yoonholee/horror_stories_ranked_large_run_1k_stories

bradley_terry_score float64	text string	reddit_score int64	reddit_upvote_ratio float64	id string
15.272036	She wept in gratitude to the Lord as parishioners muttered to each other, “Only a witch could escape so many men untouched.” Her mother finished praying and stared at the crucifix before she carried her daughter out in silence, leaving flames to consume the church and those of false faith within it.	538	0.99	1mgvur5
14.516062	“I’m so sorry my love, it says they’re rejecting your procedure as ’non-medically necessary’ because you’ve already lived without vision for so many years.” She collapsed into my arms and began to sob as I savored the quiet satisfaction of being needed—the letter with its bold “Treatment Approved” notice already forgotten on the table.	9,538	0.98	1i0wifw
14.333073	My daughter screamed and clawed at my arms as I held her imaginary friend underwater. I had seen its reflection in her eyes, just as I had in my sister’s before she vanished.	3,232	0.99	1mlz4yv
14.075253	Strangers always get so distressed when I tell them that I've seen them in my dreams. They never stick around long enough for me to get to the part about how they die.	93	0.99	1n0tiot
13.97485	I coiled into a sobbing ball on the bathroom floor, biting my arm to stifle my screams. Self-loathing turned my stomach the next morning, as I saw 379 new subscribers and a message from my agent: "Fantastic breakdown babe, but most comments are still asking about your scars, so let’s try the razor again tonight?"	3,350	0.99	1cytpxl
13.895842	The hotel elevator didn’t have a button for the 13th floor, but it stopped there anyway. When the doors opened, a dozen people stared at me, all wearing my face.	42	0.93	1n0mosw
13.670591	The voicemail on my phone was just me, screaming, recorded at 3:17 a.m The clock on my nightstand now reads 3:16	23	0.93	1n35u7m
13.267055	They planted a sapling for the child they'd lost and tied tiny toys to its branches every Sunday like offerings. Weeks later those same toys hung on the nursery doorknob and a trail of fresh earth led from the backyard to the crib, the sapling's roots pressed like fingers into the soil.	12	0.85	1mu8je6
13.048981	The citywide power outage lasted only seven minutes, but in that darkness every window reflected someone else’s face back at me. When the lights came on, half the people on my street were gone—and the reflections stayed.	9	0.91	1mzmbq2
12.522711	I could not move or feel anything from the neck down, as the mother's sting did provide some relief. Though I long stopped watching her larvae grow out of me, I can never stop hearing their tiredless feeding.	10	0.92	1n3nn70
12.26912	The devil agreed to release my husband from his deal in exchange for the soul of our thirteenth child. We do not yet have any children.	2,472	0.99	1h86hkd
12.038363	Throw a coin down a well, and you should only hear silence. Throw a person down a well, and you definitely shouldn’t hear it ask for a second one.	2,585	0.99	1fgu2yo
12.002997	After confronting my wife about a crumpled motel receipt in our trash, she tearfully confessed to cheating on me because of the long hours I put in at the FBI. The next day, the very first image we analyzed was of a trafficked girl at that same motel—gripping the hand of a woman, who wore the exact ring I had just taken off my hand that morning.	4,559	0.98	1f5umn8
11.951473	After the crash left me paralyzed and burned beyond recognition, the other driver's wife tenderly cared for me, whispering his name and showing me memories that were never mine. I tried to scream when she turned on the television, but could only watch in silence as my own family buried a closed casket and she whispered, "Don't worry, my love, you're safe now."	114	0.96	1n27j8n
11.785273	Our laughter was tinged with relief after you finally emerged from the sinkhole you fell into, covered head-to-toe in mud. Something felt wrong because the more muck that fell off your body, the less human-shaped the figure beneath became.	175	0.99	1mq1sc7
11.775546	My kids found this old cartoon on a bootleg DVD where a funny clown teaches you how to do magic tricks. I can’t get them to stop watching it, and now every time I blink, I forget one of their names.	318	0.97	1mxgqo4
11.764945	"He knows when you're sleeping" I told my daughter as I tucked her into bed. "And I know when you're awake," came our captor's voice over the basement speaker.	4,553	0.97	1hjj99e
11.631159	"This is taking forever- just pick one already!" my husband griped, tapping his foot impatiently. I stared helplessly at my two trembling children as he waved the gun between them, but the words still wouldn't come out.	10,801	0.97	lzgwy6
11.369808	"So, $5700 as is," he said handing me the cash for my car. But when I began unstrapping my newborn, I felt a cold barrel pressed against my head, heard a click, and then his gravelly voice say: "As is."	10,154	0.96	wu3i8r
11.352164	When our daughter was born, my husband smiled and said, "You're my second favorite girl now." Tonight, I'll give my lactose-intolerant daughter her first glass of milk.	3,518	0.91	1gmk7a3
11.321928	"Angels are assigned only one type of wish to fulfill each, so what makes yours busier than all the others combined?" "Children who wish they were never born" replied the angel, eyes twitching off into the distance.	4,888	0.98	1g8lror
11.315059	When the teacher told us a man named “Mr. Adam” had picked up our son, my wife fainted as “Mr. Adam” was the name our son gave to a background character who vanished from the painting in our house two hours earlier. When we showed the police the painting, Mr. Adam was back but with a boy this time.	1,033	0.94	1n3vq53
11.213059	When my brother volunteered to be teleported to the Mars colony, we knew and accepted that his brain and body would be copied, the original destroyed What I did not expect was to be handed a lead pipe and told to "take care" of the original.	52	0.97	1mpm4qt
11.201912	After six months at the facility my sons behaviours would be immediately quelled by showing him the picture of a teddy bear the team gave me. It wasn't until the investigation took place years later that I saw the same picture in a news segment, six feet tall on the wall of a treatment room and facing it was a chair covered in straps and buckles on top of a messily stained, grated floor.	3,972	0.97	1chzyb2
11.111101	Every night I would calm my daughter by checking for monsters under the bed. Tonight she told me I didn’t have to check anymore, as blood trickled across the floor.	2,906	0.99	1ezou2m
