Tastes Like Guilt

I escaped the pharmacy with all I got; another glass bottle of medicine was in my hand, thesign of the hell I just escaped. I started running through the hallway of the first floor. Thatmonster quickly rushed towards me, the burning embers still on his upper half. He keptfollowing me; I increased my speed. The air smelled nauseatingly pungent, as if a body wasrotting in the hallway.

The hallway was dark, but the slight glimmer of moon shining through the glass windows keptthe path in front of me decently visible. While sprinting, I saw some rooms whose doors wereopen on the way; the first room I saw had a patient coughing blood. As I kept running forward, Isaw another room with its door standing open; inside, a patient’s stomach was horriblycrushed as if a heavy tyre had driven through his body. The patient’s rib cage was visible andshattered; the sharp, jagged bones even pierced through his upper chest muscles and skin; hiswhole chest was a total mess of gore and blood.

I felt the bile in my gut rising up after seeing all of those decaying corpses and the patientsscreaming in the dark. I felt the urge to vomit, but I couldn’t because if I stopped even for amoment I would end up like them. The hallway ended at a door which was locked from inside; Itried kicking it as hard as I could. The monster behind me was still following me, his emberscalmed down but the smoke and stench of burnt flesh lingered in the air: the acrid smell of aburnt rubber tyre.

The monster picked up the pace, rushing towards me. I screamed “Someone Help! I can’t dielike this! Plea-” my voice was so full of fear that my throat went numb and my plea for help diedbefore even reaching. Suddenly, the door opened from the inside. I instantly rushed, crawlingon all fours in desperation just like a deer running from a bear, and went inside the room. Themonster got really close. I quickly searched for the door knob, found it, and tried to slam thedoor shut, but the latch wouldn’t catch, it felt jammed. I tried kicking the door knob with mybare feet. The first kick was aggressive; my ankle hurt a bit and the door knob twisted a little.I gathered all of my courage and strength in one more kick, and aimed directly at the door knobwith immense velocity. I kicked the doorknob and felt a sudden, immense, shivering pain in myleft ankle. A tear escaped my eye. The door knob finally broke free and became unstuck. Iquickly twisted the door knob with both of my hands, closing the door shut from inside. My leftankle was still throbbing in pain, and I realized I couldn’t even run anymore.

“Why?!? Why me!? What did I even do to deserve this! My whole life has always been a hell tobegin with; I even tried to hide my grief. Did I ever complain to anyone how shit my life was?Nope, right. Then why?” I wiped the tears from my eyes. “I freaking hated my life! Not once.Not even once, my mom was never proud, whatever I did always felt nothing more than amedal for her to show off. I even got a job in this huge firm thinking at least she’ll throw methree words of satisfaction like ‘I am glad.’ But how could I forget she was never glad. Shenever cared about me in the first place.”

“She always thought I was a piece of trash even after all the things I did for her.” I clenched myfist, and hit the shelf nearby. “I had to intoxicate myself to forget all of my sufferings, even mydad wasn’t there to look after me. Mom didn’t even shed a tear when he died. Why did he haveto die so soon!” I cried. The room was dark, filled with a musty smell. But a slight projection ofmoonlight was coming through the gap between the door and the floor. The engine monsterstarted banging on the door violently.

I whimpered in pain and tried to crawl to the side of the door, and moved towards the shelf.Suddenly, a red light shone towards me, and my vision blurred. I squinted, covered my eyeswith both of my hands, and focused on the source of the light. I realized that the door didn’topen itself, there was someone who certainly opened it which meant I wasn’t alone inside theroom. Just after that I saw a figure looking like a lady in her mid forties. I looked at her facewhich was disturbingly haunting: her face was embedded with small shards of glass, a redheadlight stuck inside her throat, and a chunk of windshield glass was wedged between herjaw, slicing through her cheeks and jagging up to her ears.

The blood was dripping from her jaws, a car rim was digging through the skeleton of her body,fused to her heart, and pulsing in time with the exposed organ. Her rib cage was torn wideopen. The veins were clearly visible through her open rib cage. The headlight flickered. “Mychildren…” I heard her footsteps. “Why… my children?” a smell of rusty iron entered my nose, Igagged and spat on the floor. The headlight turned on, she lowered her face which waswedged with a sharp piece of glass. The sharp edge of the windshield touched and torethrough my cheek’s skin.

Blood erupted from my cheek. I was lying there crouched. I tried to move myself but I wasn’table to move, my whole body froze in fear. I was pinned by the agonizing cut in my cheek andbroken bones in my ankle. The terrifying windshield woman placed her foot on my throat, andtwisted her heel. “Le… me… go…”I choked. I gathered the rest of my courage in my right legand kicked as hard as I could directly in her headlight. I felt a crack in my right toe. The womanfell back towards the shelves.

