You can call me Duck. That’s not my real name of course, but I’ll change it for the sake of anonymity. My job as a mover is fairly simple enough—people hire me to move their shit, and then drive it to another place. The company that I work with isn’t a large one; it’s a small business in a small town. Here in this small hick down, it’s easy to say that everyone knows each other.
My job doesn’t require big brains as much as it requires big muscles. I usually don’t question the items that my clientele asks me to move. There’s usually nothing out of the ordinary—a few big drawers, a refrigerator, a couch, a bed, and other things of that caliber. Someone wanting to move it to storage, or someone wanting to transport their items to a newly purchased house. Things like that.
My partner, Joel (whose real name I’ve also changed) has been moving things with me ever since I started this job. A few years back, he helped me on my very first job—a young couple wanting to move the furniture in their living room to storage. It was at that time I realized that I wouldn’t mind being a mover.
Now, I’ll move on and get to the important stuff. Something strange happened recently that I’ve decided to share my experience, hoping that I can get some of your take on what’s happening.
If I’ve learned anything, it’s not to judge your clientele on the things they ask to move. It’s especially important that you don’t get the urge to rifle through their things. On occasion I’ve seen some really weird shit—I once dropped a drawer full of dildos that unceremoniously spilled out on the street. While I stood there gaping, Joel just shrugged and started gathering them up in his arms, putting them back where they came from. Luckily, our customer didn’t witness the event and we went along with our job.
Anyways, our most recent client was the strangest one we’ve ever had. We got a call in the afternoon about a man who wanted a single item moved. He lived in the outskirts of town—this was not unusual, as our town had a few farmers who lived in the middle of nowhere. We were told to meet him to pick up a chest that he owned. Except, this came with a weird request: he didn’t want it to be relocated in a new place or put into storage. His orders went as followed: ”I want it to be placed in a place that’s farthest away as possible.”
Now, I’m not one to judge people. I figured the old man had a few screws loose in his brain. Our manager, the one who took the order, tried to convince him that our moving company wasn’t a place to get rid of their unwanted garbage. However, he remained adamant about us taking the thing away from him. He refused to do it on his own. He even offered to pay us double of what the price was. My boss, deciding that this was an opportunity to establish a connection and get double pay, gave us the okay to take the chest and move it to the opposite side of town, where we would dump it in an abandoned field. He figured it would suffice, and the deal was set.
As we made our way to the old man’s house, we joked about what this could be about.
“Ah, you know those old folks. Maybe the guy is too fragile to move it himself,” Joel said as he drove down the highway.
“But why does he want us to move it as far away from him as possible? Sounds a bit strange, don’t’cha thing?” I asked
“Honestly I have no idea. The dude’s willing to pay double, so it must be important.”
I chuckled. “Maybe there’s a dead body inside.”
Joel snorted in response. “If there is, it sure ain’t our business. Besides, it’s a chest.”
“What if it’s a dismembered body or somethin’? Or a murder weapon?” I asked. I knew it couldn’t be true, but a weird feeling was starting to take hold. “I’m just saying, none of this makes sense.”
“Guy’s probably crazy; that’s what it boils down to,” Joel said dismissively. Wild thoughts started entering my mind—what if the guy was a serial killer and was using us to do his dirty work? What if he stole something important and wanted to hide the evidence?
We arrived at his house after half an hour of driving. The old man’s house looked like any farmhouse you’d find—a large lawn and a long driveway leading up to the garage, next to the porch of the house. The grass was unkempt, as the weeds and plants had gone too long without being trimmed. I could see someone sitting in the rocking chair on the porch. We made our way up to the man. He looked ancient. There were a few thin, white strands of hair on his head, which was slightly wrinkled and dotted with sun spots. He was hunched over in the chair, holding a cane in one hand. His figure was skinny and fragile, like he were about to wither away.
“Hello boys,” he said, his voice raspy but warm. We greeted him and introduced ourselves. “You must be the movers.”
He lurched over in the chair, standing himself up slowly. “It’s fine,” my partner said. “Just tell us where the chest is and we’ll take it.”
