Kill Screen

While working the closing shift at an arcade in the summer of 1982, a New Jersey teen stumbles upon a mysterious new game that is far scarier than anything he’s played before.

Created & Produced by Samuel Weston Evans
Written & Directed by Samuel Weston Evans
Sound-Designed & Edited by Samuel Weston Evans

Vocal Performances by:
Ken Crossman as Elliott
Samuel Weston Evans as The Keeper

Cover Art Illustrated by Mongemanuk.std
Special Thanks to Ren Dara Santiago
Website: https://aloneintheattic.buzzsprout.com
Instagram: @_aloneintheattic

Transcript

Listen. Follow the voices.

Good evening. Don’t worry, I’m not going to hurt you. I opened the door and beckoned you here because I need your help. They need your help. Yes, the voices. It appears you are in need of a dark tale since you can hear the ghosts. I know this all must be a shock and I’m sure you have many questions. Come in, take a seat. Let me explain.

Welcome to the Attic. The door that appeared to you and brought you here is a portal. This room is a supernatural space, not of your world. A sort of limbo between worlds, so to speak. And I am a supernatural entity, bound here for eternity, doomed to dwell alone in the Attic.

Although, as you have already heard, I’m not really alone in here. All around us, piled high on the shelves, scattered across the floor, and overflowing from the trunk in the corner, are a number of different objects that have been collected throughout time. One could say the Attic is a museum of lost relics and I, its Keeper. Now, you may have heard the saying that “every object has a story to tell,” but in here that really is true.

Trapped within each of these items is a ghost, calling out for their story to be heard. Those are the desperate voices you hear whispering to you. They need your help to be set free.

I know what it’s like to be trapped. The familiarity of their strangled cries gnaws away at me and spurs my longing to aid them. But I can do nothing to help because the only way they can be released is if they tell their story to a human. And not just any human, but one who is drawn to their terrifying tales. You are a unique soul; one who is fascinated by the macabre and seeks to explore the dark rather than just staying in the light. Since you can hear their voices, you have the power to save them. So...will you help set them free?

I know this is a lot to take in, but you must decide quickly. Time is of the essence. If you do not wish to hear any more, you may close your ears and leave this place. The door will never appear to you again and we will find another human with a hunger for horrors to help. But if you stay to listen and liberate them, you will be exalted as a savior of lost spirits, and the Attic door shall be open for you to continue returning.

Wise choice. I am pleased to hear. But before we begin, I must warn you that the stories they have to tell are not for the faint of heart. For the account that they each must share with you, in order to be set free, is the ghastly tale of the night they died and became trapped here. All of the ghosts in this room disappeared with no one knowing where they went. They never got to tell anyone what happened, which is why they are bound ghosts rather than free spirits. They are tethered between worlds, still tortured by the haunting memory of that night. But you can give them peace simply by listening to their stories. Hearing them recount the harrowing events of that evening may disturb you, but it is a worthy price to pay, knowing that you have helped release them. Ready?

Right. Come take a look around at all the artifacts. The dust that covers much of the room is what happens to the objects when the ghosts are released from them. Once they have finished telling their story, the vessel that holds them disintegrates. As you can see, many have already been set free by similar souls who came before you.

What happened to them? Well...some grew old and passed on, having spent their whole lives setting spirits free, while others heard one story and were too frightened to ever come back.

I have listened to every tale that has ever resided in the Attic, so I am quite accustomed to all horrors...but there are some accounts in here so chilling that you will feel their shudder creep up your spine for the rest of your days.

And it’s not worth trying to find a less frightening story, because some of the most harmless looking objects contain the most horrific of tales. You must let the items speak to you in order to choose. Pick one when you hear it scream because that means the ghost is about to begin telling their story again.

The ghosts don’t know they’re dead. Within the objects they are caught in a loop, constantly recalling the events of that fateful night. And when they finally get to the moment where they disappeared, they let out a scream and start remembering the whole night again from the beginning. Those are the screams you have been hearing amongst the whispering of their tales. Take a listen and choose whichever object you hear scream out.

Ah, yes. That token from Chester’s Video Arcade belonged to Elliott Alan Thompson, who encountered a mysterious game while working the closing shift one evening. It is a tale which I like to call, “Kill Screen.”

To listen to Elliott tell you his story, all you have to do is bring the coin close to your ear, shut your eyes, and listen. If you really focus, you’ll even be able to hear the sounds inside the arcade that night.

