There exists a curious legend among the people of South Africa. Although somewhat obscure now, it was prevalent during the late 19th Century colonisation of Africa which saw the construction of railways across the countryside for the transport of workers. This is the legend of the witch trains – ordinary-looking trains, but staffed by the debased servants of a powerful being generally thought to be a witch, or sometimes even thought to be multiple witches. These trains would appear to people travelling alone at night in the countryside and take them aboard, never to be seen again. This was far from the full extent of the machinations of the being that controlled the trains, who will henceforth be referred to as the Witch, but more on that later. Although the activity of the Witch and Her trains has subsided as of late, there is one witch train still roaming, still waiting to return to the Witch’s house.

Seeking out this train is difficult and will take some time; the rails themselves are not mapped so prepare a rucksack for a long day’s journey – and to carry what you will be bringing back. On the first or last day of any month – this is most conducive to the likelihood of the rails appearing – travel by any means to the town of Karasburg in South Africa. When the sun has gone down, begin walking in any direction between north and north-east of the town. It may be advisable to prepare some sort of self-protective gear for travelling the South African countryside at night, but be warned that, once you reach your destination, whatever protective items or weapons you may bring will not be of any use against what you will encounter there.

Keep walking until you find a railroad track. Inspect it carefully to ensure that it is not merely an ordinary track. The track you are looking for will be in excellent condition, and if you look closely, the ground beneath the track will be completely undisturbed – there should be no difference between ground beneath the track and nearby uncovered ground. Walk in either direction along the track. It should take no longer than an hour for you to reach the station.

In stark contrast to the track, the station is a hovel. You will find the few small buildings completely deserted, and all but one have been burnt to the ground. The one that remains standing is a blackened, rickety, wooden shack, though the single front door appears brand new. A sign nailed to it reads,
“STAFF ONLY.”
In older days this station would have actually had staff – the station hadn’t been burned, either. The witch trains didn’t just stop abducting people of their own volition. The train you are looking for will stop here for you soon, but to make proper use of it you need something from the staff room. No matter what you try, the door will not open for you, but fortunately the Witch gave no special treatment to the walls, trusting them by themselves, along with Her staff, to keep intruders out. They are badly burned and worn. A good kicking at any wall should provide an entrance. The staff room is completely bare, save for a few equipment closets along the walls. Search them thoroughly. Most will contain generic, 19th Century mechanical equipment not worth taking, but one will contain a silver control rod for a gearbox. This control rod will be easy to find – it glows, yet curiously it provides no illumination for anything at all save for itself, no matter how dark the environment is. This is what you need. Take it and wait outside. Now wait, however long it takes. Eventually, you will see the decrepit old passenger train come trundling to a stop in front of you.

A train attendant will open the door for you. This train unusually employs both white and black workers, but regardless of his skin colour he will wear an extremely worn and filthy train staff uniform. He will stare at you with decidedly vacant eyes for a moment, and you will very likely feel a sudden, acute sense of discomfort. You would be right to feel this way – the stare is intense, yet there is no-one behind those dull eyes. The man will then say one word:
“Return.”
The tone will sound odd – as a statement, yet there will be the faintest hint of a query in the sound of it. This is because the man’s speech is meant to be a query. In the past, this man and his fellow staff would, upon stopping and opening the doors for them, ask unfortunate travellers of the South African countryside,
“Single, or return?”

If you were to answer the attendant with “return,” you would be taken on the train and ferried a fair distance along the countryside before being brutally beaten by the train staff and thrown off. This is the same for any others who would have been encountered by this train. Any other answer will simply result in him repeating his question until you give one of the expected answers. The other expected answer you can give is, of course, “single,” however, fortunately for you, the train and its staff no longer have the means to carry out their programmed response to this answer. This is why that part of their dialogue has been removed from their usual protocol. If you answer with this, the attendant will simply stare at you and do nothing until you give another response.

This is where the control rod you have comes in. Without saying a word, produce it and hand it to the attendant. His face will not have any reaction to this, but I can assure you that if he had even the remotest capacity for emotion, he would be profoundly relieved to see it. He will silently take the rod and then step off the train to walk briskly over to the conductor’s car. When he does this, simply climb aboard the train and close the door; nobody will hinder you now, and the attendant will not return to this car. It is a standard passenger car, with rows of wooden seats along the walls, everything thickly coated in dust and worn by centuries of age and neglect. The doors to the other cars, as well as the windows, are boarded up. You must spend the whole journey here, but worry not. It is a short trip, and there is nothing you need to see outside the windows anyway. Sit and wait, you will soon feel the train start to move.

The journey will be short, however, it is unlike any other you have ever taken – the train crosses more than just land, indeed, it crosses more than space, but let’s not dwell on that for now. You will not feel anything during the transition, nor will you feel anything when the train arrives at the destination, however, it is extremely important that you do not open the door until you are absolutely certain that the train has arrived – the transition is lethal to unprotected human life. To tell if the train has arrived, first wait ten minutes – this is the longest it will take to enter the transition – then periodically tap the boarded up window with your finger. A hollow knocking sound will indicate that you have arrived, whereas if your finger produces a dull thud, as if you are tapping against a completely solid object, you have not arrived yet. Disembark as soon as you are sure the train has reached its destination.

As you step off the train you will find yourself on a barren, rocky plain, surrounded by a thick mist. Probably the first thing you’ll notice the large number of rotting human bones scattered across the area. The Witch, in its activities in Earth, made a large number of servants. It also made a large number of enemies. The bones that profane the grounds here belong to both camps. The battle that made such a necropolis of this place is also the reason for the abrupt disappearance of the witch trains and new reports of them. A short distance away, not obscured by the mist, you will see a dilapidated church of white stone. Staying close to the edge of the fog but being very careful not to lose sight of the church, make your way there.

This part is important – you must keep a close eye on the church, for you will soon see a small crowd emerge from it and start approaching the train. These are more of Her servants. As soon as you see them, immediately run into the fog as far as you dare but do NOT lose sight of the church – this place is not a natural part of our world, and consequently the geometry of the land is abnormal. If you proceed in what may seem like a straight line too far into the fog, reversing your direction will not bring you back, and in this way it is far too easy to become hopelessly lost there, so do not lose sight of the church! Wait in the fog as the servants go past. They all wear the same, worn out train staff uniforms, and they all wear the same, utterly vacant expressions on their faces. Don’t let this fool you though; if they catch you trespassing on Her land they will tear you apart with a fanaticism and strength no human could match. Once they reach the train, they will stay there – this is the first time it has been here in over a century. Proceed to the church at this point, but stay close to the fog just in case.

Approach the white church and take note of the damage. The walls are adorned in scorch marks and bullet holes. More of the skeletons of the Witch’s servants and enemies surround the church and are scattered amongst the floors and aisles of the nave inside, as you will see through the blasted front doors. You won’t end up like these skeletons at this point; all of the Witch’s servants in this place have gone to the train and will stay there. The people who attacked this place made sure to destroy the Witch’s means of re-entering our world, such as the train and the control rod for activating the transition, so Her servants will be hard at work investigating the train you have brought here. But don’t worry, if you do this correctly, you should be able to return back with the train and control rod before the Witch can make use of them once more.

Enter the church and proceed through the nave to the doors behind the altar. Muster up your courage and determination here, and perhaps prepare something like a rag to cover your face with. The reports I have on this church do not indicate a good ventilation of the next hallway. When you are ready, enter.

The dim light of the hallway will illuminate the carpet of half-decayed corpses across the floor. On the walls you will see the sources of these dim lights; small globes wired into the distended mouths of rows of mutilated heads attached to bizarre machinery set into the walls. Unlike the previous areas, most of these bodies belong to Her enemies, not servants, ambushed and slaughtered here when they tried to make their way to confront the Witch Herself. Walk as quickly as you can through this hall while being careful not to trip, there is certainly no need to take your time here. You may notice that a few of the light globes are dark. Consider the bearers of those lights extremely lucky, for the truth is that these light globes are powered by the electrical signals in the brains of these heads, kept alive by the arcane machinery that supports them. Try not to dwell too much on their fates, you should save your mental fortitude for the trials ahead, And don’t attempt to turn any more of these lights off – the Witch is coming very soon, and if you do not escape, many more people in our world, including you, will end up like this.

My information on this place is based on the accounts of the few who attacked it over a century ago and managed to escape. Thus, I can’t give details on what you will find beyond this forsaken hallway, but I know that among the things here you should find a library, a door of the same luminous silver of the train’s control rod, with a crucifix set into it, and a pool of blood. Avoid the door for now, and the pool of blood at all costs. Instead enter the library. Most of the books here are worthless, except for one set, which should be the centrepiece of the library. Though these ancient books are penned in Hebrew, their place is marked by a sign in English reading “The Annals of the Connexion of the Thrones of God,” or simply “The Annals of the Connexion.” In layman’s terms, this odd phrase refers, essentially, to telepathy. These are what you are looking for.

