Hello readers.
I honestly thought this was over. I didn't receive anything after the last email and I thought that I could have a moment of peace.
I started a new career at the end of August and I'm deeply in love with it as it exercises the creative side of my brain.
So I guess I thought I could return to worrying about the things everyone in 2020 does: Extreme storms, wildfire season, a pandemic, et cetera.
Until this evening.
That same email. It showed up in my inbox. And sat there.
And honestly I ignored it which is why it's coming to you so late. Because I'm scared. I don't know what this means.
It's been a minute but I'm guessing it's picking up from the last section. Again friends of mine who are familiar with code, I welcome any kind of translation.
I leave this for you to read, and ponder.
Strange Email #4
The flashlight beam catches on green numbers and letters, illuminating the gibberish for a second before you pass it and the walls go dark again.
49 ef b8 8e 74 ef b8 8e 20 68 ef b8 8e 75 ef b8 8e 72 ef b8 8e 74 ef b8 8e 20 6d ef b8 8e 65 ef b8 8e 20 69 ef b8 8e 74 ef b8 8e 20 68 ef b8 8e 75 ef b8 8e 72 ef b8 8e 74 ef b8 8e 20 6d ef b8 8e 65 ef b8 8e 20 69 ef b8 8e 74 ef b8 8e 20 68 ef b8 8e 75 ef b8 8e 72 ef b8 8e 74 ef b8 8e 20 6d ef b8 8e 65 ef b8 8e 0a 53 54 4f 50 20 53 54 4f 50 20 53 54 4f 50
Ahead is another T crossway, no doorway in front of you, which way do you run? When things don’t go right, you run left, sprinting wide as you take the corner.
You’re running out of steam, and out of time, the thing is still chasing you. Ahead, a few hundred steps, another doorway, another sign from the Writer:
THIS WAY HIDE
An arrow points to the doorway, you dive inside, scanning the room for something to hide behind. A desk, empty, but with nasty 70s paneling on the outside of it that runs all the way to the floor. You scurry behind it and turn off the flashlight. You can just barely see the upper space of the doorway from where you’re crouched.
You put a hand over your mouth and nose.
The static scratches and rubs beetle shells together as the monster enters the room, looking, an angular wolf-like head turning left and right.
It’s huge, it fills the doorway with crackling scraping light, the static giving the appearance of a trillion ants crawling across a window.
It enters the room and starts to look for you. Your lungs are aching from the exertion, and are begging you for fresh sweet air, but you keep your hand in place.
The thing twitches up to a cabinet, bangs an appendage against it, opens the door, finds nothing and comes toward the desk.
You put a hand over your mouth and nose.
The static scratches and rubs beetle shells together as the monster enters the room, looking, an angular wolf-like head turning left and right.
It’s huge, it fills the doorway with crackling scraping light, the static giving the appearance of a trillion ants crawling across a window.
It enters the room and starts to look for you. Your lungs are aching from the exertion, and are begging you for fresh sweet air, but you keep your hand in place.
The thing twitches up to a cabinet, bangs an appendage against it, opens the door, finds nothing and comes toward the desk.
Quiet, quiet quiet. Its footsteps are heavy.
Don’t move, don’t breathe.
The static fills your ears, reaches fingers into the darkness, pulling at your clothes, pressing to find you. You see the thing has placed a hand on the top of the desk. If it looks down, it will see you.
It scans the room again.
And heads back to the doorway, going left down the hallway.
You wait until you cannot hear the static anymore, and then you release your nose and mouth and take in lungfuls of air, pushing out the staleness from your lungs. You’re surrounded by darkness again.
You switch on the flashlight and crawl out from the desk, stand up, get a better look at the room.
Cabinet in the corner, open to reveal old lab coats and an umbrella.
At the bottom rests a battery. You snag it and put it in your pocket. Could come in handy.
You scan the rest of the room. The Writer has left their mark, more formulas, splintering off in two separate paths, a question mark in the center.
At the desk the Writer has drawn a stick figure on the wall behind, sitting down, a blank expression on its face.
You check the desk drawers, finding them all stuck except for the center drawer, where another battery rolls forward. You take it and put it in your pocket.
That switch did something to the computer.
You’re not sure what exactly.
But whatever it did brought the static back to you.
The idea of venturing back out into the hallways to run into that thing again, sends a cold finger running up the length of your spine, breaking up into goosebumps that feather up your neck and through your hair.
You rub your arms trying to bring some sense of heat back to them.
Scritch.
The sound is right behind you, and you whirl to see next to the stick figure: ⅓.
The Writer has tracked your progress it seems.
And now you know there are two more switches to turn off.
Two more walks through dark hallways.
Two more computer screams.
Two more chances for the monster to get you.
An odd twitch at the back of your ear, like something breathing.
You turn.
Nothing. Nothing but strangeness breathing through these hallways.
The alternative is to….what? Stay in this cold little room surrounded by the scribbles and scraps of some survivor before you, hiding in shadows from the creature made of static, scrounging for batteries from room to room until one day you die or it eats you?
No. Fuck that.
You glance back to the Writer’s new markings, swallow and nod.
It scans the room again.
And heads back to the doorway, going left down the hallway.
You wait until you cannot hear the static anymore, and then you release your nose and mouth and take in lungfuls of air, pushing out the staleness from your lungs. You’re surrounded by darkness again.
You switch on the flashlight and crawl out from the desk, stand up, get a better look at the room.
Cabinet in the corner, open to reveal old lab coats and an umbrella.
At the bottom rests a battery. You snag it and put it in your pocket. Could come in handy.
You scan the rest of the room. The Writer has left their mark, more formulas, splintering off in two separate paths, a question mark in the center.
At the desk the Writer has drawn a stick figure on the wall behind, sitting down, a blank expression on its face.
You check the desk drawers, finding them all stuck except for the center drawer, where another battery rolls forward. You take it and put it in your pocket.
That switch did something to the computer.
You’re not sure what exactly.
But whatever it did brought the static back to you.
The idea of venturing back out into the hallways to run into that thing again, sends a cold finger running up the length of your spine, breaking up into goosebumps that feather up your neck and through your hair.
You rub your arms trying to bring some sense of heat back to them.
Scritch.
The sound is right behind you, and you whirl to see next to the stick figure: ⅓.
The Writer has tracked your progress it seems.
And now you know there are two more switches to turn off.
Two more walks through dark hallways.
Two more computer screams.
Two more chances for the monster to get you.
An odd twitch at the back of your ear, like something breathing.
You turn.
Nothing. Nothing but strangeness breathing through these hallways.
The alternative is to….what? Stay in this cold little room surrounded by the scribbles and scraps of some survivor before you, hiding in shadows from the creature made of static, scrounging for batteries from room to room until one day you die or it eats you?
No. Fuck that.
You glance back to the Writer’s new markings, swallow and nod.
If you have to trust, might as well be the Writer.
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