[NSF56K] There is nothing to fear but fear itself...

Grey Ghost

Serial killers never fail to freak me out

just the idea of it is unsettling

they could be anywhere!

scarlet st.

Grey Ghost wrote: »

Serial killers never fail to freak me out

just the idea of it is unsettling

they could be anywhere!

The most recent (and one I saw with my good pals Nads and Penguin Incarnate) one that I loved was Zodiac. That shit was tight. Long, but you don't even realize it.

Grey Ghost

Zodiac was fucking brilliant

I was all on edge and tense, like, the entire movie

Graves

Poughkeepsie is done like a documentary.

Centipede Damascus

sometimes I read wikipedia articles and stuff about serial killers

I can hardly go to sleep later, but I can't stop myself

Graves

That's what watching poughkeepsie was like.

But a little scarier.

For longer.

Grey Ghost

Ok, if anyone cares, here is siliconenehanced's bullshit but well-told story from one of D&D's old creepy threads

spoilered for looooooong

Spoiler:

siliconenhanced wrote:

I remember this thread's predecessor. I told the story about the house where the woman used to lure people in saying she was part of the Underground Railroad, and then murder/torture/sell the slaves back into slavery.

It had the dog and the ghost getting into a bit of a ruckus.

Anyway, on that note, anyone remember the Blair Witch Project? Anyone who grew up around that area knows that the woods are just like that shit, with a house coming out of nowhere.

I used to go for hikes through the woods with an old Army map, a knife, and my dog. He used to go for rabbits, catch them, and bring them back to me alive and kicking, like he didn't know what to do with this fuzzy twitching thing in my mouth. Occasionaly I'd come across him eating one though, but that's neither here nor there. Foxes had a thing for him as well, and we'd always see one up on a ridge or on some rocks, watching us walk past.

It was following a "trail, unimproved" that I came across this house. It wasn't very surprising at this point to see a house abandoned in the middle of nowhere. The explanation given was that farms would go bust, no one would tend the fields, and the trees would reclaim the plowed fields. Fair enough.

It was the middle of Autumn, so the trees were in a good lather, falling leaves and everything looking decidedly poetic. I didn't really notice anything until my dog jerked my arm, not because of him running off but because he had froze. He had looked like this a few times before, when someone was trying to break into the house and whenever he saw another male dog who tried to bump chests with him. On point, looking huge and ruffled, which is saying something when he's a rotty/chow mix. I thought maybe he got a hint of coyotes, and then I saw the house.

What paint it had once faded off ages ago, leaving warped grey side boards. It was a two story farm house, and someone had obviously wanted to keep something inside. With some resistance at first, I moved closer. How do I know the above? Mainly because the wood 2X4s were nailed on the outside of the windows and doors. Okay, I thought, they couldn't do it on the inside, because then they would lock themselves in, right?

But why would they do it period?

Something else got my attention. There was a walk around porch roof, and going around back I could see where in one second story window all the boards had been blown out, shattered, along with some of the house itself. While the 2X4s were good and rotted, I could still see where someone had carved something into them, or perhaps clawed at them? I don't know. I do know, like the protagonist in an HP Lovecraft story, I should have probably at this point ran for the woodline, or at least until I had a can of gasoline. Especially after the events in Seaford.

But I was young, and impetous, and taking matters into my own hands, I went around to the front door again. With a running start, I threw myself through the front door, and into a fucking nightmare.

The wooden walls were covered with streaks of brown in impressions in the whitewashed wood, which I know realise was blood from fingers being scratched down to the quick. And perhaps white washed is too strong a term. There was white, but someone had taken time to write hex marks in line after line around the house. I could see what I thought was huge spider laying almost out of my line of sight in a doorway. I realised that it was a hand as my brain put things together. Baxter, the dog, had entered with me, growling low in this throat, coming up to my side and never taking more steps than I did. He did not like the hand, and bared his teeth at it in a way more akin to wolves, with that sudden sharp two tone snarl they do.

The hex lines, basically pentacles about every foot interspersed with crosses, ran into what I want to call the kitchen, with empty cabinets and an old iron stove. Needless to say, a thick curtain of dust covered everything, but there were places were there were less dust. Squatting, I made out footprints, bare human footprints, and ran a finger along the middle of one. Somewhere in the house, something thumped, and there was a giggle. More like in the back of my mind, but Baxter lurched as if he heard it too. I didn't like where this was going, but I continued on, my heart beating in my chest.

