Bus groping

For example, in India, normally nobody shaves their body hair. However it is not considered appropriate to show your armpit hair in public because of its resemblance with pubic hair and therefore its sexual connotation. All tops and dresses sleeves, even the shortest one, cover the armpit for decency. If you go on a bus sleeveless, holding the bus handle or pole with your arm up, all men on the bus will stare at it with great lust, and some will probably try to grope you. Basically, showing your armpit hair is the same as showing your pubic hair. Just saying, what may not be sexy for some in some countries, may be way too sexy in other countries.

I (20f) was traveling alone at bus when a stranger sat right beside me. He kinda have a short but lean body (probably a gym rat with the way he's dressed) that he's pressing me against the bus window. Because of this, his entire right body is leaning against my entire left side. Then I started to notice his left arm keeps on grazing on my left chest. At first I thought it's just an accident till his arm keeps on subtly trying to push my bra down. That's when I looked down at his arm only to catch his hand trying to poke my breast. I then try to cover my left chest with my hand but he still keeps on trying to pull my bra down through my shirt. I started to get really pissed. I haven't have my breakfast and coffee, not to mention I barely gotten any sleep so I was really ready to take my anger out of him. I gripped my phone tightly, ready to break his nose using the phone edge but i controlled myself thinking he might have something with him that can hurt me real badly, so I just screamed at him to humiliate him. He immediately got up and got down from the bus after I screamed loudly. Too bad I didn't take a picture of him. He's wearing a white long sleeves and light blue running shorts. I'm not scared or anything, I'm just really really pissed since I'm already having a terrible morning then this random fucker decides to sit right next to me at a bus.

In the last few years I have had increasingly bad experiences whenever I walk by myself outside. I've been groped innapropriately on a bus, followed by a group of drunk men harrassing me, been catcalled and then had water thrown on me, been attacked in a shop and I've even been physically attacked in the park in broad daylight, left with a black eye.
I don't feel safe to go outside anymore. I'm scared of bumping into any attackors and they seem to be getting more frequent as I've grown up. I'm 20 and autistic, and I do not approach others outside. I try to keep myself to myself - I just seem to bump into utter cranks! I live in a dodgy and poor area near London, which is probably why these attacks are so frequent.
This is upsetting because my favourite activities before were going on park walks and foraging, but that doesn't feel safe anymore. I would exercise but I have a heart condition and I'm not allowed to at the moment, so I've lost some strength and fear I won't be able to keep defending myself anymore. I'm considering carrying around my metal water bottle as a weapon in case something happens, which I think would help me feel more secure. Things like pepper sprays are illegal in the uk so I cannot use those.
Any tips? I just want to be able to go outside again without being attacked or harrased.

In the last few years I have had increasingly bad experiences whenever I walk by myself outside. I've been groped innapropriately on a bus, followed by a group of drunk men harrassing me, been catcalled and then had water thrown on me, been attacked in a shop and I've even been physically attacked in the park in broad daylight, left with a black eye.
I don't feel safe to go outside anymore. I'm scared of bumping into any attackors and they seem to be getting more frequent as I've grown up. I'm 20 and autistic, and I do not approach others outside. I try to keep myself to myself - I just seem to bump into utter cranks! I live in a dodgy and poor area near London, which is probably why these attacks are so frequent.
This is upsetting because my favourite activities before were going on park walks and foraging, but that doesn't feel safe anymore. I would exercise but I have a heart condition and I'm not allowed to at the moment, so I've lost some strength and fear I won't be able to keep defending myself anymore. I'm considering carrying around my metal water bottle as a weapon in case something happens, which I think would help me feel more secure. Things like pepper sprays are illegal in the uk so I cannot use those.
Any tips? I just want to be able to go outside again without being attacked or harrased.

In the last few years I have had increasingly bad experiences whenever I walk by myself outside. I've been groped innapropriately on a bus, followed by a group of drunk men harrassing me, been catcalled and then had water thrown on me, been attacked in a shop and I've even been physically attacked in the park in broad daylight, left with a black eye.
I don't feel safe to go outside anymore. I'm scared of bumping into any attackors and they seem to be getting more frequent as I've grown up. I'm 20 and autistic, and I do not approach others outside. I try to keep myself to myself - I just seem to bump into utter cranks! I live in a dodgy and poor area near London, which is probably why these attacks are so frequent.
This is upsetting because my favourite activities before were going on park walks and foraging, but that doesn't feel safe anymore. I would exercise but I have a heart condition and I'm not allowed to at the moment, so I've lost some strength and fear I won't be able to keep defending myself anymore. I'm considering carrying around my metal water bottle as a weapon in case something happens, which I think would help me feel more secure. Things like pepper sprays are illegal in the uk so I cannot use those.
Any tips? I just want to be able to go outside again without being attacked or harrased.

Hi everyone My name is shirali 48 married. Son 22 daughter 21.
I was born to a Coorgi mother and a Tamil father. So my features were mixed with glass skin cat eyes and smooth body 38 30 36 D cup bra and L panty. Take the Omphie bust.
I was used by some relatives and neighbors both boys and girls during school time.
Even now my urges increase and I indulge in deliberately seducing others and I am happy when people look at me.
Mostly I wear casual clothes to work. I work in advertising marketing and my job involves many meetings with clients and office or client parties.
My husband owns a luxury car dealership abroad, he rarely visits or calls us. So I don't have to worry about the future.
Childhood
I was 5.4 feet tall in the school and had an athletic body and played many sports including cricket and tennis.
It got me involved with the boys at school and local sports clubs. The boy drooled as my breasts bounced as I ran. They grabbed me by my nipple pokies on my sports shirt sticking out. I used to wear sleeveless tops that showed off my cleavage and areolas while playing tennis.
Every week I clean my son's room Although he occasionally cleans my son's room, the maids do the other rooms. I realized he was staring at my hanging breasts without a bra
The next week I caught him downloading porn and he subscribed to live porn sites. I was surprised to find that he also subscribed to incest porn sites, although a common trait for boys. And a lot of money was transferred from his bank to many women of my age I wondered why he dated older women more than younger ones. I was praying that he should not have sex with them. Fortunately, I was relieved to know the reason later.
A vdo made me freeze in which a mom and son incest. Though I thought it is doable for the moment I thought it's not normal and unrealistic.
That made me think about behavior of young boys towards aunties like me. I started noticing my son's friends behavior with me. So far I never felt bad when they shook hands or embrace speck a kiss during celebrations like birthdays etc.
One day I overheard a conversation of boys boasting about their misdemeanors in public busses and trains with women. How they grope rub flash in public. It induced me to take a bus or train ride to see what really happens. So one day I took a train ride in general compartment. I found majority were men and very few ladies.
I was eager to see any male making advances to some female. After 30mins of travel everything was normal and nothing happened. I got bored and decided to get down at next stop.
As I was about to exit the compartment a middle aged female who was wearing sleazy dress gaudy makeup strong perfume entered the compartment and immediately most men were goring her with their eyes. So I stayed back to watch what happens.
A 50 something man got up from his seat and it to her and other men were ogling at her. He asked her which station does she want to get down and the lady answered with a slur some station. He said that he is also alighting at same which seemed far off. She replied in local accent without diction, telling him share the seat. The man glowed and addressed her as Madam n thanked her n sat along with her. As I wanted to see what happens, I got up my seat went to a girl who was seated opposite the lady n man told the girl to take my seat and offer me her seat she obliged.
Sitting in front of them I observed both of them very keenly. The told her something which was not audible and immediately the female laughed loud and told him to give 3000 rupees in an incoherent speech which made me think she is drunk. The agreed by nodding and she immediately started squeezing his crotch in public to which the man never objected. By the time some the train stopped they both got off the train holding each other's waists.
I got aroused seeing this and took a bus ride the same evening in a transparent lowest waist saree low cut sleeveless blouse in full makeup. The bus conductor asked me for ticket I told him that I get down at last stop. While he gave the ticked he held my hand and scratched his nail on my palm. I kept aloof as he is on duty but he kept on walking past me and brushing his body against mine whenever possible until the bus got crowded. I stood holding a a railing atop one by my right side. This made every male in the bus who got down had to ask me for passage. Heat n humidity made my bra n erect pokies visible. After a while I felt someone almost on me in the crowd brushing their body on mine. I got wet in between my thighs to know that 3 men, one ahead one by side one more on my back were rubbing on me. By the time I could move the man facing me groped my breasts and started to squeeze it. My erect nipples pained by it but he continued to my pleasure. I felt erect cock rubbing my ass from behind and another hand kneading my butts. I felt drugged bliss by three on me at once closed my eyes and relishing the moment.
The man in front took my hand to his dick area. I was shocked when I touched his dick going naked for me in a bus throbbing in my palm. I cud feel his sweaty cock and a mild odor emanating which made me pump him vigorously till he leaked in my palm. Without shame it took it to my nose smelt and licked it too.
I took regular bus rides during peak hours in the crowd.
Contd

Ok, So I live in a little town with less than 500 people, and not a lot of housing either. We moved into our house (by pure luck) almost a year ago now and our neighbor and her husband have been.... off. at first she seemed nice so I really did try to give her a chance, however as time moved on, she became very weird. I don't know how to explain it. she tried to pick up my chiweenie dog up from over our fence (thankfully my dog knows to run from strangers.) She tried to get my kids to help her in her garden and chicken coop, but like my chiweenie, my children have a very good sense of stranger danger and they ran back into the house. Every time we have guests or my parents come over for grandparent time, she always seems to have things to say. She demanded that my mom give her a turkey...... not asked, demanded. (my mother has chickens, ducks, geese, turkies..... just bird city up in her yard lmao) When her old dog died, she tried saying that we hit him with our car, she told her friends to pull up to our gate and blast the horn at the crack of dawn and at my children's bedtime. I asked them to please stop and they responded, " We were told that yall wouldn't mind." WHAT IN THE WORLD MAKES SOMEONE THINK WE WANT OUR KIDS BEING WOKEN UP SO AGRESSIVELY??????
Anyway, one day she pulled a recliner from her house and set it up pointing into our dining room window. Like 40 feet from the window. And she just sits there staring at my house. She stares at me while me and the kids garden, says things about how I dress, how I dress my kids, and how my husband is cheating on me and that is why he is gone for days at a time... my husband is a FirefighteEMT on 48/96 shifts. I stay home to care for the house and kids and write to pass time in-between chores. One day my husband was home and doing some cleaning in the dining room, and the neighbor flipped her lid because he took off his shirt. I was outside putting some seeds in the ground and she told me that my husband is trying to seduce her, I laughed because he saw her staring at him and he decided to be the little jokester, STARTED TO FLICK AND GROPE HIS CHEST WHILE MOANING AND GAVE THE BEST WAVE TO HER. A few days later as I was waiting for the bus to pick up my oldest, she saw me hug and kiss my daughter's head and told me that it was ab*sive to smother my child. It was literally a peck on the head. Then proceeded to tell me that my toddler can't have a tonka truck outside because he will learn to harm animals..... by pushing around a tonka truck..... So, me being done with her told the neighbor to please mind her own business and to not talk to me about my kids unless they are doing something actually bad. She did NOT like it because she called her husband outside and told him was was said, I think he was done too because he called her a profanity and went back inside.
Last week as I was watering my veggie garden, she came out and sat into that chair.... that damned recliner, and screamed at me for using WATER FOR MY VEGGIE GARDEN. She doesn't pay for my bills, we pay for our bills, so I do NOT get how it affects her, and that was my response. Looks like I won't be dropping off veggies as a peace offering. THeres more but I will update when I can.

So, I was typing my thoughts out on apple notes. Which is something I do at times to feel less stress in a way and I wrote this.
I've noticed a pattern: I tend to idealize my partners initially, relishing in daydreams about them. However, once I feel genuinely cared for, I withdraw and often exhibit narcissistic and manipulative behavior and when they try to bridge the gap I isolate myself. Witnessing someone continue to care for me despite my flaws deeply troubles me. Consequently, I often find myself sabotaging the relationship to spare them from the pain of being with someone like me. This cycle has led me to accept a life devoid of genuine connection, as I struggle to reciprocate the love and emotions others extend to me.
An i’m not trying to have you feel bad for me in anyway or trauma dump. But I think this just stems from having gone through child abuse and having a broken home since a was little til about 15. My old man has never much cared for me or even wanted me, he didn’t even show up when i was born. An he’s showed me that for as long as i can remember given the physical scare I have and all. But seeing fighting between your parents everyday you get used to, almost like it’s normal. The screaming, the crying, the bruises, it dulls you. And being the youngest most of the attention was often focused on you, that includes the beating during the argument and the words said after. I should’ve aborted, your a mistake, I never wanted you, here’s a knife yk that sort of thing. When you see that as one of the first relationships you see, you find love unnecessary and when they separated I wasn’t bothered at all. As life goes on my mom happens to get remarried and the samething happens in the relationship, but with me being the only focus point like cannon fodder or like wood to flames. An as one would cried and cried until I couldn’t cry tat that point I isolated myself from my family, and let marcellus be the golden child. At this point in time the oldest would molest me, very often. Favoritism amongst parents is trouble-sum as my oldest brother and marcellus got what they wanted and I was left to figure it out. So often times i wouldn’t mention my achievements or events for me because they would forget or not care like when I was groped on the school bus when i was a kid or when I got pants and beat up by kids a little older than me in the bathroom but that’s neither here nor there. As before my mom and her new husband divorced, and the oldest went to college.
Unfortunately, upon his return, he falsely accused someone else of rapping him, a claim that proved to be untrue. As he readjusted to being home, frequent arguments erupted, often resulting in either my mom yelling at me or me leaving the house, only to return later. A few weeks later, he went crazy and attempted to harm my mother and Marcellus. Inevitably, I had to physically restrain him and disarm him when he refused to calm down. Even in his room, he continued to act erratically, which made me grab my moms gun. With the loaded weapon aimed at his head, I came dangerously close to ending his life that night. His chilling words, labeling me as "the devil" and "a disease that plagues us," still haunt me. Thankfully, our mother intervened before I could pull the trigger, and he was subsequently admitted to a mental asylum. He's since been released and regained his sanity, but I occasionally question if I'm the root of the issue, though these thoughts haven't led to depression, fortunately.
Reflecting on these experiences, I realize they greatly influence my decision-making and my difficulty in empathizing with others. They also shed light on why I oscillate between being a people pleaser, fun, energetic to isolating myself from others. Perhaps this stems from my deep-seated fear of entering into relationships due to the pain I've associated with them in the past.
Can anyone explain this to me, makes me a little concerned about my mental health?

