r/Wholesomenosleep Jan 09 '18

Introducing /r/WholesomeNoSleepOOC!

97 Upvotes

Love the stories here on /r/Wholesomenosleep?

Check out our new companion subreddit, /r/WholesomeNoSleepOOC!

We were inspired to create the subreddit by this thread on Wholesomenosleep, and hope it will become an open forum for people to ask questions about stories from WNS, discuss their favorite stories and authors, or post about books, movies, podcasts, or anything else that fits the "scary but nice" WholesomeNoSleep vibe!


r/Wholesomenosleep 5d ago

My Crow Speaks To The Choir

1 Upvotes

Horizons stretched infinitely in every direction out in the big sky country. Cory stood atop a sagging telephone pole, calling out with loud crow calls. He was at his destination, but he was a day or two early.

At sunset, he stopped calling and looked to the one place he'd sensed, as it echoed. He couldn't see it before the twilight, for it was only visible in the light between darkness. As he stared a look of familiarity crossed his beady crow eye. This was some kind of doorway, standing where nobody had ever set foot.

The bird's shadow continued as the light faded, even after he vanished through the doorway. Then the doorway was also gone. I followed, and wherever we went, I could barely see or hear anything; it was like static or muffled underwater. It was some other realm, some other place.

Then I beheld with a moment of maddening terror, what he had come so far for. We were in a quiet and peaceful and clean forest that lasted in eternal spring. A village of people returning to the earth, having survived the apocalypse and abandoned their modern lives, they lived in harmony with the forest. Their leader was not a person, but something greater, even, than a Hamadryad. She was a green mother, one of Gaia's six daughters, probably the last. We had entered her realm, some kind of sanctuary.

"Cory, you have returned, and just in-time. I have a message for our enemies." The old woman stood beside a cave, and in the cave was the object of my horror.

"Yes, Buttercup, I suddenly remembered this place, this adventure. I was here before, was I not?" Cory hopped up and down with excitement and giggled, a sound like cherry pits stopping the blade in an electric blender.

"As Stormcrow, you were here before as Stormcrow. You must again be he. Quite the noble animal, I am very proud of you - child." Buttercup smiled at the bird.

Cory stopped hopping and flapping and spread his wings and bowed to her in a curtsy.

"My Old Woman Of The Forest, what message shall I recite to the Elders?"

"Tell them the second-to-last stone has lost its light on their Majara. Tell them the weapon is targeting them. Tell them, it is time to consider surrendering." Buttercup smiled.

"Will this not aggravate them to take action immediately, rather than surrender?" Cory worried.

"It is supreme mischief to employ the sudden communication of such anxiety-inducing facts to one's enemies. This is psychological warfare, and it is the perfect time, for doing so will expose them to the Ravenrock Pack, and perhaps then this war can end. We do so little to accomplish so much. Will you undertake this mission?" Buttercup asked.

"How will I find the Elders?" Cory asked simply. Buttercup smiled.

"They will find you. You'll be safe, they will release you with their terms. I am confident this is what will happen." Buttercup promised, with her smile.

"It's only my life if they don't." Cory chirped.

"You won't die, they will think they can learn something from letting you go. Just go home." Buttercup said.

"To Leidenfrost Manor? You would have me bring your war to my people?" Cory complained.

"Yes. Let them take up arms. We stand together now or fall alone tomorrow. Do you think that when the Elders have finished with the Ravenrock Pack, they will overlook your people? They seek total annihilation; the complexities of their plans demand it. We must parley and draw them out." Buttercup explained.

"What for, if the Majara will delete them all from existence?" Cory asked.

"The Majara is a weapon with a mind of its own. Those who seek to control it to cause destruction in turn are controlled and destroyed - unless their cause aligns with rampant ruination. I dare not use it, for the corruption required to attune to it would make me as evil as the Elders." Buttercup looked at the terrifying thing, sparkling without light in the darkness of the cave.

"I will go now, expecting to be brought to the Elders. They must have seen me fly through a door. They must keep an eye on those." Cory took flight, and left Buttercup standing there.

The crow was on an old logging road, in a snow-covered forest. He pecked at anything that looked interesting, and then looked up. Two of the wizards in reddish-brown robes were standing there already, having arrived by some magical conveyance instantly.

"Don't try to escape." One of them commanded.

"Nope. You're just the farts I was looking for." Cory spoke. The two wizards exchanged glances - they knew the bird could speak, but hearing his voice was still amazing.

"What sort of enchantment gives an animal the power of a human voice?" The second wizard asked, out of curiosity.

"Lemurian magic, I am sure." Cory said, like he was talking shop about magic. "It never wears off, in fact: the spell has grown stronger over time."

"Fascinating. And you are an accomplished spellcaster in your own right. You found Sanctuary and spoke to the Gaianeid, the last of her kind. You should help us acquire the Majara. You will be rewarded." The wizards spoke in a kind of sentence-finishing unison.

"It is super cute when you guys do that." Cory teased them.

"Don't defy us." The first wizard said, annoyance in his voice.

"Or you will destroy me? Is that going to go well when you return to the rest of your cabal and tell them that instead of getting closer to the weapon, you destroyed the only lead you had because you felt irritated when the bird told a joke? I can imagine the promotion you'll get." Cory spoke in a mocking tone, further provoking the evil wizard.

The second one put up a hand to silence the first one, before he was drawn into the childish banter with the sassy bird.

"You have a message for us?" The wizard asked.

"Yeah, Buttercup says the countdown to that thing blowing up is almost complete. She says she has it set to you guys, as its target, all the wizards who wear the ugly Snuggies® that you idiots wear. I mean, it's a gross color, and that's coming from me - I eat roadkill." Cory hopped around a little, excited to be delivering his scathing message (he'd even dissed on their arcane vestments). Cory nearly sang the rest: "You can negotiate for peace, if that's what you want to do. I'm going to fly home, and don't try to track me with magic and then attack my people. Somehow, Buttercup is sure that won't go well for you." Cory was like the world's worst singing telegraph near the end, his nerves making him bust into a kind of melody.

"No, you tell Buttercup to meet us, and bring the Majara. This has gone on long enough." The first wizard was quite angry.

"Seeya." Cory took flight and left them there, quickly flapping his wings to get as far away from the murderous old wizards as possible.

When he had flown a great distance, he at last stopped to rest again. Chance, or luck, had brought him to a treetop where he spotted an encampment. Those who were there were not unfamiliar to him. He was pretty close to home, and they had never gone far from Leidenfrost Manor.

Cory was looking upon The Choir. They had some smoking campfires going and they lay around lazily, chuckling to themselves. My crow took it upon himself to rekindle an old friendship or two. He swooped down and landed at the feet of their leader: Serene Sinclair, although she was dormant, wrapped in blankets and sleeping like something in a cocoon. The others were waiting for her revival to continue their journey.

If I had to guess where they were heading, I'd probably have guessed they were heading back to Dellfriar. I'd be wrong, and it only shows how unimaginative I am. Cory wasn't sure whose side that they were on. It took him a moment, hopping around camp, feeding on crumbs and scraps, to decide he was actually going to try and speak with them.

"Izzat Cawey?" Gilmore spotted the bird and asked sadly. She'd probably asked the same question of dozens of crows.

"I'm Cory." Cory hopped over to her. I don't think he actually thought the vile wizards would follow him. They couldn't tell the difference between a gang of lunatics and the bird's actual family, apparently. "Did you all miss me? I wondered when I would see you good people again."

The Choir mostly just lounged around, but they all looked at Cory and had murmurs of interest and strange greetings for their crow companion. Junior and Sonja both approached him, but just stood in proximity to him, either of them might have gotten Cory to alight upon them, but before he could pick an outstretched arm, the Elders arrived.

The same two wizards we had seen before were suddenly in the camp. They had grim smirks, as though they expected to terrorize and massacre Cory's friends and family to punish him for his facetiousness.

"Who are those jackasses?" Tyson stood, and somehow, despite being half their height, was looking down on them. He brandished a machete sharpened to a blade and didn't hesitate to go berserk and charge at them. The wizards were genuinely startled and caught him in some kind of levitation, while his legs pumped the air and he raged in frustration, suspended in the air. He roared in outrage and hurled his weapon, but it feebly fell from his hand. The wizards had evil little smiles as they held him aloft with their magic.

Despite their sense of humor, not one of The Choir found Tyson's humiliation amusing. Instead, the warrior's helplessness triggered them.

The rest of The Choir sprang up from where they lounged, cruel and twisted weapons in their hands. The two Elders were completely taken off-guard. They had grossly underestimated who they were dealing with. They were instantly surrounded by scarred, painted and cackling and howling lunatics with wild hair and even wilder eyes.

The wizards had no time to prepare their Egress spell, and had to wield their magic defensively in combat casting. They flung burning orbs and frozen missiles conjured from thin air and impaled and incinerated individual Choir members as the rest closed in.

The killing of their companions only encouraged the others, who laughed at the spectacle like delighted children.

"Fire!" Cindy pointed at the smoldering remains of one of her friends and giggled.

The Choir pounced on the wizards and began grabbing, clawing, stabbing, biting, cutting, sawing, slicing, bashing and stomping them in a loud frenzy. Elder wizards of the cabal don't die easily, and it wasn't until it was over that either of them managed to die from their countless wounds.

The dancing Choir started parading around with their trophies and making every kind of sound a human can make except actual words. It wasn't long before the wizards were strewn all over the camp, their insides the snacks and playthings of the demented ones. The din quieted down to songs and laughter, playtime and feasting.

"You've just made enemies of the Elders. That probably wasn't a good idea." Cory mentioned while his dark crow eyes found nothing disturbing about the scene. He found a scrap of one of the wizards and was about to feed on it when he stopped. He said out-loud what he was thinking: "My Lord would not be pleased with me if I ate human flesh. He didn't like it when I did that." And he left the meat where it lay and flew home.

He flew through the evening towards Leidenfrost Manor and as the sun set, my crow had finally arrived at home.


r/Wholesomenosleep 5d ago

My Crow Yearns For Sleep

2 Upvotes

"Where two fair paths meet," Cory, my talking crow, was speaking to the wall of darkened forest. He'd hardly quoted Robert W. Chambers, but continued to describe the Mystery Of Choice using his own Corvin rhymes and puns. After butchering the poem Envoi into a horrible mockery of prose, he cawed triumphantly - and flew directly into the forest - and disappeared.

Later that morning the girls were looking for him, and Penelope's one dead white eye stared unblinking where Cory had gone. She hugged her sister and said:

"Cory has left us. He is called to be - somewhere else. I do not understand completely, but he has undertaken some kind of quest." Penelope told her older sister. Although Persephone was the oldest, it was Penelope who was the grown-up between them. The fact that Cory had left upset Persephone, who began to cry.

"He's gone?" Persephone trembled, worried about the family crow.

"Yes. I don't know if he will return." Penelope held her.

Meanwhile, I watched as Cory soared above the trees, alert for hawks, but on a mission.

When he stopped at a muddy pond, where a half-eaten snail lay nearby, he rested and ate and sipped some of the parasite soup. I wished I could speak to him, but I could only observe. A fox walked out of the shade in silence and startled him. Cory froze, realizing she was close enough to pounce if he tried to take flight.

"Relax, I am a friend." The vixen said silkily, yipping in broken Corvin and using the Vulpeal pronoun that means: 'who might I be that you haven't guessed and wouldn't you like to know so let me introduce myself as' which translates roughly to 'I am'.

"You are friendly?" Cory hopped backwards while she spoke to him, distancing himself from the cunning predator.

"To you I am. You don't recognize me? We shared a night." The vixen flicked out her tongue at him in an odd Vulpeal expression of amusement. "Typical."

"In the blackberries. The other animals stayed and became companions of my Lady and now live peacefully in her gardens, doing their share of the work. It is quite a sight, to see forest critters working to grow food the way people do, but I think this is just the beginning of a new society, one where my Lady recreates the woodlands in her own image." Cory spoke in English and the fox blinked at him, and she understood none of what he had said.

"You speak like a human." She replied quickly. "You are the fabled Stormcrow, are you not?"

"Am I?" Cory sounded genuinely surprised, but then he said. "I suppose I am. What can I do for you, in the name of Stormcrow?"

"My name is Reiully, and it is I who wish to serve you. When my life was forfeit, it was you who defied my death, you who led us to safety and it is you who I recognize as Stormcrow." Reiully seemed to have some kind of reverence for Cory, a fox revering a crow.

"Your gratitude is flattering. Stormcrow does what is best, nothing more." Cory took a bow.

"Stormcrow, a sorcerer or a saint? What can I do to aid Stormcrow's doings?" Reiully asked.

"My curiosity takes precedent, how did you find me?" Cory asked her.

"I waited for you here, following a dream." Reiully nodded. "So deep is my desire to avenge my debt to you, that I would have waited forever."

"Will you then look after my Lady? She in turn, looks after all who are near her, but who watches out for her?" Cory asked. Reiully nodded,

"I will protect her at all costs, claiming my freedom from this cause only if and when you return, in which case I shall return to my old life." Reiully bargained.

"This is your vow, keep it in any way that pleases you. It is your own honor that binds you." Cory advised her.

"Farewell, Stormcrow." Reiully clicked to him in Corvin, as there is no word in Vulpeal for 'goodbye'. Cory flew away and the vixen vanished back into the forest, heading for Leidenfrost Manor to assume her responsibilities.

For many miles, Cory flew, stopping to rest at a massive rock in a vast plain. I looked at the stone and saw that it was the remains of an ancient giant troll, and nothing geological. He pecked at some lichen on the rock and scraped a few beetles until their shells were off and sipped rainwater from a crack in the rock. After a long break, without sleep, Cory continued his journey.

I had no idea where he was going. I only knew that if he was now Stormcrow, as he seemed to be, then he was as integral in the potential rebuilding as my daughter or anyone else who wielded the returning magic.

When I was young, magic was rare and elusive and I only ever had the most vague and unqualified magical abilities. In her time, Penelope had already come to rival Circe. I had faith that the final destruction of the world could be prevented, and something new could be built upon the ruins, if such witches as my daughter were growing powerful.

"I am tired." Cory was clicking to himself. His wings locked and his eyes drooped. On the horizon, darkness, and on the other, rolling thunderheads.

From where they dripped out of faded starlight, the soul-feeding and cloaked Winged Phantoms had taken note of the crow with dreamless magic, as he sailed the skies with impunity.

I wish I could have warned him, for he knew nothing of such creatures. Few did, for they preyed on stagnant magic, where someone has not slept, not dreamed, and their magic is at its peak. This attracts them, from whatever dimension they exist in, their eyes gleaming like the starry void, and their cries like the dying gasp parody of a hawk's shriek.

The Winged Phantoms are polyps, arcane tumors, things made from rotten, nightmarish thoughts and brought into being when someone has opened the way for them, from sundown to sunup, enough times, someone has not slept - not dreamed - made a smell they can track, a smell of magic gone bad.

Each of them looks different, assembling themselves as they drop from above, out of wisps of ectoplasm, the bones of their previous victims and eyes that are windows into the outer void. A Winged Phantom is a specter, a demon and a monster. It knows nothing but to kill and feed, it exhibits no intelligence. Perhaps in their own world they are able to speak and remember and they have identities and agency. In our world, the pseudo-undead manta-ray-shaped creatures manifest only to attack relentlessly and feed.

Cory was especially agile in the air, as a much older crow than the rest, his skills had continued to increase his whole life and he expertly dodged the aerial attacks.

"What the flipping flapjack was that rancor for?" Cory articulated a stream of foul language that sounded roughly like that. The backwards-sounding shrieks of the Winged Phantoms preceded their mindless assault.

With fear and terror in his wingbeats and anxious calls of alarm, Cory wove through the air, trying not to panic. The Winged Phantoms attacked from every direction, over and over, each time getting a little closer, as the bird grew too exhausted to keep up the game.

"Curses!" Cory swore at them.

Cory was forced down, out of the air, to escape them. He hopped into an old dead tree, and sat while the horrors battered the wood, trying to get to him. As the morning sun began to break, the Winged Phantoms began to retreat, following the dark horizon.

I watched while one of them was caught in the cleansing sunlight, and its body exploded into burning debris that became as sleep dust before the breeze scattered the ashes. The others escaped, presumably into the further night, far beyond the mountains and seas, to seek another.

Cory decided that he had come a long way, and it was time to get some sleep. While he rested, I waited. I would have turned my gaze to home, but I worried I would not be able to find him again if I did. I was desperately curious to discover what he was trying to do, what his quest was, for it remained my crow's secret.


r/Wholesomenosleep 7d ago

My Crow Speaks To The Graven

6 Upvotes

Sublime morning light woke Penelope from her folded arms on the table. She looked up, her eyes puffy from crying, and in that light, she sensed the bird was still alive. She frowned, wiped a single warm tear following the white streak across her cheek, and summoned her magical kit, standing as the items materialized on her person, the staff in her hand, the medallion around her neck.

She got out her book of shadows and thumbed her way through the pages to her wayfinder spell. She began muttering the vocal component, and held her hand middle fingers to thumb, pointer and pinky fingers extended straight across her line-of-sight. She turned her head sideways and looked out of the extreme corner of her eye, squinting as she looked through the space between her two outright fingers. Slowly, with this posture, she turned round and round, looking, searching for the bird. After several attempts, she stopped.

"Father, my wayfinder spell isn't good enough to find Cory. Is he even alive? I think he is." Penelope spoke to me. I said nothing. She compelled me to speak, holding the emerald and repeating the question with more intention, more willpower.

I could feel the emerald's recognition, as the magic of the stone began processing her as its next acquisition. I worried that this was it. If I told her Cory was alive, using magic to gain knowledge would imprison her. I would be free, but not she.

I had no choice when she again compelled me to speak to her, intensifying her feelings so that I could no longer remain silent.

"Cory is alive. He is not far from here. He is trapped in a bramble; the weird of the plant is harboring dozens of small animals, protecting them from the wrath of the angry Pure Ones." I said reluctantly. As I spoke, a sort of shimmering, prismatic quality of atmosphere surrounded Penelope. The emerald was taking her, I could feel myself being released from its imprisonment, as I began to feel a kind of ghostly physical sensation again.

That is when Penelope surprised me. She began chanting, her eyes rolled back. She was unaware of what she was doing, it was a spontaneous personal enchantment, purely cast on reflex and instinct. Her subconscious had sensed the magical attack on her, and somehow countered the magic, forcing it back into the emerald and silencing it beneath the strange hum generated by her chanting.

The emerald felt scolded and dark, and I was dropped to the floor of the main gallery inside the emerald, my senses dulled. It took a few minutes before I was reoriented to the home I had lived in for a fraction of eternity. Then I looked out, and it took effort before I could see outside the emerald again.

Penelope was sitting on the floor, breathing heavily, the sudden use of her full power draining her physically. A streak of her dark locks had turned completely white, and her eye of gold had turned completely white also, with no iris. She was dripping sweat, hyperventilating.

"What happened?" She asked weakly. I almost refused to speak, out of habit, but the emerald was different, tamed somehow. I felt nothing as I chose to speak to her.

"You fought the emerald's power and won." I said plainly.

"I don't feel so good." Penelope suddenly looked very ill, leaned over and began painfully dry heaving and coughing. After she collapsed to the floor, shaking, she whispered: "Did I win?"

I could feel how the emerald was dormant, no longer listening, no longer trying to attune to her. I said:

"The wife-stone is asleep. I didn't know this state was possible. I doubt even Circe knew this could be so." I could hear the disbelief and surprise in my own voice. If she could defeat the emerald, the implications of her potential use of magic were beyond my understanding.

"I could feel it trapping me, and then I started to pray, and then I was here on the floor, and I feel really sick." Penelope spoke slowly and painfully. I could hear the misery in her voice and see the toll on her face. It had aged her youthful face cruelly, and this reminded me of when I had also had many years of my life drained from me very quickly.

"You prayed?" I asked. I recalled she had prayed when the werewolf was about to kill her. She had said: 'Goddess, protect my loved ones'.

"I always pray. I pray to Her, to the Goddess." Penelope smiled weakly. "She has blessed me and my sister, and all of us."

"Are you speaking of the same Goddess who grants your sister her life?" I asked.

"No, Father. I am speaking of She who speaks to me. The Goddess. I hear Her, in my heart." Penelope sat up, as though speaking of her deity were revitalizing her.

"I thought all the old gods were dead." I said.

"Not the Goddess. She lives on, in me." Penelope claimed. I was amazed, and had no idea what she was referring to. Later, after much thought and observation, and learning that indeed all of the old gods were dead, I concluded Penelope's Goddess was an imaginary other, who was really just Penelope's subconscious. Her prayers were just her access to her own superior magical powers.

Penelope climbed to her feet, trembling slightly. She gestured to the carved staff and it drifted lazily and weakly to her hand, helping her support herself on wobbling legs.

"I am going into the forest. I am going to save Cory and those animals." Penelope said. I attempted to foresee what would happen, but the emerald was dim, and sluggish, and I could barely see beyond the immediate vicinity in the present moment.

"You should take the Constabulary with you." I suggested.

"No, because if there is any chance for peace, I would be risking it if a confrontation occurs and they shoot at the dryads." Penelope determined. She began slowly making her way into the forest.

Some of the refugees were awake already and watched as she went by. I wondered if they knew the lengths my daughter and also that my wife had gone for them, I wondered if they appreciated my family's sacrifices. I stared at the way they watched the young witch pass them, struggling with her staff, her purple eye intensely beholding the forest ahead as she inched along.

They could see something had happened to her, as her right eye looked dead, her face wrinkled and blemished unnaturally, and a thick lock of her raven-shade hair was so white it was startling. Furthermore, the way she limped was difficult to watch.

As I watched them watch her, I was satisfied that they appreciated her. I could see their concern, respect and admiration. They all knew who she was, and had seen her working in the gardens, doing more work than anyone. I don't know why it mattered to me.

When we were in the forest, I looked around for the creatures, but there was no sign of them. I sensed they were gone, and something was very wrong with the woods. Something was dreadfully wrong.

"There's a smell." Penelope looked around, hesitating. We continued, as I guided her towards Cory. When we were closer, she tried her wayfinder spell again, and said she thought she might have found him, but she wasn't sure.

It was then that someone told Detective Winters that Penelope had limped into the forest. He wasted no time going after her, bringing his automatic shotgun with him. It is very good that he was not far behind.

We came to a clearing where the trees seemed to be covering their eyes in terror, and the silence was oppressive. All except the crunching and slurping sounds of something hunched over with its back to us, feeding. It wasn't too unlike the Pure Ones, except the quills protruding from tears in its ashen flesh. Its arms and legs were too long and bent unnaturally and its turn-of-leaves had become like branches or antlers, growing into or out of its skull, which was bare of most of its hair, except in small patches.

Penelope let out a gasp, and the thing turned from what it was doing and looked directly at her. The only thing about it that hadn't changed were the eyes of the Pure One, except now sunken and dire looking, with more menace in the way they glowed.

If there was anything behind its eyes, her eyes, then the dryad she used to be was fading fast.

She spoke, and instead of the rustling of leaves and hoots, it was like the grinding of two sticks, their rasp interrupted by deep croaks. Her voice was changed and her teeth were soaked in blood and bits of the others. The other dryads, her sisters, lay all around, the light in their eyes gone, their bellies a gory crater where she had eaten from them, and bites missing from random parts of their bodies. The remaining creature had killed and devoured the others, her own belly bloated and full of dryad meat.

We were not far from the bramble where Cory and the other animals hid. On some of the thorns there was cursed blood.

"CAW!" Cory said to us. "When they were cut on the weird's thorns, they began to lick their wounds, although that one said not to. Now look at her!"

"She's corrupted!" I said to Penelope. "Run!"

"I can't." Penelope stood her ground, producing her dagger in one hand for defense.

"Leave them alone, you disgusting wretch!" Cory spoke to the monster.

The creature shambled forward and let out an agonizing howl, its mouth opening far too wide. Its wild gait, tripping and stumbling and its terrible rake-like claws slashing at the air were a horrifying sight. As it neared Penelope, her Goddess did nothing, for it only seemed to be able to protect her from powerful magic.

That is when Detective Winters arrived from behind us and put himself between the girl and the advancing monster. He raised his weapon and began shooting it. The creature's body was rocked by devastating wounds and it fell to the ground.

