The Strange Case Of Mrs Petrov

Through these old records, I will inform you of the incident that occurred years ago in a small village named Crete. I am a scholar and investigator who will notify you of the research I have gathered about the local college in Crete. I will give the reader a brief overview of the school’s origins. Built in the 1760s, the University of Crete became the village’s first to offer academic programs. In 1765, it was built as a fully functional institution that the Board of Education authorized. The workers hired to build the halls were instructed not to venture unnecessarily through the tunnels within the basement. At first glance, the school appeared to be like any other. Through further view, one can see the entire oddity of the place. The whole exterior was like a dying corpse gasping and clawing for its final breath. The workers who built the school tinted the windows with black panes, and the walls made of stone piled the building to a towering height, piercing upwards until the top half was shrouded in a mist of white fog.

Yet what was this tiny little village? The air was thick and heavy, the food bland and tasteless. And the people themselves seem to walk around the village streets as if a vicious illness had overcome them. Reports claim the gloom of the village did not impact the children. In all their innocence, children were protected and tucked safely in their beds at night while the senior villagers wandered the dirt paths in darkness. For many years, the villagers lived in a mindless existence. Residents suffered from ailments such as insomnia and deep modes of depression. Like other villages, they had chores and activities the villagers did to survive. The men and the women worked hard every day, cutting wood and storing large quantities of food in their pantries. Why not just receive shipments from the other cities? The village master said, “They needed to grow and prosper.” Yet many, especially the older villagers, wondered what the mayor’s plan would be. From this point onwards, the village was recognized as a depressing little shack that could not escape the horrors of its existence.

When interviewed, the villagers told tales of a strange group of men living before them in the 1740s. The village master claimed that they believed in an odd collection of Gods. To ensure their prosperity, they prayed to these Gods in extensive rituals in a cave hidden beneath the village. The travellers passing through in the evening would catch the glimmer of a red light flickering within the caves. The travellers I interviewed refused to comment on what occurred afterwards. After many years, the villagers suddenly disappeared. The residents living on the outskirts of the village had discovered something beneath the catacombs; many wondered if their truth would be revealed by examining these caves.

Reviewing the primary documents surrounding the university, I realized that much of the building was left unfinished. A report by the manager concluded that the construction of the lower level caused the most casualties. The first incident occurred with the elevator technician. The reports say he stumbled and fell off, plummeting into the basement floors. Afterwards, many of the workers complained about migraines and motion sickness. Additional contractors were calling in sick due to symptoms such as nausea and vomiting. Many of the workers claimed to the local doctors that they had even coughed up blood. As a result of these issues, the basement has been in a liminal state. At this point, the university instructed students and staff to avoid venturing within the basement halls. Those wandering the halls did not fear the basement for its secrets but for the utter solitude, the crushing silence that filled each hallway.

All of this resulted from THE STRANGE CASE OF MS PETROV.

INCIDENT # 1

After the rituals disappeared, the water within the well was contaminated. The villagers who chose to salvage the water quickly became sick and died. Years later, a group of urban explorers decided to explore the well. The explorers eagerly walked towards the well, kicking pop cans and scraps of plastic on the ground as they approached the stone relic. One of them, Jared, placed his hands on the stone wall, gazing deep into the descending darkness of the well. He began to climb down the steel ladder, gluing his hands to the rails to avoid falling. When he felt his foot touch the ground, he stepped off the ladder; using his flashlight, he examined the halls only to find rotting floorboards and buckets of dry cement. They strolled down the long, narrow passageway. The walls enclosed themselves around them until they reached the mouth of a massive cave. At that moment, a pulsing red light blinded them. Their harrowing screams echoed wildly through the halls until their voices fell beneath the swift, sudden silence. Afterwards, the explorers never returned to the university. Many of them suffered from mental ailments such as PTSD and paranoia. In particular, Jared was placed in psychiatric hospitals where he screamed and clawed at the nurses attempting to ease his suffering through medication. Yet none of them in human terms could describe what they saw. Nor what truth caused them to lose their minds.

BLACK MOLD

In the university, scientists had always been intrigued by the unfinished basement, which allowed the growth of many strange plants. One was a flower labelled by scientists as specimen P. Nature had peppered its white petals with black spots that oozed a thick black substance. The substance of the flower was yet unknown. However, one of the scientists discovered through a microscope that the flower itself possessed an abnormal agent. The agent allowing it to grow was unrelated to any plants within the human world.

