Beware the Waters, says the sign that blocks the dirt road. The road, winding down to a lake, overgrown and under-kept, lay abandoned for many years. Hollowed lake houses stand withered, their owners vanishing from reality. Nobody can say the exact reason why, but everybody knows to steer clear of …
“What a frickin’ mess this is.” Detective Mike Barrow stood atop a muddy ridge on a humid Monday morning, looking down at a small crew of police personnel in a heavily wooded ravine. In the middle of the action was a dead body that had apparently washed up onto the …
I had first heard about the Heavy Man during an unpleasant encounter with a deranged lunatic. Of all nights to visit Sal’s pub, I happened to go while HE was there. That madman probably would have painted a clearer picture of what was to come, had I actually taken him …
September 3rd, 1692 Northridge village stood as it always had, apart from most of the civilized world. It was a simple self contained community consisting mostly of farmers and the simple village folk. On this late afternoon bathed with the orange light of the setting sun the village looked like …
The first time I caught the night bus was pure chance. I’d heard the legends of course, we all had. Urban legends are a big thing where I live. I suspect its partly because I hail from an unremarkable and frankly dull provincial city that has little else going for …
Nothing was working. Garlic, one of the hokier vampire myths, was completely useless. He was prepared for that. It had bounced ineffectually off the tumbling wave of raking claws and gnashing teeth, crushed fragrantly under their mass. “No big deal.” he thought to himself, as he ran down the musty …
Lightning flashed across the sky. Jack wished it hadn’t. The revelation that it bestowed was terrifying. Large, fat rain drops spilled from above drenching the mighty creature standing under the hole it had created upon entry. It stood at an astounding eight and a half feet, skin a bright lush …
Said to be christened Apa Moarta, or ‘Dead Water’, by a passing Romanian caravan in their native tongue, and tucked away in a far-flung, scarcely populated, staunchly isolationist region of untouched Russian countryside…beyond the grotesque, fantastical stories shared by the more ignorant and morbid of the younger generations, there’s not …
I was discussing Creepypasta’s with my grandfather. He had never heard the term before, and kind of snickered at it. After I explained to him what they were, he said, “We used to just call them urban legends.” He wanted some examples, and I gave him a few of the …
Jess steadied her breath as she saw the buck. She was behind a fallen log dug deep into the blanket of snow that lay across the ground. She brought her rifle up to her shoulder and rested it on her cover, moving ever so slowly as to not startle the …
Amanda awoke with a painful feeling of dread deep within her gut. Rubbing the sleep out of her eyes, her fear was justified. Nothing has changed. Her coffee table was overfilled with beer bottles and pizza boxes, while the ashtray was over pilling with cigarettes. She awoke on the leather …
Have you ever heard the legend of Stingy Jack? No? Well, no matter. I’d never heard of him either, not until I had the misfortune of meeting the shifty bastard face-to-face. I encountered Jack, not realising who or what he was, and my ignorance almost cost me my life…Not just …
The terrible thing happened at night—as most terrible things do. While I click-clicked away at my home job as a transcriptionist, I’d often watch the boys playing in the backyard. They’d be at it for hours, acting out some scene with foam swords and plastic guns, only stopping when the …
Since last year, I’ve become a huge fan of those YouTube channels that talk about small mysteries recorded inside the United States. You know, those channels, with their dark backgrounds, white cursive letters, spooky thumbnails and soothing but ominous voices, which sometimes narrate horror stories as well? From the west …
It’s cold. It’s always cold in January. Isn’t it? This January is not so unusual after all, it would seem. It’s still cold. The snow still hangs low in the branches of the evergreens. The snow fox can still be glimpsed occasionally darting in and out of the treeline. No, …
I fell in love with his music. I didn’t care if it was for the rats. I’d always loved to dance, and he played the finest flute our small town had ever heard. We had folk songs mostly, and Jim Parsons playing the whistle at the dances we held in …
They walked the path because they had always walked the path. This year there were nine children, swallowed in coats of gray, slogging through drifts of soft, powdered snow as the bald trees stood sentinel. They had come a long way, almost halfway up the mountain, yet still the path …
The Settlement of SaultonSometime in the 1800s “Keep walking, boy.” The deep, mysterious voice kept replaying over and over in his head. He did as it told him though, not once questioning any motive. He wasn’t sure where he was, or who the voice belonged to, but he did know …
“In local news: Blackwater Lake, a long-time staple of Blackwater, Florida has been bought by Amos Entertainment Company. The company recently came forward, citing that they intend to drain the lake to make way for the development of an addition to their new chain of movie theaters. Although wildlife enthusiasts …
Emilie, Stan and I enjoyed our grandmother’s tales. During school breaks, Mom and Dad drove the three of us to her home in Plimmerton. It was a small coastal village, an hour’s drive north of Wellington. Everything about the place was tiny. It was simple. There were three cafes. There …
There’s an old, abandoned mission in the hills west of Tucumcari, New Mexico. It’s about a 3-hour hike from the nearest access point by car. It’s not marked on any map and there’s no clear trail to it, but if you had a day or two to spend searching, you …
The roaring twenties became a different time for all of America as the economy took a massive plummet. The depression sank about every industry like a stone and families of every class felt the impact. Throughout the Hoovervilles set up around Riverbend, there was one man who seemed prosperous despite …
The top half of Councilman Jones’ body hung by a steel cable looped around his neck and tied off to an old oak tree on one end. It was still dripping blood, bones and veins and torn bits of intestines dangling down where the legs should start. The cable was stretched through the air, over to an ash tree ten yards away from where the other half of the body was hanging by the legs.
