The Haunting of Toys’R’Us Sunnyvale

Staff and customers alike at the Sunnyvale, California, Toys’R’Us store have experienced what they believe is a haunting. It is not just one or two staff members, but many.

Some of the more common, strange events that occur involve staff hearing their names whispered to them, cold breezes and objects moving of their own accord. Taps would turn on by themselves in the women’s bathroom, and many of the stores female employees had experienced something unseen playing with their hair.

It is never anything violent and it does not seem to target anyone in particular (besides mainly women). Staff who have come to terms with the idea that their store is haunted regard it as a friendly, if a little mischievous, presence.

But when the phenomena was first beginning to be experienced back in the 70’s, it did take the staff unawares. As you would expect, the staff were a little freaked out by the strange poltergeist like happenings, so some outside help was sought.

As word got around, local newspapers started covering the story and in 1978 they brought in (then) renowned and respected psychic/medium Sylvia Browne to make contact, and try to work out what was going on and who the spirit may be.

Sylvia Browne was able to make contact, and the identity of the spirit was found to be Johnny Johnson, a Scandinavian Immigrant, who used to work the farm/plantation that used to be located on the land where the store now stands.

Luckily plenty of research has been done on the plantation itself, and some facts can be confirmed about this story.

In 1844 a man named Martin Murphy travelled to California via covered wagon, pulled by oxen (his party was the first to cross the Sierras in such a fashion), and settled in what is now Sunnyvale.

Murphy set up a ranch/plantation, and when he needed a few employees to work the land and its resources, he hired Johan Johnson (Johnny Johnson). Johnny fell in love with Murphy’s daughter Elizabeth, but she rejected him.

Johnny’s bad luck was not complete until he was infected with encephalitis, and was left slightly brain damaged as a result. Luckily he was still capable of working on the ranch. However, he was given the nickname ‘Crazy Johnny’ thereafter.

It was in 1884, while he was chopping wood, that Johnny accidentally smashed himself with the axe and bled to death alone, near the orchard.

The Murphy ranch continued to be occupied by several generations of the family until 1950, when it was given to the city of Sunnyvale.

In 1961 the building was gutted by a fire and was soon demolished. In 1970, a 60,000 square foot Toys’R’Us store was built on the location, and then the hauntings began.

It was during a séance held by Sylvia Browne, and attended by a large number of the stores employees, that she was able to give much of this information, but mainly that concerning Johnny (or Johy as Sylvia put it) and his demise and love for ‘Beth’ (Elizabeth).

Also attending the séance were several photographers / experts. The store was darkened, as the gathering settled down in one of the more active aisles of the store. A few lights were left on at the end of the aisle to provide some light for one of the cameras using high speed film. Another camera was using infrared film. Both were pointing in the same direction.

As the séance progressed, the others gathered stated that they could hear and/or feel a high pitched buzzing in their heads, as Sylvia talked with Johnny.

Sylvia made contact almost immediately and told the group that Johnny was presently manifested to some degree, however no one could see him.

Fortunately Johnny could not hide from the cameras, and thus we have this photograph. This is the image as captured by the camera running with infrared film. You can clearly see a slightly transparent human form leaning against one of the shelves, watching the group in front.

The bright flaring of light gives the pants he (I’ll call it a ‘he’ from here on in) is wearing a strange shape. He also appears to be holding an object in his hands, possibly a hat or cap of some form.

No one in the group saw anyone standing during the séance that night, and only the one camera captured the image, although other cameras where running at the same time, pointing at the same spot.

When Sylvia told Johnny that he could go, and that he does not need to wait any longer, he replied stating that he would continue waiting for Beth, and in the meantime he enjoys the company in the store and playing with the children.

The haunting has continued.

What do you think?
Could this really be the image of Johnny Johnson?
Or just someone accidentally in frame that no one noticed at the time?


Ashley Hall 2012

Photo: The image of Johnny Johnson.
Inset: Upper, An outside shot of the Toys’R’Us store. Lower, the Murphy ranch house.

The Exorcist Curse

Released in 1973, The Exorcist was acclaimed as a masterpiece, the scariest movie of all time and one of the most controversial films ever made.

It was adapted from the novel ‘The Exorcist’ written by William Peter Blatty in 1971. The inspiration for Blatty’s novel came from a class he was attending in 1950. A priest was a guest speaker, and he told of an exorcism he had performed the year before.

Blatty was working as a public relations director at the Loyola University, when he made an appearance on the Groucho Marx quiz show ‘You Bet Your Life’. Blatty won the $10,000, which was enough for him to quit his job and focus on a career as an author.

Several publications, including The Exorcist, were the direct result.

The Exorcist was a New York Times best seller, remaining on the list for well over a year, and soon Blatty, along with film director William Friedkin, would translate the work into a screen play.

(note, there are a few spoilers ahead)

The film (and book) concern the story of young twelve year old Regan MacNeil, the daughter of a successful actress who lives in Washington DC. All is well in the small family until strange noises are heard in the attic and within the walls.

At first the suspicion is rats, but when Regan begins to develop unusual behaviour, her mother Chris begins to get concerned. Soon Regan starts to lash out physically, and other strange events take place in the house.

After seeking help from physiological and psychological specialists, Regans behaviour and health continues to decline. As a act of desperation, Chris MacNeil seeks out the help of a priest, Father Karras. Karras soon makes the conclusion that he believes Regan to be possessed by an evil entity, and is given permission to seek out a priest who is experienced at performing exorcism, a binding by oath that the demon be removed from Regans physical and spiritual self.

The filming of The Exorcist was quite an uncomfortable affair for most of the cast. Long sessions in make-up for child actress Linda Blair (Regan MacNeil) and Max Von Sydow (Father Merrin) were not easy. During much of the filming of the Exorcism scenes, the set was refrigerated to the point where perspiration would freeze on the actors and crew, and more than once moisture would condense to a snow like precipitation.

However, such discomfort was nothing compared to the many tragedies, injuries and deaths that would occur during the filming and post production. These caused many setbacks during filming, almost tripling the amount of production days and the final cost.

Actress Ellen Burstyn, who played Regan’s Mother has been quoted as saying “there was an enormous amount of deaths connected with the film” and has stated that there were nine deaths connected to the movie in all.

One of these deaths was actor Jack MacGowren, who played Burke Dennings and died at the age 55, a short time before the film was released. His character also died in The Exorcist, and it was the last role MacGowren played.

Two other actors also died shortly after filming, as did several of the crew.

Ellen Burstyn herself was seriously injured during the shooting of the scene where she is thrown from the bed by Regan. As she was thrown back, she landed on her coccyx, causing severe and permanent injury to her spine. The resulting scream from that take was used in the final film.

The actor who played Father Karras, Jason Miller had a strange experience during the films production. Early into production, Jason Miller was eating his lunch and reading some lines for the days scenes, when he was approached by a Jesuit Priest. The priest handed him a medallion of the Blessed Virgin and told Miller “reveal the devil for the trickster that he is, he will seek retribution against you or he will even try to stop what you are trying to do to unmask him.”

Several of the crew, Blatty included, recall seeing objects move about on their own accord on occasion, notably the telephone that was used to communicate between the set and the production house. The receiver would rise off the hook on its own, before falling to the floor. On one of these occasions Blatty was sitting right next to it.

Eerie feelings were felt by all during the filming of the movie. With so many odd events taking place, the films religious technical advisor, Thomas Bermingham (also religious supervisor on The Amityville Horror and Amityville 2) was approached to perform an exorcism on the set.

Bermingham said no, as it would only increase anxiety and add to the continued speculation of the Exorcist Curse. However, the following day, the set burned to the ground and Birmingham relented blessing the set, cast and crew. The cause of the fire is still unknown.

The final movie went into post production and editing at 666 Fifth Avenue, New York. However, funnily enough, no incidences took place at that address. Maybe the evil of the film felt comfortable and content there?

Upon release, many theatres had paramedics at the standby, such was the films reputation. People were said to have fainted out of sheer terror, others becoming physically ill. More than one person was injured during the first screenings, including one man who managed to sue Warner Brothers (settling out of court) who injured his jaw after fainting and smashing his head against the seat in front of him.

At one of the early screenings in Rome, when people were entering the theatre, lightning struck and toppled a 400 year old cross that adorned a nearby church.

Such was the religious fervour and hatred of the movie, that Linda Blair (Regan MacNeil) was escorted by a bodyguard for the first six months after screenings. She had received a string of death threats due to her portrayal of the possessed, and many felt that she herself was harbouring the devil.

As did the film reels, according to Evangelist Billy Graham…

On a final note The Exorcist was close to not being called The Exorcist at all. Before release, a survey was sent out asking people if they knew what an Exorcist was. No one asked had any idea, and the name was nearly changed. Today if you ask someone if they know what an exorcist is they will likely say yes and cite the movie.