Perhaps I imagined the next rattle, coming from behind me, but I don't think I did. Investigating, I saw that the hand had slid several feet down the wall, further into the room. I could see the dust trails where it had moved, and shook my head. Something was fucking with me, but again, I was too headstrong, too reckless. I also thought my being a paratrooper, and under the auspice of St. Michael had something to do with it - if he could face the down devil, I could explore the domain of some half ass ghost, couldn't I?

Perhaps! But when a finger fucking twitched, it did not sit well in my stomach. And when I heard, much like I had before, the sound of something beating around upstairs, Baxter getting more and more anxious by the second, I decided to leave. I grabbed my fear by the throat, and walked from the house, through the threshold.

I don't know if my walking pissed it off or my running only inflamed it further, but when I heard the sound of footsteps coming, I took off for the woodline and the open fields, thinking for some reason it represented safety. Baxter ran beside me, ears back and in a flat out sprint. The wind kicked up behind me and I could smell the rot in the air. The smell of open sewage on a hot day, of a corpse putrefying and wet. The bile rose at the back of my throat and I spit, dodging through trees and leaping over more than one rock. It was riding the wind though, it's footsteps only taunting to heighten the thrill of the chase. How can you outrun the wind?

You can't. So I turned, ripped the medal from my neck, and shoved it into the wind. I don't remember what I yelled, to be honest. I suspect it was a cry to St. Michael with all of my faith, because there was a white explosion in my head, and my vision was filled with light. The only equivalent I have is when I got caught too close to a flashbang, with the noise slowly filtering back in with my vision.

Again, the smell of roses and gunpowder on the wind, and something else. You could smell fire on the wind, like your clothes might smell after standing too close to a bonfire. I heard steps again in the leaves, but it was only my dog, looking around curiously, licking the air. After a moment he looked off into the distance, wagged his tail, and then began to turn back. I followed him, looking where he had stared so intently. I saw nothing, but there was a cool breeze suddenly from that direction, and the smells, so apart but seeming so right, were stronger for a second, and then faded out. I walked with my dog out of whatever horror I had wandered into for a second.

When I got back home, my mother asked me what girl I had been with. She said she could smell me from there, and while I smelled good, I smelled STRONG. She didn't believe I wasn't with a girl, and only said "You don't have to lie, but we can pretend if you're embarassed to tell your mother. Just ask your "friend" what perfume she uses, because I'd like a bottle."

A deployment later, I returned to the house with the can of gasoline, the dog, and some handwritten prayers. What I found when the house burned to the ground is another story altogether.

---

A little over a year later had me driving down the "trail, unimproved" in a jeep, three five gallon jugs of gas in the backseat, a sheet of handwritten prayers tucked into my pocket, and the dog curled up in the backseat. I had left with this, I told my mother the area where I was going to hike, and took off. These were what I hoped, enough to finish what I had started.

I kept the events of that place to myself, knowing that I had experienced what some might call "a minor miracle" in my faith. I had told the story when I was younger about the first ghost to some people when it came to telling "Oh man this one time..." stories, much like this thread. Things would always get quiet shortly afterwards, and someone would eventually go "That's fucked up" softly, and that was that. Still, I knew the house was there, and unlike in the first case, I didn't know that I had broken whatever presence haunted that house for good.

I arrived at noon, with the first whispers of an early summer thunderstorm starting to show on the horizon. If this fire got out of hand, I hoped to let nature deal with it, and hauled the three cans out of the jeep, along with a coil of rope, and a shovel. I had my knife in the small of my back, and hefting three cans awkwardly, I walked towards the house, ignoring the sudden sinking feeling in my stomach.

Where there had once been a good wind moving through the woodline had died when I began walking towards the house with my goods. Baxter's tail was stiff, and his hair was on end again. Everything was literally silent. No birds flew, no trees moved. It felt like high noon at Dodge City, and to ease the tension I blew the first few notes of that song you hear in every spaghetti western.

