The Nameless Sightings: Sloth

''The following is a story posted on a forum on May 16th 2006. The username was partycat347:''

A bit of backstory first: it was 1995, I was 15, and ever since I was little, I was fat. Growing up, I didn’t like being fat because it was hard for me to do things and I knew about the dangers of obesity since my uncle had died of heart failure when I was little. Despite this, I was too lazy to exercise and I liked sweets more than fruit. It didn’t help matters that I was bullied to the point I became ashamed of myself and stopped talking altogether.

By the time I was fifteen, my parents decided to send me to a summer camp meant to help motivate young people lose weight and feel better about themselves. You weren’t allowed to bring snacks, you couldn’t have seconds, and you could only drink water and milk. I wanted to go, but a part of me hated the idea of attending.

The camp was alright. It looked like a normal summer camp with cabins, mess halls, a lake, and it was surrounded by a forest, but had more warehouses and jungle gyms than your traditional summer camp. A normal day at the camp was a six o’clock start, a morning jog, a healthy breakfast, morning announcements, morning exercises, free time, lunch, afternoon exercises, free time, dinner, an evening talk to help motivate us into losing weight, and finally, bed at nine o’clock. The plan was that we would start with seeing what we were comfortable in one week, and then pushing ourselves just a little as the weeks progressed. Once a week, we weighed ourselves and those who had lost the most weight were given some sort of reward, like a movie, or a trip into town.

At first, I tried my best to get involved in the activities, but once the first week went by and I barely lost weight and my feelings towards myself hadn’t really changed, I started to dislike the activities. It didn’t help matters that I was dangerously close to being in the bottom five with those who refused to participate and had snuck in their own snacks. By the second week – with the same little progress – I started to stop caring.

That however, changed on the Saturday of the fifth week. We were going through our early morning job when I grew exhausted and successfully managed to get off the trail without the instructors noticing me. I hid behind a tree until I knew I was alone before I sat down and took a long drink from my water bottle.

When I finished, I realised there was a man sitting a few feet away from me. He was staring up at the sky, smoking from a small wooden pipe. With his worn clothing, I thought he was a homeless bum. He was covered in scars, and had shaggy grey hair despite appearing to be in his late-thirties.

After a minute of staring, he slowly removed his pipe before he turned to me. “You do realise that you shouldn’t hate yourself for slow progress, right?” he said slowly.

I frowned when he said that, but I didn’t say anything.

“You know if you don’t start talking again, the ones who bullied you have won. If I were you, I’d recommend you forgive yourself before you work on improving yourself.”

I remained silent until he spoke again. “Or maybe you’re not talking because you’ve got too much food stuffed in your cheeks. I’m leaning towards that reason.”

Angrily, I opened my mouth to say something, but no sound came out. The homeless man blew a smoke ring. “If I were you,” he continued, “I wouldn’t recommend going into a forest. There’s an infestation that would enjoy feeding off people like you.”

I got up and ran back to camp. I planned on waiting until the group came back before joining them to make it look like I’d been with them every step of the way. I was exhausted when I reached the edge of the forest. The sun was quite warm at that time, so I decided to take a quick nap. I leaned against the tree and I quickly nodded off.

I woke up all of a sudden to a sharp pain in my side. It felt like I was being pinched. I let out a shriek and sat up. Several ants were biting me while hundreds more surrounded me. I managed to get onto my feet and frantically tried to brush myself off. As I did so, the remaining ants started following me. I ran as fast as it was possible for me to go, swatting at myself and screaming, when I lost my footing and landed with a thud. The ants quickly caught up with me, and I knew I wouldn’t make it back onto my feet before they caught me.

Without warning, the ground the ants ran along suddenly caught fire. I could smell them burning as they quickly burned and shrivelled up. Then, it was over and the ground was littered with tiny specks of ash.

