I’m an investigative reporter. Name? Doesn’t matter. What matters is the story I’m about to tell. A story that led me to a forgotten town, where silence became the master of ceremonies, ruling the lives of its inhabitants in unimaginable ways.
Putting aside the poetic language for a moment, it all began that morning. I was on my way to work when I read a message from my boss: “Hey ____, got a field assignment for you, free today?”
Without wasting time, I replied affirmatively. Field assignments usually meant a good story, and they were always the type of work I loved. She provided me with the details: “Take a look at this small town in the countryside, apparently all the inhabitants lost the ability to speak, overnight. I managed to cover this firsthand, so come to the office, a team of doctors heading there is waiting for you.”
As soon as I arrived at the office, I was greeted by a team of researchers who were preparing to head to the isolated town. Their expressions were a mix of curiosity and urgency, practically jumping into the van as soon as I arrived, which only increased my own intrigue about what we would find there.
As we drove to the town, the silence in the van was almost palpable. I tried to break the ice with a joke or two, but their seriousness was palpable. I gave up on that and took the opportunity to photograph the desolate landscape we passed through. We left the appearance of the town, with its cars and movements, and gradually transitioned to rural roads, which stretched like dark veins cutting through the landscape, surrounded by abandoned fields and dense forests. There was no sign of life besides us, just the enveloping silence that seemed to grow with every mile we advanced.
Finally, we arrived at the town. It was as if time had stopped there. The streets were deserted, the houses seemed frozen in time, with curtains faintly swaying in the dusty windows. There were no children playing, no adults chatting in the yards. The town was plunged into a sepulchral silence that was eerily unsettling. The only visible movement (and what made us believe we weren’t in a ghost town) were a few shops, like a pharmacy, a gas station, and a bakery, but all without any customer activity.
As we got out of the van, I was overwhelmed by a sense of oppression, as if I were treading on sacred ground, but desecrated by some indescribable presence. The doctors quickly dispersed, starting their assessments and examinations on the few remaining inhabitants in the town.
Meanwhile, I headed to the nearest store, the pharmacy. The door creaked open, revealing a dark and dusty interior. A bell tinkled timidly as I entered, breaking the suffocating silence for a brief moment.
The pharmacist, an elderly man with tired and somber eyes, greeted me with a nod. He looked at me with a serious expression, his eyes following my movements, his wrinkled fingers resting on the worn wooden surface.
Given his inability to speak, I decided to start the conversation with simple gestures. I pointed to the medicine shelf and raised an eyebrow, silently questioning about the situation in the town. The pharmacist watched my movements attentively, his lips pressed into a thin line, before turning around and grabbing a notepad and pen.
He scribbled a few words quickly and pushed the paper towards me. “No one knows what happened. People just stopped talking overnight. The doctors came, but they haven’t found any explanation yet.”
I nodded in understanding. What could have caused such a strange phenomenon? I leaned forward, gathering courage to ask the next question. “Do you know of anything strange that happened before this? Any unusual events? Illness?”
The pharmacist hesitated for a moment before starting to write again. “There were rumors,” he began, his eyes briefly shifting away before returning to me. “Stories about strange things happening on the outskirts of town. People disappearing, noises at night… but no one ever investigated for real.”
A shiver ran down my spine as I absorbed his words. I thanked the pharmacist with a nod and turned to leave the store when, stepping onto the sidewalk, I was surprised by one of the doctors coming towards me, shouting:
“You need to see this right now!”
His face was pale and his eyes widened with astonishment. I followed him back to the van, where other doctors gathered around one of the town’s residents, an elderly woman with gray hair who seemed to be having a panic attack. She gestured frantically, her eyes filled with terror, her lips moving but no sound escaping from them. The doctors tried to calm her down, but it was evident that something very serious was happening there.
I approached, trying to catch the silent words she was desperately trying to communicate. Her eyes met mine, and for a moment, I saw the reflection of the deep fear hidden within her.
That’s when she pointed to the line of trees at the edge of the town. Her gestures were frantic, but her message was clear: there was something there.
Our group exchanged glances, awaiting an explanation. I felt a knot form in my stomach as I stared at the dense vegetation in the distance, aware that something terrible was unfolding in the shadows beyond the town.
“Does she know how to write?” I asked.
“No, unfortunately not,” one of the team members commented.
“It seems like there’s something in the dense forest, she’s really worried about it.”
“Yeah, we talked to another citizen, he mentioned she had a son, but he disappeared yesterday afternoon,” As the words came out, a small spark of understanding spread.
“Ah, yes, so we can assume the boy must be lost in the woods?”
