#monsters

There is a level of great genius one may reach that far surpasses that of burning madness. There is madness, and there is animo. In a frigid, foreboding cave, a hypogeum of petrified stillness, disguised carefully as a luxury property, hidden somewhere within deep glacial valleys of scenic Swiss mountains, you can find a mechanical man, with a mechanical plan.

It was Halloween in the year 2015. I remember waking up at 7AM, feeling stoked for Halloween and watching Charlie Brown. I saw people from outside my neighborhood decorating at the last minute because a lot of people like slacking on Halloween.

Oct 10 - Today is cloudy Starting today, I'm going to keep a diary! My family includes little Jack, my mom, and the "Red Devil" too! My mom and the Red Devil are always getting into fights! It’s a total blast—whenever the Red Devil comes home drunk, a fight with Mom breaks out. Little Jack is really timid and just cries when he sees it, but I actually find it fun! Oct 11 - Today is warm

I was five when the man in the wolfman mask scared the shit out of me. No, he didn’t eat me. No, he didn’t kill me. He just gave me one good Halloween scare.

Many people say Disney is a shady company for many reasons, but not everyone truly knows what's going on with them. Some people say the tunnels hide something; some say there used to be a tropical resort; some even say Disney kills.

Ice spread from within my soul. I felt myself falling in silent darkness. Cold... it's so cold... I can't breathe and I can't move... I tried to fight: to open my eyes or recall what happened that rendered me at such a state, only to find my mind equally rigid and frozen. The coldness webbed around my body, squeezing air out of my lungs. It's too cold... My arms reached out in the dark void. Seeking, grappling, pleading for something -- anything, to stop the freeze.

[Originally posted to a paranormal forum in March 2023, split across four posts because of the character limit. Reproduced here in full, with the poster's section headings.] My counsellor thinks I should write this down. Not to post, necessarily. Just to get it out of my head and onto something that isn't my head. I'm posting it because if I only write it down, it's just me and the page again, and I've spent five years being the only person who knows the whole of it.

It is a new and so far prosperous day when we are called to the King's chamber and so we come with high spirits. Under the old king's watchful gaze we listened to his words with both eyes and ears as wide as the kingdom gates in which the people of the land came forth for their daily business. "Do not leave the kingdom walls after nightfall." Said his Majesty, eyes widened with terror "For if you are to go forth then I cannot keep you from the wild things in which will find you"

I'm awoken by a bright golden light. Carefully I open my eyes, the bright light hurting them in the process. So I rub them for the pain to go away. In order to protect my sight further, I sit up, creating shadow. It takes a moment for my eyes to finally adjust to and at last I'm finally able to see my surroundings, something by which I'm taken by surprise. There's water above me... I'm sitting on what seems like the sand at the bottom of the sea.

*Originally published in the Flash Phantoms June 2026 issue

Annabella was a Witch, She lived in a house made of sticks. Through the woods, and over a stream Where very few people are ever seen. ~ In the village, she loved a man. Jeremiah, as he stands. But no matter how hard Annabella tried... She could never catch Jeremiah's eye. ~ In her House of Sticks, she cried. Feeling her heart slowly die. But soon a vile plan was born, To get Jeremiah, this, Annabella had sworn. ~ For the toxin of love: an ingredient was needed.

The clock was ticking. Like a pickaxe in my skull. It's now 2:45. Fifteen minutes until I hear your footsteps; not that bare feet can make much noise on that gravel road. Seventeen minutes until I hear your broken nails on the wooden door. Blindly scratching away, trying to find the handle. Twenty minutes until your voice is calling out to me. But it will be strangled, like always. It's hard to talk with maggots eating at your vocal cords.

Everyone in town loves Burger Sams. Everyday they would arrive, packing the order counter, tripping over each other to get their chance to just lick the burger grease. The dining area was always a chaos of noisy chewing and smacking lips. Sometimes they would have to close the drive thru to stop the line from blocking the road. Everyone in town loves Burger Sams. Except Jen. Because she worked there.

“Hey y’all, it’s Red, White, and Ruin here with a new ghostbox urban exploration for you to watch from the safety of your home. Lucky you! Today, we’re walking through the dead Cherry Hill Mall. Let’s take a look, huh?” I said in my chipper announcer voice. I hit stop on the video I was recording and sighed. Being this perky all the time was exhausting. I sighed, took in my surroundings, and frowned. “Jesus, what a dump.”

Father did not sleep that night. Neither did I. After the fourth call faded into the mountains, he checked every door and window in the house twice. Then he pulled a chair beside the front door, laid the shotgun across his knees and remained there until morning. Nobody talked much. Mother took Thomas into their room. Evelyn stayed downstairs. She sat wrapped in a blanket near the stove, occasionally looking toward the windows whenever the house creaked.

Mr. Pike arrived shortly after noon. I knew it was him before father said anything. There was something about the way the man approached the house that made him uneasy. Most visitors, as in would imagine, would look towards the farmhouse first. Not Pike. He looked straight to the woods. He came up the road in a dark green truck that coughed smoke behind it and rattled like loose bones. The truck stopped near the barn, but Pike didn’t immediately get out of the truck.

For three days after I found the rabbit, nothing else had happened. That frightened me more than the noises had. The woods had gone quiet. Not truly quiet. The birds still called in the mornings. Cicadas screamed from the trees in the afternoon. At night, the frogs took over the creek. But the other sounds stopped. No howls. Not footsteps beneath my window. No knocking against the walls. Nothing watched from the pasture either. Nothing moved in the tree line.

By the end of our first week, father had stopped talking about Boston. That was how I knew he was happy. Every morning he woke before sunrise, dressed without lighting a lamp, and went outside with an axe over one shoulder. By breakfast, he had already split enough wood to last us for several days. He repaired the barn roof. He cleared the weeds from the garden for mother. He even found an old plow beneath a pile of rotten boards and spent the better part of two days repairing it.

I was seventeen years old when my father took us out of Boston. I loved the idea! Or at least I thought I would. For many years afterward, whenever someone asked where the trouble began, I told them it began in those mountains. That wasn’t true… It began long before we saw them.

Notice: This is 'section 2' of the story Ad Nauseam, I have ran into a unique issue due to the size of Ad Nauseam that I had to make this separate story just to continue until said issue is fixed; if you are new and interested please begin reading here: https://nightscri.be/s/89368/ad-nauseam If you are caught up to Chapter 33 then continue to the next page and enjoy! If you came later during this whole max size debacle, then you can skip some.