I looked up to see a ten-year old girl holding a metal pole that was wedged into the ground. She was covered in scars with her left eye missing and really long grey hair. She wore glasses, a doctor’s coat, and clothes that would have fit a grown man. Behind her, hiding behind some trees, was a group of small children with long brown hair and big white shirts.

The girl stared for a moment before she smiled sweetly at me and ran off with those other children following her. I remembered how she dragged one of her legs behind her as she ran.

For a moment, I sat there in disbelief at what had happened. I lifted up my shirt to inspect myself – my side was a bright red and a trickle of blood ran out of a small cut. It didn’t look too bad so I thought little of the injury. I chose not to tell anyone about what I saw, but if I saw them again, I planned on saying something.

I had trouble sleeping that night. I couldn’t stop thinking about those ants. While the pain in my side was long gone, I felt like something was creeping along my skin. When I tried to swat whatever was touching me, nothing was there. I managed to get some sleep, but I woke up early the next morning to find dried blood along my fingertips and under my nails. My pyjamas were stained red and my torso was riddled with scratches.

I let out a terrified gasp at the sight. I hurried to the clinic once again to show them what had happened. The nurse had me cut my nails, wash the blood off, and apply iodine and bandages to my cuts. She had me put my bloodstained clothes in the wash, and then sent me on my day. As I made my way to the dining hall, I felt like I was being watched. At one point, I turned around to see one of those kids staring at me from behind a tree. They quickly disappeared when I realised I saw them, but when I went to confront the child, they were gone.

As the day went on, I felt more tired than usual. I tried to make an effort during my daily exercises, but within five minutes, I wanted to quit, and I thought I was going to pass out. I tried to push myself on a little more, but I could only get through half of my daily exercises.

As it was Sunday, they had us weigh ourselves. To everyone’s amazement – including my own – I had somehow lost ten pounds. I had to be weighed again, and when it showed I still had the same weight loss, they pulled me aside and tried to figure out how I could have lost ten kilograms in a week. I couldn’t answer their questions. They called my parents and told them what had happened. The coordinators arranged for an appointment with the doctor the next day. When I finally went to bed, I was so tired I fell asleep the moment my head touched the pillow.

Once again, I dreamt about those ants crawling on me again. It felt like they were under my skin, crawling through my muscles, and I could see little black dots crawling under my skin. I scratched at them, clawing at myself until I grabbed one. The moment it was out, it managed to twist itself around and buried itself back into me by burrowing under my fingernails. When they made their way back under my skin, I could clearly make out their legs and bodies.

I awoke with a start only to find my bedsheets stained red. Despite my trimmed nails, I had still managed to scratch myself. I had to hold back a scream. I frantically pulled myself out of bed and I ran to the bathrooms. I managed to wash the blood off me and inspect how severely I’d mutilated myself. It was difficult to find an area of myself that wasn’t scratched up. As I inspected myself, I felt a tingling sensation in my left eye. I inched closer to a mirror to see what was wrong.

An ant slowly crawled through the whites of my eyes.

At the sight of the bug, I panicked and bolted away from the mirror, out of the bathrooms and into the forest, screaming. I didn’t know where I was going. I didn’t know what I was thinking. My mind blurred and I felt as though I’d lost control of myself until I collapsed, too tired to continue running.

The strong scent of tobacco made me lift up my head to see the homeless man sitting against a large oak tree. He exhaled a long thin line of smoke before he turned to me. “I warned you,” he said softly.

I took a step towards him.

“If you come near me, I will not help you,” he warned, his eyes narrowed slightly and I stopped. He turned his head towards some trees. “Boy, kids.”

I hid behind a tree as I saw the little one-eyed girl and those kids appear. Back then, I had silently given the girl the nickname Faye. I don’t know what I was thinking when I thought that, but it sounds better than calling her the little one-eyed girl.

I noticed that the kids were dragging animal carcasses. Many of them had massive holes in them like bugs had been crawling through them. I felt sick when I realised that that was going to happen to me if something wasn’t going to be done.

