Creepypasta - Where scary things go bump in the night

I was young when I first witnessed one. About 3 years old. All I remember is the bustle of the village as we all entered an underground lock-in. Despite how thick the walls and doors were, we could all still hear it faintly. The blaring of the klaxons echoed around the village.

Growing up, I'd see them. Tall poles with conical shapes on the end, facing various directions. There were no visible wires, which made you assume they were hidden inside. But there was also no opening for maintenance. Despite this, they functioned perfectly every time they went off. There was no department for them. No one knows what grid they are wired to. They're just there, and they exist. It was just a fact that everyone accepted. Though, what wasn't accepted, was a common consensus for why.

For the next 20 years, I'd occasionally bring it up. And what people felt and knew drastically shifted from person to person.

When I started high school I'd walk to school every day. Driving wasn't and still isn't a common commodity in the area. Pendletown was small enough for driving to be more of a flex than a necessity. So a regular routine for many kids was to meet up with others on the same route and the group built up as we neared the school.

By the time they reached my house, there'd usually be 4 to 5 kids already built up, ready for me to add to the number.

For the most part, the route was always the same. But due to the swings in weather, it was sometimes better to go down alternate paths. The tighter alleyways would provide cover from particularly harsh winds that plagued the winter months. And when we went this way, we'd sometimes see the Church of Many.

This wasn't some grand cathedral. It was a function room where many middle-aged men would meet for a few beers. Drinking early in the day is universally seen as inappropriate, but they always argued it was for religious reasons, and somehow they always got away with it.

We'd sometimes peek through the windows out of curiosity. We'd only heard rumors about the place, so we knew very little. However, we knew that the whole organization was based on the Alarm, which sounded every 20 years. They were known for holding public events around the village. It honestly felt more like a themed community center than a religion. Something that gave our little area an identity. But you could never say this to them. If you bring up their so-called relaxed worship, they’d argue you out the room about the importance of the organization. They would even go as far as to make you thank them for saving the town every 20 years; claiming that it was their doing that things weren't worse when the Alarms went off.

As you can imagine, it's nigh impossible to prove their claim, but equally impossible to prove otherwise.

Quite honestly, the whole thing would be forgotten about for long periods. Something that happens every 20 years doesn't exactly bring about a sense of urgency. But sometimes, in school, a kid would bring it up, and talks would start all over again. There'd be a new theory thrown in and jokes around the room each time.

But this is where Isaac always stood out.

If you ever brought up the Alarm with him around, he'd say the same thing. The Alarm is a hoax.

Something to understand; our town isn't exactly 100% on the grid. It's known about by the government but so disregarded that we've managed to uphold a sort of autonomous zone. Separate from outside influence. Because of this, we still have some kind of royal family, but to actually call them that is an overstatement. They're just the lineage of the founders that have passed down power through each generation.

They claim they know the secrets of the Alarm but say it's kept from the public for the village's safety. This is another point of contention, but we'll save it for now. Just know that this family has a lot of power in this village, but for the most part, they're well-liked since they're very involved with the growth and development of the land.

This doesn't stop the rumors, though.

Isaac had one thought when it came to the Alarm. A hoax. His theory goes that it's done to subjugate the population. Every 20 years, they assert their dominance by sounding the alarms and seeing who obeys. A simple routine that lets everyone know who's in charge.

You see, anyone who doesn't seek shelter in the town's bunker is never seen again.

During my later years in school, I met a girl called Edna. She was sweet. The village was small, so meeting new people was rare after a certain point. People exaggerate when they say a place is so small that everyone knows each other, but some of the more busy people might literally have done that.

I met her during a school outing. The years in school were split. She was in the year below, and this particular trip was mixed with a few years.

By the end, we were inseparable, and this carried on after the trip ended.

I very quickly met her family, and we all got on well. But one moment really stood out to me, and that's when the Alarm was brought up.

I only brought it up off-handedly at the dinner table. I mentioned that someone at school was talking about the Church of Many being caught being drunk and disorderly again and started raving about the Alarm like it was urgent, and the table sort grew somber.

Her parents didn't seem to want to say anything, but Edna put the silence out its misery by explaining their side of things.

Apparently, she had an older brother, James. James had heard a rumor about the Alarm that was still around. The idea was this; if you stayed out during the Alarm, you were met by the spirits of the village. If you went to them with a wish in your heart so strong, it'd be granted.

James had a wish. Something he never shared with his family.

Well, James snuck away when the evacuations were happening. Edna's family couldn't find him, but it was too late to go searching. So they had to hope James was okay when the Alarms were going off.

They searched and searched afterwards; the whole town had gotten involved. But James was nowhere to be found.

The idea of something supernatural happening during the Alarms wasn't a foreign idea to people. But Edna's family had their thoughts. James would never have wished to be away for his family. So if he stayed out to make a wish, and was gone. The spirits could never be good. They were evil and had to be hidden from.

I once talked to my dad about the Alarms. My dad was a run of the mill handyman. If you needed something done, he'd either be able to do it, or figure out how. He was able to figure out any practical issue if you gave him enough time.

My dad was sometimes sought for his advice. His practical thinking translated well to other areas, and he became a sort of councillor for some. No one had degrees in the village. Knowledge was brought in from outside sources, but no one really left Pendletown for qualifications. Besides, there would be no need. Around there, qualification came from already being able to do the job, or apprenticing with someone until you could.

This is to say, he isn't stupid. You can imagine education in a place like this isn't of the highest caliber, but he had a head on his shoulders.

When I was younger, he'd tell me the same thing. Every 20 years, there was a monster that would emerge and gobble up any kids who wondered out while the Alarms went off.

This was a common story told to kids to keep them in check. A lot of people in my school were told that. And I imagine my parents were told that when they were kids, and so on.

Even when I hit high school, he persisted with this story, but with some added details. I imagine that the gruesome notes were to keep me in check when the childish version lost its lustre.

A fear some parents had was if the Alarms went off when teens were in the woods drinking. If they were too far out, they'd never make it back in time. This isn't to say they were strict to a harsh degree. But they were often overbearing when nearing the due date.

This was because there was no set day. Sure it was known to happen every 20 years. But there was a wide variance of possible days.

People tried lining up the dates to old calendars. Ancient time measuring devices. Even alternate religious texts. But nothing could predict the exact time and date. So often, we all became especially cautious when we knew the days as coming up.

I was nearly 23 and was a few years into my career when we were nearing the date for the next Alarm. By village standard, I was considered a man. So I faintly confronted my dad to tell me what he thought the Alarm was.

He told me what he thought. It's a monster.

I resigned myself to hearing the same story again. But this time, he went into much more detail than before.

He explained that every 20 years, a monster came through and ate any who is found. This was much of what I'd heard before. But he went on to tell me of some of the things he'd heard. Claw marks on doors where pets were left. Giant footprints on the outskirts. He said that you'd just get laughed out when these things were brought up. But a small group of people were really invested in this theory.

The final point he had was about all the rumors. He brought up one I'd heard before. That wishes were granted to anyone who went out into the Alarm. My dad said that the head family knew of the secret, and had started the rumors. He proposed this. Ideas of wishes, power, and new life. All designed to get you outside during the ominous day.

He had a simple answer when I asked why they'd do this. Every 20 years- 'it' becomes hungry, and needs to eat.

