Elevator's Lament: Warren Asher's Struggle Against the Abyss

 May 1, 2016. The hum from the shiny metal box on the hotel room desk grows more insistent. It's a familiar sound—a signal of impending danger, of the evil about to reveal itself once again. The legacy entrusted to Warren Asher weighs heavy as he prepares to confront the malevolent force that has plagued elevators for decades.

The clock reads 1:22 am, a time when most people are blissfully unaware of the hidden threats lurking within the confines of elevator shafts. Warren knows he must act swiftly, drawing upon the knowledge passed down through generations. As he heads to the source of the disturbance, memories flood his mind—of Alexander's dying words, David's lifelong struggle, and his own childhood saved by the aging guardian of this grim secret.

Entering the eerily silent hallway, Warren senses the impending danger. He follows the humming resonance, leading him to the elevator on the far end. The doors open without anyone having pressed a button. It's a sign, a manifestation of the malevolent force drawing him in, just as it had drawn countless others throughout history.

With caution and determination, Warren steps into the elevator. The doors close behind him, and the descent begins. The hum grows more intense, vibrating through the walls of the confined space. As the elevator plunges, Warren recalls the stories of those who fell victim to its sinister influence—Isabelle Townsend, the young man in London, and the countless others whose lives were claimed in inexplicable accidents.

The elevator reaches its destination, and the doors open to reveal a scene of surreal horror. Warren, armed with the tools and knowledge passed down to him, must confront the malevolent force head-on. The shiny metal box emits signals, guiding him through the darkness of the abyss below the elevator shaft.

As Warren faces the malevolent presence, he realizes the weight of the responsibility he carries. The evil has persisted for too long, claiming innocent lives despite the efforts of those who came before him. With determination and a heavy heart, Warren Asher battles the forces that defy explanation, hoping to one day break the cycle and bring an end to the horrors that hide behind the seemingly ordinary doors of elevators.

To be continued...

Puzzles and Lies, Part 1

 Debra, my wife got me hooked on doing puzzles years ago, she thought it would be good for my ageing mind and improve my memory. While long story short, I’m hooked. I complete at least one 1000 piece puzzle every week. Some of them I keep, you know by gluing them and hanging on the wall. I mount mine in nice frames, I even sign and date them sometimes.

Debra and I have been married 25 years, with no children on account of an accident Debra was involved in back in high school. A drunk driver plowed through the fence in their backyard and into the above ground pool, Debra was unfortunately in the pool closest to the entry point of the car. She spent 2 weeks, 3 operations, and ended up with a completely destroyed uterus, and needing a hysterectomy at the age of 17. 

Debra has been away with work for about two months now, she should be home any week now, we hope she’s an engineer with a large oil company, currently working in South America. She’s been sending me these fantastic custom made puzzles from the village she’s staying in. The latest puzzle a 1000 piece picture of her standing in front of the giant Jesus statue in Rio De Janeiro (Christ the Redeemer). God, she’s beautiful. 

After eating supper and cleaning up the kitchen, I grab a cold beer from the fridge and sit down to start sorting the puzzle. I do my puzzles a little bit different than most, (a lot different I guess). I don’t do the usual building of the border, I find it actually slows me down looking for all those edge pieces. So I just start by sorting the pieces by the usual color groups and start building right away, it all gets done and in the end, it saves time, can’t complain.

This one struck me as a little odd as some pieces had something on the backs of them. Not sure what it was, but I will have to finish building it to flip it over to see. Maybe that’s the special surprise she mentioned on the box it was shipped in, “Hey Matt, wish I was there, you will find this puzzle has a special sullies for you, love Deb”. As I continue to build the puzzle I become more and more intrigued and excited to see what’s on the back.

I finish the puzzle in a record day and a half. The little thumbnail illustration on the box definitely didn’t do the puzzle any justice. It’s stunning, and Debra is so beautiful. I take a couple pictures with my phone and immediately text her to show her it’s all done, and to thank her again.  She is so excited, she Texts back fairly quickly asking if I got the message yet. In my excitement, I almost forgot.  I quickly sign and date, then apply the glue to the top side of the puzzle. It will take about an hour before I will be able to flip it over, so while it dries I head out to buy a new frame to mount it. 

