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Autophobia, chapter three

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I slumped over in my chair. 

My  hand supported my head as I stared down at the paper in front of me. It was late and I was busy recording the data from today's conversation. Today was the eleventh day that I had been Mark's doctor, and throughout those days nothing had really seemed out of the ordinary schedule. 

Today though, when I had settled down outside his door once more, I heard him talking to himself. I'm not quite sure what had been said since his words were muffled by the door, but when I had spoken up about my presence he quieted down. 

He seemed impatient today, almost as if he was trying to speed along our normal conversation. He must've thought I hadn't noticed his strange behavior, but I did. 

My eyes were beginning to close on me.

I weakly attempted to snap them back open, but my body slugged my request. Before I knew it, I had collapsed onto my desk in exhaustion. My pencil rolled out of my hand and for a few seconds I stared, with dull eyes, at the wall of the office before sleep overtook me. 

"Wake up." It hadn't even felt like a minute had went by before a whisper sliced my sleeping. Slowly blinking open my eyes, I found myself in a whole new environment than my last one. 

Darkness dripped from the sky above, casting shadows across the ground as I stood. The area looked like some barren wasteland, and I took a couple of brave steps forward while my mind buzzed with uncertainty. This feeling felt all too real to be some sort of fuzzy dream I would barely remember when I woke up. 

My thoughts were slashed away as I heard faint giggling to the left of me. I stood, brown eyes flooding with building fear, as a small silhouette formed from the darkness. I watched in frozen terror as it neared me, bouncing along while giggling. Only then did I take notice of its many followers behind it.

My feet kicked up plenty of dust in my avail to get away, and I was left half tumbling as I came across what looked like a gravestone. I gave it a short acknowledgement as more giggling joined into the already growing sound and my terror rose. 

That's when I began making sharp turns to get away from to wall of mannequins that would appear from seemingly nowhere as if they were falling from the sky itself. In the end, I was overwhelmed and was left surrounded. 

Glowing button eyes circled me and the giggling invaded my hearing.

I closed my eyes.  

And screamed.

"Heather! Heather!!" A voice shouted worriedly, shaking my shoulder.

Creaking my eyes open, I found that the hand on my shoulder belonged to Aaron

The british doctor was giving me the same look that someone would give a person who was holding a knife to them. 

"What i-is it?" I asked shakily.

"You were screaming, Heather." He simply put it, his hand releasing the grip on my shoulder. Straightening out my hair that had been strangled out during sleep, I yawned "What time is it?" 

"Uh, almost 4:00." The man said in a skeptical tone. I nodded solemnly, my head was still on the blurred line of reality and dream-world as I sighed "Okay, sorry to disrupt your.....whatever you were doing." 

"Are you alright?" He asked. "You need anything? You want some water, some tea?" 

"Eh, No thank you." 

When his presence had vanished from the office, I leaned back in my seat and growled irritably as the thought on my dream came rushing to me. My mind was drowning in an everlasting sea of questions of where the dream had even came from, but, as usual, I set aside the questions and chose to ignore them instead.  

"Well, I don't think it would be necessary for me to go home because I'll just be here in about 7 hours....." I muttered to myself and i soon noticed the noise rumbling from my stomach.

Light footsteps rung through the silent hallways as I tried to be as quick and quiet as possible as I made my way down the top floor. I then continued my path down the steps and then down the  hallways full of the patient's rooms. 

I slipped out of the building with ease since Kenneth had left for home by now and there wasn't much activity in the building anyway besides the few guards who wandered around. 

The darkness looming above me filled me with unease as I slid into the seat of my car and plugged in the key to give the car life. I quickly pulled out of the parking lot of the asylum and made my way onto the road. 

After a while on  the highway, I had arrived to a nearby fast food restaurant and pulled into the driveway. It felt almost unsettling to hear a voice through the microphone instead of the silence that had enveloped me on the trip. I ordered a chicken sandwich and a frappe, which would hopefully keep me awake.

Then I paid for, and received, the food before I pulled back onto the road again. Out of nowhere, my eyes started to droop with fatigue and I outstretched my hand for my coffee frappe. Instead I had found something else instead.

Pulling my hand back towards myself with the strange object, I glanced down at it to see what I had reeled in....

My eyes widened slightly as my full attention was dragged from the road to the doll that was now grasped in my hand. A frantic honk drew my attention back to the road and I narrowly swerved to miss a truck that had came roaring past. Along with those movements, I rolled down the window and tossed the doll angrily out the car. 

I made it to the asylum without anymore interruptions and grabbed my drink and sandwich, which had both fell onto the floor, then started towards the asylum. 

Slipping back into the facility, I made my descend back to my office, but this time taking my time to actually consider looking at some of the things crafted onto the doors of patients. 