The old man paused. He used the hand that wasn’t holding his cane to point to the backyard. “She’s in the back.” I raised my eyebrow at the word ‘she.’
We skirted around the house to the back as the old man settled back down on his rocking chair, watching us calmly as we pushed passed overgrown grass that had sprouted up to our shoulders. As we walked, I noticed that the house seemed to look fine at first glance, but was in more disrepair as you got farther into the backyard. Boards were on some of the windows, whose panes had long been shattered (you could tell from the dust that had settled on the edges of the shards). Light blue paint was chipping off the walls, worn down with the years that had passed.
“Poor guy,” I began as we continued to trudge through the tall grass. “Looks like he lives alone here.”
“Yeah, you’re tellin’ me. His house could use a makeover, or at least a decent paint job.” Joel sighed and shook his head. “Wonder if the guy’s got any kids?”
I thought for a second. “He seemed like a normal guy. Maybe he does.”
As we rounded the corner of the house that led to the backyard, we spotted it. In the middle of his yard, which was surrounded by a dilapidated fence, was an old-looking black chest. It almost looked as antique as its owner sitting in the front of the house. Its leather looked wrinkled and had folded up slightly in some places. The edges were lined with a rusty yellow metal, and its lock was almost completely brown from erosion. It reminded me of a pirate’s chest. We weeded through the tall grass and found that, around the chest in an almost perfect circle, no grass had grown. It was like life had refused to grow in its presence, as there was foliage all around us except for a ten feet radius around the single box.
My partner sighed and rubbed his creased forehead. The chest was approximately three feet wide and two feet tall, which wasn’t as big as we had expected. “Alright, let’s get this thing outta here,” he said.
I got on one side of the chest and he got on the other. Placing our hands at the edges, we lifted it simultaneously. It was much lighter than I expected. As we moved it, I could feel the dirt and dust that had accumulated on top of it start to shift and flutter around us. I held back a sneeze as we once again tried to navigate through the overgrown grass.
As we made it to the front, we set the chest down near the back of our moving truck. The old man had not moved since we went to the back, staring at his with a slight grin on his face. We set the chest down in the back of our van, and I went to pick up our payment from the man who had placed the order. He slowly reached into his pocket and handed me the wad of cash, which for some reason felt heavier in my hand than money would usually feel.
We loaded back into the van and drove off.
And that was it.
I half expected the man to grab my wrist at the last minute and shakily tell me a cryptic message about not opening the chest, or him giving us a warning about the evils that lurked within. While we drove, I expected a horror-movie style reveal in which a demon broke loose and killed me and Joel. Perhaps I should stop imagining the worst things.
We ended up driving for two hours, reaching the other side of town and out into another empty field. At first, we thought about driving it to the landfill where most of the town’s trash was funneled to. But Joel didn’t like the idea—he wanted to dump it farther, just as the man had requested.
We continued to drive, past the pastures and cow fields and into a mountainous area that bordered our town to the east. A devious smile crept across Joel’s face. “I know the perfect place to dump this thing.”
He went off road and drove into a rocky field approaching a mountain. From what I can see, there was a small ravine and some ditches that littered the area. He finally came to a stop about a hundred meters from the road, overlooking a steep ditch. “Why here?” I asked.
“No one’ll find this baby once it’s out here,” Joel answered. I gave him an odd look. “What? Just like the old geezer requested, right?”
Together, we took the chest from its resting place and hefted it towards the edge. It was about a twenty feet drop to the bottom, which was an empty pit. I paused for a moment as we stood close to the cliffside, hesitant to throw it this soon. “Hey Joel, do you think…we should open it first?” I asked tentatively.
He scoffed. “Hey now, wouldn’t that be too nosy? The guy just wanted to get rid of it.”
“I know, but he didn’t say anything about not looking in it,” I answered him. “C’mon, I’m just curious.”
“Ain’t it policy not to look through people’s stuff?”
“Listen, this guy’s never gonna know. He’s never gonna see this chest ever again anyways,” I reasoned. “It wouldn’t hurt to look.”
Joel sighed loudly. He looked at the chest, and then back at me. We both set the down chest and took a hard look at its lock. “How are we gonna get this thing open?” Joel asked. I knew we had a crowbar in the back of our van, so I went to retrieve it.