I mentioned the pundits that have casual meetups and run community events. But during the year leading up to the big day, the members of the Church of Many go into full force. The nice family-friendly events either wind down or are tricks to preach their word. It's almost like the cliche of a timeshare getaway.

I was looking for a nice day out with my girlfriend of 3 years. Though we went to the same school, we met a few years after. Things were well, so I wanted to splash out on something nice.

Our usual nice day out was to go to the steakhouse and get something fancy from the evening menu. The guy running the place was really nice, and if he knew it was a special day, he'd treat you right. He made a lot of business from being known as the place to go during a special day.

Though you should never lie to him. If he found out you lied about your birthday or anniversary just to get some preferential treatment, you'd never get that privilege again. Like I said, everyone knew everyone, and if word traveled enough, you could have a rough time in the village for a few years until you got your reputation back.

Wendy and I were up for the same routine, but I saw a poster on the village board about a pop-up food place on my way to work. It promised foreign food and foreign entertainment. I'm sure it's normal for you to treat yourself to a Chinese at the end of a night of drinking, but here, that was a luxury. To have tasted outside food was something you could talk about for many years with the heated interest of many. You'd have people lying about trying things just to gain a foothold on the social ladder. So when word of a travelling Vietnamese diner was put up, I immediately put in for it.

Not many people got in, but I aggressively brought up my special day and just about squeezed in.

It was the talk of the town, and I found out a lot of people that I knew were going. All seemed to be about my age.

Even though I wanted this to be about Wendy, I asked my parents if they wanted to go too. But it was strange. Even though they were on the camp of always wanting to try something foreign, they quickly refused. Wendy's parents did the same.

We should have picked up on how strange this was, but we couldn't piece together a good reason.

The day came, and everyone was tense. We were seated in a small auditorium with tables and chairs arranged so that you could see the stage. We all assumed this was to see the entertainment, which we awaited eagerly.

The lights dropped, and spots were shone on the stage. We were introduced to the head chef. A man with a complexion that was unlike anything we'd ever seen. A very distinct eye shape. And jet black hair. He was the real deal. But then he was joined with others, and it was clear what we'd fallen for.

Beside him were two pundits from the Church of Many. They introduced the chef and the itinerary of the evening. Some people were looking around, seeing if they could get out in time, but it was too late.

The lights came on, and around us were the other members of the church. They were dressed in flares of abnormal red clothes. Their faces were rubbed with a tinge of yellowed powder, and they had taped their eyes on the sides to be more narrow. A caricature of the man on the stage. The head chef seemed very displeased at this but must have been heavily compensated to put up with our small village shenanigans.

The chef was led to the back, and the evening commenced.

The heavy propaganda that ran the whole night drowned out smells of exciting spices. Members of the Church came up and had many segments throughout the night.

Throughout the years, they ran many festivals that celebrated local culture. One segment was about their contributions to the growth of the town. Raising a family here was very prospective due to the many great events they organized. This appealed to the family-oriented people of the crowd.

They also ran events highlighting local made produce that praised local craftsmen. Furniture, artisan alcohols, fresh foods. It was common to have a personal skill on top of your primary career. So to be part of that growth really appealed to the hard workers.

If you ever needed help, the Church of Many were there. One woman had an accident in which a heavy piece of furniture was dropped and crushed her leg. Her career died on that day, along with her dreams of dancing. So the Church ran a fundraiser for her to receive outside help, and with the help of a hospital many miles away, she managed to regain some of her leg function. To this day, she still leads a healthy life.

They hit all the checkboxes. Despite the deceptive nature of the event, they didn't sound too bad.

Then they had a segment appealing to the less active people of the crowd. You can drink in the morning during the 'meetings' three days a week if you join. It was allowed on workdays due to religious reasons as sanctioned by the head family. The rule of thumb was to not get belligerent, but anything before that is open game.

Again, this turned some heads. It had people thinking maybe it's not as bad as some said.

Fear of the unknown is big and circulates predominantly in talkative circles. The Church of Many always had an odd reputation where you never knew where their true intentions lay. Their nature was very relaxed, but they had some serious and unknown religious practises. It seemed you only got full details if you were in, and even then, you had to be a long time member before you got any critical information. This caused a lot of distrust from some of the more opposed members of the public.

The food came out, and it was divine. I don't even remember what it was called, nor do I fully remember even what meat it was. It was a blast of spices and sauces mixed in a way utterly alien to our meat and potatoes culture. The reaction was visceral at how shocking it was. Some people cried tears of joy at having had such an experience.

But after this, it was only downhill from there.

They had more segments on stage. We were receptive to such a fantastic meal and very persuasive points. But this is where it started to get a bit crazy.

They raved about the truth of it all. How we could be free from our mental prisons. They put down the common man as being ignorant to higher truths. Simple salvation could be had if you joined.

The eldest of the group came out. Old man Ezekiel. He had lived through four Alarms. The most out of anyone in the village. His beard hung low, giving him a sage appearance. He wore garb far outdated to the modern times of our province.

Old man Ezekiel went on to come out with something that divided the room. He claimed he survived being outside during an Alarm. He explained it was when he was but 4 years old, having been left by his mother by accident. Ezekiel claimed what he saw led him to revolutionizing the inner circle of the Church of Many. But these secrets were too much for someone uninitiated. The only way to receive the blessed knowledge was to pledge your life to the Church. Work hard, and earn the highest of trust.

This immediately had the room in whispers. Some had family taken because of the Alarm, while others had their biases and theories challenged by the notion of someone surviving. He was heckled with questions. If he survived one, why had he hidden for the others? Was anyone around who could challenge such a claim? If he had this knowledge, why hasn't he tried to stop it? He simple stood there with an all-knowing expression. And only when the commotion died down did he simply walk off stage. We received no more words. The ball was in our court.

By the end, some left in a huff, having felt insulted by the ridiculous claim. Others were already fanatical about the cause, already trying to garner more interest in the divided members of the crowd. In the end, Wendy and I left. We weren't 100% opposed to the Church, but we hadn't had the drive to seek more direct answers.

When we got home, my dad was there to greet me. He asked me how the food was, but I knew he knew what it was about. He explained what the whole thing was. Every 20 years, they did something like this. They'd run a highly desirable event that garners vast amounts of interest. And it's all to push for new members. Those who went to a previous one, or knew about it, were forbidden to 'warn' the newer generation. And so he had to sit there and let us ago, along with others who we told.

Nearing the coming day, you can feel it coming. There's electricity in the air. Less and less events happen the longer the 20th year goes on. People know to keep their schedules open in case they're caught unaware. Even the Church quietens down their excursions in fear of accidentally getting people trapped outside when it happens. But even still, there are the parties.

Some parties and meetups happen close to the bunker during the coming months. These events have strict rules to keep running. It sounds weird, but it's encouraged by the head family. I reckon it's to keep our small economy stimulated. If not enough people spend, money gets held up and bottlenecked.

There can be music, and musicians are hired, but it can't be too loud. You can drink but no hard liquor, and there's an unwritten rule to never get belligerently drunk. In the past, there have been those reported to have drunkenly slept through an Alarm and went missing from not getting in the bunker.

