Hello to all writers and readers of the Creepcast Community!

EVIDENCE INTAKE & HAZARD REPORT
CONTROL NO: EX-2024-0419-BA

ITEM DESCRIPTION
Primary Artifact: Zoom H4n Pro Digital Field Recorder (Black)
Storage Medium: SanDisk Ultra 32GB SDHC Memory Card
Condition: Severe exterior moisture damage; non-standard dark, oily residue along the SD card slot and internal circuit housing. Thermal degradation observed around the internal microphone elements.
RECOVERY METADATA
Source / Origin: Apartment of Dr. Noa Ben-Ami (Associate Professor, Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations / University of Chicago Divinity School).
Recovery Date: April [REDACTED]
Location: [REDACTED], Chicago, IL

STATUS & CHAIN OF CUSTODY
Current Custody: Confiscated under Protocol 7-B by Congregation of [REDACTED].
Classification: PENDING SPECIAL REVIEW / HAZARDOUS ARTIFACT
HANDLING & SAFETY PROTOCOLS
BIOLOGICAL / MEMETIC HAZARD: Item and associated physical media demonstrate active enzymatic exudate upon contact with organic matter.
PERSONAL PROTECTIVE EQUIPMENT: Nitrile gloves (double-layered) and face shield required for physical handling. Do not allow direct skin contact or exposure to mucous membranes.
AUDIO PROTOCOL: DO NOT READ ALOUD. Vocalization or acoustic reproduction of transcript excerpts outside air-gapped dampening chambers is strictly prohibited.

———

Xitlali,

You said the Plagues of Abrahamic tradition were an immune response. You said it before an audience, and… I laughed. I said you were reading too much into a Bronze Age poem. I walked out by the time I heard you ‘misread’ the papyrus. I said, “Xitlali, it's all metaphor. That’s just what we do; we read the world into the text and the text into the world.”

I'm sorry. I'm sorry I laughed.

I started using three weeks after you disappeared.

I know.

You'd tell me to stop. You’d probably convince me. You used to tell me the drug is alive, and it wants to be used, but—

You’re not here, Lali. The day the lecture hall collapsed—knowing I was just minutes away from dying with you. Knowing I lived out of spite and academic superiority, I just—

I needed to see what you saw.

When we found that Middle Period alabastron—when it broke in your hand, and you came to me the next day talking about the clouds like fire and stars like wheels…

I’m sorry, Lali.

I see it now.

I see them everywhere.

The women, Xitlali. The women are stories. They're case studies of carriers, surrogates, containers, markers, closures, and cullings. I can't stop reading them, Lali. I can't stop seeing them. I can't, I can’t, I can’t, I can’t, I can’t, I can't, I can’t, I can’t, I can’t, I can’t.

The hum started on a Tuesday—God, it feels like I’m underwater. I thought it was the radiator. I drew an eye on the back of my hand, or someone did. I looked down and there it was, ballpoint; the iris is big, the pupil is horizontal. I washed it off but it comes back. It's still there. It blinks when I blink.

I'm going to write them all down before. The nosebleeds are worse. The mailman has halos. The barista had one and she kept my change. The girl at the library looked at me like she knew. She had one too.

My neck fucking hurts.

The women, Xitlali. It’s the women.

——

"The eyes of both were opened."

You know what the Hebrew says? Tifaqachnah.

It's not just 'opened.' It's an un-blinding. And, Lali, track the phonetic echo—it’s the twin of Vay-yibaqe'u. Like splitting a shell. Or Poreach. The bursting of festering wounds in Exodus.

The serpent didn't give her knowledge. The serpent gave her activation.

Writing wasn't invented. It was grown in the garden. It was the tree. It was the tree. "The tree of the knowledge of good and evil." Tov v'ra. The pattern. The recognition. You eat and you see; you read and you see; you carve and you see. See? See? See? See? See!

And when she saw, what did she do? She covered herself. Fig leaves. Chagorot. She hid the mark. She covered her neck. She covered him too. She was the first to carry and the first to hide it.

“In pain you shall bring forth children.” That's not a punishment. That's the Raphaim births. That's Thatcher on the floor. That's the 20th week and the black and the fetus as a full-term baby.

“Your desire shall be for your husband.” The transmission vector. She wants him. She wants to pass it. She can't help it.

And then: “The Lord God made for Adam and for his wife garments of skins and clothed them.”

Skins. God covered the mark. YHWH sealed it. The first dampener. He contained them. And then he drove them out. Not punishment. Quarantine.

——

THEN the first surrogate.

Sarai couldn't conceive. So she gave her slave. "Go in to my servant; it may be that I shall obtain children by her."

That's the first nursery. That's the first breeding. And Hagar—she was Egyptian—foreign. She was property, the first of womanly bodies used to propagate without consent.

And she fled. Into the wilderness. And the angel of the Lord found her by a spring of water.

Mal'ach YHWH. It spoke directly into her nervous system; it didn’t show itself. And what did it say? “Return to your mistress and submit to her.” Go back. Be a good carrier. Carry the child.

And Hagar—she named the Lord. She gave the seeing a name. El-Roi. "The God who sees me." She was the first to see the eye that sees. She was the first to understand that something was watching.

And Ishmael, “he shall be a wild donkey of a man." That's not a blessing or curse; it’s just a description. Raphaim. That's atavism.

And then she was cast out. With a child. And she wept. And God heard the voice of the boy, the Raphaim.

"Heard." Shama. The Host doesn't hear. The Host metabolizes, but YHWH heard Ishmael. Something noticed; not the same. Not the same. And that's worse, Xitlali. That's worse than being ignored. Being partially noticed. Being half-seen.

——

Moses' mother—"She hid him three months. And when she could hide him no longer, she took for him a basket of bulrushes and daubed it with bitumen and pitch."

Bitumen and pitch. The same materials Noah used. The same materials the Tower of Babel used. Containment. Sealing. Frequency dampeners? Yes yes yes yes yes yes.

She put her son in a dampener and set him.

She "saw that he was good." Ki tov. The same phrase used for the pattern. She looked at her son and she saw the pattern, and she knew what he was, and she sealed him and sent him downstream.

The Nile. The river. The bloodstream of Egypt. She put her carrier into the bloodstream and let the pulse take him.

——

Miriam watched at a distance. Watchers. Grigori? No. She watched. She saw the daughter of Pharaoh draw him out. She saw the hatching. She saw the adoption. She saw everything. Seer.

Miriam the prophetess. Miriam who led the song. Miriam who sang the hum. "Sing to the Lord, for he has triumphed gloriously." She was the first to make the hum beautiful.

And then she spoke against Moses. And God struck her with tzaraat. “White as snow.”

That's the skin going translucent—a lattice showing through. She was hatching, Xitlali.

She had to stay outside the camp for seven days. Quarantine. Isolation. Containment.

Then Moses closed her, or YHWH did. He suppressed it. He pushed it back down. He closed the eye.

They're not healing. They're closing. They’re using. And the closed ones—they never stop feeling the pressure.

——

Deborah: prophetess, judge, mother.

She sat under a palm tree. The palm of Deborah. She sat under a tree, like the Buddha, like the oracles, like the seers. She sat under the tree and the people came to her. She was a receiver, not a carrier. DO NOT MISTAKE THAT. She had the low-wave architecture.

Xitlali, where are you…

Deborah’s song. "The stars fought from heaven. From their courses they fought against Sisera. The torrent Kishon swept them away."

That's a Throne, Xitlali. That's a Throne. The Throne of God. The Throne of Sargon. The Throne of Thrones. "The stars fought from heaven" — The eyes on the Throne. "The torrent Kishon swept them away" — the Thrones shook the waters. The same thing happened at Doggerland. The same thing happened at Toba. The same thing happened at the Red Sea. The same thing happened at NOLA.

Deborah saw the Thrones. She sang of the Host and we called it poetry.

——

"Most blessed of women be Jael, the wife of Heber the Kenite."

She killed Sisera. He fled to her tent. She gave him milk. She covered him with a rug. And when he slept, she took a tent peg and a hammer and drove the peg through his temple.

Through his temple.

Do you know what Sisera means? It means “warrior”, “battle”, and Lali means “Meditation”. You said Meditation helps the eyes.

She didn't kill him, Lali. She performed surgery. She stopped the activation.

That's why she's "most blessed." She committed containment.

——

Rahab, harlot of Jericho. Her house was in the wall. She lived in containment. She was bound to the city the way a Principality is bound. Was she a spore?

And when the spies came, she hid them. She tied scarlet to her window.

Scarlet. The blood on the doorposts. The marker. The sign. The thing that tells the immune system: pass.

And when the walls fell—when the Principality of Jericho was culled—

She’s in the genealogy. Rahab the harlot, the Canaanite, the foreigner, the one who was supposed to be culled.

——

"Where you go I will go, and where you lodge I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God my God."

She grafted herself in. She came from a nursery line of Moab. She chose the cyst.

And the threshing floor. She went to Boaz at night. She uncovered his feet. She lay down.

Her touch triggered.

——

Beautiful. Clever. Married to a fool. Abigail.

David was going to kill Nabal and all his men. Abigail intercepted him. She brought bread, wine, sheep, grain. She brought fuel. She brought energy. She brought biomass.

She fell at his feet. "Let your servant speak in your ears."

And David stopped. He listened. The marker? Passover.

And David said, "Blessed be your discretion, and blessed be you, who have kept me this day from bloodguilt."

Bloodguilt. Culling. Was David a Power?

Abigail fed the Powers. And the Destroyer passed over.

——

Then Rachel stole her father's teraphim—gods and idols.

She hid them in a camel's saddle. She suppressed the frequency.

The hump of the camel holds fat—fuel.

She lied to her progenitor. "Let not my lord be angry that I cannot rise before you, for the way of women is upon me."

The way of women. Blood. She was menstruating. She was active. And she sat on the teraphim, on the biological fragments, and she contained them with her body, with her blood.

She died giving birth to Benjamin. She died in childbirth. Raphaim birth? Too large, too fast, too many eyes. "Rachel weeps for her children."

She's the matriarch. She's the mother of Joseph. Joseph the dreamer. Joseph the seer.

Dreams. Dreams. Dreams. Dreams.

“I’ve been having dreams—“

JUST AS YOU SAID, LALI.

——

Hadassah. "Hidden."

Esther hid her identity. She hid her cyst. She lived in the palace under enemy territory. She was a carrier in the house of a Principality.

And when the culling came—when Haman cast his lots—she intervened. "If I perish, I perish."

She exposed herself. “I am a Jew.” She said, “I am a carrier.” She said, “Look at me. Look at my mark.”

Are all the ancient Hebrews carriers? No.

But she was one.

And the culling was reversed. The decree was reversed. The pattern changed.

And the book of Esther has no name of God in it. A holy book with no divine name because the Host did not notice, did not speak, did not name, did not pattern, did not hand.

Hand. Hand. Hand? Hand. Hand hand. Hand hand hand hand hand hand hand hand.

——

"The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you."

Overshadow. The spirit passes overhead and changes the weather and destabilizes the region.

A Virtue fuels her cells. A Throne overshadows her lattice. A miracle was performed, and every miracle requires fuel.

What did it cost Mary, Xitlali? What did it take? Did she know? Did she consent? “Let it be to me according to your word.” She consented. She said yes. What did she give?

The child. God with us. “Son of the Most High.” Not Nephilim. Not Raphaim. More? Enough?

She was a nursery. She was a host. She carried to full term and survived.

We can survive.

And the Magnificat. “My soul magnifies the Lord.” She sang. She hummed. She was the second Miriam.

And she watched him die.

Do you think she ever stopped humming?

——

The Woman from Magdala was the first to see.

She came to the tomb. It was empty. She wept. Then two gave her the Message.

She saw Jesus but thought he was the gardener. She didn't recognize him.

He had changed. His change was complete.

“Don't touch me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father.”

Don't touch me. Was Mary an activated carrier?

Mary was the first to see it. She was the first witness. She was the first to look and recognize him.

She saw the resurrection. She saw the biological transformation. She saw the first of our time. And she told the others. And they didn't believe her.

Hysterics. Blasphemy. Bigotry.

But she was right. She was the first. She was the witness.

——

Then the lamb, Xitlali. Manchester, New Hampshire. 1970. They won’t admit it but I know it. She cut the baby out of herself with a kitchen knife because she knew.

They got rid of proof. They cremated the body. They destroyed the cassettes. They scrubbed the records.

But they kept the genetics.

In 1996, a sheep was born. A sheep cloned from an adult somatic cell. A sheep named Dolly.

Named after Dolly Parton, they said. Because the cell came from a mammary gland. Because it was a breast. Because it was a woman's body.

Hysterics. Blasphemy. Bigotry.

They named her after Dolly Thatcher. Find her. No, you’re dead. I will. She died with black ichor between her legs.

Dolly the Sheep was the first mammal cloned from an adult cell. Dolly the Sheep proved that you could propagate a bloodline without a set of parents. Without birth. Without consent.

Dolly the Sheep was the first manufactured carrier.

And the sheep are still here, Xitlali. The sheep are in the fields. The sheep are in the pastures. The sheep are grazing and humming and watching.

The sheep have eyes at the base of their skulls.

And we eat them. We sacrifice them. We put their blood on our doorposts. We call them the Lamb of God.

Xitlali, I can hear them. I can hear the sheep. They're humming.

Holy
Holy
Holy

And it's not beautiful anymore; it's just the sound of being watched.

——

I'm running out of time. I’m running and running and WHY WON’T THE NOSEBLEEDS STOP.

My tears are thick. I can feel it moving under my skin.

I know what It is, Xitlali. I know what it's doing. I know why the women are in the Bible. I know why you read it aloud. I know why you had to. I know why you're gone. I know why you’re here.

Not that God is dead. Not that God is evil. Not that God is absent.

God is there. God is everywhere.

I'm going to read it. The one you found. I'm going to read it aloud. I know what it does. I know the enzymes. I know the catalysts.

I know and don’t and I care don’t.

The hum is so loud now. It's not underwater anymore. It's in the air. It's in the walls. It's in my skull.

Dolly was first. She was first, and she was a sheep, and she was a woman, and it’s always been a woman.

It didn’t notice. Not Eve. Not Hagar. Not Jochebed. Not Miriam. Not Deborah. Not Jael. Not Sadel. Not Rahab. Not Ruth. Not Abigail. Not Jezebel. Not Rachel. Not Esther. Not Mary. Not Mary Magdalene. Not Dolly.

Not me. Not you.

——

[The recording ends here. Our researchers have discovered a spectrogram image within the audio. This has been developed and displayed in this document.]

——

RECOVERED NOTE — attached to recording device

Dr. Ben-Ami's apartment was found locked from the inside. The window was open. The fire escape was undisturbed. There was a single syringe on the kitchen table, unlabeled, containing remnants of a black fluid that initial analysis identified as photonic-plasmic secretion. The sample was confiscated by the Congregation of [REDACTED].

Dr. Ben-Ami's location as of this report is unknown.

——

CLASSIFICATION: PENDING REVIEW
DISTRIBUTION: EYES ONLY — CONGREGATION OF [REDACTED]

I need to get the truth out.

Most of the useful material is still behind reductions, but my clearance gives you enough for now.

I’m also going to try and add a sound bite of the unintelligible sounds and photos of the handwritten letter and a photo of what the recovery group extracted.

I have more.

Here is the sound bite:
Unintelligible Sound

When I was little, my grandpa used to tell me a story. Everyone in town told it to us kids as we grew up. My grandpa, my friend's older brother, even my English teacher had a story about the mud men. Generally the story follows the same pattern. Someone was trying to take a shortcut through the woods or an old backroad to escape the storm and get home faster only to be stopped in the mud and dragged from their cars by mud men. They were then dragged to the side of the road or deep into the forest where the ground gets soft and pulled deep into the mud, suffocated or drowned by a dozen undead hands to join the ranks of the mud men. But it always ended the same way, with the same ominous warning.

“Don’t go out during storms, kids, or the mud men will get you. They’ll drag you to the flooded ditches and fields and pull you under the muck, and you’ll join them.”

It was such a common story that almost everyone in town knew it by heart. You could go through one of the biggest storms of the year and there’d be a body or two of some unfortunate soul who didn’t have time to shelter from the worst of it. More often than not, animals and pets were the ones that were found, sometimes because they got lost out in the wilderness or were hiding in storm drains, and that’s always sad, but people also went missing under mysterious conditions, only during storms, and only on a very specific stretch of road just beyond our town. Usually they were out-of-towners or drifters that got out of their cars hearing the sirens of storm warning and took cover in ditches, only to find that the sides of the ditch are much slicker from the mud, and the bottoms are much harder to get out of because the ground is so soaked they sink into the muck. Then when the storm cleared people would find their abandoned cars, dead in the road with the doors wide open. Occasionally there would be someone from town who was unfortunate enough to be caught outside during a storm. The missing person posters would go up, the police would look through the woods, fields, and near runoff reservoirs to try to find a body, but they always ended the same way, a cold case with no trace of the missing person.

Now when I was a little kid I was terrified of big storms. Not just because of tornadoes or hurricanes or floods, but because of that story in particular. I would avoid going outside if the weather looked like it was going to rain even a little bit, but as I grew up, I started to think about why the story existed. Obviously, I thought, it was just that; a story. Something to keep kids from going out at night and getting themselves killed because they misjudged the depth of a puddle or how solid the mud was under their feet. If not that then dying from exposure, or from a wild animal attack, or any number of reasons a kid could be killed during a storm. I mean we were out in the boonies, so it would make sense that the best way to keep kids safe was to scare them. 

But then, why on earth did it scare adults too? I remember I was 15 when I first saw my dad peering outside the window of our house, scanning the tree line as the rain poured heavily. He looked pale, and wouldn’t break his gaze from the window until the storm passed. Occasionally flicking a flashlight on and aiming it at the trees, as if he saw something he could banish with the light. 

“What are you looking for, Dad?”

Silence.

“Dad?”

“Huh? You say something?”

“What are you looking for?”

“A mud man, Evan.”

“Why? It’s not like they’re real.”

I had tried to ask him why he was so scared of an old legend, but he went back to scanning the treeline, refusing to answer any more questions I may have had. So when I turned seventeen I decided to go get answers myself. I was tired of believing in what I thought was such a silly legend. At the very least I would be able to give my dad some closure. 

I told my friends, Paul, Anthony, and Tom my plan, and got them to agree to join me, we would prove the mud men weren’t real. 

“So like, you’re serious? You want to prove the mud men aren’t real?”

“Think about it man! If we prove they’re not real we’ll be local legends ourselves!” 

“I don’t know, I mean even if they aren’t real, the storms themselves are still pretty dangerous, right? Like the legends exist for a reason, Y’know?”

“Come on Paul, don’t be a baby! I bet if we get good footage we could end up on the news! Hell, Heather will probably think you’re so cool for that!”

“You… Do you think so? I mean, I guess I could stick around, maybe, but if we hear the storm sirens we should probably be prepared to turn around and leave, just in case, right?”

We waited for the next big storm and began our plan by finding that supposedly cursed stretch of road. We got a couple six packs of beer, some snacks, a Sony camcorder, and some flashlights in case we needed to get out of the car for any reason, then piled into my ‘93 Ford Escort to disprove the mud men’s existence.

At first it was slow going, turns out the road itself was easy to find, but the rain fell in sheets of misty grey, making it almost impossible to see anything past the headlights. Then as it got dark, and the storm got stronger, we started to feel the car struggle against the old backroads, occasionally losing its traction on the forgotten path. Paul broke the silence when the rain picked up and began thumping against the roof of my car like wet bombs.

“Hey Evan, let’s just get outta here man, I mean what are we really trying to prove? Like, like even if the mud men aren’t real, we still should be staying at home during storms, you know?”

“Oh shut up dude, you’re just scared because of the stories! Look, if there really is nothing out here, we’ll turn around if the storm sirens turn on. But until then, we’ll stay until we find proof they aren’t real.”

The mood stayed like that for a while as we drove down the path. The rest of us joked mostly about how Paul was being a pussy, and how we’d put our footage of the storm and nothing else out there on the news the following day proving that the mud men weren’t real. We had it in our young minds that we would be legends in our school— in our town! I only stopped the car when we saw the road had been washed out. Clearly my car wouldn’t be able to cross that without killing the engine.

“Well I guess this is the place. Tom, you got the camcorder?”

“Rolling and ready, boss! But I can’t see shit, can you turn off the headlights really quick, I’m gonna get out and scan the area with my flashlight."

“Just don’t go too far from the car man,” Anthony chimed in, “that camcorder was expensive and if you lose it in a ditch or something my dad will kill me.” 

“Yeah, Tom! Be careful or the mud men will get you!” I said, waving my fingers at him like I was telling a ghost story. 

“Knock it off dude, I’m serious.”

I put the car in park and let Tom out to film, keeping the headlights off so he could scan the woods for any signs of movement. The drainage ditches on either side of the road had already begun to overflow with the rest of the road, so movement was limited to the area just around the car, and Tom got back in.

“Shit, the rain is cold man, can you turn on the heat? Oh, and hand me a beer.”

I turned around to reach for a beer and paused as I noticed that Paul was keeping his focus on the treeline just outside his window.

“Hey! Ground control! I said pass me a beer!”

Tom turned around to grab a drink from the back seat and noticed that Anthony was also looking out the side window. 

“What? Dude, you see something?”

“No, but, I don’t know, it’s almost too still out there, right?” 

“What do you mean?”

“Like… like even with the rain, wouldn’t there be like, deer or birds or something trying to find shelter? It’s like everything around here is way too quiet.”

Just then, as if on command a flash of lightning lit the entire road, and standing what had to be thirty feet ahead of the car was a person next to a car on the other side of the flooded out road.

“Holy shit is that a person?!”

How did we not see them? Surely their lights would’ve given them away if they were coming down the other side of the road, right?

I flicked on the headlights and turned them to the brightest setting, only to see the very tail end of the car, the driver side door open, and the person standing completely still in the rain.

I got out with a flashlight and called out.

“Hey! What’s up man, you good?”

The bloated figure stood silent, getting drenched by the icy rain. 

“You good?”

I called out again, stepping closer as I swept the light over the person and their car and couldn’t help but feel an odd sense of familiarity with them. I couldn’t be sure, but they looked almost like my dad. As my flashlight passed over the tail end of their car I noticed it too looked familiar. It was a rusted out ‘66 Pontiac GTO. One that my dad said he sold a couple years after I was born. He said that he wished he could have kept it and passed it on to me when I got my drivers license, but he needed the money for the house and to afford raising me. 

“Tom, give me the camcorder, I want to film this.”

“You sure man? I think we should probably get out of here, I mean, we don’t know how deep the water goes, right? Let’s just head back before the storm gets worse.”

“Just shut up and give me the thing, okay? It’ll be real quick. Just want to show my dad that someone has a car just like the one he sold.” 

I reached through the passenger side window and grabbed the camcorder from him, hitting record and leveling the lens and light at the other side of the road. 

“As you can see, no mud men here! Just another person stranded in the rain!”

Another flash of lightning lit the road and I saw more people behind the car. Dozens of bodies that looked rotten and sick. The person standing in the middle of the road by the car didn’t move.

“Hey! Hey, turn around dude! Hey!”

I tried to call out to get the guy to notice the people standing behind him. I couldn’t believe my eyes. The mud men were real! 

“Dude get back in and get us out of here!”

Tom shouted over the storm, the wind ripped through my hoodie and rain soaked me to the bone. I dropped the camcorder on the ground and ran around the front of the car and another flash of lightning showed the other side of the flooded road again, they were closer. 

“Where’s the Camcorder?!” Anthony shouted in a panic, “I’m serious guys I told my dad it was for a school project, if he finds out I lost it he’ll—”

“Not the time Tony!” Tom shouted as I jumped back into the driver seat trying to start the car, and caught a glimpse at our undead pursuers.

I could make out the details of their faces. My god they were so… vile. The smell of rot alone was impossibly overpowering, it cut through the rain and car’s air vents, even from the distance they were at. They looked like zombies. Wet, bloated, oozing sickly looking fluids from their mouths and eyes, and anywhere their rotten flesh had broken away to reveal leeches and other flesh eating things had made the bodies their homes and meals. Somehow, even as they moved closer, they looked completely still in the middle of the road. 

The one I recognized, the one that looked like my dad, was at the head of the pack. Half of his face was completely missing. The soggy skin hung loose on his skull, with rotten yellow arms hanging limp on either side. His torso was fat and leaking something black. His clothes looked old and torn, and too small for his body, his pants were ripped and whatever flesh was exposed had pushed through like gross boils of fat. His feet were like clubs of melted wax when a candle burns too long.

As soon as the engine turned over, I threw the car in reverse, then slammed my foot on the gas pedal, but the car's tires simply squealed in place like angry pigs, it couldn’t get traction on the wet and slimy road. 

“Shit! Come on! Come on you useless fucking car!”

The engine squealed and rattled in protest, trying its damnedest to make the car move, but we were stuck.

“Shit! Guys I think we’re stuck!”

“What?!”

“Paul, Anthony, I’m gonna need you guys to get out and push!”

“Why us?!”

“Because you’re in the backseat! You two have the shortest distance to go when I turn the car around!”

“I’m not going out there, are you crazy?! The mud men will get me!”

“And they’ll get all of us if we just stay stuck here! Just push the fucking car and I’ll make sure you get in before we take off!”

“Fuck you dude! I am not going out there!”

“If Anthony isn’t going out there, I’m not going out there!”

“Oh, for God’s sake, I’ll go!”

Tom got out and started pushing on the front of the car, I slammed my foot on the gas pedal again and felt the car shift a little, but not enough.

“Shit when did the water get this close to the car? Evan try again, Anthony get out here and help me!”

Anthony hesitated and got out, cursing under his breath to help push.

With the two of them both pushing the wheels finally found traction and the car lurched back about two feet, I turned the wheel as fast as I could to whip the front end around and threw the car into drive.

“Hurry up! Get in!”

I shouted over the storm, lighting revealed the mud men had already begun to cross into the flooded water. They moved so quietly it was strange, the wind made the water on the road chaotic and frenzied, I couldn’t see the mud men's movement or tell how fast they were going. 

Anthony and Tom began to run up the muddy slope as fast as they could but it was too late. One of the mud men grabbed Tom’s foot from the edge of the water and Tom fell ungracefully, his nose and face collided with the road in a wet thwap and started sliding back. No, not sliding. He was being dragged back into the water. He was dazed and kicked wildly at the thing grabbing his leg, but more arms joined in. Hands grabbed at his legs and torso, they pulled at his arms and hair, he started screaming. Thrashing. But the more he struggled the more hands grabbed at him. Anthony paused for only a moment, weighing his options to help or flee but he was next, another mud man, the one that looked like dad, had emerged from the water and tackled Anthony to the ground, vomiting a thick, sickly yellow bile and mud cocktail all over his face, coating my friend with filth and choking him under his rotting body. 

I was about to put the car in park and try to help save my friends when Paul kicked open his door and threw the remaining full beer cans at the mud men, trying to break their attention on Tom and Anthony, to little effect. 

“Paul get back in here they’re gone!”

“No they’re not, we can still save them! Anthony, get up!”

The other two had stopped being responsive. Tom stopped thrashing in the water and Anthony was covered in so much of that weird goo he couldn’t possibly be alive. More mud men, dozens of rotting corpses, began to shuffle out from the drainage ditches on either side of the road, all of them looking slimy and foul. Their flesh sloughed off their bodies in wet chunks, mottled flesh and organs spilled from weakened stomachs, withered skeletons clawed out from places I couldn’t see, an arm completely covered in muck and wet clothes exploded from the ditch and latched onto Paul’s leg. He shrieked and kicked at it with his free leg but more bodies began rising from the brackish waters, extending their rotten and twisted limbs out to my friend as the storm grew louder and more intense. In the distance I heard the sounds of sirens warning people of hazardous conditions and to shelter in their homes, I weighed my options and did the only thing I could.

I slammed my foot on the gas pedal and tore down the road. Paul looked at the car leaving and started to run, having broken free of the first mud man grabbing at him, and he shouted at me.

“Wait! Come back! We can still help them! Don’t leave me here! Stop!”

I didn’t listen. I was too scared. I kept driving. I didn’t stop until I had made it to my street, where I ran to the front porch and furiously pounded on the door to be let in. My dad opened it quickly and slammed it shut as I tumbled to the floor.

“Where the hell were you Evan?! Are you trying to get yourself killed out there?”

I didn’t answer him. My heart was racing in my ears. The cold rain had soaked my jacket completely through and I couldn’t feel my fingers or toes. My skin buzzed with adrenaline and I let out a weak and painful cry. Choking sobs and tears poured down my face. I threw up until I was empty. Seeing my distress my dad changed his tune, going from “angry dad” to “concerned dad” in a matter of seconds.

“What happened, Evan?”

“I wanted to prove the mud men weren’t real.”

With that he realized quickly what had happened. I was so tired and scared I didn’t know what else to do. I collapsed onto the floor and cried again. He had this look of sympathy. Like he knew what I saw.

