The Simplicity of It All

You are taking a shower.

It’s not the type of shower you take before a job interview, maybe aiming for your cleanliness to impress somebody or someone supposedly worthy of impressing, nor is it the type of shower you take after a long workout at the gym or after a jog, or after whatever it is that applies to you. No, you’re in your bathroom right now, standing under the soothing beam of hot water with wisps of steam spiraling off of your back, because you’ve got nothing better to do tonight, and you like that squeaky-clean feeling before hitting the hay, and, although this isn’t your first shower today, at least you can sleep easy knowing you’re cleansed of the day’s many stresses.

Soap.

Shampoo.

It’s all there, but you don’t so much as touch it.

For now you’re just letting the water’s steam filter through your pores, and enjoying the simplicity of it all.

The lights go out.

Startled, your feet squeal on the floor of the shower and you pause to make sure the sound was from your own.

The sound of water hitting the floor in the dark.

You feel as if you’re not alone in the room. Which is impossible, because you’re the only one in the house.

The sound of the switch had been unmistakable.

You stay under it, under the water, your one and only landmark. Feeling around, your hands meet the slippery shower tiles, and you feel like a mime trapped in a blank box as you fumble for the adjacent wall, then grab the curtain, finally something real, something you can touch that’s now in front of you and will stay static as you reclaim your bearings.

Outside of the shower, something starts choking.

You abruptly stop breathing. Strain to hear. It’s a gut-wrenching cough that wheezes in and out, and your hand freezes before recoiling back to your torso in shock. And in the middle of the bathwater rain noisily splashing by your feet, you hear its footsteps inching closer as it struggles to breathe. The thump of pads on the floor stepping closer. You can do nothing but press your back against the wet wall behind you in paralysis, to the point where the sounds are less than a foot away from where you remember the curtain to be, at your own eye level.

That’s when the lights come on and the choking stops. You shut off the water. All is quiet and you look to either side just in case, remembering all the horror movies you’ve seen in your entire life at this moment. Not a sound except the gurgling of the drain at your toes, sucking down the last of the water calmly like it had all been in your head and none of it had happened.

You’re standing there, dripping wet and naked, when you realize you’ve got to step out and meet whatever’s there, waiting on the other side of the curtain.

Tell Me You Love Me

In my town, there is an old wive’s tale of a boy who fell in love with a girl. He could never get up the nerve to ask her out, he’d follow her, waiting for an opportunity to approach her and ask her out.

One day, he found out she was moving town due to problems with her parents and most likely never coming back. He decided he’d wait on the outskirts of town and surprise her.

While he was waiting, his head filled with all the possibilities that this event could lead to. He begin to get excited, keeping his wrists together and drumming his fingers together.

He saw her car leaving the town and heading down the only road out which he was waiting beside, hiding in the bushes. As this was a rural road, there were large bushes either side of the road and only one lane for the cars to drive on.

As the car drew nearer, the excitement overtook him and he leaped onto the center of the road, shocking the girl and not leaving enough breaking distance for her to stop.

The car swerved and hit the boy, launching him through the air and landing hard on the rough terrain of the rural road. The girl jumped from the car and approached his twitching body.

As the girl bends down to examine his injuries, she hears a faint gasp from his body. He utters a single sentence,

“Love me?” He asks with a grin, as blood trickles from his deathly grin.

“What?” She replies in her confused state, after presuming he had died.

“Do you love me?” He questions a sickly monotone voice.

“Em…yeah sure.” She answers after a moments silence.

“You’re lying.” He yells louder than he should be able to, considering his current state.

The girl apologizes, and begins to back away in fear of his screaming, a look of terror spread across her face.

With great difficulty, he attempts to stand, he groans accompanied by the cracking of his bones. He falls to the ground and lets out a cry of pain.

The girl approaches him again in pity, lifting his arm over her shoulder and helping him get to his feet. She walks him to her car and lays him in the back seat and he loses consciousness.

She climbs into the driver seat and continues the way she was headed, as there is no hospital in her town and she wasn’t eager on spending the night with her parents.

The drive to the next town is along a dark and lonely side road, nothing but empty fields on either side of it. She hears him shifting about in the back seat. She speeds up, eager to get to the hospital, where she can drop him off and continue with the rest of her long journey.

“Are you alright?” She asks, not even sure if he is awake but eager to fill the silence with something.

Keeping his eyes closed, he questions her again.

“Love me.” He mutters, as if the words pain him more than his wounds.

She stays silent, pretending not to hear him and turns on the radio to fill the awkward void the question has created.

“Why don’t you love me?” He questions, continuing his interrogation.

She sneaks a glance in the rear view mirror, and immediately wishes she hadn’t. The boy was now sitting up in the back seat, staring maniacally at the back of her head, an unsettling lifelessness in his empty eyes.

“You should lay down, rest, your wounds could get worse.” She suggests, hoping he’d stop his incessant glare burning deep into the back of her head.

“Tell me you love me.” He demands, raising his voice slightly louder than before.

“Lie down, we’ll be at the hospital soon, I think I see street lights ahead.” She replies, again avoiding his question.

“Why won’t you say you love me?” He screams piercingly, causing the girl to jump in her seat.

“Stop this!” She yells in response, trying to break through his screams of insanity.

“Love me!” He screams one last time, wrapping his hands around her face.

She yells out in agony as he claws at her upper face, gouging out her right eye. She screams continuously, the car swerving on the road as he grips her around the neck.

Her focus is torn from her driving, now being driven by her primal instinct to survive. The car swerves out of control and crashes into a telegraph pole.

The following morning, the car was discovered by local police officers and the woman’s body was examined by forensic experts who concluded that the woman didn’t die from the crash, but from strangulation as proven by the severe bruising around her neck in the clear form of someone’s hands. This is the part that confused the experts, as there was only one body discovered in the wreckage. Whoever else would have been in the car with her should have died from the crash itself.