“Those ants have never fed on a human before,” the man told me before a smug smirk formed on his lips. “I’d like to see how much longer you have left.”

When he said that, I found it difficult to stand and I had to lean against a tree to stay upright. Noticing this, he reached into a large bag that sat next to him and threw out several bars of chocolate and a large travel mug. He picked up a stick and flicked them towards me.

“If you don’t want to fall asleep, you better keep yourself stimulated. They mostly feed on you when you’re asleep. It’s not the flesh, more your energy.”

I picked up the travel mug and opened it up. It was filled with hot coffee that made my nose wrinkle when I smelt it. Reluctantly, I drank the jug’s contents and ate the chocolates as fast as I could.

Faye and those kids had been staring at us for several minutes before the girl picked up a handful of leaves and threw them at the homeless man. I watched the two playfully wrestling and throwing leaves at one another. I slowly started to nod off before I snapped back awake when the kids started to throw rocks at me. I tried to run away, and tripped when a rock hit me in the back of the head.

I made my way back to my feet. The homeless man had stopped playing with the girl and was once again sitting by a tree. “You want to know what’s going on, don’t you?” he asked.

I nodded. The man removed a small vile from an old bag that sat next to him. I thought the red contents were blood, but it was too pale. He opened it and allowed a small drop to drip onto a tiny shrub that grew from his feet. We watched as the plant shrivelled up before it tore itself to pieces. Silently, the man picked up the plants remains and ate it. The sight made me gag and I backed away for a moment.

“This is the blood of an Elohim,” he explained. “If it enters your system, it will attack every single strand of your DNA and your body will violently reject itself. However, if the body is barely formed when it’s infected, it will become a part of you, making you different.”

I’m pretty sure he ignored the confused look on my face. “A few weeks ago, an ant’s nest was overtaken by some entities who bled. While the workers were killed, the eggs and queen were not. Shortly after, a bird came along to pick at what remained. The infected ants hatched when they sensed life and consumed the bird’s energy until it dropped dead. Another animal came along to inspect the remains, and the ants had a new source of energy. For the most part, their new nest will only last a few hours – or days – before they have to find a new host. They’re nocturnal and the first thing they do when they find a new host is lay their eggs.”

I thought I was going to be sick. I had to repress a retch. I was horrified when I felt an ant crawl under my skin when I touched my arm.

“We have been trying to wipe out those ants – we just have one more colony to go. If you go home, those ants have the potential to wipe out humanity. I wouldn’t mind seeing how humans will try to counteract this. Pulling them out individually wouldn’t work, in fact, it could very well infect others. You could try living with them by not spending up the rest of your energy, but you’ll end up dying anyway. Maybe there is no hope for you.”

He took out another small vile and threw it towards me. I failed to catch it, but I managed to pick it up and inspected it. It looked like it was filled with water, but I didn’t want to take any chances with it and tossed it aside.

“Alright then,” the homeless man sighed.

I didn’t see the scalpel until I felt it slice across my throat. I stumbled backwards, clutching my throat as blood ran through my fingers. I gasped for a moment before adrenaline entered my system and I started running. I could feel a lump forming inside my stomach.

I didn’t get far. I reached a small clearing before I collapsed. I was too weak to move by that point and the lump slowly started to make its way up my throat. I covered my mouth. I didn’t want to die spending my final moments being sick. I felt dizzy and it was difficult to keep my eyes open.

The sound of footsteps snapped me back for a moment. Faye was staring at me from behind a tree. I opened my mouth to speak, but no sound could escape my lips. I tried to beg, pleading with her to save me. I didn’t want to die.

Faye slowly, made her way towards me, dragging her leg behind her as she walked. The lump in my throat was getting closer to the back of my mouth. She sat down next to me. Despite being much smaller, she managed to lift up my upper body and held me close. I could almost taste the lump. I could feel it moving, wriggling about in my throat. I started to retch. Faye then covered my mouth with one hand and pressed her lips against my neck.