Apparently, I hadn't broken shit. Just driven it away from me in a desperate moment, and I couldn't be sure when it might come back. Indeed, as I set the cans down, one of the 2X4s in the second story windows chose that time to pop out, making an empty thunk as it hit the top of the awning. Baxter barked once, and I loosened the St. Mike's medal from inside my shirt, wearing it openly and spreading the contents of the first can around the outside of the house.

The complete lack of anything serious happening was more frightening, I think, than if it had appeared gibbering and screaming around the corner of the house. I took a note from Ghostbusters, of all things, and tried my damndest not to think about what the hell it could do. When my foot got caught on a root, I let out a scream, thinking that it was coming out of the ground for me. My heart was beating as loudly in my chest as the first time I jumped out of a plane, and I was glad when the first can was completely empty.

The second can and third can were meant for the inside of the house, and while it was high noon, the light inside seemed less substantial, and the door yawned like a mouth, inviting me inside. Calling the dog to my heels, I marched in, and immediately spread the gas as fast as I could. With my first step a hard stiff wind blew from the direction of the storm front, and the entire house groaned in protest. The hand I had seen the first time had not moved at all, from where I remembered it, but all the same I avoided it. As I went into the kitchen, I took a moment to look around, and noticed on the counter there were fresh footprints on the dust, about infant sized. They dissapeared thanfully under the onslaught of gas, and I had used up over half of the first can when I saw the entryway into the parlor.

Draped over the windows were large white sheets, each painted with a single pentacle. A hex mark, in other words, designed to keep something in. The darkness was more complete in there, and my bravado failed me when I tried to take the first step in, pouring the gas from the safety of the threshold and letting it leak into the room. Something thumped upstairs, and I felt I didn't have much more time before events went quickly out of hand again. I went back to the center of the kitchen, grabbed the last can, and started spreading that on the hallway walls that led to the upstairs. I was not going up there, I decided, but I didn't count on the small trapdoor in the pantry, leading to what might have been a root cellar.

Flicking my lighter, I could see that it was covered with steel banded wood, holding down the rusting door. There was no need for a lock, as the boards over the door were bolted into cement around the trapdoor. Nothing was getting out of that. All the same, when I flicked my lighter shut and continued on my crusade something wailed in the dark place under this house, that made my dog howl in response and me drop the gas, spilling it over my boots and jeans. Something down there made the house shake, sending loose chunks of ceiling down on me. It was time to leave.

I drove my knife though the jug, and tossed it down the hallway, ignoring the persistant thump thump upstairs, like a heart, and ran until I was clear of the pooling gas. Running my lighter along the wall, the gas began to spread, running in blue flames both directions. I was careful to keep the flame away from me, and ran for the door.

The inside of the house had shielded us from the wind that waited for us outside. The storm had snuck up on us and I was almost thrown back by the wind. Reaching down I picked up the dog, threw him over my shoulder, and walked towards the car, taking shelter behind what trees I could. I turned back towards the house, and the fire was starting to take, licking against the dried and rotted wood. I stood there in the wind that bent the trees almost sideways, and watched as one tongue of flame sent a blue ring around the house.

Then the smell, the rot and the decay of last time, with something slamming around in the doorway, highlighted by the flames. I felt my fear drain away at that moment, all the anxiety that had been building was gone replaced by a sudden anger. At what, I don't know. Maybe at whatever had caused this to happen, but regardless, Baxter was put on the ground and I drew my knife and took a step forward. I was literally seeing red, going into the berzerker drive that had won me so many fights before.

"I'm right here motherfucker! I'm not going anywhere!" I screamed over the wind, as if this was just another shit talking dude. The ridiculousness of it all still strikes me today, a guy yelling at the air, brandishing a knife like a retard at something only he can see. Baxter came up next to me, growling low in his throat, eyes deep set in his massive head.

I wonder why it didn't charge me. Was I just taking out my rage and frustration on the unknown that surrounded this place on a figment of my own mind? Or was it there, and it was just unused to simple human courage, drawing a line in the dirt and saying "Here, and no further". Whatever the reason, it stopped thrashing, and the outline of flames surrounding it dissapeared.

