Blue Mystery Snail
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The only way to get to the top of the mountain was by foot. So I started walking up the path that led up the mountainside.
There were a lot of trees on this mountain, and the sunlight filtering through them made it hard to see much in front of me. And the only sounds I could hear were the wind rustling through the leaves and the birds singing. It was a peaceful place, but still—it wasn’t exactly the kind of place you’d want to be lost in alone.
I turned my head slowly around as I walked, checking for any sign of an exit or anything I could use to signal my location if something happened. The path was narrow and winding, so there wasn’t much room for me to move. There was no one else around.
It had been three days since I’d left home. And now, with the sun about to set, I was beginning to worry about what would happen if I got stuck in the forest overnight.
Suddenly, a black shadow came flying from the woods.
“Wah!”
The next thing I knew, the shadow had landed on my back and wrapped its tentacles around me. Then I felt it start to bite down on my neck.
A moment later, I felt myself fall to the ground. The next thing I knew, I was lying face down in the dirt.
As I lay there, unable to move, I looked up at the sky.
Mystery Snail – Blue
Blue Mystery Snail was a very mysterious creature. He didn’t have a shell, and he had no eyes or mouth. But his tentacles were very strong, and they were covered in a thick layer of armor. It was said that you couldn’t even scratch them with your fingernails. And when this monster bit someone, they wouldn’t wake up again until the tentacles had chewed their way through their body.
This was a creature that preyed upon people who were lost in the woods. And as long as you stayed still, he would leave you alone. But if you moved, he would bite you to death.
And he was an incredibly rare creature. As far as I knew, there was only one person in the world who had ever seen him. That was a girl called Kiki.
Kiki had been living in the house in the middle of town when she met Blue Mystery Snail. She was the daughter of a local family. They were very poor, and Kiki’s father was a drunkard. He wasn’t working, and the whole family lived off the charity of the community.
But one day, Kiki saw something in the woods near her house. It was a tall, dark-haired man walking towards her. And when she went to go meet him, he stopped her by throwing something into the woods.
It was a strange black box with a single white button. And inside the box was a giant snail.
When Kiki touched the button, the snail opened its beak and started speaking.
“Hello. I am Blue Mystery Snail. Please come with me.”
That was all the explanation it gave. Then the snail put his tentacles around Kiki, picked her up, and flew off. She was so excited, she forgot to ask where it was taking her. And then, before she knew it, she was flying through the air, heading straight for the mountains.
Once they were high enough, the snail landed on a mountain peak. There was nothing but the forest around us, and the only sound was the wind rustling through the trees.
Blue Mystery Snail led Kiki to a cave in the rock. Inside, there was a large round-stone table. The snail sat down at the head of the table and told Kiki to sit in the middle.
Then he started talking.
“I know you’re curious about what’s going on, and I don’t blame you. But you mustn’t ask any questions. And you mustn’t leave the cave until we’ve finished our meal.”
Kiki was a good girl. She listened to the snail and didn’t say a word. And once the snail had finished eating, he placed a small silver bell on the table.
“If you ever want to leave this place, ring the bell. If you do, I’ll come back and take you home. And if I’m not here, the bell will summon the village elders. They can help you get home.”
Kiki nodded. Then, without a word, she rang the bell.
And that was how Kiki found herself living in the cave with the snail. The snail gave her food to eat. He showed her the basics of survival. And when the sun rose, he took her to the forest. And as long as she followed his instructions, she was safe from Blue Mystery Snail.
That was how Kiki lived for the next two years.
But one day, Kiki heard a strange noise coming from outside. When she went to check it out, she saw a tall man standing in the clearing. The man was dressed in a black suit, and he was holding a black box. And as soon as he saw Kiki, he ran toward her.
“Wah!”
The next thing I knew, the man had jumped on my back and wrapped his tentacles around me. Then I felt him bite down on my neck.
A moment later, I was lying face down in the dirt.
As I lay there, unable to move, I looked up at the sky as I had managed to turn around.
After a while, the blue mystery snail had run off to the woods.
– I was left behind in the open field. I could hear Kiki ringing the bell from somewhere in the distance. A few hours later, the man returned with three men in suits following him. Two of them held a stretcher with someone in it. They carried the person away to someplace in the woods.
And that was how I ended up on a stretcher and brought here.
***
There’s nothing like the sound of heavy footsteps in the middle of the night. They make me nervous every time. I’m always thinking someone is trying to break in and attack us. But that’s just paranoia – everyone knows there are no such things as ghosts or monsters.
Still, I guess I can understand why I feel like this. My parents died when I was five, and since then, I’ve lived in this house with my brother. We never talked much, though, so there isn’t much between us. He did everything he needed to. He cooked, cleaned, and did all his schoolwork. Then he would disappear into his room and lock the door, leaving me alone until the next morning. It was a lonely life.
So when I met Marni, it was like a dream come true.
Marni was the first woman I’d ever kissed. I didn’t know what was happening to me, and when Marni said she wanted to see other people, I almost couldn’t believe it. But I still think about her now and again. She was smart, pretty, funny…
She really was the love of my life.
For a while, I thought that maybe she could have been the one. But when she came to meet me in the forest near my house one day, we fell out. Apparently, she’d gone home to her parents and found out they weren’t her real family after all. So I suppose that wasn’t to be, even though I thought otherwise.
Now I find myself in bed at night waiting for sleep to come, with my thoughts wandering aimlessly around in my mind. Sometimes my dreams are so strange I wake up confused. And other times I find myself sitting on my window ledge staring into space.
It’s hard to tell where reality ends and my imagination begins. That may explain how I ended up here.
My parents moved to this town thirty years ago. They were from a big city called New York. Both of them worked as journalists, but it didn’t take them long before they decided to give it all up and start a new life here.
I remember my father telling me that his plan was to buy a house, settle down, become part of the community, and raise kids. Well, the only thing he managed to achieve was buying a house and starting a family. My mother died in childbirth. It must have been awful for him. She should have been fine, but something went wrong and she bled to death.
I don’t know why I was the one who survived. Maybe because it wasn’t a baby boy.
Then he met Marni and married her. He seemed happier than I’d seen him in years. But then, a year after their wedding, my mother’s body was buried by the side of the road in an unmarked grave. There were no tears, no words of comfort. My dad just disappeared off to his study with his newspaper and stayed there until he fell asleep at night.
It sounds strange, I know, but at first, I was happy too. Because I got to share my home with Marni. For six years I lived with the two of them, and Marni took care of everything. She made sure my brother and I ate, cleaned our rooms, and did all our homework. I was sixteen then, and my brother was seventeen. And then Marni started acting weird, and she stopped coming around.
One night she came home with a guy in dark glasses and asked if she could stay overnight. She told my father she’d been kidnapped by a bunch of terrorists, and she’d need protection. At first my father refused, but when she kept demanding that he let her stay, he finally agreed.
Then a few days later she showed up in her car wearing a ski mask and carrying a baseball bat. She was followed by a group of men who jumped into the backseat. When they opened the doors of the car, my mother fell out screaming.
The men ran off with Marni and the guys who’d accompanied them. My dad didn’t say anything until after he’d heard the story on TV. By then the search parties had already turned up nothing.
The End