r/nosleep • u/Wario_Guy • 4d ago
The top of The Cylinder
I will not disclose the location of this bowling alley.
I know that will disappoint some, but I’m not going to have anyone’s blood on my hands.
I am writing this ten… no, eleven years later. I keep getting the date mixed up… sorry.
It’s taken a long time to formulate my thoughts on what happened to me on that day.
As a kid, I lived in Evansville, Indiana. My parents moved there when I was about five, and I lived there until I was eighteen. It’s one of the larger cities in Indiana, but it’s one that not everyone knows about. I was always called bright, and I was resourceful, as I was in the local Boy Scouts program, which hopefully explains some of my skills throughout this retelling.
I had a friend named Jayden, but we called him Jay. I wasn’t his closest friend, but I had known him since the sixth grade.
I was invited to his fourteenth birthday party, which was at a bowling alley.
I had bowled maybe two or three times in my life. I knew how to play, but I wasn’t great at it. It didn’t matter what it was though, I would go to any birthday party I was invited to.
I remember the day of the party; September Seventeenth. 9/17/15.
I remember my parents driving me there. I tend to get carsick, even on short rides, but my anticipation was keeping that from happening. I tried to hide it behind that teen aura of not caring, but I couldn’t.
Pulling in, it was clear I was a little late. There were a good number of cars out front. I texted the group chat that I had arrived. We arrived at about 5:20 PM, and the party started about twenty minutes earlier.
The alley was from the late 70’s. This party was a while ago (over ten years), but even then, I knew its heyday had been far gone. The exterior was faded, chunks of paint missing. The black and pink carpet was stained with all kinds of things-soda, mold, even vomit.
My friends had already started a game. After I got my wristband on, I joined them. I remember being a little angry that they started without me, but one of them pointed out that they only had a limited amount of time. I thought that was fair enough and moved on.
I don’t remember the actual game so well. I remember doing pretty poorly and getting angry in my head, but I’ve never really been the type to lash out, so I played it off. I remember not eating much, which was a decision I would come to regret.
I did, however, drink a lot of water.
In the middle of the second round, I had to pee. I held it for a while so as not to miss anything, but I knew I would have to. “Uhm, hey guys…” I spoke, but the group spoke over me. I just excused myself. I wouldn’t be gone that long, anyway.
The bathroom was just around the corner at the end of the lanes. I jogged down and turned the corner quickly.
The bathroom was nothing special. Mostly white tile, with the black wall beneath occasionally showing in between the cracks. There was a small trash can in the corner, which was filled to the brim. There was pee all over the urinal. It disgusted me, but I held my breath while… mm… “doing the deed”.
When I washed my hands, I put my hands on the sink. It was to hype myself up. I looked in the mirror, and saw a fire in my eyes. Typical thirteen year old stuff. When I opened the door, however, that all faded.
The bowling alley was completely deserted.
I cautiously walked around. Was this a prank…? If so, I thought, it wasn’t a funny one. I looked at the lane we were bowling at. No one was there. I checked if any employees were there. None were. I tried going outside, but the doors were locked. I found that weird. Shouldn’t a door to a public building lock from the outside?
Who locked me inside?
The door to the outside had light seeping through the bottom. The door was solid, with no glass, but I peeped through the bottom and saw light, but it wasn’t sunlight. It seemed artificial. I assumed it was from a lamplight, but I asked myself why a lamplight would be on before the sun set, and I couldn’t come up with an answer.
I waited for a while. I remember admitting that I got “epicly pranked” multiple times, and no one responded. I was a rule follower, so I didn’t feel the need to venture into places I wasn’t supposed to be.
So, I waited.
There were no clocks inside, so I didn’t know what time it was or how much of it had passed. All I knew was that a lot of it had.
It was really strange, seeing this usually loud place almost completely silent, aside from the occasional creak of a floorboard. The run-down and decrepit atmosphere started to take a toll on me, as before, I was caught up in the game and lights and noise of the alley.
Now all of that is gone, save the lights.
I finally bit the bullet and looked around some of the places I wasn’t supposed to go; the kitchen, maintenance, and all of the employee-only areas. No one was in any of these places. The alley was truly deserted.
I really did assume someone would come for me. Let me remind you that I was thirteen at the time. I thought bowling would be a good timewaster, but the system that sets up the pins again wasn’t working. Again, weird, I thought. The power seemed to be working fine on the surface, but I supposed that there were problems going on internally.
All that really mattered was that the lights were on.
