The Novella Life of Illuscia Nester Himawari

A few years ago I was spending some time with friends exploring old, supposedly haunted, places. We were at the Edisto First Presbyterian Church, where a girl named Julia Legare was buried in her family mausoleum in 1852. People reported hearing unearthly screams time and time again, but never investigating the cause of it. Fifteen years later, when they opened the door to the mausoleum to inter the next family member who had died, finding her corpse huddled in the corner next to the door, arms outstretched as if still trying to find the exit. Well, my friends thought it would be a funny idea to shut the giant stone door (which was originally open) behind me and pick me up in the morning. The bastards left me there… I tried and tried, using all of my strength, but I couldn’t budge it, it had taken four people to put it in place. In the dark, I resigned myself to the night ahead of me. Now, I normally don’t frighten easily, but sitting there in the relatively small place, s...

I know this road better than I know myself. I know each of Interstate 85’s 250 odd miles; I know that it takes me an average of 3 hours and 26 minutes to drive west, from Charlotte to Atlanta, and an average of 3 hours and 29 minutes to make the same trip going eastward. I know the price of gas at a dozen stands, and the closing hours of each fast food shack and greasy diner. I know the curves of each low hill and I know each stand of pine and oak trees. I know the stretching dark of the long winter nights and the wet heat of the summer breeze. I know these things well because they are the totality of my existence now. I know the names of each exit, westward and east. Batesville, Poplar Springs, Spartanburg. They tick through my head as I pass, but the Silver Creek Road exit is never among them. In three years of this endless loop, it has never appeared again. If I ever begin to doubt that it will, then I have nothing left. The Silver Creek Road exit doesn’t exist on any ma...

It begins gently at first, softly falling like a child’s tears. It is a sad thing, but not so unusual and wholesome in its way. And the wind lightly blows, almost tenderly caressing your face. This will not last, but it’s nice isn’t it? In the beginning there were two and they knew love of a kind. The rain comes down harder now, no longer a child’s gentle weeping, and not quite an adult’s passionate cries for a lost love. It is somewhere in between. Then too, the wind picks up, catching your hair, causing it to fall across your face. It speaks, in the way that wind speaks, a soft moan, nothing more yet. Time passed, and the two brought forth children. The children built and bred and grew. Thousands, then millions. The rain has not changed, it does not fall with greater intensity, but in the distance the faint sound of rolling thunder and the flash of a great light. The voice of the wind calls out to it, the clouds gather more strongly. The two were not man and woman,...

I huffed and puffed under my breath as I stared into God’s Mouth. I felt like the Big Bad Wolf ready to interrupt the innocent little pigs as they hurriedly fortified their makeshift homes. I grinned at this thought and then turned my head to look for Margaret. She was a couple of feet down the hill from the entrance of the cave, holding a walking stick close to her petite breasts. “Hurry up!” I called down to her. I turned back to the cave, still grinning. An old, rotted sign outside read ‘God’s Mouth Cave: Keep Out!’ What a tired cliché. Margaret finally made it to the entrance and stood beside me, almost doubled over and out of breath. I looked down and smiled. “Check it out!” I laughed. “God’s mouth. Wonder where Jesus’ anus is?” I chuckled to myself. Margaret was less amused. “Give me the damn water bottle,” she said, exasperated. The open bottle met her lips, and for a moment I felt peaceful in a way, watching her drink the water. Actually I take that back. The ‘peace...

I was sitting in the upstairs office of the Museum with a cup of coffee when it happened. It had been a long day, and I’d set the work experience kid the seemingly unfuckupable task of dusting the exhibits- after repeating my warning, of course, that some of them must not be touched or opened. A terrified scream, quickly strangled by a building-shaking thump and an awful rending sound, brought me rushing downstairs. The mirror room- I knew it. In there, there hung an ancient mirror, about a foot around, made of polished obsidian. Behind the glass walls of its display case, it was harmless- although people amusingly reported seeing the face of an evil hag in it on occasion. Looking at it unprotected was madness, though- certainly for those without my knowledge of the old ways. I arrived in the mirror room, and a horrible smell hung in the air. On the floor lay half a body- the lower half, still in the clothes I recognised from earlier. The skin had been stretched purple and...

The freak meandered through a group of the undead. It was nearing nightfall, and he began to head back home. His pack had plenty of food in it, and he shouldn’t have to leave his house again for another week or so. Unless one of the zombie bastards punched its way in again. He didn’t carry a gun anymore. He had figured out a while ago that they couldn’t see him. It wasn’t necessary for him to carry a gun, because if they did realize he was there he would be dead long before he could pull out any kind of weapon whatsoever. He did have to carry a weapon, in the earlier days, back when he was normal. Back before he became a freak. The people back then would try to steal food from him, attack him in delirious, starving rages. He killed quite a few people, in self-defense, but managed to detach himself from emotions. If he hadn’t, he would be dead right now. Or insane. He was free of the burden of emotions now, and all he ever felt was contentment. He used to be afraid, he used...

I gave her the doll on her birthday. She loved it at first, told me it was so beautiful. That it’s hair was so soft and the dress was so pretty. She wouldn’t let it out of her sight for days. During the day she set it on the table, so she could see it while cleaning the house. During the night it sat next to the bed, looking at us sleep with big blue unmoving eyes. But my wife’s love for the doll soon changed. Soon I noticed something was bothering here. I asked of course, but she wouldn’t tell me at first, said she was just being silly. But day after day she closed herself more and more for me. Until I couldn’t take it anymore. I pressed her, told her she would tell me what was going on right now or I would drag her to a doctor. She finally broke and crying words came spilling out. She then told me it was the doll. It scared her. She told me she had the feeling it was constantly watching her. Sometimes it even seemed like it moved. This worried me and I went to take a look ...

