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The original was posted on /r/nosleep by /u/Theeaglestrikes on 2024-09-21 16:22:13+00:00.

I have u/TucsonTank to thank for my ill-fated adventure. A week ago, this nameless, faceless Redditor posted a picture from his road trip. And two days later, I saw it for myself. That’ll be the first and last time I dip my pinkie toe in the deceptive pool of urban exploring. Fuck him, and fuck me for pursuing something that shouldn’t have been pursued.

Something, it turned out, that was pursuing me.

Why didn’t I take up stamp-collecting like every other forty-year-old sad-sack wallowing in a mid-life crisis? Then I never would’ve looked for the ‘FREE CANDY’ staircase. And maybe it wouldn’t have ever found me.

Sorry, any stamp collectors out there. I didn’t mean to be rude. I’m envious of those who live the quiet life. My snarky, buffoonish sense of humour was born from trauma. I’ve been deflecting from my past for decades. Trying to outrun it. But even in those gentle lulls, that come from time to time, Hell is always waiting to resurface. And that was exactly what happened five days ago.

The anonymous poster told me the rough area in which he took the picture. I didn’t face a word of resistance, in spite of some voice, deep within my subconscious, begging for him not to tell me anything. It only took me a little research to find the building, and I immediately booked an overseas flight for the following day. I’m purposefully leaving place names out of this post, so don’t bother asking. I don’t want this horrifying misadventure to be repeated by any other adrenaline junkies with more cash than sense.

What’s down there? I asked the photographer.

No idea. I just took the photo then headed on my way, he replied.

And with that, the nameless user had sealed my fate. I was always going to visit the location, of course. I was drawn to it. But knowing that the photographer hadn’t even taken a step into the jaws of the staircase? Well, that only loudened the groan in my stomach. The mouth-frothing hunger to see this place with my own eyes. I imagined myself to be some twenty-first-century explorer on the verge of a monumental discovery.

And in fairness, that may have been so. But I don’t want you to find out by visiting the staircase for yourself.

I’m trying desperately to be as descriptive, yet non-descriptive, as possible. If anybody out there does possess the means to track down the location of the ‘FREE CANDY’ sign, I would seriously advise against using that skill.

After reading this story, it won’t take much to dissuade you.

The staircase’s entryway, which spanned the width of a typical household door, stood like a lonesome pillar amidst a mound of waste. Misshapen sheets of metal, shattered crumbs of plaster, and shredded plastic bags littered the abandoned floor of that forgotten building. I know what the place used to be, but I’m not going to tell you, obviously. What I will say is that it isn’t a place which should’ve sat above the horror I uncovered.

I shone my torch-light at the downward-sloping ceiling of the slender, enclosed staircase. Sketched on the underside of the slope, with black crayon, were the words: ‘FREE CANDY’. An abnormal advertisement written above an arrow which pointed down. Urging me to walk down the steps into the darkness. It didn’t take much urging, of course. I’d started the descent before even taking a picture of my own.

It was the muddy, maroon smears across the yellow walls which really unsettled me. Ominous marks that coated the interior of the claustrophobic passageway. In certain lights, the marks looked, to my eyes, like blood-painted handprints, but I tried to shake that notion from my head.

You’re just frightened, and your imagination’s running wild, I reassured myself.

I don’t know how many steps there were. I didn’t count. But it took roughly two minutes for me to reach the bowels of the abandoned building, and I was a little winded.

I won’t tell you what I expected to find downstairs, as that might reveal the nature of the semi-demolished building above, but I will tell you that my eyes widened disbelievingly when I found myself in the lobby of an underground cinema. It was not a derelict mall. I’ll tell you that much. The cobweb-ridden, crumbling theatre did not belong down there.

And, as if that weren’t unnerving enough, the cinema slowly revealed a series of horrifying traits. Firstly, I noticed that a solitary lightbulb shone brightly above the concession stand.

“How the fuck… Who the fuck is powering this place?” I whispered, inching forwards with the torch in my trembling hand.

