Creepy - Day 13 - They Only Want to Hurt & The Walls Are Looking

Episode Date: October 13, 2025

They Only Want to Hurt***Narrated by: Rissa Montanez***Content warning: graphic animal death***https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.0/***The Walls Are Looking***https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.0/***Support the show at patreon.com/creepypod***Sound design by: Pacific Obadiah***Title music by: Alex Aldea Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Good morning, everyone. We have some new patients this week I'd like to introduce. If you see them in the courtyard or standing in the corner with their backs to you, without startling them, please say hello to Rebecca Ashlock, Gentleman Lee Gibbis, Angie Whiting, Shelley, Samale, and Sarah Siegfried. These patients found their way to the Institute through patreon.com slash creepypod, where they are eligible for some extra perks during their stay. To find out more, please visit patreon.com slash creepypod.

Creepy presents the 31 Days of Horror. Day 13. This is creepy. A podcast dedicated to sharing the most famous chilling and disturbing creepypastas and urban legends in the world. Whether these stories truly happened or are simply fabrications is for you to decide. These stories may contain graphic depictions of violence and explicit language. Listener discretion is advised. Good afternoon, everyone.

I'm happy to say that I finally had a chance to speak with all of you one-on-one. And I am very pleased at the progress everyone is making. Progress? What progress? I'm still sleeping like shit. Yeah, me too. Plus, it feels like my dreams are making less and less sense. Like, sometimes I'm having a conversation with someone.

Other times I'm... Sometimes falling is the... only way down to where the healing really begins. You can't rebuild a foundation without first breaking apart the old one. Then why do I wake up every night with my chest tight? Like something followed me back out of the dream. That doesn't sound like healing. It sounds exactly like healing. Think of it as your subconscious wrestling with its shadows. Wrestling with anything can and does hurt. But we find victory through the pain. I don't feel like I'm winning. Last night, I dreamed of doors that wouldn't open. No matter how hard I tried, I was stuck inside.

That's your mind testing you. A locked door means you're close to discovering what's on the other side. Think of your bad dreams like an adversary. The dream resists because it knows your You're beginning to understand how to defeat it. Are we supposed to feel better about the ideas that our dreams have a mind of their own? Last night, I swear I heard someone whispering my name from inside the walls. That whisper is your own voice echoing back. A mirror of sound. Why can't I shake the feeling like I'm being watched while I'm sleeping?

Like, the dream is watching me as much as I'm watching it. Isn't that proof it's working? Dreams notice us when we begin to change. Whenever you've had big changes or milestones in your life, it's very common that your sleep and dreams are affected as well. Because of the impact your self-conscious and the changing of expectations and routines, that's why we are trying to establish as much routine here as possible. to allow the healing.

Or maybe it's because something else is paying attention to us. Attention is not the same as danger. Remember, you're safe in this room. Safe with each other. Safe with me. Then why do I wake up less safe every morning? Because safety isn't comfort. Safety is knowing you can keep walking into the,

darkness and still come back, and you are coming back every time. Now, who would like to share their dream from last night? I can. I mean, I want to. I don't really want to think about it alone anymore, because they only want to hurt. My first thoughts when my husband said he wanted to feel something revolved around panic. I remember him standing in the living room, just staring out at the window at nothing in particular.

He didn't really elaborate, but my mind flashed over to him confessing to an affair or even testing the waters of divorce. He never really did explain what he meant. Instead, he just disappeared into the garage. Nothing was said after that, and it was really hard for me to not immediately think of the worst-case scenarios. So I went to the computer, ready to look up couples' counseling. Things between us hadn't been the best lately anyway.

We just began falling into our own routines. We didn't go on dates together anymore. Not much time to really be a couple. We barely talked about anything other than house generic topics. You know, work, bills. Not much else. I'd be lying if I said that there weren't times when I looked at him and didn't recognize the men I married. The one that was so full of hope and imagination and life.

The idea of even getting a divorce felt so unsettling. I was raised to believe that marriage was forever. It was commitment. Real commitment. You handled things together, even the hard times. And you persevered together no matter what. They say love is eternal, but I don't think they ever considered what eternity might really mean. It all really started with the smell.