Though there's a somber air to these meetups, it's still a much needed social energy. It can feel like months of waiting, so going that long without any stimulation can drive one stir crazy.

It's normal to keep your circle of friends from school well after school has ended, which was the case for me. Every time I went to one of these events, I'd see familiar faces. Edna, who I mentioned before, Kyle, who was in my form, Watson, who was often on my walk to school, and Steg, whom I'd known since kindergarten. Up until then, talk about the Alarm had dried up. Everyone had said their piece many times, and there was never any new information to spark more ideas. But when we knew the day was coming, it'd creep back into conversation like old times.

Being more mature, our conversations dropped from the wild notions to more talking about getting past it. We knew the consequences of not following the rules. Other than Ezekiel, no one has ever survived being outside during the Alarm. And even then, his claim was heavily scrutinized.

We all agreed to just behave until then. Keep a low profile, and get past it. Simple, right?

It turns out Kyle had other ideas. When the date was getting close, he started bringing up some of the old theories from school. He'd bring up a few but always circle back to one. That you could make a wish if you survived.

Edna immediately flipped out about this. By then, it was known what had happened to James. So it was already a bad move to bring up the Alarm, but bringing up the rumour that got him killed was not cool.

One time Steg went off on him for always bringing it up. We couldn't figure out what he was thinking. Kyle would try to soothe the idea that it was worth a shot. That he wanted it to be true. But Steg would have none of it. It was during one of his put-downs that Kyle spoke up. He screamed so loud the pub briefly quietened down. All he said was- "But it could bring her back…"

We all knew what this meant.

When Kyle was 8, his mother fell ill. It wasn't immediate, so for three years, he'd rush home from school every day to be with her. They were really close, so losing her really took a part of him with her. So the idea of a way to bring her back, no matter how obscene, was romanticized to him.

Even though we all felt for him, we took an opposing stance. We knew it was a bad idea.

To Kyle, though, the prospect of the Alarm only coming every 20 years meant it was now or never. So looking back, I think there was no talking him out of it.

He only told me. I was often the one to talk to him afterwards and empathize with his situation. I did this to make him feel better after a harsh berated from Steg. So I think this made me his confidant. So one day, after a late-night gathering, he took me somewhere. A small reinforced hut near the outskirts of the village.

Over the years, he built it. He'd apprenticed as a builder after finishing school. So to think he chose that career just for this was an absurd idea to me. But at this point I wouldn’t put it past him. I never said anything. I just listened.

He went on to explain the rigidity of the thing. It was strong enough to withstand a bomb. The only opening was small enough to keep up the strength of the structure, and on it was a small porthole to look outside. His thinking was that he had to see and talk to whatever came to make the wish.

Inside was some food and water, but not too much since it'd only need to last for one night. By his design, it couldn't be locked from the outside. This is to allow fast access when the time comes. Trust was common in the village, so locks were often not needed. However, it could be locked from the inside. And it was a rigid lock. He let me test it, and when it was bolted, my full force barely shook the thing.

To say it was solid was an understatement.

Then the day came.

When it was time, you knew. The Alarms made a winding-up sound like they were warming up. This was your cue to get to the bunker as soon as possible. I saw everyone moving in unison. All making their way calmly but hastily to the one place drilled into us from birth.

But while making my way there, I noticed him. And only because I knew to look out for him. But there he was, Kyle, slinking away in the opposite direction. I knew where he was going, and looking back, I could have stopped. Sure, he could have still escaped if we went after him. But he trusted me when he confided in me his idea. To break that would have challenged my honour of being a friend. Something a lot of people took seriously. So I just gave him a subtle nod and wished him Godspeed.

The mood in the bunker is something you can't explain. Only when you experience it, does it fully sink in what’s truly happening. An Alarm is going off, while the whole population is hunkered together. But something they never tell you about is the commotions that inevitably start.

A couple started raving that they had left their pet. They were causing a commotion by the door, begging to be let out while the Alarms were still just winding. But they were obviously refused exit.

Then a woman started screaming. She met up with the kids brought in from the school but couldn't find her son. The teacher explained that he had just slipped away from the class. It was protocol to not go back. There were too many examples of losing a teacher long with a kid when this happened. So it was drilled into them to never go back. This sounds pragmatic on paper, but seeing the pain from a screaming parent berate them will forever stay with me.

At first, when I saw the burly crew that operated the doors, I was intimidated by their presence. They were the leading team of the local police force. Crime wasn't a common thing in the village, and when there was an incident, it was often just a civil case that was resolved with words, not action. So when you had a small team constantly trained in physical combat, it was rumoured that it was just for this instance. The manning of the door during the alarm.

It's easy to think it just a precaution. But witnessing it in person, I was thankful for the time they put into sculpting their life for this very moment. Holding down one or two people is easy for someone strong. But when the parents corralled other parents into their cause to get out and rescue their kid, to see the efficiency of the coup being put down was like a well oiled machine.

You'd think they'd be at their limit when it was nearly 2 on 1 per bouncer. But the number grew when another incident happened that they never warned you about. The knocks.

The Alarms started, and they were loud. You had to talk just below a shout to be heard. So when you heard faint knocking from the door, you knew they were hitting hard. Only when you listened closely could you hear them. People left outside, having not made it in time, just outside the door.

Though you couldn't hear the words, you could hear to the pleading in their voice. Begging to be let in. Terms of desperation screamed as loud as they could. Obviously, the humanitarian of the bunch raised a commotion about this. They yelled at the bouncers to quickly open the door and let them in. It'd only be for a few seconds if they were fast. Still subjugating the rioting parents, it was amazing to see how they could still overpower this new group causing an uprising.

All the while, seeing how serious they were taking things in the bunker, all I could think of was Kyle.

At first, I didn't realize it, but eventually the screaming and bashing outside stopped. Not just petered off. It just stopped. Yet the Alarms still rang.

They rang for a solid hour before slowing down back into its wind up sound, then died down entirely. We all stood there in silence for a moment, taking everything in. Almost in disbelief that it was over. 20 years of build-up, just for that one hour. But there'd be no reports in the past of a false end, or a double Alarm, so not long after, the doors were opened, and we were free to leave.

The held down and rambunctious lot were let go with no warning or punishment. It seemed understandable that it was to happen, almost inevitable. A high point of emotion, but not held against them. Though scratched up and bruised, they left without a whisper.

Elders from the Church of Many loudly raved celebratory words of another successful Alarm, though they were largely ignored.

Most went back into their daily routine, but I slipped away with one place in mind.

I got to Kyle's bunker and knocked as much as I could. I berated with questions. If he was in there if he was okay. To just make a sound. Anything. But I heard nothing.

I peeked inside through the tiny porthole to try to see him. The porthole offered a wide few of the small room. If he was in there, I'd see him.

Then I tried the last thing I could do. I pushed the door to open it, and it was locked.

“George, you gotta see what’s been set up by the bandstand. There’s this huge tent up and this man standing in front of it yellin’ like a carnival barker.” Sarah was out of breath and obviously had run from the park and all the way down Main Street. Her hair was whipsawed every which way and one strand stuck to the end of her nose. She gave a quick puff and blew it out of the way and waited for me to react. With Sarah, I was always two steps behind and running to catch up. Girl had energy in those days and in an unlimited supply.