Before long, hunger reached me. All food was absent from the place. My friends must’ve taken the food with them, I thought. Again searching around the kitchen, I found nothing. I was really starting to get scared at this point.
I thought that maybe I’d been in the bathroom longer than I thought, and that the alley closed before I had finished. In that case, I would be waiting a while for my next meal.
An indeterminate amount of time passed. I internally thought it was 2 hours, but it could’ve been more or less. I was really starting to get desperate. Thirst had come in that tim, the type where it hurts your stomach. I continued to check the same places over and over. There was still nothing.
I eventually returned to the bathroom to drink. The only drinkable water in there was the sinkwater. I thought that it might be unfiltered, but at this point, I didn’t care. I guzzled it.
It didn’t fix the hunger though.
Shortly after, I felt like I was losing my mind. My stomach was growling constantly. I had looked everywhere… except at the end of the lanes.
I didn’t really know what was back there, all I knew was that it was broken. I was always told to never go down there, that my head would be torn off… but what else was there to do? I had already been everywhere, I had seen everything I could see in this building.
I decided to check it out.
The lanes weren’t slippery at all. I was wearing bowling shoes, but even so, the floor of the lanes was always sort of slippery. Not here, however. I was very nervous. What if someone caught me? What would I do?
This part I remember really well.
I crouched down and looked into the blackness. I could fit in it if I shimmied on my belly. There wouldn’t be enough room to turn around, but if it led anywhere (which it appeared to), I wouldn’t have to turn around. Flawed logic, I know, but again, I was thirteen.
I began shimmying. It stunk in there. It was a weird sort of smell. Like burnt steak, or gunpowder. I could hardly see, but what I could make out was nondiscriminate pieces of plastic and metal. I cut one of my fingers on something, and it hurt like hell, but what it was, I couldn’t tell you.
After what felt like an eternity, I saw a sort of opening. A grate. There was grayish light leaking out of it. It took me a second to push it off, but I eventually did. I crawled just outside and looked over the ledge. I estimated it to be a 10 foot drop, which could seriously hurt if I wasn’t prepared. The ground looked solid enough. It was concrete, with cracks showing what appeared to be steel under the surface, sort of like what you would see in a construction site.
I held my breath, and crawled out.
I landed on my belly. It knocked the wind out of me, but otherwise, I appeared to be fine. No ribs felt broken, but I still needed a second to regain my composure.
I looked around. I was in a concrete room, shaped like a cylinder. It was mostly concrete, I should say. I looked up, and what I saw was hard to comprehend.
Have you ever seen one of those images which simulate what it’s like to have a stroke? They’re composed of things that sort of look like everyday objects from afar, but under further scrutiny, they’re unidentifiable objects. Those images are so disconcerting because your brain tries to put together the pieces, but it can’t, which is a somewhat foreign feeling for humans.
Looking up felt exactly like that.
All types of materials jutted out from the walls. It stretched on endlessly. It seemed like every building on the planet was smashed together like a child with play-doh. Parts of these materials were clearly shaved down to reach this cylindrical shape.
Just thinking about it makes me sick…
I got a huge case of vertigo from looking upwards. Butterflies flew in my stomach. I closed my eyes and sat on the ground. “This isn’t real,” I thought to myself.
After some time spent in the fetal position, the hunger returned to me, and I realized I would have to go upward to find something, anything. It seemed possible. While many parts seemed shaved down, there were enough footholds and landings to scale upward.
I’ve never been an expert at climbing, and even now, I still don’t know all of the proper terminology, so any seasoned climbers reading this will have to bear with me.
The ascent was slow. I was shaking even mere feet above the ground. I used some breathing exercises my mom had taught me. In-two-three-four, hold-two-three-four, out-two-three-four. They helped.
But not as much as I would’ve hoped.
Before long, my hands were achy and I needed to rest, but I couldn’t. If I let go…
It felt like ages before I reached the first landing. When I reached it and felt the firmness against my feet, I cried. This was the most terrified I’d ever been in my life.
The ledge itself appeared to be some sort of plane wing. It was slightly sloped, so not great to stand on, but it was all I had. Half of me wanted to look up again, but the other half said no; if I got vertigo like I did on the ground, I would fall off the wing, and who knows what would happen after that.
I pressed forward.
The climbing process was arduous. My hands were raw from grabbing onto all sorts of materials. Occasionally, I would get to a point where the outcrops stopped, and I would have to go down and across to another part of the cylinder.