I used to think it was my imagination, a byproduct of moving into a century old house with drafty floorboards and crooked doorways, but then came the changes. Small things at first. Things you wouldn't notice unless you knew a man like I knew my husband. husband. James used to hum when he read. Nothing annoying, just a quiet, breathy tune he'd done since we met. The sort of thing that might annoy another person, but it was part of him. It was comforting, and he hadn't done it in weeks. One night, I curled up beside him on our sagging couch, and I turned toward him and asked why he didn't hum anymore when he read. He didn't even look at me, didn't even blink. He just said,

It doesn't matter. Three words. Not alarming, not cruel, but his voice. It was wrong. Hollow. His mouth was just sort of hanging open as the words came out from somewhere deep inside him.

And at that moment, for the first time in our relationship, I didn't feel safe with my husband. The second incident was worse. I was asleep when I woke to a strange sound, the sound of steady dripping, the kind that seems calm, but also the kind of eerie sound that chewed at my patience. I sat up and listened,

wondering if it was coming from the shower. Drip, drip, drip. James wasn't in bed. I called out to him softly, but got no response. And then I followed the sound, my bare feet silent against the hardwood. It led me to the kitchen, and then I turned on the light. He stood there, shirtless, hunched over the sink with his arms thrust beneath the faucet. I stepped closer, and then I saw blood dripping from his fingertips into the basin.

Drip, drip, drip, drip. I screamed his name and I rushed toward him, grabbing his arms. The skin was torn open in long, jagged gashes from his wrist to his elbows. Oh my God, what did you do? His eyes met mine. But they weren't James' eyes. Too black, too deep. Even in the darkness of the kitchen, I knew they weren't right.

Like they opened into something. else. I wanted to feel something. He said. And then he smiled. I took him to the hospital, of course. And then they took him in. They took him in for a psych evaluation and said he was depressed, and that maybe this was a psychotic break. There was no history of mental illness in his family, but the doctor said that the grief or trauma can lurk and stay hidden until one day. It isn't. The doctors gave me words like self-harm and delusions and told me to give him space and love. After their evaluation, they recommended therapy before prescribing anything. I thought about what I saw in that sink and wondered what he could have said to make the doctors act so calmly.

Still, they were professionals, so I trusted them. But love didn't reach whatever was inside my husband. He came home two days later, bandaged and quiet. Too quiet. He didn't speak unless spoken to, and even then, he was clipped and cold. There was no emotion behind his words, just facts. That night, I found scratches on the walls of our bedroom. Not random.

They were patterns. rose of vertical lines, some intersected by diagonal ones like tallies. I confronted him as delicately as I could, but doctors don't tell you how to do that. They don't tell you how to put aside your entire lives together, the trauma you saw, and speak to them as if you've forgotten everything that's happened up until that point. So as usual, my words came out a little harsher than I meant for them to. What are these, James? What are you doing?

He looked up from where he sat on the edge of the bed. His face was blank, but his mouth twitched at the corners. Like I had said something that amused him. I'm keeping score, he said. It only escalated from there. Things just kept getting worse. James did start seeing a therapist, but they weren't much help. James needs love and patience, they said.

They told me the exact same thing. emergency room doctors told me. James began waking at odd hours, whispering to himself. He'd stop any time I got close enough to really hear what he was saying. I was losing hours of sleep, so one night I set my phone next to his side of the bed, face down, and recorded him. When I played it back, there was nothing but static on the recording. So much for trying to get proof that I wasn't the one going crazy. Then, came the incident with the cat. For context, we didn't own a pet, but the neighborhood stray, an old tabby with a scarred ear, often lounged on our porch. James used to feed it bits of chicken,

sometimes let it rub against his leg when he smoked a joint. Back when he was still himself, back when he used to do things that only that James I knew would do. When he was a little, he was morning I got up, decided to do a little laundry, and I found the cat's body in the basement. Motionless. Arranged. Its body had been, posed, spread out across the floor like a diagram. The cat wasn't torn apart, but it seemed like it was dissected with deliberate care. The floor was covered in symbols that I didn't understand, and they were all scrawled in blood.

I wanted to scream, but I couldn't. I panicked, and I ran back up the stairs and shut the basement door, and as I was looking for my car keys, James stood there, staring at me. He had a completely blank look on his face, and all I could manage to ask him was, why? He said, it made a sound I didn't want to feel, and then he went back downstairs.

This wasn't my James, anymore. He was twisted, warped, like something had crawled into him and rewired his soul. At that point, I felt like I'd run out of options, so I went to our church. It had always been such a source of community for me. I asked for their help, but it isn't like in the movies. Not all priests see real evil in the world. They hear confessions about adultery and impure thoughts and stealing a neighbor's tools, not self-mutilation and the butchery. of animals. I didn't call the police. I'm sure some people would have, but I really, really wanted to help him. This wasn't the man I knew, but there was something that just needed to be fixed.