I stopped rearranging the nails and said, “There wasn’t anythin’ up there when I walked by this mornin’. When’d it go up?”

She shrugged her shoulders, a quick raise and drop, “Dunno, but it’s up. And you gotta see this guy. He’s all dressed up, head to toe and he can talk. Boy, can he talk.”

I thought about and checked the clock. It was near about 5 and time for me to quit anyway. “All right, let’s go check it out then.”

Sarah grinned from ear to ear and was gone. I didn’t doubt she was telling everyone in the gang, the ones that were still in town anyway. Most of us scattered to the four winds after graduation. Only a handful of us remained in town and only a handful of us were on hand to witness the dance.

I walked down to bandstand by myself, not bothering to wait for the others. Most likely Sarah was already there waiting for us. I met up with Bill as I passed the drugstore, where he worked as a soda jerk. “What the hell is Sarah talkin’ about George? She blew in here and then blew out again before I could ask her anything.” Bill was a big guy, tallest (and heaviest) guy in our class and I just about cracked up the first time I saw him wearing that little peaked paper cap McCleary makes his soda jerks wear. Bill doesn’t really like to be laughed at though and after the knot under my eye went down, I made sure not to laugh at him anymore.

He’s a good guy aside from that temper. He was the best guy on the highschool basketball team too, though he’s one of the few guys who got kicked out of a game. Threw another player halfway down the court. And they were on the same team too. Bill said the other guy elbowed him in the gut. Had to have been an accident, no one would have done it on purpose.

We both walked down the street, Bill smoking a cigarette, a habit that caught up to him in 1995 when they removed his right lung. At the end of Main Street, we crossed Buchanan and entered the park. Normally, at that point, we would have been able to see the bandstand, perched on a hill near the center of the park. During the summer, there’d be concerts: performances by the school marching band, a church choir singing some hymns, that kind of thing. Once a couple of kids from the high school had put together a pretty good rockabilly group, but somehow the parks committee passed an ordinance that banned rock ‘n’ roll in the park. Small towns, you know?

But now, there was a huge, faded yellow tent blocking the bandstand, like the kind in the circus or the kinds those old revival ministers like to use when they’re feelin’ the spirit and they like to feel your wallet too.

There was already a pretty large crowd around the tent and as Bill and I got closer, we could hear the fellow that Sarah had told us about. He sounded like a carnival barker all right. Bill and I walked faster down the path that lead to the tent. We pushed our way through the crowd, up toward the tent and where we thought the man was.

“Come on everybody, it’s getting’ close, getting’ close, we’re goin’ to have ourselves a heckuva time tonight, yes indeed, a HECKUVA time. We’ll be singin’, we’ll be dancin’ I PROMISE that and the Song and Dance Man always keeps his promises!”

We still couldn’t see him, still too many people were blocking the way. It looked like the whole town had shown up to see the Song and Dance Man. Bill tugged on my sleeve and pointed. I followed his finger and got bug eyed. It was Reverend Harper, the Baptist minister. I’ve lived a good long time, but I ain’t ever seen a man that could thump a Bible harder than he. Harper preached against the evils of sin; sin in drinking, sin in smoking reefer, sin in smoking tobacco, sin in lying and most of all, sin in dancing. And here he was lining up to get inside the tent too, ‘cause he certainly wasn’t preaching. We waved at him, Bill waving with the hand that held the cigarette and that old Baptist turned red as the Red Sea and turned and walked away. Bill and I grinned at each other and kept on walking toward the front and toward the Song and Dance Man.

Finally we broke through the crowd and there he was. He stood on an old crate, splintered and lookin’ like it was on the verge of collapsing under his feet. On the grass beside him lay a black fiddle case with gold trim along its edges. It looked old, older than the crate, older than the town. It seemed like something ancient.

He was all angles, all knees, elbows and shoulders. Tall and gangling, his body moving and bopping to the rhythm of his words. He wore a red and white pin-stripe jacket, looking like he belonged in a barber shop quartet. A straw hat sat on his head, always getting pushed back or pulled forward by his long fingered hands. Long, six fingered hands. I started when I saw that. I had read that it some folks are born with six fingers, but readin’ about something and seein’ it are two different things.

His eyes just about flashed blue lightning as he spoke and sparks nearly flew from those white teeth. And he just never stopped talking. Not for breath, not for questions, not for anything. Just kept up that patter like his very soul depended on it.

“All right, all right, all right, we’re getting’ close, getting’ real close, yes we are. Are you ready to dance? Are you ready to sing? Cause I’m ready to play my fiddle, yes I am, yes I am. Gotta fiddle at my feet and I’m ready to play. Ready to make those strings SING, can you believe it?”

He’s clap his hands and that’s as close to a pause he was willing to do.

Sarah and Sam came up to us now, having found us in the crowd. Sarah elbowed me in the rib and said, “What’d I tell you? Looks like he should be in a carnival tryin’ to get us in to see the bearded lady or somethin’.”

Sam nodded his head in greeting to us, which caused his glasses to slide down his nose and he gave them a short push back up to where they belonged. He was as tall as Bill, but nowhere near as built. He was the smart guy in our gang. You had to have someone like him around to tell how to do things like take apart the principal’s car and rebuild it in the school gym. Not that we ever did anything like that.

“What’s he sellin’?” asked Sam.

“A dance, I figure,” I said.

“What’s it cost?”

The Song and Dance Man must have heard him because he said, “What does it cost I hear you ask? Why it don’t cost a dollar and it don’t cost a quarter and it don’t cost a dime. Folks, this will cost you nothin’, just get on in and dance to the song all night long.”

We all looked at each other. Good deal. A little free music and space to dance? There wasn’t much to do in town back in those days and there still isn’t. This was almost too good to be true.

The Song and Dance Man stopped now, a minor miracle in and of itself. He dug deep into his pocket, pulled out a gold watch and checked the time. And then he grinned a grin that must have shown every one of his teeth. He repocketed the watch and said, “Folks, it’s time for the dance so come on in. Come on in, everyone because it’s time for the dance to begin.” And with that, he hopped down from his crate, grabbed it up with the fiddle and darted through the tent flaps.

Sarah, Bill, Sam and I nearly got mowed over in the rush to get inside, but we were still the first ones in. We stopped short when we pushed aside those big old tent flaps, but were quickly driven inside.

It was huge inside. There was a hardwood floor beneath our feet that looked like it must be oak, a dark, dark oak polished to a mirror shine. There were candles in holders all along the tent-pole posts and when I looked up, I couldn’t see the ceiling for all the darkness. It was like looking up at a starless night sky, where the moon didn’t dare show her face.

The crowd kept driving us and more and more people poured in. It wasn’t just the young people either. There was Missus Crenshaw, our Junior year English teacher who was in her fifties. There was Mr. Hoskins the principal. There was the good old Revered Harper, still looking embarrassed, but also like he couldn’t help himself. It really was the whole damn town. Hell, even the mayor was there with his wife, standing and talking with the chief of police.

Soon everyone was inside and the murmur from all the talking was nearly deafening. It was already getting warm in there and I was feeling cramped and claustrophobic. We were all looking for the Song and Dance Man, to see where he had gone. No one looked up, so no one saw him until the first pull of his fiddle bow.

