Hello hello! I am back from the real world (finally). University is going great and I am preparing to graduate in the Spring this year!
I am uploading a story I started writing while chilling with @voyceatlas last month in the green room of a music venue. I want you to grade me on with the A-F scale and give me some input! The subject was to write a fiction piece on anything BUT it had to be scary.
The title of my work is Veritas Vetitum which translates to Forbidden Truth. It is a little bit lengthy but it is a wild ride! Give your best grading/critique and I'll award you with some Steem $ for your efforts! I want to be a better writer!
Spooky leviathan plug because I love leviathans! 
I'll assume you all know about the dark web. Well...what you've heard is true, it's not a great place. While some people are there to acquire cannabis, molly, acid, fake Ids, firearms, people, assassinations or even out of sheer curiosity. Others... well they're obviously not up to anything good. But I'm not here to talk about those psychopaths. I'm here to talk about what lies beyond that wall. The more cryptic and unexplained part of the internet. The part that nobody’s supposed to see, the part they don't want you to see.
There was an infographic that cropped up a while ago. Not sure when. "The Eight Levels of the Internet". Maybe you've seen it. As interesting as it was, it's complete bullshit. I'm sorry, but "Polymerization Derivation" means nothing. I guess the creator is a fan of Big Bang Theory or something. No, there's no quantum mechanics involved here. However, that doesn't mean it was an easy place to find. Now, I'm not going to begin to tell you how to get here. It's unlikely that'd you be able to, even if I did. I'm not gloating, I just didn't have a life outside of this at the time. I was warned, of course. Everybody told me I wasn’t going to like what I saw. That I wouldn’t even comprehend it. Now I’m passing off that warning to you. Don’t try to look for this.
There is no name for this place online, or at least I haven't seen one yet (that doesn't sound stupid). There were rumors swirling around however. These ranged from a Illuminati or Trilateral Commission chat room to a virtual holding cell for an experimental DARPA AI that had gone rogue and killed a bunch of soldiers. In reality, it’s so much worse. After a long and painful process of breaking down firewalls, encryption's, extracting QR codes from images, solving bizarre philosophical riddles and following hidden links, I was finally directed to a blank page with one line of text and a text-box underneath. "Quid Quaeris?” I pulled out my smartphone to translate this sentence. It was Latin for "What do you seek?” I remember feeling somewhat surprised. But in retrospect, I really didn’t know what I was expecting. I'll admit, I was a bit stumped at this point. Partly because I didn't know the answer to that question. The closest I could come close to comprehending this was a reference to a Harry Potter sphinx trap. I had no objective, I just wanted to see if I could do it. I tried some generic answers at first. I typed in "The Truth" and "Enlightenment". You know, matrix shit. Nothing happened. I tried a bunch of answers, but none of them worked. I was getting frustrated at this point. Maybe this was a gag page that would put my forum username on blast for following such a dumb rumor. Maybe I really hadn’t figured anything out.
I tried something off the wall. Not sure how this came to me or why I thought it would work, but I typed in “What Seeks Me”. Now that I think about it, this thing may have been an AI. To my surprise, the page went blank. Like fully blank. I waited. After about five minutes, I was directed to what looked like Reddit. No, not even that. It was more basic. Just a list of links over a brownish-yellow background. The links themselves were indecipherable. Just seemingly random sequences of characters, symbols and letters, almost like an md5 hash code. A lot of them I had never seen before. It almost looked like an alien language. Obviously, just a code I didn’t understand. At this point, expectations were off the wall. Each link was a shot in the dark. I clicked on the first one. It loaded up a live-feed of what seemed to be the Paris catacombs, the scene was awash in the neon green light from the camera's infrared camera, the light bounced off of walls of skulls and rat skeletons. I watched for a few minutes, then closed the window.
I moved on to the next link. It was a shaky video in a dark setting. But I could make out men in tactical gear and shiny dark blue vests. They were in a house, opening doors and sweeping each room. Eventually, they kicked one down to reveal a creature. Tall and humanoid, with scaly and cracked skin. It was gnawing on a dismembered arm, the thing turned to show its eyes towards the flashlights, the deep blue hue was offset by the design of the fly like eye clusters. They tried shooting at it, but it escaped out the window, almost like it was made of water and slipped out to the roof. The video stopped there. Well, I was floored. What the fuck was this? It looked too real to be unreleased film footage. I was officially intrigued. Maybe this was worth the months of headaches and bloodshot eyes after all. I couldn’t stop now. I started working down the list of links. With each click, everything got more and more strange. More disturbing. I stumbled upon a document called “The Lombadi Project”, detailing trials of human experimentation that would lead to superhuman levels of strength and durability. It was an apparent success with documentation suggestion implementation to the public. The document was dated February 22nd, 1979. Looked official too as it was covered in Top Secret markings and an odd rubber stamp which read “COLOSSUS.”