The boy hasn’t been sited since that night,some say he has returned to the town and has fallen in love again.

The Power of Gods IV

In Hindu mythology, there were great wars waged between the devas (gods) and the asuras (demons). Maintaining order and peace became impossible because the tide of power was in a constant flux. The devas and asuras would do tapas, which are practices that involved giving up pleasure in order to obtain siddhis, powers such as strength or invisibility.

Tapas usually involved menial tasks like yoga, fasting, tantras, meditation and the like. While the devas were more devoted to practicing tapas as a form of enlightenment, asuras would perform them long enough to obtain a siddhi and then abruptly stop.

Sukra, the teacher of the asuras, gave the asuras knowledge of different tapas and rituals to grow more powerful. Eventually, he was able to give them invincibility. The devas lost battle after battle against the asuras, and faced extinction. However, under the guidance of Vishnu, the Supreme, they were able to obtain the drink of immortality and defeat the asuras. Now, you may wonder why I told you this little tidbit of myth.

The asuras are real, and you’re going to perform a tapa to get a siddhi from them.

I have a few things to note before I start. You’re not going to be doing the upward dog on a yoga mat or chanting hymns. These tapas have more…exciting requirements that may repel those with weak hearts. This power is not meant for the meek.

Second, as I have stated earlier, the asuras were defeated in many of the great wars. While many died, some of the more powerful asuras are still alive. They are weaker than when they waged war on the devas, so their siddhis are much more accessible. You will attempt to gain a siddhi from one of them.

Finally, a word of caution; there is no turning back after the tapa. You may leave and forget everything – the power, the tapa, and this letter – before the tapa begins. Once initiated, the tapa cannot be stopped. You will either finish the tapa or die. This is not a threat from me, but a warning of what you will face once the tapa begins.

Now that you have been properly informed, please feel free to read on.

Your first step is to go to a local jeweler or charm shop to find a symbol of a snake. This can be an actual snake or just a fang. The symbol can be on a ring, bracelet, necklace – any accessory that can be worn. You will need to keep it on to begin the tapa.

Once you have found a suitable accessory, roam the streets until you come across a peculiar shop that you never noticed before. It’s a small, windowless establishment with a black snake on the door. A small peephole outlined in red will be above it.

Knock twice and hold your accessory, with the snake symbol visible, to the peephole. After a brief moment, the door will open and you will be greeted by a small, elderly women in gray robes. Return her greeting by saying “Namaste” and bowing slightly. If done correctly, she will usher you inside.

The woman will seat you at a large wooden table, and then sit across from you. Do not be fooled by her frail appearance – she is a rakshasa, a guardian of the asuras. If you show her weakness, she will either kill you or drive you insane to the point of suicide.

Do not tell her anything about yourself. She will trick you into reminiscing on a past memory or dropping a hint of the slightest insecurity. Her innocent small talk is an attempt to pry the fear from you, but you must not give her a single detail.

If she offers you food or drink, do not take it. If you start to feel tired and she offers you a bed, refuse. If she begs or pleads with you, ignore her. She will even shapeshift into hideous, monstrous forms to scare you. Do not show fear and do not scream.

Soon, she will know that you are serious and will ask about your purpose. Muster as much confidence as you can and say “I ask to be granted a siddhi from one of your asura masters.”

Afterwards she will guide to a large metallic door, inscribed with Sanskrit words. These are shamanic spells that are designed to keep you inside. This door is the final step before the tapa begins. At this point, you can still leave the shop unscathed. The rakshasa will not follow or impede you, as long as you make your decision quickly. If you choose to begin the tapa, she will wait for you to enter before closing the door behind you. Now the tapa will begin.

Inside the room you will find several things. There will be a small table in the corner. On the table you will find a crooked dagger and a small bowl filled with water. A single drop of water will fall from the ceiling and into the bowl on a regular basis. And you may also notice the man that is bound and gagged in the middle of the room.

Take the dagger and sit across from the man. Wait patiently until you hear a drop fall into the bowl, and then cut him once. Be careful how deep or precise the cut is. I recommend cutting his arms or legs, away from any veins. Do not mind if he squirms or yells while you wait for the sound of another drop of water.

Then you must cut yourself.

The tapa you are performing shows two points: that you can bear pain like an asura and revel in the pleasure of harming another being. In order to gain the siddhi of an asura, you must prove that you can act like one.

You must perform this tapa exactly fifty times; twenty-five cuts for both you and the man, with each cut getting slightly deeper than the last. Be careful with your cuts. You must make sure that neither of you bleed out before the last slice of the dagger. If you and the man survive, then you will notice significant changes on the last cut.

All of your wounds will quickly begin to close, and you will feel energetic and active. You may feel the need to prolong the man’s suffering, but you must kill him; these urges are common but can be controlled.

You’ll be strong enough now to completely crush the metallic door and let yourself out. Do not be surprised if the rakshasa bows to you as you leave.
Your body temperature will become higher than the average person, to the point where others will think you’re running a fever. But you will discover that you will not contract any sickness ever again and that you age slower and live longer than most humans do.

You may want to consider changing states after a few decades – people will start to ask questions about an eighty year old that looks twenty. You may not want to bother with a family, either. This power is not genetic, and they may grow suspicious of your youthful appearance or die long before you do.

I hope that you will enjoy your new found power. But do not meddle with the humans for too long.

Your brothers await you in the afterlife.