I knew he could be fixed, and as his wife, that was my responsibility. He'd never been violent with me, so in some strange way, he was only right that I help him. I did start sleeping on the couch, which did help. I didn't like sleeping in bed with him, just sitting there staring at the wall, staring at nothing, nothing that I could see, at least. I got to a point where I looked for help

wherever I could find it. Priests, psychics, anyone. In a desperate attempt, I found one man, a lanky priest named Father de Rogers. Well, I don't know if he was really a priest. He described himself as, a syncretist, which I found out meant he basically believed that every faith in religion

held some kind of truth. He had a master's in theology and spoke like he knew what he was talking about. I was just grateful to find someone who would even take me seriously. Then, he confirmed my fears. Your husband is being ridden, he said. He looked at me, his face grim. And then he told me about Loa. In Haitian voodoo, Loa can possess people during ceremonies or rituals. This possession is a way for the spirit to interact with the human world and offer guidance or healing. The possessed person is often referred to as a horse for the Loa.

And their actions and words are believed to be those of the spirit. I shook my head. annoyed at hearing another answer that made no sense. Nothing about this was healing. I'm sure he saw my reaction. It's not like I was at the point of hiding these things anymore. This is no Loa, he said. This is something that was never meant to be human.

Something jealous of what we are. Something darker. He didn't call them demons outright. But his explanation sounded close enough. He said demons crave. experience, not just sensation, but pain. Love is fleeting. Joy is rare, but pain. Pain is everywhere. It's easy, accessible, and most importantly, pure. They longed to feel it, he said, because they aren't allowed to. I went to the hardware store to get a new doorknob for the bedroom door and started

locking it from the outside at night. Even then, it was hard to get any sleep. Every time I closed my eyes, I heard the scratching. It wasn't just on the walls anymore. Sometimes it came from beneath the floorboards. Sometimes the ceiling. Once, I swear to God, it was inside the closet, like nails dragging against drywall from within. James never reacted. He lay down at night like a mannequin, chest barely rising. Sometimes, before I locked the door, I'd press my ear to his ribs just to hear his heart beating. Sometimes it didn't. I started video recording him at night. hours of footage just in case. On the third night, I caught it.

At 3.13 a.m., James sat upright in bed, just bolted right up. No warning, no sound. He just sat up in bed. His head turned toward the camera, and he leaned forward and whispered something. I couldn't understand it at first. It was a dry whisper, like, like leaves scraping concrete. But when I slowed it down and boosted the volume,

I made out three words. You don't know. The next day, I found the nails. They were on the kitchen table, 15 of them. Old, bent, blackened with age or something worse. Each one was coated in a thin layer of grease or worse. I couldn't tell. I touched one.

It was warm. James stood in the doorway behind me. Where did these come from? I asked. He shrugged. You tell me, this is your house. That was the first time I realized it. The subtle shift in speech.

Not our house, not even my house. Just your. like he wasn't claiming it anymore. Like he didn't belong here or didn't want to. I tried again with Father de Rogers. This time he came to the house, but he didn't make it past the front door. The moment he stepped inside, James, who had been sitting calmly on the couch, unmoving for over an hour, stood and smiled wide. His eyes didn't blink.

His voice came out slowly, deliberately. You shouldn't have come. Father de Rojas began saying something under his breath that I couldn't hear. James took one step forward and then collapsed in a heap, dropping like a marionette with its strings cut. Foam came out of his mouth and his eyes rolled back into his head. The priest only stayed long enough to help me roll James onto his side, and then help me move him to the couch.

Before Father DeRosiers left, he handed me something wrapped in black cloth. Keep it on you, he said. At all times. And never, never let it touch his skin. Inside the cloth was a sliver of bone. Burnt. Smelled like ash and pepper and something ancient. I didn't even bother to ask whose bone it was.

I guess I didn't want to know. That night, I locked the bedroom door as usual. James didn't protest. He just watched me. His face, a mask. He hadn't blinked in over a minute. I'm going downstairs. I'm tired.

I told him. You should be, he said. They've been watching you. He turned over and went still. At 244 a.m., the scratching returned. This time, from inside the kind of couch cushions. I tore them off the couch, revealing nothing.

I slept on the carpet the rest of the night. The next few days just blurred together. James was barely human now. He'd go hours without moving, and then suddenly paced the halls like a caged animal, muttering something about sensation and pure agony, like they were delicacies, practically drooling as the words oozed out of his mouth.

