Abandoned By Disney by Slimebeast[]
Some of you may have heard that the Disney corporation is responsible for at least one real, "live" Ghost Town.
Disney built the "Treasure Island" resort in Baker's Bay in the Bahamas. It didn't START as a ghost town! Disney's cruise ships would actually stop at the resort and leave tourists there to relax in luxury.
This is a FACT. Look it up.
Disney blew $30,000,000 on the place... yes, thirty million dollars.
Then they abandoned it.
Disney blamed the shallow waters (too shallow for their ships to safely operate) and there was even blame cast on the workers, saying that since they were from the Bahamas, they were too lazy to work a regular schedule.
That's where the factual nature of their story ends. It wasn't because of sand, and it obviously wasn't because "foreigners are lazy". Both are convenient excuses.
No, I sincerely doubt those reasons were legitimate. Why don't I buy the official story?
Because of Mowgli's Palace.
Near the beachside city of Emerald Isle in North Carolina, Disney began construction of "Mowgli's Palace" in the late 1990s. The concept was a Jungle-themed resort with a large, you guessed it, PALACE in the center of the whole thing.
If you're unfamiliar with the character of Mowgli, then you might better remember the story "The Jungle Book". If you haven't seen it anywhere else, you'd know it as the Disney cartoon from decades past.
Mowgli is an abandoned child, in the jungle, essentially raised by animals and simultaneously threatened/pursued by other animals.
Mowgli's Palace was a controversial undertaking from the start. Disney bought up a ton of high-priced land for the project, and there was actually a scandal surrounding some of the purchases. The local Government claimed "eminent domain" on people's homes, then turned around and sold the properties to Disney. At one point a home that had just been constructed was immediately condemned with little to no explanation.
The land grabbed by the Government was supposedly for some fictional highway project. Knowing full well what was going on, people started calling it "Mickey Mouse Highway".
Then there was the concept art. A group of stuffed shirts from Disney Co. actually held a city meeting. They intended to sell everyone on how lucrative this project was going to be for everyone. When they showed the concept art, this gigantic Indian Palace... surrounded by JUNGLE... staffed with men and women in loincloths and tribal gear... well, suffice to say everyone flipped their shit.
We're talking about a large Indian Palace, Jungle, and Loincloths not only in the center of a relatively wealth area, but also a somewhat "xenophobic" area of the southern USA. It was a questionable mix at that point in history.
One member of the crowd tried to storm the stage, but he was quickly subdued by security after he managed to break one of the presentation boards over his knee.
Disney took that community and essentially broke it over its knee, as well. The houses were razed, the land was cleared, and there wasn't a damned thing anyone could do or say about it. Local TV and Newspapers were against the resort at the beginning, but some insane connection between Disney's media holdings and the local venues came into play and their opinions turned on a dime.
So anyway, Treasure Island, the Bahamas. Disney sunk those millions in and then split. The same thing happened with Mowgli's Palace.
Construction was complete. Visitors actually stayed at the resort. The surrounding communities were flooded with traffic and the usual annoyances associated with an influx of lost and irate tourists.
Then it all just stopped.
Disney shut it down and nobody knew what the Hell to think. But they were pretty happy about it. Disney's loss was pretty hilarious and wonderful to a large group of folks who didn't want this in the first place.
I honestly didn't give the place another thought since hearing it closed over a decade ago. I live maybe four hours from Emerald Isle, so really I only heard the rumblings and didn't experience any of it first-hand.
Then I read this article from someone who had explored the Treasure Island resort and posted a whole blog about all the crazy shit he found there. Stuff just... left behind. Things smashed, defaced, probably ruined by the disgruntled former employees who had lost their jobs.
Hell, the locals from all around probably had a hand in wrecking that place. People there felt just as angry about Treasure Island as folks here did about Mowgli's Palace.
Plus there were rumors that Disney had released their aquarium "stock" into the local waters when they closed... including sharks.
Who wouldn't want to take a few swings at some merchandise after that?
Well, what I'm getting at is that this blog about Treasure Island got me thinking. Even though many years had passed since its closing, I figured it might be cool to do some "Urban Exploration" at Mowgli's Palace. Take some photos, write about my experience, and probably see if there was anything I could take home as a memento.
I'm not going to say I wasted no time in getting there, because honestly it took me another year after I first found that Treasure Island article to get around to going up to Emerald Isle.