So the curse… something strange happening, something supernatural, paranormal and evil lurking on the set?
Or a series of coincidences?


Ashley Hall 2012

Photo: The iconic shot of Father Merrin, The Exorcist, in front of the Macneil residence.
Inset: Regan MacNeil under control of Pazuzu, the demon.

Redrum

Seven Children

Credits to jellovert

The Graveyard Bell

I put my frozen hands over my mouth and blew steaming breath into them as I walked through the misty cemetery, a dense fog pouring into the half-open door of the church. Stumbling blindly down the graveyard path, I instinctively reached my hand out to guide me, but shivered when it fell upon a gravestone. I drew my hand away and kept marching,

Am I even going the right way?

I looked up at the night sky and watched dense clouds envelop the moon, taking the eerie glow from the mist, but also cutting off my sole supply of light. I shivered again. Strong winds whipped my face and wound their way into my open coat, steering me off course. Cold and disorientated, I spun on the spot to find any glimmer of light to show me the way to the gates, and as I focused I heard it.

Ringing.

The unmistakeable ringing of a bell. Frantic, panicked ringing. I followed the sound desperately, tripping over graves, trampling flowers and knocking over crosses, and where it was loudest I crouched down. There was a sparkle of brass in the darkness, and immediately I put the pieces together.

A safety coffin.

The wind dropped but the ringing continued, faster than before.

Somebody was buried alive.

Wasting no time, I fumbled on the ground on my hands and knees, clawing at clumps of soil above a coffin containing somebody slowly dying. Eventually, after crawling for several yards I came across a broken down shack. Quickly, I broke down the door and grabbed the largest shovel I could find and ran back to the loud ringing.

Shovel after shovel of soil was dislodged, and I kept shouting It’s okay! Hold on! Not caring if he heard me or not.

Eventually my spade thudded against the coffin lid, and I screamed with relief and delight, and hammered at it with the shovel with all of my might. The muffled banging and crying on the other side of the wood became so loud with every cracking of the spade against the lid. I had smashed the lid to splinters, and was about to lift off the shattered remains of the coffin when I was dragged out of the grave. I shrieked as loud as I could, but a large hand stifled my cries. My head was jerked sideways and I was suddenly face to face with the groundskeeper. He put his finger to his lips and hushed me. He released his grip and began pushing the mounds of soil back onto the coffin.

I shouted, outraged

What are you doing? There’s somebody down there!

He scowled at me and shook his head. After he had patted the remainder of the dirt flat atop the grave, he turned back to me, and I considered screaming again. He reached into his pocket and my heart stopped. Slowly, but surely, he produced a large grey object from his coat pocket, and angled it straight at me.

Click

The light of the torch flooded through the churchyard, nearly blinding me. Aiming it at the gravestone, he gestured to me to read the inscription on what was before a dark, blank gravestone.

Victor Shaw
Beloved husband, son and brother
1902-1958
He will be missed

—
Credits to: http://birthdaypigeon.tumblr.com/

Ickbarr Bigelsteine

When I was a small child, I was terrified of the dark. I still am, but back when I was around six years old I couldn’t go a full night without crying out for one of my parents to search beneath my bed or in my closet for whatever monster I thought was waiting to eat me. Even with a night light, I would still see dark shapes moving around the corners of the room, or strange faces looking in on me from my bedroom window.

My parents would do their best to console me, telling me that it was just a bad dream or a trick of the light, but in my young mind I was positive that the second I fell asleep, the bad things would get me. Most of the time I would just hide under the blankets until I became tired enough to stop worrying, but every now and then I would become so panicked that I would run screaming into my parents room, waking up my brother and sister in the process. After an ordeal like that, there would be no way anyone would be getting a full nights rest.

Eventually, after one particularly traumatizing night, my parents had had enough. Unfortunately for them, they understood the futility in arguing with a six year old and knew that they would be unable to convince me to rid myself of childish fears through reason and logic. They had to be clever.

It was my mother’s idea to stitch together my little bedtime friend.

She collected a large assortment of random pieces of fabric and her sewing machine and created what I would later refer to as Mr. Ickbarr Bigelsteine, or Ick for short. Ick was a sock monster, as my mother called him. He was made to keep me safe while I slept at night by scarring away all the other monsters. He was pretty damn creepy, I had to admit. Honestly, looking back on it all now, I’m still impressed that my mom could think of something so strange and disturbing looking. Ickbarr had the stitched together look of a Frankenstein gremlin, with big white button eyes and floppy cat ears. His little arms and legs were made from a pair of my sister’s black and white striped socks, and the half of his face that was green was made from one of my brother’s tall football socks. His head could have been described as bulbous, and for his mouth my mom attached a piece of white fabric and sewed in a zigzag pattern to shape a wide grin of sharp teeth. I loved him at once.

From then on, Ick never left my side. So long as it was after dusk, of course. Ick didn’t like the sun, and would get upset if I tried to bring him to school with me. But that was okay, I only needed him at night to keep away the boogeymen, which was what he was good at. So every night at bedtime, Ick would tell me where the monsters were hiding, and I would place him near the section of my room closest to the spookiness. If there was something in the closet, Ick would block the door. If there was a dark creature scratching at my window, Ick would be pressed up against the glass. If there was a big hairy beast under my bed, then under the bed he went. Sometimes the monsters weren’t even in my room. Sometimes, they would hide in my dreams, and Ickbarr would have to come with me into my nightmares. It was fun bringing Ick into my dream world, as he and I would spend hours fighting off ghouls and demons. The best part was, in my dreams, Ick could talk to me for real. “How much do you love me?” He would ask.
“More than anything.” I would always tell him. One night in a dream, after I had lost my first tooth, Ick asked me for a favor.

“Can I have your tooth?”
I asked him why.
“To help me kill the bad things.” He said.

The next morning at breakfast, my mom asked me where my tooth went. From what she told me, the “tooth fairy” didn’t find it under my pillow. When I told her that I gave it to Ickbarr, she just shrugged and went back to feeding my little sister. From then on, every time I lost a tooth, I would give it to Ick. He would always thank me, of course, and tell me that he loved me. Eventually though, I ran out of baby teeth, and I was beginning to get a little too old to still be playing with dolls. So Ick just sat there on my bookshelf collecting dust, slowly fading away from my attention.

Over time the nightmares, however, became worse than ever. So bad that they even began to follow me to the waking world, terrorizing every dark corner or rustle in the bushes. After one particularly bad night biking home from a friend’s house where I swore a pack of rabid dogs were chasing me, I got home to find something strange waiting for me in my room. There, on my bed, standing fully upright in the soft glow of the moon light from my window, was Ickbarr. At first I just thought my eyes were playing tricks on me again, they had been all evening, so I tried to flick on the lights. Another flick of the light switch. Then another, and another, with no change to the darkness. It was then that I started to get nervous.

I backed away slowly towards the door behind me, my eyes never leaving the shape of Ick’s silhouette, my hand awkwardly outstretched behind reaching for the doorknob. I was just about to get my ass out of there when I heard the door slam itself shut, locking me into blackness. In nothing but shadows and silence, I stood frozen in place, not even breathing. For how long I can’t say, but after what felt like a lifetime of cold fear, I heard the shrill, familiar voice.

“You stopped feeding me, so why should I protect you?”
“Protect me from what?”
“Let me show you.”

I blinked once, and everything changed. I wasn’t in my bedroom anymore, I was somewhere… else. It wasn’t Hell, but the comparison wasn’t far off. It was some sort of forest, a horrible, nightmarish place where partial embryonic abortions hung from the canopy, and the ground swarmed with carnivorous insects. A thick fog wafted through the air and with it the stench of rotting meat, while chartreuse lightening flashed across the night sky. In the distance, I could hear the agonizing screams of something not quite human. My head throbbed like it was about to explode, the pain forcing out a river of tears. In my mind, I heard his voice again.

“This is what your reality would become without me.”
I felt earth shaking footsteps approaching fast.
“I’m the only one who can stop it.”
It was behind me now, huge and angry, hot breath across my back.
“Bring me what I need, and I will.”
I woke up before I could turn around.

The following day I raided my parent’s closet for my brother’s baby teeth, giving them all to Ickbarr. Almost immediately the night terrors ceased, and I was more or less able to go on about my life as normal. From time to time, I would have to sneak into my little sister’s room and snatch what was meant for the tooth fairy, or strangle one of the neighborhood cats and pry out its sharp little incisors. Anything to ward off the visions, anything from a shark tooth necklace to a cavity ridden bicuspid. I also began to notice that Ick would move about my room whenever I left for any length of time, rearranging my stuff and hanging additional curtains. He was even beginning to look more lifelike, somehow. In the right light his teeth would glisten, and he was warm to the touch. As much as he creeped me out, I couldn’t work up the courage to just destroy him, knowing perfectly well where that would leave me. So I went on collecting teeth for Ick throughout all of high school and college. The older I got, the more things I would learn to fear, the more teeth Ick would need to keep me safe.