He was there, on the center tentpole, sitting on a small, wooden platform, about twenty feet off the floor. God knows how he got up there, because there certainly wasn’t any ladder goin’ up. He dangled his feet over the edge and held his fiddle in one hand and the bow in the other. The fiddle and bow seemed to be made of that same dark wood that the floor was and gleamed in the candlelight like a thing alive. I almost doubted that the fiddle even needed the Song and Dance Man to make its strings hum.

We all looked up at him and he grinned and jumped to his feet while the crowd gasped, worried he might plummet into their midst.

And then he began to play.

He made those strings sing. I haven’t heard anyone play like that before or since and I thank God for that every day. It made the air around us crackle and spark. It loosened the joints and jolted the mind. You felt the urge to move deep in the bone, buried in the marrow. I grabbed Sarah’s hands and we began to move across the floor and everyone followed suit. Some with partners and some without. Some doing the foxtrot, some doing a waltz and some of us doing the twist. We dance, moved, shucked, jived, rocked and rolled.

I passed Reverend Harper moving his feet in a clunky boxstep with Eloise Grendel, an old battle-axe of a Catholic. I saw the mayor’s wife waltzing with Dan Adams, one of our firemen.

I swirled with Sarah, moving across the floor, bumping and jostling with the people around us. It was hot and getting hotter in there and it wasn’t long before it smelled of sweat and bodies moving against bodies. I felt dizzy, but we kept dancing together, kept dancing and not stopping. It was awhile before I realized that the Song and Dance Man was singing too, but in a language I didn’t understand.

He lorded over us, standing on that platform, making his fiddle sing and sing. His bow rose and fell, slid back and forth, side to side. He played like he talked. No breaks, no pauses, just a manic deluge of tunes while his tongue curled around words that had no business being said in this world.

I gave my head a shake as I spun with Sarah and I realized my legs were tired. My feet ached and my lower back was beginning to throb. I checked my watch and realized we had been dancing for a solid hour. I shook my head again, trying to shake off the dozy feeling that was clouding my thinking.

“Sarah,” I cleared my throat. I had only spoken in a whisper. My tongue felt thick and funny. I tried again, “Sarah.” Louder this time, but she still didn’t respond and we kept dancing. I shook her, but she didn’t respond. I kept shaking her until I realized I was doin’ it in time with the music.

So I just tried to stop. And I couldn’t. I couldn’t stop.

Underneath the fog, I began to feel frightened. I began to see the faces of the other people now. I saw their terror. Reverend Harper’s face had grown redder than it had been before. Sweat poured down his face, but still he kept moving, twirling Missus Grendel around and around, her head lolling from side to side. She had fainted, but her feet were still moving. We moved past Bill who danced with Susie Watkins and I saw her frightened eyes darting around the room, but Bill bobbed his head in time with music and his glassy eyes looked at nothing in particular.

The Song and Dance Man laughed from his perch and kept playing, tapping his feet. His eyes were glowing in that dark, humid place. Glowed and glowed and light glanced off the bow with each sweep.

I heard a scream and swiveled my head to watch a woman drop to the floor holding her leg. She had cramped up. I was envious. She got to stop. She got to rest. My own legs felt like dead wood and the ache in my back had deepened.

Then her partner stepped on her ankle and I heard the crunch from across the room. He was still dancing, his eyes blank and empty as he moved. She screamed again and started to crawl away, but began to stand up instead. She started to dance, bringing her weight down on the broken ankle. Again and again and again. I turned away, but I couldn’t block the sound of her sobbing.

The music ran on.

I checked my watch again and it was three hours now. We didn’t flag. Didn’t falter. We kept up the same speed as the fiddle. The damning fiddle. Rapping our feet against the floor. Never mind the blisters that burst. Never mind broken toes or broken ankles. Never mind that deep pain buried in the spine that refused to go. Never mind old hearts and bad knees.

We kept up that frantic pace as one mass: a bobbing, thumping, jumping creature with one mind.

Reverend Harper died at one point. I watched it happen. He was holding up the still fainted Missus Grendel (whose feet still moved with the music) when he dropped her. And then fell to the floor. He twitched once, his feet beating a quick, staccato rhythm and then was still. Missus Grendel got back up and kept on moving. I watched Harper as I danced, trying to see if he was breathing.

He wasn’t. I swear to you he wasn’t. But he still got back up. He was dead, but he still got back and began to dance again. He turned to look at me, and he grinned the Song and Dance Man’s grin. His eyes were red, filled with blood from whatever had broken in his brain. I watched as a single red tear rolled down his cheek.

I shut my eyes and kept moving.

Harper wasn’t the last. He probably wasn’t the first. The old and the sick were the first to drop. Exhaustion, heart attacks, hemorrhages somewhere deep inside, they died. And then they got back and kept dancing, grinning their grins.

I passed Sam and Lizzie. He had lost his glasses at some point. His eyes darted around, terribly aware. I looked at his leg and I saw a jut of bone tearing through his denim jeans. There was a trail of blood behind him and as he swirled, a spray landed on the legs of the people around him. He stepped on that broken leg, twirled on it, jumped on it. All in time with that fiddle.

The night passed.

I remember stepping on something at one point and realizing I had just crushed Missus Dempsey’s right hand. She was lying on her back on the dance floor. She had been stepped on time and again. I could even see a man’s shoeprint on her stomach. Her head had been caved in, her chest beneath her dress had a sunken look. And still she was trying to get up to keep moving.

The smell of blood mixed with the sweat and I couldn’t breathe anymore. The air was thick and from all around I could hear cries, screams, but nothing that drowned out the fiddle or the Song and Dance Man’s singing.

And then it stopped. I danced one more step and then stopped myself. I looked up at the platform. We all did, craning our necks upward. He was checking his pocket watch.

“All right folks! That’s all for tonight! The dancing is done and the morning has come. You may leave if you can walk and you should walk quick cause this Song and Dance Man is gonna be gone.”

We all stood there, like stunned cattle. And then marched to the tentflaps. No one ran, because they couldn’t. It was a miracle we could walk. Sarah stepped ahead of me and left, but I stayed behind. I turned and looked. And saw at least twenty people still standing there. Harper was among them. They were all grinning, their eyes empty. They stood and made no sign of wanting to leave.

“Go on now friend, the Song and Dance Man has what he wants, but he’d be glad to add you too if you tarry and dally too long.” I looked up at him and saw him smile. And then I turned my back to him and left the tent. When I turned back again it was gone along with the people inside.

That’s the story of what happened. The others won’t tell it or pretend it never happened. Never mind the 21 people that vanished that night, the mayor’s wife included. They’d rather not think about it.

Sarah and I took Sam to the hospital over in the next county, far from folks that knew what had happened, where they had to remove his leg. Sam was quiet before and was quieter still after, pulling odd jobs that a one-legged man could do. Doesn’t move around much nowadays, just sits on his porch, a cane across his lap and massages the stump with his hand. Says it bothers him on cold nights. And warm nights. And wet nights and dry nights.

Bill left and joined the army, stayed in long enough to fight in Vietnam and won a bunch of medals. Came back and settled down to drink and drink hard and if you want to find him, you can find him in Eddie Dixon’s bar. No matter how drunk he gets though, he doesn’t talk about that night.

