First time writing r/nosleep but hey I’ll try my best.
I found something and I regret it. I hope someone finds warning this so they might not make the mistake I did so they don’t face what I discovered.
My name is Carson Lemmas, I was a police officer for the small town of Argos Indiana. In my little town we don’t really have any sort of major crimes, perhaps the occasional break in, store theft, or domestic dispute but really we don’t have anything major at all.
I had worked as a police officer for most of my life ever since I got done with high school as the only child I never got good enough grades to really get any special career nor did I really desire to do something like that so I figured I could just go into some sort of physical job.
While I didn’t have good enough grades to really go to any of my favored colleges I did find interest in some sort of physical work I briefly considered fire fighting but I didn’t have the extreme physical strength for that. So I decided on police work. I applied and was accepted into the Fort Wayne Police Academy. So I drove there and paid my tuition and trained to be a police officer. Then started training and managed to get hired.
Eventually after 25 years of diligent police work I decided to apply for a transfer back to my home town and with all my outstanding work I was given the chance to transfer to the Argos Police department with my paycheck not coming from the local department but instead the county department so my hometown didn’t have really any trouble paying me. One of the reasons I got the job was that I had been involved in 5 major crimes in the past 2 months or so and expertly handled the situations, one of them nearly killing me with a bullet just millimeters from killing me as I went to enter a building thought to contain the suspect.
I had been in Argos for about 2 years at this point and nothing really new had happened other than the occasional normal petty disputes, theft and stopping sometimes ticketing speeding drivers. I was making the rounds in the nearby countryside in my old beat up cruiser heading further north into some trees when I spotted what looked to be a crashed truck.
I pulled over and to examine it after notifying dispatch and when i looked at and in it I noticed everything was old as if it had been there for some time. Nothing however was of interest so I went to get the license plate number and when I had written it down I went and checked the truck and area again, and there was nothing.
I got back in my cruiser and started driving back doing my rounds and eventually forgot about the crash site and it didn’t enter my mind again until the next week when I was doing my round again in my cruiser. When by the same stretch road I noticed the truck. It came back to me that I had found this truck and forgot to check the plate number before reporting it to see if there were any matches to who owned it so I could let them know it would be towed away soon if they didn’t get it out of there.
When I checked I found it belonged to a guy some far off the main road further into the more wooded countryside. I let dispatch know that I was going to go give the guy a warning about moving the truck after I was done with my rounds and dispatch gave their usual official version of okay. So I finished my rounds when I went to the guys house to let him know. Except when I got there all I saw was a slightly dilapidated house with a pretty similar truck in the driveway.
When I went to let the guy know that we were going to tow his truck if he didn’t get it moved. He asked for the plate number and when I gave it to him he seemed confused as the license plate number was for the truck in the driveway when I checked I was confused. So I thought for a few seconds on what to do.
I decided to go talk to dispatch and get some orders on what to do as I had always been more thoughtful in asking for permission rather than doing something immediately. When I asked dispatch they told me to reexamine the crash site when I was heading back. So I bade the man a fair evening before getting back in my cruiser to go look for the crash site.
When I arrived back on the scene of the crashed truck I found something truly confusing, the truck was there but this time there were footsteps leading into the forest. I looked through the truck once more and nothing had changed nothing was different with the license plate it was the exact same license plate on the truck in that man’s driveway.
Only one thing was new and that was there were footsteps leading into the forest. I made to contact dispatch only to find my radio was filled with static rather than the usual feedback from the dispatch assistant replying to the channel. Confused and uneasy I tried for dispatch again the same static was there. Unsure of what to do I cautiously decided to see where the footsteps led to see if there was anyone who had thought to steal the truck or break it down for spare parts.
As I was walking with my pistol raised in hand pointing up to avoid checking anyone with a barrel unless for self defense or if I needed to make someone cease and desist. As I followed the footsteps something made me feel even more uneasy as I kept walking eventually I opened up to what seemed like a small break in the trees only to find the same clearing with the same truck.
My cruiser was gone however when I quickly went to turn around to check where I had come from I found only unchanged forest where there had been footsteps not even the ground where I knew I had walked was disturbed by passing through as if I had never walked through in the first place.
Something was seriously wrong and against all instinct to bolt I cautiously made my way up to the truck and when I looked around it something was inside. When I opened the truck to see what it was I found a sheet of paper but nothing was on it. When I looked up I saw that there were footsteps in the dirt, the same footsteps I had followed when I came back.
With that I started to run back where I had come from yet as I was running back through the forest I came back upon the the same scene with the same truck only the paper in the truck this time was different on the paper was a picture.
When I saw it my blood went cold, on it was a picture of me at the front door of the mans house talking to him about the truck only the man wasn’t a man. His twisted features were beyond imagination try to think an eldritch grey root or tentacle like being attempting to become humanoid with only the rough shape of a human body to know what a human looks like yet still be recognizable as some sort of humanoid. I can begin to only describe its eyes and expression.
The eyes were like Fog and flesh melded together and the smile was one of wicked pleasure, one that was of a predator finding its prey.
When I looked back up I was frantically looking around as if it was near yet I saw nothing but the same empty forest clearing where the truck was although my cruiser was still missing. I started to follow the road running to get away from that clearing only to find myself somewhere completely different. I had been running the route for 2 years weekly so I knew my way around the roads in the area but I found myself in a completely different area with new intersections, roads and dilapidated houses and a fog obscuring my view about 1000 feet off in every direction.
Still I kept going determined to get out of whatever I was in. Yet all I managed to find was again a completely different area from what I expected. At this point the previous fear from what I saw early was fading and only a deep unease pervaded me so I slowed down to process what I was in and what was going on around me and holstered my pistol.
At this point 2 hours had passed so I was looking for what I could do I checked the houses and all I found were a few cans of preserved foods and bottles of water so I wouldn’t starve or go thirsty if I could escape whatever was happening. I was beginning to become tired after all that happened today as dusk started to set in so I decided to try to get some sleep and see if I could find out what was happening in the morning.
So before the sun fully went down I went to search for any sort of matting so I wouldn’t have to sleep on hard floor and found a mattress and two blankets in one of the nearby houses and made myself comfortable in the one I found that was the most sturdy and drifted off into a dreamless sleep.
When I woke up I woke to find myself in darkness switching on the small hand cranked emergency flashlight I always kept on myself. I found myself in the same house on the same mattress with the same blankets I had gone to sleep with but now something was different.
As I flicked the flashlight around I saw nothing so when I moved to the windows and checked I was greeted to pure and utter terror barely a 1000 feet in front of me was the monster in the picture. Its eyes were misty and foggy yet somehow looking almost flesh like in appearance the grin twisted up on its contorted and eldritch face. Yet I knew when I was looking at it, it was somehow looking back directly at me with its inhuman eyes.
I felt fear, more fear than I had ever felt before, more fear than I had felt when my mother comforted me when i was still afraid of the dark. Fear so strong that after an eternal second I started to run as hard as i could away from that thing.
As I ran I could feel it slowly following me as I ran farther and farther away from it I hid inside one of the new houses in this supernatural area and found this paper and pencil, something tells me it knows where i am hiding and is savoring my fear as if it knows I cannot escape it and can only run as far as it lets me run. I don’t know how much time left before it kills me I can only hope it lets me live for a little longer so I can finish this warning.
If you see the crashed truck do NOT stop to look at it and do NOT return. For I found something that I regret finding. Even now barely after an hour of running away from it in fear, I know I will never find a way to survive this place until I can no longer run to escape, it won’t let me run for much longer after all whats the point of playing with food for so long.