At least once a week for the better part of a year, I've received a short-hand letter in my mail box from my next door neighbor in my condominium building, on the eight floor. In fact, they're always near identical in content. I've brought them to the realtor, even the police. After the police made a few visits, when I came to them, they told me to knock it off - even, What is this, some kind of joke? Get the hell out of here, asshole. I'm growing concerned but nobody will really look into it.

And this week's letter was certainly no different.



Michael,

I apologize about the noises you've been hearing at night. My
work often carries later than I'd prefer. I promise
to keep it down from here on out. My offer still stands, and I
invite you to come over, and we can touch base as neighbors.
You know, shoot the shit and have a few cold ones? I'd
apologize in person, but you still haven't come over. Can't wait
to meet you though, when you do!

-Tony, Unit 803.


The thing is though, I have been over. The door is always unlocked, the condo's always empty. And the realtor has even assured me nobody's lived there for years. Also, I have never heard a single peep at night, so I hadn't a clue what he was referring to. And the guy even knew my name? This ordeal has left me cold and annoyed. Today after receiving the letter, I decided to go over one last time in hopes of finding something. Any sort of answer, or resolution.

I searched the entire condo: bedrooms, closets, bathroom. Nothing as usual. I sighed and went to the front door with the letter scrunched in my hand. What? I turned the handle and it was locked. I tried unlocking it with no avail. I pulled and turned. Still, no good. I put my foot back to position myself, and gave a strong tug. Nothing, but I felt something beneath my foot. A piece of paper? I bent down and picked it up.



Mike (Can I call you that now? Since we've finally met!)

We'll have lots to talk about, and I hope you'll stay a while.
There's a few cold ones in the fridge as promised, and I'll be out
shortly.

-Tony


Have met? I turned the handle, still locked. I went to the fridge and opened it: There were several beers inside and nothing else. As I reached for one, they disappeared. And the fridge was suddenly filled with bleeding, pulsating organs and bones. The interior stained with blood and the stench made me gag. The condo began to be filled with loud, raucous noises; Distant screams echoed throughout, and now breathing was in my ear. And I felt a soft grip on my shoulder.

Turn around and have a look at me, Mike.

"3 wishes", she articulated. "I trust you know the drill? Can't wish for more wishes, or to be God, etc. That's about the size of it."

I nodded. "I understand, but one thing I want to make clear: I don't want to find out there's some crazy side effect, or hidden curse for all eternity or some shit. I want the things I wish for to benefit me, NOT to somehow turn around and hurt me. You promise that's how this works?"

She cocked her head quizzically, as toddlers do when confronted with a conundrum. "Well of course, dear boy. Contrary to what you may think, I'm not out to get you. I have no reason to want to harm you. You have literally no risk in this endeavor."

My gut tightened nervously.

"Satisfied?" she asked me with an impatient sigh, like a tired old tutor who has been teaching math for decades.

"Ok, I'm sold." I grasped the pen and signed the contract before I waivered again.

For my first wish, I elected to have a weekly paycheck bigger than anyone else's on earth. Rather than have a lump sum of cash, and risk spending it on a stupid island or being robbed, now I was guaranteed to be wealthy for the rest of my life.

Next, I took a cultured approach: fine art! I wished for an entire house full of famous pieces. My own showcase of literally priceless paintings.

Finally, I made sure to cover my ass for all eternity. "Heaven! I shouted joyously. I want to spend my afterlife enjoying limitless ecstasy & fulfillment forever.”

Smiling broadly, she signed her portion of the now-completed contract. "You've made some marvelous selections, child. You will indeed be satisfied, now & forevermore."

She tore off my copy, folded it, sealed it with wax, & slipped the document into a stately leather pouch.

Her eyes met mine, for a consummating moment filled with irrevocability, and then she gave final instructions:

"And now, our collections agency will set about obtaining your desires! Unfortunately it's not like Aladdin, you understand. These things cannot be contrived from thin air," she winked.

I didn't hide my worried tone, "Whoa, Collections Agency? What the fuck does that mean? You told me I had nothing to worry about!"

"Of course not, dear boy", she assured me. "We must simply go about the business of collecting what is rightfully yours."

"The money, we will procure from various banks around the world, and of course those places can spare it."

