I had crested the hill in the vast wilderness of Wyoming one brisk afternoon. It was February, and I always habitually did most of my little excursions around winter. There was little snow, so traveling was less impeded than usual during this time of year.
I won’t bore anyone with why I was out there; it was simply the nature hike. Of course, I did have the nasty habit of going off-trail and looking around for hidden spots that only get a few visits from other people. I’d like to be the first to see them and have memories of unique hiding spots that have yet to be discovered.
On this particular hike, I found an abandoned road in the forest.
“That’s odd?” I said to myself.
I was curious about where this road went, so I chose a direction and hoped it would be less than a five-mile walk. Anything longer, and I’ll head back. And I don’t have to worry about getting lost; I always carry an expensive GPS. The road in question looked like it had been abandoned for decades and was practically overgrown, but there were still sections of asphalt that remained.
Thankfully no more than two miles in, I spotted some houses up ahead. I was surprised to find out about their being a town in this area. They were abandoned and in severe disrepair, each sending a shudder down my spine. Had I come across one of those fabled ghost towns?
I checked many houses and saw that much of their stuff had been left behind. Everyone in the town must have gone quickly, adding a sense of mystery. Curiosity kept pushing me forward, and I wanted to know more about the fate that had befallen this obscure town whose name I could not recover when I got back home to type all this out.
I went to the outskirts of the town, finding more houses that were more reclusive in the woods. This old, 19th-century-looking house appeared to have been boarded up inside.
Grabbing my hatchet, I broke in and started looking around. Many other buildings looked like they had been ransacked, but this one was strangely untouched.
I glanced at the dining room table and saw a stash of papers stuffed inside a bottle.
“A message in a bottle. How cliche.”
Popping it open, I took out the papers and saw they had been numbered from 1 to 11 on the top right. After sorting them in order, I sat down at the table and started reading:
[August 5th, 1985]
Today was a pretty tough work day with the boys. We had been drilling for nearly six hours now with the machinery, and it was time to give it a rest.
The reason for such rest was that the drill had entered a chasm. We weren’t aware that there was an underground cave in the area. For fear of damaging the equipment, our boss told us to come back tomorrow and get some rest.
Zack and Michael wanted to visit my house to get some of my mom’s delicious apple pie. I wasn’t keen on having my friends over at my mom’s house. Being a 24-year-old who has to still live with his parents is not exactly something I’m proud of.
“Come on, Owen,” Zack cried, “we deserve some delicious sweets after all this nonsense.”
The other guys also started pressuring me, demanding that I let them after my mom’s apple pie.
“Ugh, fine…” I relented and walked with the rest of them to return our gear to the trailer. There was a brief celebration as all the guys laughed about getting their way.
“Man, after working on this stupid hole, I’m going to need something sugary in my stomach,” Brian, another coworker said.
I was out of the loop due to my inability to attend company meetings, and I asked, “What’s this hole for anyway? Are we looking for oil?”
Michael replied with his typical deadpan voice, “Nah, some guys in suits told us to dig here. Not sure who they were; they didn’t tell me anyway.”
Zack looked back at us and said, “They were called Pantheon Engineering Company.”
“Never heard of them,” I said.
“From what the boss said, they like to keep knowledge of their operations to a minimum. But they’re paying us quite a handsome amount.”
I had to agree with Zack on that one. The money we were getting was enough to get my own house.
Still, I wondered why they were outsourcing to us instead of using their own company’s workers. Perhaps they have too many projects they’re working on and have to rely on us outside, family-run companies in the area, especially with how obscure our town is. We never came up on most maps.
_______________________
My mom was as welcoming as she always is, but sadly she did not have the apple pie all my friends looked forward to. She had peach pie, which is less popular with the boys.
We could kick back, drink a few beers and watch the football game. Guys’ night could still be saved, and we told Zack that he should call his brother and friends to come over. Make the night more enjoyable.
Funny enough, I got a phone call around this time.
When I answered, it was my boss, who was angry with us.
“I thought when I told you that you could go home for the day, you would at least turn off the drill.”