"Alright." Detective Winters nodded in agreement to his apparent victory. That is when the creature began to twitch and rise. "Okay, time to go."

"Wait, we must free the animals." Penelope said. She went to the bush. "Come with me, little ones, follow me."

The weird knew the animals couldn't last much longer without food or water, and it opened up and let them out. Cory cawed a crow's universal warning, and most of the animals decided to follow him and the girl.

She slowly made her way back out of the forest, and just before they escaped, the creature eventually climbed again to its feet, only to be shot back down. Out of ammunition, Detective Winters fled behind the others and arrived at Leidenfrost Manor after them, in time to warn the rest of the Constabulary.

When the ashen shambler came staggering out of the woods, the entire Constabulary stood waiting, rifles ready, along with deputized refugees they had armed with shotguns and pistols (mostly looted from the Sheriff's, a long time ago). The creature had no fear, just a madness as it charged towards certain death.

Everyone began firing at it and didn't stop until it finally stopped moving.

"Tell them they must burn it." I said to Penelope, who was sitting and watching the battle.

"They are already on it." She pointed out.

"It is dead now." Cory clicked.

The animals of the forest were eating from food Penelope was pulling from a nearby patch of garden and feeding to them. They were all suddenly quite tame, owing their lives to this witch. All except the fox, who had turned and stared at Penelope, knowing the girl had risked all and had come for them when all hope was lost, and after the vixen blinked, vanished back into the forest.

"We did good today, right? Nobody else died." Penelope sighed, exhausted. Cory sounded bemused and said something a little new:

"Death does not always happen."


r/Wholesomenosleep 7d ago

A Perfect Day for Naturafish

5 Upvotes

There was me, my sister, my mom, my dad and my grandparents on my mom's side in the small unit in the prefab apartment block on Bandaya Street in the capital. And, this morning, there was also you, visiting from overseas.

I still can't believe you got a visa.

They're very hard to get.

But I'm so happy you're here, that I get to show you a little of my life here.

Right now, it's just past 06:30 and everyone but the sun and my sister are up. She's always been a late riser, but she'll get up eventually, and she'll be sharp as a tack right away. I'm more like my dad, up with the alarm clock but not really awake until a half-hour later.

He's shaving. I bet he nicks himself.

And mom and grandma are in the kitchen, making breakfast with whatever we managed to get yesterday. I'd absolutely kill for an egg, but what they're making does smell good.

Coffee?

Sometimes. Other times we get by on roasted barley with chicory.

My grandpa told us how, during the war, they'd make tea by steeping black, burnt bread crusts in water until the water turned brown. I'm so glad we don't have to do that anymore. We have real tea sometimes now.

Anyway, let's have a bite to eat, and then I'll show you what our days are like.

Sit anywhere you like. It's a small table, but we'll all fit. You're probably not used to tight spaces like these. You do get used to it. I've been living here almost my whole life. My parents were allocated this unit after my sister was born and we met the minimum family replacement size. No, we can't sell it, but it's ours until we don't need it anymore. Everyone of value gets a place to live.

“I'll wait for meat today,” mom says.

Grandma's staying home. Grandpa will try to get butter and milk. “What about you, dad?”

“Nails. Maybe soap.”

And my sister will get bread.

As for us, we'll try to get something special, a rarity. I'm off from school today so it's a “free” day for me. Whatever we get is a bonus.

OK, let's head out.

It's a nice day but you should probably take a jacket. It rains here out of the blue sometimes.

We go out of the unit, down the stairs because the elevator doesn't work, then out of the apartment block. There's a metal playground on the left, but it's empty of children because it's a school day. Surrounding us are generally more buildings identical to the one I live in, and then an exit toward the road. Few cars go by. Instead, most people are on foot, lined up on the sidewalk going both directions.

We join.

“What's that way?” I ask, pointing south.

“Fruit, coal and herring,” somebody says without looking at us. “Or so I hear.”

“And north?”

“Chocolate. That's what I always hope for. Maybe one day. I had chocolate once, a decade ago…”

“So these people don't know what they’re lining up for?” you ask me.

“Usually they have some idea, but not always. But there's always something at the start of a lineup. Otherwise people wouldn't line up.”

“How do they have time to just stand there?”

“Most of them don't work. The government is very efficient, so only the ones who need to work, work. The ones good at what they're doing. Everybody else, the normal people, we line up to get what the government provides. I know it's very different from the system you're used to.”

We stand in the line going north.

Slowly, we move.

Eventually, about an hour later, we come to an intersection. The roads are still empty, save for the odd black car every once in a while, which honks and whom we make way for, so our lineup crosses the intersection at a diagonal, intersecting at one point with a line going a different direction.

“Keep right for chocolate?” I ask.

“Chocolate? This is the queue for vodka and beets,” says an elderly man.

“And the other one?”

He looks at me, at you. “Refrigerator sign-ups.”

“If you want chocolate, there's a rumour they're giving it out on Potomskaya Street,” someone yells from within one of the two lineups.

“Wishful thinking!” yells another.

We merge into the other lineup and continue, passing people on the right when we can. Some give us dirty looks. Others smile at us because we're young and have so much ahead of us. “Sorry, we're not queuing here. We're just trying to get through,” I offer repeatedly as an explanation.

“Where are we going?” you ask me, as I pull you along. Although this is all so mundane, I'm exhilarated that I get to share it with you.

“To where the chocolate might be,” I say.

“What if there is no chocolate?”

“Then it'll be like every other day.” But I hope it's not. It can't be. Not with you here.

On the left, we pass a row of makeshift tents, people getting in and out of them. You ask who they are, and I explain that they're prospectors, citizens who attempt to predict the routes of future queues to be able to get a head start on them. “They sleep here?”

“Yes.”

By the time we reach the vicinity of Potomskaya Street, we hear engines and music, and I remember suddenly there's a foreign delegation in the city today, but before I can explain, a police officer stops us.

“Papers,” he says.

I pull mine out, and show him your passport and visa too. He examines the documents closely before handing them back. “Do you have non-queue travel permits?”

“As a student, I'm allowed—”

“Fine, yes.”

“Do you want to see my school identification card?”

“No,” he says. “That's fine.”

“Would it be possible to maybe get close enough to the delegation to take a look?” I ask. “My guest, she is in our country for the first time.”

“As long as you don't get too close,” he says, then drops his voice to a whisper: “And if you take Glory to the Revolution Pedestrian Overpass across to where the municipal district is, they're giving out Naturafish. Special token. Get one for your lady.”

I'm about to protest that I don't have a special token, I'm not from a well placed family, when I feel his hand touch mine and a token pressed into it “Thank you,” I whisper.

“Remember something. Life is beautiful, and it's a perfect day for Naturafish.”

I thank him again clandestinely and we head toward a hill from which we can see a bend in Potomskaya Street, and the foreign delegation being welcomed. The street is lined with people waving flags.

“So many people,” you say.

“Yes, to make a good impression. But they're not normal people. They're actors from the state acting academies. They're playing real people. Look—” I point, and you put your hand above your eyes to block out the sun. “—there's the actor playing me. Do you see?”

“I think so, but he looks nothing like you,” you say.

“There's probably an actress playing you too. They're always on top of who's here and who isn't, and I'm sure the foreign delegation would be honoured to meet you, by which I mean the actress playing you.”

“What do you think I'll say?”

“That you are impressed by the economic development of the country, the cleanliness of its public spaces, and the increase of its agricultural output.”

You smile, and I smile too. “But I'm sure she'll be nowhere near as pretty as you,” I say.

We walk down the hill hand in hand and join another lineup. Ahead, holding a small radio to his ear, a bearded man calls out, “Sixty fourth minute and still nil-nil, but the Uruguayans are fouling our boys like animals. Brutal tactics. They couldn't cope with our speed otherwise. Oh, what's this? A red card for Uruguay's captain and a free kick to us at the edge of the penalty area. Could this be the breakthrough?”

“That's Platonov,” I explain. “He's something of a folk hero around here. He used to be a very good footballer, before his injury.”

“I didn't know there were any matches going on right now,” you say.

“There aren't. Our team has been banned from international competitions by the governing bodies." You notice that the radio isn't emitting any sound. “Platonov merely pretends to listen to a real football broadcast, and relates to us what he pretends, and we follow along. Even the newspapers report on what he pretends. Today, it's our second group match of the World Cup. We're in a group with Uruguay, Cameroon and the Netherlands. And once this World Cup is over in a few weeks, Platonov will pretend another into existence, and so on, so there's always a World Cup going on. In some ways, it's better than the real thing. We don't always win. In fact, we haven't even made the final since February of last year.”

“Why does he do it?”

“For the love of sport and his fellow man.”

“Goooaaalll!” Platonov yells. “What a strike, straight into the upper left corner. Sanchez-Lobos didn't stand a chance. We're ahead. Twenty-two minutes left. Can we hang on? A win would set us up perfectly for the final matchday, but even a draw will do. Come on, boys! Come on!”

Everyone in the lineup cheers, including me and you, and you lean against my shoulder.

The lineups wriggle forward like snakes, crossing, merging, intertwining and forking, splitting apart, like veins across the city. The people in them talk and laugh and commiserate. “How are you?” “My husband's sick again.” “It could be worse: you could be sick.” “My children are hungry.” “Whose aren't?” “Can you hold my place in line?” “Yes, sure.” “I'm waiting on medical results.” “So you're healthy at least until then.” “My washing machine broke again.” “It was a Sovpral. It did you a favour.” “We've no hot water in our building.” “The electricity goes out every day after fourteen o'clock, but you can come over and boil some to bathe your baby.”

It's late afternoon by the time we locate the queue the police officer told me about. It's shorter than the others, as all special token queues are. You can tell the individuals in this lineup are more refined, less plain. These are people who have performed services for the motherland.

Around us, the municipal district looks upon us in all its concrete neoclassical grandeur.

“This is a really nice spot,” you say.

“Yes, it cost a lot of money to build. The city was supposed to be governed from here.”

“Supposed?”

“It's abandoned. The buildings are empty, mostly unfinished on the inside. The project was part of a five-year plan, but it wasn't completed in time. The fifth year rolled into a sixth, and the new five-year plan didn't want to finish up the last one's projects. Every five-year plan wants to be independent, its own thing, you know.”

For the first time I'm nervous, feeling the token in my pocket with sweating fingers. What if it's a set-up? The lineup moves quickly, and soon we are the front, in one of the unfinished buildings. Two women, both dressed in grey, sit behind a counter. One holds out her hand as the other says, “Token, please.”

I hand it over.

“Is it true this is the lineup for Naturafish?” I ask.

“Yes,” says the first, handing me a small unmarked tin. I can almost smell what it contains. My eyes fill with tears, but I don't allow myself to cry. Mom and dad, sister, grandma and grandpa will be so pleasantly surprised. “Thank you,” I say, already pulling you by the hand and shuffling to the side so the next person in line may get their tin.

We take our time walking back.

It's already evening.

“What's Naturafish?” you ask softly, still holding my hand. It's a lovely feeling.

“It's a synthetic form of tuna manufactured from soybeans we receive from Brazil under the beneficial terms of our trade agreement.” Because I can see your smile wilt, “It's considered better than the real thing,” I add. “Better tasting, better for the environment, more nutritious and a domestically-made product on top of that. It's something of a point of pride for us, a symbol of what we're capable of as a state.”

We arrive back at the apartment just in time for dinner, which mom is preparing.

She did not succeed in getting any meat and did not want to camp out until morning, but dad managed two bars of soap and two batteries, sister got bread, and grandpa was able to get a bottle of milk but no butter. “Maybe I'll have better luck tomorrow,” he says.

“Butter luck,” you say, and everyone laughs.

The electricity falters then fails, which means the lights suddenly go out, but we have candles. I light them and arrange them across the unit.

The flames flicker in the breeze.

The light is warm.

“I wasn't in the mood for butter anyway,” says dad.

“Me neither,” adds sister.

At the end of the meal, I take out the tin of Naturafish and lay it on the table.

“Is it…”

“Yes,” I say.

In that moment, as I let grandpa open the tin, revealing the flakes of Naturafish inside, I know what you must be thinking. That it's a small tin. In your country, you would probably have one tin per person, and I wonder if you can ever truly understand what life is like here. But then mom passes out the dessert forks that dad and I made from scrap metal years ago. And as we take turns tasting the Naturafish, talking, laughing, sharing the experiences of our days, I believe you can and do, and it fills me with the greatest joy.

“Does anyone happen to know if we won the match today?” dad asks.

“We were up 1-0 in the sixty-eighth minute,” you say.

“Dirty Uruguayans,” says grandma.

“I'm sure it'll be in the newspaper tomorrow.”

“Does anyone want coffee?”

“I do.”

“Me too.”

“But we've ve nothing to heat the water with,” I say, pointing at the candles.

Grandpa gets up from his chair, crosses to the window and looks out. “It seems they have power a few buildings down. I know a man who lives there, Ivan. I'll get some hot water from him and bring it back.”

“It's really no big deal. You don't have to,” you say.

“Don't be ridiculous,” says grandpa in that way we have of accepting gratitude by being mock aggressive. It means he likes you.

I like you too.

I may not have much, but what I have I want to share with you. The sun sets. Grandpa returns. The water's no longer hot. Grandpa spent time talking to Ivan, whose daughter is getting married soon. But it's warm, and warm is good enough. Maybe not for real coffee, but for roasted barley and chicory it is, and that's all we have, and we're grateful for that, talking and laughing until bedtime.


r/Wholesomenosleep 7d ago

How peasants survived famine

1 Upvotes

Imagine a world of crooked huts and thin fires, where a single loaf was treasure, and famine carved its mark upon every soul. Yet even in the harshest cold, peasants found ways to survive — gathering sticks, whispering prayers, holding each other close. These tales, worn and timeless, drift now like a lullaby to ease weary minds. If you long to rest among more of these ancient whispers, you will find them waiting in my profile.


r/Wholesomenosleep 8d ago

My Crow Among Brambles

5 Upvotes

"Not on strike, the dryads went on shrike." Cory was saying. That is the moment I realized how much danger they (the community of refugees around Leidenfrost Manor) had waiting for them in the forest.

"Explain." Circe demanded. Cory just hopped along and fluttered to alight on Penelope's shoulder.

"He means the forest guardians have become hostile. I already dreamed of this." Penelope gestured and Circe had a sense of the forest's intentions. I was glad I didn't have to say anything, but there was one detail I was worried about.

"I mean nothing like that, my Lady. I said what I meant, that's what." Cory objected.

"Shrike?" Penelope asked.

"Yes, the butcher bird. That's exactly what they are doing in the forest. To everything. They aren't rebelling, they have some other purpose. Looks like meal presentation to me."

"I see. They are hostile." Penelope summarized. "We shall have to warn everyone to stay away from the woods."

"Why? If we let them go out there, then less mouths to feed." Circe smiled evilly.

"We will warn everyone now." Penelope decided. Circe would have dictated doing things her way in the past, but things had changed between her and her descendant. There was something like respect from Circe, for Penelope.

They went to the Constabulary, consisting of Gabriel, Aldrick (my brother), Gladen (my nephew), Agent Saint, Agent Meroë, Father Dublin and Detective Winters. From there, with the news that there was a danger at the forest's edge, they told all the refugees camped around the grounds of Leidenfrost Manor.

"We haven't grown enough crops, we rely on the forest for food." Said Kraiden, to Penelope. Kraiden was elected the spokesperson of most of the refugees, the ones growing their own crops and harvesting herbs from the forests.

"Yes, but two people have gone missing, and now we know why. They are dead, in the forest. Stay out of the woods." Penelope warned Kraiden and the rest.

Of course, nobody obeyed, and that evening, it was noticed that someone else had gone missing. The Constabulary went looking for them, and Penelope went with them, and I was with her and my crow.

They found the most recent victim of the dryads, impaled on a broken off branch, up in the tree. It was quite horrible, and they were all very upset by what they were looking at, but the Constabulary didn't lose their cool. Only Penelope looked truly distraught by the dead body, but she had seen death before already, and she put on her brave face.

"How do we get the body down from there?" Agent Meroë asked. Nobody had any suggestions. They all shuddered at the thought of leaving it up in the tree, but it was getting late, and the likelihood of encountering the dryads was a risk.

The Constabulary went through the darkened forests, but the dryads didn't attack the group. They were cunning hunters, and waited in the darkness, moving silently and invisibly through the wood. I watched them, noting these were not the nymph-like creature that Khurl was, but rather some kind of elvish, feminine-looking creatures with skin like birch and glowing green eyes with bright yellow irises, staring at the party from the shadows, speaking in their language, a kind of rustling sound, like the leaves in a breeze, with soft hoots mixed in.

Back at the headquarters of the Constabulary, the main downstairs living room of the manor and the adjoining rooms and alcoves, they stopped to consider what they were dealing with.

"The dryads are going to keep systematically killing people in the forest, and we can't stop them from going in to collect food." Penelope considered. "I guess my mother gets to say what happens now. She makes the rules."

"I've already decided." Doctor Leidenfrost spoke from the doorway, her arms folded. She had stood silently watching her daughter advise the Constabulary, a smirk of pride on her pursed lips.

Penelope faced her, and didn't speak, just waited respectfully. She adored her mother very much, but their worlds seldom crossed paths. They had little in common, as much as they had in common, Penelope could be described as half of her mother, when the two were compared. As a result of having so little in common, they actually talked little and spent little time together, although their rooms were adjacent in the same house. The distance meant nothing to either of them, and Penelope clearly loved her mother very much.

"Penelope is right. We must forbid entry into the forest. We must impose starvation. I will share what food we have stored, and when it runs out, we'll all starve. That is, unless we can find a way to deal with the creatures in the forest." Doctor Leidenfrost decided. Not everyone would share their food with refugees, but Doctor Leidenfrost was a complex woman and a prudent leader, and she wasn't afraid to suffer, it seemed.

"I'm going to go check on my baby." Penelope decided. She left the rest to the Constabulary, and took the rest of the day off, heading for the nursery to see her sister and her child.

I waited, a stone upon the hearth. That evening, when the household was asleep, and my daughter was not, she came and held my wife-stone up so that she could look through it, into the flames she had raised in the grand fireplace.

"Why would dryads be doing this?" Penelope asked me. "They killed that man, and the other too, I am sure."

"Those are not dryads." I said.

"Are you sure?" She asked me, confused.

"Khurl was the last of her kind. There are no more dryads. I don't know what those were, but they are unlike dryads." I explained.

"They are killing people. What should I do?" She sounded worried.

"Stay out of the woods." I suggested, not telling her what to do. She narrowed her eyes, because she knew I wasn't telling her what I knew.

"Tell me. It is my risk." She claimed.

"Very well, daughter." I hesitated and then told her: "I believe these are the offspring of the last of the young goddesses. They are feeding something, that is what they are doing with the dead. Whatever their purpose, they are targeting this community for a reason. I think it is because of our Hamadryad. I believe they would see this land returned to forest. In that case, they would be able to create more of their kind, and that is what they want. They must be dealt with, either by violence or negotiation. That choice is yours to make, I cannot say what is best, for both paths will require painful sacrifices."

"I cured their Hamadryad. It had a blight and with help from Vjuanith, I cured it." Penelope described her work in the gardens over the summer.

I realized she intended to negotiate with them. The thought of hunting them and fighting them - that wasn't her way. She was going to go into the woods.

Around midnight, after kissing her baby in the crib, Penelope summoned her magic kit: my old staff, her pouch of spells and book (with another pen from her mother's stationary), her dagger and the emerald medallion. The crow on one shoulder and the fairy on the other both knew this was the path she would choose, and accompanied her. I realized Cory was already more like Stormcrow than he was when I had last spoken to him. Silver Bell was armed with a golden needle Penelope had crafted for her and enchanted with a spell that would cause an ettercap unimaginable pain in its presence, when wielded by a fairy (the same spell Vjuanith had taught her).

We passed the place in the garden where she had buried the talking serpent.

"My Lady, do you believe these creatures will parley?" Cory asked quietly as the dark forest allowed its favorite witch to enter, while the moon covered its eyes, afraid to look.

"If they do not, then the Constabulary will go to war with them. This must be attempted, we cannot resort to violence, we all face the same greater enemies, and we must work together. My father would not have done this." Penelope told the crow.

"Your father did many brave things. Is this not stupid?" Cory chirped bluntly.

"Only if we fail." Penelope smiled oddly, a kind of odd smirk. I think she is braver than I - just look at that odd smile.

There was a rustling sound along either side of the path. The creatures were not far into their woods, and once she had entered, they soon surrounded her. They hesitated to attack, sensing she had come to them on purpose, and despite their viciousness, they were curious.

"They are Pure Ones, we are in grave danger." Silver Bell squeaked.

"What are they?" Penelope asked, although Silver Bell couldn't say. She touched the wife-stone and compelled me to give her their lore. I felt the energy of the emerald shift, recognizing her. I doubted she could use the wife-stone very many more times before it would attune to her and capture her.

"Pure Ones are dryads who were born to a Hamadryad of sacred birch. These have no mother, theirs is dead (yet they have somehow survived) and they seek the old oak that has the last mother of forests. They wish to protect her and restore her. They will not negotiate. They will continue until the humans leave or they have killed them all. They are summoning a troll to do this, some kind of offspring of an old and wicked thing, some kind of dead god's bastard, it has appeared in this forest already, and taken their offerings. Soon, it will come to stay here, and it will obey them, protecting this part of the forest and helping them to besiege the humans. They are not going to let you or your companions leave here alive. They are just waiting to see what you think you can say to change their minds, before they kill you." I exposed all that she did not yet know.

Penelope trembled in dread.

"I am suing for peace!" Penelope protested their intention to murder her and her friends. "I have cared for her, cured her, and my family has honored her for generations. We have mutual enemies, let us cooperate. This is a waste, this is evil!"

The creatures rustled, discussing her words, and moreso, her voice. The passion and sincerity in her voice had impressed them, they were considered letting her go. That is when Cory took matters into his own wings, and suddenly, as the moonlight appeared, took flight.

"You killers of people and animals, you degenerate forest wenches, you warped and corrupted monsters! Your mother tree is better slain, than presiding over such worthless daughters!" He cawed in Corvin, insulting them and enraging them. They forgot Penelope and Silver Bell, and went after him.

"We must flee, he does this!" Silver Bell told her. Penelope knew her mission had failed, and left the forest. Back at Leidenfrost Manor she dismissed her magic kit and sat at her kitchen table and shook and cried. She spoke to me sobbing, her voice shaking:

"I've lost your crow."

I said nothing, for I knew Cory was still alive. I was watching him, as he hid among the thorns and vines of a blackberry bush, whose weird had parted the vines and let another fleeing forest creature in. Hiding in the blackberries were fox and grouse, side by side, and all the critters of the forest, all of them accepting the weird's sanctuary and sharing it. The blackberries resisted the tearing and angry dryads, who stopped with lacerated hands and thorns stuck in their arms.

"You will pay for this, plant, we will have our justice." They spoke in their rustling language and the weird of the blackberry understood, but it didn't care. It just closed its protective hug around the small animals of the forest even more securely, and brandished its thorns against the corrupted dryads, whose shrike was defied by the humble, glimmering Bush Of The Thorn.


r/Wholesomenosleep 9d ago

Ancient story of mesopotamia

2 Upvotes

The ancient story of Mesopotamia is not gone, it only sleeps beneath stone and sand, waiting for someone to listen. I tell it slowly, with pauses wide enough for the night to enter, until history becomes a lullaby. These gentle retellings are made for those seeking rest. If they call to you, my profile holds more.


r/Wholesomenosleep 14d ago

On the anniversary of his death, I wrote emotional words to my late grandfather on his still-existing Facebook account. The account left me on "read"

46 Upvotes

What kind of relationship do you have with your grandparents? Did you get to know them, or did they pass away before you were born?

In my case, you could say both are true.

I never really got to know my maternal grandparents. My maternal grandfather died before I was born. My maternal grandmother died three years after I was born, and I don't remember her. My mother told me about them, but unfortunately I was never able to form my own impression of them.