Alright, that should be all you need to know for now. It’s just about time for the story to start...so close your eyes, open your ears, and journey back to that frightful evening.


It was July 1982 in Madison, New Jersey. I had just graduated from high school two months prior and was working at Chester’s Video Arcade for the summer. It was a fairly small arcade, tightly packed with a few rows of games. We had most of the popular ones like Pac-Man, Asteroids, and Donkey Kong, so the place was always busy.

The crowd was mostly kids and teens my age, but everybody's faces were always buried in the screens, so I barely talked with any of them. All I would usually see was a line of backs hunched over the machines. It was like they were being sucked into another world.

The arcade made it feel like we were cut off from the outside world too, since there was no natural light in the room; just a few dim fluorescent lights overhead and the neon glow of the game monitors.

Since the windows were shut and blacked out, the smell could be pretty brutal too; A bunch of smelly pubescent teens cramped in a hot, musty room was not the most ideal place to be stuck for the summer. It felt like an oven in there, so most days I would sweat through the red Chester’s t-shirt I had to wear as a uniform.

I worked as an attendant, and a technician when needed, so I spent most of my time cleaning and tuning the games. A big part of my job was also telling kids to stop banging on the machines for change.

That was the soundtrack to my summer; not Duran Duran or A Flock of Seagulls, but the sound of coins clanging, joysticks jamming, and buttons beeping. But the noises, the stench, and the crowdedness was all worth it when I got to close the arcade and have the place all to myself.

Chester’s was owned by a small local company, meaning we didn’t have as many restrictions as most of the big chain arcades. So after hours, we were able to put credits onto the games and play them for free. Our manager was quite lax, so he even used to let our crew throw parties if it was our turn to lock up, as long as we cleaned up before we left. But that privilege stopped in June, when a boy went missing.

He was working at an arcade on the pier in Asbury Park, about an hour away. He was left to close up for the night, but...nobody ever saw him again. They never even found his body. His backpack was there the next day though. They searched it to see if they could find anything that would explain his disappearance, but the only thing of note they found was pot. The door to the arcade had been left unlocked, so they figured he got too high, left to go for a swim off the pier, and then drowned. The cops just used it as a message to spread awareness about the dangers of drug use. Some perfect propaganda for Reagan’s “War on Drugs.” I didn’t really believe that’s what happened that night, but our manager certainly did. The whole thing spooked him, so he didn’t want any of us throwing parties at the arcade anymore.

It didn’t really matter for me though, cause I wasn’t inviting anyone to party with me even before that happened. I didn’t really have many friends. I had only been living there for a year since I moved in with my uncle after the accident, so I was known as “the new kid” and “the orphan” for my whole senior year. And being a naturally quiet person didn’t help me with fitting in either. But I didn’t really care that much since I preferred to just spend time alone.

Video games were one of the things I found comfort in. I loved being able to escape to different worlds and play as someone other than myself. I enjoyed going to the movies too. It was always so thrilling to be immersed in a story on a giant screen and to feel like I was a part of something bigger. And the characters felt so real to me. They were the only friends I needed.

I went to the movies a lot and especially liked watching science fiction and horror films. Already during that summer, I had seen E.T., Blade Runner, Star Trek: Wrath of Khan, The Thing, and Poltergeist, which were all fantastic, although the last two both scared the shit out of me.

But my favorite movie I watched that summer was Tron, which I had just seen the night before. The story was so rad. In the movie, the main character literally leaves the real world and enters into a video game.

I wished I could do that: enter a new world and escape from the one I was in. I didn’t want to be stuck in that town anymore, I just wanted to get as far away from everyone and everything there as I could. And with only a month left before I was gonna head to my dream college across the country, the start of a new life was just around the corner.

But since I still had another few weeks in that hell hole of a town, I decided to make the most of my time at the arcade. I set a goal for myself that, by the end of the summer, I would get my name on the top of one of the leaderboards there. If I succeeded, not only would I get to leave my initials as a final farewell to the town, but I would also get to finally beat Mike Dawson and rub it in his stupid face.

One of the main reasons why I wanted to leave so badly was to get away from him. Mike was a complete dipstick and the school’s biggest asshole. There weren’t any problems between us when I first arrived, but that all changed when I got assigned to be lab partners with his girlfriend, Tiffany.

She was the first person at the school who was kind and actually talked to me, so after a few days of getting to know her in class, I started to develop a bit of a crush on her. And she looked a lot like Brooke Shields, so that definitely helped too. I didn’t know she had a boyfriend, so I walked with her to her locker after class one day and asked her if she wanted to go to a movie with me sometime.

