#horror short

[nyabas]

never stopped thinking about the hot roach girl from on roaches and rabbits by @alienfuckeronmain

[thyboylovethgaming]

If youre a scary video lover go watch miamakesmanifest on oldest video to newest, dont spoil it for yourself.

Tw for doppelgängers (that term isnt used js the concept), magick, manifesting

No jumpscares

Semi ARG

Yon also watch the overview from Loey Lane on yt

[tomedeath-blog]

Heed Her Warning

Written by: nicmarbel

Lyla Winters documents a close encounter with an apparition in northern Michigan.

Genre: Horror

Word Count: 4972

____________________________________________________

My last meaningful report was thirteen months ago, how poetic.

The Midwest has been my charter for a year and a half: last summer, in Missouri, I journeyed with a self-proclaimed wildman across the Ozark Mountains. This wildman, who called himself Manzan, assured me he had, on several occasions, seen the beast known to the locals as Momo. I did not truthfully believe Manzan, thinking him a would-be Davy Crockett and nothing more, but as we left the designated trails and relied upon his expertise, I grasped he was no counterfeit, and after a week in the mountains, we saw it.

To be more accurate, we smelled it and then we saw it. I will not go into specifics here (see my report: Ozark Oddities), but I have not received a verifiable or replicable report since that evening, until last Friday. I had just finished my journey across mainland Michigan, and was preparing to start a week dedicated to the Upper Peninsula. I had planned on spending the night in Mackinac City, but that changed when I spied a small poster hanging behind the bar at the local dive I found myself in. A woman in a flowing white dress, standing upon Mackinac Bridge, pointing into the distance. Beneath the illustration were the words ‘Heed her warning’.

I asked the bartender if there was a story behind the poster. She was slightly older than me and had the sort of face that made you scared to order a drink from her.

“Oh,” she said, with the smirk one gets when they’re about to tell a practiced story, “that’s Ariel Williams, guardian angel of Mackinac Bridge. Legend has it, she was driving across the bridge during a terrible storm and it threw her car right off!” At this beat, she smacked her hand on the bar, for emphasis. “Some say she was dead when the car hit the water, others say she slowly drowned, but either way if you’re driving ‘cross the Bridge and Ariel appears, you’d be smart to turn around and get off the bridge the way you came…”

“That’s quite the story,” I replied, and indeed it was quite the story. I had already heard three other Lady in White tales during my time in the Midwest, and they were nothing more than retellings of the story of the apparition who haunts Rochester, New York, but this was unique — no dead children, no manic ramblings, and we had a name: Ariel Williams. The story excited me, and I had it in my mind that if I left now I would see Ariel as I crossed the bridge.

It was late at this point, but before midnight, and I crawled across the bridge as slow as I could manage. When I was halfway across, I considered pulling onto the small shoulder and waiting awhile, but thought if she hadn’t revealed herself to me yet that she would not. Perhaps I should have been relieved since she is said to foretell a terrible car accident, but that portion of the story gave me the impression of campfire fluff added onto a kernel of truth. I finished my crossing and made my way to a motel in the small town of Heron Lake, where I retired for the evening.

The next morning, I purchased a small breakfast from the pub across the street and inquired about Ariel Williams, but the elderly locals were not as interested in sharing ghost stories as the bartender from the prior night. After breakfast, I strolled down the town’s quaint main street. The size of the town meant all of the landmarks were relatively close together, and in no time I had passed a weathered white chapel called Our Lady of Peace, the original town hall, still standing, and a small school across the street from the sheriff’s department. Charming. Though there was no Heron Lake Public Library, to my disappointment, I discovered a secondhand shoppe with framed aged-newspapers displayed in the front window.

The owner of the establishment was a spritely old woman who told me twice that her name was Esther, having forgotten if she had introduced herself partway through our conversation. Despite this, her mind was a steel trap when it came to town matters. I inquired about the newspapers in the window, wondering if she had more, and she told me she had decades worth. I riffled through these for a few minutes, and then asked her if she had any newspapers relating to Ariel Williams.

“No,” she responded quickly.

“Are you certain? I’m something of a researcher and -”

“I’m afraid I am quite certain, I’ve an agreement with Mr. de Brun — I send any newspapers I find about Ariel to him, and he pays me well for them.”

“Mr. de Brun?” I asked, and, I must admit, this was now becoming all too sweet. I could feel that I had hooked something for certain this time, so a smirk had grown across my face which, I believe, rubbed the kind woman the wrong way.

“Yes, he’s a private gentleman, and if that’s all, I think you should be on your way now, miss.”

That was fine by me. The private gentleman, Mr. de Brun, was far more compelling than any newspaper would be. I trolled the streets, driving through wealthier neighborhoods. The third I drove through was spacious, several lots between each house, long driveways with gates, and many of these gates bore the name of the family residing within Hastings, Silver, Cumberland, Herzing, and de Brun.