When I was 14I was at a bus stop because I was gonna go skating and this Old guy sits down so I stand up. He was saying that it’s fine and I don’t have to move. He kept on looking at me up and down and couldn’t stop looking at my private Area.
He asked me to go with him in his car and said that I wouldn’t have to pay for the bus. I said no and then he started getting very adamant that I got in with him. When he left he tried to grope me so I pushed his and shouted at him. I keep seeing him and my friends have been followed by them. He’s also been seen walking near or hanging around my college trying to talk to some of the girls.
He also offered me alcohol and at the time I was terrified because I had never drunk anything and he was doing it in broad daylight.
Also a few weeks later, I saw him and he noticed me. I sat on a bench and he sat on the opposite bench staring at me. When I stared back, he would look away and as soon as I got up to walk away from the bench, he started walking behind me.
Kinda seems a bit obsessive :/

My new landlord commented on how my parents were very imagitive when they named me, I was groped on the bus and another transfem I met didn't realize I was trans.
It seems I pass almost completely after 3 years of transition, so now it's time to go stealth. 😌

I've been in and out of prisons and jails ever since I was 17. I thought I had seen it all- Aryan Brotherhood members stabbing guards, gang wars, escapes and torture. I saw many things that still give me nightmares to this day.
"MacDonald, 402202," the guard barked out. I jumped up, the thin mattress under me exhaling a whiff of stale air. I looked through the bars, seeing Correctional Officer Shea. CO Shea was a morbidly obese man with a penchant for being loud and lazy. I had seen a member of the Bloods punch him straight in the nose before, a scene I still remembered with some humor. Shea had crumpled like wet paper on the floor, screaming and crying as more COs ran over and tackled the inmate.
"Yeah?" I asked. Shea handed me a sheet of paper. He regarded me with his gray, colorless eyes.
"Congratulations, you're being transferred. Pack your shit. This is your last day at Springfield Correctional Center."
***
You might think I would be happy to get a transfer. SCC was, after all, a shithole. The food was terrible and always cold, the place always smelled like bleach and chemicals, and at night it got so cold with only my flimsy sheet that I regularly woke up shivering. The building was nearly a century old, and the fact that it still functioned at all was a miracle in itself.
But, to be honest, I was not thrilled about the transfer. I had made friends here and knew the lay of the land. I didn't have to worry about getting jumped or stabbed to death in the showers. As the old adage goes, it's better the devil you know than the one you don't.
I was led out of my cell the next evening with all the worldly possessions I owned, which fit neatly into a clear trash bag with room to spare. I owned some prison clothes, toothpaste, a toothbrush, deodorant, a Bible, a pair of sandals and a radio. I felt the unbearable lightness of my existence reflected in that bag as it smacked rhythmically against my leg.
"Good luck, friend Josh!" a rather insane acquaintance of mine named Alvin called out from his cell as I passed down the bleak, concrete hallway.
"Take care man. I hope we meet again on the outside," I said, waving, knowing I would almost certainly never see any of these people again. Hell, I hadn't even seen my family in over five years. None of them came to visit me anymore. No one wrote me letters or put money in my commissary account or sent me books to read.
"Well, we're all born alone, and we all die alone," I thought to myself as CO Shea walked by my side. He was breathing heavily, as if he had just finished running a marathon. I looked over at his face, seeing the burst capillaries on his nose from years of hard drinking and the squint of his little, piggy eyes. There was a slight gleam of intelligence and slyness behind that ugly mug, though.
"Well, amigo," Shea said in his slow, plodding way, "I got assigned to go with you. I'll be your ride along buddy. You excited or what?" I smiled faintly at him
"There are worse people than you here, Shea," I said. "Far worse."
***
I got on the prison bus in my bright-orange jumpsuit. To my surprise, I saw the back was nearly empty. There was only one other prisoner in the back. Shea sat with us to monitor us. We were also handcuffed and anklecuffed. A chain ran down and connected the two.
I looked over at the other prisoner, a black guy with a shaved head. I think he also shaved his eyebrows. I mean, I literally didn't see a single hair on his head besides eyelashes, which he apparently hadn't found a way to shave… yet.
"Sup," he said. I nodded.
"Sup." We sat there in awkward silence as Shea plopped down hard on the bench between us. It groaned like a confused old man.
"So what do you know about this place, Shea?" I asked. He sucked down half a bottle of Coke and then heaved a deep sigh.
"I don't know much about it, to be frank," he admitted sheepishly. "It is apparently brand-new, though. They asked us to send a couple people who met... certain criteria."
"What does that mean?" the black guy asked. Shea gave him a serious look.
"Come on, Timmy, you know what I mean. Hardened criminals. People with long records who tour prisons like some people tour French beaches." I scoffed.
"There are far worse people than me in prison," I said.
"Well, they asked for no murderers or gang bangers too. I don't know why, but maybe it is some new government program. They apparently call it an 'experimental prison’.”
“What about me?” Timmy asked. Shea apparently knew what he meant.
“You’re not a murderer, Timmy,” Shea said, his lips forming the faintest twitch of a smile. “You never…”
“Well, there was that time my girlfriend got me to drop some acid with her. She went and killed her parents. Then we hit the road,” Timmy said fondly, his eyes rising as if he were looking at a hovering angel in the far-off distance.
“You were never convicted of any accessory charges, so it doesn’t count,” Shea retorted.
“Oh, it counts,” Timmy drawled in his slow, plodding way. “It counts. Everything in life counts. If I’ve learned anything in the last 36 years, it’s that you can never truly escape anything you’ve done- good or bad.”
***
I couldn't see much from the prison van. There was a small, shatterproof window in the swinging back doors, but it only gave a fleeting view of what was behind us. I noticed the dark forests stretching out to the horizon over rolling hills.
We drove for a few hours. The three of us bullshitted, talking about everything from sports to politics to the recent spate of fatal stabbings at SCC.
I felt the van stop. I looked out the back window, seeing more endless trees. I didn’t see a single house or car on the road we had taken.
“This place is a ghost town,” I said. Shea nodded.
“Yeah, it’s dead as Frank Sinatra ‘round here,” Shea said, wheezing out a high-pitched laugh at his own joke. “This area used to be big for coal mining, but as it dried up and people lost their jobs, they moved away. You know, my grandfather was a coal miner.”
“Good place to build a prison, huh?” Timmy asked. “If there is no one around…” We were cut off by a clanging alarm up ahead. I heard something large moving, probably the gate opening. Then we were inside.
I saw the guard towers and rolls of razor wire for a brief moment as the van pulled into an open garage. The darkness immediately blanketed us. The garage door slowly rolled shut behind us. Shea jumped up.
“Let’s get you boys inside so I can take off your handcuffs and everything,” he said, motioning for us to follow. He pulled out a flashlight from his belt, guiding us through the pitch black. The dim light sent shadows racing across the room like groping tentacles. I caught glimpses of strange objects in the darkness. They looked like medieval torture devices.
“What is this place?” I whispered. My voice echoed far too loudly off the cold concrete floor and walls. “Those look like torture devices on that table, Shea. I think those bloody things are thumbscrews and that might be a pear of anguish…” I pointed to the pear-shaped object with three, wicked blades whose points came together sitting on a dusty shelf. The ornate handle had springs connected to it. The object could be forced into any human orifice and, when the springs were engaged, it would open like a flower inside the person’s body, ripping their flesh apart and enlarging that orifice to a bloody, gaping hole.
“How do you know so much about this?” Shea asked, giving me a strange look. He narrowed his little piggy eyes. He continued to fumble with the flashlight, peering around for a door to exit the garage. I looked back at the car and saw the driver just sitting there, his entire body as lifeless and still as a mannequin.
“I’ve read a few books…” I said as Timmy interrupted us.
“I see a little red light glowing under that door,” Timmy said. Shea focused his flashlight on the spot. Across the room, I noticed what Timmy was pointing at. It was an ancient-looking black door. The wood had started to crack and splinter down the middle. Engraved in silver on the front, it said, “Entrance to Northfrost Penitentiary.”
“Hello?” Shea called toward the door as the three of us moved forward, the steel chains giving my steps a clinking rhythm.
Shea reached the antique crystal doorknob. Timmy and I stood next to a dust-covered brazen bull, its bronze mouth wide open as if it were silently roaring at us. As Shea pulled open the door, crimson light flooded into the garage.
Tinted black glass covered the back wall. A speaker button sat next to the window. I looked to my right, seeing a massive sign sprawled across the wall there. It read:
RULES FOR PERSONAL CONDUCT AT NORTHFROST

1. The COs without faces don’t work here and we don’t know who they are. If you see one, press one of the buttons labeled “Emergency Dispatch” that are scattered around the complex.
2. When the red emergency lights come on, hide until they shut off.
3. Do not go into the medical ward for any reason.
4. The warden roams the prison every night at 3:33 AM looking for human meat. Don’t let him catch you.

“What is this, a goddamned joke?” Timmy asked, his dark face forming into a scowl.
“Uhh, well…” Shea rubbed the back of his neck, looking like an obese little boy who lost his parents. “I’ve never been here before, but this is all pretty unusual, I’ll admit.” A buzzing came from the back of the room, and suddenly a garish, echoing intercom turned on.
“Please remove their chains and direct them through the door on the left,” a female robotic voice said calmly in a tone as cool as lemonade on a hot day. “Your transfer will then be complete.” Shea sighed in relief.
“Good,” he grunted. “This place gives me the creeps.”
“Bro, you can’t leave us here,” Timmy protested. “What the fuck is this place? Where is everyone? Why is there a room filled with bloody, ancient torture devices next to the garage?” Shea put up his hands.
“I’m sorry, son, but I have orders. I’m just a messenger here. I was told to transfer you here, and that’s what I’ve done.” He fumbled around his belt for his keyring. He came over and unlocked the handcuffs and anklecuffs from both of us. I stretched, rubbing my wrists. I was glad to be out of those suffocating restraints.
“Thanks for everything, then,” I said, picking up my extremely light garbage bag of possessions and heading for the door on the left. Timmy reluctantly followed behind. A sign on this door read: “To General Population.”
But when we got to the other side and it slammed shut behind us, I found a hallway filled with more red emergency lights streaming down. An involuntary shiver ran down through my body. I remembered those absurd rules someone had put up. What had it said about red lights? My mind raced for a few moments, then the answer popped up. It said to hide.
A man shrieked up ahead, his voice riddled with agony and terror. The hallway split to the right and left, and I couldn’t see anyone. Timmy and I stopped.
“Dude, screw this,” Timmy said, turning and running back toward the door we had come through. He tried pulling it open, but it was firmly locked.
***
The scream came again, louder and closer, but this time it was cut off suddenly. I heard someone gurgling like a man with a slit throat trying to breathe. And then everything went deathly silent again.
The gray, concrete floor of the hallway had arrows pointing forward on it. There were no doors here. There was nowhere to hide that I could see. Timmy and I reluctantly went forward. As we got to the intersection, we saw the dead body of a man in a brown khaki uniform.
His sightless eyes remained open. They stared up at the ceiling, glassy and still filled with horror. Deep gouge marks bit deeply into the flesh on his back and arms and chest. His throat had been cut or bit open as well. A spreading puddle of blood encircled his body.
I saw a dark blur at the end of the hallway on the right. It looked like little more than a shadow. I whispered to Timmy, pointing. We decided to go left immediately. My heart was pounding at this point. I felt like a soldier walking through the no-man’s land of a warzone. I expected the attack to come at any moment.
The hallway to the left had some doors. I sprinted forward as quietly as I could with Timmy close by my side. I read the first door: To Medical Ward.
“Ugh, no,” I whispered, going to the second one. I heard light footsteps behind me. Turning, I saw a creature from a nightmare sneaking up on us in the bloody glow of the emergency lights.
Its skin was black and shiny like that of a centipede’s. In its general form, it reminded me of a hairless werewolf. It towered over us, its eyes like bone-white cataracts, its claws as long and sharp as a dagger. And yet, its face seemed almost reptilian. It had two small nose holes like a snake and a jaw that unhinged and dropped far below its head. I saw rows of blood-soaked fangs. It gave off a low, gurgling growl that emanated from its chest.
With a rush of adrenaline and a sense of mortal terror, I pushed through the second door without reading the sign on the front. Timmy was right behind me. I heard him scream as he fell into me.
I found myself in a prison dormitory, and we weren’t alone. As I hit the ground, I saw a white face peering out at me from behind the bunk bed. The man hiding there saw the abomination behind us and got up, screaming and running away.
The creature growled, giving chase. In two powerful bounds, it had rushed across the dormitory and grabbed the man by the neck. I looked back at Timmy, seeing him groaning on the ground. Blood poured from deep cuts on his back. I grabbed him, pulling him up.
“Let’s go, let’s go, no time to…” I said when I was cut off by the sound of a neck snapping. I looked back, seeing the creature had twisted the man’s head around in a circle. It raised the limp body to its massive mouth and severed the head in a single powerful bite.
“Get me out of here, man, please,” Timmy whispered as I pulled him back out into the hallway. I looked over, seeing another werewolf creature bounding down the hallway, chasing a man in a prison jumpsuit. I had no choice.
I pulled Timmy toward the door labeled “Medical Ward”. With a creak of rusted hinges, it opened. We went inside to hide.
***
“Maybe there’s something in here we can use to bandage you up,” I said to Timmy, pulling him down the short hallway toward a room filled with single beds. I didn’t know why the rules said to avoid this place. It looked totally empty. Against the back wall, I saw a glass cabinet filled with bandages, rubbing alcohol, band-aids and other various first aid supplies. I ran toward it. Timmy limped along after me, still groaning.
“Goddamn, I think those claws went down to the bone,” he said.
“It’s gonna be OK,” I said as I pulled out some antiseptic and bandages, adding, “It could’ve been a lot worse.” The universe would immediately prove me right. I heard a slight giggling from under one of the beds. Timmy and I both froze.
Two rotted hands reached out, dragging the mutilated body of a little girl behind them. She had patches of garish, black stitches running across her face, hands and arms. Dark, clotted blood dripped from the sites. She wore a gore-smeared hospital gown and had no eyes. I looked into the empty sockets. They stared back at me like two black holes spinning in the void.
As she rose, her giggles became full-blown laughter, a hysterical gurgling like the laugh of a dying person. Then she ran at me. I saw the silver gleam of a scalpel in her little hand.
“No!” I screamed, raising my hands to protect myself. The scalpel came down, slicing across my palm. It cut deeply. A cold, burning pain ran up my arm. I repressed the urge to scream.
At that moment, the red emergency lights flicked off. Bright, fluorescent lights popped on, flickering and strobing in rapid succession. Timmy ran forward, tackling the undead girl. But I saw more small hands reaching out from under the beds, hands filled with sores and squirming larvae. I could see the bones of their hands through necrotic patches eaten into their flesh.
I ran for Timmy, grabbing him and hauling him up.
“Time to go! Now!” I screamed, pulling him forward as more undead boys and girls rose up, all with sharp knives and surgical instruments grasped in their little hands. I felt a sudden pain in my leg. Looking down, I saw a knife sticking out of my thigh. The empty eye sockets of a little boy’s face stared up at me, grinning like a skull.
I collapsed on the ground as we were surrounded. I prayed to God then, knowing we would die. I prayed that he would forgive me for all my mistakes, because I was on a fast-track to the afterlife and would be seeing him in a few seconds. With a sharp cry of pain, I yanked the knife out of my leg, turning it on my attacker.
Then a gunshot rang out. The head of the nearest girl exploded in a shower of bone fragments and dead maggots. I looked up, seeing Shea standing at the door, his pistol raised.
“Come on!” he screamed. “Come on, you idiots! Let’s go! Now!” Timmy and I didn’t need any more encouragement. As Shea continued to blow apart the nearest of the undead abominations, we limped and scrambled towards him. My leg gave a shriek of pain with every step.
We got out of the medical ward, battered and bruised but still alive.
***
“Why’d you come back, Shea?” I asked through pained breaths. Shea gave me a frantic look.
“When I got back out to the car, the driver was dead. His throat was… ripped out or something, I don’t know. I grabbed his keys and came back for you two. I don’t know where we are, but I’m getting you out of here,” he explained. I looked at him in amazement. I had never thought in a million years Shea would risk his life to save some scumbag inmates.
“So what’s the plan?” Timmy asked, sweating heavily, his eyes wild and pained. “How are we getting out of here without dying?” Shea shrugged.
“The door locked behind us when we came in,” I said. “Unless we can break it down and get back to the car…” We passed by buttons labeled “Emergency Dispatch” under glowing red emergency signs. I wondered if we could get help somehow through them.
“Halt!” someone cried from behind us. I looked back, seeing a man in a black correctional officers uniform. He ran toward us, his hand on the radio hanging from his belt. But something immediately seemed off about the figure.
As he got closer, I realized why. He had no face. His entire head was just smooth, white skin, without hair or any signs of features. He spoke again, and the voice seemed to come from all around his body.
“You must report to the medical ward,” the strange figure said. “We do not allow injured people in the hallways.”
“No, we’re fine,” Shea said, grinning. “See, buddy? I work for the DOC too.” He pointed at the identification clipped to his breast pocket. The figure raised his radio to his lips.
“We have resistance near Dormitory One,” the fake CO said into his radio before any of us could stop him. Shea ran forward, knocking the radio from his hand. The CO instantly straightened up and whipped out his pistol, pointing it at Shea’s torso. He fired, and I saw Shea’s chest explode in a blossoming flower of blood.
“No, dammit!” Timmy said, running forward. I saw a silver gleam in his hand, and I realized he had taken one of the scalpels from the undead Shea had killed in the Medical Ward. As the fake CO spun to point the pistol at Timmy, Timmy ran into him, stabbing the scalpel deeply into the CO’s neck.
They fell together with Timmy on top of the fake CO. His body weight drove the scalpel deeper into the white, featureless skin. Blood the color of soot spurted from the wound. The gun went off, the bullet missing Timmy entirely and smashing into the ceiling. The CO’s gurgling death gasps seem to come from all around his body. I grabbed Timmy.
“Get the guns!” I said. “They’re both dead. We need the guns.” He nodded, grabbing the CO’s gun and taking an extra magazine from his belt. I did the same with Shea’s gun and magazine. I pressed the button labeled “Emergency Dispatch” as more faceless men appeared far off down the corridor. Then we fled as fast as we could from that hallway, but, seeing as we were both in pretty bad shape, it wasn’t very fast.
At that point, I was just glad to be alive, though.
***
We wandered around the prison, avoiding the faceless COs whenever we saw them patrolling the hallways. They would radio to each other, their voices always surrounding their bodies rather than coming from their heads, which I found extremely eerie and unsettling. A couple times, I saw men in black SWAT suits with automatic rifles gunning down the fake COs. I wondered if this was the “Emergency Dispatch”. Timmy and I avoided them as well, and we gave a wide berth anytime we heard gunfire.
We passed cells with mummified corpses hanging from the ceiling. We passed dormitories where the victims of the strange, werewolf-like creatures littered the floors, rotting and stinking like roadkill. Occasionally, I would catch a glimpse of another survivor, a pale face peeking out from some hiding spot, but Timmy and I kept pushing forward, looking for a way out.
We were in a sprawling gymnasium, sitting down and resting for a few minutes, when we encountered the Warden.
We heard a demonic roar from the hallway, a mixing of many strange, inhuman tongues. As Timmy and I sat up quickly, a decapitated body flew into the gym, and a creature from Hell followed after it. The body smacked into the concrete wall with a soft, fleshy whack.
The Warden stood ten feet tall. He had on a black correctional officers uniform and a leather visor cap. His face looked like it had no flesh. A thick layer of bone covered it with two reptilian eyes peering out from behind slitted pupils. He hissed, a forked tongue shooting out of his gaping maw. His fingers looked like sharp daggers of bone. A smell like old leather and blood rose from his body.
“Shoot it!” I screamed, raising the pistol and firing at its head. The first shot blew off its visor cap, revealing the hairless, reptilian skull underneath. But the bullet only gouged the top of its skull. It ran at us with powerful, bounding steps, covering the distance in moments.
Timmy and I fired as fast as we could as it got within a few feet of us. It bounded into Timmy like a freight train hitting a car. Timmy’s body went flying and smashed against the back wall with the sound of bones shattering. I slammed another magazine in the pistol as the Warden turned to me.
We had hit it, I saw. One of its eyes had exploded in a shower of gore and vitreous fluid, and its head was bleeding badly. I raised the gun, aiming for the same eye and firing.
The Warden smacked his hand against his face as if he had forgotten something, falling to the floor. I ran forward, putting the pistol point-blank against his ruined eye before emptying the clip. By the end, he wasn’t moving anymore.
“Oh, God,” I said, walking over to Timmy. I saw his shattered legs, his broken spine and his snapped ribs. He coughed up blood. “I’m sorry, Timmy. I really am.” His head might have nodded slightly as he died, giving a final death gasp before falling still.
***
I found a ring of keys on the Warden’s body. In excitement, I ran downstairs and tried the locked door. It worked.
I went to the van, pulling out the dead driver and starting it. After smashing through the garage door, I drove it through the gate. It did catastrophic damage to the prison van, but it got me far enough away before the engine gave out.
I don’t know what kind of prison that was, but I hope I never see that hellscape again.

