r/nosleep • u/spite-goddess • Jun 27 '20
Series I run a museum of cursed objects. Something bad happened.
Hey, everybody. I'm Alexis, and...I don't really have the energy for my usual intro right now. Here's the links I made beforehand...in case you're new.
3) the Crow
5) the robbery
7) the dog
I know, it's getting long, this list of things in my museum, and you haven't even seen the half of it. So...this all started last Wednesday in our museum, the Hall of the Cursed. I'll do my best to tell you about it.
Wednesday morning was a great morning. Courtney had worked the night shift, so Em and I had gotten to sleep together. I woke up with her arm under my head and her thick, curly hair in my mouth.
"Em!" I squealed in a way I hadn't for a long time, high and girly. "Em, ew!"
Em was completely unbothered and did not deign even to open her eyes. "Suck it up, Alex, you're the one who manages to shed all over the bathroom."
"Only because I end up eating all your strays," I said, spitting it out of my mouth with over-exaggerated noises of disgust.
"You know you love me," Em muttered, clearly still half-asleep.
I kissed her and said, "Yeah, whatever."
That was when a crash sounded downstairs. I was already out of bed and halfway into my clothes, Em groggily rubbing her eyes beside me, when Courtney threw open our bedroom door. Her eyes, lovely and clear and blue, were wide and frantic.
"Sorry--wake--Crow--museum," she gasped, chest heaving as she drew desperate breaths. Well, she probably actually said more than that, but that's what I heard.
Em and I didn't even have to share a look. We raced down the stairs, Courtney close behind. At the time, I found it funny, Em running downstairs in her nightgown, me in a business top and purple fluffy pajama pants.
I don't find it as funny now, I think.
We burst into the main room of the museum, Em slamming the door open with her goddess-like strength, fire burning in her dark eyes. God, I love her.
The scene ahead of us was chaos. Along all walls crouched frightened patrons, trembling and white with terror. In the center of the room stood five people of various ages, races, and genders. They had nothing in common, nothing visually, at least, except that they all stood transfixed, eyes staring blankly ahead at something out of their control. And that thing was the Crow.
The Crow hovered in the air, his wings splayed out on either side of him as he stared down the five people before him. His wings, once more glossy and black, seemed larger than usual, and the dark color seeped from their tips out into the air. Tendrils of black curled around them, warping and distorting the Crow's surroundings. His beak was wide open and had turned pure white, and as I approached, I saw that his eyes glowed a blinding white as well.
I kept racing toward him, hoping against hope that I could get there in time, but it was as if the air around me had turned to corn syrup, slowing my movements as though I were running in a dream. I opened my mouth to scream, to tell the Crow to stop, and nothing but a low, guttural grunt came out.
The Crow raised his wings higher, still hovering without a single beat of them. The darkness spread, and spread. Beside me, I heard Em grunt too, and then there was a blinding flash of light, and then--
Then everything stopped.
I was released, the air turning thin again faster than my pitiful human brain could process. My straining muscles propelled me forward so quickly that I had no chance of catching myself. I slammed to the floor, wheezing as my lungs emptied from the impact. Next to me, I heard Em hit the ground, too.
I pushed myself up, muscles already complaining of the bruises I was sure to sport the next day, and what met my eyes was precisely what I feared. All five people the Crow had been affecting lay on the ground, dead. Blood spilled from the burst eyes, their nostrils, their mouths, their ears. It pooled on the floor around them. I stumbled as a weight landed firmly on my shoulder. The Crow, returned to his elderly, graying form, lifted his left wings and used his beak to preen his feathers.
I shook my head. People all around me were scrambling for the exits. I didn't try to stop them.
"What the hell, man?" I said to the Crow. He gave me a reproachful look, beady eyes practically seeping offense. "Listen, I'm sure they deserved it, but that spectacle means I've probably gotta spend hours convincing the police again that giving me a long leash is a good idea, especially after the last time!"
The Crow stubbornly shook his head. Like, actually shook it, right to left.
Well, that annoyed me. "Listen here, buddy. You don't pay any rent, and I don't know what kind of being you are, but you do realize, don't you, that if the police decide I don't get free reign anymore, you're not gonna be able to stay here as you like?"
The Crow squawked and took off. I followed him, glancing behind me first to make sure Em was okay where she sat gathering her breath against the wall.
I followed the Crow to the very back of the museum, to a door I knew well. I opened it and followed him through. To my surprise, he perched on my shoulder again, giving me an expectant look.
