“Demons are like obedient dogs; they come when they are called.”
-- Réme de Gourmont
Kilaran Ticker. This name has plagued many people as of late. The government denies his existence, and people board up their doors when they hear his name. I have been assigned by the FBI to investigate this matter and present my results to the public.
My name is Daniel Hawtheman, FBI agent, currently investigating the mysterious disappearances following an unknown man named Kilaran Ticker. Through my investigation so far, I have collected a set number of accounts from several people. This is Sam Wess’s account of his encounter with the creature.
My name is Sam Wess. I live in Cedar City, Utah, and I go to Southern Utah University. I’m 24 years old, and I’m currently a junior in college. I had a strange encounter with this creature that I shall name KT for now.
It all started on February 25th, three days from my roommate's birthday. His name was Jacob, a really cool dude. He was a dunce, but he got the job done right quick, spending most of his time playing Super Smash Bros. Ultimate and getting ripped in the college gym. Anyways, I’m getting ahead of myself. So Jacob was off at class that day; I think it was…math that he was going to? Well, I had no classes that day, so I spent my time in my dorm playing Splatoon 2.
I was busy getting my game on and taking out the Octolings when I decided to go to check on the mail. It was around that time that we’d get the mail anyway. So I paused the game, took my keys and locked up the dorm. I then headed downstairs to my mail cubby; when I went to check, there was certainly something there. Some bills, some letters from my parents…and there was a box!
Ecstatic and anxious about what it was, I quickly checked to see if there was a return address. No return address, no name…nothing. Even weirder, the box was addressed to a man named “Kilaran Ticker.” I didn’t really know what to do with this, so I decided to ask around the building. No one knew, so after a while I wrote on a sticky note:
“Here’s your package, Kilaran Ticker” –
…And stuck it on the apartment wall next to the lost-and-found where I placed the box. I then walked back to my room and resumed playing Splatoon 2.
…The disappearances started shortly after that. It started with a good friend of mine: Kylie Garrison. A day later, it was a guy I didn’t really know named Johnny Hancock. A day after that, it was a guy named Richard Tate. However, the next person to go missing was the last straw. I…I’d better just tell you the whole story…
I was sitting in my room doing some late-night homework for my legal studies; I believe it was 9:15-9:20PM? I think it was around that time, couldn’t be sure… Time was not something I was concerned about at the time. Anyways, I was working on my legal studies when Jacob came back from his birthday party. He stumbled into the room and asked –
“Hey, Sam! Sammaroony, Sam mah man! Yeh wanna get some nachos, mah main man?” Good god, he was drunk.
“Um, sure, just let me finish this little bit I have to do with my homework,” I replied.
“Nah, yeh don’t need that lil piece of shit, Sam! Yeh outta hang out with us,” he said, accidentally tripping on a cord and falling over on his face fast asleep. I rolled my eyes, hoisted his now sleeping body onto his bed, and resumed my work.
It had been 4 hours before he finally woke up. “Oh, shit…my head…” Jacob sat up in bed, and I got off of my Switch and asked, “Hey, you sober now?”
“Yeah, but I don’t like it…my head hurts…” he replied, rubbing the spot where he hit the ground.
“Yeah, you took quite a fall there, you ok?” I asked.
“I…I guess…I’m gonna go take a shower,” he said, getting up from the bed and walking to the showers. I sat back down and shook my head.
What a dummy, I thought.
He took three hours. I went into the shower room, hoping to find him sleeping in the shower. The shower was running in one of the stalls.
“Jacob? Oh, thank goodness, I thought you went missing like so many people already are…” I said.
Silence.
“Jacob? Are you sleeping in the shower? Wake up!” I shouted.
Silence.
To be fair, Jacob always slept like a rock. However, I was getting really nervous. I knocked on the door to the stall and heard shallow breathing.
“Oh, thank god,” I gasped.
Pounding on the door, I hollered, “Jacob! Wake up!”
“W-wuh?! What’s going on?” I heard a man say from behind. “Sam? Is that you?”
“Jacob, it’s me! What were you doing there for so long?!”
The next words he said made my false hope crumble like a christmas cookie.
“Jacob? No, I’m Henry.”
I checked the other stall, the only other one running water, and what I found was terrifying: a grim message with blood saying ‘KT’. No Jacob.
(Sam refused to say anymore about what happened that night. However, he did share information on what happened next. Here’s what happened…)
Shortly after the police investigation, they assumed he’d probably just ran away. He couldn’t have, though! It was his goddamn birthday!
I decided to lead my own investigation. The scene of the disappearance did have one thing in common with all the other disappearances: nothing was left behind.
Even the best bloodhound hits a dead end, though. I hit a trail colder than a pack of frozen chicken. I eventually…I just gave up.
…It had been a month since the disappearances started. More people were disappearing, and there were very few people left, myself included. I was walking down the cold, dark, empty hallway at around…9:30PM? Anyways, I was walking down the hallway when I thought I heard footsteps from behind. Turning around, I saw someone standing at the end.
“J-Jacob?” I asked, recognizing the face immediately.
Silence.
“Jacob, please, where were you? You’ve had everyone thinking that you were dead!”
Again…Silence.
He started to move toward me, step by small step.
“Jacob, what are you doing?”
I blinked, and then he was gone.
“Jacob? I know no Jacob,” I heard a raspy voice from behind.
Spinning around, I saw nothing.
“I only know who I am and who you are, Sam,” the voice snickered.
Twirling around again, I saw nothing.
“Ah, there’s that spirit I look for. So full of fear, so full of terror. That’s why I chose you,” it said.
“W-who are you? What do you want from me?” I asked, stuttering as I turned once more to find nothing.
“Oh, Sam, Sam, Sam…don’t you remember? I’m your good friend, KT,” it laughed.
KT…then it hit me: the message on the shower!
“Y-you took Jacob! What did you do to him, you monster?!” I hollered as I turned to find nothing once more.
“Sam, I forgot to mention…thank you for returning my box and letting me in,” it said, chuckling.
I had an idea. I reared back and kicked at the air behind me, hoping to hit it.
“Now, now, let’s not get dangerous here. I really should thank you a little more. After all, you let me enter the resident hall,” KT said with a grin I sensed was there. “You left my name on a big sticky note.”
This was Kilaran Ticker...?
With that final sentence, the voice was gone.
… Alright, now I’ve told you everything! Can you guys please pardon me? I swear I didn’t do it! I didn’t kill Jacob! I swear! Besides, KT’s already here in the prison with me! He’s torturing everyone I know and love! Everyone I care about! Please! Just free me!
(When the prison guards came to retrieve Sam, he was nowhere to be found. Reports say that he broke out of jail, but that was all just a scapegoat to allow the investigation of KT to go on without people continuing to press for more information.
This is the end of Sam’s account of his encounter with Kilaran Ticker.)
Written by The Anonymous Crouton
Content is available under CC BY-SA