I run into my best friend at the mall. Mike comes up to me, we hug, as we always do. He asks how I’m doing with Debra away so long. I tell him how it is, then about the puzzle and show him a picture of it. He’s amazed at it, “ looks wonderful, too bad you couldn’t go with her this trip like last time” he said. He then gets this weird look on his face, “the outfit she’s wearing in the picture” he says, he tells me he thought he saw her last week in Fredericton in that same outfit. but he wasn’t close enough to yell out her name or get a real good look. We laugh about it, because she’s a simple dresser, like a simple look, does most of her shopping at Wal-Mart. He tells me he’s meeting someone and has to go, we make plans for the weekend, and he goes his way and I go into the picture and framing store to pick out the perfect frame. 

When I get home I unpack the frame and take the back of it to get it ready for the puzzle. The puzzle is now dry and I proceed to flip it over. But stop, and I decide to call Debra to FaceTime with her while I flip it. Funny, she’s always home at this time of night. She must have gotten hung up at work. I decide to flip it over by myself. I completely lose my breath when I read the message on the back. It’s written in bright red ink and conveys a message obviously other than what Debra intended. She didn’t say this, not at all. 

“Don’t trust her She’s lying 🙁” 

Why? What the hell is this? Is this what her surprise is?  I can’t imagine, I try to call her again, but no answer. Where is Debra, and what the hell is this?

With more questions than answers, I teach for a beer, but decide I need something stronger, and fix myself a couple stiff Jack and ginger ale, which make me feel much better. Since I need to get some sleep, I have an early morning at the office, I hop in the shower, and then climb into bed and fall as keep quickly due to the  Jack. 

The alarm goes off at 6:00 am, I get up and check my phone, Debra hasn’t texted or tried to call, must be some emergency at the plant. I text her “we need to talk later, it’s important” and head to grab a coffee. I drink my coffee while standing looking at the writing on the back of the puzzle, trying to figure out what it means. With even more questions about what it means and who did this? Since it was a custom order, it shouldn’t be too difficult to get answers.

TO BE CONTINUED IN PART 2: Coming soon  

The Evil Christmas Elf: Part 1

PART 1:

Christmas is a fun time of year, especially for the kids. But for some, it’s filled with sadness, fear and dread. Tommy is one of those boys who knows all too well the evil of Christmas. Tommy is now 35 years old, but will never forget when at only 6 years old, he sadly stopped believing in Santa, or not to mention the dammed elf on the shelf. 

It all started out, as usual, a great Christmas season, lots of chocolate, candy, and presents starting to appear wrapped under the Christmas tree, the house smelled like Christmas. Tommy’s mom even got the family an elf on the shelf. Tommy and his younger sister Jessica who was only 3 years old at the time was so excited at first to see the joyful ways the Elf moved from room to room doing things around the house every night. They couldn’t wait to get out of bed to see what/where the Elf would be. The funny ways the Elf would be hiding in the fridge, the cereal box, he was even surrounded with chocolate and marshmallows one morning brushing his teeth with Dad’s toothbrush. Tommy and Jessica laughed so hard that morning. 

Mom and Dad used to fight from time to time about the usual things, like money and Dad’s drinking, so when the Elf started to do things a little mischievously like sitting in the nativity scene. At first glance it was funny, then you realized the Elf was sitting in the crib where Jesus lays, and on the floor in front of the fireplace was the Jesus porcelain figure broken into a million pieces, or at least seemed like that many. Of course, Mom and Dad blamed each other. Mom seemed to win that argument since everyone knew Dad had too much rum and eggnog the night before. 

Tommy and Jessica started to no longer want to look for the elf in the morning, especially after the morning it appeared the elf had hung all Jessica’s Barbies from the ceiling fan in the living room. The elf was sitting under them just watching with a piece of string tied like a noose. Just like the ones wrapped around the Barbie’s necks. Both Tommy and Jessica had nightmares that night. Mom and Dad’s fighting got worse that day, again both blaming each other. 