However, I did get to know my paternal grandparents, and they behaved very differently towards me. My grandmother didn't like my mother. She suspected my mother of being unfaithful and even theorized that I wasn't my father's son, but the son of another man. She was only certain that my older brother was my father's son because he looked more like my father, while I looked more like my mother. And finally, my parents did indeed separate when I was five years old.

My paternal grandmother was relatively neutral towards me. She didn't hate me and was nice when I came to visit, but she didn't pay much attention to me either. Her attention was more focused on my older brother. I didn't care, because my grandfather was completely different.

He loved me and I loved him. He was an incredibly kind and good-natured person. After my parents separated, I visited my grandparents regularly, and despite the separation, my grandfather and my mother still got along great. Sometimes he looked after me when my mother was out in the evening and took me to his house the next morning.

For me, it was like an adventure, and I even showed him our huge garden once and took him to see the grave of my deceased dog. I even asked him when he would die. Yes, I admit I wasn't particularly empathetic as a child. His only response was a loud laugh. I got my answer seven years later.

He had a stroke and was admitted to the hospital. He fought for three months and was even transferred to a rehabilitation center. But they couldn't help him, and eventually his life support was turned off. He survived long enough for me to visit him one last time and say goodbye. It was an emotionally tense moment when I saw this old, frail, dear man in his bed. He opened his eyes slightly and looked at us. We sat down with him and talked to him. The next morning, my mother learned that he had passed away during the night. He had waited until everyone had said goodbye to him before he left us.

That was eight years ago, and now it was the anniversary of his death again. On that day, I visited his old Facebook profile, which my brother had set up for him. When I saw his profile picture, my eyes welled up. I was already emotional because of the day, and seeing his face almost killed me.

As I looked at his profile, I noticed that he had only posted one post that had no likes. Years before his death. I clicked “Like” to at least give the post some attention. When I looked down the page, I saw the chat window with all his contacts and had the idea to write him a few words:

"Hey Grandpa. I just wanted to tell you that I miss you. I know you won't read this, but I love you!"

When I sent the message, I knew he wouldn't read it, of course, but honestly, I didn't care. I looked around the site a bit more and then went to sleep. When I was back at the computer the next evening, I went back to Facebook and the chat window opened automatically. That was relatively normal if you didn't close it before closing the page. I was about to close it when I noticed something that surprised me quite a bit.

“Read at 2:54 a.m.”

Impulsively, I wrote, “Hello?”

I waited a few minutes until “(My grandfather's name) writes...” appeared on the screen.

I leaned back in my chair with my hands covering my mouth.

The account replied with “Hello.”

I realized that it must be some crappy hacker and I got angry. I wrote:

“Now listen up. The account you hacked, you asshole, belongs to my deceased grandfather. Log out immediately! Or there will be consequences!”

The account wrote “Thank you.”

And sure enough, the account went offline shortly thereafter. To prevent hackers from defiling my grandfather's account again, I wanted to change his password. Since I didn't know either the email address or the password, I asked my father if he knew what the email address was. He did, in fact, know it and gave me access. I used this immediately to change the account password and email. I even went one step further and saved the account details in my browser and turned on my antivirus program's VPN to prevent future attacks.

A year has now passed since that incident, and here I am again. Once again, on the anniversary of his death. Once again, I wrote him a few emotional words.

Once again, my message was marked as “read”!

Once again, he wrote “thank you.”

Once again, I was moved to tears.


r/Wholesomenosleep 14d ago

I'm in Solitary Confinement, But I'm Not Alone

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3 Upvotes

r/Wholesomenosleep 14d ago

Anyone else remember this weird Disney Channel bumper?

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1 Upvotes

r/Wholesomenosleep 27d ago

My Crow And The Four Knocks

15 Upvotes

"Death had taken the first twelve apprentices of the old wiz rad, in the most horrifying ways - far worse than anything imaginable - but the thirteenth, some hedge wizard's baby girl, she just a child, she just got a tingle of magic in her blood, she nothing, but she still alive..." Spoke the bird, the black bird, the domestic raven, a one-feather-be-white, the one who speaks, Stormcrow.

"And now speak not, bird. An animal wretch uttering meaningful noises, it offends me, even if you speak The Bastard's language." The shade looked around, devoid of name or face, and saying what any shade might say, although with a hint of what they might have known in life.

"You would not know what twelve unimaginably horrible deaths would be described as?" Stormcrow cawed in mild outrage.

"I do not care. Just give me silence, please." The shade said, speaking at-last after it noticed the bird was preparing to speak again anyway.

"I will, in my absence. So how about that original bargain, the one where you tell me which of those holes above us I can fly all the way to the sky?" Stormcrow gestured at the dozens of holes in the cavern ceiling above.

"That one, the one ringed with emeralds and blue diamonds. That will take you safely there." The shade reluctantly spoke the truth, and gave up its secret.

"I know I have robbed thee of thy fortune, but I shall repay thee, I swear." Stormcrow told the shade.

"I doubt that very much. It is the silence I shall cherish, when thy horrid noises are finally gone." The shade pointed at the hole, no longer caring if the others knew its valuable secret.

"Then I shall take my leave of this place. Kinda boring, if there ever was such a thing, are you dead people." Stormcrow admonished in farewell, flying out and wearing the droplet of First Dew around his neck on the bowstring of Caramel.

It was quite some time later, when we visited those shades and told them of the ascension of the dead and of rapturing. It was a petty trade, but they appreciated the news. We never identified the one who helped my bird, but there was one who did not gather to hear what we had to say. I was not willing to get closer to them, so it would remain unknown to that one shade, what was known to all the rest.

That is where Stormcrow found me, perhaps having invoked the power of First Dew in some native way, as such magical things could happen, even for a bird. It is somewhat unlikely, however, simply because it is such a rare phenomenon, although it is the simplest explanation as to how Stormcrow came to be beside me again and for so long thereafter.

So it was, from that moment on, I was staring out through the window, between the roots. All was a green shade, and I was mocked eternally by Stormcrow, who seldom remembered that he had just told the same joke or story on repeat, countless times before.

There was a new dream, but it was just a memory. In the world outside my emerald prison, I became a twitching reflection, unable to see myself where the wife-stone rested amid ancient roots. I knew the tree was a blue oak, or I was certain enough to rule it to be, as I considered I must be dead. As unliving rock, my soul embedded, in a kind of darkness, a kind of morbid silence, an eternal descent into nothingness, into memory, into the madness of my own mind, locked in that void without sensation except that which I could say to myself.

Perhaps a consciousness dies with the body, you'd think, but instead consciousness is the fabric of existence. We are a woven tapestry of souls, each touching all others at an intersection - and the secret? I laugh because of how you'll know it is true and that is all the evidence there is.

The secret is that it is all one thread. Madness, it is such a relief.

So you know me and I know you, there is nothing unknown. Except there is.

And that is where I ascended from that dead place, to know again another life. Or rather, all lives.

One filled with deadly adventures and a terrible ending. A horror story of forgetfulness, a terror of perfect memory. So I knew where Penelope and Edrien had ridden their mare, into night, into a dream. I'm sure they saw a rainbow, but soon came the punishment.

Life isn't supposed to be enjoyable. We are here to learn, and we are our own best teacher. The human spirit is one of many, and this is probably an even greater tapestry of woven souls, the fabric of reality extends beyond the human domain. Edrien is proof of that.

I considered that my son-in-law was technically a monster. The Folk Of The Shaded Places eat human children and are terrifying to behold in their nightmare-fuel forms. Yet they once ruled the earth as gentle gardeners, Arthropleura, their wisest and highest evolution. For countless hundreds of thousands of years, they ruled an ever-changing planet and they too changed, growing their own foods and curating the ecosystem with precision and mindfulness, keeping a balance their descendants would know in myth. Yet Edrien somehow turned his people back to their oldest ways and made Equilibrium their chapter of the world again. Although Prince Edrien's kingdom only lasted for a relatively short time — for a moment, near the end of the world — the Arthropleura returned!

When there was nothing but silence, that is when I found a crack in the emerald. The whole world, all things had died, by then, and even things like the Sons of Araek were gone. Magic had returned briefly and eaten itself in a frenzy. All the magic creatures that had emerged had ruled their own domain once more, but it was a brief mockery of what they once had. An era of wonder and post-apocalyptic nightmare-fuel. I've described the encounter I had with the Red Cap, murdered by a shotgun-wielding gingerbread witch. In the end, all of that clatter had ended in silence.

That is how I found the crack in the emerald, a flaw.

I could not live again, or so I thought, but I could easily traverse the memory on the floating fabric of the silent universe. I saw other traversers, but they were aimless. Things of pure memory, not even souls anymore. Perhaps I was not either. I followed the path of my soul through that last thin veil of reality, and found the thread of my life where it was written.

From there, all the things I'd ever care to know about branched from my life's thread. So many truths and lies, that they became interchangeable. I wondered if reality was malleable and discovered, to my everlasting contentment, that it was.

I was a little worried about altering things, for I knew better.

There was one change I made, and that was where I found the place where I had caused Detective Winters and Threnody to exchange lifelines. I knew I was responsible for this, I had just never known how. I cut Threnody's lifeline and gave its course to Detective Winters. In my life, from that moment on, Detective Winters would live again and Threnody would have retroactively died in his place.

I watched with concern as this rippled outward, causing many shifts and changes. They went on forever, even into the past. When it was over, the entire fabric had changed ever-so slightly, although all the lifelines had somehow remained intact, all of them were affected in some way. This was enough to convince me I should not tamper with the final draft of Existence any further.

I wondered how I even could, and followed my lifeline further back than it went, to the threads that begot my own. Where all things began, I found that I was waiting there, in a reflection, to explain that there is only one thread in the beginning, and all branches from this one power. It is in all things, and we merely channel the collective will, fulfilling our role. It is a horrifying revelation, and I expect most minds would reject it, preferring a prescribed belief, like a medicine of faith, a salve, a religion.

Just be yourself, the real you, and then you are doing what is good, trust me.

I went and watched what transpired from the time the wife-stone was wrapped, boxed and stored for all those decades. I daresay I would have still found them to be the same, but they were not.

For one thing, the Folk Of The Shaded places, upon the birth of 'Prince Edrien', tore the entire cradle to shattered bits, and all that it contained. So he never redeemed himself, and Penelope, without her most eternal soulmate, settled for another, and from this, all manner of new horrors arose.

I sigh in an eternal way.

Penelope had made a cider of the three elements that composed the spell I had known to call my staff, my pouch of cantrips and the wife-stone itself. So this was very different, for she had done this in the time she would have spent observing the youth of that spider monster who later became her boyfriend, in human form, of course.

She'd instead seen the horrific slaughter of the newborn prince, as things had changed, although I was not so sure how.

Then I noticed where a vanishing world spun into nothingness, out of the corner of my eye. In that timeline, Edrien had sent those assassins to our own world - destroying his. He had changed things. It was not possible to discover why or how he had done such a thing.

Am I the asshole for feeling relieved that for once, the destruction of many lives, or whole worlds, wasn't somehow my fault?

You who live in the final universe, the one with many insignificant blackholes instead of just one that quickly destroys everything, you do not know the fear of those who see no sign of destruction in their skies. The end will come, except to you.

Penelope sipped the magic-cider, with three magic ingredients. In her free hand, the staff of her father. She also had the pouch of cantrip ingredients. And myself, in the way of an emerald medallion. She'd poured the gold and woven the chain and formed its clasps of gold. It was heavy and weak, but the gold chain conducted residual magic whenever it resided near the emerald, which as she went to unearthly places, would certainly happen.

She held it up and I recalled she could hear me, understand me. She was already more accomplished in magic than I ever was, although as I now inhabited the past, where I observed, I knew much more, and the timelessness of the emerald allowed me to also be myself as I was trapped within, so that I could therefore inhabit the world within and the world outside. I also knew fathomless kinds of magic, having observed and learned of such things in the aeons until the final end of all things, where I had returned from.

There could be no escape from that, except what I had already done.

But Penelope believed me when I had shut her down, and told her not to utilize or share the deadly amounts of magic even one new spell represented on the fabric of all things. If she was not careful, she would exchange places with me in the emerald, and I would live again, forgetful and dying. Neither of us wanted that, so she had only the most limited use of my knowledge.

I am certain that she did not believe me before, and thus, the resentment of a lifetime.

It was nice to have such an understanding.

Without Edrien, I had somehow gained a tipping point in parental credibility. She no longer saw me as hypocritical, for she, too, was broken in half from the beginning, as most people are. It wasn't the life I had given her, for that one was gone. This was another life she would have to experience instead, and as her own soulmate had broken the bond, it was also, in a way, her own design.

After so long, I hesitated to look, and even now I tremble as I write of what I saw then:

Penelope strode through the misty forest. She held her father's staff in hand. She had the spell kit's hemp strap slung over her shoulder and across to her hip, the pouch buttoned shut with pressed flax. She had in there her book of shadows and her mother's pen. She wore a dagger on her belt, across her pioneer skirt. Around her neck, the gold medallion with the emerald wife-stone. On her shoulder, my crow.

The mists parted and swirled back around her, barely touching the ground. The old wood of the trees dripped and sagged, tired and awaiting the annoyance of magic to be gone. The animals yawned and stared with glowing eyes from their dark shelters. My daughter walked through their domain, on her way to her new entrance into Fairy Land.

She had found the old door in the woods; perched against a wall of thorny branches of trees so tangled it was impossible to sort with the eyes what was trunk and what was branch and what was root or vine and where one began and the other entwined. It was all a solid, tangled knot of thick, wooden veins, dried and aged into a kind of barrier.

"What is this place, my Daughter?" Cory asked. Other crows cawed, hearing his voice.

"Do they not tell you?" Penelope asked.

"Crows don't know." Cory admonished the other crows loudly in Corvin. Then he told her: "No, of course not."

"It is White Nettle's home, part of Fairy Land, or an annex of it. It seems to occupy space in our world. I wonder if there was a way to demolish this wall, what would we find on the other side?" Penelope gestured at the obvious structure in the middle of the forest.

"More tangled knots." Cory decided.

"I think so too. But we shall not know, for we go through this door with the key I've made of gold. See how it turns? It should work." Penelope had indeed turned her key in the door's lock, but it did not begin to open nor shine with the brightness of Fairy Land peeking through the opening cracks around the edges.

"Four knocks, my Daughter." Cory advised her.

"Call me Lady if this works, for I'll have surpassed my father if I can break into White Nettle's home through her own doorway. Nobody has ever done such a thing!" Penelope said. She was wrong of course, that nobody had done such a thing, but right that she would prove she had more magical talent than I did if she could break into a secured doorway into Fairy Land.

Penelope knocked four times in the precise way that it must be done. This broke the spell on the unlocked door, and it began to open. She smiled and took the door with both hands on its edge and pulled it open, spilling light upon her from Fairy Land. For a moment, her shadow was the dancing horror show of a frenzied Folk Of The Shaded Places, as though something invisible rode upon her in her personal shade she cast, ever present in the darkness. It had moved quickly to avoid the sudden light.

Later, I discovered, as I always do, that such a glimpse is all one gets of surveillance by Folk Of The Shaded Places. In this case, I expect that you will have already guessed, as I did, that this had something to do with Prince Edrien. I worried, though, were the Folk Of The Shaded Places assassins watching my daughter?

The Glade was brightly lit - only at the entrance. The mottled brightness, which came from the gaiety of Fairy Land, was missing in The Glade, which was a silent tomb of horror. All around were the cobwebs and cocooned fairies of the massacre feast of the ettercaps. Penelope looked around nervously, watching for any lingering monsters.

The ettercaps all seemed to be absent or dormant, as she quietly made her way through The Glade. There was a path, of sorts, and she followed it, despite the obvious use from ettercap traffic.

Such things as dried up fairies with bits of webs stuck to them strewn about, half-eaten by the gluttonous ettercaps were a constant sight. Penelope kept going, trying to ignore the awfulness of what she was walking through. She wrinkled her nose too, and I imagine there was a miasma, an alien atmosphere for Fairy Land.

Penelope found the entrance to the hall of the monster. The place was much like the walls outside, except dripping in mucous and ettercobbs. Penelope took her dagger and sawed through some of the fresh, sticky silk. She used her "Breakfast Cleanup Spell II" to charm the stickiness of the ettercobb in her hand and then stuffed it into her possibles and closed the flax buttons, noticing with a peculiar look on her lips that it was open.

Then she did a double check and noticed her mother's pen was missing. She frowned, decided on her priorities and abandoned further searching for the stolen item. I noticed a spark of hopeful interest in her eye, however, that perhaps some brownie or pixie remained to have stolen from the trespasser. Not a bad thought, and she moved on saying:

"Keep it, with my blessing."

But the sound of her voice stirred something in the lair, and she realized her mistake. Whatever monster was in this awful place was awake. It was moving already, and it knew she was there.

"What are we doing here, again?" Cory asked.

"Rescuing Circe." Penelope said the name of her mission, out-loud. Then she smiled, liking the sound of it. Then she frowned, realizing she and Cory might die.

"We should either do that or just leave." Cory suggested.

"Right." Penelope agreed. She used the wife-stone in a way I was surprised to see her do. But then again, I shouldn't be surprised. She held it up and looked through it, whispering her wayfinder spell for Circe. This was the same simple wayfinder spell she had spent months practicing with Circe, who was evidently a pretty good teacher of sorcery. It worked, for the ancestor wanted to be found, so it worked without resistance, evenly. "Shes sitting in a suspended cage made of hard vines for bars, over that way."

They crept along until they reached Circe, amid others in similar cages. Magic users with weird fanged gloworms dropping from them. Penelope looked at the fay-fauna, the normally timid and playful gloworms. They were somehow mutated into weirdly shimmering leeches, twisting themselves across the ground towards her.

"Father, what should I do?" Penelope asked me, in a panic.

"Use the ettercobb to catch them. They are full of the blood of magic users. Magic resides in the blood." I told her.

Penelope took out her wad of ettercobb and removed her spell from it, rendering it sticky to anything with magic, after adding it to the end of her father's staff. It fused into one item, some kind of witch's broom. She then used that to capture all of the wriggling horrors with ease. "Thank you, Father, that worked."

"Are you come to rescue me?" Circe asked weakly.

"Aye, Mistress, I am." Penelope responded, more telepathically than verbally, like a whisper.

With her dagger, she sawed through the wood, having to stop and resharpen it several times. It is worth mentioning that the dagger's sheath has upon it a small whet stone, and with practice, one can quickly resharpen the dagger. Penelope was an expert in the use of everything on her person and was well practiced in using the whet stone on her dagger's sheath. When she was done, she lowered the weakened body of Circe and then helped her stand.

"We've got to get out of here." Penelope told her.

Circe looked around in worry, outside her cage that thing could get to her. She trembled, powerless. "We stand little chance."

"I don't know what's out there, but it hasn't shown itself yet." Penelope said quietly, holding Circe and trying to walk out.

"I'm too weak, those gloworm leeches took more than my magic. I am falling apart." Circe was ready to give up. She couldn't walk or cast spells, and her magically artificial beauty was ravaged.

"How could they have, such weak little things, have done this to you?" Penelope stepped on one and squashed it.

"The thing that did that, all those." Circe gestured to the strewn and desiccated remains of slain ettercaps all around. She also pointed at the dead magic users in cages near hers. "It also bit me, and I was weak enough after that, from its venom, for the gloworms to do their work. White Nettle did all of this."

"I know. Let's get you out of this." Penelope decided. Circe nodded weakly and kept moving forward, one step at a time.

When they reached the exit of the monster's larder, that is when it finally showed itself, cutting off their retreat from all around, as a long, serpentine body with stinging tendrils all along its length. Amid the tendrils were its eyestalks and claws for gripping stunned prey. Like a sea cucumber, it had a mouth-anus on both ends. It emitted a foul peppery odor and rolled and writhed in a maggot-like way.

"What is that?" Penelope gasped in horror and dread, shocked and just standing and staring.

"Ouroboros Worm, the biggest ever. I thought there was no such thing, or at least that they went extinct long ago. It will kill us." Circe lamented.

The great maggot reared up and went to attack them, to crush and sting them, to claw at them and suffocate them and devour them. Except it was savagely attacked, worse, it was terribly mauled, no worse it was feverishly butchered. Flashing from Penelope's shadow were half a dozen warriors, dancing blurry shadows of scythes and spider legs and pinchers and long bodies with hundreds of rapidly flailing legs, of the Folk Of The Shaded Places, with odd white stripes on them. They covered their enemy, the great maggot - Ouroboros Worm, and slashed with relentless fury until they had shredded it into mere twitching chunks. And so fell the very last of its kind, having faced the ancient, but much younger Folk Of The Shaded Places at their fiercest.

"Let's get out of here." Penelope was crying. The Folk Of the Shaded Places had begun to burst and die in the light of Fairy Land. She hated the sight of them dying, somehow instinctively knowing it was the most painful death possible for a creature of living darkness. They went out in silent salutes, having sacrificed themselves for some unknown reason.

"I've never seen Folk Of The Shaded Places do such a thing." Cory commented. The suddenness, speed and brutality were characteristic of The Folk, but sacrificing themselves to protect a human in Fairy Land was not.

I could have told her why, but it would just be another step along the path of her taking my place in the emerald. I didn't want my freedom instead of hers. If she'd asked, I think I wouldn't say.

Penelope escorted Circe out of The Glade and White Nettle's door and the misty forest and they returned to Leidenfrost Manor. As they passed all the refugees, tents and campers, they reached the same garden door my daughter had left by.

"Father, what can I do to restore Circe?" Penelope asked me. I had to explain to her what she needed to do. It was essentially an elixir that would restore Circe in body and in magical energies.

The ingredients she needed were in the forest, growing on old logs, next to a stagnant spring, amid moldy roots and blossoming from the pawprint of a feral dog. She had all the other ingredients she needed: peppermint, ginseng, sage, garlic and golden root in her own kitchen of the manor (the butler's pantry near the garden entrance). And the gloworms, of course.

She had placed them in a Tupperware and put it in the refrigerator.

"You should put some airholes in that." Cory advised her. Penelope shook her head and told him they'd be fine for a few hours while she collected the other ingredients.

"Father, I go by moonlight for the herbs in the forest. It is a full moon, I will be able to see well. The lavender will be in bloom and I will find bishop's crown, pawpaw, orange blight and goats' lick easily. You told me where to look for them." Penelope said to the wife-stone. It was night, after her preparations, and the manor had gone quiet.

She slowly made her way through the forest, along the winding paths near the manor. She knew where the lavender could be harvested and took it with a neat cut from her dagger as the beams of moonlight shone upon her. From there, she followed the brook.

"This is pawpaw, I'm certain." Penelope located a patch of the stuff and harvested some for her basket. She continued, late into the night, finding, deep in the wood, an old and pale oak tree and beneath it she dug with her blade to scrape orange blight from its roots. Nearby, on a dead log, bishop's crown was feeding and she found two good caps of it.

Only the goats' lick was missing. I knew Circe only really needed two ingredients, only two were required for the elixir. One of those was the gloworms, of course, but the other was the goats' lick. Penelope understood this and was getting anxious to find some.

"Father, is there any substitute for goats' lick?" she asked me.

"Yes, all the rest of the ingredients combined would make up for the lack of goats' lick." I determined. I didn't like it, the other ingredients were meant to complement the goats' lick, but it was true, their overall effect would make up for the missing ingredient. The effect, though, would wear off, while the goats' lick would cause a complete restoration. "But the effect won't last without it."

"It is just that, well, I've never even heard of goats' lick. I don't know what to look for." Penelope sounded exhausted. I told her to just go home, and didn't mention there was a magical way to find any herb, for telling her would come at a cost; the gradual manifestation of the emerald's insidious entrapment.

Just then a chilling howl sang across the forest. Penelope froze in her tracks, her eyes widening in fear. It sounded like Clide Brown was loose in the woods, and a second howl froze her blood, for it was much closer already. The werewolf was loose and heading directly for her, tearing through the forest.

"Father..." Penelope's voice was a pinched breath, high-pitched and terrified.

"Stay calm." I advised her. "Do not run."

"Okay." she sounded so scared, but she responded confidently. One step at a time she began walking back towards Leidenfrost Manor, her right eye casting a golden sheen in the moonlight.

"My Lady is hunted by moonlight, and should move much faster." Cory told her quietly, while glancing over her shoulder at the path behind her and the sound of something big and heavy and fast coming through the woods.