As soon as she did that, I started struggling to push her away from me. I stopped when I felt the lump escape through my neck. I felt Faye’s nails digging into me and her hands trembled as they made their way into her mouth and down her throat.

Finally, the last of the ants escaped my lips and she let go of me. I crawled backwards as I started gasping. I placed a hand over my throat and to my amazement, my throat had healed. The blood was gone and my scratches were non-existent. I was tired, but I was fine.

I looked back at Faye. She was doubled over in pain as she clutched her stomach, gasping. I struggled to approach her. I stopped when she let out a small wail and started to violently cough. I tried to help her, but she immediately jerked away as soon as my hand touched her shoulder and let out a shriek.

Without warning, the ground beneath us caved in. We seemed to fall for a few seconds before hitting the ground. As soon as the dust settled, I realised we were inside a tunnel. It was big, but I had to bend over slightly. I looked up and realised we were several feet underground and I didn’t have the upper body strength to climb up.

I looked back at Faye. She was sitting against the wall, staring at me with a blank look. She was making this weird breathing sound which I thought was the result of eating those ants. To my surprise, her skin was giving off a glow that illuminated the tunnel. To our left was darkness, and to our right was a turn in the tunnel.

I pointed up at the hole, trying to convince her to help us out. She followed my finger, before looking back at me. I thought she was an alien or a ghost and I thought that was why she couldn’t understand me. Instead, I tried to pick her up and force her to climb upwards. She crawled away from me, leading us deeper into the tunnels. I grabbed her arm and she bit me. I shoved her away and cradled my hand. I decided I didn’t want to bother with her and instead find my own way out. I turned around, only to realise I was lost.

Faye started crawling away from me. I raced after the girl, calling out to her to wait. Doing that was a bad idea because it made her go faster. Soon, she was a faint dot in the distance and I was alone in the darkness.

I stopped once she was gone. It was deathly quiet, except for my heavy breathing. I wanted to cry at the hopeless feeling until I felt a slight tremor coming from the way I came. It was moving fast and I didn’t want to stick around to find out. I started running in the opposite direction. The tremor was moving faster and it felt like it was coming from everywhere. I reached the end of the tunnel only to be greeted with a T-intersection. I went left only to hit a dead end. The sound was deafening by that point and I realised I was cornered. Silently, I curled up into a ball and prayed it would end quickly. I really believed that at that moment, it was the end for me.

Ahead of me, I could faintly make out a dim light that was quickly approaching me. Despite her limp, it only took her a few seconds to reach us, illuminating the tunnel once again to reveal the walls, roof, and floor were covered in millions of ants.

The ants turned and started making their way towards her. I thought she was going to set fire to them, but instead, she stood still and opened her mouth. It was horrifying to watch the ants crawling up her body and making their way into her mouth. I wanted to throw up at the sight.

After a few minutes, the girl stumbled into the wall and fell to her knees. I could see the silhouettes of ants crawling under the skin. She turned to me and grinned, revealing sharp, jagged teeth with ants wriggling through her teeth. I had to cover my mouth to hold down a scream.

She approached me for a moment before I started backing away until I hit the wall. She paused for a moment, confused before she outstretched her hand and grabbed my fingers. She helped me to my feet and she started walking me further down the tunnel. I couldn’t understand her sudden shift in behaviour, but I was hoping she knew how to get out.

We walked for a long time before we reached the end of the tunnel that led into darkness. I couldn’t tell at the time, but the girl was leading us into the middle of the ants nest. If I had known, I would have stayed in the tunnel.

The middle of the nest was like being in a massive dome with tree roots weaving around the hundreds of tunnel entrances. The ground was littered with millions of little white pebbles and a giant, dark, misshapen rock lay in the middle of the area.