But that was the moment it all went to shit, because listening to our conversation and waiting at her locker when we arrived was Mike Dawson. I was so embarrassed after realizing the situation and I immediately apologized and explained that I didn’t know about their relationship. But he didn’t want to hear it. Instead, he made it his mission to make my life a living hell. From that moment on, any time he saw me he would push me around and call me names. And as much as I wanted to tell him off and push back, I knew he would overpower me, so I just avoided him as much as I could.

But I couldn’t run away when I was at work, so he continued to torment me throughout the summer. He would show up at the arcade pretty often to play games and make fun of me, and sometimes he would bring Tiffany along just to show her off and make me jealous.

But the thing that annoyed me the most was that even though he was a complete airhead, he was great at playing video games. His initials “M-A-D” sat at the top of almost every leaderboard in the arcade. “Mad” was exactly how I felt having to constantly be reminded of him throughout the day.

I was already glad to know that I would never have to see him again after the summer, but I really wanted to get him back for all the shit he put me through. Since I couldn’t take him physically, I needed to beat him at the games. So I spent my time at the arcade improving my gaming skills in order to finally surpass him.

Achieving my goal of topping the leaderboard was the only thing I cared about for the rest of the summer. So when I finally had the place to myself for the whole night, I knew I had a golden opportunity to do it.

It had been an exciting day at the arcade because we had just gotten Ms. Pac-Man installed, although Mike had unfortunately gotten to it first and put his name at the top of the leaderboard. But the good news was that his score wasn’t super high and I still had the whole night ahead of me to try and beat him.

After the manager left, I was finally able to begin my solitary mission. But before I did that, I got my closing tasks out of the way. I started by doing a sweep of the arcade, row by row, cleaning up after all the kids who dropped change or trampled food into the carpet. I found a couple candy wrappers littered on the ground, but otherwise the place was fairly clean, which was a pleasant surprise considering how busy it got that day. I then made one final sweep to double check...but I found something else that I wasn’t expecting to see.

At the end of one of the rows was a game I had never seen before. It was completely black and there was no side art on it. I moved towards it to take a closer look, and as I did, I saw that there was nothing on the marquee above the monitor. I didn’t see a name for the game anywhere. “What kind of game is this? And when did it get here?” I had never seen it there until then, so I figured it was brought in with Ms. Pac-Man that morning and just got overshadowed. The control panel was all black too with only a single joystick and button. The monitor was off, so I tried tapping the button.

Suddenly, the screen turned on. “Feed Me - Insert Coin to Start” flashed at the bottom. At the top of the screen was the leaderboard and there was only one set of initials listed. “H-I-M” it said...“him.” I didn’t know who that was, but I knew it wasn’t Mike. I assumed he must’ve missed seeing it since he spent all day playing Ms. Pac-Man. This was the perfect opportunity to finally reach the top of the leaderboard. Only having to beat one guy made my job a lot easier, so I immediately set out to do it.

First I tried opening the game cabinet to upload credits and play for free, but I couldn’t seem to find any latch. I checked everywhere, but it was like the game was just one solid mass, not constructed like any other machine. The material felt strange too, somewhat rough or...scaly. Finally I gave up and just decided to pay.

I had one token in my pocket so I inserted it into the coin mechanism, but it rejected it. I tried again and it spit it right back out.

Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed a coin sitting on top of the console, meaning whoever claimed to play next didn’t get to. I picked it up and placed my own coin back in its place. While inspecting it, I saw that it wasn’t one of our tokens. On it was written “Tillie’s Amusement Arcade.” The name sounded familiar, but I couldn’t place where I’d heard it. Someone must’ve come from out of town and had it with them.

Out of curiosity, I tried using the token to start the machine. It went in, clanged down the mechanism and the game started. I found that quite odd at first, but I didn't have much time to question it once I began playing.

It was a maze game, where you guide a character to collect a line of coins, very similar to Pac-Man. But the character was a human-looking figure wearing a red shirt...the same bright red as my uniform.

There didn’t appear to be any threat at first, but then a dark creature entered the game. It was bigger than the main character, with beastlike features, and sunken gray eyes. It started following the character, just like the ghosts do in Pac-Man, although this one was a lot more ominous looking than them. I tried to outrun it but the creature eventually cornered me.

