Dare We Share Some Spooky Stories?

[Spookie Monster]

At the end of a long day we sit back and muse on everything that's happened.  At the same time, we can't help but contemplate tomorrow: What opportunities, what challenges will it bring?  On New Year's Eve we tally our accomplishments and our regrets; then, after an exuberant countdown, some equally exuberant "Auld Lang Syne," and a glass or three of champagne, we charge into the New Year with fresh hopes, fresh fears, fresh resolutions.  And societies carve out entire eras -- political, technological, scientific, artistic -- and weigh them against those preceding and succeeding.

It's natural to mark the completion of a cycle and to reflect on events both fair and foul.  It's just as natural to ponder the next cycle: What will be the same?  What will be different?  What will improve?  What will deteriorate?  The completion of one cycle and the onset of a new one represent a bridge between the past and the future, between what's come and what's coming, between recollection and anticipation.

Well, we here in our extended round of storytelling are ourselves in the process of completing a cycle: We've been spinning our yarns for a full thirteen years now!  Jeepers!  For those of you who've been around since the beginning: From the bottom of what little remains of my frigid, bitter heart, I thank you.  Please treat yourself to some anti-wrinkle cream, some Viagra or Spanish fly, or -- if you have like me myself already slipped into the Otherworld -- a new harp or pitchfork.  If you're only just joining us, on the other hand, that's fantastic, too: We are always in need of fresh blood and possibly other fluids.  (At the appropriate time you will be instructed to begin fasting and spanking yourself.)

Thirteen years!  But what of the next thirteen?  For surely we must continue -- I mean, it just has to be bad luck to stop at thirteen, doesn't it?  Thirteen, after all, is one of the most haunted numbers -- lucky for a lucky few, perhaps, but profoundly unlucky for most.  Better not chance it.

With that in mind, I hope that I can convince you to share some of your spookiest stories.  For a few years we here at Elliquiy engaged in a round of hyakumonogatari kaidankai, the ancient Japanese tradition where people tell stories amid one hundred candles, extinguishing them as they go.  That went just about as well as we could have asked for, so we began a round of de duizenderotischeprikkennacht, the ancient Dutch tradition where people gather together to tell one thousand spooky stories.  When that one-thousandth story is concluded, we will experience a wonderful and strange visitation from the Otherworld.

So they say.

If you have a spooky story, please tell it in this thread.  Perhaps it happened to you; perhaps it happened to someone else.  It can be long or short, simple or intricate.  It can be completely true or maybe even slightly exaggerated for effect, like the time that I told Abraham Lincoln that I'd had to fistfight nine aliens in the Vatican Double-Secret Archive to save Leonard Cohen's pet rabbit but really there were only four aliens and two of them were super scrawny.  (I am not Nicolas Cage.)  Ghost stories, urban legends, creepy folktales, supernatural tearjerkers, supernatural bloodjerkers, and unnerving anecdotes are all rockin'.  Stories can be eerie, gory, or even funny.  Though I'd be ecstatic if you were to tell multiple stories, I do ask that you include only one story per post.  Finally, please give credit where credit is due.  Editing or tweaking a source is perfectly acceptable.  Your own stories are not just permitted -- they're encouraged!

One brief note before we begin: In an attempt to placate the Spirit of Thirteen, I myself plan to tell a number of stories that involve the number thirteen.  You do not have to involve the number thirteen, though -- any spooky story is welcome.  It's just that, as the de facto horror host here, I've found that I can tie these threads together tightest when I've got a theme to work with.  Please don't hesitate to tell stories that involve the number thirteen, but please don't feel obligated to, either!

Precisely how thirteen obtained its unsavory reputation isn't known.  Does it come from the whisper that Judas, betrayer of Jesus Christ, was the thirteenth and final person to seat himself at the Last Supper?  Perhaps it was passed down to us from the Norse: According to myth, the trickster god Loki, upon crashing an unusually unusual party being held by some other gods in Valhalla, became its thirteenth guest; through artifice he then brought about the death of the party's most honored guest, the god Baldr, and thus began the chain of events that will lead to Ragnarök, the end of the world itself.  Or is it instead a sort of Judeo-Christian paranoia -- a vague recollection of a matriarchal cult, a cult which venerated the moon and the menstrual cycle, that some believe reigned in the Old Times and might someday rise again?

However it happened, we now know to put ourselves on guard whenever thirteen sidles up or swoops in.  There are of course countless threads of the tricky, sticky web that it weaves.  Where to begin...?

Hmmm.  Just above I touched on the moon's intimate connection with the number thirteen; why not, let us say, "launch" from there?  (I'm taking the below from here.)


"Okay, Houston, We've Had a Problem Here"

NASA scoffed at the idea that Apollo 13 was a cursed mission, as did the crew's commander Jim Lovell.  For Lovell, along with the mission's command module pilot (CMP) Ken Mattingly and lunar module pilot (LMP) Fred Haise, the most interesting part of the mission was its scientific return.  Apollo 13 was heading for the Fra Mauro highlands, an area thought to be rich in evidence of the moon's geological youth.  The science was the real story on this mission.

Lovell became the commander of Apollo 13 by chance.  He, Mattingly, and Haise were scheduled to fly Apollo 14 when Apollo 13 commander Alan Shepard was forced out of the mission by a medical problem.  Always unwilling to break up a crew if it could be avoided, NASA switched flight assignments between the crews of 13 and 14.

Lovell had no misgiving about the change.  He orbited around the moon on Apollo 8 and was thrilled at the prospect of returning to walk on its surface.  Whether it was on Apollo 13 or Apollo 14 was irrelevant.  His wife Marilyn, on the other hand, wasn't thrilled with flight assignment.  Though she wasn't ordinarily superstitious, she had a bad feeling about this flight.

Marilyn couldn't help looking at the numbers.  Her husband had been in space three times including the trip to the moon.  Another mission seemed to be tempting fate.  As if bringing her greatest fears to life, the Oscar-winning movie Marooned was released late in 1969, right around the time of the Apollo 13 reassignment.  It tells the story of an Apollo crew stranded in orbit after the spacecraft's engine fails to fire for reentry.  The mission's commander, Jim Pruett, sacrifices himself to leave oxygen for his crewmates.  Lovell thought it would be a fun movie to see together; Marilyn had nightmares.

To give the new Apollo 13 prime crew more time to train, the launch was delayed from March 12 to April 11.  Numerologists had a field day.  The mission's launch date written numerically was 4-11-70; add the digits to get 13.

To reach its landing site on the moon, Apollo 13 would launch at 1:13 pm Houston time, or 13:13 on a 24-hour military clock.  From there, the crew would enter the moon's gravitational pull on April 13.  (Luckily, it wasn't a Friday; April 13 was a Monday that year.)

Just days before launch, things started going wrong with Apollo 13 when Haise's backup Charlie Duke got the measles.  Lovell and Haise were immune, but Mattingly wasn't.  If he had picked up the virus from Duke, he would fall seriously ill just as Lovell and Haise were leaving the moon and the crew was reuniting during the all-important lunar orbit rendezvous.  Lovell fought to keep Mattingly on his crew, going so far as to argue that there was no better place for a man to get the measles than in a cozy spacecraft with friends, but flight surgeon Chuck Berry said thought otherwise.  The risk was too great, and on April 7 Lovell had to make the choice of swapping out Mattingly for his backup CMP Jack Swigert (who was immune to measles) or keep his crew intact and wait for a later flight assignment.  Lovell made the switch, and three days before launch found himself in command of a new crew.

The crew of Apollo 13 spent the normal period of rest and relaxation before launch in simulators going through mission phases to make sure Swigert was caught up.  His ability was never in question -- his intimate knowledge of the command module came from his time writing computer's malfunction procedures.  Rather, the crew needed time to bond and trust one another.  Just 48 hours before launch, Swigert was proclaimed fit to fly.

The morning before launch, Marilyn had another unsettling experience when she lost her wedding ring in a shower drain in the beach house she was staying in.  She'd never taken it off, and it had never fallen off.  What should have been a minor incident felt like an omen.

On April 11, Apollo 13 launched and achieved orbit with only a minor problem: one of the five J-2 engines of the Saturn V's second stage shut down prematurely.  But the other engines took over and fired longer and the mission wasn't compromised.  Two days, seven hours, 55 minutes, and 20 seconds later, on April 13, one of Apollo 13's oxygen tanks exploded.  Public interest in the mission switched from superstitious curiosity to rapt attention and unity as NASA raced to find a way to bring the crew home safely.

