Silent Jack

The Void

The dining room of St. Senan Psychiatric Hospital was full of the noise of chatter and the aroma of lunch that was served to patients of Wing C. While patients of Wing C were having their lunch, a few guards were roaming around to maintain peace and discipline, as no one knew when someone might jump into a fight.

On one of the metallic benches in the dining room, Jack was sitting and chewing bread. His hands were tightly holding the edges of the metallic lunch tray. A guard passed by and found Jack staring blankly at the wall. Suddenly, an unsettling noise broke the stillness, and Jack began to grunt and growl. His body was becoming stretched and twisted, and a nearby fellow patient, who was witnessing this, asked,

"Silent Jack, are you alright?"

Jack looked at his fellow and then suddenly lunged at him, gripping his arm firmly. The patient, who was in Jack's iron-fast grip, yelped in pain as he couldn't bear it. His screams instantly made the ward boys and guards attentive toward Jack and the patient in his grip. They rushed to the scene, and one of them shouted,

"Hold him down! Get him off!"

Two guards came forward and tried to unwrap Jack's fingers from the arm of his fellow, but the grip was so strong that they failed.

"Help me... help me," the fellow patient cried out in pain and fear.

"Hit his arm," a guard said.

The next moment, one of the guards trying to loosen Jack's grip hit Jack's forearm with a wooden stick and then struck him two or three more times. As Jack's grip loosened due to the pain, a third guard came forward and put cuffs on both of Jack's hands. Within moments, Jack was restrained with chains, and his struggling body was held firmly by the guards.

A ward boy came near Jack and noticed that his eyes were wild and his breathing ragged. He gave him a dose of muscle relaxant injection and then said,

"Take him to the dark cell."

The dark room was a small cubic-shaped, windowless cell located at the backside of Wing C. Jack heard the words and instantly started resisting, as he didn't want to go to the dark cell.

"Take him," the ward boy said in an angry tone.

Jack held onto a pillar in the dining area to stop the guards from taking him to the dark cell, which was a horrible place.

"I know you don't want to go to the dark cell and get locked in there, but you should have thought before hitting your fellow," the ward boy said in a loud voice.

Jack was still resisting, but the guards carried him away from the dining room. With every passing moment, his protests grew fainter due to the effect of the muscle relaxant. The long corridor ended, and a small room appeared, known as the dark cell. This room was built to handle the most aggressive and violent patients and always served its purpose quite well.

The guards unlocked the cell and pushed Jack inside, and the heavy door clanged shut behind him. The room was completely silent, and the only noise was Jack's labored breathing.

Soon, Jack passed out and lay down on the ground. He slept for many hours until a voice knocked at his ears, making him open his eyes. He blinked in the darkness, trying to make sense of the faint sounds he heard a moment ago. But the dense darkness of the cell didn't allow him to do so. He remembered that he was in the dark cell after assaulting a fellow patient.

Jack got up and dragged his body to a nearby wall, tucking his legs closer to his chest and wrapping his arms around them. He was scared and anxious, and with every passing moment, his fear was rising. He kept sitting there as hours ticked by, and the oppressive darkness made the isolation even more unbearable.