Over the course of that year, I did a lot of research on the Palace resort... or rather, I tried to.
Naturally, no official Disney site or resource made any mention of the place. That had been scrubbed clean.
Even odder, however, was that nobody before myself had apparently thought to blog about the place or even post a photo. None of the local TV or Newspaper sites had one word about the place, though that was to be expected since they had all swung Disney's way. They wouldn't be out there lauding their embarrassment, you know?
Recently, I learned that corporations can actually ask Google, for example, to remove links from search results... basically for no good reason. Looking back, it's probably not that nobody spoke of the resort, but rather their words were made inaccessible.
So in the end I could barely find the place. All I had to go on was an old-as-hell map I'd received in the mail back in the 90s. It was a promotional item sent out to people who had recently been to Disney world, and I guess since I had been there in the late 80s, that was "recent".
I didn't really intend to hang onto it. It just got shoved in with my books and comics from my childhood. I'd only remembered it months into my research, and even then it took me another few weeks to locate the storage bin my parents had shoved it all into.
But I DID find it. Locals were no help, as most were transplants who had moved to the beach in recent years... or old residents who just sneered at me and made rude gestures the second I managed to say "Where would I find Mowgli's---"
The drive took me through an inordinately long corridor of overgrowth. Tropical plants that had run rampant and overpopulated the area mixed with the native species of flora that actually BELONGED there and had tried to reclaim the land.
I was in awe when I reached the front gates of the resort. Tremendous, monolithic wooden gates whose supports to either side looked like they must've been cut from giant sequoias. The gate itself had been gouged in several places by woodpeckers and eaten away at the base by burrowing insects.
Hanging on the gate was a sheet of metal, some random scrap, with hand-painted letters scrawled in black. "ABANDONED BY DISNEY". Clearly the handiwork of some past local or an employee who wanted to make some small protest.
The gates were open enough to walk through, but not drive, so grabbing my digital camera and the map, whose flip-side showed a layout of the resort, I set off on foot.
The inner grounds of the place were just as overgrown as the entryway. Palm tree stood untended and ragged among piles of their own coconuts. Banana plants similarly stood in their own stinking, bug-riddled refuse. There was this sort of clash between order and chaos, as carefully planted rows of perennial flowers mixed with obnoxious tall weeds and stinking, blackened mushrooms.
All that remained of any outdoor structures were broken, rotting wood and various charred bits of unidentifiable material. What was most likely an information booth or an outdoor bar was now simply a pile of assorted debris chopped up by past vandalism and ravaged by weather.
The most interesting thing on the grounds was a statue of Baloo, the friendly bear from the Jungle Book, which stood in a sort of courtyard in front of the main building. He was frozen in a jovial wave toward no one, staring into empty space with a silly, toothy grin as bird shit covered whole swaths of his "fur" and vines ensnared his platform.
I approached the main building - the PALACE - only to find the outside of the building covered in graffiti where the original paint hadn't peeled and chipped away. The front doors weren't just open, they had been taken off their hinges and were stolen.
Above the front doors, or the gaping maw where they had been, someone had once again painted "ABANDONED BY DISNEY".
I wish I could tell you about all the awesome stuff I saw inside the Palace. Forgotten statues, abandoned cash registers, a full-fledged secret society of homeless bums... but no.
The inside of the building was so stark, so bare, that I actually think people had stolen the molding off the walls. Anything that was too big to steal... counters, desks, giant fake trees... they were all resting amid this empty echo chamber that amplified my every step like a slow rat-a-tat of a machine gun.
I checked the floorplan and headed to all the locations that might seem in any way interesting.
The kitchen was as you'd imagine... an industrial food prep area with all the appliances and space, no expenses spared. Every glass surface was broken, every door knocked off its hinges, every metal surface kicked and dented. The entire place smelled like very old piss.
The huge freezer, not even remotely cool now, had row upon row of empty shelf space. Hooks hung from the ceiling, probably for hanging cuts of meat, and as I stood inside for a moment, I noticed they were swinging.
Each hook swung in a random direction, but their movements were so slow and small that it was almost impossible to see. I figured it had been caused by my footsteps, so I stopped one from swinging by clutching it in my fist, then carefully letting go, but within seconds it started to swing once more.