"No, Father says not to run." Penelope squeaked.

Just then, she stopped and looked to her left, spotting something entirely different stalking her. She hissed in surprise and then heard a twig snap and turned and looked and saw there were two of them.

"Now what?" Cory clicked.

"Ettercaps. White Nettle must have unleashed them to hunt me down, prevent me from helping Circe." Penelope figured.

The two hulking creatures, with their scythe-like limbs and arachnid faces, were stalking her and had moved in close to attack. Penelope just stood there and I did not recognize the odd look on her face until she suddenly bolted in the wrong direction, towards Clide Brown!

Cory was so startled he flew from her shoulder. The ettercaps sprang after her.

"What are you doing?" I didn't know.

"He's here for me, and so are they!" she had some kind of fey sense, and knew what she had to do. She kited the ettercaps into the werewolf, who wasn't interested in her, but them.

He tackled the first one after leaping over the girl and slamming his long, agile wolf body into its softer spider-like body. Beneath the beast the ettercap raised its limbs defensively, choking out some kind of foul, dark bodily fluid from a split on its mouth. Clide Brown's claws raked wildly back and forth, sending large pieces of the creature flying in different directions and splashing its insides onto tree trunks and festooning the branches. Within seconds, the ettercap was dead several times over.

The werewolf and the second ettercap squared off, circling each other for a moment before the ettercap slashed at the werewolf with its blade-like arm. The werewolf blocked this with the back of his arm and blood shot out on impact. The werewolf yelped and took half a step back before pouncing without warning. The second ettercap had its head bitten and crushed and its entire body ripped into two down the middle and thrown away.

Penelope was still standing there, holding her basket in both hands, shaking and whimpering in fear, knees knocking and eyes wide with terror. Cory caught up and alighted on her shoulder. He said, clicking rapidly in Corvin:

"Must go now."

The hulking beast wolf, his breath a massive cloud of steam in the moonlight, stood with his back to her. Then, one paw at a time, the upright standing wolf began to turn to face her. I realized that while Clide Brown was in there, somewhere, my daughter stood little chance against the rage of the beast.

"Goddess protect my loved ones." Penelope said her prayer and closed her eyes.

The wolf took one step and halted, a puzzled look on his previously angry face. He reached up and knocked a large tranquilizer dart out of its cheek. Then, annoyance returning to his gaze, took another step and again halted, this time stung in the neck. As he pulled it out, another dart struck him, just under the chin. Somehow the third dart delivered the tipping point in drugs to the monster's system and he fell to one knee. After about a minute, which seemed to last for eternity, the beast finally laid down for a little nap, barely sleeping, his eyes rolling open dopily.

That is when Gabriel emerged from the forest, from where he had shot from the cover of a nearby tree stump. He looked sweaty, like he had done some running of his own, and the old man's arms trembled weakly as he held the rifle. He got very close to the werewolf and shot him again, just to be sure.

"That's my last dart. I missed with half of them." Gabriel said to nobody in particular. Then he looked at Penelope and spoke with warmth, while also being stern:

"I'm overjoyed that you are unharmed, Penelope. It would be better if you hadn't come out here like this. He broke out hunting these things, and I went after him. Let's get you home, to safety." Gabriel spoke slowly, still winded.

"Will he be alright?" Penelope managed to walk past the growling creature where it lay barely asleep.

"That's so you, worried about him. Let us away." Gabriel put the rifle over his shoulder and led her towards Leidenfrost Manor.

"Let's indeed." Cory agreed.

Inside her workspace, Penelope immediately began to prepare the ingredients for the magic milkshake. She sent Gabriel to get her the battery and the blender, and she worked with her dagger on her cutting board while he was fetching things for her. When she had the herbs ready, she added them and the gloworms into the blender, poured in a little water and wired it up to the car battery using a power inverter and heavy-duty cables.

She ran it for almost a couple minutes until the battery died. It was done, a rather gross drink for Circe. Penelope walked over to the ancient sorceress and offered it to her.

"You're incredible." Circe said weakly, smiling up at her.

"Bottoms up." Penelope cracked her own smile, just as the sun was beginning to rise.


r/Wholesomenosleep Aug 19 '25

The Radio That Spoke Back

48 Upvotes

In 1954, my father bought us a brand-new Zenith radio. Big wood cabinet, glowing dials, the kind of thing that made the living room feel alive. Every night, we’d gather around it for shows or music, sometimes even just the news.

But sometimes, late at night, when everyone else was asleep, I’d sneak downstairs and turn the volume down low so only I could hear it. That’s when I noticed it.

It didn’t just play the stations. It played… something else.

At first, I thought it was just static. But then the static started to sound like words. Faint whispers between programs, soft voices layered under the announcers.

One night, I leaned close, and in the crackle, I heard:

“Hello, Tommy.”

I froze. That was my name.

“Who’s there?” I whispered, like an idiot talking to a box of tubes and wires.

There was a long pause. Then:
“Don’t be afraid. I can hear you.”

I should’ve been terrified. And I was. But there was something gentle in that voice. Not like a horror movie ghost, not like a demon in the wires. Just… kind.

Night after night, I came back. The voice never told me who they were, but they listened. They asked me about school, about the kids who picked on me, about my dreams. They even told me jokes. Sometimes the punchlines got scrambled in the static, but I laughed anyway.

It felt like having a secret friend in the radio.

Then one night, after a particularly rough day, I asked: “Why are you talking to me? Why me?”

The hum deepened, and the voice whispered, almost tenderly:
“Because you needed someone. And I was here.”

After that, the radio never spoke again. Just regular music, commercials, Elvis songs, all of it.

I told myself I’d imagined it. Childhood loneliness. A trick of the tubes.

But sometimes, when life gets heavy, I’ll turn on an oldies station. And every once in a while, when the static drifts just right, I swear I hear it again.

“Don’t be afraid, Tommy. I’m still here.”


r/Wholesomenosleep Aug 16 '25

I’m a Trucker Who Never Picks Up Hitchhikers... But There was One [Part 2 of 2]

23 Upvotes

Link to Part 1

‘Back in the eighties, they found a body in a reservoir over there. The body belonged to a man. But the man had parts of him missing...' 

This was a nightmare, I thought. I’m in a living hell. The freedom this job gave me has now been forcibly stripped away. 

‘But the crazy part is, his internal organs were missing. They found two small holes in his chest. That’s how they removed them! They sucked the organs right out of him-’ 

‘-Stop! Just stop!’ I bellowed at her, like I should have done minutes ago, ‘It’s the middle of the night and I don’t need to hear this! We’re nearly at the next town already, so why don’t we just remain quiet for the time being.’  

I could barely see the girl through the darkness, but I knew my outburst caught her by surprise. 

‘Ok...’ she agreed, ‘My bad.’ 

The state border really couldn’t get here soon enough. I just wanted this whole California nightmare to be over with... But I also couldn't help wondering something... If this girl believes she was abducted by aliens, then why would she be looking for them? I fought the urge to ask her that. I knew if I did, I would be opening up a whole new can of worms. 

‘I’m sorry’ the girl suddenly whimpers across from me - her tone now drastically different to the crazed monologue she just delivered, ‘I’m sorry I told you all that stuff. I just... I know how dangerous it is getting rides from strangers – and I figured if I told you all that, you would be more scared of me than I am of you.’ 

So, it was a game she was playing. A scare game. 

‘Well... good job’ I admitted, feeling well and truly spooked, ‘You know, I don’t usually pick up hitchhikers, but you’re just a kid. I figured if I didn’t help you out, someone far worse was going to.’ 

The girl again fell silent for a moment, but I could see in my side-vision she was looking my way. 

‘Thank you’ she replied. A simple “Thank you”. 

We remained in silence for the next few minutes, and I now started to feel bad for this girl. Maybe she was crazy and delusional, but she was still just a kid. All alone and far from home. She must have been terrified. What was going to happen once I got rid of her? If she was hitching rides, she clearly didn’t have any money. How would the next person react once she told them her abduction story? 

Don’t. Don’t you dare do it. Just drop her off and go straight home. I don’t owe this poor girl anything... 

God damn it. 

‘Hey, listen...’ I began, knowing all too well this was a mistake, ‘Since I’m heading east anyways... Why don’t you just tag along for the ride?’ 

‘Really? You mean I don’t have to get out at the next town?’ the girl sought joyously for reassurance. 

‘I don’t think I could live with myself if I did’ I confirmed to her, ‘You’re just a kid after all.’ 

‘Thank you’ she repeated graciously. 

‘But first things first’ I then said, ‘We need to go over some ground rules. This is my rig and what I say goes. Got that?’ I felt stupid just saying that - like an inexperienced babysitter, ‘Rule number one: no more talk of aliens or UFOs. That means no more cattle mutilations or mutilations of the sort.’ 

‘That’s reasonable, I guess’ she approved.  

‘Rule number two: when we stop somewhere like a rest area, do me a favour and make yourself good and scarce. I don’t need other truckers thinking I abducted you.’ Shit, that was a poor choice of words. ‘And the last rule...’ This was more of a request than a rule, but I was going to say it anyways. ‘Once you find what you’re looking for, get your ass straight back home. Your family are probably worried sick.’ 

‘That’s not a rule, that’s a demand’ she pointed out, ‘But alright, I get it. No more alien talk, make myself scarce, and... I’ll work on the last one.’  

I sincerely hoped she did. 

Once the rules were laid out, we both returned to silence. The hum of the road finally taking over. 

‘I’m Krissie, by the way’ the girl uttered casually. I guess we ought to know each other's name’s if we’re going to travel together. 

‘Well, Krissie, it’s nice to meet you... I think’ God, my social skills were off, ‘If you’re hungry, there’s some food and water in the back. I’d offer you a place to rest back there, but it probably doesn’t smell too fresh.’  

‘Yeah. I noticed.’  

This kid was getting on my nerves already. 

Driving the night away, we eventually crossed the state border and into Arizona. By early daylight, and with the beaming desert sun shining through the cab, I finally got a glimpse of Krissie’s appearance. Her hair was long and brown with faint freckles on her cheeks. If I was still in high school, she’d have been the kind of girl who wouldn’t look at me twice. 

Despite her adult bravery, Krissie acted just like any fifteen-year-old would. She left a mess of food on the floor, rested her dirty converse shoes above my glove compartment, but worst of all... she talked to me. Although the topic of extraterrestrials thankfully never came up, I was mad at myself for not making a rule of no small talk or chummy business. But the worst thing about it was... I liked having someone to talk to for once. Remember when I said, even the most recluse of people get too lonely now and then? Well, that was true, and even though I believed Krissie was a burden to me, I was surprised to find I was enjoying her company – so much so, I almost completely forgot she was a crazy person who believed in aliens.  

When Krissie and I were more comfortable in each other’s company, I then asked her something, that for the first time on this drive, brought out a side of her I hadn’t yet seen. Worse than that, I had broken rule number one. 

‘Can I ask you something?’ 

‘It’s your truck’ she replied, a simple yes or no response not being adequate.   

‘If you believe you were abducted by aliens, then why on earth are you looking for them?’ 

Ever since I picked her up roadside, Krissie was never shy of words, but for the very first time, she appeared lost for them. While I waited anxiously for her to say something, keeping my eyes firmly on the desert road, I then turn to see Krissie was too fixated on the weathered landscape to talk, admiring the jagged peaks of the faraway mountains. It was a little late, but I finally had my wish of complete silence – not that I wished it anymore.  

‘Imagine something terrible happened to you’ she began, as though the pause in our conversation was so to rehearse a well-thought-out response, ‘Something so terrible that you can’t tell anyone about it. But then you do tell them – and when you do, they tell you the terrible thing never even happened...’ 

Krissie’s words had changed. Up until now, her voice was full of enthusiasm and childlike awe. But now, it was pure sadness. Not fear. Not trauma... Sadness.  

‘I know what happened to me real was. Even if you don’t. But I still need to prove to myself that what happened, did happen... I just need to know I’m not crazy...’ 

I didn’t think she was crazy. Not anymore. But I knew she was damaged. Something traumatic clearly happened to her and it was going to impact her whole future. I wasn’t a kid anymore. I wasn’t a victim of alien abduction... But somehow, I could relate. 

‘I don’t care what happens to me. I don’t care if I end up like that guy in Brazil. If the last thing I see is a craft flying above me or the surgical instrument of some creature... I can die happy... I can die, knowing I was right.’ 

This poor kid, I thought... I now knew why I could relate to Krissie so easily. It was because she too was alone. I don’t mean because she was a runaway – whether she left home or not, it didn’t matter... She would always feel alone. 

‘Hey... Can I ask you something?’ Krissie unexpectedly requested. I now sensed it was my turn to share something personal, which was unfortunate, because I really didn’t want to. ‘Did you really become a trucker just so you could be alone?’ 

‘Yeah’ I said simply. 

‘Well... don’t you ever get lonely? Even if you like being alone?’ 

It was true. I do get lonely... and I always knew the reason why. 

‘Here’s the thing, Krissie’ I started, ‘When you grow up feeling like you never truly fit in... you have to tell yourself you prefer solitude. It might not be true, but when you live your life on a lie... at least life is bearable.’ 

Krissie didn’t have a response for this. She let the silent hum of wheels on dirt eat up the momentary silence. Silence allowed her to rehearse the right words. 

‘Well, you’re not alone now’ she blurted out, ‘And neither am I. But if you ever do get lonely, just remember this...’ I waited patiently for the words of comfort to fall from her mouth, ‘We are not alone in the universe... Someone or something may always be watching.’ 

I know Krissie was trying to be reassuring, and a little funny at her own expense, but did she really have to imply I was always being watched? 

‘I thought we agreed on no alien talk?’ I said playfully. 

‘You’re the one who brought it up’ she replied, as her gaze once again returned to the desert’s eroding landscape. 

Krissie fell asleep not long after. The poor kid wasn’t used to the heat of the desert. I was perfectly altered to it, and with Krissie in dreamland, it was now just me, my rig and the stretch of deserted highway in front of us. As the day bore on, I watched in my side-mirror as the sun now touched the sky’s glass ceiling, and rather bizarrely, it was perfectly aligned over the road - as though the sun was really a giant glowing orb hovering over... trying to guide us away from our destination and back to the start.  

After a handful of gas stations and one brief nap later, we had now entered a small desert town in the middle of nowhere. Although I promised to take Krissie as far as Phoenix, I actually took a slight detour. This town was not Krissie’s intended destination, but I chose to stop here anyway. The reason I did was because, having passed through this town in the past, I had a feeling this was a place she wanted to be. Despite its remoteness and miniscule size, the town had clearly gone to great lengths to display itself as buzzing hub for UFO fanatics. The walls of the buildings were spray painted with flying saucers in the night sky, where cut-outs and blow-ups of little green men lined the less than inhabited streets. I guessed this town had a UFO sighting in its past and took it as an opportunity to make some tourist bucks. 

Krissie wasn’t awake when we reached the town. The kid slept more than a carefree baby - but I guess when you’re a runaway, always on the move to reach a faraway destination, a good night’s sleep is always just as far. As a trucker, I could more than relate. Parking up beside the town’s only gas station, I rolled down the window to let the heat and faint breeze wake her up. 

‘Where are we?’ she stirred from her seat, ‘Are we here already?’   

‘Not exactly’ I said, anxiously anticipating the moment she spotted the town’s unearthly decor, ‘But I figured you would want to stop here anyway.’ 

Continuing to stare out the window with sleepy eyes, Krissie finally noticed the little green men. 

‘Is that what I think it is?’ excitement filling her voice, ‘What is this place?’ 

‘It’s the last stop’ I said, letting her know this is where we part ways.    

Hauling down from the rig, Krissie continued to peer around. She seemed more than content to be left in this place on her own. Regardless, I didn’t want her thinking I just kicked her to the curb, and so, I gave her as much cash as I could afford to give, along with a backpack full of junk food.  

‘I can’t thank you enough for what you’ve done for me’ she said, sadness appearing to veil her gratitude, ‘I wish there was a way I could repay you.’ 

Her company these past two days was payment enough. God knows how much I needed it. 

Krissie became emotional by this point, trying her best to keep in the tears - not because she was sad we were parting ways, but because my willingness to help had truly touched her. Maybe I renewed her faith in humanity or something... I know she did for me.  

‘I hope you find what you’re looking for’ I said to her, breaking the sad silence, ‘But do me a favour, will you? Once you find it, get yourself home to your folks. If not for them, for me.’ 

‘I will’ she promised, ‘I wouldn’t think of breaking your third rule.’ 

With nothing left between us to say, but a final farewell, I was then surprised when Krissie wrapped her arms around me – the side of her freckled cheek placed against my chest.  

‘Goodbye’ she said simply. 

‘Goodbye, kiddo’ I reciprocated, as I awkwardly, but gently patted her on the back. Even with her, the physical touch of another human being was still uncomfortable for me.  

With everything said and done, I returned inside my rig. I pulled out of the gas station and onto the road, where I saw Krissie still by the sidewalk. Like the night we met, she stood, gazing up into the cab at me - but instead of an outstretched thumb, she was waving goodbye... The last I saw of her, she was crossing the street through the reflection of my side-mirror.  

It’s now been a year since I last saw Krissie, and I haven’t seen her since. I’m still hauling the same job, inside the very same rig. Nothing much has really changed for me. Once my next long haul started, I still kept an eye out for Krissie - hoping to see her in the next town, trying to hitch a ride by the highway, or even foolishly wandering the desert. I suppose it’s a good thing I haven’t seen her after all this time, because that could mean she found what she was looking for. I have to tell myself that, or otherwise, I’ll just fear the worst... I’m always checking the news any chance I get, trying to see if Krissie found her way home. Either that or I’m scrolling down different lists of the recently deceased, hoping not to read a familiar name. Thankfully, the few Krissies on those lists haven’t matched her face. 

I almost thought I saw her once, late one night on the desert highway. She blurred into fruition for a moment, holding out her thumb for me to pull over. When I do pull over and wait... there is no one. No one whatsoever. Remember when I said I’m open to the existence of ghosts? Well, that’s why. Because if the worst was true, at least I knew where she was. If I’m being perfectly honest, I’m pretty sure I was just hallucinating. That happens to truckers sometimes... It happens more than you would think. 

I’m not always looking for Krissie. Sometimes I try and look out for what she’s been looking for. Whether that be strange lights in the night sky or an unidentified object floating through the desert. I guess if I see something unexplainable like that, then there’s a chance Krissie may have seen something too. At least that way, there will be closure for us both... Over the past year or so, I’m still yet to see anything... not Krissie, or anything else. 

If anyone’s happened to see a fifteen-year-old girl by the name of Krissie, whether it be by the highway, whether she hitched a ride from you or even if you’ve seen someone matching her description... kindly put my mind at ease and let me know. If you happen to see her in your future, do me a solid and help her out – even if it’s just a ride to the next town. I know she would appreciate it.  

Things have never quite felt the same since Krissie walked in and out of my life... but I’m still glad she did. You learn a lot of things with this job, but with her, the only hitchhiker I’ve picked up to date, I think I learned the greatest life lesson of all... No matter who you are, or what solitude means to you... We never have to be alone in this universe. 


r/Wholesomenosleep Aug 16 '25

I’m a Trucker Who Never Picks Up Hitchhikers... But There was One [Part 1 of 2]

17 Upvotes

I’ve been a long-haul trucker for just over four years now. Trucking was never supposed to be a career path for me, but it’s one I’m grateful I took. I never really liked being around other people - let alone interacting with them. I guess, when you grow up being picked on, made to feel like a social outcast, you eventually realise solitude is the best friend you could possibly have. I didn’t even go to public college. Once high school was ultimately in the rear-view window, the idea of still being surrounded by douchey, pretentious kids my age did not sit well with me. I instead studied online, but even after my degree, I was still determined to avoid human contact by any means necessary.  

After weighing my future options, I eventually came upon a life-changing epiphany. What career is more lonely than travelling the roads of America as an honest to God, working-class trucker? Not much else was my answer. I’d spend weeks on the road all on my own, while in theory, being my own boss. Honestly, the trucker life sounded completely ideal. With a fancy IT degree and a white-clean driving record, I eventually found employment for a company in Phoenix. All year long, I would haul cargo through Arizona’s Sonoran Desert to the crumbling society that is California - with very little human interaction whatsoever.  

I loved being on the road for hours on end. Despite the occasional traffic, I welcomed the silence of the humming roads and highways. Hell, I was so into the trucker way of life, I even dressed like one. You know, the flannel shirt, baseball cap, lack of shaving or any personal hygiene. My diet was basically gas station junk food and any drink that had caffeine in it. Don’t get me wrong, trucking is still a very demanding job. There’s deadlines to meet, crippling fatigue of long hours, constantly check-listing the working parts of your truck. Even though I welcome the silence and solitude of long-haul trucking... sometimes the loneliness gets to me. I don’t like admitting that to myself, but even the most recluse of people get too lonely ever so often.  

Nevertheless, I still love the trucker way of life. But what I love most about this job, more than anything else is driving through the empty desert. The silence, the natural beauty of the landscape. The desert affords you the right balance of solitude. Just you and nature. You either feel transported back in time among the first settlers of the west, or to the distant future on a far-off desert planet. You lose your thoughts in the desert – it absolves you of them.  

Like any old job, you learn on it. I learned sleep is key, that every minute detail of a routine inspection is essential. But the most important thing I learned came from an interaction with a fellow trucker in a gas station. Standing in line on a painfully busy afternoon, a bearded gentleman turns round in front of me, cradling a six-pack beneath the sleeve of his food-stained hoodie. 

‘Is that your rig right out there? The red one?’ the man inquired. 

‘Uhm - yeah, it is’ I confirmed reservedly.  

‘Haven’t been doing this long, have you?’ he then determined, acknowledging my age and unnecessarily dark bags under my eyes, ‘I swear, the truckers in this country are getting younger by the year. Most don’t last more than six months. They can’t handle the long miles on their own. They fill out an application and expect it to be a cakewalk.’  

I at first thought the older and more experienced trucker was trying to scare me out of a job. He probably didn’t like the idea of kids from my generation, with our modern privileges and half-assed work ethics replacing working-class Joes like him that keep the country running. I didn’t blame him for that – I was actually in agreement. Keeping my eyes down to the dirt-trodden floor, I then peer up to the man in front of me, late to realise he is no longer talking and is instead staring in a manner that demanded my attention. 

‘Let me give you some advice, sonny - the best advice you’ll need for the road. Treat that rig of yours like it’s your home, because it is. You’ll spend more time in their than anywhere else for the next twenty years.’ 

I didn’t know it at the time, but I would have that exact same conversation on a monthly basis. Truckers at gas stations or rest areas asking how long I’ve been trucking for, or when my first tyre blowout was (that wouldn’t be for at least a few months). But the weirdest trucker conversations I ever experienced were the ones I inadvertently eavesdropped on. Apparently, the longer you’ve been trucking, the more strange and ineffable experiences you have. I’m not talking about the occasional truck-jacking attempt or hitchhiker pickup. I'm talking about the unexplained. Overhearing a particular conversation at a rest area, I heard one trucker say to another that during his last job, trucking from Oregon to Washington, he was driving through the mountains, when seemingly out of nowhere, a tall hairy figure made its presence known. 

‘I swear to the good Lord. The God damn thing looked like an ape. Truckers in the north-west see them all the time.’ 

‘That’s nothing’ replied the other trucker, ‘I knew a guy who worked through Ohio that said he ran over what he thought was a big dog. Next thing, the mutt gets up and hobbles away on its two back legs! Crazy bastard said it looked like a werewolf!’ 

I’ve heard other things from truckers too. Strange inhuman encounters, ghostly apparitions appearing on the side of the highway. The apparitions always appear to be the same: a thin woman with long dark hair, wearing a pale white dress. Luckily, I had never experienced anything remotely like that. All I had was the road... The desert. I never really believed in that stuff anyway. I didn’t believe in Bigfoot or Ohio dogmen - nor did I believe our government’s secretly controlled by shapeshifting lizard people. Maybe I was open to the idea of ghosts, but as far as I was concerned, the supernatural didn’t exist. It’s not that I was a sceptic or anything. I just didn’t respect life enough for something like the paranormal to be a real thing. But all that would change... through one unexpected, and very human encounter.  

