I Clean Gods to Pay the Rent

0013 A Sharp Turn for the Worse

    Fresh off earning his new badge, Cassius split from the bandaged woman and, without a moment's rest, hauled the "sniper rifle" at a run into the department store diagonally opposite the hospital, making a beeline for the shooting spot he'd picked out — while across the road, Bellfounder Memorial Hospital had already turned into a picture straight out of hell.

    In the ground-floor lobby, which should have been buzzing with foot traffic, most of the crowd had been swallowed down into the cold tile. The patients, too weak to move, didn't have a prayer of pulling themselves free — all they could do was thrust their arms helplessly up toward the ceiling.

    Look anywhere you liked, and the whole lobby seemed like concrete mixed through with countless people writhing and struggling in agony — arms shot up desperately on every side, jutting out at every height, groping and clenching without stop. It was a living fresco of hell.

    Perhaps because of the carpeting — no direct contact with the tile — the intensive care ward on the fourth floor was faring a little better. The patients inside hadn't been swallowed yet.

    But one look at the corridor outside, and nobody in there, patient or nurse, dared set a single toe past the line. Everyone was terrified that the moment they stepped beyond the carpet's "protection," they'd end up like the patients out in the hallway — buried alive under the floor tile!

    This couldn't go on!

    Glancing at the patients sinking ever deeper into the corridor floor, the older nurse swept an anxious look around the room — and when her eyes landed on the window, they lit right up:

    "The window! We can go out through the window!"

    "Right! Right! We could even jump!"

    At that, the young nurse with the skin torn off her right hand shuddered all over, as though some mysterious power had just been poured into her, stood straight up off the carpet, and declared, manic with excitement:

    "It's only the fourth floor! Land lucky and a fall like that doesn't have to kill you!"

    "Wait... cough, cough! Wait! Nobody has to jump!"

    Hearing that, Mira propped herself up in her hospital bed and hurriedly cut in:

    "Sheets, curtains... cough, cough... the fabric off the sofa! Tie them all together, then lash the end to something sturdy and..."

    And down everyone could climb, safe and sound!

    "I'll do it!"

    The young nurse grasped her meaning instantly and was over the moon. Paying no mind to her injured right hand, she ripped the curtains down with two sharp yanks, then dashed to the bedside three steps at a time and hauled the still-coughing girl clean off the bed, rough as could be.

    "What are you doing?!"

    Completely blindsided, the older nurse hurried to catch Mira before she could stumble, then rounded on the young nurse with a glare:

    "She's sick! And if she hadn't stopped you, you'd have jumped by now!"

    "I... I just want us all to get out faster!"

    She seemed to know she'd gone too far, but the freakish scene outside had clearly rattled her loose. As she knotted the sheets onto the curtains with a bloody hand, she babbled:

    "I... I'm getting married next month! I don't want to die! It's... it's awful! This... this is awful! This has to be a demon's bewitchment! There's no way I'm dying in here!"

    "Wait! Don't go down yet!"

    The older nurse saw that she'd tied one end of the "rope" to the corner cabinet bolted to the wall, thrown the other end out the window, and was about to leave — and burst out in a panic:

    "There's still a patient here! This girl is gravely ill! She doesn't have the strength to hang onto a curtain! We lower her down first, then we go!"

    "Why should I ca— ...ah, no, wait!"

    Under the older nurse's glare — apparently remembering that once she was down, the people upstairs were perfectly capable of untying the "escape rope" — the young nurse's rather vicious expression flipped on the spot, and she forced out an awkward smile:

    "I mean... my hand hurts, and I'm scared I'd lose my grip on her... Look! Don't you worry! The second I'm down, I'll find help and send them straight back up for you!"

    And with that, before the other two could so much as react, the young nurse grabbed the curtain — now smeared with bloody handprints — scrambled out the window, and began lowering herself down, inch by inch.

    "..."

    That little bastard!

    Watching her colleague abandon them without a second's hesitation, the older nurse ground out a silent curse, then walked the coughing Mira to the window and soothed her gently:

    "Don't worry about her leaving, sweetheart. Now listen close — I'll tie one end of the curtain around your waist and lower you down bit by bit. Grab hold of anything that juts out of the wall, and mind you don't just—"

    "AAAHHH!!!"