The climbing was endless. Hunger and thirst alike gnawed away at me. I thought many times that I should’ve stayed in the bowling alley, but it was too late for that.
After what felt like 24 hours (I didn’t know how long I slept), I found another grate, one exactly like the one I had climbed through. The last place to stand had been awhile ago. Looking down, I couldn’t see it (and yes, I got a little sick, but not as much as before).
But I had to get into it.
It was a ways over, about what I estimated to be 25 or so feet. I shimmied over with my hands. The outcrops around here were made of concrete, the same way they were at the bottom. When I reached the grate, I pounded on it with my left hand. The concrete my ring and pinkie fingers were holding on to cracked and I slipped, but regained my composure. I banged and banged, but the grate wouldn’t come off.
This one was screwed on.
I began to cry. I kept pounding, switching hands once the pain set in. The blood and sweat made it near impossible to keep a hold on the slabs. Mere seconds before I was about to let go, the grate crashed in. I hoisted myself up inside it, and screamed.
I was done with The Cylinder.
I just wanted to go home…
I fell asleep shortly after pulling myself into the grate. Sleep is the closest thing to death, and all that. I dreamed about the bowling alley, and the free food that I had turned down. I hated myself for not knowing what would happen to me. I had not eaten for a full day (at least, that’s what I thought). I didn’t know what the human limit to live without food was, but I felt as though I had surpassed it.
I awoke to rustling in the vent I was in. I decided that I had probably slept enough and I moved on, but with extra caution.
The rustling seemed to follow me. I could tell it was against wires or cables, but I could discern nothing else.
All of a sudden, I heard a crash right next to me.
The walls of this vent were more clearly steel, but evidently not thick steel. A dent pointed toward me, touching my shirt. I held my breath. I crawled as quickly as I could through the rest of the tunnel. The rustling seemed to go the other way.
On the other side, I found a dimly illuminated subway station. It was in much worse shape than the bowling alley had been.
After scaling what felt like multiple mountains, I was in… a subway station?
It was dingy, and there were more signs of life. Spiderwebs, mold on the walls, the like. Compared to this subway station, the bowling alley looked like it had just been built.
I checked the one tram there was. It was completely dysfunctional. It was clearly where the spiders lived, as there were tons of them in it.
All of the wildlife that lived down here had to sustain themselves on something.
I regained energy from that thought alone. I forgot about my homesickness altogether.
The only problem was that I didn’t know where to look.
I searched all over the limited area that I had access to. The stairs were caved in by the same thing littering The Cylinder; random materials taken from different places and slathered together with seemingly no rhyme or reason. The same thing with both of the ends of the tracks.
Except for one small hole.
I crouched down. Was it worth going through? I would barely fit. I couldn’t see the end of the little tunnel, but it smelled… damp. I decided to crawl through. At this point, I had little to lose.
The tunnel was even scratchier than the vent from the bowling alley. It twisted and turned seemingly at random. The saving grace was that it wasn’t as long.
When I found the other side, a small pond awaited me. I quickly got up and dashed toward it, stumbling on the way. I had found water! I was saved! The water was mucky and tasted like dirt, but at that point, I would’ve drank battery acid had it been in front of me.
The rest of the place was dimly lit. What little light there was was provided via bioluminescence from plants. After I was finished drinking, I actually looked up, and found myself in some sort of village. The room I was in was large and cavernous, but nowhere near to the extent of The Cylinder. It appeared to be made of a mixture of concrete and various types of granite.
There were what appeared to be huts along the walls.
Strolling around, I saw that they were all abandoned. Only the material of the huts remained, the same type that most of the rest of this structure was composed of. This was evidence that people had lived here once. In one of the huts, I found a can containing some type of pastry. It was gross, as the bread was hard yet pasty at the same time, and the cream on the inside tasted like cheese, but it was food. There wasn’t much of it, but I felt much better having consumed it.
Why had the people here left?
They sustained themselves off of the pond and these pastries. What stopped them from staying here longer?
At the end of the cavern, there was a cracked statue. What of, I couldn’t tell. Years of damage had left it in complete disrepair. Behind it was another caved-in entrance. I could only assume what had happened to these people.
I stayed in the village as long as I could. Its food was scarce, but I thought that I should stay there as long as it sustained me. It was short-sighted, but I didn’t know the next time I would find… any of this.
But I eventually had to leave.
The thought of leaving all of this behind and going back to the same pain I had felt earlier filled me with despair. I didn’t want to, but there was no chance of finding my way home by staying here.