None of us saw much of Sarah after. She came through the best, but that’s how she always was. She left and went to college, but like Bill, she got pulled back to Belle Carne. She teaches over at the high school now, teaching English to the Juniors.

And I stayed here, plugging away at the hardware store. I ran it for a while, but now I don’t do much of anything. Just sitting around with Sam on his porch, talkin’ about things sometimes. Though not often. Because if I stay too late, stay too long, I’ll see his eyes go glassy behind those coke-bottle lenses and he’ll disappear into himself. And I’ll catch him humming a faint trace of a song and the hairs on my neck stand on end and goosebumps rise on my arms in great knots.

And my foot will start to tap out a small beat on the hardwood porch and a big wide grin will spread across Sam’s face. The grin of the Song and Dance Man

“It’s not right, this isn’t right” he repeated over and over as Judy, his teacher, practically carried him in. She explained the situation to me and then left to get back to her class. I remember I sat silently staring at him from behind my desk, the stern look I reserved for such situations across my face. Again and again he said it:

“This isn’t right; it’s not supposed to be like this.”

He looked odd; panicked and upset, though not in the way one would expect a ten year old to be on being sent to the headmaster’s office. His eyes darted back and forth, as my own have many times when in bursts of rapid thought. Eventually I spoke over him.

“Christopher. This is very disappointing.”

I always used a full first name if I was giving a child a telling off, it sounds so much more serious. He took little notice and carried on repeating those same words, glancing this way and that, looking utterly confused.

“Christopher. Christopher. Look at me when I’m speaking. Christopher!”

I remember I raised my voice almost to a shout as I said his name that last time, something I rarely did. His eyes snapped onto mine as he fell silent. I expected to see them gloss over, it’s a dreadful thing to make a child cry, and so I began again in a calmer tone:

“It’s disappointing to have you sent-”

“Look, something’s gone wrong somewhere. This isn’t supposed to happen like this.”

I was shocked to be interrupted, but what startled me, what left me speechless for those few moments as he carried on, was the way he spoke. His voice was that of a young boy, to be sure, but as if under the control of someone far older. His enunciation was clear and precise, his tone somehow mature and serious.

“I just need to think for a moment, I can sort this out. I just need to think.”

His eyes went back to their darting to and fro. I had found my voice by now.

“I expect you to listen when I am talking to you young man. Do not interrupt me when I am speaking.”

His eyes fixed onto my own again and he spoke before I could continue.

“Sure, sure, Ok. Look, just give me five minutes to talk ok. Five minutes, that’s all I’m asking.”

I’m not sure what made me do it; perhaps it was just the peculiarity of the whole situation so far. I sat back in my chair, took the pipe out of my top drawer and began to fill its end with tobacco, for one was still allowed to smoke indoors at this point in Britain.

“Five minutes.”

I lit the pipe and popped it into my mouth, gesturing that he sit down in a chair next to my desk, which he did, and let him speak.

“Ok, how do I… I’ve been here before, well not in this situation, but at this school, at this time; I’ve lived through this before. I’ve… have you ever seen the film Groundhog Day?”

I shook me head.

“Ok, well… have you ever thought about going back in time, back to an earlier point, but as you are now? Travelling back to redo some of your life with the knowledge you have now? Well, that’s what’s happened to me, only… only I can’t control it, and I can’t stop it.”

He sat back a little further on the chair now, his face became grim as he looked out of a window across the room.

“I live life normally until my thirtieth birthday, and then I wake up a four year old, back in a house I haven’t lived in for twenty four years. It sounds great, being young again, getting to go back and do things better… but it’s a nightmare. The first time through, I showed off, I’d been a doctor of philosophy before I went back, I could do advanced mathematics, quote Shakespeare, play the piano; it was fun. I was a prodigy. But all the attention I got for me, got taken away from my younger brother. He wasn’t the same brother I’d known before. And what was worse-“

For the first time I saw his eyes become glazed and that piercing voice began to tremble.

“With so much time and effort put into me, my parents never had any more children. I had another brother and sister before, and suddenly they didn’t exist, and it was because of me. I tried to tell people about what was going on, but it’s a hard thing to prove. I’d tell them sports results that hadn’t yet happened, warn them of natural disasters. When it became apparent that my predictions were right I was taken off to study. Drugged in a white walled room. You can’t imagine how long twenty years can take in a padded cell…”

He went silent for a moment, staring blankly out of the window. Then his eyes came back to me.

“But it happened again, I woke up one morning in my parent’s house twenty six years younger. That second time round my parents had two more children, but they weren’t the brother and sister I should have had. They were different, and the others were gone. Now if I try to get the first ones back I’m writing two other kids out of existence. You can’t imagine the guilt…”

He stood up then, and walked over to look at me over the desk, his head only just reaching over it so he could see me.

“Now I need your help. This is my twelfth time. I think if I can make it right, if I can keep everything the way it was supposed to be, maybe it’ll go on. Maybe I won’t have to keep doing this. I wasn’t supposed to be sent here, you aren’t supposed to talk to my mother about this. Look-”

He grabbed a piece of paper and a pen and began scribbling something down. He handed it over after a moment. I forget what he had written exactly; some extremely complex looking mathematical proof.

“No ten year old should know this stuff.”

He grabbed another sheet and began furiously writing again. Names, dates, events, he passed it to me.

“I know it sounds crazy now, but just, just look. These are all things yet to come, you’ll see, take it. Bet on the results, make some money. But please, don’t interfere now, or again. You aren’t supposed to be involved in this.”

I remember only a little of the conversation after that. It was ridiculous, what he was saying, how could I possibly believe it. I told him to stop talking such nonsense and sent him back to his class. I called his mother into my office when she came to collect him and told her about his misbehaving and this strange outburst. I kept his list though, I’m not sure why I did it, but I kept it, safely filed away in my study at home.

I read in a paper a few years later that Chris had killed himself, around the time he told me his second brother should be born. I learnt later that his mother had miscarried. I worry now whether that was my doing. Maybe if I’d done as he asked things would have gone differently, who knows what effect that conversation with her had.

It is now the afternoon of July 21st 2017, the day before Chris would be due to turn 30. Everything on the list that boy furiously scribbled down that day has happened. World cup victories, Hurricanes, the bombing of the twin towers over in the US. Everything just as he wrote it.

But now my thoughts turn to tomorrow. What happens to me? What happens to my daughter, to my grandchildren? If everything goes back so he can live through it again, where do we go? Do we carry on without him? Or will we just never wake up; just disappear?

I’ve lived a long life and I’ve done a great many things, but none haunt me so much as that conversation, and I’ve never felt as much dread as I do today. If we really do start over, I hope I listen the next time through.

Now, when the audio cut, it doesn't sound complete, it's not finished, not over. The producers of AS/CN were purposely cutting off the rest of the sound, and for good reason. The rest that followed was the exact reason why you'll never see this bumper again on the air.

Once again, it's supposedly only run for about nine seconds, and this is a rough transcript of the usual audio: Resonating metal, followed by a rumble, followed by scraping metal, and other rumble. End bumper. So what could you put together with that? Nothing rings a bell, right? Exactly.

This part that they used is utilized effectively to scare off children that have still tuned in to Adult Swim. It even gives adults goose bumps because it's that good. It's closely rivaled with the hammer clinks in the "William Street" production card in nightmare fuel.