“Private, my ass.” Again, that same self-satisfied smirk.

I pulled down the road a ways, did my best to flatten my blouse (should’ve ironed), and pulled on the blazer I kept for moments like this (definitely should’ve ironed).

Though, I suppose it didn’t matter, I had already accepted the fact that I would be scaling the fence and walking up to Mr. de Brun’s front door. I threw over my briefcase, like the blazer, a bit of set-dressing, nothing of importance inside, some of my laundry, old notebooks, and novellas. Over I followed, careful not to snag any of my wrinkled clothing. The walk up his driveway takes a full two minutes and winds through a small but dense forest of maple and birch trees enclosed within his property.

When I breached the treeline and the de Brun manor came into view I almost burst into laughter: it’s the picture of a haunted mansion, if the bartender had described this place I would’ve written off the story, but seeing it for myself sent a shiver of excitement down my spine. Briefcase by my side, blazer hand-pressed, to the best of my ability, I approached the manor. But before my foot made contact with the first stair leading to their porch their dog bushwacked me from the shadows! I reared back, lost my balance and tumbled to the ground; meanwhile, the hound’s chain leash struggled against its anchoring as the dog snapped at my retreating heels, saliva foaming at the corners of his mouth.

Then, the front door slammed open and a tall man stepped onto the front porch. “William, au pied,” he said, and in his voice dripped with disdain. The dog obeyed his owner’s command and climbed the stairs to sit at the man’s feet. Weak strands of white hair clung to the man’s nigh translucent skin, and a coarse beard sprouted from his chin — not what I expected such a wealthy gentleman to look like. “Whatever you’re selling, we’re not interested, and you’re trespassing.”

“Mr. de Brun, I assume,” I said, as I got to my feet.

“None of your business.”

“It is my business, you see, I am not selling anything, I was hoping to buy something from you,” I started. “It is my understanding that you have a collection of newspapers relating to Ariel Williams, and I was hoping to purchase them from you, and perhaps ask you some questions about her.”

He squinted at me, his frown deepened, and I thought he might sic William on me.

“Don’t have any newspapers, don’t have anything to say about her.”

“Darling, who is it?” A woman’s voice called from within the house, quiet and sad.

“Nothing, sweetheart, don’t worry your heart about it. I’ll be back inside soon.” He turned to speak to her and his tone softened.

“Does she know anything about Ariel?” I asked.

Mr. de Brun snapped his head back to me, and stooped to release his beast from its chain. I turned and ran as he shouted another command.

“Why is she asking about her!” The woman cried.

“Get out of here! William, en garde!” He bellowed, and as the chain dropped to the porch, the dog leapt from the porch and thundered after me. So much for the blazer and briefcase act! I bolted through the woods, dodging trees, and sweating through my clothes. Without breaking my speed, I heaved my briefcase over the fence, lunged forward and vaulted for the fence, as my arms clung around the metal posts and I pulled my knees to my chest, William was a jaw-length away from me and slammed into the fence beneath me. I threw myself over the top, and cut my hand on the fence's spiked finial in my haste.

Back at my car, I tended to my hand, cleaning it with leftover takeout napkins and covering it with the miscellaneous bandages within my meager first aid kit. I was so focussed on my hand and cursing under my breath that I didn’t notice the police cruiser that had parked behind my car, nor the Sheriff as he approached and rapped on my window. I jumped, spilling the contents of my first aid kit, and lowered the window.

“License and registration,” he said.

“Uh, oh yeah,” I retrieved them and handed them off.

He examined them for an uncomfortable amount of time.

“Oregon? You’re a long way from home, Miss Winters,” he noted.

“That’s correct,”

“What brings a nice young lady from Oregon all the way to Heron Lake and the front door of Mr. de Brun’s home?”

“I’m an author.”

“Authorin’ often lead to breakin’ and enterin’?”

“Well, nothing was broken, sheriff.”

He scoffed and handed my papers back to me.

“We don’t much care for ghost stories here, so why don’t you just be on your way and find some ghost stories someplace else.”

“I didn’t say anything about ghost stories, Sheriff.” I faked a smile, rolled up my window and drove off. He followed me until I was out of town, I drove to the bridge and pulled off the road, into a small section marked for sightseeing. I leaned against my car and pondered my next course of action. After a few minutes, I concluded there were only two ways I could learn more about this apparition: a conversation with the de Bruns or the ghost herself.

A meeting with the ghost seemed unlikely, but a friendly conversation with the de Bruns seemed more unlikely, so I set my sights towards contacting or otherwise summoning the spirit and crossed the bridge south, back to Mackinac City. I furnished myself with the necessary accoutrements to perform a summoning and returned to Brickhouse, the dive where this adventure started.