I've been in and out of prisons and jails ever since I was 17. I thought I had seen it all- Aryan Brotherhood members stabbing guards, gang wars, escapes and torture. I saw many things that still give me nightmares to this day.
"MacDonald, 402202," the guard barked out. I jumped up, the thin mattress under me exhaling a whiff of stale air. I looked through the bars, seeing Correctional Officer Shea. CO Shea was a morbidly obese man with a penchant for being loud and lazy. I had seen a member of the Bloods punch him straight in the nose before, a scene I still remembered with some humor. Shea had crumpled like wet paper on the floor, screaming and crying as more COs ran over and tackled the inmate.
"Yeah?" I asked. Shea handed me a sheet of paper. He regarded me with his gray, colorless eyes.
"Congratulations, you're being transferred. Pack your shit. This is your last day at Springfield Correctional Center."
***
You might think I would be happy to get a transfer. SCC was, after all, a shithole. The food was terrible and always cold, the place always smelled like bleach and chemicals, and at night it got so cold with only my flimsy sheet that I regularly woke up shivering. The building was nearly a century old, and the fact that it still functioned at all was a miracle in itself.
But, to be honest, I was not thrilled about the transfer. I had made friends here and knew the lay of the land. I didn't have to worry about getting jumped or stabbed to death in the showers. As the old adage goes, it's better the devil you know than the one you don't.
I was led out of my cell the next evening with all the worldly possessions I owned, which fit neatly into a clear trash bag with room to spare. I owned some prison clothes, toothpaste, a toothbrush, deodorant, a Bible, a pair of sandals and a radio. I felt the unbearable lightness of my existence reflected in that bag as it smacked rhythmically against my leg.
"Good luck, friend Josh!" a rather insane acquaintance of mine named Alvin called out from his cell as I passed down the bleak, concrete hallway.
"Take care man. I hope we meet again on the outside," I said, waving, knowing I would almost certainly never see any of these people again. Hell, I hadn't even seen my family in over five years. None of them came to visit me anymore. No one wrote me letters or put money in my commissary account or sent me books to read.
"Well, we're all born alone, and we all die alone," I thought to myself as CO Shea walked by my side. He was breathing heavily, as if he had just finished running a marathon. I looked over at his face, seeing the burst capillaries on his nose from years of hard drinking and the squint of his little, piggy eyes. There was a slight gleam of intelligence and slyness behind that ugly mug, though.
"Well, amigo," Shea said in his slow, plodding way, "I got assigned to go with you. I'll be your ride along buddy. You excited or what?" I smiled faintly at him
"There are worse people than you here, Shea," I said. "Far worse."
***
I got on the prison bus in my bright-orange jumpsuit. To my surprise, I saw the back was nearly empty. There was only one other prisoner in the back. Shea sat with us to monitor us. We were also handcuffed and anklecuffed. A chain ran down and connected the two.
I looked over at the other prisoner, a black guy with a shaved head. I think he also shaved his eyebrows. I mean, I literally didn't see a single hair on his head besides eyelashes, which he apparently hadn't found a way to shave… yet.
"Sup," he said. I nodded.
"Sup." We sat there in awkward silence as Shea plopped down hard on the bench between us. It groaned like a confused old man.
"So what do you know about this place, Shea?" I asked. He sucked down half a bottle of Coke and then heaved a deep sigh.
"I don't know much about it, to be frank," he admitted sheepishly. "It is apparently brand-new, though. They asked us to send a couple people who met... certain criteria."
"What does that mean?" the black guy asked. Shea gave him a serious look.
"Come on, Timmy, you know what I mean. Hardened criminals. People with long records who tour prisons like some people tour French beaches." I scoffed.
"There are far worse people than me in prison," I said.
"Well, they asked for no murderers or gang bangers too. I don't know why, but maybe it is some new government program. They apparently call it an 'experimental prison’.”
“What about me?” Timmy asked. Shea apparently knew what he meant.
“You’re not a murderer, Timmy,” Shea said, his lips forming the faintest twitch of a smile. “You never…”
“Well, there was that time my girlfriend got me to drop some acid with her. She went and killed her parents. Then we hit the road,” Timmy said fondly, his eyes rising as if he were looking at a hovering angel in the far-off distance.
“You were never convicted of any accessory charges, so it doesn’t count,” Shea retorted.
“Oh, it counts,” Timmy drawled in his slow, plodding way. “It counts. Everything in life counts. If I’ve learned anything in the last 36 years, it’s that you can never truly escape anything you’ve done- good or bad.”
***
I couldn't see much from the prison van. There was a small, shatterproof window in the swinging back doors, but it only gave a fleeting view of what was behind us. I noticed the dark forests stretching out to the horizon over rolling hills.
We drove for a few hours. The three of us bullshitted, talking about everything from sports to politics to the recent spate of fatal stabbings at SCC.
I felt the van stop. I looked out the back window, seeing more endless trees. I didn’t see a single house or car on the road we had taken.
“This place is a ghost town,” I said. Shea nodded.
“Yeah, it’s dead as Frank Sinatra ‘round here,” Shea said, wheezing out a high-pitched laugh at his own joke. “This area used to be big for coal mining, but as it dried up and people lost their jobs, they moved away. You know, my grandfather was a coal miner.”
“Good place to build a prison, huh?” Timmy asked. “If there is no one around…” We were cut off by a clanging alarm up ahead. I heard something large moving, probably the gate opening. Then we were inside.
I saw the guard towers and rolls of razor wire for a brief moment as the van pulled into an open garage. The darkness immediately blanketed us. The garage door slowly rolled shut behind us. Shea jumped up.
“Let’s get you boys inside so I can take off your handcuffs and everything,” he said, motioning for us to follow. He pulled out a flashlight from his belt, guiding us through the pitch black. The dim light sent shadows racing across the room like groping tentacles. I caught glimpses of strange objects in the darkness. They looked like medieval torture devices.
“What is this place?” I whispered. My voice echoed far too loudly off the cold concrete floor and walls. “Those look like torture devices on that table, Shea. I think those bloody things are thumbscrews and that might be a pear of anguish…” I pointed to the pear-shaped object with three, wicked blades whose points came together sitting on a dusty shelf. The ornate handle had springs connected to it. The object could be forced into any human orifice and, when the springs were engaged, it would open like a flower inside the person’s body, ripping their flesh apart and enlarging that orifice to a bloody, gaping hole.
“How do you know so much about this?” Shea asked, giving me a strange look. He narrowed his little piggy eyes. He continued to fumble with the flashlight, peering around for a door to exit the garage. I looked back at the car and saw the driver just sitting there, his entire body as lifeless and still as a mannequin.
“I’ve read a few books…” I said as Timmy interrupted us.
“I see a little red light glowing under that door,” Timmy said. Shea focused his flashlight on the spot. Across the room, I noticed what Timmy was pointing at. It was an ancient-looking black door. The wood had started to crack and splinter down the middle. Engraved in silver on the front, it said, “Entrance to Northfrost Penitentiary.”
“Hello?” Shea called toward the door as the three of us moved forward, the steel chains giving my steps a clinking rhythm.
Shea reached the antique crystal doorknob. Timmy and I stood next to a dust-covered brazen bull, its bronze mouth wide open as if it were silently roaring at us. As Shea pulled open the door, crimson light flooded into the garage.
Tinted black glass covered the back wall. A speaker button sat next to the window. I looked to my right, seeing a massive sign sprawled across the wall there. It read:
RULES FOR PERSONAL CONDUCT AT NORTHFROST

1. The COs without faces don’t work here and we don’t know who they are. If you see one, press one of the buttons labeled “Emergency Dispatch” that are scattered around the complex.
2. When the red emergency lights come on, hide until they shut off.
3. Do not go into the medical ward for any reason.
4. The warden roams the prison every night at 3:33 AM looking for human meat. Don’t let him catch you.