Before the end of your journey you, one way or another, will be able to read Hebrew, and many other languages. However, it is advisable that you use your discretion in reading these books should you ever so choose. Aside from instruction on the creation and control of the servants that the Witch uses, these books talk about the precise nature and origins of the Connexion of the Thrones of God, the universe, of God and the other deities of the universe. It also details the origin of our species, and what we are to these beings. These things are explained in as much detail as the human mind, or the mind of any other being of this dimension, is capable of conceiving, and it is reported that an alarming majority of those who have read these texts were unable to reconcile themselves with the bleak truth of our existence, and would suffer insanity or depression at the least, often committing suicide. Carefully consider your life and outlook before you seek the knowledge in these texts.

The other copies of these books were destroyed a long time ago by the Witch, as well as others like her, along with most of the people in the world who naturally had the telepathic Connexion. These people made up a large part of the Witch’s enemies who attacked her here. Take these books and leave now – it will not be long before the Witch emerges from Her slumber, yet there is one more sacrifice you must make to facilitate your escape. Find the room with the silver, crucifix-set door, and steel yourself, for this will not be pleasant. Open the door.

The room is pitch black, but you can clearly see the machinery surrounding the chained, furiously screaming man inside, all of it in the same silver of the non-illuminating glow. Try to find something to hold onto as this man, cut off for so long, forces his mind upon you. Your head will feel as if it is being squashed like a balloon to the bursting point as the last man with the Connexion transfers it to you. It will feel like years, but it will only take seconds before it is done. The man will thankfully die from the strain, making him one less person left behind on your conscience. You will want to take time to process all this, as the knowledge and outright changes to your brain will be unimaginable, but you don’t have a moment, you must run now. If you pass the pool of blood on your way out, you will notice that it is bubbling. The Witch is emerging. Run to the hallway, and prepare yourself for the hardest part.

This hallway was created for the Connected when they attacked this place. All the people now set into the walls have been subjected to unthinkable horrors before being forced inside their minds by destruction of all five of their senses. But with the Connexion you will, upon entering the hallway, feel all of their ghastly thoughts inside your mind. This is why the Witch did this – to weaken the Connected at this hallway with the tormented thoughts of these people so as to defeat them more easily. As hard as it will be, you must focus yourself on running through this hallway. Once you are out, you will be fine, but you must get out quickly.

Get to the train, where Her servants will still be. As long as She is not nearby, you can now use the Connexion to force your will upon them, preventing them from attacking you, but not for long. Quickly enter the conductor’s car on the train, and use your will on the control rod in the same way to make your escape from this place.

If you successfully escape, what you do with your newfound talents and books is entirely up to you. As mentioned before, you now have the capability to read the Hebrew language of the Annals, and other languages. There are many people who will offer incredible sums of money for the Annals of the Connexion, as well as unthinkable gifts, many of which will sicken you with their degradations. Many more people will hunt you for the Annals, as well as for simply what you now are. Most likely, you are not able to predict what you will do, as you will surely be a completely different person at the end of this journey, so at the very least you should hope that you can adapt to your new life quickly enough before it can overwhelm you.

Credit To: corpulent

It may be hard to believe for those of us born in the digital age—when every embarrassing moment can potentially be uploaded to Youtube for posterity—but an estimated 70% of all films from the silent era are thought to be lost.  Of the silent film directors whose works have largely vanished, perhaps the most intriguing, at least for me, is the German director Kai Winckelmann (1887-1926).  Although influential in his own era, he has since been largely forgotten, for reasons which I believe will become readily apparent if you read further in this article.

Winckelmann was born on September 18th, 1887 in Offenbach am Main, the son of a butcher.  He reportedly found the family business very distasteful and did not get along well with his father, who drank heavily.  After serving on the Russian front in World War I—a period of Winckelmann’s life which left him permanently traumatized—Winckelmann married a certain Greta Schulz, a nurse whom he had met at a veteran’s hospital.  He moved with her to her home city of Vienna, Austria, where he began making films for the pioneering producer Joe May. Winckelmann created many moderately successful films while working for May, several of which survive in whole or in part, but by far his most successful work was the Lord Lister serial.

The Lister series, based on a series of pulp stories concerning a gentleman thief named Lord Lister who goes by the nom de guerre Raffles in the criminal underworld, consists of six episodes, each about an hour in length.  The films bear a somewhat superficial resemblance to their source material.  In the original novels, as in the first two episodes of the Lister serial, Lord Lister is a somewhat sympathetic Robin Hood-like figure, à la Arsène Lupin, who rarely commits any particularly egregious misdeeds.  In Winckelmann’s Lister serials, however, he became a much more sinister figure: a seemingly omnipotent mastermind of crime who is not above rape and mass murder.  In the serial, as in the novels, Lord Lister is pursued by a Scotland Yard detective named Baxter.  In the early installments of the serial, Baxter is portrayed as a figure of fun, an incompetent drunkard who is always outwitted by the master thief, but in the later episodes, Baxter becomes a tragic figure, an honest lawman who is helpless to prevent the atrocities of his implacable persecutor, Lord Lister.  Although Lord Lister was played by several different actors—the idea being that his true face was unknown—Detective Baxter was always played by Winckelmann’s friend and confidant, actor Olaf Schneider.

Olaf Schneider became close friends with Winckelmann shortly after the latter began working with Joe May.  The two could not be any more different in appearance or in temperament: Schneider was healthy, muscular, and a lover of fast cars and boxing, while Winckelmann was a recluse and often in poor health.  Nevertheless, the two shared a close relationship, perhaps finding common ground over the tragedies in their respective pasts: Winckelmann had had an abusive childhood and was left mentally scarred by his service in World War I, while Schneider’s wife had committed suicide in 1918, leaving him to raise their infant daughter alone.

The contents of the first five Lister films, insofar as they can safely be reconstructed at all—only one of them survives, and even then only in an incomplete print—are as follows:

1.      Lister tritt ein (Enter Lister): The screenplay of this first episode was written by none other than legendary director-screenwriter Fritz Lang.  In this installment, Lister, who is living under the assumed name Lord William Aberdeen, manages to steal a valuable painting during an art exhibition.  The bumbling Detective Baxter eventually manages to arrest Lister, but the latter escapes, switching identities with a guard in a clever ruse.  A spectacular chase scene ensues, during which Lister, of course, escapes.

2.      Lister schlägt zurück (Lister Hits Back): The film opens with an elaborate scene where Lister steals the pearl necklace off of a duchess’ neck at the opera house.  Shortly thereafter, Lister boldly announces his next crime via a newspaper advertisement: he will still the family jewels of Lord Willmore at such-and-such an hour.  Baxter and his fellow policeman stand guard at Lord Willmore’s side at his mansion, waiting for Lister to appear—but he never does.  Just when he is about to dismiss the incident as a hoax, Baxter hears muffled cries and discovers the real Lord Willmore bound and gagged in a wardrobe; Lister had been impersonating him the entire night, and the real jewels had already been replaced with identical duplicates.  Baxter realizes that the mansion is rigged to explode and barely escapes with his life.  This is the only surviving Lister film.

3.      Lister in Amerika (Lister in America): Detective Baxter receives a tip that Lister is hiding in the United States.  Baxter boards an ocean liner, but half-way across the Atlantic, the voyage begins to go horribly awry: the passengers are falling mysteriously ill.  It seems that Lister has planted plague-infested rats onboard, presumably in an attempt to assassinate Baxter.  Upon his arrival in New York, Baxter is swiftly arrested for a series of murders that Lister committed, and a local judge, really Lister in disguise, sentences him to death by hanging.  Baxter makes a desperate escape through the sewer system and emerges into the night air—where he is greeted with the sight of Lister taunting him from a rooftop.  He is wearing his iconic costume: a black cloak, black gloves, and a black executioner’s mask.  Lister mockingly crosses and extends his wrists, as if daring Baxter to arrest him.

4.      Das tödliche Parfum (The Deadly Perfume): Detective Baxter investigates a series of grisly murders: someone has been replacing department store perfume with sulfuric acid, resulting in dozens of deaths and disfigurements.  In order to uncover the truth, Baxter forms an alliance with a young woman who claims to have been Lord Lister’s lover.  Despite being a married man, Baxter soon begins to succumb to her charms as well.  The film ends with a shocking scene: due to the machinations of Lister, Baxter is forced to allow the young woman to be run over by a train in order to avert an accident that would kill hundreds of people.

5.      Die schreiende Leiche (The Screaming Corpse): Little is known about the contents of this particular film, as contemporary reviews contain little but exclamations of disapproval.  It is known to chronicle Baxter’s descent into alcoholism and depression after his repeated failures to capture Lister.  The plot reportedly involved a deadly fire at an opera house and a surreal scene wherein Lister wears a man’s flesh as a mask.