"The art, we will replace what we take from museums, with replicas. Not a soul can tell the difference, behind the security glass."

"And as for your eternal life in heaven, you will certainly be getting that as well! Though you didn't earn it with your actions, tisk tisk" she ...

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I woke up at midnight to the sound of a bang from downstairs. Grumbling and tired, I reached for the light and turned it on. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. I got out of bed and got ready to step out, only to hear even more noise coming from downstairs. Afraid that a rodent somehow came inside, I closed the door to my room behind me.

When I was downstairs, there weren't any signs of my previous belief. A kitchen drawer was open. Assuming I accidentally left it open, I closed it right when another noise came from the hallway to my left. I crept over to the source of this noise...

...and discovered that the front door was left open. When wind blew on it, it opened, and later closed when it stopped, making the noise I was hearing earlier. Irritated, I closed the door and stomped up the stairs to my bedroom. That was stupid, I thought as I stepped through the open doorway and laid back down.

The last human is a husk of a being. His cold body like a corpse; with sunken eyes and wrinkled leathery skin. The extinction event had turned the world into a wasteland of ash; devoid of life save for the small pockets of humanity to survive and the insects upon which they hunted for food. Even over time as their tongue became a long forgotten memory, the human race had amazingly clung onto life for some thousands of years after the event. The irradiated clouds which had poisoned the Earth had ironically given them hope. Humans gained the ability to feel the warmth of life emanating from other living creatures. The warmth led them to food. The warmth led them to mates. The warmth gave them life.

Nothing lasts forever. The kingdom of man was living on borrowed time. Over time food became scarce and birth rates plummeted. The human race was falling towards extinction once again. As the human threat dwindled the insects flourished and evolved an appetite for humanity. Countless children were dragged kicking and screaming beneath the ash, never to be seen again. Slowly and surely, the warmth faded from the Earth.

The last human crawled for years, alone, dragging the rotten stubs of his legs behind him. He crawled through the ruins of humanity’s past achievements. Edging ever closer to death, he crawled until finally he felt a prickling sensation under his skin. A flicker of heat calling for him from beyond the rolling plains of grey. His faded eyes lit up for the first time in so long, and so he crawled towards the source. The warmth comforted him and beckoned him ever onward.

After weeks he reached a quiet valley in the wastes where he saw a lone human huddled in the ash; a female. He thought of the beautiful short future they would have together. The human race would eventually die with them, but he wouldn’t be alone any longer. With haste he crawled towards her as the heavenly warmth engulfed him.

Her ash-covered chest heaved up and down with every pained breath. Her head shifted as he approached and their eyes met. They held each other’s gaze, her eyes filled with remorse. As death loomed above them, he reached his trembling hand out towards her. Without hesitation she took his hand and their fingers interlocked. They sat together in silence as the warmth of the entire human race surged through their touch.

A circle of ash kicked up around the two humans, and the ground beneath them gave way. They tumbled into the pit without ever letting go. The dust cleared and they saw the sunlight reflect off eight black orbs above them. A massive hairy leg emerged from the darkness before them, and many more followed. The lovers closed their eyes.

The two last humans on Earth held each other tightly as the creature lunged towards them. The warmth of humanity was snuffed out.

I was reading an Ask Reddit question about paranormal experiences, and was reminded of something that happened to me as a child. Although this event occurred two decades ago, I find it sufficiently creepy to share with all of you!

When I was 8 years old, I lived with my dad, stepmom, and two stepsisters (ages 7 and 6) in a very large house. My dad and stepmom went away for the weekend and left us with a babysitter. She slept in our parents' bedroom, and us kids had a blanket fort/camp-out in the living room.

In the middle of the night I heard a weird sound: something scraping around on the wood floors in the hall. Our house had no carpet except in the bedrooms; all of the halls and common areas had wood floors. We had two dogs at the time, a golden retriever and a chocolate labrador, so when they ran around they made a hell of a lot of noise. But this was not one of their familiar sounds. It was too slow and purposeful. Something else was trudging around inside my house. I imagined some horrific creature with rotting skin and flimsy little legs lurching up and down the halls of our home, poking its head in and out of rooms, searching for a child to snatch and whisk away into the night.