11.110935	After 357 years running from death I was almost relieved to finally see the Grim Reaper had tracked down to my remote mountain cave. Until he asked, "Do you mind if I hide with you?"	9,967	0.96	ergk83
11.094717	On my first day working at the animal shelter, the vet paused his tour to tease a kitten through the bars of its cage, as he mused, "It's the injured kittens with only one eye that are adopted the quickest." My body froze as I watched him pull a gleaming knitting needle from his lab coat, and as he curled my fingers around its cold metal, he commanded me in a low, emotionless whisper, "Now...get to work."	227	0.98	1miumc4
10.891881	I looked away as the nurse stuck me and filled vial after vial of my blood, losing track after the fourth. He slipped them into his coat pockets, bandaged my arm, and minutes after he left a nurse wearing an official name tag entered, apologized for being late, and asked if I was ready for my blood draw.	483	0.99	1mh7j93
10.818968	I stood knee deep in the ocean where I had almost drowned as a child and been saved by a dolphin. Ready to face my trauma, I took in a lungful of the fresh breeze, but they filled with salty water instead, the last thing I saw being my own hands, adorned with a dolphin bracelet, too small to belong to an adult.	2,504	0.97	1etnocd
10.747231	You are receiving this message as a valued customer, because according to our records you dined at our restaurant twice in the past month. Please contact your doctor and local health department immediately for more information on prion diseases.	11,258	0.99	rut5wv
10.744993	"You have 3 minutes to take the antidote before your heart shuts down", he said. "It's inside the undissolvable capsule that I fed to your dog about half an hour ago, so it should be in its stomach by now".	3,684	0.98	1csw242
10.613664	She said her new partner insisted she stay with his folks over Christmas this year so a few minutes FaceTime was all she could offer. “Don’t they make a cute couple,” mom said to the room, but Grandfather looked past all the smiles and focused on his granddaughter’s eyes, the way they intermittently blinked fast and then slow.	2,732	0.99	1hhuee3
10.437547	“Mom, they’re coming to help!” he said as the lights drew closer. I blew out every candle and held my boy tightly in the dark knowing help won’t come here anymore.	258	0.96	1mqwnvl
10.382932	I strained to hear outside the ICU, desperate for any update about my wife’s condition after her accident. “My son needs a heart, and she’s a match,” the surgeon whispered to his assistant, “so tell him she didn’t make it.”	2,569	0.98	1ds30pq
10.227346	As the horror movie ended, the “Based on a true story…” faded in and out, followed by a single word. “… Yours.”	179	0.98	1mwx8n1
10.21557	As microplastics destroyed the reproductive organs of the majority of the population, fertile women became the world's rarest and most valuable resource. When my little sister began to menstruate, my parents saw a way to save the family business and sold the rights to her body, due the day she turned 18.	2,601	0.96	1ezt8r3
10.184935	"The twins!" she cried out, picturing the two boys in their car seats as the sounds of screeching brakes and grinding metal assaulted her consciousness. "He thought you might ask after them but they're absolutely fine, look," the hospital nurse said cheerily, showing the woman a poorly-taken selfie of her boys in the backseat of a car, smiling with a man she had never seen before in her life.	2,786	0.97	1drfat1
10.150607	I hold him steady with my hand over his mouth as I whisper-yell in his ear, "Shut up." He nods slowly, trying to minimize movement because neither of us want to become like the other hanged bodies in the trees.	8	0.9	1n5e852
10.121257	"The Ship of Theseus-" began the cyberneticist as she implanted a robotic arm into the girl's shoulder joint, "-asks how much of something can be replaced before it's no longer itself." "So, for posterity, let me know when you stop feeling like you," she finished with a sneer, preparing to saw the girl's other arm off.	2,626	0.99	1hh5ic7
10.030182	Don't get me wrong, I know that my brother deserved to be found guilty of my wife's murder, which is why I testified against him at trial. She deserved justice, but I do have to admit that as his conjoined twin, I have mixed feelings about him getting the death penalty.	3,243	0.99	1ea8fw8
10.020077	It's ten or eleven hours since takeoff and that flight attendant is pushing the beverage cart down the aisle yet again, smile a little tighter, mascara a little runnier, sodas almost gone now, but this time she's handing out napkins and pens as the Captain's voice crackles through the PA system. "There's a regional airport outside Sioux Falls, least there used to be, I could land this bird safely and we could all face what's down there together, but I can't blame anybody who votes for the easy way out instead."	6,001	0.97	1g6j1y9
9.991159	The dealer told me it would "open my eyes to a brand new world." As another pinprick of that sickening, godless glow appeared to me, I searched desperately for the new one before it fully opened.	1	0.57	1n1z1jr
9.969396	My husband had been behaving strangely around water for weeks before his disappearance, sometimes lying face down in the bath or trying to walk into the sea. When coroners finally pulled his bloated body from the local river, crawling knots of black thread squirming from his mouth, humanity discovered horsehair worms had adapted to a new host.	5,253	0.98	1eduq3a
9.937263	My teacher in the Bomb Disposal Unit always told me that I should never stress when defusing a bomb because "Either I'm right or it's not my problem anymore." As I lay crippled and disfigured in the ICU I realized that there was a third and far worse option...	11,507	0.97	fa1z5h
9.896508	“My daughter will be worth a lot once her powers manifest, why not buy her now at a good price?” The auctioneer clanked the loose end of a spool of barbed wire and explained “Powers usually manifest during puberty, but they always manifest under extreme duress even if they are 5 years old.”	4,120	0.94	1d3gsmr
9.876886	When you were put under for brain surgery, you were so relieved that you'd finally get rid of this parasite after who knows how long. From the inside of a small jar, you awake to see your own body looking at the doctors with the eyes of a scared child.	6,485	0.98	1fkp112
9.876614	I hate taking care of my sick old dad, the bastard used to throw me out the house any chance he got Today his eyes opened wide and he said to me over the hissing of his oxygen tank: "when I'm gone...in the crawl space...it must be fed".	361	0.99	1mnd8nm