Despite, or perhaps because of, their often morbid content, the films were quite popular with the contemporary viewing public—one might consider them the Saw of their day.  As you might have guessed, the increasing darkness of Winckelmann’s films was accompanied by a corresponding crisis in his personal life: the affair between Winckelmann’s wife, Greta, and his closest friend, Olaf Schneider.  Winckelmann seems to have known of the affair and tacitly accepted it, although eventually, this seems to have taken a considerable toll on his already fragile psyche.  In a letter to his cousin, dated October 13, 1923, Winckelmann writes: “…And why shouldn’t she prefer him?  A man like him can offer her what I, with my frail body and lacerated soul, could never hope to give her.  My dark Muse has seized control of my life.  I am powerless to do anything but obey its commands…”

This state of affairs continued for some time before an unthinkable tragedy put an end to both the Lord Lister serial and Winckelmann’s partnership with Schneider…at least for the time being.

In December of 1923, Winckelmann was away on business in Frankfurt, having left his 18-month-old son alone with his wife.  The live-in housekeeper was away visiting her sister.  According to the report that a distraught Greta later gave the police, she and Schneider were making love in the bedroom when suddenly she heard a loud thud from the child’s room.  Her son had evidently climbed out of his crib, breaking his neck.  Naturally, this created a gigantic scandal, and no one was particularly surprised when Greta disappeared one day, presumably to start a new life under an assumed name.  As for Schneider, he emigrated soon thereafter to the United States, where he dropped out of the public eye.

Despite the horrendous personal tragedies that had befallen him, Winckelmann held up as well as well as could be imagined under the circumstances.  Although he had been a doting father—at least when he was not distracted by his film-making career–he managed to bear his grief with a certain quiet dignity, even founding his own film company a few months later.  Winckelmann’s studio was relatively successful at first, turning out several lucrative if unremarkable films.  A few years after his son’s death, however, strange rumors began circulating around Winckelmann.  It was said that he had fired most of his staff and spent his days wandering around his empty, decrepit Filmstadt.  In an interview with the Vossische Zeitung dating to six months before his death, Winckelmann claimed that he had fully forgiven Schneider and, rather surprisingly, had been corresponding with him and planned for them to make a film together.  To the surprise, and later dismay, of the viewing public, a final installment of the Lord Lister saga, entitled Listers Rache (Lister’s Revenge) was released in 1927.

Listers Rache was screened in only a few theaters before being permanently withdrawn from circulation.  The film, only 40 minutes long, was much more surreal and expressionistic than any previous installment in the series—and much more unsettling.  Contemporary accounts, though doubtless exaggerated, mention fainting fits and worse at advance screenings of the film.  According to contemporary newspaper reports, the film begins with an intertitle explaining that Detective Baxter has lost his job with Scotland Yard and been abandoned by his family.  Baxter is shown in a dirty, disordered apartment room, sitting at a writing desk; there is no other furniture around him.  Baxter is writing a note whose contents we do not see and weeping all the while.  He is surrounded by empty beer bottles and his appearance is unkempt and disheveled.  The crying scene continues for an uncomfortably long time, after which Baxter leaves his apartment and wanders through the streets of London.  The city is represented by a series of surreal matte paintings, reportedly very much in the style of Das Cabinet des Dr. Caligari, full of absurd angles that would be impossible in reality.  Sinister shapes can be discerned in the background: hanged bodies, weeping, disfigured faces, etc.

Detective Baxter finally pauses in the middle of a tall bridge, contemplating the rough waters and jagged rocks below.  It is clear that he is considering suicide.  Suddenly, a dark shape materializes at the other end of the bridge: it is Lister, wearing his usual executioner’s hood and cloak.  Lister shouts “Jump!” (via an intertitle, of course), and Baxter, after a moment’s pause, manages to gather his resolve and chase after his nemesis.  After a brief chase scene, Lister leaps into an enormous sinkhole, Baxter following close behind.  In the next scene, the detective finds himself in an enormous cavern—presumably the master criminal’s base of operations.  It becomes clear that the cavern is filled with furniture: a dining table with chairs, a wardrobe, a wash basin, even a book case.  Baxter cautiously approaches the table, soon realizing, to his horror, that all of the furniture appears to be made of human bone.  In the center of the cavern is an enormous pile of human body parts, casually stacked together like a compost heap. Baxter recoils in horror and attempts to run back to the entrance of the cavern, but it is too late: Lister, with two other masked men on either side of him, is swiftly approaching, carrying an axe.  We see their shadows on the wall of the cave encroach on the detective’s, finally engulfing it completely.

The scene shifts yet again; Detective Baxter is shown inside a damp dungeon of sorts, his hands and feet manacled to the wall.  He is bruised and bloodied.  A large metal door swings open and Lister reappears, still accompanied by his two masked henchmen.  One of said henchmen is carrying a struggling, wriggling form: a blindfolded little girl, around ten years of age.  Lister tells Baxter “Now you and your daughter will be reunited, just as you wished!”  With that, the two masked thugs hold the screaming and kicking little girl down on the ground while Lister withdraws a butcher knife from somewhere within his cloak and calmly, methodically slashes her throat.  The two masked henchmen then place the dying little girl opposite the distraught Detective Baxter.  Blood is oozing from her mouth and throat, but she is still breathing slightly.  Lister declares “Leave him to his fate!” and the three masked men exit the room, leaving Baxter to watch helplessly as his daughter breathes her last.

An intertitle announces that three weeks have passed, and Baxter is still chained where Lord Lister left him.  His clothes are ragged, his skin is covered in bruises and blisters, and his eyes have a wild, haunted look.  Across from him is the corpse of his daughter, bloated and blackened.  The iron door slowly creeps open, and Lord Lister reappears, once again shadowed by his two masked accomplices.  This time, he is carrying what appears to be a burlap sack.  The two henchmen unchain Baxter; he attempts to strangle Lister, but, in his pathetically weakened state, he is easily restrained.  Lord Lister slowly pulls an object from the sack: it is a long-haired human head, still dripping blood.  “Kiss your wife!” Lister exclaims.  A horrified Baxter refuses, but the henchmen punch him into submission and restrain his arms.  Lister forces the severed head’s lips against Baxter’s, the latter retching all the while.  Baxter is then returned to his restraints, and the two accomplices proceed to savagely beat him with nail-studded wooden planks while Lister looks on.  Lord Lister motions for his men to stop the beating, and Baxter looks up with dying eyes at his tormentor, lying in a pool of his own blood.  “Do you realize now why you’ve never managed to catch me? Why you could never have won?” Lister says.  Lord Lister begins to peel off his hood and turns around to face the camera directly.  We see his true face for the first time—or rather, the space where one should be, for Lister does not possess one at all; his face is a blank wall of flesh with nothing at all to mark it as human accept a gaping black mouth.  “I am Loss,” he says, drifting closer and closer towards the camera, as if threatening to break through it.  Lord Lister’s jaw opens wider and wider, far wider than should be humanly possible; it reaches almost down to his waist, as if threatening to engulf the audience and all the world.  And with that image, the film abruptly ends.

As mentioned above, Listers Rache was a resounding failure with audiences at advance screenings, and it was quickly pulled from most theaters.  Evidently, the film was “too much” even for a movie-going public that had made Winckelmann a wealthy man for his earlier forays into aestheticized violence.  Audiences had found the film’s gore effects to be disturbingly convincing—so convincing, in fact, that many suspected that they were not “effects” at all, and a warrant was soon issued for Winckelmann’s arrest.  After the police had searched in vain for Winckelmann at his home, a fire was reported at his downtown film studio.  Several hours later, Winckelmann’s body, having been pulled from the smoldering ruins of his Filmstadt, was identified using his fingerprints.  Though his garments were badly burned, he appeared to have been dressed in black.

The bodies of Olaf Schneider, his ten-year-old daughter, and his former lover Greta Winckelmann were never recovered.

Like most of Winckelmann’s films, Listers Rache has vanished almost without a trace.  Some copies were lost in fires—an unfortunately very common occurrence, as early film stock was highly flammable—while others were deliberately destroyed.  There is an interesting, though almost certainly apocryphal anecdote in Christian Eichheim’s Moderne Schauermärchen aus der Stummfilmzeit about a rediscovered copy of Listers Rache, which bears repeating here, if only for its dramatic interest.  In 1974, so the story goes, Peter Fleischer, an Austrian film collector, acquired a copy of Listers Rache at an auction.  After viewing the film on his private projector, he began to experience headaches, nausea, and finally hallucinations.  He reported seeing a figure in a black cloak out of the corner of his eye, but the figure would vanish as soon as he turned his head.  At first, this figure would appear to be far away, but it seemed to come closer over time.  Eventually, Fleischer began to suffer from insomnia—the figure would stand over his bed at night, but disappear as soon as the light switch was turned on.  Every appearance of this figure would cause a feeling of intense despair and dread in Fleischer.  After several weeks of agony, Fleischer finally burnt the film reel in his fireplace.  The hallucinations ended, but an inexplicable smell of charred flesh lingered over the chimney.