The doctors exchanged worried looks before one of them responded, “It could be a possibility, we’re organizing an expedition to try to find any sign of him.”
“Alright, I’ll come with you.”
“Are you sure? It might be dangerous, it’s going to get dark soon. Maybe you should stay here to find out more,” One of them insisted.
“Too late,” I said, grabbing my camera and hanging it around my neck. “Let’s go!”
Seeing that trying to reason with me was a lost battle, they agreed. We equipped ourselves with flashlights, communication radios, and any other equipment necessary for the forest search. As we approached the dense trees surrounding the town, a sense of unease washed over me. The silence of the town seemed even more oppressive in that environment. There was no bird song, no rustling of grass. Even the trees swaying in the wind made no sound.
We cautiously advanced through the forest, our flashlights cutting through the grass and lighting the path ahead. The ground was covered with dry leaves and broken branches, creating a cacophony of sounds under our feet. But despite the noise, the silence persisted, as if the trees themselves were holding their breath.
As we delved deeper into the forest, a sense of disorientation began to set in. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen a video about the “quietest room in the world,” some people get disoriented there because of the lack of sound, and we were a little like that now. Our steps were more hesitant, I thought of going one way, but then took a step in another. I was about to go crazy with this and suggest we go back in the morning when we stopped.
We heard the sound. A soft, almost imperceptible noise at first, but soon it turned into a constant murmur echoing through the trees. It seemed to come from all directions at once.
We followed the sound, our hearts pounding in our chests, until we finally found what we were looking for: a clearing in the heart of the forest, illuminated by the moonlight. At the center of the clearing, standing before an ancient twisted tree, was the boy.
He stood still, his eyes fixed on the tree in front of him. His lips moved in an inaudible whisper, his empty eyes reflecting the moonlight. It was as if he were in a trance. Carefully, we approached him, calling out his name. But he didn’t respond. He seemed not to hear us, lost somewhere within his own mind.
It was then that the silence was broken once and for all, with a noise of wood, dry. I shiver every time I hear that noise again. You know, that noise of branches twisting or trunks falling? It was something similar. As soon as I heard it, I diverted my eyes from the boy, going towards the big tree he was staring at, and then I had the full feeling of what fear is. I trembled and became unable to speak, just pointing in that direction, hoping my colleagues would notice and look, but nothing.
I pointed frantically at the twisted tree, my fingers now trembling with fear. The other team members noticed and followed my gaze, and in the moonlight, we glimpsed a dark and sinister figure emerging from the shadows. The trunk of the tree began to split, large segments moving aside from the main one and then it began to take shape: arms. They were followed by a step forward with colossal legs, emerging from under the ground. That thing stared at us, its face twisted behind thin branches, and I swear I could see it smiling, the worst smile I’ve ever seen.
I trembled with fear as I stared at that abomination, my heart pounding uncontrollably in my chest. It was impossible to deny anymore: we were facing something beyond the normal, that or it was some kind of highly elaborate and cinematic prank (which I didn’t believe much).
Instinctively, I stepped back, my mind screaming to flee. I didn’t know what to do, I couldn’t leave the others behind, and it wouldn’t be the role of the journalist, face the facts, absorb what’s happening, and then transmit it screaming for others. I yelled to the other team members to prepare to run, grabbed my camera, and began taking pictures frantically, at least if they found me minimally intact, they would have a record of what happened.
The photos captured the macabre scene before us. The creature, with its distorted and sinister appearance, seemed almost supernatural in the moonlight. I clicked frantically, each flash revealing more details of that body, its grooves extending throughout the body.
As my mind struggled to process what I was witnessing, the other team members began to retreat slowly, their faces pale and eyes wide with terror. The constant murmur of the creature filled the air, enveloping us in a cacophony of distorted sounds that seemed to echo inside our own skulls. It was like a human voice but very distorted, screaming in a mad way. We covered our ears, in vain.
“Let’s get out of here now!” I shouted, my voice ringing loud and shrill in the oppressive silence of the forest. Adrenaline pumped through my veins as I turned to run, my legs moving as fast as they could. The others were already ahead, the first doctor carrying the boy while the others illuminated the path, and looking back, I could see the creature moving towards us.
I ran like I had never run before, my mind screaming for me to escape from that abomination. As our feet pounded the ground, the distorted murmur of the creature followed us, growing in intensity with every step. It seemed like an orchestra of horror, its cacophony of sounds reverberating through the trees and filling the forest with an atmosphere of terror. It was hard to know where it was coming from, sometimes it seemed far away, sometimes it came from the left or the right, and then from in front of us, but we didn’t see it.