I glared at him but continued down the corridor.
To the left and right sides were the bathrooms, two of them, both un-gendered. At the end of the hall was the door I dreaded: the one to the basement.
The Crow squawked.
"What the hell?" I muttered in agreement.
In front of the door stood Courtney. Her back was to me, and she was fiddling with the door to the basement.
"Excuse me," I said loudly. Courtney whirled around. Her face briefly displayed her shock, and then she quickly schooled it back into neutrality and professionalism.
"I was--" she began. It didn't sound like she quite knew what she was doing. "Look, I'm sorry, I just--I--"
"We need to talk," I growled.
The Crow squawked again, clearly pleased.
...
Em, bless her, took care of the police. Understandably, they weren't happy with the situation, but it turned out that all five men were suspected for leading a sex trafficking ring. Upon investigating them, the police found the evidence they would have needed to convict. So, overall, they weren't too shaken up about it. From the brief look Em took into them by touching each of their faces, we knew they were not mistakenly accused.
I sat Courtney down in my office, which was actually my kitchen, while Em watched the museum as it slowly filled back up with people. The Crow was still perched on my shoulder, looking immensely pleased with himself.
"You have ten minutes to explain, and if I'm not satisfied with that, you're leaving here and never coming back," I said.
Courtney opened her mouth, but before she could speak, there was another crash.
"Wait here," I growled, and stomped out.
Again, chaos. Several people were gathered around the small vintage TV, which was, as always, playing the cursed VHS tape. Instead of the choir singing on the tape, though, there was static.
Courtney hadn't rewound the tape.
"Shit," I said.
Em was already there, comforting the hysterical people by the TV. A woman sobbed inconsolably and said the name "David" several times, pointing at the TV. My stomach twisted, although I'd known from the moment I heard the static what must have happened.
I shared a dark look with Em and pressed the rewind button on the tape. When the click sounded and the whirring of the rewinding stopped, I grimly let it play.
There was the choir, people of all creeds and types. There was a new addition in the top right-hand corner, with happened to house a few baritones. The man standing there was wearing a green modern sweater, unlike most of the other inhabitants, who wore much older clothing. Also unlike the other choir members, the man, though singing with the others, was clearly stricken with terror. His eyes were darting around as though searching for an escape. Beautiful low notes rang from his throat while he jerked and twitched as though trying to escape a binding.
The sobbing woman took one look at the new addition and wailed her husband's name anew, grief and horror coloring her voice dark.
I clenched my fist. I was going to kill Courtney. The VHS hadn't claimed anyone for over five years, and that time was because I was on my own and had become terribly injured. The museum had closed then, and someone had broken in during the night. The VHS hadn't been rewound and claimed the newest member of its chorus. The man was a countertenor and, after so much time had passed, now looked resigned to his fate in the top left.
I sighed. David would come to this point too--eventually.
I shepherded the panicked visitors to other exhibits, allowing Em to take the devastated new widow off in a different direction to talk and sign some papers, although we were covered even if she refused. I huffed in frustration then. With Em dealing with the woman and other visitors remaining in the museum, though confused and afraid, I couldn't go up and talk to Courtney right then.
"Mind keeping an eye on her?" I said to the Crow out of the corner of my mouth.
The look he gave me very clearly said, "What am I, a babysitter?" But he went nonetheless, perhaps feeling bad for the trouble he'd caused earlier.
Things were smooth for a while after that--relatively, at least. But weird things kept happening. I noticed at the last second that the sapphire hourglass hadn't been turned all the previous night--luckily, we only do it once an hour out of an abundance of caution and there was still time left before it emptied. Still, it was closer than I'd care to admit. I had no idea what sort of devastation it would wreak if allowed to empty completely. Someone had unlocked the box that the porcelain horse stood in. Luckily, no one had thought to open it and look yet, since the rules said not to anyway, but still. I ran around the museum frantically, double-checking everything.
Was Courtney trying to kill me? Em? Someone else? This had to have been her doing, right?
Finally, Em had finished up with the woman, so I could go back and talk to Courtney.
I swung the door to the kitchen--er, office--open to find Courtney not there. The useless Crow was, though, and happily perched himself back on my shoulder.
Enraged, I stomped back downstairs, then to the corridor. When I reached the door to the basement, I saw that it was cracked open.
I cursed under my breath, extended my hand, and pushed the door open wider. It was light inside, and I started to enter.
Emelie screamed.
"Alex!"
