It is going to sounds cliché but I will never forget the first time I “spoke” with Michael Trace. This was for a few reasons. First was he had posted to a message board. That isn’t impressive, but unlike most folks who used either an autogenerated alphanumeric handle, or a screen name. he had his name: Michael Trace as his handle. Most people just don’t do that. that is a great way to have trolls mail you dildos or swat you. This message board wasn’t Facebook is what I am saying.
The second just bizarre thing was he had his own thread. Just below the pinned thread from the admins. You know, the admin thread banning child porn, drug dealing, and explaining they will sell you to the local cops if you break the rules, so don’t fuck with us warning that we all know and love. Mike was pinned right below that. everyone would see it and wonder why the hell he was so important. His post was… honestly, I am struggling to find a word other than retarded. That said he is the one that made it an uphill struggle.
The post in his own little thread said:
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Michael Trace
Hello, I am Michael Trace. I am here to help. If you are facing any sort of supernatural issue please respond here. If you have questions, I will do my best to answer. If you need advice, I will provide what I can. If you are in real danger. Post your address and I will come help.
Serious inquiries only please.
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Yeah, let’s not pretend like that isn’t just someone ringing the bell for all the trolls to come running. For the first two days the thread was flooded with dumb posts with people asking if something was supernatural and attached a link to a pic or video usually some sort of porn. I would have to go back and check, but it was something like five thousand posts in 46 hours. Even I got in on the action and sent him a dumb video I took earlier in the week of some drunks stumbling around the streets outside my apartment one night.
Now most of you would probably think that is the end of it. The guy got trolled and was buried too deep to climb out of it. High fives all around. What are we going to do now.
Wrong
You see Mike as he signed all of his responses, replied to all of them. All of the responses in a matter of roughly twelve hours. His responses weren’t exactly long but they certainly got our attention.
They were things like this
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Michael Trace
Ben,
This is a video of a man juggling chainsaws. While cool, this is not supernatural. I cannot help you with this.
Mike
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Michael Trace
Rolf
This is a picture of two mean having sex. This is not supernatural. I cannot help you with this.
Mike
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Michael Trace
Veronica,
This is a picture of your naked torso. This is not supernatural. I cannot help you with this
Mike
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Michael Trace
Heather,
This is a video of a man dressed as a clown with a knife. This is not supernatural. That said if this man is threatening you post your address and I will come and help you. Otherwise, I would strongly recommend reaching out to law enforcement.
Mike
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Michael Trace
Lee
That is a ghost in the picture you attached. I would advise not living in that house until resolved. In theory a reaper should have collected the ghost upon the persons death. Most ghosts are harmless but the ones that become bound to a location can become a danger. They can also be extremely upsetting; due to the trauma they are dealing with. Please reply if you have further questions.
Mike
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Two things about Mike’s responses were concerning to us. The first bit was that each one started with the first name of the person he was responding to. I don’t know if you have ever been doxed but it is one of those things that puckers your asshole, knowing others can find you and…do stuff. Most of us take for granted the anonymity of the web. Having that taken from us en mass was frightening. The second bit was that he responded to everything. All of them. That was roughly 417 replies an hour, almost 7 a minute or one reply ever 9 seconds. Mike could apparently type like a demon.
Most posts were pretty short, and similar, but they were unique. He was correctly pointing out porn, and random nonsense. He also pointed out things that could be dangerous like the clown with the knife. The bits that he did say were supernatural were few and far between.
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Like I said I will never forget the day I spoke to him.
It started with his reply
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Michael Trace
Arjun,
This video is of the corrupted. They have been infected with something from beyond the edges. They are a direct danger to you and everyone. Stay away from them! They can do things worse than killing you! If you can, run! Please post your address! We need to contain this. Time is lives! Where was this video taken?
Mike
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That caused me to rethink the video. I went back and rewatched. Originally, I had recorded it because 4 guys stumbling around the alley behind my apartment were tipping over trash cans, and singing something in slurred speech. A group of local kids in a gang had approached them. I figured something was about to happen, you know, a cool fight. So, I started recording. The kids walked up to the men, but stopped short. They stayed about three arms lengths away. The gang members had pipes and one a machete. But after a few seconds, less than a minute, the kids back away and eventually ran. Three of the men went back to stumbling around. The last looked up to see me filming from the balcony.
I had gone back into my apartment and shut off the lights. Looking back on it now, that might have been a mistake. It was still early in the night. Most people would still be awake and have lights on. So, my place being dark would likely have made it stand out more.
I watched him from my bedroom window sitting in the dark. He just stood there for several minutes. Then he stumbled after the others.
That was four days ago. I glanced out my window now. Now there we eleven people standing in the ally staring up at me. They were standing impossibly still. I looked back at the screen and read Mike’s message.
They can do things worse than killing you!
I looked back out the window. The people were gone. Someone pounded on my door. They were knocking they were hammering on the steel. I stood and approached. The door and the deadbolt were locked. I engaged the chain also. I glanced through the peephole.
The people outside looked wrong. Their skin was gray and cracked. It seemed rotten. A split second after I understood that. the man hammering on the door stared into the peephole.
“Arjun, let us in,” he hissed. His voice was raspy and despite the quiet it echoed into my apartment. He proceeded to hammer his fist against the door.