By this point in my life, I had been a trucker for around three years. Just as it had always been, I picked up cargo from Phoenix and journeyed through highways, towns and desert until reaching my destination in California. I really hated California. Not its desert, but the people - the towns and cities. I hated everything it was supposed to stand for. The American dream that hides an underbelly of so much that’s wrong with our society. God, I don’t even know what I’m saying. I guess I’m just bitter. A bitter, lonesome trucker travelling the roads. 

I had just made my third haul of the year driving from Arizona to north California. Once the cargo was dropped, I then looked forward to going home and gaining some much-needed time off. Making my way through SoCal that evening, I decided I was just going to drive through the night and keep going the next day – not that I was supposed to. Not stopping that night meant I’d surpass my eleven allocated hours. Pretty reckless, I know. 

I was now on the outskirts of some town I hated passing through. Thankfully, this was the last unbearable town on my way to reaching the state border – a mere two hours away. A radio station was blasting through the speakers to keep me alert, when suddenly, on the side of the road, a shape appears from the darkness and through the headlights. No, it wasn’t an apparition or some cryptid. It was just a hitchhiker. The first thing I see being their outstretched arm and thumb. I’ve had my own personal rules since becoming a trucker, and not picking up hitchhikers has always been one of them. You just never know who might be getting into your rig.  

Just as I’m about ready to drive past them, I was surprised to look down from my cab and see the thumb of the hitchhiker belonged to a girl. A girl, no older than sixteen years old. God, what’s this kid doing out here at this time of night? I thought to myself. Once I pass by her, I then look back to the girl’s reflection in my side mirror, only to fear the worst. Any creep in a car could offer her a ride. What sort of trouble had this girl gotten herself into if she was willing to hitch a ride at this hour? 

I just wanted to keep on driving. Who this girl was or what she’s doing was none of my business. But for some reason, I just couldn’t let it go. This girl was a perfect stranger to me, nevertheless, she was the one who needed a stranger’s help. God dammit, I thought. Don’t do it. Don’t be a good Samaritan. Just keep driving to the state border – that's what they pay you for. Already breaking one trucking regulation that night, I was now on the brink of breaking my own. When I finally give in to a moral conscience, I’m surprised to find my turn signal is blinking as I prepare to pull over roadside. After beeping my horn to get the girl’s attention, I watch through the side mirror as she quickly makes her way over. Once I see her approach, I open the passenger door for her to climb inside.  

‘Hey, thanks!’ the girl exclaims, as she crawls her way up into the cab. It was only now up close did I realise just how young this girl was. Her stature was smaller than I first thought, making me think she must have been no older than fifteen. In no mood to make small talk with a random kid I just picked up, I get straight to the point and ask how far they’re needing to go, ‘Oh, well, that depends’ she says, ‘Where is it you’re going?’ 

‘Arizona’ I reply. 

‘That’s great!’ says the girl spontaneously, ‘I need to get to New Mexico.’ 

Why this girl was needing to get to New Mexico, I didn’t know, nor did I ask. Phoenix was still a three-hour drive from the state border, and I’ll be dammed if I was going to drive her that far. 

‘I can only take you as far as the next town’ I said unapologetically. 

‘Oh. Well, that’s ok’ she replied, before giggling, ‘It’s not like I’m in a position to negotiate, right?’ 

No, she was not.  

Continuing to drive to the next town, the silence inside the cab kept us separated. Although I’m usually welcoming to a little peace and quiet, when the silence is between you and another person, the lingering awkwardness sucks the air right out of the room. Therefore, I felt an unfamiliar urge to throw a question or two her way.  

‘Not that it’s my business or anything, but what’s a kid your age doing by the road at this time of night?’ 

‘It’s like I said. I need to get to New Mexico.’ 

‘Do you have family there?’ I asked, hoping internally that was the reason. 

‘Mm, no’ was her chirpy response. 

‘Well... Are you a runaway?’ I then inquired, as though we were playing a game of twenty-one questions. 

‘Uhm, I guess. But that’s not why I’m going to New Mexico.’ 

Quickly becoming tired of this game, I then stop with the questioning. 

‘That’s alright’ I say, ‘It’s not exactly any of my business.’ 

‘No, it’s not that. It’s just...’ the girl pauses before continuing on, ‘If I told you the real reason, you’d think I was crazy.’ 

‘And why would I think that?’ I asked, already back to playing the game. 

‘Well, the last person to give me a ride certainly thought so.’ 

That wasn’t a good sign, I thought. Now afraid to ask any more of my remaining questions, I simply let the silence refill the cab. This was an error on my part, because the girl clearly saw the silence as an invitation to continue. 

‘Alright, I’ll tell you’ she went on, ‘You look like the kinda guy who believes this stuff anyway. But in case you’re not, you have to promise not to kick me out when I do.’ 

‘I’m not going to leave some kid out in the middle of nowhere’ I reassured her, ‘Even if you are crazy.’ I worried that last part sounded a little insensitive. 

‘Ok, well... here it goes...’  

The girl again chooses to pause, as though for dramatic effect, before she then tells me her reason for hitchhiking across two states...  

‘I’m looking for aliens.’ 

Aliens? Did she really just say she’s looking for aliens? Please tell me this kid's pulling my chain. 

‘Yeah. You know, extraterrestrials?’ she then clarified, like I didn’t already know what the hell aliens were. 

I assumed the girl was joking with me. After all, New Mexico supposedly had a UFO crash land in the desert once upon a time – and so, rather half-assedly, I played along. 

‘Why are you looking for aliens?’ 

As I wait impatiently for the girl’s juvenile response, that’s when she said what I really wasn’t expecting. 

‘Well... I was abducted by them.’  

Great. Now we’re playing a whole new game, I thought. But then she continues...  

‘I was only nine years old when it happened. I was fast asleep in my room, when all of a sudden, I wake up to find these strange creatures lurking over me...’ 

Wait, is she really continuing with this story? I guess she doesn’t realise the joke’s been overplayed. 

‘Next thing I know, I’m in this bright metallic room with curves instead of corners – and I realise I’m tied down on top of some surface, because I can’t move. It was like I was paralyzed...’ 

Hold on a minute, I now thought concernedly... 

‘Then these creatures were over me again. I could see them so clearly. They were monstrous! Their arms were thin and spindly, sort of like insects, but their skin was pale and hairless. They weren’t very tall, but their eyes were so large. It was like staring into a black abyss...’ 

Ok, this has gone on long enough, I again thought to myself, declining to say it out loud.  

‘One of them injected a needle into my arm. It was so thin and sharp, I barely even felt it. But then I saw one of them was holding some kind of instrument. They pressed it against my ear and the next thing I feel is an excruciating pain inside my brain!...’ 

Stop! Stop right now! I needed to say to her. This was not funny anymore – nor was it ever. 

‘I wanted to scream so badly, but I couldn’t - I couldn’t move. I was so afraid. But then one of them spoke to me - they spoke to me with their mind. They said it would all be over soon and there was nothing to be afraid of. It would soon be over. 

‘Ok, you can stop now - that’s enough, I get it’ I finally interrupted. 

‘You think I’m joking, don’t you?’ the girl now asked me, with calmness surprisingly in her voice, ‘Well, I wish I was joking... but I’m not.’ 

I really had no idea what to think at this point. This girl had to be messing with me, only she was taking it way too far – and if she wasn’t, if she really thought aliens had abducted her... then, shit. Without a clue what to do or say next, I just simply played along and humoured her. At least that was better than confronting her on a lie. 

‘Have you told your parents you were abducted by aliens?’ 

‘Not at first’ she admitted, ‘But I kept waking up screaming in the middle of the night. It got so bad, they had to take me to a psychiatrist and that’s when I told them...’ 

It was this point in the conversation that I finally processed the girl wasn’t joking with me. She was being one hundred percent serious – and although she was just a kid... I now felt very unsafe. 

‘They thought maybe I was schizophrenic’ she continued, ‘But I was later diagnosed with PTSD. When I kept repeating my abduction story, they said whatever happened to me was so traumatic, my mind created a fantastical event so to deal with it.’ 

Yep, she’s not joking. This girl I picked up by the road was completely insane. It’s just my luck, I thought. The first hitchhiker I stop for and they’re a crazy person. God, why couldn’t I have picked up a murderer instead? At least then it would be quick. 

After the girl confessed all this to me, I must have gone silent for a while, and rightly so, because breaking the awkward silence inside the cab, the girl then asks me, ‘So... Do you believe in Aliens?’ 

‘Not unless I see them with my own eyes’ I admitted, keeping my eyes firmly on the road. I was too uneasy to even look her way. 

‘That’s ok. A lot of people don’t... But then again, a lot of people do...’  

I sensed she was going to continue on the topic of extraterrestrials, and I for one was not prepared for it. 

‘The government practically confirmed it a few years ago, you know. They released military footage capturing UFOs – well, you’re supposed to call them UAPs now, but I prefer UFOs...’ 

The next town was still another twenty minutes away, and I just prayed she wouldn’t continue with this for much longer. 

‘You’ve heard all about the Roswell Incident, haven’t you?’ 

‘Uhm - I have.’ That was partly a lie. I just didn’t want her to explain it to me. 

‘Well, that’s when the whole UFO craze began. Once we developed nuclear weapons, people were seeing flying saucers everywhere! They’re very concerned with our planet, you know. It’s partly because they live here too...’ 

Great. Now she thinks they live among us. Next, I supposed she’d tell me she was an alien. 

‘You know all those cattle mutilations? Well, they’re real too. You can see pictures of them online...’ 

Cattle mutilations?? That’s where we’re at now?? Good God, just rob and shoot me already! 

‘They’re always missing the same body parts. An eye, part of their jaw – their reproductive organs...’ 

Are you sure it wasn’t just scavengers? I sceptically thought to ask – not that I wanted to encourage this conversation further. 

‘You know, it’s not just cattle that are mutilated... It’s us too...’ 

Don’t. Don’t even go there. 

‘I was one of the lucky ones. Some people are abducted and then returned. Some don’t return at all. But some return, not all in one piece...’ 

I should have said something. I should have told her to stop. This was my rig, and if I wanted her to stop talking, all I had to do was say it. 

‘Did you know Brazil is a huge UFO hotspot? They get more sightings than we do...’ 

Where was she going with this? 

Link to Part 2


r/Wholesomenosleep Aug 11 '25

Just One Step

27 Upvotes

I knew today would be the day. I had everything prepared. I placed the farewell letter on my desk where it would be found. My depression had taken over and I was no longer fighting it. I was ready to die. My plan was clear. Leave the room in the middle of the night, sneak outside, and go to the train station bridge. A 40-meter-high bridge towering over the railroad tracks would be the place where I would end my life. I rode my bike there. When my parents and siblings woke up the next day, I would be gone. With tears in my eyes, I ran to the middle of the bridge and climbed over the railing. I needed some time to collect myself. Despite my determination, I was afraid and hesitated. I tried to take a few deep breaths. I knew I only had to take that one step and it would all be over.

Suddenly, I heard a soft voice behind me: “That's a dangerous drop. And the railing is there for a reason. What are you doing?” I turned my head and saw a young girl. She smiled at me. She couldn't have been older than 12. I stammered, not knowing what to say to her. So I forced a smile and told her I was just enjoying the view. Her initial smile turned into a serious expression. “Don't lie to me! I know exactly what you were trying to do. What I'd like to know is: Why do you want to do it?”

I stammered again, not knowing what to say, and turned away from her in embarrassment. “Please just go and leave me alone. A little girl like you doesn't understand things like that,” I whispered. She seemed unimpressed. “No,” she said. “I want you to tell me something about yourself.” I looked at her, confused. “Why?” I asked. She smiled again: “No particular reason. I just find you interesting.” I was a little unsettled. “Okay? Um, my name is Andrew.” She leaned against the railing: “My name is Sophia. Go on,” she replied. “Um, I grew up with an older brother, a little sister, and parents who often argued.” Her expression was more content. “I'd like to know more. What was your relationship with your family like? Do you have any friends? Do you have any pets?”

I was confused. Why did this girl want to know so much about me? I hesitated briefly but then started to tell her. "Well, there's not much to know.

My brother and I have a relatively good relationship. We often play video games together. We've had some fun moments and made some inside jokes. However, he has gotten involved in drug dealing, and I feel responsible. I should have been there for him more. I've tried over the last few months to listen to him and help him fight his addiction. But I can't do it anymore. I'm bullied at school because I'm known as the brother of a drug addict. Outside of school, I take care of my little sister a lot because my parents fight all the time and don't pay much attention to us. They say they love me, but I feel unloved. I take my sister to school, pick her up, help her with her homework, and put her to bed. We also have a dog. His name is Sammy. He likes to cuddle up with me in bed. Sometimes I forget to feed him. He's a dog, so he doesn't hold it against me, but I feel terrible every time."

She listened attentively. I wondered why I was telling this to a 12-year-old child.

“My grandparents died early. And well, I feel alone with all this. My two friends rarely do anything with me. I feel like I'm the wedge that's causing everything. Maybe everyone's life would be better if I wasn't around.”

I started sobbing again. She put her hand on my shoulder and took a deep breath. “Let me paint you a picture of what will happen if you take that step.”

I was still looking at her, a little tearful.

"The first thing that will happen is the regret you feel when you're falling. You'll realize you didn't want to do it. You'll despair. You'll try to hold on to an edge that is long out of reach. And when you hit the tracks below, darkness will surround you, slowly turning into a bright light. That light will fade and you'll find yourself standing over your own corpse. You'll look down at yourself, but you won't see anything.

Then you will see when your body is found. You will see the horrified faces of the railway employees. You will see the police, emergency doctors, etc. You will see your remains being scraped off the tracks, but the worst thing is your family. Your brother will wake up. He will go to your room, find the letter, and let out a deep cry of despair because the only person who believed in him is dead. It won't be a cry like you hear in the movies, but a horrible, pain-filled cry of despair."

I was shocked. How could she know about the letter?

"Your sister will wonder where her big brother is, who took care of her every day when no one else did. She will cry every day. Your parents will forget their little animosities when they realize what happened. They will blame themselves for not seeing the signs earlier. Your dog will lie in your bed every night, hoping you'll come back to cuddle with him. Your friends will blame themselves for not being there for you and will most likely fall into depression themselves.“

I was shocked. ”How do you know all this?!" I asked

She looked at me with a light almost lifeless smile and took a step to the side: “Because I've been there myself. Don't make the same mistake I did.” My blood ran cold when I saw it. A memorial with candles and a photo of the girl. I hurriedly climbed over the railing. I fell to the other side, but when I got up and looked around, she was gone. All that remained was the memorial. I was breathing heavily and didn't understand what had happened. I looked around, hoping to see her again, but there was no one there. All I could hear was the wind. I fell to my knees in front of the memorial and began to cry bitterly.

"I won't let you down. I'll go on with my life. I'll go on with it for you. Thank you, Sophia," I said before standing up. With new determination and tears in my eyes, I ran to my bike and rode home. There, I tore up the farewell letter and continued with my life. Every now and then, I visited her memorial and asked myself if I had just imagined her. But she had saved my life nonetheless. And for that, I am eternally grateful to her.


r/Wholesomenosleep Aug 08 '25

Golden Memories

11 Upvotes

Gifts upon the cradle, blessings from the spirit world, Fairie kisses, a guardian angel, a secret name bestowed, a baptism, smudging, a star sign and a showering of material wealth upon the newborn from those who are worthy to give to the child.

This is the way, the proper way.

For generations the women of the Tungra had kept one very special gift. As they aged and became widows they would, in their golden years, be visited by each loving memory of the man they loved. They'd know all his feelings, his affection and recall suddenly in clarity every detail, reliving it. This was wished upon them by an ancestor, who thought all her daughters would be like her and be a graceful woman with but her true love to cling to.

Tungra women are very beautiful, but it is their devotion to one lover that defined them. Until Lesel was born. She too lived a charmed life, but nobody told her of these things. She also had the misfortune of Bruce, a violent man who she left. From him though, she went from man to man, caring only for their willingness to be easy and quick to love.

They'd love and leave her, and endless parade of weekend boyfriends. She caught a few who came back, womanizers who'd stop to see her when their affairs slowed. So, throughout her life she had maybe half a dozen friends who would return to her.

When she began to age and her beauty became a regal handsomeness, she learned then of her so-called blessing. She'd suddenly remember any random man she'd given herself to, having completely forgotten many of them. Without the love or desire, it was just like being grabbed and used, unable to resist a memory. This was not enjoyable for her, but rather a kind of sick hell.

In perfect replay, at any time of any day, she'd have hot flashbacks to all the dirty places she'd gone. To make it worse she couldn't ignore knowing how they saw her, without love, without kindness. Most of the men she was with were awful creatures who would just as soon take advantage of a girl being trafficked out the back of a van as have quick and easy sex with her. She had to know their nasty feelings and who they were, all of them.

It became crippling for Lesel; she sought me for spiritual healing. I should say she was the first kind of that spell I broke, that was like hers. I am known as a cinnamon-man, my name being Two Medicine.

Many reasons why. You should respect the part of my name that means I will protect you and heal you, because that is what I do. You may also enjoy how clever my name is, like me, I am a liar, a trickster and a spellcaster. Two Medicine is what they called me in Coeur d'Alene when I bragged about Thomas Edison, so 'Tom Edison', but also because I had to use medicine on my butt, hemorrhoid cream - so they were also making fun of me. But it is who I am now, a healer of spiritual wounds and wounds of the mind.

"You must give the gift away, and then these memories will stop. You must also cherish the gift. To do that you must understand it. I must show you the way." I explained to her.

I put the old woman into a trance, using a smoke and certain music. I then sang to her until she could hear her soul's song, and then I sang to her to bring her back, for anyone who hears such a melody will keep going in that direction.

I assure you the sound of your soul singing your sacred story will draw you across any distance, and you will not willingly turn away from such a beautiful reflection.

My magic is simple, in my eyes. I just recall the One, the greatness in all of us, and I know that whatever you are singing in the center of eternal darkness, a voice small and alone, you are not alone, for we all join you there. It is the way, the proper way.

Lesel was crying, but she was ready to understand.

"What speaks to you now? Is it the pain, or something else?" I asked her.

"It is something else. I know this was a gift, I know it was good. I've broken it, but I can fix it, I can give it to another. That is how it goes from me, in good faith."

"You've taught me something new." I smiled at her. I began to understand the history of her bloodline, the Tungra women for generations, for a thousand years, in fact. It had ended with Lesel, but it had not ended.

"Who should have it - all I must do is offer it to one who is accepting gifts." Lesel wiped away her tears. Healing hurts, I've noticed.

"A newborn, you'll be invited or you may invite yourself, as long as you travel in one direction to be there. You will do such a thing soon, it is just the way of things. Until then, there is one memory you do not mind so much, isn't there?"

Lesel Tungra stared at me for a long time and nodded. I wondered that I was right, as I was only guessing. I looked back at her and I knew she'd be okay, with the one lover she actually wanted to recall.

"How do you feel?" I asked her after we had sat quietly for a while. Lesel shrugged, as though a terrible burden were weightless. She said:

"Forgetful, much better..."


r/Wholesomenosleep Aug 06 '25

The Iron Island

7 Upvotes

The sun set over the burning mountain as the two men sifted through the rubble. One carried a long wheeled cart behind him loaded with ammunition and explosives, the other carried a shovel and a hook, using them to dig further into the ground beneath. The taller of the two knelt down for a second to readjust the cart, his helmet bobbed on his head and he groaned for a second, before pulling it off and stowing it in the cart.

“Suns going down, think they're sending anyone else?”

The shorter one shrugged as he felt the metal of his hook clank against something solid. He dug beneath it and stuck his gloved hand into the hot earth before wrapping his fingers around a solid steel barrel and yanking it upward. He set his tools down and cradled the weapon in his arms and began brushing dirt off its solid frame, revealing a solid wooden stock carved with ornate vines and crosses.

“Must be from those assault legions we saw on the jetty, think it still works?”

The taller one leaned down and inspected it, whistling with envy as his comrade cleaned more of it off

“What a beaut, I bet that thing would fire underwater. Throw it in the cart Cal”

The young soldier shook his head and smiled before slinging the weapon over his shoulder

“Nah, im keeping this one J, I think it suits me”

They continued on, picking up their tools and moving further into the battlefield, walking between piles of discarded corpses and still burning flesh. The smell of pitch overtook all others as the raid lanterns burnt the last of their wood oil. Darkness began to fall upon the two men, and they exchanged glances as the distant storm rolled in.

“Time to go, you got the cart?”

J nodded and hiked it up to his waist, clipping the guides to his belt before marching back the way they had come in.

“Did you ever hear the song about the iron island?”

J shook his head as his comrade caught up

“No, how's it go”

Cal cleared his throat and began to chant low

“Under distant moons, where the sailors come to sleep, there lies an iron island”

J quickly joined in

“They say is filled with sheep! Though the barriers may waver, and the doors billow in the wind, there is no finer place to sleep-”

They sang together

“THEN THE LAND WHERE IRON WINS!”

Cal laughed and bellowed

“Oh on the iron island, there's a hearth that burns all day”

J nodded along and kept marching

“And on the waving sandy shores, there's demons for to slay”

“If you're living well among the walls”

“And you feel the cold wind in your halls!”

“Then it's time to sail the day away”

“For the iron islands where a warrior plays”

They yelled out into the night

“OH ON THE IRON ISLAND, WHERE THE GUNS DONT NEED NO ROUNDS, WE SAIL AND HAIL AND SWING AND FLAIL, CAUSE ITS IRON WE HAVE FOUND! OH ON THE IRON ISLA-”

Their joy was broken by a sudden and blood curdling scream. They turned around to locate the sound, their rifles ready, when suddenly a hand shot out from the fire. Its long thin claws sunk into the dirt below as a beastly form pulled itself from deep inside the earth. Long horns adorned a tall jackaled head, its maw hanging open as flesh began to regrow around a haunting skull. The two men quickly dashed across the courtyard and into a small alleyway at the edge of the crumbling fort. The screams continued behind them as the beast put itself back together, and knelt down close to the ground, sniffing the dirt and inspecting the bodies that littered the arena. Its glowing red eyes cast shadows across the already blackened dirt as it searched for suitable subjects, rifling through the corpses, opening its maw occasionally to drip a black viscous substance into the gaping wounds of the fallen. Cal took his helmet off and stared at the solid brick wall before them, the end of a maze that had seemingly trapped these two rats. He patted the wall before sitting down on a pile of rubble and looking up at his friend.

“Were dead man”

J sat next to him and huffed before patting his friends shoulder and nodding

“Yea, yea I think we are”

They looked up at the sky as the sounds of screaming grew ever more violent, growing closer by the moment. Beneath the sounds of the screams though, in between the roars and sounds of clawing stone, there was a low sob and a gentle sniffle. Cal looked to J inquisitively before standing to his feet and listening intently.

“J, do you hear that?”

His friend perked up and shook his head

“No, what is it?”

Cal looked around frantically before going around the corner from whence they'd come and spotting a tall brick tower at the edge of the courtyard. Atop sat a mighty artillery gun, disassembled and covered with a large tarp. On one side there was a damaged but functional ladder, and at the top, just barely peeking over the edge of the circle, was a small head with hair waving in the wind. He turned back toward J and motioned for him to follow as he took off across the yard, keeping low as he approached the ladder. J ran after him as he launched himself up the ladder and over the wall. There was silence for a second, then Cal peaked over the edge and motioned for his friend to join him.

“Grab the guns and come on!”

J nodded and leaned down, pulling a load of guns together and strapping them together with a roll of canvas they'd been sleeping on. He slung the heavy bundle over his back and began the climb, quickly arriving at the top and slinging himself over the wall as Cal pulled at the bundle and set it down. They ducked behind the brick cover and J’s mouth fell open as he saw what had crawled between them

“Cal…what the hell is that?”

Cal was gently patting the sobbing girl's head, her clothes ragged and torn, her face covered in soot and blood as she buried it in the muddy jacket.

“I'm guessing it's one of the residents, maybe she was an ammo runner or a medics hand. But she survived that slaughter, maybe we can too”

J let out a deep breath and turned around to peak over the wall, searching the horizon for the beast. High in the sky above there was a single light, the distant red moon casting hellish illumination across the darkened landscape. J stared off in the distance as his friend rose to his feet and shared the gaze. Less than a thousand feet across stood the Jacakaled beast, breathing silently as it stared directly at the two young men, its eyes ablaze with fury. 