Faye made her way inside, crushing the pebbles under her bare feet, filling the room with loud squelching sounds. I was glad I wore shoes and I tried to walk in her footprints, but my feet were bigger than hers. As we passed the rock, the ground rumbled once again. She grabbed me, dragging me across the room and forcing me into one of the tunnels.

A gigantic ant emerged from the ground. It was probably bigger than a double-decker bus with pincers the size of industrial-sized garden sheers. Its eyes were a glowing sickly grey that sprouted bulging green veins that ran along its body. At the sight, I realised that the homeless man didn’t mention the queen from that ant’s nest had died.

The queen turned to us, attracted by the girl’s glowing skin. It lunged at us, wedging its head into the tunnel and snapping its pincers at us. The girl pushed me out of harm’s way before the ant grabbed her and dragged her out.

I watched as it tried to bite her in half, but her skin must have been too hard for it to break. Frustrated, it threw her across the wall, creating a giant crater. The ant approached her and held her against the wall with its giant foot. It reached down to look at her. Instead of eating her, its feelers started running down her body as it smelt her. I turned away as it felt under her clothes.

That was when the queen started to talk. I know it sounds weird, but that’s what happened. Its voice was scratchy, like it was struggling to speak. All it said was this:

''You are one of them. Become one with me, blood sister. Devour me.''

As soon as it said that, Faye pulled back her head, coughed up a long pole, and wedged it into the ground. Burn marks formed along her skin. I felt an intense heat behind me. I looked behind to see a fire in the distance. I crawled out just in time for fire to explode from the tunnels. The flames ran down to the ground, burning up the eggs. Surprisingly, the flames didn’t touch me.

The queen let out a shriek. It grabbed Faye and threw back its head, swallowing her whole. Everything was silent for a moment before the ant turned to me. Terrified, I tried to escape into the tunnel, but the heat was too intense for me to climb up. Right when I thought it was going to grab me, the ant started screaming again. It stumbled around, hitting the walls and shaking about. I watched as its hard shell slowly shed away, revealing its transparent insides. Its shell made a loud plop and melted when it touched the smouldering ground.

I watched a lump making its way down the ant’s oesophagus. The glow on the girl’s skin showed her burrowing her way into its abdomen. I saw her stop in the middle of its body, cushioned between various organs. Next, the ants she had once devoured crawled out of every pore in her body.

The little ants made their way through the queen, devouring everything in its path. They crawled around her, turning into what looked like a gigantic, moving shell. The form disappeared into a large mass of spiders with Faye standing in the middle, covered in the queen’s slimy remains. The long pole was still sticking through her mouth. She wrapped her hand around it and pulled the rest out of her mouth.

Faye turned to me and smiled. She started swinging the pole above her head. As she did so, the ants followed her, running around in a small circle. She continued to swing as she outstretched her arm as far as it would go. The circle grew wider as the ants drew closer to me. I shrieked and tried to escape only to be swept up into the mass.

I looked down to see Faye forcing the ants to climb towards the roof. They split into two as one half carried me up while the other started digging away at the ceiling. Once a large hole had formed, I was forced through and made my way onto the surface. I looked back to watch the ants swarm around Faye and carry her upwards. Once she was out, she wedged the pole into the top layer of ants. I saw burns spread across her arm as a fire exploded through the tunnel.

I was forced to shield my eyes as the fire exploded through the hole. When the flames died down, the hole was gone. In its place was compacted dirt. I turned around to see Faye surrounded by those children. She was nuzzling them and they were laughing. They didn’t seem to care that she was covered in slime and had it smeared down their fronts.

I was exhausted by that point. Once I was aboveground, I collapsed to my knees, gasping and on the verge of passing out. Faye noticed this and made her way towards me. I blacked out before she reached me.

_

When I woke up, I found myself staring down at Faye. She was naked, covered in dried blood, with her wrists and ankles held down by steel straps. Next to her was a mangled corpse that had just been sewn up, save for its torso. It was male with no organs and I don’t think there was any blood inside him. On the other side of the girl was a small table with various surgical tools sitting on top of it.