I felt my heart hammering in my chest, my legs burning with the desperate effort to escape. Every breath was a challenge, every muscle in my body clamoring for rest. We could see the town in the distance, believing that maybe it could give us some safety, when I stumbled on a loose stone on the path, my camera flying from my hand and falling to the ground with a dull thud. I fell to my knees, a wave of pain coursing through my body as the damp earth scraped against my skin. Desperately, I turned to reach for my camera, the only witness of what had happened, but I came face to face with the creature, closer than ever.
I froze, thought it was my end, when a hand pulled me out. It was one of the doctors from the team.
“Leave, leave the camera!” he said.
We exited the dense forest, my leg was injured, I couldn’t put weight on it. As I was being pulled, I faced the forest. I saw the creature approaching the forest’s edge. It crouched down and stared at the camera, then looked at me, got down on all fours, and did the most terrifying thing I’ve ever seen: it raised its head, like a wolf howling, but what came out was a “Let’s get out of here now!” exactly like my voice… The others turned around confused, and witnessed that macabre scene.
It was as if it was enjoying the imitation, mocking us. I could feel a sadistic smile coming from it. The silent city stretched out before us like a small respite from our horrors. The creature turned and headed back to the heart of the forest, the distorted murmur disappeared, replaced by the oppressive silence that hung over the town.
I sat on the ground, my breath ragged and my hands trembling. My colleagues gathered around me, their pale faces and wide-eyed reflecting the terror we all shared.
“What… what was that?” I asked, my voice barely rising above a whisper.
No one had an answer. We were all struggling to process what we had seen, the terrible creature that emerged from the shadows of the forest. It was as if we had been dragged into the middle of a nightmare, with no logical explanation to guide us back to reality.
As we recovered from the shock, the silence of the city continued to envelop us, a constant reminder of what still loomed over that place. No matter how much we investigated or searched for answers, some questions would remain unanswered. The boy was then taken to be examined by the doctors, while I was helped by the other team members to return to the van.
The next morning, I retrieved the camera, on the edge of the forest, along with one of the doctors, but it was completely damaged: Lens damaged, partially broken hardware. I removed its memory card, sending it to a friend of mine who works with photo restoration.
The trip back to the city was silent, each of us lost in our own thoughts as we tried to process what we had witnessed in the forest. Upon arriving in the city, I handed in the report to my boss and reported everything that happened in the forest. She listened attentively, her expression tense as she absorbed every detail. When I finished, she stood up, thanking me and asking me to wait while she discussed the matter with the other team members.
As I waited, I reflected on what had happened. The creature in the forest, the oppressive silence of the city, the dark secrets that seemed to be buried. We hadn’t made any progress, on the contrary, only more questions lingered now.
My boss returned with a serious expression, her words cutting through the tense air of the room. “Look —-, we’ve decided to give you early vacation.” she said. Before I could protest, she continued, “We’re worried that this might have affected you, maybe a field mission so far away was too stressful for you, here’s what we’re going to do: take fifteen days off, travel somewhere, clear your head, and then come back, doing work in the region, covering local stories, okay?”
I knew it wouldn’t help to argue. The serious expression on her face made it clear that the decision was made. I accepted the offer, thanking her before leaving the room.
As I left the newspaper building, my mind was in turmoil. I decided to follow my boss’s advice and take some time for myself. I decided to travel to a distant place, far from the hustle and bustle of the city, hoping to find peace and clarity of mind.
Over the next two weeks, I wandered through tranquil landscapes and quiet towns, trying to push away the horrors I had witnessed. But wherever I went, the silence of that forgotten city still echoed in my ears, reminding me that something terrible was lurking out there. I spent almost all my time wearing headphones, escaping from the silence.
I was ready to return from my vacation, almost forgetting and putting this story in the “archived memories” of my mind when I received a package in the mail, from my friend. It was the memory card along with a note. “I couldn’t recover everything, just a portion of footage that wasn’t corrupted, I converted it into a photo in case you don’t mind, there was no way to understand the sound anyway. I hope you liked it, because I have no idea what this is.”
I took the memory card and inserted it into my laptop. The only recovered photo was this one. A blurry image, but enough to make my heart race again. It was a photo of the creature in the forest , from when the camera fell. It stared at the camera, lowered, the deep expanse of the forest behind it.
I know many people may not believe it, but I’m sure of what happened. There are things out there, and I believe I’ll never be comfortable in the quiet again. Because, in the end, even in the deepest silence, I know there’s always a voice that refuses to be silenced, in every silence there’s that low, hoarse murmur, can you hear it, deep in your ears, can’t you?