At first, it seemed impossible to open. The lock, though thoroughly rusted, was still in tact and seemingly impervious to our attempt to pry it open. “Damn,” I cursed, slightly out of breath.
“This thing sure is stubborn,” Joel said. “We should just dump it. Forget about what’s inside.” He started picking it up and dragging it towards the edge when I stopped him. For some reason, a fiery determination had weeded its way into me. I wanted it open at all costs.
“Wait! Let’s try to pick the lock instead,” I suggested. Joel shrugged. I found a paper clip and started to work at the lock. By this time, the sun was starting to set. Using my knowledge I had gained from certain films, I tried to pick the rusted lock. Frustration started to grate at my mind as ten minutes passed with me fiddling, and then twenty minutes passed. Joel, who had been watching me intently, started to get impatient.
“C’mon, man. Give it up already,” he said. My hope had diminished at this point. I stood up from my crouching position. I realized that the secrets held within this chest would not reveal itself to me.
“Fine.”
Together, we carried to the cliff’s edge and heaved it over the edge, watching it tumble down the rocky wall. When it reached the bottom, it had landed on its side. I squinted. The box had opened. Finally.
“You see anything in there?” Joel asked, coming to the same realization I had.
I stared intensely at the opening, but the chest was at the bottom of that cliff. I could see nothing, no contents that had spilled out from inside. In fact, one could say that it was completely empty. I frowned. “Looks like…nothing. Looks like nothing was in that chest after all.”
Joel let out an exasperated guffaw. “All that for nothin’.” A cold breeze suddenly swept over us, and I shivered. “Let’s get outta here. Boss is gonna want the money anyways.”
We headed back to the van, and we drove back to down.
I wish the story ended there, but it didn’t.
It’s been four days since we dumped the chest, and weird things have been going on in town.
On the first day, I woke up to horrifying news. I had opened the TV to find the newscasters reporting in a semi-urgent tone. While the town was asleep, the dogs and cats owned by households, and even the strays that lurked through the alleys, were found dead.
The house-owned pets were found near doors and exit ways, with claw marks on the surfaces, indicated that they were desperately trying to leave their homes. The strays’ bodies were found littering the streets. Autopsy reports concluded that the animals had died of asphyxiation, but with an unknown cause. The house pets had also died of the same cause. The day was dedicated to picking up dead cat and dog corpses from the streets and disposing of them. I was never the type of person to own pets, but I felt bad for those who did. One night your loving companion was fine, and the next day they were mysteriously found dead.
The authorities said that this was a case of some mass poisoning—that somehow, all these animals had ingested or been exposed to something in one day that had caused their sudden and unfortunate deaths. As the day went on, this phenomenon was not restricted to cats and dogs; other pets, such as hamsters and fish, started acting strangely as well. Hamsters would be wildly pacing around their cages for hours until exhaustion overtook them, and fish would swim themselves straight into the glass as hard as they could, until they eventually died from the blunt force trauma. Birds were seen flying directly and purposefully into electrical wires, electrocuting themselves. Their burnt bodies were scattered near telephone polls.
An uneasiness had settled in our town, even though no humans seemed to be affected. They all were wondering if the hysteria that came over the animals would also be contracted by the townsfolk. We went about our business tensely that day, despite the authorities chalking it up to some kind of chemical exposure that only affected animals.
From them on, it only got worse.
The next day, I woke up to even stranger news.
The water in our town, the water that ran through our pipes, had turned a rusty red color. I did a double take as I made my way to the sink and turned on the faucet, watching as the tainted water pooled up in my sink. The authorities said not to ingest it, or to use it in anyway until they can figure out what’s making it turn red.
The stores ran out of bottled water very quickly. I had rushed down there as soon as I could, but by the time I got there the store had run out. People were in a panicked state, waiting in long lines with shopping carts filled with gallons of water. The edge in everyone’s voice was tangible at this point. First the animals, now the water.
