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The original was posted on /r/nosleep by /u/GrimmestGhost_ on 2024-11-13 02:56:48+00:00.
It was my second year with the force, and me and my partner, Mendell, had drawn the short straw: we were both working Christmas Eve. As patrol officers we’d be driving around doing our usual routine, only on the night that most people would rather be doing anything but working. The scene is still vividly burned into my mind: we were in our cruiser slowly driving down a quiet road a little past midnight whilst keeping an eye out - and an ear to the radio - for any car wrecks, drunks, or some other kind of incident that required our attention. To nobody’s surprise though, in a smaller, semi-rural town on Christmas Eve, there wasn’t a soul outside except for us. I was sitting in the passenger seat watching the snow flurries fall out the side window and musing about the few hours of sleep I’d be lucky to get once home before my kids inevitably woke up early and excited to go tearing through the presents “Santa” had left under the tree for them when the call came in.
“This is dispatch, we have a potential home invasion in progress, requesting officers to the scene immediately.”
“Copy that,” Mendell spoke into the radio. “Address?”
As dispatch delivered our location, I felt a small lump form in my stomach and my heart skip a beat as I looked over in Mendell’s direction. He obviously was thinking the same thing as I, as he mirrored my actions before turning back to the road, flicking on the car beacons, and increasing our speed.
The address of the home was one we were both familiar with. Three days prior we had been called to the same house. The owner, a single mother, around early 30s I guessed, with two young kids had called 911 saying she thought there was someone outside her house. When we arrived at the scene she had timidly opened the door for us and we took a look around the property. According to her she was preparing to take the trash out when she saw something moving outside the kitchen window, after which she promptly ran upstairs and locked her and the kids in the bathroom before calling the police. She couldn’t provide us with much of a description, only that she briefly saw a “shadowy” figure before she had bolted. We checked the area around the window but found nothing. It had snowed earlier that day, so a fresh blanket covered the lawn and would’ve revealed clear footprints had someone been there, but the snow around the window was undisturbed. We checked the rest of the area around the house, but came up with nothing there either.
The woman, Beth as she told us, was very clearly terrified by the ordeal, but there wasn’t much we could do. She was very adamant about having seen what she saw, and repeatedly emphasized that she “wasn’t crazy”. While I’m not sure Mendell or I were convinced anything had actually been there, after all there was no physical evidence and the human brain isn’t immune to tricking itself, I did sympathize with her. Having kids myself, I know how powerful the drive to protect them is, and the thought of not being able to do so is any parent’s worst nightmare. As we stood there in the house’s entrance hall, Beth still trembling and her two kids - the older looked no more than six - looking down from the staircase banister, I had asked her if she had anywhere else she and the kids could go for the night just as a safety precaution. She responded in the negative, saying a hotel would’ve been too expensive, and the only family they had lived in another state. After that we told her to call if anything else happened and left. I could sense both Mendell and I were a bit weirded out by the situation, but neither of us spoke about it in the days since.
That was until now, as we found ourselves called back to the same location days later. Pulling up in front of the innocuous two story home, we both exited the car quickly. Something was immediately different about the place. It looked the same as it had days ago: the same plastic Santa in the yard, the multicolored Christmas lights strung along the porch, but something was off. I could feel it, even if I couldn’t quite place what it was. I placed a few heavy knocks on the door and announced our presence. No response. I knocked again. No response.
Mendell took a few steps over and peered through the window into the dark house before quickly turning around in surprise. I had initially though he had seen something inside, but followed his gaze to the porch railing, where the lights that had been providing what little illumination they could, had now gone dark.
“They went out as soon I looked inside.” He said, sounding a bit confused. I wasn’t sure if he was talking to himself or to me, but I began answering anyways.
“They could just be on a timer or-” I was cut off mid sentence by a loud thud from inside the house. We both gave each other a quick glance to make sure we were on the same wavelength before drawing our weapons.
“Police. We’re coming in!” I yelled before grabbing the doorknob. I had expected it to be locked, had expected us to have to force our way inside, but to my surprise, and unease, the door provided no resistance in opening itself. The entrance hall was deadly still. I grabbed my flashlight and shined it around looking for whatever had caused the noise we heard, but nothing was out of place. Mendell nodded his head towards the stairs, and I nodded back, understanding. He’d check upstairs while I took the ground floor. Ducking into the dining room on the left as I heard Mendell’s footsteps ascending up, I began a methodical room-by-room sweep of the first floor. To say I was on edge was an understatement. I still couldn’t pinpoint what it was, but something was very off in that house. Every corner I turned, every crevice I turned my light towards I had expected to find something, only to be met with nothing every time. Everything looked to be where it should be, no signs of robbery or a struggle, no signs of any life at all.
I slowly made my way into the living room, the final unchecked room, and began taking in my surroundings. A Christmas tree, a fake one by the looks of it, stood in the corner of the room by a magnificent fireplace. Through my flashlight revealed strings of lights decorated around it, they remained dark like the rest of the house. A few colorful wrapped presents sat underneath in a pile, practically begging to be torn open, while on the living room table I spotted a glass of milk and an undisturbed plate of cookies next to a note reading “For Santa”. Despite how cheerful the sight should’ve been, in the context of the dark, quiet house, illuminated only by flashlight, the scene filled me with an inexplicable sadness. Something clearly wasn’t right here, and the thought of whatever it was happening on Christmas of all days, was upsetting to me.
I was tensely scanning my flashlight along bookshelves, looking at family photos and an old radio when the sound of my walkie talkie going off nearly made me pull the trigger of the gun that was tightly gripped in my other hand. I set the flashlight down on the shelf and grabbed the walkie.
“Yeah?” I spoke, my voice unexpectedly shaky.
“I found the kids, they’re safe.” Mendell replied. A bit of relief washed over me before he continued “No sign of the mom though. They say she went downstairs and never came back.”
“She’s not down here. I’ve checked every room.”
“Maybe she left? The door was unlocked when we got here.”
I wasn’t sure how to respond. With how shaken Beth had been a few days ago, it didn’t make sense to me that she would run and leave her kids behind. There had also been that thud…
As my thoughts trailed off, all hell broke loose. All the lights in the living room, both the overhead and those on the tree, turned on and began flickering at a rapid pace. I frantically looked over at the switch only to see it in the off position. My eyes turned to the adjacent rooms only to see that they were all experiencing the same phenomenon. Suddenly the bookshelf radio roared to life, blasting Christmas carols at a volume that made my ears hurt.
“What the hell is going on?” Mendell yelled through the radio, though I ignored him. With the rapid light flickering I spotted something I hadn’t before, something that made the knot in my stomach contract tighter. In the fireplace a few unburnt logs lay resting, and on those logs I could see a few bright red spots. Amidst the sensory overload happening all around, I grabbed my flashlight and began making my way to the fireplace on shaking legs. Crouching down, I shone my light directly into the fireplace. My initial thought had been right. Pooled around the logs, and spotting them with little dots, was the unmistakable sight of fresh ruby-red blood. A fresh drop splashed down, sliding down the log and joining the forming puddle. Then another. I couldn’t hear my heartbeat over the music, but I could certainly feel it. I didn’t want to do it, but I had to. Reluctantly I crawled forward, shined my light up the chimney, and angled my head to look.
I wish I hadn’t.
Stuffed halfway up the chimney, body crushed and mangled to fit in the entirely-too-small space, was a human. I stared directly into the dead eyes of Beth, her face contorted into an eternal, silent scream as she stared down back at me, blood dripping down her face. I lurched backwards in terror as a new nightmare began. Even louder than the still-playing Christmas music from the radio, a rapid heavy stomping sound began permeating t…
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