My left hand went limp and my legs were in immense pain. I tried to slide my right hand into thefront pocket of the hospital gown. I rummaged and found the glass bottle which I had pickedup earlier. I was too afraid due to all of the things that were going on here, but after taking a sipof medicine from the glass bottle all of my pain and suffering vanished instantly. Still, I wasafraid of the creature who was slumped against the shelves. I felt my body getting back intoworking condition. The banging on the door loudened.

I felt the medicine burning down my throat, surging into my veins; it was sharp and carbonatedin taste. It made my throat go numb rapidly. The door suddenly opened with a tremendouslyloud BOOM! The monster glared right into my eyes. His engine front gleaming in the smallglimmer of moonlight. The medicine worked because I was feeling rejuvenated and my legshad stopped hurting. I gathered my courage, stood up, and quickly ran towards the back of theroom, desperate to find another way out. The horrifying windshield woman started crawlingtowards me and the enraged engine monster bolted towards me.

I saw a backdoor, and started running towards it; I reached it, found the door knob, andwithout thinking another second, I opened it. I finally escaped from the room, and saw twopaths leading to an escape from the first floor: stairs and an elevator. I was tired of running; Iwent for the elevator. It seemed like an easier route than the stairs. I pressed the call button,calling for the elevator. The elevator reached the first floor; the doors slid open. I steppedinside, and pressed the ‘G’ button for the ground floor. I breathed some fresh air and sighed,leaning my head against the cold metal wall.

But the air didn’t smell anything close to freshness; there was a sharp, alcoholic scent insidethe elevator. I didn’t mind the air much, thinking someone had been in the elevator while drunk.The lift started moving, stopped with a sudden jolt, and a thump from above, then proceededto shudder into motion again. The air became more suffocating with the rising alcoholic smell. Inoticed an open grating on the left side of the elevator; it was dripping a liquid. I felt the urge tovomit, but I kept it inside. The falling drops of liquid from the small square grating accelerated,and then, suddenly, they stopped.

Just a moment later, the alcoholic liquid started spraying inside, flooding the elevator. I lookeddown. My feet were covered in yellowish, foamy, sticky liquid. My toe and feet still lookedcrushed even though the pain was gone. I panicked and started pressing random buttons ofthe elevator. The smell of the liquid seemed familiar to me. I inserted my finger in between thedoor of the elevator trying to open it a little bit. The elevator’s door moved, making a tiny gapbetween the doors, but the moment it slid, my index finger was caught in the closing seal ofthe elevator doors.

And the sliding doors went shut; my left hand’s index finger got stuck inside. I felt a sensation,it wasn’t due to the cold liquid rising past my knees; instead, as the elevator was descendingmy finger was shredding against the concrete. I felt the skin of my finger sanding. It wasenough to send shivers down my spine; my index finger was in tremendous pain, it was likesome carpenter filing away the skin and nail of my index finger. I shrieked in intense pain; theelevator was drowning in that strange liquid.

The liquid reached my neck, my whole body was soaked in some yellowish liquid, and after amoment it reached my eyes. I tasted the liquid. “…beer?!?” The realization was terrifyinglyabsurd. The next moment I was gasping for air, suffocating in beer, the whole lift was filling withbeer. My shredded finger was burning after getting in contact with that beer. I felt myselfpassing out, but the lift door finally opened at the ground floor. The deluge burst out of theelevator, sweeping me with it. I choked on the beer, my throat, eyes, ears, nose, my wholebody was shivering with evaporating beer, making my whole body feel cold and tacky. I stoodup and tried to walk towards a room whose door was open.

I walked and entered a room which had ‘Cold Storage’ written on it. The rotten smell of fleshwas starting to fill my nose, it was so sharp that it covered the lingering beer smell on me. Ivomited on the floor, and slowly walked towards the empty beds. I noticed one bed with aperson lying on it, he wasn’t moving. I slowly walked towards him to ask for help “Hey! Are youslee… I nee—help.” I looked at his face “Thi…this can’t be!” my face went cold. The body lyingthere wasn’t a stranger; it was me.

He didn’t have a pulse, there was no sign of life on him. Suddenly, the door on the back of thecold storage screeched open. I screamed at what I saw, there were two little kids, one girlwhose whole head was completely gone and an exhaust pipe was jammed into her open neck,protruding from her gut. Another was a boy whose one hand was torn and the bones werevisible through shredded muscles of his forearm. A metal license plate reading “Nagatsuki”was embedded in his abdomen. I saw the name and realized that the license plate was frommy car.