(inhuman screaming)
- [Narrator] I never should've opened the door.
I was told one, years ago,
that a little girl named Carrie opened the door
and brought slaughter upon the whole colony.
She lost her arm to put the Brute back in its hole
where it belonged.
She didn't run away like me.
I'm in a sterile hospital room now,
and still I can hear their screams,
taste the metallic tang of blood on my tongue,
see those misshapen,
monstrous teeth as they ripped through my flesh
like parchment.
My mother, my father, my whole family and community,
gone within minutes.
I can still hear my father's final warning.
"Lilith," he gasped,
"the Brute catches everyone who runs.
"You mustn't run.
"You must face it."
I didn't listen.
And here I am lying in a bed alone in Kane Hospital,
the only survivor of the Brute.
For a moment I feel a heavy presence
lurking beyond the window,
and I wonder,
could it be the monster?
Could my father have been right?
Did it follow me? (machines beeping)
"How are you feeling, Lilith?"
I jump as a nurse steps inside the room.
No Brute, just an ordinary woman.
"Fine," I muster.
"A bit woozy."
They have me connected to all kinds of machines
I've never seen before.
The beeping, the artificial lighting,
the sterile equipment,
there's nothing like it where I come from.
Faith in the high order was all we were ever told we needed.
And look how that turned out.
"Well, you're lucky you turned up when you did,"
the nurse says kindly, eyeing the bandage on my leg.
"You were losing a lot of blood from this bite mark here.
"What did you say it was from?"
For a moment it's as if I can feel
the Brute's razor sharp teeth sinking into my calf
all over again.
I flinch.
"Nevermind," the nurse says, reading my expression.
"We can discuss the details later."
I turn to consider the other hospital beds
in the massive recovery room.
All empty.
"Is it always this quiet here?"
She eyes them, her kind smile crumbling.
"Ever since the incident,
"let's say we haven't had many patients at Kane Hospital."
"Incident?
"What kind of incident?" (lights clicking)
The lights flicker above us
and I watch the nurse's eyes widen with primal terror.
Her hands clutch her clipboard so tight
I'm sure it's going to split in half.
"Is something wrong?" I ask, apprehensive.
"He's back," she whispers.
"The prodigal son returns."
A distant scream echoes from outside the room
and we both turn toward the window.
"He's coming, he's coming here, for us,"
the nurse says, voice shaking.
"Who?" I shout, sitting up in bed,
growing more scared with every passing second.
The nurse looks at me and the lights flicker out.
For a second there is only darkness.
Then, when the lights flicker back on,
I see the door behind the nurse has opened
and a large, hulking figure stands right behind her.
It's not the Brute.
It's worse.
Black as night with burning orange slits for eyes,
and sharp tusks obtruding from its ribcage.
It looks like the devil incarnate.
The nurse whispers its name,
"Kane."
Then, slowly, she turns to face the monster.
"Don't," I whisper.
"Don't!"
But I'm too late.
The monster lunges,
tearing the nurse's head clear from her shoulders
with its bare hands,
throwing what's left of her body against the wall.
I stare in utter disbelief and horror.
First the Brute now this?
It takes a shaky step toward my bed.
Then another, cocking its head as if examining me.
I'm certain I'm about to meet the same fate as the nurse.
I shut my eyes, begging for a swift death,
letting out an involuntary sob.
And then I hear it,
a horrible, blood curdling roar that can only belong
to one creature on God's given Earth.
I open my eyes
and spin to see on the opposite side of the large,
empty hospital room, the Brute.
It's here for me, just like my father said.
I watch as its fleshy muscles ripple
and it bears its jagged teeth at Kane.
Kane clenches his fists,
sharp, white nails seemingly growing even longer.
For a moment both monsters are still.
I lie in the middle between them, paralyzed.
And then, without warning,
Kane catapults himself toward the Brute.
The sound is like a crack of thunder when the two collide.