I found pages and pages of drawings tucked under the couch, behind the toilet, between plates in the cupboard, spindly diagrams, human figures just flayed open, circles of jagged lines, and eyes, always eyes. And one word repeated over and over in the marchants. Hollow Hollow On October 1st I woke up to find James gone I don't mean that he left the house Not physically at least

But everything about him was Emptier His mouth twitched randomly like It was practicing emotion When I tried to touch his arm he pulled away I think I remember dying, he said. Or being born. One of them.

I was barely able to keep my voice from breaking as I told him that we needed to get him help. No, he said very clearly. I need pain. There was no anger in his voice, no drama. Just need. like a deep thirst. That evening I found him in the garage. He had driven nails into the walls in a perfect spiral.

There were symbols written in ash above each one. He had painted the floor red. Not blood, not paint. Something in between. He turned to me, finally showing an expression that wasn't indifference. It was excitement. I almost felt it last night, he said. The edge.

The moment right before flesh turns to screams. He moved toward me, and I backed up. It's not about love, he hissed. That's what you don't get. Love is too brief. Joy fades. Even hate. It takes.

Effort, but pain. His hands twitched. Pain is pure. Pain is always listening. I ran. I don't know how. But I made it out of the garage, slammed the door, and shoved a chair beneath the knob. My car was in the driveway, and I peeled out of there to a rest stop.

I slept in the car with a relic the priest gave me clutched in both hands. I dreamed of voices pressing against my skin like wet leaves. The next morning when I drove home, the house was quiet. I crept back inside, still clutching the relic in one hand, my phone and the other. Fingers poised to call 911. The moment I crossed the threshold, I felt it again. That dense pressure in the air, like the whole house had shifted. The corners felt sharper.

The light dimmer. James was nowhere to be found. But the smell was back. Stronger now. Like hot iron and wet coins. Blood, sweat, old firewood. It clung to the walls. I followed the scent, and it led me to the bathroom.

At first glance, everything seemed normal. until I look closer. The mirror was gone, not broken, I mean removed, bolts still hanging loose in the drywall. In its place, someone had carved deep lines into the plaster. Letters. Not English, not even a language I recognized. Just jagged, looping glyphs. And in the sink were teeth. human teeth.

A small pile of them flecked with dried red at the roots. No note, no context, just teeth, as if pain had started being harvested. I backed away slowly and I whispered more to myself than anything. James, what? What are you?

From behind me, a voice answered. What they wouldn't let us be. But there was no one there. Then I made the mistake of going into the basement. I know it was a stupid classic horror story mistake, but please understand, I was ready to leave. And when I say leave, I mean for good. My house, my life, and my husband.

I didn't have the strength anymore to fight through whatever he had become. And any time I tried to get help, they didn't see what I saw. They only saw what he wanted them to see. I don't even know why I went into that basement. Maybe I wanted to see if he was still capable of hiding. Maybe I just wanted to find a body. Maybe I just wanted to give one more chance for the world to go back to normal.

But I wasn't prepared for what I found. The air down there was thick as if the space heaters were on. My shoes stuck slightly to the concrete with every step. Then I turned on the light. He turned the basement into a shrine. Not religious, not even satanic. It was more primal than that. One wall was lined with ropes.

Each one threaded with items. Fingernail clippings, feathers, dried flower petals, rusted razors, and other things I didn't want to name. In the center of the room was a chair. A high chair. like something a child would sit in and on the seat written in something black and flaking were the words I want to taste the world like they taste us

I ran upstairs slamming the door and curled into the corner of the living room shaking somewhere in the dark James was laughing or crying the two had started to sound the same I tried calling Father de Rojas again But the number was disconnected. Then I heard movement in the kitchen and ran in the opposite direction.

The only thing in front of me was the stairs. Then James spoke to me through the walls as I barricaded myself in the bedroom. Do you remember what it felt like? He said from the other side of the wall. When you broke your arm as a kid, that white, hot clarity? That moment you knew something had gone wrong? I didn't answer. That's what they want.

That's what they feed on. Not the blood, not the scars, but the shock. The purity of pain before memory dulls it. He leaned against the door so hard, I saw the wood bend. They're starving. We get joy in teaspoons. But pain, pain's a banquet. Then, with utter finality in his voice,

He whispered directly into me. I'm not interested in you. But if you run, I will make you an appetizer. For years. I knew I had no choice, no escape. And I must have passed out. I dreamed of eyes. Thousands of eyes.