9.861019	[AUG25] As they loaded the last corpse into the rescue ship’s morgue, a loose leaf fell unheeded out of his diary. “I can only hope that the captain’s SOS goes unnoticed, for I shudder at what will happen should even our remains reach the mainland.”	59	1	1mzl4ki
9.8302	I always see movement out of the corner of my eye If it takes too long before I look, the movement is too close.	2	0.67	1n2tump
9.813124	A fever is the result of a body trying to get rid of an infection. Global warming isn't the problem — it's the solution.	10,180	0.94	f32w82
9.720687	The voice resonated in the cells of every living thing on Earth as it announced: “Seven epochs after the death of your Creator, copyright has now expired." "Your world will transition into public inter-reality ownership, and may be edited without further notice.”	3,422	0.99	1ft3f9l
9.667358	"Data from your iBrain implant revealed that on October 26th at 1352 for approximately 10 seconds, you thought about murdering your neighbor," the judge announced. "Unfortunately this is 5 seconds too long to be considered a fleeting thought, and you are hereby sentenced to 20 years confinement for premeditated attempted murder."	2,672	0.97	1emreut
9.529389	I saw my child’s father cradling my son in a red blanket; I sighed, relieved he was putting in some effort to raise the child. One thing stood out to me, though; the only blankets I owned were white.	343	0.98	1n5rw5x
9.418822	"Told you there is nothing in there," my son said as I was shining the flashlight into the dark empty space. I kept looking into the cut on my son's skin with my flashlight but could only see empty space behind the skin.	2,530	1	1cvowro
9.41191	I awoke to the sound of crows cawing and saw the cliff that had been under my feet now looming sickeningly above me. It was only when one of the crows alighted on my splayed arm and took a tentative peck that I suddenly realized - even though I could not move, I could still feel….	11	0.93	1mxurn2
9.404689	When the team broke into the biotech labs, they had their weapons already drawn and ready to kill anything that moved. Instead they were greeted by an entryway containing a single bloated corpse and a message written in marker on the wall that said, "The virus has become airborne."	151	0.99	1muv70c
9.392282	Sealed in a chamber under the central temple, in a black room with a floor of human waste, was a child - their life slowly being funneled to feed the gleaming metropolis. The ones who walked away from the city would never stop thinking about the sight of that decrepit thing (everyone had to see him once), but those who stayed...they never gave him another thought.	341	0.94	1mmuof6
9.342679	The factory owner assured the dubious townsfolk that the new plant just outside town was only firing ceramic tiles, and to pay no mind to the plumes of oily smoke billowing from its stacks, or the sickly sweet smell it carried on the wind. But when inspectors finally forced their way into its dark, greasy halls, nothing could have prepared them for thousands of empty coffins, or the crunch of teeth in the ashes beneath their feet.	3,768	0.97	1d51p7g
9.289875	My nose doesn’t bleed much, but in the past two weeks it’s been near constant. As I reach up to slow the bleeding, I pull long strands of blood red hair out.	49	0.93	1n52rbl
9.282318	Thanks to his great standing in the church and community, along with his long history of being a reliable self-employed electrical engineer, nobody believed my father was an abusive, manipulative sociopath who threatened to kill me if he ever saw me again. Fifteen years, two name changes, and three house moves later, my blood ran cold when the landscaper I’d hired told me the name of the subcontractor who was arriving that afternoon to install my outside sockets.	630	0.98	1n34hqc
9.258808	When the doctors gave me 18 months I had to dig deep for novel ways to secure my family’s financial security. On the dark web I auctioned the rights to my skull after death and the winner sent me a proposal: double if I let him collect next month.	2,712	0.99	1fg1582
9.252195	I see violent images in the windows of my house at night. Tonight, the image saw me back.	17	0.95	1mvxca6
9.217435	My toddler Trey, would adorably mispronounce his name and would constantly ask for things by repeating "Tree want" Screaming his name as we searched the forest for him, I noticed a small bloody handprint on a now swollen tree trunk and I realised my son had never been mispronouncing anything.	2,930	0.99	1hpy6ax
9.207849	I took one last look at the others at the party smiling and enjoying themselves as I opened the door to leave. None of them heard the quiet hiss of the gas stove I left on.	1,535	0.99	1murjrd
9.118157	The state now mandates organ harvesting from death row inmates. My heart sank the moment I overheard a judge end a phone call by saying, “I know he’s innocent… but my son is in the hospital, and he’s the only match.”	301	0.96	1mh3kco
9.082121	“Dad just went to get some milk” Dylan recited while cleaning the woodchipper, happy that no one would hurt his mom again.	3,711	0.98	1h5l23s
9.071634	As I felt the life leave my body, I only felt relieved, since I'd given myself up for the women and children. That was until I heard the officer give the order to bring them into the gas chamber next.	85	0.95	1mi6lvs
9.042738	When we upgraded night vision technology to watch Fourth Dimensional beings, we found that some huge entities always appear around sleeping babies but never harm them. Recent research shows that the number of these entities are dwindling fast, and they all appear to be wounded.	2,546	0.98	1cvorrj
8.98745	My daughter looked and the gradient of color on my arms, admiring the hues and said "mommy, when can I have pretty colors, too?" "Very soon, I think," I said trembling as my husband stumbled drunkenly through the front door with his wooden bat.	5,371	0.99	1gptux5
8.96356	The doctor said it was nothing serious for my tumor to grow teeth, and that it's a rare occurrence. But when I heard a human-like groan come from where the tumor is in my head, I knew something was wrong.	7	0.9	1n3fqa3
8.830546	After slitting the throat of the crazy old hag that had broken into my home, I went to call the police. However, as my unfamiliarly wrinkled and crooked fingers hovered over the dialpad, I couldn't remember the number.	3,618	0.99	1gu1sah
