“It was just a game they said”, “it will be cool” they said. “What’s the worst that could happen?” Famous last words both in general and very recently, quite literally in the story I am about to tell.
I don’t have much time but I need to let people know what happened so they can avoid the same fate. I don’t know how best to explain what happened, other than to just get it out there. I am being haunted or hunted by someone or something. I don’t know how, I do have a feeling I know why and I think my time is running out.
Why? You might ask. Well I will tell you how it happened while I am still safe and still have some sanity left as it were.
It all began when my friends and I tried to play a game. My friends and I are big fans of the Ghost hunting game Phasmophobia. We would play a ton of it and a lot of other ghost/ paranormal investigation games on steam and it led to a rather bad idea that found me in this position.
The funny thing is I never believed in ghosts before, but it turns out what you don’t know can hurt you.
It was an ordinary Saturday evening and I was online playing some Phasmophobia with my Friends Stewart and Otto.
We had another good game though I almost accidentally got Stewart killed by messing with the Voodoo doll to provoke a ghost event. He Joked that “If that is how it’s going to be I am staying in the truck from now on” I chuckled as well and was getting ready to sign off for the night when Otto mentioned something.
“Hey guys I have a cool idea if you are down for it” I was intrigued of course so both Stewart and I fell for the bait and inquired about it.“Okay what’s this cool idea? Stewart said. “Yeah do tell” I concurred.Otto started “Well there’s this really creepy old house near where I live. It has been abandoned since I moved here
” Stewart cut him off by interjecting saying “We aren’t going to split a dilapidated time share with you Otto, they are bad investments” He and I both burst out laughing over discord and Otto sighed. “Yeah no not that”
He continued.“Well my cousin was talking with some friends and there are some weird stories about that house. Some of the tales are pretty creepy and they think it might be legit haunted ”I groaned at that, already prepared to dismiss it. “No, what I was thinking is we could go check it out at night and bring some tools and search for a ghost like a real life Phasmophobia hunt!”
He exclaimed with glee. I waited to hear Stewart’s reaction. After a pause he said “That idea sounds dangerous, stupid and like a guaranteed failure. So of course I’m in” He said chuckling to himself.
“I also have a directional thermometer and an EMF reader to boot!” There was a pause as both of them waited for my answer. “I don’t know” I said “What if we get in trouble and the police catch us there.”Otto spoke up again insisting that “Dude the place has no security system, it’s a run down old house and there’s never any police or even neighborhood watch patrol, I checked.”
“Do we need to get a van for you to hide in, are you too scared?” Stewart said laughing while Otto joined in. Almost in unison they talked over each other and said “What’s the worst that could happen?! Come on man.” They pleaded.
Finally against my better judgment I agreed. “Sure what the hell” I said. “Though if any cops either human or ghost come for us this was all your guys idea” I laughed. “Alright cool” Otto said happily. “ You can bring your fancy video camera with the night vision and some paper and a pencil, a couple flashlights and some salt.”
He paused considering his list “I will bring my spirit box, a UV light and I have an infrared motion tracking sensor we can use too” “Alright guys I will see you at 10:00pm tomorrow at 1257 Birch st, just a few blocks from my place. Happy ghost hunting” “Happy ghost hunting” Stewart and I echoed.
We all signed off and it was a plan. Looking back I was actually sort of excited, it sounded like it might be fun. But I should have known better.
We all arrived separately and parked not too close to the house to draw suspicion. To add to the effect we did drive the rest of the way from where we parked our cars in Otto’s van as a nice homage to our Phasmophobia inspiration.
We figured one vehicle parked out there would not be too bad.We got out and consolidated our equipment. We had brought backpacks and could carry all our gear in at once, so no item management was an issue here.
The whole neighborhood block was really deserted. We couldn’t see any other parked cars and no lights were on in the few other houses that were occupied.Looking at the house it’s no wonder it had a reputation for being haunted. The place was a wreck of crumbling wood and creaking panels.
