Okay, I don’t know where to start. I tried to write this off as shitty sleep deprivation or too much screen time, but it’s become clear there’s something far more sinister at play here. I think I’m slowly losing my fucking mind.
Guess I should give you mouth-breathers some context before we get into the nightmare fuel. I’m what you’d call an enthusiast of all things gory, grotesque and pants-shittingly terrifying. Ever since I was a fucked-up little kid, I’ve been drawn to horror movies, paranormal shit, true crime stories - you name it. If it’s dark and messed up, sign me the fuck up.
Nowadays, I pretty much just rot away in my room, sustaining myself on a diet of stale Cheetos and Dew while I scroll through the cess-pit that is 4chan. I’m talking /x/, /b/, /r9k/ - all the most degenerate corners of that fucked-up image board. And before any of you says “Your mom must be proud of you, lol” - no, she’s obviously not, I’m really not a catch. Who would want a freaky teenager that never leaves his room?
Which brings me to last Thursday. I was casually hate-scrolling through a random /x/ thread when this image link just… appeared. No context, no explanation, it just cropped up out of nowhere. Obviously, my curiosity was piqued because that’s how these viral spookypastas always start, right? Some random nobody just drops an innocuous looking link and BAM - the next big cursed image hits the web.
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Anonymous 03/05/24(Tue)22:07:02 No.1295X07
Don’t click this shit
[IMG-616-SCREAMER]
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So like a fucking idiot, I clicked on the link. And let me tell you… this image lived up to the “screamer” name. I was met with the close up of a face of what I can only describe as a demonic woman, her mouth warped open inhumanely in a gnarled, nightmarish wail. She had these sunken, hollow pits for eyes, stringy black hair obscuring part of her face, and a sickly white skin tone that made her look more corpse than human.
My gut reaction was a mix of revulsion and morbid fascination, like staring at a fatal car crash on the side of the highway. I couldn’t tear my eyes away from this… thing. Even though it wasn’t even that special - such pictures appeared everywhere all over the internet, after all.
The replies were just a mix of edgy shitposts and more or less impressed reactions at the editing job, nothing too out of the ordinary for a classic 4chan spookypasta thread. Little did I know, that innocuous click would lead me down a terrifying, soul-rending path that I’m still struggling through to this day.
After staring at the picture for what felt like hours, I finally tore myself away and tried to go about the rest of my night - gaming, beating my mutant meat, the usual. But every time I closed my eyes, I saw her. That gnarled, shrieking face, burned into my retinas like a branding iron. I mean, after looking at a picture for too long in utter fascination, that sometimes happened, right?
I tried to rationalize it away as some kind of burnout or eye strain, but the visions persisted no matter what I did. Taking melatonin, using fucking Visine eye drops, splashing my face with ice water - nothing could make that harrowing scream of a face disappear from the backs of my eyelids as the night went on.
Look, I know this all sounds really damn stupid. Just some idiot clicking on a scary pic and then claiming to see shit. Classic paranoid reddit delusion, right? Well, let me assure you, what I’ve experienced over the last few days is very fucking real.
After that first night of seeing that twisted, shrieking face every time I closed my eyes, you’d think I’d learn my lesson and avoid looking into it further, right? But of course, my idiot curiosity got the better of me. I had to know where that soul-searing image came from and why it was burned into my retinas like a fucking branding iron.
For a couple days, I deep-dived into the darkest corners of the world wide web, scouring every shock site, cursed image archive, and paranormal image forum for any information about the mysterious “screamer” pic’s origins. I figured if it was just a really fucked up photoshop edited from some horror movie or something, I’d hopefully stumble across the original source and be able to sleep again. Maybe that’d make the obsession stop.
No such luck, of course. As you can probably guess based on me being back here ranting like a homeless guy, I couldn’t find a goddamn thing about where this image spawned from. But oh boy, did I find plenty of other unfortunate souls experiencing the exact same thing as me - haunted by this unholy wailing face whenever they tried to sleep.
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Anonymous 03/10/24(Sun)22:14:39 No.1233X10
if she was at least attractive, i wouldn’t mind lol
Anonymous 03/10/24(Sun)23:16:47 No.1249X22
Have you tried not tried being a sore loser yet
Anonymous 03/10/24(Sun)23:20:01 No.1388X12
i’m serious i can’t do this anymore
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Looking at all these posts was like staring into the abyss itself. So many people driven to the brink of insanity by this one fucking picture, forced to endure the sleepless hell of having their minds invaded by some digital night terror. A good chunk even confessed to having suicidal thoughts just to escape the endless torment.
I’ll admit, for a while I straight up thought I was in the midst of some kind of collective internet psychosis. Like maybe this was some avant garde psychological experiment by 4chan sickos to test the limits of people’s grasp on reality. I’d seen them pull off coordinated mindfucks in the past, but never on this scale. The fucking CIA should’ve been taking notes.
Whatever was going on, it was slowly but surely driving me up the wall. I was pounding coffee and energy drinks to stay awake as long as possible, because the nanosecond I shut my eyes, BOOM - there she was. Mouth agape in that piercing, skull-rattling wail that cut right through me. It felt like something was trying to claw its way out through my eye sockets.
I started blasting audio books and podcasts through headphones to at least drown out the silence and pounding aches echoing through my skull. But no matter what, that warped, demonic fucking face was always lingering behind my eyes like a bad trip you just can’t shake. Taunting me with its harrowing presence.
I’d jolt awake coated in a cold sweat, hyperventilating as the haunting image barely faded from my skull. Those few scant hours of unconsciousness were the only respite I had from the fucking thing, and yet they only intensified the torment.
Fascination turning into obsession turning into outright fear. Am I scared of this thing? Yes. Not that I really want to admit on ever being scared, but…
Look, for your own sake and sanity, please - I’m begging you, don’t go chasing after this rabbit hole of madness. Don’t click that image link. Don’t try to dig into where this thing came from. Just a waking nightmare that strips you of your mind piece by piece until there’s nothing left but the howling void. I don’t know for how longer I can handle it anymore.
And if you still think that this is just a weirdly good calculated prank, just a harmless picture… I now understand, why the image is called “screamer”.
We started hearing her, too.