I’ve always loved being scared. Thrill rides, haunted houses, horror movies. I’ve also always suffered crippling anxiety. Sounds like a paradox but I think I enjoy anything that allows me to be in control of the fear… or at least believe I am.
My buddy Adam got me into urban exploring. You would be amazed at how many abandoned buildings sit right in the middle of an otherwise over crowded, bustling city. It’s actually more peaceful than scary to me. A quiet refuge.. somewhere completely forgotten by the outside world.
We were on our way to one with a couple of our other friends. An old hospital that had shut down years ago. They put up a half assed fence around it, but for some reason or another the plot of land was left otherwise untouched. The gps said .5 miles. My excitement grew as we got closer.
“Whoa.. what’s that?” Adam asked, stopping in his tracks as he turned towards an almost unnoticeable path into a wooded area.
We were still on the outskirts of the city but there wasn’t much for foliage around here, just a few scattered trees, this was about as “forested” as it was going to get.
“It’s not going to lead anywhere, man.. probably just a service road off the highway.” Chris pointed out.
“No, Adam said .. that.. how have I never noticed that?”
He pointed towards the sky and above the thin layer of trees I could see the upper floors of a massive building towering over us.
“Okay.. that’s pretty damned weird, I’ve never noticed that either.” I said.
None of us had. We were stunned. The four of us had lived in this area our entire lives, not to mention our love of exploring. Not only had we never seen this massive building before, none of us had heard of it on the many forums we used to seek out new places to explore.
Adam began walking down the path immediately. Compelled by curiosity we followed behind him. The path led directly to the entrance. A rotted out wooden door that looked surprisingly old. In fact .. the whole building looked older and more run down than any we had explored before.
“Dude, this could be dangerous, this place looks completely run down, someone is definitely going to fall through the floor or step on a rusty nail .. this is just a bad idea” I said.
Knowing full well we had faced the same dangers before and I had never been scared, I was terrified to my core. I don’t think I can remember having such an intuitive bad feeling about anything.
“Why has no one knocked this place down? It’s huge! They cram houses and shopping centers wherever they can around here they just left this entire area like this?” Jay chimed in.
Besides Adam, Jay was the next biggest adrenaline junkie I knew, but I could hear in his voice that he was scared too.
Adam said nothing, he just kicked open the door and stepped inside.
“ADAM.. wait man, just hold up a second.” I yelled.
He didn’t stop. He just kept walking.
“Dude… come on man” .. “let’s just go find the hospital.” The three of us tried to plead with him but he didn’t say a word, he didn’t turn around, he just kept walking.”
“Goddamnit!” I exclaimed. “We have to follow him, he’s going to hurt himself!” I said.
Protesting to no one about how we’re all going to get hurt in there, we cautiously entered the building.
Yelling at Adam to wait for us we watched him turn a corner. By the time we caught up he was gone. Stunned we stared down the long hallway, now frantically calling his name.
“He has to be in one of these rooms” Chris said.
We began walking down the hall, looking in every room, most of which had doors hanging off the hinges, rust, cobwebs and rot surrounded us. We tried to dodge what we could, dirty puddles and parts of the floor that looked ready to sink in with the lightest step.
“AHHHHHH FUCK.. FUCKKK.” Chris was screaming at the top of his lungs .. I ran to find him ripping off his shirt and flailing. I could see pieces of spider web still in his hair.
“Get it off me, get it off me!” He was wailing.
“Dude, calm down it’s okay .. it’s just a spider web.” I tried my best to sound calm.
“I’m out. Fuck this. If Adam wants to ignore the rest of us and break his ass falling through the stairs, let him!” Chris shouted as he ran back the way we came.
Back in the hallway I called out for Jay, telling him Chris was bailing and maybe we should just wait outside for Adam. I waited for him to come out of one of the rooms, but he never did.
“Jay.. JAY!… what the fuck, okay I’m leaving too, sorry guys but I’m over it!” I yelled out into the empty hallway, as I made my way back towards the entrance.
I turned the corner, back to where we first came in, or so I thought… but I was staring down another long hallway. It was nearly identical to the one I was just in but somehow looked even older, even more run down, even more forgotten in time. But there was no sign of the entrance way we had first entered, no sign of the door.
I began screaming for Chris, completely frantic as the panic set it. No reply. At the top of my lungs I yelled out for anyone, but the only sound was the echo of my own shaking voice.
“Okay, okay….” I spoke out loud to no one now, just trying to reassure myself. I was going to smash a window and get the hell out of there. But there were no windows. How were there no windows? Weren’t there windows visible from the outside? Wouldn’t we have noticed such a bizarre feature on a massive building?