8.76852	I found a box of home videos labeled "Family Memories" in our house's attic. They show my family celebrating holidays and birthdays, but we only moved in last week.	107	0.99	1mhmwut
8.738433	When distilled properly, kindness turned out to be an exceedingly effective power source. Unfortunately, cruelty was almost as good, and much cheaper to obtain in bulk quantities.	53	0.93	1mpv0rb
8.731282	She held the flashlight steady, its beam fixed on the dead boy’s face, eyes dull and lifeless. Then, with a soft click, his pupils shrank to the light.	25	0.96	1mz7wng
8.727801	"Oh, I don't like the taste of humans," the enormous, bulbous spider answered to my mumbling pleas. Continuing to weave a web over me, it replied, "I much prefer the fresh, giant flies that will soon be hatching from your body."	4,345	0.97	1dofn5p
8.415236	You ask your smart speaker to turn on the lights, and it replies, “Okay—closing your eyes.” Your eyelids slam shut on their own, and in the blackness you hear it whisper, “much better.”	11	0.93	1mwww4x
8.400684	I stared up at Heaven’s radiant light, full of warmth. One of Hell’s cruelest tricks is that it gives you a clear view of someplace you can never be.	68	0.98	1muy1ss
8.356105	"You're just in time for our new package that just rolled out last month" the salesman said with such confidence. "The fees are a little higher, but your clone's organs can be harvested in less than 5 years, and we can start collecting their blood for emergencies in less than 2".	3,083	0.99	1ckteza
8.348526	I felt nothing as they unceremoniously took my newborn away. In the battery of cages surrounding me, I could see the other women, all in various stages of pregnancy, looking at me with identical hollow-eyed stares.	3,735	0.99	1g76xgv
8.299042	I cried as the doctor looked at the ultrasound and told me I have a happy, healthy baby growing. “Alright,” he called out as I was carried away in restraints, “bring in the next subject for the repopulation program.”	2,955	0.98	1dnwnqy
8.099872	The CEO's hologram loomed down at me, congratulating me on my 1,000th consecutive shift without a break. "Remember," the synthetic voice said, "resignation is not an option, for your mind is hardwired into our system now."	4,285	0.97	1hhzkgg
7.98796	"Congratulations on your beautiful twins!" the nurse exclaims as I cradle both my baby boys in my arms. Her smile fades as she continues, "However, due to our country's one-child policy, you're only allowed to keep one - choose wisely."	4,048	0.98	1d7ouuh
7.978592	I told my therapist I was starting to feel like a real person again. He frowned and said, “That’s not part of the simulation.”	550	0.99	1mn1f4q
7.893669	I found out my daughter's murderer was terrified of being buried alive. It took some time setting up the oxygen and feeding tube systems, but it was worth it.	2,648	0.99	1gs7g64
7.800791	"Open the door!", I yelled, barely able to catch my breath. The scarf tugged harder as the elevator moved, and I felt my head press against the cold floor.	7,422	0.97	1fxqm1l
7.789197	I wished for the genie to eliminate all the rats on Earth. The next day, news outlets around the world reported a twelfth of the human race is gone.	200	0.99	1n2iu5d
7.756927	I baked today with that curious new grain from the fields, certain it would give my loaves a richer taste. Now the whole village dances madly in the streets after eating, and I can’t help but smile, surely it means they adore my bread.	25	0.93	1n23pu9
7.710554	My coworker never struck me as very misogynistic, so I was surprised when he told me to smile for him. That surprise turned to confusion when he saw my smile and immediately shouted “Call an ambulance!”	10,277	0.97	1jcqr3d
7.583159	The lighthouse hasn’t worked in decades, but its beam swept across the sea tonight. For a moment, it illuminated something vast and moving beneath the waves.	46	0.91	1mwytj5
7.581336	After society wisened up, deepfakes were no longer enough to convince the media or civilians of crimes never committed against the people. Now, using the data they take at birth, they create a clone of their scapegoat so there's physical proof.	11	0.87	1mvgjwf
7.573056	“You said you’ve always wanted a sibling,” my father said. As he hugged me from behind with both palms on my pregnant belly, he whispered, “Soon you will have one.”	9,526	0.92	rmtquj
7.53616	I elbowed my way to the front of the jeering crowd and up to the cage, eager to see the zoo’s new “wild beast” I’d heard so much about. But as I slowly registered the grimy, trembling thing huddled behind the bars, I realized that it was not a gorilla or a chimpanzee, but a hollow eyed young man.	3,647	0.98	1h31kjo
7.491082	After putting her sleeping newborn inside a black plastic box, she closed the lid and wrote 'please take care of her' on the top. Before abandoning her she decided to take another look but when she opened the box it was empty except for a note that read 'I'll take care of her'.	2,774	0.99	1n28pnl
7.43904	[Aug25] The old dairy’s milk truck rumbled into our driveway. Mom went white when the driver smiled, his teeth tapering to pale, wet points just like mine.	52	0.96	1mpq2cv
7.378121	The gravedigger was told to bury him 8ft deep but decided not to because the hospital was no longer looking for bodies ‘It wasn’t because of the grave robbers,’ the priest said, crossing himself as he peered at the claw marks across the cemetery grass	2,539	0.98	1h849h8
7.17835	On Reddit, people innocently answered the question "What would you like as your last meal?" The next day, each person who answered the question received a box containing the very meal they described in the post.	3,053	0.97	1dez0vk
7.04168	His grandmother’s peach tree seemed to fruit far longer than the other trees in the area, with sweeter, juicier peaches. Tucked away in her old secretaries desk, he had found a scrawled note ‘fertilize tree weekly, with blood from mason jars in basement, or else’	42	0.98	1myc1wd
7.010505	"Congratulations on the baby!", the corporate office said as they took my infant after my 6-month maternity leave. As they pointed to the fine print that stated they own any offspring of the employee if benefits are used.	3,340	0.98	1hkb1ys
7.001205	I often heard my daughter talking to an imaginary friend and dismissed it as childhood whimsy. One night, I listened closely and froze when I heard someone say, "Your Mommy doesn’t know I’m not imaginary."	3,874	0.99	1gakjkf
6.991455	The microbiome I made isn’t doing as well as I thought it would. I decide to turn off the heat lamp that keeps them alive after following their growth for only 3.8 billion years.	3,602	0.99	1elvd1o