Getting back on topic, usually a Cartoon Network employee would enter the control room left by an Adult Swim crew member and take over for a day. It wasn't quite the case that day, however. The usual man schedule to cue the sign-on and such programming for CN for some reason did not start up the day schedule. No one knows if he did this purposely, and whether or not his contract was terminated. This was the least of problems CN had at the time. What followed the common nine-seconds was an extended two-minute broadcast of some of the most horrifying audio ever heard on public television.

The metal continued to resonate, and the scraping continued. Slowly, an uncontrollable sobbing came clearer. Not one person was crying, but a multitude of people were screaming and yelling.

As the metal scraped, the screaming grew louder. Soon, you could hear the slicing of flesh, the grinding of bones, the gushing of blood, and the guttural death rattles of people dying.

All across the United States, millions of children and adults were being exposed to what sounded like a barbaric mass murder. People were calling in all across the country, crying or screaming or begging for it to be turned off. Something kept their eyes attached to the screen and kept them listening to the broadcast.

People assume the control room was finally gotten into, and the bump was shut down, ending a traumatic experience no one could undoubtedly forget. In the last few moments as the resonating metal grew into an unbearable volume, the channel showed the peeking sun winking at the viewer, and the channel cut to Bars and Tones.

How was Cartoon Network going to cover this up? No one knows their exact tactic to this day. Multiple theories have been thought of, ranging from a pre-emptive "cease and desist" to possible news articles to subliminal viewer hypnosis over the following weeks.

While all public evidence does not officially exist, Cartoon Network officials do acknowledge a hijacking of the channel's frequency on the day but go into no further detail. All late morning bumps, including TDIYE, were replaced with the corresponding ones from the 1:30 AM timeslot. Word is, however, that somewhere hidden in an onion site (accessible only via Tor) is a recording of the bump played that morning.

The question asked the most among the few who remember this is how Cartoon Network got the audio in the first place.

It all began with a hippie roommate and Lot, or “the place where things get weird.” It’s a music festival, but it’s more. Lot is a place where music and people and drugs all become one (for the right price). If you’re really concerned about technicalities, it’s a version of the parking lots where Grateful Dead fans used to accumulate before/after/during shows.

It was at one such show where it all changed.

I was wandering around between bands one afternoon when a glimmer of something in the tall grass caught my eye. With a sense of childlike wonder one can only attribute to being high as a kite, I approached the shiny. When I got closer I saw that it was pouch of aluminum foil. Trash anywhere else, at a hippie festival this is a ground score. Like a child on Christmas I peeled open the little envelope to expose a few small squares of paper.

Each of the squares was different. I’d seen blotter acid a few times and recognized most of the prints. One was a mystery to me. I spent a lot of time fixating on it, but the best I could figure from the piece I had was that it was some kind of fractal with an odd script I didn’t quite recognize. When I first looked at my prize it had appeared to be purple and green, but later it seemed reddish. Who knows, because I promptly ate a few of the more familiar pieces and went about my weekend. Had a good time.

When it was time to return to the real world, I brought the mystery dose home and promptly forgot about it.

A few months later the restaurant I worked for closed and I found myself moving back in with my parents. Luckily, they were at the point in life where traveling had become a semi-regular occurrence and about two weeks into unemployment I found myself sitting in their empty house staring at my little foil pouch on a Saturday night.

I was unburdened by responsibilities and my parents wouldn’t be home until next Friday, so I knew I had plenty of time for that mystery hit. I decided to take some time to fast and meditate to get the proper ‘set’ to go with my setting and the unknown dosages I was in for. I took the hit around six in the evening and watched dusk creep in.

I started watching some Doctor Who around seven, and began to feel screwed about nine. I know it’s wrong to feel screwed out of something free, but I was really excited about this unknown experience. It was looking like it was all for nothing. By 10:30 I had retired to my normal evening past time of browsing r/nosleep and assorted creepypasta archives while making sarcastic and skeptical comments. Something about laughing at the story that just made me pee myself a little softened the blow, doing wonders to alleviate my fears.

A little bit before midnight, and long after I’d written off the drug, it felt like lead ball fell in my stomach. I doubled over in surprise and tried to catch my breath. I thought I heard someone laughing. I closed my eyes as another wave of cramping shot through my guts and when I opened them everything had gone grey.

Usually acid made my world vibrant and new, but this was just scary. The shadows seemed to pulse and ebb with some sort of malicious intent I couldn’t quite understand. I quickly pulled my feet up to the couch and wrapped my arms around my legs. I sat there shaking for what felt like hours. Any time I glanced at the clock it said the same thing: 00:00.

I kept reminding myself that this was a drug-induced state, that this would eventually end and everything would go back to normal. It’s the hardest thing to believe when you begin to loose yourself, and the overwhelming despair that threatened to drown me was making my situation even more difficult. The shadows seemed tangible as they ebbed towards my upholstered sanctuary, and I knew dread. Not the fight or flight, adrenaline-pumping terror, but a deep certainty that something was wrong, I was in danger, and there was absolutely nothing I could do about it.

I still don’t know why I thought it would help to close my eyes.

Tortured faces, distorted in agony, screamed behind my eyelids. I only saw their faces, so I was left to imagine the cause of their misery. As soon as their eyes began to cloud over to embrace death as their final relief, they would be replaced by a new victim. And screaming…

I didn’t understand how I could have missed that screaming before; it seemed to be surrounding me. It sounded off though, like some demented sound editor chose only the peak moments of anguish from thousands of screams and blended them together in an unending loop of the most brutal and unnerving compilation of human suffering. A blood curdling shriek from the pale blonde housewife faded into a teenaged boy groaning into a old man’s wail into another face and another voice.

When I opened my eyes, the faces were gone. The shadows seemed subdued, no longer emanating the same aggression that was so intimidating before. The screaming continued though. It was soft and nagging, barely louder than the sound of my heartbeat pounding in my ears. I figured I could tune it out with a little music. Hopefully, the right tunes would draw me to a better trip on their own.

I couldn’t find my iPod, so I weighed my options. I could risk it with the TV, but I had some mildly unsettling experiences in the past involving cable while tripping so that should probably stay out. The entire CD collection in my mom’s 50-disc changer was hair metal, country, and adult contemporary. Computers, with their screens and mouses and keyboards, are just too hard for one in my condition. Time to fall back on vinyl.

I’m going to interject here things I wish I would have remembered before getting my heart set on some Beatles. Thing the first is that the record player was located in a spare bedroom on the far end of my basement. The room in itself was nice enough ever since I cleaned and furnished it to have a ‘me zone’ when I was a teen, but that’s where the next thing comes in. The rest of my basement was an unfinished pit full of junk we were too frugal to throw away but hadn’t missed in years. I mean, concrete floors, exposed rafters, constant leaking, and plywood ‘walls’ separating the rooms. You also had to walk through the cluttered garage and down the stairs with the impossible to reach light bulb socket to get there.

Filled with the bravado of my new mission, I began my journey. The trek went smoothly enough through the well lit garage, but the stairs were menacing even when sober. When the bulb that lit the stairwell burnt out, replacing it involved a precarious arrangement involving balancing our ladder about two-thirds of the way up the stairs. All I’m trying to say is, this bulb was seldom replaced. With the unlit basement waiting at the bottom, the pool of garage light seemed powerless against the shadows.