Imagine yourself on the far side of the moon in a powerless spacecraft with no control, no communications with Earth, and no certainty if you're going to make it back at all.

Now that's scary.


Liftoff...!

Spel

[Spookie Monster]

From that I'd like to step back a century -- a century in itself a cycle.  Just after the Civil War, the Winchester Repeating Arms Company released the first Winchester rifle, the Model 1866.  A few years later they released the Model 1873 -- "The Gun That Won the West."  The sheer number of lives claimed by Winchester rifles simply can't be reckoned.  This grim truth may very well have led to the construction of one of the world's strangest buildings: the Winchester Mystery House.  (Suitably, given the subject matter of this story, I ended up mashing together material from several sources.*)


The Winchester Mystery House

The Winchester Mystery House, a mansion located in San Jose, California, was the personal residence of Sarah Winchester, the widow of gun magnate William Winchester.  Sarah Winchester's husband and daughter both died prematurely, and it was claimed that she was terrified that her loved ones' deaths were supernatural retribution for all of the people who'd been killed with the Winchester rifle.  A medium, reportedly channeling the late William Winchester, instructed her to move west and construct a massive mansion -- either to provide the ghosts of the rifle's victims with a place to haunt, or to lure them in, confuse them, and ultimately trap them as they tried to hunt her down.

The bizarre mansion, started in 1886 but constantly expanded until Winchester's death in 1922, is built like a labyrinth.  Measuring about 24000 square feet, it features staircases that lead to nowhere, doors that open onto walls, rooms with windows on the floor, and interior balconies.  It possesses an estimated 160 bedrooms, 40 staircases, six kitchens, and 47 fireplaces (albeit only seventeen chimneys, some of which stop before the ceiling).  There are more than 2000 doors, though they don't all lead where you would expect: One opens to a fifteen-foot drop into an outdoor garden; if you step through another, you will land eight feet below in a kitchen sink.  One cabinet door opens to a hive of 30 additional rooms.  Many visitors are fascinated by the vast collection of windows, more than 10000, and the realization that some of the loveliest Tiffany stained glass is hidden away where no light can reach it.  At the same time, there are only three mirrors in the entire place; further, there was just one shower and, although there were thirteen bathrooms, only one bathroom -- one which contains thirteen windows -- had a functioning toilet.

One of the mansion's many curious characteristics is the recurrence of the number thirteen.  The ceiling of the carriage entrance hall is divided into thirteen sections; there are thirteen rails by the floor-level skylight in the south conservatory.  There are thirteen squares on each side of one of the mansion's elevators and there are thirteen glass cupolas in the greenhouse.  There are thirteen-paned windows and thirteen-step stairways.  An expensive chandelier that originally possessed twelve gas jets was altered to include a thirteenth.  Drain covers throughout the mansion have thirteen holes.  The "séance room" offers thirteen coat hooks -- but for whom?

Sarah Winchester appears to have had something of a preoccupation with the number thirteen.  And when she died, she left a will with thirteen parts; she signed this thirteen times.  Strangely, the will makes no mention at all of the Winchester Mystery House.


Thirteen times the Season of the Witch has invited us into its misty, moonlit labyrinth.  Thirteen times it has guided us out again -- a generosity that is, to be sure, never guaranteed.  Now it beckons once more.  Dare you share a spooky story?

Spel

* This, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, and this.

[Jag]

They Got The Definition Wrong

It has been said that the definition of insanity is "doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results". I understand the sentiment behind the saying, but it's wrong.

I entered the building on a bet. I was strapped for cash and didn't buy into the old legends of the hotel to begin with, so fifty bucks was more than enough to get me to do it. It was simple. Just reach the top floor, the 45th floor, shine my flashlight from a window.

The hotel was old and broken, including the elevator, so that meant hiking up the stairs. So up the stairs I went. As I reached each platform, I noted the old brass plaques displaying the floor numbers. 15, 16, 17, 18. I felt a little tired as I crept higher, but so far, no ghosts, no cannibals, no demons. Piece of cake.

I can't tell you how happy I was as I entered that last stretch of numbers. I joyfully counted them aloud at each platform. 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 44. I stopped and looked back down the stairs. I must have miscounted, so I continued up. 44. One more flight. 44. And then down ten flights. 44. Fifteen flights. 44.

And so it's been for as long as I can remember. 44.

So really, insanity isn't doing something repeatedly and expecting different results. It's knowing that the results will never ever change; that each door leads to the same staircase, to the same number. It’s realizing you no longer fall asleep. It's not knowing whether you've been running for days or weeks or years. It's when the sobbing slowly turns into laughter.

[Lilias]

[Valerian]

Yesterday I hopped on a late-night flight from New York to Los Angeles. After boarding I saw that I had an entire row to myself. Take off passed without incident, and soon I was stretched out for a nap across the row.

I slept for a few hours, I don’t know how long, but I woke up to some severe turbulence. It's possible that the lights in the cabin went out for a moment, but I was so disoriented that it's hard to say.

I checked my phone to see that it was 3:13 AM, which I figured gave me about an hour until we landed. When I looked out my window, I was shocked to see nothing but wide open ocean. My jaw dropped; there's obviously no ocean between New York and Los Angeles.

I hit the button to call the flight attendant and spent the next few minutes wracking my brain for a lake that could've been possibly been big enough to explain what I was seeing. I jumped when the attendant flipped off the light. She was smiling widely, but tears were pouring down her cheeks.

“How can I help you, sir?” she asked.

I froze for a moment at her expression before deciding to just ask my question. “Where are we? Why does it look like we're flying over an ocean?”

She wiped her cheeks to clear the tears, still grinning. “Sir, we'll be landing in about an hour.”

“I, uh, OK, thank you,” I said.

After she left I checked the clock on my phone again. 3:13 AM blinked back at me.

It hadn't changed.

I had to have been waiting with my call light on for at least five minutes. How was it possible that it hadn't changed?

I opened up my laptop and saw it too displayed 3:13 AM. I pulled out my phone, started a stopwatch in the app, and spent the next two hours looking back and forth between the clocks, waiting for them to change.

They never did.

I tapped the shoulder of an older woman sitting in the row ahead of me. She looked back, an annoyed expression on her face. “Yes?” she asked.

“Do you know how long until we land?” I asked.

She narrowed her eyes. “That flight attendant said it would be about another hour.”

I shook my head in confusion. “That flight attendant? We talked almost two hours ago! We should've landed already.”

She stared at me as if I was crazy. I was going to continue trying to convince her, but I felt a hand on my shoulder. I spun to see a male flight attendant with the same expression as the first attendant -- a huge, strained smile and tears on his face.

“Sir, I'm going to have to ask you to calm down, or I'll call the Captain.”

I told him that wouldn’t be necessary and sat back. He removed his hand and stepped away.

The flight attendants continued to stop by every few hours offering meals. My stopwatch continued to tick up and is now telling me that I've been on this plane for more than thirty hours.

I've explored all of coach and tried talking to some of the other passengers, but they’ve all told me that they’re expecting to land in an hour or so.

Around three hours ago I tried getting into first class. I made it past the curtain but was escorted back by two grinning flight attendants. Their grip on my arms was like iron.

“Sir, the seatbelt sign is on,” one said. “Please remain in your seat with your belt fastened. We'll be landing in about an hour.”

I'd just about given up hope when a woman came down the aisle dressed in a business suit. She didn’t look at me or slow down, but she dropped a piece of paper onto my tray as she made her way to the bathrooms at the back of the plane.

I shot a look around before unrolling it.

It said, “Are you stuck too?”

I pulled out a pen and wrote “Yes. It's been thirty hours.”

I folded the scrap of paper up and set it on the tray closest to the aisle. She left the bathroom and picked it up as she passed.

It's been twenty minutes since then.

It's still 3:13 AM.

[Spookie Monster]

Welcome, fellow spookmongers, and thank you very much for the creepy stuff!

It is said that the Inuit have hundreds of words for snow.  I'm not sure if that's true -- I haven't asked them -- we've both been super busy.  What I am fairly sure about is that English has one word for fear of the number thirteen: triskaidekaphobia.