I’m 22 years old now, with a decent job, my own apartment, and a set of dentures. It’s been almost a month since Ick’s last meal, and the horrors are starting to crowd around me once more. I took a detour through a parking garage after work tonight. Found a man fumbling with his car keys. His teeth were stained yellow from a lifetime of cigarettes and coffee. Even still, I had to use a hammer to get out the molars. When I got back to my apartment, he was waiting for me. On the ceiling, in the corner. Two white eyes and mouth of razors.

“How much do you love me?” He asks.
“More than anything,” I reply, taking off my coat.
“More than anything in the world.”

Credit To: Stephan D. Harris

I Miss Her

I had memorized every detail of this beautiful woman in front of me. The dirt under her fingernails, the vein that throbbed on the side of her neck as she screamed at me, the subtle bumps that ran down the center of her back when she curled into a ball in the corner to sob after each of our visits - every little feature made me love her even more. The sound of her voice, and the way her tone would change depending on if she was begging me or threatening me, was music to my ears. I began to crave the smell of the sweat that would coat her skin during our rendezvous in the humid basement. I knew she could never leave me, and that kept me going during the day and helped me sleep at night.

My feelings for her weren’t like this at first. She was intimidating. She didn’t talk to our coworkers unless she needed to, and she only needed to when they were in trouble or she had a demand to make. She was the type of manager that everyone dreaded, a bitch that asked too much and allowed very little. It wasn’t until our sessions in the basement had been happening for some time that I began to adore her. I know she felt the same way, despite the names she called me and the angry look in her eyes at the beginning of our nightly dates. She would soften once she let her anger out every evening, and after she would have a good cry she would beg me for forgiveness. Our relationship would seem flawed to outsiders if they saw us, but they just wouldn’t understand.

The day the police took her from me was the worst day of my life. They obviously thought they were helping when they removed the restraints from my hands and feet and led me out of her basement and into the ambulance. They were confused and upset that I didn’t want to leave. The doctors have said things like “Stockholm Syndrome” and “PTSD”. They just don’t understand true love.

—
Credits to: photofreecreepypasta

Summer of 2004

The house my family and I grew up in was a really disturbing place. Completely normal-looking both inside and out, and yet the feel of the interior was never quite right. Even though it isn’t true, the most correct way that I feel for describing the house is that the dust refused to settle - even the dust wanted to be far away.

We all experienced the simple scares: doors opening or closing; lights turning off and on; unceasing footfalls throughout the house with nobody else around; finding items moved without anyone to offer explanation.
And then there were the singular events that went beyond: watching the radio tuning itself up and down the FM band, then the light turning itself off, then the physical attack; the shower curtain pulling itself open in an otherwise vacant room; drawers and cabinets opening themselves to cause a moment’s terror.

All of this and more I simply grew up with. They were generally causes of alarm and confusion, rarely raw fear. But when I was 16, one night went so far beyond what I’d grown to ignore finally convinced me that the house itself was evil, and that I needed to escape forever.

I had already been forced out of my room. I wasn’t allowed to sleep upstairs at all. I tried sleeping in the kitchen but it found me there. The basement was no refuge. Night after night I fought against sleep and scrambled to find a safe corner where I might hide. Hell, I even slept in the dog kennel and the kitchen pantry.

Finally, I settled on the front living room. Up until this decision I had not considered it an option, seeing as the stairs leading up ended in the living room, and in the dark silence of those nights I would lay awake, staring up and into that miserable little void that pressed down into my space. But nothing happened. I convinced myself that the living room, with its peaceful view of the outside world beyond and silvery glow of the moon as a night light…. I convinced myself that this room was safe.

A few nights went by. The family cat, Scamper, put aside our longstanding rivalry and deemed me worthy to be her bed. This interaction would be our first and last experience with one another. She and I had been enemies for ten years prior to this, always scrambling to be not-quite-the-littlest-family-member.

Of course the worst would come after all of this. Of course I should have seen it coming.

As memories tend to go, I don’t remember the events leading up to this culmination. My memory begins with the lamp already turned off, Scamper already kneading away on my chest. And then it starts. It starts with her. Her ears prick up, her hair pulls tight, her claws come forth and grip my chest. She hisses at nothing, her attention focusing entirely upon the staircase. Just a single moment later and I am slammed by the same emotion that seems to have hit her: terrified.

At no time before and no time sense have I felt it appropriate to describe anything in the way I am about to describe this. A presence of pure, radiating evil came down those stairs and into that living room. (I am tearing up while writing this. Seriously.) As I felt it come into the room, Scamper screamed and tried to leap off of me and run away… but I couldn’t let her. I didn’t have the courage to face this attack alone, so I grabbed her in my arms and squeezed her to my chest, completely oblivious to her scratching and biting.

The presence came closer. I couldn’t see it, I couldn’t hear it, but I tasted it, I smelled it, I felt it. What it did goes beyond words (or I just don’t have the right ones)… for that entire night, I was tortured in my mind and in my heart; I was forced to watch and bear witness to the absolute most horrific actions capable by man… I saw murders and rapes and eating and burning and bodies and blood everywhere all the time and fires and ropes and bombs over and over and over. I couldn’t fall asleep, I couldn’t move, I couldn’t even cry.

And then it was morning, it was over. I didn’t talk for a few days. And then I told my mom about it and convinced her it was about time to move. I’ve never been back.

Credit to Reddit user menace64

Within Every Wall

When I was a child, my babysitter told me a scary story about a man that lived in the walls. This man did not just live in the walls of my particular home, but somehow lived in all walls in all buildings simultaneously. He could see us through the walls, and even reach out from them, but what he could not do was take a step onto the floor, which required you to be in arm’s reach for him to do anything.

What was this man’s modus operandi? Simply put, he would wait for children to fall asleep, and then he would drag them into the wall to be tortured mercilessly for the rest of their days. They never elaborated on his motivations, but really, you don’t have to. This was his motivation. This is what he did. Why he did it was immaterial—anybody being told this story just didn’t want to get dragged inside of any walls and tortured in any way.

Even seven year old me thought it was BS. Just some made-up story the cool teenagers told to scare the kids. It was fine. I went to sleep that night they told me this like it was nothing. But even my visceral self was wary as my intellect told me it was just a silly story. Then the noises came. I could hear scratching, banging, from inside the walls. It was my babysitter and maybe one of his friends. I just knew it. I told them to cut it out, but they didn’t answer. I kept leaving my room and finding my babysitter pretending to be idling, playing some video game or something while I slept. I knew he was just faster than my ability to leave my room. I knew it. Right?

Then, well after my babysitter left, I swear someone grabbed me nearmost the wall. When I looked at the wall, nothing was there. I’m not sure if it was a tactile hallucination experience in a dream that just carried over in that twilight period where you’re awake but the delusions of the dream are so fresh and seem so real that you still believe them. That’s probably what it was.

All I know is, to this day, I make a point to place my bed in the center of my bedroom and I refuse to sleep on anything within arm’s reach of a wall. Just in case he decides to make a second attempt.

Reddit User: [TheStranjer]

Return to Darkness

    “Last chance to back out, are you absolutely sure you want this?” the man asked.

    At the question, Robert turned to the man and swallowed the fear that had been building since his surgery only a week ago. The horrors he had seen in that short time would stay with him forever, he knew this. This new procedure would merely prevent him from being subjected to it any longer, but he could not un-see anything he had experienced.

    He had lived in a fantasy world his whole life. Dreams of beautiful sunsets, “blue” skies, and pretty women had plagued him and all he ever wanted was to see them for real. Being born blind, he had no way to really know what anything described to him would really look like but when he learned of a procedure that would grant him sight he didn’t even hesitate. It took his family hours to get him to stop screaming after they removed the bandages.

    He looked at the horrific creature in front of him now, waiting for an answer.

    “I’m sure,” he said, “but can you do something for me first?”

    The monster nodded.

    “Get me a mirror.”

    He had refused to look in a mirror after the surgery but he had to know. He had to know if he was as horrible as everyone else. He held it up, and gasped. He fought the urge to scream and dropped the mirror, shattering it. The monster didn’t seem to mind.

    “Do it.” Robert said.

    As the doctor prepared the needle, a single tear fell to Robert’s cheek.

—
Credits to: meeplol

I’m Still Scared, and I Cannot Go Back

So, I have lived in my home for my whole life until recently. I was literally born into the house. We live out in the country and when my mom went into labor it was the middle of winter and there had been an ice storm, and my dad was very reluctant to travel the icy county roads with his pregnant wife. So I was born upstairs, in the master bedroom. Until recently, I hadn’t thought much of this, but now it seems to be a lot more important given recent circumstances.