It had large arched windows that looked like glaring eyes following you as you moved. The front door had frosted glass that caused an eerie kaleidoscope of colors that looked somehow wrong when viewed in this darkness, like some ethereal light was illuminating them despite that oppressive dark.
As we stepped closer there was a strong gust of wind and a chill breeze struck us. “Freezing temps!” Stewart blurted out. We all had a quick quiet laugh at that to try and break a bit of tension but I still felt nervous. Not just that we might be caught, but actually standing here despite not really believing in things like ghosts or the supernatural, I could at the very least understand why someone might think this place was haunted, if for nothing else than its appearance alone. “Alright, here is the game plan.” Otto said.
He handed out radios to us as he spoke. “Keep these turned to channel 4 for when we inevitably split up. We don’t have multiples of everything so we can go around and try and check different spots with different tools and maybe we’ll find something spooky” He said with a smile.
He continued “We can poke around and have fun looking for about an hour but then we should leave to reduce the chance we are caught by someone and because I have to get home before midnight.
If someone does spot something dangerous check in right away”“Happy hunting fellas, don’t get killed.” He held up his arms in a mock ghost way and we returned the gesture and went into the old house. Shockingly the front door was unlocked and it opened right up for us. I knew it was abandoned but still whoever owns it wouldn’t want to just leave it unsecured, who knows what people might get up to in a vacant house.
Inside it was somehow colder than it was outside, we all shuddered as we walked in and breathed the dank cold air of the house. On a whim of wishful thinking I flipped the switch by the front door but was not surprised by no lights coming on. The guys looked at me and I shrugged “Had to try it, though maybe if we find the fuse box and this place has somehow not been completely disconnected we could turn the power back on.
”It sounded like a long shot as I said it but that’s what I resolved to try and do first. Otto switched on his spirit box radio and was asking if anyone could hear him and shouting “show us” while chuckling and walking towards what looked like a kitchen. Stewart had switched on the EMF reader and was wandering with that and a flashlight in hand towards a hall.
I supposed I had better play my part so I stepped back outside and walked around back and found the breaker by a back door. The main switch felt stuck but I was able to force it on and I thought I saw the faint glow like a lamp showing in a downstairs room near the hall when I flipped the switch.I started for the back door to the house when I heard the thud of a lawn chair falling over, it was tipped sideways out of nowhere.
“That’s weird” I thought. I paused for a moment and after deciding it was nothing, possibly just a scared raccoon or something I radioed the guys.“Try the power” I directed them. “Sorry what was that, I thought I heard something but I didn’t hear an “over”, over” Stewart replied sarcastically.
“Try the power over,” I said with emphasis on the word over. “Nothing ‘’ was the reply from both of them. “Maybe it’s just out in general.” Otto said. “No I don’t think so I thought I saw a light in one of the hall bedrooms from the outside.” As I spoke I looked back and saw that the breaker case was open again, I thought I had closed it. Looking inside I saw it was shut off again.
What the hell? I thought I knew I just turned it on, it had not flipped back right then, what made it shut off again after only a few mins I thought. I moved closer and flipped it back on to try it again when I heard a voice behind me whisper “Hey you” I wheeled around taken off guard. “Who is it?” I cried not wanting to bring attention to myself out here.
I looked around, shining my flashlight everywhere I could think but I didn’t find who had spoken to me. I chalked it up to one of the guys playing a prank on me, though that was an impressive way to throw their voice if so.
Just then I heard Otto radio in. “Ok thats a good one guys, not sure how you got your radios onto the frequency for the spirit box, but thats why i told you to keep them on channel 4.”
“Channel what? Over” Stewart chimed in laughing “Channel 4, over” Otto said exasperatingly. “Seriously though ‘’ He continued “That bit about my grandparents was not funny, if you are going to do the bit pretending to talk like ghosts you don’t need to bring my grandparents into it.I had no idea what he was talking about.
I knew his grandparents had died in the last couple years but I wouldn’t joke about them and I didnt think Stewart would either. We told him it was not us but he just scoffed and didn’t believe us.Heading back inside I decided to go upstairs and look around, the lights where the bulbs were not broken had indeed been restored by flipping the breaker.