The red faded from my vision shortly after the first story ceiling caved in, and I walked backwards the entire time, never taking my eyes from the house. I went to the jeep, got in the with the dog, and we had dinner at subway.

Roast beef with bacon, for both of us, on that cheese bread. It started to rain when we arrived at the Subway, and kept on after we had returned to the smoking embers of the house. I had made a stop on the way back to pick up a flashlight and a crow bar, and with that and the shovel, I shifted the ashes, not finding anything of interest until I got near the trapdoor. Baxter dug it out, a caved in skull that was partially destroyed by the fire, but huge and mishapen. The skull was too large, the eye sockets uneven. I ran a finger around the nose hole and wondered again what had happened here?. After several minutes of work with the pick and crowbar, I had a sort of answer. The faintest smell of corpses rose up to meet me, like a soda can in winter that a mouse died in during the spring.

There was a skeleton down there, and from the wider set of the hips I assumed it was a woman, with both of her femurs smashed. Several skeletons surrounded her, small infant skeletons. Making several knots in the rope, I tied off the rope to a sturdy looking tree nearby. If worst came to worst I could always chimney my way up, as it was only a ten foot drop. Either way, I had made sure that someone knew where I was if the shit met the fan.

I crawled down, looking at the skeleton surrounded by three infants with odd skulls and other deformities. I was surrounded by great despair, and shook my head at the waste of it all before carefully shouldering the skeleton and making the climb up with it. My internal revulsion was offset by a need to do the right thing here. So it took me several trips to collect all the bones, longer than it took me to dig the actual graves in the rain soft dirt. I piled stones over each, five graves. One for the mother and her four children, I think, and pulled out my sheet of prayers. I prayed to God, to Saint Michael, and I folded it up and offered my own blessings. Baxter sat quietly and watched throughout it all, and when I was done, he howled low and long.

I walked from that place filthy and covered in soot and dirt, and my nose was filled with the smell of fire. There was no scent of roses, no smell of gunpowder freshly burnt, but there was a smell of things growing underneath it all that hadn't been present before. That, I think, was all the sign I needed to know we had done the right thing.

I got in the jeep, and we drove away. I have never taken the supernatural for granted since.

Centipede Damascus

oh man, I've read that story before

that story is terrifying

Grey Ghost

Centipede Damascus wrote: »

sometimes I read wikipedia articles and stuff about serial killers

I can hardly go to sleep later, but I can't stop myself

Check out a book called "The Monster of Florence" by Douglas Preston; he usually writes thrillers, but this one is non-fiction

it's about this notorious Italian serial killer who has never been caught, and Preston and this Italian journalist spent months conducting their own investigation into the killings

it's fucking terrifying when you consider the ramifications of everything that happens

tugga

this one time, i pooped pure blood for a week

Rinder

tugga wrote: »

this one time, i pooped pure blood for a week

Hey you and Beavo are like butt blood buddies.

tugga

ok this scared the holy shit out of me the first time i saw it

Metzger Meister

The homps in D&D thought that shit was unadulterated truth didn't they?

Good story though.

Grey Ghost

Metzger Meister wrote: »

The homps in D&D thought that shit was unadulterated truth didn't they?

Good story though.

I don't think anybody seriously believed it, but it was the sort of thread where you didn't call people out on bullshit, because they were usually good stories

Cilla Black

I'm not a big fan of horror movies, but the Shining will probably always be one of my favorite movies ever. It's not just scary as hell, it's also just a high-quality movie. I don't think I've ever seen a movie since that's been able to make scenery and the camera work together to portray an atmosphere/feeling as well as the Shining.

The Otaku Suppository

Metzger Meister wrote: »

The homps in D&D thought that shit was unadulterated truth didn't they?

Good story though.

It's a true story in that he concocted a well-woven tale to disguise the fact that he burned down a house and accidentally killed 3 goths and a wiccan wannabe who were trapped in the cellar when he locked the door.

Mr. Henry Bemis

Alien is fucking insanely good

Metzger Meister

So, really, four goths.

Crazy Robot

It's been years since I've been so: touched, hearbroken, and horrified all at the same time by a film. The whole story is about tension and atmosphere, when those few moments of actual release happen they hit me like a sledgehammer.