Tommy was the first to realize the elf was getting worse, and it seemed linked to their fighting parents, the more they argued the worse the elf would be. He tried so hard to convince his mom, but she just put it off as a scared little boy trying to make delve of the things he is seeing the elf do. Things continued to get worse, the fighting worse until just a week before Christmas, Tommy’s mom told his Dad to get out and stay at a friend’s house. Tommy and Jessica, and especially mom thought the elf thing would be done and over. Mom had taken the elf and moved it to a drawer beside the fireplace and with Dad no longer there, everyone woke up on that cold rainy dark morning in anticipation of a great day of Christmas celebration and preparing for the holiday now just 5 days away. 

To their surprise, they found the elf sitting on the kitchen counter with a family picture of all four of them, and a knife in the elf’s hands stabbing Mom’s eye. There was even a little bit of blood on the knife and picture, must have been ketchup but it looked so scary. Mom immediately swept the whole disturbing mess into the trash and called Dad to yell at him, she assumed he stopped by in the night to set this up and scare her and the kids. Of course, he denied everything. Mom called the police and reported him, changed the locks and explained Dad wouldn’t be spending Christmas with them, but Mom promised them they would have a great Christmas.

Assuming that was that as the trash had gone out the night before, when they woke up the next morning, Jessica was screaming so loud. When Tommy and Mom ran into her room, the Elf was sitting on one of her pillows beside her head, holding a utility knife, the kind Dad has in his toolbox. There was blood on the pillow, knife, and Jessica had a cut on her cheek that was still bleeding. After a trip to the hospital, 6 stitches, and the police being called again on Dad, this was becoming the worst Christmas ever for Tommy and Jessica and their Mom. 

The police had taken the elf with them after their investigation, it was over, or so everyone thought. When they woke up a couple of mornings later, now Christmas Eve, the elf was back and to Tommy’s horror this time Mom was dead. Cut up in pieces and spread throughout the house in a bloody mess something like out of Friday the 13th. The elf sitting beside Mom’s head with a saw, also from Dad’s toolbox. Tommy knew it wasn’t dad that did this but was this evil doll. 

Tommy called 911 and kept his sister in her room so she couldn’t see anything until the police showed up with their Nanny to take them to her house. The police questioned Tommy about the saw and the elf, and all the fighting his parents did. Of course, the police didn’t believe it was the elf doing this, and the thing that killed his Mom, so Tommy knew he had to do something. He quickly grabbed the elf from the police officer holding it and started to rip it apart, he pulled off the head, threw it on the floor and stomped on it feeling it break under his foot. He then pulled off the arms and legs, throwing stuffing everywhere, some of it falling into the pools of Mom’s blood on the floor.

It was all over, Tommy and Jessica had a somewhat Christmas with Nanny and Grampy, but Christmas will never be the same. 

Now at 35 years old, Tommy had kids of his own Sally, 8 and David, 5. Christmas was always a difficult time. Aunt Jessica spent every Christmas with them and had just arrived to spend the week with armloads of Christmas presents. Everyone was so excited on Christmas Eve morning. They all got up, had breakfast then headed downstairs to the family room to see the Christmas tree and play some video games. That’s when Tommy saw it, and it scared him to death, the broken ornament sitting on the floor. It was a glass ball with a picture of his Mom inside it. On the floor around the broken pieces were some dolls stuffing with dried blood on it. He knew someday the elf would be back.

1918 Death, he saw him coming

 May 1, 1918. Alexander was very ill, on his death bed actually. By that time I wasn’t even born yet, but David Jones was there receiving detailed instructions on what had to be done. You see David had been with Alaxander since the beginning, saw it all happen, the death, the secrets, the evil but couldn’t do anything to stop it. 

Alaxander knew what the evil was and how to track and stop it.  He used his entire fortune and died with nothing ensuring David would have the tools he needed. Alaxander saw death coming for him, and told David with no time to spear he was was finally able to get the patent office to update his patent to include a device at the bottom of the elevator shaft which when the evil was near or connected to the elevator would emit a signal which could be tracked and stoped before someone dies. These plans and tools have since been passed onto myself. 