INCIDENT # 2

One day, the dean tasked a pipe repairman with checking some of the pipes in the basement. The students complained that there had been abnormal sounds coming from below. According to the police report, the repairman never returned and was reported missing. The police sent two patrolmen to investigate. The officers trekked towards the elevator leading into the basement, evading the haunted faces that observed them. When they pressed it, the elevator hissed, creaking as it ascended upwards. The elevator rattled wildly before coming to a complete halt. The button on the elevator glowed red; the doors creaked open, and rolling in front of them was the severed head of the repairman. Upon further examination, the policemen stood back in horror, …freshly cut into his flesh were the words “LEAVE IT ALONE. After this incident, no other person was authorized to enter the elevator. At this point, the Federal Law Enforcement agency opened an investigation labelling project P.

The agency began interrogating a collection of witnesses possessing information on the incidents within the basement. Authorities asked the more reliable witnesses to describe a brief basement layout. Yet each witness offered a new depiction of the cellar. Each description differs from the previous one, thus making it more challenging to know the truth.

Two federal agents searched through the archives at length. The long hours and the relentless stacks of papers overwhelmed them. As they searched for answers using computers and histories of old records, they found only one list of employees in the basement. The agent examined the list. The employees were crossed off with a thick red marker line except for one sitting at the bottom of the list, MRS PETROV. She has no first name, and her occupation is labelled as a teacher. The lack of information about the staff member raised questions among the faculty. When asked, the professors said that they were unaware of this woman. The dean did not meet her for the job interview. He claimed he sent the interview questions to her by letter and received a response two days later. The letter written by Mrs Petrov was written in the form of ancient scripture that filled every inch of the page. The dean desperately wrote back to Mrs Petrov, rewarding her with the job, considering he was desperate for someone to fill the position.

She also had very little information about her life outside of the school. The local villagers told agents that she lived in a manor-like house on the outskirts of the village. The two agents investigating the incidents decided to drive to her home for answers since she was considered a lead suspect. Once they arrived, they saw a bleak abandoned property standing alone amongst a vast field surrounded by broken fences and deep forests. The property owner stood limply upon the front lawn with a grim expression. He nervously twitched his fingers and scratched at the back of his neck, occasionally glancing towards the house as if something loomed behind him. He claimed that no one had lived in the house for hundreds of years. Yet the decrepit walls collapsed into wood along with the cracked windows on the floor, indicating it belonged to the suspect.

The two agents brought up the name of Ms Petrov. The owner began staggering towards the doorways leading into the estate. He jerked his head to gaze up at the sky; he reached for his revolver and, pressing it against his throat, pulled the trigger. His body dropped lifelessly onto the grass. Then, a speck of black dust arose from his corpse and disintegrated into the decaying atmosphere. The agents returned to the archives, digging up a few more files on Ms Petrov’s case. According to one source, one document claimed she taught a class of four students. Communication between teachers and students was conducted through letters. The class students perceived it as a joke to engage with the written assignments. In addition to the strangeness, the material taught by this woman was even more obscure. The assignments were translation exercises. Yet, the advanced students majoring in subjects such as Latin could not translate any of her works. Her assignments did not possess anything remotely familiar to the human language.

No one wanted to venture any further into the basement. The true identity of Ms Petrov was so messy and obscurant. No matter how hard they tried, they could not justify the pain and sickness brought on by the legend. Perhaps there was no way to justify it; the only hope left was to explain the phenomena to themselves in a way that made sense. The legend of the basement introduced the villagers to a new form of dread. Every night, children have wandered about the strange story of Ms Petrov. The fear the narrative evoked had caused villagers to lock their doors with metal chains at night. One of the residents had claimed that the bell tower had struck several times on the night the deaths occurred within the university. The bell tower was as old as the land itself, and it was unknown who built it. Yet the villagers viewed it like a crying preacher awaiting someone to hear its message. The town mayor walked the streets; the bell tower struck once and began ringing relentlessly, marking the town with another profound tragedy. The mayor fell to his knees and buried his hands over his ears to block out the tower’s desperate cry.