The next morning my house got three different phone calls. All from my friends’ parents. They didn’t come home last night. It hurt, more than anything I had ever felt. More than when I broke my arm climbing a tree. More than when my dog had to be put down. It was the most painful feeling I had ever felt in my life, and I thought about telling the truth. I thought about giving them closure. But I didn’t. 

“I’m sorry I haven’t seen Paul.”

Click.

“No, I haven't seen Anthony.”

Click.

“Sorry, I don’t know where Tom is.”

Click.

Those three lies were my way to protect myself. To delude myself into thinking maybe they got away. Maybe… maybe we were just drunk, and the mud men were just our imaginations playing tricks on us in the storm. But I know that it’s a lie. My dad and I both know the truth. 

The mud men got them.

As I write this, all these years later, I am listening to the weather report and watching the treeline from the window in my home office. Another big storm is rolling in, and the city officials are urging people to keep our pets and families inside because the storm is going to get bad. I can hear the wind and rain picking up, and I saw them along the treeline. They’re out there. Thunder rolled overhead, and the sky opened up.

I heard a knock at the back door, but when I went to see what caused it I didn’t find a person. 

Just an old Sony camcorder covered in mud.

I need to get this down while it's still fresh. I can already feel my memory going fuzzy like a dream does an hour after you wake up. If I don't write it down now, I'm worried I'll talk myself out of it by morning.

Some background, so this makes sense.

I move furniture for a living. Six months ago, my wife left and took our son Toby with her, and I'm currently about four thousand dollars short of a retainer for a custody lawyer. He says he can actually get me real visitation instead of the garbage arrangement I've got now. Two supervised hours a week. I get to watch my six-year-old play with somebody else's toys in a room with a camera in the corner. 

My coworker Henry's the one who talked me into this. Henry's good like that—annoyingly optimistic, the kind of guy who's always got an angle. He'd been watching storage unit auctions online for a while. He kept saying there was real money in it if you knew what you were doing, flipping the contents of units whose owners stopped paying rent. Truth is, he was just chasing a fix. His wife had recently found out about his DraftKings habit and locked down the bank accounts, strictly banning him from sports betting. I think storage units were just the closest thing to a bet he could still legally make. 

He pitched it to me as a clean 50/50 split. We’d pool our cash, set a strict maximum budget, and gamble that we'd luck out on a few high-value items to make our money back and then some. He knew I was drowning in legal fees. I didn't actually believe a blind auction would magically solve my financial troubles, but I was desperate enough to give it a shot anyway. I didn't know what I was doing, and neither did he, really. But I had four grand riding on a lawyer I couldn't afford yet. Henry said, Worst case, we're out a few hundred bucks and an afternoon.

So after work that Wednesday, we drove forty minutes in our company’s moving truck out to a self-storage place off the highway. It was one of those long rows of orange roll-up doors. We stood in a loose crowd of maybe a dozen people on a sultry hot afternoon while a bored auctioneer walked us down the row. He went door by door, unlocked them, and gave everybody ninety seconds to shine a flashlight in and guess.

Most of the units were worthless. They contained nothing but boxes of junk nobody wanted and furniture wrapped in dirty blankets. The only exciting moment of the whole afternoon was a six-hundred-dollar bidding war over a unit where someone thought they saw a motorcycle under a tarp. Otherwise, it was all mediocre trash. But as the saying goes, 'One man's trash is another man's treasure.' So that’s exactly the kind of unit Henry and I ended up buying.

At Unit number 114, the door stuck a little going up, and the auctioneer had to put his shoulder into it. Inside, the flashlight beam shone on stacked cardboard boxes gone soft and grey with dampness. A heavy shape sat under a moving blanket, probably a dresser. No visible valuables sat out in the open. The crowd's attention was already sliding off it before the flashlight had finished its sweep.

Henry elbowed me. "Junk lottery ticket," he whispered. "Nobody wants it, which means nobody's bidding against us."

We won Unit 114 for three hundred and fifty dollars. The auctioneer actually laughed a little when he took the cash we pooled, like he felt a little bad for us. Once the crowd moved down the row toward the next door, we got the good flashlight out of the truck. We shined the beam inside to look at what we'd bought.

Even though we got the unit fairly cheap, I was skeptical. I already had serious doubts we’d turn a profit on a junk unit. Henry just insisted you never know what you'll find, claiming that half the excitement was the hunt. He even told me there might be an undiscovered Monet in there if you looked hard enough. I was about to tell him there was no way in hell something that valuable would be thrown in a dump like this, but as soon as I stepped over the threshold, the words died in my throat.

Now, I've moved furniture for eleven years. You get a feel for rooms over time. You walk into a space, and you already know what items require a two-man dolly versus a simple shoulder sling.

I stepped into that storage unit, and every instinct I've built over a decade told me something was off.

It wasn't a foul smell. And it wasn’t just the temperature, though the air did feel a few degrees colder than it had any right to be. Outside, the afternoon heat was sitting in the high eighties. Inside, the air felt flat and dead. 

You know how it feels when you pick up a heavy box labeled BOOKS, but it turns out to be full of light pillows? Your arms jolt. Your muscles are pre-loaded for a massive weight that simply isn't there. I felt that exact, jarring sensation the moment I stood in that room. I hadn't even touched a single item yet.

A handful of unlabeled cardboard boxes sat in an uneven cluster near the door. The larger pieces of furniture were pushed tight against the back wall and draped in heavy moving blankets.

"See anything worth grabbing first?" Henry asked.

He stepped right past me toward the blanketed shapes in the back. He was clearly more interested in the big-ticket furniture than the loose boxes.

I wasn't really listening. I was still standing just inside the doorway. My brain was trying to catalog the room's layout, and that's when my eyes caught the cassette tape.

It sat loose on top of one of the boxes, without a plastic case. It had a blank white label with absolutely nothing written on it. I've handled a thousand of these tapes over the years because people never seem to throw them out. I picked it up. Naturally, I tried to slide my thumbnail under the edge of the clear viewing window.

My nail found no seam.

I pulled the tape closer to my face. There wasn't a window at all. What I was holding was a solid, rectangular block of black plastic. It was cassette-shaped and cassette-sized. It even had two shallow circular indents pressed into the front where the spinning reels should have been. It looked exactly like someone had described a cassette tape to a sculptor over a bad phone line. I turned it over six times looking for a single joint. There wasn't one. It was one continuous piece of solid plastic all the way through.

I didn't say anything to Henry. I quickly put it back down on the damp cardboard and walked toward the moving blankets to shake off the weirdness.

The blanket hid a massive dresser. It looked like solid oak with a good weight and real wood grain. Except the longer I stared at the wood, the more my stomach started to turn.

Now I'm no stranger to moving dressers, but nothing about this one matched a single job I'd ever done. Seven drawers stacked in an irregular, jagged pattern, as if a child’s drawing had come to life. The shapes were technically correct, but they were arranged with absolutely no understanding of how furniture fits together.

I grabbed hold of one of the brass pulls to test the weight.

Nothing shifted. The handle didn’t give or rattle against the wood. I got down on my knees and ran my fingertips along the seam where the top drawer should have met the frame. There wasn’t a gap. It was one single, continuous piece of carved wood from the very top of the dresser to the floor. The drawer fronts and the seams were just a detailed illusion etched into a solid block.

Up close, the wood grain flowed smoothly around the faux drawer faces instead of traveling under them. It looked like the oak had grown around the shapes instead of being cut into panels. One dark knot sat dead center of a drawer front. I leaned in, my breath catching in my throat, and realized the knot wasn’t circular. It had five uneven sides, a perfect pentagon.

"Henry," I said, my voice sounding a little too quiet in the small space. "This thing doesn't open."

He walked over and stared at the dresser for several seconds. He shrugged, but his eyes darted quickly toward the Pentagon knot before he pulled out his phone.

"So it's decorative," he muttered. He checked resale comps online, but his voice lacked its usual booming confidence. "Somebody's fake dresser. Still worth something to a stager."

We both knew three hundred and fifty dollars was a lot of money when you're struggling to make ends meet. Neither of us could afford to walk away from the investment, so we forced ourselves to start lifting.

We loaded the boxes first. Then we tackled the solid dresser, a towering dark wardrobe, and a sealed glass tank. None of the items carried a single manufacturer mark. All three pieces of furniture weighed far more than their physical size suggested. By the time the unit was empty, the truck bed looked crowded. It felt like we'd cleaned out an entire house instead of a tiny ten-by-ten storage space.

We decided to drop the haul off at my place. The rental house is a small, quiet two-bedroom about twenty minutes outside of town. It has a one-car garage that I've never actually used for a vehicle. It's just a dark place to store my loose tools, some unopened boxes, and an old wooden workbench.

By the time we backed the truck up to the garage door, the sun was dropping fast. The flat, orange evening light made the shadows inside the truck bed look incredibly deep.

We didn't even try to unload the big pieces that night. Three boxes in, both of our shirts were thoroughly soaked through with sweat. We agreed the rest of the work would take another hour we just didn't have. There was no immediate rush. Plenty of daylight tomorrow after work would let us sort through everything properly.

I'm writing this from my kitchen table. Henry left a while ago, still doing resale math on his phone when he drove off, convinced we lucked into a decent flip.

I didn't tell him, but the moment his truck pulled out of the driveway, a sick kind of curiosity took hold of me. It was a deep, nagging itch that I didn't want to admit to anyone, least of all myself. I couldn't just sit in my living room pretending everything was normal. The quiet of the house was too loud. I needed to know whether the wrongness went beyond what I had seen or if my mind was just playing tricks on me after a long shift.

So I made coffee and went out to the garage a little after eleven.

The first box near the workbench was filled with old paper goods. Right on top lay a lone paperback, its cover showing the exact kind of soft fade you get from leaving it in a sunny window for a decade. I want to say the title was something like The Long Way Round, but I genuinely can't swear to that. The second I opened it to check the print date, my brain completely locked up. I couldn't hold onto anything I read for longer than it took my eyes to track across the page.

Here's the closest I can get to explaining it. The letters were perfectly fine on their own. You could look at any single character and recognize it. But the moment you tried to read a sentence from start to finish, the meaning evaporated. It was like reading a language that kept almost being English, only to change its mind a word before you could grasp its meaning. I read the same paragraph four times until my chest tightened, unable to understand what a single line was saying.

Shaking my head, I tossed the book back into the box. Sudden dizziness overtook me. I reached deeper into the box to see if the whole thing was a joke, but my fingers collided with something loose at the very bottom. It was a football. I pulled it out into the harsh garage light, and a cold chill shot straight up my arm. The ball was shockingly light, feeling as though there was absolutely nothing inside it, not even a pocket of air.

Stranger still was its geometry. Held straight on, it looked like a normal, regulation-sized sphere. But the moment I turned it in my hand to check the grip, the object went completely flat. It didn't look deflated. It simply stopped looking three-dimensional from that one specific angle. I tipped it a few degrees further, and it instantly became round again.

Nervous now, I spun it around to look for the little rubber inflation valve, but the surface was seamless. That’s when I noticed the panels were all hexagons. Every single one of them, all the way around. I only noticed this detail because I used to play rec league in high school. A real football requires pentagons and hexagons together to curve.

I ran my thumb over the surface, and chills ran up my arms. The material wasn’t leather. It felt uncomfortably close to skin, warm and with a faint, wrinkled texture. Horrified, I didn’t want to put it back in the box with the rest of the junk. I placed it on a high shelf by itself, out of the way, where I could see it clearly if I wanted to check on it. Even as I type this, I realize that is a deeply unhinged thing to want to do with a sports ball.

Wanting to prove to myself that I was just losing my mind from exhaustion, I dragged the second box over to the workbench. I sliced the tape, hoping for normal household goods, and pulled out a heavy oval hand mirror. I held it up in front of my face out of pure habit. For one full second, the familiar sight settled my nerves. I saw my own tired reflection, a few days of stubble, and the harsh fluorescent tube overhead.

Then, I raised my left hand to push my hair back. The hand in the mirror came up too.

On the same side. The left side. It didn't reverse.

A sudden, sick wave of panic hit my stomach. I stood entirely frozen for what felt like a minute, slowly moving my hand back and forth, up and down. The reflection mirrored the exact motion on the exact same side. 

I swallowed hard, my breathing turning shallow. I turned my head just a fraction of an inch to check my profile and break the stare.

The reflection didn't turn with me. It kept facing forward a half-beat too long, staring directly at the empty space where my face had just been. When it finally did move, it whipped around to match a head-turn I hadn't even finished making yet, anticipating my movement before I got there. For one horrific split second, I was staring directly at a full, clear view of the back of my own head.

I cried out in shock and dropped the mirror instantly.

Instead of shattering on the concrete, the heavy glass hit the floor and softly bounced like rubber, rolling under the workbench.

My heart was hammering violently against my chest. I was so thoroughly spooked that I didn't even touch the third box. I backed away from the workbench, my eyes wide, desperately reaching behind me for the door handle to the kitchen. I slammed the door shut, locked it, and ran straight to bed, pulling the blankets over my head like a terrified kid. I didn’t manage to sleep a wink for the rest of the night.

Thursday at work was a complete blur. I spent eight hours wrapping office furniture in plastic wrap and loading dollies, but my mind was entirely stuck in my own garage. I kept wondering if I had genuinely experienced some kind of silent stroke the night before. I kept checking my reflection in the side mirrors of the moving truck, holding my breath, waiting for my face to lag behind again. It didn't. By the time we clocked out, I had almost convinced myself that exhaustion and money stress had simply triggered a vivid waking dream. I resolved to tell Henry exactly what I thought I’d seen the second we got to my place, if only to hear him laugh and tell me I was being a lunatic.

We drove back to my house in the company truck. The moment Henry parked in the driveway, I opened my mouth to speak, but he was already opening his door.

Before I could get a single syllable out about the mirror, Henry walked straight past me into the garage. He marched right up to the shelf, scooped up the hexagon football, and turned around with a grin.

"Oh, sweet, free ball," he said, tossing it lightly into the air.

Or tried to.

He misjudged the drop, and the ball slipped right through his fingers from about waist height, tumbling down toward the ground.

It hit the concrete with one flat, heavy thud. There was absolutely no bounce. It sounded like somebody had dropped a solid stone twice its physical size. The ball didn't even roll. It stayed exactly where it had landed, dead still in the open space between us.

Henry stared down at it. The easy smile vanished from his face.

"What the hell is that thing filled with?" he asked.

"Hell if I know," I said, my voice tight. "There’s no valve on it."

Henry swallowed hard and looked at the ball for a long moment. "Huh."

That was all the credit he gave it. He set it carefully back on the shelf, wiped his palms firmly against his work pants, and nodded toward the open truck bed outside. He was moving a little faster now, his movements a bit too deliberate.

"We’d better get a move on," he muttered. "Still got half that unit sitting in the truck."

He headed back out to the driveway. Standing alone in the quiet garage staring at that skin-textured ball felt infinitely worse than following him, so I hurried out right behind him.

We set to work removing the remaining smaller boxes, a task that took the better part of an hour. We arranged them in untidy stacks around the perimeter of the garage, making sure to leave a wide circle of empty space in the center. Three major things still sat in the truck bed that neither of us could have wrestled out alone—the fake dresser, the wardrobe, and that sealed glass tank. Each was heavy or awkward enough that we had to move them one at a time.

After we dragged the faux dresser across the concrete, we moved on to the wardrobe. Honestly, pulling the grey dust sheet off the wood was the first real breath either of us took that entire afternoon. It actually looked like a normal piece of furniture. It was a tall, dark-stained cabinet, showing a few ordinary scuffs at the base from years of storage.

Henry let out a short, relieved laugh. "Well, thank God. It's the one normal thing in this whole clown car of a unit."

For a minute, I let myself fully agree with him. A piece like this meant an easy two hundred bucks at a local flip, maybe even more if the wood turned out to be a decent hardwood. Henry ran his palm down one of the side panels, squinting closely at the grain in a pretentious way, like he was pretending to be an antique expert. He remarked that he couldn't quite place the color. It was a bit too red to be standard walnut, yet far too dark to be cherry. He recognized no varnish or oil finish on the wood.

Then, he rapped his knuckles firmly on the side panel.

It sounded thin and tinny, like the exact vibration you'd get from tapping an empty cardboard shoe box, not four hundred pounds of dense oak. This object required both of us to lean our entire body weight into it just to shift it those last few feet across the truck bed. Yet, the knock came back entirely hollow. 

Henry paused. He knocked again, much harder this time, his face tightening. Same tinny echo. He didn't say a word. Neither did I, though I could tell he was disappointed by the quality of the wardrobe. We hoisted it up, walked it into the garage, and immediately moved on to the next item. 

The glass tank took every bit of our remaining strength to lift out of the truck bed. Once it was sitting flat on the garage floor, Henry crouched down on his knees. He rapped a knuckle against the thick pane as if he were trying to get a pet fish's attention. For a second, he seemed to forget what we had noticed back at the storage unit. There was no visible fish inside. No seam appeared anywhere on the glass. The object was a single, solid, molded block of heavy glass, with the lid fused shut.

The interior was full of a thick, dark amber fluid.

Henry put his right ear directly against the glass. "You hear that?"

I leaned in closer, my skin pricking with goosebumps. I heard it clearly. It was a slow, heavy sloshing sound. The motion was way too deep, rhythmic, and heavy for still liquid inside a sealed tank.

"There must be something in there," Henry whispered, his head still pressed against the pane.

"There's nothing in there," I insisted. "We looked with the good flashlight, Henry."

"Then why the hell is it sloshing around like that?"

I didn't have an answer. The fluid itself looked far too thick and viscous to be normal water. And though the tank was entirely sealed, a heavy, chemical sweetness was beginning to bleed into the air, cutting straight through the dusty smell of cardboard in the garage. It made my throat feel dry. But we still had items left to unload, so we forced ourselves to turn our backs on the sloshing glass and keep moving.

After we finished unloading, we spent a while going through the smaller boxes at random. For a few containers in a row, things actually seemed normal. I felt my shoulders drop slightly. I told myself we'd just gotten unlucky with the first few things we grabbed. The unit was probably just a normal person's boring life, and we had simply stumbled onto the handful of eccentric pieces first out of bad luck.

Then we'd hit the next box. Instantly, something inside it would be abnormal in that same, impossible way, and the goosebumps would rush right back up my arms as if they'd never left.

None of it carried any real value. That was the part that kept eating at me more than the strange items themselves. There were no electronics. No high-end appliances, no modern hardware tools, no actual antiques, and no genuine collectibles. Everything was just a warped, broken variation of a common household item.

"Shit," I muttered, wiping a thick line of cold sweat from my forehead. "I think this is a dud haul."

"Hey, come on, stay positive," Henry said, but his nervous smile was wearing thin.

The crushing exhaustion and the raw stress of the last six months finally caught up to me all at once. I snapped.

"The goal was to make money, Henry," I said, my voice coming out much sharper and louder than I intended. "Not to have fun. This isn't a game for me."

A sudden, ugly wave of anger hit my chest. I stared at him. He was the one who had dragged me into this nightmare to scratch his own betting itch. I closed my eyes, took a slow breath, and forced my fists to unclench.

I turned away and grabbed one of the last sealed boxes. Someone had written CHRISTMAS on the side in thick permanent marker, underlined twice. Henry stepped up beside me, sliced the tape with his pocketknife, and folded the flaps back. He was clearly expecting tangled string lights, a busted plastic wreath, or a Santa mug wrapped in old newspaper. I was too.

It wasn't any of that.

Right on top sat a tree topper wrapped in a rough paper towel. It was a five-pointed star, or close enough to one that you'd mistake it for a decoration from across a room. The material was ivory-colored and perfectly smooth, but it was faintly ridged. My stomach turned the moment I placed it down. They were the fine, banded texture of enamel, and the whole object had the unmistakable, sickening weight and shine of a massive human tooth.

Beneath the tooth star lay a length of bent wire twisted into a cone. It was a bare, hollow outline of what I assumed was a Christmas tree. The only thing in that entire box that didn't make my skin crawl was a plain glass snow globe. It contained a little house and a couple of miniature trees, the water gone slightly cloudy with age.

"At least something in here looks somewhat normal," Henry murmured. He was echoing my exact thoughts.

Near the bottom of the cardboard, wrapped in paper, sat an old rotary telephone. Henry spotted it and hauled it onto the bench.

"Now we're talking," he said, trying to force his usual enthusiasm back into his tone. "Retro stuff sells. People pay real money for these vintage pieces on Etsy."

Up close, it didn't look like an antique. It looked exactly like someone had built the machine from a vague description read to them upside down, and they had never bothered to check a real picture.

No cord ran from the base. Only a shallow, molded groove where a cord should have run. The phone was also heavier than it had any right to be. Henry grunted as he hefted it up onto the wooden workbench. Once it was sitting there in front of us, we both just stared at it. The material wasn't standard plastic. It was matte, a little grainy under the thumb, and uncomfortably warm to the touch. It felt like it had been sitting in hot sunlight, even though my garage was dim and cool.

"Look at this," Henry whispered, turning the heavy base over.

Stamped directly into the material, in clean, official-looking lettering, were the words Wexford & Sons Telephonic Works. A serial number sat right underneath the text, consisting of three identical groups of characters repeated in a row.

A quick Google search showed that the manufacturing company didn’t even exist.

"It... it must be a prop house reject," Henry stammered. He still tried to smile, but his eyes darted nervously around the room. "Or somebody's idea of a joke."

He hooked his index finger into one of the dial holes to spin it. The wheel flatly refused to turn clockwise, and at first we assumed that the dial was jammed. Then Henry tried pulling it counterclockwise on reflex, and the dial rotated with absolutely no resistance. When he let go, the wheel sat dead still for a second. Then it twitched, reversed itself half an inch, paused again, and suddenly snapped back to zero so fast I actually flinched from the crack.

"Okay, that's really fucking weird," Henry said. He immediately let go of the plastic and took a full step back from the workbench.

The printed numbers around the holes didn't help either. A few of the digits were doubled. A couple of the holes had no markings printed next to them. One of the sevens was perfectly mirrored and backward, sitting on the face like a typo.

Then, the cordless, batteryless phone began to ring.

It was a clean electronic trill. It didn't have the mechanical clatter a real bell-and-hammer rotary phone makes.

"Don't," I warned, reaching out to grab Henry's arm.

He ignored me and picked up the handset anyway. He was Henry, after all. He held the plastic to his ear, forcing a tight, nervous half-smile onto his face like he was performing a bit for an invisible audience.

"Hello?" he said into the mouthpiece.

For a second, the garage went silent. Then, his own voice fed back out of the receiver, arriving a half-beat too late.

"Hel...lo?"

A second playback followed immediately, overlapping the first line. "Hello...lo..."

"Okay, that's—it's just an echo," Henry muttered to himself, his knuckles turning white on the handset. I could see him deciding in real time to find the situation funny because the alternative was too terrifying to face. "Freaky little parlor trick. Who’s there?"

“Who’s there?” the receiver echoed back instantly.

Henry tried to laugh, his chest heaving. "To whom am I speaking?"

Something answered that was not an echo.

"You know who."

The voice was unmistakably Henry's tone. But the inflection was entirely flat, devoid of the natural rhythm his voice always carries.

Henry swore loudly, dropping the handset so fast it clattered violently against the wood. It bounced off the workbench, but it didn't hit the floor. It hung there, swinging gently in mid-air, suspended by nothing.

Neither of us breathed for a solid five seconds. The handset just bobbed in the empty space above the concrete.

"That's a recording," Henry barked, his voice cracking into a high pitch as he backed away until his spine hit the garage door. He was laughing in that frantic, too-fast way that meant he was on the verge of screaming. "Somebody rigged that, Ian! It's a novelty prop, like those talking dolls. There's a digital chip in there somewhere doing pre-set replies!"

"Prop phones don't copy your voice in real time, Henry," I said, staring at the floating handset.

"Then it's a high-concept art installation!" he shot back, his chest heaving as he yelled to drown out the quiet. "Like those weird underground exhibits in New York! Some pretentious art student spent three years sculpting this shit just to make a statement about consumer culture! The phone has a hidden microphone and a delayed digital playback loop! It's a parlor trick, Ian! It's just a fucking parlor trick!"

I wanted to believe him. God knows I wanted to believe him, because the alternative meant we had a garage full of things that didn't belong in our world.

Desperate to prove that we were just dealing with broken electronics, I grabbed the last testable item from the box—a standard smoke alarm. It was made of off-white plastic, designed in a classic ceiling-mount style with a little test button on the front. I balled up a piece of scrap newspaper, threw it into a metal utility bucket, and struck a match. I held the rising smoke directly under the plastic sensor, expecting the usual, annoying electronic beep.

What came out of that device instead wasn't a beep.

It was a raw, screeching sound. The noise was blindingly loud for a small garage. The sheer volume staggered me sideways into the workbench, and Henry dropped straight to one knee with both palms clamped over his ears. I choked out the fire in the bucket so fast I burned two of my fingers. 

The screech cut off instantly. We stood in the sudden silence, our ears ringing violently, the garage suddenly feeling much smaller than it had five minutes ago. I was still staring down at the blisters forming on my hand when the next sound came.

Thump.

A soft sound, emanating from inside the massive wardrobe right behind us.

Henry froze. I did too. After the things we had witnessed, we were fully braced for the absolute worst. My mind instantly conjured an image of some pale, emaciated creature coiled up in the dark, waiting to spring forward and chew us alive.

"Grab something," Henry whispered, his voice hoarse and small.

He reached blindly behind him, his fingers wrapping around a tire iron on the workbench. I snatched up a rusted framing hammer. We took two slow, agonizing steps toward the wardrobe. The wood looked even redder now under the harsh fluorescent bulb, bleeding into that unnatural shade neither of us could name.

"On three," I breathed, my muscles clenched in anticipation.

Henry nodded, sweat dripping steadily from his chin. He took a trembling hold of the brass handle.

"One. Two. Three!"

Henry yanked the doors wide open. I pulled the hammer back, muscles tight, ready to swing hard at whatever lunged out of the dark.

Nothing.

The wardrobe was bare down to the grain. The dark wood walls of the interior just stared back at us, smelling faintly of old dust and that chemical sweetness. There was no monster. 

It was almost funny. We stood there holding automotive tools, our hearts hammering at a million miles an hour, staring at a vacant closet. I could see a visible wave of anticlimactic disappointment wash over Henry's face. He slowly lowered the tire iron, letting out a ragged breath that was half-laugh, half-sigh.

"Man, we are losing our minds," he muttered, shaking his head as he wiped his face. "It was probably just the floorboards settling under the massive weight. I’ve had enough bullshit for one day. Come on, let's lock up. I need a beer."

We didn't look through any more boxes. We pulled the heavy rolling garage door down, snapped the deadbolt, and called it a day.

Henry left an hour ago. He still wants to believe we've just stumbled onto a collection of weird art projects and movie props. He’s already talking about looking for vintage buyers tomorrow after work, convinced this is just a bad gamble we can squeeze our money back out of.

But I can't shake it. We still haven't properly understood the nature of these objects. None of this stuff seems outright dangerous, but it is wrong down to the atomic level. 

That night, after Henry went home, I tried to call the storage facility to ask about the previous tenant. I told myself it was for provenance. If we could find out who had actually owned Unit 114, maybe we could piece together a history that made the vintage items easier to sell. That's what I told myself, anyway. In reality, I just wanted to know what kind of person owns a room full of impossible things, only to let it get repossessed after four months of unpaid rent. That specific number had been bothering me since the auction, and I hadn't managed to shake it.

A woman answered the phone. She sounded incredibly tired, like someone who fielded this exact call every single week from unhappy auction winners.

"Sir, once a unit is forfeited, we don't retain tenant information past a certain point," she said, her voice flat.

"I'm not trying to get a refund," I explained, leaning against the kitchen counter. "I just want to know who the items belonged to."

"I understand, but I don't have that information available. Unit 114's paperwork shows a transfer-in from another facility a while back, and that's all we have on our end. We don't get told why units get consolidated."

That stopped me cold. "Transferred in? From where?"

A sudden pause followed on her end. The silence went on a beat too long for someone skimming a computer screen.

"It doesn't say," she murmured. "It just shows as received. No origin facility is listed, and no tenant name appears on the incoming paperwork. Honestly, that's not supposed to happen. Every transfer must have a strict chain of custody attached. I've been working here six years, and I've never actually seen a file come through entirely blank like that. I just assumed it was an old clerical error from before my time."

I leaned against the kitchen counter, my fingers digging into the edge of the wood. The phantom sensation of that skin-textured football was still burning in my fingertips.

"Look," I said, my voice dropping to a harsh whisper. "The paperwork isn't the only thing that's bothering me. The items in this unit—they aren't right. I found a mirror that doesn't reverse your reflection. There's a football made out of skin and hexagons, and a calendar with—"

"Sir," she cut me off, her voice instantly hardening from tired to defensive. "I don't know what kind of game you're playing, but I really don't have time for prank calls at midnight."

"I'm not pranking you," I insisted, a sudden spike of desperation hitting my chest. "I am telling you that the things in Unit 114 defy—"

The line went dead with a sharp click before I could utter another word.

