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<h1>Caller Unknown</h1>She answered a phone call from her own number.At first, Ellie thought it must be a glitch—some weird carrier issue or a spoofed call. But curiosity got the better of her. She stared at the screen, thumb hovering over “Answer,” hesitating just long enough for the phone to stop ringing.It started again.Same number. Her number.With a nervous chuckle, she hit “Answer” this time.“Hello?”Static.“Who is this?”Then: her own voice, crackling through the line. “Ellie. Don’t go into the basement.”She froze. Her breath caught in her throat. “What? Who is this?”The line went dead.She stood motionless in the kitchen, her coffee growing cold in her hands. The only sound was the ticking of the clock over the stove. For a moment she wondered if it was some kind of prank—a friend using an app to mimic her voice. But it hadn’t just sounded like her. It was her. The inflection. The cadence. Even the slight lisp she’d had as a child but trained herself out of, mostly.Don’t go into the basement.That was the worst part. The specificity. She lived alone, in an old rental house near the outskirts of town. The basement was half-finished and mostly used for storage, a place she rarely ventured unless she needed the circuit breaker or her Christmas decorations.A chill crept up her spine.She pulled her robe tighter and walked slowly to the basement door. It was closed. Just as she’d left it the night before. She pressed her ear to the door. Silence.Then came a thump.She jumped back.It wasn’t loud, more like something shifting. Maybe a box falling. Her mind raced to rationalize it—an unstable pile of books, a mouse, or the vibrations from a passing truck. But still, the call.Ellie retreated to the living room and locked her phone. She stared at it for a moment before opening her call history. There it was. Incoming call from: Ellie Harper. Her own number. 7:03 AM.She hit “info.” No data. No voicemail. Nothing.By 9:30 AM, she’d almost convinced herself it was just a dream. Maybe she’d fallen asleep with the TV on, and her subconscious had stitched together something weird from static and reruns. She got dressed and made it to work, trying to focus on spreadsheets and emails. But a gnawing unease followed her, like a shadow one step behind.That night, after feeding her cat and microwaving dinner, she sat on the couch flipping through channels. She kept glancing at the basement door, half-expecting it to creak open on its own.Her phone rang again.Same number.Her heart lurched. She let it ring, her fingers trembling.It went to voicemail.A notification popped up. She opened it, hands clammy.This time, it was a recording. Her own voice again.“Ellie. You didn’t listen. It’s waking up.”She dropped the phone.“No, no, no,” she whispered, pacing in small, frantic circles. “This isn’t real.”She grabbed her coat and keys and left the house, not bothering to turn off the lights. She drove without a destination, ending up in the parking lot of a 24-hour diner. The neon buzz gave her some small comfort. She sat there for an hour, watching drunk college kids laugh over milkshakes and fries, then finally drove back.Everything was exactly as she’d left it. Lights on. Basement door closed.She didn't sleep that night.Over the next few days, things got worse.She kept getting calls—from herself. Each one more urgent.“I told you to stay out.”“You need to listen.”“It knows you know.”Ellie stopped answering altogether. She blocked her own number, but the calls still came through, now listed as Unknown. She considered going to the police, but what would she say? “My own voice is warning me not to go into my basement”?And the noises were getting louder. Not constant, but enough to be undeniable. A scraping sound. Something moving. Sometimes a soft, low moan that vibrated the floor beneath her feet.By Friday, she'd had enough.She took a flashlight, a crowbar, and a kitchen knife, and stood at the basement door.“No more games,” she said aloud, trying to muster courage.She opened the door.The stairs creaked under her weight. The beam of her flashlight bounced across dusty boxes, old furniture, and a sagging couch. Nothing looked out of place.She was about to turn back when she saw it—a section of the wall that didn’t match. The bricks were newer, the mortar sloppier.She stepped closer. The air felt colder here. A slight draft brushed her cheek.She knocked. Hollow.The crowbar bit into the weak mortar with little resistance. The first brick fell with a thud. Then another. And another.Behind the wall was a room. Small. Windowless. Dirt floor.And in the center, a figure.It was… her.Eyes closed. Pale skin. Hair matted and tangled. She was dressed in the same pajamas Ellie had thrown away years ago. She looked barely alive, like someone in stasis.Her phone buzzed in her pocket.She pulled it out, hands shaking.Unknown Number.She answered.Her own voice, a whisper: “Now you’ve done it.”The figure in the hidden room opened its eyes.They were black. Entirely black.It screamed.Ellie stumbled back, dropping the phone, the flashlight flickering wildly. The scream was deafening, a sound of pure rage and despair. She turned and fled up the stairs, slamming the basement door and throwing every lock she had on it.She didn’t sleep that night either.The next day, the door was cracked. The locks broken.Her phone was gone.And a new message was scrawled on the mirror in red—lipstick or something worse:“You were warned.”

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Caller Unknown

ElenaK10

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She answered a phone call from her own number

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Caller Unknown

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Elena Kapatou

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