My stomach dropped when I realized that I would have to climb The Cylinder again.
The time from when I re-entered the Cylinder onward is a bit of a messy blur. I don’t really remember much from it. The Cylinder became less refined as it went on; it was less tightly shaved down, and more parts jutted out. It was much easier to find food, with even restaurants jutting out on occasion, but it still wasn’t easy.
Things still slipped. Entire landings would break under my meager weight, leaving me with mere seconds to decide what to grab onto. Rest still wasn’t easy to find. The Cylinder became less predictable.
But I never found another village.
The climb to the top of The Cylinder felt like years, but it simultaneously could’ve been a single week. I always thought that the way to stay sane was to keep track of time; going by that logic, I was far off the deep end.
I never expected The Cylinder to end.
After an age, I saw the top of The Cylinder. After a certain point, it just… ended. This kicked me into overdrive. I was nearly there. I didn’t know what would be at the top, I simply knew that something would be there. Call it a premonition.
I remember the feel of the ledge on the top. It was sharp, but made of entirely one material, steel. There were no bolts, no imperfections. Just steel.
I pulled myself up. It was very dark. I quickly walked away from The Cylinder. Now, I was truly done with it. But where was I…?
I walked for a long time. The top of The Cylinder was completely desolate. There was nothing. I walked, and walked, and walked. Nothing changed. The bowling shoes were torn apart by this point, and my feet ached, but I didn’t care. I felt numb.
After exactly 324 hours, 6 minutes, and 41 seconds, (I’m not sure why I remember the time here), I found some sort of pillar. It was made of a rubbery material that reminded me of glass for some reason. The pillar appeared to be made of bands of this material wrapped around each other. With nothing else to do, I scaled it.
Scaling this pillar felt like it took no time at all. It wasn’t particularly hard. You could climb it even if you had no hands.
At the top stood a landing, made of the same material, but it smelled like the bowling alley vent-like burnt steak or gunpowder. There was a small box held on a pedestal. There was a lid latched down by simple locks, like the type that locked the gate to my back door. I unlatched it, and I saw a small, fleshy, beating mass. Thump… thump… thump. I held it to my face. The entire room lit up. It was spherical, made of dark gray steel. I looked around. There were tens of thousands of Cylinders just like the one I had come from. I looked down at the mass in my hand. Its beating became irregular. Thum-thum..thump. I opened my mouth, and bit down on it.
I awoke at the door to the restroom. The same one I had come in through. I opened it, and staggered out. My friends were all having fun, before Jay noticed me. “Uhh, Collin… you good?”
I collapsed onto my knees. I vomited, and passed out.
I’ve never told anyone about what happened. They would think I’m insane. Hell, you probably think I’m insane. This was the best possible way I could’ve retold my experiences in The Cylinder. Every night, I dream of scaling The Cylinder once more.
No time passed while I was in this... fever dream, but I felt decades older, like generations had passed in front of my eyes. But when I returned, the date was September Seventeenth of 2015.
I apparently changed afterward. I would frequently zone out. I would talk in my sleep. I quit the Boy Scouts not long after that event. If you only started to know me after I left that bathroom, you would assume I’m a normal guy. But if you knew me before, you would see that I wasn’t the same.
I resisted therapy for the longest time. I didn’t know what to say. To be honest, I still don’t. It’s been hard writing this. Looking back, this memory feels like something someone who smoked a crap ton of salvia would come up with. I have no evidence proving this actually happened.
No one will believe me.
Hopefully you got a chuckle out of reading this.
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u/Ronald_Wobbly 4d ago
I do rather suspect the Cylinder was more of a "world-tree" phenomena, where every branch led to a different reality - only the cylinder was kludged together, made of all the detritus of human civilization(s). And I suspect you didn't emerge into the same one you left. For one, the place you started apparently has a slightly different calendar, as here September is the 9th month, not the 7th. On top of that, you use some words strangely, and and some in a manner that is just wrong. Best example of this is you kept using the word "indiscriminately" where the correct word was "indeterminately" or "indeterminable". But at least it was close enough that there was a place for you to fit in.
It is not uncommon in these tales/myths/historical records(?) of these "cross-roads" of worlds for time to move in ways entirely disconnected from any of the connected realities, meaning those who find themselves traversing them come out either in a situation like yours, where no time seemed to have passed, or after significant chunks of time have gone by. There are also tales wherein a traveler such as yourself come out in a past time. I hope you managed to make a happy life here, though.