Tomino’s Hell

This is popular Japanese story is about a poem called “Tomino’s Hell.” They say that you should only read with your mind, and never out loud. If you were to read it out loud, then you must take responsibility for your actions.”Tomino’s Hell” (トミノの地獄) is written by Yomota Inuhiko (四方田 犬彦) in a book called “The Heart is Like a Rolling Stone” (心は転がる石のように), And was included in Saizo Yaso’s (西條 八十) 27th collection of poems in 1919. It’s not sure how this rumor started, but there’s only a warning that “If you read this poem out loud, tragic things (凶事) will happen.” It just looks like a curse.It asks to not compare this with the common ”You’ll grow taller” or even “My parents died.” Do you get a sense of how dangerous this is?This story used to be very popular in 2ch, and there were many people taking pictures and videos as proof and posting them on 2ch. There were many users that said that nothing happened, but there were also many posts that didn’t have the user come back to post the results. I think it’s scarier than someone posting that someone else got sick or that someone else passed away. But if you were to read it out loud, it’s better to read it in Japanese rather than the translation.

 (Tomino’s Hell)

His older sister vomited blood, his younger sister vomited fire,

And the cute Tomino vomited glass beads 

Tomino fell into Hell alone,

Hell is wrapped in darkness and even the flowers don’t bloom.

Is the person with the whip Tomino’s older sister,

I wonder who the whip’s shubusa(?) is.

Hit, hit, without hitting,

Familiar Hell’s one road.

Would you lead him to the dark Hell,

To the sheep of gold, to the bush warbler.

I wonder how much he put into the leather pocket,

For the preparation of the journey in the familiar Hell.

Spring is coming even in the forest and the steam,

Even in the steam of the dark Hell.

The bush arbler in the birdcage, the sheep in the wagon,

Tears in the eyes of cute Tomino.

Cry, bush warbler, toward the raining forest

He shouts that he misses his little sister.

The crying echo reverberates throughout Hell,

The fox penoy blooms.

Circling around Hell’s seven mountains and seven streams,

The lonely journey of cute Tomino.

If they’re in Hell bring them to me,

The needle of the graves.

I won’t pierce with the red needle,

In the milestones of little Tomino.

The Night Springs Cemetery

n orange sun lowered steadily into a pit of evergreen teeth, valiantly spilling it’s last light upon the Night Springs Cemetery while it still could. If he had noticed, middle-aged Simon Willis might find himself grateful for this light so he might continue overlooking his mother’s grave in peace. After all, the cemetery was dangerous after dark. Not for any mysterious reason, mind you. The forest outlining Night Springs Cemetery was one of the only places wolf sightings have been reported in all of Pennsylvania.

“You know about the wolves, don’t you?”

Simon jumped at the voice and twisted his body at the intruder with anger. He managed to calm himself as he recognized the kindly-looking old man who approached him as the groundskeeper for the cemetery. His cold annoyance further melted when he saw the old man raising his hands in apologetic surrender.

“Sorry. Didn’t mean to scare you like that. I assumed my creaky legs would’ve given me away for a mile.”
The old man laughed and continued to approach, as Simon allowed himself a small grin for the first time all day. For a minute, the groundskeeper stared silently at the grave beside him, in solemn reverence. Despite politely declining similar offers from friends and family, Simon appreciated the man’s company here. The groundskeeper brought a sense of practiced officiality to Simon’s mourning and gave him a reason to stay rooted to the spot. The man even seemed to know the appropriate time to break the silence.

“I dug this grave you know. I dig all the graves around here. It keeps my body younger than I really am.” he said, eyes winking with pride. It was true too. Simon knew the man was well into his eighties at least, because he remembered the site of him as a child. He didn’t seem to have aged much in that time. He looked like he could be just barely approaching sixty.

“I’ve had this job for forty years now. Got it from my father after he died. I must’ve been about the same age as you when it happened. My name’s Jeremy Carter, if you’re wondering what to call me. Plain ‘Carter’ does most people just fine.”

“‘Carter,’” Simon repeated vaguely. “How’d your father pass? If you don’t mind me asking.”
“No, no, it’s fine. He just got tired of living, I s’pose. Probably smoked too much tobacco and buried too many good people.” He changed the subject here. “I didn’t know your mom much–could recognize her from passing in town, but I never knew her name or nothing. I heard she was taken by cancer.”
“Yeah.” Simon’s voice sounded so hollow and he wondered if that’s how it’d always sound from now on.
“A terrible way to go, cancer. Wasting by inches. You’re tired of hearing this, but you have my sympathies all the same.”

Carter was right. The “thanks” that tumbled out of Simon’s mouth was smoothed from overuse. The word felt like an overworked muscle–raw and lifeless–and Simon wanted nothing more than to hide away from all the apologetic well-wishing that demanded response and give the word time to rest until it’s meaning could be salvaged once more.

Simon wanted to talk about his mom to this man. He even managed to push out a forced “She–” before he realized he had no words to follow it and found his throat dry. Somehow, the old man seemed to understand this and brought the subject closer to his mother.

“I know your mother always lived here, so am I right in assuming you grew up in Night Springs too?”
The question offered direction and Simon gratefully seized upon it.

“Yeah, I never knew my dad so I grew up here alone with my mom.” He corrected himself. “Well, not alone you know. There’s the whole town, of course, and I used to know just about everybody here. My mom never had another kid or remarried though so it was always just us two in the house.”

Simon paused a moment, reflecting, then realized he needed to speak more to properly convey his mother.
“It was great though. My mom was a great woman. The house was small compared to others, but just fine for the two of us and my mom worked her ass off to made sure we always had it. Mr. Anderson at the bank–I don’t know if he still works there anymore–he wasn’t at the funeral today–Mr. Anderson was always good enough to give my mom an extension on the loan if she needed it. He helped out a lot when I was going through college. My mom had two jobs back then so I wouldn’t have to do any work myself and could focus on my education. Got a business degree and then went to law school and later became a lawyer working out of Chicago. I stopped seeing her and the town so much, since then. I tried to come back for the holidays, you know, but something started coming up and I missed more than I ever should have allowed.”