Who was paying the power bill was another question entirely.I passed a few dilapidated rooms and decided to take out my camera. I switched it on and turned on the night vision and everything I saw was tinted a grainy green and white color.
It was a slightly older model, not too bad and had a decent night vision function. It helped a lot since a lot of bulbs were destroyed so light was minimal even with the power.
I had no illusions about actually finding anything in this run down place, but I swept the camera back and forth and looked around all the same. Primarily looking near the ground to make sure there were not any holes in the floor I would step on, or anything gross that I might miss in the dark.
I heard a dripping of water from a nearby room and saw a small half bathroom in the upstairs hall. I was surprised the place had running water still though I guess if it still had electricity then it made sense, though whoever was paying the utility bills remained a mystery.I peeked inside from the hall and saw the rather dismal state of the bathroom, it was covered in grime, what looked like mold.
The slow drip drip of water was into a sink that apparently was clogged or stopped because it was nearly overflowing with dirty brown water.It smelled horrific as well, not sure what biological matter died in here but it was repellent. The light switch was out of course so I looked with my camera and as I panned around the room I thought I saw a strange glimmer of light that I hadn’t seen before coming from the shower.
It smelled so bad I didn’t want to go further in so I zoomed the camera in on the spot and it moved! “I stepped inside and saw the strange glowing orb moving behind the shower curtain and then vanish into the wall.
I fumbled for my radio and blurted out “Hey guys, you have got to take a look at…..” But I was cut off by Stewart “Whoa no way check this out in this bedroom upstairs there is actually a strong EMF signature, come look, over” I decided I would just tell them when I got there so since I was upstairs already I listened for the footsteps of my friends. I heard some steps coming up the stairs and rounded the corner expecting to see Otto but there was no one there.
I stopped at the top of the stairs and strained my ears till my radio cut off my reverie. “You coming or what dude? You’re not dead right, over” They laughed on the line and when they did I heard the laughter from back the other direction down the hall.
I saw them going in and out of one of the bedrooms and walked over to meet them.“Hey guys how did you both get up here so quick, I know Stewart was up here but I thought You were still downstairs Otto, I even heard steps on the stairs but no one was there”“I don’t know, the ghost maybe.
’’ Otto said, smiling.“Shut up you guys” Stewart said “ check this out” He walked slowly into the room and we followed him with our flashlights standing by the threshold. He moved about half way into the room and the single green diode on the EMF reader instantly changed to a red indicator of level 5.
“Spooky” Otto chuckled. I agreed and then considered that an actual reading of Electromagnetic Frequency that high could indicate a genuine hazard and I felt less amused and more concerned. “I kind of hope it’s a ghost, because that degree of EMF could be really dangerous”I said, bringing the humorous mood down.
My friends paused to consider it and we all turned to leave. Just as Stewart was walking out of the room the ceiling fan overhead crashed down to the ground right where he had been standing moments before.“Holy shit” we all said almost in unison. “Ok Maybe this place is not so safe after all,” Otto said with a tinge of genuine concern in his voice. “Oh gee ya think” Stewart said, more than a little flustered that he was almost crushed.
“Yeah maybe we should go” I said, shivering as a sudden chill was felt in the air. “God damn that is cold” Stewart said and out of curiosity he took out his directional thermometer and pointed it into the hall. When we saw the results there was a genuine shock and silence.Despite outside being a fairly brisk night, we stared in disbelief at the thermometer which read 20 degrees Fahrenheit.
Inside it was somehow legitimately freezing in this hall.“Ok this shits getting creepy now, let’s head out. I think there’s enough weird stuff happening that we can call it good with the evidence collected thus far” Otto said. It was hard to disagree with the assessment and we nodded silently and started heading back downstairs.
As we reached the stairs there we were startled by an exploding lightbulb in the hall, it burst showering us with hot glass and as we backed away.
Back down the hall there was a loud thud and what sounded like footsteps downstairs! To our horror besides the footsteps and exploding lights our flashlight beams began to flicker rapidly.