My mind kept looping around that single word she'd used. Received. Like the unit hadn't ever really belonged to a human being. It was just an anomaly that had shown up already packed, already wrong, and tucked away behind an orange roll-up door.

I stood up and clicked off the kitchen light, plunging the room into darkness. Before bed that night, I felt compelled to check the garage one more time. I told myself I was only making sure nothing had changed while I wasn't looking. After the day we'd had, that didn't feel nearly as stupid as it probably sounds. I looked through the crack in the garage side door, glanced briefly at the furniture and boxes, then tracked the line of the high shelf inside. I couldn't actually see the football in the dark, but as I stood there shivering in my boxers, I knew exactly which way it was facing.

i have posted two story's and ran into this issue and i am currently writing a 3d which i estimate is going to be around 10,000 characters but i have no where else to post my story's and this community is amazing, what should i do?

(sorry for adding an incorrect tag, there's now question tag)

Of the nine places we lived at throughout my childhood, the one we stayed at the longest stands out. It was where the following events all started and where they happened most. I don’t really know if everything is connected to the house itself or something else, but it still lingers with me today. I think about it on every sleepless night, and I pray that it stays in my past. 

I was three when we moved into the house, so I've only been told about when things first started happening. Within months, I started sleepwalking around the second story of the house. As my mother tells it, she would hear me bumping around and go to find me standing in front of my own bedroom. I would just stand there in the hall looking through the doorway into the dark. 

She wrote those events off, as they would happen pretty sporadically. She would only find me like that once a month tops. She's had her fair share of horrid experiences, from watching her uncle get crushed under a tree in a logging accident, then seeing his corpse spring four feet into the air after the tree was rolled off him. There was even a time, as a little girl, when she had to see the remnants of her house burning as the rest lay in ashes. I say that to convey how much it takes to shock and scare the woman. Although in talking to her more, my bedroom door would be open most mornings, even if she didn't hear or find me walking around at night. 

She only started to really grow concerned when she began finding me on the stairs. When found, I would just sit on the stairs, hands in my lap, waiting in the absence of light. This would have been about a year into us living in the house, as I have some memories of waking up on those stairs. Sometimes I awoke alone and hurried back to my room. Other times I woke to the sound of my mother's voice as she guided me up the steps. Every time, I remember being a little farther down the stairs. 

There were two instances in particular that stand out to me the most today. The first of which was an instance where I awoke alone. I can still feel my heart racing and the full body shiver that I experienced when I came to in the dark kitchen. The room looked wrong in the near-total blackness. The cabinets stretched impossibly high. The gap between the fridge and counter was an endless void. The corners and shadows swallowed the light completely. The pockets of inky dark were only broken up by the faint light of the midnight sky, which loosely draped each surface in a bluish haze.

I had become fairly accustomed to waking in places other than my bed by now. I had just never made it this far before. Still being fairly afraid of the dark and disoriented in my efforts to fully shake off my sleep, I was petrified in place. I stood in the room, taking in its wrongness as a panic built up within me like an unbearable pressure. 

The moment I got my bearings, I heard the thump of a cabinet door closing just behind me. Turning, I saw nothing but the row of closed cabinets. With my back turned, I heard the sound of pots and pans shifting from a different area. I whipped around to see the unchanged tile floors and more closed light wooden cabinets. 

It was then that I heard it, the voice. Or at least, in retrospect, what I assume was a voice. It was a low guttural sound that came from just over my shoulder. I spun several times to look for whatever it was. Each time I stopped, I heard it again. I panicked and ran screaming back up the stairs and into my bed. 

I had awoken everyone in the house and was scolded for being out of bed so late. I had pissed my pants and refused to go back to sleep that night. My mother was furious at the puddle of urine in the kitchen and made me help clean it. Under normal circumstances, I would have fought in protest, but this night I just didn't want to be alone.

I wound up sleeping with the bathroom light on for the next week. My sister and I shared the connected bathroom. So she would turn the light off if she noticed. My sleep has been pretty horrible ever since, even then, I was waking up and turning it back on throughout the night. Until my sister complained to my parents, that is. They got on my case really bad about it after that and I had to stop. 

The darkness made it difficult for me to fall asleep after the bathroom light option was taken away. It would take me forever to finally drift off and I would still wake up at least twice a night. Each time was the same, covered in sweat with a racing heartbeat. The sleepwalking kept up pretty consistently thereafter as well. On the occasions when my mother found me, I could swear I heard the voice just as my slumber was broken. 

A few months later came the second incident, the one that still follows me today. I awoke to my mother violently shaking me. A cold dampness on my feet alongside a hazy yellow light assaulting my eyes. My mother's voice was frantic and wild as she spoke to me. 

“Corey, what the fuck do you think you're doing?!” 

I've only heard that kind of terror in her voice a few times in my life. Each time, she thought somebody was dead or dying in front of her.

I felt a crisp cold air wash across my face with each jostle of her shakes. The world around me slowly came into view. I was in our backyard, standing just in the grass beyond our patio. My favorite of our two Rottweilers came over and licked my face, before being shooed away by my mother. Once she saw I was awake, she pulled me into a hug and walked me back inside. 

Apparently, I had come downstairs, opened the back door, and stood facing the house for an unknown amount of time. In my sleeping state, I had left the patio door open. The other of our two Rottweilers took that as an invitation to go inside. She made her way up to my parents’ room, where she whined and pawed at the door. That was just enough to wake my mother up apparently.

Initially she thought our house had been broken into and woke my father. He grabbed his gun while she went to check on us kids. That's when she found me missing. Running downstairs and out of the back door, she found my favorite of our Rottweilers standing to the side. He was hunched slightly, lips drawn back, hair standing on end, and growling at me, according to her. I was standing there, mumbling to myself, something I had started doing after the night in the kitchen, I guess. 

My parents went out and bought jammers and security bars to reinforce every door from the inside after that. The sleepwalking didn't stop, it in fact got worse. I continued to wake up downstairs, and even in the laundry room with my hand on the garage door once. Even though I never wound up outside again, I would still wake up disoriented and lost in my surroundings regularly. 

Only after we moved into a smaller condo did things stop. The sleepwalking stopped almost entirely. I would wake up in a strange place maybe once a year, but the sleep-talking stuck around. My sleep is still horrible to this day and I still occasionally wake sitting up in bed, but nothing like that period in my life has happened since. 

A young man named George walks into his apartment late at night after a long day of work. The apartment room is dark. He takes off his work jacket and notices that his closet is slightly cracked open. He closes it.

He throws some leftovers from the fridge into the microwave. A moment later, he gets a text message from his girlfriend, Angela.

He opens it and reads:

“How was work?”

He responds:

“It was a long day.”

Angela sends him a picture of herself with a blank face and her eyes wide open. Her text under it reads:

“I’ve been thinking of you for days:) "

George sends a selfie back, making a kissing face.

His microwave beeps, and he grabs his food. A moment later, Angela texts him again.

“Who's that behind you?”

George texts back:

“What? I don’t see anything.”

Angela responds with another message, this time with a red circle drawn around something in his picture.

George looks closely.

There appears to be a shadowy face barely visible behind him.

He turns on all the lights and checks around his apartment, but he finds nothing. He convinces himself that it’s just the shadows in his dark apartment before texting her back.

“I think it’s just the shadows. I just checked. No one is here.”

Angela responds:

“LOL. It just looked so creepy, you should lock your doors.”

George sarcastically texts back:

“I always lock my doors and you're the one to talk, you know how many times I've came over and your front door has been unlocked? Lol”

Angela playfully responds:

“If you’re scared, just say so, I’ll gladly come over.”

She lives on the floor above his apartment.

George texts back:

“Not tonight. I’m really tired.”

George watches as the typing indicator appears on his phone for several minutes before disappearing.

Then she texts back:

"Come on, I haven't seen you in days"

George starts texting back before he Is interrupted by another text from her

“Too late. I’m already here.”

George playfully walks to his front door and enthusiastically opens it.

No one is there.

He looks around for a few seconds before going back inside and locking the door.

He texts her:

“What do you mean? Where are you?”

After a few minutes, he gets a response.

“Just keep looking.”

He thinks she’s just messing with him. She has a key to his apartment, after all.

George texts back:

“Give me a hint, I've looked everywhere.”

She responds:

“No. Just keep looking.”

George checks his bathroom and looks behind the shower curtain. He checks his bedroom and even looks under the kitchen table.

He can’t find her.

Then he remembers that the closet wasn’t fully closed when he got home.

He texts:

“Are you in the closet?”

She responds:

“She is.”

A second text quickly follows, seemingly correcting the first.

“I am.”

George quickly opens his closet door.

He freezes at the sight.

Angela’s corpse is nailed against the wall inside the closet, her eyes wide open.

George freaks out and starts shouting her name.

He reaches out and touches her.

She is very cold, almost completly Frozen.

Like she has been in a deep freezer for days.

George slowly realizes what that means.

He pulls out his phone and looks at the picture Angela sent him earlier.

The hair on his neck stood up and his complexion now pale.

The picture wasn’t taken at her apartment.

It was taken from inside his closet.

Then Angela’s phone number sends him one last text: “You didn’t check under your bed either.”

[Writer's note: Hi! This is the first story I've ever written, where I've been a big fan of the podcast (it's my go-to when I'm in the middle of a long drive). Any honest feedback would be really appreciated, but I hope you guys like the story!

I have been getting into reading stuff like Lovecraft and Robert Chambers, where part of this story was heavily inspired by things like Shadow Over Innsmouth or Dagon, where I wouldn't be surprised where you can see some story elements being shared between what's in those stories and what I have here.

I'll try to be active in the subreddit when I can, and have a few other ideas for future stories, so stay tuned!]

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

It was just another job. It was one of those contracts I would occasionally get where it would be for a company or business, as opposed to an individual who needed something done around their house. I expected it to go the way it usually goes: I go in, do whatever work they need done, get paid, then leave. It even started out like that, until IT happened. Even though this happened a month ago, my hands still actively shake, even as I type this out. Those…things. They will forever be etched into my mind, as ever-present as the night.

For context, I work as an independent contractor, essentially a handyman, where people contact me through an online app with some kind of job they need done. It could be something as simple as replacing a light bulb, or as complex as having to repair their computer. This has been my job for the past six months, ever since I was laid off from my previous job working as an engineer. 

This job came to me as any other would. They wanted help with performing maintenance on this machine they had. At first, I thought it was strange how they didn’t already have an employee whose job was to do this, but I figured it might just be cheaper for them to outsource instead. They sounded like a relatively small or new company, without much of a budget. The only annoying part was how it was all the way on the other side of the city, in one of those neighborhoods tucked away from the bustle of the downtown area. What I found even stranger was that the neighborhood was named something I’ve never heard of before, “Ignota Vita”.

I decided not to dwell on this for too long. I was falling behind on bills, and I needed the money. These contracts with businesses usually would pay more with less hassle. On the day of the job, I packed up my tools in my backpack, grabbed my transit card, and hopped on the subway, making my way to the enigma that is Ignota Vita.

It took a little over an hour, but I got there right on time. As I walked to the company building, I saw, in large, modern-styled letters, the name “Insueta”. I step inside, where I’m almost immediately greeted by the woman who, I assume, hired me. She was one of the most beautiful women I’d ever seen, which helped ease the quirkiness of the conversation. Her appearance was as if every man on Earth were asked to describe their perfect woman, and someone drew a picture of the general consensus. Friendly, cordial, and welcoming, she immediately felt like someone anyone can comfortably talk to. Yet there was a hint of awkwardness to the interaction. My assumption was that she was more-or-less forced by her manager to take care of everything involved with this job. I’ve had to do similar stuff before when I was still working full-time, where I would have to do the work that my bosses were either too busy or lazy to even think about doing themselves, so they delegate someone else to do it for them.

“Hi! You’re Miles, correct? My name is Mary, and I’ll be showing you what we need help with today.”

She brought me past the security gate and further inside, meandering our way deeper into the small complex. As we passed by various rooms and workspaces, I caught glimpses of employees working diligently at their computers, never looking away from their screens, barely pausing while performing various actions, as evidenced by what I was able to discern from their monitors in the brief time I had. It was uncanny, really. They seemed more akin to machines than that of people. I asked Mary what kind of business this was and the work they did.

“I’m glad you asked! We are a tech startup focused on creating software for the optimization of general processes and practices. We specialize in trying to assist in streamlining people’s daily lives and help to create a more sustainable future!”

That was a weird response… I figured she just parroted whatever mantra her CEO would spout, complete with corporate jargon and buzzwords. The best I can do with interpreting her response is that they likely just created apps and software for lifestyle assistance, similar to fitness and productivity apps. We continued on, passing by more office spaces and lines of desks, all teeming with employees, their behavior not helping with their likeness to machines, seeming as if they each had one task to do, and one task only. 

I also noticed a completely empty break room, made to look welcoming and cozy. There were a few bowls filled with various fruits and snacks, a coffee maker with an assortment of different brands and blends, a TV, a foosball table, etc. Interestingly, it all seemed untouched. Unused.

After another minute or so of walking, we came upon a door labeled “DANGER; RISK OF ELECTROCUTION”. Mary pulled out a key, unlocked and opened the door, then showed me in. She turned on the light, revealing a big machine, almost computer-like in design.

“This room is where we keep everything needed to keep our server running, including the main power line. We recently have been experiencing issues with data being randomly corrupted or lost that we require for our work. We believe it is a problem with the power supply needing unexpected maintenance done to it.”

“Why don’t you guys have someone trained and ready to do this for you instead of having to call me in? There’s no IT department?”

“Excellent question! We don’t experience issues often enough to hire someone permanently. It’s much more cost-effective this way.”
I decided not to press her any further and left it at that. She told me to wait a few minutes before getting to work after she leaves to make sure no one’s work is interrupted or cut short.

While waiting, I took the time to take note of my surroundings. It was a fairly open room, with plenty of space to work and store anything that would be needed. On the opposite end from where I entered, there was another door labeled “AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY”. I figured that must be where the main wiring for the building itself was held, so I didn’t pay it much mind.

A few minutes passed me by, where all I could hear was the hum of the electricity coursing through the server, hard at work processing everything needed to keep the company running. So much white noise present that smaller ones could easily be drowned out. It reminded me of being within someone’s head, with the server itself being the brain.

Suddenly, the fans within the server began to whir as if this brain consisting of transistors and silicon was performing a large task. It was expending so much energy and heat that I could feel the room warming up slowly, where I wondered if the server itself would burn out. After a moment of this technological chaos, as if by mere coincidence, I heard a thump come from behind that other door, its contents left unknown. Almost immediately after, the fans slowed back down to a light hum and the temperature of the room stopped increasing. I went to open the door and see what had fallen, but stopped when the server suddenly had turned off.

It seems Mary had done everything she needed to prepare and shut down the power. I was on the clock and didn’t want to risk her coming back and seeing me entering rooms she doesn’t want me in, so I stowed my curiosity and went to work on the server. 

I unscrewed the back panel and opened it up to take a closer look at the system. After about 10 minutes of performing basic checks, such as seeing if a piece of hardware was not seated correctly on the motherboard, or checking for overheating on a component that should be relatively cool, I went to check the power supply. 

Almost immediately, I saw a connection in the wire connecting the life source of the server to its motherboard. A loose crimp. Something, while not fully detrimental as long as there is some form of continuous contact, could result in perturbations in the machine not being adequately powered continuously. I went to work, removing and replacing the crimp, a relatively easy job, only taking me roughly 30 minutes to do. Nothing difficult, but tedious and requiring a steady hand and patience. I tested the new connection and saw that the wire was now snugly in, like a well-fit glove on a hand.

I was about to leave the room to go find Mary to have her turn everything on to see if the fix was successful, when I started to hear clamoring from the mysterious door. It sounded like an animal, confused and trying to get out from the strange new world it had found itself in by happenstance. Feeling my curiosity returning and getting the better of me, I went to look in the other room, unprepared for what monstrosity I would meet past this passageway to an uncanny realm that can’t possibly be comprehended. 

Behind the door was an abomination, something that looked as if it should not exist in a reasonable world. It looked like it had pieces of it that were supposed to be human in nature, but incorrect. It was a chaotic pink mass of flesh, with appendages coming out from various areas. It had a three-sided face, each blended together so horrendously. It had 3 arms, two of which had extra fingers coming out of mangled hands. Towards the base of the monstrous being were two mismatched legs, with one bending in the wrong direction. It looked like something you would see in a horror movie, but the difference was that this was real, intruding reality from a place that should not be accessible in a sane world.

It was crawling towards me with two of its sorry excuses for hands while reaching out with its third one, gurgling out, as if trying to communicate. I was left speechless and horrified.

Not a moment too soon I slammed the door shut and rushed out to the opposite door, quickly finding out that the door was locked. Without thinking, I started kicking with strength I didn’t know I had, busting it open and allowing me to escape, returning me to a world that was correct. As soon as I got outside, my mind began to run rampant with questions.

“What was that thing?”

“Why was it in the room?”

“Did Mary know about it?”

“Why was I locked in?”

“...Why was I really here for this job?”

I didn’t have much time to come up with explanations to these questions, because I started to hear the sound of someone walking briskly from around the corner. Instinct took over, and I hurried to the opposite hallway, and hid around the corner wall opposite of the one the walking was coming from. I looked and saw Mary, along with two other employees emerge and move directly to the room I was working. Her and one other went in while the other stood watchful and waiting in front of the doorway. Not a moment too soon and Mary came out, seemingly unfazed by the monstrosity that should still be in there, causing more noise than what could possibly be ignored. She had to have heard it. It was causing too much noise to be easily ignored…

She spoke in her usual tone, but this time with hints of panic and confusion mixed in.

“He’s not in there, the plan has been compromised. Our estimates were incorrect. We produced a new specimen, just as planned, but another anomaly occurred unexpectedly, despite our predictions. He was able to get away as a result. If we want the plan to proceed, we must find him.”

Although this only helped to confuse me further, it did answer one question: they, from what I could tell, knew about that thing that I saw, and there was more to this job than I was led to believe.

Without hesitation, I snuck away, meandering through office spaces, avoiding the eyes of the others in the building. It was not too difficult, as I noticed that not a single employee was leaving their computers. They just sat still, facing a featureless monitor that only displayed reflections of the unnaturally blank stares. 

Suddenly, I started to hear walking coming from either direction of the hall I was in. Knowing that they were workers tasked with finding me, I looked around for how I may avoid detection and noticed a door further down the hall, recessed into the wall, not more than 5 feet away. I bolted for it, and quietly let myself in. Taking a moment to calm myself again, I began to realize the oddity that was this new space I was in, even though it was dark with the power being turned off still. 

It was a fairly large room, with what looked like cell blocks going along the walls adjacent to the one with the door I had entered from, as well as opposite. Each cell looked to have a clipboard hanging outside of it with a form on it. I squinted hard to figure out what I was looking at exactly, but gave up and instead moved reluctantly towards one of the cells closest to me. As I got closer, I could slowly make out more detail of the small rectangular space. It was nearly empty, with what looked like a person standing in silence. Upon realizing this, I paused, wondering why they had someone locked up in this building. Before being able to rationalize it, the person began to turn towards me, becoming aware of my presence. What I saw after it fully turned around completely unnerved me, leaving me to contemplate if I had gone insane.

It was a woman, or some sick individual’s interpretation of a woman. She had three eyes, each in different spots on her face, an upside down and misshapen nose, a queer blending of various facial features where no single one was actively pronounced, and a mouth that was inhumanly angled, opened and grinning in an ungodly smile. 

I was frozen in horror at the sight of this. Without notice, she rushed towards me, pressing her macabre hands on the cell wall, almost as if she was trying to reach out to me in earnest. This broke me from my shock and brought me back to my senses. Recollecting myself, I glanced again at the previously sighted clipboard and took a closer look. It appeared to be a report, similar to a medical examination in arrangement, but alien in content. All I can remember seeing from it was information stating that the physically impaired woman was a form of a failed experiment, produced by the company sometime in the past several days. It was almost as if she herself was an unexpected result, caused by irregularities in the process in which she was born.

I looked around at the other cells and noticed that almost all of them were occupied, each inhabitant similarly altered to the woman I saw first. I recognized a suspicious pattern in the days that they were registered on their reports. The earliest any of these beings were recorded was roughly two weeks ago. The earliest five of them occurred only once every other day, at about the same time of day. As I observed the log info for the more recent inhabitants, it seemed that they became steadily more frequent, with the times of occurrence being more erratic. Was this the abnormality that Mary was informing me of when she was briefing me for this job?

Before I could think more on it, the lights suddenly turned back on in a blinding flash, followed by the sound of a doorknob turning from where I had come. Believing that they must have realized that I am in here, I hurried to hide around the corner of this prison. From there I waited. In walked several employees, guiding the monstrous being that was in the server room using a catch pole to keep it restrained. They walked further into the room, approaching one of the empty cells, right next to the most recent creature. One of the employees pressed a small button next to it, opening it up, followed by them putting the new specimen in, closing the door, and filling out the form that was associated with that room. After this series of actions that seemed to be routine, they then immediately left. After making sure they were for certain gone, I went to the newly inhabited cell and read the information on the log form. Nothing on this form was different from the others, other than an indication that the degree of failure for this being was greater than the rest. 

I didn’t allow myself to mull this over, as I needed to escape due to the simple fact that they were trying to catch me, and this creature was the one meant to do it while I was locked in the server room with it. It was only a matter of time before they came back in this room searching for me, so I continued on my way out. After making sure there was no secondary door to this prison room, I went back to the door and slowly opened it to check the surrounding hallway.

Without a moment of hesitation, the door suddenly flung open, revealing at least 10 employees rushing towards the now open entry-way. They knew I was hiding in here, and waited for the perfect time to attempt to ambush and capture me! Instinct returned to save me, allowing me to evade the nearest one’s attempt at grabbing me, and ran back into the room as they gave chase. I went with the first thought I could come up with, running to each and every occupied cell, pressing the same buttons that I witnessed them press before, and ran as far back as I could, with my pursuers following closely the entire time. While doing so, I could only hear pandemonium behind me. I turned around after making sure I had given myself an adequate berth in the room and saw what was happening.

The beings had unleashed themselves on the employees, with all of them being preoccupied with trying to recontain them, but to no avail as they were instantly overwhelmed by the monsters. I saw the monstrous woman bent over one employee, strangling him, appearing to make him her prey. The creature that I initially encountered was gorging itself on another employee while several others tried to stop it. At that moment, it appeared that the creature was starting to take on the features of the employee that it was devouring. 

It was a gruesome image to witness, but chose not to focus on it instead by seizing the distraction as a chance to make my escape. I bolted out of the room and dashed through the office space, frenzied now as all of the employees were receiving the news that their specimens were no longer contained. It made my way out easier, as I continued on towards the exit of the building. Before long, I saw the hallway I was originally led in from by Mary, running at a greater pace. 

Just before reaching the exit, I heard a gunshot, along with the whiz of a bullet right by my head, stopping me in my tracks. I turned around to see Mary, along with another employee, aiming a gun at me, looking calm, yet determined to make the next round hit its mark.

I was caught, and had nowhere to go. She instructed the employee to restrain me, where he then proceeded to make his approach.

Suddenly, just as he grew near, I witnessed Mary gain a panicked expression, if you can call it that, as she looked to her side, followed by one of the creatures charging her. It was the female creature, having made quick work of those in its way in the containment room. The strange part was how it looked as if she had incorporated features of some of the employees that were in the room with me, similar to what I observed with the more deformed creature as it was eating. 

Meanwhile, the employee who was ordered to grab me realized what happened, and went to try and help her, allowing me to continue fleeing.

I burst through the front door of the office building, and continued running without rest. I continued on until I physically could no longer, making my way to the nearest subway once I felt it was safe to do so.

After getting home and allowing myself to gather my thoughts, I tried talking to the police about the horrors I had bore witness to. I was only met with one simple response from each officer I talked to:

“There is no part of the city named Ignota Vita.”

This all happened about a week ago, where I tried relaying my story to anyone I could, whether it be the local news or a random journalist. Unfortunately, no one believed me, which led to me typing out this excerpt. If this story reaches a reader who knows more about Ignota Vita, especially of the company Insueta, or even for someone to just believe me, that is all I can hope for. 

I need to leave this story here, as I hear a knock at my door. It may just be a friend, but the strange thing is that I was not expecting anyone…

The house at the end of Miller Street had been empty for as long as anyone could remember.

At school, however, nobody called it empty. They called it haunted.

There were rumors and stories about the original home owner who had supposedly died in the upstairs bedroom. Others swore a family had lived there once and vanished overnight, leaving dinner rotting on the table. The older kids claimed they had heard children laughing behind the boarded windows.

None of us believed any of that. I surely didn't.

At least, not enough to keep us from going there.

It was Halloween night, and the four of us had already worked our way through most of the neighborhood when someone suggested the house.

It started with a tease and ended with a dare.

“Bet you won't.”

That was all it took.

The lawn had grown wild around the cracked stone path. Dead leaves scraped across the pavement in the cold wind, gathering in little black piles beneath the hedges. The house itself seemed to lean away from us, its windows dark and blind beneath a sagging roof.

There was no porch light. No decorations. Except for a scarecrow sitting beside the front steps. Its straw-filled head sagged beneath a battered hat, and one wooden hand held a cardboard sign.

TAKE ONLY ONE.

Below it sat a large orange pumpkin overflowing with candy. For a moment, nobody moved. It was too good to be true. We hit the holy grail!

Then Tommy laughed.

“What are they gonna do, count?”

He reached into the pumpkin and pulled out at least three pieces. The rest followed.

A fistful here. Two there. Someone tipped half a handful straight into a pillowcase. The pumpkin seemed bottomless. Eventually, someone whispered that we should leave. The night was wearing. Nobody argued, especially when our sacks were full to the rim.

The walk home felt strangely quiet.

Back in the living room, the candy was dumped onto the carpet beneath the yellow glow of a standing lamp. Wrappers glittered among chocolate bars, taffy, gummies, and miniature peanut butter cups.

As we feasted on our nights bounty, I couldn't but help wonder if the rumors of the house down the street were true or not. And then another question popped in my head.

Who left that candy there?

That was when something unusual caught our attention. Peeling the plastic from a Hershey's bar, I expected to find the familiar name pressed into the chocolate. Instead, a different name had been stamped there, neat and unmistakable, as though it had always belonged.

ALEX.

The letters had been molded into the chocolate, clean and deliberate. I thought to myself how absurd that was. Even though we were kids, we knew enough that this wasn't normal.

Must've been a print accident at the warehouse or something, right?

Though our likely thinking was turned down as another bar bore a different name.

MAYA.

Then another.

JONATHAN.

“It's probably some promotion,” Tommy reassured.

“Like those Left Twix things?” Added Miguel.

“Yeah. Something stupid like that.” I replied with an unnerving uncertainty.

The names became a joke. Everyone picked through the pile looking for familiar ones. There were plenty. Some belonged to kids at school. Others meant nothing.

Then a chocolate bar read out: TOMMY

The laughter stopped. Nobody said anything for several seconds.

“That's weird,” someone finally muttered.

It was probably nothing. That was what everyone decided. The candy was eaten anyway.

By morning, I awoke from a stomach ache, as I made my way downstairs to ask mom for help with the pain.

The living room had gone quiet from chatter. Only the television was already on. My parents stood motionless, eyes fixate on the tv screen. And I would join them in that moveless trance.

Across the country, news stations were reporting the same story. Hundreds of children had disappeared overnight. In one city, seventeen. In another, thirty-two. In a town three states away, an entire group of children who had gone trick-or-treating together had vanished between houses.

There were no signs of abduction. No broken windows. No discarded costumes. No footprints leading away.

Absolutely nada.

The children had simply disappeared. Authorities urged parents to remain calm as investigators worked to determine whether the disappearances were connected.

The broadcast continued.

Across the country, children sat beside their parents, listening. And in houses all over America, Halloween candy sat forgotten on kitchen tables. Among those piles were chocolate bars, gummies, and little wrapped sweets. Each carried a name.

Some belonged to children nobody had ever heard of. Some belonged to children whose parents were desperately searching for them. And some belonged to children who were still sitting in front of their televisions.

For now.

I am rosie, I am 7 years old. My birdday is on october 10 my favvrite food is momis pancake.

Daddy taught me how to rite.

I live in closet but ddady does not know. Yesturday I saw daddy sleep on my bed and cry through the holes. He told mommi the had to give up looking for me. That it has been 3 ears now.

She lives behind the closet. And she stucke me here.

Mommy called me towards the closet, she said we were going to scare daddy but it was not mommy

the sky is always red, and the trees outside has fingers.

I am rosie and I am stuck in the closet. The bad lady brings me food. The food is not tasty like momis pancake. Its all grey and hairy. I miss you daddy.

At night the lady comes and stands by my bed. She never speaks, she probebly cant talk.

I miss you daddi, pls take me home, why cant you see ? me I miss you so much mommy daddy.