A short history on my experience regarding strange activity in my house- most of it occurred during childhood. I contributed most of it to an overactive imagination and all that bullshit until recently. A lot of it consisted of just seeing out of place people. That’s the best way I can explain it. That’s how I felt when I saw them, like they were just out of place. Not quite right. These are vague memories, but I remember well the emotions that accompanied them. And the thing was, they weren’t bad emotions. Whoever they were, they made me feel good. Like everything was going to be okay.

This house I’m talking about, my home, is about 200 years old according to my dad. I am a single child. Many people, friends of mine and my girlfriend have claimed to have had paranormal experiences in the house, or whatever you want to call it. All of these accounts happened when I was not present (or was at least in a different part of the house), and the accounts span across a variety of people who are not all connected with each other. A friend that lives near me ( a couple houses down) had friends over, and they walked over to my house at night to see if I was there, wanting to hang out. They did this pretty frequently, but I was on spring vacation, in Arkansas. I woke up to several texts from one of them, and talked to each one the next day. They all reported the same thing. They approached my house, saw a female figure up in my window, turned around and started walking back, heard a scream, and then ran.

I never experienced anything negative in that house regarding ghosts or whatever. Until recently. I’m 19, going to community college nearby, and I was living with just my dad. My mom and dad divorced when I was 14, and my mom lives in New Zealand now with my step-dad and half-brother (it’s awesome there). Two weeks ago, my dad left to go to a conference in Chicago (our house is in the boonies of central Illinois) for some mandatory judge/lawyer thing involving continuing education for that line of work (he’s a circuit court judge). He was supposed to be gone for a week. I was left to watch after my beagle Shiloh and the house etc. Now, the first weird thing that happened, happened on monday, the second day my dad was gone. I was downstairs watching TV, and I went to the kitchen to get one of the powerades that we always had. The ZERO fruit punch ones, I love those. For some reason, the cupboard was cleared out of them, and there should have been about three left. I figured I drank them all, simple as that. So I continued to watch TV for awhile and then decided to go upstairs and get to bed. When I went up to my room, there were three full powerades sitting on my bed. Now this seems really menial, but it scared the shit out of me. I knew I was the only one in the house and that I didn’t just absent-mindedly bring all three full powerades up to my room. I put them on the floor and went to sleep a few hours later with the lights on.

The next day my girlfriend came over. I didn’t tell her about the powerade thing because she is really sensitive to spooky stuff and gets freaked out quite easily. It was daytime, and we were up in my room, taking advantage of having the house to ourselves. This is going to seem pretty irrelevant, but it’s not. My girlfriend can be pretty loud when we have sex, so it usually happens when my dad is out of the house. One of the things she yelled this time was, “Oh my fucking GOD,” a pretty generic sex exclamation, not unique to the situation. This is important for later.

The next day went of without any hitches, it was Wednesday, and my girlfriend and I both had classes in the morning, so I drove us to school. Came back home by myself after school, walked the dog a couple of times, watched some TV, went to bed. Thursday is when shit started getting really weird.

I woke up Thursday morning to hear my dog barking. This alone freaked me out a bit, because my dog never barks, ever. She is usually really calm and kind of lethargic most of the time. So I went downstairs, dreading the situation but wanting to confront it nonetheless. As I was walking down my stairs I heard talking that sounded like my dad. All that I could make out was the voice saying, “Just me.” I went into the kitchen where my dog is gated in and by the time I got there my dog was whimpering and standing in the middle of the kitchen, looking up towards me. I stepped over the gate and stood in the doorway, watching my dog. She was acting very strange, looking at the air right by me and walking towards that area, kind of crouched, sniffing, and then darting back and whimpering, and then sniffing at a distance. I looked by me, and there was nothing there. By this time, my heart was racing, and I was more than a little freaked out. I was frozen where I was, and I was confused and still groggy from just waking. I didn’t really understand what was happening. I said, “Dad?” and then right after I said that my dog starting growling and baring her teeth at whatever she had been looking at. Still nothing, no figure, no temperature change, no weird feeling besides fear. I took the leash and walked my dog outside, intent to get her away from whatever it was she thought she was seeing so that she could stop freaking me the fuck out. When I brought her back inside, she was fine.

The rest of the day I spent alone at my house. It was that evening when I was sitting in my room, on my laptop, and I heard the door in the hallway to the master bedroom open. Footsteps approached my door and paused there. I was frozen, like fucking paralyzed. Couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think, nothing. Then my door to my room opened and my dad came in.

"Hey!" he said. What the fuck. He scared the shit out of me, and he wasn’t supposed to be home this early. "Jesus, you scared the fuck out of me!" I said, "I thought you weren’t going to be home until Saturday?" He stood there smiling, and that’s when I noticed something strange about him, a little off. Out of place, so to speak. "I’m home," he replied.

Now, I have to interject here, I didn’t think anything was too odd about this situation. My dad has been an off-and-on recovering alcoholic for a few years, and this kind of behavior was easily attributed to him being inebriated, if that’s what it was. I didn’t say anything. “You know I really love you, I always have,” he said, still grinning, and then he left my room. At this point, I didn’t really think much of anything. I was still wired from the adrenaline rush of hearing the footsteps etc. I wasn’t thinking about the fact that I hadn’t heard my dad come in the house, nor had I seen headlights or heard a car pulling in the driveway. I just wanted to sleep, it was late. So I slept. I feel like an idiot in retrospect.

Friday morning. I woke up, got dressed, got ready for class. I was texting my girlfriend, telling her that my dad had come home early and that we would have to postpone our plans for that night, considering her house was out of the question (endless siblings, parents home, etc). I had noticed when I was getting dressed that my dad’s car wasn’t in the driveway, which was odd. Unless he left early for work, it should be there. I leave about an hour before him on friday mornings for my early class. Not thinking much of it, I went downstairs, looking forward to a quick breakfast before I headed out. I got a text on my way downstairs from my dad, reminding me to turn down the thermostat before I left because we had to conserve propane. So I figured he must have gone off to work early that morning after all.

I entered my kitchen. My dad stood there, in the middle of the room, grinning at me. I knew something was very very very wrong. He was holding hands with my mother, who was also grinning. My dad started to speak, “Always loved you,” and it wasn’t his voice. He sounded like my friend who would come over to hang out. I stood there, horrified, knowing this was just not right, just totally out of place and just wrong. This wasn’t reality. Both of them grinning, and their eyes were just … vacant. Neither of them were looking directly at me, just in my direction. My mother opened her mouth to speak, still grinning, and yelled, “Oh my fucking GOD,” sounding exactly like my girlfriend. I found myself quietly saying “no.” My mother spoke again, “Love we’ve always loved we’ve always loved you alway we’ve loved you my precious little …” and then my dad, this time speaking with my own voice, and grinning the whole time, “Dad, you know I love you,” he said. And I knew, I knew what the fuck that was from. It was a conversation me and my dad had when he first wanted to get sober and he had broken down about being a horrible father and I told him that I had always loved him, just like that, with those exact words, in that exact way. I fucking BROKE, I turned, ran from my house, and never looked back. Had my neighbor get my dog for me.

I’m staying with a friend right now. My dad came back from Chicago and he’s staying in the house now. I told him everything. He thinks I was taking drugs. I’ve convinced him to bring me some of my things, and I’m just trying to decide what to do. I can’t stop crying. My mom doesn’t even know about it, I don’t want to bother her. I’m scared for my dad.


Credit: Reddit user krokee64

The Rats in the Walls

On July 16, 1923, I moved into Exham Priory after the last workman had finished his labours. The restoration had been a stupendous task, for little had remained of the deserted pile but a shell-like ruin; yet because it had been the seat of my ancestors I let no expense deter me.

The place had not been inhabited since the reign of James the First, when a tragedy of intensely hideous, though largely unexplained, nature had struck down the master, five of his children, and several servants; and driven forth under a cloud of suspicion and terror the third son, my lineal progenitor and the only survivor of the abhorred line. With this sole heir denounced as a murderer, the estate had reverted to the crown, nor had the accused man made any attempt to exculpate himself or regain his property.

Shaken by some horror greater than that of conscience or the law, and expressing only a frantic wish to exclude the ancient edifice from his sight and memory, Walter de la Poer, eleventh Baron Exham, fled to Virginia and there founded the family which by the next century had become known as Delapore.

Exham Priory had remained untenanted, though later allotted to the estates of the Norrys family and much studied because of its peculiarly composite architecture; an architecture involving Gothic towers resting on a Saxon or Romanesque substructure, whose foundation in turn was of a still earlier order or blend of orders—Roman, and even Druidic or native Cymric, if legends speak truly.

