The light bulb above the reception nurse flickered once before returning to normal. At first, neither the nurse nor the patients waiting nearby paid much attention to it. Hospitals were old buildings, and electrical faults were common enough to ignore.
However, within the next few seconds the disturbance began spreading throughout the entire building. The lights above the reception counter flashed repeatedly, the bulbs lining the long corridors dimmed and brightened without warning, and one after another every light inside the hospital started behaving strangely, as though an unseen pulse had begun travelling through the electrical system.
While everyone below remained confused by the sudden malfunction, the true source of the disturbance was one floor above them, inside a private laboratory where Genido continued working completely unaware of what was about to unfold.
Genido sat quietly before a microscope, one eye pressed firmly against the lens while the other remained tightly closed. The laboratory around him was silent except for the faint humming of electrical equipment surrounding the workstation. For a brief instant, the image beneath the microscope suddenly darkened before becoming clear again. Genido immediately noticed the irregularity.
He slowly lifted his head from the eyepiece and looked towards the ceiling where the fluorescent lights had begun flickering repeatedly. His expression changed almost instantly. Something was wrong. Without wasting another second, he pushed his chair backwards and stepped away from the workstation, allowing instinct to guide him towards the concealed entrance positioned along the left side of the laboratory. Behind a large wooden cupboard rested the hidden room that very few people even knew existed.
He walked directly towards the cupboard, intending to slide it aside himself. Before his fingers could reach its surface, the heavy structure shuddered violently. Genido froze midway, watching silently as the cupboard scraped across the floor on its own. The movement was slow, unnatural and completely impossible. Within moments the hidden laboratory revealed itself without anyone touching the mechanism. Genido remained standing where he was.
Something inside that room had changed. He could not explain why, but the sensation was powerful enough to make his body hesitate. For several long seconds he simply stared into the darkness beyond the opening while his curiosity steadily overcame his caution. Eventually, unable to ignore the feeling any longer, he stepped inside.
The switches remained fixed to the right-hand wall exactly where they had always been. Without taking his eyes away from the laboratory tables ahead, Genido stretched his hand towards them and pressed the switches. The bulbs illuminated brightly for a brief moment before fading into a weak yellow glow. As the room gradually became visible, Genido immediately realised something was terribly different.
The concrete walls had darkened completely, their surfaces stained by the same unnatural blackness he had witnessed inside the washroom earlier that day. The phenomenon had spread here as well. Before he could process that discovery, a faint crimson glow emerged between the three laboratory tables. Initially it remained weak, hovering close to the centre of the room like a dying ember. Then, almost imperceptibly, the glow shifted from its original position. At the same time, the glass bottles resting across the tables began trembling ever so slightly.
Genido stood completely still. His widened eyes followed the movement of the red light as it settled beneath seven separate glass containers. Unlike before, the glow intensified rapidly, becoming brilliantly crimson within seconds. A perfect circle formed beneath the bottles before climbing upward like liquid fire wrapping itself around every one of the seven containers. The laboratory itself seemed to vibrate faintly as metallic instruments rattled against the tables. Genido immediately understood what was happening. A quiet whisper escaped his lips before he could stop himself.
"No..."
The red light continued growing brighter. It climbed higher around the bottles while the trembling became increasingly violent. Genido suddenly rushed forward, his footsteps echoing sharply throughout the laboratory as he reached desperately towards the nearest container. The bottles shook harder with every passing second while the crimson glow rose almost to the ceiling. His fingers came within inches of the glass. Just a little further...
Then everything disappeared.
A blinding flash swallowed the room. Instantly the laboratory was consumed by complete darkness. Genido stopped exactly where he stood, his arm still stretched into empty air as though frozen in time. For several long seconds nothing existed except silence. Gradually the ordinary ceiling lights began returning, one after another, until the laboratory slowly emerged from the darkness once again. Genido lowered his arm and drew an uneven breath before looking towards the three tables standing before him.
They were no longer the same.
He stepped closer, inspecting the first table, then the second, then the third. His eyes searched frantically across every surface. Several bottles still remained exactly where they should have been. Others did not. He counted them once. Then again, refusing to believe the result. Only five glass containers remained inside the hidden laboratory. The other seven had vanished completely. They had not shattered.
They had not melted. There were no fragments scattered across the floor. They were simply... gone. Genido stood motionless between the three tables, staring at the empty spaces where they had rested only moments earlier. The crimson light had disappeared. The trembling had ceased. The laboratory had fallen silent once more.
Yet somewhere deep inside, he understood a truth that terrified even him. The red phenomenon had not destroyed the bottles. It had taken them somewhere else. And wherever those seven containers had gone, something had already begun.