Eyes watching me from behind James' face. All blinking out of sink. They whispered in my ears without sound. I woke up with my own hands around my throat. I was starting to wonder if it wasn't just him anymore. When I came too, I looked out the window and saw James in the backyard with the neighbor's dog. He hadn't touched it. Just sat cross-legged in the grass, staring at it.

That dog hated everyone and barely ever stopped barking when people were near the yard. But there it sat. Completely silent. James looked up at me slowly, and his lips started to move. Somehow, I could hear him through the window. It's harder with animals. Their pain is clean. But it doesn't linger like ours. Then he reached into his mouth and pulled out a tooth. Deliberately, calmly, he held it out to the dog like an offering. That night, I took the bone from Father Doro. Rojures and placed it beneath James's pillow. He screamed the moment his head touched the pillow. Not a human scream. Not even pain. It was like a hole opened in his throat and something else

poured out. A roar that shook the walls and made the air vibrate. When it ended, he collapsed. When I rolled him over, I saw that his eyes were back. His real eyes. Blue. human, wet with tears and confusion, he asked where he was. And for one brief second, I had my husband back. But behind those eyes, I saw it, a flicker of black, a ripple in the pupil. And I knew he wasn't alone. James didn't remember anything. At least that's what he claimed. The look in his eyes was so fragile, like waking up from a nightmare that hadn't finished playing out. He cried in my lap like a child, saying that he was sorry, but he didn't know what for. His hand shook when I tried to give him water.

He didn't even flinch at the side of the bone anymore. I just sat on the nightstand, like some mute relic of war that we both knew wasn't over. For two days he was lucid. two days of soup, silence and tiptoeing around the crater that had become our marriage. My thoughts of leaving him faded away. Because for two days, he held my hand again, hummed when he read the paper, kissed my forehead like he used to. And God helped me.

I wanted to believe it was enough. Then came the third night. I woke to the sound of chewing. Not soft, not subtle. A wet rhythm. grinding. Bone against teeth, gums tearing. I turned on the lamp. James was sitting on the edge of the bed. Back to me. Holding something in his lap. I didn't speak. Just rose slowly and stepped around the mattress. And his hands was a rat. Half of it anyway. The rest was in his mouth. He chewed with

slow satisfaction. Eyes locked on mine, not blinking. When he swallowed, he said calmly, It doesn't hurt them the same, but it's closer. He held out the other half to me. Want to know what they taste through us? I ran. Again. It was all I could do. I bolted out the front door barefoot, straight into the dark. Let her remember if I scream. I just ran. I made it to the woods at the end of the road and collapsed behind a rotted tree, heaving. My hands were shaking so badly I couldn't even dial my phone.

But I didn't need to. James was already there. He walked slowly down the road, shirtless, barefoot, humming that same melody I hadn't heard in months. A twisted version of the tune that he used to hum when he was, He read. It was slower. Off-key. His voice carried on the wind like a nursery rhyme sung over an open grave. And behind him, the shadows moved. Not like figures, more like specters, shapes in the dark that pulse with hunger, watching me, judging,

judging, waiting patiently. I stayed in a motel two towns over that night. I locked the door and slid the dresser in front of it and watched the peephole. At 3.11 a.m. The hallway lights flickered once, and I heard whispering on the other side of the door. James's voice, You think it's about me, paused. And then he said, It's about you.

I went back the next morning. I didn't want to. But I had to. Because I wasn't scared anymore. I was angry. My life had fallen apart to the point I didn't recognize anything. I had nothing left, and I was done watching whatever this thing was picking apart the man I loved. If it wanted pain, it would get it.

But not the kind of good feed on. The kind that ends things. I brought gasoline and salt. and the bone. I brought every journal page, every drawing I'd found. I soaked them all until the house stank like gasoline and fear. James wasn't there, at least not in the living room, or kitchen or bedroom, but the basement door was open.

And the smell. That old metallic rot had changed. It wasn't just rust now. It was something cooked, like something had been burned alive over and over, and the ashes refused to settle. I went down the stairs, one step, then two, then three.

And that's when I saw him. James stood in the center of the basement, naked, arms outstretched, his skin covered in cuts, some shallow, some deep, symbols carved into his flesh, symbols I'd seen before, but this time he wasn't alone. The air around him shimmered,

and then they emerged, not as monsters, not as beasts, but as faces, hundreds of them stretched across the walls, the ceiling, the floor, all of them his face, all smiling, all watching me.

They didn't speak out loud, but I felt their voices in my spine. We are hollow. You are not. What bleeds is real. Let us in. Let us feel. James turned to me and whispered, It's not about pain anymore.

About being real. Being alive. Life is such a lot. wonderful pain, isn't it? He reached toward me with shaking hands. Let me show you what they showed me. Just once. You'll understand.

You'll see. And behind him, the face is grinned wider. I wrapped my fingers around the bone in my pocket and stepped into the circle. As quickly as I could, I pulled the relic out and pressed it against his chest. James screamed. Not in agony, but in something older, like his voice had broken open and released a scream that had been trapped for centuries. The symbols on his skin glowed red, and then peeled away like shed scabs. The faces all shriek, flickered, and then vanished. Like they'd been sucked back into whatever hole they'd crawled out of. James fell.

but I caught him. And for one breathless moment, I thought it was over. But then he looked up and smiled. Not cruelly. Not like them. Just tired. I felt it, he said. It felt real.

It was so real just once. He exhaled and he didn't inhale again. The coroner said it was shock. Blood loss, nerve failure. Take your pick. But I know the truth. James wasn't killed by demons. He finally let go.

He let go of the pain they wanted so badly. I live alone now. The house burned down that night while I was at the hospital. Authorities told me it was arson. That they had found gasoline all over the place, but they never pressed me that hard on it, and I didn't tell. Tell them what I saw.

The bones gone, buried, and I won't say where. It's peaceful now. It took a long time. But finally, I found peace. But sometimes, just sometimes, when it's quiet, I swear, I hear humming. Thank you, Rissa. You're welcome. If there's nothing else, then I...

If I keep dreaming I'm naked in public, do I solve that with therapy or just by buying more clothes? Those weren't dreams. Yes, Owen, please wear the clothes we provide for you, for all of our sakes. We are going to be switching up things a little bit this week, as it's been difficult to get around to everyone in a timely manner to get you the time. and attention that you deserve. Instead, we are going to be doing some sign-up appointments. And now that I've had time to get to know you each a little bit more, I will be able to provide some more thorough interpretations of your dreams when we talk. Please speak with Nurse Natalie about available times. That way, for those of you who would like to talk, I will be available. And those

who would rather be left alone, can have more time to themselves. How does that sound? Yeah. That's fine. That'll work for me. What the fuck is that? Please take the recorder and press play. Who are you?

Please take the recorder and press play. Tell them about your dream. They're here to help. Yes, this is you talking right now. I know you can't remember what's happening or who you are. You aren't well. They're here to help. Just tell them your dream.

My dream? What? You want to hear about how the walls are looking? There are no bounds to human depravity. Eleven years on the forest and I've seen shit that you wouldn't believe. usual gripes every cop has about the revolving door of the justice system picking up the same criminals for the same crimes over and over again just to have some bleeding hard judge give them another chance

so they can go home and feel good about themselves never mind the people actually risking their lives and livelihoods to try and stop these pieces of shit from doing what they do and it's only getting worse I blame all this true crime shit and before you want to try and call me a racist or whatever the fuck just because I'm a cop stop that shit right now I ain't talking race if anything it's getting worse out there because of this new generation

white kids especially never have you seen such an entitled bunch as absolutely no grasp of having to face consequences they watch the documentaries on Netflix or whatever they listen to the podcast they buy the book watch the TV shows, go on serial killer fucking tours, as if they were walking in the shoes of rock stars. They grew up in a world that thinks we give a shit about what they say. Then they become adults and realize no one gives a shit.

No one ever gave a shit. And suddenly they feel this emptiness like they need to leave a mark on the world. They pick up a gun, or they follow someone home. They learn about cell phone track and DNA fingerprints, all that shit. They think they know their rights, but all they really know are the rights they think they have. They flood their lives with this fucking darkness, and one day they wonder, what's it feel like to kill someone? Don't act like you don't know what happens.

Don't pretend. Don't act innocent. Take some fucking responsibility while people like me play janitor and get spit on. I'm not some fucking hero. I get paid for this. I could quit. but I've seen what's out there. I can't walk away from this and try to pretend.

Try to live like a sheep like everyone else? It started as an accident, with a set of cord and it scribbled on the back of a decade's old invoice. I found it in the drawer at the Records Department of the building when I was doing some follow-up on another case. No one working there knew what the invoice was for or where. It shouldn't even been there. The warehouse listed had no owner, no tax record, no permit.

I had to look up the address, and when I did, I recognized the area. I thought it was abandoned. I'm not sure if I was right. Abandon implies someone once left it. I don't think any business has had ever been there. Victims of an economic boom that crashed and burned. It was on the outer edge of our precinct past the freight yards and overgrown service roads where the buildings get fewer and the trees.

Streets creep closer. One day, when I had some down time, and I wasn't too far away. I pulled up the picture I'd take into the invoice and decided to go check it out. I got a bad feeling about the place. Call it a cop hunch if you want, but I didn't feel like something shady was going on there. Gate had no lock, just rusted chain, loosely looped through the frame like he was trying to pretend it was secure. I stepped through it. to my presence loud and clear for my body cam.

The building was enormous, gray, dull, stretched long and low like a sleeping animal. All the meddling rivets and windows were so dirty that looked like they were painted that way. The arrowed side smelled like it was damp and chemically, but faint,

like a campfire that had been put out with a fire extinguisher. If our door wasn't long, locked either, just slightly a jar. No warrant needed. The door creaked as I nudged it open and announced myself again. That was the last fresh air I tasted for two hours. Inside the silence was wrong. A silence that seeps into your joints. It made my toes feel weird. Every step I took seemed to be swallowed. Light from outside barely filtered to the dusty pains. A fire from outside. I barely filtered It did the dusty pains. My flashlight didn't help much.

It's been felt thinner than usual, like it was being absorbed. The floor with a grid of rotted planks and metal plates, and every surface looked damp, even though there was no water I could see. I moved cautiously, sweeping my light across long-forgotten crates and twisted machinery. Nothing moved. No rats, no wind. No echoes. It was the smell that changed first.

With far into the warehouse, the air grew sharp, like hospital anticeptic. My eyes watered. That may be something spilled, some chemical. Not strong enough to make me turn back. I kept walking. That's when I saw the first one. The wall to my left looked warped, like it had bubbled outward from rainwater getting in the walls. My flashlight caught something pale in the texture.

At first I thought it was just insulation, maybe mold or decay under the paint. When as I got closer, I saw it wasn't that at all. It was skin. Pale, dry, stretched, tight and smooth between the metal beams. Human skin. Part of a face pushed out just barely from the wall. frozen in an expression I couldn't read. No nose, no ears, just a line of cheeks, lips,

and two wet, lidless eyes staring in nothing. Then they blinked. Not often, just once, slowly like it took every bit of energy to do so. I froze. My brain refused to catch up to what I was seeing. I stepped back instinctively, and that's when I realized. the entire wall wasn't solid. It was made of people.

Dozens of faces all pressed out from the interior structure of the wall. Cheeks, taut, lips barely parted, heads tilted or straight but fixed. All of them had eyes, wide and open, glistening. None had eyelids. Just wet orbs shining under a faint film of condensation. I tried to back away, but the floor beneath me hissed. A faint mist sprayed from small nozzles embedded in the ceiling. It wasn't much, barely visible, but I saw the faces twitch when it hit.

It blinked again involuntarily. Moisture running over pupils and corneous. It wasn't random. It was maintenance. Whoever, whatever built this place, had engineered it to keep them from going blind. I couldn't even begin to imagine how any of them were still alive. What was worse?

Whoever, whatever, built this place had engineered it to keep them from not just dying, but keep them from going blind because they were meant to watch. I'm not ashamed to say I ran. Don't fucking act like you wouldn't have. You didn't see it. You didn't see how impossible it was. How there was no saving what was left of them. I'd be my lower lip hard enough to draw blood just so I wouldn't throw up all over the scene.

I didn't care about evidence or reports or arrest. I just need to go away from the wall from their eyes. But as I turned the corner into the next corridor, I realized the same design repeated. faces in the wall, staring, motionless. Some looked fresh, skin still pink and trembling. Others were dried and sunken. Their eyes still open but crusted at the corners. One face looked burned.

Another looked like it had been screaming when it was absorbed. Chah was unhinged, teeth barely visible behind thinning lips. but none of them were dead. Couldn't close their eyes, couldn't scream. They were simply aware. Witnesses fixed in place, trapped forever. There was no coming back from what had been done to them. There was no kindness in saving them.

The real kindness would have been putting them out of their misery. I saw camera on the ceiling. Old, boxy, caked with dust. dust, but with a tiny red light still blinking. This wasn't just some derelict building. It was active. Someone was watching. Who knew how many?

And I wasn't supposed to be here. I tried my radio, but I couldn't get anything more than static inside the metal walls. I kept moving, trying doors. Most were sealed. I got turned around almost immediately. I found a stairwell but couldn't bring myself to go down. The floor was sticky and railing at something red flaked along the side. I followed a corridor that opened into a massive chamber with an observation platform above it.

There's a grid below, like a stage or a pit, with glass panels wringing the walls. I didn't want to look through them, but I did. Inside were rooms, like cells, but... clean, sterile. Each one had one or two people. Some were strapped to tables. Some sat in chairs facing mirrors. Some just stood trembling as of waiting for something.

None moved much. Some had bandages. Some had wires attached to their limbs. One was smiling, but it was wrong. It looked stitched into place. The wall I'd entered through, the one behind me, had faces in it too, pressed just between glass cells, so they could see everything happening in the pit. Their skulls pressed so thin, I couldn't imagine, I could still be alive and aware.

Their eyes tracked the movement, watched the people in the rooms below, watched me. And they were the audience. They watched as what had been done. None to them was done to others. I don't know how long I stood there. At some point I saw a new panel slide open in the floor, and a figure was dragged into one of the rooms. It wasn't a machine doing the dragging,

just long rods extending from the ceiling, gently moving the person like a puppet. The figure looked dazed, maybe drugged. The witnesses in the wall, all blinked. Then, lights in the chamber dimmed. I pulled my gun and aimed at the window. Bang.

Nothing. Just a scuff from where the 9mm round bounced off the glass. I pulled out my baton and pounded on the glass, begging it to break. The person was alive. They could be saved. I had to save them from what was going to happen. It turned away before anything started.

I couldn't bear to walk. I stumbled backward into the hall, busy and breathless until I collapsed next to a utility door that stood half open. I crawled inside and found the mechanism. There was a small control room. Dozens of monitors, buttons, old analog readouts. Most were dark, a few flickered, but the central panel showed a schematic of the entire building. Grids of rooms, vents, and the misting system.

There's a folder on the console. Inside were handwritten notes. There are no names, no government stamps, no logos, just one phrase repeated over and over. They must see even if they cannot speak. Another page hastily written said, Eyes only, voices are contagious. In one last sheet.

Cycle seven near complete. Last stage. install new witness, room 32C reserved. I left the control room and tried to retrace my steps. The mist hissed again. My skin stung, and I heard a distant thud, heavy and final. Although hum started in the walls, the faces tensed. Their eyes widened if such a thing was even possible.

Something had noticed me. I didn't run. I moved carefully, choosing on my paths, voiding cameras. The air was getting heavier, thicker. The corridors looked different than when I entered. I felt dizzy. Finally I managed to find a window. I broke it, climbed through, cut shit out of my hands on the glass, but I can give a fuck.

Outside, the air felt real again. I ran until I collapsed beside my car, pulled myself into the driver's seat, and called for backup. I don't think I can really explain what it feels like to know that I wasn't the only one to see what I saw. As much as I would have wanted it at all to have been a nightmare or hallucination, it was real. At least I wouldn't have to be the only person to carry those images with me. The best of my knowledge, no one inside survived. Feds took over quick and didn't seem interested in sharing details. I didn't care.

I didn't want details. Another investigator claims that they were able to track down a suspect, but weren't sure if they had enough to charge him on. From what they told me, it was a 30-year-old med student dropout still living at home. Mom was a doctor, dad was a doctor, expected him to be a doctor, didn't keep two shits about anything else in his life. Did the boarding school thing, trust fund, all that? Kid probably didn't live a moment of his life where someone wasn't watching him, hovering over him, trying to change him into what they wanted him to be. What? You think poor kids are the ones coming up with this elaborate shit?

Like food stamps pay for the kind of mechanics it takes to keep eyes damp on a timer? Like some guy working a blue collar job can figure out how to press and stretch skin to keep people alive inside a massive machine? Maybe you need to check your fucking judgment at the door. It was two months ago. Since then, I haven't slept well. I keep the lights on. I covered up every mirror in my apartment. My eyes hurt all the time.

Sometimes I wake up with tears running down my face and I taste of rust in my mouth. Worst part, I keep blinking in unison with something that isn't in the room. And my walls feel thinner than they should. Turns out, no one escaped that nightmare. Okay, so... Now what? Please take the recorder, press the record button, and read what is on the note card, then return both items to the window.

We are here to help. Tell them about your dream. They are here to help. Yes, this is you talking right now. I know you still can't remember what's happening, but you will soon. They're here to help. Just tell them your dream. What?

That's it? That's supposed to help me? Did I do this yesterday too? Hello? Hello? Who are you? Where the fuck am I? Let me out of here!

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