This foundation was a very singular thing, being merged on one side with the solid limestone of the precipice from whose brink the priory overlooked a desolate valley three miles west of the village of Anchester. Architects and antiquarians loved to examine this strange relic of forgotten centuries, but the country folk hated it. They had hated it hundreds of years before, when my ancestors lived there, and they hated it now, with the moss and mould of abandonment on it.

I had not been a day in Anchester before I knew I came of an accursed house. And this week workmen have blown up Exham Priory, and are busy obliterating the traces of its foundations.

By: H. P. Lovecraft

Active Imagination

When I was a kid, I had a really active imagination. I would create scenarios in my head, think of characters on the spot, and make up a story to my younger sister as she drifted off to sleep… I just presumed I had a talent for it. My parents smiled as I began using my talents for the creative pieces of work I brought home from school. Paintings, stories, songs filed onto a compact disk… and my mother would hold me close and whisper into my ear;

“You have an excellent gift Terry.” And that gift stuck with me all my life.

In elementary school I didn’t really have many friends, so I’d make them up. On the spot. I had a new one everyday. Then I’d sketch them into one of my books. The kids would laugh at me but I didn’t care. I had my mind, and it was my friend. I sat alone, and talk to the characters I had imagined out of nothing. They had different personalities also. Teachers would smile whenever I walked passed them.

“How’s your imagination going?”

“Good,” I would reply, “Frank has played with me today.”

“That’s nice sweetie. Now off to class.”

That’s all I basically remember from those days, apart from my adventures with my mind. But in high school, I met a girl. I had never made any… real friends before so I was incredibly shy. I walked over to her and started to talk

“Hey there, I’m Terry.” I smiled at her, ignoring my imaginary friends’ sneers and giggles behind me. I never really grew out of my imagination.

“Well I’m Janet,” she said in a sweet tone. “Want to be friends?”

From that moment on, I spent most of my days with Janet. My imaginary friends soon left, disappeared and were lost from my memory. But I had a friend. Not a fake friend, a real one. A friend I could actually talk to, to actually play with.

We dated for a few years, after leaver’s exams of coarse. We had the same job, we lived with one another, we had all the time we needed with one another. Then, when I was twenty-one, I proposed to her. As I hoped, she said yes.

For the next six months we planned our wedding, and a few days before the wedding, Janet talked to me.

“After we get married, can we go somewhere?” She asked.

“Yes,” I said happily, “I’ve always wanted to go to France. Do you want to go there?”

“France it is!” She replied happily. Hugging me tightly. Then, the walls of the room we were in started to turn white. A pitch white. Like no white I had ever seen!

The furniture started to dissolve into nothing, the lights disappeared and I grabbed Janet and I rushed to the door. As I put my handle on the knob and turned it… I took a look back. The room was empty, only Janet and I were inside. The walls were padded with pillows and there was a bed in the corner. I looked at Janet, she looked back at me. Then she started to disappear, softly at first but started to go faster, and faster. I tried to reach out for her but my arms were stuck inside a jacket. I pulled and pulled and pulled but it was no use. I watched her disappear. My love, my life, my only friend. Gone. Leaving me in this empty room, a prison. An… an asylum.

What can I say? I have a really active imagination.

—
Credits to: reddeath-in-roomzero

Betsy The Doll

It’s a long one. But trust me. Worth it. Every single word. This story will haunt me for days to come.

Like most people, I had a sad childhood. Who doesn’t, these days? My father left before I was born and my mother was on drugs from the day she brought me home. She slipped right back into her party lifestyle and turned our apartment into an opium den. I walked around in a drug-fueled haze for the first 5 years of my life. The smoky air flooded down the hallway and under my door and seemed to linger for days.

My mother wasn’t a bad person, just a victim of her addictions. When she did have spare money, she would put food in the house and even sometimes buy me clothes from Goodwill. The only pieces of furniture I had in my bedroom were a box spring and mattress set and a little blue and white toy chest. Not that I had a lot of toys to put in it, just the 3 I had gotten for birthdays: one was an art kit, one was a red wagon, and the last, my pride and joy, was a doll named Betsy.

Betsy was my best friend. We would have imaginary tea parties together, sleep together, take baths together and, sometimes, I remember her speaking to me.

Thinking about Betsy in adulthood has led me to believe that I was a severely traumatized child who was often high on opium and therefore, my memories were extremely unreliable. Still, I remember the sound of her voice, a high-pitched, tinkled lilt. And I remember the things she wanted me to do. Steal food for her. Bring her forks, bring her knives. Hit the bad man who slept on our couch.. Always bad things that would get me in trouble. I would blame it on Betsy but my mother would never believe me. Adults never do.

Around my 6th birthday I asked my mother for a birthday party. I wanted to invite the not-nice girls from school, serve them cake, make them like me. I still remember standing in the kitchen with such high hopes, a glass bottle of soda shaking in my hand as I held my breath and awaited my mother’s answer. She turned to me and laughed.

"A birthday party? Laura, that’s ridiculous. I can’t afford to feed 15 other children that aren’t even mine - I can barely afford to feed you! You eat like a elephant, or should I say little Betsy does. I barely get anything to eat around here!”

My face fell as she shook her head, mumbled something and stumbled off. I heard the music go up in the living room as more people walked in the door. Some left, some stayed. I knew none of them. My mother threw parties all the time. What about me? I was a child, all my friends had birthday parties and now the mean girls would know I was too poor to have one and they would tease me even more.

I felt tears start to swell and I ran into my room and slammed the door. Betsy was laying on the bed and smiling. She was always smiling, how could I forget. Just staring at me, smiling. She was going to tell me to do something bad. Like steal more food or worse. This was her fault. Betsy didn’t have to go to school. Betsy never got in trouble like I did. And in my 5 year old little brain I truly believed it was the doll, not my mother, who was the source of all my woes.

I screamed in anger and threw the bottle as hard as I could at the bed. It hit Betsy and she fell on the floor. I laughed. I dragged her into the bathroom and threw her into our bathtub, which always had water in it as the drains were all clogged. Of course, she didn’t fight back while she was underwater, but it made me feel better. A few minutes later, after I had finished taking out my anger and humiliation on my favorite toy I threw her in the toy chest and slammed it shut. I kicked the chest against the wall; I never wanted to see Betsy again.

I never owned another doll after that. About a week later the police came and two nice ladies took me to live in a new home in a new state, with food and toys and no drugs. The trunk went into storage and the wagon disappeared. I never saw my mother again. As I got older my foster parents admitted she was in jail, doing 25 years. I felt nothing for her anyway, I was still having nightmares because of the life she had given me. I focused on doing well in school and ignored her letters from prison. She reached out to me several times in my teens but I always declined her calls.

That is, until this morning. I am 30 now, with my own children and a husband who loves me deeply. I have a beautiful house, two dogs and a career as a social worker trying to make a difference for kids who had it bad like me. So when I got a voicemail from my mother letting me know she had been paroled and wished to speak, I felt stable enough to let her say her piece.

Since the kids were home from school I went out into our shed in the backyard to return my mother’s call. The shed was the children’s domain and they used it to play in the summer. I sat on my old toy chest which was currently being used as tea party table and dialed the number she had left me.

Three rings.

"Hello? Laura?"

"Hello, mother. How are you?"

"Oh Laura, thank you for speaking to me. I know you have your own life now and a family. I would love to meet them someday! I just wanted to tell you how sorry I am. For everything."

"You are not meeting my kids - ever. I am going to say my piece here, too.The drugs destroyed you and you took me down alongside you. Honestly, I am surprised it took you so long to get caught."

"I’m not sure what you mean about being caught, Laura I honestly know nothing! Look, it hardly matters. I do understand why you would feel that way. Why you would hate me and not want me to meet your little ones. I learned a lot about Jesus and forgiveness while I was away and just..oh Laura, I am so sorry about Betsy."

"Betsy?" I paused, confused. "Why would you care about her?"

'I know, I know Laura, believe me I do. It was all my fault, the drugs. And Betsy, oh God, if I had only been able to see through the haze, if I had only known. She's gone forever now and it's all my fault.”

As my mother began to cry, I tapped my fingers on the toy box impatiently. The drugs had clearly fried my mother’s brain.

"Mother, why are you talking about Betsy? Why do you even care? And I know where Betsy is." Right underneath me.

"You do? What are you talking about, Laura? Oh God, where is she?!"

I shifted uncomfortably. “Betsy’s in the trunk.”

I honestly thought she had hung up, I heard nothing on the other end, not even breathing.

"…..What do you mean your sister’s in the trunk?"

"Sister? What the hell are you talking about? Back on drugs so soon, mother? Betsy is a goddamn doll. I locked her in the toy box a few days before you got arrested for opium possession."

"Laura.. oh God no…no… Laura, I wasn’t arrested because of the drugs, I was arrested because of Betsy’s disappearance! You always called her your little doll, but we all thought you knew.. Oh God, what did you do, Laura? What did you do to my baby?!"