I told the guys about this, and they looked around. Each one said, “But it is off.”
Zack— the responsible one on the team— replied, “I shut it off myself.”
I told Glenn, our boss’s name, that we shut it off, and Zack confirmed.
“Well, I don’t know why I hear sounds coming from the drill. There’s a screeching sound.”
I repeated, “Screeching?”
“Yeah. I’m hearing it right now. Listen.”
The sound of high pitch screeches was slowly fading in. I listened more carefully to hear it more clearly and noticed something more distinct about the noise. It sounded like someone was speaking that was getting overlapped by the high pitch noise. I listened more closely until I heard, “We see you.”
I pulled the phone away and told Glenn it wasn’t funny to prank someone like that.
He pulled the phone away but said he only heard my voice muffled by the sound. I repeated my sentence, and he replied, “I’m not. Also, I checked the machine. It’s not turned on, just like you said.”
“Told you,” I snarked impulsively.
He sounded more grumpy this time. “Don’t start mouthing off at me. I don’t know what’s going on, and frankly, I’m going to call up those Pantheon guys and tell them that I want to know more about what they’re having us work—”
Suddenly the phone cut out. “Hello? Glenn?”
The line was dead, and I assumed he must have lost power in the area. “Huh, that was weird.”
I put down the phone and went back to the guys. We were already in the 2nd half of the game and I didn’t think much more of the conversation. I was sure Glenn just messed around with something and blew a fuse back at the project.
Michael asked, “So what did the old man want? Did he figure out what that screeching noise was?”
“The phone line cut out. He said something about confronting that company that has us working on it.”
Jimmy, a Mexican friend still practicing English, replied, “Why would the power cut out? Something doesn’t seem right.”
Everyone else seemed to have difficulty understanding his accent, but I was secretly dating his sister. She had been teaching me some Spanish and I was able to understand more of the accent in my interactions with her, not to mention that I have been friends with Jimmy the longest out of everyone in the group.
“I don’t know, you’re right about it being rather odd. It’s almost coincidental that it cut out right as he talked, and I heard some voice coming through the screeching.”
Michael, ever the type to disregard anything, shrugged it off. “It was probably Glenn making it up.”
I decided to voice my concerns more, but everyone returned to the game. I sat down next to Jimmy and took another sip of my beer. Still, I could not shake my feelings of anxiety as I wondered what could have caused the abruptness of the line being cut and that noise.
_______________________
30 minutes still passed, and Zack’s brother had not arrived. Nor did any of the others that we had invited. We were way out in the backwoods areas of town. In fact, reflecting on the events that proceed made sense why it took so long for us to notice that something was dangerously wrong with the absences. My mom’s house is opposite where the dig site is. Walking from one end to the other could take you well over an hour.
“Ugh, where is that loser?” Zack started to grumble.
I replied, “Maybe he’s held up by his girlfriend?”
“It shouldn’t take him that long to shake her off.”
He went back to my phone and dialed him up. “Hey Harry, what’s taking so long— What!”
His sudden change of tone instantly got everyone’s attention.
I leaned in beside him to listen in. These were the words that I heard.
“Listen, something weird has been going on. I feel like there are people outside the house. A lot of them. But I can’t quite look at them correctly. Like they fade in and out, and they have glowing white eyes. It’s bizarre.”
There was a brief silence before he said, “Wait, I think I hear them whispering. They’re saying something, I’m trying to lean my ear against the door. Katie is freaking out.”
Again another brief moment of quiet before he said, “They’re saying, ‘we see you.’ What does that mean?”
Zack looked at me, and I remembered what I heard back at the dig site with Glenn.
An abrupt crashing of glass and wood broke through, muffling Harry’s screaming. His girlfriend Katie could be heard in the background. “HARRY!”
Zack and I pulled away from the phone, but I could hear Katie’s guttural screams on the other end, followed by the sounds of her gurgling and then a splashing sound like a water balloon popping.
Zack put the phone down and looked at everyone else like he saw someone just get hit by a car.
