I've seen a lot of things, like a Grim Reaper

You can read my previous stories here:

Like my Mom getting taken

Like a whole town Possessed

Like a God

Once again, I’m sorry these got taken down, I was foolish and didn’t read all the rules. But, here it is, in all its glory, my direct follow up to my godly experience.

Now… For a creature a good bit more sinister…

People fear death, as a concept, of course. I fear death very often. I run from its many causes because I prefer to stay alive. The longer I am alive the more good things I can see. Even a single, dew-speckled flower catching light with the dawn is enough beauty to remind me that the horrors that I encountered the night before are less frightening than the world is beautiful.

People fear Death, as an entity, almost wrongly. I have met specters that act as reapers, and frankly they get a bad rap. Many of them are tasked by a higher power that we cannot entirely fathom, but try to anyway, they are tasked to collect the souls of the dead so that they do not remain on this Earth. Some of them even act more as salesmen. They’ll approach a freshly separated soul and pitch their potential afterlife as a possibility. Some of those Grim Salesmen are trying to sell you a bad timeshare, but many just seem to want to take you to a different place. They aren’t bad.

But, they have Imitators. There are demons and spirits, phantoms, monsters that pose as carriers of souls. They consume the souls, most often, or carry them away to eternal torment.

I believe I met the real deal in a rather standard, expected place, a hospital. I had a lover that had gotten too close and was swept up in my supernatural maelstrom. That’s a story for another time, just know I was in the hospital and this girlfriend was not the subject of the creature I encountered now.

I was pacing the halls, waiting for a doctor to come find me and deliver me news. The halls were bustling and busy as nurses powerwalked between rooms and desks, doctors strolling about looking down at clipboards, patients in gowns walking about casually, visitors visiting. It was busy, but calm and normal. I got restless. I told the nurse at the nearby desk that I was going for a walk, and she assured me that everything would be fine when I came back.

I took off down the sprawling halls, turning left and right, making note of where I was going and where I would need to return to. I passed a maternity ward, and the nursery nearby. I don’t know, the sight of babies is kinda hopeful, so I stayed there a bit. I was watching the babies, one started to cry and a nurse quickly came in to check on them.

“Which one’s yours?” I was surprised by a nurse speaking beside me. I spun on her, but quickly calmed myself.

“Oh, no, none of them. I was just walking the halls to pass time.” She smiled at me and looked back into the nursery. I did as well. All the babies were quiet and asleep.

“I understand. I like to watch the kids, too. When they are calm and still, it makes you feel just as at ease.” She was sighing a little. I don’t know what she was thinking, couldn’t tell, but she had a light smile on her lips. I was gonna say something when the same baby from before started up again. The nurse huffed a little. “He gets so uppity, nobody knows why but he’ll just start crying randomly.” Just as the nurse came in to quiet him I turned to say something to my companion. When I turned, I could see down the hall, to the end where it intersected with another. My muscles tightened.

There was a figure in all black, stalking across the hall. His form was as vapor, billowing, dissipating at the floor. In a moment he disappeared down the hall. The baby stopped crying.

“Maybe he’s just a little more sensitive than the others.” And I left the nurse there, confused, as I followed the form down the hallway.

I was gone when I reached the intersection. I followed the hall it had gone down, checking each room I could as I walked. Nothing. I reached another intersection. I saw nothing, directly, but there was the smallest flicker of movement down another hall. When I turned, I saw nothing. The flicker of movement may have been nothing, a trick of my eyes. I don’t believe in that, though.

I stalked slowly down the hallway, eyes sweeping side to side. Everything seemed fine. The brightly lit hall was empty. Most the doors were shut, and looking into their thin windows showed nothing. One door wash suspicious. Just barely cracked open. I crept closer, and very cautiously peered through the window.

Nothing.

The room was standard, set for two people. The closest bed was partially obscured by the bathroom that was right beside the door. I could only see a pair of feet under blankets, stirring gently as I watched. The room was dark, lights out to allow the residents to sleep. The second bed at the back of the room was completely hidden by a hospital privacy screen.

Then it appeared, a great blobby shadow drifting beside the bed of the closest occupant. It turned away from me and headed towards the room, towards the back of the room and the second bed I could not see. It vanished behind the screen.

I took a deep breath and started to push the door open. It glided silently on well-oiled hospital hinges, making no sound. I was able to take several step into the room, pushing the door all the while. I had no way of seeing the wheelchair stashed behind the door, no way of knowing it would make such a starkly awful clatter in the quiet room. I froze in place, refusing to move. The shadow reappeared around the curtain, leaning out as if just checking what the problem was. It seemed to stare at me, watching my crouched form. Then, it retreated back behind the curtain.

It was not gone, and I did not move. I could feel the pervasive cold creeping up my flesh. The back of my neck was getting more and more chilled. I shut my eyes, too frightened to turn and face the monster I had foolishly tried to stalk. I made silent prayers, hoping to hit on something that may drive it away.

A stomping boot, jingling keys, and a rough hand grabbed my shoulder to spin me about. The cold was gone, and the man in front of me looked to be just a tired, slightly panicked, old, and certainly overweight security guard. He looked me up and down, then went into the room and looked at both patients, mumbling a soft apology to the closer of the two. Then, he returned to me and grabbed me under my arm.

“I don’t know what game you think you’re playing, but I can sure as hell guarantee it’s not funny. Trying to pull some Monty Python bullshit and scare people. You know some of these people may actually be on their death bed? You sicko…” I shook free of his grip and he turned, looking angrier.

“Hey, quit dragging me around. What are you talking about, I was just walking around!” The guard shook his head.