With no emotion, I set the phone next to me and stood up. I could hear the distant sound of my mother’s anguished cries and feel the dark clutch of agony in my own chest. Memories were stirring in the back of my mind threatening to come flooding forward into my consciousness. Pushing against a door in my head, a door that had been locked so tightly for so long, I had forgotten it was there.

Could the trauma and the drugs have really led me to believe that a small child was actually doll? Asking for food, asking for utensils to eat with, asking me to protect her from the bad man…

No…

I slowly turned around and brought my eyes down to the chest. Surely, it was too small. You couldn’t fit a person in there. You couldn’t. But what about a very small, starving, emaciated child? What about her? If I were an investigator looking for a child I would never consider looking in this chest. It was just too small.

I knelt down to the ground and unclipped the clasps. It would be better to not look. After all that I had overcome, this new life that I had earned. It could all be undone by opening this toy box. I shouldn’t open it. I should throw it in a landfill and forget it ever existed. I should not look inside..

I opened the chest.

I never had a doll. My mother never could afford to buy me one. I never had a wagon either. But I did have a toy box. A pretty, blue and white toy box. And when I was five, I drowned my two year old sister and put her in it. And now my life is over.

By reddit user The_Dalek_Emperor

Ochelari

    In my room, on my desk, sits a black, plastic casing which holds my glasses.

    They have a power of minus 9 and they were very expensive to wear.

    When I was younger, my mother used to warn me about sitting too close to the television. She used to tell me that my eyesight would get progressively worse and I’d either end up needing glasses or my eyes would simply be bad enough to make me legally blind.

    Being an overly obnoxious nine-year-old, I never listened to her. So whenever my favorite cartoon or TV-show was on I would scurry to the living room and rest my head an inch away from the screen. I figured that the closer I got to the TV, the closer I could get to the show.

    Whenever my mother found out about this she would yell at me about how expensive glasses would be and that we couldn’t afford even a single pair. She’d then proceed to slap the back of my head so hard that I would accidentally bite my tongue or unpleasantly acquaint my face with the hard TV screen. It happened every time and I always ignored her.

    Until one day she got to say ‘I told you so’ and we were forced to get me a pair of glasses. Because we couldn’t afford to buy new ones, she took me all over the neighborhood to find a used pair that did the job well enough. And so it continued until my eyes settled at a power of minus 9. Finding a used pair of glasses that would suffice was hell.

    We eventually spotted a proper pair at an antique store. The store was filled with objects and trinkets that could have come straight out of a horror movie. Most of it, including the elderly woman who was sitting behind the counter, looked fit for use by witches.

    The woman was wearing sunglasses that were much too dark for the dusky little store. My mother asked how much they would cost and the woman simply replied ‘very expensive’. She seemed to be blind because she never looked at my mother while they spoke about the price, but she stared intently at me. Even as we left the store I could tell that she was following me with her gaze. It made the hairs on my neck stand on end.

    Despite being very ugly, the glasses did the trick. She had to work 7 days a week for months in order to earn back what it had cost, but at least my eyesight didn’t seem to get any worse.

    Needless to say that my glasses were a necessity. Without them I was essentially a baby in a suit. I had to look out for every little thing so as not to break or otherwise damage this life-saving piece of technology. Eventually, my girlfriend and I grew tired of having to always watch out for my glasses. And so, after a lot of coercing, she managed to talk me into getting laser eye surgery.

    I can’t say that I’ve ever regretted making that choice. It was wonderful seeing things perfectly clear again without wearing my glasses. At first, the discomfort was horrible but eventually it faded and I got my perfect eyesight back. I felt like a new man; reborn with the eyes of a god.

    I’m a sentimental idiot and so I never managed to throw my old glasses away. Months and years passed until one day, when we were packing our stuff because we were moving to a new town, I stumbled upon the old, plastic casing of my massively expensive glasses.

    Holding them again after such a long time felt strangely nostalgic. They were once incredibly important to me, enabling me to live like a reasonably average human being. I may have actually shed a small tear or two. And in my nostalgia I wanted to wear them again, even if just for a little while.

    Looking through glasses if you don’t need them is bad for your eyes, but I figured a quick peek wouldn’t hurt too much.

    The moment the pads rested on my nose and the temple tips nestled gently behind my ears, I could feel something wrong. My eyesight wasn’t distorted at all, despite what I’d expected. In fact, when I think back, it might have actually improved marginally.

    Naturally, as any sane person would, I was confused and I wanted to take them off to reassure myself that my eyesight was still perfect without them. But they wouldn’t budge.

    No matter how hard I pulled, and I pulled REALLY hard, I can assure you, the pads stayed perfectly still on my nose and the entire damn thing wouldn’t move so much as a millimeter.

    At this point, I was freaking the hell out. I called out to my girlfriend, who had been in the kitchen, packing our cutlery and plates and such, but she didn’t reply.

    At first I figured she must have not heard me, so I launched myself out of the chair I’d been sitting in, wanting to make my way to the kitchen with all sorts of haste.

    Beyond the door, however, was a desolate, empty house where only moments before a vibrant, new home of a loving couple had been. The previously white wallpaper was filled with holes and patches of mold and it slanted away from the wall as if it had grown tired of its own existence.

    Behind the wallpaper were cracks in the wall, as if the house had been abandoned for a hundred years. The wooden floor beneath my feet creaked so much I feared it would cave in, and the roof above my head was already partially on the floor.

    Through the holes in the roof I could see the sky. Clouds rolled over each other, as if at war with themselves, and in the distance I could see the sun rising, leaving a blood red stain on the deck of clouds as it pierced through them like a knife through soft flesh.

    I called her name again, suddenly fearing for her life. My legs were trembling but they obeyed me and moved faster than they had before.

    When I finally made it to the kitchen, it was as empty and decayed as the rest of the house had been. The stench of rot and decay penetrated my nose and my gag reflex automatically set in. Panic and fear mixed in my stomach and I ran out of the house into a world that was completely and utterly dead.

    There were no people, no animals, no plants. There was no sound other than that made by the wind. I was completely alone in a place that seemed to be rotten and saturated with death.

    My fear fueled my adrenaline and with all the strength in my arms I pulled at the glasses, but they still would not move.

    I closed my eyes, took several deep breaths and then punched the contraption of plastic and metal and glass that had glued itself to my face and was showing me the end of the world. I punched until I couldn’t feel my face and my knuckles were raw.

    Her gasp is what woke me up.

    She was standing in the doorway with a horrified look on her face; as if her worst nightmare was coming true. It filled me with worry but the sight of her dampened my fears with love and relief.

    I crawled to my feet, wanting to wrap her in my arms and hold her. I wanted to make sure that this was real and that she was safe. But she shied away from me, as if she feared that I would attack her.

    Her eyes briefly darted over me before feverishly fixating on my face again. I reached out to her again, hoping that she would understand that I wanted to hold her in my arms, but those very arms were covered all over with a red, sticky wetness. I felt no pain, so that must mean it was someone else’s blood.

    Disgust and terror gripped my heart and I frantically ran my eyes over her entire body while she stood frozen in the doorway. The only thought going through my mind was ‘Did I hurt her? Is she alright?’ and I wanted to tell her that I had no memory of whatever had happened and that I would make sure that everything would be okay.

    No sound came from my mouth. It was as if there was an emptiness in my throat that swallowed all sound I was trying to produce.

    I tried talking again, but all I could hear was a low gurgling coming from the back of my throat followed by the horrific scream that came from the woman I loved. She turned on her heels and bolted away. I started chasing her, ignoring the wet, disgusting feeling on the rest of my body that I’d finally become aware of.

    The stickiness didn’t matter. All that mattered to me was to tell her that everything was going to be okay, that I loved her and that we would make it through this if we stuck together.

    She reached the front door, pulled it open and ran out before slamming it shut behind her with such a force that it rattled the mirrors in the hallway. I passed them by and glanced, briefly, from the corners of my eyes.

    Except there were no eyes.

    Two caves of rotting flesh stared back at me, oozing blood that crawled down my face and stained my clothes a dark, filthy red.

    My mouth opened in horror but that only made it worse.

    In my mouth was an emptiness. My tongue had been cut out and the same disgusting blood was bubbling up and over my shredded lips. I wanted to scream, but I was met with nothing but a gurgle.

    I stood still for minutes, staring at the horrific creature in the mirror. Its hollow, bleeding eye sockets stared back at me and in the far reaches of my mind I wondered how that could be. How could I see without eyes?

    But then I remembered an old woman who wore sunglasses in a gloomy store, as if she were blind, and my mind made the connection.

    Back in my room, on my desk, sits a black, plastic casing which held my old glasses.

    They had a power of minus 9 and were very, very expensive to wear.