As I began the long descent, I watched as the amorphous tentacles of darkness crawled up the pale wall past me. It was surrounding me. I didn’t brace myself with the handrail for fear this thing hiding in the dim corners of my world might touch me. I jumped and tripped down the last couple of stairs and stumbled through the basement door. I could have sworn I heard my name in the screaming.

At this volume, the screams were almost like a song. They were still as gut-wrenchingly brutal as ever, but now that it wasn’t as overwhelming I could hear how the rise and fall and changes in tone between the screams meshed together to resemble something like the slow, drawn out chanting of monks. Maybe my mind was just looking for patterns, trying to make sense of this chaos any way it could.

I felt around on the wall for the light switch I knew had always been there. I knew this basement well, but for some reason I couldn’t find the switch. The darkness seemed to throb while I continued my search in vain.

My only option was to sprint to the corner where the next light switch was. For some reason I didn’t want to show weakness to the shadows that were threatening my sanity, if not my very existence. That, and my fear of physical contact with the shadows, kept me from safely feeling my way along the wall like a sane person. I darted to the point where I thought the corner was and reached for the light to my left.

There was nothing. No wall, and certainly no instant safety brought on by a welcome pool of light. I ran blindly, now certain this was not a safe place to be. I couldn’t see the light from the garage where I had come in, and I began to panic. I thundered through another door and finally found the light switch I’d been searching so desperately for. Somehow I had found my way to my room, my sanctuary, and there was light.

The light was so welcome at first that I didn’t miss color. Compared to the unknown I’d traveled through to get here, even the sharp shadows cast by the naked bulb hanging from the ceiling were accepted. I couldn’t welcome the sight of anything that menacing, that ominous, but at least I knew where it was and where it stopped. If I could see it, I could run away; if I could see it, I would be safe.

I was beginning to think everything was going to be okay after all. If I couldn’t get myself out of this bad trip, I could still exert control, even if only by responding rationally to an irrational situation. I convinced myself that I was on the other side of the peak and that things would only get better from this point. I fired up the turn-table and started digging through the vinyl bin.

I needed something mellow enough to calm me down, familiar enough to take me to a good place, and trippy enough to distract me. That meant the acid rock classic, Sergeant Pepper. I’d tripped to it many times, and it was a sort of stand-by.

I started up a couple of novelty lights I had (a variety of colored lights and a laser light projector). Soon I was ignoring the menacing shadows on the floor in favor of the shifting patterns on my ceiling. I was getting through this trauma with a little help from my friends. When it came time for Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds, I fell into the song as I had many times before.

My eyes slid shut as I began to picture myself in a boat on a river in a wonderful, awesome, and colorful world. Somebody called me, and I turned in my mind to the place where the girl with kaleidoscope eyes often stood. She was there, but she too was screaming. Her eyes weren’t the pools of color I was used to getting lost in, but pits writhing with the constant swell of the shadows. The screams came back with renewed vigor, drowning out John Lennon’s attempts to soothe my freakout. In my mind, I turned to run from the terrifying vision of Lucy, and was greeted by tangerine trees smoldering against a ash-streaked marmalade sky. The shades of grey invaded my imagination; painting the entire landscape in harsh and uninspired tones.

When I opened my eyes, I was relieved to see traces of color had slipped in under the radar while I had been gone. The warm colors seemed to be creeping back in through the reds in the wood paneled walls and the lights I was running cast intermittent beams of red light through the otherwise greyscale world. As welcome as the small step towards normalcy was, the red glow was almost as unsettling as the shadows. I stood up to kill the lights and locked eyes with my reflection in a mirror across the room.

The woman in the mirror looked just like me. She had my hair, my nose, my mouth. But her mouth was screaming. I could hear her clearly in my mind not instead of the other screams, but over them. The chorus of shrieks seemed to be speeding up, sounding more and more like a message. If only I would stop screaming, maybe I could make out what they were trying to tell me.

The eyes in the mirror were just like the girl in my mind: oceans of darkness and menace twisting and surging against the surface and threatening to break free. I lifted my hands to my mouth and found it closed as I’d expected, though I’d hoped I really was the one screaming. My mirror self also lifted her hand to her mouth. She had a pistol in her hands. I watched anxiously as she placed the barrel in her mouth. Her screaming had stopped, but I filled the vacancy with my own.

I turned away when she put her finger on the trigger. I heard the gunshot. I couldn’t bring myself to look at the mirror again. I couldn’t sit by and idly watch myself blow my brains out, and I didn’t want to see what was left of me. I wrapped myself head to toe in an old sleeping bag and curled up in the recliner. The looping screams continued to build momentum, coming faster and faster until it was impossible to deny it was a carefully crafted message.

The shadows inched closer to me, licking the floor at the base of my chair. The dread that had been growing since this started had grown into an inferno of terrified adrenaline, with every muscle in my body pleading me to run. As much as I wanted to flee, to escape this horror, I knew it would follow me wherever I went. I knew the shadows would always be a few steps outside of the light, creeping and waiting. For now, they seemed content to toy with me. The darkness seemed eager, but for whatever reason it wasn’t closing in. Was it waiting for something?

On queue, the looping chain of cries grew almost deafening. After listening to the repetition for so long, it was hard to hear anything but disjointed syllables. Unfortunately, like Mad Gabs, once it clicked it was impossible not to hear.

“Jenny, we are the monsters in the shadows. We are the things that go bump in the night. We’ve been watching you.”

I remained in my cocoon until the sun lit my basement room. I never bothered to turn the record over, I just sat in the red room and stared at the grasping fingers of my shadowed tormentors. I ran through the basement up into the house like my life depended on it. Maybe because it did.

The rest of the colors came back gradually once I was upstairs and in the sunlight. I figured I was straight again. That was about noon on Monday. I wasted the rest of the day playing mindless flash games and watching Netflix. Everything was golden until I went to bed.

I haven’t been able to sleep. According to my computer, it’s Thursday. That means it’s been five days. Five days and every time I close my eyes I see the same victims from before, only now I’m just watching them die. The housewife appears and sobs softly before letting go of her suffering. The teenage boy cries out for his mother one last time. The old man chokes mid-scream and twitches silently for a few moments.

The screams have stopped. I actually haven’t heard them at all since I deciphered the message. That’s all they needed to say to me. I never thought I’d say this, but I wish they’d come back. I wish they would tell me what they want from me. The silence is deafening.

I keep catching glimpses of myself in the mirror. I can’t bring myself to look directly at it. I’m terrified that’s their last message for me. They wanted me to see it the first time, but I ignored them. They’re telling me what I have to do. They’re showing me the way out.

My parents will be home tomorrow. I only have to make it one more night and Mommy and Daddy will be here to make it safe and warm. I made sure to turn on all of the lights in the house well before dusk, but that doesn’t keep them away entirely. There will always be another dark corner and another void behind the couch or under the bed. They always find a place to creep in, and they are constantly reaching just a little further into the light than they should.

The light in the kitchen just flickered out. Only an extremely paranoid person would say this is anything more than chance. Then again, the bathroom down the hall just went dark.

There are things that reside in the dark corners of our world. They are very real, and they don’t like to be mocked.