5:00 AM, on the dot, I woke up to the sound of my printer going off in my office down the hall. I thought nothing of it, maybe it was a bug in the printer or my cat ran over the power button, maybe it was a paper informing me of an update, or maybe it was an advertisement printed out by HP themselves to make a quick buck, I had seen that on Reddit before. I soon went back to sleep because I had work in the morning.
When I woke up I had gotten a text from my boss telling me that, due to an unexpected blizzard, everyone would have to be working from home today. With my pyjamas on and my coffee brewing, I went to my office to start my computer, and that’s when I remembered my printer going off. I went to go check what it had printed and my heart sank. It was me. Like, a photo of me. But it wasn’t a photo I had taken, it was me leaving my work building, the photo was taken from a table from the coffee shop across the street. I was thoroughly freaked out for the rest of the day. Soon it came time to go to bed, and I tried to think of a rational answer as to why what just happened happened. My rational side figured that I wasn’t a sensible target for stalking, so it had to be a prank of some kind. My suspect was Carter, he was experienced in IT and often got out before us, and he likes to go to the coffee shop after work. Combined with the fact that I’m a relatively new hire I figured that this was some kind of initiation thing for the IT department.
The next day at the office I asked Anna if she ever had a similar experience when she joined the IT department. She’s also a relatively new hire, she’s only been in the IT department for a little over six months now, so if Carter had ever pulled a prank like this, it would still be a fresh memory. She looked bewildered and told me that no such thing had ever happened to her. Ok, maybe when Carter’s done joking around with you he tells you to play along, I figured. While I do love a good prank, I’d definitely have to report that to HR or something.
When I got home from work that day, I passed my office on my way to the kitchen, and I saw a piece of paper on the edge of my printer. I picked it up and took a look at it. On the page were two photos, one was a photo of my car, the other was a photo of my license plate, and it was back to being scared I went. I wanted to call the cops, but what I could tell them? “Officer, somebody’s hacking my printer”, no, that sounds stupid.
The next day, it was a photo taken from a car next to mine at a stoplight. The next, it was a photo of me and my friends at a bar. The next, it was a photo of my mother’s grave. The next, it was a photo of me at the post office. The next, it was a photo of me visiting my father’s house. It had become a daily thing for me, checking the printer first thing every morning. There was always something there.
Yesterday, it wasn’t a photo, it was a list.
-Clipboard.
-Leash.
-Spare tire.
-Sunglasses.
And when I went down to my car, I found the driver’s side window destroyed, someone had broken into my car. I checked the car and everything on that list had been stolen from it. Now I had evidence, I could finally call the police. I called them that night, they came over, investigated my printer, inspected the damage in my car, and left. They told me they were opening an investigation, some DNA had been found in the car, and they were working on creating a profile of the perpetrator. That night, the printer went off again. It was the first time it had done so more than once per day. On that piece of paper was the most disturbing thing I have ever seen.
On it was my full address, apartment number, door code, full name and birthday. Below it was a photo of my front door. Below that was a photo of a tool box containing a bottle of chloroform, a rag, a rope and a box cutter. Lastly, there was a photo of three masks in a box. The masks looked like mutilated human faces. It wasn’t like Halloween masks. These masks were covered in a deep bronze shade. Dried up blood. These masks had blemishes, cuts, wounds, and layers of skin. I could see their pores. They were rotting. These were real corpses.
“See you soon” was written at the bottom of the page.
I’m staying a friend’s house tonight. I’m scared. What do I do?