The man who lives above you is the quiet type. How lucky you are to live in an apartment underneath someone so courteous! It seems he never drops anything, seeing as how you never hear any loud thumps coming from the rooms above yours. He is even kind enough to keep the volume on his radio and TV too low to disrupt you. Come to think of it, had you not seen and spoken to him, you would think no one lived up there. Quite a big change from living below a batch of rowdy teens. He is terribly kind as well. Within the first week of you living there, he invites you up to dinner and offers his services as a plumber in case you have any leaky faucets. The maintenance crew at this complex is awfully incompetent. You can’t have it all, I suppose. He didn’t even get offended when you told him you were far too busy and didn’t know him well enough to dine with him. He simply smiled, gave you his number, and let you know the offer stood as long as you lived below him. One night, you decide to take h...

It was a few weeks ago that the hay bales started creeping slowly away from the house. Every morning when I woke up, each had moved a few hundred feet from where it was before. I assumed it was pranksters with nothing better to do, and I so I ignored it. Within a few days, though, the bales began to approach the boundaries of the farm. I was tired of the whole game by then, and decided to move them back. It took a tedious hour to bring them all from where they were to over near the house again, and by the time I was done I was ready to snap the neck of whatever little pissant was deciding to screw with me. The next morning, I found each and every one of my horses messily decapitated. The smell was what woke me up. Each one was slumped over against the side of its stall. There were no signs of the heads. I spent the rest of the day cleaning up the mess and burying the remains. It was only when I was done that I noticed the bales of hay had all returned to their positions f...

During the first few days of the release of Pokemon Red and Green in Japan, back in February 27, 1996, a peak of deaths appeared in the age group of 10-15. The children were usually found dead through suicide, usually by hanging or jumping from heights. However, some were more odd. A few cases recorded children who had began sawing off their limbs, others sticking their faces inside the oven, and chocked themselves on their own fist, shoving their own arms down their throat. The few children who were saved before killing themselves showed sporadic behavior. When asked why they were going to hurt themselves they only answered in chaotic screams and scratched at their own eyes. When showed what seemed to be the connection to this attitude, the gameboy, they had no response, but when combined with either Pokemon Red or Green, the screams would continue, and they would do their best to leave the room it was located in. This confirmed the authorities suspicion that the games, so...

In Fallout 2, after you beat the game you can continue playing. Remember that defunct vault near the beginning? The one with the toxic sludge on the ground and the elevator where you kill golden geckos. It's called "toxic caves" on the world map, but it is clearly a very smal vault with 3 levels (including the first cave level, where you take a ladder down t the actual vault structure). Well, if you have one of the original pressings of the game and you have not patched it, you can return to the toxic caves after the game is over and if you have the item "heart pills" from the Westin murder quest, you can kill yourself in the elevator. After the usual death scene plays, the screen will stay black without the menu screen opening up. Adter several minutes, you will begin to hear a hollow echoey white noise cave sort of sound. The screen will slowly fade back in to find your character in a pile of that nasty biomass goo that was all around The Master from the first...

A young woman on her way to town broke her journey by staying with friends at an old manor house. Her bedroom looked out to the carriage sweep at the front door. It was a moonlit night, and she found it difficult to sleep. As the clock outside her bedroom door struck 12, she heard the noise of horses’ hooves on the gravel outside, and the sound of wheels. She got up and went over to the window to see who could be arriving at that time of night. The moonlight was very bright, and she saw a hearse drive up to the door. It hadn’t a coffin in it; instead it was crowded with people. The coachman sat high up on the box: as he came opposite the window he drew up and turned his head. His face terrified her, and he said in a distinct voice, “There’s room for one more.” She drew the curtain, ran back to bed, and covered her head with the bedclothes. In the morning she was not quite sure whether it had been a dream, or whether she had really got out of bed and seen the hearse, but she was glad to...

My damnation came in the form of a bottle. No, not like that. When I was a child my best friend lived next to a little junkyard. Great place for a kid to hang out, a junkyard. Full of mystery and exciting discoveries, and if you find anything nice nobody minds if you take it, except your parents, obviously. Well, not my friend’s mom. Most of their bowls and plates came from that junkyard. But anyway. One day a bunch of us were hanging out, dismantling a car. Some of us might have been interested in the parts, I just thought breaking stuff was great. When we’d got the engine strewn everywhere we set to work on the interior. Under one of the seats was a little glass bottle, full of some green, bubbly liquid. Curiosity trumped hygiene in those days. I uncorked it and sniffed it. The smell was pleasant, minty, a little floral. One kid, Jackie, dared me to drink it. It was a double-dog dare. I had to. The taste was also pleasant, and it warmed me on the way down. My body was fill...

The discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls in the early part of the 20th century is one of the most important episodes in the field of Bible scholarship. They have been studied and transcribed for decades, so it was quite a shock when an unnoticed Hebrew text was found in the collection. The theology of this text, apart from references to Sheol (the abode of the dead) and the primordial chaos monster Leviathan, is quite unlike anything found in the Qu’mran community, the Bible or the Ancient Near East as a whole. Here is the entirety of the text, as translated so far: This is the vision of prophetess Zarah revealed to her in the dark of a dead land and written in the dust of a blind moon. There are Things that were tamed in the beginning of the cosmos and chained by the stars which were placed in a sigil of five dimensions in the tongue of a formless race which was ancient before the elements. Their servants were condemned to the mirrors, to serve as reflections until the sigil of s...