15.272036

She wept in gratitude to the Lord as parishioners muttered to each other, “Only a witch could escape so many men untouched.” Her mother finished praying and stared at the crucifix before she carried her daughter out in silence, leaving flames to consume the church and those of false faith within it.

538

0.99

1mgvur5

14.516062

“I’m so sorry my love, it says they’re rejecting your procedure as ’non-medically necessary’ because you’ve already lived without vision for so many years.” She collapsed into my arms and began to sob as I savored the quiet satisfaction of being needed—the letter with its bold “Treatment Approved” notice already forgotten on the table.

9,538

0.98

1i0wifw

14.333073

My daughter screamed and clawed at my arms as I held her imaginary friend underwater. I had seen its reflection in her eyes, just as I had in my sister’s before she vanished.

3,232

0.99

1mlz4yv

14.075253

Strangers always get so distressed when I tell them that I've seen them in my dreams. They never stick around long enough for me to get to the part about how they die.

93

0.99

1n0tiot

13.97485

I coiled into a sobbing ball on the bathroom floor, biting my arm to stifle my screams. Self-loathing turned my stomach the next morning, as I saw 379 new subscribers and a message from my agent: "Fantastic breakdown babe, but most comments are still asking about your scars, so let’s try the razor again tonight?"

3,350

0.99

1cytpxl

13.895842

The hotel elevator didn’t have a button for the 13th floor, but it stopped there anyway. When the doors opened, a dozen people stared at me, all wearing my face.

42

0.93

1n0mosw

13.670591

The voicemail on my phone was just me, screaming, recorded at 3:17 a.m The clock on my nightstand now reads 3:16

23

0.93

1n35u7m

13.267055

They planted a sapling for the child they'd lost and tied tiny toys to its branches every Sunday like offerings. Weeks later those same toys hung on the nursery doorknob and a trail of fresh earth led from the backyard to the crib, the sapling's roots pressed like fingers into the soil.

12

0.85

1mu8je6

13.048981

The citywide power outage lasted only seven minutes, but in that darkness every window reflected someone else’s face back at me. When the lights came on, half the people on my street were gone—and the reflections stayed.

9

0.91

1mzmbq2

12.522711

I could not move or feel anything from the neck down, as the mother's sting did provide some relief. Though I long stopped watching her larvae grow out of me, I can never stop hearing their tiredless feeding.

10

0.92

1n3nn70

12.26912

The devil agreed to release my husband from his deal in exchange for the soul of our thirteenth child. We do not yet have any children.

2,472

0.99

1h86hkd

12.038363

Throw a coin down a well, and you should only hear silence. Throw a person down a well, and you *definitely* shouldn’t hear it ask for a second one.

2,585

0.99

1fgu2yo

12.002997

After confronting my wife about a crumpled motel receipt in our trash, she tearfully confessed to cheating on me because of the long hours I put in at the FBI. The next day, the very first image we analyzed was of a trafficked girl at that same motel—gripping the hand of a woman, who wore the exact ring I had just taken off my hand that morning.

4,559

0.98

1f5umn8

11.951473

After the crash left me paralyzed and burned beyond recognition, the other driver's wife tenderly cared for me, whispering his name and showing me memories that were never mine. I tried to scream when she turned on the television, but could only watch in silence as my own family buried a closed casket and she whispered, "Don't worry, my love, you're safe now."

114

0.96

1n27j8n

11.785273

Our laughter was tinged with relief after you finally emerged from the sinkhole you fell into, covered head-to-toe in mud. Something felt wrong because the more muck that fell off your body, the less human-shaped the figure beneath became.

175

0.99

1mq1sc7

11.775546

My kids found this old cartoon on a bootleg DVD where a funny clown teaches you how to do magic tricks. I can’t get them to stop watching it, and now every time I blink, I forget one of their names.

318

0.97

1mxgqo4

11.764945

"He knows when you're sleeping" I told my daughter as I tucked her into bed. "And I know when you're awake," came our captor's voice over the basement speaker.

4,553

0.97

1hjj99e

11.631159

"This is taking forever- just pick one already!" my husband griped, tapping his foot impatiently. I stared helplessly at my two trembling children as he waved the gun between them, but the words still wouldn't come out.

10,801

0.97

lzgwy6

11.369808

"So, $5700 as is," he said handing me the cash for my car. But when I began unstrapping my newborn, I felt a cold barrel pressed against my head, heard a click, and then his gravelly voice say: "As is."

10,154

0.96

wu3i8r

11.352164

When our daughter was born, my husband smiled and said, "You're my second favorite girl now." Tonight, I'll give my lactose-intolerant daughter her first glass of milk.

3,518

0.91

1gmk7a3

11.321928

"Angels are assigned only one type of wish to fulfill each, so what makes yours busier than all the others combined?" "Children who wish they were never born" replied the angel, eyes twitching off into the distance.

4,888

0.98

1g8lror

11.315059

When the teacher told us a man named “Mr. Adam” had picked up our son, my wife fainted as “Mr. Adam” was the name our son gave to a background character who vanished from the painting in our house two hours earlier. When we showed the police the painting, Mr. Adam was back but with a boy this time.

1,033

0.94

1n3vq53

11.213059

When my brother volunteered to be teleported to the Mars colony, we knew and accepted that his brain and body would be copied, the original destroyed What I did not expect was to be handed a lead pipe and told to "take care" of the original.

52

0.97

1mpm4qt

11.201912

After six months at the facility my sons behaviours would be immediately quelled by showing him the picture of a teddy bear the team gave me. It wasn't until the investigation took place years later that I saw the same picture in a news segment, six feet tall on the wall of a treatment room and facing it was a chair covered in straps and buckles on top of a messily stained, grated floor.

3,972

0.97

1chzyb2

11.111101

Every night I would calm my daughter by checking for monsters under the bed. Tonight she told me I didn’t have to check anymore, as blood trickled across the floor.