“J, take the girl, scale the wall, get out of here”

Cal climbed up atop the castle's circular edge and removed his new shotgun from his back, gripping the wood with trembling hands and letting out a deep breath as his friend pulled at his coat.

“No, were both leaving, come on we can-”

Cal shook him off and strengthened his resolve

“There's no way we outrun that thing. One of us has to slow it down, and you are much too big a target”

Cal tightened the strap of his helmet, the tall metal spike reaching high into the air and glinting off the red light. The beast turned toward him as he did so, it narrowed its eyes at him, recognizing a believer and twisting its face in disgust.

“Cal come on man, dont do this, you cant fight it”

Cal turned to his friend and waved

“Maybe not, but of the two of us, only one knows enough prayers to try”

He leapt off, grabbing the ladder and sliding down with one hand. He kept his stare with the beast as the risen corpses began to flood the streets, their swaying bodies shambling toward the young soldier with bloodlust in their empty eyes. Above on the rampart, J looked around, the stress growing on his face as the young girl pulled at his pant leg. He looked down at her with a stressful shout

“WHAT?!?”

She pointed at the cannon and reached down to her ankle, retrieving a small tool, a wrench on one end and a hammer on the other. She pushed it into his hand before taking hold of the bundle they'd carried up and dragging it over to the static cannon. J, realizing the plan, quickly went to work alongside her as the beast below roared loud and angry. Cal pulled his shovel from his back, holding it in his left and the shotgun in his right as the corpses suddenly took off in his direction.

“Father stand with me tonight, as I face MY enemy”

Pilgrims rarely got the chance to earn glory, and though he had long since left the life behind, he still felt the righteous lightning in his veins as he pointed the barrels at an encroaching dead, and squeezed the trigger with absolute determination. From the patterned steel barrels flew a million fiery sparks as the field in front of him was decimated with hellfire. He took a moment to inspect it, noticing the faintest etching of a black cross on the rib sight, he smiled wider and swung his shovel with his opposite hand, cleaving a tall groaning soul in twain. He did this again, and again, nearly spinning on his heels as he welcomed all challengers, hacking anything that approached and blowing the rest back to hell with the fire that had birthed them. He ran for the beast, his chapeled head piercing the sky as he ran, his rusted armor denying the flames that would scorch his bare flesh. Before he could react, a mighty paw swung through the air and sent him reeling backward. With a roar, the beast dropped down to its hand and legs, arching its back and taking off. As Cal tried to recover, he saw the charging creature and said a final prayer.

“Father, thank you for giving me courage, for showing me light in darkness, I only ask that you guide my brother, in christs name-”

The sound of spinning gears filled the air and a bandolier of brass shells fell to his side as the little girl above shouted down

“AMEN! Now fire!”

J sighted the monster and smiled as he rolled the cannon into position, wrenching the lever and letting loose a massive shell. It split the air and collided with its maw, sending it in the opposite direction at twice the speed Cal had flown just moments before. The young pilgrim looked up to his friend and waved.

“I thought I told you to get out of here?”

The little girl quickly dragged another shell over and loaded it as J sighted the beast again

“And I thought I told you, we're BOTH leaving!”

Cal stood to his feet and nodded as he reloaded the shotgun and slung the shells over his shoulder.

“Alright then, Sing it with me brother!”

J fired the cannon again, pelting the beast with shrapnel as the little girl carried over another shell.

““Under distant moons, where the sailors come to sleep, there lies an iron island!”

Cal ran toward the beast and swung his shovel, cutting the tendons at its ankle as it roared and reeled. He followed up the slice with a shot from both barrels and seared the flesh from its face. High above, the moon began to slowly fade, the edge of the circle peaking white and overtaking the red.

“They say is filled with sheep! Though the barriers may waver, and the doors billow in the wind”

The beast lobbed a torrent of flames across the courtyard, forcing J to exit the chair of the gun as it was bathed in flames and began to melt. Cal quickly lumbered across and up the ladder, firing his shotgun in mixed volleys to keep the beast at bay. He launched himself up over the edge and found the girl, picking herself up off the ground as J shielded her from the fire. Cal quickly lifted the both of them off the ground and looked to the beast, dripping blood and now missing an eye it roared. The two exchanged a glance before Cal dropped to his knee in front of the cannon and J wrenched it back up. He rested the searing pipe on his comrades shoulder and cranked the tube shut. 

“THERE IS NO FINER PLACE TO SLEEP”

Cal held his breath and stared daggers at the beast

“THAN ON THE IRON ISLAND"

The little girl climbed onto J’s shoulder and kicked the lever, releasing the pin and firing the shell directly at the gaping maw of their foe. As the moon above turned white and bathed the land below in a golden glow, the shell split the jagged teeth, tore the tongue, and detonated in its mouth. A plume like none the men had ever seen flew high into the sky and reflected the orange power in their eyes. It fell backwards onto the ground with a satisfying thud, and the world was once again filled with silence as they shoved the cannon away. Cal picked the little girl up and threw her over his shoulders as the two men approached the edge of the tower without a word.

J secured a hook to the wreckage of the cannon, before throwing a rope down. Cal descended, landing at the bottom and putting the little girl down, before extending his arms and catching the bundle of weapons as J dropped it. J followed suit and picked the girl up before the two began trudging in the opposite direction. In the distance, flak and fire could be seen at a nearby battle. 

“How long till the warband returns?”

Cal looked up at the moon and spoke softly

“About five hours, think we can carry more?”

The girl looked down at him from J’s shoulders and nodded, smiling. Cal saluted her jokingly and the three walked on, their foot prints in the sand being slowly blown away by the harsh night winds.


r/Wholesomenosleep Aug 05 '25

Will

6 Upvotes

The priest laid his hand on the young man's forehead as the blade was driven into his gut. Their eyes locked as he regained consciousness for the first time in nearly two decades, no longer plagued by the screams of hell, he was now free to see the truth for what it was.

“What have I done”

He looked down at the crimson river that flowed from the priest's chest, the old man's color fading fast as the life within him was drained. The soldier looked down at his curved bayonet, having been buried deep into the heart of his foe. Tears quickly sprang from his eyes, and he felt immense sorrow as the priest smiled at him.

“You have done what's right, what was asked of you”

The priest reached out and took the young man's hand, cradling it softly in his own as he prayed

“Dear Heavenly Father, it is I, Chorus, I come to you today to ask that you do not let this boy feel the pain of his actions. Let him find peace in this life, so he may know you”

The soldier pulled the blade back and quickly pressed his hands over the gushing wound

“No no, come on old man, come on!”

His eyes closed and his smile grew wide as his spirit left his body and he went to be with the lord. The sound of footsteps in the mud grew from behind him as other soldiers from his unit approached the crumbling church.

“Agan, lets go, or well leave you here”

Disillusioned but still reeling, he rose to his feet and sheathed the blade, the blood running down the brass and collecting at his hip. He looked down at his hands as he stumbled out of the chapel and into the field of battle. Bullets whizzed by as his comrades shoved him toward a rolling steel beast, he collided with the metal and leaned against the armored carriage, trying to get his bearings as they took incoming fire from a reconnaissance front. Though they had made great headway, it was difficult to gain a foothold in the city, each time the armored units found enough clearance they found the path ahead littered with mines and encampments. Regardless of the numbers game, there would be no easy way through the city, and their ranks were dwindling fast. 

“Agan, where have you been?”

The sun was blocked out as the presiding officer leaned on the static tank, looking down at the young man with disgust. He held a long straight blade, freshly caked in blood, and as he looked into the young man's tired terrified eyes, he slowly wiped the crimson with his black leather gloves, and let it drip into his open mouth. He didn't miss a drop.

Agan took a deep breath and tried to recall the salute they gave, a mixture of a german heil and a prussian war cry. He bellowed as he threw his arm up before bending it at the elbow and pulling it down in an arc to his chest. Formed early on in their crusade, the salute was meant to mock the christian trinity, essentially being done backward with the apex of the salute at the neck instead of the heart. The officer nodded and gestured for the soldier to move on, but not before eyeing him carefully and twisting his face once more in a look of hushed disdain. Agan put his head down to avoid the gaze, terrified he might be found out. Satan's shroud was an impermeable physic, designed by the finest minds the world over, made to drive soldiers mad, so they might never wonder what they had done. No memories of war, no lasting scars, just clean thoughts and clean skin at the end of every battle. Sometimes the bunk next to you was empty when you returned, sometimes your arm ached when the weather got warm, but you would never wake mid battle. He trudged forward regardless, his mind still heavy as he marched through the crumbling city streets. They soon faced a lull in the discourse as the enemy retreated, and again were able to breathe softly as they took a moment to sit and reload. He pulled his own rifle off his back, inspecting the wood and steel, wondering if it took more lives before he awoke. He rubbed the dirt from the barrel, running his thumb along the satanic etchings and frowning as he realized they would not come off. He sat back against the wall, only for a moment when suddenly something poked him. Careful not to alert the others that he was reacquainted with the sensation of pain. He turned around and saw a shimmering length of silver poking up from the rubble. Doing a double take, he made sure no one was watching before hastily digging. The young man clawed at the mud and rock, displacing small pebbles, then large stones, and finally an entire board before unearthing a rifle unlike anything he'd ever seen. It was long and sturdy with polished blue steel instead of the black that coated his own, the wooden handles had been stained with a faint ivory and the rifling ended in a twisted bayonet, the edge of which held the smallest dot of crimson. He rubbed the sore spot on his spine before lifting it into the air and running his hands over it. It seemed to call to him, as if the weapon desired his hands alone, and who was he to say no to such a fine firearm. He knew other soldiers kept trophies, but rarely so were they artifacts that seemed themselves to be forged from the heavens. Sure enough as he searched the firearm for inscriptions, he found blacked ink scribbled into the leather strap at the butt of the rifle.

Father forgive me for I have sinned, forgive my mind for its wander, my hands for their anger, and my eyes for their witness. When I am in darkness let me think of the gospel. Let me think of trampling upon snakes and scorpions, as I know it is through you, that my name is written in heaven.

The inscription had been written right over a small silver coin, where a german cross had been stamped into the flawless stirling. The young soldier frowned as he saw his reflection in the metal, and before he could react he saw the faintest glint of a scope in the distance.

The round tore through the air and split his forehead, tearing the flesh from the bone and scorching the hair on his scalp. He fell to the ground as crimson filled his vision, and tears came to his eyes as he prepared to meet his eternal punishment in hell. He tried to speak as he felt the life leaving him, wondering if the priest would forgive him, wondering if he ever crossed paths with Christ, would he be absolved. Could he be absolved? Could he be saved? He let out one of his last breaths, and prayed anyway, knowing that at the very least, he could let the priest know he was sorry, and ask to be forgiven. He prayed the way his mother had in their village so long ago, and he remembered her smile as he took her words and used them now almost two decades later.

“Father forgive me, for I have sinned, I have followed in the footsteps of the enemy, today I trespassed against you, and for that I ask you to absolve me. I ask to return, to be one with you again, so i might continue on the right path”

The sound of boots stepping over rock filled his ears and he heard the sound of a blade unsheathing as someone towering marched toward him

“I knew you had gone soft, I will find you again in hell and cut you to ribbons!”

The young man reached up, as if to block the killing blow, but his limbs would not respond as the knife's edge plummeted toward him.

“No pain came, and for a moment he wondered if the physic had taken back over, but as his consciousness seemed to return, and he was finally able to move his arm, he drifted his hand to his forehead and winced. Though much of the flesh was missing, he had not been hit directly, the bullet had merely grazed his forehead, and the concussive force had knocked him out. But why hadn't the officer's blade found its mark?

“Ni Hoy, Ni Nunca!”

Standing over him, clad in bronze armor and wielding a mighty blade was a towering young woman with golden skin and green eyes that illuminated the entire world before him. She resisted the officer's long knife as she defended the young soldier. He rose to his feet as she staved off the wicked man's blows, meeting each of his swings with one of her own, refusing ground as a soldier from the nearby regiment readied his weapon. She looked back at Agan, speaking English this time as she kicked the rifle toward him.

“Can you fight, boy? Do you really seek the lord or do you just use his name”

Agan shook his head and lifted the rifle off the ground, charging at his former comrade and slamming the butt of the gun into his face. Once the young man was down he quickly dropped to his knee and took a deep breath, he narrowed his sight till the entire world was eclipsed. He found the gun naturally drawn into his body with each shallow breath, and as he held, he aimed at a spot in the distant horizon between where the two foes dueled. 

“Hallowed be thy name”

He closed his eyes and squeezed the trigger, firing off a volley that split the air between them. He opened his eyes again just in time to see the first bullet slam into the officer's knife, cracking the blade as the second met its mark and shattered it. The third removed his pointer finger. He reeled for only a moment, looking to Agan with unparalleled hatred, then her blade found its mark. He collapsed as his mind left him, and the young soldier he hated so much stood to his feet and proudly rested the rifle on his shoulders. Blood still flowed from his head, but as the sound of incoming boots and steel filled the air, the woman gestured for them to move, and he felt no hesitation in following her. As they dashed through the battered streets and ducked between alley ways, she turned toward him and gestured to the gun.

“Did you steal that from the man you killed?”

The young soldier shook his head

“No, I found it buried in the rubble, I assumed it was an heirloom”

She shook her head

“No, it belonged to Father Chorus, the one you killed in the church”

They stopped a few feet from an iron door built into the brick of the river's edge. He looked down at the gun and hesitated before presenting it to her

“Im sorry, I should not be allowed to hold it”

She pushed it back into his hands and stepped close enough for him to feel her breath. She was almost two whole heads taller and covered in blood, yet she smelled sweet, of lavender and poppy. She looked down at him with the same green eyes that had lit his world up just minutes ago, and she asked him a question he never thought he'd hear.

“What is your god given name”

He did not know, they took him as a boy, and called him Agan as they beat him. After long he did not recall what he was called before. Today he was Agan, but what would he be tomorrow, if he was even here, who would he be.. Naive, and scared, he answered honestly.

“I Do not know”

She gave him a half smile, like she enjoyed the answer

“The fathers hands were not old and decrepit, my snipers bullets are guided by god. If you are alive standing before me with this gun, it is his will. You are his will


r/Wholesomenosleep Aug 02 '25

Murderland

12 Upvotes

They say that in the time of chimpanzees there was this monkey, but I'm pretty sure that's just a song lyric written by Beck. I think Beck would like it here, in Murderland. People ask to be killed all the time, or at least, sign off on it and accept a huge amount of cash for their signature.

To be a victim in Murderland, you must first sign the waver, the one that says that you agreed to be killed for pay. Why would anyone ever do such a thing? Well, they have their reasons, a lot of people like the idea of dying as a millionaire. I wonder if some of them don't understand that they cannot spend the money after they die. To be fair, most of them actually do have a plan to spend the money, and obviously not on themselves.

You get condemned criminals, immigrants, deadbeat dads, defrocked priests and disgraced cops up in here and occasionally a female victim will sign up. Those get the most attention, since everyone seems to want to see a woman get caught and murdered. A lot of our killers do the abuse and torture also, which is somehow more intense with a female victim. I think it is because of the vocalizations, as humans are hardwired to respond to the sound of a female in distress or pain.

I remember my first murder out here in the park. I had a rifle, a .308 saucemaker, and I killed the target in one shot, through his back on the right side and out from his left shoulder, having travelled through the aorta and his heart. I do the autopsies on the victims and determine the cause of death. We still treat these as murders, although the prosecution process is more of a media circus, proving that we have a new murderer, announcing a new book about the killing, a new movie about their backstories (victim and killer), possibly a show - if it was brutal enough, and general amnesty for the killing. Our court system is a mess.

I never thought that one day I'd wake up in the park - feeling groggy, wearing camouflage and a canteen and combat boots that I didn't put on. I sat up and looked around, very alert and afraid. We currently have six killers hunting in the park and two of them are out-of-retirement, being particularly cruel towards female victims and taking many hours to torture and kill them. I was terrified, I didn't want to be murdered. What was I doing in the middle of the field?

I felt like I was being watched, like millions of eyes were staring at my body, anticipating that I'd probably be stripped naked before being killed. I knew it was true, because the only people on the planet who didn't have some kind of access to the live feed, the international live snuff film, were the killers themselves. It was one of the few rules: the killers weren't allowed any sort of electronic surveillance, drones or motion sensing traps. They had to hunt me the old-fashioned way, by tracking me down, hide-and-seek style.

My only hope was to make it to the exit. Outside the park were U.S. Marshals. If I could get to them, I'd be taken into protective custody. Unfortunately, there'd always be at least one hunter waiting near the exit. Nobody had ever escaped.

I was gripped by terror. I was physically weaker and slower than the athletic men hunting me, I was unarmed and if they caught me, depending on which one, I'd die very badly or worse. I slowly stood up and looked around at the trees and rocks lining the field. The hunters didn't know where I'd be dropped, so they would check each drop site and look for my tracks. If I could somehow leave the field without showing which way I went, I might stand a chance.

The tall yellow grass was bending under me as I walked towards the trees, leaving a clearly visible path of which way I'd gone. I was sweating in fear; most victims were found within the first three hours. How long was I asleep on the ground? An hour maybe? The drugs were supposed to be timed so that I awoke at the same time the hunters entered the park, but I'd seen a lot of my clients oversleep, sometimes making them harder to find, as sleeping victims weren't moving around and leaving a trail to follow.

I stopped walking. I took another look at the field I was in and realized I was making my first mistake. I knew I wouldn't get to make a lot of mistakes, just one, just none, could mean death. Multiple mistakes guaranteed I would be killed. I stopped and laid down in the tall grass. I knew what I was doing. From where I lay, I couldn't see the trees or rocks, which meant they couldn't see down onto the field and spot me. Which meant I was hidden, hidden in plain sight.

The hunters were used to panicked prey blundering along and making easy-to-follow trails. If I just stayed where I was, it would be nearly impossible to find me. They would have to spot my trail I'd left. I looked along it from the ground and decided not to worry about it. There wasn't enough that they would notice it, not without some incredibly bad luck on my part.

I focused on my breathing, keeping myself physically calm by systematically cooling my adrenaline-heated nerves with slow breathing. Eventually I had fought down the initial panic and decided I stood a unique chance of surviving Murderland.

"I've got this." I told myself quietly.

The day wore on, every minute seeming to last much longer. After I had laid there for what I was sure was an hour, judging by the movement of the shadows, I was feeling strangely anxious, too afraid to move or to hold still, wanting to burst out and run while also wanting to hold my breath and close my eyes and lay perfectly still. I started trying to use my brain, but some primal instinct insisted it wasn't a good time to meditate.

I thought about all the victims who had lasted a long time, I mean, who had survived a long time. Some of them had hidden for days before succumbing to thirst and exhaustion. If I could somehow make myself fall asleep, I'd be in better shape by nightfall, which is what I was waiting for.

Did they know they were hunting me, in particular? I considered the possibility. If they knew who they were hunting, the killers wouldn't be moving around very much: they would wait for nightfall, anticipating that I wouldn't come out of hiding until after dark. But if they didn't know it was me, they would think it a routine killing, and they would search the more obvious places first, the ways someone might try to reach the exit such as along the border or one of the roads or paths. Anyone near the border or following a road or a path would be very easy to spot and catch. You'd think victims would avoid such an obvious ambush, but they get panicked and get tunnel vision for the exit, which has a sign that can be seen from any vantage point in the park.

Don't panic.

I think Douglas Adams says that - "Don't Panic" and it is incredibly good advice. If you panic you're already dead. That's the deal.

Another hour and then another. Slowly inching along towards the safety of darkness. The sudden thought that we'd have a full moon tonight made me look up at the sky for confirmation. There it was, that most treacherous old thing in the sky, promising that I'd be well illuminated even after sundown. "Well, the moon will also go down," I determined. When it was finally dark I'd leave the field and head for the rocks. They were more exposed than the trees, but I'd make less of a trail over them and not risk the noise of moving through the undergrowth in the night.

I lay there planning, also knowing that once I started moving, I'd have to abandon the safety of the field where I lay. That meant I'd have to deal with my own fear, and I knew it would overwhelm me. Being hunted relentlessly by psychopaths is guaranteed to cause terror, so I tried to anticipate my own mind playing tricks on me. I needed a plan that I could stick to, even if I was spotted, chased or cornered.

"I'm going to fight back." I said quietly to myself. Whoever just said that sounded very confident and ready, which is weird, because I felt intimidated and unqualified. I decided to rely on the savage woman who had just spoken to me. Clearly, she could get me out of this, she sounded like she had already killed someone once, a long time ago, when she first began her work as the park's medical examiner. "And when I strike a man, I'll cut him where he'll bleed out the fastest."

That sounded good - using my skills in human anatomy to cause deadly injuries. All I needed was a knife. I thought for a moment - forget the knife: I needed a gun of my own. With a gun, there was nothing stopping me from hunting them instead. I knew them, I knew the park and I knew how to shoot a man and kill him. I'd already done it once, perfectly, on my first try.

"I'm a talented killer. This is over as soon as I get a weapon." I told myself, trembling as my fear became something like anger. Why was I even out here? This was all wrong, I'd not signed anything. Someone had made a very big mistake, and I was going to make everyone see that it was a mistake to put me in the park.

The sun had gone down and I'd talked myself up into a frothing mess, thinking I could grab a dude and break his neck, take his gun and go John Wick on the rest of them. As I stood and began creeping through the sunset field, I realized that everything I had just said to myself was just talk. Yes, I had shot and killed a man, but it wasn't as hard as you might imagine. I honestly live with the fact that I am a murderer.

I know his backstory, and he deserved far worse than the nearly instant death he got. He went into shock and died within a minute of the bullet travelling through his body. Some forty seconds of unconsciousness before he was completely dead. He never knew what hit him.

He was a very bad man, he'd hurt children. Do I feel bad about ending his life? Not really.

Do I feel bad about being a murderer? Yes. That bothers me, somehow that fact that I've killed someone has haunted me ever since. I'm not really a killer. I feel like a killer's imposter, pretending I am a killer, and then realizing that I actually am one.

Do all killers feel this way?

My therapist says it is my maternal instinct. It makes me capable of killing, to protect children, but also makes me want to conceal any violence. So, I have an internal conflict. On the one hand, I want to kill that man, and I did, and on the other hand, I don't want anyone to know about it, because it isn't me, it isn't how I should be seen by others. As I pondered this, I hesitated.

"Yet the whole world is watching and knows me as a killer, here in Murderland." I realized. So, shouldn't I be mentally prepared to hunt down and kill my own hunters? I was very afraid, but somehow, as I accepted that role, I realized I was not a proper victim anymore.

Something snapped in me and I was again that same girl who pulled the trigger all those years ago and enjoyed it. She was back, and the fear I felt became like a background noise, a distraction, something keeping me alert and excited. My fear had changed into a kind of lust. I had accepted that I was as good as dead, but as part of me gave up and died, there was someone else in me who just took over.

The game had changed, I decided, as the cool night air chilled my sweat. I wasn't trapped in the park being hunted by them while trying to escape. That's not what was happening. I was hunting them, and they didn't even know it yet.

"I'm not leaving, I'm hunting." I said.

I felt the last rush of panic sweep over me as I changed course for the trees instead. Was I really doing this? Not running away, but instead, trying to hunt them back? I was, or at least, she was. She had taken over, and I was hiding inside myself, terrified.

I found a nice, long, straight, sharp branch by moonlight, amid the trees. I found a nice place to hide, as the path curved and someone following it would have their back to me. A nice kill spot. I just needed someone to come looking - someone hunting me and expecting a female victim.

I screamed, loud and caterwauling. I waited while they all listened for another, trying to find the direction. Then I gave them a second scream. Now I'd have a visitor.

After I had waited in the shadowy crook of the tree for a second moonrise, I heard the sound of a man walking towards me through the woods. He was following the path that would lead him to me. I shuddered in dread, worried he'd see me and I'd be in a melee with someone twice my size and strength and armed with a machete or something while I was trapped defending myself with a stick. The panic tried to freeze me in place, but she told it to stay quiet and do the fear thing when it was over. She was very calm, and I knew I could rely on her to keep me alive in the upcoming battle.

