The Iron Tongue

My name is Evelyn Marsh, a paranormal investigator from Leeds. Last Tuesday, the 14th of October, I led an investigation into the abandoned St. Jude’s Hospital on the outskirts of the city. The hospital had been shut for decades, but locals whispered about the ‘Night Nurse’ who still wandered the corridors, rattling her trolley of pills long after the last patient had died.

My partner on this excursion was a skeptic named Tom Harker, a former paramedic who had seen too much to believe in ghosts but still insisted on coming along to ‘keep me grounded.’ We entered through the rusted emergency doors, our flashlights cutting through the thick air. The place smelled of mold and bleach, a nauseating combination that clung to the back of the throat.

Our first stop was the children’s ward on the third floor. The Ovilus I carried clicked to life, its screen flickering with random words. ‘Cold,’ it said. ‘Pain.’ I noted the temperature drop in the room, but Tom dismissed it as broken heating. He pointed to a corner where the floor was dark with water damage, but I felt a deeper chill settle around my ankles, as if something had brushed past me with icy fingers.

We moved to the maternity wing, where the most disturbing reports had come from: objects like empty bassinets and surgical tools had been found rearranged in patterns. Tom scoffed, but as we stepped inside, a stack of bedpans clattered to the floor behind us. We spun around, but the room was empty. Tom’s face paled slightly, but he muttered about rats and loose shelving.

I set up a camera in the hallway and began an EVP session. ‘Is anyone here with us?’ I asked. The Ovilus responded almost instantly: ‘Hush.’ A single word, spoken in a feminine tone that made my skin crawl. Tom shook his head. ‘It’s just a text-to-speech program,’ he said, but his voice wavered.

We proceeded to the old operating theater. The room was cavernous, with a large skylight that had long since been boarded over. In the center stood a rusted operating table surrounded by corroded trays of instruments. The moment we entered, the Ovilus went wild, spitting out words in rapid succession: ‘Nurse,’ ‘Medicine,’ ‘Drink.’ Then it fell silent.

Tom walked over to the table and ran a finger along its surface, coming away with a streak of dust. ‘This place is a dump,’ he said. ‘Nothing here but decay.’ But as he spoke, a cold breeze swept through the room, and I noticed my breath fogging in the air. The temperature dropped sharply.

I asked again, ‘Is there a spirit present? Can you show us a sign?’ For a moment, nothing happened. Then, the heavy door to the theater, which we had wedged open with a rubber stopper, creaked and began to swing shut. It moved with deliberate slowness, as if pushed by an unseen hand, until it clicked locked with a solid thud.

Tom rushed over and yanked the handle, but it wouldn’t budge. ‘It’s just the hinges,’ he said, but his voice was high-pitched. ‘Maybe the building shifted.’ I pointed out that there was no wind, no draft, and we were the only ones inside. He grew quiet, and for the first time, I saw genuine fear in his eyes.

As we struggled with the door, the Ovilus spoke again, its voice flat and robotic: ‘Tongue.’ I asked, ‘What about a tongue?’ But there was no reply. Instead, the sound of a gurney rolling across the linoleum echoed from the adjacent hallway, the wheels squeaking like hysterical laughter. We froze, listening. The sound grew louder, then stopped outside our door. A moment later, a guttural, hungry moan vibrated through the walls.

I demanded we try the fire escape, but Tom shook his head, pointing to the barred windows. ‘We’re trapped,’ he whispered. Then, the lights, which were long dead, flickered on for a split second, illuminating a figure at the far end of the theater: a tall, gaunt figure in a tattered nurse’s uniform, her face obscured by shadows, holding a metal tongue depressor that glinted in the brief light.

We stumbled backwards, and as the darkness reclaimed the room, we heard the clatter of the depressor hitting the floor. I fumbled for my flashlight, and when I aimed it at the spot, it was empty. But the door was now unsealed, hanging ajar. We fled down the stairs, not stopping until we burst out into the night air, gasping.

Later, reviewing the footage, we saw a white blur on the third floor, and the audio picked up a soft, rhythmic whisper that sounded like a lullaby twisted into something foul. Tom, for the first time in his career, admitted he could not explain the events. But the real horror came the next day, when I found a tongue depressor in my jacket pocket, stained with what looked like dried blood. On it, etched in crude scratches, was the word ‘Stay.’ I have not slept soundly since, and I am certain that the Night Nurse, with her iron tongue that probes and tastes, has marked me as her next patient. The hospital still stands, its dark windows like hollow eyes, and I know that some doors, once opened, cannot be closed again.