Ben was sitting in silence that on the ride home that night as the pitter patter of rain danced on the roof of his Honda Del Sol. The only symphony he wanted to hear was the sound of the storm so that he could relax from a hard day of performing live music. He had made quite the name for himself in this remote town as a local artist, maybe even the best in town. When Ben finally pulled into his driveway a sense of relief came over him, despite the drive being relatively uneventful he didn’t like the fact the only other car he saw on his commute home being a pulled over squad car with lights on and no officer in it. The next few hours truly were uneventful. Dinner, watching the latest updates on news that was definitely not good on the tv, followed by an embarrassing amount of time doomscrolling. “Ah the good life”, he thought to himself sarcastically. However, this is a horror story not an existential horror story. Sat upside down on his bed, Ben jumped onto the floor when he heard it. The only way to describe it would be the sound of metal trying to speak. It was taunting him from what sounded like the shrubbery behind his fence. Ben was not about to go investigate though; he immediately crawled under the bed. For what felt like an eternity he heard the strange metallic sounds getting closer to his house. They weren’t right, they didn’t make sense, and the more attention Ben payed the sounds got louder. That’s right, the more attention he payed the louder it got. Much to his dismay when he’d tuned it out, they’d go almost quiet like nothing was outside lurking, ready to devour. It was stalking his mind as much as it was stalking him. Then the knock came, and it all went silent. Nervously our hero crept to the doorframe looking through the peephole and he saw a police officer. Without thinking he immediately opened the door and invited the policeman inside. “Officer thank God you’re here! There was an intruder in my yard, and he had something metal he was grinding. I think he was going to try and enter my house!”, exclaimed Ben. The officer nodded and gave him a knowing look before addressing his concerns and giving the house and yard an inspection. Much to Ben’s relief it seemed like the cop had checked every nook and cranny before leaving, only after the officer had left he realized. There was never a cop car in the driveway, and he had never called 911.