The same book also offers a rather strange urban legend concerning an alleged curse that hung over the life of Kai Winckelmann.  While serving on the Russian front during World War I, so the story goes, a dying prisoner of Romani descent who had been captured after a particularly bloody skirmish cast the “evil eye” on the young Lieutenant. “The weight of the deaths you have caused will follow you like a cloud,” the man is reported to have said.  Perhaps this was the “dark Muse” Winckelmann spoke of in his letters?  It bears mentioning here that Winckelmann’s sketch book from his stay at the veteran’s hospital contains numerous line drawings of a faceless, cloaked figure.

Regardless of what you think of the supernatural, ask yourself this: who is more real, Hamlet or Shakespeare, Dickens or Oliver Twist, Charles Foster Kane or Orson Welles? Some fictional characters have more life in them than you or I.

Credit To: Lucretius

DERPNOTE: This pasta is a Crappypasta Success Story. That means that it received enough upvotes during its time on Crappypasta for it to be posted on the main archive. You can find its Crappypasta entry here. Thanks, everyone!

“JESUS!!” I cried.
Being jolted from a half dose at a quarter to midnight by my new ‘Halloween theme’ ringtone didn’t do wonders for my heart-rate, especially since I’d momentarily forgot I’d changed the tone at all that day.
Took me a while to find my phone stuck down the side of the armchair I was sitting in, not helped by the fact that the only light in the sitting room was the static on the widescreen TV.

“Unknown Number.”

I answered it, there was no-one there.
To be honest I was expecting heavy breathing on the other end as I was still a little freaked out, but there was no noise at all.
I hung up, took a deep breath and frowned- Maybe I just pocket dialed myself.
My old iPhone could make a fake ‘self call’ designed to create a diversion, so if I was having a boring conversation with someone I could pretend mom was ringing or something , although I wasn’t familiar at all with this ‘new’ piece of crap.
Dad bought it from a gas station for twenty bucks a few days ago, as I’d lost my iPhone on a trip to the city last week.
I flicked through the features on the menu screen trying to find the fake call option, but didn’t have much luck, for one thing the screen was about half the size of a credit card.

I cursed and decided to watch T.V. instead to take my mind off things.
I tried using the light of my cell to find the remote with little success.
Groaning out of laziness, I hauled myself out of the chair to get to the light switch.
Stopping halfway, I registered the fact that I had the T.V. on the satellite channels when I fell asleep yet now: static from the analogue Ariel.
I ran the rest of the way to the switch and basically punched it.
Light flooded the room and my darting eyes saw nothing.
After another deep breath, my moment of fear passed, guess I was a little unused to having the whole house to myself.

Mom and Dad were only gone for the night, but it was quite a treat for me since they rarely went anywhere, even during the day.
Nowhere to go but fields around this part of the country, so them going to a friend’s wedding meant I finally had some solitude.
I still couldn’t see the remote so I decided to recheck the sides of the armchair.
I threw my phone on the seat and reached deep down either side.
The Phone rang again at full creepy blast with my ear pressed right up against it.
I angrily grabbed it- “Dammit WHAT!??”
Again, there was dead silence.
Cursing, I threw the phone back on the seat hard.

POP!!
At that moment the lightbulb blew out violently and the power went out, thrusting me into total darkness.
With a shriek, I scrambled to grab the phone again and found it after an instant of blind terror.
Using the tiny screen light to see, I panicked and bolted down to my room as fast as I could, jumped into bed and pulled the covers. I curled into a fetal position.
I was panting hard, from both the run and the fear. I couldn’t form any thought for about 5 breaths, until I decided to call dad.
Looking at the screen, I saw I forgot to hang up the last call.
My breath caught in my throat as I saw that this time, it wasn’t an “unknown number”- It was mine.

My old number from the phone I’d lost.

As I hit the red button my terrified mind began to race through a thousand horrible implications until I realised something else.

My bed was already warm.

BEEP BEEP. The message tone nearly gave me a heart attack.

“It’s under your pillow”

Ever so slowly, my trembling hand slid underneath the pillow- and found the T.V. remote.

From under the covers I heard my bedroom door close, then lock.

Credit To: Beefnuts

I’m writing this down in this journal because if I don’t, I may go insane. You may think me insane after reading my story. I wish I was.

My name is Jared Baldwin, and I am twenty-two years old. I recently moved into a brand new apartment in rural Maine. Everything was going great the first two weeks, I was having no problems unpacking my boxes and everything seemed to fit nicely. It looked as if everything I had bought had been bought to furnish this apartment. The power company had forgotten to shut off the electricity, cable, and wifi since the last tenants had moved out. Or perhaps, now that I think about it, they had left so fast the company never knew they had even moved. I can’t blame them.

The first night sleeping in the apartment, once I had completely furnished it and gotten everything set up the way I wanted it, was fantastic. I had no problems adjusting to the new environment whatsoever. I fell asleep within five minutes of getting into bed. It was strange, especially for me, since I usually have trouble falling asleep anywhere I’m not used to. I had this feeling that I was meant to live in that apartment, though it was run-down and in a completely isolated area. I don’t do well with isolation, though it didn’t bother me in the apartment.

The second day went well, though I noticed something strange about the bathroom mirror. It had been painted over with black paint, not an inch of mirror could be seen through the coat. A sledgehammer rested on the tile as though someone had just dropped it and left after considering smashing the mirror, too concerned about leaving the apartment to pick it up before they moved away.

Of course, I didn’t think anything of it at the time. I was rather excited to have gotten a free sledgehammer.
A few weeks went by without incident, and I was completely happy in my new abode. However, strange things were starting to happen.

One night, around three, I woke up with the urgent need to use the restroom. I shuffled in and stopped dead in my tracks. Though the mirror was covered with black paint, a faint silver glow showed beneath the cracks in the coat. I was fascinated, and overwhelmed with the desire to scrape off the paint and shove my hand through the mirror. I thought I could hear faint whispers coming from the other side, beckoning me to clear the mirror of its black cover.

I came to my senses and realized that what was happening was not fascinating at all, but frightening. The voices behind the mirror became agitated, and a split second later both the glow and the voices were gone. I closed my eyes and shook my head, and when I opened them again I couldn’t shake the feeling that I had been dreaming and had merely sleepwalked into the bathroom.
I used the restroom and returned to my bed without giving the mirror a second thought.

The next night the same thing happened, though I noticed some of the paint had chipped off the mirror. A small hole in the paint, about three inches tall and two inches wide, revealed a sliver of mirror, which glowed and pulsated with a sort of silver electricity. The voices, soothing and inviting, called me and begged me to remove the paint from the mirror.

I closed my eyes, and when I opened them again I found myself in bed. I glanced at the clock, 7:43 am. Had I dreamed the whole thing? I had a nagging doubt in my mind that maybe what was happening was not a dream at all, but common sense put that idea to rest for a while.

A few more nights passed without incident.

I awoke once more and shuffled into the bathroom in the middle of the night, as I had done twice before. This time a very large amount of paint had been removed from the mirror. A hole about a foot tall and four inches wide had been made in the paint. The pulsating, electric glow permeated the surface of the mirror and reached out into the bathroom. Tendrils of smoke trickled from the mirror. Once again, the voices pleaded me to free the mirror from its coating. Once again I found myself back in bed, only to find that it was the next morning.

I went into the bathroom and saw that an even larger hole in the paint had been made overnight. I looked at my hands and saw black under my nails and staining my fingers.

God, had I been the one removing the paint at night? The thought frightened me, and that night I bolted the bathroom door shut from the outside. The previous tenants had placed the lock there, no doubt for the same reason I had.

When I awoke that night, I unlocked the deadbolt and went into the bathroom. The voices, more inviting than ever and making me feel like I was meant to do nothing else but free whatever hid behind that mirror, once again demanded I remove the paint. I obeyed, though a very deep level of my subconscious screamed for me to stop. I suppressed it and let the sheer pleasure of removing the paint drive me to do my duty.

I awoke the next morning horrified to see that I had removed all the paint from the mirror. Not a shrapnel of black remained on the mirror, and my hands were completely black. What had I done? I was afraid to sleep that night.

A few weeks passed without incident.

One night, waking up around three as I had done many times before, I went into the bathroom at the request of the voices coming through the bathroom door. They were louder now, as one would expect, for they were no longer muffled by the paint. What I saw terrified me more than anything I had ever before experienced. The thing that lived in the mirror was not pleasant at all. The silver glow was more intense than ever, surrounding the outside of the mirror. Tendrils of smoke poured out from the glass, and the creature inside grinned at me, revealing rows of jagged fangs. My heart nearly exploded through my chest. The voices that had before been so kind and pleasant now sounded menacing and sinister. The creature, hidden by shadow, climbed through the glass, chanting my name.

