Stanley The Sleepless

   This is artwork for encounter #6 of the encounter short stories for my series Blackhaven Institution which is written below. The day Blackhaven Institution a house for orphaned children and unwanted infants burned to the ground mysteriously one day, the souls of those trapped inside became corrupted by an evil that warped them into demons that dwell in an alternate Blackhaven Institution.There they await those who are dragged into this alternate world by an unknown evil. The encounter with this nightmare “Stanley The Sleepless” takes place in the "Orphan Wing" as follows: 

In the south side of Dracove city exist the Dracove Correctional Center, a large towering prison that holds the most notorious criminals from the city and neighboring communities. This prison is an absolutely claustrophobic nightmare, with hardly any outdoor areas the inmates are trapped inside surrounded by artificial light constantly breathing the stagnant air of the indoors. The only glimpses of a world outside for inmates are when peeks of sunlight pass through heavy bared up windows in their cells, or when having to be transported in between buildings. Today is the day before the notorious murder Hubert Gallows is sentenced to the death. Hubert was sentenced for committing a truly horrific crime. One night he slaughtered the parents of a boy named Stanley Caldwell in a gruesome fashion. Stanley Caldwell survived, but being a witness to the ordeal he developed a severe trauma. The details of the crime scene were heinous and grisly enough to give Hubert the death penalty. After the crime was committed the boy Stanley was sent to Blackhaven Institution as an orphan as he had no close family to claimed him, tragically he perished in the fire that claimed the building. Other prisoners in Hubert's cell block would complain about hearing Hubert screaming in the night. He would wake up in a distraught state tormented by a recurring nightmare mumbling words such as “Ple...ple..please don't let it get me, don't let it get me!!!”. In this nightmare Hubert would be grabbed by long black arms, unable to escape from their grasp they would ravage his body, everything in these nightmares feeling so real. The day after he would always rant to his cellmates, asking them why the long black arms where out to get him. They would swiftly become annoyed after constantly hearing about it about every other day. Hubert soon had to be secluded from the rest of the prison population as he was beaten horribly by fellow inmates because his outbursts in the middle of the night disturbed their sleep.

It was the night before he would be put to death, Hubert huddled in the corner of his isolation cell was rocking back and forth. Constantly reminding himself not to fall asleep in short fast paced breaths,did this for hours in his cell. Paranoid yet at the same time excited to get through the night as he saw his death as a release from this miserable life and from the night terrors that haunted him. It was far past midnight as the anxious and nervous Hubert sat there still rocking in his cell, in anticipation of falling asleep, even just for a second. Staying up for days at a time it was evident by Hubert's exhausting expression that tonight he would fall succumb and fall asleep. He fought throughout the night, cutting himself with his own figure nails and smashing himself against the walls to keep himself awake. An ominous drowsy spell soon cast itself onto Hubert as he lost control of body and mind falling into a deep sleep. Though he didn't experience his usual reoccurring nightmare, a worse, graver nightmare has befallen him as Hubert Gallows is taken into the dimension of the alternate Blackhaven Institution... 

Wide-eyed and panting Hubert wakes up, startled, to anxiously observe his surroundings. The dimly lit room is in ruins, the walls are filthy and covered in black stains, toppled over chairs and clutter covers the floor, and the scent of smoke lingers throughout the room. Hubert trembles as he realizes this maybe the usual nightmare that torments him. Yet instead of taking place somewhere familiar to him he was in odd surroundings he has never before witnessed. He begins to pacing around the door trying to figure out what to do, soon breaking down a door on the far side of the room leading to room filled with filing cabinets. Hubert rips open filing cabinets filled with documents, most of them in a virtually unreadable condition. Opening a folder with the faded out words 'orphan files' Hubert dumps all of the worn pages, though one catches his eyes. Hubert drenched in sweat from his previous tirades reads the title of the file, it reads “Stanely Caldwell”. Huberts glues his eyes to a heavily faded picture of Stanely Caldwell, below that a worn sentence that reads “omitted to Blackhaven Institution...”. Hubert gasps in disbelief as the name sounds all to familiar. The paper suddenly catches on fire in his hands, Huberts throws the paper to the ground and begins sucking on his hand in pain from the burn. Something seems off about this nightmare he figures by now the long black arms would've got him yet nothing has happened yet. He runs out of the rooms into a hallway, soon finding himself in a lobby. He notices a large pair of door which looks like an exit, he bangs furiously on the doors, even trying to use nearby furniture to break it open but the doors do not even budge. Hubert stops as he hears a voice in his head, the voice of the child describing in detail about his nightmares. Hearing the child's voice talk about the long black arms Hubert becomes very anxious and starts banging on his head with his fists telling the voices to shut up. With a few bangs the child's voice only becomes louder, becoming louder and deeper Hubert frantically begins to smash his head against the wall to the point of blood running down from his forehead. Desperately he tries to find a way to kill himself as the child foreshadows a vision of the long black arms. Hubert breaks off a chair leg with the intentions of gouging himself in the neck with the jagged wood. Before he is able to do so suddenly the doors of the “Orphan Wing” fling open behind him. Hubert is knocked to the ground and is dragged through them by an invisible force.

Dragged down the hallway at an alarming pace a random door opens revealing horrible deformed dark faces while Hubert's body is flung side to side violently. It pauses for a moment as one of the beings jumps from a room onto Hubert. Hubert cringes in horror as the being just stares into his eyes and vomits blood all over his jumpsuit. The being soon hops off and scuttles back into the room as the door slams behind. Hubert is then continually dragged down the hallway until he is tossed randomly into and locked in one of the open rooms. Engraved into the floor in front of where he lands it reads “My first dream since....I see only see their corpses staring back at me...” The force weakens and Hubert struggles to stand back on his two feet. The furniture and all surroundings in the room fade into darkness, urine begins to stain Hubert's jumpsuit as nerves shake his entire body. An intense sense of dread is felt as he hears a creaking noise as well as sullen moans coming from the darkness in front of him. Hubert's bloodshot eyes widen to their limit,he digs his hands into his skull, screaming a terror at the top of his lungs as he witnesses the emergence of a true nightmare. Hubert is paralyzed as the monster approaches him, suspended in the air as two blackened elongated arms reach out to him. Accompanying this monster two eyeless pillows with frozen expressions of horror dripping with black liquid. The arms soon grab Hubert, drifting slowly back in the darkness as Hubert shouts, begs, and shudders in its tight grasp. Disappearing into the darkness this nightmare does unfathomable things to Hubert. Retribution through the horror of Blackhaven, the first of its kind... It may very well seem like the perfect punishment for someone as cold-hearted as Hubert, but this can be igniting the sparks of an evil, a corruption far greater than mans. With Huberts soul soon sinking into the depths of the alternate Blackhaven Institution...