Ebrugh Report 0: This Is Why I Collect Strange Tales...

Artist's Rendition of the Crooked Tree.

This Ebrugh Report is about teenagers that have a strange encounter in the woods that they can not understand.

## Summary

At the birthday celebration of a young boy named Peter Kaiser, where he and his group of close-knit friends embark on a playful adventure in the nearby forest. Their quest for fun and excitement leads them to a mysterious destination—the Crooked Tree, an ancient and gnarled giant nestled in a picturesque clearing near a tranquil creek.

As the sun begins its descent, the group of friends clambers up the Crooked Tree. However, their joyful escapade is abruptly interrupted by otherworldly noises that ripple through the forest, signaling the imminent arrival of something strange and uninvited.

Startled and apprehensive, the children scramble down from the tree. Seeking refuge, they conceal themselves in the dimly lit garage adjoining Peter's home. There, they recount the unnerving encounter in the forest, sharing their fears and speculations.

With a mixture of excitement and trepidation, they approach Peter's father, hoping to find solace and understanding in the arms of an adult. Regrettably, the man does not take their account seriously and dismisses their tale as a product of vivid imagination and youthful fantasies. He decides to venture into the nearby forest to dispel any lingering apprehensions.

Upon his return, the man bears a conspicuous cut on his cheek. Uncertainty shrouds the events that unfolded in the depths of the forest, leaving Peter and his friends oscillating between believing in the mysterious presence and questioning whether it was simply a trick of the imagination.

In the end, one of the children, Harold Kebba, decides to sketch the creature he believes he encountered in the forest. When Peter lays eyes on Harold's drawing, he is struck by a profound sense of recognition, and his reaction is one of sheer shock.

## Ebrug Report 0

### Rumoured Origin

*I once have had an encounter of sorts as well. An encounter with the strange and unnatural. It was not a ghost or a commonly known creature from creepypastas or other internet tales. It was something different, something more disturbing and weird and it has never left my mind since.*

*Let me tell you about it, so you might start to understand why I believe in things many don’t consider to be real. Why I try to find more information linked to the…. Ebrugh…*

(Harold Kebba, 2012)

### Main Report

This story – my story - happened when I was still very young – about 9 years old – and therefore did not really know of the world's worries and its darkness, of the things lurking in the shadows and in men. Everything seemed fine back then and I sure as hell am glad for those days.

During my youth, I lived in a little village in the west of Germany. It was located near a big deciduous forest, a place like heaven for us kids. Many happy days we passed with building hideouts or tree houses below the canopy of leaves. We spent almost every afternoon playing between the tall green trunks and jumping over the small creeks that were running along tiny hills.

We probably would have spent our whole childhood there, had not an event occurred that made us never set foot into those woods ever again. It was Peter’s birthday. He had sent out invitations to his party all around the village. That might seem like a lot of invites, but our village was very small. We were only ten children on that day, celebrating with Peter.

The whole afternoon long we did what most children do on such an occasion: we had a good time, played some games, ate cake.

Then, evening came.

The sun was already setting when Peter got… an idea.

“Let’s wait for the dark. We have never been to the forest during nighttime! Must be crazy in there at midnight!” he said after having thought about it for some time.

I did not like that idea. It was true that we never had gone in at night, but for good reason: As we lived in a rural area, our parents had warned us many times of dangerous animals and people with bad intents sneaking through the dark. Back then, I did not believe that there was anything beyond our imagination, though I had seen a wolf once or twice and did not want to risk my life on a stupid whim.

“We can’t, you know what our parents say about the forest at night” I must have said.

Of course, no one paid attention; they all liked Peter’s idea.

Perhaps it made them feel grown up?

After the sun had fully set, we made our way into the woods. The treetops did not let any moonlight pass through, so we had to use flashlights to illuminate the way.

I remember those moments, being afraid of the unknown for the first time in my life for real. The blackness surrounding us felt malicious and the rustling of the leaves in the breeze made me imagine ghosts soaring through the air. Not the kind of ghosts I know of today – the flying bed sheet kind of ghosts, more harmless than those others that are probably… out there…

While the owls sang their haunting songs around us, we ventured deeper into the forest. Peter led the way, but all of us knew the area, and we only let him do so because it was his birthday. I knew where we were at all times, having played in these parts for many hours.