The pool scene, Jesus. I felt so horrified yet glad at the same time. Those Swedes man, they sure know how to make a vampire flick.

BYToady

tugga wrote: »

ok this scared the holy shit out of me the first time i saw it

Tugga, did we really need to see a picture of your outhouse during your butt blood week?

darklite_x

The only movie that's really scared me was the Exorcist when I was young. I love horror films and I watch every single one that I can get my hands on, but the only types that actually unnerve me are the ones about possession and that sort of thing. I guess it's the fact that you hear about those types of things happening all over the world and there's no way to really explain them.

space_satan

Graves wrote: »

That's what watching poughkeepsie was like.

But a little scarier.

For longer.

Oh damn...The Poughkeepsie tapes scared me so badly.

Fun to note: Graves texted me later that night about being horrified.

bongi

tugga wrote: »

ok this scared the holy shit out of me the first time i saw it

Yeah, that film was terrifying

Grey Ghost

space_satan wrote: »

Graves wrote: »

That's what watching poughkeepsie was like.

But a little scarier.

For longer.

Oh damn...The Poughkeepsie tapes scared me so badly.

Fun to note: Graves texted me later that night about being horrified.

Where did you see The Poughkeepsie Tapes?

apparently it hasn't had a wide release yet?

space_satan

Theres ways to see it.

Zombiemambo

I gotta say The Blair Witch Project didn't disappoint me even though I saw it 6-7 years after it was released

it's not "holy shit" scary but it's definitely eerie and I love the claustrophobic effect the camera has

Cold Salmon and Hatred

The Blair Witch Project was shit

Zombiemambo

Cold Salmon and Hatred wrote: »

The Blair Witch Project was the shit

yeah it was pretty good

one movie I just cannot watch is The Grudge (Japanamica or American version, doesn't make much of a difference)

cj iwakura

The documentary about TBWP was better than the actual film.

The faux-historical one, that is.

Grey Ghost

cj iwakura wrote: »

The documentary about TBWP was better than the actual film.

The faux-historical one, that is.

I remember seeing that on Sci-Fi, back when they were still keeping up the facade of TBWP being avctual footage

also back when I was young enough to fall for it

Lockout

BYToady wrote: »

tugga wrote: »

ok this scared the holy shit out of me the first time i saw it

Tugga, did we really need to see a picture of your outhouse during your butt blood week?

Swill

Crazy Robot wrote: »

It's been years since I've been so: touched, hearbroken, and horrified all at the same time by a film. The whole story is about tension and atmosphere, when those few moments of actual release happen they hit me like a sledgehammer.

The pool scene, Jesus. I felt so horrified yet glad at the same time. Those Swedes man, they sure know how to make a vampire flick.

My goodness, this movie was so wonderful.

DarkPrimus

bongi wrote: »

More of a sci-fi thriller but I guess so

Man WHAT?

Alien is a straight-up horror film, it's just in a sci-fi setting.

bongi

DarkPrimus wrote: »

bongi wrote: »

More of a sci-fi thriller but I guess so

Man WHAT?

Alien is a straight-up horror film, it's just in a sci-fi setting.

I was talking about Cube.

DarkPrimus

Okay, going between the two pages confused me.

You're in the clear for now.

BusterK

The first time I made out with a girl was before seeing The Blair Witch Project
So I consider it a great film

Grey Ghost

Why is that other thread still open

Weaver

I have recurring nightmares that feature a bodiless(well, her body is kind of an indistinct, amorphous blur) lady with an expressionless, ceramic white face and straight black hair several feet long that I'll be having a regular ol' dream, then it starts to change to some really creepy shit and I realize that I'm dreaming but I can't wake up or control it or anything and eventually she comes out of fucking nowhere and gets right up face to face with me and I end up going into convulsions or screaming at the top of my lungs and lashing out violently and just shivering/shaking for a long time after waking out of it

so when I saw the ring and the grudge I was a might bit freaked the fuck out

Weaver

Also didn't the original version of the thing take place on a train?

Weaver

and I enjoy the Hellraiser and Friday the 13th films but they're not in any way scary

Well, with Hellraiser I guess the seeming inevitability of your horrific death can be scary when considered, Jason doesn't really draw out your pain & suffering for personal enjoyment he's just all *stab*