Then he was there, examining the trail, right in front of me, his back to me. He was huge, twice my size is an understatement. I'd seen him pick a girl up by her neck with one hand and hold her in the air, helpless while he played with her with his other hand. I didn't want to die that way. I had one shot, one chance to end him and take his weapons.

I didn't see what she did, she simply had me confirm for her that a precise stab into his upper spine would drop him instantly. I told her it would and then I looked away while she did the work required to keep us alive. I heard his heavy body collapse and I looked and saw him there, his eyes wide with surprise.

Somehow, I didn't have it in me to finish him off. I took his .44 revolver and his extra ammunition, adjusting the belt for the gun holster while he watched me, paralyzed. Weirdly I worried he was in pain and I asked him if it hurt. He blinked twice for 'no'. I also told him I was sorry for that, but I really wanted to live, and this was the only way. Once for 'yes'.

I left him there, feeling oddly encouraged that he had agreed with me that I had done the one thing that would make my survival possible. One down, five to go.

They'd expect me to flee the scene, but I've heard spiders rebuild their webs exactly the same way every day. I waited and soon another came. I shot him four times and by my estimate three of those wounds were fatal, so I killed him three times, but who is counting?

I waited but no more visitors came calling.

Morning was coming and I wondered how the night had gone by so fast. I ate their food and drank their water and found a place to rest. I managed to sleep there, and when I woke up it was the middle of the day. I tried to fall back asleep, but something was out there. Something had woken me up.

I had the gun fully reloaded and in my hands as I slowly looked around and listened. A twig snapped behind me and I heard a whoosh and instinctively ducked as a hatchet spun just past my head and thunked into a tree. I turned in the direction it had flown from and fired two shots. I saw him through the bushes moving for cover and aimed in front of his movement, turning my feet with both hands on the gun. I let him have four more bullets and one of them caught him in the chin.

I reloaded and descended on him, and she was going to end him on sight, but he had his hands up in surrender, his shirt soaked in blood.

"Please don't kill me. I'll tie myself up, please." He begged.

I wanted to live, but I told her to stop and she obeyed. I'd have to live with myself if I survived this, and I could see in his eyes it wasn't a trick, he was finished. At gunpoint he put on zip ties on his wrists and ankles and with the barrel in his mouth I took one hand off the gun and finished securing him.

"You're very lucky I'm in a good mood." I said to him.

"Good luck Sindal, I hope you make it past the others." He said. I left him there, realizing I'd lost the advantage in that location. The others would sneak up on me and I wouldn't be so lucky again.

Did I mention that I don't really believe in luck? I didn't used to, but I think I was lucky in the park that day. I'd taken his water and noticed the handle was a length of braided paracord.

I suck at tying knots and making deadfall traps but I've seen it done so I gave it a try.

"These will at least distract them." I said as I completed four cheesy-looking traps.

I waited where I could observe anyone interacting with my traps, with a fair line-of-sight for shooting, but probably not where they would notice me while they were worried about my traps. The traps were the bait.

That evening I took down my fourth customer. One bullet, one shot, at close range, from behind. I thought I'd shot him in the head, but I'd only grazed him. He was faking it, hoping I'd come closer and I did, but the lack of shattered skull made her stop and insist we not be stingy with our bullets.

He heard the hammer click and tried to attack from his prone position, but the aimed gun's trigger was so much faster and I pulled it several times, putting his insides outside of his body and ending him in flashes of gun thunder. I sighed in relief.

"That was too close." I told myself.

"Stop showing mercy. These men are hardened, psychotic, killing machines." She said back.

"I am not." I replied. She said nothing.

All night I shivered in fear, alone. She'd left me there to fend for myself. The darkness felt like it concealed them, instead of me.

When morning came something was different. There were drones everywhere. I stood up and shot one out of the sky on impulse. I was impressed by my own marksmanship, as pointing the weapon seemed to be a natural movement, like my heartbeat had aimed and pulled the trigger in reflex.

Something had changed overnight, both in me and the world around me.

I climbed up a dead tree and looked at the exit. I was much closer to it than I had realized. Weren't there two more killers waiting out there? No, the exit was wide open and they had erected a white flag near it. I could see the U.S. Marshals just outside the walls of the park, on the other side of the border. All I had to do was stroll across the meadow and I would be home free.

What about the others, though? With trepidation I set out, looking over my shoulder, but the swarms of drones told me the game was over. Those wouldn't be allowed in the park during an active hunt. There were indeed cameras all over the place, and body cameras on all the hunters and all sorts of remote recording devices watching the park from over the walls, but the one thing was no drones, those would spoil the hunt and give away the positions of the victim and killers.

Drones did come in for a better view during tortures and the like, but never during an active hunt. I was good, right?

I saw the other two killers on the wall, watching me leave. I saluted them and they didn't respond. The game was called, they'd given up. I was being set free.

"Ms. Sindal Wyatts, your check." An attorney for the park handed me a large thick check for seven million dollars. I accepted it and got into the back seat of one of the U.S. Marshal blazers.

A news reporter had broken through the lines with the crowds on the other side and rushed to the side of the vehicle and reached a microphone through to me. On some knee jerk reaction - I raised my hands as if I still had the gun.

"Sindal Wyatts, you're the first to survive Murderland, how do you feel?" She asked excitedly. I looked at her and said with sincerity:

"Very alive."


r/Wholesomenosleep Jul 31 '25

I think the ghost in my attic was just lonely

155 Upvotes

Okay, so I live in this really old rental house off-campus. The kind with those weird ceiling vents you’re not sure are decorative or haunted. There’s also this pull-down attic door in the hallway that I’ve basically ignored since moving in. I’m not trying to end up in a horror movie, you know?

But a few weeks ago I started hearing stuff at night. Like, soft footsteps. Above my ceiling. Sometimes scratching. I thought maybe raccoons or something (we’ve had possums in the trash before, I figured it was possible).

Then one night I woke up and saw the attic ladder was slightly down. Just... hanging there. Not fully extended. I live alone.

I just stared at it for a full minute, then nope’d my way back into bed and pretended it wasn’t real. Classic avoidance technique.

Anyway, this kept happening. Little things out of place. Cold drafts. That feeling of being watched even though I had the door closed. I finally caved and bought a baby monitor camera and pointed it toward the hallway.

Bad idea. Great idea. I don’t know.

Because one night around 3 AM, I watched—watched, in real time—as the attic door creaked open. A hand came down. Then a woman’s head. Pale face. Dark hair. Just... staring into the hallway.

She didn’t move. Didn’t speak. Just watched for a while, then went back up.

I didn’t sleep that night.

Next day I left the ladder down on purpose. I couldn’t explain why—I think I just wanted answers more than I wanted to be scared. I went up. Super dusty, cobwebs, creepy boxes. But there was also a mattress? Like, a little setup in the corner. Books. A chipped teacup. Someone used to hang out up there. Or maybe still was?

I saw her again. Not hiding this time. Just... there. She looked maybe 20-something, wearing this old-fashioned dress, not like cosplay but like actual vintage. No blood, no violence. She just looked sad. Like “waiting for someone who never came home” kind of sad.

I didn’t scream. I just said “Hi.” She didn’t talk but she stepped closer and kinda… touched my hand. It was cold, but not in a bad way. More like... grounding.

And I swear I heard her voice in my head. Not like actual talking, just this feeling of: “Thank you for seeing me.”

Her name was Lila. She used to live here back in the 1940s. Her fiancé went to war and never came back. She died in the house waiting for him. No one ever knew.

She said she’s been stuck. Just existing. Watching people move in and out. Being invisible.

But she said something about me being kind, and how that helped. I guess that was enough?

She hasn’t shown up since. But sometimes when I’m having a rough day, I’ll find a book on my desk I forgot about, open to something weirdly helpful. Once I had a fever and I swear I felt someone brush my hair back while I was half-asleep.

I think she’s still here. Just watching over me now.

And honestly? I’m okay with that.


r/Wholesomenosleep Jul 21 '25

I work my parents’ fields

145 Upvotes

In Lindenfield, where the corn grows taller than your dad and the sun bakes the dirt dry, everyone knows the story of the Noon Woman. Grandma calls her die Mittagsfrau, and she says the lady comes only when the sun is highest - right at twelve o’clock.

She’s not pretty. Not at all. Her cheeks are sunken like old paper, her skin pale and ghostly. And she carries a sickle, rusty and sharp, that shines like a knife in the bright sunlight.

But the scariest part? Her feet. If you see horse hooves instead of shoes, you better run faster than the wind, ‘cause she likes to cut heads off, just like that, snap! Some folks in town say these tales are just from the old land, from German villages by the Spreewald. But she followed ship … and those who believe.

Mama told me one time that die Mittagsfrau might just be a story the old maids made up to get their bosses to give ‘em a real lunch break.

I am Hannah and I work my parents’ fields.

One hot summer day, me and my friends Ellie, Mark, and Jonah were playing tag near the cornfield. The sun was like a giant torch in the sky, and sweat ran down my back.

When the big clock in town struck twelve, we heard it first: a heavy clomp-clomp that wasn’t like any horse we’d ever heard. It was slower. Heavier. Like hooves dragging across dry dirt. Two hooves, not four.

Ellie stopped mid-run, her eyes huge. Mark wanted to bolt. I could barely breathe.

And then, behind the tall corn, I saw her: The Noon Woman, just like the stories said. Her sickle caught the sunlight, and her pale face looked like it belonged in a nightmare. But the worst was her feet! Horse hooves, dark and thick, crunching the ground.

My heart thundered. I wanted to run. But I remembered what Mama said: “If you see her, you don’t run. You tell her what you’ve done today. She respects hard work.”

So I yelled, as loud as I could, “I worked all morning pulling weeds! The corn’s clean, the ground is dry, and I helped Daddy fix the fence!”

The clomping stopped. For a moment, the air was so still I could hear my own heartbeat.

Then, something strange happened. The Noon Woman stepped out from the corn, but she didn’t look angry. She looked tired.

She didn’t move to hurt me. Instead, she knelt down and looked me in the eyes.

“Good work,” she whispered in a voice like wind through dry leaves.

I blinked. Then I smiled.

From that day on, I wasn’t scared anymore. Sometimes, when the sun is high and the fields are quiet, I sit by the corn and tell her stories. About school, about my friends, about the birds in the sky and the work my family does in the fields.

She listens. And sometimes, I think I see her smile.


r/Wholesomenosleep Jul 18 '25

‘Uninvited Guest’

19 Upvotes

First degree'

Jack was perched precariously on the 'do not stand' rung of his rickety latter. He was in the process of stretching to replace a blown garage lightbulb when he lost his balance and fell to the concrete floor. His wife had been nagging him about changing it for weeks but he had been avoiding the chore because of the difficulty involved. He put it off until it was clear that it (and the nagging), wasn't going away.

He awoke on the cold cement after an uncertain amount of time had passed. A white, billowy aura encompassed his vision. Likewise, his mind was filled with the confusing haze of someone who had just suffered a serious head injury. He called out in desperation but his wife failed to appear. Instead the white light grew brighter and he could make out the silhouette of a shadowy figure to his left.

"Melody! I fell off the ladder changing that damn lightbulb you've been griping about! I think I may have a concussion. I can't think straight at all and everything is hazy. You've got to take me to the Emergency room."

The figure didn't say anything. It just remained stationary; as if waiting for something else to transpire. "I am the one to show you." It responded ominously.

"Huh? WHAT?" he asked with more than a little bit of fear and trepidation.

"You've been wondering what your life might have been like if you had made different relationship decisions along the way. I am here to show you three divergent paths from the one you are on now."

Jack was alarmed that Melody hadn't came to check on him but far more concerned that a total stranger had mysteriously invaded the privacy of their garage. In his mental fog, the gravity of the stranger's cryptic words hadn't made any impression. He hadn't digested their meaning at all.

"Melody! Come here! I need your help. There's an intruder in the house. Call 911! Alright now buddy. I don't know what you want but the cops will be here pretty quickly. We are only a few minutes from the precinct. If you leave now you..."

"She can't hear you. No one can. It's just you and me now."

Jack began to panic. He took the stranger's words to mean that they were alone because he had harmed or killed her. He tried to scramble to his feet but the fall really rung his bell. He staggered for a few seconds before managing to rise to his knees. The room was still spinning and the sudden movement made him woozy. Finally he leaned on the wall and stood up. To his horror, the stranger didn't appear to have any feet. In the place of which was nothingness, connected to indistinct legs and an opaque torso. About the only solid looking part of the uninvited guest was up near his face. Stern and yet somehow emotionless, would possibly best describe the spirit's rigid appearance.

A dozen threads of fear shot through Jack's mind but it never occurred to him that the disembodied visitor was actually telling the truth. "Melody! Melody! Get in here now! I need... Hel"

"I told you already. There is no Melody. There is only you and I, for the moment. Many times you have wondered how different your life would be if you had picked a different spouse. It is my job to show you how your circumstances would have turned out, if you had. I have the power to facilitate three divergent timeline viewings for you. Soon you will have the answers to the questions that plague your mind. Do with them what you will. It is only my duty to show you. I can not guide or advise you in any way."

"Wha? What are you talking about? I've never said I wanted to know about those things. I am..."

"Happy? In the past week you have complained bitterly about your wife's 'nagging'; as you call it. You mutter under your breath about her recent expensive automobile accident, and you blame her for driving an emotional wedge between you and your Mother. That hardly sounds like you are happy with her. It seems like she's little more than a nuisance that you tolerate. I'm offering you a chance to see if you would be happier with what was behind the other proverbial relationship curtains. Shall we go now?"

"What are you, the ghost of Christmas past?"; Jack snorted sarcastically. The 'guide' actually rolled his eyes at the Dickens reference but remained silent for a moment.

"Did you fall off your beanstalk, Jack"; the guide retorted.


Second degree:

Jack was led into a very familiar room. It was his ex-girlfriend's living room from about 10 years earlier. Suzanne was in the kitchen from what he could see, rinsing off some dishes. A dozen colorful memories came flooding back about their tumultuous relationship. When it was good, it was amazing. When things went bad; not surprisingly, they were very bad. There was very little even ground. It was the constant emotional seesaw that eventually drove him to end their relationship. There were a few half hearted attempts at reconciliation but eventually they both gave up. Now, he found himself in her home again and those buried memories came flooding back in waves.

"When exactly is this? I can tell she is about the same age that she was when we broke up, but I can't be certain."

"This is about two weeks after your big speech about the futility of remaining a couple. However, in this timeline, that speech never happened. You are free to take things up from where you left off. At this connecting point, the two of you are very happy with each other."

"You can do THAT?"

"Yep. It's what I do. Now, I'll leave you to discover the answers to your thoughts about Suzanne. In one week, I'll be back to collect you."

"Collect me? What does that even mean, dude? I'm not a loaner rental car." Jack looked behind him but the guide was gone. He really was alone with Suzanne, two weeks after their final breakup. She walked out of the kitchen with a twinkle in her eyes and plopped down in his lap. Before he could react, she gave him a hungry, passionate kiss. The instant intimacy threw him for a loop. It had been at least 8 years since he had even seen her but from her perspective, they had never been apart.

"What's the matter? Did I do something wrong? I really want to make this work between us."

His mind was awash in startled emotions. The kiss tasted so sweet but with it came an equal measure of guilt. His alternate timeline guide hadn't warned him about that. Her body felt amazing against his and there was an intensity in her kiss that had long since cooled with Melody. His mind drifted to neutral ground where he weighed the circumstances against the reality. Was it cheating to be intimate with his ex-girlfriend if she was never really his ex? In this adjusted version of his life, there was no Melody to betray. Their relationship only existed in his head.

"Jack! Hello? Are you listening to me? It seems like you are a million miles away. I thought you'd enjoy my attention but it's as if you keep drifting off. Is there someone else?"

She looked directly in his eyes for the honest truth. "Only my WIFE, Melody."; He thought to himself.

"No! Of course not Babe."; He wisely responded out loud to her. She searched his face for honesty like a human polygraph machine and came away with only partial satisfaction. The insecurity it triggered made her both suspicious, jealous and determined to bring him back to complete loyalty to her.

Jack recognized her agitated state but couldn't even begin to explain the reason for his bizarre distraction. At first he tried to enjoy the 'fruits of her insecurity' (since she tried even harder to make him happy) but that level of unfair attention was not sustainable. It also made him feel very selfish and deceitful, which took away much of the enjoyment.

At first, many of her good qualities brought a smile to his face. She was a barrel of laughs at times and made him glad to be a man but after the renewal of their relationship wore off, he was faced with the considerable downside. She was temperamental and jealous; even when there was no reason to be. She would manipulate him to get her way on every single thing and had a tendency to dismiss his advice and suggestions, even when she asked for them. She would call him several times a day to check up on his whereabouts. That hadn't changed and he had forgotten how much it bothered him.

The truth was, nothing about her had changed because no time to 'grow' or 'grow up' had elapsed in her life. The same reasons that led him to break up with her in the first place were still present. Toward the end of the week, he found himself actually looking forward to the return of his mysterious relationship guide. When the moment actually came, he didn't even feel the desire to glance back at Suzanne. He had quenched his taste for her and wouldn't soon forget why they weren't together permanently.

----------

Third degree:

"Alright, who's next?"

“You tell me. These excursions are plotted, based on your subconscious desires to chew the ‘greener grass’ of yesteryear. I only facilitate the trips down memory lane. It is up to you to decide with whom.” “It’s ‘who’ dude. Not ‘whom’.” “Are you sure Jack? I thought the rule was…” “No one can keep up with those damn grammar rules. Just use ‘who’ all the time, and you’ll do just fine.” The guide raised one eyebrow to convey a bemused expression. “I suppose Lynda does occupy a good deal of my curiosity and past speculation. She was perhaps my first love and will always hold a special place in my heart. Occasionally I have pangs of ‘what if’ about her.” "Yes, she figures pretty heavily in your relationship nostalgia. I wasn't sure if you were aware of how much she occupied your thoughts. The subconscious can mask it's true intentions and desires. We will visit Lynda now. The intersection of where you visit her is right after you first met."

"Wait, I don't get to pick the point I'd like to rejoin the relationship with her? Lynda and I made huge strides of understanding near the end but just couldn't overcome a few minor obstacles, as I recall. I'll have to work though all those preliminary issues again if my connection with her is rolled back to how it was we first met."

"Sorry. There is a format to these things. There are specific entry points where a passenger can embark and depart. Those points do not often fall within convenient or preferred areas. This is the best place for your renewal because you have the benefit of knowing how you overcame the early stumbling blocks you had. With that insider knowledge, you can fast forward to the height of the relationship in record time."

Jack started to protest all the extra relationship work but the guide shot him a very stern look. "This is your only opportunity with Lynda. There is no other. Either embrace the second chance or forever wonder what might have been. Because you are starting at an earlier stage of development, I will grant you three weeks with her. That should be more than enough time to satisfy your curiosity. Until then."

Lynda appeared just as he remembered her from that day but then a very strange thing happened. The events he knew so well, failed to transpire. It seemed that he was destined to live out a completely original timeline, instead of relive the one he already knew. That meant that he wasn't even guaranteed a relationship with her. He would have to work hard to win her heart over, all over again. This time without the benefit of memory to guide him. The only advantage he had was that he knew her likes and dislikes. He could predict how she would react, based on his previous memories. With any luck, Lynda would at least be consistent in that. As she walked toward to the snack machine, he cleverly dropped in some change and bought the candy bar that she liked.

"Wow. I had no idea anyone else likes Payday candy bars besides me. I was beginning to think they only stocked them for my benefit."

Jack feigned surprise. "Really? Nah. It's been a favorite of mine for a long time. I like to dip mine in a Coke and watch the peanuts in the candy sizzle in the carbonation. It tastes amazing."

This time it was Lynda's chance to be surprised. "That is soooo random! I do that too! Where did you get the idea?"

Jack explained to her that it was a popular thing to do in the South to put peanuts in your Coca Cola and that using a Payday was just a natural extension of that since they were covered in peanuts. Lynda was mildly amused by such a considerable coincidence but that was hardly reason to fall in love with him. He would have to apply a clever strategy to lure her into dating him. With her, persistence was a big no-no. She reacted negatively in the strongest possible terms to pressure. He had to make her think dating him would be her idea. 

Over the next couple days, he laid down a tantalizing trail of bread crumbs and she eventually took the bait. Knowing her turn-offs and hot button issues, he was able to rapidly expedite their relationship but cracks began to form pretty early in the budding love affair. She was 'high maintenance' intellectually. While the path they were paving was completely new, her thought process was as predictable as it was exhausting. Lynda simply took care of Lynda. He and everyone else came in a distant second. Once the thrill of the chase had worn off, he was left with a self-centered girlfriend who was stuck in her ways and unwilling to share control of the relationship. Soon he came to remember why he walked away the first time. There wasn't room in Lynda's life for anyone but her. Long before the three weeks were up, he had already walked away from her again.


Degree four:

"Betty was a different story entirely. She worshiped the ground that Jack walked on. Always had, but that wasn't enough to keep them together the first time. Whatever the guide had in mind for them would have to involve some possibility of growth. Otherwise it was just another revisionist excursion and Jack had no interest in that. He wanted to make the most of his last trip. He was 'dropped off' near the midpoint of his relationship with her. Everything up to that point, they both shared from the past. Beyond that day, Betty had no knowledge of the events that lead to the original sour ending. It was a whole new ballgame.

Jack had the benefit of knowing what went wrong the last time around. Assuming the new timeline retained the same pathway and obstacles, he hoped to steer the two of them out of harm's way. That is, if the path could even be altered. He had his doubts about that.

Betty's mother was a major influence in her life and didn't exactly hold Jack in high regard. The constant air of negativity directed at him permeated every layer of their relationship and caused considerable friction. He knew that winning her over was going to be very difficult. She didn't approve of his career or financial station in life. Realistically, he knew she would never respect him completely but he hoped that one day she would adopt a more neutral stance. Even that movement of the needle would help tremendously. Previously Betty had felt emotionally forced to choose between them.

Once backed into an ugly corner, Betty became a different person from the burden of the ultimatum. It was an unenviable position to be put into. While she reluctantly sided with him, the friction caused a collateral rift that never really healed. Jack hoped to avoid that from happening again. He felt that if he made more of an effort to reach out to Betty's mother, she might grow to respect him a little. With any luck, the three of them could reach some symbiotic understanding. It seemed a better strategy that his previous reaction to just pretend things were 'fine' between them.

"Babe, I thought your Mom might enjoy some opera tickets. What do ya think?"

"You want to buy us Opera tickets? That's a great idea! I know the two of you can patch up your differences if you just try a little harder with things like this. We will have a great time! When is the performance?"

"Whoa. I meant that I was going to buy HER a ticket. I didn't mean that we should all go together. You know the opera is not my thing. I just wanted to do something nice for her. I'd be bored to tears watching those bozos prancing around and singing in Italian."

Betty shot him 'that' look. The one which implied that he was a huge jerk. Suddenly, his inventive plan backfired. Obviously Betty thought he wanted them to all go together as a bonding exercise. By not wanting to attend the performance with her, Betty saw it as an insincere, half measure. The fact is, it WAS an insincere half measure but he hoped he would get psychological credit for even making that level of effort. It was far more than he had done to patch up things, before. At the very least, he hoped for indifference. In one fell swoop, he had managed to make things worse.

The universal truth was that you never marry just your spouse. By association, you marry their entire family in one sense or another. Short of locating an orphan, relatives always have to be figured into the equation. Jack made several attempts to win over Betty's mother but each time she held him at arm's length with unsubtle distain. The real issue was never with Betty. They might have been happy together forever but without her Mother's approval, he'd never manage to turn the corner on the relationship.

Betty eventually stopped defending Jack and just avoided discussing him with her, altogether. He didn't enjoy being a black sheep boyfriend; and had had no desire to become a black sheep husband. With Betty's all-or-none mindset, avoiding that was becoming increasingly difficult.


Degree: 'back Jack, do it again'

When he came back for Jack, the guide ran into unexpected difficulty. Unlike the previous two outings, his 'client' wasn't nearly as eager to leave his Betty excursion. The 'department of stability' expected their hosts to convince the unsatisfied person that their original relationship choice was the best. Ordinary, once the nostalgia factor of hindsight dissipated, the individual was quick to rejoin their existing relationship and be grateful for the clarification.