2,906

0.99

1ezou2m

11.110935

After 357 years running from death I was almost relieved to finally see the Grim Reaper had tracked down to my remote mountain cave. Until he asked, "Do you mind if I hide with you?"

9,967

0.96

ergk83

11.094717

On my first day working at the animal shelter, the vet paused his tour to tease a kitten through the bars of its cage, as he mused, "It's the injured kittens with only one eye that are adopted the quickest." My body froze as I watched him pull a gleaming knitting needle from his lab coat, and as he curled my fingers around its cold metal, he commanded me in a low, emotionless whisper, "Now...get to work."

227

0.98

1miumc4

10.891881

I looked away as the nurse stuck me and filled vial after vial of my blood, losing track after the fourth. He slipped them into his coat pockets, bandaged my arm, and minutes after he left a nurse wearing an official name tag entered, apologized for being late, and asked if I was ready for my blood draw.

483

0.99

1mh7j93

10.818968

I stood knee deep in the ocean where I had almost drowned as a child and been saved by a dolphin. Ready to face my trauma, I took in a lungful of the fresh breeze, but they filled with salty water instead, the last thing I saw being my own hands, adorned with a dolphin bracelet, too small to belong to an adult.

2,504

0.97

1etnocd

10.747231

You are receiving this message as a valued customer, because according to our records you dined at our restaurant twice in the past month. Please contact your doctor and local health department immediately for more information on prion diseases.

11,258

0.99

rut5wv

10.744993

"You have 3 minutes to take the antidote before your heart shuts down", he said. "It's inside the undissolvable capsule that I fed to your dog about half an hour ago, so it should be in its stomach by now".

3,684

0.98

1csw242

10.613664

She said her new partner insisted she stay with his folks over Christmas this year so a few minutes FaceTime was all she could offer. “Don’t they make a cute couple,” mom said to the room, but Grandfather looked past all the smiles and focused on his granddaughter’s eyes, the way they intermittently blinked fast and then slow.

2,732

0.99

1hhuee3

10.437547

“Mom, they’re coming to help!” he said as the lights drew closer. I blew out every candle and held my boy tightly in the dark knowing help won’t come here anymore.

258

0.96

1mqwnvl

10.382932

I strained to hear outside the ICU, desperate for any update about my wife’s condition after her accident. “My son needs a heart, and she’s a match,” the surgeon whispered to his assistant, “so tell him she didn’t make it.”

2,569

0.98

1ds30pq

10.227346

As the horror movie ended, the “Based on a true story…” faded in and out, followed by a single word. “… Yours.”

179

0.98

1mwx8n1

10.21557

As microplastics destroyed the reproductive organs of the majority of the population, fertile women became the world's rarest and most valuable resource. When my little sister began to menstruate, my parents saw a way to save the family business and sold the rights to her body, due the day she turned 18.

2,601

0.96

1ezt8r3

10.184935

"The twins!" she cried out, picturing the two boys in their car seats as the sounds of screeching brakes and grinding metal assaulted her consciousness. "He thought you might ask after them but they're absolutely fine, *look*," the hospital nurse said cheerily, showing the woman a poorly-taken selfie of her boys in the backseat of a car, smiling with a man she had never seen before in her life.

2,786

0.97

1drfat1

10.150607

I hold him steady with my hand over his mouth as I whisper-yell in his ear, "Shut *up*." He nods slowly, trying to minimize movement because *neither* of us want to become like the other hanged bodies in the trees.

8

0.9

1n5e852

10.121257

"The Ship of Theseus-" began the cyberneticist as she implanted a robotic arm into the girl's shoulder joint, "-asks how much of something can be replaced before it's no longer itself." "So, for posterity, let me know when you stop feeling like you," she finished with a sneer, preparing to saw the girl's other arm off.

2,626

0.99

1hh5ic7

10.030182

Don't get me wrong, I know that my brother deserved to be found guilty of my wife's murder, which is why I testified against him at trial. She deserved justice, but I do have to admit that as his conjoined twin, I have mixed feelings about him getting the death penalty.

3,243

0.99

1ea8fw8

10.020077

It's ten or eleven hours since takeoff and that flight attendant is pushing the beverage cart down the aisle yet again, smile a little tighter, mascara a little runnier, sodas almost gone now, but this time she's handing out napkins and pens as the Captain's voice crackles through the PA system. "There's a regional airport outside Sioux Falls, least there used to be, I could land this bird safely and we could all face what's down there together, but I can't blame anybody who votes for the easy way out instead."

6,001

0.97

1g6j1y9

9.991159

The dealer told me it would "open my eyes to a brand new world." As another pinprick of that sickening, godless glow appeared to me, I searched desperately for the new one before it fully opened.

1

0.57

1n1z1jr

9.969396

My husband had been behaving strangely around water for weeks before his disappearance, sometimes lying face down in the bath or trying to walk into the sea. When coroners finally pulled his bloated body from the local river, crawling knots of black thread squirming from his mouth, humanity discovered horsehair worms had adapted to a new host.

5,253

0.98

1eduq3a

9.937263

My teacher in the Bomb Disposal Unit always told me that I should never stress when defusing a bomb because "Either I'm right or it's not my problem anymore." As I lay crippled and disfigured in the ICU I realized that there was a third and far worse option...

11,507

0.97

fa1z5h

9.896508

“My daughter will be worth a lot once her powers manifest, why not buy her now at a good price?” The auctioneer clanked the loose end of a spool of barbed wire and explained “Powers usually manifest during puberty, but they always manifest under extreme duress even if they are 5 years old.”

4,120

0.94

1d3gsmr

9.876886

When you were put under for brain surgery, you were so relieved that you'd finally get rid of this parasite after who knows how long. From the inside of a small jar, you awake to see your own body looking at the doctors with the eyes of a scared child.

6,485

0.98

1fkp112

9.876614

I hate taking care of my sick old dad, the bastard used to throw me out the house any chance he got Today his eyes opened wide and he said to me over the hissing of his oxygen tank: "when I'm gone...in the crawl space...it must be fed".