“What is this, a goddamned joke?” Timmy asked, his dark face forming into a scowl.
“Uhh, well…” Shea rubbed the back of his neck, looking like an obese little boy who lost his parents. “I’ve never been here before, but this is all pretty unusual, I’ll admit.” A buzzing came from the back of the room, and suddenly a garish, echoing intercom turned on.
“Please remove their chains and direct them through the door on the left,” a female robotic voice said calmly in a tone as cool as lemonade on a hot day. “Your transfer will then be complete.” Shea sighed in relief.
“Good,” he grunted. “This place gives me the creeps.”
“Bro, you can’t leave us here,” Timmy protested. “What the fuck is this place? Where is everyone? Why is there a room filled with bloody, ancient torture devices next to the garage?” Shea put up his hands.
“I’m sorry, son, but I have orders. I’m just a messenger here. I was told to transfer you here, and that’s what I’ve done.” He fumbled around his belt for his keyring. He came over and unlocked the handcuffs and anklecuffs from both of us. I stretched, rubbing my wrists. I was glad to be out of those suffocating restraints.
“Thanks for everything, then,” I said, picking up my extremely light garbage bag of possessions and heading for the door on the left. Timmy reluctantly followed behind. A sign on this door read: “To General Population.”
But when we got to the other side and it slammed shut behind us, I found a hallway filled with more red emergency lights streaming down. An involuntary shiver ran down through my body. I remembered those absurd rules someone had put up. What had it said about red lights? My mind raced for a few moments, then the answer popped up. It said to hide.
A man shrieked up ahead, his voice riddled with agony and terror. The hallway split to the right and left, and I couldn’t see anyone. Timmy and I stopped.
“Dude, screw this,” Timmy said, turning and running back toward the door we had come through. He tried pulling it open, but it was firmly locked.
***
The scream came again, louder and closer, but this time it was cut off suddenly. I heard someone gurgling like a man with a slit throat trying to breathe. And then everything went deathly silent again.
The gray, concrete floor of the hallway had arrows pointing forward on it. There were no doors here. There was nowhere to hide that I could see. Timmy and I reluctantly went forward. As we got to the intersection, we saw the dead body of a man in a brown khaki uniform.
His sightless eyes remained open. They stared up at the ceiling, glassy and still filled with horror. Deep gouge marks bit deeply into the flesh on his back and arms and chest. His throat had been cut or bit open as well. A spreading puddle of blood encircled his body.
I saw a dark blur at the end of the hallway on the right. It looked like little more than a shadow. I whispered to Timmy, pointing. We decided to go left immediately. My heart was pounding at this point. I felt like a soldier walking through the no-man’s land of a warzone. I expected the attack to come at any moment.
The hallway to the left had some doors. I sprinted forward as quietly as I could with Timmy close by my side. I read the first door: To Medical Ward.
“Ugh, no,” I whispered, going to the second one. I heard light footsteps behind me. Turning, I saw a creature from a nightmare sneaking up on us in the bloody glow of the emergency lights.
Its skin was black and shiny like that of a centipede’s. In its general form, it reminded me of a hairless werewolf. It towered over us, its eyes like bone-white cataracts, its claws as long and sharp as a dagger. And yet, its face seemed almost reptilian. It had two small nose holes like a snake and a jaw that unhinged and dropped far below its head. I saw rows of blood-soaked fangs. It gave off a low, gurgling growl that emanated from its chest.
With a rush of adrenaline and a sense of mortal terror, I pushed through the second door without reading the sign on the front. Timmy was right behind me. I heard him scream as he fell into me.
I found myself in a prison dormitory, and we weren’t alone. As I hit the ground, I saw a white face peering out at me from behind the bunk bed. The man hiding there saw the abomination behind us and got up, screaming and running away.
The creature growled, giving chase. In two powerful bounds, it had rushed across the dormitory and grabbed the man by the neck. I looked back at Timmy, seeing him groaning on the ground. Blood poured from deep cuts on his back. I grabbed him, pulling him up.
“Let’s go, let’s go, no time to…” I said when I was cut off by the sound of a neck snapping. I looked back, seeing the creature had twisted the man’s head around in a circle. It raised the limp body to its massive mouth and severed the head in a single powerful bite.
“Get me out of here, man, please,” Timmy whispered as I pulled him back out into the hallway. I looked over, seeing another werewolf creature bounding down the hallway, chasing a man in a prison jumpsuit. I had no choice.
I pulled Timmy toward the door labeled “Medical Ward”. With a creak of rusted hinges, it opened. We went inside to hide.
***
“Maybe there’s something in here we can use to bandage you up,” I said to Timmy, pulling him down the short hallway toward a room filled with single beds. I didn’t know why the rules said to avoid this place. It looked totally empty. Against the back wall, I saw a glass cabinet filled with bandages, rubbing alcohol, band-aids and other various first aid supplies. I ran toward it. Timmy limped along after me, still groaning.
“Goddamn, I think those claws went down to the bone,” he said.
“It’s gonna be OK,” I said as I pulled out some antiseptic and bandages, adding, “It could’ve been a lot worse.” The universe would immediately prove me right. I heard a slight giggling from under one of the beds. Timmy and I both froze.
Two rotted hands reached out, dragging the mutilated body of a little girl behind them. She had patches of garish, black stitches running across her face, hands and arms. Dark, clotted blood dripped from the sites. She wore a gore-smeared hospital gown and had no eyes. I looked into the empty sockets. They stared back at me like two black holes spinning in the void.
As she rose, her giggles became full-blown laughter, a hysterical gurgling like the laugh of a dying person. Then she ran at me. I saw the silver gleam of a scalpel in her little hand.
“No!” I screamed, raising my hands to protect myself. The scalpel came down, slicing across my palm. It cut deeply. A cold, burning pain ran up my arm. I repressed the urge to scream.
At that moment, the red emergency lights flicked off. Bright, fluorescent lights popped on, flickering and strobing in rapid succession. Timmy ran forward, tackling the undead girl. But I saw more small hands reaching out from under the beds, hands filled with sores and squirming larvae. I could see the bones of their hands through necrotic patches eaten into their flesh.
I ran for Timmy, grabbing him and hauling him up.
“Time to go! Now!” I screamed, pulling him forward as more undead boys and girls rose up, all with sharp knives and surgical instruments grasped in their little hands. I felt a sudden pain in my leg. Looking down, I saw a knife sticking out of my thigh. The empty eye sockets of a little boy’s face stared up at me, grinning like a skull.
I collapsed on the ground as we were surrounded. I prayed to God then, knowing we would die. I prayed that he would forgive me for all my mistakes, because I was on a fast-track to the afterlife and would be seeing him in a few seconds. With a sharp cry of pain, I yanked the knife out of my leg, turning it on my attacker.
Then a gunshot rang out. The head of the nearest girl exploded in a shower of bone fragments and dead maggots. I looked up, seeing Shea standing at the door, his pistol raised.
“Come on!” he screamed. “Come on, you idiots! Let’s go! Now!” Timmy and I didn’t need any more encouragement. As Shea continued to blow apart the nearest of the undead abominations, we limped and scrambled towards him. My leg gave a shriek of pain with every step.
We got out of the medical ward, battered and bruised but still alive.
***
“Why’d you come back, Shea?” I asked through pained breaths. Shea gave me a frantic look.
“When I got back out to the car, the driver was dead. His throat was… ripped out or something, I don’t know. I grabbed his keys and came back for you two. I don’t know where we are, but I’m getting you out of here,” he explained. I looked at him in amazement. I had never thought in a million years Shea would risk his life to save some scumbag inmates.
“So what’s the plan?” Timmy asked, sweating heavily, his eyes wild and pained. “How are we getting out of here without dying?” Shea shrugged.
“The door locked behind us when we came in,” I said. “Unless we can break it down and get back to the car…” We passed by buttons labeled “Emergency Dispatch” under glowing red emergency signs. I wondered if we could get help somehow through them.
“Halt!” someone cried from behind us. I looked back, seeing a man in a black correctional officers uniform. He ran toward us, his hand on the radio hanging from his belt. But something immediately seemed off about the figure.
As he got closer, I realized why. He had no face. His entire head was just smooth, white skin, without hair or any signs of features. He spoke again, and the voice seemed to come from all around his body.
“You must report to the medical ward,” the strange figure said. “We do not allow injured people in the hallways.”
“No, we’re fine,” Shea said, grinning. “See, buddy? I work for the DOC too.” He pointed at the identification clipped to his breast pocket. The figure raised his radio to his lips.
“We have resistance near Dormitory One,” the fake CO said into his radio before any of us could stop him. Shea ran forward, knocking the radio from his hand. The CO instantly straightened up and whipped out his pistol, pointing it at Shea’s torso. He fired, and I saw Shea’s chest explode in a blossoming flower of blood.
“No, dammit!” Timmy said, running forward. I saw a silver gleam in his hand, and I realized he had taken one of the scalpels from the undead Shea had killed in the Medical Ward. As the fake CO spun to point the pistol at Timmy, Timmy ran into him, stabbing the scalpel deeply into the CO’s neck.
They fell together with Timmy on top of the fake CO. His body weight drove the scalpel deeper into the white, featureless skin. Blood the color of soot spurted from the wound. The gun went off, the bullet missing Timmy entirely and smashing into the ceiling. The CO’s gurgling death gasps seem to come from all around his body. I grabbed Timmy.
“Get the guns!” I said. “They’re both dead. We need the guns.” He nodded, grabbing the CO’s gun and taking an extra magazine from his belt. I did the same with Shea’s gun and magazine. I pressed the button labeled “Emergency Dispatch” as more faceless men appeared far off down the corridor. Then we fled as fast as we could from that hallway, but, seeing as we were both in pretty bad shape, it wasn’t very fast.
At that point, I was just glad to be alive, though.
***
We wandered around the prison, avoiding the faceless COs whenever we saw them patrolling the hallways. They would radio to each other, their voices always surrounding their bodies rather than coming from their heads, which I found extremely eerie and unsettling. A couple times, I saw men in black SWAT suits with automatic rifles gunning down the fake COs. I wondered if this was the “Emergency Dispatch”. Timmy and I avoided them as well, and we gave a wide berth anytime we heard gunfire.
We passed cells with mummified corpses hanging from the ceiling. We passed dormitories where the victims of the strange, werewolf-like creatures littered the floors, rotting and stinking like roadkill. Occasionally, I would catch a glimpse of another survivor, a pale face peeking out from some hiding spot, but Timmy and I kept pushing forward, looking for a way out.
We were in a sprawling gymnasium, sitting down and resting for a few minutes, when we encountered the Warden.
We heard a demonic roar from the hallway, a mixing of many strange, inhuman tongues. As Timmy and I sat up quickly, a decapitated body flew into the gym, and a creature from Hell followed after it. The body smacked into the concrete wall with a soft, fleshy whack.
The Warden stood ten feet tall. He had on a black correctional officers uniform and a leather visor cap. His face looked like it had no flesh. A thick layer of bone covered it with two reptilian eyes peering out from behind slitted pupils. He hissed, a forked tongue shooting out of his gaping maw. His fingers looked like sharp daggers of bone. A smell like old leather and blood rose from his body.
“Shoot it!” I screamed, raising the pistol and firing at its head. The first shot blew off its visor cap, revealing the hairless, reptilian skull underneath. But the bullet only gouged the top of its skull. It ran at us with powerful, bounding steps, covering the distance in moments.
Timmy and I fired as fast as we could as it got within a few feet of us. It bounded into Timmy like a freight train hitting a car. Timmy’s body went flying and smashed against the back wall with the sound of bones shattering. I slammed another magazine in the pistol as the Warden turned to me.
We had hit it, I saw. One of its eyes had exploded in a shower of gore and vitreous fluid, and its head was bleeding badly. I raised the gun, aiming for the same eye and firing.
The Warden smacked his hand against his face as if he had forgotten something, falling to the floor. I ran forward, putting the pistol point-blank against his ruined eye before emptying the clip. By the end, he wasn’t moving anymore.
“Oh, God,” I said, walking over to Timmy. I saw his shattered legs, his broken spine and his snapped ribs. He coughed up blood. “I’m sorry, Timmy. I really am.” His head might have nodded slightly as he died, giving a final death gasp before falling still.
***
I found a ring of keys on the Warden’s body. In excitement, I ran downstairs and tried the locked door. It worked.
I went to the van, pulling out the dead driver and starting it. After smashing through the garage door, I drove it through the gate. It did catastrophic damage to the prison van, but it got me far enough away before the engine gave out.
I don’t know what kind of prison that was, but I hope I never see that hellscape again.