The bathrooms were in much the same state as the rest of the place. Just like the Treasure Island resort, someone had methodically smashed each porcelain commode with coconuts and other implements. There was about a half inch of rancid, stinking stagnant water on the floor, so I didn't stay there very long.
What's odd is that the toilets and the sinks (and the bidets in the ladies' room, yes I went there) all dripped, leaked, or just ran freely. It seemed to me that they should've shut the water off long, LONG ago.
There were plenty of rooms in the resort, but naturally I didn't have time to look through them all. The few I did peer into were similarly wrecked, and I didn't expect to find anything there. I thought there was actually a television or radio in one room, as I really think I heard a quiet conversation coming out.
Though it was like a whisper, probably my own breathing echoing in the silence, or just another case of the sound of flowing water playing tricks on the mind, this is what it sounded like...
1: "I didn't believe it."
2: (short, unknown reply)
1: "I didn't know that. I didn't know that."
2: "Your father told you."
1: (unknown reply, or possibly just weeping.)
I know, I know, that sounds ridiculous. I'm just telling you what I experienced, why I thought there might've been something running in that room - or worse, some vagrants who had holed up there and probably would've knifed me.
At the front doors of the Palace again, I figured I hadn't found anything of note and had wasted the trip up.
As I looked out the door, I noticed something interesting in the courtyard that I had apparently missed. Something that would give me at least ONE thing to show for all my trouble, even if it was just a photograph.
There as a lifelike statue of a python, maybe eighty feet long, coiled up and "sunning" itself on a pedestal right in the center of the area. It was almost time for the sun to start setting, so the light fell onto the object in the PERFECT way for a photograph.
I approached the python and snapped a photo. Then I stood on my toes and snapped another. I moved closer again to get the detail of its face.
Slowly, casually, the python lifted its head, looked directly into my eyes, turned, and slithered off the pedestal, across the grass, and into the trees.
All eighty feet of it. Its head long disappeared into the woods before its tail even left the sunning spot.
Disney had released all their exotic animals onto the grounds. Right there on my floorplan map was the "Reptile House". I should have known. I'd read about the sharks at Treasure Isle, and I should have KNOWN they'd done this.
I was dumbfounded, just utterly stupefied. My mouth must've been hanging open for the longest time before I came back down to Earth and snapped it shut. I blinked a few times and backed away from where the snake had been, back toward the Palace.
Even though it was totally gone, I still wasn't taking any chances and backed my way into the building.
It took a few deep breaths and slaps to my own face to get myself right in the head again after that.
I looked for a place to sit down, as my legs were feeling a bit like jelly at this point. Of course, there WAS no place to sit down unless I wanted to recline in the broken glass and dead leaf carpet or haul myself up onto a desk of questionably reliability.
I had seen some stairs near the Palace's lobby and decided to go have a seat there until I felt better.
The staircase was far enough away from the front of the building to be relatively clean, save for a startling accumulation of dust. I pulled a wedge of metal off the wall, once again painted with the "ABANDONED BY DISNEY" motto I'd become accustomed to. I placed the wedge on the stairs and sat on it to keep at least somewhat clean.
The stairway led downward, below ground level. Using my camera flash as a sort of improvised flashlight, I could see that the stair case ended in a metal mesh door with a padlock. A sign on the door... a REAL sign... read "MASCOTS ONLY! THANK YOU!".
This perked up my spirits a little bit, for two reasons. One, a Mascots-Only area would have definitely had some interesting stuff back in the day... Two, the padlock was still in place. Nobody had gone down there. Not the vandals, not the looters, nobody.
This was the one place I could actually "explore" and perhaps find something interesting to photograph or wantonly steal. I had come to the Palace essentially agreeing with myself that it was okay to take anything I wanted because - hey - "abandoned".
It didn't take much to bust the lock. Well, actually that's wrong. It didn't take much to bust the metal plate on the wall that the padlock was hooked to. Time and decay had done most of the work for me, and I was able to bend the metal plate enough to pull the screws out of the wall - something nobody else had apparently thought of, or hadn't been able to do at the time.
The Mascots-Only area was a startling and very welcomed change from the rest of the building I'd seen. For one, every second or third fluorescent light overhead was illuminated, even though they flickered and faded randomly. Also, nothing had been stolen or broken, even if age and exposure were definately taking their toll.
Tables had note pads and pens, there were clocks... even a punch-in clock on the wall complete with filled-out time cards. Chairs were scattered around and there was even a small break room with an old, static-filled television and long rotted-out food and drink on the counters.
