There was a time when I believed in monsters. Since then I was taught to prove, not believe. I lived my life disregarding the unexplained as mere superstitions . As such, when I saw those ill-fated articles in the gazette a few months ago, I publically denounced the rumors contained within. A few weeks after, I have received a letter from a reader named Elder Berry. She read my articles, and while finding my reasoning to be clear, claimed to have seen the creatures and to have proof of their existence. Initially I assumed she were just a senile fool, having lost touch with reality in her isolated forest cabin. But as weeks passed, I have come to respect Elder Berry, noting her wit and clarity of mind. Eventually I received the supposed proof - a photograph of a dark shape in the woods and a phonograph recording of strange sounds, that resembled faint struggling breathing and whispers.
Shortly after I received those items, Elder Berry's messages became more frantic and troubled. She told me that the creatures, who before could only be seen from distance, were now appearing closer and closer to the cabin, leaving her to stand guard every night, as they watched her home. As more and more appeared each night, Elder Berry was in terror. I urged her to leave the cabin, but she refused. She said she couldn't leave behind certain items and books, ones she refused to speak of, just as she did when asked why she lives alone and hidden.
One day I received a new letter from her, expecting a new tale of night terrors, but found something different. To my surprise, Elder Berry claimed to have made peace with the creatures, after finding a way to properly communicate with them. She was so exhausted and ill from the siege that lasted for months, that I could hardly recognize her normally neat handwriting. I was told to take the items she sent me and go over to visit her cabin, where we could be the first to come to know these mysterious beings. I spent weeks hesitating, quoting different tasks as taking up my time. In the end, despite a foreboding sense of danger, I packed my things and got on the morning train to the far-off forest town near which she settled. By sunset I stood before Elder Berry's cabin.
From the letters I knew that Elder Berry was ill and chair-bound. But as I entered her home, I was startled by the eerie cabin's strange smells and sounds. Every window was covered in thick layers of cloth, leaving the insides of the house dark as the night itself. I found Elder Berry in her living room, laying in her chair, covered by shadows. Her hoarse whispering voice troubled me, but she told me of her serious condition, spending most days dreaming in the dark room, trying to regain her strength. She told me that she hired help from a local village, to take care of her while she were under the weather. I felt deeply ashamed, being afraid of her after she spent weeks sleepless, paranoid, under the watchful gaze of those strange beings. Elder Berry told me that a room and dinner were ready for me upstairs, her face as motionless as before. I bid her good night and went through the silent house, bothered by the strangest feeling that I have heard Elder Berry's voice before.
As I wandered through the house, I couldn't help but keep my eyes out for the items that Elder Berry mentioned as the reason she could not leave before. I entered my room and found the cold porridge left for me. Although I was in hunger, the smell of it, doubled with the strangeness of Elder Berry's condition and my remaining distrust of the creatures, made me leave the food be. I wandered restlessly around my room, looking out of the window into the dark of the night. It seemed as empty and lifeless as the dusty rooms of the house.
I laid onto the bed, preparing for sleep, when I heard strange whispering voices through the open window, chilling me to the core. I snuck out of my room and crept down, taking care not to make any noise. I entered the living room and moved away the cloth covering the window, to let in some light. As I turned to Elder Berry's chair I was frozen with terror. I could not believe what lay before me. Before I could even make up my mind, I felt a strange cold sensation in the stale air. In primal fear, I hid beneath a pile of junk. They were here.
I looked out from my hiding spot into the corridor. Minutes felt like hours, as I breathlessly listened for even the slightest hint of a noise. I tried to suppress the scream ready to leave my lips, as I watched a wrong, broken shadow pass on the wall. I couldn't even hear a sound of them moving, but I had my proof. The creatures were in the cabin. For what felt like an eternity, I waited and then crept through the house, taking only a single stop to take the bag containing the items Elder Berry sent me, before I leapt out of the house. I do not know if I saw anything. The only thing I know is that the next time I was conscious I was on the train, watching the dark forests fly before my eyes, with only a faint recollection of running through darkness, and the dirt and bruises on my coat to show that it were real.
I leave these notes behind, not as a revelation to our world, but as a warning. Whomever finds these, I beg you not to look into the things I witnessed. I made care to describe naught which could harm you. These beings dwell in a void of obscurity and that is where they must remain. To give them recognition, to give them names, would be to give them power over us. Makes us their prey. I beg of you to do what is best and go to the lonely cabin in the woods and burn it down, without looking within.
Even now, I feel their blind stares. I can sense them. They make sure you can. All I have left are these notes and the hope that you make the right choice. But there is no hope left for me. All I have left is the little time before they come to claim me, and the recording Elder Berry sent me all those months ago.
It's strange. I keep playing it, over and over again. Listening to that strange whispering voice over and over, and remembering it speaking to me in the darkness of Elder Berry's cabin. As I look from my window onto another sleepless night, the same question haunts me. Whose voice spoke to me through the lips of Elder Berry's withered lifeless body?