I ran, out of the bathroom and into the living room. Hearing it close behind, laughing and taking its time, I bolted out the front door and didn’t look back. I didn’t worry about my belongings or about leaving my door unlocked. I didn’t even grab my car keys, I just ran.

Now, as I take refuge in a neighbor’s home, I can’t help but feel as though I’m not safe. I released it from the mirror, and I know it will hunt me until it pulls me into the mirror with it. I have to get away from Maine. Tomorrow I will be moving to California. I don’t care about my belongings, I just want to be safe.

-

It has been two months since I last wrote in this notebook. I am now living in a very small apartment in southern California, and am working in a restaurant to pay the rent. Though I can barely afford to buy groceries, I am happy that I no longer have to worry about the demon in the mirror.

Though last night I thought I heard a soft, lovely voice calling to me from my bathroom while I slept. That couldn’t have happened, though, I’m probably just still having nightmares because of what happened in Maine. It couldn’t have followed me here, right?

Credit To: Kaylin Rutter

During the second world war many families in Berlin where confined to shelters for days, sometimes weeks while outside air raids flew overhead.

Many of the children, who were supposed to be at school making friends, where instead put under great stress.

However during this time, the english government, in an attempt to raise moral began a large scale propaganda campaign, the most noticeable of which was the “Keep Calm and Carry On” poster. However less notable was the british government’s contracting of Wonderment Toys & co, to produce free stuffed bears, which were handed out to kids and families around Berlin during raids. the toys were made by war prisoners under forced labour, and at very little expense to the ministries. The project was soon discarded, though after a massive loss of man power in the workhouses.

On the 6th of June 1942, the bodies of over 300 prisoners where found in the workhouses of w&co toy manufactures. The bodies where described as still chained to the work benches, but butchered, bisected from head to crouch and void of all internal organs. Baffled by the massacre, the police were unable to find any leads to who may have been behind the event, but mentioned in the reports that the toys and workstations remained untouched.

Three days after the workhouse massacre, there was a series of small bombings near the north suburban end of Berlin. While causing little damage, the explosions were thought to be responsible for the disappearance of the final shipment of bears, which never arrived at the towns.

The week after the countryside bombings, a large air raid hit most of berlin and in the wake of the raid came a spree of missing children’s reports from north. This while tragic, was nothing more then a footnote, as the war began to reach it’s peak.

The documents following the case reveal no connections to the workhouse massacre, save a disturbing report by an elderly women living in the suburbs on the night of the air raid.

Sue Geese, the elderly woman, reported seeing a large group of children gathered in the streets through her window. The children appeared to be playing with their toy bears.

After a few hours the raid sirens sounded and Miss Geese ran to the bunker screaming at the children to “run home”, according to Geese the children did not hear her or simply ignored her.

During the bombings geese claimed to hear screaming that seemed “hollow” and “metallic” over the explosions, but upon leaving the bunker found only the children’s stuffed bears, which, according to geese, where actually in “good condition considering the damaged surroundings.”

Other reports from the area, not related to the missing children, concerned a bad smell, described as “rotting meat” for three days after the raid.

The children were never found, yet another tragedy born in the horrors of WWII. However, if you look in antique shops, you can still find the bears today, a silent reminder of the hardships endured by the people of England.

Credit To: hendo

‘Diana…Will you marry me?’

Howard opened the small black box. Inside was a ring encompassing a small emerald gem. If you looked close enough at it, you could see a small crack down the middle.

At first Diana looked as if she was going to be sick, though that may have been a side-effect of the excessive champagne.

‘H-H-Howard…’she stuttered. Her eyes widened, and began to well up. Howard determined whether they were tears of joy or tears of-

‘Yes,’ she whispered. ‘Yes,’ a little louder. ‘Yes!’ she screamed, ‘of course I’ll marry you!’

They embraced each other, Diana seizing her husband-to-be so hard that the ring slipped from its box. It hit the restaurant floor, and rolled across the room. And then it was picked up.

Howard, realising the ring had escaped from its box, arose from his chair. He saw the old woman and approached her, though he thought twice about doing so.

The old woman’s face was hidden beneath a black shawl. The hand that was holding the ring was withered and grey. She stood up, her face still a shadowy mass and spoke five words, her voice weak and trembling.

‘You must change the ring.’ She held out her shaking hand. Howard took the ring. He looked down at it.

‘Excuse me?’ He looked up, but the old woman had gone. She had had only one thing to say. Howard soon forgot about her, the ring was fine. Diana loved it, he was sure.

The next morning, Howard’s alarm sounded at half past six. He awoke smiling. Last night had been the happiest of his life. He turned to Diana; only her hand was visible from under the quilt. Immediately, he thought something tragic had happened. He swept up her hand and let out a sigh of relief; a pulse. He was just being paranoid. Howard kissed his fiancé’s hand and left the bed.

Howard worked for a modelling agency, he himself wasn’t a model of course, he only took the photographs. And he was very good at his job, he had a knack for capturing young people on screen.

Howard looked in the mirror, he felt a changed man. He would be married soon, committed. It seemed like the right way to live your life; meet someone and give your life to them. Metaphorically of course.

He quickly breakfasted and headed out to the car. Later, he would regret not giving a proper goodbye to his wife-to-be.

Diana yawned, she too felt different. But for the better or for the worse?

It took her a long time to awaken and even after that, her eye sight was unclear.

She arose with great struggle, her back aching. She tried to shake it off, but only gave herself a headache. She had some painkillers in the bathroom somewhere.

Once in the bathroom, she rushed straight to the medicine cupboard, not even looking in the mirror, the way she always did in the morning. Where were they? Her headache seemed to getting worse by the minute- and so did her eye sight. After she had emptied the entire cupboard, she found what she looking for. Diana took two tablets and swallowed them. She arose to the sink, her back cracking unpleasantly, and washed her face. That seemed to clear up her eye sight a little.

Standing up fully, she met her reflection in the rectangular mirror. Diana screamed in terror.

Ahhh… one of the most important things in life was to enjoy your work. And Howard did, very much so. He entered his car with a smile on his face. His life was perfect. He could wake up looking forward to his day, every day for rest of his life. He had finally met the perfect woman and he would love her no mater what.

Well- that’s what he thought…

He rustled around his pocket for the house key. Once he found it, he slid into the keyhole and turned. There was click and the door opened.

‘Honey, I’m home!’

There was no reply.

‘Honey?’

He skimmed the living room, the kitchen and the downstairs toilet. The ground floor was deserted. He ascended the stairs at light speed. What if something had happened? He wouldn’t be able to bear it, his life had just took a turn for the better, it wasn’t going to be ruined now.

He burst through the bedroom door. There was Diana, under the covers.

‘Oh! You gave me such a fright!’ He approached her.

‘Honey?’

The quilt quivered.

‘Come on, now. That’s enough joking around.’

Any moment now, she was going to jump out screaming ‘BOO!’ and he would sweep her up and kiss her…Any moment now…

‘You’re scaring me now, Diana.’

He pulled the covers away from her, immediately regretting it.

There sat an old woman, sobbing into her withered hands. On the ring finger of her left hand was a ring, a ring with a cracked emerald gem.

‘D-D-Diana?’

‘Don’t look at me,’ she said, her voice identical to one belonging to woman from the restaurant.

Howard would have been sick, but he was paralysed from head to toe.

For a minute, a young man stood staring at the woman he used to know. And then, slowly, he backed away from her, spoke two words, ‘I’m sorry,’ and left the woman he loved, alone and dying.

*

She had one chance left. The hooded woman entered the restaurant. Immediately, she saw them, talking intently to each other. She found a seat behind them and waited.

He proposed. And then the ring slipped from the box. It rolled towards her. She picked it up. He approached, and then she spoke.

‘You must change the ring.’

He looked down at the cracked emerald and she faded into nothingness.

Extracted from the personal notebook of Detective Charles E. Willows, 1891-1940

Of what has become of Frank Elwood or where he has vanished to; none can rightfully say. When the townsfolk of Portland were questioned extensively by authorities; only a handful of the more rustic country folk could say they had spied him traveling the old dirt roads to Hopps Hill in the eve of Good Friday. Their initial investigating to the shunned old hill hidden by thick forest growth was only met with the morbid discovery of small pools of blood; foul odour in green, brown, black, yellow, and purple spatters of tar like liquid, with trace scraps of clothing found among those monolith slabs of dark antiquity. Further investigation of nearby locals provided the discovery of a medium sized pad-locked cylinder jammed against a rock in Dragon’s River before it meets with Salamander Bog; to which it must have ventured down from the hill whence the river’s mouth flows. Upon prying it open with a spade, they found the most material ‘evidence’ to the fate of the young New Englander.