There was a symbol of some sort, a circle with a large X slashing through it. I didn't really take much notice of that. 

There was one of the doors with paint on it, which looked like a golden statue. 

Many of the other symbols included, an alien with the words 'Minion' written under it,  a diamond sword, a radioactive sign, and some other things that I couldn't quite place. 

I stopped by Mark's door, it looked out of place amongst the many other doors which had been marked with creativity. Just a plain wooden door. 

 I set my hand onto the doorknob, tempted to open it. That would be pushing the lines, wouldn't it? I hadn't entered his room so far, so why would I do it now? 

"Heather? What are y-" 

"Nothing!" I yelped, spinning around to face the person who had spooked me. It turned out to be Minx, who had dark circles under her eyes. Some loose strands of hair added onto her fatigued appearance while her brown eyes gave me a weary gaze. 

Silence covered both of us and I wondered if she was gonna say anything at all, but before I decided to turn and march off down the hall, she spoke.  

"You're doing a pretty good job, with your patient." She nodded. "You should try bringing him to the breakfast court with all the other patients today, at 9:00." 

"Do y-you really think that's a good idea!?" I asked in caution, was Mark really ready for so many people?  

"I do." She said, delivering me a small pat on the shoulder then turned and marched down the hall. I just watched her walk down the hall, still disbelieving he was ready. 

I didn't think it was such a good idea. 

"Am I really going to have breakfast with others?" The voice of my patient felt as if someone had dumped freezing water onto me. I almost jumped out my skin. 

"Y-yeah, if you're o-okay with that." I said, picturing the male sitting on the edge of his bed with messy hair and tired eyes, awoken by the sound of our conversation. 

There was a long pause in response, and I couldn't place why he would be so silent. Had he fallen back to sleep, was he surprised or doubtful. Maybe he was enraged... 

"Okay." He said calmly, then I heard the rustling of sheets which signaled that he had probably went back to bed. 

I gave a small nod, knowing he couldn't  see it anyway, and turned to continue my walk to may office. Taking a long drink from my frappe, I headed up the staircase and down the hall of doctors to my office. When I entered it and closed the door, I plopped myself down into my chair. 

It was now almost 5:20. 

I took a bite out of my chicken sandwich then opened up my laptop up and got to work. At the moment I was really just researching the many common phobias that plagued the human mind.


6:50 I started noticing that the coffee wasn't really helping me and began to slowly drift off to sleep. My sleep was interrupted by giggling and my eyes immediately flew open. By now the sun was starting to rise and light began to peek through the window in the room. I gave a small yawn, feeling myself being weighed down by the weight of slumber once more.

"A few minutes wouldn't hurt anyone." 

My eyes snapped shut. 

Giggle. Giggle. Giggle~ 

"Heather, get up." The blunt voice of Minx caused me to crack my eyes open. The lady with the purple streaked hair  had her hand placed on my shoulder as she talked to me. 

"It's 9:14, Wake up." 

"So?" I gave a tired yawn. 

"You said you was gonna bring Mark to the breakfast court." 

"Ung~ You came up here to make sure I did that?" 

"Yes." 

"Alright, I'm getting up." I huffed, dragging my head from the laptop. "Just let me get my clipboard." 

"Alright, meet me in the hall." 

When she had walked out of the office, I reached into the drawer for my clipboard and pen. I found my clipboard almost instantly, but I had to fish around for my pen. Eventually I did find my pen, but when I pulled it out of the drawer I was met with a surprise. 

The black ballpoint pen was piercing the chest of a doll. 

A squeak escaped me and  I dropped it back into my drawer, pen and all, and shut it. 

"Hey, Minx, you have a pen I can borrow?" I asked when I went out to go meet the women, closing my office door. 

"Don't you have one of your own?" She replied back. 

"I lost it."  

"Alright, here." She said, placing the red colored pen into my hand before we started off down the hall. The asylum was now busy, full of doctors who went to go retrieve their patients for breakfast. 

When we got to my patient's door Minx stated that she would meet me at the food court and walked off, leaving me to face this alone. 

This was gonna be a huge step forwards.....or backwards, depending on how this goes. 

I took a deep breath

"Mark?" I asked, placing my hand onto the door knob. "You ready to go?" 

"Yes, Doctor." He said immediately. 

I unlocked the door with a simple twist of my hand, and on the inside stood the man. He looked no different than when I last saw him, he was even wearing the same clothes. 

"Your hair is a mess." I bravely snorted, trying to start somewhat of a conversation. 

"Speak for yourself." He snorted back. 

We walked down to the breakfast court, me clenching the clipboard the whole trip while Mark kept quiet. We were given weird and frightened looks, which I chose to ignore. Mark, on the other hand, stared down some of the people that looked directly at him. 