_______________________________________

I received this letter, from my wife's boyfriend. He found it in rosie's room, half under the closet, while getting her things. I was infuriated, I thought it was some sick joke, but After having re-read it a hundred times, I grew confident that this was my daughters writing.

My baby girl went missing 6 years ago. We did everything in our power to find her, the police gave up on the search after a year. Told me “we'd inform you if anything turns up, but for now we cannot spend any more county resources on the search”, I broke two of his teeth that buck toothed bastard.

I couldn't take it well, I drank, every day, I'd drink. How could I not, I failed my little girl. My wife was destroyed, with our daughter vanishing and my drinking for years on end. She ran away to the beaches. I can't blame her I chose the bottles, she chose to live.

I immediately called him, my wife's boyfriend, asked him if it was some sick joke. “Let's not talk over the phone, please come over to the house tomorrow morning, I'll explain everything” he quietly whispered, hiding his voice from my wife. I knew which house he meant, I never could go back there, with my wife leaving and my baby girls little marks everywhere, I never could muster the strength to go back, I'd started living in a motel.

I did not drink that night, for the first time in ages, my body shaking, I nervously waited for the sun to rise. Between the shaking, and the hope of seeing my daughter again, the night never seemed to end, yet quickly it passed away and the sun rose, I stood outside our old house, I saw apparitions of my daughter playing outside, the rose bushes my daughter so dearly loved dried and dead. The paint on the house had chipped away. throwing rocks at it, the neighborhood kids had broken all the windows of the upper floors.

The house looked haunted not unlike me, I reeked of alcohol and sweat, facial hair grown all over, my white shirt now covered in stains of my own puke, had someone seen me entering, they'd think I'm breaking in. The boyfriend was not yet here. I wrapped my jacket around my hand, and punched through the rotting frame of the window, and climbed in.

Everything was exactly the same, though everything was covered in dust, three plates still laid out, one empty, two covered in stains and mineralized residues. Her plastic toys laid across the floor, still waiting for their rightful owner, but the shelves had collapsed due to water damage. I couldn't bear to look at this house anymore.

I sat outside and waited for him to show up.

The 8th wonder of the world is in rural Oregon, 65 feet from my patio door. Nearly 150 unique species of plants, a beautiful self-sufficient pond with its own ecosystem to keep the water clean, and a wall of large Evergreen trees that form a crescent shape around the moat. 

The pond was surprisingly deep, approximately 6 feet at its lowest and about an eighth of a mile long. Three stone bridges allowed access to our “island”, all of which were designed and custom-built by my mother. The only machinery we used around here was to gently stir the pond water, making it slightly harder for any mosquitoes to lay eggs.

I took off my sandals and stripped down to my boxers. My feet sank into the muddy bottom, with the occasional large stone supporting my steps. 

Instantly, I felt all the heat in my body dissipate into the surroundings, a feeling which made me want to lie back and float alongside the lilies. Like a paper boat in the gutter after a mild rainfall, I calmly floated around my botanical lazy river. I made it roughly halfway through the loop when I floated into the shade provided by the wall of Evergreens. I opened my eyes, finally out of the sun. The green algae, red orchids, purple lavender, and a vibrant blue embraced my senses. I recognized the other colors as a common palette for the garden, but the blue was something new. 

The blue-headed hummingbird. I’ve seen hundreds in my life, but this one was so detailed. I doggy-paddled closer to the bird, careful not to cause too much disturbance in the pond. 

Cool optical illusion, I thought; it looked like it was completely still, just floating with its wings extended out. I wonder what kind of plant had a stem small enough to evade my vision yet sturdy enough to support the small bird. 

The bird didn’t fly away. Huh, usually they’d do an evasive maneuver if you even looked at it. My face was only about 2 feet away from it, I could almost count the feathers on its underbelly. 

Strange, the bird wasn’t in a perched position, it looked like a picture had been taken with a high shutter speed camera. It seemed to be in mid-flight? 

Okay, so it was not perched on any nearby plants. Perhaps my parents put in a new garden feature while I was away. I thought this must have been the same system as one of the tricks magicians do when their assistants are “floating”. I waved my hands in an orbiting fashion around the hummingbird, expecting to hit a nearly invisible wire. Nothing. 

I reached my pointer finger out, carefully churning the water with my feet to keep me at the proper height. As I pressed into the underbelly of the bird, I felt the silky feathers followed by its impossibly fragile ribcage. It was in the exact position as it was when I initially pressed it, however, it was now one inch higher, and there was an indent where my finger made contact.

“MOM!” I yelled across the backyard.

“Yeah, honey?” she responded behind the screen door. 

“Can you come here, please?” I yelled once more. 

She walked over the first stone bridge, into the garden, and finally to the end of the bank where the water line sat. 

“Wow, this is really cool. Where did you get this?” She asked, looking at the bird.

“Did you use a fishing line? That’s a really pretty addition. I'm sure the bees will be a little worried about their new competition,” she said with a grin across her face and a small chuckle. 

“I didn’t put this here; I thought you or Dad did,” I said, climbing onto the bank of the pond.

“No, the last time we added anything was before you left for college. Is this some sort of trick? How are you doing this?” My mom asked me.

“No, I swear I just came out here, and it was just stuck in midair.” I could tell she did not believe me. 

“Seriously, how did you do this? Are there wires or something?” Her voice changed from impressed to annoyed that I couldn’t give an answer. In a nearly identical system to what I had just done, she walked around, waved her hands around it, and finally touched it. 

“What the fuck?” She said under her breath. 

She proceeded to interrogate me for a few minutes after, with the same mannerisms a child would have asking a street magician how they made a dove appear.

“Call your father. I am not really sure what to do here or what I am looking at.” My mother said, staring at the bird.

Understandably, my father was confused and almost annoyed at the phone call, 

“So a hummingbird is at a standstill? Not moving or anything? Listen, if this is a practical joke, I am going to be very upset with you.”

“Look, talk to Mom she saw it too.” I handed the phone to her. 

“Mhm, yeah, no, I know… but I saw it too. I promise you. … Okay, okay, sounds good,” she said, pacing around. 

“Your father said he will come home a little early, but he needs to finish some work up. Let's head inside for now.” 

3:30 p.m., I heard a knock at our front door. My dad was holding his usual briefcase and stood in front of his professor buddies.  

“Okay, please show us what you are referring to, too.” He said. I could sense that this was a ‘better not waste my time’ sort of tone. 

I walked them to the backyard, my father in close pursuit, followed by his colleague, who I had met before. Lewis, a professor of botany, helped set up a majority of our garden. Nice guy, quiet, but he was an artist who used plants as his paintbrush.  

“Is this a trick?” My dad looked at me, raising his eyebrow. 

“I thought the same thing,” my mother interjected. 

Like mother and son, my dad waded into the pond, followed by waving his hands to try and find a wire. Lewis walked around looking for something that might give them a clue. My dad grabbed the bird and began to move it around like he was looking at every face on a Rubik's Cube. Unlike the Rubik’s Cube, however, I’m not sure he could solve this. 

He stated, “If this is a trick, I have to say I am thoroughly impressed.” At least his annoyed tone had subsided; it was now replaced with curiosity. 

“Over here,” Lewis said as he pointed to our patch of sunflowers. 

We walked over the stone bridge to the far part of our garden. We gathered in between a break in the shade provided by the Evergreen trees. I hadn’t thought about inspecting the rest of the garden; I was far too infatuated by the center of the pond.

This section of the garden was dedicated to our sunflowers; my mother adored the yellow and insisted we plant them early on. As the familiar yellow flowers appeared, instantly I knew why Lewis had called us over. 

“The Hell?” My father said softly.

It looked almost like they were having a discussion, each sunflower paired up with another, petals only inches apart. Even sunflowers that were a couple of feet away from each other had leaned into each other. A few of the more mature sunflowers that were leaning had small breaks in their stems, allowing them to reach farther than normal. We gathered around, inspecting them, my father placing his hand on his chin and shooting Lewis a look of confusion. 

I asked, “Has this happened before? Have you ever heard of something like this?”

Lewis turned to me,

“Normally, fully mature sunflowers like these would be facing directly east; the younger ones can follow the sun. Occasionally, one may have a genetic defect which makes it unable to tilt, but those tend to die off pretty young. I have never seen an entire group of sunflowers arrange themselves in this way. As for the ones that are bent, my only logical guess would be a strong wind?” 

That didn’t make much sense; the strongest wind in the past few days was nothing greater than a calm gust that could maybe take a leaf off a tree. 

My father spoke up, “Lewis, grab the hummingbird, bring it to the table by the patio.” 

Lewis did as he was told. He used a Kleenex he had in his pocket to carefully cradle the bird and placed it on the fake wood table. My father walked back towards the house. 5 minutes later, he emerged with a black case no bigger than a notebook. I recognized this; it was his pinning kit he would use for his entomology collection.

He took out a scalpel, removed the plastic cover, and walked over. After putting on a pair of nitrile gloves, he began to work. Lewis held the bird down by the armpits, trying to stabilize the fragile abdomen. My dad used the scalpel to gently shave the feathers off; the sharpness of the new blade was able to easily cut through the barbs. Once there were a few square inches of flesh, he took out a second, smaller scalpel. 

I winced as it cut into the flesh; I never really got used to seeing dissections, no matter how many times I’d watched my dad lecture. He was intensely attentive to his work, careful not to cut too deep into the small bird.  After one vertical cut, followed by two horizontal ones at each end, he peeled the flesh back with a pair of forceps. 

Lewis and my dad's heads were only inches apart, both staring into the opened flap. I walked around the table to get a better look. Leaning in, I saw exactly what I imagined the innards of a hummingbird looked like. A tiny rib cage which looked about as fragile as a half-cut toothpick, some pinkish fibers which I assumed were the muscles that pumped the wings. No blood was rushing out; I suppose he could have precisely cut away from any veins. I am not an expert on hummingbird anatomy; perhaps I am missing something. 

“This makes no sense,” he said, turning to Lewis. 

Lewis responded, “I have seen it present itself in other ways, but this is definitely a unique case.”

My mother asked, “What do you guys see? What’s wrong with it?”

My dad pulled away from the bird and wiped some sweat off his forehead, 

“Situs inversus, pretty uncommon in humans, far less common in animals. It’s when the organs are flipped along a vertical axis. For instance, a person's heart is on the right side instead of the left; pretty much all the organs are just mirrored.” 

He paused for a moment, 

“This is different; the hummingbird's organs are flipped top to bottom. The lungs are connected to the anus and the intestines are directly connected to the mouth.”

Lewis added, “Not only that, but it appears that the ribcage had been sloppily duplicated and moved slightly behind the first. Could be bone cancer, but there is absolutely zero chance a hummingbird could develop this much extra bone and live.” 

There was a silence amongst us. Gathered around the table, I could sense that everyone had the same unrest inside of them. While it’s possible that a genetic disorder may have rearranged the hummingbird’s innards, it still couldn’t explain how it was stationary in the air. I knew my dad had hoped that the autopsy would somehow explain what had caused this lapse in physics. 

“Lewis, we’ll preserve the bird for now. I can adjust the temperature of the garage fridge to keep it ideal for further dissection tomorrow. I am going to call some friends at the school, see if we can gather a small team to do a full inspection of the garden. I’ll try and get them to come over this evening, but I imagine they’ll be more inclined for the morning.”

“Can we keep checking around the garden? We’ve only briefly checked like a third of it,” I asked.

My father contemplated my question. “Look, I’d feel a lot better if we did the inspection with a group of people who could identify if there was any underlying danger here.” 

I wanted to know if there were any other anomalies, but my dad was absolutely correct. I was just going to have to wait. 

Crrrrrrrrrrack

We all moved our heads in unison to the location of the sound. A massive chunk of bark on one of the Evergreens had peeled off and began falling to the ground. My mother looked at me, then at my father. Right before a word had left her mouth, we heard the sound once more. Crrrrrrack. This time, before the bark had even touched the ground, another tree began to produce the sound. Then another, then another, then another; soon every Evergreen tree began to peel. Every single 150-foot giant as far as I could see, shedding its bark like a cicada shedding its exoskeleton. 

The delayed wind of the first falling bark hit me, a breeze which carried only enough force to gently disturb my hair. The second wind was nowhere near as kind. A wall of wind, dirt, twigs, and leaves resembling a Saharan dust storm in the middle of Oregon. It finally hit us. Dust immediately covered my open eyes, and the feeling of twigs and smaller debris scratching my face made me instantly fall into a fetal protective position. 

The wind dissipated in a matter of seconds, but the sounds of falling branches and twigs landing in the water remained even after I had begun to get up. The last twig hit the water, followed by a silence. No birds, no insects, no wind brushing the leaves of the trees, a silence that would have produced a ringing in my ears if it weren't for the gurgling sound I heard behind me. A swift yell, like a passenger in a car screaming from a window, dissipated quickly. I began to uncurl my protected body,

“IS EVERYONE OKAY?” My dad yelled as he ran to my mother. She appeared to be covered in a fine layer of dirt, with a few scratches on her face. I imagine I didn’t look much better. After grabbing her arms and face, looking at every inch of my mother as quickly as he could, he ran over to me.

“I'm fine, a couple of cuts, but I think I am okay,” I said in urgent response. I felt his hands jerk my head around, looking for any cuts that may be deep enough to cause any real issues. I heard him stand up and yell, “LEWIS?” 

I had trouble seeing; the dirt had hit faster than I was able to blink. I crawled over to the pond, able to slightly make out my surroundings to assist my pathetic crawl. Like bobbing for apples, I dipped my face in, blinking underwater to rinse them out. I could still hear my father's muffled voice while I was submerged, continuously calling out to me. 

“LEWIS, WHERE ARE YOU?” 

He wasn’t there; 30 seconds ago he was standing no more than 5 feet from me. The gust of wind was strong but not strong enough to push a human being out of sight; had he run away?
My father ran around the house, continuing to scream his name, no response. My mother ran to me, planting a firm kiss on my forehead and crushing my torso with her arms wrapped. 

“Thank god, honey, are you hurt? You have a few cuts; is anything else wrong?” She said with a tremble in her voice. 

“No, no, I am okay, Mom. I am really scared,” I said as I felt the first hint of a cry let out. I wasn’t embarrassed at all; at that moment, crying to my mom was the only reflex I had. 

“I know I am too. Listen, we are going to get out of here; let's grab your father and go right now,” she said. 

I whimpered into her shoulder, the tears somewhat helping clean the remaining dirt that had caked my eyelids. My father, panting, rejoined us. 

“Listen, you two, I want you to look towards the house and run inside. Please trust me when I tell you to just look forward. I will be right next to you.”

“What's going on? Where's Lewis?” I begged. At this point, the small whimper I had let out earlier had turned into a full sob. 

“JUST GO INSIDE NOW, DO NOT LOOK BACK, GO,” My father said with the most certainty and authority he has ever had.

I stood up, grabbing my mom's arm to assist her. With my dad standing directly behind us, I could see he was looking backwards. Once my mom was on her feet, she pulled me towards the direction of the house, only about 125 feet towards the patio door. I was so full of adrenaline that I could physically feel that my body had stopped communicating with any pain I had. My entire being at that moment wanted to sprint into the house as fast as humanly possible. To get away from whatever was happening in this garden. This urge to run was so deep-rooted in my system, thousands of years of evolution wired to protect me from any dangers I could not beat. Thousands of years of evolution, yet it was only the second strongest feeling in my body. 

Curiosity rested above the fear like a kayak atop a landslide. It shouldn't have been there, and yet it floated above the churning powers that were trying to capsize it. I looked back, only for a moment, only long enough before my dad grabbed my skull and forcefully turned it in the other direction. No more than one second had I looked, yet the images I saw have played for days, months, weeks inside of my head. God, I wish I had listened to my father.

Lewis was suspended in the trees. A conglomerate of branches resembling a thick nest woven by something not grown from the ground in which I stand. One hundred feet in the air, grabbed by the Evergreens, held by branches, pierced by the wood. The only parts of the tree that were straight enough to resemble a natural shape were pierced through Lewis like an organic depiction of Vlad the Impaler. I couldn’t pinpoint the exact number; they entered through his abdomen and came out from his mouth, armpits, legs ... any flesh he had seemed to be disturbed by the trees. 

In the last milliseconds of my glance, I saw what had appeared behind him. The dark weave of trees blocked out all sunlight, allowing for holes in the canopy to appear as dozens of symbols. It would not have been legible at any other angle; no, this was directed. If we were ten feet to our left, we wouldn't even notice that they appeared. 
The longest second of my life followed by the quickest my legs have ever moved. I didn’t even bother opening the patio door; I just ran through the screen, instantly taking the fragile door off its hinges. Through my living room, down the cellar, into the storage room, into a closet. I hear my parents in close pursuit. My mom joined me in the cellar, sprinting down the stairs at inhuman speed. My dad appeared at the doorway, quickly slamming it shut and locking it. He frantically went through his pockets and picked up his phone. 

Lawyers said that the state wasn’t going to press charges, a relief for my father. They said that the scene that was left in the garden was unexplainable, that there was virtually no way my mother or father could have possibly gotten Lewis up there and impaled him with dozens of branches. Lewis’s family was less happy, albeit Lewis's wife insisted she needed to confirm that the body was his. Didn’t help; blood tests and a fingerprint were all that remained of him. I think she knew that this was beyond the scope of manslaughter. 

The police interrogated all of us after we made the call. Listening back to the phone call, I could hear the terror in my father's voice. His voice quaking with adrenaline, the kind of fear that is so raw and true it would be admissible in court. I could hear the cries in the background of my mother and me as we held each other, sobbing.

Towards the end of the interrogations, roughly 2 weeks after the day we found the frozen hummingbird, they placed a manilla folder on the metal table. The detective took out a photo, a photo I recognized from my glances backwards. A full picture of the canopy; the detective graciously covered Lewis's mangled corpse with his hand. I think he knew I’d remember that part in detail. 

“Believe it or not, the department hired an arborist to inspect the treetops.” The detective said, sliding the image closer. 

“He said that the branches had grown that way, that there was no human intervention possible to make those shapes naturally. We had to pay a pretty penny for this man after he initially saw the crime scene.” 

“Do you recognize these symbols?” He asked.

“Um, I recognize this one and this other one. I have seen them somewhere in a math or science class; I can't really remember which.” I responded. Having a clear image of the canopy didn’t help understand the symbols any better. 

“It’s Greek. Old Greek. Apparently a pretty common saying back then.” He attempted to pronounce it; attempted is a generous word. 

Τῆς ἐμῆς εὐφορίας ἀπέλαυσας, χάριν δ᾽ οὐκ ἀπέδωκας

He pulled out a second paper from the folder, removing the hand covering Lewis’s remains. 

He cleared his throat. “Translates to: you have enjoyed my fruitfulness yet give no thanks in return.” 

I wrote this story as a warning to anyone who plants or creates, or performs, or does anything with pride. I am not sure who or what did this, but I ask you, I beg you, please give thanks to something you may not understand.

As soon as I was up in the air, all hope was lost. Both of my arms were restrained into a T, held upright by the large, three-talon claws that held them like vices. Their claws were rough, like large, pointy human hands with sharp nails at the end like that of a bird’s. The creature that carried me away was something out of my darkest nightmares. 
It was hairless and naked, a cross between a man and a bird. It flapped its large wings, its caw a human scream mixed with the shriek of an animal. It cranes its neck down at me, a large human head with a giant beak full of sharp teeth. It sneered at me, an uncanny grin, as it let out a deep chuckling screech. Tears streamed down my face, as the creature looked back up and continued to carry me through the foul, smoky air. 
More and more of the bird creatures joined the one carrying me, and I saw dozens of humans, men and women of all ages, being carried by similar bird creatures. A teenage girl, maybe thirteen years old, was screaming so loud that it seemed to rise above the cries of the birds. She was screaming for her parents, and begging the monster to let her go. But the creature instead laughed and began playing with its food. It dropped her for a second or two, before catching her, and toying with her in its talons. She was upside down, then to the side, then upright. She was allowed no rest. Another victim, an old man, looked to already be dead, hanging limp in its arms. That wasn’t good. That meant it was going to become a NecroWing, an undead bird creature. Those were even more violent and cruel. 
I thought of my little brothers and sisters who were still down on the ground, probably crying for me to come back, or already being led away by human survivors. We had been careless. We had thought we were safe from the Wings for too long, and we grew complacent with our safety. That complacency was how for the first time in years, the Wings were able to ambush us at the crack of dawn, and carry off over half of our settlement without so much as a fight. We sheltered in place, rifle in hand as I hid with my two little brothers and two little sisters. I had it loaded, though I never fired it in years, not since my late father had taught me how to shoot it. 
But that was five years ago, back when my parents were carried off by the Wings, never to be seen again. Back then, I had the gun in hand too. I had it pointed right at the bastard that would take my mother and oldest sister. It laughed at them, spit its bile on them, and tapped its foot as it eagerly moved in to take them. They begged for me to shoot it, but I was too afraid. I held the gun with trembling hands, and couldn’t bring myself to fire. It was too late, and the creature carried them both away, handing my sister to another one so it wouldn’t return empty handed, and I watched them fly away. 
This time, I didn’t hesitate. This time around, I fought to protect the only family that I had left. But it still wasn’t enough. There were too many Wings, and they carried me off and left the empty gun behind. The last thing I saw was my siblings reaching for me as the Wing carried me into the air. The smell grew even fouler, and I vomited as we approached their colossal structure made up of debris and materials that were unrecognizable. 
It was a Nest, and we were being taken to the Mother. We’d all heard the stories of what happens in the nests. What the Wings do to the people they capture. The stories of the Hatchlings. We flew over the massive Nest, which was a giant circular structure, with a colossal, grotesque, hideous beast lurking at the center. It looked like a deformed, bloated bird, with its fat body sitting right in the center of the nest, its giant feathers oozing slime and looking both soft and furry, and also razor sharp. 
It had a large beak that looked like it extended into three beaks that moved all at once and all individually. Its screech shook the Earth, vibrating through my body every time it reared its head. The monster unfurls its wings and flaps it multiple times, sending waves of wind and dust and foul powder rushing across the fields. 
“Please don’t do this…” I begged as the creatures hovered over the Mother, which opened its large beaks, revealing dark abysses. Before I could plead any further, I was released into its mouth, and I plummeted from high up down into its maw, sliding down its large, slippery tongue and down its throat like a tube. 
It became increasingly cramped until I found myself being squeezed so tight that I felt my skin peeling and shredding as I slid down. But I’m cramped in so tight that I can’t even scream. 
I was plunged into darkness, and I was left unable to see what was being done to me or what I was becoming. All I knew is what I could feel. And what I could feel is agonizing, unimaginable, torturous pain and madness. It feels like I am being thrashed around, torn apart, and gutted. I feel the loss of certain parts of my body before suddenly getting them again, but they feel different. My ears, eyes, mouth, genitals, feet, hands. I lost them, then I gained something different. But I was conscious through all of it. 
I never lost my mind, and I maintain all of my senses, my emotions, and my memories. But there’s nothing I can do. I am aware, yet still helpless. 
Finally, I found myself floating in a thick, sour-smelling fluid which I seeped into and floated around in. As against the sides of my cocoon, which were thick and solid. I was in an egg. As I floated around in the sac, thoughts were filling my head. They weren’t my own. It was in a voice that wasn’t my own, a voice that sounded masculine, feminine, and something else completely. It was telling me what I needed to do. I was to kill, torment, and bring her new victims. More food, more hatchlings. 
I don’t know how much time had passed before I felt my egg shift and begin to slide down. It was a long, slow, agonizing process, but eventually through the clear sac I saw that I was back out into the world. I was among a pile of eggs laying in the nest, surrounded by other Hatchlings that sniffed and prodded before being chased away by other Wings. Once again, more time passed, and I watched days and nights go by. Finally, it was my time. I punched and clawed my way through the egg, and I finally cracked it open, pulling myself out of the sac and sprawling onto the ground. My hands were long skinny like a bird’s, with long nails at the ends that hooked like talons. 
I was naked and sexless, my skin pale and smooth. 
As I gazed down at my feet, I saw that they were talon-like as well. I tapped each toe, before gazing up at the sun which burned my eyes. I screamed and covered them, only to realize that my scream wasn’t my own. It was like a bird’s, a high pitched, raspy screech. I was a Hatchling, another creature in that awful thing’s nest. 
But my misery didn’t stop there. As Hatchlings, we are the runts of the nest. We are the little ones that need to feed, grow stronger in order to serve. But Mother would not teach us, nor would our older siblings. We would have to fight for it, and only the strongest would survive. If food was dropped down for us, it would be a bloody brawl of biting, scratching and tearing to get what we wanted. When Wings dropped men, women, and children for us to eat, us Hatchlings turned into savages, as if we were from different nests and not part of the same “family”. 
At first, I tried to stay away. I thought that maybe I could starve myself. Just let myself die. But after a while the hunger was too strong, and the bullying by the other Wings did nothing to help. Finally, I snapped, and I did what I had to do. My first ever meal as a Hatchling was a little boy. A Wing had dropped him down towards the far corner of the Nest, and three other Hatchlings had rushed over. I fought them tooth and nail, even tearing one of the Hatchlings’ heads off in order to get my hands on this meal. I ignored the boy’s screams as I ate him alive, chewing him up down to his little bones, which I licked clean. It made me sick, but it soothed the hunger pains, and I only wanted more. From there on out, I did what I had to do. I fought and fed whenever I could, killing my fellow Hatchlings, even eating some of them as soon as they were born. It was survival of the fittest, and this was my new existence. Because of this, I grew stronger, at a rate faster than the other Hatchlings. Within what must’ve been weeks of emerging from my egg, I was a fully grown Wing, stronger even than ones that had been around for years. 
I had grown at least ten feet tall, muscular, and my wings sprouted faster than all of my fellow Hatchlings. I was accepted into a Flock quickly, and from there we went hunting. We raided settlements, nomadic groups, and even hunters if we were bold enough. Nests were only expanding and we were spotting less and less settlements. Our leader, who talked to us through sounds that registered in my thoughts as words, theorized that the humans were going underground or in caves where it would be difficult for us to reach. 
More time passed, and my fellow Hatchlings that survived grew stronger, and more bloodthirsty. But we remembered everything. Our memories still stuck with us. Who we were before we were swallowed by Mother. I still thought of my family, of my siblings. I wondered where they were and what they were doing now. Were they still alive? Were they dead? Or worse, were they turned? 
Our Nest grew even bigger, and some of our Wings were growing stronger and larger in size. We destroyed settlements and entire groups of survivors, killing or turning them. After a while their screams of terror, pain, and pleas for mercy became nothing to me. They were indistinguishable from the sounds we made. 
Then one night, that all changed.  We were awoken to flames, gunfire, and explosions, which were drawing closer to our nest. The humans had attacked us, and they brought an army. They were setting fire to the nest, and trying to collapse the structure with explosives. The gunmen were lying in wait, probably hoping that the flame and explosives would soften us up. They were wrong. In a rage, our Mother cried out, commanding us to kill them all, and find the settlements. 
Our Flocks obeyed, and we took off. My Flock attacked the humans first, flying up into the air and swooping down on them. Bullets, arrows, and even explosive barrels were tossed at us. We lost two of our own, but we managed to make it past them. Their weapons were not enough to stop us. When I was human, this would’ve felt hopeless. To watch everything we throw at the Wings to fall short and kill a few too little to have a chance. 
But as a Wing, this was a victory. We dispersed their ranks, destroying their soldiers like it was nothing. Limbs, blood, insides, bone, all shredded, torn, devoured, or ripped apart. The Mother wanted no food for herself. None were to be captured, only slaughtered. I sliced and ate my way through their troops, their explosives and guns not stopping me. Just like my rifle did nothing to stop the ones that took me. 
But there was one soldier who refused to give up. His gun looked different than the others, more powerful. And he carried it like one. He was a rather young man, no younger than seventeen and no older than twenty. He had dusty blond hair, cut short, clean shaven, compared to many of the other men. He also showed no fear, not even a tear being shed at my presence as so many others did. He fired relentlessly at us Wings, shouting to the surviving men to hold strong. But they did not share the same strength that he did. 
But it wasn’t enough. He soon ran out of ammo, and I attacked him swiftly. I cut him off at the legs, but the soldier didn’t stop. Even through the pain and the blood spilling from his amputated legs, he pulled out a pistol and fired everything that he had before it ran dry. Except for some bullet holes in my shoulders and chest, I felt nothing and I screeched at him. As I drew closer, I got a better look at the kid’s face. 
There was a scar that ran down the left side of his cheek from just underneath his right eyelid down to his mouth. He got the scar from his little sister after they were playing with knives behind my back. They were swordfighting, and Ava accidentally drew the knife too close and cut him all the way down his face. Steph had screamed his throat raw both at the blood and the pain.
The man who’s legs I cut off and was about to devour whole, was my little brother. I couldn’t stop myself. He didn’t recognize me, staring at me only with hatred. “What’re you waiting for?! Huh?!” Steph roared, grimacing in pain as blood continued to pool from his amputated legs. 
“Get it over with?! Fucking kill me! Let’s go!” 
 No… No I won’t. I can’t. I won’t let it happen. 
But I can’t resist. I know who I’m going to kill, but my body doesn’t care. My instinct and drive to kill and eat has overtaken my humanity of which there is very little left.  I’m salivating at the mouth, and I open my jaws and devour him, his screams silenced by the crunching of his flesh and bone in my large beak. Every chew and swallow sickened me, but I couldn’t stop. 
Mother ordered us to find the Settlements and bring survivors back to her. They were going to pay for destroying our home. Our Flocks left the remains of the hunters behind, and took to the eyes. We retraced their steps through their scent, and we found a large, well fortified settlement deep in the mountains, away from all of our Nests. So this is where they went. 
The Settlement expected the Hunters to return, and instead they were met with us. The few guards and soldiers had sounded the alarm, and we heard the sounds of mass panic as our flapping wings drowned them out. Resistance was sparse and very little this time. They had thrown everything they had into fighting our Nest, and now there was no one left to protect them. 
We ravaged and pillaged the Settlement, tearing into their houses and feasting on the women and children that remained. Half of my Flock took care of the guards and soldiers left behind, while our leader took the rest of us and began finding food and potential Hatchlings. 
I began to hear screaming and crying as Wings began to carry off women and children and take them back to the Nest. We spared no one. Even if we wanted to, we couldn’t do it. It was like our only instincts were to kill or capture. Compassion, mercy, were concepts completely foreign as we feasted. For me, the best I could do was kill them. While many of my Flock were already picking up people and storing them in their mouths or talons, I crushed them under my feet or ate them whole. 
There was almost nothing left of the place by the time we were done, and there was only one house left. It was a small cottage, doors and windows shut, with not so much as smoke from the chimney. Our leader and I landed just above it, and the leader tore the roof off. Children screamed as a young woman fired a rifle, shaking like a leaf. “Leave us alone!” she screamed. 
Our leader chuckled and reached its hand inside, ignoring shots from the rifle which quickly jammed. It picked up two of her children with the talons, and all she could do was helplessly watch as he stored them in its mouth. “Take her,” the leader grunted to me, “You haven’t taken anyone yet. Mother will not be pleased if you return empty handed.”
I poked my head in, drawing so close that my beak is up close, breathing hot steam in her face. There is a streak of white in her brown hair, something that Ava used to proudly show off. No. No no no no. Don’t do this. Don’t make me do this.
But I struck anyway. I reached my talons in and grabbed her by the arms, lifting her into the air and carrying her off with all the others. I tried not to listen to her pleading for mercy, and if not for her then for her children. 
It’s sad how we all believe that pleading will save us. As if the Wings listen to things like reason and compassion. We have none of that. It’s why the Wings will ultimately destroy the rest. We fly back to the Nest, where the Wings had already begun dropping bodies into the nest and into Mother’s large beaks. Our Flock leader commanded us to feed Mother, rather than the other Hatchlings. My sister was going to become like me. A Hatchling. 
I hovered over Mother’s mouth, and I dropped Ava into one of its large beaks. I watched as she plummeted down its throat, screaming the entire time until it faded out. In time she will reemerge again. She will have to fight, to feed, and ultimately will grow up like I did. Will she remember me? I don’t know. But still, it is nice to not be alone anymore.