—
Credits to: gabriel-alistair

The Reaper in the Tree

There may be strange details in this story. Not all of them will seem to add up and appear to be significant, but it’s all true. That sort of statement is common with these types of stories, but this time it is meant in absolute earnest.

My grandfather was a mortician and about a year after he retired he himself passed on. He and I shared the exact same name and it was slightly unsettling to hear my own name in the eulogy. To witness firsthand the lowering of a casket, revealing one’s own name on the headstone. It gave the whole event a sort of dreamlike quality. I suppose such things got me thinking of my own mortality more than a funeral normally should.

After the burial we drove passed the old funeral home. The business had been handed over to a new guy who did an alright job I guess. Grandpa looked okay. Though that wasn’t on my mind. There was a large tree in the front yard of the old funeral home. Near the peak of the tree, amongst its naked branches, was a wicked grim reaper halloween decoration. Seven feet in height its dark robes fluttered ominously in the wind like a flag of morbid purpose. Characteristically, its face wasn’t visible, but nor was its blade. It was already early November, so I guess the new undertaker was just putting off taking him down. Still though, it was a bit ghastly for a funeral home.

As we returned to grandmas house everyone was talking about how much they were going to miss grandpa. How sorry they were he was gone. “What a great guy he was.” “A real funny bloke.” “Gonna miss his smile.” Except they never called him grandpa, instead always opting to use my name. It felt like I was looking into the future, glimpsing my own passing, and it conjured up resonating images of the reaper again. Pointing at me. Staring through me behind his hood. Enveloping me in his darkness.

After an evening of uncomfortable mourning, I’d had enough. I said I needed to take a walk and clear my head. The nice thing about small towns is the absolute isolation and quiet that comes with nightfall. During my wanderings I gazed into a fenced backyard. The skull of a buffalo hung on a fencepost. I wasn’t sure if that was also a leftover halloween decoration, I wasn’t sure if it was anything. A squeaky mini windmill gave off an endless cycle of tiny screams to the garden gnomes quietly gazing at nothing.

I adjusted my coat’s collar and stepped across the street, towards my grandfather’s old place of work. I figured that sick decoration from earlier would look even better at night. I tilted my head upwards and was surprised to find nothing clutched in the leafless branches of the overgrown maple. Either he was finally taken down or its black robes cloaked the reaper in the darkness of night. I somehow felt it was the latter, as his deathly presence was actually made more real by lack of physical manifestation.

That was my whimsical thought as I walked back across the street from the funeral home when all of sudden a gust of wind kicked up the sand and I heard a loud scraping noise on the concrete behind me. Had I not been on edge from the funeral I would have figured it was the wind blowing a tree branch across the road, but as of that moment it sounded so much like a scythe being grazed upon the concrete that my legs sent me sprinting back to grandmas like prey from a predator.

When I returned I saw my grandmother and family playing pinochle. My heart was hammering a hole through my chest. They asked my why I looked so frightened. I rubbed my forehead of sweat, closed my eyes, and smiled. It was so stupid. I told them everything chuckling as I did. How the day affected my mindset, the grim reaper in the tree, and the grazing on the road. They laughed and said the day was stressful on all of us. They asked me to join them. I happily complied. I took off my jacket and put it on the chair. I was about to sit down but suddenly I paused…my uncle asked me what was wrong and my grandmother asked me why I look so pale. I couldn’t hear them. They might as well have spoken in tongues. For upon my coat, there lay a single diagonal gash upon the back!

Credit To – Johnny V

Mr. Widemouth

During my childhood my family was like a drop of water in a vast river, never remaining in one location for long. We settled in Rhode Island when I was eight, and there we remained until I went to college in Colorado Springs. Most of my memories are rooted in Rhode Island, but there are fragments in the attic of my brain which belong to the various homes we had lived in when I was much younger.

Most of these memories are unclear and pointless– chasing after another boy in the back yard of a house in North Carolina, trying to build a raft to float on the creek behind the apartment we rented in Pennsylvania, and so on. But there is one set of memories which remains as clear as glass, as though they were just made yesterday. I often wonder whether these memories are simply lucid dreams produced by the long sickness I experienced that Spring, but in my heart, I know they are real.

We were living in a house just outside the bustling metropolis of New Vineyard, Maine, population 643. It was a large structure, especially for a family of three. There were a number of rooms that I didn’t see in the five months we resided there. In some ways it was a waste of space, but it was the only house on the market at the time, at least within an hour’s commute to my father’s place of work.

The day after my fifth birthday (attended by my parents alone), I came down with a fever. The doctor said I had mononucleosis, which meant no rough play and more fever for at least another three weeks. It was horrible timing to be bed-ridden– we were in the process of packing our things to move to Pennsylvania, and most of my things were already packed away in boxes, leaving my room barren. My mother brought me ginger ale and books several times a day, and these served the function of being my primary from of entertainment for the next few weeks. Boredom always loomed just around the corner, waiting to rear its ugly head and compound my misery.

I don’t exactly recall how I met Mr. Widemouth. I think it was about a week after I was diagnosed with mono. My first memory of the small creature was asking him if he had a name. He told me to call him Mr. Widemouth, because his mouth was large. In fact, everything about him was large in comparison to his body– his head, his eyes, his crooked ears– but his mouth was by far the largest.

“You look kind of like a Furby,” I said as he flipped through one of my books.

Mr. Widemouth stopped and gave me a puzzled look. “Furby? What’s a Furby?” he asked.

I shrugged. “You know… the toy. The little robot with the big ears. You can pet and feed them, almost like a real pet.”

“Oh.” Mr. Widemouth resumed his activity. “You don’t need one of those. They aren’t the same as having a real friend.”

I remember Mr. Widemouth disappearing every time my mother stopped by to check in on me. “I lay under your bed,” he later explained. “I don’t want your parents to see me because I’m afraid they won’t let us play anymore.”

We didn’t do much during those first few days. Mr. Widemouth just looked at my books, fascinated by the stories and pictures they contained. The third or fourth morning after I met him, he greeted me with a large smile on his face. “I have a new game we can play,” he said. “We have to wait until after your mother comes to check on you, because she can’t see us play it. It’s a secret game.”

After my mother delivered more books and soda at the usual time, Mr. Widemouth slipped out from under the bed and tugged my hand. “We have to go the the room at the end of this hallway,” he said. I objected at first, as my parents had forbidden me to leave my bed without their permission, but Mr. Widemouth persisted until I gave in.

The room in question had no furniture or wallpaper. Its only distinguishing feature was a window opposite the doorway. Mr. Widemouth darted across the room and gave the window a firm push, flinging it open. He then beckoned me to look out at the ground below.

We were on the second story of the house, but it was on a hill, and from this angle the drop was farther than two stories due to the incline. “I like to play pretend up here,” Mr. Widemouth explained. “I pretend that there is a big, soft trampoline below this window, and I jump. If you pretend hard enough you bounce back up like a feather. I want you to try.”

I was a five-year-old with a fever, so only a hint of skepticism darted through my thoughts as I looked down and considered the possibility. “It’s a long drop,” I said.

“But that’s all a part of the fun. It wouldn’t be fun if it was only a short drop. If it were that way you may as well just bounce on a real trampoline.”

I toyed with the idea, picturing myself falling through thin air only to bounce back to the window on something unseen by human eyes. But the realist in me prevailed. “Maybe some other time,” I said. “I don’t know if I have enough imagination. I could get hurt.”

Mr. Widemouth’s face contorted into a snarl, but only for a moment. Anger gave way to disappointment. “If you say so,” he said. He spent the rest of the day under my bed, quiet as a mouse.

The following morning Mr. Widemouth arrived holding a small box. “I want to teach you how to juggle,” he said. “Here are some things you can use to practice, before I start giving you lessons.”

I looked in the box. It was full of knives. “My parents will kill me!” I shouted, horrified that Mr. Widemouth had brought knives into my room– objects that my parents would never allow me to touch. “I’ll be spanked and grounded for a year!”

Mr. Widemouth frowned. “It’s fun to juggle with these. I want you to try it.”

I pushed the box away. “I can’t. I’ll get in trouble. Knives aren’t safe to just throw in the air.”

Mr. Widemouth’s frown deepend into a scowl. He took the box of knives and slid under my bed, remaining there the rest of the day. I began to wonder how often he was under me.

I started having trouble sleeping after that. Mr. Widemouth often woke me up at night, saying he put a real trampoline under the window, a big one, one that I couldn’t see in the dark. I always declined and tried to go back to sleep, but Mr. Widemouth persisted. Sometimes he stayed by my side until early in the morning, encouraging me to jump.

He wasn’t so fun to play with anymore.

My mother came to me one morning and told me I had her permission to walk around outside. She thought the fresh air would be good for me, especially after being confined to my room for so long. Exstatic, I put on my sneakers and trotted out to the back porch, yearning for the feeling of sun on my face.