Nothing made sense. That’s when I noticed there wasn’t even graffiti on the walls. There was always graffiti on the walls. Signs of life, of other explorers, of anyone. I felt sick, dizzy, tunnel vision set in as I looked around and realized there was nothing here but empty, endless hallways. It all looked exactly the same, I was a rat in a maze. As that realization set in I swear I felt like it knew. Like the building knew it had trapped it’s prey.
Fight or flight kicked in and I ran, faster than I had ever run before. Screaming for my friends, screaming for anyone. Begging and pleading in the silence for help.
Then out of the corner of my eye I saw him. I saw Adam in the room closest to me. He was just standing there. Completely still in the far corner of the room, his back towards me.
I saw him… I swear I saw him.. but when I got to the room he was gone. Questioning my sanity, panicking and desperate I froze. I couldn’t move. My body was paralyzed.
“Brian!! Brian…? Where are you.” It was Adam! I could hear him calling out for me. I snapped out of my paralysis immediately, running as fast as I could towards the sound of his voice.
I frantically called back to him but nothing, but silence responded to my cries. All I could do now was wander… wander the endless halls, sobbing hysterically. Desperate enough to convince myself that maybe, just maybe I could find something to smash through the solid concrete walls that surrounded me if I kept at it long enough. But I knew it was hopeless. I was going to die in here.
I walked for hours, through the endless maze of hallways. The adrenaline in my body had worn off. I was exhausted, but I kept walking. I couldn’t stop. I couldn’t sit still, alone, trapped with my thoughts. It felt like the walls were closing in every time I stood still, like the building would swallow me whole. I had to keep moving. Deeper into the maze.
No concept of time, it should go without saying that my phone did not work in this place. Even the time had frozen at exactly 4:20. It had read 4:20 since the first time I pulled it out of my pocket and tried to dial 911. There was no signal of course, but the phone worked otherwise. Except for the time, the time remained frozen.
“Shitttt!” I exclaimed as I tumbled down a flight of stairs .. I could feel a few of them cracking beneath my weight, I couldn’t stop myself until I slammed into the floor. Hard. Immobilized for a second, stunned and afraid to even look at my own body for injuries. I managed to stand up, painfully. My head was pounding, my entire body felt like a bruise but I had somehow managed not to break anything.
“Thank G…” Wait… stairs!! There were stairs! Finally, something other than the maze of hallways. I was so excited I began to laugh hysterically. I was so thrilled by the change of scenery, it took me a moment to process the terror of realizing I had broken my only way back up and now found myself in a dark, disgusting basement, the only light shining through was above me, coming from the hallways, from the windowless hallways. Yet another anomaly I had been too afraid to even notice, where was the light coming from?
At least my phone’s flashlight still worked. I scanned the basement, shining my light back and forth. It was completely empty… except for a small hole in the far corner of the room.
I shined my light into what I could now see was a tunnel. It was slanted, I could crawl into it…. The thought repulsed me so much I was surprised at my own mind for even considering it. But what else could I do? Where else could I go.
“Shit, shit, shitttt.” I exclaimed, shuddering as I got down on my hands and knees… and began making my decent. The tunnel allowed barely enough space to crawl. I could feel the top of it on my back. Claustrophobia set it immediately. What if it grew more narrow? I would have to back all the way out…
Nope.
Too panicked to crawl any further I began inching my way backwards, trying to fight against the incline. I kept going … and going ..
I should have been back to the basement by now. I could swear I crawled back further than I had even gone forward. Like a gut punch I remembered the senselessness of this place and desperately began to crawl forward as fast as I could.
“No, no, NO! I can’t get stuck in this fucking tunnel. Please don’t let me get stuck in this tunnel!” Crying out loud, knowing no one could hear me. Surrounded in darkness with only my phone’s flashlight, I crawled. I could feel the tunnel descending. No idea how far down I had gone or how far I would go.
Eventually my body gave out. Thirst, exhaustion, exasperation, I was spent. Physically and mentally. I couldn’t move anymore. I dropped and cried, laying in a tunnel I was sure had no end.
I must have fallen asleep… I don’t know how but when I woke up my phone’s battery was nearly dead.
“Ohh that’s great, so the battery isn’t frozen, that’s just fucking great.” I seethed. Almost throwing my phone in my rage as I looked at the time, 4:20.
With nothing better to do I continued my decent. Knowing what I dreaded now more than anything was imminent. The light would die, and I would be left in complete darkness… until I died too.
Blackness… total blackness. The terror I felt when the light went out was something I cannot physically describe. I just kept crawling. I had to keep moving. It was as if my growing sense of terror was chasing me, at my heels, so close to catching up to me. There has to be a cap to fear .. right? Eventually, my brain will just give in the hopelessness of the situation and I’ll fall into a sense of calm acceptance… right? My thoughts seemed like disembodied voices in the silence. And so far I had not reached the cap on fear as it continued to engulf my entire being.