“Ghost girl, you’re back!” the bartender exclaimed.

“Can’t stay away, I suppose,” I replied, taking the same seat at the bar. What followed was far different from the blazer and briefcase bit: buying drinks, sharing stories, breaking ice. After the second round of shots with the bartender, I learned her name was Jeanie, and after a few more rounds and the best tales in my catalog, I had amassed a handful of drunken audience members.

“Alright, last call, folks!” Jeanie announced shortly after midnight, now was my chance.

“Ever tried a Ouija Board?” I asked the group.

“Sure, when I was a dumb kid,” Grant, a young man with a naive face replied.

“You’re still a dumb kid,” Jeanie laughed. “You really are the ghost girl, aren’t you?”

“Gotta have hobbies, right?”

“Have you got one? A Ouija board, I mean, not a hobby.” Tricia asked as she pushed up her glasses.

“Oh, no, but I thought we could perform a séance, try to contact Ariel Williams”, I nodded towards the poster.

“Not sure I like the sound of all this,” Hank said followed by a hiccup. He was an older man with a square-stubbled jaw.

“C’mon, Hank, it’ll be fun,” replied a fellow whose name I hadn’t caught, he had either come to the bar with Hank, or had attached himself to the older man at some point throughout the night.

“Well, what’ve you got in mind?” Hank asked, and I was thankful for the younger man’s charm — the summoning works best when the sexes are equal, why that is I’m not sure, but in my experience it's true.

“It’s a simple summoning, I’ve done it before, and if the stories I’ve heard about the guardian angel of Mackinac Bridge are true — we shouldn’t have anything to fear.”

“What about, like … demons?” Jeanie asked, and I noted the others looked as though the question was on their mind too.

“It is not an unfounded fear, but follow my instructions and that won’t be a concern.”

At this point, I gathered my supplies and prepared them while Jeanie locked up the bar. Our group sat around the largest of the tables, and I lit a candle for each of the members of the summoning circle: myself, Jeanie, Hank, the charming young man, Grant and Tricia. Finally, a seventh candle, in the center of the table, for Ariel Williams.

“Now, link hands, and it is most important that, once our hands are bound, we do not break the circle until it is over.”

The confidence of booze and peer pressure was flowing within my cohorts so they linked hands. I took a deep breath in, and started my incantation: “Soul trapped from beyond, spirit torn asunder, we six invite you to be seven: Ariel Williams, Guardian Angel of Mackinac Bridge, we call to you!”

I did not lie to my fellow summoners when I said I had performed this ritual before, but never has it had this effect. The last thing I can recall is a frost overtaking me, as if the very blood in my veins was replaced with the icy water of the Styx. When I awoke after the event Jeanie reported the following to me:

When you finished saying your prayer, or what have you, you jolted out of your chair and stood straight up. Your face was pointing up towards the ceiling, and your mouth was hanging wide open. You were gripping poor Hank and Grant’s hands so tightly you made Grant cry!

Hank cried out, “What the hell is all this,” and I could see that he wanted to bolt, but I held his hand tight — I was afraid, and didn’t want to break the circle and invite in some demon to eat our souls, so I held him tight.

Then you said, “Now cometh the seventh,” but it wasn’t your voice, or it wasn’t just your voice, it was like you were speaking with all of our voices at once. Before we could even think too much about that, the room became freezing cold, and the front door blew off the hinges! You owe me for that door by the way, and the frame!

Anyways, we all screamed when this happened, but thank God nobody let go of anybody else’s hands. (Thank God indeed, I know not what would have come of me had the circle been broken while I was trapped within this state.) Tricia passed out then and hit her head on the table. I told Grant to take her to urgent care before you woke up, that’s why they aren’t here now, but then it happened.

A fog rolled into the bar and she followed! It was her, Ariel - er, well, I suppose not Ariel! The sight of her made me quiver, I thought you would say something, but she spoke first.

“You ask for Ariel Williams! She is not here! For too long I have answered to this name, this lie!” Her voice was booming, and icy wind was whipping all around like it was the middle of winter. I think that’s when your nose started bleeding, but I’m not too sure, because I couldn’t look away from her. Then she kept talking: “I tire of wandering this stretch, I yearn for whatever awaits me beyond this cursed soil. Summoner! You have called me here, reminded me that I cannot remember my name, and you will discover it for me! I curse your soul for reminding me and will only lift my curse if you free me from this torment!”

Then it was over as quick as it started! The fog was sucked out of the room, but it was like when you get hit with a strong wind and you can’t breathe, you know? She pointed, like people say she does on the bridge, and then she was gone. The candles went out at the same time and you dropped to the ground like a bag of rocks! (I asked her then in what direction she pointed, and Jeanie pointed towards the northern wall of the bar.)