Yes, yes: There are some wags out there who confidently declare that thirteen isn't actually unlucky and that any misfortunes that it seems to be responsible for are mere coincidences.  We here know better, though, don't we?  And we aren't the only ones.  According to John Gunther, biographer of Franklin D. "The Only Thing We Have to Fear Is Fear Itself" Roosevelt, for instance, "[Roosevelt] hated Friday the thirteenth, he would never start an important trip on a Friday if he could help it, and he disliked sitting down with thirteen at dinner."  And I'll allow Stephen King to speak on his own behalf: "The number 13 never fails to trace that old icy finger up and down my spine.  When I'm writing, I'll never stop work if the page number is 13 or a multiple of 13; I'll just keep on typing till I get to a safe number.  ...  I always take the last two steps on my back stairs as one, making thirteen into twelve.  There were after all, thirteen steps on the English gallows up until 1900 or so.  When I'm reading, I won't stop on page 94, 193, 382, since the sums of these numbers add up to thirteen."

One individual who shared a fear of the ol' one-three was revolutionary ("evolutionary"?) composer Arnold Schoenberg.  Schoenberg's anxiety about the number dwarfed that of Roosevelt and King, however -- and, in fact, it very likely contributed to his personal finale.  (I'm staging this with a flourish of this in the overture.)


Arnold Schoenberg and His Fear of the Number 12a

Arnold Schoenberg was born on 13 September 1874, and as fate would have it, he died on 13 July 1951 at age 76 (7+6=13).  In the meantime, of course, he devised a method of composition that assigns the 12 notes of the chromatic scale equal importance.  Dodecaphony, also know as twelve-tone serialism or twelve-tone composition, replaces the structural force of tonality with increased thematic oneness.  Schoenberg's approach, both in terms of harmony and development, has shaped much of 20th-century musical thought; many composers from at least three generations have consciously extended his thinking, whereas others have passionately reacted against it.

Schoenberg genuinely believed that his birth on the 13th of the month would have fateful consequences.  Throughout his life he fastidiously avoided rooms, floors, and buildings with the number 13.  He even refused to rent a house because its street address had been 13 Pine Street.  This was not a superficial concern, but rather a powerful, all-consuming obsession that was central to his entire belief system.  His musical manuscripts show the customary measure numbers, but starting with the composition of the thirteenth song of the cycle Das Buch der Hängenden Gärten (Book of the Hanging Gardens), Op. 15, Schoenberg began to substitute the number 13 with 12a in the measure count.  And in his opera Moses and Aron, Schoenberg spelled "Aaron" with a single "a" instead of the double spelling customarily found in English translations of the Bible.  The reason for the missing "a" has nothing to do with orthography, but is squarely numerological.  You see, had the title included the second "a," it would have had 13 letters.  Omitting the second "a," there are only 12.

As Schoenberg got older, the degree of obsession increased and spread into all aspects of his life, from the mundane to the existential.  He absolutely dreaded his sixty-fifth birthday in 1939, because that year was a multiple of 13.  He even asked the composer and astrologer Dane Rudhyar to prepare his horoscope.  Schoenberg was told that, "the year was dangerous, but not fatal."  In a letter dated 4 March 1939, Schoenberg wrote: "Indeed, I am not so well at the moment.  I am in my 65th year and you know that 5 times 13 is 65 and 13 is my bad number.  But when this five-times-thirteen year has passed, then I have 13 more years."

Schoenberg's prophecy, however, did not come to pass.  In 1950, on the occasion of this seventy-sixth birthday, Schoenberg received an ill-omened note from his fellow composer and musician Oskar Adler.  Adler stipulated that since Schoenberg's age of 76 added up to 13 (7+6), it would be a critically dangerous year.  According to friends and family, this ominous suggestion severely depressed and stunned Schoenberg.  Things finally came to a head on Friday, 13 July 1951; on that day, Schoenberg, sick, anxious and depressed, stayed in bed all day.  His wife Gertrud reported, "About a quarter to twelve I looked at the clock and said to myself: another quarter of an hour and then the worst is over.  Then the doctor called me.  Arnold's throat rattled twice, his heart gave a powerful beat, and that was the end."


As a note, while English has one word for fear of the number thirteen, it has two (!) for fear of Friday the 13th: friggatriskaidekaphobia and paraskevidekatriaphobia.  How many words for fear of Friday the 13th do the Inuit have?  Answers on a postcard.

Spel

[Spookie Monster]

Now, thirteen's questionable reputation is mostly confined to the English-speaking world.  In many cultures it's considered to be an unremarkable number.  Heck, in Italy it's sometimes considered to be a lucky number.  Numbers are mischievous critters, though, and where one is innocuous another is sure to toy with us.  For example, tetraphobia -- fear of the number four -- is quite common in many East Asian cultures, as we ourselves touched on here some years back.  Meanwhile, heptadecaphobia -- fear of the number seventeen -- simmers in the aforementioned Italy.

Although it would be prudent for us not to tempt numbers, sly as they are, it appears that we can't resist doing so anyhow.  If you set a candle in front of a mirror in an otherwise darkened room, stare at your reflection in said mirror, and say the name "Bloody Mary" thirteen times, you may just get a visitor.  If you go into a Japanese school, proceed to the girls' bathroom on the third floor of the building, approach the third stall, knock three times, call out "Hanako-san?", and open the door of the stall, Hanako herself may just be waiting for you.  Is it simply our nature to poke bears?

One relatively recent game involving numbers is the so-called Elevator Game (no relation to Jag's ill-fated bet above!).  Did it originate in Japan?  In Korea?  No one can say for certain, though that tetraphobic first step does hint at an East Asian origin.  Wherever it started, it's since spread worldwide; perhaps best known for its proposed connection to the tragic Elisa Lam case, it's been snaring adventurous souls for over a decade now.  Here's a terrifying example of what one might expect from sneaking into a bottle in search of a genie.  (This account contained a few dirty words, incidentally, so in the interest of protecting those whose nerves are already frayed, I've tweaked them a little.)


I Played The Elevator Game And I Did It Wrong, The Woman Followed Me Back

First off, before I say anything else, I want to make it absolutely clear that under no circumstances should anyone play the 'Elevator Game to Otherworld'.  If you're curious about it then please, just stop.  If you've tried it before and it didn't work then please, please, please, don't ever try it again.  I tried it and now I'm pretty sure I'm screwed.

Here's how it started.  About a year ago I was reading about the death of Elisa Lam and happened upon a couple of websites about the elevator game and a lot of conjecture that Elisa had been playing this game prior to her disappearance.  For those not familiar with the case, she was later found dead in a water tank on top of the hotel where she was last spotted.  Just prior, she'd been seen acting really strangely on one of the building's elevators.  The CCTV of it is easily found if you're really interested but anyway that's what got me mildly interested in playing the elevator game.

I read instructions for how to do it in a few different places (there are slightly different versions, I don't know why) and it creeped me out.  I closed my browser and then honestly didn't think about it again for months until I happened upon another article about it on this very website in May.  It contained more info on the "game" than I'd seen in any one place before and I became absolutely convinced the game was complete B.S. being handed around the web as a quick way to get reads from people interested in Elisa Lam.  The community that's obsessed with her is relentless, like, they're really completely obsessed with her.  I know because my boyfriend is one of them and that's how I came to considering playing the game myself.

My boyfriend is sweet, he's kind, but he's also very into missing persons stories and the idea of the paranormal being a real thing.  These are things I find mildly interesting every once in a while but they're not always on my radar like they are for him.  So, one evening when he wouldn't stop with the spooky Elisa theories I asked him if he'd stop talking about it if I played the game and showed him it was fake.

He agreed, the bet was made, and that's when I knew he thought it was fake too.  If he thought it was real then there's no way he would have wanted me to play the game which just goes to show how much of a distracting fantasy being interested in this stuff is for most people.  Like, who would agree to the proposition that their girlfriend should play a game that could possibly result in them being stuck in another dimension forever?  No one, that's who.

Anyway, so I took notes on the game to take with me and identified a building where I thought I wouldn't draw attention to myself in any way that might cause me to mess up the game's order and thus be ruled invalid by my true believer boyfriend.  I won't say which building because I wasn't supposed to be there and they likely don't want the attention but it's in downtown Atlanta where I live.