Among its chief bulk of contents were a charred hand woven skin-bound book whose characters had been damaged by age but clearly those of the Irish language; a pair of spy glasses, the leather bound portfolio of notes and report’s badge branding the name Robert B. Loch who disappeared in 1891, and the commonplace journal of Frank Elwood. Yet the most curious find came when all of these contents had been removed, for in the bottom of that cylinder lay a strange jack-shaped black stone the size of a large rat; in which strange characters were carved and dyed a luminous red by some unknown means. It was agreed upon by the investigators to send it to the famed Massachusetts University of the occult in that witch haunted old city where men of science and scholars alike could study it; had not a young officer of Welsh blood seen the stone, which had stirred him to anarchist action in deposing it into the bottomless depths of Back Cove. Upon being detained and questioned thoroughly for the reason for his insane action of disposing of crucial evidence; the young officer could only vow on his own soul that he had forever rid the world of a horror that would be set loose had it remained in the realms of mankind.

One must bear in mind that all recorded in Frank Elwood’s commonplace journal may be an imaginative spectacular hoax. For he may have known of the local hidden legends of the old grotesque and unorthodox Coven of the Black Goat; despite his claims in the journal as only knowing of trickled whispers of the supposed witch cults survival while in Vermont the year prior. Nor was he ever truly mentally sound after his experience in the witch-house near his university when he was still a student; as the dwellings speculation of having unnatural beings had been confirmed. His disappearance may merely be the catalyst boon for the tourism and industrial growth of Maine’s forgotten countryside.

There are still those who believe the journal should be taken at its face value and even though highly irrational; take Elwood’s account as truth. Correlating the found evidence with all the journal has to offer allowed for such a solid grounding of beliefs. It may have been by such gossip among the early investigators of Elwood’s disappearance that the young officer moved to his radical extremes upon seeing the stone. Then, what is the true fate of Frank Elwood? The facts and the fantastic become blurred the longer Elwood remains lost.

It is between the schools of reality and fiction one must discern in pondering. The tangible evidence has been made clear and with a calculating mind may the mystery be merely an answer. To which, the journal can be brought into question. Now, studying the journals contents closely, listlessly, and at our leisure; the macabre chain of events can be surmised by their chief actor.

Young Elwood had come to Maine in the late autumn of 1931, taking a cozy dwelling of a small Georgina cottage off Baxter Woods. With a gentle smile did he greet the majority of townspeople he saw while passing from train to motor car; waving ever so often. His coming was made wide-spread by the local papers; for he was to be chief land surveyor for Bangor’s pulp and paper branch in the town. Some of the faces of the people seemed to quiver in an odd way when his eyes glanced at them; as if trying to convey some horror through expression. It was behind his own dark emerald irises that he had concealed the truth of why had had come to the town.

Merely was the proposal of the job his excuse to come to the region from his settlement in Vermont. His despair had reached the deserted countryside where he had lived in the spring month of April; when he had gotten the letter from his one-time Landlord Dombrowski. Dombrowski was a man who spared no detail and it was here that Elwood learned of the horrific discovery of the human and inhuman bones discovered in the demolished witch-house he had stayed just years ago; sending him into utter dread. The waxing and waning months of summer did little to clear it from his mind; as the domed hills that pictured his landscapes of the region only filled him with loathing half-real fears when he had tried to grasp truth from the native Pennacook Indian tales. Frantic desperation to leave the state had found him the opportunity in Maine and with Dombrowski’s relative whom owned a cottage there; he had found his escape. Of why he did not flee the regions of New England in itself; he attests in writing that its aesthetic natural beauty and not its morbid legends is the only reason he can ever truly consider it his home.

This relative, one Felix Dombrowski, had given him the cottage for a cheap rent; as he admitted it lack most proper furnishing and there was an odd pungent odour about the room which he could not explain. As Elwood navigated the room; he found the odors source to be on the large Oriental rug that lay on the floor. Removing the rug, under it was nothing more the utter putrid green slim-like water that had sprung from a hole in a floorboard. Burning the rug and plastered the floor with Felix’s help; the room soon lost its odour as Elwood had bought a few chairs and other sundry objects to fill the blank canvas the room had been; acquiring his books and bookshelf sent to him from his parent’s home in Road Island.

Once truly settled in his now livable domain by November’s end; Elwood began his work in surveying the land around the town. As chief and most skilled land surveyor; his business was done alone with no assistance as his employers figured it the cheapest way for the remote woods of the Province to be surveyed. It was in the winter months that he had become accustomed to the diverse townsfolk; for there were many of difference ethnicity and creed than he. There was the self-styled ‘True Americans’ whom were merely English descendants that had roots there since the 17th century; the superstitious yet self-denying of such superstitions French-Americans that reminded him of the people of Salem, the hardy Germans, the lively Italians, and the wholesome Irish to which his ancestry placed him among. It had been, too, during this month that he first gazed upon the standing stones that sat lurched atop Hopps Hill in Presumpscot Woods.

Elwood had only glanced about the stones by chance when he was spying the town’s lush pines and barren scattered maples; as he was viewing the from the town’s opposite hill Truffle Mound in the center of Baxter Woods. They had absorbed his interest to the upmost; as he had known of standing stones throughout New England but had never heard of any accounts of them this far north. As his gazing instruments spied the regions around the summit; his eyes were caught by the black torn away spire that protruded into the sky from the base of the hill. It was a church that had been abandoned yet why had it not been razed to the ground by the locals? He would have to seek Felix out for information when he returned to the cottage the following week; as he was out visiting friends in New Hampshire.

He kept studying the spire when he went surveying; noticing that shadowy crows seemed to shun its edifice whenever they were flying by and the land around it seemed desolate even for winter. Tuesday brought Felix’s return to the domicile in which Elwood showed him through his instruments the deserted church. Yes, he had known of the building before but could not provide any tales or urban gossip spoken of it; as it lay off in the old French quarters where they kept to themselves. He warned Elwood that such area was hard to navigate as the roads intertwined, streets disappeared into forest, the French-Americans rarely left their houses or talked to strangers, and the whole air around it gave one the feeling of grim warning on the unseen monoliths hidden by the dense forest growth and the gothic deserted church. Despite his efforts to discourage Elwood, Felix’s warning seemed to spark a burning flame of adventure in his young soul. That Friday, the week before Christmas, he set on his quest for the church and whatever mysteries its age old walls kept hidden from the superstitious self-denying folk that settled around it.

The trip was a cold and lonesome one; for the northern winds blew harshly against Elwood as he made his way through the town. Looking around him as he journeyed onward past the humble small shops and antique houses; he saw a few Italians hailing their patron saints and chanting in their native tongue as he passed by. They were not alone in their chanting and prayers, as it seemed even the Irish and Germans were doing likewise; giving him an odd feeling about the entire town. Were they merely canting for celebration and respect or was it all some attempt to ward off a lurking evil that lay in wait; hidden among the forest? He crossed himself as his customs had taught him, taking from under his vestments the golden cross he had since boyhood; kissing it as he hurried his pace.

It was not long before he reached the French quarters that the brooding feeling of forbidden things became a phantasmagoria of the otherworldly. From end to end of the forgotten courtyards were the litter remains of collapsing roofs from the decaying houses in disrepair they called homes; fences snapped at ends and the rotting wood amalgamating into sickening discoloration. The houses seemed huddled together, casting their shadows down on Elwood; as if trying to communicate the dark history their paintless walls had seen centuries before. Where the house did not loom were the natural spires of pines encroaching the area; this pattern he could one day foresee devouring this forgotten section and sending its hidden mysterious past into oblivion; if industrial progress did not do so at a later date. Interweaving through the various roads that were gnarled with vegetation and loose bricks; he could scarcely hear low moaning of words barely recognizable; despite his study of languages the world over, both in and out of his college days. Always was the black spire of the deserted church in sight but even with his best efforts; Elwood became lost among the nightmare landscape that he could not traverse.

He had deemed his quest a daydreaming fancy; the church he sought a stupendous dream world no human feet should ever tread. His resolve was that of failure; had not the faint glimmer on the neighboring street caught the corner of his eye. It was the badge of a hardy blue coat, thick bearded German patrolman he had seen often in the town square. Making his presence clear to the officer, Elwood was met with the officer’s surprise that someone was actually out in the harsh weather besides himself; more so for this region of the town known for such lonesomeness. When question about the deserted church, he made a curious sign with his right hand, speaking very coarsely that the French had made damnable warnings to everyone against it; that some unspeakable thing had once dwelled in its shadowed depths and left its hideous mark. Even recalling how in his boyhood lay the whispered weird stories; made all too real by his father’s account , being a patrolman like himself in those olden days.