We couldn’t believe what was happening and we silently fell back down the hall and crowded into the bathroom holding our breaths and gingerly closing the door. We fell into separate corners of the disgusting bathroom and held our breath to not make noise and also to not have breathe in the horrifying smell.
As we waited we heard heavy footsteps getting closer. From up the stairs it stomped down the hall and kept walking and stomping until it sounded right outside.
We didn’t know what was going to happen next, was someone in the house with us? It could just be someone coming in here to squat for the night, I hadn’t thought of it before but if it was abandoned this whole time there might be people trying to stay here.
Admittedly though the light flickering was such a disturbing paranormal thing to happen for it to be just some rando coming to the house. It had me doubting that theory on who was behind those pounding footfalls.After a long pause and no further footsteps we started to relax a bit.
Otto started to whisper saying “Maybe they are gone” When a loud static sound started coming from his hip. He reached to his belt and saw the spirit box had turned itself on. We listened to the static in the mounting dread until right before trying to turn it off again so it would be quiet. The box came to life and a voice shouted a loud ear splitting “Here!”.
“Ok that’s it I am out of here” Otto said and he got up and out first throwing the door open and rushing down the stairs to the front door. We were shocked and admired his boldness for opening the door, but felt like he might be in real danger so we went to follow him.
Suddenly just as fast and it had been thrown open, the door was violently shut as I was about to leave, slamming me in the face and almost breaking my nose.
I was laid out on the ground clutching my face and Stewart looked on in horror. He checked on me first and then he tried to the door and it wouldn’t budge. “Holy shit you have to be kidding me” He said as he pulled harder on the door to no avail.
Then we both heard something that froze out blood, it sounded like Otto, he was screaming and then it was cut off.“We have to get down there” I shouted as I lurched up to my feet, my entire face still burning with pain. Stewart and I both started pulling on the door then realizing it was not budging we decided to ram it, so we both took a few steps back and charged it at the same time.
The timing was off and we bounced off the door hurting our shoulders, but we tried again and went on 3 charging it with all our strength and the old hinges gave out and the door fell forward on a single broken hinge.
We landed in a heap but got to our feet quickly and rushed down the stairs. We were not ready for what we saw. It was Otto he was laying on the ground by the front door. Looking up at the ceiling, unblinking with a petrified look of sheer terror on his face.
We couldn’t believe our eyes and I bent down to check his pulse and felt nothing.“What the fuck, what happened? He is dead!” I screamed.“Stewart looked him over too, in utter disbelief. “What happened, whats happening, was that a fucking ghost? Did it kill him?!” He was freaking out and I didn’t blame him I was too.
How was this happening, was it really a ghost? I thought. We had heard footsteps, it could have been someone, but there was no wound on him, it just looked like he was scared to death.
It seemed too much like the game to believe it could be a coincidence, was someone doing this? It had to be, there is no way a ghost was here and it killed him. I kept telling myself that as I looked around my fear mounting again as I noticed that the downstairs was dark again, the fuse box, I thought.
We tried to open the front door but of course it was locked tight, wouldn’t budge and it was much thicker than the bathroom door. Neither of us thought we would be able to break this one down.We shined our flashlights around to look for a window, but to our horror all the downstairs windows now appeared to have solid iron bars crossing them, preventing any escape by that means.“Oh hell man what are we going to do?” Stewart said, panic mounting in his voice.
Just as I was about to respond a thunderous crash came from the living room as we saw an old antique looking cabinet fall down to the ground for no explicable reason.
“We have to find a way out of here, maybe the basement windows are not covered up with those bars come on” I urged, not being a big fan of going down there, but seeming to run out of options to escape this madhouse.
We descended the creaking stairs and I almost fell through a bad 5th step but caught the handrail. We were not prepared for what we saw when we reached the bottom.
There was a mess of occult objects all over the dingy basement. A moldering library of arcane looking books were scattered everywhere on the floor by a couple of fallen bookshelves.On the floor was a strange ritualistic circle, complete with candles at the points of a pentagram.
