Bogleech.com's 2018 Horror Write-off:

Neds Town

Submitted by Inkstie

There it was, a big wooden sign with the phrase “Neds Town” written over now non-identifiable words in splattered orange paint.


I had been trekking across the U.S., and was somewhere in the south west near California when I had passed through “Neds Town.”

I’ve seen many small towns with their own quirks and uniqueness to them, usually having a low amount of residents with few to no eventful things going on in their lives. The towns they lived in usually reflected this.

 

It’s rare though when you’re greeted by absolutely no human life in seeing distance though.

 

The deafening silence of the town immediately hung over me with its presence, and the lack of people only supported it. The buildings looked ancient, like out of an old cowboy western movie. It was the ideal Hollywood ghost town.

The buildings LOOKED like they had been lived in and used at some point though. I could see that furniture was set up in the housing and restaurants, and even make out dirty footprints scattered across porches and stairs.

The archaic architecture, obliterated window panes and the peeling paint all showed that the town had been long abandoned though, and gave of a somber and sorrowful tone I haven’t felt in long time.

I decided it would be interesting to get out though and explore. I enjoyed urban exploration before when I was younger with nearby abandoned parking garages and empty homes, and even now that has transcended into adulthood with my love of traveling over the U.S. and exploring what its small towns have to offer, but I have never explored an actual ghost town before.

I parked my truck in front of a small shack that looked like it was some kind of vegetable market back in the day, but it was completely destroyed, more so then even the other buildings around it.

I hopped out and headed over to the destitute old saloon near the front of the town.

Yes, and I mean the type of saloon where you’d see bandits hang out in to play billiards and smoke cigars in movies.

It looked to be a wreck, the upholstery on the chairs was a tattered mess, and dirt and all sorts of garbage littered the floor. Some chairs were broken on and smashed, and I swear I must have saw the most flies I’ve ever seen in my lifetime buzzing around the place.

 

 

The weirdest part though was the carrots.

 

 

They were placed everywhere, and I mean literally placed.

Some carrots were sat up on chairs, leaning against the back. Some were sitting on stools at the bar counter. Some were even put into positions that made me laugh yet impressed at the dedication, with certain ones positioned like they were playing an intense game of pool, while others were sat next to empty down turned beer bottles like they passed out drunk.

I stood there in confusion and amusement, looking around like I was at some abstract art gallery.

Still in awestruck, I finally left the saloon regretting leaving my phone in the car this time around. I went out the double doors and found my way back into the center of the town, deciding where I might go next.

Noise was coming from one of the houses, and it sounded like two people talking in a muffled conversation. I walked over hoping to find someone living there to explain why the town was so empty, but once I got over to the house it looked as abandoned and decrepit as the rest of the town.

The door was missing from its frame, and I walked in half-scared some lowlife drugged out of his mind was going to jump out and knife me.


Instead, what I saw baffled me.

More carrots.

Someone had actually left the TV onto some local news channel, and had set the carrot in a patterned cushion chair with an empty pipe stuck into it like it was some kind of image of a nuclear family dad.

I left the room and looked at the kitchen, to find two carrots sitting opposite of each other at a dinner table, with one baby carrot sitting in a high chair. The plates were empty besides some puny piles of meat sitting in the middle I couldn’t identify but looked like it had been recently placed judging by the lack of flies.

Before I was amused, but now this actually amazed me. An entire series of questions bombarded my mind.

Who was doing this? What’s the point? If no one is around to look at this, and this isn’t being advertised anywhere, why the hell would someone set this all up? Who are they doing this for?

 

Just then, I heard a sharp THUD, coming from one of the more worn down buildings near the edge of the town I spotted outside the shattered window.

 

It sounded like something was dropped on the ground, like metal on wood. I ran to the old shack as fast as I could to try to catch a glimpse of some coyote or other animal sniffing around the place for food.

I opened up the creaky door barely hanging by its frame, and walked in.

The building was nearly empty, besides a door to my left and a far reaching hallway contorting in front of me. I could hear noises coming from the hallway as I listened.

The first thing that I had noticed though was the horrendous, awful smell coming from the closed room next to me. I instinctively plugged my nose and walked on, trying to go beyond the terrible stench and to see what was making all the racket in the other room.

I paced down a narrow and dark hallway, using my hands to guide me by touching the walls that were starting to feel closer and more claustrophobic the further I got in.

After passing a few more turns, I had found the door of the room that the noise sounded like it was coming from.

The door looked nearly destroyed, handle crushed, and I could see a blinding yellow light coming from beneath it.

I slowly opened the creaky door to see what was inside.

 


 Have you ever seen a pictures of one of those deformed carrots? Ones that had grown around some obstructions such as rocks or other roots, and had changed into awkward formations like having two carrots coming out of one plant, or even looking like some funny carrot human?

Well, one of those funny carrot human ones was standing right in front of me, about three feet tall, trying to clumsily pick up a

spilled watering can.

It would have been amusing, if not for the slouched over human corpse sitting in a chair with hundreds of growing carrots overwhelming their body now being used as make-shift fertilizer.

 

 

I must have gone brain dead for a second, because I gave that little abomination enough time to pick up the watering can with two orange nubs and look at me with that blank featureless surface it used for its head and “face” I guess.

I immediately shut the door and bolted, smacking the walls repeatedly as I ran to find the exit.

I could hear its two loud stomps in a rhythmic motion quickly coming towards me.

The sound kept coming closer, and I knew I needed to hide soon before I would figure out whatever the hell it would do once it caught up.

I hastily shoved myself into that room near the entrance of the building, and peeked through the keyhole to see if it was near.

 

Of course, what I first noticed in the room was the piles of hundreds upon hundreds of dead, mangled rabbits littering the floor and rising to the ceiling. Some had their necks twisted while others had their bodies smashed. The one thing they all had in common though was the horrendous stench that had greeted me when I first came in.

 

I suffered through the morbid sight and stench and stared out through the keyhole.

The little thing suddenly stampeded into view, and I almost thought from the noise that the floor boards beneath it were going to break in two with each step.

The thing took a quick “glance” around. Its head went up into the air like it was trying to notice something, but then failed to find it.

To my surprise, it started aggressively smacking itself repeatedly in the head with its hairy root arms, and quickly left the room.

I quietly opened the door and tried holding back the stench one last time as I went to look for my truck I had parked in front of the old vegetable stand. Stumbling back to the car once it was in sight, I grabbed my keys and yanked open the door.

The ride away from the place was forgettable and lost in my memory. I’m not sure if it was because my mind forced it away, or I just couldn’t comprehend what I saw.

The car had gotten at least a few miles away when I saw something else.

 

 

A farm, a carrot farm, with a crude sign that said only the words “Neds Farm” sitting proudly at the entrance. I think I know what they use as compost.