Now, if you're familiar with the game at all then you know there are concrete steps you have to take in perfect order to do it right.  These steps are consistent across every version of the game I've ever read.  The only things that aren't consistent are the consequences of doing the steps wrong and exactly what "Otherworld" is actually like.  As a result, I was able to plan with confidence so there wouldn't be any question about doing it right or not later.

It took about twenty minutes before I was able to take an elevator alone.  It was a new elevator (the building is fairly new) and there was absolutely nothing creepy about it, no music in the elevator, nothing.  So, I started the steps of the game.  Here they are.

• Enter the elevator from the first floor by yourself.  If anyone else gets on then understand that you cannot continue from the first floor and wait until the elevator can be taken alone.
• Press the button for the fourth floor.
• Do not get out when the elevator reaches the fourth floor.  Stay in the elevator and press the button for the second floor.
• Do not get out when you reach the second floor.  Stay on the elevator and then press the button for the sixth floor.
• Do not get out when you reach the sixth floor, remain in the elevator and press the button for the second floor.
• Do not get out when you reach the second floor.  Stay on the elevator and press the button for the tenth floor.  Some have reported hearing a voice calling to them on the second floor during this middle section of the ritual.  Do not reply.  Do not answer in any way.
• Do not get out once you have reached the tenth floor.  Stay on and and press the button for the fifth floor.

Everything was dull up until this point.  I didn't hear anything at step six when I hit the button to take the elevator to the tenth floor.  Then I started step eight and I screwed up completely.

It has been reported by some that a woman may enter the elevator on floor five.  She may appear as a stranger who wishes to engage with you.  More importantly, she may appear as someone you know.  It is important that you do not acknowledge her in word or glance.  If the elevator you are in is reflective then stare at the floor or the buttons only.

A woman did get on at the fifth floor.  The problem is that I never had an opportunity to not look at her because I was looking at the lights above the doors telling me which floor I was on and it startled me when the elevator suddenly stopped.  By then I was already looking at the door and she was getting on.

This was so stupid of me.  It's so obvious that I should have been facing the corner where the elevator buttons are, not staring at the lights telling me which floor I was on the whole time.

I immediately thought, "okay, no biggie, this is B.S. anyways" but I have to tell you I was extremely nervous and as I hit the button for the first floor and the elevator started moving again I made sure to look down at the floor.  That's when she started talking.

She was a tiny thing, I'd seen that as she got on, and pretty.  Her hair was a light blonde and she had striking green eyes and freckles.  She started talking about how there'd just been an accident on the fifth floor and asked if I would go back with her to help.  This was totally nonsensical.  She'd just gotten on the elevator in the hopes that someone might be there and then go "help?"

I didn't speak.  It was too weird.  No way I was going to speak to her.

She said it again and this time she sounded like she was getting angry.  Again, I ignored her.  The third time was very different.

"Hey, you bitch, I'm talking to you.  You freaking bitch."

Damn, I can't tell you how scary that was.  The hair on my arms was standing up and I got that dizzy confused feeling whenever something seems really and truly dangerous and you get that first hit of adrenaline.  I'm sure I'd moved completely into the corner of the elevator at this point.  I know I was staring at the elevator buttons and wondering what was taking so long to go just five short floors.

We should have already hit the first floor but we seemed stalled on the third even though I could still feel the elevator moving.

The next thing I knew, she'd gone from calling me a bitch to this kind of soft weeping.  I would say that it sounded sad or even mournful but the truth is that it didn't, it sounded despicable and pathetic.  Remembering it now, the effect that her crying had wasn't to make me want to console her.  The effect was that I suddenly found her disgusting.  For no reason other than the sound of her crying, I suddenly found myself hating her and she wouldn't stop crying.

I could practically feel her body shuddering she was crying so hard and the wet sound of it seemed to fill the elevator, getting louder and louder until I simply couldn't take it anymore.  Hatred filled me and turning around I yelled "shut up" as I grabbed her by her blonde hair and smashed her head into the elevator door over and over and over again.

I couldn't stop myself, blood spattered across the seam in the elevator door and still she kept weeping, the sound rising in pitch and shifting in pattern until it was no longer a cry but a kind of cackle.

She was happy.  "Oh God no," I thought, "she's happy.  This is what she wanted."  And like that I realized that I had not only looked at her when she came through the elevator door but I had acknowledged her and, worse than that, I had touched her, grabbed her hair, struck her.  I'd given her what she wanted.

And then?  *Ding* went the elevator door.  We had arrived on floor one.

Turning, the woman's face was no longer that of a pretty young girl but was contorted in a face of pure pleasure as if she had been relieved of a burden long carried and she stepped off the elevator and into the lobby, blocking my exit.

The door slammed closed and the elevator began a rapid ascent.  I pressed every button on the elevator's console trying to stop it but nothing responded.  The buttons were dead.  Faster and faster the elevator ascended until, with a loud creak and squeaking of the cables it came to a complete stop.  The floor indicator light read "10".  The doors opened and... nothing, there was nothing.  It was just the 10th floor of the building.  On the right and left were offices with glass doors and windows.  Inside people answered phone calls or appeared to be in meetings.  Just your basic stuff.

I hit the elevator button for the first floor and the elevator moved smoothly downward.  At the lobby, I stepped out and walked quickly out of the building and onto the street.  I didn't know what in the hell I had just experienced but I knew I didn't want any part of it.

I immediately called my boyfriend and told him what had happened on the elevator and he just laughed and said he didn't believe me.  He compared what I'd told him to the things he'd read about Elisa Lam.  He wouldn't listen to me at all, so caught up his little spooky fantasy that all he could do was try to pick my story apart with the B.S. he'd read on internet forums.  He said what had happened to me was impossible and that I was just making stuff up to try and win our bet.  I hung up and shut off my phone.

This is the part I need you to really listen to.  This is the part that matters.

The next morning, after going to sleep in my own bed, I opened my eyes and I was standing in the middle of an office building of some kind fully dressed.  The light was dim and as I peered out the window I saw what I can only describe as a dead city.  A faint dim light on the horizon illuminated everything with a crimson sheen that glimmered like a greasy film in the low light.  There was no sound.  I don't mean it was quiet.  I mean the place was absent of sound.

Ahead of me was an elevator and the floor indicator read "10".  I pushed the down button to call the elevator in such a panic that sweat seemed to instantly cover my body.  The elevator arrived.  The door opened.  I got on and it took me down to the lobby where the low red light was gone and in its place was the normal lobby I had seen the day before and it was morning.

This has happened every night and "morning" for the past ten nights.  During the day, when I'm out of my apartment I see the blonde girl's face in every crowd but she always disappears once I try to focus on her.

On the sixth morning that I found myself in the building, the elevator quit working and I took the stairs down to the lobby and I've had to take the stairs every night since but they get longer and longer.  Yesterday morning, after walking down at least fifty flights of steps I opened the stairwell door at the floor I was on and I was back at the tenth floor.  It took what seems like hours to finally get out after that.

I am afraid that tonight I will be trapped.  I can feel it in my bones that this is it.  I will never be able to get out again.  I've been trying to stay awake but I never can no matter how much caffeine I've had or what I'm doing.

Even worse, I saw the pretty young girl with blonde hair two nights ago on the stairwell.  I didn't see her clearly but more like out of the corner of my eye below me and I could hear light footsteps.  She's there.  She's in the building with me.  She has something in store for me, I'm sure of it.

Please, do not play this game.  It will be the end of you.  "Otherworld" isn't something to be screwed around with like a hobby or a spooky thing to try on a dare.  It's a prison and when I finally fall asleep I know I will have become its most recent resident.


Will you be next to try the Elevator Game?  If you do try it, please pass along the story of what happens -- I mean, assuming that you can.  In the meantime, maybe you have a different story to share...?

Spel

[Lilias]

[Valerian]

I was staying at a cottage in North Wales in 1997. The cottage was owned by my best friend's grandfather and was in a fairly isolated location, but still on tracks which lead to the main road. It was very basic, but it had electricity and a boiler for hot water, although no central heating. It was a three double bedroom property with no outhouses. There were six of us staying in this cottage one Easter weekend and we spent much of our time lazing around and visiting local sites of interest.

We decided one Saturday morning to go out to the local market, stopping off for a pub lunch on the way back. While sitting at the pub eating our meal, other friends of ours, who were staying in a nearby town, entered the pub and sat at our table saying they were glad that we were still here and they hadn't missed us. When asked how on earth they knew where we were, they said they had phoned the cottage where we were staying and the lady who answered the phone told them.