It was like one of those post-apocalypse movies where everything is left in the state of evacuation.
As I walked the maze-like sub-basement hallways of the Mascots-Only area, the sights just became more and more interesting. As I went further, desks and tables were knocked over, papers scattered and almost melded with the damp floor, and a large carpet of mold was slowly overtaking the real rotting crimson floor-covering.
Everything was just sort of "squishy". Anything wood disintegrated into mush when I applied even the least amount of force, and clothing items hanging on hooks in one of the rooms simply fell to moist threads if I tried to unhook them.
One thing that annoyed me was that the light was becoming more sparse and unreliable as I went further into the dank, suffocating depths of the place.
Eventually, I reached a black and yellow striped door with the words "CHARACTER PREP 1" stenciled on it.
The door wouldn't open at first. I figured this was probably where the costumes were kept, and I definately wanted a photograph of that twisted, stinking mess. Try as I might, whatever angle or trick I tried, the door wouldn't budge.
That is, until I gave up and started to walk away. That was when there was a slight popping sound and the door creaked open slowly.
Inside, the room was completely dark. Pitch black. I used the camera flash to look for a light switch in the wall by the door, but there was nothing.
As I made my search, I was jarred out of my sense of excitement by a loud electrical buzz. Rows of lights overhead suddenly flashed to life, flickering and fading in and out like the rest I had passed.
It took a second for my eyes to adjust, and it seemed like the light was going to just keep getting brighter until all the bulbs exploded... but just when I thought it would reach that critical stage, the lights dimmed a bit and steadied.
The room was exactly as I had pictured it. Various Disney costumes hung on the walls, fully put together like strange cartoon cadavers hung from invisible nooses.
There was an entire rack of loincloths and "native" clothes on hangers toward the back.
What I found odd, and what I wanted to photograph right away, was a Mickey Mouse costume at the center of the room. Unlike the other costumes, it was lying on its back in the center of the floor like a murder victim. The fur on the costume was rotten and shedding, creating bare patches.
What was even odder, however, was the coloring of the costume. It was like a photo negative of the actual Mickey Mouse. Black where he should be white and white where he should be black. His normally red overalls were light blue.
The sight was off-putting enough that I actually put off photographing the thing until last.
I took a picture of the costumes hanging on the walls. Upward angles, downward angles, side shots to show an entire row of frozen, putrid cartoon faces, some with plastic eyes missing.
Then I decided to stage a shot. Just one of the bedraggled character heads on the slick, grimy floor.
I reached for the headpiece of a Donald Duck costume and carefully removed it so the thing wouldn't fall apart in my hands.
As I looked into the face of the wide-eyed, moldering head, a loud clattering sound made me jump with fright.
I looked down at my feet, and there between my shoes was a human skull. It had fallen out of the mascot head and shattered into pieces at me feet; only the empty face and lower jaw remained, staring up at me.
I dropped the Duck head immediately, as you'd expect, and moved for the door. As I stood in the doorway, I looked back to the skull on the floor.
I had to take a picture of it, you know? I HAD to, for any number of reasons that may seem silly, but only if you don't think it through.
I'd need proof of what happened, especially if Disney was going to somehow make this go away. I had no doubt in my mind, right from the start, that even if it was just gross negligence, Disney was RESPONSIBLE for this.
That's when Mickey, that photo negative, opposite-Mickey in the middle of the floor, started to get up.
First sitting up, then climbing to its feet, the Mickey Mouse costume... or whoever was inside of it, stood there at the center of the room, its fake face just starting directly at me as I mumbled "No..." over and over and over...
With shaking hands, a violently thrashing heart, and legs that had once again turned to jelly, I managed to lift the camera and aim it at the opposite creature now quietly sizing me up.
The digital camera's screen displayed only dead pixels in the shape of the thing. It was a perfect silhouette of the Mickey costume. As the camera moved in my unsteady hands, the dead pixels spread, marring the screen wherever Mickey's outline moved to.
Then the camera died. Went blank and quiet and... broken.
I raised my eyes once again to the Mickey Mouse costume.
"Hey," it said in a hushed, perverted, but perfectly executed Mickey Mouse voice, "Wanna see my head come off?"