My stepsisters slept through the noise. I listened for a long time, then finally got the courage to go investigate. I climbed out of the blanket fortress and grabbed the flashlight off the bar counter. I walked around the ground floor of the house, looking for the source of the scraping sound.

The ground floor of our house was comprised of four long hallways that made a square. The kitchen and living room were at one end, and at the other, there was that stupid room with all the nice furniture that nobody was ever allowed to actually sit in. (It's a rich people thing from my parents' generation.)

As I reached the off-limits living room, I saw something move past the piano at the far side of the room. It moved into the adjacent hallway. The scraping sounds resumed. I hurried over, flashlight in hand, trying not to trip over anything.

As I rounded the corner into the hall, I saw our golden retriever, Bear, walking through the darkness - on his hind legs. You know how sometimes when a dog jumps up on you, you grab him by the front paws and kind of help him stand? It looked like someone was doing that with our dog...but there was nobody there.

I watched Bear stagger 4-5 steps, his back facing me. When he noticed my light, he fell to all fours and wagged his tail, then resumed walking like a dog normally walks. He trotted away up the stairs to the second floor, like nothing strange was going on.

The weirdest thing was, when I was laying in the blanket fortress earlier, I listened to that scraping sound for a good 5-10 minutes before deciding to investigate. The dog was walking around in the dark for that long, on his hind legs, in slow circles around the house.

To this day I have never figure...

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I lived in a big city for a short period of time and it wasn't until I moved there that I realized I had lost something I was going to miss: silence. It's one of those things you take for granted when you live in a small town or a suburb. We instinctively crave it; the constant noise of a bustling city wears us down and we desire the solace of silence to refocus our minds, to allow our bodies to relax. Without silence, there's no juxtaposition for music, nothing against which to measure the chaotic score of a movie. There is often more said in moments of silence than in long-winded speeches or quick interjections. We measure our lives in silence. It rules our existence.

Once I moved out of the city, I relished the silence I had rediscovered, seeking it wherever I could. Once I realized how fascinated I had become, I started doing research about sound and silence. Surely I wasn't the only person who wondered why we crave something that simple so strongly.

My research led me to accounts of scientists (and others) who had secluded themselves in soundproof rooms to experience true silence without any interruptions whatsoever. All of the experiments I found seemed to yield the same results: there is a short period of adjustment while the brain becomes accustomed to the new environment, followed by the subjects reporting hearing a rushing noise. This was explained as the subjects hearing their own blood as it rushed through their ears. After the mind adjusts to this, the subjects would report hearing the workings of their internal organs as they performed their routine tasks. Each of these phases would fade as the mind adjusted and hearing became more sensitive. Eventually, subjects would report hearing a high-pitched whine; this was actually the electrical signals and impulses of their own nervous systems. Most official reports ended at that point.

Fueled by my own curiosity and bolstered by my research, I decided to do the experiment myself. Using some connections I'd made throughout the years and getting some strings pulled, I was able to arrange for a period of a few hours one afternoon in a soundproof lab space to experience true silence myself.

The day came and I was ecstatic. I couldn't wait for my chance to explore something I was so fascinated by. When I arrived, they explained the procedure: once in the room, I would be given a headset. If I needed anything, I was to pick it up and place it in my ear. It would be switched off until I did this; only then would it be activated so there was no chance of unwanted external noise. Once the headset was in, I could communicate with the observing expert. I received the information and headset willingly, although I was resolute that I would not use them. I wanted no pollution in my pristine world of silence.

After the briefing, it was time. I was led to a heavy door with a sizable locking mechanism. As it was opened, I observed a room covered w...

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Henrietta Lacks had immortal cells. She passed away just like a typical human, but the cells collected by scientists continue living to this day. No one knows why.

Typically when cells are extracted, they can survive for a few days. But Henrietta’s sample could survive and even grow. This phenomenon created huge scientific potential. Researchers have conducted experiment in attempts to cure cancer, HIV, and other illnesses. They even managed to successfully clone her cells.

This is what you, the public, knows about her cells.

What you don’t know, however, are the Tithonus Trials.

The Tithonus Trials were performed at a leading research institution. They were led by a then-young professor named Dr. Liam Bosch. Bosch procured a section of Henrietta’s cloned cells. He did so under the radar. The cells were reportedly lost by an absent-minded lab tech. This lab tech went on to quit academia and lives luxuriously in Hawaii now.