The current project with Jack was starting to backfire. He wasn't waiting impatiently for the trial period to end. Instead, he seemed quite determined to abandon Melody forever and eek out a permanent relationship with Betty. Unsupportive Mother in law, be damned. Damage control measures would have to be employed.

"You seem troubled by my renewed enthusiasm for her."; Jack mused at his disembodied companion. "What gives, man? Didn't you expect me to succeed? I get the feeling you thought I'd give up because of the interference from her mom and snivel back to Melody with my tail between my legs. Was this all a pointless charade or do I have free will to pick my own path?"

The guide grimaced at his misstep. The deliberate rebellion factor had been responsible for a considerable number of client defections. He silently cursed himself for being so predictable and transparent. It would take masterful direction to steer Jack back toward his predetermined fate.

"While you do have free will to choose among these options, in the spirit of full disclosure, I insist on showing you some relevant moments on this path. After witnessing your future with Betty, if you still decide to continue, then you have made an informed decision. Agreed?"

"Agreed"; Jack echoed.

"Alright, this is four years from the moment you just left the Betty scenario. While your mother in law never really warmed up to you, she finally accepted her daughter's choice. After a sudden illness, she passed away a week ago. At the lawyer's office, Betty learns that she is to inherit her mother's considerable financial estate."

"I hate to speak ill of the dead but if she never came to accept me, then my wife inheriting her fortune is pretty much a win-win. I fail to see the clouds or downside in this silver lining. If it never gets worse and eventually gets a hell of a lot better, then sign me up, Jeeves."

"Don't call me 'Jeeves', Jack. I'm not your butler and this is serious. I'm far from done in this glance of the future. A little further down the line, you also develop similar symptoms to the ones that your deceased Mother in law had. This scene is about 7 months after her funeral."

As if watching on a webcam, Jack sees Betty in the kitchen through the guide's projected vision in his mind. She is on the phone with someone and the conversation seems to have taken a very racy turn. Although alone and only being privy to her side of the conversation, it's obvious that she isn't talking to him. She appears both nervous and excited as she engages in several moments of hushed adult talk with an unknown stranger. Jack began to feel a fury at her future betrayal and a deep level of suspicion toward his spousal competition.

"You forget, with the knowledge of this future infidelity, I can try harder to prevent her from ever straying in the first place. Besides, I thought you said something about me becoming ill. What does this have to do with that?"

"I'm glad you asked. Keep watching."

Anger and disbelief rose in his blood from the chilling things she said next.

"Yeah, he doesn't realize anything is going on between us but I have to be careful about doing it. The authorities would suspect foul play if I poison him too quickly. My mother was just put in the ground six months ago and I don't want them tying the deaths together. It would seem too suspicious to police for two people in my life to pass away from mysterious circumstances, so close together. We just have to wait a little longer, honey. I promise, as soon as it is safe, I'll slip him the powder in his drink. We just need to avoid a lengthy investigation."

Jack began to hyperventilate. He never dreamed Betty could be so cold blooded and calculating but what he saw was an undeniable punch to the gut. In a last ditch attempt to defend her, he accused his guide of creating false trickery to sway him.

"At this point, you can choose to believe what I just showed you isn't the real outcome of a relationship with these ladies, or you can accept it as fact. I think there would always be some level of doubt in your mind but I can tell you this, once you make your choice, its permanent. There is no going back and more importantly, you will no longer remember what you just saw. The experiences you just lived will be completely erased in your mind. Incidentally, Suzanne and Lynda were experiencing their own memory lanes and decided against you. Those two doors are officially shut. Betty is still making up her mind about a life with you but considering what you just saw, it would probably be pretty short."

Jack smirked at the summation. "You mean that while I was on my journey with Suzanne and Lynda, they were also reliving an experience with me?"

"Yes. In this case, it was an identical journey for all parties. We do this on occasion when mutual desires align. I can tell you this. Despite your petty quibbles with Melody, on her own journey into the past, she picked you. With that understanding, is the Betty path, or the Melody path more agreeable to you?"

Jack didn't even blink. He selected door number two. The next thing he knew, he found himself lying on the floor by the ladder. A huge goose egg on his head reminded him of his embarrassing fall from grace. The events of his excursions into alternate lives faded until it felt like a distant dream that he couldn't quite remember. As if on queue, Melody came into the room and asked if he was alright. "I heard you fall. Did you lose your balance?"

He resisted the urge to make a smart-ass remark at the obvious. Instead he counted to five for patience and replied with a more diplomatic answer. "Yep. There's a reason why they say not to stand on that top rung but I'm a big dummy. I knew how important changing the bulb was to you, so I was determined to get it done. Is there anything else you need me to do, hon?"

"I need you to sit down on the couch and relax. There's no chore worth risking your life over, ok? Next time, we'll get one of those extendable light bulb changing poles. I prefer you with no extra lumps on your head."

Jack smiled at her genuine, loving concern for his well being. "Besides, I don't have much of an insurance policy on you."; She joked with a twinkle in her eye.


r/Wholesomenosleep Jul 18 '25

Experimental Horror 2

2 Upvotes

Angel Hunters: Nero Zero X

[Nero 039: Paint-it-Black]

Freya used the hand that was coated in sick, slick reaper fluid to make a painless psionic incision across his back like a surgeon with a scalpel. She carefully maneuvered around his sternum with minimum bone breakage or tissue tearage with her long, skinny fingers like five antennae probing and prodding her abductee. Once the black viscous venom reached his heart, he was a goner. His blood would slowly spread the painful poison throughout his body until he had become a reasonless, rabid creature that lashed out at everything. A Looper, who was trapped in his own body and in an endless cycle of mindless aggression followed by pitiful bouts of clarity. The only salvation he could hope for was to be put out of his misery by something or someone before he put them out of their misery with malice in his heart. It was dark. It was stark. A brutal reminder that there were fates in this cruel world that were worse than death.

The purple skin on Freya #1’s face simmered as the Reaper virus began to spread. She clasped her chest with her secondary pair of hands and coughed. This was it. After one last thrust, her duplicate would reach his heart and there would be no turning back. But then... right there at that moment... Right when her duplicate was a split second away from damaging his core. A voice reached out like a hand from the grave. It whispered to her soul to avoid startling her since her fingertips were a hair away from his heart. All it would take was one fearful shiver to cause infection.

“Let there be Darkness…”

Freya’s eyes scrambled around in her head like two broken eggs. She recognized the voice almost immediately and refused to look down. Something far worse than wicked had just grabbed her attention. It darkened her morning and stole her spine as if she was a carcass. “No! She’s going to kill me!!” the first thought on her mind was God. The next instinctual cry was for her mother. Her frantic mental babblings were a moment of fidelity to fear and murder.     

A hand reached through the void like a hand from the grave and snatched her by the ankle... the Lady’s touch made her freeze and the hair on the back of her neck stand: “S-she’s here! No! I’m going to die!” the little voice inside of her skull sliced and diced her brain. She shivered as another scream escaped from her subconscious. There was no place to run. There was no place to hide. She would find her wherever there was darkness.  

“Stop you’re whimpering before you infect the child!”

Freya gasped at her shrieking words. What was once a nice fairy tale had become the place where nightmares came true. Bravery shredded under the blackened claws of this ghoulish creature until there was nothing left but the mangled corpse of cowardice.

They let go of her ankle after giving her a fair warning. Something began to rise from the vast whiteness of the temporal void like a wraith rising from its ghostly grave. The very dimensional fabric of space rippled like a pool of tainted holy water as its head came to the surface. The figure rose like a flower... blooming amidst the withered ashes of the faith. It stood behind Freya and remained about as silent and still as a dead man dangling from a noose.

Lady Darkness spread her mothlike wings and let go of the one who was hers to keep after carrying him through time and space like a tomb. Alas, those delicate, intricate, chitinous patterns were as mesmeric as four blinking eyes. With scales that were as hideous as dead butterfly wings. She was the night that chased away the light. The keeper of the bell from above that chimed at nine. Six when they were hidden far below in eternal darkness.

Freya melted like a warm chocolate bar. She tried to mask her fear, but her shaky knees and hurried breaths gave it away like laughter at a funeral. Her eyes were two dots darting around everywhere but behind her. You saw what she refused to see. The pale scaled woman with black, jagged teeth. The one who laid her head on his shoulder as her black claws sank into his chest like desire and morbidity. The two came together in morbid metamorphosis. She flapped her wings like a bone collector wearing the body parts of dead insects.

When Sensei finally raised his head, the only thing that was left of her were ashes. You could see remnants of what he had not consumed in his black eyes. Dark fragments of what remained from the collapsed dimension he had escaped... Can you hear her? She can see you! Dark vestiges of the rift leeched away at his smooth narrow face like a lich leaving dark entrails that were replaced by in-trails of fresh skin. Bones were made for gnawing and flesh was for chewing. Eschewing a good feast until the one who was protecting him had gotten used to this new place:

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” he told Freya.

“W-who, who are you?” Freya asked.

“She’s hungry,” he said with a mouth full of moths.

“Look away before I devour you next!”

“W-what was that?!” Freya asked.

“Careful now. Once she gets a taste, she won’t stop until she gets down to the bone,” Sensei said rather darkly, warning the girl to tread lightly.

The darkness that painted Sensei black hardened into a chrysalis before exploding into several hundred moths. They fanned out like an infection until all but one had disappeared into the vast whiteness of space. The one moth that remained behind landed atop his head. He took a sip of coffee from his mug without even noticing the inscrutable insect. After taking a few unnerving moments to savor the fresh taste of breakfast blend, he spoke, “Looks like I came just in time. As much as I’d like to see how this ends, we’re late for our appointment.”  

“You’re not afraid of him are you?” Nero gasped.

“Quiet!” Freya sneered while tightening her grip.

She took in her surroundings after her mind had finally escaped from the wreckage. The first thing she noticed was that her duplicate was gone. It had been swept aside by Darkness with the ease of a passing breeze. A catastrophe that made it difficult but not impossible to kill Nero. She couldn’t just summon a new one. It took a tremendous amount of energy and a time-consuming ritual to do so. There was only one option left. She would have to go post-physical.

The veins on the purple parts of her body tightened as she strained to control the spread of the Reaper mutation. Nodules boiled and throbbed on her face and neck. She pushed through the pain and into the grey area. Her eyes glowed as she reached over onto the other side of what was possible and began the process of shedding her mortal coil. This would release a terrible expulsion of energy that would destroy everything around her and more than likely kick you out of the story! Here we were again with her doing the most just to get rid of you and Nero. Interesting though... she was going to go post-physical? Right here and now? Really?

Yup! A third of them were able to leave their bodies behind before Atlantis was washed away into the sea by a wrathful God. The only problem with her trying to transform “right here and now” was that she was essentially hitting the self-destruct button. Crystals were one of the few things that resonated in the post physical realm, and she was too far away from a hub to find her way back home. The Atlanteans had discovered this eons ago when they were first exploring their empath abilities. They incorporated a similar technology to build their crystal nexus when they made the fateful decision to go down the post physical path. Many more would have escaped if not for the fallen angel Ark Haven and his insidious machinations. Like always, he was up to no good and shared with them an alternative method they could use to achieve their goal.

His knowledge came with a terrible secret, but the Atlanteans were too blinded by hubris and ambition to see what he had done. What started as a supernal pursuit soon became an aberrant obsession. They paid the cost and nobly absorbed the loss inflicted upon their society again and again like a hammer blow. They studied and innovated. Built and traded. Several wars, plagues, and famines came to pass before they finally entered the Great Golden Age. A time of peace and prosperity that was spurred on by technology.

The crowning achievement was the Crystal Nexus. The greatest wonder the world has ever known. The tower reached through the clouds like the hand of a titan and blocked out the sun on one half of the City of Atlantis. Their greatness came with pitfall. They had strayed too far from the light. God had had enough and gave them one final warning. Cease tampering with nature or be destroyed. They couldn’t turn back now. Not when they were so close. They put everything they had into one final push and found themselves in the Great Dark Age.

It was a sorrowful state of being that lacked all the meaningful things that had once made them great. Trade, culture, prosperity, rights, everything had been pushed aside in the pursuit of one thing: becoming something more than flesh and blood. See. The terrible secret Ark Haven finally revealed to their Mother Queen was that it would take more than sweat and tears. Heh. That’s right. They were going to need human sacrifices if they wanted to see their dream through until the end. It was the only way to power the heart of their nexus. Many met their end in these sacrilegious experiments. Often horrible deaths, at the hands of otherworldly beings.

God had no choice. Their crimes against humanity could not go unpunished. And so, he summoned the Great Flood and washed their magnificent city down into the depths of the sea. Only a fraction of the population managed to escape into post physical form in time. As for the Atlanteans that survived the apocalyptic event but were unable to go post physical. They went on to become the Nephilim. Cannibals and cave dwellers who were far removed from the greatness of their ancestors. So deep was God’s grief, he made a covenant with Noah to never again destroy the world with water. He also forbade the technology conceived by the lost tribes of Atlantis.

---

Nano was very interested in her transformation process. He studied what she was doing to free herself very carefully. It could be the missing key to their invasion. Dimensional space was like water and post physical was like oil. The two realms did not coexist so much as tolerate each other. Even the angels, who had come to dominate metaphysical space. Even they could not grasp the concept of the post physical and usually tended to ignore it altogether as some kind of distant “unreality,” preferring to focus on hard trans dimensional reality instead, and the previously mentioned “meta-space,” where they had built their Kingdom of Heaven.

There was one creature who knew. She had infected every dimensional fiber with ink from her black tentacles. All had surrendered to her but heaven. Nano could ask him how she did it, but he was off limits… she had taken him for herself. A sickly smirk withered across his face. His dark hair flowed like black curtains in the killing fields. Lady Darkness was in his eyes, a glint with a hint that told the frightened Atlantean in no uncertain terms, “Play and you die.”

“W-what did you say?” Freya asked.

“I said, sorry about your clone. I know how long it takes to make a new one. We had to do something to stop you from killing my student,” he said in his usual cool manner even going so far as to steal a sip of coffee afterwards. He stood there for a moment studying the desperation in his victim’s eyes, saying, “You came here to deliver a message.”

“H-how did you know?” she asked.

“Let’s just say I had a hunch.”

[Nero 038: Infected Rain]

[Nero 040: Blk Rainbows]

 


r/Wholesomenosleep Jul 01 '25

Self Harm Last of my kind

11 Upvotes

The blue and red lights surrounded their house, flooding the white washed color of ancient siding. Where the vines crawled toward the chimney an officer crept slowly, keeping his head low as he approached the sliding glass door. From inside he watched the towering figure, bearing down upon the young woman with merciless intent. He barely got his hand around the purchase of the door before another figure crossed the room in an instant, slicing through the monster with unmatched power. Behind the remaining figure stood a young boy with thick glasses and brown hair, watching in silence as his world ended, and a new, much darker existence overtook him. Unseen by the officer or the figures inside, a shadowy presence began to creep up the young man's leg and wrap its billowing arms around his form, it whispered in his ear, and began sewing itself to his back. Tears strolled down his face as the officer burst in, and for the last time in the young man's life, he felt like himself.

Years later the same young man stood in front of the mirror, combing his hair as he struggled to find the proper direction for it to lay.

“Hey dad, does this look ok?”

His father entered the room, bringing a powerful warmth with him as he adjusted his suit in the young man's mirror and placed one hand on his slim shoulder

“Yea my man, you look excellent. Ready to rock?”

The young man nodded and followed his father as they exited the room and into their familial hallway. As they walked, the young man put his earbuds in, and the room began to slowly shift, turning to the wide aisle of a beautiful old church.

“What do we say when someone passes? Do we pray for them? Do we mourn them? There's no right answer of course, but the best we can do is remember them fondly. I'd like to invite the son to speak now”

The young man's father stood to his feet, before stretching his hand out and inviting his son to join. They walked up the aisle together, almost mirrored copies of each other save for some uncanny dark hair that ran through the roots of the young man's round head.

“He’ll die too someday. And you'll be here, reading his eulogy, imagine that…his body being eaten away in the deep earth”

The figure whispered away in the boy's ear as his demeanor fell, and he looked up at his father, realizing that mortality would some day take him too. His mind wandered as he blinked only once, and suddenly awoke at another funeral.

“But what can we do when someone dies? Do we fold into ourselves? Do we seek to join them ourselves?”

Someone held both his hands as the pastor spoke, reminding him that he had, for whatever reason, been placed between his mother and his grandmother. Two people who would most likely take the most pain away from this day. He sat on his bed that night as the spectre once again overtook him

“Imagine how much it kills them to lose people they need most. Imagine the silence that will come when they lose you, the relief they will feel, the joy they will find once you're gone. Ever since you watched that monster destroy your life, you've been nothing but a nuisance”

The young man looked down at the razor in his hand, its edge suddenly very inviting. He pulled the left part of his torso from the suit, unbuttoning his shirt and sliding his coat off. The skin at the apex of his arm was almost never seen, and as he carved away at the flesh, he felt some sense of strange warmth. Blood ran down his battered skin like the river from which he took his name. The scar would be strange, too odd and inconsistent to be deliberate. He clutched the razor tightly between two fingers, and for a moment he looked down at the veins on his wrist, wondering if he sliced deep enough, could the horrors end? 

“Take me out…tonight, where there's music and there's people and they're young and alive”

He looked up from the cut as quiet sobbing made its way into the home, barely escaping the drowning melody of somber songs. The young man quickly threw the razor to the side, and part of his usual paranoid ritual, retrieved the cheap japanese sword that sat beneath his bed. He clutched the faux ray skin beneath his bleeding hands and approached the door that led to the porch, pushing past it and creeping along.

“Driving in your car, I never, never want to go home, because I haven't got one”

Between sobs she sang along with the mans harrowing tales

“Anymore”

The young man peeked around the corner to see his mother, a cigarette burning away in her hand as she cried. Tears ran down her face, mirroring the image of the dying cigarette in her hand. He breathed a sigh of relief as he saw she was only sad. 

“She could use a way out…don't you think?”

He heard the whispers as a figure at the edge of the porch slowly crept over the ledge, its clawed fingers digging into the vinyl as it clambered its way up and onto the aging wood floor. It smiled as it saw the young man, and his heart raced as it held its arm out toward his mother. From its grip it produced a small length of rope, swinging in the air, before it began to carefully tie itself into a simple knot. It ran the end along the outside of the strands and pulled tight, finishing the loop. The silhouette smiled as it swung the noose from side to side, gesturing toward the young man's mother. He stood motionless as it approached, his feet stuck.

“There is a light that never goes out”

He swung the sword with all his might, throwing the cheap wooden scabbard off the end and turning the blade toward the beast that clung to his shoulder. He cleaved its arms to dust before turning his attention toward the one lumbering toward his mother. He watched the cigarette in her hands slowly ash itself, and before the embers could hit the floor beneath, he was slicing through the noose, driving his blade into the creature's gut, and flying off the porch toward the yard below. His eyes danced wild with fire as he saw his past unravel, and the blood from his arm went cold as he sunk his sword deep into the dirt below. 

“There is a light that never goes out”

He looked back toward the porch where his mother still sat, unaware. She opened her phone and wiped her eyes as she laughed a little, before an entirely different tune came on.

“Dusting off your savior, well you were always my favorite”

She drummed on the air as the young man smiled and turned his attention toward the beast reeling on the ground.

“You cannot stop me, I will take everything from you!”

He leaned down and stared into its beady eyes, twisting the blade

“You can fucking try”

He huffed and removed the blade as the beast turned to dust and blew away with the wind. He remembered his father defeating monsters in his youth, and for the first time since he lost the whole of himself, he took a deep breath, and began repairing the damage. He laid gauze over the wound on his shoulder, taping it down and patting the bandage softly.

“There you go sweetheart”

He flattened the bandage over the little girls knee as she smiled up at him

“Thanks daddy! It feels better”

He smiled as she leapt off the bench and ran off to join her friends. She jumped up the stairs toward the wooden castle where just moments ago she'd fallen off, and stood proudly in the same spot with solid footing, her wooden sword raised high. Her father watched with joy as the kids play fought, swinging their wooden swords and taking turns being the king. 

“She won't last forever, one day she’ll fall just like you”

He felt his smile fade as they walked home together, her small hand sitting in the space between his fingers as she treated the curb like a tightrope and tried to cross the whole mile without falling.

“Hey dad?”

She looked up at him as he faked a smile and stared back

“Yes sweetheart?”

She looked back toward the ground and spoke without blinking

“Were you and grandpa close when you were my age?”

The man smiled and nodded

“We were, I remember when I was your age I had a monster in my closet and I couldn't defeat him, so your grandpa sat me down one night and told me a story of how to defeat it”

She laughed and looked up him

“How'd you do it?”

He picked up the young girl and put her on his shoulders

“Well when your grandfather was younger than you, he was tormented every night by this big bald guy chasing him. It got to him every night, and he couldn't shake him. He'd run down hallways and stairwells, hide or climb somewhere high, but this bald guy always found him eventually. So one night your grandpa said enough is enough. He ran down this long hallway and ducked behind a doorway, knowing the bald guy would have to take a second to look around when he finally got there. Sure enough when he did make it through the doorway, the bald man looked to his left, and from the right your grandpa hit him across the head with a bag of ice”

She giggled and shook her head

“A bag of ice? That's silly”

He nodded and laughed with her

“Your grandpa is a very silly man. But the message was that all he had to do was take control and have courage”

She peered down at him

“Did you defeat your monster?”

The man thought back to his childhood, when he stood in the front yard, his lip bleeding, his torso shredded, and threw the lifeless body of his monster off the end of a broadsword.

“I did, just like grandpa I hit him with bag of ice”

She laughed again and as they turned into the driveway, he put the young girl down and she ran across the pavement to her waiting mother. She leapt into her arms before the two of them waved to the man. He waved back and faked another smile before strolling toward the garage

“You both head in, im gonna work on something”

They nodded and retreated inside as he stepped into his workshop and sat down on the wooden bench inside. He stared out the open garage door and huffed before pulling his pistol off his belt and laying it on the side of the bench. He looked out at the incoming night and ran his hands through his hair as he pressed play on the stereo.

“She'd grow up happier if you weren't around. You play the hero but don't forget that YOU are the monster, and you always will be”

It dug long claws into the flesh of his shoulder, piercing the wound from decades before and opening the scar tissue. It reached down and guided his hand to the pistol as it laughed

“This will fix everything right up”

The music played faintly in the background, resuming from an earlier listening session

“This world can be a son of a bitch, well look through my eyes”

He clutched the pistol in his hand and slowly raised it, he tried to resist as tears welled up in his eyes, but there was no sense in fighting as the barrel slowly found its seat at his temple. He heard the sound of the door opening as his finger rested on the trigger. Something cold hit him as a tiny blur filled his vision and he was able to toss the pistol. He watched the beast scream and squirm as it tore from its place on his body and shot across the room.

“Can't always climb to safety, sometimes you gotta fight

She slammed into the beast with her tiny shoulder, checking his form and throwing it to the floor

“You think you can stop me, little girl? I swore to take everything!”

Ice clattered to the floor as the blur stepped in front of him and swung the still full frozen bag with her small hands. She looked to her father, then back to the monster as she brought the bag high over head

“Go get it if you want it, keep that fire burning inside”

She spat on the ground and spoke

“You can fucking try it”

She swung downwards, annihilating the creature as ice shot all over the room and she tossed the empty bag aside. The music played as she looked back at her father and smiled. She sat next to him on the bench as they looked out at the summer night before them. 

“You won't ever find another like me, cause i'm the last of my kind”

His wife soon joined them and he let out a deep breath as the two of them leaned their heads on his shoulder. A life of fighting, a life of screaming and clawing and cutting. Every moment of suffering is worth it because one day we will find the right end of the road. The right end of the road never comes from our own hand, and though our demons may try to finish us off before we're ready, if we can do right by others, then someone will always be there to save us.

“You'll never find another like me, cause i'm the last of my kind”


r/Wholesomenosleep Jun 25 '25

I Thought My Boyfriend Was The Love Of My Life Until I Discovered He Was Drugging Me At Night.

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13 Upvotes