Ghosts in the Fallout by The Vesper's Bell

nor anyone else had noticed it until recently. I'm pretty sure the only people who pay those things any mind anymore are kids who genuinely just don't know what they are or what they're for. But the poster remained quite adamant this particular payphone was a new addition, so only evidence being some low resolution screenshots from Google street View from the approximate location where he was talking about, none of which showed the phone. Even granting that the phone

was new, that still didn't make it paranormal. The guy wasn't really making a very coherent argument about it or why it was. He just kept rambling on and on about how the phone would only work if you put in a shiny FDR dime minted prior nineteen sixty five, when they were still made from ninety percent silver. He said, give it silver and you'll see what. He refused to elaborate on exactly how we figured out the phone and

only work with old American coins. Everyone pretty much just assumed that he was full of it and the thread fizzled out. But I just so happened to have a coin jar filled with interesting coins that I've found in my change over the years, and he only took a moment of sorting through them before I found a US dime from nineteen sixty three. I honestly couldn't think of

a better way to spend it. I decided to check out the phone just after sunset, in the hopes that there wouldn't be too much traffic that might make it difficult to make a phone call. It was right with post said it would be, and as I viewed it with my own eyes, I was instantly convinced that I would have noticed it if it had been there before. The thing was turquoise, like some iconic household appliance from

the nineteen fifties. Its color and its pristine condition clashed so much with the surrounding weathered brick buildings that it would have been possible not to notice it. Standing in front of it, I could see that there was the logo of a cartoon atom, a silver inlay beneath the name Oppenheimer's Opportunities, and a calligraphic lettering. Beneath the atom was an infinity symbol followed by the number of fifty nine, which I assumed was supposed to be read as forever

fifty nine. It had to have been a modern day recreation. There's no way that it could have been over sixty five years old and still looks so good. It had a rotary dial and was befitting its alleged time period. Beneath which was a small that should have held the usage instructions, but instead it held a poem If it's gold, it glitters, If it's silver shines, If it's plutonium, it blisters,

Won't you please spare a dime? That at least explained how the original poster figured out that he needed silver dimes to operate the thing. Why I didn't just come out and say it. I'm not sure that I would have gone looking for something that might give me radiation burns. I briefly considered leaving and possibly coming back with a gey your counter, but I figured there was no way this thing was the demon core or the elephant's foot.

I also didn't have the slightest idea where to get a Geiger counter, and by the time I found one, it was entirely possible the phone would be gone before I got back. I wasn't willing to let this opportunity slip through my fingers. Even if the phone was radioactive, brief exposure couldn't be that bad, right, I gingerly reached out and grabbed the receiver, holding it with a folded handkerchief for the radiation. I guess shut up. It was heavy in my hands, and even through the handkerchief I

could feel it was ever so slightly warm. It was enough to give me an uneasy feeling in my stomach. But I nevertheless slowly lifted it up to my ear to see if there was a dial tone. I was hardly surprised, you know, it was completely dead. After testing it a bit by spinning the dial or tapping down on the hook, I put a modern dime in just to see what it would do. Unsurprisingly, nothing happened, so with nothing left to do, I dropped my silver dime

into the slot. I waited to see what would happen. As the dime passed through the slot with a rhythmic, metallic clinking, I could feel soft vibrations as gears inside the phone word to life, and the receiver greeted me with a melodic, yet unsettling dial tone. I would describe it as forcefully cheery, like it had to pretend that everything was wonderful even though it was having the worst day of its life. It was a sensation that sank deeply into my brain and lingered for long after the

call had ended. Thank you for using Oppenheimer's opportunities psychotronic atophone. An enthusiastic, prerecorded male voice greeted me, sounding like it had come straight out of the nineteen fifties. Here at Oppenheimer's, our mission is to preserve the promise of post war America that the rest of the world had long turned its back on. A promise of peace and prosperity, of nuclear power too cheap to meter, and nuclear families too

precious to measure. A world where everyone has his place and newest place, a world where we respected, rather than resented. Our betters were proudly dedicated to bringing you yesterday's tomorrow. Today you are promised flying cars at at Oppenheimer's Opportunities. We've got them. We'd happily see the world reduced to radioactive ashes then fall from its golden age, which is why for us, year after year it's forever fifty nine. Please keep the receiver pressed firmly against your ear for

the duration of the returning procedure. We're honing in on the optimal psychotronic signal to ensure maximum comfortability. Suboptimal signals can result in serious side effects, so for your own sake, do not attempt to interrupt the signal. If at any point during the procedure you experience any discomfort, don't be alarmed. This is normal. If at any point during the returning procedure you would like to make a phone call, we