More strangely than that, I didn’t even need the torch. The single bulb, swaying perpetually on a stringy, splaying cable, somehow illuminated the entire lobby. Revealed, beneath the dust and grime, a well-maintained establishment. The red-carpeted floors, donning a diamond pattern that both belonged to a bygone era, appeared eerily vibrant and untarnished. It was as if the place were simply in need of a little spring cleaning to look brand new once more.

The posters on the walls were inconsistent. Some were faded and dated. Others bore quite modern graphics. But what bound them all together was that they advertised films which had either passed me by or never existed.

Shards of Space

The Exacter

Archie Bolton in The Real World

“Hello?” I called.

The place didn’t feel abandoned to me. Old and forgotten, perhaps, but oddly well-preserved. The most disconcerting thing, of course, was the fact that electricity still powered the cinema. The abandoned cinema below an abandoned building. And everything about the place set my hairs on end. So, in spite of my urge to find out what was happening, it was an absolutely batshit-bonkers play to cheerily utter a yoo-hoo to the large, unnatural place.

Thankfully, there came no reply. No menacing door creaked open to reveal a mysterious figure. No malicious giggle echoed from the backroom of the establishment. Nothing called out in response.

Still, none of that settled my gut. It made things worse, though I did not know why. And as I crossed the red carpet towards the concession stand, I noticed something. Something which, disturbing as it may have been, at least felt consistent with the untoward sign at the top of the staircase. A piece of card was propped above the containers of sweets, and it read:

First time at Cine Cinema? Help yourself to FREE pick ‘n’ mix! We won’t tell if you don’t.

DISCLAIMER: 1 well-portioned bag per visitor. No more. No less.

Smile. You’re always being watched.

Terrified by that final sentence, I snapped my head around and searched the expansive lobby for a couple of watching eyes in the darkness. There was nothing. But, again, that did not slow my heartbeat.

I feared the unseen thing in the emptiness of the cinema. If I were going to meet my end, I wanted to see it coming. I remember that strange thought ringing in my head.

Will you calm the fuck down? I thought. There’s a reasonable explanation for all of this.

However, that lie wasn’t working anymore.

As I squatted to eye the assortment of sweets in the glass casing, I gulped at the fresh licorice, gummy bears, and cola bottles. Unless they’d been encased in futuristic preservatives, the candy should’ve rotted after only a year of the building being abandoned. And that fact, along with the many other facts surrounding me, solidified what I’d known since entering the cinema.

This place was not abandoned.

“Hello?” I called again, voice breaking.

Will you stop that? I asked myself, slapping my forehead with the heel of my palm.

I kept forgetting that instinct in my belly. That feeling of unevenness. A human wasn’t going to answer my calls. This was no cinema. It was an illusion that had lured me across an ocean.

I’m quite a spontaneous man. There’s no denying that. But even for me, this was a rogue move. I’d flown across the world to investigate a staircase. Was it a disturbing staircase that gained traction on Reddit? Sure. But at the end of the day, that hardly warranted an international flight. I’m not so brain-rotted that I’d believe otherwise.

I started to sense that I’d been intoxicated by the image. By the ‘FREE CANDY’ sign. The photograph had been alluring in some perturbing way.

Before I followed that thought to some sort of grand conclusion, there sounded a roar of brass instruments, like fanfare to signal the arrival of royalty.

I stumbled back from the concession stand, in fright, and rose to a standing position once more. My eyes darted to the side hallway as I searched for the source of the sound. Above the passage’s open doors, a sign displayed:

Screens 1-11

Another lightbulb, midway along the corridor, shone from the ceiling. This one, however, did little to illuminate the full length of the hallway. There were dark cavities untouched by the bulb’s glow, and I once again sensed the Watcher, whose warning had been printed quite clearly on the slip of card above the pick ‘n’ mix.

I didn’t want to enter that hallway. I truly didn’t. In fact, I’d wanted to turn and run the second I reached the bottom of the staircase. It wasn’t ego that kept me in the underground cinema. It was the invulnerable power that had pulled me across the ocean in the first place. The same power that pulled my legs, one after the other, in a stilted, unwil…

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