The hallway was dark and stifling. The only direction they could move was forward.
An still led the way, but he moved slower now, more cautiously. The faint moonlight from the main hall had completely vanished behind the solid concrete wall. Now, the darkness was absolute. The only light flickering was from Thanh's phone. The battery was only at 11%, and the light from his lock screen (a blurry family photo) was barely enough to illuminate a few meters ahead.
Khue walked right behind An, trying to step exactly where An had trodden. Thanh was third, and Son walked last, constantly glancing behind him, as if afraid the wall would move again.
No one spoke. The space was filled only with the faint scraping of their steps on broken tile, their suppressed breathing, and Thanh's continuous, whimpering sniffles.
"I want to go home... I want to go home..." He repeated it like a meaningless mantra.
"Shut up, old man!" Son snapped from the rear. "You want 'that thing' to know exactly where we are?"
"Thanh, Son." An's voice cut through, sharp and cold. "Silence. Both of you."
An stopped. Thanh's phone light swept across a wooden door. It was the only door in this corridor that wasn't locked or nailed shut. On the door was a peeling decal of the sun and moon.
An raised a hand, signaling everyone to halt. He pressed his ear against the door.
Nothing.
He carefully turned the doorknob. It made a small c-crack sound. The door was unlocked.
He took a breath. Using his shoulder, he pushed the door gently open. It swung open with a long, drawn-out groan.
The smell.
A sharp, sour, sickly sweet odor rushed out, hitting them directly. It smelled like spoiled milk and... and like crayon wax.
An swept the weak phone light inside. It was a children's common room. Small plastic tables and chairs, an overturned wooden rocking horse, and a blackboard.
But what stunned them were the walls.
The walls, from floor level up to an adult's eye level, were densely covered with crayon drawings. Hundreds of pictures, layered on top of each other, a sickly bright, chaotic mess of color.
"Close the door." An commanded. "Son, block it."
Son backed up, used a small stool nearby to wedge against the doorknob, and leaned his body against it.
An raised the phone higher, trying to sweep the room. "Khue, check for windows or another exit."
"No... there aren't any." Khue whispered. "It's an internal room. No windows."
An muttered. "Safe. At least safer than the hallway."
Khue didn't feel safe. She was completely drawn into the drawings. An and Son worried about exits and physical threats, but Khue only saw the scrawled handwriting. It wasn't a coincidence. There had to be a pattern. She backed up, beginning to scan the wall sections.
She counted. There were too many pictures. Twenty-three pictures featured the Nurse. At least fifteen different styles, indicating multiple children's work. But they all did one thing: They erased the face. The face was erased... A chill ran through her. She recalled an old case study on abuse. Victims refuse to draw the abuser's eyes. Because, in their memory, the eyes were the last thing they saw before the trauma.
This cold truth spurred Khue's adrenaline. She moved faster, looking for a physical clue.
Khue moved to the last drawing. This one was different. The lines were neater, like an older child's work. The Nurse still had no face. But underneath, a line was scrawled frantically in red crayon, pressed so hard it tore the paper:
"IF YOU LOOK IN HER EYES, SHE WILL FIND YOU"
Khue felt the blood in her body solidify. It was no longer speculation. This was evidence. The dying plea of a dead child. She had found the rule.
"An, Son. Thanh. Everyone, look here!" Khue spoke up, her voice now sharp and decisive.
She pointed to the drawing. "This is the rule. Dozens of pictures, all erasing her face. This writing is the warning. If we see her, do not look at her face. She uses her eyes to find us."
An looked at Khue, then at the crimson inscription. He trusted the cold certainty in her eyes.
Meanwhile, Son didn't care about the inscription. His eyes, the eyes of an artist, were drawn to something else. A nearly full box of crayons lying on the table.
He picked up a red crayon. It was cold. Strangely cold. He ran it across a blank patch of the wall.
The crayon snapped in half. It left no mark whatsoever. As if the wall had simply rejected the color. Son shuddered. He stepped back, looking at the drawing where the child had pressed the crayon so hard it tore the paper over the Nurse's face. The anger. The fear. He understood that emotion.
He looked down at his hands. Since arriving here, the two things he relied on most—his Zippo and his ability to create color—had both been stolen from him. He felt like a knife that had lost its blade. Useless. No fucking way. Even this place is fighting me. He quickly threw the two crayon pieces away.
"Listen to me." An said, his voice firm. He looked squarely at the other three. "We are not a team. But we are going to cooperate."
He pointed to Khue. "Khue, from now on, you assess the environment. You find the rules, you find the clues. That is your role."
He looked at Son. "Son, you're sensitive to your surroundings. You take the rear, you're on watch. We need eyes in the back."
He looked at Thanh. "Thanh, you walk in the middle, stick close to Khue."
"Understood?" An asked. Khue nodded. Son reluctantly answered, "Understood."
"The smell... the smell of milk..." Thanh suddenly mumbled, his eyes distant. He was staring at the wall at the end of the room, where there was a small cabinet door, the kind used for cleaning supplies. "It... it smells like it's in there..."
"Where, Thanh?" Khue immediately asked, moving closer. She looked into his eyes. "What do you see?"
"It's... a nest. Where they wait. Where the smell of sweet, spoiled milk is..." Thanh said, and he began to walk like a sleepwalker, heading towards the cabinet.
"Thanh?" An called, recognizing the vacant look in his eyes.
An looked at the cabinet door. It was flush with a newly bricked wall. New brick. No signs of wear. Absurd. An shivered. This wasn't a wall. This was a gateway.
"Thanh, don't open it!" Khue screamed.
"Stay away from him!" An ordered. He knew this was a trap. He lunged toward the cabinet door.
But Thanh was faster. He opened the cabinet door.
Inside was absolute, thick darkness, deeper than the hallway.
Thanh looked into that darkness, and for the first time since they arrived, he smiled. "Finally... I can go home..."
He stepped inside.
"No!" An roared. He had been too slow once. He would not be slow again.
An lunged, grabbed Thanh by the collar, and hauled him backward out of the threshold with all his strength.
Thanh resisted, fighting wildly. "No! Help me! Help me!"
An was not a businessman. He was an architect, a man used to dealing with dead weight. He dragged Thanh, sending him sprawling to the floor.
An planted his knee firmly on Thanh's chest, his hand locking the cabinet door and slamming it shut with a dry THUD. He heard a faint hiss from within.
Thanh stopped struggling. He lay there, panting, eyes still fixed on the cabinet.
"The smell... the smell of milk... It touched me..." Thanh mumbled, not looking at An. "She... she's calling me..."
An looked at Khue and Son. He was alive, but he was damaged.