I've been in and out of prisons and jails ever since I was 17. I thought I had seen it all- Aryan Brotherhood members stabbing guards, gang wars, escapes and torture. I saw many things that still give me nightmares to this day.
"MacDonald, 402202," the guard barked out. I jumped up, the thin mattress under me exhaling a whiff of stale air. I looked through the bars, seeing Correctional Officer Shea. CO Shea was a morbidly obese man with a penchant for being loud and lazy. I had seen a member of the Bloods punch him straight in the nose before, a scene I still remembered with some humor. Shea had crumpled like wet paper on the floor, screaming and crying as more COs ran over and tackled the inmate.
"Yeah?" I asked. Shea handed me a sheet of paper. He regarded me with his gray, colorless eyes.
"Congratulations, you're being transferred. Pack your shit. This is your last day at Springfield Correctional Center."
***
You might think I would be happy to get a transfer. SCC was, after all, a shithole. The food was terrible and always cold, the place always smelled like bleach and chemicals, and at night it got so cold with only my flimsy sheet that I regularly woke up shivering. The building was nearly a century old, and the fact that it still functioned at all was a miracle in itself.
But, to be honest, I was not thrilled about the transfer. I had made friends here and knew the lay of the land. I didn't have to worry about getting jumped or stabbed to death in the showers. As the old adage goes, it's better the devil you know than the one you don't.
I was led out of my cell the next evening with all the worldly possessions I owned, which fit neatly into a clear trash bag with room to spare. I owned some prison clothes, toothpaste, a toothbrush, deodorant, a Bible, a pair of sandals and a radio. I felt the unbearable lightness of my existence reflected in that bag as it smacked rhythmically against my leg.
"Good luck, friend Josh!" a rather insane acquaintance of mine named Alvin called out from his cell as I passed down the bleak, concrete hallway.
"Take care man. I hope we meet again on the outside," I said, waving, knowing I would almost certainly never see any of these people again. Hell, I hadn't even seen my family in over five years. None of them came to visit me anymore. No one wrote me letters or put money in my commissary account or sent me books to read.
"Well, we're all born alone, and we all die alone," I thought to myself as CO Shea walked by my side. He was breathing heavily, as if he had just finished running a marathon. I looked over at his face, seeing the burst capillaries on his nose from years of hard drinking and the squint of his little, piggy eyes. There was a slight gleam of intelligence and slyness behind that ugly mug, though.
"Well, amigo," Shea said in his slow, plodding way, "I got assigned to go with you. I'll be your ride along buddy. You excited or what?" I smiled faintly at him
"There are worse people than you here, Shea," I said. "Far worse."
***
I got on the prison bus in my bright-orange jumpsuit. To my surprise, I saw the back was nearly empty. There was only one other prisoner in the back. Shea sat with us to monitor us. We were also handcuffed and anklecuffed. A chain ran down and connected the two.
I looked over at the other prisoner, a black guy with a shaved head. I think he also shaved his eyebrows. I mean, I literally didn't see a single hair on his head besides eyelashes, which he apparently hadn't found a way to shave… yet.
"Sup," he said. I nodded.
"Sup." We sat there in awkward silence as Shea plopped down hard on the bench between us. It groaned like a confused old man.
"So what do you know about this place, Shea?" I asked. He sucked down half a bottle of Coke and then heaved a deep sigh.
"I don't know much about it, to be frank," he admitted sheepishly. "It is apparently brand-new, though. They asked us to send a couple people who met... certain criteria."
"What does that mean?" the black guy asked. Shea gave him a serious look.
"Come on, Timmy, you know what I mean. Hardened criminals. People with long records who tour prisons like some people tour French beaches." I scoffed.
"There are far worse people than me in prison," I said.
"Well, they asked for no murderers or gang bangers too. I don't know why, but maybe it is some new government program. They apparently call it an 'experimental prison’.”
“What about me?” Timmy asked. Shea apparently knew what he meant.
“You’re not a murderer, Timmy,” Shea said, his lips forming the faintest twitch of a smile. “You never…”
“Well, there was that time my girlfriend got me to drop some acid with her. She went and killed her parents. Then we hit the road,” Timmy said fondly, his eyes rising as if he were looking at a hovering angel in the far-off distance.
“You were never convicted of any accessory charges, so it doesn’t count,” Shea retorted.
“Oh, it counts,” Timmy drawled in his slow, plodding way. “It counts. Everything in life counts. If I’ve learned anything in the last 36 years, it’s that you can never truly escape anything you’ve done- good or bad.”
***
I couldn't see much from the prison van. There was a small, shatterproof window in the swinging back doors, but it only gave a fleeting view of what was behind us. I noticed the dark forests stretching out to the horizon over rolling hills.
We drove for a few hours. The three of us bullshitted, talking about everything from sports to politics to the recent spate of fatal stabbings at SCC.
I felt the van stop. I looked out the back window, seeing more endless trees. I didn’t see a single house or car on the road we had taken.
“This place is a ghost town,” I said. Shea nodded.
“Yeah, it’s dead as Frank Sinatra ‘round here,” Shea said, wheezing out a high-pitched laugh at his own joke. “This area used to be big for coal mining, but as it dried up and people lost their jobs, they moved away. You know, my grandfather was a coal miner.”
“Good place to build a prison, huh?” Timmy asked. “If there is no one around…” We were cut off by a clanging alarm up ahead. I heard something large moving, probably the gate opening. Then we were inside.
I saw the guard towers and rolls of razor wire for a brief moment as the van pulled into an open garage. The darkness immediately blanketed us. The garage door slowly rolled shut behind us. Shea jumped up.
“Let’s get you boys inside so I can take off your handcuffs and everything,” he said, motioning for us to follow. He pulled out a flashlight from his belt, guiding us through the pitch black. The dim light sent shadows racing across the room like groping tentacles. I caught glimpses of strange objects in the darkness. They looked like medieval torture devices.
“What is this place?” I whispered. My voice echoed far too loudly off the cold concrete floor and walls. “Those look like torture devices on that table, Shea. I think those bloody things are thumbscrews and that might be a pear of anguish…” I pointed to the pear-shaped object with three, wicked blades whose points came together sitting on a dusty shelf. The ornate handle had springs connected to it. The object could be forced into any human orifice and, when the springs were engaged, it would open like a flower inside the person’s body, ripping their flesh apart and enlarging that orifice to a bloody, gaping hole.
“How do you know so much about this?” Shea asked, giving me a strange look. He narrowed his little piggy eyes. He continued to fumble with the flashlight, peering around for a door to exit the garage. I looked back at the car and saw the driver just sitting there, his entire body as lifeless and still as a mannequin.
“I’ve read a few books…” I said as Timmy interrupted us.
“I see a little red light glowing under that door,” Timmy said. Shea focused his flashlight on the spot. Across the room, I noticed what Timmy was pointing at. It was an ancient-looking black door. The wood had started to crack and splinter down the middle. Engraved in silver on the front, it said, “Entrance to Northfrost Penitentiary.”
“Hello?” Shea called toward the door as the three of us moved forward, the steel chains giving my steps a clinking rhythm.
Shea reached the antique crystal doorknob. Timmy and I stood next to a dust-covered brazen bull, its bronze mouth wide open as if it were silently roaring at us. As Shea pulled open the door, crimson light flooded into the garage.
Tinted black glass covered the back wall. A speaker button sat next to the window. I looked to my right, seeing a massive sign sprawled across the wall there. It read:
RULES FOR PERSONAL CONDUCT AT NORTHFROST
The COs without faces don’t work here and we don’t know who they are. If you see one, press one of the buttons labeled “Emergency Dispatch” that are scattered around the complex.
When the red emergency lights come on, hide until they shut off.
Do not go into the medical ward for any reason.
The warden roams the prison every night at 3:33 AM looking for human meat. Don’t let him catch you.
“What is this, a goddamned joke?” Timmy asked, his dark face forming into a scowl.
“Uhh, well…” Shea rubbed the back of his neck, looking like an obese little boy who lost his parents. “I’ve never been here before, but this is all pretty unusual, I’ll admit.” A buzzing came from the back of the room, and suddenly a garish, echoing intercom turned on.
“Please remove their chains and direct them through the door on the left,” a female robotic voice said calmly in a tone as cool as lemonade on a hot day. “Your transfer will then be complete.” Shea sighed in relief.
“Good,” he grunted. “This place gives me the creeps.”
“Bro, you can’t leave us here,” Timmy protested. “What the fuck is this place? Where is everyone? Why is there a room filled with bloody, ancient torture devices next to the garage?” Shea put up his hands.
“I’m sorry, son, but I have orders. I’m just a messenger here. I was told to transfer you here, and that’s what I’ve done.” He fumbled around his belt for his keyring. He came over and unlocked the handcuffs and anklecuffs from both of us. I stretched, rubbing my wrists. I was glad to be out of those suffocating restraints.
“Thanks for everything, then,” I said, picking up my extremely light garbage bag of possessions and heading for the door on the left. Timmy reluctantly followed behind. A sign on this door read: “To General Population.”
But when we got to the other side and it slammed shut behind us, I found a hallway filled with more red emergency lights streaming down. An involuntary shiver ran down through my body. I remembered those absurd rules someone had put up. What had it said about red lights? My mind raced for a few moments, then the answer popped up. It said to hide.
A man shrieked up ahead, his voice riddled with agony and terror. The hallway split to the right and left, and I couldn’t see anyone. Timmy and I stopped.
“Dude, screw this,” Timmy said, turning and running back toward the door we had come through. He tried pulling it open, but it was firmly locked.
***
The scream came again, louder and closer, but this time it was cut off suddenly. I heard someone gurgling like a man with a slit throat trying to breathe. And then everything went deathly silent again.
The gray, concrete floor of the hallway had arrows pointing forward on it. There were no doors here. There was nowhere to hide that I could see. Timmy and I reluctantly went forward. As we got to the intersection, we saw the dead body of a man in a brown khaki uniform.
His sightless eyes remained open. They stared up at the ceiling, glassy and still filled with horror. Deep gouge marks bit deeply into the flesh on his back and arms and chest. His throat had been cut or bit open as well. A spreading puddle of blood encircled his body.
I saw a dark blur at the end of the hallway on the right. It looked like little more than a shadow. I whispered to Timmy, pointing. We decided to go left immediately. My heart was pounding at this point. I felt like a soldier walking through the no-man’s land of a warzone. I expected the attack to come at any moment.
The hallway to the left had some doors. I sprinted forward as quietly as I could with Timmy close by my side. I read the first door: To Medical Ward.
“Ugh, no,” I whispered, going to the second one. I heard light footsteps behind me. Turning, I saw a creature from a nightmare sneaking up on us in the bloody glow of the emergency lights.
Its skin was black and shiny like that of a centipede’s. In its general form, it reminded me of a hairless werewolf. It towered over us, its eyes like bone-white cataracts, its claws as long and sharp as a dagger. And yet, its face seemed almost reptilian. It had two small nose holes like a snake and a jaw that unhinged and dropped far below its head. I saw rows of blood-soaked fangs. It gave off a low, gurgling growl that emanated from its chest.
With a rush of adrenaline and a sense of mortal terror, I pushed through the second door without reading the sign on the front. Timmy was right behind me. I heard him scream as he fell into me.
I found myself in a prison dormitory, and we weren’t alone. As I hit the ground, I saw a white face peering out at me from behind the bunk bed. The man hiding there saw the abomination behind us and got up, screaming and running away.
The creature growled, giving chase. In two powerful bounds, it had rushed across the dormitory and grabbed the man by the neck. I looked back at Timmy, seeing him groaning on the ground. Blood poured from deep cuts on his back. I grabbed him, pulling him up.
“Let’s go, let’s go, no time to…” I said when I was cut off by the sound of a neck snapping. I looked back, seeing the creature had twisted the man’s head around in a circle. It raised the limp body to its massive mouth and severed the head in a single powerful bite.
“Get me out of here, man, please,” Timmy whispered as I pulled him back out into the hallway. I looked over, seeing another werewolf creature bounding down the hallway, chasing a man in a prison jumpsuit. I had no choice.
I pulled Timmy toward the door labeled “Medical Ward”. With a creak of rusted hinges, it opened. We went inside to hide.
***
“Maybe there’s something in here we can use to bandage you up,” I said to Timmy, pulling him down the short hallway toward a room filled with single beds. I didn’t know why the rules said to avoid this place. It looked totally empty. Against the back wall, I saw a glass cabinet filled with bandages, rubbing alcohol, band-aids and other various first aid supplies. I ran toward it. Timmy limped along after me, still groaning.
“Goddamn, I think those claws went down to the bone,” he said.
“It’s gonna be OK,” I said as I pulled out some antiseptic and bandages, adding, “It could’ve been a lot worse.” The universe would immediately prove me right. I heard a slight giggling from under one of the beds. Timmy and I both froze.
Two rotted hands reached out, dragging the mutilated body of a little girl behind them. She had patches of garish, black stitches running across her face, hands and arms. Dark, clotted blood dripped from the sites. She wore a gore-smeared hospital gown and had no eyes. I looked into the empty sockets. They stared back at me like two black holes spinning in the void.
As she rose, her giggles became full-blown laughter, a hysterical gurgling like the laugh of a dying person. Then she ran at me. I saw the silver gleam of a scalpel in her little hand.
“No!” I screamed, raising my hands to protect myself. The scalpel came down, slicing across my palm. It cut deeply. A cold, burning pain ran up my arm. I repressed the urge to scream.
At that moment, the red emergency lights flicked off. Bright, fluorescent lights popped on, flickering and strobing in rapid succession. Timmy ran forward, tackling the undead girl. But I saw more small hands reaching out from under the beds, hands filled with sores and squirming larvae. I could see the bones of their hands through necrotic patches eaten into their flesh.
I ran for Timmy, grabbing him and hauling him up.
“Time to go! Now!” I screamed, pulling him forward as more undead boys and girls rose up, all with sharp knives and surgical instruments grasped in their little hands. I felt a sudden pain in my leg. Looking down, I saw a knife sticking out of my thigh. The empty eye sockets of a little boy’s face stared up at me, grinning like a skull.
I collapsed on the ground as we were surrounded. I prayed to God then, knowing we would die. I prayed that he would forgive me for all my mistakes, because I was on a fast-track to the afterlife and would be seeing him in a few seconds. With a sharp cry of pain, I yanked the knife out of my leg, turning it on my attacker.
Then a gunshot rang out. The head of the nearest girl exploded in a shower of bone fragments and dead maggots. I looked up, seeing Shea standing at the door, his pistol raised.
“Come on!” he screamed. “Come on, you idiots! Let’s go! Now!” Timmy and I didn’t need any more encouragement. As Shea continued to blow apart the nearest of the undead abominations, we limped and scrambled towards him. My leg gave a shriek of pain with every step.
We got out of the medical ward, battered and bruised but still alive.
***
“Why’d you come back, Shea?” I asked through pained breaths. Shea gave me a frantic look.
“When I got back out to the car, the driver was dead. His throat was… ripped out or something, I don’t know. I grabbed his keys and came back for you two. I don’t know where we are, but I’m getting you out of here,” he explained. I looked at him in amazement. I had never thought in a million years Shea would risk his life to save some scumbag inmates.
“So what’s the plan?” Timmy asked, sweating heavily, his eyes wild and pained. “How are we getting out of here without dying?” Shea shrugged.
“The door locked behind us when we came in,” I said. “Unless we can break it down and get back to the car…” We passed by buttons labeled “Emergency Dispatch” under glowing red emergency signs. I wondered if we could get help somehow through them.
“Halt!” someone cried from behind us. I looked back, seeing a man in a black correctional officers uniform. He ran toward us, his hand on the radio hanging from his belt. But something immediately seemed off about the figure.
As he got closer, I realized why. He had no face. His entire head was just smooth, white skin, without hair or any signs of features. He spoke again, and the voice seemed to come from all around his body.
“You must report to the medical ward,” the strange figure said. “We do not allow injured people in the hallways.”
“No, we’re fine,” Shea said, grinning. “See, buddy? I work for the DOC too.” He pointed at the identification clipped to his breast pocket. The figure raised his radio to his lips.
“We have resistance near Dormitory One,” the fake CO said into his radio before any of us could stop him. Shea ran forward, knocking the radio from his hand. The CO instantly straightened up and whipped out his pistol, pointing it at Shea’s torso. He fired, and I saw Shea’s chest explode in a blossoming flower of blood.
“No, dammit!” Timmy said, running forward. I saw a silver gleam in his hand, and I realized he had taken one of the scalpels from the undead Shea had killed in the Medical Ward. As the fake CO spun to point the pistol at Timmy, Timmy ran into him, stabbing the scalpel deeply into the CO’s neck.
They fell together with Timmy on top of the fake CO. His body weight drove the scalpel deeper into the white, featureless skin. Blood the color of soot spurted from the wound. The gun went off, the bullet missing Timmy entirely and smashing into the ceiling. The CO’s gurgling death gasps seem to come from all around his body. I grabbed Timmy.
“Get the guns!” I said. “They’re both dead. We need the guns.” He nodded, grabbing the CO’s gun and taking an extra magazine from his belt. I did the same with Shea’s gun and magazine. I pressed the button labeled “Emergency Dispatch” as more faceless men appeared far off down the corridor. Then we fled as fast as we could from that hallway, but, seeing as we were both in pretty bad shape, it wasn’t very fast.
At that point, I was just glad to be alive, though.
***
We wandered around the prison, avoiding the faceless COs whenever we saw them patrolling the hallways. They would radio to each other, their voices always surrounding their bodies rather than coming from their heads, which I found extremely eerie and unsettling. A couple times, I saw men in black SWAT suits with automatic rifles gunning down the fake COs. I wondered if this was the “Emergency Dispatch”. Timmy and I avoided them as well, and we gave a wide berth anytime we heard gunfire.
We passed cells with mummified corpses hanging from the ceiling. We passed dormitories where the victims of the strange, werewolf-like creatures littered the floors, rotting and stinking like roadkill. Occasionally, I would catch a glimpse of another survivor, a pale face peeking out from some hiding spot, but Timmy and I kept pushing forward, looking for a way out.
We were in a sprawling gymnasium, sitting down and resting for a few minutes, when we encountered the Warden.
We heard a demonic roar from the hallway, a mixing of many strange, inhuman tongues. As Timmy and I sat up quickly, a decapitated body flew into the gym, and a creature from Hell followed after it. The body smacked into the concrete wall with a soft, fleshy whack.
The Warden stood ten feet tall. He had on a black correctional officers uniform and a leather visor cap. His face looked like it had no flesh. A thick layer of bone covered it with two reptilian eyes peering out from behind slitted pupils. He hissed, a forked tongue shooting out of his gaping maw. His fingers looked like sharp daggers of bone. A smell like old leather and blood rose from his body.
“Shoot it!” I screamed, raising the pistol and firing at its head. The first shot blew off its visor cap, revealing the hairless, reptilian skull underneath. But the bullet only gouged the top of its skull. It ran at us with powerful, bounding steps, covering the distance in moments.
Timmy and I fired as fast as we could as it got within a few feet of us. It bounded into Timmy like a freight train hitting a car. Timmy’s body went flying and smashed against the back wall with the sound of bones shattering. I slammed another magazine in the pistol as the Warden turned to me.
We had hit it, I saw. One of its eyes had exploded in a shower of gore and vitreous fluid, and its head was bleeding badly. I raised the gun, aiming for the same eye and firing.
The Warden smacked his hand against his face as if he had forgotten something, falling to the floor. I ran forward, putting the pistol point-blank against his ruined eye before emptying the clip. By the end, he wasn’t moving anymore.
“Oh, God,” I said, walking over to Timmy. I saw his shattered legs, his broken spine and his snapped ribs. He coughed up blood. “I’m sorry, Timmy. I really am.” His head might have nodded slightly as he died, giving a final death gasp before falling still.
***
I found a ring of keys on the Warden’s body. In excitement, I ran downstairs and tried the locked door. It worked.
I went to the van, pulling out the dead driver and starting it. After smashing through the garage door, I drove it through the gate. It did catastrophic damage to the prison van, but it got me far enough away before the engine gave out.
I don’t know what kind of prison that was, but I hope I never see that hellscape again.

[ For obvious reasons I’ve used fake names. ]
I (F, 31) and my boyfriend Ryan (M, 29) are part of a group of friends who reside in different parts of the country, but make it a point to meet at least once a year.
Ryan and I live in the South of our country.
The second couple, Dan and Ella, live in the capital.
Then there is Lucas, who resides in the North.
Ryan and Dan have always been close friends, having grown up as neighbors. About 11 years ago, they befriended Lucas, establishing a strong and enduring relationship. They bonded over their shared interest in video games, D&D and role-play games in general; they frequently talked over Discord and played a few D&D campaigns together.
In 2021 Lucas met Mary, and they started dating. He invited all of us over to get to know Mary, so that December we all gathered at Lucas's - we had a habit of sleeping over every time we came over since we were all traveling from different cities.
DECEMBER 2021
We spent about a week there: Mary was lovely, very kind and warm. She loved cooking for everyone and she showered everyone with affection. For instance, every day she liked to hug everyone good morning. I love hugs, so I never thought anything of it.
Mary also liked to make quite a lot of sex-related jokes. Nothing against it, I do it too. But jokes like “So… When’s the orgy?”, while funny the first time, made everyone uncomfortable when repeated almost every day.
Ryan was also acting differently that week. He’s always been very affectionate, even in public, but he was particularly loving (almost clingy) during our stay, and was always by my side. I didn't really notice it right away since I thought he was just being shy.
On the 31st, we planned to celebrate the new year by playing some board games, having drinks, and then heading to the beach to watch the midnight fireworks.
Mary's sister, Anna, also joined us with her boyfriend to spend a couple days at Lucas’.
We all drank but Mary was the only one getting tipsy - weird, since Ella and Dan are occasional drinkers and they were still sober. About thirty minutes before midnight, Mary appeared noticeably "drunk". We decided to get ready to go out, with everyone taking their turn in the bathroom. Ryan was the last one. While everyone gathered at the front door, I was still getting dressed in our room while Ryan was in the bathroom.
When I came out I saw Mary bent over the bathroom door, peering through the keyhole, laughing, while Anna was whispering to her to stop and to look away. I glanced toward the front door and noticed that everyone else was gathered at the door except Ryan.
I was in shock, so I stood there, frozen. I didn't know what to say.
Also, as I said, Ryan is very shy. If he were aware something like this was happening outside the door, he would’ve been mortified.
While I was still processing all of this, staring at Mary, Anna noticed me and pulled Mary away from the door. Mary then turned to me and, still laughing, said: “I saw your boyfriend’s penis”.
Seeing that I wasn’t laughing with her (AND WHY WOULD I), she shifted from laughter to tears in a fraction of a second. Mary and Anna both started apologizing. Mary kept repeating that this wouldn’t happen again. All I could mutter was: “...I should hope so. Were you planning on doing it again?”.
Anna asked me not to mention this to anyone since Mary was too drunk to think straight, and I said “I won’t tell for now or Ryan will be devastated”.
Luckily Ryan didn’t seem to notice because he came out of the bathroom in a good mood, ready to go. I didn’t tell him right away.
I tried to get ready but I was so in shock I came out of the bathroom too late, so we ended up staying in.
That night, when we went to bed, Ryan told me that he had the impression he was being spied on while in the bathroom. I hesitated a second, unsure about what to tell him since he caught me off guard. Sensing my hesitation, he pressed for an answer, so I had to tell him. He was so mortified that for the rest of the week, every time he went to the bathroom he locked the door, closed the window shutters, turned off the lights and blocked the keyhole with a t-shirt.
I began to notice things during the rest of our stay. Mary’s morning hugs were a tiny bit longer with Ryan. Mary was always invading Ryan’s personal space, which is why he always came by my side and showed me so much affection in front of everyone. I later discovered she was always molesting Ryan, giving him kisses on his neck, nibbling him, pinching or groping him, and it always happened when I wasn’t looking or when I wasn’t right there.
Mary also said some stuff that sounded pretty shady. For example one day she randomly opened Google Maps and handed her phone to Ryan, asking him to show her where he lives. When Ryan showed her his building on street view, she got her phone back and put it in her pocket again. When I asked her "Don't you want to know where I live? Or where Dan and Ella live?" she looked like she wasn't expecting me to say that.
We ended up overstaying for a couple of days, so we had to use their washing machine. Mary offered to load it, but I helped her unload and fold everything the next day. While we were folding and talking, she took one of Ryan’s t-shirts, buried her face in it, took a long sniff and moaned, right in front of me. Then she said: “Ryan’s clothes smell so good, even after being washed…”
I figured she was talking about his fabric softener’s scent still lingering after being washed with her products, so it completely went over my head at the time. Also, I thought that there could be no way Mary would actually do something else in front of me, especially not while sober. So I didn’t say anything and moved on with our conversation.
Days later, when I brought up that sentence with Ryan, he told me he had caught Mary sniffing his underwear while loading the dirty clothes in the washing machine.
I can’t even imagine what he must have felt like. The more I heard or noticed things, the less I knew what to do or if I could even react at all.
You might wonder where Lucas was all those times. He missed the bathroom incident and both of the clothing episodes, but he was there for the general harassment happening during the day, and he never said a word. We’re still not sure whether he noticed and chose not to say anything, or if he simply didn’t notice at all. This uncertainty stems from some random remarks Lucas made on a few occasions.
For example, there was a time when Ryan walked into Lucas and Mary making out in their room, and Lucas jokingly remarked: “Oh, no, Ryan’s here…”, playfully insinuating that Ryan was some sort of romantic rival.
A lot happened that week, but Lucas was so happy with Mary that Ryan chose not to tell him for the time being. Ryan also wanted to avoid creating tensions between him and Lucas, so we only confided in Ella and Dan. They were shocked and disgusted, but they agreed to keep it quiet.
AUGUST 2022
Lucas invited us again the next summer and so we went again. This time I was extremely vigilant about Mary’s whereabouts at all times. I tried to stay close to Ryan as much as possible and subtly kept an eye on the door whenever he used the bathroom.
We went to the beach a few times. Mary made unsolicited comments about Dan’s and Ryan’s physiques. She compared Dan and Ryan, saying that “Dan has no booty”, while describing Ryan’s as “perfectly round and plump”. “Our boyfriends have great asses”, she said to me one morning during our walk to the beach, while we were walking behind Lucas and Ryan. I responded with an awkward “I don’t know about Lucas. I don’t look at him like that, to be honest”.
The trip was more or less fine otherwise, except the usual daily orgy proposal and her constant attempts to be alone with Ryan.
We also played a quick D&D one-shot campaign, and she turned out to be an extremely negative, disruptive, problematic player, but I might share more about that in another post.
We concluded the trip peacefully.
SEPTEMBER to DECEMBER 2022
Between the following September and October, Ryan and Dan received a message from Lucas, urgently asking for a call. When they called him, they found Lucas crying desperately, revealing that Mary had cheated on him.
Apparently, Mary cheated on him with some guy from her band named Sam (Mary sings).
Lucas saw some incriminating message notifications on her phone that day and immediately confronted her. She said all kinds of horrible things to Lucas, blaming him for not supporting her enough (I think she referred to Lucas not giving her enough likes on her socials), claiming Sam was her soulmate, and asserting she had her reasons to cheat. She convinced Lucas it was his fault she cheated on him.
That was what Lucas said to Ryan and Dan that night. And while he was bawling his eyes out, desperate, he also told them that Mary was in the next room, talking on the phone with Sam.
A few days later Lucas was set on the idea that what happened was entirely his fault and that since Mary was “very regretful”, he forgave her and insisted that we had to do the same.
[ Note: by “we” I mean everyone except myself. Lucas never treated me as part of the group. He simply accepted my presence because Ryan wanted me there. But whenever he initiated anything with the group I was never invited. At the time, he was DMing an entire D&D campaign with everyone else but me, despite my having been in the group since 2016. So from now on I’ll refer to the three people he always talked to - Ryan, Ella and Dan - as RED. They always updated me every time something happened so that's how I know these next parts. ]
At this point RED already wanted nothing to do with Mary, given what they knew and also knowing what a horrible person Mary had been to Lucas. In an attempt to manipulate them, Mary orchestrated a Discord call where Lucas was supposed to be alone, but when RED joined Mary was there as well.
Mary tried to play the victim, beginning by saying some cringe-worthy statements like “Call me a whore, I deserve it…” and, seeing it wasn’t working, she shifted back to blaming Lucas.
Dan and Ella were firm on their opinion of Mary, so Lucas called them narrow-minded because they “could not understand them”.
The call was overall painfully awkward.
I just want to make a little note about the state of Lucas and Mary’s relationship up to this point. Mary and Lucas were living together at Lucas’ apartment, along with their two cats. Having saved for years, Lucas had accumulated a decent sum of money in his bank account, so he had a nice stable environment to offer.
Mary was still a student. According to Lucas, she struggled to concentrate on her studies, attempting to pass the same exam for the last two years and failing numerous times. “You have to understand”, said Lucas, “she cannot concentrate enough. Too many distractions at home. She has to take a bus to get to the library, so she prefers to study at home”.
Mary wasn't employed and had no intention of working at the time.
Back to the story.
The subsequent months were insane. RED constantly got into calls with Lucas, in tears, telling them the new horrible thing Mary did to him that week. Here’s a little list of the most heinous acts Mary committed:

• One night Lucas called at 1 AM to see if anyone was up. Only Ryan was available. Lucas told him he just wanted some company. During the call Ryan heard loud splashing in the background and inquired about it. Lucas explained he had to drive to the beach, under heavy pouring rain (it was almost winter), because Mary had asked him to leave so she could “have some privacy to stay on the phone with Sam”. He complied.
• Mary decided to try out both relationships at the same time, with Lucas being fully aware of this (even though he was not okay with it), and also having to be her confidant for her relationship with Sam. She shared every detail with Lucas, and he always listened.
• Mary regularly asked Lucas to drive her to Sam’s place, which is a 20-minute drive. She mostly saw Sam for intercourse. Lucas drove her every time.
• During one of those drives, after being with Sam, Mary cried in the car with Lucas. She complained about Sam getting jealous and resenting their current arrangement.
• Mary took Lucas to meet Sam at one of their band practices. Lucas later said to RED: “I can’t seem to hate him, no matter what”.
• Mary faked a suicide attempt to get pity from Lucas since they were fighting a lot and she was “scared Lucas was going to leave her”. Her words.
• RED suggested therapy for Mary after a while, but she manipulated her way into couples therapy after discussing it with Lucas. Mary also chose the therapist. The few sessions that took place were filled with Mary’s rants about Sam being her soulmate and Lucas not doing enough for her. The therapist, who was a friend of Mary’s family, seemed somewhat biased, suggesting that Lucas needed to “meet Mary halfway”.

You’d think this could be enough to break any man. Not our Lucas. He was in love.
DECEMBER 2022
December arrived, marking the time to organize the yearly group reunion.
Lucas was insistent on having Mary invited to Dan and Ella’s house. We chose the place particularly to avoid seeing Mary. But Mary wanted so much to “repair” her relationship with us, so she instructed Lucas to call RED.
The call was supposed to be between RED and Lucas only. But while Mary wasn't logged inside the call, she was there, beside Lucas. She was listening the whole time and telling Lucas exactly what to say. RED noticed by the way Lucas was speaking, so out of character, with noticeable pauses before each sentence.
The gist of it was that Mary wanted to spend New Year’s Eve with us because she enjoyed spending time with us. Flattery wasn’t working so she told Lucas to say: “Why is it so important to you guys? Why do you care if she did what she did? It’s my relationship, you guys don’t have a say in it”.
That made their (and mine) decision even simpler. Lucas had to come alone or not come at all. Also RED asked that Mary at least apologize before even considering meeting her again sometime in the future.
Meanwhile Dan encouraged Ryan to open up to Lucas about the harassment. Ryan agreed, so Dan called Lucas and explained everything.
Lucas didn’t seem very receptive to the idea of Mary harassing Ryan for some reason (cheating yes, bullying of course, but anything else seemed implausible, apparently). He decided to confront Mary that night and find out. Mary, of course, denied everything. Her reasoning shifted from “I don’t remember” to “I was too drunk and lost control” to “I don’t even like Ryan”. He believed her.
After that, Mary reached out to RED creating a new group chat, in which she basically said she was sorry, she was devastated to find out RED thought of her that way, and that she had no memory of any harassment or weird behavior towards Ryan. She cooked up a bunch of excuses and justifications for her actions while also denying said actions. No sincerity in those words whatsoever, we could all tell (of course RED updated me and shared the entire conversation with me). Dan and Ella responded but Ryan kept to himself.
When we all met for the last week of the year at Ella and Dan’s place, Lucas came alone. We all managed to give him some input without having it being utterly poisoned by Mary’s gaslighting. It was almost as if he was hearing our words for the first time.
I also had the chance to talk to Lucas about everything, finally.
He heard me out, patiently listening to my version of the facts (pre-Sam) and looked shocked as I recounted the bathroom incident from my perspective.
Over the course of the next few days, we had extensive conversations with Lucas, and he ultimately reached the decision to end his relationship with Mary once he returned home.
JANUARY to MARCH 2023
So when Lucas came back Mary was waiting for him at his house. He ended the relationship on the spot.
Mary put on a whole show: she cried, she begged, she put on their song and sang along. Lucas stuck to his decision.
For a month. They were back together by the first week of February.
During that month apart from Lucas, Mary started a serious relationship with Sam. And that was when we learned a little bit more about him. Lucas told us that Sam was in his forties - nothing wrong with that per se. He was divorced with a kid in first grade and he had a bit of a reputation with Mary’s family.
Sam had known Mary's family for years. They also knew why Sam and his ex wife split up - apparently he beat her. So understandably, Mary’s family was opposed to Mary getting with Sam.
We know very little about what is true and what is not but I tend to believe the ex-wife personally.
Some red flags were uncovered during that month. First, he became very jealous. He didn’t want Mary to have anything to do with Lucas (great, good riddance) as he believed Lucas was trying his best to “lure her back into his arms”. I don't know if that was true, but from what Lucas was telling us he had no intention of "disrupting their relationship" at that time.
One night, Mary came out as bisexual to Sam and he didn’t like it. After dinner they apparently went a little wild in bed and Mary called Lucas to tell him Sam hit her during the act.
Of course Lucas told her to come back immediately (and good on him, in my opinion).
Of course Mary had lied again. A week or so after coming back to Lucas, Mary told Lucas it was only a light slap; she and Sam used to moderately smack each other in bed, and that time Sam hit her a little stronger than usual and she got scared. I sincerely hope she didn’t change version just to reassure Lucas, but who knows with her.
In February Lucas and Mary were back together. Lucas wrote on our group chat (I was finally included yay), that he hoped we would all understand and accept his decision. We told him we still didn’t like Mary and would not attend anything if she was there. Lucas expressed he was hurt and the group chat fell silent for a month.
We all gave Lucas some space since he also told us he needed time to think.
There was a little pregnancy scare after a while: Mary was late and she decided that even if it was Sam’s, she would raise the baby with Lucas “because she loved him more”. Of course Lucas was overjoyed at that prospect. When it turned out it was a false alarm, Lucas told me he was “pretty disappointed Mary wasn’t really pregnant”.
Lucas wrote again in March. He was disappointed in the lack of interest we showed for his life lately, asking why nobody wrote anything - even though he was the one telling us he needed space. Lucas wrote a long message, in which he once again said that he believed Mary and that what Mary did to Ryan “wasn’t so bad after all”. Lucas also said that he didn’t understand why we were being so hateful about Mary.
Lucas then proceeded to discuss in length with Ryan and Dan that Mary’s actions were only driven by innocence and clumsiness rather than depravity.
For example, she wasn’t spying on Ryan. She was just trying to check if someone was in the bathroom since she noticed light coming from the keyhole.
This led to a big discussion, where I repeated once again what I clearly saw. Ryan was just hurt and decided then and there that Lucas was no longer his friend.
DECEMBER 2023
Months later, Lucas wrote again in the group chat. He said he wanted to give us a call to state once and for all what we wanted to do with this friendship. Dan ended up being the only one calling Lucas to give him a chance to explain.
Lucas told Dan he was hurt and confused about the whole situation and, when the topic came up, Lucas went ahead to describe yet another version of what happened in front of that bathroom door two years prior.
The new bathroom incident 3.0 was now involving Mary and Anna both at the door, without me. Mary, still drunk, was “checking if anyone was inside” by looking through the keyhole, and while she was doing so she regained clarity enough to come running to my room (where I still was, apparently) and tell me, out of the purity of her heart, what she had done.
Of course, Lucas believed her, even though it was a whole new story. I can’t even imagine what she told him to justify her other actions. I don’t really care at this point. I just want nothing to do with both of them. And Ryan feels the same way.
Lucas also sent a fake apology message to Dan and Ella (the usual “I’m sorry BUT…” kind). Nothing for me or Ryan though.
All Ryan wanted was Lucas’ sincere apologies. He went as far as telling Lucas directly. Ryan didn’t even receive a fake apology like Dan or Ella. Dan is trying to mend back the scraps of this friendship, but I think it’s too late. Lucas is trying to get Ryan on a call to “resolve this conflict”, but he is still justifying everything Mary did to him and to Ryan. Nothing we could say can change his view at this point.
If anyone was wondering, I’m still not even in the picture in Lucas’ apology plan. I don’t want any apology, since even a sincere one would not erase all that happened. I could not trust Lucas or Mary ever again.
That’s all for now. It was a very weird couple of years.
I’m sorry for the length of this story. It was very tiring to piece it up together, remembering everything, organizing facts and stories, asking everyone to fill in my blanks where I didn’t have all the facts. Also translating everything and checking each paragraph for errors with the help of ChatGPT took a lot of time.
There might be another update since Lucas and Mary are still together, but honestly, I hope not.

Literally cried like a child when I woke up
So can anyone help me understand/ interpret this nightmare I had. So it starts off with me back in high school (I'm currently 23), so it's the end of the day and there's 2 busses leaving to take students home, but i'm thinking "my mom is supposed to fetch me, so I'll wait for her" (this was the reality when I was in high-school). So I go to the parking spot in front of the school and I don't see her or her car...so I text her, she says she'll be late and I'll have to wait. So as I'm waiting I get this creepy vibe all of the sudden, I'm alone in this school, most kids left...definitely an eerie vibe. So I'm in the school assembly room and someone locks all the doors,locking me in. Eventually I get out. My mom still making excuses and still not showing up, then I find a bunch of random kids and they're the kind your parents don't want you being friends with. But I didn't wanna be alone anymore. So I stick around. Turns out this one guy Literally locks other students up in tiny rooms and tortures them. He almost does the same with me but somehow I convinced him not to. He does start getting extremely touchy though, to the point where it's basically assault. I run away and another bus comes to pick up kids. But again I have Faith my mom is coming or already here. The bus leaves. I go to the parking lot she's not there. So at this point I decide I'm gonna Uber home. I get into my Uber and at first everything is okay, i send my mom a voice note saying I'm on my way home, and I read some more of her excuses. I'm exhausted at this point and just glad to be going home. But of course all of the sudden I get a creepy vibe from the Uber guy, he literally takes a charging cable and starts strangling me, as he's strangling me and I'm trying to kick the windows out he starts groping/ assaulting me. I wake up still feeling anxious and scared and I literally start crying like a child.

I’m worried about getting fired because I’m a competent and responsible preschool teacher who worries about the safety of the students I care for. My boss has a vendetta against me and used my medical history (adhd) against me when I was first hired. Today two children were discussing stabbing each other on the bus. I listened in and the argument evolved into calling each other’s mothers so that the mothers could slap each other…
Anyway, the thing that worries me is that the child who stabbed the other with a pencil, has stabbed plenty of other things in our classroom. They bites and punches and kicks other children and has groped teachers and other female students. Now this child mentioned THIS MORNING, that they had a knife at home… so of course I told the lead teacher and together we wrote an email to tell their parents.
I ran it by the school’s principal to make sure it was worded correctly and they told us to call my boss and have her make phone calls…
When we called her she told us to downplay the situation to parents and said “boys will be boys…” “they were probably playing cops and robbers”…
I have more to say but I’m so incredibly angry and upset about not being listened to or taken seriously. I don’t want to get stabbed. What should I do.