regret to inform you that service is currently unavailable. If at any point you would like the returning procedure to be terminated, you will be a grave disappointment to us. For all other concerns, please dial zero to speak to an operator. Thank you again for using Oppenheimer's Opportunities. Psychatronic out a phone your only choice in psychotronic returning since fifty nine the recording ended abruptly, replaced with the same

insidiously insipid dial tone as before. I started pulling the receiver away from my ear, only to be struck by a strange sense of vertigo. Everything around me started to spin until my vision cut out, refusing to return until I placed the receiver back against my ear. When I was able to see again, the scene around me had changed into the silent aftermath of a nuclear attack. Not just an attack, an apocalypse. Not a single building around

me was left intact. Everything was toppled and tumbling to dust, dust that I could feel fill my lungs with every breath. The air was thick, gritty, filthy. I was amazed it was still breathable at all. Didn't smell rotted because there was no trace left of life in it. It was dead it with dusty air that no one had breathed

in years. Radiation shadows from the victims caught in the blast were scorched into the numerous nearby surfaces, many of which still bore tattered propaganda posters that were barely legible throughout the haze. The city had been bombed to hell and back, and no effort at clean up or reconstruction had been made. It had been abandoned for years, if not decades, And yet there was no overgrowth from plants

reclaiming the land. Nothing grew here anymore, nothing could. The sky above was a strange, shiny canopy of rippling clouds, illuminated only by a strange pale light. Somehow I knew that radioactive fallout still fell from those clouds, even to this day. Long ago, hundreds of gigatons of salted bombs had blasted civilization to ruins in a day, while sweeping the earth in a apocalyptic firestorms, throwing billions of tons

of particles high up into the atmosphere. Now all was silent except for that intolerable psychotronic dial tone and the insidiously howling wind. And then, when I realized that those two were the only sounds, did I realize that they were perfectly harmonized with one another. I looked up into the sky at the ash clouds they should have washed out long ago, and I realized it wasn't the wind

that was howling, It was them. The ripples and the clouds were constantly forming into screaming and melting faces before dissipating back into the ash. I was instantly stricken with dread that they might notice me. I wanted so desperately to flee and cower in the rubble, but I was completely unable to move my feet. I wasn't even able to pull the phone away from my ear. So I

did the only thing I could. Summoning all the strength and will that I could manage, I slowly lifted my free hand, placed my index finger into the smoothly spinning rotary, and dialed zero. Don't worry, came the same voice as before through the phone. It sounded much more like a live person than recording. This isn't real, not for you and not for us. You just needed to see it. Nuclear annihilation is an existential fear no one ever knew before the Cold War, and it's one that's been far

too quickly forgotten. One can never be galvanized to defend a world in decline the same way they would a world under attack. A world rotting from within invites disillusionment, descent, and despair. A world facing an external threat forces you to fight for it, to love it wholeheartedly, worts and all without the threat of annihilation. Every crack in the sidewalk is compared to perfection, and we bemoan the lack of a utopia, as if that were something we were

entitled to and unjustly denied. When you see the cracks in the sidewalk, don't think of utopia. Think of what you are seeing now. Think of how terrifyingly close this came to reality, and how terrifyingly close it still is. And yet you must not let the terror keep you from aspiring to greater things, As the fear of nuclear meltdowns, radioactive waste, and mutually assured destructions stunted the progress of

atomic energy in your world. The instinct of fear fire is natural, but the drive to understand and tamement is fundamental to humanity and civilization. Decline is born of complacency as easily as it is from cynicism. You must love and fight for both the present and the future. Do you understand yet? Or do I need to turn the ataphone up another notch? Who? What are they? I managed to choke out, my head still turned upwards, eyes still locked on the faces forming in the clouds now sun.