On the floor was a skeleton wearing clothes that looked like they came from an era about a century ago. The skull had a strange dent in the front like they had died from a terrible blunt force to the head.
On the shelf was a terrible assortment of occult tools, icons and talismans, that looked like they were ripped straight out of a horror film. We both stood there dumbfounded. Looking at the horrifying array of ghoulish parafinalia.
“Ok so someone called something from beyond into this house” Stewart said with a deranged certainty in his voice and look of bemused vindication. “Turns out ghosts are real after all, I never wanted to find out this way but still a cool way to die I suppose ‘’ He laughed an empty hollow laugh like a madman with nothing left to lose but the rest of his sanity and his life.
I frowned at the assertion, but more so that I no longer believed with any certainty that he was wrong.
We went further into the macabre basement, spelunking in the abysmal horror of the scene. The last straw for my own sanity was what I saw next. While looking near the walls for any window or basement aperture we could use to escape I saw another shelf of disturbing curios.
There was a row of terrifying little dolls. On closer inspection I saw they were horribly life-like. I grabbed one and turned it over in my hand, shining my flashlight on it. I immediately dropped the thing in horror when I realized it looked exactly like Stewart. It was him down to the finest detail.
When it hit the floor I saw its head bounce off of the ground and I looked over my shoulder at the cry of pain I heard. It was Stewart who had cried out, he was clutching the back of his head, and groaned as his hand came away from his head covered in blood.“What in the hell?” He groaned.
I bent down to help him up and I grabbed the terrible doll from the ground and showed him. He saw it and was speechless. After a terrible pause he just said “Let’s take it with us and get out of here” I agreed and we kept looking until we found a small glint of light shining into the basement and saw a tiny cellar window that might work.
It was kind of high up but we found some objects to stack to make a makeshift platform, it was wobbly but hopefully we could get the window open and get the hell out of here.
I climbed up first and pressed as hard as i could on the cellar window, it didn’t budge at first but it finally started moving. Eventually it gave in and the overbalanced and fell forward reaching out to catch myself by grabbing the window sill so i wouldn’t fall back onto the floor.
I hadn’t realized I was still holding the terrible Stewart doll in my hands but the nightmarish thing that happened next still haunts me.
I reached out to pull myself up and out but as soon as the doll in my hand was out of the house on the ground outside, the window crashed back down onto my arms and I fell back onto the cellar floor. The impact of the fall knocked the wind out of me and almost knocked me out completely.Stewart bent down to check on me and said
“Dude are you ok, what happened you were almost out” As he said that we looked up and saw an iridescent glow coming from the window and the Stewart doll looking down at us. It was standing up on its own at the window, it looked down and waved to us and made a motion of dragging its arm across its throat and with a gleam of red flashing its in hellish features it walked off on its own power!
“What the Fu…..” We were cut off from our collective exclamation by a burst of light appearing behind us.
There was an audible sparking sound and to our horror the candles of the circle on the ground were starting to light on their own.
It happened again, our flashlights began to flicker and as we watched on in horror the circle was lit and inside the circle a shadowy apparition began to take on a real though nebulous shape.
Oh my god I thought, this can’t be real. There is no way, is this an actual ghost?I was truly afraid for the first time that the threat was undeniably paranormal. After seeing the malformed head of the thing manifest into a disturbing tangible form, my shock and awe was dispelled and full blown panicked fight or flight set in.
I grabbed a nearby brick and hurled it at the window and the glass smashed apart. Stewart had the same idea and had grabbed a spare piece of construction board and smashed the remaining hanging glass off.
He was halfway up the wall in a flash and I got underneath and boosted him up further so he could escape.When he was through the window I jumped up as well just as I heard thumping footsteps behind me and the horrible raspy exhalation of something not truely breathing. I reached up and caught on the window sill, the remaining glass cutting up my forearms.
Stewart reached down and grabbed my arms and with a supreme effort pulled me up and out of there.We heard a terrifying gurgling scream coming from back in that nightmare basement and we got up as fast as we could and turned to sprint away for our lives. But before we could take off running, we were stopped by an even more chilling sight. Standing there was the horrific doll of Stewart.