When we arrived at the breakfast court, We picked a seat far off to the side. I wasn't any familiar to this than Mark was, seeing that I didn't usually eat with others, and did not want to sit anywhere I could draw attention to myself. So for a few minutes, when we had sat down, I fiddled with my clipboard, unsure of what to do. 

"Are you new?" I gazed upwards from the blank sheets of my clipboard to find myself staring at a man with a poker face mask on, and Felix, who was clenching a golden statue in his hands. 

"Uh, not really." I answered him, glancing over at my silent patient who was holding his gaze with the blonde. 

Without an invitation, he sat down across the table. His face turned to Felix, who also sat down with his statue clenched protectively in his hands. He was now glaring at Mark, who only stared at him with emotionless eyes.

His emotionless gaze then directed to the masked man then at me. I only stared back with a confused gaze before he reached out for my clipboard. It took me a moment to figure out that he just wanted to draw something and I let him take the clipboard along with the borrowed pen. 

"So, name?" I heard the poker faced man ask and I turned to him. 

"Eh...Heather, you?" 

"Just call me Cry." 

"Oh, well whats with the Ma-"

"Its a personal issue. Its nothing too serious." 

"Oh......your patient has a nice looking statue, is it real gold?" 

"Yeah. It's pretty valuable, but he won't let anyone else touch it. I'm even given limited access to it." 

Felix's glare had softened now, and he gave me a weird stare before turning back to his statue and started cooing at it. 

"So, are you gonna get breakfast?" He asked.

"Where do you even get the-" 

"Just follow me." 

"Okay, Mark, do you have anything specific you want?" I asked, turning to him as he doodled onto the paper something I couldn't really identify. 

"Cereal." He said in a callous voice, not looking up at me. 

Cry leaded me to the breakfast table, where everything was set out. There was a bunch of choices, but I just chose some yogurt and then I got a box of "Frosted Flakes" for Mark. Grabbing a bowl, a pint of milk and two spoons, I headed back over to the table to find Felix having some sort of fit. 

"Stephano is filthy now! Your dirty hands have touched him." He hissed at Mark, who barely granted the man eye contact as he sighed "I barely touched your sacred statue, my hand only grazed it while reaching for my pen." 

"Stephano is not an it and Stephano says that you wasn't  reaching for your pen. You was reaching for him." 

"Well, Stephano is wrong." Mark stated. 

The Swedish man gasped at that comment and was about to retort when he noticed me standing there and closed his mouth. 

"Uh.... Here's your cereal, Mark." I said cautiously, passing the breakfast items to him. He took them without a word and began to pour his cereal. 

I sat down and ate my yogurt silently until Cry came over with his and Felix's breakfast and started to stir up conversation again.

"Hey, you guys should be more active in some of the activities here. There's a free session today, and theres going to be a recreational room where there's gonna be drawing and stuff. You know, games-" 

"Games?.....What type of games?" Mark said, looking up now. 

"Board games, checkers-" 

"Any video games?" 

"A few." 

"Heather, can we go?" He asked, now turning towards me. 

I gave a light shrug and huffed "I don't see why not, what time is this?" 

"Right after lunch, at 1:00." Cry nodded.

"Yeah, I'm sure we'll be able to go." I nodded back. 

Cry turned towards Felix, who was leisurely eating the egg sandwich given to him. "Would you like to go the recreational room?" He asked.

The blonde eyed me warily then glared at Mark before turning to his doctor and giving a small shrug. Cry nodded again and continued eating. 

After breakfast I herded Mark back down the hallway to his room, avoiding many questions from curious doctors. 

"Oh! Can I get my clipboard back?" I asked, remembering he still had possession over the writing tools. He reluctantly handed me the board, and pen, and I tucked it under my shoulder. 

Arriving at the room, I kept my distant from it when I felt an unnatural feeling churn in my stomach. It felt almost unwelcoming and Mark didn't move to enter to room, so I sighed "I can't bring you with me, Mark. I have things to do. You'll have to stay in here until Lunch." 

Through his glasses, I hinted what appeared to be fear, before it was drowned out with the same emotionless look.

 "Bye.....Doctor." He said, giving a small nod in my direction before flicking the door open with a twist of his wrist and slipping into the room. Door closed, I fell the unease in my stomach worsen until I felt sick.  

Hobbling away, I ignored the feeling in my stomach as I dragged myself up to my office. With the time given to me, I might be able to catch up on my sleep. 
























 








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I've had this chapter for so long and I had no idea what to do with this. I liked it, but then I didn't like it. It was frustrating so, here ya go. :) 

I've got a bunch of mistakes don't I.
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I catch some of the references... like the Slender "Operator" symbol, and Daniel from Amnesia, as well as the other guy...