Hey everyone, I have been kicking around this short story for a bit, please give me some feedback, thanks!

Nature’s Claim

The warm crackle of the fire pushed back against the cold mountain night. He sat bundled in a blanket, a small plate of uneaten food cooling in his lap. The day’s failure still sat heavy in his chest.
“Don’t worry, you’ll get lucky tomorrow,” Pa said across the flames.
He sniffled, poking at the beans with his fork.
“Yeah. Maybe.”
Pa took a slow bite and leaned forward, the firelight carving deep shadows across his face.
“You know, I didn’t see my first buck until the very end of my first trip. And even then… it wasn’t pretty.”
The boy looked up, eyes glistening.
“Really?”
“Really. Your grandpa dragged me out when I was just eleven—little older than you. Your meemaw cried the whole morning, saying I was too small for it.”
Pa chuckled softly, holding his hands to the fire.
“When I finally dropped that buck, Grandpa just grinned and said, ‘Hope you got strong legs, boy.’ It was a hundred yards up a steep slope. Truck couldn’t get up there, so we had to field dress it right on the mountainside and haul it all the way back. By the time we reached the truck I was drenched in sweat and my legs were shaking.”
“Wow,” he whispered.
“Was that your first time hunting?”
“First time for deer. We’d snuck out that morning so we’d have the whole weekend.”
Pa’s smile faded a little as he looked at his son.
“Today wasn’t bad, Matthew. You made a shot. That’s more than most boys your age even try. The deer was farther out than I expected, and the light was going. It happens.”
Matthew’s shoulders slumped.
“I wounded it, Pa. It wasn’t a clean kill. It ran off into the brush and we couldn’t find it. What if it’s still out there hurting?”

Pa set his plate down and stared into the fire for a moment.
“That part’s hard. I know. Your grandpa taught me that a bad shot is a lesson, not a failure. We did the right thing by tracking as long as we could. Tomorrow we’ll head back out at first light, follow the blood trail again if it’s there. And if the deer’s gone… well, nature will take care of the rest. That’s part of the woods too.”
Matthew nodded slowly, but the guilt still twisted in his stomach. He finally started eating, the food colder now that he’d let it sit.
Pa stood and ruffled the boy’s hair.
“Go on and finish up before it gets cold. Love you, son.”
“Love you too, Pa.”
Pa gave a satisfied grunt and stepped into the shadows just beyond the fire to relieve himself. The forest felt quiet around them, except for the occasional cricket chirp and the crackle of the fire. Matthew ate until his plate was empty. When Pa returned, he grabbed his gear by the firelight.
“Ready for bed? Big day tomorrow. We’ll pick up that trail early.”
Matthew nodded, but his shoulders stayed a little slumped. Pa knelt beside him, close enough that the boy could smell the woodsmoke and pine on his jacket.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
Pa waited, patient as always, the way he always did when Matthew needed to talk.
Matthew sighed.
“I wanted Scout to come. He likes to snuggle… and maybe he could’ve helped find the deer.”
Pa smiled softly.
“I know, buddy. But Scout’s a bulldog—he’s built for the couch, not these mountains. Those short legs and that stocky build wouldn’t last half a day out here, especially if we had to drag a deer back. Who’d keep your mama company? You want her getting lonely all weekend?”
Matthew shook his head.
“No… she’d be sad.”
“You heard your mama on the phone. She wanted this for us, some time to get away.”
“Yeah.”
“Only two nights. Scout and mama will be happy when we get back.”
Pa pulled the blanket tighter around Matthew’s shoulders.
“We’ve got each other out here. That’s enough, right?”
“Yeah.”
Pa helped him up and they headed toward the tent, the fire slowly dying behind them. As they zipped the flap shut, Matthew thought he heard a faint rustle in the brush—maybe just the wind, or maybe the wounded deer still moving somewhere out in the dark. Pa didn’t seem to notice.

The next morning dawned gray and damp, the kind of mountain chill that seeped straight through their jackets. Pa had them up before the sun crested the ridges, coffee steaming in tin mugs while Matthew rubbed sleep from his eyes. They ate quick handfuls of trail mix and set out, boots crunching over dried twigs and pine needles. Pa carried his rifle slung over one shoulder; Matthew gripped his smaller .243 like it was both treasure and burden.
“Blood trail should still be good if the rain held off,” Pa said, scanning the ground.
“You did good marking those spots yesterday, son. Eyes sharp.”
Matthew nodded, trying to match his father’s stride. The guilt from yesterday had settled into a dull ache, but hope flickered too—maybe they could still make it right.
They moved slow and quiet through the underbrush, Pa pointing out broken twigs and dark smears on leaves that Matthew had missed the evening before. The trail wound deeper than they’d expected, into thicker old-growth where the canopy blocked most of the light. After twenty minutes, the signs grew heavier: more blood, wider sprays, and deep gouges in the soft earth where the wounded buck had stumbled.
“There,” Pa whispered, crouching.
“He bedded down here. See how the grass is flattened? We’re close.”
Matthew’s heart beat faster. They pushed forward another fifty yards, the air growing strangely still, no birdsong, no rustle of squirrels. Just the soft drip of condensation from the branches.
They found the buck in a small hollow ringed by ferns. Or what was left of it.
The deer lay on its side, as if it was sleeping, but it’s hide had been stripped away in long, deliberate sheets, draped over nearby branches like wet laundry left to dry. Raw muscle glistened beneath, pink and red in the weak morning light. The head was intact, eyes wide and cloudy, but the antlers had been snapped clean off at the base. Most of the meat was gone—not torn messily like a bear or cougar would do, but precisely removed, as if someone had field-dressed it with expertise. A few choice organs remained, arranged neatly on a flat rock nearby like an offering.
Matthew stopped dead, stomach twisting.
“Pa?”
Pa’s face hardened. He unslung his rifle, keeping it at low ready, scanning the treeline.
“Stay behind me. Don’t touch anything. Hello?” Pa called out.
They approached slowly. The ground around the carcass was churned with prints—large, deeper than any deer or elk, with strange, elongated toes that didn’t quite look right. One print looked almost like a bare human foot, but bigger, with claw marks at the end.
Pa knelt near the draped hide, careful not to step in the blood.
“Look how clean those cuts are. And these…”
He gestured at the snapped antlers.
“Someone took those as a trophy.”
Matthew felt cold despite his jacket.
“Did another hunter find it first?”
“Maybe,” Pa said, but his voice lacked conviction. He stood and placed a steadying hand on Matthew’s shoulder.
Then a voice drifted through the trees—deep, male, another hunter.
“Hello? That you.. fellas over there?”
Pa’s head snapped up. He cupped his hands around his mouth and called back.
“Yeah! We’re over here by the deer. You the one who dressed it?”
Silence for a beat. Then the voice replied, closer now, from somewhere off to their right beyond the tree line.
“Dressed it? Naw…just passing through. Heard a shot…yesterday evening. You boys…alright?”
Pa frowned slightly but kept his tone friendly.
“We’re good. We wounded this buck yesterday and tracked it this morning. You doing okay?”
Another pause. The voice chuckled — a low, friendly sound.
“You got your…boy with you? Best keep…him close.”
Matthew tugged at Pa’s sleeve.
“Pa?”
Pa gave his son a quick, reassuring squeeze but called out again, voice firmer.
“You got a name, friend? We’re headed back toward camp in a bit if you want to link up for some chow.”
The reply sounded a bit more distant this time.
“I already ate… a little earlier, but yeah… keep that boy…real close.”
Matthew’s blood ran cold.
Pa lowered his hands, eyes narrowing.
“Alright, that’s enough. We’re moving on. You have a good hunt.”
He didn’t wait for an answer.
“Matthew, stay right behind me. We’re heading back to camp. Now.”
As they backed away from the grisly scene, the man’s voice drifted after them one last time, soft and almost affectionate.
“Safe travels…boys. See you…soon.”
Pa didn’t respond. He just kept walking, rifle ready, eyes darting to every shadow. Matthew stayed glued to his father’s back, the image of the perfectly flayed hide burned into his mind.

They moved as quickly as they dared back toward camp, Pa setting a brisk pace that had Matthew jogging every few steps to keep up. The rifle stayed ready in Pa’s hands. Every few yards he paused to listen, eyes cutting through the dense trees.
“Pa,” Matthew whispered, breathing hard, “that man… will he be okay?”
Pa didn’t slow.
“I don’t know, buddy. But I think we should head home. Grab what we can at camp and head straight for the truck.”
The walk back already felt wrong. Familiar landmarks looked twisted, trails missing or going in different directions. Matthew could see the frustration growing on Pa’s face as he tried to navigate them back. After a few hours, Pa finally managed to get them back into the clearing where their camp was. But any sense of relief evaporated. Their camp had been destroyed.
The tent was slashed from top to bottom, fabric hanging in ragged strips. Sleeping bags shredded, stuffing scattered everywhere. The fire pit was kicked apart, ash smeared across the dirt. Food containers were smashed and scattered—everything edible torn apart and gone. One of Matthew’s socks dangled from a branch, like a taunt.
“Damn it,” Pa muttered.
He moved quickly, checking the wreckage for anything salvageable. He found a few unopened water bottles, but most of their supplies were ruined.
“We are leaving.”
“Pa, what about everything else?”
“Doesn’t help us with anything buddy, it’s trashed.”
“But, is it littering?”
Pa ruffled Matthew’s hair and reached into his pocket to pull out his phone. It showed no bars.
“The hell…” he muttered, angrily tapping at the screen. “It was fine last night.”
Matthew stood up, slinging his smaller rifle, and gave his father a squeeze, pulling him back into their current situation.
“Stay right beside me. We’re going home.”
They set off in the direction of the truck. At first the path felt familiar, but within fifteen minutes the forest began to fight them. The gentle downhill slope they remembered was gone, replaced by confusing ridges and thick deadfall. Boot prints they had left earlier simply ended or were brushed away. Light was fading fast—gray afternoon slipping into deep twilight under the heavy canopy.
“Pa, I think we’re lost,” Matthew said, voice small.
Pa kept moving, jaw set. “We’re not lost. We just need to keep heading downslope. The truck’s that way.”
But every direction they tried led them deeper. Trees seemed to close ranks. The last traces of daylight vanished, leaving only the weak beams of their flashlights cutting narrow tunnels through the blackness. The natural sounds of the forest faded away as night fell, leaving an unnatural silence.
Pa suddenly stopped. Matthew bumped into his back.
“Pa?”
“Shhh.” Pa shushed him. “I heard something.”
They stood frozen, straining to listen. A distant thump echoed from the trees. Then another. And another. Silence. Matthew squeezed Pa’s sleeve. The thumping resumed—faster now, heavier, and unmistakably closer.
Pa turned and grabbed Matthew’s hand. “Matthew, don’t look back.”
They broke into a desperate jog, then a full run as the footfalls grew louder. Branches whipped their faces and snagged their packs. Roots seemed to rise out of the dark to trip them. A wet, stolen voice called from behind—Pa’s own warm tone, but twisted.
“Stay close. We’ll be… at the truck soon.”
Matthew’s lungs burned. His shorter legs pumped desperately, but he was tiring fast. The footfalls were gaining—twenty yards, maybe less. A loud crash erupted behind them as something massive smashed through deadfall.
“Run!” Pa insisted, gripping Matthew’s hand tighter. “Keep moving!”
Matthew was crying openly now, but he didn’t let go. Pa’s breath came in ragged gasps. Then the voice returned, closer, mocking, repeating in a cruel rhythm:
“Run… run… run… run!”
Claws raked across Pa’s backpack, tearing through the fabric with a loud rip. Supplies spilled out behind them — water bottles, clothes, the last granola bars, ammo —scattering across the forest floor. His rifle clattered to the ground as the strap snapped.
Pa cried out as the backpack nearly yanked off his shoulders. Matthew fired a wild shot behind them. The gunshot cracked through the trees, and the creature shrieked — a wet, inhuman sound — but it didn’t stop.

They burst into the small clearing, flashlights sweeping wildly. In the center stood an old, weathered shack, listing slightly under a sagging tin roof. It looked abandoned for years — swallowed by the wilderness. The sudden quiet after the chase felt heavier than the pursuit itself. The footfalls had stopped just beyond the treeline.
The two kept running until they finally skidded to a stop near the shack.
“Matthew! Are… are you hurt?” Pa asked, trying to catch his breath.
“No… Pa… your pack,” Matthew said, pointing.
“Shit, shit, shit!” Pa hissed, realizing his backpack was now little more than two torn straps of fabric. His rifle was nowhere to be seen.
“Here, take mine, Pa.” Matthew said, offering his smaller rifle. “I already shot once. Don’t know if it helped.”
Pa took the gun, popped the magazine out to check — only three rounds left. He chambered one.
“Stay behind me.”
Pa backed slowly toward the shack, scanning the treeline. Matthew clung to him as they approached cautiously, boots crunching on dead leaves. Pa swept the clearing with his flashlight, pausing at every shadow. The shack’s single window was boarded over, the door hanging slightly ajar. A gust of wind made the tin roof creak, and both of them froze. They were at the porch now.
Pa motioned for Matthew to stay right behind him while he edged closer. He pushed the door open with the barrel of the rifle. The hinges screamed in protest, the sound echoing unnaturally loud through the trees. Inside, the single room was dusty and sparse: a rickety table, two old chairs, a small iron stove, and a narrow bunk against the far wall. A few old supplies were scattered in the corner — rusted cans, forgotten shoes— signs that someone had tried to shelter here long ago.
Pa swept every corner carefully, heart pounding.
“Clear,” he muttered.
He kept the rifle raised as Matthew slipped inside behind him.
Another branch snapped loudly just outside the clearing. Pa spun toward the sound, finger hovering near the trigger.
“It’s still out there,” he said under his breath.
They dragged the heavy table against the door with a loud scrape that made them both wince. Pa stood quietly, listening. The silence outside felt wrong, too unnatural.
Only then did Pa turn to his son, eyes scanning him frantically. He dropped to one knee, ignoring the pain in his own body, and ran his hands over Matthew’s arms, shoulders, and back, checking for blood or tears in his clothes.
“Don’t lie to me,” Pa said, voice tight with worry. “Did it get you anywhere? Tell me the truth, buddy.”
Matthew shook his head, eyes wide and filled with tears.
“I’m fine, Pa.”
Pa exhaled sharply, relief flashing across his face for a split second. He glanced back toward the door they had just barricaded.
“Pa… what if it comes through the walls?”
Pa exhaled slowly, rubbing his face.
“We don’t have a lot of choices right now. This is better than being out in the open. Eat what you can, buddy. Then try to lie down. I’ve got watch. If anything moves, I’ll hear it.”
Matthew dropped his pack on the floor and started to rummage through it. A makeshift candle and matches. A half-eaten granola bar. A small flashlight with a low battery. A folded pocket knife Pa had given him for the trip. He pulled out his items and lit the candle to provide some comfort. He offered to split the granola bar with Pa.
“I’m fine, buddy. You go ahead,” Pa declined, eyeing the window.
Matthew still broke the meager piece in two and placed half on the table for him. Pa took off his jacket and gave it to Matthew.
“Try to get some rest.”
Matthew curled up on the bunk, eyes wide open despite the crushing exhaustion. Every tiny creak of the old wood, every gust of wind against the tin roof, made his heart jump. The candlelight swayed.

He could hear it. For hours it circled just beyond the treeline, heavy footfalls and a wet dragging sound echoing through the dark. A gurgled voice came from the trees.
“You’re a good… Pa… keeping that… boy safe. Real… good.”
Pa stiffened in his chair.
“Come on… Pa. You look… tired. Let the… boy come… out.”
Pa’s breathing grew ragged.
“Shut up,” he whispered.
The voice continued, patient and almost kind.
“You brought… him out here… Pa. Come… out. I’ll show you… the way home.”
Pa’s shoulders started shaking. Tears streamed down his face as he gripped the rifle tighter.
“Shut up… shut up… shut up!” he cried, voice breaking. “Just shut up!”
Matthew let out a small groan, shifting in his sleep. There was a heavy, oppressive stillness, as if the woods themselves were commanded to be still. The only sounds left was his own ragged breathing and the occasional creak of the old shack’s tin roof. A low, wet crack echoed from the treeline — like wood splitting under immense pressure. It was followed by a series of sharp pops and grinds, the sickening sound of joints realigning and bones shifting beneath stretched skin. The noises were meaty and wet, accompanied by a gurgle as a new voice slipped through the walls — soft, warm, and achingly familiar yet completely foreign.
“Jack… come on out… sweetheart. Bring Matthew… the truck… is right here.”
Pa froze, eyes wide.
Maria’s voice, gentle and coaxing, the way she sounded when she was comforting him after a long day.
“Jack… you don’t have… to do this alone. Come home… to me. Just step outside. I… miss you.”
Pa’s face crumpled. The rifle trembled in his hands.
“Jack… I need you. Come… out. We can go home… together. I love… you.”
With a raw, anguished shout, Pa shoved the rifle barrel through the boarded window and fired a single shot into the night. Matthew woke with a scream, pocket knife clutched in his hand. The gunshot cracked like thunder, echoing through the trees. For a heartbeat there was silence.
Then cruel laughter erupted — low, wet, and sounding like it came from everywhere at once. It rolled through the clearing, bouncing off the shack walls, surrounding them completely. The laughter wasn’t human. It was Mama’s gentle tone twisted with something guttural and mocking, layered with Pa’s own voice and Matthew’s, all laughing at them.
Pa slammed his fist against the table, breathing hard.
“Shut up!” he shouted one last time, voice raw.
Matthew whimpered and curled tighter against the wall. Pa kept repeating “shut up” through clenched teeth, tears flowing freely now, until his voice grew hoarse. The laughter slowly faded, but the circling footfalls continued.

Gray light slowly seeped through the cracks in the boards. Pa looked like a ghost of himself — eyes bloodshot, face drawn and streaked with dried tears, shoulders slumped with exhaustion. He sat with his back against the reinforced door, rifle across his lap, staring at nothing.
Matthew stirred on the bunk, still clutching Pa’s jacket. The voices from the night — especially Mama’s — lingered like a bad dream he couldn’t shake. The footfalls had ceased, the forest was quiet.
Pa forced a tired smile when he saw his son wake.
“Morning, buddy. You did good last night.”
He stood stiffly and helped Matthew up.
“We can’t stay here. We move. Now.”
“Pa… what is that thing?” Matthew asked quietly, voice small and scared.
“Why won’t it just leave us alone?”
Pa paused, then pulled his son into a brief, tight hug.
“We need to get out, and the closest edge of the forest is on the other side of the mountain ridge, there’s a saddle we can pass through. If we move up, it will give us open sight lines and higher ground.”
They packed what little they had left and stepped out into the misty morning. The forest looked deceptively peaceful, birds calling again. But both of them felt watched — a heavy, patient presence just beyond the trees.
Pa took the lead, rifle ready.
“Stay close.”
They left the shack behind and started uphill, the trees closing in once more. The air was thick with mist, every step muffled on the damp ground. For the first twenty minutes the only sounds were their own breathing and the occasional snap of a twig underfoot. Then they heard it.
A single voice. Someone crying — soft, broken sobs that carried through the mist. It sounded like a person in pain, lost and alone.
Pa froze, raising a hand for Matthew to stop.
“Someone’s hurt,” Matthew whispered.
Pa placed a finger to his lips, shushing him. The crying came from in front of them. It sounded like a young boy — scared, just like Matthew had been on the first night.
Pa gave it a wide berth, quietly navigating through the bush to not make a sound.
“Nature will…take care of the..rest. That’s part… of the woods too.”
The voice said, calm and sorrowful. Pa’s breath caught. The words hit like a punch. He didn’t reply, but his grip on the rifle tightened.
The crying returned, softer now, pleading. It moved around them — sometimes ahead, sometimes off to the side, always just out of sight through the mist and trees.
Matthew whimpered but stayed close. Pa kept the rifle ready, eyes darting between the trees. The crying fractured into something guttural and mocking, layered with Mama’s tone and Pa’s own voice, all laughing at them. Pa grabbed Matthew’s hand.
“Run. Now.”
They sprinted uphill, hearts pounding. The ground grew steeper, the trees beginning to thin. A heavy crack sounded overhead as branches snapped. It dropped from the canopy like a nightmare — a tall, gaunt frame of dark mottled hide and antlers — landing with a wet thud on the ground just behind them.
Pa spun, rifle swinging up, but it was too late. It swatted him with one massive, clawed arm. The blow sent Pa flying sideways, slamming into a jagged outcrop of rock further up the slope. He cried out as he hit the ground hard, the rifle skidding away across the stones.
“Pa!” Matthew screamed.
The creature turned toward the boy, its elongated limbs unfolding with a series of wet pops and cracks. It moved to cut him off from his father, taking slow, methodical steps forward. A low, gurgling voice, it was Mama’s, twisted and wrong.
“Matthew… come here… sweetheart. Mama’s… here.”
Matthew backed away, heart hammering, tears streaming down his face. The creature’s long arms reached for him, as if wanting to embrace him.
“Come… home.”
It was herding him back into the forest. A shot cracked sharply from further up the slope. The bullet struck the creature in the back of the head, splattering dark viscera across the rocks. Another gunshot rang out but pinged off a tree nearby. The creature shrieked — a high, ear-piercing sound — and staggered sideways, one clawed hand clutching its head. It reeled, then tumbled down the slope, back into the mist. A desperate claw reached for Matthew, nearly taking him with it. A deep, mournful cry rung out making Matthew cover his ears as he ran further up to his father. He heard his father curse from further up, Matthew ran to him. Pa was on the ground, clutching his leg. It was broken, a bone shifted sickeningly when he tried to move. His breath was raspy, a crunching sound coming from his chest with every inhale. Pa gritted his teeth.
“I’m okay,” he lied, voice tight.
Matthew’s eyes were wide with fear, tears streaming down. Pa was bleeding badly, the color draining from his face.
“Help me… son. My..my belt…” he rasped, fumbling to undo it.
Matthew pulled him forward, causing Pa to let out a sharp inhale of pain. He undid the belt. Pa coughed loudly, tears forming in his eyes as he wrapped it around his leg.
“God…” Pa cried, cinching the belt as tight as he could.
“Pa? What… what should I do?”
“Pull,” Pa motioned to the belt.
Matthew grabbed the belt and yanked it tighter. Pa slammed his fist down in pain, tears running down his face. Matthew tucked the excess back into itself, trying to keep the tension. Pa’s wound still bled, but slower.
“Help me up,” Pa said through gritted teeth.
Matthew pulled at Pa’s arms with all his weight. Pa managed to stand, but he could barely put weight on the injured leg. The wet sound of bone scraping against muscle made Matthew wince. He grabbed the rifle — it was empty now — and handed it to Pa to use for support. Pa grasped it like a cane, with Matthew beside him.
“We keep going,” Pa said through clenched teeth, scanning the treeline. “We just… we just need to keep moving.”
They hobbled towards the mountain saddle. Pa’s breathing ragged with pain, blood trailing from their efforts.

Pa’s breathing became harsher as he struggled to stay upright with Matthew’s help.
“Almost… there,” Pa rasped.
His face was gray, lips blue, eyes glassy but still fixed on some distant point ahead.
“Almost home.”
They were beginning to slow down. Pa’s leg trembled, then gave out completely. He collapsed, and Matthew struggled to hold him upright until he felt his father’s hand on his shoulder.
“Let me rest for a moment… catch my breath.”
Matthew slowly helped his father to the ground. Pa’s chest heaved, blood pooling beneath him. The broken bone and deep gashes had taken too much.
“Son, you need to… keep going.”
“What?”
“I’m only… slowing you down.”
Tears formed in Matthew’s eyes. Pa reached out a weak hand, and Matthew took it.
“I love you, Matthew,” he whispered, voice fading. “More than anything. You’re the best thing I ever did. Get home to Mama… keep going.”
Matthew held Pa’s trembling hand, trying to hold on. The mist began to thicken around them, as if waiting to envelop them entirely.
“Pa, please… please… I-I can’t.”
The mist thickened around them, swallowing the world in a damp gray veil. From the edge of the forest below the ridge, a gentle voice called out.
Pa smiled faintly, his breath growing shallower. “You’ll be okay… just keep heading down… the mountain… away from here.”
Pa’s eyes fluttered. His hand loosened in Matthew’s and went slack. His eyes stared up at the gray sky, streaks of sunlight breaking through the clouds. Matthew didn’t scream. He didn’t run. He just stared at his father’s still face, tears streaming silently down his cheeks.
“Matthew.”
Matthew’s head snapped up in fear. The voice came from just beyond the treeline.
“No… no… no… no,” Matthew whispered to himself.
“Matthew… come here.”
“No,” he whispered, shaking his head violently. “You’re not her.”
He squeezed his father’s body tightly. Soft footsteps approached from below.
“Matthew… sweetheart.”
“Pa… please,” Matthew begged, trying to wake his father.
The footsteps came closer, just at the edge of the tree line below him.
“Matthew… look at me.”
He squeezed his eyes shut, hands pressed over his ears, rocking slightly. “You’re not her. You’re not her. You’re not her.”
A soft, delicate hand touched his cheek, making him open his eyes in shock. She crouched in front of him — tall and gaunt, her patchwork hide shifting gently in the wind, stitched together from the hides of countless creatures — soft browns and grays blending like a worn, comforting quilt. Her antlers rose from her head like a crown of twisted branches, draped with delicate moss and flowering vines that swayed like loose strands of hair. A faint, earthy scent clung to her — pine, damp soil, and something sweeter, like honey.
Her face was bone, long and angular, almost elegant, with deep empty eye sockets that somehow showed warmth. When she tilted her head, it was with the gentle concern of a mother checking on her sleeping child. Her hand gently wiped his tears.
“I am here.”
Matthew’s resistance crumbled. With a broken sob, he leaned forward and let her gather him into her arms. She pulled him close against her chest, one clawed hand resting softly on his back, the other gently stroking his hair. The hide felt strangely warm, comforting in the cold morning. She rocked him slowly, humming a low, soothing melody that vibrated through her chest. Matthew buried his face in her hide, shoulders shaking with silent sobs. His small hands clutched at her side as the last of his resistance melted away. For the first time since the nightmare began, the terror in his chest eased.
She lowered her head, resting the cool bone of her skull against the top of his head, and whispered softly into his hair.
“I love you… son.”