Written by Patrick Ferrymoor
Branches swayed as a light chill engulfed. No-one was visible to the eye, but you could hear people faintly. It was Halloween night, and most were out having fun… except — for 24-year-old Sarah Linock
She sat within the confines of the bus stop shelter, which resided on a short rural road. She had just finished her eight-hour-shift at the local petrol station, a mile’s walk from the bus stop. Sarah’s brunette hair flickered gently — her left foot tapped repeatedly. The bus was five minutes late.
She glanced down at her phone —
9:05pm.
She sighed, rolling her big brown eyes. This was the third time this had happen within the week. All she had to keep her company was the orange leaves that scattered the ground, and the pub that resided half a mile away. The whistling air brought her just a smidge of comfort.
Sarah turned her head left to see a car driving in her direction. It beeped it’s horn, and gradually slowed down. The driver’s window lowered.
“Hey, fancy a lift, love ?” the girl shouted as she and her friend in the passenger seat giggled.
The driver was dressed as a nurse, and her friend a slutty clown. It was pretty clear both were under the influence of something. Alcohol? drugs? both? It was hard to tell.
“Oh, never mind then!” the driver laughed as she slammed her foot on the accelerator. Not even so much as giving Sarah a chance to respond.
The fumes from the car cornered her in the bus shelter.
“idiots,” Sarah said under her breath.
A part of her envied girls like that. She so wished she could be as care-free as them, but it just wasn’t in her nature. She hated the fact that she was so sensitive — so insecure. Her negative opinion of herself had been holding her back for most of her life. Sarah was completely unaware of her attractive qualities, and what she was capable of bringing to the table.
It had been a rough couple of months: Breaking up with her boyfriend of five years, along with financial struggles and toxic family drama. Sarah’s life was in a mega-rut, and her head was firmly planted in the sand.
Sarah’s eyes closed. The environmental whispers amplified. She took a deep breath — her eyes opened upon hearing a chirp from her phone.
“Happy Spooks Brat! Don’t be too boring tonight!” The text read from a contact named Bro Denny
She replied.
“Fuck you buck teeth lmao.”
Sarah’s ears picked up on relentless crunching. Her eyes darted right: A man approached. Silver headphones with minuscule wear and tear rested on his head. Plastic full-rimmed square glasses covered his blue eyes. He was casually good-looking. Textured navy zip-up cardigan, slim-fit black chino trousers, and a very peculiar pair of boots.
They were obnoxiously orange, having a similar texture to that of pumpkin skin. A visual not so easy on the eye — however, Sarah couldn’t look away. She had never seen such an unusual pair of boots. She almost respected the ballsiness to even wear them out in public.
The man entered the shelter, sitting down on the bench. There was a reasonable gap between he and Sarah. She could mildly hear the song that played in his headphones. It rung a bell for her, but she couldn’t quite remember what it was.
The man turned to Sarah, she quickly looked away. She felt slightly uncomfortable knowing that he was now looking at her. The man then focused straight ahead, sliding the headphones down his neck. He began running his fingers thoroughly through his dark brown, Ivy League hair.
“Late again, huh?” he said out-loud.
Sarah acknowledged his comment, turning.
“Oh never mind us, freezing our arses off.”
Sarah laughed.
“Well, to be fair it’s not that cold, but still,” he continued.
Sarah half smiled while nodding her head.
“Nick,” he said, going for a handshake.
“Sarah,” she replied, awkwardly reciprocating.
“So, have you been waiting long then, Sarah ?”
“Long enough.”
“I assume you’re… on your way home from work ?”
“You assumed right, Nick.”
“I work the night shifts myself. I suppose there are worse jobs than wondering around a mostly empty warehouse.”
“Sounds fun,” Sarah said.
“It has its perks,” laughed Nick.
“What do you do, Sarah ?”
Just as she was about to answer — they were both distracted, by two men wearing matching demonic skull masks, driving motorbikes.
“YEH!!! IT’S HALLOWEEN YA CUNTS!” yelled out one of the riders.
The motorbikes then sped down the road. The men screamed at the top of their lungs as they both did wheelies.
“Don’t you just hate vermin like that ?” said Nick.
“Vermin is a bit strong, but… yeh!” Sarah responded.
“Grown arse men, acting like snotty teens. It’s fucking embarrassing. Pathetic!”
Sarah couldn’t have agreed more.
Nick appeared somewhat flustered.
“I’ve been dealing with people like that my whole life. They sicken me… fucking sicken me!”
“You shouldn’t let them get to you, ya know,” Sarah said.
“I know, but they just frustrate me so much. Like, who do they think they are ? I…“ Nick sighed — a few seconds of silence then passed.
“Anyway, anyway,” he said motioning his hands.
“Like I was saying… where do you work, Sarah ?”
“At the petrol station just up there,” she pointed.
“I know the place, it’s… seen better days. Do you actually like working there ?”
“Um… it pays the bills, so…”
“I get ya, I get ya,” Nick said.
“I’m just gonna say this, and you can tell me to fuck right off if you want to, but… I think you’re too bloody pretty to be working at some petrol station.”
Sarah’s eyes fluttered, her cheeks flushed.
“Oh shut up!”
“No I’m serious, I mean… you’re a sort, Sarah.”
Sarah shook her head, laughing.
“It’s true!” Nick laughed back.
In that moment, both made heavy eye-contact. Sarah couldn’t help but be captivated by this mysterious man wearing the ugliest pair of boots she had ever seen.
“You’re… quite the charmer, Nick.”
“Well when you’ve practiced as much as I have in the mirror, I mean…“
“Well you’ve become quite the pro.”
“Why thank you, Sarah. I do appreciate it.”
Both continued to laugh at what now had become a ridiculous conversation.
Then, familiar sounds returned. Faint screaming emerged from the distance —the masked men were approaching.
“Here we fucking go,” mumbled Nick.
“Oi! Danny! The fuckers are still here,” the secondary rider said.
The front motorbike reduced its speed, eventually coming to a full stop. The other did the same.
The front rider wearing the black and yellow leather jacket removed his mask. His buddy in the brown body warmer opted to keep his on.
“Aw… you still waiting for your bus ? Fucking hilarious!”
“Mase, this is too sad,” laughed the man in the brown body warmer.
“Fuck it, Let’s get to know the cunts, Danny boy,” said Mase.
Nick stared daggers.
“What the fuck are you looking at, specky four eyes?!”
Nick didn’t budge.
Mase unzipped his jacket, and threw it at his motorbike.
“I said, what the fuck, are you looking at?!” he said shoving Nick’s forehead.
He then ripped the headphones from Nick’s neck. He dropped them, and proceeded to stomp rapidly.
“You like that, huh ?! You like that fuckface ?!” laughed Mase.
“I hope they weren’t a fortune, mate.”
Danny approached Sarah.
“Well, aren’t you a little fox”, he said, licking his cracked lips.
“Fuck off!” said sarah.
Danny grabbed her by the forearm, smirking as he did so.
“Mouthy, Mouthy,” he said.
’I’m gonna have to teach you a lesson now, slutbag.”
Mase watched on laughing.
“Go on, Danny! Show her who’s king!”
Mase looked back at Nick — he immediately felt something sharp slice against his face. He instinctively backed away, groping his left cheek. His hand, was covered in blood.
Nick held a black coated pocket knife. Beyond the lenses, his eyes displayed a look of harmful intent. Mase chose to keep up the tough guy act.
“COME ON THEN, SPECKY!” he roared.
Danny rushed toward Nick — he got a knife in the stomach for his troubles. Nick yanked the knife out of the gut.
“The cunt stabbed me, Mase! He fucking stabbed me!” Danny cried as he dropped to his knees.
Sarah looked on, big-eyed.
Mase moved forward with no common sense thought. Nick pointed the knife at the oncoming — it pierced right into Mase’s chubby Adam’s apple.
Both hands clutched his neck. He stumbled backward and collapsed onto the leaves. Nick sauntered toward him.
He stood over Mase. Blood poured out between his fingers. His eyes were draining of life — and fast!
Nick began penetrating the flesh of Mase. No part of him was safe.
Sarah winced with each stab. She looked away, but her ears continued to absorb every sound of flesh being violated.
Nick stopped upon realising stillness had overcome Mase. He turned his attention to Danny.
“PLEASE!” he screamed, guarding his wounded gut.
“I fucking beg of you! Leave me alone! please!”
Nick removed Danny’s mask. He grabbed him by his shaggy, dirty blonde hair, and positioned him to face Sarah.
“I dare you… DARE YOU, to call her slutbag again. I FUCKING… DARE YOU!”
“I’m sorry… I’m fucking sorry!”
“Didn’t quite catch that, Danny! Say it louder… GO ON! SAY IT! SAY IT!”
“I SAID I’M SORRY! PLEASE!”
Tears flowed from Sarah, she was frozen.
“You people, make me… sick!” Nick whispered in Danny’s ear.
He released his grip. Danny fell face first at Sarah’s feet.
“I’m sorry! Please… help!” Danny muttered.
Sarah let out a deafening scream — as the knife plunged into his back! Nick’s face was beaming. Sarah’s body shivered at the sounds of Danny’s cries. His vocal performance getting weaker and weaker.
“NOW WHO’S THE CUNT?! HUH ?! HUH ?!TELL ME, WHO’S THE FUCKING CUNT, DANNY BOY?!” screamed Nick.
The knife entered Danny’s back again — and again — and again. Mercy, didn’t linger anywhere near here.
Nick grabbed him by the hair and propped him up to face Sarah once more. The blade found its way in front of Danny’s throat. It pressed itself against the skin. His eyes vibrated weakly.
“Please… please,” said Danny in a barley passable voice — then — SLICE!
Danny gasped, he shook, but then he collapsed once again at Sarah’s feet. Nick turned his head. His eyes closed. Silence, hovered over this massacre.
“Why can’t they leave me alone ?” Nick whimpered as he put the bloodied knife back inside the inner pocket of his cardigan.
“All I want is peace. it’s… all I’ve ever wanted.”
Nick stared back at Sarah, teary-eyed.
“WHEN WILL IT EVER END? WHEN? I’M FUCKING TIRED!”
Nick wiped the tame tears away. He glanced downward. He dipped both palms into a mini blood-pool. Nick entered the bus shelter, and approached the frontal glass. He leisurely smeared its appearance with redness. Nick stood back, gripping both sides of his neck, and chuckled.
“I just… have to laugh at it all. Do you know what I mean? Like… what else can I do ?”
Sarah’s bottom lip quivered.
“Are you, ok… Sarah ?”
Sarah couldn’t look him in the eye. Her vision was firmly locked on his hideous boots.
“I understand I… really do,” Nick said.
“People like you and me, were just meant to suffer. It’s not fucking fair. Nothing about it is fair, but, that’s just the way it is, I suppose.”
He tittered.
“That’s just… the way… it… is!”

White or light skinned woman is going undercover as a sex worker. I can't remember if she was a detective or a regular person trying to get revenge for something. She might have been sexually abused or trafficked in the past. Maybe she was trying to rescue someone who was being trafficked? She has a long ponytail as part of her disguise. She gets on a bus with other sex workers to go to a sex party and a few people on her side tail the bus in a car as backup in case something goes wrong. The party is dark and mostly populated by old men. One of them, possibly someone who she had history with, starts to grope her and she kills him without anyone noticing. I think she was drugged before she got on the bus and there were visual effects suggesting an altered state of consciousness. I think I remember her going through an upstairs window or door to escape. There might have been a fight scene. I watched it in the late 2010s and I think it was recent when I watched it. I keep thinking it was Killing Eve but it doesn't fit with the plot as far as I remember.

This happened many years ago when I was in high school. A friend of mine and I took a bus home in the evening. The bus pretty full - all the seats were taken and a few people were standing. The ride was uneventful... until this short, skinny guy stood right next to my seat. He held a folded news-paper (I told you this was a long time ago!) over the front of his pants, and stood in such a way that when he moved the news-paper I could see his dingle dangle. My friend who was sitting next to me was looking out of the window oblivious of the whole event. For a second I cringed and felt embarrassed... Then thought: "Why am I embarrassed when HE's the one with his privates in public?" So I laughed and said in a loud voice so the whole bus could hear: "Oh! Wow!! Look at that! This guy here wants everyone to admire his family jewels... Just ask him to move the news-paper a bit"
Everyone turned to look at him. Some people made comments, others were yelling at him to get the H out. If he could, he'd have loved to automatically retract his dangling dingle into his pants - alas, this was not humanly possible, so he hurried and got off the at next bus stop - dingle expose to the elements flimsily covered by some folded news-paper.
This taught me to always be vocal and call out creeps who take advantage of a crowd to grope or whatever. I did notice as I grew older that I was never singled out this way anymore. Turns out the weasels know whom to intimidate and make uncomfortable.