My mind was overflowing with thoughts as Jeanie relayed this to me: what was the ghost pointing towards, how had she come to take this false name, and what role had the de Brun’s played in this?

“Do you have any ground beef?” I asked her.

After that, Jeanie let me crash at her apartment above the Brickhouse. I woke early, careful not to rouse my host, my head was throbbing from the dual efforts of my hangover and last night’s possession, and I helped myself to a handful of over-the-counter pain relievers from her bathroom. I left a note on her kitchen table, thanking her for her generosity and apologizing for the traumatic nature of the summoning, along with a few hundred dollars for repairs, plus a twenty for the medicine and the half-pound of ground beef I was leaving with.

A fog was consuming Mackinac Bridge, and as I crossed the midpoint, I glimpsed the apparition in my rearview mirror. She was pointing north, pointing me forward. The words ‘heed her warning’ crossed my mind, but I raced across the bridge, and my smirk returned one final time as I reached the other side and burst from the fog.

“Campfire fluff, after all.”

During my escort out of town, I had noticed a small parking area cut into the woods for the trail leading to the town’s namesake Lake Heron. I parked here, and, instead of the trail, walked through the woods alongside the road until the town came into view, then I crept into the city. I had timed things perfectly, and I reached downtown Heron Lake in time for the church’s bell to ring out nine times. I watched from a distance as parishioners entered the weathered church, the weathered priest greeting them on their way in. Then, I spied them, Mr. de Brun and the veiled woman.

I could see the Sheriff’s car was parked outside the department, and gambled that he was the God-fearing sort. I raced through the woods back to my car, and sped toward de Brun Manor. I had put the ground beef in a paper lunch bag which I now shoved into my jacket pocket. Then, once more, I climbed over the fence and marched up the driveway. This time, I thought I would be prepared for William, I knew he would be waiting for me in the shadows of the porch, and he wouldn’t get the drop on — snarl. I turned quick enough to see him coming, and dodged to the side, crashing to the ground, as the shepherd bit at my leg.

I scrambled back as William growled and inched towards me, I felt a tree behind me, and got to my feet as he sprung his next attack, charging forward, teeth bared. I slapped him, and leapt to grab a low hanging branch. He jumped, like a shark out of the water, and bit down on my hanging calf. I screamed, and tried to shake him off, but his grip was tight, and his teeth were sinking deeper. I screamed again, and kicked him with my other leg, he yelped and crashed to the ground. He tried the maneuver again, but I pulled myself onto the branch and the sound of his jaw snapping was like a bear trap! He growled and scratched at the base of the tree, as I caught my breath. Blood was staining my pants, I tore part of my shirt and cursed as I tied it around the wound.

Next, while William barked ferociously, I fished the beef out of my pocket and dropped it on the ground. He was a good guard dog, and ignored the beef for a full thirty seconds, but animal instincts overtook obedience and soon his snout was buried in the paper bag. I dropped out of the tree, and crept away, at first, then ran as fast as my limping leg would allow as it became clear William was entranced by the beef.

The de Brun manor came into view, I climbed the stairs to the porch, and held my breath as I tried the front door — unlocked. I breathed a sigh of relief, I wasn’t in the mood to break a door down, but then I was overtaken with grief as I saw within the house. The inside was depressing, it felt to me like nobody lived there. Their home was veiled like the woman, curtains drawn over every window left the interior devoid of natural light. Dust and cobwebs clung to every surface, save for the floor where the couple’s routine paths cleared the debris.

Hanging beside the front door, on a small-bespoke hook, was a silver locket. I opened it, and it appeared to hold two pictures of the same young woman. Upon closer inspection, I noticed that one of the women had a blemish on her cheek, while the other woman did not. Owing to the angle they were photographed, one could spot the edge of the birthmark, otherwise the women were identical. I carried on.

I considered going upstairs, but my intuition, or perhaps it was my spiritual charger, told me to search this floor first. In a backroom behind the kitchen there was a padlocked door — nothing too fancy, the kind you’d buy at a hardware store. I helped myself to one of their cast iron pans and beat the lock asunder. Whether William heard this, or merely ran out of beef, I’m not sure, but shortly after this he was jumping and barking at the front door.

The basement was pitch black. I fumbled in the darkness, wishing for once I was a smoker, but soon enough I flicked a string with my hand, and yanked it to turn on the single bulb which hung in the basement. On the wall in front of me was a large, stunning portrait of the blemishless woman from the locket, though aged, and standing behind her with his hand resting on her shoulder was a much younger Mr. de Brun.

Beneath this portrait was a similarly locked gentleman’s chest. Pan still in hand, I dealt with this padlock. Opening the chest, I got what I was looking for and more — not only were there dozens of newspaper articles, but many more photographs of the woman, and even a small selection of dresses, scarves, and undergarments. I started feeling sick at the sight of these contents.