“I have to go out there,”
Michael wanted to know what was wrong, and we explained everything we had heard.
We weren’t about to let our friend go out there by himself. After all, there were five guys. Me, Zack, Michael, Jimmy, and Brian. We were drillers and I’m not bragging when I say this, we were pretty properly built guys. We worked around heavy machinery and we had this idea that we could take on anything.
There was also the fact that we had to go rescue our other loved ones. There was Zack’s brother, plus his grandma, Michael didn’t have anyone so that was lucky, but there was also Jimmy’s sister, and Brian’s parents and little sister.
The plan was set, and we tried calling around first, wanting to know who was still available and who wasn’t. Zack’s brother was a no-go, although he was insistent that his brother was still alive. In the back of my mind, I wasn’t so sure. Jimmy’s sister was fine; she was the closest to my house, which meant we would be there first. Brian’s family and Zack’s grandma would be our next stop.
We stepped out and thought it best not to take the car. It wouldn’t be able to fit all five of us anyway because it was a simple pickup truck and could only seat three.
Walking was easier to navigate anyway, and we made it to Jimmy’s house within 7 minutes.
“Jairo!” His sister shouted from the deck of their house.
Jairo was Jimmy’s real name, but Jimmy was his choice. We would have been fine calling him by his Spanish name, but he liked being called by that name.
The two of them hugged each other quickly, and his sister Valentina and I exchanged brief glances. I wanted to rush in quickly and kiss her, but circumstances wouldn’t allow it.
Long story short, we were now six people walking along the road into town, the next stop being Brian’s family. When we called them back at my house earlier, they said everything was fine in their area, so we thought nothing of it.
But upon reaching the house, the front door had been smashed in, like someone had just rammed a rock straight through it.
Zack and I were the first to go up, Brian already showing signs of a panic attack. He hung in the back, having thoughts I could only guess he was having. As far as we knew, the house had been attacked, but nothing in terms of bodies to be spotted.
Zack went into the back of the house, but I went up the steps. Seeing his sister’s door closed, I approached cautiously and gave it a few knocks. I wish I had known her name at the time. Brian needed to be more informative in telling us the names of his family members.
“Hello, is the sister of Brian in here? Brian’s outside, kind of panicking.”
I twisted the knob, noticing it was distinctly loose like it had been forcibly opened, then closed shortly afterward.
When I gently opened the door, I lost my breath and immediately was seized by a gut-wrenching fear.
There was blood and visceral remains everywhere in the room. It was like a balloon filled with it had been popped in the center and splashed in every direction. It was still fresh and dripping from the ceiling, covering the little bits of pink paint on the walls and her white bed.
I quickly lost my nerve and ran back downstairs, only to see Zack, who had the same look of shock on his face. They were in the middle of telling Brian, who was crying bitterly.
Zack checked the kitchen and saw the exact same scene as I saw upstairs.
None of us could develop the words needed to comfort Brian. Valentina tried her best to hug him, something he appreciated, but he was still much too disturbed by the current loss of his family.
“She was only six…” he muttered to himself.
I felt so useless. Why couldn’t I develop the words to help my friend feel better. Even as I write these words now, there wasn’t anything I could say to ease the pain. There’s sometimes nothing you can do to help.
Strickened by the grief that he was feeling, Zack told both of them to go back to my house since it seemed to be the safest place.
The four of us continued our journey until we got into town. I was worried about Valentina and Brian, but I knew they wouldn’t have to walk long before they reached the house.
Tired from all the walking, we briefly approached the old diner I occasionally ate at. “Amber’s Eats.”
In his distinctive deadpan voice, Michael remarked, “What is she even eating?”
The time for jokes was not now, and most of us groaned. Zack, who typically always encourages Michael’s nonchalant, carefree attitude, even found himself finding this a little ill-timed given the circumstances.
The restaurant was still open, but surprisingly there wasn’t anyone inside.
“Hello,” I called.
Zack, Michael, and Jimmy sat in a booth in the middle of the 1950s-style trailer-themed diner. Beautifully vintage, although considering most of the other buildings in the town were still trapped in the 1800s, it’s still one of the newer structures.
