I know that this title sounds pretty silly, but i hope this story will make you think twice before answering a phone number that you don’t recognize.
“There used to be a time when i would always answer the phone, whether i knew the number or not. This all comes down from a joke i had with my family that there was a possibility that a number you didn’t recognize was from a kidnapped person and maybe you would be able to help, so that’s where all the “Always pick up the phone” came from.
This all started about eight months ago, when i changed my service provider after moving to a different country. I changed my phone number too. And i also had to register everybody in my contacts again for this reason. I actually couldn’t remember any of my friends numbers, so i only told them my new number, hoping that after that they would call me and like that i would get my contacts back.
Anyways, first week after moving in i get a call from an unknown number. First thing i noticed before answering is that the first 2 numbers were the only ones that were apart from the rest of the number, which was quite unusual, since there were usually 3 spaces in the number where i lived. And it also showed where the call was coming from, but instead of a name, there were just the coordinates of the place.
Still, i answered it.
There was silence on the other end for some moments. I was ready to hang up the phone then and there, when a small sound on the other end appeared: music. But it didn’t sound like a normal music, like the one that you here when you call a location and they can’t respond right away , but something people would now associate with the backrooms, like Caretaker’s “It’s just a burning memory”. Really strange.
Then a voice started speaking so suddenly, that i almost dropped my phone. It also didn’t sound human, but robotic almost. It started saying a bunch of random numbers, but on a closer inspection, i realized it was saying the phone number that it had called me from. Then another few seconds of silence and that robotic voice started saying something again:my full name. I was confused at first, but before i could react, it started telling me a whole bunch of inforamtion about myself, like my age, my parents’ name, my birthday, etc.
After saying even the hospital where i was born, it suddenly hung up the phone. I was baffled. I thought that that might be one of my friends, but why would anybody from my friend group pull such a twisted prank on me, knowing that can get really paranoid from these kinds of jokes. I decided to meet up with them.
We arranged a reservation at a restaurant in my home country and all met a month after the incident. You may ask why we arranged it so late and that is because, first of all, we lived in different countries, and second, all of them were going to be on vacation for the next 2 weeks, but the 2 weeks after they came home, i was the one going on vacation, so only a month later i got the time to take the car for a trip over there, because i lived about 1 hour from the border.
The trip was ordinary, if not a bit boring, but 4 hours later i arrived in my home city. We all met up at a friend’s house that was closer to the restaurant and from there we walked. After we sat down, we caught up with one another. I didn’t actually tell them why i decided to make such a long journey just to go to a restaurant, so when i told them why i did that, they all seemed really confused.
I told them everything that had happened, but their expression changed from weirded out, to confusion and to disturbed. They all said they would never scare me like this and those expressions all looked genuine. We decided to end the night and i made my way back to my city and went straight to bed.
In the middle of the night i woke up at the sound of ringing from my nightstand. I sat up and looked at my phone screen:an unknown number. Exact same format of the robotic voice one, just different numbers. Again, under it there were some coordinates. I didn’t wanna pick it up, but curiosity got the best of me.
Same call format. Music->robotic voice->hang up. Only this time it told me things about my life that i never told anyone, not even to my friends. And the detail was so precise, that only a person that was there with me could have known all of these.
This went on for about six months before i started noting the location of the call. I was feeling that it had some sort of importance. Every month i would get a call revealing something about my life that no one exept me knew. I never went to the police, cause the call were never threatening.
I remember being bored one day and putting into Google earth’s search bar the coordinates i have gathered along these months. They lead me to places that at first were pretty far away from my current location and they only got closer and closer until one of them was just a block away from my house.
The seventh and eighth’s month call were by far the most disturbing. The robotic told me my full name and the date of my supposed death. 3 months from now. Even though i knew the possibility of me dying on that exact date were slim, i was still disturbed as to how or why somebody would terrify me for so long.
A month passed and i got the eighth call. Silence. Then i heard my full name and my “cause of death”. Death by drowning. This time i hung up the phone first. I sat in my room quiet without really doing anything for about an hour before i decided to finally go to the police.
I told them what was happening and showed them on my phone, the entry of the calls. But something was odd. They didn’t seem to be worried at all. They looked rather confused.
“Ma’am, there is not a single entry of any number showing on your screen”
I looked at them with confusion and then looked at my phone screen.
“No recent calls”
I got the hell out of there without saying anything and ran home. I locked the door and the windows. I went to my bedroom and locked myself inside.
There is no specific reason why i did this, i just this awful sinking feeling, like i was being watched. I just glanced at the window in my room, which is on ground floor and saw fugures. Im sure they were not human, because they were just like shadows:human-shaped black mists. They all just stood there except for one individual, he looked as if he was holding his hand on his ear. He was calling somebody.
Just then, my phone rang again. I need to stay in my room. I think there are more of them outside my front door. I can hear banging. I don’t have much time left. Goodbye. I think they are already inside.”
That is how it ended. The rest of the journal was blank. It has been 2 months since i reported my sister missing to the police. I think they will discover her soon in one of the lakes nearby. The journal was the only thing that tells me that my sister once existed, as after she disappeared, so did all photos, videos of her that were ever taken of her. Like she was gone of the face of the earth.
I think they are coming for me as well. I started getting calls very similar to my sister’s and i only answered one of them, the first one. Even so, i know i don’t have much left.