I began looking through the newspaper articles, and they indeed centered around Ariel Williams. Ariel’s father had died when she was thirty, survived by Ariel and her sister Victoria. Ariel had apparently inherited the majority of her father’s wealth as well as ownership over his businesses. As a wealthy, business-owning woman in the early sixties, it appeared she drew some attention from several local newspapers, and one of these gossip articles contained a picture of Ariel: she had a large birthmark on her right cheek, a discolored patch of skin which evidenced itself even in black and white. Victoria’s portrait loomed over, staring down at my discovery.

Then, her obituary, “Ariel Williams, local magnate, dead at 33 by suicide.” The article explains Ariel is survived by her only living heir, her sister Victoria de Brun, recently married to Henri de Brun, a former business associate of their father. Upon reading this, goosebumps bloomed across my body, spreading like a wildfire. William’s barking stopped and I heard a booming command ring out from Mr. de Brun, who barged inside.

“Someone’s in here, sweetheart, call the Sheriff!”

“My locket! It’s gone!” She cried.

I had no time to waste. I snatched up one of the dresses and clutched it to my chest, gripping the locket in my other fist. Mr. de Brun bounded down the stairs into the basement.

“Soul trapped from beyond, spirit torn asunder! I, one invite you to be two!”

Now Mr. de Brun was here, and he started cursing a storm at me.

“Victoria Williams! I call to you!” I cried.

The sound of her name seemed to stun him. Looking back now, I think he could feel her before I could.

“No! No!” He started crying.

The lightbulb flickered out then, and the basement chilled enough to make our teeth chatter, though Mr. de Brun’s may have been fear-induced.

“Husband of mine,” came a voice from within the darkness. When it spoke, it was as if the darkness breathed around me.

“Victoria!? No! It can’t be! Foul witch! You play tricks on me!”

“This is no trick Henri Georges de Brun! Long have you tortured me,kept me bound to this place, this chest!”

The chest burst behind me and covered me with splinters, but I kept my hands pressed against me, maintaining my one person spirit circle.

“I - I - I am sorry, Victoria!”

“Henri! Henri! What is it?!” The veiled woman cried from upstairs, I believe the event was constrained to the basement, for as she crossed the threshold, she yelped in fear as the spirit called to her.

“Ariel! My thieving sister! You stole everything from me!”

The veiled woman stumbled down the stairs, but now the pair was groveling in fear.

“We are sorry, Victoria! Please, God have mercy on our souls,” the woman wept.

“You will know no god!” The voice boomed. “Summoner, you have served me well, and now I lift my curse from you, and place it tenfold upon these treacherous souls! For eternity you will walk this land as longing, desperate spirits, until another comes along to free you as this truth seeker has freed me!”

A great white light appeared in the heart of the room, the dress and locket were torn from my hands, and draped around the light as the glowing mass took the form of Victoria Williams.

“Please, sister, no!” the veiled woman begged.

The spirit approached her sister, who quivered before her visage, and she reached her hand out to lift her sister’s veil, revealing her tearstained birthmark.

“Hide your face no longer, Ariel, for nobody can remember a veiled ghost.”

Ariel took her sister’s spiritual hand, but as she did, the form vanished with another burst of light. Once she was gone, we were left in the darkness again.

“It is done. Victoria Williams is free at last.” The darkness breathed a final breath, and suddenly the power returned to the room, and the light bulb flickered on again. All three of us were on our knees and each of us was crying, albeit them far more than I, but I was quite moved by the event. I rose, I made to walk past them, but as I did the Sheriff appeared, with all the ruckus I hadn’t heard him enter the house.

“Henri, Victoria!” The Sheriff cried as he barged downstairs. “You again! Well, now, caught red-handed, aren’t we? Come on!”

He grabbed me hard, dragged me up the stairs, threw me in his cruiser, and booked me downtown. I was in lockup for around ninety minutes, and when the Sheriff asked if I wanted a phone call, I told him I had a feeling I wouldn’t be needing one. He looked at me funny, but soon enough Mr. de Brun and Ariel came into the station and provided an explanation to the Sheriff, who walked over and begrudgingly unlocked my cell.

The couple drove me to my car, and we went the whole way in silence. I thanked them when we got there, but Mr. de Brun stopped me as I got out, and told me there was something for me in the trunk. Inside, I found the chest with all of its contents, and Ariel told me they had agreed it should be left in my care. I told them they could keep the underwear, took the chest, and thanked them once more.

“We may have a dark road ahead, but we don’t have to live the last days of our lives as a lie, so we thank you,” Mr. de Brun said, and they drove away.

I don’t suppose I know when they shall pass, and from what I gather happened, I’m not sure they deserve forgiveness, but I think I will return to Heron Lake every ten years or so, and see if there are two more ghosts in need of remembering their name.

