The Occult

Read only if you believe in SUPERNATURAL

This story starts in a math’s class way back in schooling precisely about 10 years ago.

“Sir, no more class please it’s so much for a day” pleaded an exhausted classmate after a 3 hour long class, which was a compensation class for the ‘Unexpected’ holiday the previous day.

Srinivasan – ‘the Angry young man’ (as we call him) over his 40’s is well known for the “rage” he carried with him. He poses a cool look with deep eyes and a well trimmed moustache, unlike his attitude, to the outside world.

The teacher turned to look at the pitiful faces of his students and said “we still got more than half an hour, got any doubts just shoot ‘em”.

The question hour started with the subject and went on to his personal opinion on trivial things.

“Sir, do you believe in ghosts?” asked an enthusiast.

“I do!” came back as an immediate reply leaving all the girls in the class shivering. One of ‘em even cried if I remember it right. Girls always do over react in certain situations. “Yes, I do believe because I have had my experiences with them”.

“Now that’s very interesting sir please go on. Explain it!” said I while stressing on the latter part in the angry man’s ‘mark’ style to which the class bursted out in laughter.

“Well, I was a kid then. I along with my sisters were in our fields for sightseeing on a mid day. A huge black smoke seemed to be following us after sometime; picked running soon after we noticed. You won’t believe if I say it started growing bigger and bigger above our heads in the sky. Just don’t look back keep running said my sister. I would never forget that day and the running race we had”

His words sent chilling shivers through our spines. “Sir, have you heard of the SPIRIT BOARD!” asked my friend Karthik.

“Yes, it is connected to mediumship, spritualism and vodoo. I advice you not to play with ‘em: They can be real dangerous, I got to tell you this story, a real story as a matter of fact” he stressed.

“As you know I also used to take home tuitions​ earlier, there were 3 notable students whom I used to teach. One day they were very much interested in playing this game of Spirit Board which I hardly believed then. They insisted I stay back and take part in their game which I rejected. By the time I packed my things and began to leave, they already started their “Play”, two of the three were playing and the ‘one’ came to lock the door as I stepped out” he took a long pause and said “The following day I was told that the two were dead as the ceiling fan fell on ‘em and the ‘one’ is missing from the night”.

“One hell of a story, what happened to the ‘one’ who is missing? Was he found?” I asked, unable to hold my curiosity.

“Never found”

Tong… tong… the distant bell began tolling leaving the whole class in a pin drop silence.

“So I request you not to play such games ” he ended the class.

“That was a scary story, don’t know whether he made it up or real” I said to my buddy Karthik.

“What do you think? At his age do you think he is a stupid to prank? After all he is the most revered teacher in the school”

“…and I have this gut feeling of trying this out in the night today” intervened Naren; another friend of mine.

  “Really? After all what has been told?” I rebuked Naren

“Common man it’s worth a try!” came back the reply.

“You try and tell us tomorrow” said Karthik to Naren and turned to me saying “don’t worry he won’t have the balls to do it”

The following day sensing something fishy as Naren was absent for the school, Karthik and I went to Naren. We were shocked to see him in bed.

“He is down with 104 fever from last night, please do inform your class teacher about the leave” told his mom.

“What happened buddy?” Karthik stepped towards Naren hardly controlling his smile, mocking his courage.

“I did try, you guys wouldn’t have the guts to do that even” replied Naren.

“Ok, everythings gonna be fine tell us what happened” I asked.

“I made the board and started playing all alone but I couldn’t get a thing; may be more than one is a mandate, trying till late night I decided to drop the idea and sleep. I was the only one awake; having made my bed I stepped out to attend nature calls. As soon as I opened the door I found a buffalo skull at the door step and the seconds later it was gone. That looked real scary man!” I could feel his pounding heart from the distance.

That evening…

I told my elder brother the whole story only to hear him say “oh! Really then we got to try it” at the end. “Don’t worry” he continued, “I know how to avoid the worse”

“How come you never mentioned it?”Later I learnt that there are evil spirits and holy spirits. The former ones being malevolent, your fate depends on who attends your call.