It started to pull at its own head, working its clumsy, glove-clad fingers around its neck with clawing, impatient movements similar to a wounded man trying to pull himself free of a predator's jaws...
As it worked its digits into its neck... so much blood...
So much thick, chunky, yellow blood...
I turned away as I heard a sickening tearing of cloth and flesh... only cared about getting away. Above the doorway out of this room, I saw the final message clawed into the metal with bone or fingernails...
"ABANDONED BY GOD"
I never got the pictures out of the camera. I never wrote the blog entry about it. After I ran from that place, fled for my sanity if not my very life, I knew why Disney didn't want anyone to know about this place.
They didn't want anyone like me getting in.
They didn't want anything like that getting out.
Photo-negative Mickey.
Room Zero by Slimebeast[]
It's been a while since I've written anything related to the Disney Corporation, and I'm sure you can understand why.
A lot has been going on since my last post. I've received a lot of questions and concerns from folks who read my first-hand account of Mowgli's Palace... a resort that was built and abandoned by Disney.
I want to thank everyone who mirrored by post. It's been taken down from a few places, mostly corporate sites that were easily leaned on by a larger power. However, for every nuked topic or disappearing blog post, it seems like a hundred more have popped up.
This is something they'll have to face. There's no turning back for them... none for me, either...
I'm definitely being followed. For the first month or two, I chalked it up to paranoia. Any casual glance or half-smile in my direction set me off. Hairs standing on the back of the neck and everything.
The first one, or rather, the first one I was actually able to spot, was a telephone worker milling around my apartment complex.
He was middle-aged, doughy, dressed just as you'd expect, but something just seemed off about him. I couldn't place it, but I knew this wasn't just my imagination acting up. He was awkward and out of place, not somebody who was comfortable doing his routine job.
I followed him around a corner, only to lose him there. When I turned back to go home, there he was. Staring directly at me, about ten feet behind me. Expressionless and cold.
"Exploring?" he asked. That was all he said, and there was an accusing tone to his voice.
Tell me what blue collar phone jockey does that.
I guess that's the worst part. Never feeling safe. Never feeling alone. That, and the occasional Disney merchandise left somewhere for me to find. Little rubber Mickeys in the mailbox, a Disney Adventures magazine on my bookshelf.
They hide little Mickeys everywhere. Three circles, one big, two small, in the silhouette of the famous mouse's head.
I've started keeping a running list of Mickeys I've found.
Coffee cup rings on my coffee table. One big, two small. Colored glass bottles left on the doorstep, viewed from the top down. (All red.) Graffiti on the wall on my way to work; a huge Earth, small Sun and Moon in the proper locations.
They're everywhere.
People have emailed me about this as well. If you repost anything I have to say, you're going to start finding those son of a bitch outlines. I guarantee it.
The best one by far, one that actually made me laugh because of the horror of it all, was a drawing in chalk next my car. I was taken aback at first, walking through the parking garage, keeping an eye out for people following me.
The outline seemed a perfect match for... well, a "murder victim" you're probably familiar with if you've read my past posts.
Written in yellow... paint, I'm sure... was a single word.
"RETRACT"
The only good thing that has come out of all this is that I know I'm not the only one who's seen something they shouldn't have.
I'm not going to give their names, because... well, if I have to tell you why, you haven't been paying attention.
"Researcher" goes to Disney parks whenever he can, all throughout the year. He's not going to have fun, enjoy the rides, etc.
He's looking for the Gascots.
There's been a long tradition, apparently, of people reporting strange patrons throughout the park. Silent, motionless, staring patrons of every age, shape, and size. Men and women, adults, children, and teens.
All wearing Disney-themed gas masks.
Way back when, Disney would get tons of complaints about "oddly dressed" folks following others around the park. Folks who would then merge into crowds and disappear.
Later on, the gas masks caused folks to draw other conclusions, and reports of "possible terrorists" and "bombers" started flowing.
All of those reports most likely went straight into the trash can. I know I can't find any sign of any such occasions reported on by the media. (Although you should be aware of the fact Disney can pretty much control its press like no other.)
Researcher goes to the parks, talks to a few people, and tries not to draw any attention to himself. He'll just ask three or four families if they've seen "his friend", who's wearing a "funny mask".
He has yet to see a gascot for himself... though on one occasion, a child pointed him toward Frontier town. As he raced through the crowd, he heard a single voice ahead cry out "Mommy! I want a Goofy air-mask too!"