Lyla Winters

8th of June 2010

____________________________________________________

[x3nnyx0xo]

Smart House

debut short story on here! i cranked this out after spontaneously getting a good idea for a short story after almost a year of not writing anything. i'm not expecting anything too crazy, but if any of y'all take the time to read it, let me know what you think!

word count: 2,990

------------------------------------------------

National Weather Service:

SEVERE THUNDERSTORM WARNING in effect for this area until 8:30 AM CDT for DESTRUCTIVE WINDS and FLASH FLOODING

Take IMMEDIATE shelter in a sturdy building, away from windows

The alert from David’s phone snapped him out of his television-induced trance. He glanced down and scanned the message displayed across the screen before clearing the notification. The glow from the television was the only source of light in the room besides the moonlight flooding in from outside, and the harsh glare 87of the phone screen burned his eyes. David flicked his phone off, and then on once more to check the time. 

9:21 PM

“Shit…”

He slowly stood up from his spot on the couch, joints popping with every movement. He hasn’t moved in a very long time, and the toll it took on his body when he finally stood up was a big one. 

David was getting too old for this shit. 

At the ripe age of 65, David had retired from his long run at a tech company with a lot of money in savings. Paired with a hefty monthly retirement check, he was pretty much set for life. He had blown through most of his savings account souping up the house that he owned. Since he had worked in the tech industry for more than half of his life, he was well aware of just how smart a house can get. He had trashed all of his own appliances and opted to replace them with the highest quality “smart” counterpart that money could buy. His connections in his old workplace had helped him find suitable replacements. 

He didn’t stop at replacing the items in the house. He revamped his home security system, set up a high-tech home lighting network, and made sure every piece of technology in the house was connected to an app on his phone. If a device didn’t have an app offered, he simply made his own.

David was a very smart man.

After months of updating his home, he was finally able to live out the rest of his retirement in peace. He was thrilled to barely have to lift a finger around the house with his new tech system.

Dirty dishes after a meal? His brand new dishwasher had a slot that he could place the dishes in. They organized themselves, and every single wash cleaned and polished them so well that it was like they were brand new. 

Messy house? There was never a chance to get to that point. He had cleaning bots that swept, mopped, vacuumed, organized, washed clothes… Everything that could possibly need to be cleaned or tidied was automatically done so by his bots as soon as it got dirty.

Feeling hungry? His kitchen had the power to automatically prepare and cook any dish he wanted. All he had to do was say it out loud. It didn’t matter if he didn’t have the ingredients for it. His microwave had the power to make meals by changing the molecular structure of the air inside of it. Sure it lost some nutritional value, but it was too convenient for him to give a shit about. 

Need to go to the bathroom? He’s got a robot for that, too. It comes, rolling along the tiled floor, every time that David relieves himself. It takes his old pants, puts them in its washer/sanitizer compartment, cleans him, and supplies him with fresh clothing. He’ll be damned if he has to wipe his own ass. After 40 years slaving away in the workforce? He deserves to not have to move a muscle if he doesn’t want to. No matter what.

He even has a bot made to give him pleasure equivalent to that given by a human woman. Feels the damn same, too. This particular bot made divorcing his bitch of an ex-wife a hell of a lot easier to deal with. 

Modern day technology really is something, isn’t it?

While David really doesn’t bother moving around on his own too often, he does like to stretch his muscles every now and then. His joints weren’t getting any younger, and they ached after too long on the couch. He picked up his phone and clicked on the alert, looking for more information on the incoming storm. A thought crossed his mind, something about what would happen if he lost power, but the worry subsided almost as soon as it came. He had spent millions on this house, there’s no way that the power would go out just because of some storm. 

From the main power grid in his home, to the backup generator, to the backup-backup generator, there was absolutely no chance in hell that his house would fail.

David looked through the window to his left. It had been raining lightly all day, but it had picked up quite a bit since he had last bothered to check. A flash of lighting in the distance preceded a loud crack of thunder, and the wind was violently shaking the branches of the trees in his backyard.

Another loud alert blared, but this time, it came from the television.

The show that he had been watching had been replaced with a bright red screen with a string of words in the middle.

EMERGENCY WEATHER ALERT

EXTREME THUNDERSTORMS INCOMING

SHELTER IN PLACE

“As if the alert on my phone wasn’t enough…” he grumbled. Raising his voice, he commanded his television, “Change the channel back.”

Nothing happened. 

“What the fuck? I said change the god damn channel back!”

Nothing. 

Usually, all he had to do was yell at his TV to get it to display what he wanted. He had never gotten a weather alert so serious that it had to be broadcast onto his television before, but he didn’t understand the point of having it stay there. As if the constant reminder was going to help anything. 

“Fuck it,” he exclaimed, rather frustrated. He supposed he would just do the second-best thing and watch the storm. Plopping back down on his couch, he opened his phone and went to the app that controlled the walls of his home.

