Go Outside



I've never believed in anything paranormal. Ghosts, poltergeists, haunted game cartridges: bullshit to me. I often spent my time online, occasionally reading some stories about such topics, either for a laugh or because I really just wanted to find something so convincing it could creep me out. I never spent much time outside the house. I was always a shut-in, and as a shut-in it was always the daily challenge to quell boredom. So, naturally, I'd try to find some rush of adrenaline wherever I could, in here. I'm still here, in fact. I'm alone with something, trying to keep me here, not with force but with some kind of need to provoke madness. What may be interesting to you now is how I've gone from being so skeptical of the idea of some sinister, malevolent "thing" trying to scare people to not only insisting that such a "thing" exists, but that it's reduced me to that little, childish fear of the dark that those old ghost stories try to stir up again. I'm living this.

It started as it always did: I get up, I bathe, I eat, I spend the rest of the day in my own little hole in the wall doing nothing. I came to this site and started reading up on some creepypastas, passing the time, wondering why people wanted to use their childhood games to generate fear, the same thing I wondered every time I came here and yet still didn't keep me from reading such things. I was halfway through one story when I heard something, a mild bump that seemed to be coming inside the walls, maybe from another room. The bump happened once, then twice, and again, traveling along the length of the walls with each sound until stopping at my door. I was held in suspense waiting for a knock, but it never came I just sat there, not quite afraid but not quite calm either. Eventually, I let it go.

Later in the day, I decided to play a game. Of course, it would be all too appropriate for me to say that game was Majora's Mask, and of course, it was. The game played like it always did. There was no "Ben", no Link bursting into flames, and no backwards-playing songs. What there was, however, was a text box saying "Go outside" on screen, at all times. It wasn't coming from any character or sign or anything. It was just there. Now, keep in mind, I'm a skeptic. To me, this is a glitch of some kind; some in-game text that found its way on screen. After reseting and attemtping to play several times, I found that the text box didn't go away. I just gave up the game and tried something else. In between changing games, I heard loud thud from the ceiling overhead. It was like stomping, it was so loud. It was aggressive and shook me. I paused for a moment trying to collect my thoughts when it came again, this time joined by a cracking sound, but a cracking sound I couldn't quite place. Was it like a whip? Not really. Like a branch. Not exactly? Bones? I don't think so. You can only imagine it as sounding something like every cracking sound you can clearly place. I just sat there, on the floor, genuinely petrified. But, again, I tried to rationalize it. It could have been...I don't know. What could it have been? "Nothing" I heard in a small whisper right next to my ear, pushing me against the wall. I stood up and looked around. I was just tired was all. Of course, that was all it was. I hadn't been getting much sleep and I was just hallucinating because of the bumping earlier and the weird glitch. My room is not trying to fuck with me, of course. That's crazy.

. I calmed myself down again my turning on the TV and laying down. It was on some lame show I never really watched but would occasionally put on as background noise to get to sleep. As I was drifting in and out of sleep, I couldn't help but think I was beginning to lose it. Perfectly sane, rational people don't hear things like stomping and whispers. They don't sit and wait for a knock at their door. And they certainly don't make eye contact with a person on TV, who's mouthing the words "go outside" in the background of a scene.

I can't put into words how frozen in fear I was at that moment, how I had instantly given up on rationalizing anything when, immediately after witnessing this person on TV looking me dead in the face while an otherwise normal scene played out front of her, the TV shut off by itself and I could see my reflection in the dark screen, accompanied by the reflection of someone else against the wall at the foot of my bed, just fucking staring at me before quickly looking into the screen and meeting my eyes. I was shaking, hyperventilating, on the verge of tears, slowly turning my head to see this person who wasn't there, and, to no relief, the person wasn't there. The reflection, I think, was that of a woman, maybe a girl. It was practically a shadow figure with just vague enough facial features to notice it was completely devoid of emotion. It just stared.

I've been up for days since then. I've been trying to find some answer for all of this. "Go outside" was a threat. This thing wants me go out towards the noises I heard. Maybe the reflection wasn't real. Maybe that was just me Maybe this thing can only really get me from the outside. Every day I hear noises from out there, from children playing, to people arguing, to weird tapping and sneaking around by my window. I haven't seen the figure again, but I've heard that phrase "go outside" plenty of times now. I've heard plenty of things. As I type this I hear breathing somewhere. I'm just prolonging the end because I don't want to look anywhere but the screen right now. I know I'll see what it is that's breathing down my neck.