It must be an omen, whispers said in the crowd. Some people dismissed these new happenings as merely frightening coincidence, but everyone was anxious. I called Joel that afternoon, but I found out that he was still mourning over his dog, his long-time partner. “I found him in the basement, trying to squeeze his body through a small window,” he said to me weakly. I could tell he had been crying all night.
“What are you gonna do about the new water situation?” I asked him, worried. I had my own stash of water at home, enough gallons to last me a few days I figured.
“It’s fine,” he said. “I’ll be fine, I promise. I have enough water. They’ll fix the problem.”
He sounded to broken; I’d never heard him like that. I shook myself free of this sadness and concentrated on getting the latest news. I kept my eyes glued to TV screen, waiting to hear the newest information regarding our current situation. In addition to efforts to clean up our streets of the dead animal carcasses, our scientists were working hard to identify the source of the red water. They claimed that sediments from the nearby mountain range somehow made it into our aquifers and our water supply, thus coloring it red. They claimed that it isn’t poisonous, but that we should filter it to make sure.
I eyed the report cautiously. I wasn’t comfortable drinking water that could’ve been poisoned. As many times as I filtered it, the red hue would not leave the liquid. I decided that I wouldn’t test fate; I didn’t use the water at all, only drank from untainted bottles and didn’t shower.
On the third day, things only increased in severity.
I woke up that morning, intending to turn on my television to check the latest news. However, as many times as I pressed the remote, the TV wouldn’t turn on. It only took me a few seconds after to realize what had happened—the electricity was out. And it wasn’t just me.
I looked out my window and saw that there were people wandering around, knocking on their neighbor’s door. There were no lights, no televisions playing, no cell phones that worked. No power at all in our little town. I went outside to get the latest news. Overnight, while we all slept, the electrical power source in our town had malfunctioned and suddenly stopped. No one knew why, and the power plant workers were hastily trying to find a solution.
Things seemed to cease in our small town. People stayed inside, business temporarily shut down to wait until the power came back up. The subtle uneasiness was starting to grow, as these events followed each other consecutively. Most establishments, except the fire department and emergency services and doctors, were halted.
Meanwhile, our water was still rusty red, and our animals were still dead.
There was a feeling of dread in my chest that had been building up to this moment. At first I thought it was mere coincidence that these occurrences had happened right after we had tossed the box. It still could be, but the more I think about it the more I get scared.
The fourth day confirmed what I had been fearing ever since that day we had picked up the chest.
If I had said that losing power or having un-useable water had been the worst part of this whole experience, I would’ve been wrong.
The fourth day brought with it screaming in the streets as I woke up that morning.
I shot up in bed as I heard painful wails emanating from outside. As I crashed out of bed and pulled open my blinds, only to see figures ambling around in pain around the streets. Their skins were red and blistered, and they had their hands cupped over their eyes as if to shield themselves from the sun. They ran around the streets, begging for people to help them, for something to relieve the pain. It was if they had been burned all across their bodies. I sunk to the floor of the bedroom, panic settling within me. I quickly checked my body to see if there was anything wrong, but a quick inspection revealed that I was fine.
With no news coming through my dead television, I ventured out into the streets. I learned that most of the people who were suffering with these afflictions had drank the tainted water that ran through our pipes, despite the authorities claiming that it was safe for human consumption.
The local doctors were overwhelmed. They had no idea how to stop the symptoms, as they had never come upon cases such as these. Especially with no known cause or toxin to pinpoint as the cause of their illness, all they could do was apply burn ointment and hope that the sickness would wear off eventually. Everyone who was suffering looked like they were in immense pain. This sent waves of fear through the community. Police came in to guide the sick to the nearest hospital, but with no luck—the power was out, and the only treatment was the medicine they had on hand. The sound of the ambulance was constant throughout the neighborhood.
People’s whispers have turned to hysteria. Some people walking the streets preach of an apocalyptic, end-of-days scenario. They claim that it is the second coming of Christ. They claim that we are finally paying for our sins upon this earth.
I drove up to Joel’s house. He opened his door, looking miserable. His eyes were puffy from crying and he hadn’t shaved for days. I was grateful to find that he wasn’t sick like the others. We couldn’t call our boss since no cellphones worked, so we drove to his house. I asked Joel if he suspected the same thing. He shook his head solemnly. “We have to find that damn old man. There’s no way this shit’s a coincidence.”