There had once been a strange sect there in the town’s youth—a lawless sect that had called monstrous shadows from the forest’s blackest depths of night; where those monoliths stood primal. It had taken strong and courageous priests to banish such things back into the gulfs of forest from whence they came; though there were those who said an ordinary cross could ward them off. If Father Brown were still alive; there would be many the tales he could tell. Now, it was best left for nature to obliterate. Those who owned it had vanished while the rest fled like vermin after the threating talk of 1887; when people began to take notice when children and younger kin disappeared now and then throughout the town. The forest would topple and send it away soon enough; best to leave it untouched least those unknown things from the shadows be called forth once more.

After bidding him farewell; Elwood saw the cobble road that led him to his destination he sought long before but now shrived at its sight. The large black iron gates rounded the building were parts terminated into the forest. From the oddly unbroken decorative windows; it spoke to his remembrance of arcultetcutral history the Gothic Revival period that proceeded the stately Upjohn period. Of true ancientness the church had, he was certain. His slender frame being able to fit through the bars; he slid through the gate as he left the French square behind him.

He stalked the path slowly taking in the oddities he saw as he passed them. The snow on the ground did not seem to be placed as naturally as it should be; for the layers looked thinned as he could see what appeared to be charred ground under it. The trees around the church were barren as they should be but their branches looked off at angles; very loose and bent. The area itself reminded him of a true view of a blasted heath; liken to those painted in the imaginings of Poe and Shakespeare. When he approached the door, it did little to change this unease; for even it looked less worn than an unused door ought to be. Mustering what courage he could his resolve let him thought the door and headlong into the forgotten ruins.

Closing the door silently behind him the endless clouds of dust fluttered about the room; irritating him enough to utter a faint cough. Scatted half-destroyed pews; torn curtains and their broken rods, peeling plaster walls, and fallen candle holders littered the dusty and molded over carpeted covered floors as he inspected the area. The faint light that seeped in from the stained glass windows was blacked over by dirt and soot gave saints highly open to criticism; by mere expressions alone. There was something vaguely perplexing in the postures their hands made; one window alone being nothing more than a single tall man wrapped in cloth who stood among a fire with a strange object prostate in his right hand. Shuttering visibly at all he had so far seen; Elwood’s eyes were drawn to the cobwebbed pulpit whose cross drew his attention.

Upon closer investigation, the cross was that of Celtic nature; known by his religious studies to be an incorporation of the sun cross of Pagan times with that familiar cross of Christianity. Behind it lay the small bookshelf with crumbling volumes and few legible titles he could scarcely make out. As he was only a novice of the occult, none of the titles gave him a true shock of horror; though he was sure to the more discerned mind than he that they were of some antiquarian importance. Two of the titles that he recorded in the journal for latter study were Chronike von Nath by Rudolf Yergler and Dhol Chants. He would have to send a letter if he wanted to know more to either the more avid English professor in folklore or the wise aged chief librarian of his old college’s Orne Library, known for its special collection; books his ill-fated university student neighbor Gilman was fond of reading.

There were few places left to explore after the main room; as the Gothic columns merely provided for large spacing of area on the ground floor to which most rooms lay in abysmal damage. Left to his probing voyage would be the cellar whose entrance was guarded by a vaulted door or the room just under the church’s spire. Trying the vaulted door as it was closest to him; he found it impassable and tightly secure. Even so, a foul odour crept from its hinges; making him all the more reluctant of wanting it open at all. Grasping sturdily on the rafters of the onyx stairs; he ascended to the unknown heights of the upper room.
The room was half what he expected it to be; for parts of the withering spire sank into the floor. Disappointment came from the lack of chimes he had known churches like this to have; the room devoted to vastly different purposes with its high flat table were pens and paper lay scrawled in abandonment. Illumination was scarcely light by the small broken window near the table so that he drew from his coat pocket a small electric lantern to improve the visibility. It was then that the faint red glimmer of the large black jack-like stone caught Elwood’s attention.

In his mind there was no doubt, as he viewed it, that it wasn’t a relic of some kind; though if it be some bas relief of a Pagan symbol or merely some eidolon image of an unorthodox god used in esoteric worship, he could not say. He believed the thing to be half completed as its lower half; despite its smooth flat quality underneath, gave one the feeling that there was more to it. Picking the stone up had revealed it was being used as a paper-weight for a few worn pieces of parchment; only adding to this eccentricity by being in a strange self-styled cryptic text. As it would provide musing for a later time; Elwood bore off these papers by folding them into his vest pocket before his attention was drawn back to the stone.
Absorbing his interest more than he had realized; Elwood could scarcely try to divert his eyes from it. A phantasmal glow seemed be radiating from the stone; conjugating surreal imagining in his mind. Vague, threating menaces stood robed around hell spawned fires as rites were hollowed against those cyclopean blocks. Signs were made, words were spoken but not of the know languages and symbolisms he had known. These figures differed in their sizes and shapes under those robes; for only few were liken to his size while others only gave the smallest outline of being human. Yet it was not this rite that his mind conjured up that made Elwood feel a clinging apprehension about the church but the feeling of a presence watching him from above in the dim spire’s shadow.

Bearing his eyes away from the stone; a distance shining in the opposite side of the room next to the stairs caught his glance. Motioning towards it after he had placed the black stone in the elm wooden box from whence it must have been stored; he wiped away the surface of dust with his glove only to choke back a scream he felt rising in his throat, for he was doubly afraid by the first visible horror he had seen since entering the church. For what his glove had so easily wiped dust from was a severed human hand that had turned to rotting bones in its entombment here for untold years; as their lay scatted bits of a gentlemen’s tweed sleeve and sliver buttons from whence the hand had been cut off. The second shock of fright had come from what had been clutched in that hand to the last; for beneath its grizzled remain was the slight charred volume bound in snakeskin, whose shuttering title lay in the dark lavender of devilish abomination the world over. For even Elwood knew it with his lack of occult knowledge as he shuttered its title in the native Irish his mother had taught him; An Rí I Buí, roughly translated to English, The King in Yellow.

So my grand father recently died, not unexpectedly might I add, at 81 he had a good run. Anyway my mum and I had to go to his house and grab anything we wanted to keep before the cleaning crew came in to clear it out. During the process of searching through his bedroom I came across his box of military stuff, most of which belonged to his father, my great grand father, who had died in the second world war.

I had fond memories of this box, my granddad would tell me stories about the photos and letters inside, how much was truth I can’t say because he wasn’t in the war, nevertheless it keep me entertained as a young kid. As I begin to look through the box the memories came flooding back, every letter and trinket reminding me of his story, until I came to one letter. Post marked Oct 1944, it appeared to be another letter from my Great grand father to a man named David who I believe my have been his brother, but unlike the other letters describing the war and conditions, this was different. As I read it I realised my granddad had never shown me this letter, I’m still unsure what to make of it. The letter is as follows:

Dear David,

It’s been almost 3 weeks since my two friends Howard and Johnson went missing, and I can’t keep this to myself any longer. Someone needs to know the details in case something happens to me.

Normally I would just blame the krauts, as they are the cause of most of my missing soldiers, however this is different…

It started around a month ago, when my men started reporting finding these black leather bound diaries while out on patrol. Of course as we are occupying a town it’s not uncommon finding things like these around, however these diaries were odd. The diaries contained names of my soldiers scrawled on the inside cover, no other writing just the name, and then after a certain date the pages seemed to have been ripped out. Putting it down to the enemy playing mind games I ignored the reports, thinking that maybe they were just writing common names in them to unnerve us. I remember hearing from HQ they had used mind games before, like hiding soldiers helmets and pieces of glass to reflect light in windows and woods to look like snipers.

However, what set these diaries apart was that over the next few days, they started to appear around the city, now I know my lookouts are tired and sometimes half-drunk, but surely even they would notice someone getting that close! The other thing is… no matter how many of these things we collected, burnt, destroyed, they would appear back the next morning.

I don’t know who put them there or with what intention, but there they were and they were having an effect on some of my troops. Many, including my friend Captain Howard, who after finding a diary with his name in it had claimed to hear whispers when no one was around. Howard was also plagued with dreams, where he was lost in a wasteland and a voice on his radio would recite the time and date of his death, over and over, until he would wake in a cold sweat. He never told me the date or time, but on the 22nd of August he went on routine patrol and never returned.

His good friend Captain Johnson who he had known since childhood was naturally distraught. The loss of his friend hit him hard, I had to abandon the search after 5 days and he became very angry. At this point he must have felt the only thing to do was continue the search himself, as he was seen leaving the city the same day with a rifle and standard issue kit.

Three days later around dusk, a lookout spotted a figure walking out of the thick fog that had come down during the day, he had returned, but something was different. His eyes were vacant, he had pale skin, he had none of the kit he left with, apart from the ripped and blood stained fatigues. Who’s blood remained a mystery as he had no visible injuries and wouldn’t speak, he just followed me, like a small child. He refused food and water, I say refused… it was as if it was foreign to him, like he’d forgotten what to do with it. Over the next 24 hours he did strange things, he broke every mirror in medical area he was kept in and drew all the curtains, preferring to sit in the dark, I insisted 2 men watch over him.

