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The original was posted on /r/nosleep by /u/Carl_Sefni on 2025-07-07 13:28:13+00:00.

Hey folks. ( Part 1 and Part 2 here)

I don’t even know how to say this… honestly. First, I wanted to say thank you. I don’t know if anyone really understands how much reading your comments and all the interest in this made me feel like I still had some thread connecting me to the rest of the world. I think this is going to be the last time I write here. Not because it’s over, actually, I feel like certain things have barely started but because this part of the story is the final point for me. After this, whatever happens next doesn’t belong online, doesn’t belong to strangers.

But you were here until now, so you deserve to know how it ended.

At least, how this ride ended.

Noah had pushed me into the passenger seat with a strength that didn’t match his single arm and crooked bones. He got in on the driver’s side and settled in naturally, pulled the seat back, tested the wheel with one hand, started the car like he’d done it his whole life. Maybe he had. Maybe he’d driven through that same hell when it was his turn.

The road swallowed us again. We left that freight yard behind, heading down something that stretched out from there, with curves too smooth, almost numbing. The lights came and went, rhythmic, hypnotic. I sat frozen, tense, terrified that this Noah at the wheel would throw himself at me, or drive us off a cliff or something, but I think the way it actually happened shook me much worse.

For a few minutes, Noah was just my brother again. He spoke like he used to, gave soft little laughs, slapped my shoulder the way he always did, the thing that used to annoy me but now, somehow, felt comforting.

— "Remember when the old man almost killed us for breaking the truck’s side mirror? You swore you’d lie for me but you gave it all up in two seconds."

I laughed, a nervous, half-sobbing laugh, but it was a laugh.

— "I was a kid, Noah. I didn’t know how to keep a secret, you know he could be scary when he wanted to."

He laughed too, and that was almost a balm. Until…

— "Yeah. You cried so much he felt sorry for us. He took us to the lake to make up for it, but you dropped Tobby in the water, remember? You screamed that he was gonna drown."

The laugh died in my throat.

— "Tobby…?"

— "Yeah, that yellow lab they gave us for Christmas."

— "His name was Rex, Noah."

— "Oh, you know I was never good with names. Besides, you were the one who named him tha—"

— "You, Noah. You named him Rex."

He went quiet. He turned his head toward me, taking his one good eye off the road to stare straight at me. The smile stayed on his face for a long moment, like a loose mask. Then the corner of his mouth twitched, the eye blinked in a little involuntary tic.

—"Ah," — he said, the voice more guttural now, thick with something viscous. — "Right. Good old Rex."

My stomach turned over.

I shrank back, pressing against the door, my hand fumbling for the handle, not even sure what I’d do if I got it open. My hands trembled too much to grip it properly and the only sound I managed was a weak:

— "What are you?" — I whispered.

Noah let out a sound that started like a laugh but ended in a deep hiss, like air escaping a shriveled lung. Then he turned the wheel too sharply. The car veered off the road, plunging into brush so dark it felt solid. Branches slapped the windows, scratching like claws trying to get in. I screamed, tried to grab the wheel, but Noah (or whatever it was) shoved me back.

It was so hard my head slammed into the dashboard. I saw stars, the world went muffled, like I’d dunked my head in a bucket of water. The glove compartment popped open with the impact and from it, the little toy soldier fell out. I hadn’t noticed when the passenger left it there. When he saw the toy, Noah screamed. I saw smoke rising from his skin as he shielded his face with his hands like a vampire shown a crucifix.

At last, he started gurgling and coughing, I could hear something scraping in his throat, rising up, his windpipe stretching. By then, I was already horrified enough when he vomited up an amorphous mass onto my lap. It looked like some kind of octopus, twitching its long thin arms, limp and sticky. I screamed as I threw it out the window. The car lost control, shaking through the brush, headlights sweeping over tree trunks that seemed to shift, almost flinch away from the path. The dashboard flickered with red warning lights, the engine groaned like a wounded animal.

— "Jake… Jake…" — Noah said, his voice wavering, but before he could say anything else, the car completely lost its line, spun out, the world turning into a smeared painting of black and brown.