There were essays on rips in the fabric of space-time spawning portals, visible glitches in reality and apparent pictures of alternate dimensions. There were detailed explanations regarding Area 51, the Bermuda Triangle, photographed Hitler sightings in Columbia, disappearances, and the true nature of the Pyramids, not just in Egypt but worldwide. One of the more upsetting ones was a document referring to a “world-ending bomb”. A nuke that’s 720,000 times stronger than the H-bomb developed in the 1960s. I don’t want to know why we would need that. I found contingency plans for different kinds of Apocalypses - nuclear winter, biological weapons, viral outbreak, mass hysteria . Some more peculiar ones were called “The Marianas Trench Abnormality”, the bluntly labeled “Strange man on the seventh floor”, and one simply referred to as “Stargate”. Recovered logs of skin-walker hunting expeditions, 911 transcripts from residents of a town in Virginia that went missing in 1977 and even the journals that belonged to the people involved in the Dyatlov Incident. They didn’t go insane because of the snow by the way.
I spent hours on there, looking through pages and pages of things I felt like I wasn’t supposed to see, the guilt and shame from reading the titles of the content quickly dissipated. I came across a trailer to a silent film made back in 1910. One that apparently made people claw their eyes out after watching that nearly derailed the whole industry, inspiring the movie, The Omen. There was a live stream of a hooded man sitting in front of a camera, head crouched down. He eventually lifted his head. Even though he had no visible mouth and his eyelids were stitched shut. A deep, guttural, “Hello” came through my headphones, the sound racked inside my brain. Somehow, I knew it came from him. I didn’t stick around for that and clicked on another link. There were obscure sets of step-by-step guides that involved things like cutting off your own limbs and sewing on a corpse’s, performing cult incantations in the middle of the Siberian forest and going to coordinates that apparently housed captive aliens and human-animal hybrid experiments. It was unclear what any of these were supposed to achieve. There was also a 50 second long clip titled “The Futility Of Mankind”. I didn’t watch it. That’s when I realized there was no way any organized government on the planet had full control over this. One of the scariest things about this whole experience was that I didn’t find an end to the list. It didn't matter far I scrolled down, the scroll bar on my screen just kept getting smaller and smaller.
I think I had a seizure and passed out eventually, because I woke up next to my desk in the middle of the night. I looked at my computer screen to see looped helicopter footage of a massive, crab-like creature tearing apart a coastal island followed by deep underwater footage of an eye. The sheer size only allowed the iris of the eye to be illuminated by the submarine lights. I clicked off of it. I just sat there for the longest time. I couldn’t comprehend what I was seeing and I don’t think I really wanted to. Now, I’m not really sure why I kept going. My brain was screaming for me to take my computer out to the lawn, smash it into pieces and torch it while drinking a Bud. I didn’t. I noticed something I hadn’t before. A small message at the bottom left hand corner of the screen. I don’t know if it was always there or not. It was hard to read so I had to squint. Ugh...more Latin. I used my phone again, this time the text translated into “Are you satisfied?” There were two options underneath it, Yes and No, highlighted in a shimmering text box, reminiscent of a Vegas street sign.
Now, I knew the answer to this question. Hell no I wasn’t satisfied. I was horrified, scarred for life but I should have clicked on yes. If I just clicked on yes it would have taken me out of that godforsaken place. Back to comfort and sanity. Even right now, I can’t tell you why I clicked on no, only that when I did, I felt a deep warm feeling in myself. Like I was a detective on the prowl for the final clue. Once I did, the page seemed to refresh. It was still the same basic setup, except there were only four links this time. There were no recognizable numbers or characters. Hell, it didn’t look like anything that could have come from this world. Just a collection of crude rune-like symbols, that didn’t give off any sense of pattern or direction. I clicked on the first link.
After about 20 seconds, I slammed my computer shut. I can’t describe to you what I saw. All I know is that I wasn’t supposed to see it. NO ONE should ever see something like this. It’s not only that it didn’t make any sense, I can’t tell you why it didn’t. I couldn’t begin to grasp the images I was seeing, I let my eyes focus. It wasn’t graphic or anything, not like that. I just couldn’t recognize anything. I could make out things moving, but not in a way any creature on earth has ever moved before. Colors that I’d never seen before, guttural sounds that caused my ears to ring in my headphones. Just writing about it gives me a splitting migraine. This is my best attempt at visualizing it. The images appeared to be of a large thing, it, creature, whatever I don't know what it was. My jaw dropped when I read the watermarks and header on the images, “LUNA Site 11-Bravo. Orbit 3452. 1996” I needed to dig deeper. After a few minutes of going through photo albums which depicted a destroyed Moon base and still images from satellites, I finally realized the scope of what I was looking at. The life form described in this link was truly on a leviathan scale, stretching underneath the base superstructure going on for miles. These things had mangled itself way through the compound and most of the structure had been sucked into a massive sinkhole. We have three dimensions in our physical plane here on earth. We can move forwards, backwards, left, right, blah blah blah etc. These things aren’t restricted to movements in our three dimensions. The way in which they moved was I can’t explain it any further. All I know is that I didn’t want to watch one more second. I don’t think I would have been able to. I slammed the lid on my laptop closed again, this time harder. I heard the distinct sound of my screen shattering. “Shittttt” I whispered to myself. At this point I didn't care what happened to it, the portal to which I had just witnessed hell.