The words, “EAT HIM,” appeared on the screen in pixelated red letters and the character disappeared. The game was flooded with a kill screen and went to black, shutting off completely. Kill screens usually only happen when you reach a super high score, so it's really weird that it happened then. But I figured it was a glitch since the game had just arrived.

I tried pushing the button and tapping on the side of the monitor, but it wasn’t coming back on. I hoped I hadn’t broken it. But then I figured it was still being tested and hadn’t been properly tuned yet, so I decided to just leave it be. I was bummed that I wasn’t gonna be able to beat it that night, but I decided to go back to my original plan of trying my hand at Ms. Pac-Man.

I headed across the arcade and played a few rounds, improving each time until I was closer to beating Mike’s score than I ever had been before. I was only 1,000 points away from passing him. First I got a strawberry. Then I got a power pellet and turned the ghosts blue. I ate one of them and then was gaining on a second. With all the Pac-dot points I was getting, I just needed to eat one more ghost to get the high score! I was so close! And just as I was about to get it...

The screen turned off. “No! What happened?” Then all at once, the lights in the arcade shut off and I was left alone in the dark. I couldn’t see a thing.

But after moment, a slight glow flickered on from the opposite side of the room. It seemed to be coming from the strange game. I started to head towards it, but felt my foot step on something. I bent down to pick it up and saw that it was a coin. It was another token from Tillie’s Arcade.

Suddenly everything in the arcade turned back on. All the machines were flashing and playing their usual tunes. With the lights on, I could see that the token I had picked up from the ground belonged to a line of coins along the floor. “How the fuck did those get there?” I hadn’t seen any coins on the ground when I was cleaning earlier.

I started to feel really spooked. “Hello? Is anyone else here? If this is some kind of joke it’s not funny.” But then I heard something across the room, coming from where the coins lead. I slowly followed the trail until it brought me to the mysterious game.

Right when I arrived, all the lights went out again. I couldn’t see anything, but I heard something. I tried to rationalize the noise, telling myself that it was coming from the machines or that it was just my mind playing tricks on me from those scary movies I had seen...but I couldn’t help but feel that I was no longer alone in that arcade.

The game turned back on. I looked around behind me and didn't see anything in the glow. When I turned back to face the screen I saw that it had changed. The bottom part still said “Feed Me - Insert Coin to Start” but the leaderboard had been updated. At the top it said “eat”. There they were, my initials: “E-A-T.” I had done it. I finally topped the leaderboard!

But the euphoria I felt soon went away when I looked at the initials, “H-I-M” below, and then down at the Tillie’s token in my hand. It all clicked in my head and I realized that it was a leaderboard I did not want to be on top of. The grim newspaper article I had read not so long ago flashed across my mind: “17-year-old Henry Isaac Matthews, an employee at Tillie’s Amusement Arcade in Asbury Park, missing after a night of intoxication at the arcade.”

I was rendered frozen in place, staring into the dark abyss of the screen. Within it I saw sinister sunken gray eyes. Around those two soulless circles, I started to make out a dark and gruesome face that was more terrifying than anything I had ever seen in my life. My eyes shifted focus back to the initials on the leaderboard which I then realized read: “EAT HIM." I held my breath and heard...I slowly—


It all went dark. A “kill screen” so to speak. No one ever saw Elliott again and the game disappeared with him. No one knows where they both went...except for me and you.

His ghost had been stuck inside that token, captive here in the Attic since that fateful day in 1982. His wish of escaping to another world came true, only this was not the one he had in mind. But at last you have set his spirit free. Henry Isaac Matthews, the other boy who disappeared, once resided in the Attic as well, but he was released by another liberator before you. Both tokens are now part of this pile of dust, and their spirits have flown far from this place.

What happened to the game? Oh...

Well, that’ll have to be a story for another time. I’m afraid you must get going. The night is almost done and the sun will soon be rising.

It’s time for you to leave the Attic, but I will open the door for you again soon. Elliott and I thank you for your service. Stay safe out there...and if you ever come across a mysterious looking game, don’t play it.


Thank you for listening to Alone in the Attic. Tonight's episode was written, directed, and edited by Samuel Weston Evans, with vocal performances by Ken Crossman as Elliott and Samuel Weston Evans as The Keeper.

Join us next week to hear the haunting story of “The Stalker.” When an Illinois farmer opens his new corn maze in the fall of 1997, he discovers that something sinister is lurking within the labyrinth of stalks.

Find out next time...Alone in the Attic.