THE EVIL'S SOUL

It was a silent night. No traffic, no loud horns. All quiet except the grinding sound of the scooter, trying to move as fast as it could through the eerie air. The night was going just fine as both Rahul and his friend Rachit returned from the railway station on his old scooter after a tiring business trip.

“Rahul, you should come stay at my place tonight, it might rain so we gotta get home fast. Is that fine with you?”

SILENCE.

Rahul?

Rachit assumed Rahul was too sleepy to talk but he wasn’t. He was wide awake staring at something far away. His eyes too wide, eyebrows pulled up together and looked as if he’d seen a ghost. And maybe he did…?

“Rachit! STOP!” he choked out as soon he could breathe.

“STOP”

“What happened dude? Did you see a ghost or something!?” said Rachit, trying to remain calm.

“No...Look ahead of yourself. Don’t you see that weird figure standing over there?”

“Duh…I’m driving. Of course I’m looking out front.” said Rachit ignoring what Rahul said later.

“DO YOU SEE THAT FIGURE OVER THERE?” Rahul’s voice grew more frightened as Rachit pulled the scooter to a stop.

“Dude that’s just a tree. I guess you drank too much.”

“No…I really saw something. I swear, it wasn’t the tree.” he said pointing out to the tree down the road.

“Well, it’s not there now. Let’s get home fast.”

Just after a few moment, Rahul exclaimed again –

“Who the hell is that? Don’t tell me you can’t see that too.”

“No…no. I see that.” said Rachit wondering how that man suddenly appeared out of nowhere. They both may be drunk but not so much that they didn’t know what they saw. A meek looking man, his face almost covered by his long black hair, seemed to drop in the middle of the road. That wasn’t possible. Was it?

Rachit was so lost in his own thoughts he almost forgot about Rahul who was now sweating hard, staring right at that person.

“Hey…Rahul! Stop staring.”

“You remember that story I told you? The ghost who lived at the railway station and murdered people for their souls. Maybe it’s him. We’re not that far from the railway station. I think it’s him. We need to RUN!” Rahul screamed in fear as he realized what he had just said.

“It’s not ghost. We’ll be fine.”

Rachit started driving after he calmed his friend but then he stopped. He couldn’t understand for a second why he had stopped until he saw the weird man standing right in front of his scooter. It all happened a bit too fast to understand. Just now he was driving and now he suddenly stopped looking at the man right in front of him who happened to seem quite far away a second ago. It was crazy….it was just his imagination, he thought, but they both knew it wasn’t.

“Give me a lighter. Fast.” spoke the man in a deep, horrifying voice.

“I need a lighter.”

“Y-Yea…yea. I have one, just a sec.” Rachit managed to choke out.

Was this really happening? A weird looking ghost talking to him, asking for a lighter. Maybe it’s just a dream because ghosts don’t exist. They don’t.

He gave him the lighter and the man walked away just as he came disappearing into the eerie night breeze. But everything seemed too scary now. The silent peaceful night was no longer peaceful for both the friends. Rachit drove as fast as he could with his poor old scooter.

Finally, they reached home. Rahul stayed over with at Rachit’s place after the chilling incident. Rachit’s wife was already asleep so they both entered and slept quietly not uttering even a single word about what had happened. The next morning, both left for work and almost forgot that mysterious man they saw.

Everything was going just fine. It had been almost a month. Both of them never discussed that night with each other or with their families.

One night, Rahul came back from work later, around 2:00 in the night. He heard slight banging voices from the room where his mother slept but he felt too tired to check and went to his room.

Soon he woke up to his wife, Anita’s voice saying, “Rahul…you hear that? I think it’s from mom’s room. Let’s go check.”

The banging was now even louder.

“Wait. Let me go check.”

He got out of bed, towards the noise that seemed to grow louder. He went inside and to his shock his mother was banging her head against the cupboard, too loud. She was bleeding. Dark red blood dripping down the side of her face and onto the floor. Rahul turned the lights on, more blood dripping down. It felt as if Malti, his mother had no idea what she was doing. Rahul grabbed her by her hand and shook her. As she woke up, she seemed clueless about all the blood dripping down. Rahul thought his mother had some sleep walk issue but it did seem weird.

The next day at work, he told Rachit what had happened. Rachit caught the hint of Rahul’s doubt.

“Don’t worry. It might just be because of age. Moreover, it has been a month since that incident. Forget about it, stop worrying and move on.”

“Yeah…Maybe you’re right. I’ll just take her to the doctor.”