Suddenly, I knew where we were heading.

“Peter, are we going to the Crooked Tree?”, Matthew asked. He must have had the same thought.

“Yes. We haven’t been there for some time”, Peter answered with a wide grin.

The Crooked Tree was just an age-old oak tree, standing on a little glade near one of the many creeks, being surrounded by thick bushes. The thing was already dead and rotting – we once had tried to build a hideout around it with no success.

In the darkness, however, it looked like a creature with a thousand arms, stretching in all directions. The trunk seemed grey and wrinkled, the many big knotholes resembling dark, gaping mouths lusting for us. I got a bad feeling.

“We are going to wait here until midnight”, Peter decided. In those days, midnight was something mysterious, ghostly for us. Today, I know that 3:00 AM is the real time to worry about, but back then, we were all afraid of the clock striking twelve.

“We can’t stay, there might be monsters”, Sarah complained.

“Are you afraid? I am not! Let us just wait!”, Peter teased her.

And so, we waited.

Peter, me and the two other boys started climbing the Crooked Tree, looking for comfortable but safe spots between the branches. We sat there for about an hour, relaxing, trying to ignore the girls’ talk about boring things near the creek.

At about 10:20 PM, I heard a rustling nearby.

“What was that?”

We fell silent, listening into the darkness.

Nothing to hear. Nothing out there...

“Stop kidding”, Peter said.

He seemed a bit frightened.

There was still nothing.

“Why are you…”, he started to shout at me, irritated.

But there it was again, the loud sound of rustling bushes.

The thick bushes right below us.

With a shriek, the girls started to run away. They were always easily frightened, but at this late time we all were.

The two other boys had sat on branches far away from the tree’s trunk, reaching over the creek, so they could just drop down into the shallow water before fleeing as well.

Peter and I did not have such luck. We were stuck above the bushes.

“Don’t worry, it is probably just some squirrel”, I tried to calm Peter and myself down.

The others had already covered some distance; I could see their flashlights about a hundred meters away, leaving us behind.

“GET BACK!”, Peter screamed, his voice trembling.

“Shhh! It is right below us!”, I muttered.

I did not dare to look or shine my flashlight down. I remember the raw fear, feeling pure terror for the first time in my life.

I closed my eyes, ignored Peters wailing, and focused on the sounds below. If only I heard it again. I knew the sounds of some animals around these parts, perhaps I could identify it by its call! I listened for clicking, cooing, roaring or snorting.

A gurgling, wheezing sound reached my ears, almost like water being poured onto burning coals.

Getting dizzy, I opened my eyes and looked at Peter.

He had heard it too. His face seemed to ask only one question:

“What now?”

The rustling of the bushes below continued, mixed with the gurgling.

I gathered all the courage I had left and pointed my torch downwards. The leaves were shaking. Something was slowly moving inside the bushes, towards the tree trunk. Stalking.

Towards us.

“We have to climb over to the creek. If we fall down into the bushes or stay here, it will get us!”, I whispered, hoping that it could not understand our words.

Peter nodded.

As quickly as possible, we made our climb, hands shaking, the flashlights leading our way. Every moment I expected the branches to crack, expected us to fall and…

But we moved on.

When the creek was right below us, we calmed down a bit.

Almost there.

“Ready?”, Peter asked, having gotten some of his courage back.

“Yes.”

We dropped down, landed in the water and started running home. The trees were flying by as I aimed my flashlight back towards the Crooked Tree while Peter’s was leading our way.

I imagined something coming out, jumping in a flowing manner, felt its gaze…

Then it was gone.

Peter let out a scream, having looked back for a brief second as well.

Luckily, none of us fell over a root or something alike, not even in the brief second of turning our backs.

When we reached Peter’s house, the others had hidden away in the garage, where the party had taken place in the afternoon. The tables were still there, but everyone cowered behind the bar counter Peter’s Dad had built.

“Peter, is this just you two fooling around?”, Matthew asked, partly scared, partly angry.

The look on our faces silenced him.

