The Occurence In Appalachia (STORY alert-see workflow for story)

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Flux Realism in Remix AI

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[TRIGGER WARNING] During the 1950s, in a small Appalachian town, there was an... occurrence. In fact, that is how those in government circles in-the-know reference it to this day. "The Occurrence". A group of... entities arrived in Harrleson's Hollow, a blink-and-you-miss-it town of one store, one gas station, and one movie theater with only one screen. Its claim to fame was a large factory that originally manufactured stoneware jugs often used for moonshine. The majority of the population of Harrleson's Hollow sent their children to school the next town over, and it was a school day, so most of the children were gone when the... occurrence took place. By the time the children returned on the bus, it was already too late. The town was completely silent. The old men were no longer sitting at their customary checker board in front of the gas station. The police car normally hiding behind the BermaShave sign was nowhere to be seen. Food was left on the tables or burning on the stoves. The children knew something was amiss and went to the only adult left in town, the bus driver. Adoniram Jones, an elderly veteran, was dozing on his bus before returning to the next town over. He liked to stay nearby until all the children's parents came to get them from the bus stop. He was awakened by the children knocking on the bus window. It was a cool fall day, and he suggested the children wait on the bus, but they were frightened of being left alone. So Adoniram marched through town, with his tiny troops trailing close behind. It didn't take him long to realize every car in town was parked at Harrelson's Hollow Methodist Church. As they were about to enter the building, Corporal Adoniram Smith's senses began to set alarm klaxons blasting in his head. Whether it was intuition, latent psychic abilities, or the faint scent of blood in the air, he suddenly turned to the children and told them firmly to wait on the front step of the church, and under no circumstances should they come in. The children reluctantly agreed and huddled close together, hugging each other in a cluster as only terrified children could. Adoniram entered the church, and as he passed through the foyer, every hard-won sense in his body and mind screamed at him to run. Flashbacks sent mortars flying over his head and bullets whizzing past his ears. But he didn't run then. And he wouldn't run now. He pushed open the swinging doors to the sanctuary and stopped in his tracks. Not the mortars, the bullets, or the bodies of his dead friends prepared him for what he saw. His feet made a sickening sticky sound as he robotically strode forward, through inches of blood that had begun to soak through the floorboards of the old sanctuary. At the center far end of the room, against the podium, every pew was stacked into a crude pyramid shape. And every adult resident of Harrleson's Hollow was arranged around the base of the pyramid, some standing in a ring, and fifty or so more in kneeling positions scattered in a seemingly random arrangement around the room facing the pyramid. And each one had been skinned. When authorities arrived from the next town over, two small children who were homeschooled on their family's farm were found hiding near the church. According to their testimony, halfway through their farm chores, they saw 10 men in black suits and hats approaching the farm. Their father, a deeply (and apparently appropriately) distrustful man, told the children to hide and approached the men with a shotgun. As the children watched, a deep, pulsating, nauseating sound seemed to emanate from the group of men, and their father's arms fell to his sides, and the shotgun clatered to the dirt road at his feet. A few moments later, their mother hobbled out of the farmhouse, and the two adults followed the suited men as they walked back toward town. The children followed at a distance in the trees and then from behind building. As the group passed each home and business, that same, deeply wrong sound thrummed, and every adult inside would totter out, mindlessly following. Until the massive group finally entered the church. The children took hope from this, thinking if they were going into the church, they must be helping. But then the screams began, and the children blacked out. They woke up just in time to see the men in black suits leaving the church. One passed near their hiding place, and they saw him adjusting something. He turned toward them in time for them to see his face. Or what should have been his face. The pale children stuttered, trying to explain what they saw, and the little girl began to wail. The boy stared off numbly. All he would say after that was the same thing, over and over again. "Their faces weren't faces.... faces that weren't faces... faces that weren't faces... faces that weren't faces... faces weren't faces..."