Malti had some tests done and the report was normal. The doctor said it was maybe because of some stress. The next night, it was normal. No banging, nothing weird. It was all good, thought Rahul.

Another week went by, today Rahul’s sister, Richa was moving in with him today for her new job. In a long time, he was finally feeling a whole lot of positivity around.

He went to work. Anita and Malti prepared to welcome Richa home. Anita was cooking dinner while her mother-in-law went to fetch in some groceries. All of a sudden, all the utensils started clattering and all the bowls and glasses fell off of the wall mounted shelf. Anita was terrified by this sudden incident and called Rahul. As he reached home he saw his mother coming in with Richa and hid his fear. Anita felt scared even with everyone around when Rahul told her about the incident near the railway station. They thought something was wrong and decided to call the priest.

During night time, they again heard the banging noise after long coming from the same room.

But it’d stop if it was Malti because Richa was sleeping with her mother, thought Anita. The noise grew louder, and louder. It was hard to even think about sleeping now. She decided to go check and it was all good. Her mother and Richa both asleep.

Anita was scared enough by the past few days, but little did she know it was just the start of a series of the most horrifying events of her life.

The priest couldn’t visit the next day. It was just the four of them. Rahul told Malti and Richa about what was going on and they decided to get the house blessed by the priest and get rid of any negative energies as soon as he could visit.

The first day of her Richa’s new job hadn’t gone great as she described it. She lied down on the couch and soon Rahul was home. They all were talking about their day, feeling normal, happy. Richa went to the refrigerator to grab a pack of snacks. As she came back, she felt dizzy and fell to the ground. Before Rahul could go to pick her up, she stood up. Her head tilted in a strange way, her hair fell to her face covering half of it and her eyes wide with a creepy smile pulled on her face.

Anita was the first one to react, she screamed at the top of her lungs in a high-pitch voice. Richa moved towards her gesturing her to be quiet. She moved around the house, as if scanning each and every corner of it and then fell to the ground again.

This time Rahul didn’t move. He was too scared to. He let her lay for a few minutes and when he really felt she was unconscious, he went and lay her down in her room. Richa woke two hours after all of it was over and didn’t remember anything except discussing about her not so good day with her brother.

It was quite later but Rahul didn’t care anymore. He called the priest and ordered him to come over.

“Its late son, why don’t we talk over the phone right now and I’ll visit you tomorrow.”

“Do you not understand the fact there’s something that’s been haunting my house for almost past two months and it may kill us now?”

“Okay…okay, I get it. I’m sending guys over with specialized cameras to detect any spiritual activity.”

“Fine…just send them fast!”

“They’ll be right there.”

Two men dressed in black and white reached their home and set up cameras. All four of them and the two men spent the night monitoring the cameras and it caught nothing! The priest came the next day and sprinkled holy water all around the house.

“Son, there’s nothing wrong going on here. It was the spirit of the goddess that entered your sister’s body and it’s a good sign. Something good is really soon going to bless your family. Just wait and watch as the goddess works her magic.” said the priest.

This really seemed convincing and it was. Everyone, even Rahul was not convinced that everything’s. But it wasn’t. Same things happened again and again over the course of the next few weeks that turned into months. Anita was now habitual of the activities happening during the day.

Rahul decided it was enough. He couldn’t live like that anymore. He called the priest for an exorcism. The priest arrived right on the scene and started the ritual.

“This spirit is way more powerful than I thought it was. It wants a soul!”

“Why the hell do you think we called you here?”

“I order this spirit to leave this house and the people for good.” The priest went on with his chants till the spirit gave up.

“Gone…it’s gone. The spirit’s gone. I no longer feel its presence.”

“Woah! That’s g-great.” exclaimed Rahul as the others celebrated happily.

It was finally over. The worst time of their life was behind them now. Months passed and nothing suspicious happened but there was always this strange feeling in Rahul’s gut that something was eating him on the inside. As if something bad had found its house inside him.

“No...No...T-that can’t be t-t-true. NO!” cried Rachit as he heard Malti say –

“Rahul is no more!” she started crying over the phone unaware Rahul was still listening.

The spirit never left the house. It lived inside Rahul, it consumed him! It left him with nothing. He felt ending his life for his own good was better than living with such emptiness. But it was the end of everything. Anita ran away from the house for she couldn’t bear it. Malti and Richa were left alone but soon Richa was summoned by the wicked spirit of the evil and ended the life both her mother and herself.