First part: https://www.reddit.com/r/nosleep/comments/13e7uto/i_found_a_hacked_pokemon_game_in_my_room/
I don’t know how to start this. I’m just going to be real. I know the beginning, middle and end. However, typing it out seems to be a task that I find myself unable to do. I feel so much pressure to get this right, especially after my last post: “I Found a Hacked Pokemon Game in My Room.” I want to get this right. I want it to be perfect. After all, she deserves it. After everything she’s been through, she deserves to have her story told correctly.
I guess I’ll start with who “she” is. I’ll call her Violet for the same reason I called my childhood friend “Craig” in my last post. She’s a friend of mine, we met at the local game store where we play Magic the Gathering. It had been a slow day at the store, I had been fine tuning my Shadrix Silverquill commander deck when she came over and asked if we could get a game in. She was really fun to play against, and we took turns ogling each other’s cardboard. Her laugh was addictive and she made plenty of fun jokes.
Violet was a tattoo artist, and had been for close to a decade. She tattooed Flapjack from Owl House on my shoulder for my birthday one year. It had been my first tattoo and I hate to admit that I was a little bitch when she did it. She gave me a lollipop after it was done like I was a little kid. It was a perfect gift though, the tattoo, not the lollipop.
After I wrote my last post, she and I had a good laugh at the idiots sliding into my DMs, claiming to be Craig. I think they all missed the fact that the name “Craig” was just an alias. Usually, these people were just scammers. One time though, this guy messaged me claiming to be Craig and wanting to “service” me. Violet and I laughed for hours at that.
One day, after a long day where I worked two dishwashing shifts, Violet met me after work. She had worked late too. She asked me to walk her home, which I agreed without hesitation. As we walked, I asked her why she wanted me to walk her home. She told me to look behind me, but to do it subtly and not to let “him” catch me. I used my phone camera to look behind me but I didn’t see anyone. It was late, and it was a small town, so we were pretty much the only ones on the sidewalk.
I told her I didn’t see anyone. Violet frowned and she looked behind us. Apparently he was gone. She said to look out for a white guy in a black suit with a weird looking head. When I asked how weird looking, she said his head looked like his skull wasn’t formed correctly, like there were strange angles that shouldn’t belong. That caught me off guard, so I made an offhand Slenderman joke. She didn’t laugh. She just kind of shrugged.
When we got to her house, she invited me in for beers. She had a six pack in the fridge, she said I could shower there and crash on the couch. That sounded glorious, I was drenched from washing dishes for 12+ hours and smelled like literal garbage. Plus not having to walk back to my place until tomorrow sounded like a good idea. I ordered a pizza and hit the shower, after which, I stepped into the living room where Violet had put on Teen Titans (old one of course).
I sat down. I thought back to the man she had talked about earlier and I asked how long he had been following her.
“A few days now,” Violet said, holding her legs up to her chest. She had all the curtains drawn, and I noticed the knife on the side table on her end of the couch.
I knew what it was like to have someone follow you, I knew the paranoia it could bring up in a person. Violet knew I knew, I think that’s why she asked me to be here for her. She had other friends and frankly, some of her friends were more physically fit than my pudgy ass, others even had guns. However, I think she wanted someone who knew what she was going through. I gave her hand a squeeze. She returned the squeeze, giving me a smile.
The knock on the door made her jump like a startled cat. She grabbed her knife before I reminded her it was probably just the pizza. I answered the door, indeed, it was the pizza. While I was paying for the food, I asked the delivery driver if she had seen the strange man Violet had described. He hadn’t. I brought the food in. Violet had calmed down, the knife had returned to the side table. I grabbed her favorite blanket and threw it over her legs.
“You always know what I need,” Violet said sweetly. I smiled and we continued watching our cartoons. After a while, Violet passed out on the couch, her three empty beer bottles surrounding the knife like some sort of weird shrine. I picked up the bottles and took them into the kitchen garbage. While there, I peeked out the window, looking for the man. I didn’t see him anywhere. This was weird, as distinct as this man had been described, he wouldn’t be able to hide easily.
When I went back into the living room, Violet was gone from the couch and the front door was wide open. I blinked. I stepped outside, confused. I saw her, standing in the middle of the road barefoot. I called her name. She didn’t answer. Luckily there wasn’t any traffic, so I went into the road and got in front of Violet. Her face was slack and her eyes were blank. I waved my hand in front of her face, she showed no recognition I was even there.
The only thing she said was “I don’t want to. I don’t want to.”
I don’t know if Violet had any mental disorders, but if she did, she never told me. I was getting worried. I shook her a little, finally snapping her out of it. She blinked about a dozen times before finally focusing on me. “How did I get here?” she asked, her voice seemed so weak and scared. I didn’t have any answers for her, I wish I did. I led her back inside and helped her into bed. I covered her up with her blanket.