And then it was suddenly broken. The silence, the darkness… broken by laughter!? I could hear children laughing and up ahead I could see a light. I’ve never moved so fast in my life … crawling at the speed of a professional runner towards the sound .. towards the light. But the further I crawled the quieter the sound became. It was as if I was getting further away from it…. How??
“FUCK YOU!!” I screamed at this place, this place that seemed to be knowingly tormenting me in the worst possible ways every chance it got. This place was alive in my paranoid mind. This place mocked my feeble attempts to survive.
I froze when the light and laughter had faded so far, I could barely hear it. I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t go back to the silence. I couldn’t take it!
But then it began growing louder, and louder… somehow more sinister as the decibel increased. Louder, LOUDER, LOUDER! The laughter surrounded me, it grew so loud I had to cover my ringing ears. The light grew brighter too…. So bright I could no longer see the tunnel. I could no longer see anything, blinded by the white hot light. I closed my eyes and screamed at the top of my lungs but my screams were drowned out completely by the booming sound of the continuous laughter.
When I opened my eyes again, I was on my hands and knees in a classroom. It was old and empty, but it didn’t look run down, or abandoned like the rest of this place.
A window. A WINDOW!! I ran at full speed to the classroom window. Looking down at the ground below I saw children playing, laughing.
Slamming my fists into the window I banged and screamed to the kids below. I couldn’t have been more than two stories up, they would have to hear me!
“HELP!! HELP ME PLEASE!” I begged. Over and over I begged and screamed.. but not one kid looked my way. As I looked closer I realized something that disturbed me to my core. There were children playing ring around the rosey, jump rope, tag, stick ball…. Over and over and over. I could hear them singing “ashes to ashes we all fall down.” I watched them fall, get back up and repeat the song again. I watched the girl on the jump rope continue to jump, not missing a single step, over and over. The other kids were playing tag on a loop, they just kept running in the same circles, over and over. I saw a kid throw a ball and another kid hit it, but like a lag in a video game they just reset, throwing, hitting, throwing, hitting.
“No….” I whispered to myself. As if I should be surprised by anything impossible at this point, but I could take it anymore. I was absolutely distraught. The fleeting moment of hope was gone so fast, something in me just snapped.
I grabbed a chair and hurled it at the window as hard as I could, then another, and another. Nothing .. I tried with all my strength to smash through it but it might as well have been made of steel.
Rage came over me, a rage like I had never felt. I screamed at the building. I screamed at myself. I screamed at Adam. I screamed at no one.
I walked back to the window, to allow myself one more moment of sunlight. When I looked down I was horrified. The children had stopped playing. Stopped moving. They were completely frozen. They all stood there, stiff as wood, all with their backs towards me.
I closed my eyes, as if trying to will them away. And when I looked back again, they were gone. They were all gone. The courtyard they were playing in, now a cracked and overgrown mess of weeds that had forced themself up through the cement. Their wills stronger than mine apparently. I was never getting out of here. There were no cracks to push through.
I left the classroom in disbelief. Still running through the impossible things I had seen. Why couldn’t I break the window? Why were the kids fucking glitching.. and why were they dressed like it was the damn 1920’s. The sudden realization that I had crawled my way down and ended up on a second floor was the least of it. But for some reason that was the part I really couldn’t wrap my head around. The rest was too much to even ponder.
I walked down another maze of hallways for God knows how long. Just waiting. Waiting for noting, anything. The building wasn’t done with me yet, I could feel it. It was still taunting me. It was still—
Before I could finish my thought, I heard a loud crack as the floor dropped out beneath me.
No idea how long I was out. I woke up groggy and disoriented. The pain set in immediately. My head was throbbing, I must have bruised every rib in my body and I had dislocated my shoulder. It was excruciating. I tried to pop it back into place like they do in the movies and almost passed out from the pain. I forced myself to my feet. Not even allowing myself to be thankful that my legs were still intact for fear of daring this place to change that as quickly as I knew it could.
Another fucking hallway… but this one was different somehow…. There were lights on. It looked clean, too clean, sterile. Before I could understand what I was seeing I watched as a woman walked past me. She was dressed in an old nurse uniform, 1950’s maybe?
I choked out a desperate plea for help, but she didn’t even look my way. Completely stunned I watched her as she walked up to another nurse. They were talking. Their mouths were moving .. but neither of them made a sound.
“HELP ME!! Please help me!” I kept trying to get their attention, but they didn’t even see me. I turned to look around and when I looked back they were gone. I ran down the hall and flung open a door to a patient’s room.. shouting at the woman in bed.. but she stared blankly at the ceiling. I tried two more rooms, nothing.
I opened the last door at the end of the hall, and saw an old man lying in bed. His eyes shifted towards me.
“Oh god, you can see me! You can actually see me can’t you!” I exclaimed, rushing to his bed side.