Bosch was interested in seeing the effects of the cells on human subjects. Would they be rejected by the host? Or would they be accepted, perhaps causing an increase in immortal cells throughout the body. Bosch hypothesized that these cells could reduce the likelihood of illness and possibly even prolong life.

The Tithonus Trials were not advertised. Dr. Bosch targeted four of his undergraduate students. He offered them $40,000 to spend the semester sequestered in his facility, being studied. All four of them agreed.

They were instructed to tell their families and friends that they were traveling to South America for a research project. They would be unreachable for next four months. The students then withdrew from school for the semester. The only person who would know where they were was Dr. Bosch.

For the purpose of the study, Bosch gave each of the students a code name. They were not allowed to share their real name with the others. Dr. Bosch believed this would remove any unnecessary attachments. He called them Memnon, Emathion, Eos, and Strymo.

Memnon and Emathion were male. Both were nineteen. Memnon was large in both height and weight. He might have been a football player if he hadn’t injured himself in high school. Emathion was of average build but his intelligence was impressive. He was consistently the smartest student in his classes.

The other two were women. Eos was eighteen and quiet. She had a disfiguring scar on her face from a childhood accident. Strymo was twenty. She was extremely outgoing and smart. She was the hardest for Bosch to convince to participate in the experiment.

The four students were thoroughly examined before entering the facility. The facility was in the basement of the psychology building. The room the students were to stay in was large and windowless. There were four cots against one wall. Against the other was a large two-sided mirror. Bosch was able to observe the students at any time, while they could see not...

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The first email was sent around midnight. I was up cramming for a test and I heard my notification go off. I have a very specific tone for academic things, and it surprised me to hear it that late. I checked it out, and I felt that tingly, lower belly excitement, the kind that only comes from seeing someone fuck up catastrophically.

It was, very clearly, not an email that was meant to be sent from that account. It was only one sentence, and it wasn't signed. It had been sent to the entire student body and staff, and it was coming from the Administrative office. All it said was:



Is anyone else seeing flashing lights when they try to sleep?



I read the email a couple of times before I Googled the message. I wondered if maybe it was a reference to something, a movie or a TV show. But I didn't come up with anything that I thought was related. Mostly just alien abduction accounts, or WebMD horror stories about detached retinas. I closed the browser, finished studying, and went to bed. I watched the back of my eyelids for a bit. No flashes. I passed out.



The next morning, the chaos I'd anticipated was very much a reality. We're a small rural college, and not a lot of excitement happens here, so any event tends to throw us all overboard. Some of the more dramatic girls were terrified, and I heard a lot of whispered conversations about 'terrorists'. It took a lot of self restraint to avoid politely informing them how asinine that idea was. Most people just wanted to know who'd done it, and there were a lot of guesses. Obviously, it had to be someone who either had the password to the account, or knew enough to hack it, and in both cases it pointed to one of the office interns. There were only a handful of those, and one in particular was known to be very good with computers, so most people leaned toward him. The teachers, having also received the email, assured us that the school was looking into it, and that pranks were taken very seriously when they involved such a huge breach of confidentiality. Later that evening, after a day of rumors and speculation, an official email from the Administration was released. It claimed that the breach had been located and patched up by the IT team. There was no mention of the culprit. With the mystery defused, if not exactly solved, the excitement faded, and by the next day we'd mostly forgotten about it.



Until the second email came out.



We were in the middle of class, and those of us with our phones on received a notification. I pulled mine out of my pocket, ignoring the teacher's monologue about the importance of paying attention, to see what I'd gotten. The email was, again, only one sentence, and sent from the same Admin address.



It really hurts to sleep, are any of you noticing it too?



Murmurs rippled through the class, and the teacher, sensing that somethi...

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“A good listener” was the most enduring phrase on my school report cards.
I was quiet, punctual and obedient. Many of the teachers largely forgot about my presence in the classroom, since I caused no trouble.
It’s ironic, that this recurring summation of my character missed something. Certainly I was a good listener, but only because that allowed me to be a much better observer; specifically of other people, and mostly without them even noticing. If anyone had bothered to ask, I could have listed every habit of Kari Pearson, the girl who sat two desks away, or provided a comprehensive psychological profile of my teacher, Mrs Rawlins – although that would have been very much from a child’s perspective.
After I left highschool, I started studying to become a psychologist. I must confess, my choice of study was an exercise in academic curiosity right from the start, rather than being born of any great desire to help people. You can’t observe humankind as keenly as I already had without realising how nasty and self-absorbed most of us are. I wasn’t sure that any amount of analysis was going to solve that problem.
But as I honed my skills of observation to a wicked edge, I noticed him.


