Hi kind strangers!
I moved into a new place recently, and the last tenant in my apartment left a LOT of stuff behind when they moved, most of which were books and DVDs. There was some good stuff in there I kept, like Kill Bill and Batman, but among them I found something you guys might find interesting too.
It was a blank dvd in a paper sleeve. It looked out of place, because all the other discs were in proper plastic cases. The number four was written on the paper with blue pen ink, but there were no other markings on the disc or the sleeve. I got curious and, naturally, I wanted to see what it was! I put it in my player, but disc was scratched up and worn, so it was a pain in the ass to get working. I got it to play eventually though.
The film was around an hour long, and it started with a short intro. It was a simple, crewdly animated forest silhouette with a fade in Times New Roman title: “Rotlive.4”. It was very 2007, but charming in a way. Judging by that, I thought it might have been some kind of school project or family film. That quickly went out the window though, when a disclaimer was shown. It said something like: “All parties depicted within this film are over 18 years of age and have provided both verbal and written consent to its events.” At that point I thought “oh, is this a porno?” and kinda laughed at myself. I kept watching though, for research purposes of course.
The video began. It was shot in a forest with a simple, white, plastic garden chair in the middle of the scene. A fat, light skinned, short man walked into frame and sat on it, fully clothed by the way. He seemed to be in his 60’s or 50’s, an older guy none the less. He looked at the person filming, nodded, looked at the camera, and spoke. It went on for around fifteen minutes or so, so I’ll paraphrase it for you:
He told the viewers that his brother had died in 9/11, right before his eyes. Ever since that day, he had been afraid of dying in the same way, so afraid, that he couldn’t even go inside tall buildings anymore. Just being around a house that was more than 2 stories tall made him severely anxious and gave him flashbacks. The man had tried everything to remedy this condition, from years of professional therapy to spiritual healing, but nothing worked. Eventually he just stopped going outside, became a bitter shut in and lost all his friends. It was honestly heartbreaking to listen to, especially near the end of his monologue. His voice was so shaky and you could see the tears welling up in his eyes. I felt bad for him. When he was done speaking, he composed himself, cleared his throat, stood up and said: “I am ready for Rotlive!”
There was a sudden cut in the video after that. The man was sitting on the chair again, but he was visibly more loopy now, like he had taken some sort of drug. His movements were lazy and his speech was slurred. A new voice spoke from behind the camera: “This is your last chance to go home. Are you ready for rotlive?” It startled me, it was the first and last time she spoke. The man clapped his hands sluggishly and laughed: “Aww yeah, gimme doc, gimme.” I chuckled at that, though I probably shouldn’t have. I remember those words clearly.
The camerawoman walked next to him and took out a hypodermic needle. She wore a mask and a hoodie, so I could see anything identifiable about her. I have no idea what in the needle, but I assumed it was drugs and thought “Ugh is this some kind of hippie thing?”. Anyway, the man leaned his head over to the left, exposing his neck to her. He winced as the needle entered his body. I couldn’t watch, it made me light headed. I think that was just my fear of needles though. Once that was over, the man sighed and shook his limbs a bit.
Most of the film after that was just footage of the man sitting, sometimes groaning and laughing. He spoke every once in a while, but I couldn’t make out what he was saying. There was something that separated the film from your regular drug stuff though. It happened slowly and gradually, so I didn’t even notice it until I got bored and skipped a bit of it. After the man got pricked, his body had started changing. It was horrible, his skin became a greenish pale color and his eyes looked sunken in and yellow. His fingertips and lips were blue and swollen and his entire body seemed to bloat. It was subtle, I thought my eyes were tricking me at first, but the way the buttons on his shirt were straining showed it. It was gross, really gross. The sounds of flies buzzing across the camera became more frequent too.
A drop of blood trailed its way down the mans cheek from the corner of his mouth. He said: “It doesn’t hurt doc, it really doesn’t m-“ but before he could speak more, the video cut again. A similar graphic to the intro disclaimer was shown, but the text was different: “Active and advanced decay is online exclusive. Visit Rotlive’s website to see more. Enter code DavRots1.” Underneath the text was a link made up of random letters and numbers. I tried visiting the site, but it didn’t exist anymore. I’m kinda glad it didn’t.
The message was on screen for about a minute, after which it cut back to footage of the chair in the woods. The forest was darker, the sun had started setting and little rays of light peeked through the trees. At first I wasn’t sure what I was looking at. There was no man anymore, and the chair was covered in what seemed to be a blanket of gray mush and fluids. Only when I noticed the bones sticking out of it, I realized that it WAS the man. He was in such a bad shape that I couldn’t even get grossed out anymore. I was just confused.
So, do you guys have any idea what Rotlive is? I tried looking it up online, but all I could find were lost, password locked, or unarchived websites. It seemed to be around from 2006-08 maybe? Maybe one of you can identify the man?
Message me for the mp4 file. I hope you can find something. Ciao!