Inferiority Complex

Cell block D was currently out of use, but the cleaner was still required to clean there, in case of new patients. At the moment, at 10:30PM, it was in darkness and locked away behind a solid steel door, carefully hidden away from the outside world. There were two words scribbled hastily upon the door that fooled no-one:

BOyLER ROoM

However, the secretive nature of Cell block D meant that the patients kept well away from it. Rumours were a dangerous thing in a place with paranoid delusions being as common as darkness falling at night, but still, rumours managed to emerge that there was something up there. Not a boiler room, the misspelling ensured that being a certainty. The rumours gave details of shreiking sound every morning. One of the previous cleaners, who was now committed in the asylum under the fact that he "Heard The Ghosts", had gone into great detail about it, only to be dragged away, kicking and screaming by the brutal new guards. The new management, headed by Ross Wilson, wasn't helping, either, ignoring claims of the patients, dismissing them as delusions. The old management at least looked into the more sane claims.

The night cleaner, taking over from Jack, whistled softly to himself as he dragged his legs up the steel-rimmed stairs. He was heading towards the supplies closet, located on the fourth floor. The same as Cell block D. The night cleaner, or Matt, took out a heavy ring of keys. This ring contained a key for every single cell in the asylum and every single door aside from the one that led to the BOyLER ROoM. With a loud rattling sound of metal on metal, he found the right key for the cupboard door and pushed it into the lock and turned it. The lock gave a satisfying click, before he placed a hand on the cold, metal handle, realising that something was disturbing him. He shrugged it off for now: the asylum was pretty creepy in itself, without the potentially dangerous patients. But then, he knew that before he signed up to work here, didn't he? He had recently began to doubt that he ever knew what he was getting himself in for truly.

He pulled a red Henry hoover from the cupboard, barely recognisable as most of the paint had chipped off over the last year. Its smile had been turned into two jagged fangs, standing out  from the blood-red plastic that surrounded it. Searching for a plug for the hoover, he noticed an ajar door. He looked up at the heavy steel door. It said BOyLER ROoM.

Now he knew what was worrying him. When he was on the morning shift, he heard some of the things the previous cleaner had said about block D. The ghosts, he had said. Howling every night. Admittedly, Matt had heard strange sounds most nights, but had put it down to bad winds or the piping around the exterior. He edged inside the room and saw, to his expectations and perhaps feaars, that the room was not a boiler room at all, but a room filled with strange symbols drawn on the walls in a red...well, he hoped it was paint.

He prayed it was paint.

Clank.

Footsteps. Matt turned, heart pounding. Something had escaped. something deranged and perhaps dangerous that was not on any records. Matt made for the door, thinking of hiding in the supply cupboard, but he saw a shadow on the top stair and realised he had no chance of making it. There was only one way now: fight. He bent down to the Henry hoover and dismantled the suction pipe, giving him a metal pole to defend himself with. Seeing a corner near the door, he ran towards it and hid in the darkness, the only thing giving him away was his shallow breathing.

Clang.

The heavy metal door sung shut and was locked from the outside. The outside? Matt thought The thing had help.

Matt stepped out from his corner and yelled for help, hoping that the unknown assailant had a conscience, but all Matt heard was hurrying footsteps. Matt looked at The Resident and realised, as it drew closer, that he had no chance. It loomed at him. Matts hands shook and the pipe fell to the floor with a clatter. The thing reached out a hand and in its palm sat, covered in blood, a knife. A thick, eight inch bladed knife, quite capable of easily carving through human flesh.

The Resident swung its blade as Darkness fell once more....