Good Evening. This happened back in March of 2019. I was living in a ground floor apartment in Ashland, just off the main strip. Small place, one bedroom, but it had these big windows that looked out onto a little courtyard area. I liked the light during the day. My roommate was out of town that whole week, staying with her parents up in Portland. So it was just me. I remember I'd been working doubles at the restaurant, coming home exhausted every night. My feet were killing me. That week I barely had energy to do anything except collapse on the couch. It started on a Tuesday night. I got home around eleven thirty, maybe closer to midnight. I was too tired to even make food, just kicked off my shoes and went straight to the couch. The TV was on, some late night talk show I wasn't really watching. Just background noise, you know what I mean?
I must have dozed off for a bit because when I opened my eyes, the TV had switched to infomercials. All the lights were off, pitch black in my apartment except for that blue glow from the screen. And that's when I felt it. This sharp poke right on my shoulder. Not hard, but firm. Deliberate. Like someone jabbing you with their finger to get your attention. I jerked awake and turned around, but there was nothing there. Just the dark living room, the couch, the coffee table. I figured I'd imagined it, you know? Half asleep, probably dreaming. I settled back down, pulled the blanket up. Closed my eyes. And then it happened again. Poke. Right on my arm this time. Sharp, insistent. I sat up fast, really awake now, heart pounding. Looked around. Nothing. The apartment was silent except for the TV.
I grabbed my phone from the coffee table, turned on the flashlight. Swept it around the room. Empty. I checked the front door, still locked. Checked the windows, all closed. I even looked in the bathroom, the bedroom, the closets. Nobody. Nothing out of place. I went back to the couch, left the phone flashlight on this time, pointed at the wall so it gave off some light. Tried to tell myself I was just overtired, stressed from work. But I couldn't shake this feeling that something was in there with me. That I wasn't alone. I lay there for maybe twenty minutes, just listening. And then I heard it. This sound. Not quite a whisper, but not quite anything else either. It was like, you know how they have those recordings of what planets sound like? Those deep, rumbling frequencies they convert into sound? It was like that, but compressed into this wet, clicking rhythm. Coming from somewhere near the floor.
[ Story continues in the full game... ]