Hall of Shame
Wordcount: 983You wake in the infirmary. Or rather an infirmary. You don't recognize where you are at all, although it’s hard to tell with the darkness that fills this space.
Your eyes have had time to adjust to the incredibly dim light, evidently, as you can make out some of the forms around you.
You are in a small bed and there are a few others next to yours. There's a desk on one end of the room, by a door, as well as a set of large metal cabinets.
Out of habit, you reach out an arm to where your bedside table would be at home to grab your phone and wallet. After waving it through the open air, you return your arm to your side and rummage through your pockets with both hands. Empty.
You sit up and plop your feet on the ground with a dull thud, stand, and begin to make your way through the dark. At the desk you find a lamp with no light bulb, a small trash bin, various papers, and a lighter.
You pick up a sheet looking for any sort of indication of where you might be. It feels somewhat damp and despite having some amount of visibility, the writing on the page is impossible to make out in the low light. Giving the lighter a quick flick, the paper instantly bursts into flames, causing you to instinctively drop it, where it lands on the desk setting every other sheet of paper ablaze in turn.
You flee from the room, with unlit lighter in hand, frantically shoving your way through the door and into the hall. The light of the fire fades as you shut the door behind you. You flick the lighter a few more times and it produces a small flame.
You look around and find yourself in a wide hallway with what appears to be windows on the side opposite you, but no light shines through them. They don't seem opaque, as if painted over, but rather like there's literally nothing on the other side.
Dark, ashen particles float in the air around you, and your lungs feel heavy as you begin to turn to your left and trod along the smooth stone-like tiles down the hall. For a moment you stop to think about what may have been to the right of the doorway you exited from, yet you have no desire to turn around and check.
One small step after another, you find another door on the left. This one is different from the last. It's a thin two-piece sliding door, with a square window on either section. A small sign above reads 2-B. You slowly slide the door open. It moves silently. What's inside is a classroom in horrible disarray. Desks tipped over and books strewn across the room. There's a clear area in the center of the mess where a small object rests.
You crouch down to examine it, holding the lighter close. It's a heart-shaped locket on a gold chain. Popping it open, you see an image of a much younger you standing beside another person whose face has been blotted out with a marker. You drop it in surprise.
Rising to your feet to see the chalkboard has a message written on it in large, blocky letters.
THEY THAT ARE SUCH SERVE NOT OUR LORD BUT THEIR OWN APPETITES
BY GOOD WORDS AND FAIR SPEECHES, THEY DECEIVE THE HEARTS OF THE SIMPLE
A sudden stinging pain emanates from your skull. You clutch your head and stumble back towards the door.
A flash of a regret, an emotion you thought was long buried, now leaves a mark in the form of a throbbing headache.
You trip and fall to your knees on your way back into the hallway as the door closes itself behind you. You realize that you lost the lighter along the way, but now a faint gray glow permeates the walls around you allowing you to see without it.
Dizzily clambering further down the hall you arrive at another very different door. It's a light colored wood with a metal handle. A silver placard in the center reads Chief Executive Officer.
In an act of a sort of muscle memory, you push through, slam the door shut behind you and forcefully slump down into the chair behind the desk. Your desk. You know this place.
This is your office. You remember being here earlier today.
You feel great relief with the familiar surroundings. Perhaps you fell asleep at your desk and now you're awake and it's gotten dark outside.
You decide to login and check your email before you leave.
There are hundreds of new unread emails. A few names you recognize, but they are certainly not currently employed by the company. The others you are certain you have never seen before. Every subject line reads the same: “ACCEPTABLE LOSSES”.
Frantically scrolling through, one email opens on its own.
There is no sender address or subject line.
HE THAT GIVETH UNTO THE POOR SHALL NOT LACK
HE THAT HIDETH HIS EYES SHALL HAVE MANY A CURSE
It’s awfully late. It’s time you went home.
Hands shaking, you attempt an escape from this facsimile of your life.
Back into the hall.
Running as fast as your legs will allow.
The hall stretches farther and farther but you refuse to slow down. The gray glow starts to increase in brightness, becoming a yellowish white. There, ahead of you, lies a wall with a door. The light shines brightest from its edges. Daylight, maybe. The way out, definitely.
You grab a hold of the small, ornate knob and searing pain shoots up your arm. You cry out in pain and tear your hand away from the burning doorknob, and yet the door opens anyway.
Gazing into the blazing light ahead, you mutter to yourself, “Oh, I see.”