A man slowly made his way towards Faye. He too was covered in blood. He wore gloves and he set down a needle and thread on the table. He then held her hand as he stood over her. The girl had been staring at the corpse but looked up when he touched her.

“You’ve been given enough anaesthesia to knock out a horse,” he told her. “You can’t keep hold of his soul for much longer. I know you have no idea of what’s about to happen, but give me a sign that you don’t really want to do this?”

She didn’t respond to him. Instead, she looked back to the corpse and outstretched her free hand to him. Her fingers gently bushed against his arm. She then looked back at the man, her eye pleading with him to continue.

The man tightened his grip on her hand before he slowly let go. Silently, he took a scalpel off the table and lowered it towards the base of her neck. Next came her screaming wails of pain.

I awoke to the sound of a crackling fire. I could smell burnt meat. Through half-closed eyes, I saw twenty large white shirts hanging over a branch. They were soaking wet. I sat up and I saw Faye and those children were sitting on the other side of the fire. The girl had a large bowl of hot soup by her feet and the children took turns to be fed. I covered my eyes when I realised the small children weren’t wearing anything.

Faye noticed that I had woken up and stopped. The children followed her gaze before they scurried backwards into the forest. She stood up and cautiously limped her way towards me. I lowered my hands to stare at her. I watched as she placed her hands into her white-lab pockets and held out handfuls of dead ants.

I gave a nervous smiled and nodded. She stared at me before she threw the ants into the fire. She emptied her pockets, ridding herself of its contents. When she finished, she smiled at me before going back to the other side of the fire. The children went back to her when she returned.

I looked around. The darkened woods and sky showed that it was night fall. I couldn’t make out anything aside from a few trees until my eyes set on the homeless man sitting not too far away from the fire, smoking. The smell was almost unbearable so I stood up and slowly made my way over to him.

He turned to me. “Do not come near me,” he said, his grey eyes narrowing and I realised his pupils were slits, like a cat’s. My eyes widened at the sight and I stepped back.

He smirked. “I’m not really one of those entities,” he told me before he looked over to Faye. “She didn’t know what was going to happen. You could say that I’m a hybrid. I’m grateful to be one.”

I then pointed towards Faye and those children. “They’re something else,” he replied. I looked over at the one-eyed girl as she fed those children. She wasn’t paying attention to us.

I felt something bounce off me. I looked down at my feet and found there was a vile at my feet. I picked it up and realised it was the same vile I had seen earlier. I opened it up and I faintly made out the scent of vinegar.

“If you had bothered to question what it was, I would have told you that when a demon takes on a form of a living thing, they have to follow the rules of that species,” he flatly stated. “To be perfectly blunt, ants don’t like vinegar in water. Just a sip would have them racing out of your body. But since you didn’t want to go that route, I did the next best thing – you see, creatures like that will always leave the host when they sense their demise. I can’t say for sure if they all died. With a bit of luck, they should be. If this park closes off due to so many mysterious animal deaths, you better hope no humans were infected. It’s best to kill those things with fire, so if this area is someday burnt down through mysterious circumstances, you’ll know why.”

I looked back at the fire and I knew then where the smell was coming from. I felt someone’s elbow hit me in the back. I immediately fell to my side, winded from the impact. I saw the homeless man walking away from me and returning to his original spot. I struggled to breathe for a minute before I managed to make it onto my knees.

“Why did you do that?” I gasped.

“You’re not shocked you just said something?”

I looked back up at him. “Did you do something to me?” I asked. “Did you give me a confidence boost or something?”

“No. I just did that to see if I could shock you into talking again.”

“How does hurting me help do that?”

“My original plan was to stick a scalpel to your throat and threaten to show you what your windpipe looked like unless you talked. Which one would you have preferred?”

I made my way back onto my feet and leaned against a tree. “Will I be going back now?” I asked.