A fellow I'll call "Lifeguard" worked in a Disney water park from 2001 through 2003. He stood at the top of a huge water slide and made sure none of the kids got too rowdy. He passed the kids through, one at a time, telling them over and over again to be safe, keep their arms in, and so on.
One day, as he tells it, this fat kid goes down the tube and doesn't come out the other end.
He's sent two or three kids after, the whole thing moves at a steady clip, so naturally you'd expect that if fatty got stuck, the kids that followed him were stuck, too.
Not so. Only the big kid disappears. Everyone else comes out the other end, cheering and splashing like nothing's wrong.
Lifeguard shuts down the slide, much to the aggravation of the kids waiting. Before he can go through any of Disney's strict procedures... SPLASH... fatty finally comes out.
Staff members pulled the kid out of the water. He sank like a stone when he hit, his skin already blue and his eyes wide. All he would say was "No-face Kids" and "Stop squeezing".
The kid was okay, in case you're wondering. He got carted right off to the medical center. When Lifeguard was told to open the slide back up, he made a big stink about how it clearly wasn't safe. Despite his complaints, he was threatened with firing and begrudgingly opened the slide again.
From that point on, he kept a closer eye on the kids. Every so often, they'd come out in the wrong order... never as stunned as the fat kid, but always with a vague look of concern... a dreamy half-stupor that seemed as if they were trying to figure out what was reality.
They'd take on some water and choke a bit... and they'd never come back up to ride again.
I read his emails with the same sort of unease you might be feeling right now. I wanted him to share his own story, but in the end he didn't want to expose himself that way. I can't say I blame him.
"Snow White", which wasn't the actual role she played, was a "character" in the park. She had a nice little tidbit for me. You know what happens when a costumed employee drops dead in his suit?
Like, one second he's taking a picture with little Jimmy, and the next he's had a fatal stroke?
A second costumed mascot in the area has to sit with the corpse on a curb or bench and wait for a designated "Dry Cleaner" to arrive and cart the body away in a discrete manner. All the while, patrons have no idea they're sitting with a dead body for photo ops.
Feel free to check your photo albums at this point.
That was bad, but another fellow, "Janitor", went completely off the creepy charts.
Disney World (and probably others) is built with a series of underground tunnels just below your feet. Three stories' worth. Anything and everything you can imagine is down there, for use of the employees.
They're called Utilidors. Utility Corridors.
Basically, that's the reason you don't see character out of place or Janitors wandering through the park. They pop in and out of hidden doors, and travel a concealed town you're walking on.
Janitor told me something that might be common knowledge, but was nonetheless news to me.
Walt Disney had several apartments built into his parks. There's one above Cinderella's Castle... there's one in the Pirates of the Caribbean ride. They're all over the place.
More than that, there are night clubs, a movie theater, a bowling alley, and much more. All behind doors built right into the whimsical facades you passed by without a second look.
Club 22 is one such hidden area. If you have the cash to join the exclusive club (you don't) then you'll have access to it and much more.
Club 22 is a place where anything goes. Disney Co. calls these places "Dark Zones". Spots where the squeaky-clean visage of Mickey Mouse gives way to drinking, drugs, and, yes, sex.
Conversely, the rest of the park is the "Bright Zone", with a few "Gray Zone" utilodors between.
As far as Janitor has said, it wasn't always that way. It was more of a slow decline and the gradual relaxation of social norms within that elite group.
The reason he knows all of this? You may have already guessed - He's cleaned it.
After a lengthy background check and a non-disclosure form, Janitor moved up from a park attendant to one of the Dark Zone cleaning crew.
Now, before you get some Satanic "human sacrifice" vision in your head, Janitor saw nothing of the sort. Lots of empty alcohol bottles? Yes. Used condoms scattered like deflated New Years balloons? Oh, yeah. He cleaned up his share of blood, piss, and vomit, but it was all down to the unrestricted behavior of patrons as opposed to any sort of cult behavior.
At least that's how he sees it in retrospect.
All that trash, that profane shit, went into a furnace and mingled with the smoke of a quaint cottage's chimney.
If you've been to Disney World, you've breathed ultra-condensed sin.
Backing up this information was "Hammer". Hammer mailed me the old-fashioned way, though I don't know how he got my home address. He sent me photocopies of work papers proving his employment, with the instruction to burn them when I was convinced.