Michael made a remark that caught all of our attention. “Isn’t it strange that we haven’t seen any police officers around?”
Zack agreed, and the two of them kept talking while Jimmy sat nearby quietly. I went up to the counter table, peeking into the little slot where they place food when it’s ready. It was empty, which I had grown more suspicious of. No one was around, yet the neon sign said they were open.
Walking behind the counter, I went to the door and swung it open. The ovens were still on, and food was either burnt or soups boiling in their pots, almost like everyone in the building left in great haste.
I checked other sections but saw that the back door was wide open.
Sensing danger, I retreated back to the dining room, about to inform my friends of my discovery.
When I opened the door, I said, “Guys, we should probably get moving. Nobody else is here.”
When I looked up at them, I froze in place. They were still alive, thankfully, but I happened to notice from behind the glass that a crowd of silhouetted people with glowing white eyes was staring from behind them.
“Guys, look.” I pointed and lost my breath.
They hadn’t noticed until now, and all three jumped out immediately. Michael exclaimed, “What— who are— what are they!”
I told them we should all run to the back door of the building.
Noticing that the silhouettes were moving for the front door, we wasted no time going through the kitchen, and I was only hoping that whatever it was, it hadn’t blocked off our only exit.
We heard the front door open, and Zack pushed everyone forward so we could get out without a second to spare. The first one out was Jimmy, then Michael. I was a little too curious before and lingered behind them, wanting to get a better look at whatever it was that was chasing us. Zack insisted that I keep moving, and I had the unfortunate encounter of slipping in some of the spilled-over soup on the floor.
Hitting the ground sent a shock through my body, and pain in my elbows and knees from hitting them on the tile floor.
Zack was beside me, screaming at the top of his lungs for me to get back up.
Powering through the soreness in my joints, I quickly got back to our feet and I looked back for a moment and saw the kitchen door swinging open. They were now in the room with us.
But thankfully, we made it to the back door and joined the others as we ran as fast as we could from behind the building, heading towards a nearby grocery store parking lot.
When we got to the store, we started screaming out many different things, most of which I do not remember now.
We all agreed that we wouldn’t stop anywhere until we got to Zack’s brother and Grandma.
But Michael was quick to say, “Zack, I didn’t want to say it before, but—”
“Keep your mouth shut,”
“No, Zack. Considering all the things we have seen today, I feel that your brother isn’t alive anymore.”
“I SAID KEEP YOUR MOUTH SHUT!”
Zack and Michael were always friends, so to see them suddenly fighting because of shaken nerves was not something that I was prepared to deal with. Zack and Michael have always been stronger than Jimmy or me, so it came down to two weak dudes trying to stop two strong dudes from duking it out.
But while we were trying to wedge them off each other, one of the many parking lot lights flickered for a few seconds before burning out.
I looked in that direction and saw dozens of glowing white eyes staring at us.
“They’re here,”
“I’m going for my brother!” Zack broke off from the fight and ran in the direction of where his brother’s house. We tried to tell him to come back, but he wasn’t listening anymore. In his case, blood is thicker than water. But after what happened next, his blood sure did become like water.
Zack wasn’t paying attention because he kept looking at us as he ran away. He was almost on the main road, but when he looked back at us another time to see if we still hadn’t started following him, likely feeling hurt at our apprehensions to do so, I saw more of those white lights right in front of him, and I and the other started pleading for him to come back.
He looked back to see where he was running to, but it was too late. He ended up crashing into the silhouettes, and they touched him. Still, he tumbled to the ground, moaning and coughing. But he jumped back to his feet quickly, and it looked like nothing had happened to him. He looked at them again and then back at us before the most awful thing I’d ever seen happened right before my eyes. And I literally just got back from seeing a family get massacred.
His body swelled up immensely. He bloated like a huge, morbidly obese person, but even his head was getting huge. And within seconds, he exploded into a massive shower of blood.
