Up there in these woods is an ancient ground, a big clearing, where the grass is at its greenest. In the middle of it lays a big, flat round and very black stone. It was there, when the trees grew, and still there when they burned in a circle around it.
People have said all things about the clearing, the stone. In fact had they talked so much about it over some centuries, that now all that is left of its origin has become myth.
The main fact on which everyone asked will agree, is, that it is a cursed, a bewitched place. None of the locals go there, and if I say none, I mean none.
It has led to many speculations, this old place, up there in the woods. It is quite difficult to reach, only on foot and takes half a day to do so.
Why we engaged on this in this godforsaken part of the countryship, is a matter I will tell, and what ocurred when we did conduct our scientific research there.
Someone let us slip information, that was so highly unbelievable, that we could just laugh. First.
We then did find out more on our own, which made us think and in the end convinced us to look up the place and proof that it all was a mare.
There had over the years we were together as a group of scientists not been a single proof to the existence of such a place, and we visited many and listened to all the stories provided to us by old folks. But we always came back empty handed. And as the times are over, in which researchers can come back empty-handed, and we had no private investors all the time, we soon looked for daily jobs, so could place food on the table and could put a roof over our heads and the heads of our families.
This time it was different. As soon, as we decided to take part in this excursion, funded by our own group, a gentleman appeared at my doorstep.
He was a very tall man, with a withered face, looked like he spent a lot of his time in the open. He was dressed in a black gown, and wore an old-fashioned hat. He told me, we would get all the money we needed to spend all the time we needed up there, to come back with answers to all the clues. I figured that the person who gave us information on the place must have been someone in this gentlemen´s service. For all we knew, was really not much close to nothing. I told him so, and he retrieved an envelope from the deep pocket of his coat.
'This is all you will need for now...Let me know when you depart for Yorksham. I got enough money, so don´t worry.'
The envelope wasn´t to be opened until we reached the place. And we didn´t. We took our work seriously and out of our own curiosity and because we had a job, with money in prospect, we stayed out of prying. We would learn soon enough.
The trip was dreary and hard-labour, it was hot and sticky in the woods and we brought lots of equipment with us. It took us almost a whole day to get there. Some of the locals who talked to us at a service station were not too happy about the news that a group of scientists wanted to go up there. But warn us, they did not. Maybe they should have done that.
It was a beautiful day, and we still had sun, when we arrived, for we had left early. The grass around the blackened stone was astonishing in its green, you wouldn´t believe. and the stone, even the sun must have shone on it all day long, was cold to the touch.
It started in the very same night. We opened the envelope, that contained an old manuscript only a few pages long. It was handwritten and very hard to decipher, it must have been written in a hurry. It was no information, it was a warning. It already was the ultimate warning. It said, we couldn´t come back to where we came from, and if we tried, we would get lost in the woods. Why did the man give this too us? If he had planned on this, he didn´t have to give us a warning. It was a riddle to all of us. And anyway, even though we were a little scared, after discussing the matter, we decided to do some research on this place and if we hadn´t found out anything in two days time, we would leave.
The rain started around midnight. Heavy rain, that left us shivering and wet to the bones. All of our equipment drenched and not usable. Only some torches and flashlights we had. I tried to get some sleep. I woke in the night, my ears ringing in a high pitch and I felt as if I was sinking into the ground, it felt as if someone was pulling me and it started to smell of foul earth, I had a bitter taste in my mouth and my heartbeat kept getting louder and louder, when I woke, I wasn´t sure if I had really slept at all, and my pulse was way too fast. I became nervous and left my tent. No one else seemed to be awake, the wind was howling in a gruesome tone, sounding like a tortured dog.
I kept thinking of all the stuff people used to say about this place, all the horrific stories. I know they had no scientific ground to stand on, but somehow I grew more and more frightened.
Have you ever heard about gateways? I am sure you have. They play heavy roles in horror movies and books. People said, the place up in the woods was a gateway, or more than one, and you shouldn´t mess with that. All the ones who had done so, never came back, or when they did, had changed never spoke of what they had seen and became reclusive.
I didn´t believe in the horror of the stories, but I believed that there were energies in this world, that were old, older than mankind. I also believed that they were actual energies, of a physical nature, like elements. And they had to be discovered and proven.
But now, in the rain, in the dark with that horrible wind blowing, I wasn´t sure what I was doing there. The stone lay still in the grass, and it was only a guess where exactly it was, when I stumbled upon it, tripped and fell onto it. I felt fear rising, terrified, I was unable to move.
I heard whispering, first I thought my colleagues had looked for me in my tent, and now were looking for me, once they saw I was gone. But nothing, no lights, nothing. No shouting, 'John, where the hell are you? Come on, that ain' t funny!?'
Just the whispering. I couldn´t understand much of it. But it was the way it was spoken, that really made me cry and when I wanted to scream, no sound came over my lips.
Under me, the stone had started glowing, a dark green, almost liquid. It changed in colour slowly, first I thought it had faded. In this weather it could have been a trick of my mind. All a trick of my mind, elms light. But when I thought it was over, it turned into a mirror-like liquid, and I put my head through.
First I saw nothing, just blackness. But a few minutes after I looked and looked into the darkness, I saw the first light, which pretty much looked like a star. Then I saw the second, the third, the fourth, fifth and so on, all the darkness glowing with little lights. I knew there had to be something else than our world, or dimension, or universe, or whatever you call it, it really has no name. There was much speculation on the topic of parallel worlds, infinite rooms, etc.
And I couldn´t really describe what I saw, what I felt, but I somehow instantly knew, what it was, as if someone plugged it into me. It was not in this universe, nor any other, it was not even outside them, for the universe is infinite, it has no borders. It is forever. No, it was something entirely different to the concepts we had. And it was horrible. It had waited, since long before our universe came to existence, it had. Or what I call it, for I don´t know its nature. I only got to know what it wanted, and not very surprisingly that was to come over to our side, to get over to us, to devour us. A basic fear of some evil we have, and I knew that it sounds like a movie.
The lights grew bigger, and bigger, very fast and I knew they were heading for me, for the gate that I had opened. The whispering started again, becoming a wild roar of suffering. Whatever I would meet at this point, it must have been having terrible pains. I knew, it was suffering from a terrible loneliness.And I didn´t want to meet it.
I was scared to death. Now it became darker again in front of me, the lights were fading, and I started to see silhouettes, twisted, twitching, big, moving in all directions, not very far from me. I imagined hands or arms reaching towards me, tentacles that would pull me in, to them.
And as a dark eye opened in front of me, a yellow and silver staring at me, and as I saw a mouth open, I saw old teeth, a rolling tongue, it spoke, it said the word:'Come.'
I started screaming, finally able to do so, I screamed and screamed and screamed, while the eye came closer and closer. And then all grew dark and silent.
When I woke, I found myself lying in the debris of the stone-template. My colleagues were gone, everyone and everything was gone, and I was alone, all alone.
It took a long time until I could stand up. And took an even longer time, until I found myself back in Yorksham. I told the police everything I knew after I spent the day in the hospital to get treatment for the cuts and bruises I had, and for malnutrition and dehydration. I didn´t believe it at first, but the police told me, it had been eight years to the day since we went up there in the woods, and none of my colleagues had returned. I found myself a flat in the town, eager to go on with my research, after what had happened, eager to find out more. But I grew weary soon, and scared. Always scared. For I would see an eye in my dreams, and hear the word:'Come.'
And I knew I would and that it´d be the end of me, the end of days and the end of everything we believed we knew.'Come.'
Up there in the woods, by John Springtime
