I am a big fan of anything creepy, spooky, paranormal, you name it. I go hunting for monsters frequently, and I was pretty convinced I’d find something eventually. Surprisingly, the odd thing I was hoping to find was in my house’s attic.
I had been tasked by my mother to clean out the old attic, as it hadn’t been touched in years. It took an hour just to get rid of the dust and cobwebs, so I was pretty tired by the time I had to sort out the items. Most of it was useless junk, keepsakes, and things I thought I lost years ago but were apparently jammed up here without being told. After about an hour of looking around, I had found a box with my father’s name on it. We’ll call him “Frank.” Considering I haven’t seen my dad in years, and my mom never talked about him, I was very curious. I opened the box, and found a few things inside.
First, I found a stuffed animal of a lion. The lion’s fur was covered in black, crusty stains that felt like the texture of dirt. A note on it read “From: Frank. Will you be my friend?” I set it off to the side to look at more interesting stuff.
The second item was a stack of papers. It had random words written on it like “cat,” “bee,” and “red.” The writing seemed to get progressively better as I went on, but it was more like going from barely readable, to a child’s semi-understandable handwriting.
The third item was some old, expired candy. I didn’t think much of it and ended up throwing it off to the side.
The fourth was another expired bag of food, but this time it was an off-brand bag of potato chips. Again, this item also didn’t seem very important.
The fifth item was exactly what I was looking for. It was a journal. Since my mother always refuses to answer any questions about my dad, this surely would. I opened the journal up, ready to find out what my dad’s life was like.
“I am not the type to write a journal, but I figured since my current assignment is of the more dangerous and uncertain type, I will write it so at least somebody will know what happened to me - in case this mission does kill me. I am to investigate a strange entity that was captured sneaking around one of our laboratories. It seemed to be trying to release one of our bioweapons. Melissa was quickly alerted of this, so she sent a team of soilders to capture the entity. After a while, it was confirmed to be secure and was sent to me to be researched. I wasn’t sure if I should be glad that I am considered such a high level researcher where I can investigate top secret entities such as this one, or if I should be terrified. There’s no turning back now.”
I didn’t know how I was supposed to feel reading this. According to this tiny journal in my hand, somewhere out there, there is a lab with paranormal creatures and bioweapons? This felt like something out of a book to be honest, which is the kind of stuff I like, but I was a bit disappointed. I didn’t think this was going to be real at all. I wanted a real story of my dad’s life, not some sort of science fiction story he probably wrote for himself.
Despite all of this, I knew that my school’s “Paranormal Investigation Club,” (which was sadly, not a real club but something me and my friends had made up) would appreciate it. I called them, and three of my friends said they would come.
While I was waiting for them to get here, I continued to read the story. However, I found out that most of it wasn’t very story-like. It was just a bunch of scientific nonsense that I might’ve been able to understand if I paid attention to biology and chemistry class. I began to regret calling them over, but I was able to pull out some information from the book. I wrote down the information on a sheet of paper.
“1. The entity is not made out of anything on the periodic table.
The entity can change shape and color. None of my father’s tests were able to prove why.
The entity has potential to be a sentient being
Lots of what my dad does seems to be conducted with the help of “Melissa.” However, he seems to be deeply afraid of Melissa.
The entity has copied my dad’s behavior before. He is going to start training the entity.”
I decided to save the “training the entity” part as something me and my friends to read together, since it seemed much more understandable then whatever I just read. It was just in time when I heard some people knocking at the door.
I ran downstairs and opened the door for them. My mom scowled when she saw them, and pulled me to the side.
“I told you to clean the attic, not hang out with your friends. Finish cleaning, then you can go do your ridiculous monster hunting things,” she whispered loudly.
I just begged her to let us go in the attic. I told her that I just wanted to show them evidence of a ghost in the attic. Then, we would all clean up the attic together and get it done super quickly. My mom reluctantly agreed, and let my friends inside.
I led my friends into the attic, and then to the old journal. My friends all looked eager to see what was inside. My friend “Cathy”, a girl with a gothic fashion sense and obsidian black hair who was obsessed with ghosts, asked if I was lying about there being ghosts in my attic. I replied “Sadly, yes.”
My friend “Lisa” a messy-haired girl with a dad who is obsessed with monster hunting, asked if my dad’s journal revealed that my dad was a monster hunter too. “Not really,” I replied, “apparently he was a scientist who researched a strange monster.”
Lisa and Cathy both looked excited to open the book. However, my third friend, “Dave,” seemed have been uneasy since he saw my mother. Dave was one of my newest friends, and this is the first club meeting he has been to. All of my friends are outcasts, but Dave was a whole new level of weird. He acted normal, I guess, but nothing seemed natural about him. It was as if the muscles in his face were built wrong. He could smile wider than a normal person could. He could open his eyes wider than any person could. On top of that, everything about him was perfectly symmetrical. His face was perfect, his clothing was incredibly boring but nice, and his hair was neatly combed. We didn’t mind befriending him though, since we accepted everyone with an interest of supernatural things to our group. Dave seemed nervous about this.