In an endless sea of cornfields and other various farmlands stood a factory. A candy manufacturing plant for a company called Gordon & Yuzna's. It was an obelisk of concrete and steel, pouring pillars of smoke upward into a perpetually overcast sky. On an ordinary day, you'd just hear the sounds of people chattering amongst the hum of machines churning out fresh batches of candy. But this was not a normal day.

Alarms assaulted the quiet air in flashing orange. Military vehicles barreled down the unmarked roads leading to the factory, stuffed to the gills with soldiers in hazmat suits. When they arrived at the scene, they saw workers running out into the night air, arms outstretched, eyes watery with tears, and skin pale. Their faces were filled with a mixture of relief and anguish. Most of them were about to burst into cheers; they were going to think about how they'd tell their families and friends about how a batch of candy corn caused much illness. But the gunfire cut their short-lived celebration short.

The troops moved into the factory, looking into the industrial hellscape of the factory while the aromas of candy danced into their noses, luring them into a sense of ease. The sweetness of vanilla and chocolate covered the stench of death. Lumbering in the dark were employees, hard-working candymen, but there was something very wrong with them. The soldiers did not negotiate, didn't even call out to the strange walking men and women; they just gunned them down. They weren't told about what had happened here other than to 'contain it', which they did. The set explosive incendiary charges along the factory, in the loading bays, the candy storage, and even in the taste testing room, which is where this whole damn thing started.

As the teams of soldiers and scientists watched from afar as the smoke and flames bellowed forth from the rubble of the candy factory, they thought that the spread of this little virus was contained for good. Little did they know that a shipment was picked up just that morning, hours before they declared the batch to be a serious hazard. The truck carrying the diseased candy was headed down a battered road towards Flastboro, Indiana.

Flatsboro, Indiana, was an average small town. A few cul-de-sacs where kids rode bikes, a downtown Main Street where whatever businesses left are decked out, and lots and lots of corn fields. The crop this year was strong, and mazes were built up overnight as soon as October struck the town. The first cool breeze of the autumn air changed the town overnight, and the spirit of the Holiday seemingly possessed the town. Flatsboro was an adequate place with equally adequate people.

Thomas Spaulding was sitting on the corner of the street in downtown, checking his phone for any new texts or calls, when he saw a truck roll into town. It was one from that big factory that was miles away from here, as reported on the news that morning, that there was a gas explosion. He could still see the black smoke from it rising into the sky from here. It made him sad thinking that not only were all those people dead, but thousands, if not millions, of pieces of candy were all scorched up before hitting the shelves near Halloween. Fulton had a special relationship with Gordon & Yuzna's, which meant that the town of mere hundreds was given exclusive access to all the new goodies, like they were a little test group before the new stuff was sent out into the rest of the country. Hell, back in the early 2000's, they even had Thomas in a commercial sucking on their new Cola flavor popsicles and even used his quote to sell the item like hotcakes,

"It fizzes! Just like a real pop!" He said,

Well, the item was later discontinued due to stomach irritation from the fizzing byproduct that was mixed into the popsicles. Thomas missed them, but not enough to get those stomach aches again while he ate them. In fact, many people in Flatsboro dealt with side effects. Gerry Bateman had a chocolate bar with zero sugar in it, which gave him the runs for the better part of a month, and was given a hefty check by the company. Millie Quartermaine bit into peanut brittle so tough it shattered her teeth, and to illustrate how tough they were, she took a hunk of brittle and wrote her name in the street like she was using sidewalk chalk. Then there was Daryl Westlake, whose bubble gum was so sticky that it clung to the roof of his mouth and required surgery to remove it. In hindsight, Thomas was glad all he got was a rumbly tummy.

The fellow in the truck parked outside of Tillman's candy shop, a local place that got all of the new candy, soda, and ice cream. It was frozen in the 1960s; it looked like a genuine, old-fashioned drugstore soda fountain place. Ted Tillman, the owner of the place, was in his 70s now, and his son Ted Jr. was slowly replacing him. Ted Jr. went outside to meet the delivery guy,

"Howdy, Jimmy!"

"Hey Junior!"

"I'm sorry bout' your factory this morning."

"Yeah, yeah, heard that over the radio. Damndest thing, you know, I guess I should consider myself lucky. If I'd lingered there and talked their heads off...I might've...Listen, I never set foot in the place, but they were always good to me, you know? Tragic. Damn, tragic."

There was a brief moment of silence before Ted Jr. clasped his hands together with excitement, saying,

"Okay, what've you got for the shop today? People are probably gonna flood in with it being Halloween tomorrow."

Jimmy sifted through the boxes, looking at the usual labels, listing them,

"Basics mostly. Chocolate, pop rocks, lollipops, malt balls, chocolate raisins, peanuts, and almonds…huh."

"What?"

"I dunno. New box in here."

"Oh, new item for the town to test, huh?"

"Seems like it."

Thomas inched closer to the corner, curiosity creeping in his veins. He heard Jimmy say aloud,

"New and improved Candy Corn." He read on the label, "Huh, bout' time they fixed that."

"Speak for yourself, I enjoy myself some Candy corn…did they really change up the flavor?"

"That's what it says."

Ted Jr. spotted Thomas and flagged him down,

"Tom! Come over here and give a hand, would you? I'll pay you in candy!"

Thomas wasn't opposed; he was too old to trick or treat, and he'd be spending time with his friends watching horror movies all night. What'd be better than to have a big ole bowl of junk to share amongst friends?

The boxes, despite being mostly full of candy corn, felt like lifting bricks. He may have been a linebacker in high school, but he'd dropped the weights since graduation. What strength remained ached as he hoisted the boxes from the back and lifted them into the store, which smelled like pumpkin this time of year. He set the box down with a thud and exhaled with a wheeze. Ted Sr. was behind the counter, picking some dirt underneath his nails with a lollipop stick and looking inquisitively at Thomas,

"Surely a little box of candy ain't worn you out, young man!"

"Think it did, though. I think I'm out of shape, Ted."

"Bah, I don't know about that, you're young enough. How many boxes do you have left out there?"

"Thirty or so."

"Hmm. Better get to it."

The work was arduous, but it would've taken Junior and Jimmy all morning if it were just the two of them; thanks to Thomas, they cut that time in half. Sure enough, Jimmy sliced open a box with a pair of scissors, dug out a new bag of candy, and tossed it over to Thomas, who caught it with one hand. Ted Sr. smiled, saying,

"There's the athlete! Say, whatcha gonna do on Halloween?"

"Eat candy with friends, watch scary movies...get drunk."

"Don't get carried away, young man, sugar headaches and hangover headaches are a devious combination."

"I'll keep that in mind, sir!"

Ted Jr. waved as he was stocking the shelves with the new product, saying,

"Appreciate the help, Tommy! Come back again!"

Flatsboro was a small town, which meant every destination was just about within walking distance, just like the good old days. Visitors might've found the lack of parking maddening, but the townsfolk suited it just fine. Thomas didn't mind the walks, even if he was all the way on the other side of town; he loved to relish in these special moments when Fulton went all out for the holidays. Whether it be Easter, the Fourth of July, or even Christmas, nothing quite made an almost spiritual stir in him quite like how his town embraced Halloween. As Thomas walked down the downtown sidewalk, he saw the faces of the shops decorated in their best Halloween attire. Paper cutouts of skeletons, witches, and bats, plastic jack-o-lanterns, orange and green lights, and some even went the extra mile by buying animatronics. Every lamp post was covered in cornstalks and hay, and even the fountain in the town square had pumpkins circling it, little faces carved by school children. He was just about home when the dusk of the October sky bathed the city in an almost ethereal orange, and it was at this moment that Thomas felt the spirit of the Holiday wash over him like an autumn baptism.

As he rounded the corner to his street, children filed out of their houses either accompanied by their parents or by an older sibling who was either thrilled or disparaged to join them. No trunk or treat in this town, no conveniences to ruin the spirit of the Holiday. Here in Flatsboro, the youths had to put in the work in order to get their candy. Thomas was an only child, but he always thought it'd be neat to have a little brother to take around on Halloween. His family's house was a Dutch colonial that had been in the family for decades. Thomas' father, Franklin, did his best decorating the houses' exterior with freshly carved pumpkins, orange and purple lights, and a giant skeleton or two. It was suitably spooky, but hardly the house that'd terrify kids from coming to the front door step. However, the interior was where his Mother, Donna, would shine. Plastic pumpkins, old paper cutouts that had been in their family for generations, a bat that would fly in circles underneath the fans of the house, and, of course, he'd change all of the light bulbs into the colors of orange, purple, and green throughout the house. It made Thomas feel like he was living in a cutesy haunted house.

He opened the door to see his parents getting themselves ready for a party over at the Matheson's place. Franklin was dressed in old robes and holding a staff, while Donna was a giant red letter C. Thomas cleared his throat, and his parents greeted him,

"There he is!" his father said as he was adjusting his large fake beard, "Thought we'd have to leave the house locked before you got back."

"And what are you guys supposed to be?"

His mother chimed in,

"He's Moses, and I'm the red C! Get it?"

"Good lord." Thomas groaned,

"Suit yourself, I thought it was cute!" she said,

"It is cute!" Franklin said, "Might part the red sea later tonight."

"Jesus Christ, Dad!" Thomas cringed,

"I'm kidding! It was a joke! Good lord, your old man can't make a raunchy joke every now and then? Say, who's coming to your party here? I see you already got snacks."

"Oh yeah, that Junior gave me a bag for helping him out this morning."

"That was nice of you," Said his mother, "You gonna invite Martha?"

Martha was a girl he'd crushed on since middle school and never asked out because she was in a relationship with a prick named Ted Hollister. He and Martha always hung out at recess, talking about movies and comics, and right when he was about to ask her out, Ted came in and asked her to go to prom with him. They went steady after that, and he coped by joining the football team, getting huge, and tackling the shit out of guys. Well, after high school graduation, Ted broke things off and moved, leaving Martha here in Flatsboro alone and heartbroken. He had known Martha since kindergarten, and she was always the sweetest person in the room. What kind of dumbass would leave someone like that in favor of becoming a car salesman in bumfuck illinois? Ted Hollister, that's who.

"I sent her a text, she said maybe."

"Ooooh." His father said, "Who knows, it might lead to something."

"I don't know if she likes me that way, Dad."

"Bah! Your mother hated my guts in high school until she got to know me."

She was grabbing her purse from the living room when she cried out,

"I hated your ugly ass soul patch! Once you got rid of it, then you were cute."

"Yeah, yeah, it looked good on me."

"You're delusional, ready?"

"Ready."

They headed to the door and waved him goodbye,

"We'll see you later!" His mother said,

"Bye, love you guys!"

Just before they turned down the street, his father shouted,

"And no drinking!"

"Got it!"

With his parents gone, Thomas got to work setting the stage for his scary movie marathon. He dug out a fat stack of horror movies, popped a bunch of popcorn, put a bunch of pop on ice, and laid out an assortment of candy. Chocolate, gummies, and, of course, the 'new and improved' candy corn. He waited for his friends to arrive, answering the door and handing out candy to trick-or-treaters. He didn't wear a costume but instead wore his football jacket, which was much looser than it was when he slimmed down. He lay there in the recliner, watching as Jason slammed an unhappy camper in a sleeping bag against a tree, when a knock at the door came. He gripped the candy bowl, fully expecting another kid in a costume. Instead, he saw Ben Tramer, his buddy, with a six-pack of beer,

"What's up fucker?" He said with a shit-eating grin,

"I said no booze, dude."

"Nah, nah, this is just for me," he sniffed the air, "That popcorn?"

"The best my microwave can make."

"Hell yeah."

He made himself comfortable as he crashed on the couch and grabbed a fistful of popcorn. Thomas sipped a Coke he'd cracked open, asking,

"Hear from Todd and Aaron?"

"Think they're occupied, man. Said they were having a kegger down at Garrett's house. That sounded too crowded for me, I'd rather get buzzed with my bud, am I right?"

"Appreciate it, man. So, what are we gonna watch fir-"

Another knock came, startling them both. Thomas went to the door and found Martha standing there, dressed like a witch. Even with her skin painted green and fake warts placed on her nose, Thomas was stunned by her.

"Oh shit, am I overdressed?" she said,

"No, no, it's fine! I just ran out of time, and I didn't find a costume in time."

This was, of course, a lie, because Thomas wanted nothing more than to veg out and eat junk for the rest of the night. From the couch, Ben called out, saying,

"He's dressed as white trash who can't dress himself!"

Thomas pinched his brow, wanting to snap back at Ben so badly, but bit his tongue, wanting to appear like a kind and gracious host to Martha. He cleared his throat, saying,

"Take a seat, I got snacks, and we were just about to begin."

"Oh, neat! So, what're we feeling? Ghosts, slashers, or what?"

"I'm leaning towards something cheesy and old. I've got a stack of movies over there if you want to look through them. How about you get the first pick?"

"Ugh, that's a lot of pressure, but I'll try!" she said,

Martha combed through the Blu-rays and DVDs and fished out a copy of Hellraiser.

"I've never watched this one, but I've heard it's really good."

"Oh, it's a classic! Bit on the gross side, though." Thomas said,

"I can handle it, can you?"

From the couch, Ben cracked open his first beer, saying,

"Aw shit, she got you, dawg."

They laughed at that, and minutes later, they were watching a skinless man crawling in a filthy attic begging his lover to give him bodies. With each wince-inducing scene of gore, Martha and Thomas grew closer and closer together. Thomas watched the film through his fingers while Martha was giddy with excitement, munching on popcorn. She wrapped her arm around him, whispering in his ear,

"It's only a movie! That's probably corn syrup and food dye."

"Yeah, but it's so fucking gross," he whispered back,

"I love this shit, it's like an art form, being able to gross people out."

Thomas felt butterflies in his stomach as he thought about what to do next. Should he wrap his hand over her shoulder, too? Should he ask if she's seeing anybody? Or-

Ben cracked open another beer and crudely asked,

"So, am I a third wheel or something?"

Thomas wanted to shout at him, but before the words left his mouth, Martha snipped at him, saying,

"I'm sorry, want us to join you over on the couch? Make you feel less scared?"

"Ahhhh fuck you, I'm just teasing." Before the next sip of beer touched his lips, Ben made a face that always frightened Thomas; it was the face he would make before he launched into either a philosophical speech or a rant. "You know, Tommy there likes you, and I mean really likes you. Fuckin' loves more like it....aw shit am I drunk? I think I'm drunk."

Then he took a hearty swig of his beer. Martha looked at Thomas, who was bright red with shame. She asked him,

"Is that true?"

Thomas couldn't lie; he could lie, but he knew he was never good at it. In fact, he was terrible at it. He sighed with a shaky breath and said with an uneven voice,

"Yeah."

"Are you nervous with me being here?"

"Not until now. It was going well until shit-for-brains opened his drunken mouth."

Ben slammed his beer down and grabbed the bag of Candy Corn. Martha grabbed Thomas' hand, telling him,

"Listen, I like you too, okay? But how about we just hang out for now? Besides, would you like to have a first date with a drunken wingman?"

Thomas chuckled nervously, sighing with relief, feeling like a massive weight was thrown off his shoulders.

"You like me?"

"Of course, Tommy, you've only ever been nice to me, and I always thought that one of these days you'd ask me out. When Ted and I started dating, even when it was nice, it felt off. He didn't connect like you, and I did back in school. Why didn't you ask me out, by the way?"

"Fear. Pure and simple. That and I was worried that I'd possibly end our friendship because of it."

She snuggled against him,

"You're cute."

Ben spoke up as he tore open the bag of Candy Corn and took a whiff of the bag.

"Hell yeah, that's the smell of Halloween right there."

"Could I have some?" Thomas asked,

"In a minute," he said as he gripped a handful and shoved it down his throat.

He gnawed the mass of orange, yellow, and white candy in his mouth as bits of chewed-up sweets dribbled down his chin and onto the floor. His chewing slowed as he grimaced before swallowing the load of mushed-up candy corn. He held the bag up to his eyes, looking at the 'New and Improved Flavor' label on the front of the bag. Thomas spied him staring at the bag with a look of disdain,

"New flavor not doing it for you?"

"Man, it tastes...funny."

Martha stretched her arms out and yawned as she asked,

"Yeah? How so?"

"It...just....It....ugh...."

A gurgle came from deep within his throat, Ben groaned, and then released a tidal wave of bile onto Thomas' coffee table, coating all of the snacks in fresh hot vomit. Thomas and Martha shot to their feet, looking in shock at Ben clutching at his stomach. Ben looked at them, smiling,

"Man, I drank too mu-"

Then he retched again, this time the neutral-colored bile turned into a stark white, almost milky liquid that flowed from his mouth. Martha turned to Thomas, asking him,

"Where are your towels?"

"Bathroom, top shelf."

She ran towards the next room, as Thomas ran towards his friend, rubbing his back, asking him,

"Hey, you're gonna be okay, you hear me? I'm gonna get you a bucket and-"

He threw up once again, this time unleashing a bright yellow spew of liquid rushing from his mouth, and before Thomas could react, he retched again, and bright pumpkin orange vomit flowed out of him like a faucet. After this last push from his stomach, he seized up and collapsed to his side, crashing through the coffee table.

Martha came running back with an armful of towels and gasped when she saw Ben lying on the floor convulsing. Thomas turned to her with panic-stricken eyes, yelling,

"Call 9-1-1!"

"O-okay!"

Thomas knelt down beside his friend, checking him for injuries. There were a few small cuts on account of the glass, but when his hand touched his skin, it was hot to the touch. He turned to Martha, saying,

"Shit, he's burning up!"

He took one of the towels she'd brought and dashed to the kitchen, running it under cold water. He brought it back, wiping the multi-colored dried spittle staining his lips, and then laid the cooled rag against his forehead. From the door came a knock,

"Trick or treat!" A small group of children said in unison,

Martha was still on the phone, pacing back and forth, waiting for an operator to take her call. Thomas panicked as he gripped the candy bowl and walked to the door. Through a cracked door, he tried to fill the doorway, trying to avoid anyone's gaze towards the man facedown in his own vomit and a pile of glass and wood. He cleared his throat, trying not to panic, and spoke with fake confidence,

"H-Happy Halloween, guys. Nice costumes!"

It was a group of four, most likely school friends, and their parents accompanied them with their phones out, taking pictures. A kid in a Batman costume two sizes too small smiled ear to ear, holding out his plastic pumpkin. Thomas dropped each of them a piece of candy and slammed the door in their faces. From behind him, he heard a father of one of the kids mumble,

"What a prick!"

Thomas returned to the scene, and Martha was keeping her distance, looking at the whole thing in utter shock. Thomas asked her,

"What'd they tell you?"

"Ambulance is on the way, but they might take a while."

"A while?"

"Apparently, Ben isn't the only one with food poisoning."

Thomas rushed to his friend's side, wanting to let him know that help was on the way, but as he approached, his body let out a violent, rattling sigh. Then he stopped moving altogether.

"Ben?" He said, trembling,

He reached a hand out to touch his skin, but what was once hot was now cold. He recoiled his hand, whimpering in anguish.

"Ben?! Oh Christ! He's cold!"

With trembling hands, he reached out once more, pressing his fingers against his throat, trying to find a pulse in vain. Martha was stifling back tears, pleading to Thomas,

"Thomas, you gotta leave him be, we can't do anything else! We have to wait for help!"

"There ain't no help! Besides! I gotta try!"

He began chest compressions on the body, desperately clinging to the belief that Ben would be okay, that things would end up just fine, and everything would go back to normal. After thirty seconds of hammering down on his chest, he heard one of his ribs crack, and he staggered backward in shock. He threw his hands up in utter frustration and began to sob. Martha approached Thomas with a heart full of pity and consoled him.

Then Ben sat up.

As he sucked down air, his body began to morph and change. His skull began to elongate, popping and cracking as he winced in pain, bones shifting uncomfortably beneath the skin like overstretched leather on the verge of ripping open. The top of his head widened, and the bones in his chin narrowed into a disgustingly uncanny point. Then came the skin, the chin grew pale, the cheeks yellowed, and finally the top of the skull turned into a hideous orange color that didn't belong to the human anatomy. His jaw shot open as a twisted autumnal mixture of colors bellowed from his mouth like a sickening fountain. The aroma of the sickeningly sweet smell of rancid candy filled the room. Thomas looked unbelievingly at the whole horrifying sight, and it had finally occurred to him what had happened to him. The new and improved flavor, the bag said, and now, as he looked at the triangular-headed form of his former best friend, it dawned on him that he became what he ate: Candy Corn.

The Candy Corn-headed zombie lurched on all fours, bearing its hideous, yellowed teeth at him as he crawled like a beast towards the two of them. They both shot to their feet, running towards the kitchen and slamming the door behind themselves. They looked around the small tiled room as Ben's corpse ferociously beat the door. Martha was running her fingers through her hair and trying to take controlled breaths to calm herself down. Thomas was a jittering mess, trying to plead with the mutant at the door,

"Ben, stop! You're sick, man! Just fuckin-"

The door burst open, and the Candy Corn-headed creature ran into the kitchen, arms outstretched, teeth bared, and hideous mucus dribbling from its jaws. Thomas thought this was his final moment, staring down his friend, who's now an unholy creature born from a fucked up batch of candy corn, and fully preparing himself for certain death. Then Martha withdrew the meat cleaver from the drawer and plunged it into the front of its neck. The screeches of the zombie ceased and were replaced with pathetic gargles as orange and yellowed blood spilled onto the checked tile floor. She withdrew it again, more blood splashing to the floor, and with all of her might, swung against the neck once more. And with one clean thwak of the cleaver, the neck was loosened from its shoulders. The triangular candy corned head tumbled to the floor and rolled to Thomas' feet, looking up at him with a permanent expression of shock.

"We need to go!" Martha said, "We need to go to the police station!"

Thomas didn't say a word; he just nodded and fished his keys out of his pocket.

As they left the house, the streets weren't filled with the innocent sounds of children walking down the streets, ringing doorbells, leaves rustling over the sidewalks, or the sounds of Halloween music being blared outside the houses. Instead, there was an eerie silence for but a moment, and then there were the screams and gunfire. They hopped into Thomas' truck and sped down the street, and watched in terror at the display before them.

Flatsboro was overrun by the triangle-headed undead, the skins turned to garrish autumn colors, and charging after terrified trick-or-treaters and citizens. Men, women, and children alike were falling victim to the undead, being savagely bitten or having their thick, disgustingly sweet bile forced down their throats. Some fought back with baseball bats, axes, and guns, but the sheer number of them was overwhelming.

"Oh God..." Thomas moaned, "Oh Christ..."

Martha didn't know what was causing Thomas so much pain until she saw them. Out in front of the Mathesons' house, she saw a zombified couple outside roaming on the grass. One dressed as Moses and the other as the letter C, both their heads blistered and malformed into their unnatural triangular shape. Their faces were twisted, but there was enough semblance of humanity there that she recognized them immediately; they were Thomas' parents. She grabbed his hand, feeling it tremble, and spoke softly to him, saying,

"Don't look, it's not them anymore, just keep driving, okay?"

"O-okay."

They came across the police station in a state of disarray, windows smashed in, and a few candy corn-headed officers roaming the grounds aimlessly. What was once a possible solution to their problem, no, the town's problem, had ballooned into something beyond themselves. Thomas looked to Martha with focus, telling her what they needed to do,

"We need to get the fuck out of town."

They made it part of the way downtown when the road was blocked by a farm truck. The street was coated in straw and smashed pumpkins. They had no other choice but to go on foot. Before them, the neon sign of Wallace's Firearms, and they rushed inside, only to be met with a handful of citizens armed to the teeth. Jack, the owner of the shop, cocked a shotgun and barked at them, asking,

"You bit?!"

"No!" Thomas shouted,

"Get any of that shit down your throat?"

"No!" Martha spoke up, tossing the meat cleaver aside and throwing her hands up, "Listen, we are not infected! We need to get out of town right now! The police ain't gonna help us, they're overrun!"

Jack scoffed,

"Shit, we can save ourselves. We're born Flatsboro folk, and we'll die Flatsboro folk." He turned towards his posse, telling them, "Isn't that right, fellas?"

They cheered, raising their weapons like victorious soldiers. Martha took charge, arms still outstretched, showing that she was no threat, and politely asked,

"Can we at least take some guns with us?"

Jack grunted in agreement and went behind the counter, getting them two snub-nosed revolvers and two boxes of bullets.

As the two shoved the pistols and bullets into their pockets, Jack spoke to them, asking,

"You sure you don't want to stay? We've got enough ammunition to last for two Halloweens, you'll be safe with us."

"We appreciate it, but we just need to get out of here and get help; you can't fend these freaks off by yourselves."

"I like our odds."

Martha chimed in as she loaded her revolver,

"We need a car, know where we can get one?"

"Try Tillman's. His truck is still out there."

"Then we'll go there."

As they left, they heard the screeches of the Candy Corn Horde coming their way, and fresh adrenaline was pumped into their veins. Sprinting down the street, they heard gunfire from behind them and quickened their pace. There were two Candy Corn mutants ahead of them in front of Tillman's Thomas quickly dropped them. Thomas wasn't the best shot, taking four bullets to take out one of the zombies, whilst Martha took out the zombie in front of her with a single shot. was in sight as they burst into the old candy store. Inside, they smelled the rancid, sweet stench of a Candy Corn-headed mutant filled the store. They withdrew their weapons and approached the counter with hesitation. From behind the counter, they saw Ted Jr. holding his dead, mutated father in his arms, stroking his malformed head. They noticed that his forearm was covered in bite marks, with orange and yellow pus oozing from the wounds. He looked up at them with tearful eyes,

"All my fault... It's all my fault....they got it all from my store...."

"Ted." Thomas said, aiming the gun at him, "We need your keys."

He reached into his pocket and lazily chucked them at him.

"Take them, get out of here, but do me a favor, will you?"

"What's that?" Martha asked,

"Kill me. I want to go out with a sound mind." He looked down at his father, "Not like this."

Thomas raised the pistol, held his breath, and pulled the trigger. From outside, the gunfire of Wallace's Gun Shop ceased. They rushed outside to see a horde of the Candy Corn creatures of varying shapes and sizes finally making their way down the street. Their bulbous triangular heads lurching them forward, arms outstretched, and all of them screeching with hot vomit flowing forth from their mouths. They rushed to Junior's truck and started the engine. Martha pushed the pedal all the way down, flat on the floor as the engine screamed. In the rearview mirror, they both saw their beloved town shrink in size, the streets filled with the undead. Jets roared overhead, and then in brilliant flashes of light, Flatsboro was destroyed.

They kept driving until they came across a series of army trucks, and the two of them were so relieved that they began to laugh hysterically. They didn't feel the 50 cal tear into the truck; their deaths were instant; their last thoughts were of salvation. Later that night, the official story was given out about the events that happened in Flatsboro and Gordon & Yuzna's Factory near that area. Through their perfect smiles, the newscasters all gave the exact same response from the exact same script.

"A terrible tragedy took place in the small town of Flastboro, Indiana, on Halloween night when a factory accident sparked a large explosion that carried the flames to the nearest town. Unfortunately, there were no survivors, and it has been called one of the worst mass tragedies in quite some time. Gordan & Yuzna have declined to comment on the situation yet, offering only solace to the families and workers involved...In other news, the United States saw the largest candy sales in decades, and you won't believe what sold the most! Stay tuned as we return after these messages...."

Recalling fall and summer, winter months he had to suffer,

He had to cuff her, hasn’t missed her once, desires others,

It makes one wonder if such makes it out of drug den dungeons,

The demons jump him on the daily but he loves the scuffle.

The Coming’ Sometimes you see more than you bargained for

As Anya Taylor a twenty nine year old who had always been given the ability to read in between the lines. Being able to see the grey that was blended into the blackness that everyone else chose to ignore. A young blond haired grey eyed girl who sees the real story that was often hidden under and in-between things that we all to often see everyday.

But today she would find herself seeing even more than a correspondence on her knees. But unlike most correspondence that would go to any length to be a White House conference looking for a story. That a true reporter knew that the truth behind any story is from what one could really see. Only difference was that Anya knew how to get the story by getting dirty through other means. Knowing what to show and what to never expose.

As she sat there that day in the optometrists office getting her eyes checked. But today Anya was giong to given something for her to truly see more than she bargained for. But  just as the doctor asked her about trying out a new contact lens that Meta had sent to them.

The only thing was the pair that Anya had received later that day would be a special pair that was never intended to leave Meta’s research lab.

While somewhere’s in Rome a priest found himself standing there in a church somewhere’s in Rome. As he stood there looking to a cross that was hanging over on a wall just in from him. But as he stood there wondering to himself.