Yes, you read that right. He was able to control everything in this house, even the walls.

He clicked a few buttons, and when he looked back up, the solid wall had become transparent. He was able to see everything that was happening outside. He looked all the way up, to the ceiling, and watched as the raindrops hit the roof of his home and slid down the sides, and after a few moments, he was lulled to sleep.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

CRACK!

An extremely loud clap of thunder woke him up from his slumber. He groaned and checked the time.

12:47 AM

“Fuckin’ hell…” he muttered as he looked at the transparent walls of his home just in time to see a large branch fly into the glass of one of his windows. Instead of the glass breaking, however, it just bounced off and hit the ground with a thud. David chuckled. “Gotta try harder than that…” he said to himself.

The storm outside was raging. The rain was falling heavier than he had ever seen, the thunder was deafening, and the wind was still shaking the…

David looked to the side, out that same window from earlier, and saw that the trees that he had in his backyard weren’t there anymore.

“What the hell?” he said as he stood up and walked over to the window. There were clumps of dirt surrounding the spots where the trees once stood. It looked like the trees were uprooted completely, but if that were the case, where the hell did they go? Was the wind outside that strong?

And then, all at once, before David had the chance to process anything…

click

The house went dark. The red glow of the alert on his television was gone, replaced by a dead, black screen. The lights upstairs had turned off. The sound of the bots tidying up in the other rooms had ceased. 

His house had lost power.

He wasted no time in running to the basement, where the power grid to his house and multiple backup generators were held. He hastily descended the steps in complete darkness, his heart racing. He didn’t notice the nail sticking out from one of the boards in the steps until it had pierced completely through his heel. 

Crying out in pain, he toppled down the remaining stairs, and instead of landing on the harsh concrete floor of his basement, he landed in almost six inches of water.

So, this is why his backup generators failed. He could have sworn he had special-ordered them to be waterproof. Dumbass fuckin’ kids couldn’t even send me the right models, he thought, sitting up in the lake that was now his basement. He couldn’t see even an inch in front of him, and to make matters worse, his foot felt like it was on fire. He trailed his hands down his leg and used his fingers to assess the damage that the nail had done. 

There was a large puncture wound smack dab in the middle of his heel, and it fuckin’ hurt. He crawled through the water, groping around in the darkness until he found the stairs that he had just fallen down. 

“Come give me a fuckin’ hand, would ya?” he called out to the bots upstairs before remembering that nothing was able to answer his call. Everything in his house had relied on that god damn power grid to work. He had thought it was unbreakable. He had thought that his two fucking backup generators would prevent the complete loss of power in his home.

David spent the next twenty minutes crawling his way back up the stairs. Since he couldn’t see anything, he carefully inspected each step with his hands to avoid another nail-in-the-foot situation. Once he made it to the top, he stood up and started limping back to his living room. 

When his house lost power, the walls had reverted back to their normal state. Since they were no longer transparent, the only light was coming from the dim moonlight cascading through the windows. He stumbled his way through his living room until his foot hit one of his robot vacuums on the floor, causing him to lose his balance and topple over. 

David had lost an incredible amount of strength in the years since his retirement. He rarely had to stand or walk to get anything in his house thanks to the helping hands of his gadgets and robots. This second fall had taken what little remaining strength he had. He was out of breath, and rolled over on the floor so that he was laying on his back. 

“Come fuckin’ help me you useless fucking robots!” he yelled, knowing that nothing would happen. “I need some fucking water,” screamed. The stress of losing power, his foot injury, his two falls, and all of his screaming at things that could not answer had left his throat extremely dry. He had a god damn robot specifically made to bring him water, but with the complete loss of power, he was helpless. After another hour of him yelling expletives to nobody, he succumbed to his exhaustion and fell into a fitful sleep.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

David woke up to rays of sunshine gleaming through the windows. The storm had stopped, and it was morning.

“Thank fuckin’ god…”

His voice was raspy. He was so fucking thirsty. But, the storm was gone, and he couldn’t help but let a smile make its way onto his lips. 

His smile faded, however, when he realized that the power in his house was still out. “Fucking useless god damn generators-,” he yelled. His body was exhausted, but he tried to get up anyway. The second he put pressure on his foot, his fucking foot, he cried out. Placing a hand on his couch to steady himself, he lifted his leg to examine the wound from last night and saw that it was red, swollen, and severely infected. 

David cursed under his breath and tried limping his way to his front door. None of the tech was working in his house, obviously, so he couldn’t call for help. His best bet was to make his way outside and yell until someone came to his aid. With the state of his injury, walking was very difficult. It wasn’t long before he tripped, stumbled, and fell. Unfortunately for David, his knee had taken the brunt of the fall this time. He heard a pop and screamed out in agony, crumpling further to the ground. Just his luck, the injured knee was on the opposite leg as his injured foot. 