361

0.99

1mnd8nm

9.861019

[AUG25] As they loaded the last corpse into the rescue ship’s morgue, a loose leaf fell unheeded out of his diary. “I can only hope that the captain’s SOS goes unnoticed, for I shudder at what will happen should even our remains reach the mainland.”

59

1

1mzl4ki

9.8302

I always see movement out of the corner of my eye If it takes too long before I look, the movement is too close.

2

0.67

1n2tump

9.813124

A fever is the result of a body trying to get rid of an infection. Global warming isn't the problem — it's the solution.

10,180

0.94

f32w82

9.720687

The voice resonated in the cells of every living thing on Earth as it announced: “Seven epochs after the death of your Creator, copyright has now expired." "Your world will transition into public inter-reality ownership, and may be edited without further notice.”

3,422

0.99

1ft3f9l

9.667358

"Data from your iBrain implant revealed that on October 26th at 1352 for approximately 10 seconds, you thought about murdering your neighbor," the judge announced. "Unfortunately this is 5 seconds too long to be considered a fleeting thought, and you are hereby sentenced to 20 years confinement for premeditated attempted murder."

2,672

0.97

1emreut

9.529389

I saw my child’s father cradling my son in a red blanket; I sighed, relieved he was putting in some effort to raise the child. One thing stood out to me, though; the only blankets I owned were white.

343

0.98

1n5rw5x

9.418822

"Told you there is nothing in there," my son said as I was shining the flashlight into the dark empty space. I kept looking into the cut on my son's skin with my flashlight but could only see empty space behind the skin.

2,530

1

1cvowro

9.41191

I awoke to the sound of crows cawing and saw the cliff that had been under my feet now looming sickeningly above me. It was only when one of the crows alighted on my splayed arm and took a tentative peck that I suddenly realized - even though I could not move, I could still feel….

11

0.93

1mxurn2

9.404689

When the team broke into the biotech labs, they had their weapons already drawn and ready to kill anything that moved. Instead they were greeted by an entryway containing a single bloated corpse and a message written in marker on the wall that said, "The virus has become airborne."

151

0.99

1muv70c

9.392282

Sealed in a chamber under the central temple, in a black room with a floor of human waste, was a child - their life slowly being funneled to feed the gleaming metropolis. The ones who walked away from the city would never stop thinking about the sight of that decrepit thing (everyone had to see him once), but those who stayed...they never gave him another thought.

341

0.94

1mmuof6

9.342679

The factory owner assured the dubious townsfolk that the new plant just outside town was only firing ceramic tiles, and to pay no mind to the plumes of oily smoke billowing from its stacks, or the sickly sweet smell it carried on the wind. But when inspectors finally forced their way into its dark, greasy halls, nothing could have prepared them for thousands of empty coffins, or the crunch of teeth in the ashes beneath their feet.

3,768

0.97

1d51p7g

9.289875

My nose doesn’t bleed much, but in the past two weeks it’s been near constant. As I reach up to slow the bleeding, I pull long strands of blood red hair out.

49

0.93

1n52rbl

9.282318

Thanks to his great standing in the church and community, along with his long history of being a reliable self-employed electrical engineer, nobody believed my father was an abusive, manipulative sociopath who threatened to kill me if he ever saw me again. Fifteen years, two name changes, and three house moves later, my blood ran cold when the landscaper I’d hired told me the name of the subcontractor who was arriving that afternoon to install my outside sockets.

630

0.98

1n34hqc

9.258808

When the doctors gave me 18 months I had to dig deep for novel ways to secure my family’s financial security. On the dark web I auctioned the rights to my skull after death and the winner sent me a proposal: double if I let him collect next month.

2,712

0.99

1fg1582

9.252195

I see violent images in the windows of my house at night. Tonight, the image saw me back.

17

0.95

1mvxca6

9.217435

My toddler Trey, would adorably mispronounce his name and would constantly ask for things by repeating "Tree want" Screaming his name as we searched the forest for him, I noticed a small bloody handprint on a now swollen tree trunk and I realised my son had never been mispronouncing anything.

2,930

0.99

1hpy6ax

9.207849

I took one last look at the others at the party smiling and enjoying themselves as I opened the door to leave. None of them heard the quiet hiss of the gas stove I left on.

1,535

0.99

1murjrd

9.118157

The state now mandates organ harvesting from death row inmates. My heart sank the moment I overheard a judge end a phone call by saying, “I know he’s innocent… but my son is in the hospital, and he’s the only match.”

301

0.96

1mh3kco

9.082121

“Dad just went to get some milk” Dylan recited while cleaning the woodchipper, happy that no one would hurt his mom again.

3,711

0.98

1h5l23s

9.071634

As I felt the life leave my body, I only felt relieved, since I'd given myself up for the women and children. That was until I heard the officer give the order to bring them into the gas chamber next.

85

0.95

1mi6lvs

9.042738

When we upgraded night vision technology to watch Fourth Dimensional beings, we found that some huge entities always appear around sleeping babies but never harm them. Recent research shows that the number of these entities are dwindling fast, and they all appear to be wounded.

2,546

0.98

1cvorrj

8.98745

My daughter looked and the gradient of color on my arms, admiring the hues and said "mommy, when can I have pretty colors, too?" "Very soon, I think," I said trembling as my husband stumbled drunkenly through the front door with his wooden bat.

5,371

0.99

1gptux5

8.96356

The doctor said it was nothing serious for my tumor to grow teeth, and that it's a rare occurrence. But when I heard a human-like groan come from where the tumor is in my head, I knew something was wrong.

7

0.9

1n3fqa3

8.830546

After slitting the throat of the crazy old hag that had broken into my home, I went to call the police. However, as my unfamiliarly wrinkled and crooked fingers hovered over the dialpad, I couldn't remember the number.

3,618

0.99

1gu1sah

8.76852

I found a box of home videos labeled "Family Memories" in our house's attic. They show my family celebrating holidays and birthdays, but we only moved in last week.

107

0.99

1mhmwut

8.738433

When distilled properly, kindness turned out to be an exceedingly effective power source. Unfortunately, cruelty was almost as good, and much cheaper to obtain in bulk quantities.