“What did you see? Was it a boar?” Sarah was still shaking violently.

“I… I don’t know”, I said, sitting down next to her. The garage gate we had just closed behind us looked like a gateway to a world of pure horror.

Our quick breaths were the only thing I heard, eyes closed again, trying to calm down.

Some minutes passed and everything seemed fine. Though, I did not trust the calm.

I looked up and saw the window in the wall, right above us. The glass parting us from the outside world suddenly seemed frail and weak. What if it was outside, trying to get in? Whatever it was? What if it had followed us after all?

BANG.

The window shook violently, something having hit it from the outside. My heart almost stopped. It was here!

Sarah and the other girls started crying…

“Got you good! That is why you should not enter the forest at night!”, I heard someone laughing.

Peter’s Dad came into the room through the side door.

“Dad, what the hell? Are you insane?”, Peter roared and started crying as well.

“No! I saw you running out of the forest. I just had to take this chance! You should see the look on your faces…”

He stopped. Looked at his son.

“Why are you crying? It was not that bad of a shock, I hope?” Sarah and the other girls were just sobbing uncontrollably, the other boys shaking, frightened.

“Guys, calm down, it was just a joke!”

“Dad… there was something… below the Crooked Tree… in the bushes”, Peter whispered, his voice shaking.

“For real? What? A boar? They mostly come out at night these days! You are lucky it did not…”

“No, not a boar… some… thing…”, I must have said, still in shock.

Peter’s Dad seemed to think for a while, then he said:

“Okay. I will go take a look. So that you can all sleep tonight.”

With those words he took a baseball bat from a shelf and started opening the garage gate.

“No, please, Dad, no… It will get you”, Peter said, begging.

“Don’t be such a wimp! Stay here, I’ll be back soon!”

He left us in the garage, the gate open.

None of us dared to close it. We did not want to get too close to the darkness outside.

Time seemed to pass slower than ever before. The cool of the night started to creep into the room and I imagined hearing whispering outside.

Or was it real? What if the being had taken Peter’s Dad? What if it came to take us as well? Or rip us apart? Claw out our eyes? My imagination ran wild. And between all the made up thoughts it slowly came up from within me, one image. The thing I had seen – or believed I had seen - below the Crooked Tree.

After what felt like half an hour, Peter’s Dad did return.

But something was not right. He had a large cut on his cheek.

“Just one of those thorn bushes”, he told us.

Even now, I am not sure whether I imagined the deep fear in his eyes. He never spoke of that night again. These days, after having processed the happenings, I am not sure any more of what I had seen. Whether there had actually been something or whether we had just encountered a boar looking for worms and snails.

It had been a dark night and we had been kids.

Some days after the events our teacher told me to doodle: I had finished solving all my maths problems and he probably did not know what other task to give me.

I don’t remember what got me to draw the thing I had imagined below the tree:

A creature, about one meter tall, its lower body seemingly consisting of thick smoke, its upper body being covered in greyish fur. It had two long arms with sharp claws and the head seemed to be that of a cat or a cheetah. But where the face should have been: only darkness, as if a hole had been drilled into its skull. A deep, gaping hole of eternal blackness. I almost smiled at the stupid doodle, but when I heard Peter behind me, gasping, his face turning white in fear, I got a sickly feeling as well.

I have not seen Peter in a long time. He moved away one or two years after the events, when his parents got divorced. Forests are nothing I ever liked to visit again, not even nowadays, though my hesitation slowly fades.

After the encounter below the Crooked Tree, I knew the world was stranger than I thought, more challenging and a lot more dangerous. So, when I read the tale of Miharu, the strange girl that found a black mirror and saw a silhouette, I did not simple-mindedly laugh at it but listened to my gut feelings and took it seriously. And I think… I think I am right. I think these reports… These few that… are probably real… They paint a picture far more horrifying than anything I could dream up with my primitive mind. Please, help me to understand the bigger picture, the picture some would probably say should stay unknown…

## Characters

* Harold Kebba
* Peter Kaiser
* Joseph Kaiser
* Sarah Schiller
* Matthew Schwan

## Entities & Objects

* Entity below the Crooked Tree
* Crooked Tree