It could be. It could just be a string of terrible luck. But both of knew—we had a feeling deep in the pit of our chests. “Do you think…?” I began.
“It started with that stupid chest?” Joel asked, starting up our car. It seemed that independent sources of energy, like in our cars, were still working. “I can’t help but it did. I tried denying it over and over again. But now that I think of it, none of this shit’s ever happened before. Not until a few days ago.”
The rest of the ride was silent. We finally made it to our boss’s house. We made a horrifying discovery. After knocking on the door for a few times, there was no answer. Our boss was a lonely man—he used to have a wife that died a few years ago, but now he resided in the house alone. We knew that he kept his spare keys under the mat at the front door. We wanted to check to make sure that he was okay, but we had a feeling what we would find when we entered through the door.
He was sitting on the couch when we found him, stiff as a board. His skin was a deep red tint, and there were welts all around his body similar to the others around town who had been affected with the bad water. “Jesus Christ,” I whispered. We checked his pulse. Joel shook his head.
“Oh god, oh god…” Joel murmured to himself. “Why…?” I surmised that the boss had died from a heart attack; the pain from the affliction on his body was too much for him to handle. There was no one we could call. We were sure that there were many others who were suffering.
We laid the boss’s body on the floor and neatly set his hands at his sides. Using a nearby table cloth, we carefully covered his body with the makeshift shroud. “We’ll tell his family later, when there’s power,” I said. Joel gave me a grave nod. Right now, we knew who we needed to seek out.
The old man’s house looked the same as it had a few days ago, with some notably missing details. For one, the old man himself was not there. Neither was his rocking chair. All the windows had been boarded up, and the door had some kind of notice taped to its door. It was a vacancy notice. From a few years ago.
Now this is some horror movie shit, I thought to myself. Joel yelled for the old man to show himself, but no one came. According to the notice, no one had lived there since I started my job as a mover. We drove back to town, defeated. We couldn’t explain it.
We had no idea what was going on anymore. While we drove through the streets, we noticed that there were some people in panic mode. Our pharmacy was crowded with people hoarding medications just in case any new ailments came up. There were those who were afflicted with the diseases lying about the street, their skin bright red and blistered, wailing for anything to relieve their pain.
I went straight for home. Joel decided to spend the night with me.
They’ve finally got the power working. For a few hours, at least. From what I can gather on the news, it keeps ducking in and out of functionality, so there’s not much time for me to fully explain what’s going on here. Newscasters are reporting that people are evacuating town, not wanting to know what happens next. I watched the TV, seeing the news crew at near the ravine where we had deposited the chest. All around the area was a dense fog, and a woman with the microphone beckoning gravely to the fog.
“All attempts to pass this fog have failed thus far.” She motions behind her, and the camera pans to a dozen or so cars halted right before the border of the fog. “Whenever someone tries to go in, they end up coming back into the town in the opposite direction.” She paused to watch as a car drove straight through the fog, waiting until the light of its taillights had disappeared into the mist. No less than a few second later, the very same car came barreling back in the opposite direction, a complete 180 turn. The man got out of his car and shook his head—some mysterious force was not letting them leave. “The police have attempted to contact outside help. The military has responded and is trying to send aid, but for now we must wait for them to come.” She paused once again, I assumed for dramatic effect. “God help us all.”
The news cut out after that.
I’m terrified for what day five has in store for us. It’s all been getting worse and worse. I was able to post this story because the power plant workers have managed to get the electricity back and running. It’s still been spotty—the electricity comes on for a few hours, a few minutes, but then it goes back to being out. As if it’s fighting to stay shut.
I can’t help but feel that this is all my fault. Because I wanted to open that chest. Because I feel like I’ve unleashed the evil stored within. I’ve opened Pandora’s chest and I don’t know how to close it. We're all trapped here, at the mercy of what the next day holds in store for us.
Please send help.
Submitted June 14, 2017 at 09:57PM by tsuyaha http://ift.tt/2sAD40w nosleep
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