To give you some context, I’ve been working for a large maintenance company for 10 years. In terms of our sectors of activity, we cover a wide range: industry, healthcare, agri-food, tertiary… We even work for private individuals and local authorities. In other words, we’re always busy. For my part, I work in a subsidiary specializing in tag and graffiti removal. Let me tell you, it’s not the most exciting job in the world. It’s like pulling weeds in your garden: it’s a pain in the ass, and you never see the end of it. For every tag removed, three new ones appear the next day. Clearly, we can’t keep up with these tagging bastards. Despite this, cities continue to…

‘Hey, girly! I’ve decided to start selling cosmetics.’ I groaned as I read the text message. When a girl you haven’t spoken to since high school, Kimmy in this case, sends you a message like that, it means they’re trying sell you on some MLM BS. My phone buzzed again, and despite my better judgement, I checked it and braced myself to read the words ‘boss babe’. Instead, I was surprised at what I read. ‘I need help figuring out my formulations for my products before I can take them to market, and I would love it if you would test some out. They’ll be free product in it for you!’ I was immediately intrigued. Kimmy had always been a…

The game was almost over, but things didn’t get easier. I knew that the Rot wouldn’t let me win this. I had to plan ahead. I could tell that judging from the last 2, the final candles would both be in one of the main areas of the park: the circus, and the rides in the center of the grounds. I checked my map, looking to see which was closest, and from what I could tell, I was just between the two areas, between whichever hell I would suffer through first. I peeked my head out of the door of the shack, which I had opened a few minutes earlier to let the light in, and carefully weighed my options.…

TAG…YOU’RE IT!! The Graveyard Game Ten people. Ten people in ten different places,  doing ten different things. But all sharing one single thought… “What if it really works?” It seems an unwritten rule in tiny little spit shot towns all across the country that each has it’s own tall tales and legends of old, whispered through the ages and shared from one generation to the next, just as it has been since the beginning of time and as it will continue to be. This is simply the version of one of those tall tales and legends as it’s known here in our little town. You see, in the little town of Sawnhurst, California, there is an age old tradition tied…

I began my career at the military institute for applied physics, of which nation I am not at liberty to tell you. My role was as a junior research engineer at the lasers and optics department, primarily tasked with equipment maintenance, calibration, embedded programming of makeshift equipment, and procurement for a high-priority research project with long-term funding. In truth, it was an amazing workplace. I’ve always been fascinated by the physics of light, and working in a top of the line research institute with some of the most advanced technology available at the time was thrilling, to say the least. At the time when these events took place, we were working on encoding data into a quartz matrix using high-powered…

Paramedics are incredibly superstitious. It’s surprising how much people will argue with me about this simple fact. “Oh, definitely not. They’re too reasonable, too smart, too calm in a crisis to engage with something as irrational as superstitions.” Some will even fight with me about it, for an absurd amount of time. As if I wouldn’t know. Me! An EMT myself, four generations of emergency medical professionals in my family, with both of my parents working for decades as paramedics, and a long list of other relatives that work either in the hospital or in an ambulance. And they think I wouldn’t know! It’s never a matter of source, though. They don’t doubt for a second that I know what…

Everyone thinks they have an idea of what madness is, but in reality, you don’t. I’ve come to accept that our physical death is nothing compared to what happens in the other plane, and there is nothing we can do about it. An unseen world that we share with our counterparts. The madness I will never understand. Yet, I was able to realize at a very young age that they will take us all a lot sooner than we think. You won’t see or feel these creatures take you from this world. I don’t even know why they do.  They just exist to do whatever they so choose from what I’ve gathered over the years. It all started when I…

A hallway that never ends. Picture this. Life is great. Ten years old. Ten years of your life have been on earth. Ten years. On my tenth birthday, I got the worst birthday gift. I fell asleep that night, the night of my tenth birthday. I had gotten great gifts, and I was exhausted. The moment I woke up, however, I was in a completely different place. Laying on the ground, I slowly gained consciousness. The room was gray with dim light, and by me was a crumpled sheet of paper. I opened it, and there were the rules. The list of rules that have kept me alive this long. Currently, I’m fourteen. Four years I have relied on these…

I’m usually a ‘take things slow’ kind of girl, but there was something about her in the bar that night. I was sitting at a table in the back, watching my friends’ coats and purses while they were out on the dance floor. This was my usual role, and I suspected it was the only reason they still invited me out. One second, I was cringing at the bitter taste of my drink, and in the blink of an eye, she was right in front of me, smiling brightly. Despite the little shock her sudden presence gave me, her dark green eyes had me fixated immediately. “Van Gogh!” she said enthusiastically. I blinked twice. “What?” I asked, feeling confused, but…

Sol 5111 A voice awakens me to darkness. Terrifying darkness. The voice is concerned. Concerned about my well-being. Who am I? Who is the voice? Whoever it is must be a friend. Why else would they be worried? Yes, they must be a friend. It is a kind voice. But what is it worried about? Why is it dark? It must be a storm. Yes, it must be a storm. I am cold. So very cold. The voice tells me to check my heater. Vaguely, I can make out my old, weathered body. There’s the heater, but it’s broken. The air is cold. This cold… it makes me feel tired. I want to sleep. I want the voice to tell…