Everyone cursed, and Jimmy even threw up a little. I thought I would faint after what I saw, but I could hold it together. I’m glad I did because I saw more. Standing in the center of where Zack was, another silhouette with white eyes and a glowing nervous system and brain inside the silhouette.
“Wait, is that Zack?” I inquired.
It was Zack. He had become one of those things which we started to call Night-Stares. That’s what I’ll be calling them anyway.
Not wanting them to get any closer, we ran back to my house as fast as we could. It was the only place that we could think of as a safe place.
The town felt so empty now that these things have taken over, but what are they? And then I remembered. The drilling project that we were doing.
Because we were so focused on running back to my house, I didn’t have much time to reflect on my thoughts until I finally got up to the door and was greeted by my mom and Valentina. She must’ve forgotten about her brother still being with us because she instantly pulled me into a hug.
Jimmy stared at us briefly before putting two and two together. “Wait, are you guys dating?”
I remained quiet out of shame for not letting him know until now, but Valentina immediately came to defend our relationship. She snapped into him, speaking Spanish the entire time, so I can’t recall anything that was said.
But while that was happening, I looked to my right out at the woods and saw more of those little yellow balls of light staring at us.
“Night-Stares!” I warned everyone, hurrying them inside.
In the attic, we had plenty of boards of wood that we could use to seal off all the windows and doors in the house.
It also helped to push furniture in front of said doors and windows as extra protection.
Once everything was settled, all we could do next was wait it out and hope rescuers come for us. Hopefully it wouldn’t have to be a long wait. Jimmy didn’t seem so angry anymore after getting chewed out by his sister. Although I could still tell he was a little perturbed that we hid the relationship from him.
“If it wasn’t for the fact that some freaky shadows are following us, I’d be a little more upset about you dating my sister behind my back.”
“She and I have been dating since we were in high school. Maybe you would have seen the signs if you paid attention more.”
He scoffed at my words, angry that it was this many years that we had been together.
I checked outside and still saw the crowd gathering around us. They weren’t attempting to force their way in like they had done. Maybe we had a fighting chance.
Valentina came up beside me, and we both leaned our heads into one another. I held on to her soft fingers as we tried to think of a plan. My mom had called 911, but they had gone dark. She wasn’t sure if there was anyone else to call. We didn’t know the phone number for the National Guard.
_______________________
Ten minutes passed, and they were starting to close in. I hope they haven’t found a weakness in our makeshift defenses. That sounds really dumb now that I say it.
We’re going to hide in the basement. It has no windows, and we can quickly board up the basement door if necessary. There are no lights in there, so there is no point in keeping these pieces of paper with which I’ve been passing the time. If anyone finds these notes, please forgive us. We didn’t know what we were digging for. It was that company that hired us. Oh God, I hope we didn’t just end the world. I’m sorry.
_______________________
And that was the last page. I checked the backs of them, but that was it.
“This has got to be a prank.”
I got up from the table and walked around to the other side of the house. I found the basement door. Well, what was left of it.
I didn’t need to go downstairs; I felt a nasty vibe that told me I wouldn’t like what I saw.
But should this story be true? What happened to these Night-Stares? What happened to the remaining people that were in these dark notes? And how was this all swept under the rug? I have never once heard about this town or any of this stuff. Nor have I ever heard of a company called Pantheon.
I found out how they got into the house. It’s only a hunch, but I think it has to do with a now-torn-through back door in the laundry room. It seems like the boarding-up did little in the end.
I took the notes with me and hastily made my way out of that town. It has a dark history that I don’t want to linger about learning more of.
Returning to the road that led out of town, for a brief moment, in the corner of my eyes, I swear I felt like something was staring at me from the woods. Slowly moving my eyes, I thought I saw the faint, yellowish glow of a dozen orbs staring at me. I hastened my walk, wanting to put as much distance between whatever I saw and me as possible.
Even as I sit back at home and type out this entire revelation to the outside world, I feel no desire to uncover the truth about any of this. Someone else could take up such a task, but I’d rather live quietly and keep my head down.
After all, I’m naturally curious, but sometimes there are things even I don’t want to know about.