“I was crushed when I found out my mom had cancer. I tried to get her to move in with me–get her better medical care, you know?–but she was dead set on staying in Night Springs. She always loved this town. I couldn’t wait to get to college, but she was always happy living here. I thought of moving closer, of course, but I couldn’t just abandon all my clients and practice. And my mom insisted Debbie next door was taking good care of her. They were always like sisters to each other. I offered to pay Debbie as a nurse, but she wouldn’t hear of it. You know how people in this town are.”

The two men grinned in shared understanding for a moment. The sun was nowhere to be seen now. You could make out some orange lingering in the night right at the edge of the horizon, but no more than that. It was getting very dark.

“She fought it for a while. I was… am very proud of her. Seven months later though, that was it. I visited a lot in that time. At least a dozen times, though never more than for a weekend. Still, I just figured she’d pull through somehow. I never let myself consider that she might actually go like this until the last couple weeks.”

Simon realized he was finished. The man clasped him on shoulder and said “You were a good son. I talked to Debbie, you know, and she told me that all your mom’d do is talk about you and how hard you were trying. She’s very proud of you.”

Simon didn’t cry, but he couldn’t speak either. A long pause and then Carter broke the silence once more. “Well, I best be leaving now. A gravekeeper’s work is always plentiful. You’d best be getting back soon too. They howl up a storm some nights, but I’ve never known the wolves to actually attack anyone unprovoked. There ain’t no lights around here though and you’d be best be careful if you want to avoiding cracking your head on someone’s grave.”

“Thanks. I’ll be heading out soon. If it’s okay, I think I might stay another few minutes.”
Carter patted the man’s shoulder one last time and said “Of course son.” With that, he dipped away through the moonless night, leaving Simon to mourn his mother in solitude once more.

Simon was good to his word. He waited a few minutes. He thought some final words to his mother, hoping she would hear them, wherever she was. He tried to remember every good time they ever had together and did his best to press out intruding images of his sickly mother wasting away on her death bed. He was just about to leave when he heard the scream.

A howl was heard just moments before, then a quick shout followed by agonizing screams of a voice he recognized.

“MR. CARTER!” he shouted, running in the direction of the scream as they grew more frenzied. It didn’t take long for the small, black headstone to trip him up, sending him hurtling into a freshly-dug grave. Simon Willis died instantly.

Only fifty paces away, shrouded in darkness, an old man tossed his dog a treat. His throat was a bit raw from screaming, but he made sure to say “Good boy,” to his pet wolf for acting on cue.
Slowly and methodically, Jeremy Carter made his way through the labyrinth of graves and finally approached the one he had just finished an hour ago. He had filled the bottom with wooden spikes about three feet tall placed every six inches or so.

He shook his head in mild disappointment as he peered at the body, punctured and bloody. He was good kid, he thought. Almost wanted him to just run and save himself. A strange thought for Carter. Maybe he had buried too many good people too. Still, he drunk deeply from the energy leaving the man’s body and moaned in relief as his ailing joints seemed to strengthen somewhat.

Maybe he would call it quits soon, but his father was only a hundred and twenty when he passed and he was determined to make it a bit longer than that. Besides. A gravekeeper’s work is always plentiful.
A wolf howled into the night as Jeremy Carter set about filling the hole he made in the earth.

Moonlight

I don’t know how long I’ve been running, nor do I care. I just know I have to get away, escape from the creature and its rancid, hot breath. I can almost hear its heavy paws giving chase, snapping the slender branches on the ground as it covers the distance between us. The hair on the back of my neck rises and I have to force my fear down or else I’ll stop, my legs will give in and I won’t be able to go on.

I must not stop.

I must not turn back.

Suddenly, my foot gets caught in a raised root. I fall hard, scrapping my hands and knees with a few sharp rocks. I scramble back to my feet, cutting my right cheek with a nearby branch. The smell of blood registers first and I cover my nose and mouth with a trembling hand as I resume my desperate escape.

Nausea rises in me, along with another urge. I can feel it running through my veins, slowly poisoning my very soul with each ragged breath. But I’m still in range, I have to get away.

Pain hits me like a truck, demanding my immediate attention to what I know is unavoidable. It has finally reached me. I can’t go any further now. Oh, God, I tried! You know I tried! I close my eyes and let the images engulf me, the memories of the fatal night that changed my life forever. Sharp fangs covered in my blood flash before my terrified gaze before they resume their feast. I hear a gunshot, a painful whine and the voice of my rescurer in my mind, an echo of a time long past.

The creature was destroyed years ago, but I always recall the doomed chase in nights like this. It forces me to run faster, to place enough distance between us for the sake of those around me.

But it always catches up with me in the end.

Bones snap and rearrange themselves, wrapping me in pure agony. Thankfully, the process is quick and soon only my rough panting disrupts the otherwise silent park. Shaking the thick, black coat of fur covering this distorted version of what once was my human body, I feel my rationale slowly give in to the primal instincts that drive my hunger now.

It’s time for another chase, but this time, I’m the hunter.

I’m the creature.

A deep, loud howl leaves my throat before I turn around and settle my attention on the houses bathed in the soft glow of the moon and streetlights. Time for dinner.

