VOL 1. A collection of bizarre stories

Nurse Andrews

The institution for holding inmates deemed unfit for social life was named Hickory Dickory Dock.

As the sound of her footsteps grew closer, there was an immediate desire to be anywhere but near Greta Andrews.

She was a tall, heavy woman, and her six-foot eight-inch body towered over the unfortunate residents of Hickory in 1966.

Every morning, Ms. Andrews would enter the psychiatric ward to distribute muffins. Her imposing presence made even the toughest patients uneasy in their damp, cold, and dark rooms.

Maggie Magpie, who was twenty-one, was wandering the hall when Greta grabbed her by the neck and said, "I didn't say I wanted to see you. I don't want your darn muffins." Greta lifted Maggie two feet off the ground. "Are you going to eat my muffins?" Greta asked. She then squeezed both of her puffy fists into her eye sockets, which made an unusual squishy sound. When she dropped Maggie, she ran hysterically in shock until her body hit the floor at the end of the hall with a thump. Despite her fall, Greta continued moving forward. The smell of blood was all around, and some was dripping from the ceiling. Now, with Maggie gone, Greta wiped the blood from her hands and fingers.

You could see where the blood had begun to coagulate. "We should have waited," Greta said to herself. She waited for a while, and there were odd gusts of wind coming from the upstairs window. "What are you eating?" asked the tall woman. "A muffin," the boy exclaimed. "It's too hot to argue." The putrid smell emanating from the boy was overwhelming. "It has started to rain," Greta sighed. "I love days like this - just the sound of raindrops on branches, soft thunderclaps, and the feeling of wetness." She liked the way nature looked when it was wet, which is strange coming from a woman who had just demolished Maggie moments earlier.

The sub-zero temperatures were no longer hospitable in the evening, as Squeezeball, the kid living in the east wing, found out. He wouldn't be squeezing any balls anytime soon because his hands had frozen off after getting lost in the frosty pine forest not too far from Hickory. He was eventually found, but by that time it was too late. He had passed stage three.

When frostbite sets in, the cold seeps around the fingers causing them to crystallize. There is nothing you can do. One of Dr. Tsunami's female surgeons had to perform an amputation. Greta Andrews never realized the horror of frostbite. Sadly, this was not the first time that people from Hickory got lost out there.

The water could still be heard pounding hard against the seawall. It is uncertain how the fire broke out that night, but Keepup rushed out of the blazing hospital where almost an entire side was engulfed in flames.

The sirens were now masking the sounds of the angry currents hitting several boats in the harbor, breaking apart the ice and smashing a small boat against the wall, sinking it. As the fire truck arrived, about a dozen men jumped out and started preparing to enter the building. "They're in there, sir! They're stuck on the ninth floor," Keepup stammered to a man with a gruff, trimmed dark brown beard and heavy brows. He pointed to where they were.

"Okay, sir! How many are there?"

"There are many. I don't know. You have to hurry!"

"Here, take this blanket and breathe in some oxygen. We'll get your friends out of there."

"Thank you, sir!"

Eight men went in, but only one came out.

"What happened in there, Rodriguez?" said Lieutenant M. Allen.

"Their all dead."

"What do you mean, they're all dead?" Rodriguez slumped onto the lieutenant's shoulder. "Rodriguez, speak to me, goddammit!" Allen slapped him to keep him from passing out. It was hopeless. Some first-year firefighters walked up. "Men, get him out of here..." "...And go find that scrawny man who was here too," but Keepup had gone. Allen assembled another group of men to enter the inferno.