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The original was posted on /r/nosleep by /u/Downtown-Football248 on 2026-05-18 02:19:45+00:00.

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I don't know what compelled me to confess here of all places. Maybe all the years in the pews caught up to me, took in the good word. Or maybe it is the lingering prognosis that has me crawling my way back to Jesus. I don't know. Either way, I am ready to talk. From what I read, this is the type of group to listen. Father Lincoln says that sins are like roots. You don't fully get them up unless you dig out the hole, right down to where it all started. He wears clothes to forgive. The internet throws words to condemn. To be frank, I could use a little of both.

So, let's dig it all. Back to the first day of many mistakes.

"Oh, and lock the freezer after showtime."

"Come again?" I said, finishing the last swirl of my signature.

"That's the last part of the gig," Rustburrow coughed out as he inhaled the last bite of his cro-nut, showering the table and both of us in buttery flakes. "Studio closes just before sunset. You get here 15 minutes earlier, do your tasks, and lock the freezer no later than 7 p.m."

"Why does the studio own a freezer?"

He leaned back and swallowed. A deep breath wheezed in and out of him, indecisive on whether it was for annoyance or contemplation. He had heard that question before. Many times. His dense monobrow suggested he was considering whether he would have to hear it again.

"Do you want this job?"

The chill from the previous night's air was fresh lingered in my bones. I was out of gas, and had only two blankets two my name. That rat cloth I had gotten from St. Mary's weren't holding up as we ran into October, and I didn't know how many more nights in the Acura I could handle.

"Yes, sir. I do."

"It won't work out if you are curious. Believe me. Some doors? Better left shut."

I sat with that. Nothing about it sounded good. I'd heard the stories about these Hollywood types. Was it a vat of baby oil? A baby plantation to harvest fresh stem cells? The more my mind wandered, the more I wondered if I could handle whatever it was. If it were horror beyond my stomach, what would I do? Then my eyes landed on the contract again, and the length of the zeros made me unsure.

"Lock it after seven. Got it."

"No later than seven, kid. That's important."

"Alright, alright. Got it."

Rustburrow didn't seem pleased with that, but he reached into his bottom desk drawer and pulled out my gear: an Outer Lights Security hat, a metal clipboard case with a laminated paper taped to the front that had the word "CHECKLIST" bolded at the top in faded red letters, and a Glock 19.

"Whoa. I get issued a gun for this job?"

"You got a problem with that?"

"No, I just... didn't expect it. Do studios typically have armed security?"

His eyes sat half-open, unamused. He reached over to the black security hat, analyzed it, then matted it down on my head.

"Do now." He smiled. His extra cheek fat curled around the corners of his lips, creating an echo of a double smile like he was silently laughing at me. "Listen, the talent we have here requires a bit of extra protection. I ain't no yuppie. If someone tries to get to where they ain't supposed to be, you use that. You hear?"

I nodded.

"Anyway," He brushed away some arm hair infringing on his Rolex. "Shift starts in about an hour. Why don't you watch from the screening room?"

"Is that okay?"

"Course. Welcome to the Outer Lights family."

I left Rustburrow's office and made my way to the screening area. The Glock heavy at my side. Always such a light thing in the hand, but heavy on my hip and in my guts. I'd never gotten used to it. I fired plenty in my life. A lot less since leaving Beaumont PD that Spring, but still. Authority. The power to do what needed to be done. Such big things. You think you know what you'd do, how you'd act in a situation where you needed to pull that trigger, to be someone's hero. Then you get to the moment and just about shit yourself.

The screening room was dead save for three individuals. The first was a man in his late forties. The studio lights blinded me from the reflection off his head. Wafts of cigarette smoke enraptured him as he sat, watching the talent perform from his director's chair. To his immediate left at the foot of the stage was someone in an all-black suit, sunglasses indoors, total G-Man. He was the only one who turned to me the moment I opened the door. He saw my hat and gave me a faint nod of acknowledgement. I didn't return it. But it was the man on stage who stole my attention.

