NoEnd House • horror

nine.

David was still sitting in the chair, though he was very calm now. 

He looked up at me with a slight grin. I couldn't tell if he was going to laugh or strangle me. Slowly, he got up from the chair and stood, facing me. 

It was uncanny. His height and even the way he stood matched mine. I felt the rubber hilt of the knife in my hand and gripped it tighter. I don't know what I was planning on doing with it, but I had a feeling I was going to need it.

"Now," his voice was slightly deeper than my own. "I'm going to hurt you. I'm going to hurt you and I'm going to keep you here." 

I didn't respond. I just lunged and tackled him to the ground. I had mounted him and looked down, knife poised and ready. He looked up at me, terrified. It was like I was looking in a mirror. 

Then the hum returned, low and distant, though I still felt it deep in my body. David looked up at me as I looked down at myself. The hum was getting louder and I felt something inside me snap. 

With one motion, I slammed the knife into the patch on his chest and ripped down. Blackness fell on the room and I was falling.

The darkness around me was like nothing I had experienced up to that point. 

Room four was dark, but it didn't come close to what was completely engulfing me. I wasn't even sure if I was falling after a while. I felt weightless, covered in dark. 

Then a deep sadness came over me. I felt lost, depressed, and suicidal. The sight of my parents entered my mind. I knew it wasn't real, but I had seen it and the mind has trouble differentiating between what is real and what isn't. 

The sadness only deepened. 

I was in room nine for what seemed like days. The final room. And that's exactly what it was: the end. 

NoEnd House had an end and I had reached it. 

At that moment, I gave up. I knew I would be in that in-between state forever, accompanied by nothing but darkness. Not even the hum was there to keep me sane.

I had lost all senses. I couldn't feel myself. I couldn't hear anything. 

Sight was completely useless here. I searched for a taste in my mouth and found nothing. I felt disembodied and completely lost. I knew where I was. 

This was Hell. Room nine was Hell. 

Then it happened. A light. One of those stereotypical lights at the end of the tunnel. I felt ground come up from below me and I was standing. After a moment or two of gathering my thoughts and senses, I slowly walked toward that light.

As I approached the light, it took form. It was a vertical slit down the side of an unmarked door. I slowly walked through the door and found myself back where I started: the lobby of NoEnd House. 

It was exactly how I left it: still empty, still decorated with childish Halloween decorations. After everything that had happened that night, I was still wary of where I was. 

After a few moments of normalcy, I looked around the place trying to find anything different. On the desk was a plain white envelope with my name handwritten on it. Immensely curious, yet still cautious, I mustered up the courage to open the envelope. Inside was a letter, again handwritten.

David Williams,

Congratulations! You have made it to the end of NoEnd House! Please accept this prize as a token of great achievement.

Yours forever,
Management.

With the letter were five $100 bills.

I couldn't stop laughing. 

I laughed for what seemed like hours. I laughed as I walked out to my car and laughed as I drove home. I laughed as I pulled into my driveway. 

I laughed as I opened my front door to my house and laughed as I saw the small ten etched into the wood.