it. The chair seemed familiar, like something from a
forgotten nightmare. I couldn't help myself. I sat down, my
body moving against my will. The chair groaned under my
weight as if it were alive. I looked at the
photograph on the walls again. They had shifted. The faces
were clearer. Now I recognized something in the eyes of
the people staring back at me. They were trapped. The
voice came again, clearer, Now you opened the door, Now
you belonged to us. My heart raised as the photographs
began to shift, the faces now moving, whispering, their eyes
following me, their mouths opening in a silent scream. The
room began to close in on me, the walls narrowing,
the air growing thick and suffocating. I tried to stand,
but the chair held me in place, its arms like
iron bands around my body. I was trapped, surrounded by
the soles of those who had opened the door before me.
As the room closed in my vision blurred, my mind
sparling to madness, the whispers intensified, the walls pressing against me.
I knew deep down that I was no longer in
the hospital, this place, this realm, something entirely else. I
could feel the shadows closing in on me, could hear
the figure's voices growing louder. You opened the door. You
are ours now. But then, in the haze of my mind,
a thought emerged, a way out the door. It wasn't
just the door to this place, it was the door
to escape. I fought against the chair's grips, summoning every
ounce of strength I had left. With the final scream,
I pushed myself forward, my hand reaching out for something, anything,
the moments my fingers brushed against the edge of the
door frame. The world shifted again, the shadows receded, the
air lightened. I gasped for breath as the pressure around
me lifted, the room vanishing into darkness. I awoke in
my hospital bed, gasping for air. My body was drenched
in sweat, my heart pounding in my chest. The stirl
white walls were back, the quiet hum of the machines
grounding me in reality. For a moment, I thought it
was all the nightmare. But when I looked at my hands,
I saw something that made my blood run cold, dark
shifting marks on my skin, as if something had crawled
beneath the surface. My heart sank as I realized the
truth I had never truly left. I had opened the
door and it had followed me. Jeez