There was no one else staying at the cottage. There was no cleaner or any other person tied to the cottage. I spent the remainder of our time there sleeping with the hall lights on and have never returned.

[Spookie Monster]

Thank you so much!  Lilias, your story actually sounds quite alluring, hehe, and Valerian, doubtless you remember my fondness for spooky telephone stuff...!

Now, driving in New Jersey --

No! -- wait! -- hang on!  That's not the horror story...!

Although...

No, no, no.  Ahem.  Let me start over:

Driving in New Jersey, you might find yourself passing between the towns of Watchung and Scotch Plains, gliding along the picturesque mountain road known as Johnston Drive.  Then, suddenly:

Bump!

And soon after:

Bump!

And again:

Bump!

Thirteen times total.  Why?  Well, if you dare to hear the truth, listen to this next tale...


13 Bumps for 13 Witches

Young drivers in Union County know the ultimate moonlight rush can be found on Johnston Drive -- not for the scenic overlook it provides but, perhaps, for what is buried beneath it.

This mountain road that runs from Watchung to Scotch Plains is, as local legend has it, the final resting place for 13 sisters who were found to be killing children in an area that is now known as the historic "Deserted Village."  That village, also known as Feltville, consisted of about 175 residents in 1850 that was abandoned after property owner David Felt sold it and future businessmen failed to make it a successful site.  Some of the original structures still stand deserted in that spot.

The legend continues that these "witches" who killed children in the village were tried and hanged and then buried under what is now Johnston Drive -- their bodies left as bumps in the road.  The road has since been paved multiple times and with every paving application, the bumps mysteriously re-appear.  Now there are some that seem to present logical explanations for why the bumps were there in the first place, but no one can seem to debunk the mystery of why the bumps pop back up.

Michelle DeRocco, the City Clerk in Watchung, noted that a project to repave Johnston Drive was recently completed in June.  When asked if she thinks the bumps will re-appear once again, DeRocco did not discount the legend and instead simply stated, "only time will tell."

Mayor Gerald Mobus of Watchung said that although his family has lived in Watchung since the 1800s, he only heard of the legend about 10 years ago.  Offering his own explanation for the bumps, Mobus guffawed at the notion of 13 murderous sisters, light-heartedly poking fun at those who fall for the story.

"Back in the 1800s there used to be a school house on the top of the hill," Mobus said.  "Those bumps were placed in the road so that the horses and buggies wouldn't slide back down the hill."

But wait, hold on a second; multiples sources including the 13th issue of Weird NJ state that in 1993, the road was paved again and the bumps arose two days later.  Patch asked the mayor about this claim.

"That project in 1993 was the first phase of the paving that was just completed in June.  In 1993, the paving ended at Upper Drive; the workers didn't even touch the 13 bumps," Mobus said.

James Sully Sullivan, a lifelong resident of Berkeley Heights states that "the 13 bumps have re-appeared after paving at least twice since 1978."

In the process of investigating this local horror story, Patch tracked down Sullivan after discovering a YouTube video he had posted about his own midnight ride.  He is a firm believer in "whatever makes the bumps pop back up."

"The story goes that in the days of Feltvile [now known as the Deserted Village] there was a long carriage path from Seeley's Pond to a hotel on the top of the mountain.  Thirteen sisters lived on Johnston Drive.  There were families all along that trail.  Supposedly these sisters went over to Feltville to kidnap children and kill them.  The citizens of Feltvile hunted the sisters down, killed them and buried them along the side of the mountain.  Before they were executed, the witches vowed to come back.  This road has been repaved and repaved over and over again and every time the bumps come back."

Sullivan went on to elaborate the connection between the Deserted Village and the 13 bumps.

"You can go back and research and ask, 'why was the village deserted?'  Something as traumatic as having a bunch of children stolen from your town and brutally murdered would make anyone want to get the hell out of there," Sullivan explained.

The legend continues that if you drive over the bumps and count them, then say "thirteen witches" and turn around, you can see the witches following behind your car.

Sullivan's first time driving over the bumps was as a teenager.

"I was 14 years old and sitting in the back seat of my friend's older brother's car who we were all afraid of," Sullivan said.  "It was like getting to the top of a roller coaster; Johnston Drive is a long stretch of road giving first-timers a lot of time to build up anticipation.  I didn't see any witches that night, but the thirteen individual bumps were definitely there."

According to Sullivan's YouTube page, he's tried to see those witches numerous times but, so far, the bumps are all that appear.

When confronted with the latest information on the paving of Johnston Drive, Sullivan reaffirmed his belief stating that "the bumps will rise again."


Do you have a story that will make us go bump in the night?

Spel

[Valerian]

The Paramount Arts Center in Ashland, KY, originally known as the Paramount Theater, was initially planned to showcase silent films product by Paramount Studios. Plans changed and when it was built in 1931 it was one of the first transitional theaters constructed to accommodate the recent arrival of “talkies.”

The Art Deco theater was designed by Rapp and Rapp and plans had to be scaled back somewhat due to the Great Depression. During construction, a crew of four were working in the auditorium one day. At lunchtime, three left to grab a bite to eat while one, a man named Joe, stayed behind. When the workers returned, they came upon a terrifying site. Joe was hanging by the neck from the stage rigging, stone dead. Whether this was an accident, or an act of suicide remains a mystery to this day.

Since Joe’s death, there have been a number of ghostly encounters at the theater. Employees and visitors have experienced cold drafts, mysterious lights and sounds, items going missing, and being tapped on the shoulder only to find no one behind them. The ghostly figure of Paramount Joe in his overalls has also been spotted sitting in the audience of the theater on several occasions.

Paramount Joe is said to be a friendly spirit -- unless you mess with his things. Billy Ray Cyrus apparently signed a poster for Joe when he was filming a music video at the theater. It hung in the lobby along with other signed photos of past performers.

Years later, some of the signed pictures and posters were removed to free up space on the walls, including the one signed to Joe from Billy Ray Cyrus. The following morning when workers arrived at the theater, they found all the remaining pictures that were left hanging up were now laying on the floor. Joe’s picture was quickly hung back up and hasn’t been moved since.

[Lilias]

[Spookie Monster]

Many thanks, Valerian and Lilias, as always!

Thirteen days now have we been slinking together through the Chapel Perilous.  Stay close! -- we wouldn't want to wander off in different directions, doomed never to meet again.  As we seek out our destination, we must rely on our courage, our camaraderie, and our wits.  Perhaps it would also be wise to consult the diviners among us for advice on which paths to follow, for we do have here at Elliquiy astrologers, oenomancers, anthomancers, numerologists, selenomancers, arachnomancers, ichthyomancers, tyromancers, and even taromancers -- those who wield the tarot.

The tarot!  That celebrated -- or infamous, depending upon your opinion -- set of 78 cards that, in the hands of a skilled practitioner, is said to reveal the concealed.  It's known the world over; we even have a thread in these very forums where you can discuss the subtle art, and Oniya has a neat tarot-related project here.

The thirteenth card in the tarot is, as will surprise no one here, Death.  O.K., O.K., in the Language of the Cards the card Death probably doesn't mean death death: As any experienced taromancer will inform you, the card more properly represents transformation, transition, metamorphosis, purification...

Then again, it can just mean plain ol' death, as in the following story.


XIII

I know everyone has their own thoughts on how the tarot process itself works, but earlier I was contemplating the strangest reading I've taken part in.  It was also the first time I was able to look at the cards and understand most of the story instantly.

So I was staying somewhere out of town with someone I'm close to, and this person was expressing interest in my cards in a kind of joking way.  It's always been kind of hard to talk to this person due to their own hangups, but I wasn't too concerned about that at the time.  I know this person was, though.  I knew the joking was kind of a front for "I'm finally ready for a reading on this topic" and I knew that I was the only one this person could have trusted to do this reading, which I think is what ended up making the moment so unforgettable.

They weren't ever really able to "truly" believe in stuff like psychic things or reincarnation or anything really spiritual like that, even though they wanted to.  And as for me -- I've been studying this stuff for a decade and a half now, so while I love little confirmations of things, I don't feel the desire to have tarot "prove" itself to me, if that makes sense.  I like it as an intuitive tool that I can use to access my subconscious and that of those around me who want to be read.

