The Other World (Short Horror Stories)

Nightmare

"I had that dream again..."

I woke up in the middle of an empty street.

The city around me, unrecognizable and dead.

Skyscrapers stood rotting and falling apart.

Cars parked near shattered walkways lay rusted.

A sing building stood taller than all the rest.

Its frame, untouched by time, stood tall and looming.

It was just a regular building, yet I feared it with every fiber of my being.

I looked upon it and thought:

"Everything that is horrid and ugly in this existence lies within this building..."

I don't know why I thought (knew) this.

Against my will I found myself walking toward the building.

As I moved closer and closer I began to see the front of the entrance of the structure.

There hung a sign above the entryway.

It glared a foreboding neon red and simply read "Hospital".

It was like a child's drawing...

A child doesn't know that certain places have specific names.

They just label police stations as "Police Station" and stores as "Store".

When I saw this sign I laughed (sobbed).

All I could think was:

"Hospitals have two sides to them. On one side you have the smiling two year old walking proudly out of doctor's office with a band-aid on his shoulder and a lollipop in his hand. Then you have the other side, where the two year old doesn't get the lollipop, instead he gets the news that he won't live long enough to ever get another piece of candy again."

And I laughed (cried) because this hospital only had that one side.

This is no place of healing; it's a damn pit stop before you're on your way to the pearly gates in the sky (the fires of hell).

There were no smiling faces in this hospital.

No excited children telling mothers or fathers about how brave they were when they got their seasonal shots.

No wives telling anxious husbands that a little bundle of joy was on the way.

There were only mothers and fathers crying and sobbing as the doctor placed the white sheet over their child's face.

Only crying wives sobbing to their husbands because they had miscarried for the third time.

Hell, even the doctors that worked here wouldn't be the kind, gentle healers we all know.

They are cold, heartless, and uncaring:

"Oh I'm sorry sir/mam, your loved one has fallen into a coma and we had to put him/her on life support. Of course, we later found out that your insurance won't cover this so could you please let us pull the plug, you're costing this hospital money."

Of course all of this was just my imagination.

There are no people in that hospital, be they doctor or patient.

No one could survive in that godforsaken place.

My feet started moving again.

I was horrified to find that I was moving closer and closer to the door: