Dr. Creepen's Dungeon - S6 Ep307: Episode 307: Bizarre Horror Stories

Episode Date: January 13, 2026

First up is ‘A Cult of Metal’, a wonderful story by Kyle Meadows, kindly shared with me via the Creepypasta Wiki and narrated here for you all with the author’s express permission under the conditions of the CC-BY-SA license:https://creepypasta.fandom.com/wiki/A_Cult_of_Metalhttps://creepypasta.fandom.com/wiki/User:Kyle_MeadowsNext up is ‘Ghostwhispers.io’ by the wonderfully talented Corpse Child, kindly shared directly with me for the express purpose of having me narrate it here for you all:u/Corpse_Child/r/DrCreepensVault/comments/1010ygj/ghostwhispersio_part_one/Today’s final tale of terror is ‘Patty’s Food Addiction’, an original story by Dgrady237, kindly shared with me via the Creepypasta Wiki and read here under the conditions of the CC-BY-SA license.https://creepypasta.fandom.com/wiki/User:Dgrady237https://creepypasta.fandom.com/wiki/Patty%27s_Food_Addiction

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BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with Eye Gaming Ontario. Welcome to Dr. Creepin's Dungeon. Bizarre things can be so creepy because they disrupt our expectations of how the world is supposed to work. And something feels familiar but behaves in an unfamiliar way. It creates a sense of uncertainty that our brain struggle to resolve. This mismatch triggers alertness and discomfort as we instinctively look for threats or hidden meanings. The unexplained nature of bizarre experiences leaves room for imagination to fill the gaps. often with unsettling possibilities that linger long after the moment has passed,

as we shall see in tonight's collection of stories. As ever before we begin, a word of caution. Tonight's tales may contain strong language as well as descriptions of violence and horrific imagery. That sounds like your kind of thing. Then let's begin. A cult of metal, my Kyle Meadows. When I was younger, I remember my grandfather telling me not to be afraid of my dad. He was an old wrinkled man with pale skin, blue eyes, and a crinkled up face, and most striking to me, hair as black as calm.

The only traits he shared at all with father were his eyes, and a shred of his temper. That was admittedly grandfather's own fault. In his youth, while raising my dad, he was a vicious drunk. He was extremely brutal in his tirades. I don't wish to say he changed very much as an old man, simply drunk less. The absence of alcohol made him no saint, but the presence of age made him see what he'd created. I honestly wonder if grandfather pitied me while I crept round the halls of father's home. Did his thoughts turn to me at night when I'd moved silently to secure food and water?

It wasn't always like that. I remember a time when I wasn't hungry and emaciated, but that particular period of my childhood is not something I can remember well. But perhaps that was mercy for me. I honestly prefer not to remember all of it, but I still remember some. I remember being hungry. I remember measuring every single footstep,

listening to every single breath. I remember my anxiety, was water from the faucet, whooshed into my cup, and the relief when nobody came running down the stairs. I was an intelligent child, they were not physically intimidating, and coupled with my idea,

disposition towards anxiety, I willingly delved headfirst into a situation that I failed to realize would be so stressful. I was young. I wanted father to love me, so I endured many things. I wondered if maybe father had felt the same way about his own monster. His dad used to beat not only him, and not only his siblings, and not only his mother, but potentially anybody that pissed him off when he was drunk. Grandfather was by no means a good man. He was a brutal man from the mountains of Appalachia, a far cry from the rest of us. It was incredible that people would excuse his behaviour in that era. Well, his primary victim, my grandmother, was his biggest defender. For some reason it amazes me that his children then were not. Perhaps the most damning

thing my grandfather ever did was brutally assault my grandmother with my uncle present. My uncle was a child from a previous marriage. His father had committed suicide without a word. Maybe that's why my grandmother defended her husband so much. She didn't want to lose him, either. But as he watched my grandfather beat my grandmother that night, I can wholly imagine a boy who wasn't able to raise his hand in critical moments before surged with fury. And then he grabbed a knife and stabbed my grandfather seventeen times. Well, this occurrence changed him. He started to behave as if he'd been possessed of some boundless kindness.

And this was the grandfather I knew, and he used to tell me strange stories. He always told me to be vigilant for the signs of a particular family madness, a madness he swore he had not outgrown. Well, it did not exist in father, he claimed. but the madness existed within me. I couldn't have realised what he meant that. My father seemed pretty crazy at some points. But grandfather had told me about what my uncle had done

and what he'd seen as a result. It was some years later that grandfather was stricken with illness and certain to die. He had private words with his children and then called us sin alone as well. There were four of us. my sister, myself, and my two cousins. Grandfather was weeping after seeing his children. No doubt many apologies were handed out to them. My uncle was not among them.

He died many years earlier in a fashion similar to his own father, a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head. I imagine that he glossed over that when speaking to his still-living children. But grandfather offered a different kind of apology to us. He told us about when he was dying in the hospital. I was a bad man, he claimed to us. A hateful man. I wasn't able to cope the world around me.

But you children need to understand, because all of you carry a dreadful gift. Something that my father and mother saw fit to escape from before they themselves were driven mad. I drank so, so much, and I hurt your parents' kids. Yeah, I hurt them really bad. I know that some of them have heard you too. I want you to know. I'm sorry. And I want to warn you.

We leaned into grandfather's story, exchanging uncertain glances with one another. One day, you children will wake up, and you'll smell rot. It won't be like the typical kind of decay. It'll be a scent in your nose like a penny in your mouth. You might hear things like wails, So loud they seem at first to be sirens.

They'll come and go, but they are symptoms. When you start to hear those things, you have to fight harder. You have to stay vigilant. All the sickness will consume you. It isn't your fault that it'll happen. Sometimes things happen for no reason. But if you're not vigilant, the scent and sound will drive you to seek violence on those you love. Grandfather began to tear up.

We did, too, as gripped by fear as we were. Now when your uncle stabbed me all those years ago, something happened to the madness. I died on the table, kids. I died twice, and they brought me back both times. His voice trailed into silence as he contemplated his own sentence. If he hadn't done that, couldn't have pull myself together.

If I hadn't died, I'd still be afflicted. When I died the second time, I remember floating above my body, looking down on the operating room. And beside me, between the doctors, I saw something emerge from the earth children, a black beast with bright orange eyes. Its movements were jerky, like in his old claymation specials.

They jerked his arm right over to where I was floating. I told me Well, it told me That I belonged to it Well, my grandfather's story naturally scared the hell out of us Even though my cousins told their mom Nobody would confront their sick father about it And he died later that night

I often heard weird things about grandfather's death Things that sounded an awful lot like his death It was far from ordinary I know they said the levels of iron in his blood and organs were extremely high, higher than even those with hemacromatosis normally had. Yet he had developed no apparent life-threatening conditions. It seemed as though the iron may have prolonged his life. Grandfather had been cutting the veins on his arm, we discovered,

likely in an attempt to kill himself. And his thick blood was slow to bleed, so it was at least a little possible that he survived varied attempts, of the same nature. The various revelations had their toll on my father. For a brief while he was some form of lucid, if not stricken by some inexplicable lamentations. I don't know what father was told by grandfather,

but at least for a little bit it changed him. Father broke down to me in the aftermath and confessed his sins, as he put it. My father was a religious man once. He tried to be a church deacon, but after his brother died he cast off faith he tried to find his way in the world as a carpenter as a man of god and finally as a soldier on the battlefield where the horrors of desert storm were contained to some of the missions that the army rangers ran and my father himself told me of one of the encounters

he had with the enemy they came over the hell father sobbed at me he started to describe a situation in which he and others were essentially forced to shoot children for survival. I didn't have a choice if I wanted to live. We tried to talk them down. We tried to scare him before we tried to shoot him. We didn't get a choice in the end, boy. It was us for them. They didn't even make a noise when they fell over.

They just crumpled like bottles under our boots. Soon after, though, my father started to experience even more brutal mood swings than before. He would hop from cold. calm to violent in an instant. He would attack me for the slightest noise. My sister was lucky to live with our mother, and in truth I wanted to live with her too. Well, I could have. In any moment, I only had to call her and end the abuse. But in his most lucid moments, father had begged me.

Please, he pleaded, don't give up on me. It wasn't a fair request. When I was a child, too. I was the latest victim to crumple under his boot. And for the next few years he grew worse. I stopped going to school. We stopped eating regularly. He didn't pay bills on time leading to several shut-offs. Basic necessities were scarce, and so too was mercy. He became restless in those final days, for even the slightest mistake or the smallest noise there via beating. I endured. it, I endured all of it. I wanted to endure it.

Well, that is until the final night with my father. I've been creeping to get some water, but as soon as I opened the door, I could faintly see his shape sitting in the darkness. I could smell copper in the air as he stood up. Think I don't know about your nighttime drink runs. Oh, that's a beating boy. He had for some reason been waiting in the room

that was positioned between mine and the kitchen. The shadows played off his nearly emotionless face. There was no malice in what he was doing. This was how he disciplined his child now. This is what he needed to do. In my father's broken mind, it must have been proper. I slammed my door shut and shunted my dresser against it. I recognised the killing intent in his eyes immediately.

I'd seen it before the last few times in the world. of the beatings that left my hands shaking and my body broken. This was the night. I was going to die that night, and I knew it. My first and last act of rebellion would be to call the police. I sat on the phone with the operator for half an hour while father bashed at my door. He kept calling out my name, making cruel jeers at me. Open the goddamn door, boy.

My hands are bleeding. You want me to get an axe? I'll bash this fucking door down if I have to. In the distance there were sirens, but they weren't close enough to reach me before he did. I saw the glint of metal as my door and dresser began to shatter. He'd found his hatchet and was carving through the door. As it grew weaker, he kicked and shoved at it,

hacking away while I trembled on my dirty bed in the corner. The sirens grew louder. They were close by now. Still, my father kicked his way, but finally he was fully into my room, and they couldn't have felt any further away. He threw his hatchet at my window, shattering it as he advanced on me. No axe for you, boy. Discipline shouldn't come from tools. He shoved me against my room wall, lifting me off my bed. One hand gripped my neck, and then the other, as he started to dig his thumbs into my throat and squeeze.

Please. Oh, he shook me, beating my head against the wall behind while my hands fruitlessly pride at his. Yeah, just like me, boy. We gotta fix that. We have to fix your weakness. We have to eliminate it at the source. I tried to yell, to argue, to struggle, but I wasn't equipped to fight my father. Of all people, I was the least prepared.

I had no killing intent. I was frustrated at my mistreatment, but I didn't have it in me to be angry. Even now, as it seemed I would die, I couldn't hate the man before me. I simply felt utterly, completely betrayed, as I was sent off into the darkness. The sound of the sirens so loud now that I felt them drop upon me, even as I lost all sensation. I was lucky. They shot my father through the window, a bullet catching him in the head. I was unconscious, but I was alive.

I woke up in an ambulance, groggy and scared. It took both of the paramedics to hold me when I started to struggle. I had a nervous breakdown of some kind. Coupled with post-traumatic stress and anxiety disorder, and a newly acquired personality disorder, I had a difficult period with therapy, hospitals, and failed suicide attempts. It took a while to pull myself together. There were some days I didn't want to.

They were bad weeks, bad years even. I had been sent back to my mother for recovery. She was furious. Not with me, but with my father, with the situation. She had a difficult time understanding why I'd stayed, and that might have been the biggest source of friction between us for a while. I don't know why she ever understood. What I know is that after some time she seemed to drop it.

Well, I had to. It was part of moving on. I moved out some months after I turned 19, still far from well, but forcing myself to try and function. I had a lot of nervous breakdowns in those days. Even part-time jobs proved stressful and taxing. Angry customers and experienced managers or plainly hard days played badly with my afraid nerves. Trying to get better from this led to what personality quirks, weird habits, Atypical beliefs and passive qualities. Stress played havoc with my rational thinking. Submission to my friends and family was an easy way to avoid it.

I lived a life where I was considerably less for a time. And then one day I was able to do a little more. Each day past then my abilities seemed to rebound. I suppose that whereas trauma had prevailed for some time, finally there was more of me than there was of it. I think I simply outgrew it. I found myself with a steady part-time job at a pizza place. I had a cheap house I was renting with friends that travelled,

and I had gotten healthier. I never forgot, though. As much progress as I made, I guess some things just wound up staying with me. I proud the strange corners of the internet, reading about obscure religions and occult conspiracies fairly often. I was agnostic on a good day, but a nihilistic atheist to all the others. I'd partially blame religion from my abuse from him. I became preoccupied with mythology in my attempt to find an actual answer,

but saw them as the stories I needed them to be. Old gods, greater deities, and more inhabited my faux reality, and yet the supposed new religion had begun to spread that nobody had yet known the name for. The first rumours came from the hikers in Appalachia, posting on a forum I frequented, that they'd stumbled on some kind of, some kind of village cult. Didn't have any pictures, which was my first red flag. They claimed the place made their phones and cameras lock up. But they said that the locals seemed friendly,

even though their physical appearances may betray that truth. Sewing and sticking shards of metal into various places on their skin. They didn't speak much of their religion, nor were they tried to evangelise to their guests. They spoke briefly of Metal's gospel, so the hikers called them the cult of metal. But what exactly is the gospel? Well, the hikers had no answer. Looking through their blogs, I could see that they were indeed the real deal, with tons of photos of different trails and scenery that they'd encountered.

It was just odd that for this particular claim, all of their equipment, stopped working at once. And naturally not a lot of people believed them, and at first the story didn't circulate. A friendly religious cults aren't great for horror stories. Well, the story gained a tiny bit of traction for a short time when somebody joined the forum, claiming to have been contacted by the group about the gospel of metal,

and asked if anybody on our forum knew what it was. It was received largely as a prank, though people responded to it by and large in an honest fashion. Only occasionally did somebody pull some weird, elitish shit, like demanding one read through an entire active forum for similar topics. Often, though, they were ignored. Still, that was how I first heard about the cult of metal. For a bit, we got cult of metal-related topics, people posting real gospel of metal stuff, and so on. It died down a few months in, and I'd nearly forgotten about it until the very short of the very short of,

time ago. The air in the town had smelled different that morning. The scent of mash from the distillery usually prevailed in the air every morning, but on this day the mash smelled as if it were mixed with rotten meat. I thought that it vaguely smelled of copper, recalling my grandfather's words and father's wrath. I was able to dismiss the fairy tale easily enough, though. I thought it was a more tangible issue. Maybe something had happened with the distillery. Well, no sirens or alarms, so it couldn't be serious. I checked my phone, but there were no emergency notices. The worst thing about today was the odd smell and the fact that my phone took too long to load up messenger on the water to work.

I mentioned the smell to my co-workers for small talk, but none of them seemed to know what I meant. The air smelled the same as it always did for them. But even inside the restaurant, I could frankly smell the copper. It only bothered me as much as an unwanted yet barely noticeable smell might, but I still took notice of it. It was definitely powerful outside of the building, though. I held my arm to face when taking out the trash, trying to believe the smell was just the trash. I was having a very hard time dismissing it anymore. When I returned inside the smell, it became tolerable once again.

A customer sat in one of the window tables that looked out into the street. but his eyes were turned towards me from the moment I walked in the door. He gazed at me eagerly, the visible part of his face contorted into some kind of smile underneath his mess of cold black hair. Despite being the morning, this was still summer, so I found the apparently thick jacket he wore to be a little too thick to be comfortable. In particular, he wasn't shy about brandishing a mask that covered a little less than half of his face while he grinned in my direction.

I tossed my head back to check for a kitchen ticket to see that there were none. He hadn't ordered anything yet. So I threw an aside to my other co-worker at the counter to ask if she recognised him. She looked up at him briefly, returning her eyes to the pizza boxes that needed to be folded. She shrugged, saying that she didn't think she'd seen him before, but couldn't be sure. Her eyes trowled back up to his face, and she saw him still drilling me with his gaze. I had retreated around the corner into the kitchen now. She poked her face through the ticket window, teasing me about my new-found admirer.

But the truth was, the way he looked at me from the shadow of his hood, made my flesh wriggle in discomfort. He sat there for an entire hour before my co-worker finally shared my level of concern, and without her constantly assuring me it was fine, I became empowered to bring the issue before my boss. Wouldn't you know it? The minute we left from the back of the kitchen, the man had gotten up and glided out of the door. The boss pulled cameras. We'd all three agreed that this behaviour was some level of disturbing.

The recorded footage added some depth to that for me. From before the gentleman even opened the glass door to the moment he left, the footage had strange visual distortions. The colours were off. the image was slightly pixelated, and the ratio was warped vertically. Even so, the man's face may have been obscured through the failings of technology and his hood, but his expression was unmistakable. The alarming thing was how he held faster that expression for apparently the entire hour.

We didn't involve the police. Honestly, with regards our small-town cops and this damaged footage, it was fairly obvious they didn't have the ability to, as simply restore it as a better equipped. facility might. My boss opted to hold on to the footage. If the man came in again, we'd have a better reason to try and pay somebody for restoration and use it against the man in court. My co-worker got my boss to cover the register while she drove me home. We made arrangements for a ride the next day. By this time, I should mention, the smell was at least gone. Still, my encounter that day was one which encouraged me to take caution. While it always locked my house when I wasn't home,

home, I seldom had the front door or living-room windows lot when I was actually present. Well, that evening, I didn't take the chance. Even without windows in the hall by my door, I turned off the hall light, lest even the peephole give away my concealed presence. My lights were even off where they were near windows. A blackout curtain long put to pasturice or revival when I hung it against my bedroom window. I woke up when I heard something thump on my porch. followed by the creek of the old wood which composed it.

All the liquids in my body evaporated, and I poured the covers with me as I shrank towards the head of my bed. I shook myself to full weightfulness fairly quickly as my adrenaline dispersed. I silently began to peel the covers back when a knock came at the door. In the darkness of my room all there was for light with the crimson letters on the alarm clock, casting a dim, ominous glow over my bed and walls. When just past one in the morning, somebody was wrapping at my door.

The numbers on my alarm clock began to flicker. I stealthily moved from my room and turned into the hall, creeping up to my own door to get a glimpse at whatever was on the other side. I pressed my eyes to the looking glass and saw the man from the restaurant upon my porch. Now I saw him from the front, I without a light outside would not have been able to understand. Two of my questions were suddenly answered. His face had been hidden due to the fact that half of it was a gruesome patchwork of jagged metal pieces jammed deeply into his skin.

Some were even held in place with stitches, and the pieces that weren't jammed into the skin were fastened with what could only be described as screws. He didn't have a cheek on that side, and I could see his gums with metal jammed into his teeth and jaw that seemed to simply bleed into the rest of the metal. My second question was how he found out I was home. I didn't need to ask how he found out where I lived. I simply surmised that I had been followed. But I'd exposed myself. I'd left one light on that I'd failed to notice from my room. My porch light, hidden from my scrutiny, still bloomed in the darkness.

The moment I caught sight of him, my heart dropped. My chest grew tight and my breath shallow. He lighted on the point. porch a moment longer, before putting his own eye to the peephole. I told myself he couldn't see me. I've looked into this people before, just like this, to test the very thesis. There was no way. But even so he started speaking as if he knew I were listening. I know you're a family. The thing's voice crunched against my door. I know you smelled it. The putrid scent of rotten metal in the air. Oh, it's a symptom, you know. It's something that's always there but usually just

goes unnoticed. And then you get sick. But you weren't there when it happened. Oh, no, you came from after, a pause in the voice as fingers drummed against my door. Oh, pardon, I was just thinking, I should introduce myself. I've surrendered my name unto the Lord child. You may simply call me his deacon. I did not reply to the thing's invitations. I acted as though I weren't there, but still I was affixed to what the thing spouted by simple anxiety. I've been sent by his prophet on a special task. This task has led me to you. You are sick and need glorious salvation. It is a sickness not of the mind but the spirit, not of the visceral, but of something even more vulnerable. He did nothing to become sick. You inherited the sickness,

but your particular sickness is a mark of sin. For at not, I welcome you with arms splayed wide. I come bearing an invitation to the place you truly belong. Another, pause as it drummed against the door slightly more vigorously. My hand started to fish at my pajamas, but I'd been ill-prepared. My phone was still in my room, and I was not willing to move. I don't know why, but I couldn't muster up the will to move. Ah, but there's no rush. No fuss, no worries. I'll find you soon, you'll hear his prophet's gospel. Then should. I'll show. You'll you'll be given to him. Oh, child of my child's child, ready yourself for your first service. We'll see if God will forgive you. I could almost feel the pressure of his body shift from where I stood as

our porch groaned. He didn't look so heavy at work, but perhaps there was even more metal beneath his thick clothing. Perhaps he wore that jacket to conceal any jagged corners. And yet when he moved, it was as smooth as could be. He seemed to skate through the air as he left my yard and turned onto the street. I swore his feet weren't even moving. Free now from my formerly imminent concern, I dashed to my room and grabbed at my phone. I called the police.

I filed a report on the important details, his physical description, what he was wearing, and made them take note of my earlier incident. They were going to contact Boss for the video later. I was going to tell him when I went in. It was almost three in the morning by the time we were finished and after the cops left I couldn't go back to sleep I stayed awake until my shift and tired or not I worked

I informed my boss of what had happened and he had the footage ready in case he was contacted still the fact he intended to come back was at least taken seriously by the police for the next two weeks there was an officer on my street at night provided it wasn't a great street so I might not have been the only reason, but still I was reassured. The entirety of the two weeks the man didn't show up at my door,

but as soon as the cop left, that changed. He was back that night. I kept my curtains up and had been remembering to turn my porch light off. When he arrived back this night, I'm not sure how he knew I was home. As the scent passed, and just because your symptoms have subsided does not mean this disease is gone. Even the sickness sleeps. You can go days or weeks without feeling it, without the smell of copper, without the madness it brings.

But you shouldn't fear the madness, for it's not truly insanity. It's truth turning about within your skull. As you grasp the despair, your understanding only widens. While he spoke from behind my window, I was desperately trying to get my phone to work. The screen was frozen, the bright light certainly cutting through the thick curtains, even if just a bit. In a fit of panic, I started to reboot it, turning it off and begging for it to load while I sat frozen in my bedroom. I could hear that mangled half of his face scraping and clinking against the glass as he spoke. It was our people who found the Hobbit's grave, resting within the mountain.

breast. Our two maidens found the vaulted tomb and opened it, touching something gloriously forbidden. They disturbed the dissident king's daughter of bones, and so our Lord stole back her cradle to the sea of stars. Yet he left with the maidens a gift of hope, a song that was ingrained in their souls. Within the cradle of mountains were new laws made, and they together brought back our Lord's grace and sickness. My phone had yet to reboot. I was staring at the screen, pleading with the goddamn circle of dots to boot the thing so I could call the cops.

The circle was a barely calming reminder of the urgency. Outside my window, he continued. And all accepted his gift at first. Even though the sickness spread, the youngest babies were spared. Your grandfather's father's ilk may have been. knowingly sinned, but the metal forgives. If you've smelled the rot of the world, the scent of copper, then it is time. Let me your ears, brothers and sisters of the mountains.

Let me your ear, boy. Can you find it inside your heart to atone? I said, boy, can you find it inside your heart to atone? Do you seek forgiveness? Do you seek salvation? Do you seek answers? Those pigs will never offer you communion. I can feel your fingers prudding against that glass from here.

The medal has decreed that you will hear me before you can call for help. I stopped breathing, looking at the screen of my phone as a circle continued to try to load. What did he just say? My head turned towards the window as I processed. Did he just reference my phone? So he could see it from outside. He must have. How could he have known about any issues on my phone?

Surely is Mel Ross, with lack of care, with lack of faith, your soul will rot. Our first service will conclude soon. But if you want a second, head to the mountains on the night of fog and cloudy sky. We have cataloged your scent, sinner. You need only call for us when the conditions are right, and we will take you home for your second service. With the truth of his prophet beating in your breast, you'll be ready for your communion.

I held my breath as his child words filtered through my curtain, flooding my room with fear. I pounded at the phone screen flaccidly as my own convictions faded, and with some final words I felt the stranger depart from my window. Heed the metal, child. The sickness spreads. every inch of metal in this town will succumb to the rot from eons discarded

my phone screen finally binged to life under my thumbs moments later but my resolve was drained I still called the police but they didn't find him this time either I don't think they believe me quite as much as I wanted them to and they didn't leave a squad car this time

but it turned out that thankfully I didn't need one for the next few weeks life returned to normal. That was until I woke up one morning to the sound of sirens and once again smelled acrid copper. There were too many sirens for a town as small as mine. That's what I thought as I stumbled out in my room and crashed into my front door.

I gathered myself and opened it. But as I did, the siren stopped. Outside I only saw darkness and heard crickets. I listened for minutes but heard no signs of sirens. I was gripped with a firm confusion. Was it because I was tired? Perhaps I'd misheard my alarm for something far, far louder. But was it really that simple?

I pull myself into the kitchen to see the time plastered on the oven. It wasn't even six in the morning, yet though the sirens had faded to nothing, the acrid smell remained strong. I honestly had forgotten about my grandfather's ramblings of the sirens. But the sound, coupled with the smell, forced me to recall. It was an odd day at work.

I went in a few minutes early, as I always did. In the middle of our lunch rush, the cash register jammed and became entirely defunct. We had to stop everything to pull the spare and make a hasty withdrawal at the bank. But by the time we got back from there, more things had started to break down. On the way, it started with bikes.

Other businesses, registers were doing the same thing. It wasn't all at once. but everything seemed to be breaking. More specifically, the metal components in everything seemed to be the only parts of them breaking. Electronics were stalling. Phones weren't working. Computers were freezing.

Even old computerless cars began to break down as their pistons broke inside of their shafts. If only to exacerbate the situation, metals of buildings began to give out. In minutes our city had completely collapsed. A few large buildings we had broke suddenly, killing all of those in sight, and surely the majority of those that stood around them tried desperately to get their phones to work. Those that survived beneath the rubble must have suffocated.

People with metal fillings in their teeth had them slosh out of their place. Metal teeth casings peeled away like cornskin. Bolts in ankles and screws in hips gave out. Those with pacemakers never even made it this far, dying with the initial loss of electronics. A great many of us survived, but our ruined town was mostly rubble now. The smell dissipated,

and at that time everybody's phones began to work once again. Anybody in a conversation with somebody out of town had their messages finally delivered, and it was all they could do to call for help. The police of our town were as afraid and confused as the rest of us were. The more religious people were at their wit, sand, swearing that this was the apocalypse. The National Guard came to our small mountain town pretty quickly. They set up camps, tents for the families to use. I got my own tent, thankfully.

They found power lines out of the area and spent a few days getting them rewired out to the areas of the town where the people were. Food wasn't scarce, but it wasn't plentiful either. It was rationed with great caution, as if it was some sort of famine. I asked, but according to the guard, this wasn't happening anywhere else but here. The FBI came. The interviewed as one by one asked us if there was anything strange. I told them about his deacon, and that I'd filed two police reports on him, as well as there being some evidence from a camera.

I informed them of his rants about metal and the rot, and suggested there was some kind of connection. And they offered me a number to contact them with, but I don't know how serious they were. Very soon after the guard showed up, my phone as well as the phones of others had completely fallen apart. I think they knew that.

I think the phone number they gave me didn't matter. I never got to test it out. We didn't really control our movements, aside from putting a curfew and roll call into place. The roll call wasn't even comprehensive or intrusive. Somebody just went round after curfew to check our tents and make sure we were there. and somebody came by in the morning to make sure we were still there.

I was never really sure why they did that, but I just assumed it was for safety purposes. There were other questions on my mind. We'd hardly been in this situation for a week when a few friends and myself decided to make the most of it, well, the best we could, and head to a hiking trail nearby. They'd done well to provide us with books and the like,

but we were bored nonetheless. I like reading books, but I used to do more than just that. I play games, watch movies, read news. But I also like to hike a lot. With a straight week of reading logged under my belt, a good and proper hike would help me digest those narratives. We very quickly encountered a problem, though.

A lot of that hiking trail was bridged, primarily because it was dangerous on the alternative routes. Only better-equipped hikers go on those, and with the metal rot that occurred, not a whole lot of people had the gear in hand. My friends were determined, though, and insisted we take the treacherous path. I protested, but ultimately succumbed to beer pressure.

I went on the dangerous route with them, feeling a mix of my measured confidence and a want to not be left behind. We travelled on thin trails, clung to the side of a mountain, and edged along a tiny platform of stone that protruded just far enough for us to tiptoe on. We navigated through dense brush to find ways around the down bridges

and pressed maybe an hour into the trail when we decided to turn back. Like itself wasn't the issue, but the farther we went, the more disquieted we felt about not having any way to call for help. We had packed a flare, but without magnesium it wasn't much of a signal. Discussing that was actually what led to us calling it off. Then, to make matters worse, something was clearly wrong with my friends. I hadn't thought much about it in the beginning, but as they became more winded and tired, I was nearly provoked to broach them about it.

Instead, I half-heartedly cast and aside about how out of shape they must all have been. Well, they dismissed me, jokingly, called me a freak of nature for not being tired, and we laughed it off. But we didn't do much more laughing after that. things got pretty twisted on our way back. I began to smell that acric copper again and winced at the first sniff of it, fearing that some other horrible malady would befall all of us.

Instead, the person at the front of the group simply stopped in place, fidgeted for a moment, and then went completely still. We tried all sorts of things to get him to move and eventually settled on needing to drag him out. The problem was, though, that we weren't going to be able to get him to move. carry him across the same precarious ledge we'd travel to get here. Refusing to leaving behind, but unable to go back the way we came, we spent a while sussing out a way to get back on a potentially safer, if much longer, path.

There were trails up and over the mountain that spun themselves back to near where we entered, so we simply needed to head a little deeper to find one. To make that faster, the other two decided that they go on ahead so they could move quick but try to keep each other in line of sight. I stayed back with my immobile companion for much the same reason. If they found a trail, they'd be back. No more than an hour, they said. For the time I could tell it was evening.

I was through chastising myself of having a poor sense of time and being utterly impatient. I was right, though. They were taken far too long. Something must have happened to them. I wondered if they too had been rendered. to immobile like my friend. If I left, but the same thing happened to me.

I couldn't just sit there while my friends might have been in trouble. I couldn't just leave my other friend here either, nor did I want to be stuck here after dark if I could help it. I dragged his sometimes limp, sometimes rigid form through the trowl that they'd set down, hoping I'd find a sign sooner than my body found itself exhausted. I hadn't walked for ten minutes when I came upon them. One was frozen in much the same manner that our first friend had been before we were moving him.

Wrapped around his wrist was my other friend's hand, who was facing the opposite direction for whatever reason. I gathered that one of them froze, the other had tried to get them to move, and then they froze as well. I dropped the person I was carrying and hit the ground in utter defeat. I couldn't drag all of them out. I could find a trail, but could I find a trail, traffic to the end of the mountain, and be back to drag each of them out before nightfall.

No way. There wasn't even a guarantee that I'd pick the right trail or a safe one. We hadn't brought tents, sleeping bags, or hammocks. We just brought backpacks with basic necessities for a hike. So I found myself essentially alone, decidedly ill-prepared, and for all intents and purposes immobile, even if it was due to moral and ethical concerns. Basically, that was complete.

and properly fucked. Maybe somebody else, if it had been to somebody else, they could have made an actual choice. I was already undergoing small relapses due to what happened to the town, but with my friends like living statues and my inability to help them properly, I felt my anxiety start to rise.

I couldn't think straight, wasn't in the position to make a healthy choice. I moved them over to a particularly big tree and laid them against it, before sitting myself down near them and building a fire. The night came slowly. I was counting the sounds in the distance. They would see that we'd missed roll call.

Somebody had come looking for us, and they basically had to. If they weren't keeping roll to track us, then why else? Yet I heard nothing in the distance, even as the sun descended behind the mountain. In the night over the din of insects, I decided that they needed to be closer to the fire. That's when I realized how cold they were to the touch, when I realized their lips were blue,

and when I felt that they no longer had pulses. I mourned alone in the forest as the fog settled in during the night. A terrible rage bubbled in my guts, and I hit the ground once as hard as I could muster, a dull thud and a tiny hole in the dirt being the only thing I had to show for it. I hit the ground again, but with far less conviction. My hand limply struck the earth in a vain act of defiance against the arbitrary cruelty we've been subjected to. My thoughts spun out of control. Were they aware the entire time, but unable to move?

Were they brain dead the moment they stopped moving? Did they see me do nothing but move them and make a fire, resigning them to their fate? Did they hate me when they died? I started to bawl. I began to bash my head into the dirt while I sobbed and heaved out whales and cries. I wrapped myself in my arms as I chewed lightly at my own mouth when I wasn't gritting my teeth or crying out.

It was in that unrelenting darkness that closed in on my body and mind that I heard a voice ring out to me, a familiar voice. They came for us after all. It was too late for my friends, but they still came. They tried. I held the hope for only a moment before realizing where I'd heard this voice before. My dear sinner, it hissed slyly.

His deacon strode up to me as brush crunched beneath his heel. His coat was adorned with decorations of metal applied with a very nearly purposeful sense of chaos. His attire clinked like wind chimes in the night. His deacon's presence seemed to silence the insect. The sickness has reached its final stage, but it won't spread beyond this town. Not until you sing your gospel, not until you sing your truth. All diseases need a method of transmission. For your strain, you must spread the gospel.

Speak the truth, and the sickness spreads. I think in that moment I realized that he might have been at fault. I believed that he was. I was off of the ground, all of my indecision gone as I spiraled into a blood, curdling rage. I sprinted into him, as I shoved him to the ground and leapt on top of him, I began to beat him in his stupid fucking face

and tear his damn shitty coat. My hand shredded themselves on the metal that I hit, but I ignored the pain and gritted my teeth so hard I thought they might break. As I lost control, the thought of breaking my teeth made me slow down. It was just enough for his hand to shoot out from under his coat, covered in sharp bits of metal,

and jammed me in the eye. I reared back and howled. With the same hand, he slashed me across the face. I felt my face go to pieces as I stumbled back and hit the ground, clutching loose skin as I groaned. I felt the man's cold metal fingers socked me right in the nose, and I started to grow nauseous from the pain right after the sick cramped. I rolled around, dazed and unable to stand as the man chortled above me.

Boy, as a fire in you. There's a fire in all of you, all those who are like you. He grabbed me by the hands that I used to hold my face and started to pry them away. The darkness I'd made for myself to rive in, parted as he drew my hands apart like curtains. I saw his mangled face and wicked eyes glinting in the moonlight as the flames lapped at his back. He pressed forward and folded me onto the ground. My leg strained as they slid out at discomforting angles beneath me. My feet were practically at my rib cage, splayed out to the sides. He had my wrists. I had no leverage, no grip, and I had no balance. I was light-headed and weak.

I had absolutely no chance. He threw my hands aside and with another jab to my skull, the world ceased. I woke up a few minutes after the impact, thrust up and unable to move, possibly even more uncomfortable than when I was pinned down. The man was dragging me on something like a wagon or trolley that he trailed behind him.

I tried to move, but the pain in my nose came back to me almost as quickly as I'd come back to the conscious world. Slight movements churned my stomach. I hadn't felt it at the time, but my knees must have been strained horrifically, I was unable to move my legs well.

I dread to think about how I could walk. The eye that he stabbed with his fingers as well as the shredded part of my face had been wrapped with a tattered bandage. It was tightly affixed to my face, leaving my jaw unable to move. We bumped along the deepest forest trail as my mind raced with terrified thoughts. My single working eye examined the sky in trees above me, catching the faintest glimpses of stars and the moon through the fog and fog. forest canopy. My captor was mumbling to himself. I didn't catch much over the sound of the

axles thumping and thudding beneath me as this man managed to pull me through rough terrain. What I did catch was a confusing assortment of incomplete thoughts. Oh, to the bride of sorrows, cast out, mercy for the grieving, medals sold to sinewine, us, Lord, for we have. We have trespassed. He seemed to be praying. I didn't speak, trying to think my way out of a confusing situation. Whatever predicament I was in, there was no way I was walking out of it. With my hands bound, dragging myself, didn't seem so plausible either.

I laid in that damn wagon for what? Could have been hours before it stopped. I heard his deacon walk around the side of the wagon and watch the gate at my feet open. This time his hand that wasn't coated in metal reached out and dragged me by the foot towards the front of the wagon The pain making me squirmed He sat me up on the gate

And before me I saw Frankfurt yet again Everyone The National Guardsmen The people They were all stuck like my friends were What tragedy has befallen them Do you know Meadow's rod is closed

claim them just as it has claimed your springs and screws. I wanted to cry or scream on do something. I could feel anger and sadness within me, trying to boil to the surface, but all I could do was muster a strange, disconnected feeling. I barely felt like I was in my own body at the sight of all theirs. I barely felt like breathing. I don't really know why.

I suppose I was just emotionally drained already. But why haven't you asked yourself? yet. Or have you already? My eye looked over to his deacon as he grinned at me earnestly. If the rot claimed them, stunned them, deprive their lungs of breath and their skin of warmth, why didn't it do the same to you? He patted me on the back before shoving me into the wagon once more. The rot lingers here.

It will not destroy anything now without exposure, as it has long since started to disappear. but I must make haste nonetheless. He slammed the wagon door closed behind me, but it heard something when the latch clicked. I don't know the proper terms to describe the noise exactly, but I recognised it as a sound I'd heard before. It was the sound of a loose latch. It was a sound of possible freedom.

I waited for a while, trying to set out if there'd be a proper time to act. I'd decided that I was wrong about earlier, I would even have used these bound hands to drag myself to freedom regardless of the difficulty. Wherever this man was taking me, it was a place I did not want to go. I didn't want to solve the mysteries of the metal or the maidens, or the daughter of bones. I didn't honestly care about those in this moment. I'd watched an entire town collapse due to something. I saw my friends and everybody I'd come to know was corpses.

I accepted entirely that this was due to something supernatural, and I absolutely refused to find out what waited at the end of this wagon ride. I already knew where I was going. I knew what this man was. He was a zealot of the cult of metal. I felt the wagon come to an incline, and I let my body roll back against the gate. I hadn't thought that I was actually going to roll through it just from that,

and I was correct. I was just massed with no leverage, but hitting the gate like that probably didn't. me some favours in terms of my next move. The wagon didn't even seem to slow. He didn't care if I thudded around, but he'd probably hear the sound of an open gate swinging fairly quickly. I couldn't see well for the wood,

but there were tiny cracks that I pressed my eye against. There were sounds outside. I was trying to place myself in the walls. Dawn was coming soon, and escaping in the daylight would be considerably harder. So I listened. There'd be no point in giving up my advantage just yet. But when the wagon's wheels left the road

and I heard bushes up against the wood sides, I acted. I wriggled my way towards the gate, and with all the weakness my knees could muster, I kicked at it. The latch came almost entirely free, hanging enough that I wasn't able to yet escape, but that I could see outside.

I didn't recognise where we were, but I didn't matter. I'd lean myself against the side of the gate to try to discern where I could go, when a massive bump not the gate entirely free. I fell out of the wagon, surprised, but silent as I thudded onto the ground. The wagon continued into the distance as I crawled my way into the brush. I had wheels come to a halt and footsteps for a moment before his deacon fell to riot as laughter. I crawled quietly through the bushes as heckled me from some distance away, stopping whenever I thought he might hear me.

stopping so that I might hear him in relation to where I was hiding. I knew what direction I was headed. I needed to reach the road. I needed to wriggle my way beyond the National Guard's blockade. I needed to find somebody you could help me get out of my bonds and get the fuck out of here. Do you think you can outrun the Lord? No matter where you run, you are but a prodigal child,

and whether by my hand or by the medal, you will return to us. You can run, run, run into the forest, run to shelter, run to others. But no matter where you run, it will never be to safety boy. The truth has you by the throat. He just hasn't started to compress yet, but it will. Believe me when I say it will. You're not the first carrier that we've captured, and you won't be the last. I wait there still as clay.

The fact that this man found the room to my house I slept in, not far at all from my mind. Hopefully this would be more difficult, though. Hopefully by laying still here, by holding my breath and being as still as possible, he'd leave. And he did leave. I'll find you one day, boy, don't you fret a bit. The medal will have you. He paused for a moment, perhaps sniffing the air.

Perhaps he was thinking. I know you can hear me. I'm certain that you can. So let me tell you something, boy. You're not considering what your survival here means, so I'll spell it out to you. It wasn't random that your home fell to pieces around you. It'll happen again no matter who you know or wherever you go. You will be a harbinger of ruin.

You will bring his glory to whatever space you inhabit, and we will follow you there, led by the smell of copper in the air. You're not his prophet. but you may yet be a convert. So go. Carry a gospel. Let what befell your town be inflicted on others. If you won't come with us, then to ruin you will bring those beside you.

You carry the glorious rot in the depths of your soul. We have the answers. We won't ever spare you the details. We came too, so now I'll show you the greatest display of faith I can. I'll let you free here. I will not search for you any longer. But I know you will search for us. Prodigal, son of metal.

And soon... I got away. You let me get away. All that effort to capture me, and let me go so easily. Why? Well, I know. And that brings me to why this story even exists.

It's an explanation to those around me about where I've been and where I've gone. It wasn't curiosity that drove me to find them. It wasn't a need for answers that I frankly don't care about. Another town felt a glorious ruin around me, and then another, and I suppose that I began to feel that I truly had nowhere else to turn. The scars I had from my encounter with his deacon have started to harden,

my eye socket, with my previously ruptured eye, having been removed after it was discovered to have gotten tetanus, was no longer vacant. A new eye had grown in a single night, only this one glowed dimly in the darkness. When my nose was broken before, I had lost my sense of smell. Now I can smell the metal rot.

I started to have dreams of something beyond the curtain of stars that we can see when we look to the night sky, something that sat amongst throngs of corpses on a world that burned beside its sun, something that had a precious thing, hidden away on our world disturbed by petulant little humans. It took back

its cherished war and left a wound in the mountains. Now our world festeres with the rot gifted to us by our metal lord. If you're listening to this, the reason will be that I am a convert. And this is the gospel

I've left behind. So I say to you, if you start to smell the scent of copper, we will find you. After all, it means that you're due for your first sermon, and as long as you can smell it, I can smell you. As his missionary, I have to be sure that you get a good sermon. Ghostwhispers.I.O. By corpse child. Hey, uh, you want a dance cat? I looked in the direction I thought her voice was coming from. Jenna was smiling at me, crooning to me.

God, I'd wanted this chance for freaking years. Yeah. I straightened up and then with a little more confidence shouted. Hell yeah. I got up and walked over to her, putting on the colour-coded headphones. I took her hand as she led me out to the middle of the dance floor. There I gave a thumbs up to the designated DJ to crank our music up. We got the blue DJ, the good one.

So me, her and about three other people were shaking and wraying and round. rocking out to Combit Christ and a few other techno-metal artists, while everyone else will listen to God only knew or cared what. 30 seconds. Half a minute. That's how long my little taste of heaven lasted. About ten seconds later, I remember hearing a faint screaming noise. Actually, multiple screams would be accurate.

Still, faint being the key word, which meant I easily swept it off to keep dancing with Jenna. Well, that lasted almost another 15 seconds before I noticed that everyone had stopped dancing. Everyone was now looking toward the back of the dance room, toward the hall. The music was still playing in the headphones, so I took them off to immediately be met with screams and gas and, oh my God. Jenna had taken hers off now at this point, and I looked at her. I was about to ask if she knew anything about what the hell was going. on but the bewilder look on her face took care of that for me she was cringing her neck to look out

and over the throng of people to see the hallway i did the same with no luck from me either jenna started moving closer to the crowd i tried to staying behind her but we were quickly separated only about a quarter of the way through the crowd trying to wade through the crowd was like trying to wait through an audience at a rock concert maybe even made all the work here because of the apparent hysteria. Jenner! I caught out, trying desperately to spot her again. I couldn't see her anywhere.

A little way further through the crowd, I heard one of the girls up ahead shriek at the top of their lungs, damn near killing me right then and there of a heart attack. Right then, I was stuck between just freezing up where I was and wanting to push and fight my way further through the crowd. I was terrified of what I'd find ahead, but more so, of course, about what my mind. might have happened to Jenna.

With that, I ended up electing the latter, something far easier said than done. By luck or she of willpower, though, I actually managed to get myself close enough to the front of the crowd to start seeing what was going on. I couldn't see much, with a lot of the taller people there standing right at the front,

but I could see that someone was on the ground, twitching and twisting spasmodically. Heart racing, I managed to spot Jenna just to my right and I went to her. Yeah, what's going on? Who is that? The head snapped suddenly to me, wide-eyed and startled,

before exchanging glances between me and the person on the ground ahead. I don't know. I gaze returned to the guy on the floor. I could hear choked sort of gurgling noises, almost like he was trying to talk, but he was being choked while doing so. He had one hand clawing at his arm,

clawing at his throat, with the other clawing at his eyes, so much so I could faintly see streams of blood running down his face. Oh my God, I think he's choking, I cried. No one moved. Here, move, and I violently shoved my way past the two grillers in front of me to rush to the guy's side. As bad as he was flopping around on the ground, I had a hell of a time trying to lift him up to a sitting position so I could try to give him. him the Heimlich maneuver.

Sir, I called to him. Sir, my name's Catherine Danvers. I'm going to give you the Heimlich maneuver, okay? Just try to hold still for me. He continued bucking wildly against me. Sir, please, I called out again. Nothing. I saw then that his headphones were still on.

After a second of readjusting, I managed to pull his headphones off. sir my name is i was cut off when his body abruptly seized following by him blasting out the most horrific most startling and just the single most unnatural scream i'd ever heard in my life and what i would ever hear instantly let go of him and he dropped to the ground stiff as a board his scream lasted for almost a full thirty seconds long enough for it to be forever seared into my memory. Even after he stopped, well, at least when I was pretty sure it wasn't him, the scream itself still lingered in the air like a foul smell, passing itself through everyone else gathered around as well. The guy laid now on the ground in front of me, lifeless and frozen in this weird, freakish-looking upward thrust with his back bent off the ground, stomach facing the ceiling. My own body froze as well, stuck with. with my knees huddled to my chest, almost in a fetal position, shaking.

For a moment, time seemed to really freeze all throughout the club. Each set of eyes from the crowd was fixed on me, mouths hanging halfway to the floor. Someone finally managed to break the stupor by pulling out their phone and calling the cops. Everyone else then started filing out in an unorganized, utterly manic manner. Not me, though. I couldn't even force myself to try and make any part of me move. I couldn't even take my eyes off of the guy's body either. My eyes were fixed on his, with his staring back at me, blank and soulless.

His scream, despite having died out everywhere else in the club building, continued echoing in my own head. I couldn't place it at that moment, but I knew something about it wasn't natural. something about it was I don't know just wrong I stayed in entropy like this until I was shaken back to the real world by Jenna

shaking my shoulder cat she called out rocking me gently cat you okay babe my head snapped at her then again one last time to the body and then back to her before

absently nodding yes come on let's get out of here She helped me up and the two of us joined the rest outside. Everyone was asking each other frantically what they all thought was going on. Jenner and I just stood waiting for the authorities to arrive. It was only another minute or so before they did. The crowd was then divided and questioned individually,

but I refused to leave Jenna's side. Jenna and I were pulled to the side and asked for our side of the story. I had no idea what the hell, any of the other people was saying about me, but judging from the rather suspicious looks on their faces, I could tell something was being spun against me. The both of us did our damnedest to emphasize the fact that I was only there to help the guy, that he'd been seizing even before I'd touched him. I could see, though, that this did about as much to convince them as if I just stayed silent. In either case, Jenna and I were still good to go home. I was about to walk to my

car when Jenna stopped me, offering to give me a ride back with her. There's no way I'm letting you go home by yourself after that, she declared. I'd have protested, but I'd known by that point, having already been good friends with her for at least two years by that time, when she put her foot down like she was here, it wasn't wise to question or refuse unless you were willing to risk your ass being the next place her foot went. That was, admittedly, one of the reasons I wanted to be more with her. Always the more headstrong of the two of us. Well, I was always the more calculated one.

Of course, this also meant that I get to bunk overnight at her place, an even bigger plus, even if neither me nor her were in any mood to fool around. The ride was silent, almost suffocatingly so. I could tell both of us wanted to say something about it, but, well, what? What really could be said other than it was the single most horrifying thing either of us had witnessed in our lives. It wasn't until we got back to her place that either one of us spoke to the other. Hey, you okay?

She asked me. I loaded her, my face probably shaking and obviously anxious. She started toward me when I held my hands up. I'll be okay. It's just... I looked down to the floor and then to the TV. My body was sort of on or not. autopilot while my brain ran amok.

Just what? My attention snapped back to her. I don't know. Just so crazy. I mean, what was that? Hell, if I'd know, honey. She threw off her jacket before heading to her kitchen. I stood where I was, losing my focus to the TV again.

Hey, want a cold one? She asked. Without taking my eyes away again, I replied. Yeah, sure. She told me to take a load off on the couch, so I trudged over and plop down in the center cushion. She joined me five seconds later with a six-pack of millers and a bottle of Harwood Canadian.

Well, ever since we were a couple of freshmen girls, it was our favourite little combo for when it was the two of us. Here, Kitty Cat, this will take the edge off. I offered her a weak, half-smile before taking and downing a decent swig of the miller. For about the next minute and a half, the two of us drank in silence until, finally, having gotten herself a nice little buzz going, she looked at me and asked, Hey, um, I still want to dance, kitty cat? I rolled my head to her, by that point I was well under, though, not enough to get blacked out. A grin stretched across my face. Fuck yeah, I slurred excitedly.

Look, I've got a new CD I wanted you to check out. Remember that little band we used to listen to, Serafim, yeah? I nodded my head. How could I forget? The band that her, me and a couple of other friends originally only listened to to see if its little supposed curse was real. I even noticed she still had a few of their CDs. She pulled out her phone then and held up her music playlist to me.

She pointed to one of the songs at the top of the list and said, Hey, check it! The song was titled Something Weird. Six God, Six, Cry, Six. Briefly scanning a couple of the other songs below it, I saw that they were all titled like this, all of them looking like a weird serial code or something. Yeah, this techno group called Ghostwhispers.io.

Hmm, cool. I continued looking at the track. The album art was a sort of sloppily drawn skeleton wearing headphones. That was it. You'll love it, I promise. She downed another swallow of her drink before going over and connecting her Bluetooth surround sound speakers to her phone. You ready? She hit the play button on the song. I was confused for a second when nothing happened. I looked at Jenna, who held her finger up, winking. Eventually, I began to hear it. It sounded like a low sort of rumbling noise that very, very slowly built in pitch and tempo. I imagine the stomping footsteps of an elephant approaching you. It was a lot like that if the footsteps also got higher in pitch the closer they came.

Several wave-like sounds then came from the speakers that, at first, made me think the opening riff was about to cue, except it wasn't. Instead, two or three more of them passed through the room. Following this was a weird sort of heartbeat sound that, after a few more passing waves, the two sounds synchronized with one another. I looked at Jenner again.

She had her eyes closed, bopping her neck back and fall. I couldn't understand, because not only was there no music, at least nothing I'd have considered music, but her head bops weren't even in rhythm with the actual sounds themselves. The rhythm stayed the same, steadily growing higher and higher in pitch, yet her bopping was much more erratic by comparison.

Then, when I'd say the rhythm from the song reached about a mid-range sound, I started to notice something about the wave sounds, or rather I should say, the sobbing sounds. I don't know how best to describe the sand other than what you'd think of if you imagine two or three whales simultaneously crying deep underwater. It was low and incoherent, and it all the same I could somewhat feel this cloud of overwhelming sadness, as well as a sense of ominous dread coming from it. When it started getting louder and louder, so too did the bass blasting from the speakers,

causing my entire body to vibrate inside and out. Jenna still wasn't bothered by this though. I started to wonder if somehow we were listening to a different song altogether. Then I heard a noise like an extremely deep voice come from the speaker saying, By man's will, the almighty weeps. As garbled as it was, that's really only my best guess as to what I'd heard. Whatever it was, though, was immediately followed by this high-pitched squeal, sort of like a guitar trill that almost immediately broke my eardrums, literally to a point where, even to this day, I actually still have a hard time really hearing anything.

I looked over to Jenna, who had her face contorted in a silent sort of scream, kind of like when you're listening to a heavy song and you react by screaming like the vocalist is. It was like that, only she was perfectly still. In fact, so was everything else. I took a second, but I actually noticed that the speakers weren't vibrating anymore, not like they were earlier. As well as this, my own body wasn't vibrating anymore, even though the base was still blasting from the speakers. I tried to look around the room, but I couldn't move my head,

only my eyes, and even that was more of a struggle than it should have been. I noticed too that the room was turning grey-scale. The LED lights Jenna had around her liver, room now weren't colored or glowing. Jenna herself even looked like this. The screeching noise by now was a sort of droning ambience in the background. I started hearing more voices coming through the speakers,

mixing and distorting as they came closer toward me. I couldn't make out anything they were saying, except for one thing, screamed at me in another language. There's so much. et flemos satay Parasituses et finiendoses This too

then dispersed into a multitude of other crying voices They were all mixed too Some were men's voices Some women, some of them were even children's voices They were mixed languages too Like the one from earlier All of them were saying different

things at the same time, none of which I could understand, but whatever it was, it was done so out of fright. I'd be almost willing to swear this carried on for hours, but as I found out only a second later, only three minutes had passed since this all began. Eventually the music ended, and I saw everything normally again. Came to, I saw Jenna grinning at me. So, What'd you think? Part two. I didn't reply. And her face fell into one of concern. Kitty Cat, you? Anyone home? I didn't answer. The world felt normal again, but I still couldn't make myself move. Not even out of shock or anything either, but like something was actually holding me perfectly still. Cat! She came over and started shaking me.

In my mind, I could almost feel my lungs tearing from how much I was screaming out to her, but no sound actually came out. Cat, Cat, come on, baby. Catherine! I heard her voice start to jumble like the ones from the beat earlier. My name started to twist and morph into other words in her distorted voice, words I couldn't understand except for this phrase. Homonym Flemy!

Repeating over and over. Jenner began slapping me to wake up, but I couldn't even feel it, or anything for that matter. My body was essentially a vegetable, only really conscious inside my own head. I could see and hear, but not move or feel. I wasn't until long afterward that I knew that I wasn't dreaming any of this or dead. When I watched and heard Jenner call 911, who showed up about 15 minutes later and took me to the hospital. where I woke up, so to speak. During all of this, my mind was screaming,

along with the other million, 100 million, possibly billion other voices I was hearing screaming those two words to me. When it all stopped finally at the hospital, I found Jenna asleep in the chair next to my bed, a hand holding mine gently. I moved my hand, my head to look around, and even wiggle my toes.

I could move my body, again. I was back. Jenna stirred awake soon after. Well, good morning, kitty cats, she said with a groaning sort of early morning chuckle. I looked at her, my face a mix of confusion and exhaustion. Oh good, you're actually moving too. Jenna, I said grogly. What the hell happened? and why am I here? She scoffed dryly and replied. I was kind of hoping you'd tell me, Sugar. Well, I just kept staring at her.

You don't remember last night? I squinted my eyes, rubbing my head, which was pounding like crazy for some reason. Um, I... I don't. Look, how are you doing this morning? "'Gener and I both looked to see the doctor entering the room, then. "'I exchanged glances between him and Jenna before answering,

"'still groggy, that I was fine. "'He had me then sit up and start going through all the regular check-up routines "'before tapping my knees with a mallet. "'Oh, my reflexes were fine, "'but when he attempted to check my hearing, something weird happened. "'Whenever he hit the button to trigger the beep in the headphones I was wearing, I didn't hear the beep, but instead the phrase from before. Homenom, flabit.

I still raised my hand when I heard it for the first few times, but then, after about the seventh or eighth time, I felt my body go stiff again. This time, along with the abandonment of my senses, I could feel something heavy sort of stuff itself inside my head, like it was a glass jar. You know how when you eat too much, your body feels like a giant, brick of lead has replaced your organs.

This was like that. Only it was all inside my head. Nowhere else, and instead of food, instead of something tangible, it was filled with a low, deep sobbing noise from the song. The pressure alone made my head prone to explode. The sounds in it got louder and louder as well, silencing the world around me. I couldn't take it anymore, but when I opened my mouth to scream,

I couldn't make any sort of sound I mean, not at all not even a whimper or gasping or wheezing nothing I could barely even breathe in fact one of the worst parts about this was thanks to my mind being as infested as it was I couldn't even scream internally

what the fuck like I wanted to I couldn't form any of my own thoughts my mind was as empty as my body this time The only sign this time that I was still alive was my sight. I could see Jenna and the doctor calling out to me and shaking me again, but now I couldn't feel or hear them. I remember being wheeled out of that room and back into the OR. Another thing that scared me about this was just how slow time seemed to move.

I mean, I couldn't have been in the audiology room for any more than ten or twenty minutes. I could almost swear that I was in that room for two hours. The same with when they wheeled me down the hallway to the OR. That hallway stretch for a freaking eternity, despite being only a couple of rooms away from the audiologists. In the OR I watched figures all around me scrambling with various surgical implements. I could tell from their body language that they were all panicking,

though about what exactly I couldn't really tell, except that it was to try to revive me. There must have been in critical conditions. I thought. God, I'm going to die. The old time, all I could hear was the sobbing and crying in my head. Even my screams were silenced by them too. I imagine for a moment that you're a dummy, a wooden puppet, and you know you're a puppet, and you're forced to watch the world around you while someone else is talking for you.

You want to scream out with your own voice, but you can't because you essentially have no voice of your own. That's exactly what this was, save for the fact that only I could hear the voice that wasn't mine. This time I have no idea how much time had actually passed before I came out of this spell, because it was a while before it even registered that I was actually back. A sort of delayed effect, you know, like it all stopped, but you don't even realize it because of just how overstimulated your brain was. Eventually, though, I did come out of it to find myself in the whole. hospital room I was in before. I couldn't tell where I was at first because of the way everything

was happening so fast, feeling like the ninth acid trip I never had. I'd clean myself off after the eighth, and it also hadn't registered to me that I'd been moved here. It was dark, the clock beside me reading 10.30 p.m. I picked my head up as much as I could and tried looking around the room. Jenna! No one answered. I was alone in the room. My head fell back down and I just stared back at the ceiling.

I couldn't sleep, couldn't move, well not much anyways. I just lay in bed and stared at the freaking ceiling. Ironically, I felt the quiet was just as detrimental to me mentally as the voices screaming in my head were. At least with that, something was happening. God only knew what, but it was something. But now, though, I was all alone. My thoughts were mine, sure, but that was far from consoling.

All I could think was that I was starting to lose my mind, and there was no fathomable reason as to why. I don't have a history of mental illness. I've been cleaned from drugs, like I mentioned before, for over three years now. I knew that I wasn't making any of this shit up, despite how much I actually wished to God that I was. The only thing I could connect any of this shit to was that song.

That made me start thinking a little bit. The song itself was called God cries, and the tracks sounded like someone was crying, not to mention the words themselves that kept repeating in my head, which I was starting to realize sounded like Latin. What was said, though, well, I'd had no idea at the time. I couldn't look it up yet either because I didn't have my phone with me.

The next morning a nurse came in and went through the routine check-up. Just like before, my reflexes were slower than they should have been, even more so than the previous day, in fact, not to mention my body feeling even more still than before as well. Each movement of any of my muscles ate like crazy. Afterwards, though, I still asked if I could have my phone brought to me. She agreed, somewhat reluctantly for some reason, and then brought it to me. After she left, the first thing I did was to check my messages to see if Jenna may have said anything.

Maybe a, hey, I'm worried about you. Call or text me when you get this to let me know everything's okay. Love you. Or some shit like that. Sadly, there was no such message or any message at all from her. Next I opened Google to search the meaning for the phrase homonym flabit and the other phrases from the music. Before I even got that follow,

an article from my newsfeed caught my eye. It was the club from two nights ago with a headline reading. Owner of nightclub sued for soliciting illegally pirated music and the death of a patron. Curious now, I clicked on it and read the article. Apparently one of the tracks that was playing that night was done so without the artist's knowledge, and they found out because, following the incident, the police investigation revealed that the track the guy was listening to,

the designated song for his colour group, was that from a particular artist? Well, you probably see where this is going, but I'll tell you that it honestly shocked me the first time I saw it. The artist was ghostwhispers.io. More specifically, Rolf E. Co. The apparent mind behind the madness. Rolf was quoted in saying that his music was, More than an art,

what a gift to the elder ones. And explained that because of that, he required a high price for any individual or media platform to download, use, or even listen to his music. A sign of tribute to the ones below, as he put it. A bit overcompensating, I know, but art is art, I guess, well, each to their own.

The point was that the club had been playing his music, despite him refusing to allow it after failing to agree to his lofty price arrangement. This compelled me to want to look further into Rolf E. Corps, and see exactly what Ghostwhispers.io was actually about. After spending about 30 minutes trying to find anything about it, other than the lawsuit and the incident at the club, I finally settled on an old Facebook page from Rolf himself.

Judging from the fact that the last post that had been made by the account was from all the way back in 2009, I knew that any information I'd find here would be outdated at best. Still, I was able to sift through and learn that Rolf E. Cole, to no real surprise, used to be an active Satanist and ran an old group on there known as the whispering ghost from below. Now, I'm in no way religious. I don't have anything against those that are. Your beliefs are your own. But I say right now that the shit I read on the old post from this guy

and a few of the others in his little niche was nothing short of freaking bizarre. I really can't explain much of it, but basically these wingnots believed in preaching about the coming of what they called the elder spirit. None of them could give any consistent details on what the elder one was. or what they did.

Some gave a more or less weird spin on the story of Genesis, where others try putting elements from Lovecraft books to create this pseudo-fan fiction for it. Rolf E. Kohl himself, however, oddly enough, didn't seem to take part in this. In fact, his philosophy was that only by speaking with the Elder One themselves, could you even begin to understand what they are and or what and why they do the things they do?

If you're wondering just how to do that, there's actually a list he put together on how to somehow pull this off. But you're insane if you think I'm going to list it here. Suffice to say, it's a long and extremely dangerous process. Somewhere along the way, though, there was a sort of disconnect, some sort of point in time where the whispering ghosts drifted apart from one another, with fewer and fewer posts being made and less and less chat among the members. From what I could see, there wasn't any sort of falling out between any of them, or Rolf himself, but rather just a growing apathy between them all.

That is except for Rolf, who, um until the last post made in late 2011, kept up the most and pretty much only activity throughout the group. For the most part, the posts contained mostly just drawings and or descriptions or portents, as he called them. Got a real whack job, this one. I can't stress this enough. Yeah, post-importance about the elder ones rising. The drawings were, at least the best I could make of it,

of something similar to those freakish, biblically accurate angels, being a giant mass of assorted eyeball surrounded by a generated aura of some sort of energy or something. Some showed something similar to this, but instead of just a ball of eyes, the elder one had the body of a person with the eyes embedded all across its body, with the exception of its face, which was blank.

The dreams were more or less the same psychotic shit you'd expect a burgeoning cult leader to ramble on about, being all, I've just dreamed of the almighty elder one's awakening to hail the apocalypse, another such shit. It was in mid-2010 when the group had really lost traction, but Rolf started talking about making music. It started with small posts, similar to the ones of his portents,

where he'd describe how he'd hear and transcribe the prophecies of the elder one. And then he'd start leaving audio tracks in posts. Finally, come the end of the year, he'd start uploading the tracks to SoundCloud and start posting links to them there. This continued right up until the last post made at the end of 2011, like I mentioned earlier. Well, at first it seemed like there was potential

for Rolf to reignite interest in the group with his music. with members engaging in the posts, commenting on the tracks themselves, well, it didn't last terribly long. The last post was Rolf saying, The elder one has chosen me as his prophet, and I have spoken. You have all closed your ears and your hearts to him. Do as you will, but with or without disciples of my own, I will continue his good work.

I try to click on the sound-clown links, only to find the account and the tracks were no longer there. No surprise, I guess, considering the lawsuit. That got me wandering then. Just how in the hell did the club owner have the track playing to begin with if he didn't pay for it? In that same vein, how did Jenna even hear about it? The solution? Asked the club owner himself.

Part three. That day I went through my routine check-up with no further incidents. At least none as extreme as that. The next few days progressed like this, with the only weird thing to be the only weird thing occur being the occasional nightmare here and there, or the odd auditory hallucinations sometimes when I'd walked down the halls to the bathroom or lie in bed. Well, I still can't say whether or not it was necessarily a good thing, that I'd become so desensitized to it by that point that it meant next to nothing for me to repeatedly hear,

hominom flebit, in my ear, by about a hundred different people, in the floor just below the Wackle Lodge, but nevertheless I didn't make any sort of scene with it. I mean, I still had control over my body and my senses, and I guess that was enough for me. Either that or my mind has a twisted sense of humour all its own. Anyway, it was enough of a charade to swindle the doctors and nurses to deem me safe to go back home without hurting myself or anyone else just a few days following. I called Jenna that afternoon to come pick me up, and she was there a few minutes past noon. Hey, listen, I'm sorry I haven't called.

she said immediately after I got in the car. It's okay, I replied. I have a favor to ask you, though. She raised her eyebrows. Can you drive us by the club? She chuckled. Wow, five days in the hospital and the first thing you think about is wanting to go dancing.

She threw her head back laughing. I just stared at her. Oh, shit, you're serious. Her eyes passed rapidly back. and forth between the car, clock and me. Hell, kitty, cat. I don't even think the place is open. What are you even wanting to go there for,

especially when it's only noon? I opened my mouth, then stopped. To be honest, up to that point, I hadn't really thought of what to say. I just kind of thought she'd go along with it. Even if she had a point, and the place probably wasn't open,

I wouldn't likely be until around ten that night at the earliest. I wasn't sure what to tell her about, Ghost Whispers, I owe, the stuff that I found online. At the same time, I needed to talk to the club owner, see what he knew, and or how the hell he'd even got the track to begin with. In the end, I went with pulling out my phone and showing her the article about the lawsuit. The first reaction was confusion, then shock, and then something of interest, giving the phone the same look she sometimes gave me when we drunk together late at night.

Oh, I see. You're trying to learn more about the band, her. She winked and added, Had a girl. It's more than just that, Jen. I opened the Facebook links. The dude was nuts, and I want to know how and why they got the track illegally.

She raised an eyebrow then and gave me a patronizing smile. Oh, God, I told you you watched too many crime shows. I sighed and stared, pleadingly. "'Oh, come on, not the puppy eyes. You know I can't resist that.' "'Somwhat amused, somewhat relieved she was caving. "'I made my eyes cartoonishly bigger and more pathetic-looking. "'Ah, all right,' she said finally, "'throwing the car in gear and driving out of the hospital parking lot.

"'We arrived at the club about five or six minutes later. "' Admittedly, Jenna might have had a point with the club "'probably not even being open, because the parking lot was the most deserted that I'd ever seen it. We got out and went to the door, knocking as usual. Fortunately, Jenna always remembered the club's secret knock because I never could. It was a certain rhythm that was taught for all the paid members like Jenna and I, sort of like a gang sign, if you will, that lets them know that you're a member.

For almost three minutes, the two of us just stood there like a couple of the idiots we always hear about who didn't know the secret knock, and we left standing all alone outside. Sheard, she and I used to make jokes about them. Jenna turned to me, giving me a sarcastic look and said, I told you, dumb, dumb, without telling me. I was actually about to try my hand at the knocking, when I heard the bolt on the door slide back.

We took a step back, and the door soon opened. Tanner, the door guy, stood in the doorway, eyeing us, wondering why the hell we'd be here so early. Hey, the owner here? I asked. Yeah, but he's a bit tied up at the moment. Why? We need to... Jenna cleared her throat. Okay, I need to talk to him about the other night.

He scoffed and said, Good luck, get in line. Focus from the recording studios and the courthouse have been chomping away at him all morning. the way this shit's gone, it's probably going to be yet another couple of nights before we can get this in order and open up again. Look, I promise it'll only take a minute. I was cut off when I heard the sound of shouting coming from down the hall. I couldn't make out much other than something about.

Mother fucking whore. God, son of a cuck-sucking whore. I exchanged glances between Tanner and the hallway, and he grimaced. "'You see what I mean now?' he asked. "'Yeah, but still, I need to ask him something.' His eyebrows raised in disbelief. "'Come on, sweetheart. "'You really want to go pissing the big man off after hearing that?

"'Here, why don't you tell me, and I'll give him the message.' I sighed and was about to turn back when Jenna stepped up. "'Look, dude,' she said in that saying, I'm about two seconds from planting my foot in your ass tone than I was talking about earlier. My girl here said she needed to talk to the guy okay. Now, you're going to let her through, or am I going to have to lay you out like a little bitch while Cat here gets it on video for the world to see? Tanna looked at her, then to me, and back to her before stepping aside.

I almost couldn't believe that actually was. I mean, Jenna was tough, sure, but I honestly figured Tanna, built as he was, and keep in mind he was also the bouncer for the place, well that he'd be able to take her in a one-on-one. Regardless, the two of us walked right in toward the room at the end of the hall. Right when I reached the door, I heard a low humming sort of noise, a droning, so to speak. It was low, almost like a buzzing noise.

I stopped from opening the door and instead started listening. The droning remained low for almost three minutes before I heard this garbled, rumbling sort of voice Say something I think like Viginalamus Se creasio are dead The shiver passed down my back

At the sound of the low-toned Latin My arm shook Caught stuck between wanting to throw open the door and rush in And wanting to rush back to the exit Jenna Noticing my hesitation Took charge and threw the door open for me

The both of us then froze in shock when we saw the owner of the club splayed out on the floor, seizing violently. The droning sound was deafening. I was forced to bend down and cover my ears when I heard the music land out a huge wave of synth noise and the voice repeated.

Vigilamus, sick creachio, or dead. This time, though, I noticed the voice wasn't actually coming from the speakers in the room at all, but instead from the guy himself. His eyes were bugging and his mouth was wide open, almost impossibly so. I was about to rush and tried to help him when Jenna threw her arm out in front of me, stopping me. That was when, in a single motion so quick that it was startling, plus a bit painful to watch.

The guy shot upright, staring right at me in Jenna, wide-eyed and slacked jaunt. From there he started jerking while disjointedly standing up. Jenna grabbed my arm and pulled us toward the door when it slammed itself shut, jamming itself in place. Jenna tried pulling and pulling, even battering against it with her shoulder, but it wouldn't budge. The droning was now a heart-stoppingly loud.

God, I could feel it like it was actually part of the air itself. It was an all-consuming force. The owner took a disjointed step forward and the two of us stepped back in response. "'Dammit, it won't open,' Jenna shouted above the drony. The owner's jaw distended in the deep, distorted voice spoke. "'We awake, and thus creation burns.' "'What?' I asked, too confused to even properly be terrified.

It took another step, and with each second his body jerked more and more actively dislocated. and relocating several of his bones simultaneously. We have been awakened after thousands of years, and we've heard the call. Creation's time has come. Now it must end, starting now, with you. Who are you? Jenna yelled.

We are the elders of all creation. My eyes grew. The man stopped suddenly doubling, over in pain. I was bright, glowing orbs of light appear all over his body, followed with him screaming in a way that resembled a hundred people screaming in pain all at the same time. The oars began to char and burn themselves into his skin like cattle brandings before revealing themselves as a multitude of eyeballs. They were all different colors and twitching anxiously all over his body. Jenna screamed, What the? I just froze.

I couldn't feel my heart pounded away in my chest. The man, the thing, whatever the hell you want to call it, took two more disjointed steps towards us. Jen was back to beating on the door, shouting, Hey, open up, get us out of here. He can't save you. No one can. His arm raised and Jenny was suddenly thrown from the door into the wall.

Before my brain could even register her what had just happened, the man's arm raised again to the ceiling, causing a handful of the electrical calls to coil around her wrists and ankles, suspending her in the air. She struggled furiously, but couldn't break herself free. I watched the prongs of the different plugs embed themselves into her arms, causing her to cry out in sharp pain. The cords started to glow bright orange, and the smell of burnt matches filled the room. Plumes of smoke started to rise from the different points where the plugs were embedded into her arms. Her eyes rolled back and her body started to shake and twist. I ran to savour, but was stopped before I even made my fifth step by a rogue

cord that had suddenly come to life as well, wrapping around my leg and likewise stabbing my thigh with its prongs. Immediately I felt something searing the nerves in my leg before, then feeling nothing at all. I wrestled furiously, but just like with Jen, Jenna, this thing had me stuck fast and I wasn't going anywhere. I looked up to see black spots growing all across her arms and all the way up to and around her shoulders. Others were even forming up her neck. I reached out to keep trying to pull myself to her, but I couldn't move.

Smoke then began coming out of her mouth and blood rained down from her eyes. Jenna! I screamed. I then turned to the figure, still holding its arm outstretched. What are you doing to her? The figure turned to face me, but didn't speak. Instead, the voice came from Jenna, whose jaw now moved up and down, all wonky like she was trying to talk while it was broken. I told you, we are bringing creations end.

We have seen the error in its creation, and we can no longer stand for it. In seconds, the lights from the room blinked rapidly for a couple of seconds before going out completely. The room began to glow again when Jenna's body emanated a bright orange aura just like the club owner's body had done before. Her eyes were gone, with all the other ones from before, now opening up across her body. Her jaw began to move again and she said, This will suit us nicely. She is one of our strongest disciples, thus she will be our voice to the world. She ended this with a screech that almost immediately,

deafened me. "'Gena!' I cried out, feebly attempting once again to wrestle my foot free from the court. "'Let her go, you son of a bitch.' "'We cannot. We will not. She is with us now.' The eyes twitching intensified, as did the glowing around them. She'll be the voice of life's end,

the bugle of the end of days. "'No, I'll do whatever you want, okay? Just give Jenna back to me.' And then struggled forward again, and this made the prong sink itself deeper into my thigh. It would have hurt like hell had the electrical surge not fright all the nerves until a black patch had formed all around the muscle itself.

Still, I couldn't move, even if I'd been able to rip my leg free without feeling anything. You're of no use to us. You're my mind. was weak when you heard our call but hers is strong only the strong can vessel us before I had any time to think about anything I was yanked back by my leg and hurled into the back wall smashing into the control panel in front of the recording room the impact of my body small and mousy

as it was total of the panel itself causing several sparks to shoot out everywhere catching the carpet floor a flame. It only took about five seconds for the entire floor to turn into an inferno, and only a further three before the flames were going up the wall. My consciousness didn't last any longer than that, though, having cracked my head hard against the panel. I was out cold, two, no voices, no dreams, nothing. Just silence, which made me think I was finally done in until just a few moments later,

at least I'm assuming only a few moments. when I was being shaken awake by Tanner and a couple of firemen. My head felt light, and when I opened my mouth to take a breath in, smoke and carbons stuffed themselves like lead weights into my lungs, and I coughed. Oh, easy there, said one of the firefighters. He held up an oxygen mask and said, Here, put this on. I did, and after a few seconds I was able to breathe a bit more normally again.

I looked around the room. Everything from the floor to the ceiling was charred. By the door was a discarded fire extinguisher and a few areas covered with foam. I looked over to where Jenna was and I almost wanted to vomit right there and then. She was burned almost beyond recognition, having just enough of her intact from me, though probably very few others, to even realize that was or had ever been her. The plugs were still hooked permanently. into her carcass.

The club owner's body was likewise scorched, only he had absolutely no flesh left uncooked. A few seconds later, two policemen entered the room and came over to me, asking me if I was okay. I was taken out of there in a stretcher and rushed to the burn ward at the hospital. From there, I was treated as best they could for me.

I ended up having the leg amputated and fitted with a prosthetic. Fortunately, I happened to have the instrument, and a good bit saved up to have afforded that. Of course, that meant I couldn't go to the club anymore. Not that mattered anymore. Jenna wouldn't be there anymore. My Jenna, she's ours now. Those words have resonated with me ever since that moment. About a week ago now. The more I think about it, the more it makes sense to me. The being, the elder ones, claimed that my mind was too weak to be used as a vessel like she and the club owner were.

I was unsure of what they meant at first, until I thought back to that night at Jenner's, as well as the club before that. And that's when the dots started connecting, realizing that both Jenna, the club owner, and God knows how many others had all listened to Ghost Whispers I-O before, known them having suffered any sort of effects like me and the kid from the club that night had. I thought at first that it may have been something of Rolf E. Co. had done in the event. Someone tried pirating the music like the club owner allegedly had. But then the thought came back to me that that couldn't have been it,

given that Jenna couldn't have paid the price he was asking for just to download the track that she played that night. Never mind the others she probably had. That led to the conclusion that only certain people could, and couldn't be affected in any such ways by the music. The only thing I could think to do was to try actually reaching out to Rolf E. Cowell directly, see if he could explain any of it. But everything I've tried, emails, various phone numbers, social media outlets, have all resulted in nothing.

I'm stuck on what to do now. I was finally released from the hospital to go back home two days ago. It didn't feel as relieving as it had the first time. My Jenna wasn't there with a snarky wit to greet me. No, it was just some random Uber guy who wouldn't shut the hell up. But it was what happened when I was leaving the hospital, and on my way back to my apartment, though, over the driver's radio while it was on some comedic radio show,

I heard the all-too-familiar droning noise in the backgrounds, the built-in pitch to overtake the audio. It was followed by a deep, gobbled voice bellowing. Homenum, flare bit. Patty's food addiction by D. Grady, 237. Don't be scared, Eddie. It won't bite. Or will it? The camera zooms in on the pink crab claw in Pat's hand

as his voice dips down into mug demonic bellowing. It zooms out to show animated flames leaping leaping out around Pat's head like a halo, and the playback speed slows down to half. In a flash, normalcy resumes, and Pat continues on. No, no, it's already deliciously cooked. Don't worry, Ed's. Is it me, though? Or was the camera shaking a little there?

Pat's eyes glint with good humor and his warm, endearing smile, broadens as he brings the segment home. Upbeat pop music plays over his final words. The Santa Monica Crabhouse is devilishly good, and you, my fiends, I mean friends, who've got to check this place out. Keep the description for more info, and don't forget to like and subscribe to Patty's food addiction to follow our food tour across the States. See you next time, weirdos. The video ends, and Pat tosses a cell phone onto the motel's floral bedspread.

Not bad, right? Ed says, sleepily. He's already made himself comfortable on his twin bed, the one tucked in the corner. Pat, of course, has taken the window bed. Not bad. Pat raises his eyebrows and waits for a response. Eddie, finally noticing the expectant pause, glances over at his friend. Yeah, you don't like it?

It's missing the wink sound, Ed. What the hell is a wink sound? Eddie replies. already mourning the sleep he'll lose to whatever argument is on the horizon. I told you right after the shoot that you should add a wink sound when I wink at the camera. It's funny. People like it. Right. Okay. I'll send a memo out to my team with one to get on that for next time. Edward, Pat says in the pandering tone of a parent waiting out at Charles Temper Tentrum.

I added flames shooting out of your head, Pat. Sorry I missed a wink sound. How the hell is a wink even supposed to sound? Gee, Eddie, I didn't know you hated your job so much. Pat crosses one leg over the other and lets his eyes linger on Ed's, daring him to continue on, daring him not to acquiesce. Not what I meant. Because, if I remember, you were the one practically on the street when I offered you this position.

Oh, great, yeah. holding that over my head, Pat. Defeated, Eddie lays back down on the bed and turns over to face the wall. You're welcome, Pat says cheerily. He props himself up in his bed and turns the television on. Hey, Eddie. What? Ed grumbles. A wing sound should be like a little bell ringing. What? Eddie half turns and his profile is washed away with the silver light of the television. or just for next time there should be a little bell ringing any time I winked the camera

okay Ed turns away too angry to speak looking over at Ed's back Pat points the remote at the TV screen and turns the sound up to the maximum volume Sleep well Pat shouts

Ed's only reaction is to pull the pillow over his head Ed wakes up sweating when he pulls the pillow off his face the harsh sunlight from the open doorway pours in and bakes the room with dry desert heat. He takes off his glasses. Pat, rubs his eyes and puts his glasses back on to look around the room. The bathroom door is closed and he can hear running water. He looks back towards the open front door.

Jesus, Patty, he left the door open. The beam of sunlight shifts and a shadow small and quick flutters just, outside the door. Ed walks towards it. A grey rat peeks his head around the door and looks at him with murky black eyes. Ed screams and jumps up on the bed. The bathroom door opens and pad appears, his lower half wrapped in a towel. We've only got 15,000 views on the Santa Monica video. I'm telling you, we need to find our niche. There's too much food content out there right now. Why are you on the bed? Red,

Do we? Ed's pointing but looking away. Pat looks at the door and walks closer. Huh? What? Eddie says. It's dead. What?

It's dead. Look at this. Pat throws the door all the way open before Ed can object. The rat is lying on its side, flanked by a skinny orange cat. The cat's standing over the rat, chewing on its exposed intestines. Close it, close the door, Ed shrieks. Beat it! And Pat deposits a quick kick to the cat's side as it hisses at him and then runs away,

abandoning the mangled rat at the door. The drive out of California into Nevada is hot and uneventful. Pat talks and Ed pretends to listen. Red swells of dusty cliffs rise up around the road as they drive. through the desert. When the land settles into miles of flat plains, the world's divided into two, perincle blue and apricot, meeting on the horizon in a line as sharp as a knife. The camera lingers on a cherry tomato perched on a bed of iceberg lettuce, then pans up at a steady pace to reveal each additional layer of a colossal stack of food. The stack ascends in the following order.

A bloody New York strip. Two Belgian waffles, drenched, in syrup and butter, a fried chicken thigh and drumstick, jiggling shrimp lo-main, a dollop of beef and broccoli, cold glass noodles with kimchi, shrimp cocktail, and three pieces of crispy bacon fanned out on top. As the camera reaches the top of the edible mountain, Pat's eyes, wide and crossed in disbelief, peek over the top of the bacon. The camera pulls out to a wide shot and Pat can be seen holding the plate with two hands. He's walking away from a pristine buffet that snakes around a room as wide and tall as a ballroom.

Tourists in cargo shorts and white sneakers mill about, holding their mounds, though theirs are not quite as outrageous as Pat's. Oh! Pat pretends to lose balance and tips the plate to one side, but then writes himself at the last moment, laughing. What do you think, Ed's, did I get enough? Animated sparkles glint around the top of the food. and then an inserted belching sound rings out. Pat puts the plate on a nearby table, grabs a piece of bacon,

and rips off the end with his teeth. He chews enthusiastically. Listen, friends, if you're hungover, sad, lonely, happy, celebrating any or all of the above, then gravy-trained buffet is the place to be in Las Vegas. The food is fresh and beyond bountiful. Pat snatches another piece of bacon off the top,

and hands it to a passer by. The young woman looks at the piece of bacon nervously, and then at the camera. She giggles, tucks a piece of hair behind her ear, then takes the bacon and scurries away. Follow us on our food tour across the states. We've done the big and bold,

and now we'll be chasing down the lesser-known establishments of this great country. I'm talking greasy spoons, roadside smoke brisket, the works. Subscribe to Patty's Food Addiction to see it. all. The camera zooms in with quick jerky movements and settles on Pat's mouth as he's finishing his call to action. A piece of charred bacon sits on his lip and glistens as he talks.

A fake sparkle shoots out of the bacon beard on his lip and a bell rings for a second and then the video ends. Pat looks up from his phone and over the roof of the car at Ed. Funny? I thought you'd like it, it smiles. The sky is a low blanket of Cassie, barring a burning line of orange and pink at the border of sky and earth. A pair slide into their respective seats and head east, putting more distance between themselves and the lights of Las Vegas. Let's stop somewhere. It's been hours, Ed says. It's only been to, and there's been nowhere to stop anyway. I want to make it to Winona. Fine. I'm sleeping then. No. No? The least you can do is entertain me. I'm driving. I'm paying for the rooms and meals. Ah, geez. All right. Great. Go on then, Pat says.

Okay. What's in Winona? Nothing. Where there's nothing, there are hidden jams. I want to find the weirdest small town spot possible. I'm sure it'll be a culinary delight. How'd you hear about this place? I thought the next episode was Albuquerque. Some girl in Vegas told me about this place. It's from there, apparently. He says it's complete shit and there's nothing to do,

and we should avoid it at all costs. And, um, you took that as we should definitely go and eat the food there? Yep. That smiles to himself. staring hard at the road. That looks at him and scows. Oh, you didn't. Pat looks at Ed and grins.

Come on, ma'am, it says, turning away, disgusted. Suppose, I was supposed to keep this one to myself, too, huh? Rime me to avoid Allison when we get back. You know, I can't lie for shit. Pat says nothing, and starts happily humming. The head pulls his hoodie up over his head and shuts his eyes. It's his go-to routine, and the only way he's found to help him escape the torment of being Pat's friend. Arguing would be futile.

Scoulding would only make Pat more proud of himself, and so he simply shuts down, leaving his friend with the only punishment that would really wound him, being alone with himself. The only thing Pat can't handle is loneliness, a world without a stage in spectators. The car hits a bump and it jostles Ed awake. He sits up, startled, surprised that he actually fell asleep. He looks through the windshield and sees a white square floating towards them out of the midnight dark. As it gets closer, Ed can make out words on a white sign. For an Apache reservation.

Ed watches it pass by and disappear again into the darkness. Ah, here we are, Pat says, turning left down a dirt path. The sound of his voice startles Ed out of his thoughts, and he looks over at him. Where? Ed says. A small wooden arrow is stuck in the ground at the right of the dirt path, and it reads, Sally's diner. Gray, fat shrubs that are probably green in daylight, sit on either side of the road as they drive towards mellow, orange glow in the distance. How do you know they'll be open, Ed says, sitting up in his seat and squinting ahead.

"'Ah, she said they're always open. "'Who are—' "'Oh, right. "'The memory of Pat's infidelity "'crups back in and makes him feel slightly ill. "'They pull up to a double-white trailer "'with a truck parked on the right side of it. "'It's an old pick-up from the 50s,

"'sitting on cinder blocks. "'It's rusted almost beyond recognition. "'Amorphous lumps of brown material "'can be seen in the back seat "'where Pat's headlights shine in. Ed jumps in his seat as two shining golden eyes appear from out of the truck's window and glare at them. Pat turns off the headlights and the animal, still visible in the dim light from the trailer's windows, reveals itself to be a cat.

It jumps out of the truck window and disappears behind the side of the trailer. Ed looks at Pat with deep incredulity. We're not really eaten here, are we? Yeah, damn right we are, Pat says. He turns the car off and we're. walks towards the door. When Pat gets within two feet of the place, a figure appears behind the screen door

and then slams it open. Pat stops suddenly. His feet slide into a halt in the gravel. Why there? Are you open? Pat says. A bare bulb to the left of the doorway turns on and finally the man can be seen clearly.

He's old, but looks strong with broad shoulders in a thick midsection with muscled arms still untouched by age. His hair is thick but shockingly white and pull back into a low ponytail. It stands out against his tan skin. Ed gets out of the car and stands behind the shelter of his car door. He looks at the man and wonders if he's part of Apache. The man looks pat up and down and then says,

Closed. The blinds in the window to the left of the man's head flick open and a striking woman with long, dark hair looks out. She looks much younger than the man. and possibly she's his daughter. Come on, Pat, let's go, Ed says uneasily, already putting one foot back into the car. He sees the woman's eyes flick over to him.

They glow like the cat's eyes. She taps on the glass twice with a knuckle, and the old man looks back at her. This time Ed goes ahead and gets himself back in the car without hesitation. Pat, meanwhile, has been gazing at the young woman with his signature Paddy smile. The man looks back at Pat, noting his blatant flotation. The man smiles, revealing a mouth full of gums.