Which I did gladly.
Hammer worked around the Disney World park, doing demolition and construction. At one point, he approached a superior regarding some strange construction plans.
There was wide, rectangular area marked off on the blueprints, about the size of a supermarket. The area was left unnamed, and only bore the words "DO NOT DIG".
Not only was his superior in the dark, but he was super-fucking-purposefully in the dark. He didn't want to talk about it, didn't want to know about it, and ended the conversation with "this space intentionally left blank".
Hammer didn't get it. The area seemed a waste of space, and it was directly conflicting with the work his team had been given. He started poking around the area on his off-time, finding only a derelict steel door, and a great span of concrete just beyond.
It was a "supermarket's worth" of blank, gray floor.
Soon after, Hammer started picking gascots out of the crowds.
Unlike all other reports, the people... the things... would stand in full view of the guy. They'd cluster together in the distance, or they'd just be pressed against a wall when he turned a corner.
He said they "moved weird", like they were weak or injured... like a deer that's been run down by a hunter and can't flee anymore.
The gasmasks... the Disney character faces with filters jammed in... he noted that they seemed wet on the inside, like condensation on a car window. Tiny beads of water glimmered behind the glass, making it impossible for any of them to actually see.
Probing further, Hammer started asking questions of anyone and everyone who had been working in the park for a decade or more.
He hit dead ends throughout, until he was directed to Ida, an elderly woman who worked in a restaurant on Main Street. She'd been there since way back, and though nobody had the balls to ask directly, everyone KNEW she had plenty of terrible stories to tell.
Hammer asked about the empty space, then about the gas-masked customers, and at first he thought he would receive the same non-answers he'd gotten so far. She was quiet. Eerily quiet.
"Room Zero." She croaked, a single, shaking hand placed to her cheek as if she were a little girl fearing a Father's punishment.
She didn't meet the man's gaze for the entire conversation.
Room Zero, as it turned out, was yet another hidden room just like the apartments and Club 22. However, its sheer size and its spot deep beneath the park set it apart from any of the "fun" dark zones.
It was a bomb shelter.
Room Zero was built to withstand a massive attack, be it conducted by foreign or domestic enemies.
Room Zero was to be stocked with enough rations to feed the entire park's average number of patrons at any given moment, and housed a smaller yet lavish "panic room" of sorts for Disney higher-ups.
During World War II, official Disney gas masks were actually produced for children to wear in the event of an attack. The idea was that it would be less scary for kids if Mickey's face was emblazoned on the wartime safety device.
Yes, I know the obvious problems with that.
During the Cold War scare of the 60s, when Disney World was constructed, Room Zero was stocked with similar masks, as well. Whether they cared about the fears of children, or just callous branding, the things found their way down there.
What's more, some genius decided that kids would THEN be frightened by the gas masks their parents wore... and so all masks, adult and child, were made to comply to this insane standard.
Ida described it as "Treating a wound with lemon juice."
None of this explained what Hammer had been seeing, though. Not only the seemingly supernatural appearances, but the emptied out room as well.
"I've been in there," he explained, "There's nothing but a cement floor and four walls."
"No," Ida shook her head and covered her mouth, stifling a sob, "You've been on top of it."
Someone or something sounded the alarm one day, when the park was at full capacity. The warning was clear. It was supposedly an air attack.
Security ushered everyone down, down, down into the tremendous shelter. There, they were ordered to put on their masks and hunker down for the duration fo the assault.
Everything was quiet for about thirty minutes, save for the crying children and the frightened whispers. No one wanted to die, and so they were thankful in a way for this strange measure of safety.
Then, the first scream rang out.
"Hey!" a man shouted, "Quit pinching!"
Waves of shrieks and yelps rippled through the crowd, from one wall to the other, back and forth.
"Who's running around? Settle down!" Someone hollered.
"Who's laughing? This isn't funny!"
"Ow! Who stepped on my foot?!"
Despite security guards' urging to calm down and keep their cool, the crowd became more and more agitated until, finally, after nearly an hour of madness...
The lights flickered...
Then died.
What followed could only be described as utter chaos. In the dark, only the wails of the young and the anguished cries of adults could be heard in a massive, swelling din that bloodied the ears of all within that black echo chamber.
A group of staff members and a select few patrons made it out of the door, ready to face the War above rather than the insanity below. What they found, of course, was a desolate, yet untouched theme park. The music continued to play, echoing through silent storybook towns.