    Right then, a scream packed with raw panic tore through the window. The older nurse flinched, then leaned out — and discovered, to her utter horror, that the young nurse who'd just gone down was jammed into the outer wall at the second floor!

    No — not jammed. Just like the patients out in the corridor, she was being swallowed whole into the hospital's outer wall!

    "Help... help me! HELP!"

    And how was she supposed to do that? Last time I could still haul you back. This time, I've got nothing left...

    One look at the terror on her colleague's face down below, and the older nurse let out a long, long sigh, a deep and genuine despair welling up in her eyes.

    If the hospital's outer walls "ate people" too, then this last way out was as good as bricked up. What now — actually jump? Even if she herself could gamble, jump, and see whether the fall killed her, what about that kindhearted girl who was still sick?

    ...

    "Knock, knock, knock."

    Just as the two of them had run completely out of options, someone rapped on the intensive care ward's glass door.

    "You're Mira, right?"

    After one more glance at the plate by the door, the bandaged woman's gaze locked instantly onto the sickly-looking girl, and she strode briskly over, spare with words:

    "I work with your brother. I'm here to get you out."

    Her brother?!

    At the bandaged woman's words, the anxiety on Mira's face loosened its grip.

    Thank goodness — if she could come rescue her, that meant her brother had to be safe! Although... why was her brother's coworker dressed so strangely?

    Sizing up the tall woman wrapped head to toe in bandages, an odd mask covering her face, Mira clutched the middle-aged nurse's hand and asked, treading carefully:

    "Excuse me... um... ma'am! If it's at all possible, could you get her out too? If she hadn't been looking after me, then..."

    "I can."

    One glance at the middle-aged nurse — hope written all over her face too — and the bandaged woman didn't waste a syllable. She nodded, led the two of them to the window, and then...

    "Hm?"

    Catching sight of the young nurse already half "swallowed" into the outer wall, the bandaged woman's brow creased, and she turned back to ask:

    "Is she with you? Should I save her?"

    Hearing that this strange woman in the black mask might actually be able to save her, the young nurse in the wall lit up like sunrise, eyes all but begging:

    "Yes! Yes, we're together! Quick... quick, back me up here! Say something! Please say something!"

    Meeting the young nurse's pleading eyes, the middle-aged nurse — still fuming at being left behind — sighed and had just opened her mouth when she felt her hand squeezed, hard.

    "No!"

    To the middle-aged nurse's astonishment, the girl — so kindhearted before, so willing to let a patient shelter in her own room at real risk to herself — shook her head and denied it without a flicker of hesitation.

    "She's the one who tried to abandon us and save herself. If saving her is no trouble, then by all means, please pull her out too. But if saving her is dangerous, then forget her — just get this kind lady beside me out safely."

    "Mm. Understood."

    Taking one more look at the girl — calm, rational, and perfectly organized even in the middle of something this freakish — the bandaged woman smiled and nodded. She drew the curtain over from the window, lashed it around the middle-aged nurse, then gripped the window frame and thrust her arms outside.

    Under the stunned stares of the three other women, this mysterious bandaged creature — built like nothing that should legally be a person — lowered the middle-aged nurse, easily a hundred pounds if she was an ounce, in one smooth, level "hoist," nothing but pure arm strength, never so much as touching the wall.

    After one glance back into the room, the bandaged woman unwound the bandages from her wrist, wrapped up the medicines from the nightstand, and bound them to the IV stand — then gathered up the whole assembly, wide-eyed Mira and all, and carried her out the window.

    "Go find your brother!"

    As she lowered Mira down bit by bit, the bandaged woman leaned out and called softly:

    "He's perfectly safe. He's just across the—"

    "BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!"

    Four blasts, nearly on top of each other, swallowed the rest of her sentence. The corner cabinet anchoring the curtain jumped — and all four bolts lodged in the wall tore loose at once!

    Over the middle-aged nurse's hysterical shrieking, Mira dropped — and the three-hundred-plus-pound metal corner cabinet, riding the curtain's makeshift escape rope, came thundering down toward the bandaged woman's back!