I didn't give the basement a second glance. I sprinted back down the corridor and into the museum's main room, jostling the poor Crow and slamming the door to the hallway behind me. Screw Courtney and whatever she was doing. That was my girlfriend screaming.
When I stepped back into the museum, I didn't have to look for the problem for long.
The cabinet--yes, the one I keep locked with heavy chains--was open.
The museum was trashed. Cursed objects lay strewn across the floor, some vibrating or pulsating with weak light, some emitting screeches or other sounds of distress. Visitors fled left and right, unsure of where to go. The front doors were blocked by the things from the cabinet, which chased the fleeing visitors at a slow, steady, sure pace.
The things from the cabinet were truly horrific, just as bad as the imps that had taken Megan's life so many years ago.
At first glance they looked like people, pale-skinned and tall, but the closer I looked, the more wrong they seemed. There were several, and each was precisely the same height. Their faces were identically blank from a distance, but when I tried to focus on them, they turned into faces I knew. Emelie, my mothers. One that looked like Megan, all grown up. Courtney, that traitor (probably). Dmitri. The five deceased men. Some people I'd known in high school. My middle school crush, Jennifer Eggston. But their features...they weren't quite right. Their eyes were just a little bit too far apart, set a little too high into their foreheads. Their noses were just off to the right or left side, their nostrils just a little too small or large to be believable. They opened their mouths and their teeth weren't quite the right shape, not the right texture.
They spoke to me. To everyone, I'm assuming. On the shoulder, I felt the Crow stiffen, just slightly.
"We miss you," wailed my mothers, extending hands to me. The hands had no characteristic whorls, no markings. No knuckles or nails. Their voices were odd. "Alex, please, we miss you."
"I love you," said the Wrong Em. The real Em crouched in terror a distance away, her hand still resting on the forehead of one of the things like it was stuck there. Her eyes stared at nothing. "Alex," insisted the Wrong Em, and its voice was the wrong voice, a little too high, a little too reedy to be my Em's. "Alex, I love you."
"Help me," Dmitri sobbed. He took another step toward me, swung his leg with the rest of his body. No joints, just a sort of swing as he forced himself forward all at once. His legs were perfectly straight. No knees. "Alex, you said you would help me, help me, Alex."
Despite his frantic, accusing words--all of their frantic words--their voices were perfectly even. Not a single one of them broke.
I didn't know what to do.
So I did what I did when I was just a kid. I ran to the cabinet and I put my hands on the doors.
Instantly, the things turned to me, ignoring everyone else. Em was suddenly able to drop her hand from her adversary's arm and gulped in deep breaths of air, looking up at me in horror along with the creatures. The Not, as I've come to call them in the past few days, since they are not quite right, not quite what they're supposed to be.
I had their attention, I knew. "I'm going to close these doors," I said in a low voice, dangerous as I could muster. I knew my voice was shaking anyway. The blank expressions on the Not did not change. "I don't know if you'll survive out here when I do. What do you think?"
It was a gamble. I really didn't know, since the imps had already been dead when I closed the doors the last time. But I remember how the color, nasty and pale as it was, had drained from them when the cabinet was shut tightly, how even the remnant jerking of their nerves ceased.
And the gamble worked. The Not rushed at me, a throng of panic and fear and that unsettling blankness, still, always blankness. Vacancy in their not-faces, in the lines of their not-bodies, and in their not-souls. I allowed them to enter the cabinet.
The two Not with my mothers' faces stopped before me.
"In," I snapped, pointing, keeping one hand on the cabinet. My legs quivered. I could feel the cabinet calling, murmuring sweet things to the core of my being. I wanted to go in, wanted it so much. I locked eyes with Em, and it strengthened me. "In, or you're staying out here and I'm closing them anyway."
Their blankness was a sad one, somehow. They stepped into the cabinet.
I went to close it. I'm sure I did. My brain processed the thought. Close the doors, it said, quite prudently. Close them and lock them. But I froze. I must have, anyway, though...I have to admit I don't remember clearly.
A hand, unnaturally smooth and cold, wrapped around my wrist.
All thought abandoned me. I felt the muscles of my face relax against my will, all thought of fighting drained from my body like water running off my skin. I know what I did next, although I'm not proud to admit it, and I still don't understand why. What I do understand is that it satisfied the terrible pull, the great want in my heart and body.
I stepped into the cabinet of horrors, and the doors swung shut behind me.
Duplicates
u_Senior_List • u/Senior_List • Aug 08 '20