They skid across the linoleum floor,
snarling, tearing, biting,
each intent on destroying the other.
I know I should stand up.
I know I should run for the door
and never look back,
but I can't keep my eyes off of the carnage.
The Brute, larger and more vicious,
slams Kane against the floor, again and again.
The linoleum cracks from the sheer force of it.
With his signature move he tears his teeth
into the black monster's neck
and rips out a chunk of bloody, rotted flesh.
I know, because I watched him do it to my mother
with my own eyes. (monsters growling)
I expect Kane to react, to cry out, to roar with agony,
but Kane feels nothing.
Kane, I realize, is not a monster.
He's a corpse given wretched life.
With a violent thrust Kane plunges his sharp,
clawed hand into the Brute's abdomen
and pulls out an organ unlike anything I've ever seen.
It almost looks like it's pulsing.
The Brute, unlike Kane, does react.
It flies backward, scuttling across the floor,
gasping in its own grotesque way.
Kane rises to his feet and looks at me triumphant.
His cries,
his glowing eyes seem to burn a hole into my chest,
charring my heart into a crisp.
I can't breathe.
I can't speak.
I'm at the mercy of this undead perversion of a man.
But just as I'm sure Kane is about to pounce,
to make mincemeat of me,
the Brute throws itself in front of my hospital bed,
roaring into Kane's face,
challenging him once more,
almost possessive. (monsters roar)
They're fighting over me. (monsters growling)
It would almost be romantic if they weren't both hellbent
on ripping me to shreds.
Kane doesn't hesitate, he jumps,
his pincer-like tusks opening to enclose the Brute
in a lethal embrace.
I can see the tips of the tusks piercing the flesh
on the monster's back,
digging in deeper and deeper,
but the Brute isn't crying out anymore.
It opens its fetid mouth,
its jaws crack open wide,
and the misshapen teeth take hold of Kane's face
like a kiss of death.
Both monsters collapse to the floor,
overcome by the other,
and I realize this is my chance.
I look at the door,
then at the bandage on my leg.
It may be injured but I'm sure I can still make it.
For a moment I hear my father's warning
in the back of my head again.
"You mustn't run.
"You must face it."
But I can't face what I have done.
Not to my home, not to my family, not to myself.
I have no choice but to run for whatever is left
of my life before either monster ends it.
As blood spews from the Brute's mouth,
and Kane's tusks shred into the monster's back,
I do it.
I get up and run toward the door as fast as I can.
I don't dare look back.
But the moment I touch the cold handle of the door,
I sense it,
a prickling along the nape of my neck,
like I'm being watched.
And suddenly I realize I am standing in absolute silence.
The inhuman roars, the gnashing teeth, the blood spurting,
it's all abruptly stopped,
as if both monsters have come to a truce.
I slowly turn the handle,
and as I do I sense from the periphery of my vision
both monsters on either side of me.
"Don't look left, Lilith," I tell myself.
"Don't look right.
"Perhaps if you are brave enough to simply open the door
"and take a step
"you can walk out of this hospital unscathed."
But as I swing the door open a black,
oozing hand suddenly grabs my outstretched hand,
the hand of Kane.
To my right another hand curls around my shoulder,
fleshy and pink and smelling of death,
the hand of the Brute.
I can't help it, I turn my head,
and all at once I feel the whole world split in half
as I cry out and blood explodes all around me.
I hit the ground with a thud,
or part of me does anyway.
I vaguely notice Kane dragging my bottom half away,
my legs still twitching,
a bloody stump where my stomach should be.
I bend down to see the Brute looking right at me.
The carving in his head a reminder of the door I opened,
of the colony I allowed to be destroyed,
of my feet running, running, running away,
and now gone forever.
"Brute, Brute," I gasp, blood gurgling from my mouth.
"Go back in your hole."
The last thing I see
are the monster's teeth flashing toward me.
I never get to say,
"And spare the living one more soul."