FINAL CASES

I will describe the next part of this history as one of the final cases related to this phenomenon. One student registered for one of the classes for Ms Petrov. Aimlessly, he walked down the stairwell and into the basement. Records noted that the student entered the cellar at 7:05 pm and remained there until 2:00 am. The janitor cautiously cleaned his way through the debris on the tiled floors. In the darkness, he witnessed a shape curled up in front of the doorway leading into one of the classrooms. The Janitor moved closer and found the student lying face down on his stomach on a pile of writings. Like a mindless child scribbling across the page, the letters had no form or structure.

After months of no progress, many investigators were ready to pass the case on to the CIA. However, one day, one of the agents received a yellow file folder with the letter P drawn on the cover. He picked up the folder and brought it to his office, where he and the other agent examined it. Each report carried with it these odd photos of the hallways within the basement. At first, they saw nothing, but after further analysis, they saw an oddly shaped shadow half-hidden in the doorway of one of the classrooms.

The following report then led to the most influential part of the history. According to the following documents, a group of students descended into the basement after this event, searching for Ms Petrov. As they climbed down the ladder leading into the catacombs, they felt a frigid chill sting on the backs of their necks. Drunkenly, the students wandered the darkness, stepping over blocks of cobblestone and dirt, calling out in the halls, “Mrs Petrov, Ms Petrov.” Their voices steadily grew in pitch until their voices echoed a loud screech. Instantly, they saw a flash of red light covering the entire hallway in a gorge of red glow. They stumbled towards the redness filling the air. Then, they saw a cobblestone stairwell promising a steep descent into darkness.

One of the students complained of a sharp pain in her neck. She took a step forward, stumbled, and slipped, collapsing into the rocks. She lay on a gravel floor, blood seeping from the side of her head. One of the students heard someone breathing from below, a series of rasping breaths in unison. One of the students used the flashlight on his phone. When he flashed the light over the dark domain, he saw endless rows of white hooded figures hunched over, swaying side to side as if mesmerized by some hypnotic melody. And those hooded figures looked up at the students with their white veils. Appearing from the darkness like a twisted angel was the demented, tall, towering figure Ms Petrov. She stared among the crowd that chanted her name. Shaking the room with a fierce roar, the ceiling shook, and rocks began raining from above. Then she fell to her knees and cried as her body began morphing into a crooked figure; tentacles slithered from her back, twisting like serpents towards the fallen corpse on the ground, swallowing it up into a fierce embrace until it vanished into a mouth of endless shadow.

The documentation that I obtained afterwards was rather abstract. The reports stated that almost all the students went missing, and no one nor anyone could adequately understand why. The public curiosity about the cellar was revealed through this encounter, and something was lurking within the halls. Some suggested that the black mould embedded in the walls was known to cause bouts of psychosis and even the onset symptoms of schizophrenia.

I must explain the last recorded document in that it is necessary to complete the history. We behold the image of a young woman, a student, standing at the end of the hallway. We think that there is something around her. A figure appears as the young woman stands there frozen among the searing red light cast upon her. Standing tall and crooking forward is the shape of the frail older woman, her skin pale, her withered black dress falling off her body as she forms into a lengthy serpent-like creature, and the film goes black. But I wish not to think any more of this strange phenomenon. In the process of documenting this history, I have suffered from strange delusions and obscure nightmares reflecting the toil of my past study. I struggled to find meaning in any of it.

As I sit at this desk writing this history, I realize I have offered no further clarity on understanding the events plaguing this little village. Yet I sit in my office on the basement floors. I have learned the noises of this place; I have listened to the clicking footsteps that haunt the hallways at night. I attempt to deceive myself by turning on the light, hoping that someone will reach down and save me from the depths of this abandoned building. But I have heard it now, and I have done my job.  And I had spent so many months writing this history that no sound had become unfamiliar, no footstep unknown to me. I heard voices and witnessed cultic markings scratched against the abandoned chalkboards. And yet, I knew nothing more about this place than anyone had before me. What purpose did I have? What meaning does documenting this history allow? I have discovered no answers to this question, as I can no longer hear my thoughts. My logic has become corrupted by those low, raspy voices, and I think I listen to them. The cold draft whipped against their cloaks in the darkness, their footsteps stamping towards me. I press my ear against the door, and all I hear are their whispers.