“You’ll have to wait until morning to go home.”

“Good,” I said before I could stop myself.

“You’re afraid to go back, aren’t you?”

“What makes you say that?”

“Why are you relieved?”

“I don’t know. I just…”

“I have extreme doubts that you’re being honest.”

“Well, I just…I don’t think I’m ready to go back.”

“Why not?”

“Because I’m tired and…”

“Of what?”

I didn’t answer him. “Based on your silence, I’m guessing you agree with me,” he continued. “If it makes you feel better, I don’t have anything against you.”

“I don’t know what you think of me.”

He turned to me. “I’m sorry you were picked on. It wasn’t your fault and you didn’t deserve it,” he said so sincerely that I felt tears sting my eyes. “I should probably point out that they only do it to deal with their own insecurities. Next time, just tell them that and then challenge them to continue bullying you just to prove you were right. If that doesn’t work, then when they comment on your weight, just let them know that at least you’re not a cunt.”

I smiled slightly. “I don’t think I’m confident enough to do that.”

“They’re just trying to get a reaction of out you. You can ignore it, or you can try and turn the tables on them.”

“Maybe I could do that.”

The man slowly withdrew smoke. “Have you seen the eldest?” he suddenly asked.

Before I could stop myself, incomprehensible words escaped from my mouth. I covered my mouth in shock when I stopped before I coughed up one more ant. It was already dead.

“What was that?” I asked.

“I was checking something. You know, if you’d bothered to drink from that vile, none of that would have happened. It was just vinegar and water. Although, I’ll admit that I’ve never seen a fat person run so fast. What a way to go.”

I went back to the fire and sat down. The girl placed what remained of the soup next to me before she started dressing those children. The soup itself was just brown water with chunks of meat that each had their own bizarre and unusual taste; some were stringy, while others tasted downright disgusting. I looked back at the fire and I slowly came to realise what those pieces were. I wanted to throw the food away, but I was so hungry, I forced myself to continue.

When I finished, the girl took my hand and nuzzled it before she wrapped the ends of her hair around my wrist. She stepped away, allowing her hair to slide off, leaving a grey bracelet I quickly realised was made from her hair.

I found out that as a result of coming into contact with those people, I would be vulnerable to attacks from monsters like those ants. As a result, I had to have a piece of them with me at all times to stay safe. To this day, I have always had it close and I wear it as a hairband.

By the time I was done admiring it, the girl was leaning against the tree, fast asleep. The other children were curled up around her. It was cold that night and I tried to keep the fire going until I gradually fell asleep.

I woke up in the clinic the next day. My parents were sitting by my bedside, relieved that I had woken up. They told me that at one in the morning, a little one-eyed girl had dragged me to the edge of the woods before disappearing back into the woods.

I went to the hospital for a check-up, and despite the weight I had lost, I was fine. I didn’t have to spend the night in the hospital or anything like that, and I went back to the camp.

I worked really hard to lose weight. Everyone was surprised at my sudden change in behaviour. I hardly ate anything fatty, I exercised for two hours every day, and I stopped getting upset when people called me fat. I never said those things to anyone who picked on me, instead I smiled back and shrugged. My parents were happy that I was making an effort to improve myself. I became a much happier person because of it.

I never saw Faye, that man, or those children again. I didn’t even see any of those monsters. However, in the year 2000, something very odd happened. I don’t remember what day it was, but I suddenly found myself crying. I didn’t feel sad or happy, but I just cried until I didn’t have any tears to shed. All the time that had happened, my bracelet had turned a dark brown colour until I stopped and it went back to its original shade of grey.

Even after all these years, there are still so many questions that I have about the incident. A part of me doesn’t want to know, but if anyone out there has had a similar experience or any explanations, please let me know in the comment section.

''The story was deleted by the user on May 17th 2006. The story received 1 comment:''

''H. M.Star: Keep your experience with my family to yourself, Georgina Richardson.''