In simple terms, David was fucked. The serious injuries on both of his legs coupled with his weak, frail body made him unable to walk. David thought that maybe, just maybe, he could crawl his way outside. Crawl his way to help. He would drag himself outside if he had to. 

But David had no strength left. The pain in his knee was becoming unbearable. He tried to slow his breathing, to focus on somehow making it outside, but the fucking pain was clouding his thoughts. After a few unsuccessful attempts to drag his body along the long hallway of the house that he had once loved so dearly, he collapsed. His face rested against the cold, unforgiving floor, as his mind raced with angry thoughts about this fucking house, and his useless robots, and those stupid fucking kids that sent him the wrong fucking generators. Eventually, the pain became too much for him to handle. ‘I don’t deserve to die in this fucking prison,’ he thought. David could’ve sworn that, in his half-minded state, he heard the whirring of the house coming back to life, and he could’ve fuckin’ sworn that he heard the unmistakable sound of wheels squeaking across cold tile as he finally fell unconscious.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Rosie pulled into the long driveway of her ex-husband's mini-mansion. She put her car in park, opened the door, and just stood there for a moment.

Rosie was very pissed off. A few days ago, she had gotten a call from her asshole ex-husband’s old workplace. It was their service department. They had explained to her that they had tried to come to his house quite a few times in the weeks since that crazy storm had rampaged through the city to check if any maintenance was needed on the many, many gadgets in the house, but her piece of shit ex had not answered the door once. When Rosie asked why the hell they would call her about it, they had explained that she was still his emergency contact. Since he had worked with the company for so long, he had an extensive profile still in their system. The man on the phone had explained that, while nobody particularly enjoyed being around the asshole, they thought that they should let her know that he hadn’t been answering the door.

‘This is just like him,’ Rosie thought. Their entire marriage was plagued by his obsession with fancy tech. All he did was work in order to save the money that he needed for his big retirement plan. Rosie was against the idea of having a house completely run by technology and AI, and she was always very vocal about it. They would get into screaming matches regularly because he thought she was trying to sabotage his precious plans for his future.

She slammed her car door shut, stormed up the walkway, and banged on the metal of his front door with her fist.

“Open the door, David,” she yelled, knocking a few more times. She let out a weighted sigh and fumbled with her keys. She had lived in this house with him before they got divorced, and before he made all those ridiculously extravagant upgrades. Rosie didn’t mean to keep the keys for the place, but she had never really cared enough to remember to take them off her keyring. The thought of him changing the locks crossed her mind, but she decided it wouldn’t hurt to try the key.

To her surprise, the lock clicked successfully. “What, you didn’t think to get a bot that could answer the door for you? Are you that lazy and–”, her snarky comment was cut short by a foul odor assaulting her nose. She backed up, covered her face with her hand, and pushed the door open, not daring to actually step inside the house.

The corpse of her ex-husband lay a few feet from the front door. He had what was left of his face pressed against the cold floor, and advanced decomposition had made it look like it was melting into the tiles. There were flies buzzing around his body, and she could make out maggots crawling in and out of the partially sloughed off skin of his head. A pool of filth and decay had started to form around him, and the smell was unbearable. 

The bots that he had relied on so heavily were motionless in the hallway. All of them. Rosie counted at least ten. They were surrounding his rotting corpse, and she couldn’t help but be reminded of vultures around fresh roadkill. 

Rosie was only shocked for a moment. She walked away from the house, trying to ease her nausea with the fresh air of the front yard, and dialled the number for emergency services. She stayed long enough for them to get there and take his body, but did not linger a moment longer. She drove home. She took a hot bath. She made herself dinner. She cleaned up the kitchen. Rosie tucked herself into bed that night with the television still on and fell asleep to the gentle pitter-patter of rainfall against her windows. 

[mcoulombewrites]

Here is a snippet from the first draft of my new short story DEL OBISPO ROAD, available now on my Substack page.

Del Obispo Road

written by Michael Coulombe

[bideogaymes]

oh yup this was a ki, they had my sister looking casket ready, id flash on them too

[mcoulombewrites]

Mommy Uncanny

A while back, I wrote a horror short film called Mommy Uncanny for my friend’s YouTube channel. Since its release, the film has grown to more than 223,000 views, and I’m incredibly grateful to everyone who has watched and shared it.

What makes this even more exciting is that YouTube creator Empeds Casul recently created a remake of the film using the same audio, putting a fresh spin on the story and introducing it to a whole new audience.

As a writer, there’s something incredibly rewarding about seeing a story take on a life of its own. Thank you to everyone who continues to support my work—it truly means the world.

If you haven’t seen Mommy Uncanny yet, now’s the perfect time to check it out!

Find out more on my Substack

Mommy Uncanny

written by Michael Coulombe