“Can you help me? Please, do you know where we are? I need help, call the nurse!” I begged. His breathing got heavier, his eyes darted back and forth, he looked terrified. I could tell he was trying to move but he clearly wasn’t able.
“Please, please.. blink twice if you can see me!” I pleaded.
The man blinked twice. I grabbed his arm, excited, desperate!
“Help me, help me!!” I cried.
The man started shaking, then convulsing, his body’s unnatural movements getting faster and more frenetic. His eyes widened and the movement stopped. He was dead.
“NOOOOOOOO!” I screamed and pounded desperately on the man’s chest with my one good arm but it was useless.
This place, this evil fucking place.. it allows just enough hope to make the horror of it’s true hopelessness completely crush your spirit.
When I left the man’s room I was back in a decaying hallway. That man saw me though, that was real. I didn’t imagine it. I know I didn’t. My thoughts were back on my side for the moment as they began racing.
‘There has to be a way out… there has to be some way out.’ I thought.
I turned the corner and this time found myself in a massive circular room. It was completely empty, yet pristine. Perfectly laid tile floors that looked like they had just been scrubbed clean. A chandelier on a high ceiling. There were two things out of place here. One, a gaping hole in the wall across from me, and the word “RUN” strewn across the walls from floor to ceiling.
I did as instructed and ran into the hole. Another tunnel, but this one was much larger and there were torches lighting the way. I ran until the hole opened up into a cave. An entire cave system lit up by torches. It reminded me of a secret passage under some ancient castle. Another maze I realized. As the cavern split into seemingly infinite paths. All I could do was pick one.
Inside the belly of this beast I was certain now that this place was meant to intentionally confuse anyone who found their way inside, that no one who wondered in was meant to find their way out, but why?
I walked a long way.. the passage getting more and more narrow.. until I was crawling again. At this point I was almost numb to it all. I guess I finally reached the limit of my fear. All that was left was my instinct to survive. At the point the tunnel narrowed until I could barely fit, I found a small metal door.
I will try my best to describe what I found on the other side. But I don’t think I will ever truly be able to. At first it was akin to two mirrors facing each other, creating the illusion of infinite mirrors as far as the brain is able to make sense of until it appears too small to see. An illusion of distance when there shouldn’t be. An illusion of infinity. However, instead of two mirrors facing one another, it looked like countless mirrors creating a never ending illusion on all sides. This place stretched and spanned infinitely. Everywhere I looked.. in every direction.
And I could swear it was …. Moving, twisting, expanding and contracting… breathing. I couldn’t make sense of what I was seeing but I felt as if this “room” was alive. Infinite layers of reality like tentacles reaching out, through all of time and existence.
It looked like a hologram, and any idea of “material” structure seemed to phase in and out. I felt like I was inside an infinite computer program continuously designing and redesigning itself. A living machine.
I had no concept of time or space or even self. I was just a part of this.. thing. I was no longer even aware of my own body.. until something grabbed me.
This creature.. I guess you could call it that, but it wasn’t really a “thing.” It’s features were completely undefined. It morphed and phased in and out of existence. It’s shape changing so fast I couldn’t keep up. Like it could take the shape of anything and everything all at once.
I saw more of them…. So many more of them. They were appearing in and out of this place, in and out of infinite dimensions across all of time and space …yet they were a part of it. Operating it somehow. “Bodily functions” of this living machine, yet fully aware of their function within it.
Still trying to process what I was seeing, being dragged through the infinite, everywhere I looked I could see different worlds, different realities.. some so foreign to me I had no frame of reference to even create a memory of them.
And then I was thrown at an incredible speed through time and space, right back to where it began. I looked down at the ground, and found myself standing at the almost unnoticeable path.
“Whoa.. what’s that?” Adam asked, stopping in his tracks.
I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t move. The four of us were back, repeating the exact same events that led us to that place, to the entrance of everything.
I don’t remember the next hour or so…. My friends described the rest of what happened to me when they came to visit me in the institution. Apparently I had a psychotic break. I started screaming and crying, wailing and begging them to get away from that place. I continued screaming until I collapsed and my friends called an ambulance.
But it wasn’t my friends. The person I knew as Adam was named Jacob. He looked like Adam, but he wasn’t Adam. The other two of my “friends” were completely unrecognizable to me.
My parents were the same people I knew, but not my name. Everyone keeps calling me Lucas. I no longer have a little sister either, but I have an older brother now.
They can call me schizophrenic, paranoid, delusional. But they don’t have a specific diagnosis for the sister I know I had. The brother I never did. The years worth of memories I had with her, the years worth of memories I did not share him.
I told them I wasn’t crazy. I told them how I stumbled upon a place I was never meant to be. Some sort of “in between” space. In between this constructed version of reality and the thing that constructed it. I told them my real friends were still trapped in there.
I told them how some eternal creature sent me back to the wrong place, the wrong world.
They told me I’m going to be here a while.