I already told you that this thing can't make phone calls. The man said, but not without some irony in his voice. But to put it simply, they are the dead. The nukes that went off in this world weren't just salted, they were spiced too. The sound waves produced by blasts were designed to have a particularly psychotronic resonance to them, causing every human consciousness that hurt it to literally explode out of their skulls. Explode, I asked, meekly, attention to

my own head, having already gone far from comfortable. That's right, coblmo, the man shouted. The intention was just to maximize the body count, but there was an even darker side effect that the ball makers hadn't dared to envision. Those disembodied consciousnesses didn't just go and line up at the pearly gates, no, sir. Caught in a psychotronic wave, they rode it all the way up into the stratosphere and got caught in the

planet's spanning ash cloud. Their minds were perpetually stuck in the moment of their apocalyptic deaths, and since their screams are all in perfect resonance with each other, they just grow louder and louder. That wind you hear, it's not wind it's billions of disembodied voices trapped in the stratospheric ash cloud, amplified to the point that you can hear

them all the way down on the ground. So my head's going to explode and my ghost is going to be stuck haunting a fall out cloud for all eternity, I demanded in disbelief. Disbelief, I desperately clung to you, as it was the only thing keeping me from succumbing to a full existential meltdown. Oh, not to worry, Son, As long as you don't resonate with them, you'll be fine, he assured me with a warm, fatherly tone. Your head won't explode and you won't get stuck up there in

the ash cloud. Just listen to the dial tone. Let your mind resonate with it instead. Once you believe in the wonders of the atomic age, you will be free of the fear of an atomic holocaust. No, you're lying. The only signals coming from the phone, not the sky, I managed to protest, Son, Paxton Brinkman doesn't lie. My psychotronic returning makes it impossible for me to consciously acknowledge any kind of cognitive dissonance. The man tried to assure me.

So when I tell tell you something, you had better believe that this is the one and only truth in my heart. That's what makes me such a great salesman, ceo and war propagandist. Honestly, the screaming coming from the cloud is both real and fatal. And if you don't let the otaphones countersignal do its thing. I'm telling you your goose is cooked. I'm sorry, Is it just cooked? Now? Is that what the kids are saying? You're cooked? Son, San's goose. You said it yourself. You said it yourself.

This isn't real. You wanted me to see the apocalypse so that i'll embrace salvation, your salvation, I managed to croak. There are no ghosts in the fallout. You just want me to be too afraid to reject you. To hang up before you finish doing whatever it is you're trying to do to me. There was a long pause where I heard nothing but the screaming ghosts screeching dial tone, before Brinkman spoke again. If you really believe that, then go ahead and hang up the phone, he suggested, calmly.

I stood there, panting heavily, but saying nothing, my fingers still clutching the receiver and pressing it up against my ear. I closed my eyes, tried to ignore the nuclear healthscape around me, trying to focus on the fact that if it wasn't real, the dial tone that was trying to rewrite my brain was the real threat, not the imagined ghosts in the fallout saturated stratosphere. But the louder the

dial tone grew, the less forcefully cheerio it sounded. Didn't sound sincere necessarily, but it sounded better than eternity as a fallout ghost. I began to wonder if it would if it would be better to end up like Brickman then risk such a horrible but it'd be more rational to choose the more pleasant hell. Was it worth the risk to ensure that my mind remained my own? Slowly but surely, I gradually loosened my grip on the receiver

until I felt it slip from my hand. As the sound of the dial tone faded, the vertigo that I had felt from before came back tenfold, and an instantly debilitating cluster headache overcame me. As I cried out and collapsed to the ground. The pain was so intense that I could barely think, and for a moment I did truly think that my head was about to explode. To them, my consciousness was to be condemned to a radioactive ash

cloud for all eternity. Before I lost consciousness, I remember hearing the Brinkman's voice again, wafting distant, dream like from the dangling receiver. Son, You've been a grave disappointment. When I woke up, I was in the hospital. Someone had called an ambulance after they found me collapsed outside. When I told the healthcare workers at least my story, you told me there'd been no phone there and it never had been. They weren't sure what was wrong with me

or if I was lying deliriously. They kept me for observation. The fact that there was no phone and no evidence that any of it had been real was enough to make me seriously doubted it ever happened. I spent several hours just thinking about what else could possibly explain what happened to me, and that's when the radiation burns started

to appear. The doctors estimated that I was exposed to at least two hundreds of radiation, maybe more, too soon to say if I received the fatal dose, but it definitely would have been if I stayed on the phone much longer. The doctors are flabbergasted over how I could have received so much radiation, and they are specialists sweeping the streets with guy your counters to find an orphan source. I wish I knew where I could have gotten one of those earlier, and again I suppose I didn't really

need one. I was warned, after all, if it's plutonium, it blisters. Now it seems that I and my goose who maybe cooked either kids. It's me, mister Creepasta, and I just wanted to tell you thank you so much for watching tids or for listening to tonight's episode of the podcast. And as always, I want to give a very big thank you to everybody who supports me over at patreons patreon dot com slash mister Creepypasta. I cannot

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