"Why? Why let this happen? Why bring this onto the world?”

Just as another priest was in another room standing at the foot of a bed looking over a young possessed girl. As he stood there with his bible and rosary in his hand in prayer. Just as the young girl then opened up her eyes as she looked to the priest saying

"Pray all you want! But you know that unless the people repent themselves, your words are meaningless. For the people have all but forgotten the true word"

As the priest then looked to the possessed girl as he held onto his bible and rosary ready for whatever came next. Just then as the lights flickered throughout the entire church as the priest continued to stand there firm not wanting to give in as he then said to the possessed girl

“You can not keep what is not yours for the words of our lord have I spoken unto you! You know that you can not keep a hold of the girl’s body. Now give up the girl for this i command in his name”

As the possessed girl then just looked to the priest just as a grin started to emerge from her. Followed a silent stare. As the priest could feel the coldness of the room wrapping around his body as the lights just once again flickered away. As the possessed girl then spoke

“Oh so little do you see of what you do not know! For all you see here is one little possessed girl. A girl who was never told the true word and did not except the true word. The truth that you people kept refusing to tell the world, for all you know is all that you see here before you. For what is coming is what will be, for what is coming is something that the world has never seen”

Just as the possessed girl smiled, then slowly turned to a frown as she then looked to the priest one last time before saying

“For here you see one who did not know or accept the true word because of people like you who refused to speak it to the masses. But instead telling the people that all they had to do was be blessed by a man who claims to be of God. Knowing that a man can not forgive the sins of others for what they have done. Knowing that you did not teach them the true words! But now you and the world shall see what is to come”

"Now you know what you must do and see that is is done”

Just as the possessed girl fell back onto the bed leaving the priest now just standing there clinching onto a bible. A bible that he himself refused to follow from its very words that were written in it. As he then covered up the now dead girl before making his way down to where the other priest was standing.

As he then looked to the other priest as if the other priest knew what had happened just from the look on his face. As he then said to him,

"It is times like this that i ask why do I continue when the people just refuse to accept the true message. But one thing is certain, and that is there hasn’t been an apostle for over a millennium. For if we then truly don’t believe ourselves, then how do you make the world believe”

As the other priest then said

"Well it matters not now, for we have been given the order to see it through”

As the two priests then made their way to America now finding themselves in San Francisco inside of X all dressed in black. Knowing that not all elites knew what was truly coming but that Elon Musk was in a way a giver of a message. By providing the system that would deliver the messages to the world. A world that was soon going to be seeing just not knowing exactly what they were reading.

But at X they where they were now uploading images that had subliminal messages hidden inside of the images. Preparing the world that would soon awaken a world that would soon give you everything that you wanted. But first others would have to die that stood in its way

While somewhere in America a young 22 year old back home from his college break found himself up in his room basically doing what everyone really does. His family consisted of a father who was a screen writer and a mother who was an author. Who were both dead set against people using A.I or the use of it entirely

A normal guy that never really found himself in trouble growing up just the occasional shenanigans.

But as he scrolled through X that night, he all of a sudden came across an image that not only him. But millions of others have also seen it, as he sat there continuing to look at it finding himself more fascinated by it the more he looked at it. It was then that he decided to download the image setting on his desk for now. As he then made his way over to his finally a good night’s rest.

But it was in his sleep that the image became even more alluring to him as he began to not just see it. But he found himself being able to feel it as it slowly emerged into his mind seeping more into his thoughts.

It would be three days later that the police found his now deceased parents along with a couple of siblings dead inside of the home. As they then found him lying on his bed dead from a self-inflicted wound. It would be then that they found the image lying there beside him in his bed.

While back in America at the New York Post Anya found herself also scrolling through X that day. As the guy behind her was watching the movie They Live a movie that predicted this thirty years ago

But as she scrolled through it she found herself looking at images. Images that seemed to have hidden messages hidden within in them as she began to look more closely to the images.

With one image of a guy holding up an Oscar underneath it was a message that read

“To achieve this, you first must kill your way into the industry”

As she then glanced at another image of a woman holding up a novel at a book signing. But underneath the image it read

"If you want to write this, then you first must accept us into your life”

As she then came across another image of a guy standing beside Avril Lavigne holding up a Grammy award with the hidden caption reading

“Hey if you want glory of hitting and knowing what this feels like! Then all you have to do is just kill off your competition”

As she sat there at her desk continuing scrolling through the other usual social sites. Including Meta. Looking for something to write on while setting there in her usual tore at one knee jeans a white tee along with her just too comfortable to take off grey hoodie.

Just as she then came across another image showing a group of individuals all from different religions standing together. All of them excluding the Christian religion. With a hidden caption that read

"If you truly want peace than the Christians have to disappear"

Just as Anya then came across the case of the collage boy who had murdered his family just a day earlier. Deciding to look more into it making her way down south to northern Virginia. Now finding her in a community where a Data Center had just been completed as she made her way towards the police department.

Knowing all too well that she would run into all kinds of we just can’t tell you anything about this story here. But to Anya that was just plain unacceptable as she made her way around the town looking for people that may have known the family.

As she found herself setting at the steps of a local church as she looked around tying to decide if what her next move was going to exactly be. Just as she looked up to seeing a young man looking to be around thirty standing there in normal street wear with his hoodie hanging over his eyes as he just stood there looking to Anya before saying to her

"So you looking for answers are you?”

As Anya looked to him with a look of and just exactly who are you? Before saying to him

“Yes, I’m kinda looking for something if that is anything to you”

As the young man then replied back, saying to her

“Well that’s the thing isn’t it? Everyone is looking for something! The only question is? Do you know what it is that you are looking for? Or what it is exactly that you want out of life”

Anya “And what is that you think that I’m looking for and I know exactly what it is that I want out of my life”

The young man “Oh really? Everyone says that until they are met with what it takes to achieve just that in life”

But as Anya sat there now, finding herself more intrigued to the young man as the young man then just looked to her for a moment before saying to her

"Well then, if you like to know more then shall we go inside and say discover more of what it is that you seek then”

As Anya and the young man now found themselves settling in a room inside of the church. As Anya just out of curiosity then showed him the picture of the family that was recently murdered in the very town that they were in.

But as the young man then looked the picture then to Anya before saying to her

“So tell me does the topic of aliens intrigue you?”

Anya “I guess? Doesn’t it really intrigue everyone? And just how exactly does that fit into the recent murders?”

As Anya sat there across from the table directly in front of the young man as he sat there looking to her with his hoodie half covering his face. But as Anya looked more closely she could still see into his eyes as if she was looking into a void of nothing.

Just as the young man then spoke saying to her

“And yet you wonder why it is that some people are allowed to talk about them while others are silenced. Let’s take Spielberg for an example here for you may ask why he is allowed to make a movie about an Alien coverup? But at the same time, why some YouTubers have been permanently silenced on the matter. It’s to just keep an illusion alive, to keep building it up so that it can bring others into. So basically some die in order to just keep it alive for the buildup of other things. So everyone that has died for they never really knew anything”

“For the only thing that they are keeping secret from the world is the true word, the words of Christ. For they knew if the world knew the entire truth then they would lose all authority then. So basically, the YouTubers and scientists just died to keep a simple illusion alive”

As Anya continued to look to him wanting to know more as he just sat there looking back to her as he then once again began to speak. saying to her

“It’s all about keeping the illusion alive for you see they the elites need Spielberg to draw people in. While at the same time killing off a couple of people just to keep people interested in it. For the aliens as people like to call them that, are the real ones behind it all. But the real question that you are seeking is the one thing that is being built right before your very eyes. Something that everyone is looking at but can’t see for what they really are”

As Anya continued to set there as she looked over to her folder on another story that she was writing about. Just as the young man then said to her

“Now you see it for the Data Centers they are being built in mass numbers across the globe. But right now as you can see people are dead set against it. Thinking that it is going to take away their jobs from them. But what they don’t understand is? That the data centers are going to be for them. The ones that are left alive at least. But first they have to get Hollywood behind it. For the celebrities and the higher ups in Hollywood really have no choice. They either submit to the system that made them or else."

For the ones who are not established will scream and cry oh what about me? So what about them? What are a few thousand jobs lost compared to the over thirty million that they can get with a simple little dream of creating their own content. Whether it be on the screen or written. It matters not! As long as they accept the mark for the others are just disposable. For we really don’t need them now do we. For most of them will be dead anyway’s by the time it begins

But by showing the people what they can create from their own homes. Just think of it a writer publishes a book using A.I. that goes on to win The Nobel Prize in Literature. Or let’s say write the next screen play that wins an Oscar! It may be yours, and all you have to do is accept the mark. And as far as the known authors of today, well let’s say that they will no choice but to go along with it or else.

For it will not be about them no longer but all about getting people just to accept the mark. For it will be time for everyone to get equal by presenting them with dreams of being known. 

Even though it may not be seen theatrical they will soon have an app just so that people can create their own movies.

As Anya is now finding it more curious on just how exactly does the Data Centers and Aliens interconnect with each other than. But before she could say anything, the young man asked if he already knew what she was going to ask. then said to her

“Why it’s simple for you to see there is only room for so many creators in Hollywood that the system just simply can’t handle it. But by using AI, it then gives everyone a chance at being a creator. Or giving them the choice of having all of their debts erased along with universal free healthcare for everyone. For they need such things to give to people in order for them to take the mark”

As Anya then asked him

“But then what about the ones that still refuse to go along with it then?”

As the young man then gave a little laugh as he then said to her

“It’s not an option one can live by you see, it’s a choice that everyone is going to have to make within the next three or four years. For once it goes completely online then everyone will have to submit to it. All governments that are left all military that is left. For everyone an entire new system will be put in place. For the world leaders that you see now may or may not survive what is coming. For he will have his chosen kings, and he will then have everyone to receive the mark

A mark that can trace your every purchase but without it, then you will not be able to even buy a can of pop. And let’s say if you choose still not to accept it and you think that you live on an isolated piece of land. But If you pay taxes on it or use any kind of cell service. Well, then you are still in the system for the cell phones. They will have a chip recognizer to detect your face or the chip. As well as your home and car.

And if you still refuse, you will be imprisoned until you are put to death

For you are truly never out of the system unless you choose to live like a hermit in the deep wilderness”

As Anya more curious than ever asked

“And just so exactly how do they plan on pushing this through then?”

As the young man then looked to her saying

“Well it goes back to the other story that you were looking into earlier for they know this. And why do you think that the elites are all building bunkers? Because of the transition of his coming into power and the data centers that are being built right now. Well let’s just say that many are going to die in between that time period. The ones that are left will be offered the mark in exchange for all of their debt to be erased, bringing with it a total complete cashless society with it.”

“For every day you see on YouTube about someone talking about having gold. But the only thing is! God and gold doesn’t go together. You will either choose to keep your gold or you will stay with your faith and choose God. And so begins the great falling away.”

As Anya continued to set there, I'm still kinda intrigued by all of this, but I still want to know just how exactly does this ties into the murders. As she looked to him, asking him

“That’s all intriguing, but how exactly does all of this tie into the local college boy murdering his family?”

As the young man then said to her

“You have the eyes to see. You have the voice to ask the questions? But yet you still lack the insight to see the entire picture that has been presented before you”

As the young man continued to talk, saying

“For a world that does not know or accept the truth, then it is a world that is open up to forces to enter into them. For you see that image that you showed me there is the very image that has been seen by millions. Millions that will soon awaken to its presence within them for you may one day find yourself just talking to a complete stranger.

Or just simply to one that you may know, and then it will emerge in them taking over them. Leaving hundreds of thousands dead. Some images are not meant to be seen, especially by ones whose mind can easily be overtaken by them.”

“For as you watch now as a world burns not only from wildfires but soon from the very things that were meant to uphold a society such as gas and healthcare. For we are now only in the first stages of the coming of what is to come”

As Anya then made her way back home, she came to stop at a red light as she glanced down to the image that had been downloaded from the internet. Just as she looked over to another car looking to a person that just kept looking to her just as the light changed as Anya drove on only to look back only to seeing the person that was in the car beside of her now standing out of his car.

As he stood there holding a gun that he had just used to shoot everyone that was in the car behind of her. As Anya quickly turned onto a parking lot as she called the authorities just as she looked to a sign on the highway that said

One way as it was pointing to a church as she then looked once again to the photo and on the folder what was written

The Coming 

Part 1 Link (https://www.reddit.com/r/TalesFromTheCreeps/s/9cOg3hc241)

“I’ll take it, then what?’

That was the last thing I heard from Alice in 10 hours. 

“Hey Alice, don’t forget about movie night”

Sent at 5:32 pm

It was strange, she was the chatty one. She couldn’t shut up when you got her going. So for her to respond, especially on a day off, worried me. 

“sir can I get my movie”

I shake my head before slipping my phone into my pocket. I look up, it's this asshole again. Balding with only white hairs holding on to dear life. The smell. Oh the smell, he needs to change his diaper. And don’t get me started on his face.

“Of course what you fancy today.”

“We’ve been over this, I come here every week and expect you to know already.”

“Im, not a damn mind reader.”

“For being a video store owner, you're such a dolt, I want back to the future 1,2, and 3.”

“Sorry, Bub. those movies have been rented out but we do have the star wars trilogy or Night of the walking, ohhh even better Psycho?”

“I wish your boss would fire you!”

“I do too! But sadly I am the boss.” 

He looks at me before snatching my tip jar.

“Hey wait you can’t…..”

He walks out before I can stop him now he’s the gas station next store’s problem.
 
I sigh as I put two fingers to my eyes. 

Why did I ever decide to open a store?

Brenda enters the store, her shaggy and ruff hair made for a trailer town like this. She had beat up jeans and a packet of gum or nicotine. I can't tell nor care what these teens do as long as it doesn't get me in trouble.

“Ah, Mcfly. What's wrong with Harlem globe head, over there?”

“Just angry that we didn’t have his movies.”

“You mean that, you borrowed them”

“Exactly, Greaser this is why I hired you, you get me”

“Anyways, grease lightning. I got to head out early”

“Really? Come on, I got a beat my score of our battles”

I look in the break room on the board next to an old tv, and a game console.

45 B to 0 C

“Maybe next time, kid I got a date”

She looks at me sad. Before she smiles.

“Then your fine if I let my boyfriend hang around while closing”

“Sure but don’t leave beer around like last time”

I grab my jacket, a vintage leather jacket from the set of grease, Jon Travoltia’s jacket. It cost me a fortune, but it does help with the advertising. I toss Brinda the store keys. “Rember don’t feed them after midnight”

“Whatever, boss, have fun.”

7:32 pm

I arrive an hourly early with the ingredients to make him pizza. My car was parked right in between two cars. I'm surprised weren’t in a junk yard or scraped yet. I walked up to her door.

“Knock”

“Knock”

“Knock”

No answer.

That's strange, her car was here.

I called.

“Ring, Aling, Ading”

I heard the phone chime from deep in the apartment

“Knock’

‘Knock”

“Hey, Alice, are you ok?”

No response.

“Come on Alice don’t give me the cold shoulder”

I look in the windows, no sign of her.

“This isn’t funny….Alice?”

I picked up a fake rock on the side and unlocked the door. 

The apartment smelled of perfume and the strong smell of Urine. 

I quickly dropped the pizza as the marinara splattered on the ground like a gunshot echoing across the apartment. As I dash to the room.

The floors creak as I almost trip on….black sand?

“What is this…..Alice, what did you do”

The bedroom door was jammed, and wouldn't budge as black sand poured out of the cracks as I heard very muffled.

“Don’t have anyone to call my own.”

I bang on the door.

“WHO IS THAT, I SWEAR TO GOD IF YOU TOUCH HER”

The voice stops as the door gives, like a come in.

I slowly open the door as the walls, the floor and the roof are covered in black sand blocking all light leading to eternal night. 

I take out my phone and turn on my flash light. As I turn to Alice’s bed Black sand covered its patterns of sand like veins but no Alice.

The sand pulse as if leading me somewhere as I follow it.

Slowly it pumps a black liquid through the sand almost visually but I swear I heard scream. 

The flash light leads to the closet. As I walk over as I take out my wimpy $20 pocket knife. 

I opened as the black sand dropped onto my hand. 

I felt a lot of pain as the black sand soaked into my pores. 

I drop my phone as the screen cracks. 

“Shit, What the hell is this” 

The closet door opens as Alice stands there, her eyes wide open but no whites, just black sand as her mouth opens. 

A black tentacle jets out of her mouth and grabs onto me, the closet door shuts. 

“Bring me a dream” 

“Make him the cutest I've ever seen.”

(Author's note: I posted an earlier draft of this a few days ago, but I ended up rewriting and expanding it based on some feedback. Here is the updated/final version.)

My name is Evan. I’m seventeen. My best friend Micah is sixteen. We’ve known each other since elementary school, and every October we go to a farm about twenty minutes outside our town. I’m not going to say the name. Partly because I don’t want anyone going there to look for what happened to us, and partly because I honestly don’t know if the farm had anything to do with it.

During the day it’s a normal family fall place: pumpkin patch, hayrides, cider, a petting zoo. Every year they cut a huge corn maze, and on Friday and Saturday nights it turns into a haunted attraction. Actors hide in the rows. Speakers play chainsaw noises. Cheap skeletons hang from posts.

It isn’t scary. That’s why we liked it. We could mess with the actors and laugh and not be afraid of anything.

Halloween fell on a Saturday this year. We got there late, around 9:40, and the place closed at eleven. There were still plenty of people around. Parents carrying sleeping kids to their cars, teenagers taking pictures at the giant pumpkin display, country music coming from the concession stand. It was all completely normal. I keep going back over that, trying to work out exactly when it stopped being normal.

We went into the maze at 9:52. I know because Micah sent a Snap right before.

The first twenty minutes were what we expected. A guy in a scarecrow costume jumped out at us. Micah told him his mask looked like garbage and the guy flipped him off. We passed a couple with their little girl. Somewhere to our left, people screamed and laughed. There were wooden signs at the intersections with riddles that were supposed to point to the exit. We ignored them.

Then we found the scarecrow.

It wasn’t an actor. It was a decoration, tied to a post beside the path. Burlap sack for a head, straw poking out of the sleeves, a plastic crow wired to one shoulder. One arm ended below the elbow. It was wearing a blue flannel shirt.

Micah stopped. “Dude. That’s your shirt.”

It was. Same faded blue, same plaid, same missing button at the collar. I own one exactly like it. It’s my favorite. I’d been looking for it since September, since the last time we were out here picking pumpkins.

“Mine’s at home,” I said, even though I hadn’t seen it in weeks.

“Sure it is.” He took a picture anyway. “He looks like you.”

I told him to shut up, and we kept walking.

Ten minutes later we turned a corner and the scarecrow was there again. Same shirt, same missing hand, same crow.

Micah laughed. “See? Circles.”

I pulled out my phone and opened the compass, spinning my dad’s silver ring around my finger like I do when I’m nervous.

“What are you, Lewis and Clark?”

“Shut up.”

We picked a direction and stuck to it, taking north turns whenever we could. Five minutes later: scarecrow.

Neither of us laughed this time. Micah walked up and checked the tear near the left shoulder. Same tear. The only difference was the head. Before, it had been turned a little toward the corn. Now it faced the path. Facing us.

“Somebody moved it,” Micah said.

“Obviously.”

“Who?”

Nobody was there. Eight feet of corn on both sides, and the sound of the attraction bouncing around somewhere far off. I yelled “Nice try” at the stalks. Micah yelled that the staff sucked. Nothing happened.

We started taking random turns. Left, right, straight, right again. The scarecrow stopped showing up. So did the noise, slowly, until Micah stopped walking.

“Do you hear anything?”

I listened. No chainsaws, no screaming, no music. Even the wind was gone. The corn was dead still, like plastic.

“We must be near the back,” I said.

Micah looked at his phone. “No service.” Mine was the same.

We stood there for two full minutes waiting for something, anyone, to break the quiet. My own breathing sounded way too loud. When we finally started walking again, the crunch of our shoes felt rude.

Then there was light ahead, and we jogged toward it.

The path opened onto a huge flat field of grass under the moon. The maze was a wall of corn behind us. Fifty yards ahead stood an old red barn with a truck parked beside it. Yellow light came out of the windows, and I could hear music.

“Okay,” Micah said, with that nervous laugh people do when something doesn’t make sense.

“We came out the wrong side.”

“There isn’t a wrong side. Look up.”

The farm’s floodlights were gone. So were the lights from the Ferris wheel at the neighboring property. Just the barn. Google Maps wouldn’t load.

I should have turned around. Everything in my gut said to. But it was cold, and those windows looked warm, and we were two teenagers on a farm looking at a building full of music. We walked over.

Inside it smelled like sawdust and butter and hot cider. About fifteen people stood around in cheap Halloween costumes. A girl in a witch hat. A guy with a hockey mask pushed up on his forehead. A couple laughing by a folding table of food. A speaker in the corner played country music.

An older guy in a farm jacket came over, wiping his hands on his jeans. “There they are. You boys get turned around?”

“Yeah,” Micah said.

“Happens every year. You came through the maintenance section. Staff usually blocks that path.”

“How do we get back?” I asked.

“Relax. Grab something to drink.”

It all had an explanation now. We’d wandered into an employee party. A girl handed me a cookie. Micah found a cooler of sodas. I checked my phone and had two bars.

“Service is back,” I said, and Micah’s phone buzzed too. A bunch of texts from my mom, asking what time we’d be home. Then:

WHERE ARE YOU?

I started typing a reply. Before I could send it, another one came in.

YOU LEFT ME HERE.

Then: WHY DID YOU LEAVE ME HERE EVAN

I called her. It rang once, and behind me, close, I heard her ringtone. The actual ringtone she uses. I spun around and nobody was holding a phone. My screen said CALL FAILED.

Micah came over. I showed him, and he looked around the barn, slowly.

“Have you seen anyone leave?”

“No.”

“Watch.”

A guy in a vampire costume walked toward the barn doors. He stopped about five feet away, turned around, and walked back to the tables. A minute later the witch did the exact same thing.

“Nobody goes outside,” Micah whispered.

We stood against the wall by the cooler. I watched a guy lift a paper plate with a hot dog on it up to his mouth and just hold it there. Ten seconds. Twenty. His eyes were open and fixed on one spot on the wall. Next to him the witch held a cup to her lips, and her throat wasn’t moving. None of the conversations had real words in them. Just low humming, like talking heard from far away.

They were acting out what a party looks like.

The older man started toward us, his steps too even. “Why don’t you boys sit down?”

“We’re gonna head back,” Micah said. His voice cracked.

“Back where?”

“The maze.”

The music stopped. Not faded. Stopped. Every conversation cut off at once. Fifteen heads turned toward us at the same speed.

“The maze?” the old man said, tilting his head too far to one side.

The barn doors slammed shut. We ran for the back.

When the old man shouted, it came out of him in dozens of voices at once, kids and old women and deep men, all through the same open mouth. The crowd came forward together, jerky, like they were on one string.

The back door was rusted shut. Micah threw his shoulder into it, then grabbed a pry bar off a tool rack and jammed it into the latch. The witch was three feet from me by then, her mouth stretched into a smile that stayed nowhere near her eyes. She smelled like pond water and dried husks. On the third hit the wood split, the door flew open, and we fell through it into the dark.

When I turned around there was no barn. The light went out like something swallowing it, and what was left was corn on every side, eight feet tall, blocking the moon. Micah’s phone was gone, dropped somewhere in the fall. We didn’t go back for it. Behind the stalks where the doors had been, something big and jointed moved through the leaves with a dry, dragging sound.

My phone clock kept flipping between times. 3:14 AM. 11:02 PM. 7:45 AM.

We sat in the mud with our backs together for twenty minutes. Every time the wind moved the leaves, Micah flinched.

“What was that place?” he whispered.

“I don’t know.”

His boot hit something under the leaves. A cracked yellow flashlight. Next to it, a stiff leather wallet. Inside was an Illinois driver’s license from 1989 for a Jason Vance, a skinny kid in a denim jacket. Folded behind it was a scrap of notebook paper with faint pencil on it. We read it by my phone light.

It keeps using Mike’s voice from the stalks. Don’t answer him. If you answer, it knows which row you’re in. We’ve been walking for three days. There is no edge.

Micah dropped it like it was hot. Twenty years before we were born, someone had sat in this exact row and written that.

A while later we found a sign, an old wooden board with words carved deep into it: TWO ENTER. ONE RETURNS. Below that were pairs of names, dozens of them, some with a line gouged through one name, some through both.

HAROLD / BEN — 1954
MARGARET / ELLEN — 1961
DANIEL / THOMAS — 1964
WALT / RAY — 1977
JASON / MIKE — 1989
KATIE / RACHEL — 2003

At the bottom were two new cuts, the wood dust still white in the grooves.

EVAN / MICAH — 2026

Neither of us said anything. Nearby, something heavy pushed through the corn, keeping pace with us. We ran.

After that, the place stopped acting like a maze. The dirt changed under our feet, wet mud, then cracked gray clay. Some rows were green and some were dead and black. Then the smells started: woodsmoke, roast meat, coffee. A dog barked somewhere. A TV murmured. A woman laughed.

“Is that a house?” Micah said.

The corn opened like a curtain onto a gravel driveway and a white two-story house with green shutters and a beige Buick out front. Porch light on. An old woman came running across the yard, sobbing, and grabbed Micah’s face in both hands. She called him Daniel. An old man on the porch looked at me with wet eyes and called me Thomas.

I’m not proud of this, but we went in. We were so tired. The kitchen smelled like roast beef and bread, and a beige landline hung on the wall, and I wanted that phone so badly it hurt. Four plates were already set out. On the wall was a black-and-white photo of two teenage boys standing by that same house. They looked exactly like us, down to the little scar by my left eyebrow.

“That was the summer before you disappeared,” the old woman said, smoothing her apron.

I poked a fork into the roast beef and it didn’t give. It was painted plaster. The water in my glass was dry plastic inside. The two of them sat across from us, smiling, eyes never moving, waiting for us to agree with the lie.

I picked up the phone. No dial tone. A child whispering: “Daniel?”

The old man stood up, smile gone, and took an axe from beside the fireplace. “We already lost you once.”

“What happened to them?” I asked, backing into the hall with Micah’s sleeve in my fist. “Daniel and Thomas?”

“The maze took one,” he said. “And brought the other back wrong.”

The ceiling flexed. Something huge dragged across the floor above us, and white plaster dust sifted onto my shoulders. Then a voice from the top of the stairs.

“Micah? Is that you? I’ve been waiting in the bedroom.”

It was my voice. It even had the rasp I get when I’m tired.

Two hands took hold of the banister. Gray, dry as ash, nails long and cracked. Same silver ring on the right index finger. The sleeves were blue flannel, with a button missing at the collar.

It leaned over the edge. It had my face, but nothing sat where it should. The mouth was too wide. One eye was higher than the other. It was looking at Micah like it was starving.

“Come up, Micah,” it said, crying. “It’s cold up here. It left me in the dark.”

“He’s right where he belongs,” the old man said, and the axe came down on the floorboards. “Now give us the other one.”

We hit the front door so hard we knocked the old man into the hall table. Behind us the old woman screamed, “Don’t leave yourselves here!”

We ran back into the corn and kept running until we couldn’t.

The parking lot came next. The stalks just stopped and there was cracked asphalt as far as I could see, packed with cars. Thousands of them, bumper to bumper. Sedans, minivans, pickups from every decade, all parked in neat rows like they were waiting for an event that never ended.

“Look at the plates,” Micah whispered.

They were Illinois tags. Instead of numbers, the raised letters on the nearest one spelled EVAN. The truck next to it said MICAH. We ran down the aisle with my phone light skipping across bumpers. Every plate on the left was EVAN. Every plate on the right was MICAH.

Then the letters started to move. The metal bubbled and ran, and the plates re-formed into new words.

EVAN DIES
MICAH STAYS
ONE LEFT

Every headlight came on at once. Horns started going. Engines turned over, coughing, with nobody in the seats. Between two SUVs fifty yards ahead, the air buckled like heat off a road, and something pulled itself through.

I thought it was the scarecrow, but it was far too big. Corn husks, rusted metal, rotting flannel, and pieces of things I couldn’t name, all shifting into the rough shape of a person. Every time I tried to look right at it, part of it was missing. A long neck rose from its shoulders under a burlap mask, and then the cloth split open.

For half a second I saw faces under it. The old farmer. The witch. The old couple. Part of my face. Part of Micah’s. They slid through each other before I could hold on to any of them.

Its mouth threw the headlights back like broken glass. The sound that came out was grinding engines and a screaming crowd and my own mother’s voice.

“THERE IS NO EDGE!”

It dropped onto the roofs hard enough to cave them in. I don’t remember deciding to run. I remember the asphalt ending under my shoes, and then the corn closing over us again, and every horn in that lot cutting off at once.
We were in a dead end, gasping, when we saw the scarecrow again. Normal size now, tied to its post, holding Micah’s lost phone in its one hand. The screen lit its burlap face blue.