“How do I know which one is who?” I asked my brother

“Procedure, the procedure you call it. Holy ones attend your call even in light. The Dark ones love it when everything is DARK”

“Did your friend throw the coin away? And burn the board?”

“No. I don’t think so. We are not even aware of it” I shrugged.

“You got to learn about it fully when you do something” he said with his eyebrows raised.

 The Night

I got courage over brother’s confidence of handling the things and decided to play the Dark that night.

The night of November the 13^th, 2003.

Spirit Board,

The Spirit Board also known as the QUIJA , has all the alphabets arranged at the top two rows and followed by numbers 1 to 0. Bottom of it has five circles; four in each direction NSEW and one at the centre.

The North and South directional circles has Start and End written inside the circles and the East, West has YES and NO respectively.

Unlike the traditional Planchette we use the rupee coin to call the spirit into it. Centre circle is where the coin is placed. If the coin moves, it’s the sign of the Devil.

“Off all the lights and light up the candle” said my brother. It was half past Eight we started the play.

“Ok, now recite the words ‘Oh evil spirit please come to this coin’ when I ask you to, we should do it together with utmost concentration. You get that?” asked my brother.

I nodded as a sign of accord.

“Our father in heaven hallowed be thy name…..” he started with the prayer to lord for keeping a watch on us while we hover in the Dark.

In the candle light the brown spirit board seemed to be glowing between our laps. Adding to the glory, the cryptic symbols on the board gave a mystic feeling.

“Now”

“Oh evil spirit please come to this coin” we recited in unison.

About more than fifteen minutes we kept reciting the same. All our attempts turned out futile.

“hmm… turn the god pictured wall hangers towards the wall, I mean face them towards the wall” said my brother almost murmuring.

I did so

We started reciting the same now and in about two minutes I witnessed the light of the candle fluttering like it went mad despite not much air. 

Slowly the coin started moving towards north to the ‘start’ circle. I now hear my heart beat quivering with the same pace that of the candle light.

Flickering of the candle doesn’t seem to fade.

“Hi are you here?” my brother started speaking to it.

I didn’t say a thing as I was scared as shit.

My heart began to tremble even more when the coin started moving towards ‘Yes’.

Our own shadows appeared to be moving rapidly in the flickering candle light.

“What’s your name?”

The coin moved towards ‘Z’ then slowly headed to ‘A’ and then to ‘I’ and finally ‘D’

ZAID, ZAID it is, I thought

“Where are you from?”

It was a long time till the coin touched all the letters “BAGHDAD”

“How did you die?” all the questions were about the spirit as it is essential to know what kind of spirit it was.

WAR came as a reply.

All put together we are confronting a spirit named Zaid who was killed at war in Baghdad.

The flickering light gave me a strong feeling of a bad omen. The light doesn’t seem to fade but just to flicker flicker and flicker.

A series of quick questions were posed and answered by the spirit. After all that we wanted to know was finished then it was time for us to stop.

But the hardest and the saddest part in the spirit board game is you do not have the liberty to end it. The spirit chooses whether to leave when we ask to leave or go play on.

“Are you willing to leave now?” we asked when the clock struck half past ten.

Our hearts began to pound faster when it moved towards ‘No’

Keep playing that’s what it meant.

Then I decided to ask the most mysterious question of the mankind,

“What is life after death?”

In the Dark, the candle began to flicker faster. We were scared as hell. I began to think that asking the question was an invitation to death.

The coin did not move an inch.

The intensity of flickering went high and high.

It flickered flickered and suddenly dead.

Pitch Dark, for a second my heart seemed to have stopped beating.

The next second the lights in the house were on

“What were you guys doing” said my father switching all the lights on.

I found myself on the floor to the corner with my eyes filled with tears and legs quivering

“Nothing” said my brother.

“Get back to your beds” saying this father returned to his room.

We didn’t speak a word and moved towards our beds.

The next morning at the breakfast “Dad, you literally saved us coming to our room last night” I said to him

“Last night?When?”

I will never forget the night, the flickering candle and what had happened.