David had fought this evil for almost 40 years before meeting and training me to take his place. When I was only 5 years old in 1950 when my parents both died in an elevator accident in Las Vegas. David was there that day, I wouldn’t be alive of it wasn’t for him, and I was with him ever since, that is until he died in 1972 at 102 years old.

The shiny metal box sitting on the hotel room desk starts to hum softly, it’s happening again. Right here in this very hotel, evil is value to show itself. I have to stop it.  I’ll pick this up when I get back.

Time- 1:22am thank god most people are asleep  

 

Elevators, Death Traps, The Evil No One Knows About!

Have you ever noticed an elevator door open as you passed by, but no one was on it, no one getting off, nor was there anyone around who could have pressed the button? As far back as elevators have had automatic doors, this bizarre occurrence has been plaguing unsuspecting people all over the world. Alexander Miles invented the automatic elevator doors in 1887, this was a tremendous safety feature which he hoped would save lives; you see, before these automatic doors, people would accidently fall to their deaths in open elevator shafts due to doors being left open. What would you say if I told you the number of people who died in elevator accidents after the invention of the automatic doors remained about the same? The reason for this will be shocking and unbelievable, but the story needs to be told. People need to know the truth. You may never want to step foot on an elevator again, but you still need to pay attention, your life may depend on it.

New York Times 1922

Reports such as this have appeared in newspapers around the world since people have been constructing buildings higher and higher, requiring a means to quickly move between floors.

Many people ride in elevators on a daily basis not knowing the number of people that are horrifically killed in elevator accidents every year. One of the first to die in an elevator accident since the advent of the automatic doors, was 24year old Isabelle Townsend, of Buffalo, New York back in 1892. “A dreadful shame,” said the morning addition of the Buffalo Newspaper. Isabelle stepped on the elevator, but before she was all the way inside, the doors quickly closed on her small frame and held on tight. The elevator then accelerated upwards trapping half her body inside and the other half outside. She was split in half. Eyewitness reports say the elevator didn’t stop until it had reached the 10^th floor, spreading her body throughout the building on the way up. Within 5 months of this incident, there was another death, this time in a health club in London, United Kingdom. A middle-aged man, stepped into the elevator when suddenly, even before the doors could close it dropped like an asteroid to the ground floor; he was on the 30^th floor at the time.  As I’m sure you can imagine, there was not much was left of him to identify. What makes these two stories even more concerning was neither person needed to get on the elevator in the first place, and at the time were on their way somewhere which the elevator would have delayed them. So why did they get on the elevator? The answer lies in the unexpecting opening of the doors when there is no reason for them to open. The draw to enter has been said to be so strong, like a magnet sucking the individual in.

Alexander Miles, 1888

What makes this even more bizarre, is that the invention by Alexander Miles hasn’t saved any lives. There something deep down in the abyss of darkness, far below the elevator shaft which keeps coming back to cause destruction, death, and wreak havoc. Alexander knew this and couldn’t do anything to stop it. The picture below was taken after the very first elevator death, an elevator which had the new technology patented by Alexander. It was 1888, a young man stepped into the open elevator, to his disbelief the elevator wasn’t there, only an open shaft. Alexander knew what went wrong, look at his eyes, they say it all. Hs eyes show the torment and sadness he lived with, as he knew there was something more sinister at play in his invention. He spent the rest of his life trying to make elevators safer, but no matter what he did, some unwary individual still died when the elevator chose to take a soul. 

My name is Warren Asher and I hope with these entries I can inform people of the hazards which prowl in elevators. I investigate elevator accidents around the globe trying to track the very evil which lurks within. I do as my predecessor did before me, as was instructed by Alexander Miles himself.  Alexander, on his death bed, knew something needed to be done; he entrusted a young man who was attending to him, giving him strict instructions on how to proceed and what needed to be done to stop this evil. 

As for myself, I don’t know how much longer I can keep this up. I have been doing this far too long, I will need to train someone to take over for me soon enough.

But now I’m getting carried away, let me start at the beginning so you may understand better. 

Warren Asher, 2016