Flicker

Mr. Black entered Leaf Wing with the hunched gait of a man carrying too much silence in his bones.

He’d just come from Cactus.

And it showed.

There was a rawness in his expression . . . quiet, tight-jawed . . . the kind of look a man wears after scrubbing trauma from tile grout. His sleeves were still faintly damp from the mess. His hands smelled like bleach and peroxide, no matter how many times he rinsed them.

He pushed his trolley down the corridor without ceremony, the wheels whining against the floor in protest. The familiar hum of Leaf Wing wrapped around him. A gentler soundscape than Cactus, but not by much. Here, at least, he knew the rhythms. The layout. The cracks in the linoleum he had to steer around.

His office sat near the end of the wing. A boxy little corner unit beside Elizabeth’s. Not glamorous, but it was his. A place where nothing bled.

He was nearly there when he saw it.

The puddle.

It stretched across the corridor in a lazy, indifferent smear. Yellowed and shallow, already beginning to dry at the edges. The sour tang of urine lifted into the air like a curtain.

“Brilliant,” he muttered.

He didn’t sigh. Mr. Black had passed the age of sighing. At some point, the world simply expected things to go wrong, and he’d learned to save his breath.

He parked his trolley just beside the offending puddle and reached for a caution sign. Yellow, plastic, “CAUTION: WET FLOOR” embossed in multilingual warnings. He placed one on either end of the trail, giving them a small kick with his boot to square them up. It was stupid, really. No one ever paid attention to the signs, yet it mattered. It was the ritual.

Only once the markers were down did he retrieve the mop.

A heavy-headed thing, with streaks of gray thread. The kind that left damp trails rather than cleaned them. He began with slow, circular passes, coaxing the urine into the centre of the spill.

Above him, something clicked.

The light.

One of the square LEDs in the ceiling grid switched off without warning . . . dead in a blink.

Mr. Black paused mid-sweep, frowning up at the panel. A faint hum lingered in the air. The aftertaste of electricity.

“Oh, come on,” he muttered. “You’re joking.”

Another light gone. He’d replaced two already this week..

He stared at it.

Waited.

It stayed off.

For a moment, he debated getting the stepladder. But just as he reached toward the trolley.

Click

The light came back on. No fanfare. No reason. It simply decided to return.

Mr. Black kept his eyes on it for a long, quiet moment, daring it to try that again.

It didn’t.

“Right,” he said under his breath, dragging the mop forward again.

He finished the job in silence, swapping the wet mop for the dry one and gliding over the linoleum until it gleamed under the fresh light. Once satisfied, he bent to collect the caution signs, stacking them one atop the other with a quiet clack.

That’s when he heard it.

A voice.

It had come from a room beside him . . . door ajar.

“That gobshite again? I’d rather get fingered by a leper.”

Mr. Black paused, one boot still planted near his trolley.

Television Room 5. The lights inside were dim, the glow of the screen washing softly across the walls. There were a dozen of these rooms scattered through Leaf Wing. Sunny Meadow’s answer to communal conflict was simple: more televisions, fewer arguments over what to watch.

He took a half-step toward the open door and leaned just far enough to peek inside.

Mrs. Baldwin.

Wrapped in a knitted pink cardigan that looked like it belonged on a biscuit tin, she sat perched in one of the room’s vinyl armchairs, legs crossed like a lady . . . tongue sharp as broken glass. She looked every inch the frail old darling . . . until she opened her mouth. Which she often did.

Mr. Black gave her a brief nod.

“Afternoon, Mrs. Baldwin.”

She didn’t turn. Just sniffed and added under her breath, “Waste of skin, that one. Bet he dyes his gums.”

He turned toward the wall-mounted TV.

And there was Ozzy Ox, larger than life. The gaudy OzOx logo plastered behind him in high-gloss vinyl. Sports supplements stacked like trophies. The man himself in a branded gym vest, muscles greased, grin polished.

Ozzy had won another match, apparently. Another belt. Another ceremony.

The interviewer asked what came next.

Ozzy said something about empire-building.

Mr. Black rolled his eyes and turned to leave.

But that’s when he noticed it.

Mr. Omnia. Standing in the middle of the room, alone. He wasn’t watching the screen.

His head tilted upward . . . slowly, unnervingly . . . as if tracking something on the ceiling.

A fly?

No . . . there was no twitchiness to it. No reflexive jerking.

His eyes drifted, slow and deliberate, following an invisible path across the ceiling, then the wall. Mr. Black watched from the hallway, caution sign still in hand.

The light nearest Mr. Omnia flickered. And went out.

Mr. Omnia’s gaze moved past it. The light snapped back on.

Mr. Black narrowed his eyes.

Again, Mr. Omnia shifted his body, gaze trailing to the next wall light. It blinked once, dimmed, then extinguished.

When his eyes passed over it . . . it returned.

Twice more this happened, always in the same rhythm. As though something in the act of being observed was wilting beneath it.

Then . . . Mr. Omnia’s gaze found the television. The image warped. Not a flicker, not a channel change, but a stretch. The screen bulged outward as though something inside it were pressing against the glass. A distortion bloomed from the centre, pulling the image of Ozzy Ox into something monstrous. His face warping into elongated fragments before snapping back to normal as Mr. Omnia’s gaze moved on.

He turned in a full circle. And came to a stop. Staring straight at Mr. Black.

Mr. Black didn’t move. The caution sign remained frozen in his grip, one hand halfway to the trolley.

The light directly behind him . . . clicked off.

The hairs on Mr. Black’s arms rose. He turned quickly, staring up at the panel, waiting.

A low buzz. A hum. Then the light returned.

He exhaled through his nose and turned back toward the room . . . Mr. Omnia was gone from the centre of the floor. He was in the doorway. Inches away. Breathing heavily.

Mr. Omnia looked awful. Not monstrous . . .just . . . hollowed out. His skin had that drawn, pale tone of someone who hadn’t slept in days. His clothes hung awkwardly on his frame, looser than usual, as though he’d lost weight he couldn’t afford to spare.

Dark crescents curved beneath his eyes. His hair was uncombed, matted slightly at the back from where he’d probably passed out upright in a chair . . . or hadn’t passed out at all.

He stared directly at Mr. Black . . . and lifted one trembling arm. Then he extended his index finger. It pointed down the corridor. Toward the far end of Leaf Wing. Toward the last set of double doors.

“They don’t like him talking to her,” Mr. Omnia whispered.

His voice cracked . . .hoarse, like a man who’d been shouting in his sleep or whispering to walls.

Mr. Black blinked.

“What… who don’t… what?” he stammered, the words tangled and clumsy on his tongue.

Mr. Omnia didn’t blink. He looked like a man walking through his own nightmare.

“The wall people.”

Mr. Black felt a slow chill creep up his back. Still, he said nothing.

“Cactus patient,” Mr. Omnia muttered. “with Dr. Malone.”

There was no sarcasm. No confusion. Just quiet urgency, stretched thin over fear.

Mr. Black looked down the corridor. Then back at Omnia. Then again to the double doors at the end.

“Go,” Mr. Omnia whispered. Then louder . . . “NOW!”

The word cracked like a command, too sharp for a man that looked so worn.

Mr. Black moved.

The caution sign dropped from his hand with a hollow clatter, spinning once before landing face down.

He ran. Boots slipping slightly on the floor he’d just dried. His own work biting back. One hand dove into his pocket, ripping free the lanyard. The ID card flapped in his fist like a loose feather as he sprinted. He didn’t look back. Only forward. Toward Elizabeth. Toward whatever the hell had just woken up behind those doors.