It was standing behind us by the window where we had just gotten out of. It looked up at us and to our profound terror we saw its mouth split open, bursting the stitches that had comprised its mouth and revealing a sickening bloody smile of what looked like real human teeth!
The whole thing was impossible and Stewart somehow mustering some measure of insane bravery walked forward and kicked the thing back down into that hellish basement. A look of horror but also grim accomplishment on his face. “Take that you psychotic little monster, he screamed in triumph.”
But just as he celebrated his victory we saw a hand reach out of the window, it was holding the doll and we heard something resembling a rasping voice of the damned mutter the word “Hey!” almost as if it was trying to get our attention.
We looked on in horror as the specter took the Stewart doll and threw it into one of the candles by the ritual circle and its dry material caught alight. There was a terrible pause as we considered the implication of what happened.After a moment of watching the horrid sight and the doll burn we thought everything might be ok when suddenly Stewart began to spontaneously combust.
I watched in horror as he screamed and immolated on the ground by the basement window. There was no hose for water nearby and no amount of trying to roll him or tamp down the flames would cause them to disperse.
None of the screaming had successfully drawn any attention, no help was coming and after a short while my friend was no more, a burned husk was all that remained just as down in the abyssal basement I saw the embers of the burning doll finally die down.
As I stared in utter shock and horror, my flashlight began flickering again and I heard around the corner of the house the front door get thrown open. My eyes widened as I realized the implication of this and I ran.
I ran as fast as I had ever ran in my life. Hurdling through the darkened streets not knowing if that murderous phantom was still behind me or not.After running several blocks I finally stumbled into my own car and jumped in gunned the engine and drove off, my heart still pounding in my chest.
I had no idea what I was going to do now.I got home at around 2am and once I got in my house I slumped onto the ground by the door. I couldn’t believe what I had just witnessed, there is no way that just happened. I remember clutching my head, rocking back and forth and even vomiting.
We had gone there to mess around and play ghost hunter and now we had found something we were never meant to find. And because of our curiosity my friends had all died and for all I knew, I was next.The whole ordeal was too much.
I felt like I might pass out but as I lay in the entryway to my house. Just as my heartbeat finally slowed down and I was about to embrace unconsciousness I was jolted awake by knocking on my door. I sat up and backed away instictively. The knocking grew more insistent and I had the strong urge to open it and just end it all now, the anticipation was too much to bear.
I settled on a different option and I cautiously approached the door, the knocking continuing all the while. I crept up to the door and looked out the peephole. What I saw I have difficulty writing of, just describing it fills me with such utter dread I cannot take it.
It was a skinless humanoid apparition with hollow empty eyes and tattered clothing clinging to its horrible emaciated frame.
It was flanked by a burned body of a familiar shape that I shuddered as I recognized and the face of the being that had once been Otto, a rictus of terror still plain on its face but somehow glowing and moving along with its trio of nightmarish company.
I screamed and fled to my room, locked the doors and grabbed my dads old crucifix from the closet and sat there shaking and shivering, my mind alight with new concepts of supreme terror I had never imagined before.
Oh ghosts were real alright, real as a heart attack and just as deadly it seemed.The night actually passed and in the daytime I summoned the nerve to emerge from my room.
I looked around cautiously but did not see anything out of place. My front door was still closed and locked.I was too terrified to leave the house so I decided to stay inside all day today. That about catches up to the here and now of it.
Everything I have detailed up to right now had taken place just last night.I decided just in case to write this account of what happened as a warning that hopefully people will read and heed.
Stay out of that house, the haunting there is real, it’s all real!I don’t know what will happen to me but if I can get out of here maybe I can buy some sage or strong wards that keep me safe, maybe the crucifix will work I don’t know.
We just wanted to play a game, we never imagined that any of this could really happen. I am sorry I have to cut this short. I have to go now it’s getting late and I need to change the batteries on my flashlight. As I sit here writing, I’m not sure but it seems like the light is starting to flicker.