A couple of days later, I awoke to one of my men banging on my door around 5am, “Sir, there’s been an incident” he said. I arrived the medical area around 5.15am, a crowd had gathered around the house that was our make shift medical area, all staring at the blood still dipping from blown out main window, I walked inside through the recently broken door. Inside it looked as though someone redecorated using machine guns and body parts, there had been a fight, bullet casings littered the floor, as did the remains of my men. He was nowhere to be found, had he escaped the fight? Was he taken away? All I know for sure is, the day after he disappeared, so did the dairies and the fog…

Then one morning after no patrol finding a diary for just over two weeks, I was presented with one found on patrol that morning. I could tell from the patrol man’s expression before I even opening it and there it was, smeared in black ink on the inside cover… I quickly flicked to the back, the last page was Oct 15th… today is Oct 14th.

Charles

Credit To: LiamD

I had just come home from a tiring day. I had to stay in school until eight because I had failed a Math test and had to go for extra lessons. I was so freaking tired. Mom and Dad were overseas for a little vacation for a few days so I was all alone at home.

I was brushing my teeth while looking at myself in the mirror. It was a beautiful circular mirror with intricate designs on the glass. Mom bought it for a hundred bucks at an auction. It had been in our house for a few years. I remembered how as a little kid Mom would tell me an old Chinese superstition. “You must never sleep facing a mirror,” she warned me, “or your soul will go into the mirror and live in it.” A part of me dismissed her words as a chunk of nonsense, but another part of me believed her and hence there were no mirrors in my bedroom.

I proceeded to bend down and rinse my mouth.

What I saw when I looked up again had me shell shocked for the rest of my life.

My face in the mirror wasn’t my face in the mirror. It was the face of a girl with BIG, really, really BIG, white eyes and long black hair. And her lips were redder than the reddest of lips. Blood was dripping down her chin and onto her white dress. Her white eyes had that gloomy look about them. It was almost as if she looked really sad. I wanted to reach out to touch her, to tell her everything was okay. That nothing was going to go wrong. I felt like I was partially hypnotized.

Theklights in the bathroom went off. That snapped me out of my little trance. I jumped, taken aback.

Suddenly, the girl in the mirror said in a high-pitched, girly, sinister voice, “I need to esssssssssscape… Out of thissssssss mirror… Help meeeeee…”

I tried to move a step back but to no avail. I tried to move the rest of my body but couldn’t. I made an attempt to scream, but nothing came out of my mouth. I could only watch the girl/half-snake move three inches closer towards me in the mirror. At any moment now, she would probably get out of the mirror like how the long-haired girl from that horror movie got out of the television and kill me.

No. No. That was not going to happen. Mentally teetering on the verge of panic, I struggled even ha2der than before. I tried to turn around and run. Still, nothing happened. The girl continued to inch closer towards me in the mirror. Shit. Any moment now…

But she didn’t.

“Sssssleeeeeeeeeep fasssssssing thissssssss mirror toniiiiiiiight. And yooooooou will not ssssssssuffer.”

And she vanished.

In her place was me. Me, sweating like I had just run a forty-kilometer marathon, with eyes wide like saucers, but still me.

I tried to move my arms and it worked! It worked! I could move my legs, my head, my knees, my whole entire fucking body! I had never been so relieved. But that relief was soon replaced by what the girl, or snake, or whatever, had told me just now.

No. I wasn’t going to sleep facing the mirror tonight. No way. I would rather go to school naked than sleep facing a mirror. I would rather eat shit than sleep facing a fucking mirror. All of that, the girl, the mirror, whatever, was probably a nightmare I had. I looked into the mirror again. Seeing my own reflection, I was fully convinced that it was all nothing and rinsed my mouth, changed into my PJs and went to bed.

That was probably the best decision I had ever made in my whole entire fucking life.

I woke up the next day to find out I wasn’t on my bed. It didn’t take me long to find out that I was in a hospital. Bandages were all over my body. Some were even covering the bottom half of my face. Suddenly, the memory of the terrifying nightmare I had during the previous night came flooding back into my head. And I began to wonder what happened after that. Why did I even end up in the hospital?

I tried to call out for a nurse but all that came out of my mouth was a noise which sounded like a chicken was being strangled. A nurse appeared beside me. “Oh, you’ve woken up!” she said in a cheery voice. “I’m sorry but part of your house was burned down last night. The firemen rescued you just in time. Your mom and dad have booked flight tickets back here. You could’ve died back there, you know?

“The police thought that everything else in that part of your house was gone in the fire, but they were wrong. They managed to find a circular mirror which wasn’t even burnt in your bathroom. Just about everything else in that part of your house was either badly burnt or gone.”

My eyes widened.

The nurse chuckled. “I know, right? I guess the mirror is a magical one. Ha ha! Anyway, your mom and dad decided they didn’t want it anymore because it seemed like the mirror had been giving them bad luck ever since they bought it. According to what I had heard yesterday, they wanted to get rid of it but were really busy so they kept forgetting about it until the fire happened. When they found out that the mirror was the only thing in that part of your house that wasn’t either badly burnt or reduced to ashes, they were so shocked that they decided to sell it to a friend who was interested in mirrors.” She shrugged. “You okay?”

I nodded.

“Good. I’m going to attend to the other patients. If you need anything, call me, okay?” she smiled and walked away.

So, there you go – a Creepypasta with a nice ending.

Just don’t ever go to sleep facing a mirror or else.

Credit To: iloveitpink

Don’t is a contraction we hear all too much. As a child, it was all I heard. “Don’t play with this” “Don’t touch that” “Don’t go here” etc. It was my father’s favorite word. As I grew older, I stopped taking it seriously. I realized if I did what my father told me not to, everything would turn out better than expected, by both him and I. Yet he continued to say it, I suppose by force of habit.

At the age of 18 years old he gave me a necklace. He said that it belonged to my late mother, and at both of their requests I was not to have it until I was 18. It was simple enough, a gold heart locket with a rose engraved on the front. He warned me never to take off, or rather “Don’t take it off” was what he said. I never expected I would take it off, because it was so beautiful and reminded me of my mother. I wore it everywhere, even to bed and in the shower. As you would expect, one day it disappeared.

Devastation filled my heart, followed by confusion. How could it have been lost? I went to bed wearing it last night, and this morning it’s vanished. I did not tell my father, as I knew it would crush him. This was the biggest mistake I have ever made.

Needless to say I could not sleep that night. The atmosphere of the room felt cold and unwelcoming. The other problem, was that my ears started ringing. Not the type you experience after a loud concert, or after your ears pop however. It sounded like a high pitched moaning. I put in ear plugs, and it stopped. Finally I fell asleep, but it was not peaceful. I consistently woke in a sweat during the night, at least 5 times. There were no dreams I could remember to help me figure out why. When I finally decided to stop trying for sleep, I went for a walk. The moment I stepped outside I felt worse. Yes it was dark out because it was 2 in the morning. But I have never seen such a pitch black sky in my life. The moon and stars did not exist. I brought a lighter with me, so I could have a cigarette and try to calm down. The lighter would not catch. I supposed it was out, so I ran back and got matches. Once outside, I tried them. They did not work either. After this, I noticed not just the sky was pitch black. Everything was. I could not see a thing; it was as if I was standing inside of a 4 walled room that was painted black. That is the last thing I remember.

I awoke in my bed at 8 o’ clock, as I had class at 10AM. I was too tired to notice my father was standing over my bed. He screamed, and this is when I noticed him. This scream sounded as if a banshee was being burned with acid. It was the ringing I had heard earlier. This went on for about ten minutes, as I stayed there paralyzed. This was not due to fear. He cocked his head to the side and smiled. Then he started melting, like a candle that has been lit. While melting, he said, “I told you. I told you don’t take it off. Now, you’ll die like your mother.”

With that, the melting thing I called my father walked to my side of the bed. I saw the black again. The blackest of blacks was all I could see, along with my candle of a father. He, or rather it, said “Look what you’ve done. You took the light from his world. Just like your mother. I lived inside of him, I was his evil. I cursed everyone he ever loved. And that lock protected them, until they doubted him enough to take it off. Except you. I took it off you myself because I was strong enough. I took him over, and he is no more. You are mine.”

Headline: Home Tribune News
Father and Daughter Found Dead
-Tim and Shelly Norbin were found dead in their home Tuesday night, at 12:00 AM. In place of ears they had gaping holes filled with blood and brain matter. There is no current cause of death. Even suicide cannot be considered as their bodies were deflated. It was as if someone has sucked the life out of them. George Pasi found the bodies and stated, “They were such good people, and dearest friends of mine. I plan to continue Tim’s legacy, as I consider myself almost exactly like him, although maybe I have a darker sense of humor”

Credit To: Razi