So, when they jokingly brought up the possibility that some of their deep-rooted fears / anxieties were rooted in a past life and that I could do a reading on it, I took them seriously and said I'd be happy to.  I can't say whether they were more relieved or surprised that I said yes!  But I immediately began shuffling the cards and focusing on what I needed to know to do the best reading possible.

They waited a room over while I laid the cards out how I felt they needed to be spread in order to tell me the story that would do the most good.  When I flipped the cards, I felt confused and then a little sad, because there was a *clear* story / progression with the cards, and it was tragic.  I worked out that at some point in the past, when this person turned from a happy and creative individual to a reserved and fearful one, they had been a protector of a group of 4 (this person + 3 others).  They ended up against something awful, and one of the 3 died.  This completely wrecked my friend in their past life.

That was my general read on it -- and as I tried to relay what I saw in the cards, my friend took over and shook their head and told me I was "so close" but that I was missing important details -- and then they started tearfully relaying a story that they innately understood in the cards!  Moments prior, they had been in a good and joking mood.  After not more than a second or two of looking at the spread, they were devastated.  They went on about how the 4th person had been murdered, and hadn't just died.  This was evident in the Hanged Man card that happened right in the middle.  My friend reminded me about his lifelong aversion to things around his neck, and also his deep frustration with innocent people being killed for things they didn't do -- and how they knew this had originated here, where someone else let themself be killed for the sake of my friend and the 2 others escaping the situation.  They told me about the lifelong feeling he had of being scared the closer he got to others... like something bad would happen and someone in their cluster would die if they got too close.  And they were just, crying harder than I've ever seen or known this person to do in my life (we've known each other for half our lives now).  It was really intense.

Afterward, they described it as like... "it's like I was grieving about this my whole life without knowing it" and "like a blockage is just gone now".  It was a lot, and I felt completely dumbfounded by the experience.  I honestly didn't know what to even say except that I was glad, because needless fear and anxiety has been plaguing this person for so long now.  And it was really just... gone.  Just like that.  Where so many other efforts had fallen flat, this was finally the thing to help.

And that was so strange for me.  Direct "confirmation" of a thing I had felt to be true, but never had really had any proof for myself (not that I needed it, but it was really nice regardless!).  I kept thinking... even if "reincarnation" doesn't really happen the way people think it does -- or even if it doesn't happen at all -- that it's incredible that readings of this nature can have that kind of lasting, visible improvement for someone, especially where all else had failed for years and years.  I think that's the thing that blows me away most.  Healing comes in all forms!

Addendum: when I did my deck interview with the deck I used to give this reading, it told me that the best outcome of our working relationship would be "death".  Which I took to mean... offering closure to people.  I didn't anticipate that it would end up giving closure via a past life reading about an untimely death... but that was so cool when I realized it.


It's true: Death is not an end but simply a transition.  And thus we must press on to our thirteenth tale...

Spel

[Spookie Monster]

Cycles: comings and goings, ups and downs.  Though we may choose how to respond to them, we all of us are subject to the whims of the Wheel of Fortune.  Pumpkins included.  I'll be drawing this story from a site with a number of stories inspired by tarot cards; this particular story was inspired by the Four of Cups in reverse.  (You can even listen to it here, if you'd prefer -- nifty!)


Pumpkin Dreams

It was a beautiful Halloween morning, sunny and warm for a Fall day.  Wiley, a girl in her early teens, had already finished her chores around the farm and was eager to start decorating their home for tonight's event.  Her family will host the annual Halloween party, inviting all nearby friends and neighbors.  There was lots of work ahead, and the entire family was busy doing their part to ready the farmhouse for guests.

Next on her agenda were the pumpkins.  Earlier this year, Wiley planted a patch in a small area of the farm designated by her dad.  She was able to grow and harvest around a dozen pumpkins, and yesterday, had placed them on a long table in the barn.

In addition to the worktable, the barn housed tools and equipment needed to run the farm.  It was also used to store seeds, young plants, and saplings.  Wiley stood at the table examining her pumpkins while trying to decide the sort order.  She made a decision; from right to left, the pumpkins were arranged from smallest to largest.  Satisfied with the order, she said out loud: "Yeah!  The biggest one will be the centerpiece on our buffet table."

Her dad, sitting on a small tractor, drove into the barn, parked it, then shut off the engine.  "What are you doing Wiley?" he asked.  Wiley explained that she just arranged the pumpkins and will be decorating the house, starting with the smaller ones.  She grabbed the first two smallest pumpkins and headed out of the barn.  Her dad grabbed a few more and said, "Here, I'll help you."

After several more trips, only the two largest pumpkins were left on the table.  They were the most perfect having the classic pumpkin shape, very few scars, and with deep, rich orange coloring.  The pumpkin on the left was just slightly larger than the other.

In the quiet of the barn, the bigger pumpkin spoke and said: "At long last, after many months on the vine soaking up sun, water, and air, I have grown in strength and size.  I have safely endured an onslaught of savage animals, including our nemesis -- the rodents.  And after having been poked and prodded, and finally harvested, I am hardened, I am ripe, and I am ready.  I am a mighty pumpkin -- strong, solid, flawless.  I am Halloween personified.  All will gaze at me in awe as I inspire visions of ghosts and goblins.  I will bring pride to our farmer family as the grand All-hallows Eve centerpiece.  This is, after all, my dream."

"This, too, is my dream," said the smaller pumpkin but only half-heartedly.  This pumpkin did not originally have any aspirations as the All-hallows Eve centerpiece.  In fact, the thought had not crossed its mind until the bigger pumpkin explained its dream.  But since it was mentioned, the smaller pumpkin felt jealousy toward the other pumpkin.  "I have suffered and survived the season through the harvest, with my sole purpose of bringing joy to all through fright and fear.  But you are larger -- you, who grew on the strongest vine, who received more sun and water, who was carefully protected from our savage nemesis -- you were groomed to be perfect.  I, on the other hand, struggled to not only to survive, but to grow and be a contender for the grand Halloween ornament.  Here I am today, a large, round pumpkin, yet slightly smaller than you -- so not quite perfect, but no less deserving."

"Do not sulk or be agitated," responded the bigger pumpkin.  "You can sit by my side, but below me.  You can shine and scare, but not as well as I.  They will gaze at us both but will only attain fright upon witnessing my presence.  I, and not you, have that honor."

The smaller pumpkin, irritated at the other pumpkin's response, would not stand at being second to his neighbor.  His jealousy grew.  He thought for a minute and said, "That will not do.  I am perfect and more deserving."  The smaller pumpkin with all its might violently pushed the bigger pumpkin off the table.  The pumpkin fell, shrieking all the way down.  Upon hitting the ground, it exploded, leaving behind a splatter of broken orange flesh and gooey seeds.  "Now I am the perfect one," gloated the remaining pumpkin.

Wiley's elder sister, Greta, came into the barn.  "Ah," she said.  "There you are," pointing to the remaining pumpkin on the table.  She lifted the pumpkin and turned around to head back to the house.  Wiley came in and saw Greta, the pumpkin in hand, and the remains of another pumpkin on the floor being nibbled by mice, then said: "Where are you going with my pumpkin, and why did you trash the other one?"

"No idea how that one ended up on the floor," said Greta.  She continued, "But I need this one for mom and the buffet table."

Inside the kitchen, Greta, her mom, and several others were busy preparing and cooking food that would be featured in the buffet table.  Greta roughly sawed at the top of the pumpkin.  It was a slow process given her use of a dull, serrated knife.  Having removed the top, she began scooping its insides with a spoon, digging, and scratching deeply into the flesh.  After cleaning the interior, she grabbed a sharp kitchen knife and sliced the pumpkin into small cubes, carefully separating the flesh from the outer skin.  Throughout this 'preparation', the pumpkin screamed in agony, feeling each slice, cut, and scrape.  But its wails and screams were unheard as they were audible only to itself.  "This will make a delicious pumpkin soup," said Greta's mom.


Is there a spooky story from you in our cards?

Spel

[Lilias]

[Valerian]

I used to work graveyard front desk at a luxury resort hotel.  One night, around 10 pm, the swing shift managers were still there and I was manning the back office telephone answering guest questions. The phone rang from room 9325 (not the real room number.) "That's odd," I thought,, because at that time all the rooms in building 9 had been stripped down for an extensive remodel. There wasn't even a chair left in those rooms and the entire building was barricaded by 6 foot tall construction walls.