Credit To: Angry_Mog

Dead Bart

You know how Fox has a weird way of counting Simpsons episodes? They refuse to count a couple of them, making the amount of episodes inconsistent. The reason for this is a lost episode from season 1.Finding details about this missing episode is difficult, no one who was working on the show at the time likes to talk about it. From what has been pieced together, the lost episode was written entirely by Matt Groening. During production of the first season, Matt started to act strangely. He was very quiet, seemed nervous and morbid. Mentioning this to anyone who was present results in them getting very angry, and forbidding you to ever mention it to Matt. The episode’s production number was 7G44, the title was Dead Bart.In addition to getting angry, asking anyone who was on the show about this will cause them to do everything they can to stop you from directly communicating with Matt Groening. At a fan event, I managed to follow him after he spoke to the crowd, and eventually had a chance to talk to him alone as he was leaving the building. He didn’t seem upset that I had followed him, probably expected a typical encounter with an obsessive fan. When I mentioned the lost episode though, all color drained from his face and he started trembling. When I asked him if he could tell me any details, he sounded like he was on the verge of tears. He grabbed a piece of paper, wrote something on it, and handed it to me. He begged me never to mention the episode again.The piece of paper had a website address on it, I would rather not say what it was, for reasons you’ll see in a second. I entered the address into my browser, and I came to a site that was completely black, except for a line of yellow text, a download link. I clicked on it, and a file started downloading. Once the file was downloaded, my computer went crazy, it was the worst virus I had ever seen. System restore didn’t work, the entire computer had to be rebooted. Before doing this though, I copied the file onto a CD. I tried to open it on my now empty computer, and as I suspected, there was an episode of The Simpsons on it.The episode started off like any other episode, but had very poor quality animation. If you’ve seen the original animation for Some Enchanted Evening, it was similar, but less stable. The first act was fairly normal, but the way the characters acted was a little off. Homer seemed angrier, Marge seemed depressed, Lisa seemed anxious, Bart seemed to have genuine anger and hatred for his parents.The episode was about the Simpsons going on a plane trip, near the end of the first act, the plane was taking off. Bart was fooling around, as you’d expect. However, as the plane was about 50 feet off the ground, Bart broke a window on the plane and was sucked out.At the beginning of the series, Matt had an idea that the animated style of the Simpsons’ world represented life, and that death turned things more realistic. This was used in this episode. The picture of Bart’s corpse was barely recognizable, they took full advantage of it not having to move, and made an almost photo-realistic drawing of his dead body.Act one ended with the shot of Bart’s corpse. When act two started, Homer, Marge, and Lisa were sitting at their table, crying. The crying went on and on, it got more pained, and sounded more realistic, better acting than you would think possible. The animation started to decay even more as they cried, and you could hear murmuring in the background. This crying went on for all of act two.Act three opened with a title card saying one year had passed. Homer, Marge, and Lisa were skeletally thin, and still sitting at the table. There was no sign of Maggie or the pets.They decided to visit Bart’s grave. Springfield was completely deserted, and as they walked to the cemetery the houses became more and more decrepit. They all looked abandoned. When they got to the grave, Bart’s body was just lying in front of his tombstone, looking just like it did at the end of act one.The family started crying again. Eventually they stopped, and just stared at Bart’s body. The camera zoomed in on Homer’s face. According to summaries, Homer tells a joke at this part, but it isn’t audible in the version I saw, you can’t tell what Homer is saying.The view zoomed out as the episode came to a close. The tombstones in the background had the names of every Simpsons guest star on them. Some that no one had heard of in 1989, some that haven’t been on the show yet. All of them had death dates on them. For guests who died since, like Michael Jackson and George Harrison, the dates were when they would die.You can try to use the tombstones to predict the death of living Simpsons guest stars, but there’s something odd about most of the ones who haven’t died yet. All of their deaths are listed as the same date.//Not gonna lie, I personally think this one’s not that great, but it’s been both submitted and searched for a ton, so apparently it needs to be archived. Only credit I can find is to someone calling themselves “KI Simpson”, so there you go.