Mr. Widemouth was waiting for me. “I have something I want you to see,” he said. I must have given him a weird look, because he then said, “It’s safe, I promise.”

I followed him to the beginning of a deer trail which ran through the woods behind the house. “This is an important path,” he explained. “I’ve had a lot of friends about your age. When they were ready, I took them down this path, to a special place. You aren’t ready yet, but one day, I hope to take you there.”

I returned to the house, wondering what kind of place lay beyond that trail.

Two weeks after I met Mr. Widemouth, the last load of our things had been packed into a moving truck. I would be in the cab of that truck, sitting next to my father for the long drive to Pennsylvania. I considered telling Mr. Widemouth that I would be leaving, but even at five years old, I was beginning to suspect that perhaps the creature’s intentions were not to my benefit, despite what he said otherwise. For this reason, I decided to keep my departure a secret.

My father and I were in the truck at 4 a.m. He was hoping to make it to Pennyslvania by lunch time tomorrow with the help of an endless supply of coffee and a six-pack of energy drinks. He seemed more like a man who was about to run a marathon rather than one who was about to spend two days sitting still.

“Early enough for you?” he asked.

I nodded and placed my head against the window, hoping for some sleep before the sun came up. I felt my father’s hand on my shoulder. “This is the last move, son, I promise. I know it’s hard for you, as sick as you’ve been. Once daddy gets promoted we can settle down and you can make friends.”

I opened my eyes as we backed out of the driveway. I saw Mr. Widemouth’s silouhette in my bedroom window. He stood motionless until the truck was about to turn onto the main road. He gave a pitiful little wave good-bye, steak knife in hand. I didn’t wave back.

Years later, I returned to New Vineyard. The piece of land our house stood upon was empty except for the foundation, as the house burned down a few years after my family left. Out of curiosity, I followed the deer trail that Mr. Widemouth had shown me. Part of me expected him to jump out from behind a tree and scare the living bejeesus out of me, but I felt that Mr. Widemouth was gone, somehow tied to the house that no longer existed.

The trail ended at the New Vineyard Memorial Cemetery.

I noticed that many of the tombstones belonged to children.

//
Credited to perfectcircle35

Killswitch

In the spring 1989 the Karvina Corporation released a curious game, whose dissemination among American students that fall was swift and furious, though its popularity was ultimately short-lived.

The game was “Killswitch.”

On the surface it was a variant on the mystery or horror survival game, a precursor to the Myst and Silent Hill franchises. The narrative showed the complexity for which Karvina was known, though the graphics were monochrome, vague grey and white shapes against a black background.

Slow MIDI versions of Czech folksongs play throughout. Players could choose between two avatars: an invisible demon named Ghast or a visible human woman, Porto. Play as Ghast was considerably more difficult due to his total invisibility, and players were highly liable to restart the game as Porto after the first level, in which it was impossible to gauge jumps or aim.

However, Ghast was clearly the more powerful character–he had fire-breath and a coal-steam attack, but as it was above the skill level of most players to keep track of where a fire-breathing, poison-dispensing invisible imp was on their screens once the fire and steam had run out, Porto became more or less the default.

Porto’s singular ability was seemingly random growth–she expanded and contracted in size throughout the game. A Kansas engineering grad claimed to have figured out the pattern involved, but for reasons which will become obvious, his work was lost.

Porto awakens in the dark with wounds in her elbows, confused. Seeking a way out, she ascends through the levels of a coal mine in which it is slowly revealed she was once an employee, investigating its collapse and beset on all sides by demons similar to Ghast, as well as dead foremen, coal-golems, and demonic inspectors from the Sovatik corporation, whose boxy bodies were clothed in red, the only color in the game.
The environment, though primitive, becomes genuinely uncanny as play progresses. There are no “bosses” in any real sense–Porto must simply move physically through tunnels to reach subsequent levels while her size varies wildly through inter-level spaces.

The story that emerges through Porto’s discovery of magnetic tapes, files, mutilated factory workers who were once her friends, and deciphering an impressively complex code inscribed on a series of iron axes players must collect (This portion of the game was almost laughably complex, and defeated many players until “Porto881″ posted the cipher to a Columbia BBS. Attempts to contact this player have been unsuccessful, and the username is no longer in use on any known service.) is that the foremen, under pressure to increase coal production, began to falsify reports of malfunctions and worker malfeasance in order to excuse low output, which incited a Sovatik inspection.

Officials were dispatched, one for each miner, and an extraordinary story of torture unfolds, with fuzzy and indistinct graphics of red-coated men standing over workers, inserting small knives into their joints whenever production slowed. (Admittedly, this is not a very subtle critique of Soviet-era industrial tactics, and as the town of Karvina itself was devastated by the departure of the coal industry, more than one thesis has interpreted Killswitch as a political screed.)

After solving the axe-code, Porto finds and assembles a tape recorder, on which a male voice tells her that the fires of the earth had risen up in their defense and flowed into the hearts of the decrepit, pre-revolution equipment they used and wakened them to avenge the workers.

It is generally assumed that the “fires of the earth” are demons like Ghast, coal-fumes and gassy bodies inhabiting the old machines. The machines themselves are so “big” that the graphics elect to only show two or three gear-teeth or a conveyor belt rather than the entire apparatus. The machines drove the inspectors mad, and they disappeared into caverns with their knives (only to emerge to plague Porto, of course).

The workers were often crushed and mangled in the onslaught of machines, who were neither graceful nor discriminating. Porto herself was knocked into a deep chasm by a grief-stricken engine, and her fluctuating size, if it is real and not imagined, is implied to be the result of poisonous fumes inhaled there.

What follows is the most cryptic and intuitive part of the game. There is no logical reason to proceed in the “correct” way, and again it was Porto881 who came to the rescue of the fledgling Killswitch community. In the chamber behind the tape recorder is a great furnace where coal was once rendered into coke.

There are no clues as to what she is intended to do in this room. Players attempted nearly everything, from immolating herself to continuing to process coal as if the machines had never risen up. Porto881 hit upon the solution, and posted it to the Columbia boards.

If Porto ingests the raw coke, she will find her body under control,and can go on to fight her way out of the final levels of the mine, which are impassable in her giant state, clutching the tape containing this extraordinary story. However, as she crawls through the final tunnel to emerge aboveground, the screen goes suddenly white.

Killswitch, by design, deletes itself upon player completion of the game. It is not recoverable by any means, all trace of it is removed from the user’s computer. The game cannot be copied. For all intents and purposes it exists only for those playing it, and then ceases to be entirely. One cannot replay it, unlocking further secrets or narrative pathways, one cannot allow another to play it, and perhaps most importantly, it is impossible to experience the game all the way to the end as both Porto and Ghast.

Predictably, player outcry was enormous. Several routes to solve the problem were pursued, with no real efficacy. The first and most common was to simply buy more copies of the game, but Karvina Corp. released only 5,000 copies and refused to press further editions. The following is an excerpt from their May 1990 press release:

Killswitch was designed to be a unique playing experience: like reality, it is unrepeatable, unretrievable,and illogical. One might even say ineffable. Death is final; death is complete. The fates of Porto and her beloved Ghast are as unknowable as our own. It is the desire of the Karvina Corporation that this be so, and we ask our customers to respect that desire. Rest assured Karvina will continue to provide the highest quality of games to the West, and that Killswitch is merely one among our many wonders.

This did not have the intended effect. The word “beloved” piqued the interest of committed, even obsessive players, as Ghast is not present in any portion of Porto’s narrative. A rush to find the remaining copies of the game ensued, with the intent of playing as Ghast and discovering the meaning of Karvina’s cryptic word.

The most popular theory was that Ghast would at some point become the fumes inhaled by Porto, changing her size and beginning her adventure. Some thought this was wishful thinking, that if only Ghast’s early levels were passable one would somehow be able to play as both simultaneously.

However, by this time no further copies appeared to be available in retail outlets. Players who had not yet completed the game attempted Ghast’s levels frequently, but the difficulty of actually playing this enigmatic avatar persisted, and no player has ever claimed to have finished the game as Ghast. One by one, the lure of Porto’s lost, unearthly world drew them back to her, and one by one, they were compelled towards the finality of the vast white screen.

To find any copy usable today is an almost unfathomably rare occurance; a still shrink-wrapped copy was sold at auction in 2005 for $733,000 to Yamamoto Ryuichi of Tokyo. It is entirely possible that Yamamoto’s is the last remaining copy of the game.

Knowing this, Yakamoto had intended to open his play to all enthusiasts, filming and uploading his progress. However, to date, the only film which has surfaced is a one minute and forty five second clip of a haggard Yamamoto at his computer, the avatar-choice screen visible over his right shoulder.

Yamamoto is crying.