The Yellow Phantom

The legend of the Basilisk is a terrifying one to think about. A serpentine monster is said to be born when the egg of a chicken is incubated by a toad, and it is said that this monstrous progeny can kill people simply by looking at them. Alarmingly, this ability is not only confined to one preternatural entity - there is a story from Spike Island in Ireland which discusses the existence of a nightmarish being referred to as the 'Yellow Phantom' which is allegedly capable of instantly killing those who look into its dark eyes. Luckily, the person responsible for the spread of this story managed to evade the thing's deadly gaze...

## Spectre of Spike Island

Spike Island is a small island off the coast of Cork Harbour in Ireland. It was originally occupied by a monastic settlement as early as the 7th century if some sources are to be believed, but this holiness has evidently failed to keep one of Ireland's darkest spectres from calling the island home. The central figure of the harrowing story I am about to tell was only six years old at the time - and she was wandering along a path next to the sea on a June afternoon in the year of 1914. She was absorbed in some unspecified hobby of hers - keeping her eyes close to the ground. However, as she approached the wall of a local doctor's house she happened to look up. She was only five yards away from the doctor's house when she caught sight of a humanoid figure peering over the wall that went across the harbour to the coastal town of Cobh.

Intrigued, she took a few more steps towards the unidentified thing before she realised what it was that she was looking at - almost immediately becoming rooted to the spot with fear. The thing was under ten paces away from her, and this was rather too close for comfort. The wall was at least 5ft high, and yet she could see the head, arms and torso of this entity down to its waist, showing just how tall the entity must've been. It was roughly humanoid in shape, and its body was entirely coated with a weird glistening yellow colouration - save, of course, for the black chasms in its face where its eyes would've been. Its hands were hidden behind the wall.

The wall was parallel to the road on her left, and thusly the Yellow Phantom wasn't looking at her but across the road and towards Cobh. However, this slowly began to change as the creature turned its head towards her inch by inch. She stood there, paralysed with terror before a voice whispered into her ear. *If it looks straight at you, Eileen, you will die*. Her feet still felt like they were glued to the floor, but she managed to twist herself away from the monster and start running away from the entity surely out to take her life. Sprinting as if her life depended on it - which it very well might've done - Eileen finally thundered up to a small cottage which had been about 15 yards away from her. Her memories of the event stopped there before picking up again with the owner of the cottage, Mrs Reilly, cleaning her face with a wet sponge. She was still shaking all over with unadulterated terror. Presumably between chattering teeth, she managed to tell Reilly that she had seen something horrifying in the doctor's garden - to which Reilly ominously replied that she wasn't the first and probably wouldn't be the last...