“So, I’m not sure if this journal is real or fake, but it’s definitely the biggest piece our club has found in a very long time. In fact, after I explain the entity my dad was researching, we can read the next section together. How does that sound?” I asked.
Cathy and Lisa nodded their heads. Dave nodded his reluctantly.
And so, I explained what I thought about my dad’s job, and what the entity was like. As we were talking, Dave began to look at some of the other stuff my dad had. He took the expired bag of potato chips, opened them, and started to eat them.
“Hey, don’t eat those! That’s one of my dad’s things!” I snapped at him, much ruder than I anticipated. I quickly corrected myself. “Well uhm, they’re also expired. You’ll get a stomachache.”
Dave seemed to sort of understand, and put the chips down. He began to play around with the lion instead. Wanting to get on with the journal, I just ignored him.
I then began to talk about Melissa, who I though to be my dad’s boss.
“Hey,” my mom called to us, “It doesn’t seem like you two are talking about ghosts. Stop talking about this “Melissa” lady and start cleaning if you kids aren’t going to talk about ghosts.”
“Alright,” I whispered, “We’ll just talk quieter then. Are we ready to start reading the journal?”
My friends nodded their heads, and I began to read out loud to them. What was in the journal was surprisingly wholesome.
“I began the entity’s training by teaching it simple movements. I taught it how to wave hello with one of it’s black, inky hands. I then taught it how to move around in a circle, nod and shake it’s head, and even dance to music. However, anytime I came in to do my research, it always shook it’s head for no. So, I began to look for food it likes. At first, I tried feeding it candy. It seems to really hate sweet foods. I found that it really enjoys potatoes, especially potato chips. It was more happy to be taught these things when it was rewarded with potato chips.”
The journal entries of these events were much more fun to read then the previous ones. It was as if my dad was training a dog.
“Eventually, I had taught the being how to talk, read, and write. The being’s human transformation is a bit unsettling, but it is still impressive for Melissa. I even gave it a stuffed lion for comfort, and it seems to really enjoy it. Now, I can finally figure out what this creature’s motives were.”
I almost immediately flipped to the next page, eager to see what would happen next.
Everything felt like it was going downhill as I read it.
“I found out that the entity was not of this world, but some sort of very far away point in space. I predict it used some sort of wormhole to get close to Earth.”
“The entity claims that its ancestors had been here before a long, long time ago, and would shapeshift into humans.”
“The entity said it was told that “they are here to finally make this land their home.” It said that “there were too many people living here, so we must find a way to get rid of them. Luckily, the people there had things that would make it easy.”
“Melissa was finally able to confirm that the entity was hostile. She wanted to get rid of it. We finished our mission. However, I knew that the entity wasn’t evil. It couldn’t have been. It was so sweet. It had its own interests and preferences, it had a favorite stuffed animal. It was like a human child. I wanted to keep it. I wouldn’t let Melissa get rid of it.”
“I knew what I had to do. If my workplace was against creature, then I’m against the workplace.”
“Me and the entity had finally gotten rid of the workplace. I don’t even care about the horrors that escaped it. At least we’re both safe.”
“Melissa survived. She hates me. She had went completely insane. I don’t have much time left. I shouldn’t have married this woman.”
The rest of the pages were blank. I closed the book. “Well, uhh… I guess this is the end. It’s probably just a story though.”
I felt dizzy. My heart was racing. I knew this story had to be fake, but a part of me said it had to be real. I slowly walked out of the attic, listening to a conversation from downstairs.
“Melissa?” Dave asked. What was Dave doing down there?
“No, my name is Stephanie. Didn’t my son tell you about my beforehand?”
“Melissa… It’s me.” I head a scream. I fell down the attic stairs, and ended up passing out.
When I woke up, my house was empty. I had a note next to me. The note was poorly written, and had multiple punctuation and grammar errors.
“Hello. Jamie. You know your dad Frank? I guess you are friend now like him? Well I got rid of Melissa. Who is not my friend. The other girls tried to stop. I guess they weren’t friend too. But you didn’t respond to me so I just did it myself and left goodbye.”
Did what?
I looked downstairs. Three dead bodies, who I couldn’t even tell apart were lying on the ground. All of them were covered in a black, inky substance. I just went to the bathroom and threw up. I’m not sure if I should be glad I survived or not. My new friend is a monster. My family is dead. I don’t even know if I should call the police or not, since I don’t know if I’ll get involved with even more creepy science stuff.
I am terrified of monsters now. I want nothing to do with them. Also, Dave stole my dad’s stuff.