Run Escape

My first attempt at a gaming creepy pasta. Spent a while thinking about it, though there still may be some contradicitions. Tried to be original with this one.

-Dernz

The Beta Testing
A while back ago in the early 2000's I got really into computers, video games in particular. At this time new games were always coming up and needed beta testing, especially multiplayer games looking to get started. I managed to get into a closed beta for one game in particular. It was called "Run Escape".

Run Escape started you off on an island, where you created your charecter and just got the feel for the game. At the charecter customization screen a charecter came up that would be changed by the customization tools, however none of the customization tools worked. I assumed this was just the default charecter model everyone in the closed beta had to use and didnt think much of it. I ran through the island doing a few meaningless tasks and got an okay understanding of the game. Once I got off the island I was sent to the main town and encountered a few other beta testers. These beta testers charecters looked differnt than mine, I must have encournterd a bug.

The game did not have an objective, it was a sandbox style game where you could do what you want by training skills. The game during beta had a few skills one could train: swordsmanship, blacksmithing, and agility. Considering the name of the game I assumed agility was the skill the devs wanted people to focus on the most. I spent hours upon hours leveling up my agility skill, so long sometimes I started in the morning, and when I went to take a break it was 8 at night. Before I knew it I was addicted to this game.

I made friends with a few others playing the game who were also trying to level their agility up as fast as possible. We became good friends. The hours upon hours of running around and jumping up walls and walking across buildings to level up our agility skill seemed to fly by even faster with some friends.

The game was about to go into open beta. I figured the closed beta testers would be getting really excited for the open beta, but the servers for Run Escape were empy aside from at times what seemed like myself and my agility leveling friends. The open beta date was announced, and we were close to what we thought was maxing out of agility skills. We pulled an all nighter and did it, maxed out the agility skill. Once we did we were congratulated with a message that popped up on screen.

CONGRATULATIONS!

'YOU HAVE REACHED MAX LEVEL IN THE AGILITY SKILL. YOU ARE NOW READY RUN FROM THE FUTURE.'

A bit of an odd message but considering agility consisted of running away and jumping up things it made sense. With a job well done everyone said goodnight and logged off. The following morning I logged on into the now open beta. But instead of logging back on to where I finished last night, my charecter was standing naked in what seemed to be a cave. The cave was dark, I turned the games brightness up to full but it did not help at all. I could hear heavy panting and dripping sounds from my speakers. I typed into chat "Hello?". I sat infront of my keyboard and saw a message come up. It was from one of my friends who was also naked. We could just see each other, we figured this was some content update putting us here.

We explored what we could of the dark cave until we found a torch. We lit the torch and the cave around us was illuminated. The heavy panting was still unknown but the source of the dripping sound was revealed. At the ceiling of the cave were the bodies of my other friends avatars nailed into the hard cold rock. A shiver of fear went down my spine. I typed to my friend if she knew what was going on. I looked in my friendbox and saw that the friends who were on the ceiling were removed. The only friend online was the friend standing with me in the cave.

We spent an hour or so trying to figure out how to get out of the cave, and why our friends avatars were dead and haning from the ceiling, the heads facing backwards instead of forwards and their eyes hollowed out. The panting still coming from the speakers. We were both impressed with the game, and disturbed. We decided to explore the cave more and found a secret wall. The wall opened and on the other side was what looked like an agility room. On the other side we could see what looked like an exit. Many obstacles laid between us and the exit as well as a dark void beneath the obstacles. We assumed if you fell you died. My friend tried the first obstacle which was a set of jumping pillars. Jumping from one pillar to the next it seemed like an easy course. I decided to let her go through first to see exactly what the course entailed. As she went further and further into the course the panting from the speakers got louder and heavier. She came to the last obstical before the exit when the panting now became a loud shreak. Red eyes from the void below penetrated the darkness and a massive hand reached out and grabbed my friends charecter. I did not know if I should have felt scared or impressed because the models were surprising life like, better than any other game at the time.

I figured either my friend respawned in the cave room we started in our was directed back to the main town everyone respawns at upon death. I ran back to the main cave room, the dripping sound no longer heard. She was not there. I checked my friend box and she was no longer in it. I looked up at the ceiling and found her also nailed to the ceiling of the cave, her head facing the opposite direction as well and her eyes hollowed out.

I became very disturbed and was going to just log out and email the game devs about what this content update was. However I could not log out. Every time I pressed the log out screen a message came up saying.

YOU MUST ESCAPE!

This must be an end game event for agility, an all or nothing agility course. The obstacles themselves were easy enough, the real challenge must lie with avoiding the giant hand at the end. I went back into the secret room and just observed the course, see if any changes happened or if the red eyes appeared at certain places at certain times. Eventually I figured the puzzle out. The red eyes appeard at every obstacle, except at certain times they would be closed or open. The key was to run across the obstacle while the eyes were closed. Simple enough puzzle.

I began the jumping pillar obstacle. A felt a weird senstation as my charecter jumped from each pillar, my feet felt cold and a weird pulsing feeling with each jump came over my feet. The next obstace was a set of monkey bars and it was almost as if I could feel the wood the monkey bars were made of inbetween my hands as my charecter crossed the obstacle. The same senstations came about until the last obstacle where my friend failed. The last obstacle was simply walking across a plank. I began walking across it, feeling the wood beneath my feet. Just as im about to make it across the red eyes open from the void. A shreak penetrated my ear drums as if the monster was right next to me screaming his blood boiling scream. The giant hand reached up from the void and only scracthed my charecter's back as he dived to avoid the hand.

I felt a white hot pain on my back as well, but dismissed it quickly as the adrealine from beating the endgame course took away the pain. I exited the cave and a white screen occupied my computer for a couple a moments.

I became horrified in what I saw next. First there was a picture of me as a child laughing as my father pulled at my toes. Then one of me in my teenage years smiling at the camera getting ready to go to a football game with a few of my friends. Then a picture of me sitting at my computer playing the game wit my back to the camera. How did the the game manage to get these pictures of me? I began to panic. Then all three images came on screen, but they were now all differnt. In all the pictures my eyes were blacked out. The first picture I was no longer laughing, my face was plain my father's hand was missing from the picture. The second picture I was still not smiling and my friends were missing from the photo. The last one was the most disturbing. My neck was bent around 180 degrees, my face now looking at me through the screen with an incredibly large smile on my face.

The images vanished and I was logged out of the game and taken back to the login screen. The login screen was now differnt. Instead of a plain screen with a username and password being requested, it was now a long hallway with mist covering what lies at the end. Two torches of multi coloured flame were on either side of the screen. The title of the game "Run Escape" now slowly changed. The E in escape now became lower case and drifted towards the left. The s now became capitalized. The title was now "Rune Scape".

I tried to log back in then...

The Police Report
Victim: Joshua Harding

Cause of Death: Homocide

Time of Death: March 16th, 2004. Approximately around 11:59 PM.

Details: Victim was found dead in his chair when his roomate came home from his classes. The roomate contacted 911 soon after discovering the victims body.

Autopsy Report: Victim was killed by snapping of the neck. The neck was broken so severe that the head faced 180 degrees in the opposite direction. The eyes were gouged out of the victims sockets. On the victims chest was a carving, most likely from a crude knife. The carving said "Do not Run". The victim also had a carving on the back, no doubt from the same crude knife. The carving said "No Esacpe". Three large scratches also ran down the victims back.

Notes: This is the 5th victim found with these carving, a neck broken such as this, and eyes carved out of their sockets, however this victim, unlike the others did not have carvings on his body. No link can be found with these victims aside from how they were killed. See reports 192A,B,C, and D.