“I saw you on the cameras, dressed all in black, tugging that cart about. You’re gonna be the death of some innocent people, and I-” He was beginning to jab a finger at me accusingly. I interrupted him.

“What the actual hell are you talking about? As you can see, I am not wearing black,” I gestured at my outfit, a light blue shirt and white shorts, or something like that. It’s been a while but I definitely wasn’t wearing black. “and I sure as hell am not dragging any kind of cart with me.” This one was obvious. I had no cart. The guard still looked suspicious.

“Fine,” he said, “We have video evidence so I’ll show you.

He led me back to his office which was decently sized, the side wall of his desk an array of monitors. The room was well lit, and the desk itself was a mess. An unfinished McDonald’s meal and coffee and donuts sat in between unkempt stacks of paperwork. He took a sat in his swiveling chair and gestured me over to peer at the screens with him. He fiddled with some stuff and the larger, central monitor brought up a full color view of the hallway we had just been in, the camera was pointed straight down the hall without any angle.

Suddenly a blob of black appeared at the bottom of the screen. It wobbled and bobbed and moved forward down the hallway, revealing to be a hat with a massively wide brim, covering the head and the back of its wearer. It continued bobbing along, steadily revealing more of the person. Then, the hips and hands came into frame. The security guard started to shake his head.

“This is just disgusting of you.” The hands were gripping the handles of a large cart that was slowly getting pulled along. The puller and cart stopped when the cart was only have visible on screen, but enough could be seen.

The cart was full of bodies. Young and old, any race, either gender, just stacked on top of each other, naked. All were clean, free of wounds, and pale. But, worst of all, everyone had their eyes open, just staring blankly into nothing.

“Oh my God,” The guard whispered and pointed at an elderly woman in the cart, body mostly covered but head listing to the side, “That’s Old Maggy, she died here six months ago…” I guess he didn’t really watch the footage before coming out to get me.

The hat and cart had stopped in front of the door of the room I’d gone into. The hat tipped side-to-tide as if the owner was tilting his head to hear. Then, he turned and looked straight at the door, lifting his head, as if sniffing, though his face was still blocked by the wide brimmed hat. He then shuffled over to the door, opened it, and walked inside, not closing it all the way. A moment later I crept through the cart on to screen. The cart seemed to disappear as I walked through it. We then watched as I crept inside, could still see one of my legs a bit when I froze. A couple moments later the guard shuffled into screen and dragged me off. The guard leaned back away from the screen. “Well, shit,” He finally huffed, “That’s nuts.” I was busy scanning the rest of the monitors. I felt it wasn’t gone and was looking for it. Unfortunately, I was right. I final spotted it, headed towards the camera down a hall.

“There,” I said, pointing at the screen, “It’s still around.” We both looked at the screen, watching as the cart puller, big hat too low to see its face, ambled towards the camera. I could almost hear those squeaky old cart wheels.

Abruptly, the cart puller stopped, and started the side to side deal with his head. I heard the guard muttering and looked at him. He was sweating profusely, collar soaked, and flesh pale, eyes glued to that monitor.

“Holy Hell, that’s this room.” He whispered, voice high and squeaky from terror. I looked back at the monitor, the cart puller was sniffing at the door. I turned and looked at that door, backing away from it, working my way around the desk, somehow hoping to use the trash and clutter as cover.

The door swung up gently, and there he was, for I could see it was indeed a man, or at least was at some point. His robes were black, as was the hat, of course, and his skin was dry and stark white, old and sagging. The worst though were his eyes, a creamy, smooth off-white, like his eyes were just two pearls. I almost thought they were moving and flowing when that old head turned to look at me. But, he quickly went back to focusing on the guard.

“Oh my God, Jerry,” He was whispering, almost pleading, “You can’t be here, you died a month ago. You died, I watched you die!” The man ignored him and just calmly and rather slowly walked up to him. He reached forward and grabbed the guard by his cheeks and held him firm. The guard started opening his mouth to scream, but no sound came out. He started shaking in the grip, releasing the inaudible shriek. Then, he was still.

I couldn’t see the old man’s face all the while this was happening. But, as he hoisted the guard’s body over his shoulder and turned to me, it was with the guard’s face, but those same pearly eyes, now they were definitely flowing about. He stared me down intently for a couple minutes. I couldn’t move, could barely breath. Then, he tilted his head back and took a couple deep breaths.

Then he spoke, in a voice that was certainly not guard’s, it was deep, but scratchy, airy and old.

“No.” He said it with a long O, drawing it out as he exhaled. Then, he turned and took the guard out, shutting the door behind him. I could finally move again. I walked around to the cameras and looked to the one outside this room. I watched as the creature disrobed the guard, stuffing the clothes under its own cloak, then threw him in the back of the cart. He grabbed the handles of the cart and started wandering off. This time, I’m certain I heard those squeaky wooden wheels as he wandered off down the hall, before it just suddenly stopped and he vanished from the screen.

He was gone.

But, guard was not.

When I turned around, there he was sitting in his chair, head lolled back, and drool running down his chin. I shouted in surprise and ran from the room, calling for help.

I spent the next hour trying to talk my way out of a full blown police investigation before an examiner told us he had died from a sudden heart attack cause by cholesterol in his heart. I was reminded of the shitty food on the guy’s desk. It made me wonder.

I spent the rest of the night in my girlfriend’s room, watching over her.

Once again, when you know what you want to find, Google delivers. I typed in “old ghost man with cart dead” and found this as the second result. This is what I saw in that hospital that night. I’m certain of it.