Squidward Suicide

I just want to start off by saying if you want an answer at the end, prepare to be disappointed. There just isn’t one.I was an intern at Nickelodeon Studios for a year in 2005 for my degree in animation. It wasn’t paid of course, most internships aren’t, but it did have some perks beyond education. To adults it might not seem like a big one, but most kids at the time would go crazy over it.Now, since I worked directly with the editors and animators, I got to view the new episodes days before they aired. I’ll get right to it without giving too many unnecessary details. They had very recently made the SpongeBob movie and the entire staff was somewhat sapped of creativity so it took them longer to start up the season. But the delay lasted longer for more upsetting reasons. There was a problem with the series 4 premiere that set everyone and everything back for several months.Me and two other interns were in the editing room along with the lead animators and sound editors for the final cut. We received the copy that was supposed to be “Fear of a Krabby Patty” and gathered around the screen to watch. Now, given that it isn’t final yet animators often put up a mock title card, sort of an inside joke for us, with phony, often times lewd titles, such as “How sex doesn’t work” instead of “Rock-a-bye-Bivalve” when SpongeBob and Patrick adopt a sea scallop. Nothing particularly funny but work related chuckles. So when we saw the title card “Squidward’s Suicide” we didn’t think it more than a morbid joke.One of the interns did a small throat laugh at it. The happy-go-lucky music plays as is normal. The story began with Squidward practicing his clarinet, hitting a few sour notes like normal. We hear SpongeBob laughing outside and Squidward stops, yelling at him to keep it down as he has a concert that night and needs to practice. SpongeBob says okay and goes to see Sandy with Patrick. The bubbles splash screen comes up and we see the ending of Squidward’s concert. This is when things began to seem off.While playing, a few frames repeat themselves, but the sound doesn’t (at this point sound is synced up with animation, so, yes, that’s not common) but when he stops playing, the sound finishes as if the skip never happened. There is slight murmuring in the crowd before they begin to boo him. Not normal cartoon booing that is common in the show, but you could very clearly hear malice in it. Squidward’s in full frame and looks visibly afraid. The shot goes to the crowd, with SpongeBob in center frame, and he too is booing, very much unlike him. That isn’t the oddest thing, though. What is odd is everyone had hyper realistic eyes. Very detailed. Clearly not shots of real people’s eyes, but something a bit more real than CGI. The pupils were red. Some of us looked at each other, obviously confused, but since we weren’t the writers, we didn’t question its appeal to children yet.The shot goes to Squidward sitting on the edge of his bed, looking very forlorn. The view out of his porthole window is of a night sky so it isn’t very long after the concert. The unsettling part is at this point there is no sound. Literally no sound. Not even the feedback from the speakers in the room. It’s as if the speakers were turned off, though their status showed them working perfectly. He just sat there, blinking, in this silence for about 30 seconds, then he started to sob softly. He put his hands (tentacles) over his eyes and cried quietly for a full minute more, all the while a sound in the background very slowly growing from nothing to barely audible. It sounded like a slight breeze through a forest.The screen slowly begins to zoom in on his face. By slow I mean it’s only noticeable if you look at shots 10 seconds apart side by side. His sobbing gets louder, more full of hurt and anger. The screen then twitches a bit, as if it twists in on itself, for a split second then back to normal. The wind-through-the-trees sound gets slowly louder and more severe, as if a storm is brewing somewhere. The eerie part is this sound, and Squidward’s sobbing, sounded real, as if the sound wasn’t coming from the speakers but as if the speakers were holes the sound was coming through from the other side. As good as sound as the studio likes to have, they don’t purchase the equipment to be that good to produce sound of that quality.Below the sound of the wind and sobbing, very faint, something sounded like laughing. It came at odd intervals and never lasted more than a second so you had a hard time pinning it (we watched this show twice, so pardon me if things sound too specific but I’ve had time to think about them). After 30 seconds of this, the screen blurred and twitched violently and something flashed over the screen, as if a single frame was replaced.The lead animation editor paused and rewound frame by frame. What we saw was horrible. It was a still photo of a dead child. He couldn’t have been more than 6. The face was mangled and bloodied, one eye dangling over his upturned face, popped. He was naked down to his underwear, his stomach crudely cut open and his entrails laying beside him. He was laying on some pavement that was probably a road.The most upsetting part was that there was a shadow of the photographer. There was no crime tape, no evidence tags or markers, and the angle was completely off for a shot designed to be evidence. It would seem the photographer was the person responsible for the child’s death. We were of course mortified, but pressed on, hoping that it was just a sick joke.The screen flipped back to Squidward, still sobbing, louder than before, and half body in frame. There was now what appeard to be blood running down his face from his eyes. The blood was also done in a hyper realistic style, looking as if you touched it you’d get blood on your fingers. The wind sounded now as if it were that of a gale blowing through the forest; there were even snapping sounds of branches. The laughing, a deep baritone, lasting at longer intervals and coming more frequently. After about 20 seconds, the screen again twisted and showed a single frame photo.The editor was reluctant to go back, we all were, but he knew he had to. This time the photo was that of what appeared to be a little girl, no older than the first child. She was laying on her stomach, her barrettes in a pool of blood next to her. Her left eye was too popped out and popped, naked except for underpants. Her entrails were piled on top of her above another crude cut along her back. Again the body was on the street and the photographer’s shadow was visible, very similar in size and shape to the first. I had to choke back vomit and one intern, the only female in the room, ran out. The show resumed.About 5 seconds after this second photo played, Squidward went silent, as did all sound, like it was when this scene started. He put his tentacles down and his eyes were now done in hyper realism like the others were in the beginning of this episode. They were bleeding, bloodshot, and pulsating. He just stared at the screen, as if watching the viewer. After about 10 seconds, he started sobbing, this time not covering his eyes. The sound was piercing and loud, and most fear inducing of all is his sobbing was mixed with screams.Tears and blood were dripping down his face at a heavy rate. The wind sound came back, and so did the deep voiced laughing, and this time the still photo lasted for a good 5 frames.The animator was able to stop it on the 4th and backed up. This time the photo was of a boy, about the same age, but this time the scene was different. The entrails were just being pulled out from a stomach wound by a large hand, the right eye popped and dangling, blood trickling down it. The animator proceeded. It was hard to believe, but the next one was different but we couldn’t tell what. He went on to the next, same thing. He want back to the first and played them quicker and I lost it. I vomited on the floor, the animating and sound editors gasping at the screen. The 5 frames were not as if they were 5 different photos, they were played out as if they were frames from a video. We saw the hand slowly lift out the guts, we saw the kid’s eyes focus on it, we even saw two frames of the kid beginning to blink.The lead sound editor told us to stop, he had to call in the creator to see this. Mr. Hillenburg arrived within about 15 minutes. He was confused as to why he was called down there, so the editor just continued the episode. Once the few frames were shown, all screaming, all sound again stopped. Squidward was just staring at the viewer, full frame of the face, for about 3 seconds. The shot quickly panned out and that deep voice said “DO IT” and we see in Squidward’s hands a shotgun. He immediately puts the gun in his mouth and pulls the trigger. Realistic blood and brain matter splatters the wall behind him, and his bed, and he flies back with the force. The last 5 seconds of this episode show his body on the bed, on his side, one eye dangling on what’s left of his head above the floor, staring blankly at it. Then the episode ends.Mr. Hillenburg is obviously angry at this. He demanded to know what the heck was going on. Most people left the room at this point, so it was just a handful of us to watch it again. Viewing the episode twice only served to imprint the entirety of it in my mind and cause me horrible nightmares. I’m sorry I stayed.The only theory we could think of was the file was edited by someone in the chain from the drawing studio to here. The CTO was called in to analyze when it happened. The analysis of the file did show it was edited over by new material. However, the timestamp of it was a mere 24 seconds before we began viewing it. All equipment involved was examined for foreign software and hardware as well as glitches, as if the time stamp may have glitched and showed the wrong time, but everything checked out fine. We don’t know what happened and to this day nobody does.There was an investigation due to the nature of the photos, but nothing came of it. No child seen was identified and no clues were gathered from the data involved nor physical clues in the photos. I never believed in unexplainable phenomena before, but now that I have something happen and can’t prove anything about it beyond anecdotal evidence, I think twice about things.