I answered the phone and it was silent on the other end. I hung up and informed my managers and they decided to go out to the building and make no one was in the building (for safety reasons).

They came back 20 minutes later, reporting that they hadn't found anything. But they were definitely nervous. They went home after 11 and my phone rang again. Same room. Same silence. This time I have to contact the “duty manager” or the only manager in charge of the resort at night.

He called security and his assistant to go up with him. I got a phone call from him a few minutes later saying that he was coming back and I should get out the crisis keys.  These are the only hard keys we have that will unlock the deadbolts on the doors when guests have locked themselves in the room.

When he got the keys, he told me that when he arrived at the room with security, the door was deadbolted and the connecting room door was also. He sat a security guard outside the door and the assistant by the connecting door while he went to get the keys from me. When he returned and unlocked the deadbolt, he tried to open the door but couldn’t because it felt like someone was holding it closed on the other side.

Finally the door gave way and slammed open -- revealing a completely empty room.

[Spookie Monster]

Thank you very much for the dolls and calls, Lilias and Valerian: More spooky and fun stuff!

In my last couple of posts I talked about taromancy.  Well, speaking of prognostication, I'm informed by the astrologers here at Elliquiy that Mercury remains retrograde until about midnight tonight.  As a consequence, any attempt to communicate -- posting most certainly included -- still carries with it the risk of misinterpretation...

Then again, couldn't the Season of the Witch also be considered the Season of Inversion, when the unexpected becomes the expected, when monstrosity becomes beauty, when dread becomes catharsis, when repulsion becomes attraction, when tricks become treats?  This peculiarity would only be reinforced during a change in cycles, when ends become beginnings and beginnings ends.  As we ourselves bid farewell to one cycle of thirteen years and welcome another, therefore, things must be especially turvy-topsy.

Yes!  This is doubtless the best time to post, not the worst.  Let us follow these steps, then, and find out where they lead...


The Thirteen Steps of Maltby Cemetery

The 13 Steps down to hell were located in Maltby Cemetery in Washington.  There used to be a staircase that began at ground level and descended down under the earth.  It was said to be low-grade entrance to the tomb of a wealthy local family.

According to the legend, you had to go to the cemetery late at night and walk down these 13 steps.  While descending the steps, you wouldn't be able to hear anything.  Once you had reached the bottom, if you turned around, you would be confronted by a vision of hell.

They say that the vision would drive you insane.  Those who watched people performing this ritual said that they witnessed the person stop at the bottom, turn around and then collapse to their knees in horror.  According to some reports, several children emerged nearly comatose from the steps; many of them never uttered another word.

The 13 steps no longer exist.  As the story goes, they were bulldozed or filled in with concrete years ago.  Since then, there have been severe No Trespassing limitations on the cemetery and even rumors of kids making expeditions late at night to Maltby Cemetery, armed with shovels, hoping to unearth the 13 steps down to hell.

As told by someone who dared to visit before the powers that be worked to hide the staircase:

"My girlfriend and I wanted to see this for ourselves.  You have to go down these thirteen steps and then you see a little chair.  If you sit in the chair it automatically means that you have sold your soul to the devil.  It sounds really creepy.  I was at church with my friend and his pastor said that he went there when he was 16 years old and it was the worst experience of his entire life.

"A group of us headed out to the cemetery in Maltby.  We made sure we got there as close to midnight as possible.  After about an hour of searching around in the dark, we finally found it.  The 13 steps.  In the moonlight, you couldn't see the bottom.  We tried using a flashlight and we still could not see the bottom.  It was frightening and one of the girls was so freaked out that she couldn't even look down into the staircase.  I decided I was going to go for it, but as I walked down the first two steps, I started to feel sick.

"After the next two steps, I felt light-headed.  When I got to the sixth step, I became so cold that I could barely breathe and I could hear muffled yelling and screaming.  I was not going any further.  I couldn't even take the next step.  When I turned to climb back up, I could feel something pushing on my back and I couldn't see out up to my friends clearly.  When I finally reached the top of the staircase, I realized the yelling and screaming were coming from my friends.

"They were screaming that I had disappeared when I went down.  I am six feet tall.  I couldn't have been out of sight after having only gone down halfway down.  Needless to say, we were all completely freaked out and got out of there as quickly as possible.  To this day, every now and then, I dream about the 13 steps that lead down to hell and I always wake up in a cold sweat."


Deeper and deeper we go.  Do you have a spooky story to share?

Spel

[Lilias]

[Valerian]

One night when I arrived for work my supervisor looked confused and asked me what I was doing there. I said 'I work tonight.' And he said, 'But they told me you called in a few hours ago saying that you were sick.' I was a bit confused and said 'It must have been someone else and they got the message wrong.' After everyone else showed up for work that night it was a bit more weird, but we carried on as usual and assigned everyone their places for the night; I went to work in the control room where I usually work. The control room is the center of the prison that has direct control over the cameras, doors, phones and everything.

After I relieved the guard on duty and settled in for the night, I looked at the message that said I called in. It said that I had called at 6:50 and said that I had gotten sick while out cleaning up after the storm. There had been a storm the night before and it was a bit bad, but not anything that I had to go out to clean up. It was truly weird.

The supervisor came into the control room about that time. He was also a friend of mine outside work and we started talking about the call and how odd it was. I decided to call my wife at home and tell her about it while he was still sitting there. I picked up the phone and dialed. After two rings a man picked up the phone and with a raspy voice said 'Hello?' I did not know what to say for a few seconds. I looked at the phone to make sure I dialed the right number, and I had. After a few seconds the person said 'Hello?' again in the same raspy voice. I said 'Hello. Who is this?'

'This is Taylor who is this?' the person said. My head started spinning because my name is Taylor also. I said in almost a scream 'Where is Ann?' He said 'Ann's in bed. Who is this?' I dropped the phone and told my supervisor to ring me out, I had to get home, and I took off toward the door. I could hear Dave pick up the phone behind me and say 'Hello?' followed soon after by 'What the fuck!' rather loudly. I ran to my car and drove home faster than what was legal, my mind racing the entire time. I busted through the door and my wife was sitting watching TV and was shocked at me being home. I asked her who was there and she said no one has been here. After a rather long talk with my wife, I went to call the prison to tell them what was going on, but the phone was dead.

I went back to work and when I came in Dave was acting weird and asked me 'How the hell are you doing this?' He told me that when I left, he picked up the phone and the person on the other end sounded like me. He freaked out and hung up the phone. A minute later as he could see my car leaving the parking lot, I had called back from home and asked what the hell was going on. He said that I sounded a bit irate and said I was sick and did not feel like playing these games and was telling him to stop prank calling me and hung up. After convincing him I had no idea what was going on we went back to work.

Later, I found out that the phone line for my area had been knocked down the night before by the storm.

[Spookie Monster]

Thank you so much, Lilias and Valerian!  Spooky!

"Good things come in small packages," they say, though many a trick-or-treater has contested the aphorism.  Less commonly mentioned is that evil things, too, come in small packages.  In that spirit, please don't enjoy the following thirteen-word story, which I'm adapting from here.


The Impostor

"Honey, monsters aren't real..."

Amusing.  She still thinks I'm her son.


Brief but bitter...

Spel

[Spookie Monster]

Certain social cycles, like days, months, and years, we develop from natural cycles.  Others, like weeks and centuries, we develop through intuition and reason.  Whether the cycles that we observe originate outside of us or within us, however, we often divide, punctuate, and balance them with holidays, traditions, and rituals.

Well, as you might remember, I've been endeavoring to instill episodes of old radio shows into our traditional rounds of storytelling -- to bring, as it were, a tradition into our tradition, a cycle into our cycle.  ("Yo Dawg...")  You can listen to the Quiet Please episode "The Thing on the Fourble Board" here; you can listen to the Suspense episode "Ghost Hunt" here; you can listen to the Suspense episode "The House in Cypress Canyon" here.  And now?  Now I'd like to offer you "Baker's Dozen," a 1948 episode of Quiet Please.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BzThLnNEJVg


Do you have a spooky story to share?

Spel

[Lilias]

[Spookie Monster]

Thank you so much, Lilias!  And I'm as pleased as punch that you brought up the matter of disagreeable endings...