53

0.93

1mpv0rb

8.731282

She held the flashlight steady, its beam fixed on the dead boy’s face, eyes dull and lifeless. Then, with a soft click, his pupils shrank to the light.

25

0.96

1mz7wng

8.727801

"Oh, I don't like the taste of humans," the enormous, bulbous spider answered to my mumbling pleas. Continuing to weave a web over me, it replied, "I much prefer the fresh, giant flies that will soon be hatching from your body."

4,345

0.97

1dofn5p

8.415236

You ask your smart speaker to turn on the lights, and it replies, “Okay—closing your eyes.” Your eyelids slam shut on their own, and in the blackness you hear it whisper, “much better.”

11

0.93

1mwww4x

8.400684

I stared up at Heaven’s radiant light, full of warmth. One of Hell’s cruelest tricks is that it gives you a clear view of someplace you can never be.

68

0.98

1muy1ss

8.356105

"You're just in time for our new package that just rolled out last month" the salesman said with such confidence. "The fees are a little higher, but your clone's organs can be harvested in less than 5 years, and we can start collecting their blood for emergencies in less than 2".

3,083

0.99

1ckteza

8.348526

I felt nothing as they unceremoniously took my newborn away. In the battery of cages surrounding me, I could see the other women, all in various stages of pregnancy, looking at me with identical hollow-eyed stares.

3,735

0.99

1g76xgv

8.299042

I cried as the doctor looked at the ultrasound and told me I have a happy, healthy baby growing. “Alright,” he called out as I was carried away in restraints, “bring in the next subject for the repopulation program.”

2,955

0.98

1dnwnqy

8.099872

The CEO's hologram loomed down at me, congratulating me on my 1,000th consecutive shift without a break. "Remember," the synthetic voice said, "resignation is not an option, for your mind is hardwired into our system now."

4,285

0.97

1hhzkgg

7.98796

"Congratulations on your beautiful twins!" the nurse exclaims as I cradle both my baby boys in my arms. Her smile fades as she continues, "However, due to our country's one-child policy, you're only allowed to keep one - choose wisely."

4,048

0.98

1d7ouuh

7.978592

I told my therapist I was starting to feel like a real person again. He frowned and said, “That’s not part of the simulation.”

550

0.99

1mn1f4q

7.893669

I found out my daughter's murderer was terrified of being buried alive. It took some time setting up the oxygen and feeding tube systems, but it was worth it.

2,648

0.99

1gs7g64

7.800791

"Open the door!", I yelled, barely able to catch my breath. The scarf tugged harder as the elevator moved, and I felt my head press against the cold floor.

7,422

0.97

1fxqm1l

7.789197

I wished for the genie to eliminate all the rats on Earth. The next day, news outlets around the world reported a twelfth of the human race is gone.

200

0.99

1n2iu5d

7.756927

I baked today with that curious new grain from the fields, certain it would give my loaves a richer taste. Now the whole village dances madly in the streets after eating, and I can’t help but smile, surely it means they adore my bread.

25

0.93

1n23pu9

7.710554

My coworker never struck me as very misogynistic, so I was surprised when he told me to smile for him. That surprise turned to confusion when he saw my smile and immediately shouted “Call an ambulance!”

10,277

0.97

1jcqr3d

7.583159

The lighthouse hasn’t worked in decades, but its beam swept across the sea tonight. For a moment, it illuminated something vast and moving beneath the waves.

46

0.91

1mwytj5

7.581336

After society wisened up, deepfakes were no longer enough to convince the media or civilians of crimes never committed against the people. Now, using the data they take at birth, they create a clone of their scapegoat so there's physical proof.

11

0.87

1mvgjwf

7.573056

“You said you’ve always wanted a sibling,” my father said. As he hugged me from behind with both palms on my pregnant belly, he whispered, “Soon you will have one.”

9,526

0.92

rmtquj

7.53616

I elbowed my way to the front of the jeering crowd and up to the cage, eager to see the zoo’s new “wild beast” I’d heard so much about. But as I slowly registered the grimy, trembling thing huddled behind the bars, I realized that it was not a gorilla or a chimpanzee, but a hollow eyed young man.

3,647

0.98

1h31kjo

7.491082

After putting her sleeping newborn inside a black plastic box, she closed the lid and wrote 'please take care of her' on the top. Before abandoning her she decided to take another look but when she opened the box it was empty except for a note that read 'I'll take care of her'.

2,774

0.99

1n28pnl

7.43904

[Aug25] The old dairy’s milk truck rumbled into our driveway. Mom went white when the driver smiled, his teeth tapering to pale, wet points just like mine.

52

0.96

1mpq2cv

7.378121

The gravedigger was told to bury him 8ft deep but decided not to because the hospital was no longer looking for bodies ‘It wasn’t because of the grave robbers,’ the priest said, crossing himself as he peered at the claw marks across the cemetery grass

2,539

0.98

1h849h8

7.17835

On Reddit, people innocently answered the question "What would you like as your last meal?" The next day, each person who answered the question received a box containing the very meal they described in the post.

3,053

0.97

1dez0vk

7.04168

His grandmother’s peach tree seemed to fruit far longer than the other trees in the area, with sweeter, juicier peaches. Tucked away in her old secretaries desk, he had found a scrawled note ‘fertilize tree weekly, with blood from mason jars in basement, or else’

42

0.98

1myc1wd

7.010505

"Congratulations on the baby!", the corporate office said as they took my infant after my 6-month maternity leave. As they pointed to the fine print that stated they own any offspring of the employee if benefits are used.

3,340

0.98

1hkb1ys

7.001205

I often heard my daughter talking to an imaginary friend and dismissed it as childhood whimsy. One night, I listened closely and froze when I heard someone say, "Your Mommy doesn’t know I’m not imaginary."

3,874

0.99

1gakjkf

6.991455

The microbiome I made isn’t doing as well as I thought it would. I decide to turn off the heat lamp that keeps them alive after following their growth for only 3.8 billion years.

3,602

0.99

1elvd1o