I lay on the couch, hoping I could get some sleep. I kept thinking about my friend. I had lost Craig, I didn’t want to lose Violet too. I checked my DMs, no fake Craigs. I had hoped to have one to take my mind off things. I put on a podcast about Commander and lay my head down, soon drifting off to the voices talking about my favorite card game.
I awoke to the sound of Violet screaming. I rushed into her room, she had her knife pointing in the direction of her closet. “He’s in my room! He’s in my fucking room!” she was screaming. I looked at the closet. I didn’t see anyone. “He’s right there! Can’t you see him?!” I shook my head. I looked at her knife, it had still been on the end-table in the living room when I went to bed. I reached out to slowly take the knife from her. I told her I couldn’t see the man. She was trembling like a leaf. When I told her what I did, she looked at me with abject terror.
“Maybe you just need some sleep,” I said, softly.
“Stay with me,” she begged.
I agreed. I put the knife on the nightstand on my side. It was where she kept the inks for her tattoo gun. I noticed one of the bottles was empty. I pointed this out to her, though given what she was going through, I think that was the last thing on her mind. I told her we would go out and get some help in the morning. She held onto me, her face in my chest. I stroked her purple hair as she relaxed enough to slowly drift off. It took me a long time to get to sleep, it was almost five in the morning when I finally passed out.
When I woke up, I could smell iron. I felt something wet and sticky on my hands. I opened my eyes, seeing red everywhere. I thought at first that I had cut myself on something. However, I was proven horribly wrong when I saw Violet, my deep and dear friend, kneeling on the bed. She had the knife in hand and her clothes were drenched in blood. I gasped in horror and checked her over, thinking she had hurt herself. “It’s not my blood,” Violet said softly.
I was speechless and hyperventilating. My mind was having trouble wrapping around what was going on. I tried to ask whose blood it was but the words kept getting caught in my throat. My heart raced as I looked over Violet. I kept thinking maybe this was a dream, but the pain I felt in my chest from my rapid breathing and pulse proved me wrong. This was all too real.
“He’s in my head, he’s in my dreams. He showed me things. They make me sick but when I do them they make me feel good.”
My breathing stopped as I listened to my friend. This had to have been going on long before Violet asked me to come here. How long had my friend been suffering like this? She said the man had been following her for a few days, but I think it had been longer. I think she told me that to make me not worry. My friend had been going through Hell and had only just now asked for help. Perhaps it was too late.
“What things?” I asked, knowing the answer, but dreading her confirming my worst fears.
She didn’t answer. She just looked at her knife with longing in her gaze. She ran a finger along the edge. I went to take the knife from her.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you. I want to hurt you, and I don’t want any justification to do so,” Violet warned me. It didn’t sound quite like her. Violet had a cute voice normally, but this voice was deeper and more breathy. As she spoke, black fluid was dripping from the corner of her mouth, mixing with the blood on her skin and clothes. Her hand was shaking, like she was holding back the urge to slice my throat. I was reminded of the Ash Williams line ‘it got into my hand, turned it bad, so I lopped it off at the wrist.’
“Leave, leave now before I indulge in this addiction again,” Violet said, holding onto her knife hand with her free hand. The black sludge was now coming out of her mouth like a waterfall as she spoke. I left the room quickly, leaving the house barefoot. I kept looking over my shoulder, hoping I wouldn’t see her.
I was picked up by the police, I was covered in blood and ink so I wasn’t surprised. They asked me many repetitive questions, most of which I didn’t have answers for. Apparently a neighbor lady had been killed the night before, her vocal cords had been sliced, so she couldn’t scream for help. I can’t bring myself to describe what was done to her after that. Violet was missing from her house. I told the police everything I knew, including my suspicions about her dealing with these issues longer than she let on.
I’ve lost her now. She’s gone. I wish she had opened up sooner, maybe I could have helped her. It all seemed to go over so fast. From my perspective, it did. From hers though, it had to have been months, maybe years. I shudder to think of her going through all that alone. My friend is no more. She’s no longer the Violet I know. She’s a monster now, a killer.
I moved back in with my parents recently. The real Craig got in touch with me, hopefully I can get some answers from him about what happened with that hacked cartridge. I’m planning on visiting him soon. My stepdad has a gun, so I hope they’ll be okay while I’m gone. They’re too old to move again like they did when Craig’s dad turned out to be a killer. I can’t believe this has happened to me twice now.
I don’t know how to end this. I feel the urge to just end the post here. I don’t know what to say to truncate this thing. I’m at a loss for words. Sorrow and guilt well up inside me. I should have known something was wrong with Violet before. She hid it well, but if I was a good friend, I would have known. I’m alone now. Maybe I should stay that way, especially now that I’m starting to see the man too.