The mazes of Chapel Perilous sometimes tease, sometimes menace, but always do they strive to deceive.  Every hint, however, suggests that we ourselves are finally close to our destination.  Let us take this opportunity, therefore, to talk about the end.  I'm not referring here to the end of the Season of the Witch, though; I'm referring to the end -- the end of everything.

As I was saying in this year's opening post, some scholars have concluded that the number thirteen was originally deemed unlucky because according to Norse mythology the trickster god Loki, an unwanted, thirteenth guest at a party being held by the gods in the dim mists of the past, contrived to have the god Baldr slain there and thus set us on the road to Ragnarök, the very end of the world.  But what exactly is Ragnarök, and how will it occur?  And will there be snacks?  Let's find out.


Ragnarök

Someday -- whenever the Norns, those inscrutable spinners of fate, decree it -- there shall come a Great Winter, the Fimbulwinter, unlike any other the world has yet seen.  The biting winds will blow snows from all directions, and the warmth of the sun will fail, plunging the earth into unprecedented cold.  This winter shall last for the length of three normal winters, with no summers in between.  Mankind will become so desperate for food and other necessities of life that all laws and morals will fall away, leaving only the bare struggle for survival.  It will be an age of swords and axes; brother will slay brother, father will slay son, and son will slay father.

The wolves Sköll and Hati Hróðvitnisson, who have hunted the sun and the moon through the skies since the beginning of time, will at last catch their prey.  The stars, too, will disappear, leaving nothing but a black void in the heavens.  Yggdrasil, the great tree that holds the cosmos together, will tremble, and all the trees and even the mountains will fall to the ground.  The chain that has been holding back the monstrous wolf Fenrir will snap and the beast will run free.  Jörmungandr, the mighty serpent who dwells at the bottom of the ocean and encircles the land, will rise from the depths, spilling the seas over all the earth as he makes landfall.

These convulsions will shake the ship Naglfar, the "Nail Ship," free from its moorings.  This ship, which is made from the fingernails and toenails of dead men and women, will sail easily over the flooded earth.  Its crew will be an army of giants, the forces of chaos and destruction.  And its captain will be none other than Loki, the traitor to the gods, who will have broken free of the chains in which the gods have bound him.

Fenrir, with fire blazing from his eyes and nostrils, will run across the earth, with his lower jaw on the ground and his upper jaw against the top of the sky, devouring everything in his path.  Jörmungandr will spit his venom over all the world, poisoning land, water, and air alike.

The dome of the sky will be split, and from the crack shall emerge the fire-giants from Muspelheim.  Their leader shall be Surtr, with a flaming sword brighter than the sun in his hand.  As they march across Bifröst, the rainbow bridge to Asgard, the home of the gods, the bridge will break and fall behind them.  An ominous horn blast will ring out; this will be Heimdall, the divine sentry, blowing the Gjallarhorn to announce the arrival of the moment the gods have feared.  Odin will anxiously consult the head of Mímir, the wisest of all beings, for counsel.

The gods will decide to go to battle, even though they know what the prophecies have foretold concerning the outcome of this clash.  They will arm themselves and meet their enemies on a battlefield called Vígríðr, the "Plain Where Battle Surges."

Odin will fight Fenrir, and by his side will be the einherjar, the host of his chosen human warriors whom he has kept in Valhalla for just this moment.  Odin and the champions of men will fight more valiantly than anyone has ever fought before, but it will not be enough: Fenrir will swallow Odin and his men.  Then one of Odin's sons, Víðarr, burning with rage, will charge the beast to avenge his father.  On one of his feet will be the shoe that has been crafted for this very purpose; it has been made from all the scraps of leather that human shoemakers have ever discarded, and with it Víðarr will hold open the monster's mouth.  Then he will stab his sword through the wolf's throat, killing him.

Another wolf, Garmr, and the god Týr will slay each other.  Heimdall and Loki will do the same, putting a final end to the trickster's treachery, but costing the gods one of their best in the process.  The god Freyr and the giant Surtr will also be the end of each other.  Thor and Jörmungandr, those age-old foes, will both finally have their chance to kill the other.  Thor will succeed in felling the great snake with the blows of his hammer, but the serpent will have covered him in so much venom that he will not be able to stand for much longer: He will take nine paces before falling dead himself and adding his blood to the already-saturated soil of Vígríðr.

Then the remains of the world will sink into the sea, and there will be nothing left but the void.  Creation and all that has occurred since will be completely undone, as if it had never happened.


All this and they'll be raising Netflix fees!  What is the world coming to?!  I ask you...

Nearly there, now, nearly there; have you a spooky tale to share?

Spel

[Valerian]

When I was a kid, my sister and I, and the neighborhood kids roamed pretty freely through the woods to the south.  The undeveloped land to the west, however, was forbidden by my mom, who just said, "People hunt back there sometimes." But those woods ended in a giant rock quarry with water in it, which was an absolute magnet to us kids. We desperately wanted to go.

One summer, when I was 8, my sister and a friend decided they were taking the neighbor’s dog and going to the quarry. When my mom got home an hour later, I told her and she immediately ran out the door when I told her where my sister had gone. A few hours later, my mom returned with my sister, who was sobbing.

My mom’s side of the story: My sister and the friend were not at the quarry. She was scared to death they’d drowned inside it. She’d gathered some more grownups who searched as my sister and her friend deliberately hid from them for a couple hours.

My sister’s side: They never made it to the quarry. The dog had growled and taken off running. They’d chased the dog, gotten turned around and, even though they could hear (and sometimes see) the highway to the north and knew they were heading back east, they kept ending up back where they’d started. They could hear the search party and could tell they were close, and they were screaming at the top of their lungs, but nobody could hear them. So they stayed in one spot until finally my neighbor’s dad came within sight. They said they’d been screaming up to the second he spotted them, but he didn’t hear them and was surprised to stumble upon them.

Flash forward to twenty years later. I’m working remotely from my parents’ house for Christmas, and my dad tells me they’re going to develop part of the area near the quarry into a subdivision. And he’s got a hankering to walk to the quarry. So we grab my parents’ dog Bean and head out.

We take a deer path from our back yard to a clearing and then move to the snowmobiling path that leads west to the quarry. We grab a florescent flag that some workers had used to mark something for utilities and stick it in the ground, right where the deer trail hits the clearing, so we can easily find it.

We walk for 30 minutes. We check Google maps, knowing we should be at the quarry by now, but our dots are going haywire and showing like we hadn’t moved an inch. I remark we have only about 45 min of daylight left, so we decide to go back. We return to the clearing.

Suddenly, Bean the dog (who has been in a reverie the entire walk, having the time of her life, and constantly cocking her head and staring off into the distance while making little guttural noises), takes off into the woods like a shot. She’s running in the direction of our house, though, so we decide that’s where we’ll go and hopefully meet her at home.

But the flag we placed by the deer trail is gone. We find it back near the middle of the clearing, where we found it originally. We figure a pissed-off utility worker must have happened by and moved it back. We walk the periphery of the clearing, and there’s no deer trail to be found. But the setting sun, highway, our phone compasses and the power lines make it really clear which direction is east. So we head into the woods. Eventually, we see our house’s window lights glowing through the trees. But we walk and walk and walk and get no closer. We lose the lights, only to find them again, just as far away.

Suddenly, the trees give way, and we're back in the clearing! Our house is up-hill, we’ve been walking up-hill the entire time, but somehow we’re back at the clearing down-hill.

We realign ourselves, and use my phone compass to make sure we do not stray from due east. My dad keeps an eye on our window lights. Suddenly, we get spit out into a yard.

My dad realizes it’s the back yard of a house in our subdivision. It’s several houses to the EAST of ours, and we’ve just entered the property from the east side. Not possible, given we were originating from the west, were using a freaking compass, and had eyes on our house’s big glowing picture windows the whole time.

Then, Bean suddenly bursts from the woods. Not scared, but looks like she’s seen something and is super hyped up. No way are we going back into the woods. We trespass through the neighbor’s property to the front, to the neighborhood street and take the street home. When we get to our house, we realize all our lights are off. We ask my mom if she’d turned the living room lights on at all, and she tells us she hasn’t, she’s been painting in the basement until she heard us come back in.

We tell her what happened. My mom sighs and says, "That’s why you don’t go to the west."

[Lilias]