Echoes

**The Hospital of Lingering Shadows**

The hospital stood silent, forgotten by time. Its windows, now shattered, gazed out like dead eyes into the surrounding mist, where the trees bent unnaturally, as if bowing to some unseen terror. Rumors had spread for decades about the place—a facility once used for medical experiments long buried by history. No one entered the building willingly. Not anymore.

Sarah, however, was drawn to it. A fascination, perhaps an obsession, with the stories of strange happenings within its rotting walls had brought her to the front door. She hesitated only a moment before stepping inside.

The air was thick with an unnatural chill, and as soon as the door creaked shut behind her, she felt the weight of the place settle over her. It was as though the very walls were watching her every move. The stale scent of antiseptic hung in the air, mixed with something else—something rancid, that turned her stomach with every breath.

Her flashlight flickered to life, casting long, erratic shadows across the peeling walls. Every inch of the building seemed to hum with tension, like a predator waiting for its prey to step closer. She had only gone a few feet inside when she heard it—a soft, barely perceptible *click*—like the sound of a door unlocking.

Sarah paused, listening intently. She swept her flashlight across the hall, but nothing moved. The silence that followed was deafening, the kind of silence that pressed against her ears, making her feel as though something was breathing just behind her.

She turned sharply, heart racing, but found nothing. Just the empty hall stretching endlessly in both directions. Yet, something wasn’t right. The air itself seemed to shift, growing denser, more oppressive. And then came the sound—soft footsteps, echoing faintly in the distance.

There was no one else here.

She swallowed hard, her breath quickening. The footsteps grew louder, but they didn’t follow any natural pattern—some were slow, deliberate, while others were fast, frantic, as if something was running. She couldn't tell from where they were coming. They seemed to circle her, closing in from all directions, but the hall remained empty.

The doors lining the hallway began to creak open—one by one—each revealing nothing but dark, hollow rooms. But Sarah knew better. She could feel it. **Something was in those rooms, watching her.**

Her flashlight flickered again, the beam growing dimmer. The temperature plummeted, and she could see her breath fogging the air in front of her. Just as she turned to leave, the doors slammed shut with a violent bang, all at once, sending a shudder through the entire building.

Sarah’s heart pounded in her chest as she stumbled backward, her hand brushing the icy-cold wall. A loud *crack* echoed through the corridor as a lightbulb burst above her, raining down shards of glass. Panic welled in her throat, but before she could move, the hallway lights began to flicker erratically. In the brief flashes of light, she caught glimpses of figures—blurred, indistinct—at the edge of her vision. They were there, and then gone.

The sound of metal scraping against the floor reverberated down the hall. Slowly, inexorably, the sound grew louder, drawing closer with each second. Sarah’s breath hitched as her flashlight blinked out, plunging her into complete darkness. She could hear it now—right behind her—the soft scraping of something sharp dragging across the floor.

She froze, too terrified to turn around, but the sound grew louder, now accompanied by shallow, labored breathing. Cold sweat dripped down her back as she felt the pressure of something—or someone—hovering just inches behind her. Her skin prickled with the sensation of being watched, of unseen eyes tracing every movement, every breath.

Summoning every ounce of courage, she spun around. Her heart dropped. **Nothing**. But the air was colder, heavier. The sense of presence was undeniable.

Suddenly, the floor beneath her began to vibrate softly, like a pulse, as if the building itself were alive. The walls creaked and groaned as the hallway seemed to stretch, elongating into an impossible distance. The far end of the corridor flickered in and out of sight, warped by an unseen force.

The silence was broken by a woman’s voice—a soft, broken whisper, calling her name from the darkness. "Sarah…" The voice echoed, disembodied, coming from everywhere and nowhere at once.

Her legs threatened to give out as the sound grew louder, more insistent, until it was all she could hear, the walls themselves chanting her name in a haunting chorus. The temperature dropped again, and icy fingers seemed to brush against her arm. She gasped, recoiling, but saw only empty air.

Then, without warning, the hallway doors burst open again, but this time they revealed more than darkness. Inside the rooms, the furniture had moved—beds were overturned, chairs placed in odd angles as if they had been violently tossed about. And in each room, the faint outline of something flickered—shapes barely visible, like imprints of terrible things that had happened long ago.

The whispers grew frantic now, unintelligible, overlapping, filling her head until she could hardly think. She stumbled backward, desperate to escape, her footsteps heavy on the cold tile floor. But as she neared the exit, the building seemed to shift, blocking her path. **She wasn’t getting out.**

The last thing Sarah saw before the lights went out for good was her reflection in the glass door. But something was wrong. **It wasn’t her face staring back.**

The hospital had claimed her, as it had claimed so many before. And from the outside, it stood silent once more, waiting for the next to wander in.

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