If you’ve ever tried not to be noticed, you’ll know how difficult it is. You try to quiet your breathing, stop fidgeting, and keep your eyes down, so that nobody around you has that prickly feeling of being watched.
But where most people go wrong is by trying to hide, rather than simply staying unnoticed – and these are very different things. Hiding is active, not passive, and best done behind or beneath something, where only sound or movement will really give you away.
The key to not being noticed is to be so ordinary that other people’s minds skip right over you.
I describe my jacket as not quite grey. Perhaps it’s faintly brown, or perhaps it’s vaguely blue; in different lights, it seems to shift, to reflect the surroundings. The cut is somewhere between blazer and business, but truly neither. With it goes a blouse that is a lighter grey, with a hint of cream – but not pale enough to draw the eye. My knee-length skirt is the same colour as the jacket, and my shoes are flat and serviceable.
This nondescript ensemble, combined with shoulder-length brown hair, glasses with gunmetal frames and a naturally forgettable face, allowed me to feel that I had mastered the art of blending in.
I bought coffee every day at the same café, and the barista always asked for my name. My doctor had to remind himself who I was whenever I visited, flipping through my short file. Other students barely registered my presence, and I didn’t have any friends – but that suited me fine. I knew everything about my peers already, picking up the nuances of their personalities when they thought they were unobserved. And that left me with little desire to become closer to any of them.
In an odd way, I felt I was more connected to humanity than anyone else arou...

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I found out about him through a friend. I guess that’s how most people find out about him. I guess it’s sort of awful, if you think about it. It would make more sense if your worst enemy told you about him.

His name is Robbie. We’d been friends since high school. We bonded over Tarantino movies, video games, and comic books. I guess he was my best friend.

He told me on the bench in the park, while we were chomping down on some street meat. He didn’t know the consequences that telling another would have, or he would never have told me – never have told anyone. Halfway through his sausage, he turns to me and brings it up out of the blue.

“My friend told me the weirdest fucking thing,” he says in between mouthfuls, “I thought it was stupid when I heard it, but it’s been like, stuck in my head ever since.”

I stare at him quizzically as I take a sip of my iced tea.

“Listen to this,” he says, finishing up his meal.

And then he told me the story that his friend told him (who was told by a friend, who was told by a friend). It went something like this:

He is called Obscurity Man, but he’s hardly a man. Although he really is quite obscure, in all senses of the word.

He draws his power from his obscurity. The fewer that know about him, the stronger he becomes. He would be strongest if only a single person knew about him, but he is far too cautious for that. If that person died, he’d simply cease to exist entirely. So, at all times, he keeps three people in the know.

Those in the know usually don’t last long. Most of the time, somebody can’t help but tell somebody else about him. That makes four. He doesn’t like four. The one who’s been in the know the longest needs to be culled from the herd of those who know. He is fast. There are only four for a few hours before there are three once again.

He knows who is in the know almost from the moment they hear his name. He sees into their thoughts, pushing his at the forefront so he can never be forgotten...

My fried finishes telling me and looks at me. I’m baffled by what has just come out of his mouth. It isn’t like him to say something so weird.

“Pretty fucked up shit, yeah?” he says, laughing.

“Yeah, I guess,” I said, “Who told you this?”

“This guy I met on League of Legends,” he replied, “Username was HeyJude5565, real name was Jude something-or-other. Not a bad player, we dual queue a lot. He played with Cherry before he played with me. Lives in the UK somewhere. Cool guy. Not very social though, he won’t play with anybody except Cherry and I.”

Cherry was another one of our friends from high school. She was one of the few girls in the school who played video games, so naturally we got a long pretty well. There was a while when Robbie had a thing for her (hey, maybe I did too), but I suppose that the phase passed for both of us. That’s hardly relevant though.

After that we changed the subject. And ev...

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