Written by Patrick Ferrymoor
Branches swayed as a light chill engulfed. No-one was visible to the eye, but you could hear people faintly. It was Halloween night, and most were out having fun… except — for 24-year-old Sarah Linock
She sat within the confines of the bus stop shelter, which resided on a short rural road. She had just finished her eight-hour-shift at the local petrol station, a mile’s walk from the bus stop. Sarah’s brunette hair flickered gently — her left foot tapped repeatedly. The bus was five minutes late.
She glanced down at her phone —
9:05pm.
She sighed, rolling her big brown eyes. This was the third time this had happen within the week. All she had to keep her company was the orange leaves that scattered the ground, and the pub that resided half a mile away. The whistling air brought her just a smidge of comfort.
Sarah turned her head left to see a car driving in her direction. It beeped it’s horn, and gradually slowed down. The driver’s window lowered.
“Hey, fancy a lift, love ?” the girl shouted as she and her friend in the passenger seat giggled.
The driver was dressed as a nurse, and her friend a slutty clown. It was pretty clear both were under the influence of something. Alcohol? drugs? both? It was hard to tell.
“Oh, never mind then!” the driver laughed as she slammed her foot on the accelerator. Not even so much as giving Sarah a chance to respond.
The fumes from the car cornered her in the bus shelter.
“idiots,” Sarah said under her breath.
A part of her envied girls like that. She so wished she could be as care-free as them, but it just wasn’t in her nature. She hated the fact that she was so sensitive — so insecure. Her negative opinion of herself had been holding her back for most of her life. Sarah was completely unaware of her attractive qualities, and what she was capable of bringing to the table.
It had been a rough couple of months: Breaking up with her boyfriend of five years, along with financial struggles and toxic family drama. Sarah’s life was in a mega-rut, and her head was firmly planted in the sand.
Sarah’s eyes closed. The environmental whispers amplified. She took a deep breath — her eyes opened upon hearing a chirp from her phone.
“Happy Spooks Brat! Don’t be too boring tonight!” The text read from a contact named Bro Denny
She replied.
“Fuck you buck teeth lmao.”
Sarah’s ears picked up on relentless crunching. Her eyes darted right: A man approached. Silver headphones with minuscule wear and tear rested on his head. Plastic full-rimmed square glasses covered his blue eyes. He was casually good-looking. Textured navy zip-up cardigan, slim-fit black chino trousers, and a very peculiar pair of boots.
They were obnoxiously orange, having a similar texture to that of pumpkin skin. A visual not so easy on the eye — however, Sarah couldn’t look away. She had never seen such an unusual pair of boots. She almost respected the ballsiness to even wear them out in public.
The man entered the shelter, sitting down on the bench. There was a reasonable gap between he and Sarah. She could mildly hear the song that played in his headphones. It rung a bell for her, but she couldn’t quite remember what it was.
The man turned to Sarah, she quickly looked away. She felt slightly uncomfortable knowing that he was now looking at her. The man then focused straight ahead, sliding the headphones down his neck. He began running his fingers thoroughly through his dark brown, Ivy League hair.
“Late again, huh?” he said out-loud.
Sarah acknowledged his comment, turning.
“Oh never mind us, freezing our arses off.”
Sarah laughed.
“Well, to be fair it’s not that cold, but still,” he continued.
Sarah half smiled while nodding her head.
“Nick,” he said, going for a handshake.
“Sarah,” she replied, awkwardly reciprocating.
“So, have you been waiting long then, Sarah ?”
“Long enough.”
“I assume you’re… on your way home from work ?”
“You assumed right, Nick.”
“I work the night shifts myself. I suppose there are worse jobs than wondering around a mostly empty warehouse.”
“Sounds fun,” Sarah said.
“It has its perks,” laughed Nick.
“What do you do, Sarah ?”
Just as she was about to answer — they were both distracted, by two men wearing matching demonic skull masks, driving motorbikes.
“YEH!!! IT’S HALLOWEEN YA CUNTS!” yelled out one of the riders.
The motorbikes then sped down the road. The men screamed at the top of their lungs as they both did wheelies.
“Don’t you just hate vermin like that ?” said Nick.
“Vermin is a bit strong, but… yeh!” Sarah responded.
“Grown arse men, acting like snotty teens. It’s fucking embarrassing. Pathetic!”
Sarah couldn’t have agreed more.
Nick appeared somewhat flustered.
“I’ve been dealing with people like that my whole life. They sicken me… fucking sicken me!”
“You shouldn’t let them get to you, ya know,” Sarah said.
“I know, but they just frustrate me so much. Like, who do they think they are ? I…“ Nick sighed — a few seconds of silence then passed.
“Anyway, anyway,” he said motioning his hands.
“Like I was saying… where do you work, Sarah ?”
“At the petrol station just up there,” she pointed.
“I know the place, it’s… seen better days. Do you actually like working there ?”
“Um… it pays the bills, so…”
“I get ya, I get ya,” Nick said.
“I’m just gonna say this, and you can tell me to fuck right off if you want to, but… I think you’re too bloody pretty to be working at some petrol station.”
Sarah’s eyes fluttered, her cheeks flushed.
“Oh shut up!”
“No I’m serious, I mean… you’re a sort, Sarah.”
Sarah shook her head, laughing.
“It’s true!” Nick laughed back.
In that moment, both made heavy eye-contact. Sarah couldn’t help but be captivated by this mysterious man wearing the ugliest pair of boots she had ever seen.
“You’re… quite the charmer, Nick.”
“Well when you’ve practiced as much as I have in the mirror, I mean…“
“Well you’ve become quite the pro.”
“Why thank you, Sarah. I do appreciate it.”
Both continued to laugh at what now had become a ridiculous conversation.
Then, familiar sounds returned. Faint screaming emerged from the distance —the masked men were approaching.
“Here we fucking go,” mumbled Nick.
“Oi! Danny! The fuckers are still here,” the secondary rider said.
The front motorbike reduced its speed, eventually coming to a full stop. The other did the same.
The front rider wearing the black and yellow leather jacket removed his mask. His buddy in the brown body warmer opted to keep his on.
“Aw… you still waiting for your bus ? Fucking hilarious!”
“Mase, this is too sad,” laughed the man in the brown body warmer.
“Fuck it, Let’s get to know the cunts, Danny boy,” said Mase.
Nick stared daggers.
“What the fuck are you looking at, specky four eyes?!”
Nick didn’t budge.
Mase unzipped his jacket, and threw it at his motorbike.
“I said, what the fuck, are you looking at?!” he said shoving Nick’s forehead.
He then ripped the headphones from Nick’s neck. He dropped them, and proceeded to stomp rapidly.
“You like that, huh ?! You like that fuckface ?!” laughed Mase.
“I hope they weren’t a fortune, mate.”
Danny approached Sarah.
“Well, aren’t you a little fox”, he said, licking his cracked lips.
“Fuck off!” said sarah.
Danny grabbed her by the forearm, smirking as he did so.
“Mouthy, Mouthy,” he said.
’I’m gonna have to teach you a lesson now, slutbag.”
Mase watched on laughing.
“Go on, Danny! Show her who’s king!”
Mase looked back at Nick — he immediately felt something sharp slice against his face. He instinctively backed away, groping his left cheek. His hand, was covered in blood.
Nick held a black coated pocket knife. Beyond the lenses, his eyes displayed a look of harmful intent. Mase chose to keep up the tough guy act.
“COME ON THEN, SPECKY!” he roared.
Danny rushed toward Nick — he got a knife in the stomach for his troubles. Nick yanked the knife out of the gut.
“The cunt stabbed me, Mase! He fucking stabbed me!” Danny cried as he dropped to his knees.
Sarah looked on, big-eyed.
Mase moved forward with no common sense thought. Nick pointed the knife at the oncoming — it pierced right into Mase’s chubby Adam’s apple.
Both hands clutched his neck. He stumbled backward and collapsed onto the leaves. Nick sauntered toward him.
He stood over Mase. Blood poured out between his fingers. His eyes were draining of life — and fast!
Nick began penetrating the flesh of Mase. No part of him was safe.
Sarah winced with each stab. She looked away, but her ears continued to absorb every sound of flesh being violated.
Nick stopped upon realising stillness had overcome Mase. He turned his attention to Danny.
“PLEASE!” he screamed, guarding his wounded gut.
“I fucking beg of you! Leave me alone! please!”
Nick removed Danny’s mask. He grabbed him by his shaggy, dirty blonde hair, and positioned him to face Sarah.
“I dare you… DARE YOU, to call her slutbag again. I FUCKING… DARE YOU!”
“I’m sorry… I’m fucking sorry!”
“Didn’t quite catch that, Danny! Say it louder… GO ON! SAY IT! SAY IT!”
“I SAID I’M SORRY! PLEASE!”
Tears flowed from Sarah, she was frozen.
“You people, make me… sick!” Nick whispered in Danny’s ear.
He released his grip. Danny fell face first at Sarah’s feet.
“I’m sorry! Please… help!” Danny muttered.
Sarah let out a deafening scream — as the knife plunged into his back! Nick’s face was beaming. Sarah’s body shivered at the sounds of Danny’s cries. His vocal performance getting weaker and weaker.
“NOW WHO’S THE CUNT?! HUH ?! HUH ?!TELL ME, WHO’S THE FUCKING CUNT, DANNY BOY?!” screamed Nick.
The knife entered Danny’s back again — and again — and again. Mercy, didn’t linger anywhere near here.
Nick grabbed him by the hair and propped him up to face Sarah once more. The blade found its way in front of Danny’s throat. It pressed itself against the skin. His eyes vibrated weakly.
“Please… please,” said Danny in a barley passable voice — then — SLICE!
Danny gasped, he shook, but then he collapsed once again at Sarah’s feet. Nick turned his head. His eyes closed. Silence, hovered over this massacre.
“Why can’t they leave me alone ?” Nick whimpered as he put the bloodied knife back inside the inner pocket of his cardigan.
“All I want is peace. it’s… all I’ve ever wanted.”
Nick stared back at Sarah, teary-eyed.
“WHEN WILL IT EVER END? WHEN? I’M FUCKING TIRED!”
Nick wiped the tame tears away. He glanced downward. He dipped both palms into a mini blood-pool. Nick entered the bus shelter, and approached the frontal glass. He leisurely smeared its appearance with redness. Nick stood back, gripping both sides of his neck, and chuckled.
“I just… have to laugh at it all. Do you know what I mean? Like… what else can I do ?”
Sarah’s bottom lip quivered.
“Are you, ok… Sarah ?”
Sarah couldn’t look him in the eye. Her vision was firmly locked on his hideous boots.
“I understand I… really do,” Nick said.
“People like you and me, were just meant to suffer. It’s not fucking fair. Nothing about it is fair, but, that’s just the way it is, I suppose.”
He tittered.
“That’s just… the way… it… is!”

Written by Patrick Ferrymoor
Branches swayed as a light chill engulfed. No-one was visible to the eye, but you could hear people faintly. It was Halloween night, and most were out having fun… except — for 24-year-old Sarah Linock
She sat within the confines of the bus stop shelter, which resided on a short rural road. She had just finished her eight-hour-shift at the local petrol station, a mile’s walk from the bus stop. Sarah’s brunette hair flickered gently — her left foot tapped repeatedly. The bus was five minutes late.
She glanced down at her phone —
9:05pm.
She sighed, rolling her big brown eyes. This was the third time this had happen within the week. All she had to keep her company was the orange leaves that scattered the ground, and the pub that resided half a mile away. The whistling air brought her just a smidge of comfort.
Sarah turned her head left to see a car driving in her direction. It beeped it’s horn, and gradually slowed down. The driver’s window lowered.
“Hey, fancy a lift, love ?” the girl shouted as she and her friend in the passenger seat giggled.
The driver was dressed as a nurse, and her friend a slutty clown. It was pretty clear both were under the influence of something. Alcohol? drugs? both? It was hard to tell.
“Oh, never mind then!” the driver laughed as she slammed her foot on the accelerator. Not even so much as giving Sarah a chance to respond.
The fumes from the car cornered her in the bus shelter.
“idiots,” Sarah said under her breath.
A part of her envied girls like that. She so wished she could be as care-free as them, but it just wasn’t in her nature. She hated the fact that she was so sensitive — so insecure. Her negative opinion of herself had been holding her back for most of her life. Sarah was completely unaware of her attractive qualities, and what she was capable of bringing to the table.
It had been a rough couple of months: Breaking up with her boyfriend of five years, along with financial struggles and toxic family drama. Sarah’s life was in a mega-rut, and her head was firmly planted in the sand.
Sarah’s eyes closed. The environmental whispers amplified. She took a deep breath — her eyes opened upon hearing a chirp from her phone.
“Happy Spooks Brat! Don’t be too boring tonight!” The text read from a contact named Bro Denny
She replied.
“Fuck you buck teeth lmao.”
Sarah’s ears picked up on relentless crunching. Her eyes darted right: A man approached. Silver headphones with minuscule wear and tear rested on his head. Plastic full-rimmed square glasses covered his blue eyes. He was casually good-looking. Textured navy zip-up cardigan, slim-fit black chino trousers, and a very peculiar pair of boots.
They were obnoxiously orange, having a similar texture to that of pumpkin skin. A visual not so easy on the eye — however, Sarah couldn’t look away. She had never seen such an unusual pair of boots. She almost respected the ballsiness to even wear them out in public.
The man entered the shelter, sitting down on the bench. There was a reasonable gap between he and Sarah. She could mildly hear the song that played in his headphones. It rung a bell for her, but she couldn’t quite remember what it was.
The man turned to Sarah, she quickly looked away. She felt slightly uncomfortable knowing that he was now looking at her. The man then focused straight ahead, sliding the headphones down his neck. He began running his fingers thoroughly through his dark brown, Ivy League hair.
“Late again, huh?” he said out-loud.
Sarah acknowledged his comment, turning.
“Oh never mind us, freezing our arses off.”
Sarah laughed.
“Well, to be fair it’s not that cold, but still,” he continued.
Sarah half smiled while nodding her head.
“Nick,” he said, going for a handshake.
“Sarah,” she replied, awkwardly reciprocating.
“So, have you been waiting long then, Sarah ?”
“Long enough.”
“I assume you’re… on your way home from work ?”
“You assumed right, Nick.”
“I work the night shifts myself. I suppose there are worse jobs than wondering around a mostly empty warehouse.”
“Sounds fun,” Sarah said.
“It has its perks,” laughed Nick.
“What do you do, Sarah ?”
Just as she was about to answer — they were both distracted, by two men wearing matching demonic skull masks, driving motorbikes.
“YEH!!! IT’S HALLOWEEN YA CUNTS!” yelled out one of the riders.
The motorbikes then sped down the road. The men screamed at the top of their lungs as they both did wheelies.
“Don’t you just hate vermin like that ?” said Nick.
“Vermin is a bit strong, but… yeh!” Sarah responded.
“Grown arse men, acting like snotty teens. It’s fucking embarrassing. Pathetic!”
Sarah couldn’t have agreed more.
Nick appeared somewhat flustered.
“I’ve been dealing with people like that my whole life. They sicken me… fucking sicken me!”
“You shouldn’t let them get to you, ya know,” Sarah said.
“I know, but they just frustrate me so much. Like, who do they think they are ? I…“ Nick sighed — a few seconds of silence then passed.
“Anyway, anyway,” he said motioning his hands.
“Like I was saying… where do you work, Sarah ?”
“At the petrol station just up there,” she pointed.
“I know the place, it’s… seen better days. Do you actually like working there ?”
“Um… it pays the bills, so…”
“I get ya, I get ya,” Nick said.
“I’m just gonna say this, and you can tell me to fuck right off if you want to, but… I think you’re too bloody pretty to be working at some petrol station.”
Sarah’s eyes fluttered, her cheeks flushed.
“Oh shut up!”
“No I’m serious, I mean… you’re a sort, Sarah.”
Sarah shook her head, laughing.
“It’s true!” Nick laughed back.
In that moment, both made heavy eye-contact. Sarah couldn’t help but be captivated by this mysterious man wearing the ugliest pair of boots she had ever seen.
“You’re… quite the charmer, Nick.”
“Well when you’ve practiced as much as I have in the mirror, I mean…“
“Well you’ve become quite the pro.”
“Why thank you, Sarah. I do appreciate it.”
Both continued to laugh at what now had become a ridiculous conversation.
Then, familiar sounds returned. Faint screaming emerged from the distance —the masked men were approaching.
“Here we fucking go,” mumbled Nick.
“Oi! Danny! The fuckers are still here,” the secondary rider said.
The front motorbike reduced its speed, eventually coming to a full stop. The other did the same.
The front rider wearing the black and yellow leather jacket removed his mask. His buddy in the brown body warmer opted to keep his on.
“Aw… you still waiting for your bus ? Fucking hilarious!”
“Mase, this is too sad,” laughed the man in the brown body warmer.
“Fuck it, Let’s get to know the cunts, Danny boy,” said Mase.
Nick stared daggers.
“What the fuck are you looking at, specky four eyes?!”
Nick didn’t budge.
Mase unzipped his jacket, and threw it at his motorbike.
“I said, what the fuck, are you looking at?!” he said shoving Nick’s forehead.
He then ripped the headphones from Nick’s neck. He dropped them, and proceeded to stomp rapidly.
“You like that, huh ?! You like that fuckface ?!” laughed Mase.
“I hope they weren’t a fortune, mate.”
Danny approached Sarah.
“Well, aren’t you a little fox”, he said, licking his cracked lips.
“Fuck off!” said sarah.
Danny grabbed her by the forearm, smirking as he did so.
“Mouthy, Mouthy,” he said.
’I’m gonna have to teach you a lesson now, slutbag.”
Mase watched on laughing.
“Go on, Danny! Show her who’s king!”
Mase looked back at Nick — he immediately felt something sharp slice against his face. He instinctively backed away, groping his left cheek. His hand, was covered in blood.
Nick held a black coated pocket knife. Beyond the lenses, his eyes displayed a look of harmful intent. Mase chose to keep up the tough guy act.
“COME ON THEN, SPECKY!” he roared.
Danny rushed toward Nick — he got a knife in the stomach for his troubles. Nick yanked the knife out of the gut.
“The cunt stabbed me, Mase! He fucking stabbed me!” Danny cried as he dropped to his knees.
Sarah looked on, big-eyed.
Mase moved forward with no common sense thought. Nick pointed the knife at the oncoming — it pierced right into Mase’s chubby Adam’s apple.
Both hands clutched his neck. He stumbled backward and collapsed onto the leaves. Nick sauntered toward him.
He stood over Mase. Blood poured out between his fingers. His eyes were draining of life — and fast!
Nick began penetrating the flesh of Mase. No part of him was safe.
Sarah winced with each stab. She looked away, but her ears continued to absorb every sound of flesh being violated.
Nick stopped upon realising stillness had overcome Mase. He turned his attention to Danny.
“PLEASE!” he screamed, guarding his wounded gut.
“I fucking beg of you! Leave me alone! please!”
Nick removed Danny’s mask. He grabbed him by his shaggy, dirty blonde hair, and positioned him to face Sarah.
“I dare you… DARE YOU, to call her slutbag again. I FUCKING… DARE YOU!”
“I’m sorry… I’m fucking sorry!”
“Didn’t quite catch that, Danny! Say it louder… GO ON! SAY IT! SAY IT!”
“I SAID I’M SORRY! PLEASE!”
Tears flowed from Sarah, she was frozen.
“You people, make me… sick!” Nick whispered in Danny’s ear.
He released his grip. Danny fell face first at Sarah’s feet.
“I’m sorry! Please… help!” Danny muttered.
Sarah let out a deafening scream — as the knife plunged into his back! Nick’s face was beaming. Sarah’s body shivered at the sounds of Danny’s cries. His vocal performance getting weaker and weaker.
“NOW WHO’S THE CUNT?! HUH ?! HUH ?!TELL ME, WHO’S THE FUCKING CUNT, DANNY BOY?!” screamed Nick.
The knife entered Danny’s back again — and again — and again. Mercy, didn’t linger anywhere near here.
Nick grabbed him by the hair and propped him up to face Sarah once more. The blade found its way in front of Danny’s throat. It pressed itself against the skin. His eyes vibrated weakly.
“Please… please,” said Danny in a barley passable voice — then — SLICE!
Danny gasped, he shook, but then he collapsed once again at Sarah’s feet. Nick turned his head. His eyes closed. Silence, hovered over this massacre.
“Why can’t they leave me alone ?” Nick whimpered as he put the bloodied knife back inside the inner pocket of his cardigan.
“All I want is peace. it’s… all I’ve ever wanted.”
Nick stared back at Sarah, teary-eyed.
“WHEN WILL IT EVER END? WHEN? I’M FUCKING TIRED!”
Nick wiped the tame tears away. He glanced downward. He dipped both palms into a mini blood-pool. Nick entered the bus shelter, and approached the frontal glass. He leisurely smeared its appearance with redness. Nick stood back, gripping both sides of his neck, and chuckled.
“I just… have to laugh at it all. Do you know what I mean? Like… what else can I do ?”
Sarah’s bottom lip quivered.
“Are you, ok… Sarah ?”
Sarah couldn’t look him in the eye. Her vision was firmly locked on his hideous boots.
“I understand I… really do,” Nick said.
“People like you and me, were just meant to suffer. It’s not fucking fair. Nothing about it is fair, but, that’s just the way it is, I suppose.”
He tittered.
“That’s just… the way… it… is!”