Pat smiles back, proud of himself for disarming the man so easily. We've been traveling all night, and we're awfully hungry. This place looks just so cool. We had to stop by. I actually have a popular YouTube channel. Yes, hungry. Let's see what we can whip up for you, boys. The man opens the screen door and goes back inside.

The door snaps shut behind him. Come on, Eddie, Pat shouts. No fucking way, Ed says to himself. He folds his arms over his chest and socks. He looks at the window and the woman is still there looking at him. He blinks and waves tentatively. And she closes the blinds. Pat's face appears in Ed's window and his expression is a warning.

Do not fuck the... this up. He opens Ed's door and pulls him out by the front of his hoodie with one hand. Right, let's go. Get the equipment. Oh, Pat. Pat is already opening the trunk and holding things out and onto the ground.

This is crazy. You know we're going to get murdered right. Eddie, we're doing this and it's going to be huge. People love to be scared in this, my friend, is scary. Okay, look. Just start for a second and listen. Ed grabs Pat's arm and turns him so they're facing each other. How do you know they're even going to let us film?

But we have to get them to sign the release form. Don't worry about it. I'll talk to the woman. She seems friendly enough. Pat picks up a heavy black box of sound equipment and push it against Ed's chest. Let's go. The inside of the trailer is cut into two parts. The outer door leads into a room with a small.

wooden bar set against the wall. Five small, mismatched tables are scattered around the room. A folding screen separates the kitchen, which consists of a small stove, refrigerator and a counter. Ed puts the equipment down and Pat walks around talking to no one. A great place, wow. Very rustic. Homie, you know. Hey, we haven't started filming yet, Pat.

Ed says as he starts unpacking the camera. You can't film in here. The woman from the window emerges from a door leading to the other half of the trailer, probably their living quarters. Oh, hey, there she is, Pat says. You can't film in here, she says again. Oh, yeah, um, sorry, uh, we won't, that's okay, Ed says, and starts packing up swiftly. Pat steps between them. I'm Pat.

Not sure if you get the internet around here. but I have a famous YouTube channel called Patty's Food Addiction. Basically, we're touring around the country looking for good food and good people. Unique places, too, like you're a fine establishment. We'd love to put a spotlight on your restaurant and feature you in our next segments. It gets you a ton more business. Pat smiles from ear to ear, already celebrating his successful manipulation. The woman stares at Pat Blankly and then disappears behind the kitchen's folding,

screen. The old man emerges from behind the bar and handsom each a warm bottle of beer. Only tattered white remnants remain of their labels. He smiles his fleshy smile and walks through the door into the other section of the trailer. Pat nods towards Ed, indicating that he should try the beer first. Ed sniffs at the top of the bottle and then takes a swig, when it tastes skunky and warm, but drinkable. The woman comes out holding a chipped white plate topped with a mess of something grey and brown that gyrates with each step. She puts it down on the nearest table with a thong, and then drops two forks next to it.

She looks at them. Eat this, and then you can go. She walks behind the bar and begins drying glasses and stacking them neatly on the dusty wooden bar before her. Pad and Ed edge over to the table and peer down at the substance. The lump covers almost the whole plate. Parts have you are bumpy and rainbow shiny, like bifringence on a piece of meat. Other parts were smooth and grey as shark skin.

It's impossible to tell if it's meat, vegetable, or some kind of oatmeal mush. What the hell is this? Pat says loudly. You don't want it? Then go, she says angrily and approaches the table. Wait, Ed interrupts. This is perfectly fine. Thank you so much. much. Really, Eddie? You expect me to eat this? We aren't even filming. What's the

freaking point? Pat says. Ed pulls Pat away from the table and whispers. The point is that we walk these people up in the middle of the night, and they're being hospitable. You can't just insult their food. Then you eat it. Pat's suddenly grinning. Yeah, this could be our alternate segment theme. Eddie is inedible food tour. Something like that. Ed looks over Pat's shoulder and sees the woman glaring at them. I'll do it, but we're not filming. Pat thinks for a second and then agrees.

I'm sorry about that. Pat here has a sensitive stomach, but I'll be happy to eat the meal. Thank you again. Ed says, seating himself down in front of the food. Pat sits on the other side of the table and smiles at Ed expectantly. Well, here we go. He picks up his fork, but then pauses and guzzles down half of his warm beer. The tips of his fork sink in, and he finds no resistance as he scoops up a chunk of the flabby substance.

His stomach clenches, but he places the morsel into his mouth anyway. It's as soft as bread pudding, and chews quickly, tasting salty, vinegar and an earthy flavour that he can't place. He swallows and closes his eyes, willing his gag reflex to relax. bright white stars dance around the inside of his eyelids, and he fears for a moment that he's going to pass out. He gags for a moment and then regains his composure. It opens his eyes, but he can't see anything. The world is steeped in blackness. He blinks and looks around, but he's blind to the world, and then a pimp-pric of white appears.

He squints and concentrates on it as it grows in size. A pattern of thuds can be heard as well, and they also increase in volume as Ed stands there listening to the void. Pat, he tries, but he has no voice. The wide is now thumcised and the thudding is growing louder. The white shape grows closer until he can see that it's the body of a man riding a horse. The horse's hooves are thundering towards him, and the man's body is brown and painted with black streaks slashed up and down his chest. His head and face are completely wrapped up in a white cloth,

but antlers emerge through the top of it, sharp and broad as a stag. When Ed tries to scream, he wakes up in the car. He's panting and droolies drying on his chin. He looks around and realizes he's in the passenger seat of Pat's car. Pat's driving, and he looks over at Ed. He, you are right? What happened? Ed croaks. His mouth feels like sandpaper, and he's incredibly thirsty and surprisingly hungry.

I don't know, man. You ate that nasty shit, and then we walked back to the car and you passed out. I did? I don't remember. Where are we? Holbrook. Going to find a motel. Take a day off so we can sleep a little, Pat says. Pat is being suspiciously easygoing. What about the next segment? Ed says. I already got it, Pat says with a sheepish smile. What do you mean?

Well, the trailer trash diner. We didn't film that, Ed says, feeling even more disoriented. Oh, I did, with my phone, Pat says and tosses the phone over to Ed. It goes to Pat's videos and opens up the most recent one. He presses play. Well, the video is shaky and shows the plate of food in front of Ed. Half of the shot is obscured by Pat's beer bottle, which he used to prop up the phone and partially hide it from view. Ed watches himself gag and then close his eyes for 30 seconds.

Then his eyes open again and he takes another bite, and then another. By the end of the video, Ed has devoured the entirety of the meal. The rest of the video shows Pat thanking the woman and the walk back to the car. Ed has suddenly developed a thumping headache. Oh man, we've got to stop somewhere, man. I need some water. We're almost there. Stop here, stop here.

Ed says hysterically as they near a gas station with a little shop attached. Jeez, all right. That pulls over and waits in the car for Ed to go in. It comes back with a plastic bag filled with snacks and drinks. He plops down in the seat, shuts the car door and immediately grab. a large bottle of water out of the bag, twists off the cap and starts gulping it down. Nothing for me.

Pat puts his hand in the plastic bag and starts shrewting around in it, but Ed slaps his hand away. All right, then. I don't want any of that crap anyway, bad for my physique. Pat pulls out of the gas station and starts driving towards the centre of town.

Ed rips open candy bars and chips and choms down, trying to fill a cramping emptiness in his stomach he's hoping isn't going to end up being food poisoning. He finishes off the last Snickers bar as they pull into a parking space at the motel. While Pat sleeps, Ed lies on his bed and watches TV. His stomach is grumbling and looks bloated under his thin t-shirt. Eventually, he too falls asleep.

Pat wakes up to a dark room. He's slept longer than intended. his hand fishes around in the blankets for the remote whatever's playing on the TV is loud we can't find it so he sits up squinting it's dark in the motel room and the TV is off a chill raises the hair on his arms and legs as he realizes that the sounds are coming from inside the room

Eddie Pat lunges for the bedside lamp and it turns on when the light hits the room he can see that Ed's bed is empty. He looks around wildly, trying to find the source of the moaning and slobbering. Then he sees two pale white feet sticking out from the space between Ed's bed and the wall.

Pat stands up and walks over and sees Ed sitting on the ground, staring straight ahead, shoveling a piece of pepperoni pizza into his mouth with both hands. Sauce and grease cover his face and his crooked glasses. Ed, what the hell are you?

you doing? Pat says with an uneasy laugh. Ed stops chewing and looks up at Pat. His mouth filled with half-masticated food. I'm eating. Yeah, I can see that man, but it's... Pat looks at the clock on the bedside table. It's 3 a.m. I couldn't sleep. I took a walk, and someone had left it outside the door, so I just took it. So you're eating garbage? Oh, great. I'm Just go clean yourself up and go to bed. We're going to leave in like three hours. Ed lays down where he is and falls asleep with a piece of pizza still clutched in his hand. Pat looks at him, disgusted, and then goes back to bed.

The next day they drive the three hours to Albuquerque and make it to the 50s-themed 66 diner. The place is pristine, shiny and bright like a cartoon. Hey, Daddy-Oh, check out this double-decker chival. cheeseburger, chili fries, and milkshake combo they've got over here at the 66 diner in Albuquerque in New Mexico. The camera zooms in on the melted orange cheese that's sliding down the side of the beef patties. It lingers there for the entirety of Pat's dialogue. What the fuck is this, Ed? You didn't get any footage of me talking. Ed is unresponsive and eating his third hot dog from the diner as they sit in the car reviewing the footage. Pat grabs the hot dog out of a

Ed's hand and throws it out of the window. Ed turns toward him so quickly that Pat flinches back and hits his head on the roof of the car. Hey, Pat says, but Ed grabs him by the front of his shirt and pulls him forward. Their nose is a touching and Ed pulls his lip back and bears his teeth. He makes a sound in his throat like a snarl. From Pat's perspective, Ed's eyes look black and his face is impossibly long and white. Ed lets go and gets out of the car. Pat's heart is thumping hard in his chest as he watches Ed walk back towards the diner. A busboy exits the side door and tosses a trash bag into the dumpster behind the diner. Ed makes a sharp left towards it and Pat can only stare in disbelief as Ed hauls himself over the side of the dumpster with ease

and starts tearing through the garbage, pulling out clumps of left over food. Half a heat, and buns, mounds of wilted lettuce and tomato, meat and cheese and coffee grounds. They blend together in clumps as he pulls them out and stuffs them into his mouth. Without thinking, Pat turns the car on and backs out at the parking space. He slams on the brakes before nearly hitting a couple exiting the diner, and when he turns back towards the windshield to accelerate forward, Eddie is standing there in front of the car, his mouth smudged with filth. He stares at Pat and then slowly walks around to the passenger side and gets in.

He turns his head and looks at Pat. Are you going to leave without me? Eddie, why the hell did you do that? I was hungry. After a few moments of shock silence, Pat drives the car out of the parking lot and onto their next destination. The two do not speak during the hour drive to. Santa Fe. That night, Pat has trouble falling asleep in their hotel room, despite it being slightly more upscale than their previous lodging. Ed is sleeping soundly, but Pat feels troubled.

When he finally falls asleep just past midnight, he's haunted by strange nightmares, filled with torchlight and behemoth beasts moving through ancient landscapes. Pat wakes up, gasping and sweating. He's never had a nightmare before. God, he's in so much. He's in so much pain, he fears he must have thrashed around and injured himself. He tries to reach his arm over to turn on the lamp, but his arm is stuck. He pulls again and realizes his wrist is tied to the bed. His other wrist is as well, and so are his legs. A sharp agonizing pain lights up in his right leg.

He screams and pulls against his restraints. What, help! Eddie! Somebody! But no one answers. A car drives by, with headlights lighting up the room through the slats of the blinds, allowing him to see the end of the bed. Huddle there is Ed, chewing on his leg.

His teeth sink in deep and he rips off a chunk of calf meat. Pat screams again, and Ed keeps on eating. A glint of light catches Pat's eye from the bedside. table. He looks and sees his cell phone. It's recording live on YouTube. The gruesome nightmare he's in is reflected back at him and thousands of comments are spilling in as people watch him being devoured. Golden eyes flash in through the hotel window. Somebody, please help me. Pat is pleading with a voyeur in the window, with his subscribers with anyone who'll take pity on him.

The eyes in the window shiver with movement, and then suddenly he can see the outline of a cat, stealthy and silent, watching them. And so once again, we reach the end of tonight's podcast. My thanks as always to the authors of those wonderful stories, and to you for taking the time to listen. Now, I'd ask one small favor of you. Wherever you get your podcast wrong, please write a few nice words and leave a five-star review, as it really helps. was the podcast. That's it for this week, but I'll be back again same time, same place, and I do so hope you'll join me once more. Until next time, sweet dreams and bye-bye.