There was impact.

A dull crash, metal crushing, glass shattering. The seatbelt bit into my chest so hard I thought it would break my ribs. The sharp smell of fuel filled my nose. When the car finally stopped, flipped over or just mangled too far to move, I couldn’t really tell, everything went so quiet I thought maybe I was dead.

I unbuckled, dropped awkwardly onto the dented roof, and crawled out through the broken window. The ground was cold, damp, dead leaves sticking to my sweaty skin.

Noah lay on the other side of the car, his body twisted at a painful angle.

For a second I thought he was just another empty shell, but then he moved, coughing loud.

— "Noah…?" — my voice came out thin, ragged. I crawled to him, pressed my hand to his narrow chest. — "It’s me, man… it’s Jake."

His eyes opened slowly. This time there was nothing hungry or wrong in them. Just fear. Pure fear.

— "Jake…? What was that? What was… inside me…?"

He started crying, short sobs, almost like a child. I held him against me, even with the sour stench of blood and gas. I ran my hand through his hair like I used to when we were kids, when dad was yelling and we hid in our room.

"It’s okay, Noah. I’m here."

Of course it wasn’t okay. But it was the only thing I could say. I could feel his body shudder, each sob shaking bones that seemed too fragile to endure. The smell of gasoline was overwhelming, made me nauseous, but I wasn’t going to let him go for anything in the world.

That’s when I heard a sound, something wet, something that didn’t belong in the forest around us. A hiss that quickly turned into a crack, like something being twisted. I pulled back just enough to see what was happening. And I wished I hadn’t.

The thing Noah had... spat up, or whatever verb you’d use for that, was a few yards away. It looked like a gray, viscous lump pulsing on the ground, trembling, inflating and deflating as if it were breathing. Then it started to grow, to stretch, projecting thin tendrils that slowly lengthened, first touching the ground, then rising like deformed legs.

I tried to pull Noah away, but his legs gave out, and his weight nearly took me down with him.

— “Come on, Noah! Get up, man, please…”

But the monster was already rising, tall, slender, a cylindrical trunk that swayed as if testing the wind. On top, something that resembled a head, featureless, just a cluster of fissures opening and closing, exhaling white vapor. One of the tendrils came too fast, wrapping around Noah’s waist. I grabbed his shoulders, dug my nails in, but felt his skin slip under my fingers, slick with blood and sweat.

— “No! No! NO!”

I was screaming so loud my throat burned.

Noah looked at me, eyes wide, his lower lip trembling, and all I could say was:

— “I don’t want... I don’t want you to disappear… ever again!”

A cruel, horrible, inverted echo of our last meeting.

But it didn’t help.

My fingers slipped, and Noah was yanked backward with force, his body twisting as more tendrils wrapped around him. His scream was cut off abruptly, swallowed by the dark, both of them vanishing into the murk beyond the halos of the streetlights.

I stayed there, collapsed on the damp ground, the world seemed distorted, the trees stretched and shrank like figures in a cracked mirror. Everything was buzzing. I don’t know how long that stupor lasted, but I just remained still, trying to process the shock of it all, letting my joints rest, if only for a moment.

Finally I stood up, not sure how, my feet carried me back to the road. I walked without thinking, until I saw the glow of hanging lights. The courtyard from the start, now brighter than ever, full of figures standing still.

In the center, there they were.

The passenger, hands clasped behind his back, with that small smile that seemed reserved just for me. And Maya, standing next to him. Her face was too pale, lips parted like they wanted to say something, but nothing came out. When she saw me, her eyes filled with tears that never fell, just sat there trembling.

I wanted to run to her, but my legs stiffened. The passenger raised a hand and pointed, almost lazily.

— “One of you goes back. The other stays. It’s the last rule, Jake. The end of the game.”

My head was shaking “no” like it was involuntary, repeated a thousand times.

— “No… don’t do this, please… you already took my brother…”

He tilted his head, raising his eyebrows with false compassion.

— “Ah, Jake. There’s always room for one more on the road.”

It was Maya who broke it, before I ...

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