Atop the stage, centered by six lights of soft white, blood red, and sapphire blue, was the star. He was young, no more than twenty-three. Dusty blond hair, striking green eyes, and a grin that said he knew more than you did. Draped over his shoulders was a scarred blue suit coat, painted with grime and old blood. He was shirtless underneath and had a gun in his hand. He looked down at it in his lap, switching his expression in an instant. I was never a movie type, but I could see his thoughts. He went from a generalized sorrow to now thoughts of impending oblivion.

"If she were actually fucking here, we would have Margorey enter stage left," The director said. I could now see the name Stillwell on the back of the chair. "Fuck's sake, can we get an intern or something to read her lines to Thomas?"

The man in the suit nodded at him and looked behind the curtain on the stage. At his glance, a frail nineteen of something jogged out, her brow drenched in sweat, a script in hand. Everyone stopped, waiting for each other to continue, until the director scoffed.

"It's your line, sweetie."

"Oh, sorry," She mumbled, flipping to the page in a frantic rush. She cleared her mousey throat and continued the scene in a jilted performance.

"Isaac? Just put the gun down. Whatever's wrong, we can fix it."

"They're gone, Alyssa."

"What do you mean, 'they're gone', Isaac? What happened? Where is everyone?"

Thomas, now fully his character Isaac, looked to her, his brow pinched into a grimace, lip quivering, eyes misty. "Alyssa..."

"Isaac, where are the others?"

"What about me? I'm right here! Right here, having to live with it." His eyes fell back on the gun.

"Isaac, where are they?"

"How can you ask me that?" He said, looking to her now. "Don't you dare look at me like that. You don't get to judge me. You didn't make those choices. You didn't feel the hunger we felt."

Stillwell spoke, reading the stage direction, and the actors followed suit. "As Isaac starts to cry, Alyssa hugs him, embracing the truth of what he did in those mountains—what they chose to do to do—to survive. She buries herself in his shoulder, apologizing for everything. But Isaac looks on to the mountain, looking on to what was left behind. Was it his friends or all of himself?"

Thomas then looked to the stage, right at me. His eyes gripped me like a thousand pleading hands begging me to stare. Gooseflesh broke out all over my body as he spoke.

"The jungle stole their lives. But I stole their souls. With every bite."

"Cut."

Thomas snapped up, ignoring the intern. "You don't think that line at the end is too much?"

Stillwell raised an eyebrow. "It wraps the story up well."

"Yeah, but what about just, 'I stole their souls...' I mean, the audience already knows I nibbled on my friends up there."

Stillwell looked at his watch. It was 6 p.m. He looked back at Thomas, and they had a silent conversation about that. "It's a good point, Tom. I'll consider it on the rewrite. We'll pick up tomorrow when Margory is here and not coked out in a Denny's shitter or wherever the fuck she is. Let's clear out so Security can close up shop."

They did. Not a single word or glance at me. I watched the room clear and, in a few minutes, it was just me. The majority of the checklist I had to do were basic items: cut the power to the stage, conduct walkthroughs at three-hour intervals, ensure building access points are secure by 6:30. All standard stuff I'd done before in some fashion. I knocked them out swiftly and was left with the last three items. The first of which gave me pause.

"Let in the groupie?" I read.

I followed the instructions, making my way to a service entrance deep in the heart of the studio. I opened the door, mostly to get a view of what to expect, when I heard a short scream as someone scattered to the ground. I looked down to see a young girl on her knees, looking up at me with a wounded expression. She was a frail thing. Pencil skirt, low-cut top, curly brown hair, a dense amount of foundation, and clashing red lipstick.

"Sorry," I said, helping her up. "I didn't see you there."

"It's okay." She said, though I could tell it wasn't. Still, she made an effort to put me at ease, and I appreciated that. I gave her a once-over and saw she now sported a small splotch of crimson on her left knee.

"Let's get you a bandage for that. It looks like a good scrape."

"No, that's okay. I'll clean it up in the bathroom."

I insisted. While cleaning her up, I found out her name was Regina. She was twenty, or so she told me, and that she was so, so, so thankful to be here. However, when the hydrogen peroxide hit her skin, her positive energy crumbled, and she stomped her good leg as if I was amputating the other.

"So, you know the actor? Thomas?" I asked, hoping to distract her. It worked. She lit up like Figueroa Corridor.

"No, but I really want to. We met at a coffee shop while I was practicing my lines—I'm an actress."

"Uh-huh...

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