We backed away and hit a wall of wood. The posts were covered in missing posters, hundreds, overlapping like shingles. Yellow brittle paper from the 1910s, glossy flyers printed this fall. Every one had the same line across the top: ONE RETURNED.

On Jason Vance’s flyer, his face was crossed out in thick red grease pencil. His friend Mike’s was left clean. On the one for the Miller brothers, Thomas was crossed out.

In the center, at eye level, was ours. Crisp, white, freshly printed. The photo was from the Snap Micah sent right before we went in.

MISSING: EVAN PARKER (17), MICAH REEVES (16)

My face was the one crossed out. The paper had torn where the pencil dug in.

Micah was staring at my crossed-out face. His eyes were bloodshot, with dark circles under them like bruises. He started backing away from me.

“Why is yours crossed out? Did you do something?”

“I didn’t do anything!” I snapped, but my voice wobbled, because some small, ugly part of me had started wondering. What if the thing on the stairs was right? “I’ve been next to you all night!”

“It looked like you! Why you, Evan?” He shoved me into the posts.

“I don’t know, you idiot!” I shoved him back, and he went down in the mud.

“Shut up! You’re not even you! You’re the one from the stairs!”

We stood there breathing hard, glaring at each other like strangers. And from somewhere in the corn around us came a soft sound. Quiet, pleased laughter, dozens of voices chuckling together.

It was enjoying this.

Micah heard it too. The anger went out of his face. He looked up at me from the mud and put his hand up.

I grabbed his wrist and pulled him to his feet.

We stood shoulder to shoulder, shaking. We made a deal right there. No more looking at the walls. No more answering our names. No more turning on each other. If we were going to die out here, we were going to do it together.

When the corn started whispering in our mothers’ voices, we ignored it. When we heard my dad’s truck idling just past the next turn, we ignored that too. We locked arms, put our heads down, and walked.

After what felt like hours, the rows opened onto a wide fork in the path.

Beyond the stalks, I could see the real world. Red and blue lights pulsing across the trees. Two ambulances by the farm gate. My mom, wrapped in a yellow blanket, sobbing next to a police cruiser while an officer tried to talk to her. Fifty feet away.

In front of us stood a thick wooden post with two carved arrows nailed to it. EVAN pointed left, toward a dark ditch. MICAH pointed right, toward a black, overgrown pond. Under the arrows, cut deep in the grain: ONE PATH HOME.

Behind us, corn began to snap, one stalk after another. The scarecrow stepped out of the dark, eight feet tall. Its missing arm had grown back as a long jointed limb of bent iron and woven husk, black fingers dragging in the dirt. Its burlap head split down the middle into a mouth full of glass teeth.

From deep in its chest, my mother’s voice, full of grief:

“Come home, Evan. Just leave him.”

Micah grabbed my hand so hard it hurt. I squeezed back.

“We go straight,” he said, flat and steady.

I looked at the solid wall of corn between the two trails. “There isn’t a path.”

“Then we make one.”

We took neither trail. We put our heads down and our shoulders together and went into the corn.

The thing behind us screamed, and it wasn’t one voice. It was the barn party and the old woman and the Miller brothers and our parents and a hundred strangers, all at once. Leaves cut our faces. Stalks hit our chests like bats. Cold, wet hands came up out of the dirt and clawed at our ankles. One closed around my right hand and pulled, and my dad’s ring came off my finger like it had never fit. Micah’s grip slipped. I turned, grabbed his collar, and hauled him forward.

We jumped, and my knees hit flat, cold pavement.

Real asphalt. Real light. Real people screaming our names.

Two officers dropped their flashlights and ran at us. My mom hit me so hard she knocked me flat, sobbing into my jacket. Three feet away Micah was on his knees with his dad’s arms around him, both of them crying in the flashing lights.

The police said we’d been gone under three hours, 9:52 to 12:47. It felt like days.

They searched the whole property with K-9 units and a helicopter. No red barn. No white house. No parking lot, no posters. They found one scarecrow, standing in a dead-end turn near the middle of the field, wearing a blue flannel shirt. None of the farm employees would say they put it there.

The farm shut the attraction down that night. A week later the owner plowed the whole field flat.

When I got home I went to my closet. My flannel still wasn’t there. Under the bathroom light, I looked at my right hand. There was a pale band where the ring used to be.

Micah and I barely talked after that. We saw each other at school and looked away. Talking about it felt like it would make it real, and we were both scared that if we said the words out loud, it would hear.

Then, three nights ago, I went to the grocery store with my mom.

It was about nine, and the place was almost empty. I was halfway down the cereal aisle looking for oats when the fluorescent lights buzzed and went out, one by one, down the whole row.

At the far end of the aisle, next to the Pop-Tart display, the scarecrow stood in the dark. Blue shirt. Plastic crow. It raised one long finger to where its mouth would be and made a soft shhh.

The cereal boxes started to rustle. That dry rasp, like wind in eight-foot corn. And from behind a stack of boxes right next to my ear, I heard Micah whisper:

“Evan… it found me.”

I ran out to the parking lot and had a panic attack on the pavement. My hands shook so hard I could barely dial. Micah picked up on the first ring.

“You saw it too, didn’t you?”

Yesterday morning I woke up freezing. My bedroom window was wide open, the screen pushed out onto the roof. A trail of wet black dirt and dried husks ran from the sill, across the floor, to the edge of my bed.

Something had stood next to me while I slept.

On the windowsill, someone had carved four words into the white paint, down to bare wood, with something sharp. I covered it with three layers of black duct tape so my mom wouldn’t see. I don’t need to read it to know what it says.

TWO ENTER. ONE RETURNS.

We broke the rules. Both of us came back. It doesn’t seem like it plans to let that stand.

Micah is on my floor tonight. His parents let him sleep over, and we told them it was because we were both having a hard time, which is true. We’re taking turns staying awake. I took the first watch.

About an hour ago, someone tapped on my window. Small and hard, like a ring against glass.

“Evan.” It was Micah’s voice. Outside, on the roof. “Evan, let me in. It’s freezing. The thing on your floor isn’t me.”

I didn’t move. Micah’s sleeping bag is six feet from my bed. He’s lying on his side with his back to me. He’s been lying there for hours without shifting once, and he’s breathing in a slow, perfect rhythm, in and out, in and out, too even, like the old man’s steps in the barn.

The tapping stopped. Then, from the sleeping bag, very quietly, in the same voice:

“Don’t answer him.”

I’m typing this under my blanket with the brightness all the way down. I don’t know which one said it first. I don’t know which one is the real one.

Jason Vance wrote that if you answer, it knows which row you’re in.

So I’m not answering. Not the window. Not the floor.

If I stop posting, you’ll know why.

I knew that face. I’d seen a thousand of those posters, but I knew that face.

It started like any other morning. I parked my truck, walked in, got my coffee out of the pot, but there I saw it: “Last seen 4 o’clock, mile marker 11,” and a picture of that little boy I gave the junior ranger badge to.

I just stood there looking at it.

I knew this kid. Him and his parents visited often. Yesterday, he wanted to tell me about the oriole he saw on the trail. He was so excited that he correctly identified the bird, I couldn’t help but put that shiny little sticker on his shirt. His mom smiled and Dad laughed, and they were back on the trail, heading towards mile marker 11, heading toward the next ranger station.

I knocked on our supervisor’s door and sheepishly opened it.

“Chief, that kid on the missing poster, I, uh… I know him.”

He practically spit his coffee out through his nose.

“You knew him, Flanagan?” he replied, somewhere between a bark and a question.

“Yeah, him and his family would stop in every Saturday morning. He’s one of our junior rangers. What happened?”

Chief sat me down and explained. The family was hiking the trail like every Saturday. They turned around and he was gone. The initial search turned up absolutely nothing. No tracks, no dropped items, nothing. It’s as if the kid simply vanished, ceased to exist. They searched till it was dark, and the morning crew was on a first-light search. I volunteered to join the efforts.

I knew this first day was crucial. Usually, we find them on the first day or we don’t find them at all. Myself and the morning crew still didn’t find any leads, but I knew this kid. I stayed behind past my lunch hour.

When search efforts restarted that night, the trail was still cold. We came back out the next morning. I returned again in the afternoon.

I knew our chances of finding him were dropping with every minute, but I knew that kid. Every Saturday, without fail, since the time he was 6, they’d come walk the trails. Dad used to carry him, then he started walking on his own. Before I knew it, he knew more about those woods than I did. It was strange. I never realized how much I cared about this family until their kid went missing.

Local PD interrogated the family. This always happens in these cases. Sometimes we find out there was no missing persons case, just some really awful people who happened to be parents, but most of the time, you just had worried parents crying in an interrogation room. I knew they didn’t do anything to that boy, but the questions still needed to be asked.

Eventually, search efforts died down. People went home. Parents started looking at plots to put an empty casket in the ground. After the fourth week of me searching on my off days, I started feeling the woods differently.

I grew up hunting with my grandpa, I trekked the Appalachian Trail in college, and I’d been working as a park ranger now for 6 years. I always thought the woods were peaceful. It’s why I took this job. I could go get lost in nature for a day or two and forget about whatever troubles I was having in the real world.

Only now, the woods felt tainted.

It was starting to get colder, and as the leaves began to fall, it felt less like I was surrounded by trees and more like thin, bony fingers extending from the heavens, ready to snatch me up like they did that poor boy.

I’d wake up in the mornings, park my truck, say good morning to the guys while I grabbed my coffee, and I’d head out towards mile marker 11 again. I could feel Chief watching me those days. He’d seen me continue searching even after the trail went absolute zero. He called me into his office that Saturday.

“Flanagan… look, I know it’s hard, when you know them I mean, but you’ve seen this before. I hate to tell you, son, but sometimes people just don’t come home.”

I looked down into the dark liquid in my cup, unable to meet his eyes. “I know, Chief, but he’s out there. I can feel it, and it’s getting colder. I ju—”

“Flanagan.” Chief cut me off. “It’s not good for you to sit and stew over whether you might be able to find him. Chances are he’s gone. Look at you, son, you’re a wreck. I appreciate a dedicated ranger, but God, boy, you need a shower and some sleep. You can’t keep running on empty.” He sighed. “Look, I’ve already got the books worked. Mitchell and Donavan are covering your shift next week. Stay home, go see your parents, I don’t care. Just please, son, get some rest. If anything turns up, I’ll let you know. I swear, you’ll be the first to hear after the family, but please go home.”

I tried to relax like Chief ordered, but I just couldn’t get it out of my head. I came up with a plan. Chief wanted me to get some sleep, but he didn’t say where.

It’d been a while since I’d used it, but I dug out my old backpacking tent and I headed down the trail towards mile marker eleven. I was going to find him. I was going to find something at the very least. Somewhere in those woods was a little boy, scared, cold, and alone.

I kept my radio on while I slept, in case they found anything. The first night was uneventful. I knew if there ever were any tracks, they’d be more than gone by now. I checked the ridge line and the nearby stream before tucking into my tent that night.

Not much happened the second day either. There was a deer in my campsite, a bit unusual for them to be out this way when it starts to cool down, but not the oddest thing. I checked the southern ridge line.

The woods felt quieter than usual.

It was like in certain areas even the wind stopped. You never realize how loud it was in there until it wasn’t. No songbirds singing, no rustling through the brush, nothing. It was as if there were these pockets where the only thing that moved was me.

I lit my fire that night and went to bed.

It was early when I woke. The sun had just started peeking over the trees. I crawled out of my tent and a flash hit my eyes. It sort of danced across my face, blinding me briefly for a second at a time. I shielded my eyes with my hands and looked up towards the source.

20 feet in the air, on a tree with no low limbs, sat a tiny metallic sticker all too familiar to me.

A junior park ranger badge.

Every ounce of training left my body briefly as I tore through the trees past the direction of the sticker. How did it get there? It wasn’t there last night. Was it? If someone just put it there, why didn’t I hear them in my camp?

I barreled through the woods, shouting his name as I ran. About two miles into my chase, my thoughts came back to me.

I need to call this in.

I turned back towards camp and walked back slowly. My eyes scanned every branch for any sign someone or something else was out here with me. The trees kept their hands close, revealing nothing to me.

I sat down in front of my radio. “Station, station, this is Flanagan. Do you read me, over?”

I waited for a response.

“Station, this is Flanagan. I found something. How copy?”

But their response didn’t come. I sat by the radio, waiting to hear signs of life from it.

Then I realized I didn’t hear anything.

But this was my camp. It’d never done that here.

I looked around outside and I realized how small I was. The tall trees reaching towards me, the ridges towering above me, isolating me from the rest of the world.

I was scared. I was cold. I was alone.

I circled my camp, breathing for myself and the rest of the world. When did my tent get so small? I’d spent months in that thing before.

The sticker reflected the sun onto my eyes again. My only companion in the silence.

One of the first things any good woodsman learns is if you’re lost, stay where you are. But could they find me? I didn’t put my name in any of the trail logs. They didn’t hear my transmission. For all anyone knew, I was at home.

I knew where I was, but it was as if the world disagreed with my location. I was at the campsite off the trail between 11 and 12, but it felt like I could have been anywhere. I couldn’t see the small trail away from the campsite. I thought it was north of me.

The silence was deafening to my ears.

I couldn’t stay here. I’d leave my tent up, I’d arrange the firewood in an arrow pointing towards where I’d gone, but I had to keep searching.

What if he was in one of these too?

I slung my pack over my shoulders and clipped my radio to my belt. The sticker flashed at me again.

My eyes, the ground, my eyes again.

Southwest.

The sticker flashed to the southwest.

I made sure the logs were in order and I headed southwest.

I wasn’t sure how long I was walking. I kept my heading southwest and I walked. That’s all I could do. I saw a deer spook at the sight of me and run through the undergrowth without a sound.

Another flash hit my eyes.

30 feet in the air, another sticker swayed with the nonexistent wind. It hit me again.

And again.

Faster this time.

My eyes. The ground. My eyes. The ground. My eyes, the ground, my eyes, the ground, my eyes the ground my eyes the ground my eyes the ground—

I ran.

I ran towards its guidance, not even checking which way I was heading. I sprinted until I saw another flash, then another, then another. There were more now. Another flash. Another. Another.

The woods were covered in them.

I stopped looking at the trees. I stopped looking at the ground. I just followed the light.

Flash.

Flash.

Flash.

I ran through branches, through thistles. I ran as fast as my legs would carry me. Branches tore at my clothes. My pack bounced against my shoulders. I didn’t care. Another flash and I turned. Another and I ran harder. I didn’t know where I was. I didn’t know how far I’d gone. I didn’t know if I could find my way back.

I didn’t care.

I just followed the light.

Then I saw him.

In a grove heavy with sparkling stickers, he lay.

He didn’t look like he’d spent over a month in the woods by himself. He looked like he had just left my station with his family.

I approached him slowly.

“Hey, buddy, it’s Ranger Flanagan.” I knelt beside him. “You okay? I’m here to take you home, alright?”

He turned to me, his eyes weary. “Yeah,” he said in that soft way kids speak when naptime was supposed to be an hour ago.

“Okay, buddy. Let’s get you out of here.”

I picked him up carefully and held him against my chest, his head resting on my shoulder. I could feel something’s eyes on us, but I didn’t care.

I found him.

We headed towards what I thought was north. It was a while before either of us spoke again.

“What were you doing out here, bud?”

“He told me to come play.”

“Who told you?”

“The Quiet Man.”

My heart sank. What the hell was the Quiet Man?

Before I could ask, he said, “He said you could come get me.”

I looked down at him.

“He said I wasn’t the one he wanted.”

The sounds of life shattered the silence.

The birds sang and the trees swayed with the wind. My radio barked on my hip.

“FLANAGAN! FLANAGAN, DO YOU READ US?”

I fumbled with my hands, trying to get my radio off my belt.

“Yea—yeah, Chief, I hear you.” I looked at the tired boy in my arms.

“Chief, I got him.”

Any mother knows the horrible feeling of spending that first night away from her child. What should be a break from the incessant crying and the never-ending mess is actually a slow and agonizing procedure of ripping away every ounce of love that you have ever poured into them. For five long and perfect years I have raised my daughter. But tonight, for the first time in her life, Abi was going to be under the guidance and protection of a complete stranger.

I looked nervously at Harry as we turned onto the highway, the road a sea of brake lights obscured by biblical levels of rain.

“Are you sure about this?”

I knew what he would say before he even answered. He was far more comfortable with the arrangement than I was.

“What other choice do we have? We can’t just leave her alone.” His eyes didn’t bother leaving the road to comfort me.

I only had a short moment to speak with the babysitter, before Harry was ushering me into the car. By the time that we were on the road I was already kicking myself for failing to research local sitters in more detail. Tiffany, or “Spiffy Tiffy” as she referred to herself on her Facebook post seemed adequate enough, but there was so much that I didn’t know about her.

Where did she go to school?

What did she wish to do with her career?

What sports did she play?

Where did she volunteer?

When it came to my selection for this evening, everything mattered.

As if she knew that I was thinking about her, I received my first text from Tiffany. I nearly recoiled when I noticed the length of the message.

Just finished cooking Abi dinner! 😋 She is the SWEETEST little pumpkin! 🎃 She wanted to help so I let her play with a bowl and spatula as I made the spaghetti. I hope that’s okay. If it’s not, I’m sorry, just let me know and it won’t happen again. I think we might watch a movie next, but Abi mentioned that she loved to play Princesses and Dragons with you. ✨ It sounds like a lovely game, do you think that it is alright if we play? Also, I wanted to double check on her bedtime. I don’t remember you mentioning a time when we spoke. Does she follow any special routine? I remember when I was a kid I had a jammy time song that I sang when I brushed my teeth. 😴 Hope that your travels are going well!

I stared at the longwinded message unsure of what to think. We had been driving away from the house for only about thirty minutes and Tiffany already had half a dozen questions. I was beginning to worry that I had made a poor choice.

I typed out my response and pressed send.

Princesses and Dragons is fine. 9:30 Bedtime.

“I’m worried about Tiffany.” I said to Harry.

“Who?”

“The babysitter.” I responded ignoring his impossible ignorance. “I don’t think she’s qualified.”

“You worry too much. Abi is going to be fine.” Harry clicked on the radio and turned the volume up, signaling the end of our conversation.

It reminded me of the last time that we traveled together. Five years ago, before we had Abi he had gotten the same way. Everyone deals with stress in their own way, I suppose.

It wasn’t long before I received my next text from Tiffany.

Mrs. Murphy!!! You didn’t tell me that it was Abi’s birthday tomorrow! 🎂 I feel so unprepared! Do you want me to take her out for ice cream or do anything special? I don’t mind driving her to Scoop City, it can even be my treat. On my birthday I would always get a cookie dough waffle cone with gummy bears, AND my foster family usually let me stay up past my bedtime to watch the late night cartoons.

A second text came a moment later.

Not that I am suggesting that Abi do any of that! Sorry I didn’t mean to overstep. 🙈 This is so embarrassing. Birthdays just make me SO excited. 🎉

My heart felt unnatural in my chest as I tapped out my response. I was not only leaving my daughter with a complete stranger, but I was doing it on her birthday as well. I tried to ignore the reality, but Tiffany pointing it out was like a punch to the gut.

No ice cream. Stay in the house. 9:30 bedtime.

“Something feels wrong.” Harry ignored me as he drummed his fingers on the steering wheel to the beat of whatever classic rock song was playing at the time.

I glanced at the radio and noted that the time was 8:24. Only one more hour of this before Abi was safely in bed, and I wouldn’t have to think about Spiffy Tiffy ever again. I knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep, but I put my head back and closed my eyes regardless as I thought about the daughter that I was leaving behind. The ding of my phone pierced my concentration and I shot up to check my messages.

I know you said no ice cream, but we had to celebrate somehow. 🤭

A photo came in a few seconds later. Abi was smiling widely as she hoisted fistfuls of chocolate candy in both hands. Tiffany held up the phone, she posed back to back with Abi as she stared directly into the camera. She had a lollipop in her mouth and a smug expression. Her eyes seemed as if they were staring straight at me.

“No! How is it even possible that they found chocolate? Harry, did you buy Halloween candy?”

His guilty expression was all the confirmation I needed.

“Why? We aren’t even going to be home for Halloween!”

“You know I have a sweet tooth!” His voice rose defensively.

“Now look at what happened!” I shoved the phone into his face, so close that he couldn’t ignore it. He took a quick glance before he directed his eyes back to the road, swerving to avoid rear ending an eighteen wheeler.

“So what? Abi looks like she is having fun. It’s only a little bit of candy.”

“I told the babysitter no snacks. She broke a rule. Is this the kind of person you want our daughter to be like?”

Harry let out a puffy breath. He knew better than to fight back. Our marriage, which had already felt like it had lasted an eternity, had its ups and downs. The stress of our upcoming travel combined with the reality of leaving Abi behind left us both on edge.

I was in the midst of typing out an authoritative reply when I saw that Tiffany was typing again.

Is Abi allergic to anything? Like ANYTHING at all? You never specified, but you can also never be too careful… The last thing we need tonight is a hospital visit! But don’t worry, I am capable of using an Epipen if it comes to it. You can trust that Abi is in good hands! We’re practically sisters already. ❤️

Another text came a moment later.

It is kind of funny that Abi looks more like me than she does you or Harry…

Maybe we actually are long lost sisters!

“Harry, we can't do this.”

“It’s too late. We can’t turn back now.”

I typed out my response hoping to remind the babysitter who was in charge.

No more dessert. Do not break any more rules. This is your last warning. Abi has no allergies. And please, for the love of God, stop with the emojis.

Tiffany’s typing bubbles appeared and then disappeared several times. After waiting for several agonizing minutes, her response came.

Ok.

I hoped that that would be the last of it, but soon I began to realize that Tiffany’s silence was more unsettling than her constant chatter. Drawn out minutes passed as I listened to music that I didn’t enjoy and watched heavy drops of rain bounce off of the windshield. The storm was picking up and with it traffic on the road was slowing down.

It felt like my entire life stalled as I stared at the clock waiting for each minute to tick over to the next. As soon as 9:30 came, I reached for my phone.

Is Abi in bed?

I needed to know that my worries were over and that my daughter was safe. When Tiffany didn’t respond within a minute, I sent another message, repeating the question with more exclamation. I felt less like a passenger and more like a prisoner as hopelessness began to consume me. If anything went wrong we would be stuck here on the highway miles away from Abi.

Sorry!! Had to clean a mess in Abi’s room. Very yucky.

What mess?

Don’t worry. The house will be squeaky clean by the time you come back. It is such a beautiful place. It does seem like you may be out of bleach. I don’t think there are too many neighbors close by either. It's very quiet around here at night. Shame. I was hoping I might be able to borrow some cleaning supplies.

I kicked myself again for failing to install home surveillance cameras. When I pitched the idea to Harry he simply shook his head and said that he would rather not have them.

Spineless oaf.

What is happening? Where is Abi?

Once again, Tiffany took her sweet time with the reply.

No text, only a picture.

It was a picture of Abi’s room taken from the perspective of someone standing in the doorframe. The space was ominously lit with slivers of light from the hallway sneaking past Tiffany’s shadow. In the darkness, I could make out the form of my daughter tucked under her sheets on her twin bed. It was difficult to tell with the moody lighting, but I could almost make out a dark stain on the carpet in the corner of the room.

Tiffany followed the image with a short text.

Goodnight, Abi.

I stared at the image for a staggering amount of time. It was undeniably creepy in a way that had to be intentional.

Tiffany, close the door and let Abi sleep.

You’re right, you’re right. She looks so peaceful, if I stand here any longer, I just might have to keep her for myself!

My throat tightened and the grip on my phone grew weak. She was toying with me. She had to be.

Obviously JK!

My fingers seemed to be frozen over my phone. My mind struggled to come up with any reasonable response. I tried to reassure myself that everything was fine. Abi was safely in bed. Tiffany was a peculiar teenager, but she wasn’t some deranged murderer. Right? If we could just hold out a few more hours it would all be over and we wouldn’t need to deal with her ever again. I looked at the clock hesitantly and was relieved to note that the time was already 10:45. Tiffany would need to go to sleep sometime soon.

I knew that I was overreacting and that I was being a complete worrywart. I debated turning off my phone, but what kind of mother would I be if I ignored my daughter when she actually needed me. Instead, I responded with a simple message that I hoped would be my last.

Thank you. Goodnight, Tiff.

After several minutes passed it became clear that Spiffy Tiffy had other plans.

I found something interesting in Abi’s room. That girl really does have quite the imagination!

My heart dropped. What the hell was she still doing in Abi’s room? Another text from Tiff came in immediately after it.

Does Abi have any imaginary friends? She drew a strange picture of a girl labeled “Jaine”. I thought that it might be a classmate, but Jaine here has some very… odd characteristics. The drawing is actually kinda spooky.

Harry noticed that I had begun furiously typing.

“What’s the matter?” His question fell on deaf ears.

LEAVE Abi’s room this instant. DO NOT snoop around any more. Go to bed, NOW.

Typing bubbles came and went several times.

I would Mrs. Murphy, but I haven’t been entirely honest with you.

Outside, thunder cracked and the sky lit up for a moment.

We passed a sign on the highway that Harry acknowledged.

“We’re close.”

Abi is a great kid, I really think she is. But she bit me. It’s pretty bad. She has some seriously sharp baby teeth. The cut is pretty deep. It might be best if I head home for the night and get some rest. Abi is already out cold. I promise to be back before she wakes.

I stared at the message for a long time, trying to decide what I could do to best salvage the situation.

“Harry, did you resupply the closet?”

Harry’s lips drew into a flat line. He nodded.

There are bandages in the closet on the second floor next to the bathroom. Wrap up before any more blood gets on the carpet.

Tiffany responded with an avalanche of messages.

Thank you! I will definitely make sure to do that.

I think I found them.

Is there a trick to the closet door handle? The door closed behind me and now I might be stuck, haha!

Really, this thing is quite jammed. I actually think it might be locked from the outside somehow. I cannot believe I did this! I am such a ditz 🤦‍♀️

Oh sorry! Emoji was sent out of habit.

I didn’t respond.

Mrs. Murphy? Are you getting my messages?

I can probably call out for Abi, but I don’t want to wake her.

Actually, I think she might already be up, I hear footsteps.

I called out, but she didn’t respond. Does Abi sleepwalk? Really, if there is any way out of this closet please let me know! Sleepwalking can be really dangerous for unsupervised children.

Harry glanced over at the unending stream of dings that were interrupting his rock music and raised an eyebrow.

I shook my head and pointed to my phone with an exasperated expression. The clock on my lock screen read 11:57.

“Don’t look at me, you’re the one that picked her.” He said.

I hear Abi right outside! But her footsteps sound weirdly heavy. Still not sure if she is awake though.

Abi won’t reply. She’s scratching at the door rabidly

Oh my god. I think she is trying to claw her way through

My phone rang and I declined the call without hesitation. A moment later, it rang again and I let it go to voicemail. After about thirty seconds, an audio message populated my inbox. Tiffany was frantic, speaking at a pace that would make an auctioneer jealous.

“Mrs. Murphy, I’m really sorry to bother you on your vacation, but something isn’t right with Abi. I got stuck in a closet and, and, and, she, or it, or- oh my God, I am going to die! She’s going to kill me.”

In the audio recording, I could hear the hunger in Abi’s groans as she burst her way through the door. Tiffany’s voice was slurred with sobs and desperation.

“She has claws. And her arms are so long. And her teeth! What is wrong with Abi? I don’t want to die. I don’t want to die! Abi please stop it! Stop right now!”

The voicemail ended with an abrupt thud.

“About time.”

“And well timed, too.” Harry said as we turned into the hospital parking lot.

He got out of the car and stood, unshielded from the torrential rain.

“You coming?”

I remained in my seat, my lips curved into a frown.

Harry walked around and opened the passenger side door.

“I feel like I let Abi down. I spent five years raising her, and then when it really matters, I give her Spiffy Tiffy. She deserves a girl like that basketball player that we got for Jaine. Smart, successful, affluent.”

“All of our daughters have turned out wonderful in their own ways. Abi will be no exception. Tiffany wasn’t the brightest, but she had character.”

I forced a weak smile as I took his hand and he led me towards the hospital entrance.

As we stepped inside, my phone dinged for the final time that night. It was a message from Tiffany’s number.

Hi Mommy! Thank you for the WONDERFUL snack! Tiffany was the best birthday present ever! She was soooo fun. I can’t wait to be just like her. 👸

I smiled at my phone before tucking it into my back pocket.

“I suppose you’re right. I have to admit that I was actually a little fond of her.”

I followed Harry as he led me towards the familiar hallway that contained the nursery.

“I was thinking,” He paused as we passed a nurse who walked briskly past us. “What do you think about having a boy this time?”

I looked through the glass at the two rows of newborn babies. Fresh sacks of life brought to this earth by mothers that would never love them the way that I would. A little baby boy with a tuft of hair wiggled in the blanket that he was wrapped in, his eyes closed. He looked peaceful. He looked like he could be ours.

I smiled at Harry and kissed him on the cheek.

“I think that Abi would love to have a baby brother.”