I fell back into the office and looked to the screen. Out of panic I posted my address. The power went out about a minute later. That was just enough time to realize I had doxed myself. I would have worried about that, but my door started rattling again.
Not really thinking I engaged the privacy chain. Yeah, that wasn’t going to do anything.
I ducked into the kitchen and grabbed my big knife. I had no idea what I would do with it but I didn’t want to deal with what might happen next bare handed. I had to white knuckle grip the knife to stop my hand from shaking. The people outside were shrieking my name now.
They pounded the door constantly. They must have broken their knuckles from the impact. The thing that honestly made my blood run cold was not the door beginning to crack. It was the smell. When I was young, before moving to the city, I grew up on a farm. Sometimes an animal would die and in the summer heat the body would putrefy. The awful heavy reek of rancid meat and ruptured guts wafted into my apartment from the door.
These people were rotten, literally. How were they moving? How did they know my name?
The adrenaline hit when the screaming started. I almost shit myself as the piercing wail cut through the din. I did soil myself when the noise was cut off and followed by a wet “Rip!” and soft “thud.” This was followed by a painful and long silence.
Even now I can’t tell you why, but I crept closer to the door. I gazed through the crack. Through the splintered wood I saw eight more of the decaying people. They were crammed into the hall but all had their backs to me. they seemed to staring in horror at a wall of absolute dark shadow.
That’s not quite right. Two hard glittering, golden eyes peered out of the void. every nerve in my body sang with survival instinct to stay away from whatever had those eyes.
Then it happened. An arm gestured from the darkness. The shadows exploded froth. Thousands of hands, tendrils and other umbral appendages seized the corpses in the hall. Words fail to truly describe how violent the next ten seconds were. the shadows rendered the people into a wave of gore. No muscle was untorn, no bone unbroken, all skin tattered, and every organ splattered. A fetid wave of blood and other material leaked under my door.
The darkness drifted closer to my door. The golden eyes met mine. I stubbled backward and nearly slipped in the blood.
“Arjun?” a man’s voice asked, “Are you okay?”
I didn’t answer. My heart hammered in my chest. Every hair on body stood up straight. Some primal lizard part of my brain screamed in horror, as it held me still.
“Arjun,” the man called again. “I am going to open the door. Please remain calm.”
The deadbolt disengaged. Then, the chain unhooked itself. The broken door pressed itself together and then slowly swung open. It moved like someone was lifting it slightly to prevent it from catching but nothing was touching it.
Those golden eyes looked at me through the now open door. “Hello Arjun. Don’t be afraid, I am here to help.” He paused for a moment than said, “I am sorry. I am Michael Trace.” When I just stood there staring, he continued. “I regret this happened on your doorstep. The Corrupted are an existential threat though. You are lucky they didn’t get ahold of you.” He looked down and saw I was leaving bloody foot prints, “you are going to want to burn those shoes. Do not touch this blood. It is tainted. I would recommend moving.”
“What are the shadows?” I managed.
The golden eyes blinked. “You can see them?”
I nodded.
The darkness drifted slowly into my apartment. I realized Mike, whatever he was, was a man draped in darkness floating a few inches above the ground. he was also heading right towards me. I whimpered as he got within arm’s length of me.
“that’s different then.” His hand reached out of the dark.
I flinched. Then realized he was offering me a card, “what’s this?” I asked taking it reflexively.
“A card. On it is a phone number. Call it and you will contact someone with a job offer. We need someone in this area to keep an eye out for further corrupted activity. It could be dangerous, but I think you will find the pay enticing.” The darkness retreated and he was out in the hall again. “Before I go, I have a favor to ask. Please post about this to the forum. Tell them about how I helped you, just don’t post the phone number. Other than that, say what you want. Just be careful. There are some real weirdos out there.”
He swept away. I followed only to see an empty hallway.
The lights came on a minute later. Cops showed up after another hour. Oddly enough they weren’t very interested in me or my neighbors. They seemed much more interested in getting people out of the building. I grabbed my stuff, and ended up squatting on a friend’s couch. The next day I found out a moderate fire destroyed my apartment and damaged the neighboring units. What happened next still bugs me. I had let my renter’s insurance lapse about two months ago. I just forgot. I was shocked when they sent me a check for the full amount of everything I lost. I hadn’t even submitted a claim.
I posted my experience to the thread. The others immediately labeled me a fag, and a noob, and a liar. A few others also explained they met Mike. They describe meeting a tall man with black hair and a beard. He was describe as wearing all black clothing, and for the most part polite if extremely eccentric. The list of things he did included, “talking a ghost into leaving a home in peace, finding a lost child, taking away a cursed doll, convincing a werewolf to leave a teen girl alone, and the slaughter outside my apartment.
The thing is. That just isn’t possible. Mike would have had to have gone from my apartment to California to Germany to South Korea, to Brazil. That took him around the world in about 10 hours.
So of course, people tried to dox Mike. It didn’t work. The fact that they couldn’t do it, woke the deep web types up. they dug into this and also came up dry. This led to the only logical conclusion. A wave of people demanding Mike explain what the hell he is, and how he did all this shit.
Eventually Mike responded with a link.
I clicked and was immediately serenaded by Rick Astley. He Rick rolled us. At least the bastard had a sense of humor.