Flip Book

As a kid, I loved making flip books. They were all I did in art class, whenever I had the chance. I worked really hard on one particular flip book that was around 50 pages long, I guess. It had a simple stick figure that would walk onto the page, wave at me, and just simply walk off. I looked at it dozens of times on the day that I made it, but eventually I got bored. I mean, once it was finished, t just wasn’t something that can keep someone entertained for long. I tossed it under my bed and never gave it a second thought.A few months later, I was cleaning up my room and swept the stack of paper out from under the corner of my bed. I couldn’t quite remember what it was.I flipped through it once more, as I was flipping, I noticed that the pages hadn’t worn out at all. I flipped through again. The little stick man walked onto the page, but this time he didn’t walk off. Instead, a second stick man walked on with something in his hand. He walked up to the first stick man and whacked the poor fellow on the head. The first stick man fell and the second stick man swung to hit the first stick man again. And again. And again.Blood ran from the first stick man’s jagged body. It looked like nothing more than a smeared pencil stain. The killer stick man proceeded to bend down and tear apart the first stick man’s body, limb by thin limb. He bent each line into letters and set them up upon the page to form a single word. Then grabbed the base of his own round head and tore it off, followed by his legs, and then one of his own arms. His zig-zagged body parts formed a second word. What I read made me burn the book.

“You’re Next.”

Baby Bridge

Somewhere in Georgia back in the 1800′s a poor farmer and his wife were expecting their 5th child. The farmer knew that he and his wife could not provide for this child because crops had been bad that year and he could barely feed his family of six.

When the wife went into labor the farmer called for the doctor. Unknown to the wife, the farmer and the doctor had already made arrangements to get ride of the baby. Their plan was to take the baby from the room immediately after the delivery and tell the wife that the baby died during birth.

When he left the farmhouse that night, the doctor took the baby to a nearby bridge and dropped him over the side. The wife never found out about what the farmer and the doctor had done.

It is said that on a cloudless night during a full moon you drive your car to “Baby Bridge” and park it in the center at the bridge’s highest point. Get our of your car and sprinkle baby powder in a circle around your it. Then get back in your car and turn the engine and the lights off for 10 minutes. You will hear the soft sound of a baby crying. When you get out of your car there will be baby footprints in the circle of powder.

Baby Give Away

On a lonely road off of Main Street in my hometown you’ll find a bridge with an unfortunate past. A young family lived near this bridge and the husband was away from his wife and child fighting in the war. A neighbor had always held a candle for the young wife and when he discovered that she had had a child and the husband had gone off to war, he became jealous and determined to have her for his own.

He came to her house one night and forced entry into the home. When she refused him, he savagely attacked her and threatened to kill her child. She escaped and ran from her property with the baby, blindly crashing through the forest and brush seeking a hiding place from her obsessed neighbor. Just as she realized she couldn’t hear the man chasing her anymore, she came to the bridge and took refuge under it with the scared baby in her arms.

The distressed child had been whimpering in fear during her flight from the house, but now that they had stopped the baby began to wail. The child began to cry loudly and ended the hope of the bridge being safe refuge. The neighbor was drawn to the baby’s cries and their position was revealed to the man. He brutally murdered both mother and child right there under the bridge.

Only the woman’s body was ever recovered.

Now, if you drive down this bridge and stop half way across, turn off your car engine and headlights and lights and get out, you can hear the baby’s cries that gave it’s mother’s position away years ago. Beware! It’s been said that if you go down underneath the bridge at night, you will never be seen again! The spirit of the young mother is trying to protect her baby even in the afterlife.

The Bunny Man Bridge

After the civil war Fairfax County, Virginia became more populated and eventually an insane asylum was built there. No one wanted to live near the asylum and because of the public outrage the institution was shut down.

The administration transferred the patients and in 1904 the process was completed. During the transfer, some of the patients escaped and hid in the surrounding woods and forest. These individuals were lost, delusional and dangerous. Most of them were found except Marcus Lawster and Douglas Griffen. The local authorities found a trail they believed belonged to them, littered with half eaten mutilated bunnies.

The trail led deep into the woods to a tunnel bridge crossing a wide creek. There they found Marcus hanging from the tunnel entrance. There was a note attached to his foot that said, “You’ll never find me no matter how hard you try! Signed, The Bunny Man.” That tunnel has been called Bunny Man Bridge ever since.

The legend says that if you walk all the way down the tunnel at around midnight the Bunny Man will grab you and hang you from the entrance of the bridge.

 

Strange deaths and phenomena has been connected with the Bunny Man Bridge. There was a young man from Clifton, Virginia who came upon the Bridge while traveling. Later, he killed his parents and dragged their bodies into the woods to hang them from the bridge and then killed himself. In 1943, three teenagers, two men and a young woman, were at the bunny man bridge for Halloween night. The three youths were found dead, hung from the bridge with their bodies slashed open. All with notes attached to their feet saying the same thing,” You’ll never catch the Bunny Man!”

In 2001, after hearing the tale, six local students and a guide searched the area. They found mutilated bunny parts during their search and left the forest after they heard noises and saw figures moving around in the woods.

The Tale Of The Hookerman

Long ago, when the trains were still the main commerce transportation in the state, an accident occurred on the tracks of Budd Lake. Now these tracks, which run through Netcong, Flanders, and Budd Lake, were said to carry coal, and other industrial fuel sources.