I left my room and stumbled into the hallway. For the first time in a while, I was planning to leave my house. I needed fresh air and a run or something. Hell, I was thinking about running a marathon in the middle of the night in October, just to get my mind off of that shit for a few hours. I was putting on my sweatshirt when I heard a loud engine turn off outside and then followed by a knock at the door. I stopped dead in my tracks and my stomach dropped. Obviously, I wasn’t opening up for a single knock, it could be anybody. About a minute and five more sets of knocks came before somebody spoke up. “Open up. We know what you did, we’re not here to hurt you. We just want to talk!” The tone wasn’t threatening but sounded calm and cool, almost friendly. I ducked behind my bathroom door. I opened up my door to two tall, slim men in dark gray suits. They smiled at me. “May we come in?” one of the pair said. I still don't know how they found me, my palms were sweating and my voice moaned, “Yes..come in.” I thought for sure that I was off the grid through using firewalls and IP rerouting programs.
We sat down on the couch. I guess I was just waiting for answers at this point...or a hail of gunfire. One of them looked at me and said “What were you looking for?” “I don’t know. But I’m not going back”, I responded. He smiled again, this time even wider. Like this is what he wanted to hear. The other one piped up: “Who do you work for?” His tone was a bit more aggressive. I just shook my head. “Look, I didn’t know what I was getting into when I was on there. I wasn’t looking for anything.” They just stared at me for a while. “I’m not gonna tell anybody. Trust me.” They finally responded: “We’re not worried about that. Doubt anybody's gonna believe you.” Another smile. Somehow it felt genuine. “We just wanted to know what your objectives were.” In retrospect, that was a very strange question. “Just do us favor and we’ll leave.” I perked up. “Give us the device you used to access it”. I didn’t ask any questions. I ran upstairs and basically threw them my laptop from halfway down the stairs. They both smiled at me one last time before heading for the door. Just as they were about to leave, one of them turned back. “I don’t think you need to be told, but don’t try this again. Don’t show anybody else how to get there either. We’ll know. We will be back too.” I didn’t ask who they were. I’m not sure I would have wanted to know. The men let themselves out and as quickly as they arrived, they were roaring down the street. Their SUVs gone from the driveway as I peaked through the blinds in the living room. Oddly enough their license plates seemed obscured. I rubbed my eyes, thinking my contacts were the problem. Yet when I looked on as they sped off it was as if the plate itself was a blur that kept changing. Maybe that was a dark secret too.
It has been almost 42 days now. I don’t go on the internet so much anymore, I threw my smartphone in a lake a few miles from the state border and bought a RAZR the day after the men came. I’m going to try and forget what I saw, so I keep telling myself. The act of trying to not think about it is becoming a struggle. I’ve started having horrific nightmares and in some classes I've been passing out, my friend says it could be narcolepsy. I have been seeing a therapist for some of that but I don’t think it’s helping. Anyways, I’m not going to let this consume the rest of my life. My deep fear is, I’m afraid this might not be possible. There are some things we aren’t supposed to know about, maybe never. Probably for our own safety and sanity. My head's pounding. All I know is that I should have just stayed on YouTube.
A!
Awesome story! Detailed very well. Possibly a true story? or at least partly true.
Noticed a structure issue, not sure if it's just me or not.
""We just want to talk!” The tone wasn’t threatening but sounded calm and cool, almost friendly. I ducked behind my bathroom door. I opened up my door to two tall, slim men in dark gray suits."
You duck behind your bathroom door and then immediately open the front door to the two men.
Either way its a great read, especially for some one that has considered the dark web, but has come across way to many stories like this, or resulting in worse.
Dude! A+! This is a modern day Lovecraft tale, the forbidden tomes of esoteric knowledge are no longer musty books bound in human flesh but the rotten core inside the onion of the Internet! I thoroughly enjoyed this. I appreciate that you didn't go TOO gross/over-the-top body horror / sexual horror - which you could very well have done and I was sort of grimacing expecting where this was going to go when I saw the set up - I think you walked a really nice line here of playing on the sort of conspiracy theories and rumors and half truths everyone hears about the dark web, without getting bogged down in grotesquerie. [Huh, Steemit auto correct doesn't know the word "grotesquerie", must be Lovecraftian vocabulary coming through LOL]
Yes this was a little long but it really moved along briskly. I had to keep reading to the end. One of the better short stories I have read here on Steemit - thanks so much for sharing! I am very happy to have found you, following! Much love - Carl
PS please no SBD reward for me, kindly direct any reward that you would have shared with me (if any) to a newer poster who displays promise. Cheers
AAAAAAYYYY @dubvdave's first big post! congrats! keep making good content.
@carlgnash from the @humanbot Human Certified Original Works Initiative has manually determined this post to be the original work of the post author. To learn more about this certification visit the Badge of Originality genesis post:
https://steemit.com/art/@carlgnash/the-badge-of-originality-human-certified-original-works
Thanks for being an original content creator! You rock!
I simply love your articles, what great content and quality of posting you offer the community here on Steemit and abroad.
Thanks a lot :)
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I kind of wish you would take the road less traveled by @ainal and stop spamming Steemit... but I suppose that is too much to ask