Dark Fantasy · Horror · The Plot Calls Anthology · Juli 21, 2025

The Plot Calls #12 : "Side Theories part 2 of 2"

Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination and/or Ai-assisted-content-generation. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

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Sam Erriden never liked unfinished business. But some business, it seemed, refused to finish itself.

The Bone Lantern tapes were still sitting on his desk. He hadn’t touched them in days. Maybe weeks. They stared at him, neatly stacked, ominous by their very existence.

It wasn’t fear. Not exactly. It was that creeping, heavy kind of hesitation. The one that tells you there’s work to be done—but maybe… maybe it’ll still be there tomorrow.

But after Officers Gunn and Alvarez knocked at his door for the 4th time in 2 weeks, tomorrow wasn’t feeling so guaranteed anymore. There was an epidemic of some kind. Anonymous sources who survived encounters with the plot messaged them, and those who didn't were relayed by Officers Gunn and Alvarez. Things were starting to turn sideways.

Sam sat at his desk, headphones on, eyes fixed on the spinning cassette. Across the apartment, Marcus leaned by the window, arms crossed, gaze distant but alert.

The tape hissed and warbled as Robert Serling’s voice cut through.

“Robert Serling. 1978. Gloamhaven, New Jersey. Encrypt Corp Log. 223. The Bone Lantern. I spoke to The Whispering Librarian. (static) ... A detective, or someone in detectives clothing, bumped into me. I was sure he was human, but I couldn't tell. He gave me a flashlight with---(static)---. I followed the path from The City Between to The Forest Between. The light in the lantern isn't the entity. The compendium is the entity that feeds. The lantern is just a signal for something. But what? It seems things... (static)...”

Sam pulled off the headphones. “Okay, first off, why does your family get the cool mystery tapes and mine left me a houseplant and anxiety?”

Marcus didn’t look away from the window. “You got an inheritance, Sam," he said, gazing somewhere beyond reality.

Sam sighed and slid the headphones back on.

Robert’s voice continued, distorted but steady. "Robert Serling. 1978. Gloamhaven, New Jersey. Encrypt Corp Log. 227. The Bone Lantern. The light in my flashlight is the same entity that leaps into The Bone Lantern... The Lantern was a trick. The light identifies lies and the creature pretending to be The Sideways Compendium eats the the frequency of lies."

Sam froze. He thought about the flashlight he found when he went idle, and thought about Marcus's strange flashlight. It made sense. As the tape played, Sam's jaw-dropped.

"The Compendium was a shape-shifting creature. An entity named Nain. One of the Sideways entities called "The Little Ones." Nain made a pact with a woman named Gemma. A pact she wasn't aware of. When it couldn't feed, it brought Gemma to The Room with No Ceiling. My Ivory Flashlight opened the space between and I entered as a horde of The Little Ones were ready to devour Gemma's flesh for breaking the pact with Nain. Ironically, Nain didn't know pacts had to be explicit. Nain explained it ate the sound of voices and thoughts, but loved the taste of lies the best. It didn't know that in eating the frequency of human thoughts it devoured a person's mind. It never meant to cause harm. It just wanted to eat what it liked. It turned itself into The Compendium so... "

Sam turned to Marcus, face pale. “You knew about them? Your grandparents? How they met?”

Marcus shook his head. "I don't want to know."

"That's fair, man. But, my, God, Marcus--Did you know about The Little Ones and The Room with No Ceiling?"

Marcus's still face tilted down and his eyes widened. His hands shook. Then, Marcus shook his head. “I know enough. The Sideways isn’t all hunger and trickery, but those… they’re different. Nain deals in stories. The Little Ones… they deal in people. They make pacts that aren't always clear. Whispering Thoughts. Howling Giggles. Things you can't take back.”

Sam’s shivered. “I don't even want to know what that means, Marcus. But, did you... ?"

Marcus sighed. "I've wandered into The Room with No Corners. The Room with No Ceiling. The Room with No Doors. The Room with No Floor... The Room with No Floor is the space above The Room with No Ceiling... and, The Room with No Ceiling is where I met a Little One. I didn't know what it was. It spoke. I spoke back. It grinned and said we were bonded. Forever."

Sam cringed. "What does that mean?"

Marcus shrugged. He stared beyond the window. Looking beyond the horizon.

"My, God," Sam whispered. He shook his head. "And my grandfather? He worked with Encrypt Corp. We thought he was a bookkeeper. The suitcase. The notebooks. The folders."

Marcus looked at Sam. His eyes were staring somewhere else, a space between spaces. "Don't ask things you don't want to know, Sam,” Marcus offered. “Appreciate that when you went idle, you received the flashlight I through into the darkness. I didn't bring it to you. I didn't even know who you were.”

The memory hit Sam hard—the slow collapse of his life after his grandfather’s death. The inheritance. The paid-off bills. The endless days on the couch with chips and TV reruns. That heavy, creeping sloth that whispered, It’s fine… stay still… there’s always tomorrow…

And then, the tapes arrived. Personal deliveries from an Idle Man. Visions of himself dying… over and over.

"I watched myself die, Marcus. Over and over and over again. The plot appeared. I never made an offering to it. I turned into a Plot Person and delivered tapes of my death to myself," Sam said. "I would have remained in those black robes, pale, hollow, stuck in that loop..."

Sam clenched the porcelain flashlight in his hand, the faint memory of the post-it note signed by his grandparents still etched in his mind. The only thing that pulled him back. The only thing that cracked the hollow, idle trance.

“You think all that… the Little Ones… the Bone Lantern… Nain… my idle phase… you think it’s all connected?” Sam asked quietly.

Marcus nodded once. “To the plot? The Little Ones are...”

Before either could speak again, another knock rattled the door.

Sam shook his head. “Man, this is becoming a thing. The bring me info and I feel like the informant. You mind getting that? The double knocks... I'm still not over it. I half-expect to see a plot person.”

Marcus moved to the door. Two figures. Gunn and Alvarez, back again—but something had changed.

Gunn’s face was pale, eyes wide. Alvarez? He hovered behind him, quiet, distant… off.

“We need to talk,” Gunn said, voice low. His eyes were sunken. Officer Gunn looked concerned, exhausted, and afraid. “...Anders Croy. Evelyn Bainbridge.”

Marcus tensed. Sam’s mouth opened, but no words came.

Gunn exhaled sharply. His hands trembled at his sides.

“It keeps happening. It doesn't stop…” Gunn muttered.

Officer Alvarez inhaled and exhaled. He shut the door as the officers entered Sam's apartment. He sat on chair by the window, slid the window open, lit a cigarette, inhaled and said, "Either the world is collapsing, or..."