One night, while repairing a railroad track, one man had the extreme misfortune of getting his arm, shirt, skin and all, stuck on the tracks. In this hand he held the latern that was helping to light his way.

And although the trains were not supposed to be running at this time of night, one did, and the conductor of this very train did not see the trapped man struggling by the side of the tracks, nor did the conductor see the faint glow of his latern. Within a matter of minutes, but what surely seemed like hours for the trapped man, the train had passed and made its way towards the next town. But with this train went the man’s hand and lantern.

He died that evening from blood loss and shock, his body found later the next day by town locals. But to the dismay of everyone, his hand, and his latern, were missing. Some say that it was swept up with the force of the train, others say an animal took it as dinner.

But if you stand on the tracks in the middle of the night, close to the time when the unfortunate man lost his hand, you will see a green light hanging above the tracks, bobbing up and down the same stretch of land.

And that green light is no other than the man’s latern, being held on to fastly by the man’s hand, searching and searching in vain for it’s body.

Now, for all intents and purposes, there actually is a green light that seems to hang over the tracks in this area – but unscarily enough it is supposedly due to chemical deposits in the soil, either due to pollution or natural mines. Still, the sight of the green light on the tracks in the middle of the night will always recall the tragic tale of the Hookerman.

School Bus Rail Road Tracks

One day, on their regular route home from school, a school bus full of children was crossing over the railroad tracks on their way to the next stop when something went wrong and the bus stalled straddling the tracks. As the driver struggled to restart the bus, the train alarm signal started to sound and the children saw a speeding locomotive coming quickly toward them. By the time the driver opened the doors and evacuate the children, the train had arrived, and the children’s screams were drowned out by the screaming whistle and brakes of the deadly train. None of the children on the schoolbus survived that horrible accident.A few years later, a man was driving down the same road and stalled on the tracks, in much the same way as the bus full of children. Again, the driver struggled as the alarm started to sound, the lights began to blink and the guard bars lowered in front and behind the man’s passive car. Just before impact, the driver could feel the train bearing down on him. He ceased to struggle and squeezed his eyes shut, anticipating the explosive collision. Suddenly it was as if time stood still and everything became quiet. He felt his car somehow move and it was as if he was being pushed to safety, guided off the tracks by an unknown force. When he and his car were out of danger from the oncoming train, suddenly sound and time came back to life and the locomotive barreled past him, just inches from the bumper of his vehicle.To this day if you put your car in neutral on those tracks and sprinkle some baby powder on the back bumper of your car the children from the bus accident will push your car to safety off of the railroad tracks where they met their untimely fate. You will see small hand prints in the powder of the ghosts of the poor children who died that day.

Subway Stare

A woman was sitting on the subway late one night and she noticed that the woman sitting across from her was staring intently at her. She pretended not to notice but each time she glanced at the woman the staring continued.At one of the stops a new passanger got on and sat next to her. After a couple of minutes he quietly told her he thought she should get off at the next stop. Knowing the next stop was a busy one, she agreed.When the next stop came up, she left the train with the man. The man said to her, “Thank God, I didn’t mean to scare you but I had to get you off that train, the woman sitting opposite you was dead and the two men either side were propping her up”.

Express Train To Hell

For days, a ragged old man had hung around the Newark Central Station. The stationmaster kept running him off, but night after night he would return. He kept accosting people, shouting: "It’s coming for me! It’s coming!" Whenever anyone asked him what was coming for him, he would just clutch his head and cry: "I done wrong! I killed a man that cheated me at cards, and now I’m going to pay!"The stationmaster finally took the man aside and threatened to call the police if he did not cease and desist. The old man rolled his eyes and replied: "The Express Train for Hell is coming for my soul! You’ve got to help me." He broke away from the stationmaster and ran for the door. The time was two minutes to midnight. At that moment, new sound introduced itself. A long whistle blew, once, twice. The stationmaster was startled. The next train wasn’t due until 12:05.The old tramp started screaming when he heard the whistle. The stationmaster could hear the roar and chug of a steam train, approaching fast. Approaching too fast to stop at the station. The old man was standing at the edge of the platform, staring down the tracks in frozen terror. The stationmaster ran forward and grabbed hold of the old tramp to pull him out of harm’s way.The train whistle sounded again. A warm rush of air blew against everyone near the platform and the stationmaster heard the roar of an invisible train passing directly in front of him. He heard the hiss of the steam and the screech of flanges against iron rails; he felt the wind whipping our hair and faces, but he saw nothing.Beneath his grip, the old tramp gave a terrible wail. Then he vanished, leaving the stationmaster empty-handed. The roar of the invisible train faded into the distance and then ceased. The stationmaster glanced at the station clock. It was midnight. The stationmaster stared blankly at the tracks. Around him, the waiting passengers and other bystanders were gasping and murmuring in fright. "Good lord, he was right," the stationmaster murmured to himself. "It did come for him." He pulled out a handkerchief and wiped his sweating, bald head with it.A trembling man standing nearby approached the stationmaster: "Sir, what was that?" he asked. "Son, I believe that was the Express Train to Hell," said the stationmaster. He shook his head and that seemed to bring him to his senses. "Why don’t you go back into the station and pour yourself a drink?" he suggested to the trembling man.He pushed the man through the station door and then turned to address the dazed and frightened passengers. "Nothing to worry about folks," he said. "It was just an express train passing through. The next train will be here in five minutes." The stationmaster’s reassuring manner calmed everyone. People turned away from the empty tracks and settled back into their seats, whispering to each other about the strange events that had just taken place.Then the stationmaster went into his office, closed the door, and poured himself a stiff drink to calm his nerves. "Well, that’s one for the books," he muttered aloud. "I wonder if I should put it on the schedule; 12 am-Express Train to Hell." Shaking his head, he fortified himself with one more brandy and then went back to work.