I wandered through the stalls a bit, trying to use my map to figure out where I was, and the quickest way to get to the lake. The way I saw it, I wouldn’t have to struggle as much to put the candle out since it would already be surrounded by water, but first, I’d have to actually navigate my way to the lake. After a few hours worth of figuring out where exactly in the park I was, I began my trek to the lake. Usually, a walk like this would take hours back when the park was open, especially because of the crowds. Not to say it was popular, it was just that the park wasn’t really designed…

They kept sending us money, that was the problem. Even after the drugs which made your mind spiral into rainbow hell, and the noxious smelling salts, and the obscure rituals, they never cut funding. Even when we got desperate, they still kept pumping in the surplus of our good taxpayers. It wasn’t just money either, they kept us in good stock of all sorts. This included the drugs, obviously, alongside the sleek and sinister machines, chrome-plated man-made horrors. They kept us in good stock of all sorts of horrible things, yes, but arguably the worst things they kept sending us were the kids. More hypersensitive and/or strange children from all over the country than you can shake a menacing middle-school…

Sometimes we do things without really thinking them through, especially when we feel desperate. I think it’s finally safe to share this story, everyone else who knew about it is either dead or senile. I’m so old at this point that it doesn’t really matter if anyone comes after me, anyway. My wife, Anna-Karin, and I both worked as research assistants at a remote military installation in Sweden. This was in the mid 1960s, DNA had more or less just been discovered, and even though we couldn’t work with it directly at the time, the race was on to unlock the secrets of engineering life. Still, our lab was at least a decade ahead of main stream medicine. We were…

Master, please wake up. Everything will be okay. I’ll just lay here next to you. Too bad you wouldn’t teach me how to use the phone. I saw how to use it on TV.  You said I wasn’t allowed to touch it, so I won’t. I’ll be a good boy. You’re not breathing like you usually do, but I’m sure the men in black will come soon with their lights. They’ll know what to do. They always come when it gets too loud. This time they’ll be surprised when I answer the door. All because my wonderful Master is sleeping, of course. I remember when you plucked me from my mother. You said, “she’s dying anyway,” and threw some of…

You hear all the stories about the big two.. heaven and hell… Either you’re a sinner and are ready to go down to the fiery abyss to suffer or.. you float to the clouds ready for eternal salvation-.. what if I told you that it’s all a lie? There is one place I never want to end up again-.. One place where the souls who have something they left behind.. those who are missing something.. purgatory. Yeah I went there myself before I was brought back to life, let me tell you now.. everything you have been told is all a lie.. there is no salvation waiting for you.. only pain, fear and the void.. Let me go back, so…

December 27, 2024 Alternate universes are real I can swear on it. There’s rumors circulating on social media about leaked studies on alternate universes and how it could be possible. I remembered all my visions from when I was younger, and some of the visions from more recent times. Could it be possible that there are alternate universes and I just so happened to keep seeing them? I’ll be committing most of my time to these studies from now on. January 2, 2025 Me and my friend Hannah had been collaborating on some of my studies. We’ve come to the conclusion that there would most likely be a door somewhere considering we had both seen it. I had recently been…

Once upon a time. long ago. A kingdom of beauty and sirens were told. The royals were all fair, but a plague drew near. The people begged and screamed for the royals did not make a beep. Unknown to the people. The fairest daughter fell ill. The King journeyed far and away. A little doll was gifted to the fair daughter. She loved it so, the doll was odd to others, for it did not match the princess. The princess had hair of ocean blue. She wore dresses of vibrant hues. The doll, however; was avoiding any color at all. The doll was dressed in a dark shirt with a face on it. Monstrous like with boots of black and…

My parents live up North, and so every Christmas my drive to their house is defined by a lot of grey, brown and white, as well as bitter cold. Never liked the cold. I spent the first 18 years of my life in it, so I think I definitely have an educated opinion on it. I don’t like the passionless white-skied coldness, or the stark freeze of the deep dark night where you can see your breath billowing out from you like a smokestack, and I especially don’t like when the sky is a deceptive bright blue and all sunny, the rippled clouds all golden and hazy purple, and you go outside thinking it’ll be warm and it’s still fucking…

I tried not to panic as I watched The Rot lurch up from the ground, hobbling as it began to search for me, its mouth twitching and its bones cracking as it moved, it limped and crawled around, occasionally taking a second or two to sniff the air. Slowly, it spoke, its voice still loud and deafening. “Where are yooooou?” It called, tauntingly, I could hear it chuckling as it searched. “Jonaaaaaah…” I slowly navigated to the exit of the warehouse, reaching for the exit and… “THERE YOU ARE!”  shouted The Rot, charging at a speed I didn’t know was possible. I was barely able to shut the door as The Rot slammed into it, each time stronger than the…

My grandmother, when she was alive, lived on an old farm on the side of a hill in a remote village in northern Sweden, right next to a beautiful lake surrounded by mountains. Whenever we were there, we would spend all day swimming or fishing for perch and crayfish. Grandmother was however always very assertive that we must never get out on the lake during the night, though she never gave us any reason. I always assumed she worried that something would happen while no one was around to help. Of course, time passes, and last year so did my grandmother. My grandfather died when I was very young, so my grandmother’s passing left the house empty, and neither my…