Upon returning to Room Zero, the few who stood at the top of the steel staircase that lead down into the pitch blackness heard no sign of the previous fray. There was only silence.
Ida herself descended that staircase despite the begging of those she left above.
She reached the reinforced doors, herself now awash in darkness and hearing only the buzzing in her ears.
A single voice came out of the darkness. The echo made it impossible to tell whether the mocking, raspy voice was at the back of the bomb shelter, or if it was right in front of her face.
"Shut the door, dear. You're letting out the cold."
Gripped by terror, she did just that. Within days, the entire thing... shelter, staircase, all of it... was covered with feet upon feet of cement. Air systems and generators above its ceiling were removed, creating the large, empty space.
"They're all still down there." Ida told Hammer, "Down there with whoever that was."
You might notice I've used Ida's name.
Unfortunately, she passed away soon after telling her story. Accidental fall, supposedly, after getting out of bed to turn on a light.
"Such a company devotee," the paper reported, "that her entire bedroom was covered with Mickey silhouettes."
Corruptus by Slimebeast[]
If you really believe in something, it can be yours.
That's how we've been conditioned to think. Mostly, I suppose it's a coping mechanism to keep us from eating the rich. We all think we'll be rich someday if we just want it hard enough. How long has it been since there was a good, old-fashioned culling of the wealthy elite?
That probably wasn't a good way to start this blog post... I'm more than a little tired, but fuck it. I'm leaving it.
"Corruptus".
That was the subject of an email I received before my ISP dropped me. My phone turned into a brick the same day. Hell, I think it was the same precise moment, though it's difficult to know for sure since I only tried it after my laptop couldn't connect.
"Corruptus"... I'd never heard the word before, and to be honest I'm not exactly sure it IS a word at all. It could be Latin. It sounds like Latin. I haven't been able to look it up, and this is the first time I'm getting on the web since my unexpected removal from the grid.
I tried to sign on at the local library, by the way. My card was revoked... unpaid late fees for books I'd never read, much less checked out. Mostly borderline fetish material and self-help books for various mental illnesses. The apparently quite detailed tome on weapons of mass destruction seemed to be of the most concern for the librarian.
I hung around the library for maybe a half an hour, until someone left a computer logged in and unguarded. When I went to check my email, to tweet a complaint about what happened, those accounts were gone, as well. Honestly, I was a pretty huge dumbass for expecting them to be there.
It wasn't long before I noticed the computer's rightful user pointing me out at the front desk. I guess she wasn't a fan of the direct approach. I was out the door before anyone could cause a real fuss.
It's been over two years since I left Mowgli's Palace and never looked back.
The original blog post has come and gone so much... across so many different sites... that I can barely even remember the first place I tried to host it. If I'd known how far this would go, I don't know if I would've been able to hack out that clumsy, flawed account of what happened. The pressure would've been too great, and I suppose there's a certain level of comfort in the idea no one will actually see or care about your work.
It seems like a lot of sites removed the information, either upon direct request from Disney... or on their own in fear of reprisal. I know a really popular YouTuber who pulled readings of my posts from his channel. The rumor was that someone threatened to sue him, some supposed "author" of the "story". Bullshit. I know first-hand that he took it down in a bout of pants-shitting fear when he realized Disney's connection to his partner company.
I tried to keep up my "After Abandoned" blog for a while. I don't know how many people out there saw my notes on Room Zero, Club 22, and so on. They're still around if you look... at least at the time of this writing.
Yes, "Club 22" exists. No, it's not a typo of "Club 33". I later learned, from the same contact, that there's an 11 as well, and supposedly the debauchery only grows as the numbers get lower. I heard of a "Club 00", but I can't confirm that as clearly as I can with the previous contact. I also don't know if it has any connection to the "Room" of a similar name.
Yes, the door probably said "Characters" or "Cast Members" instead of "Mascots". I know, I know, I hear you all. Thank you so much for that. I'm sure your memory is crystal clear in moments of abject terror, right?
Overall, I'm glad that my words have spread so far and wide... but the down side is that so few of you are taking this seriously. I can't stress this enough... Treasure Island? Real. The Utilidors? Real. Just because you can't substantiate the rest doesn't mean it's "a cool story". Instead of picking apart the inaccuracies and making games about how cool it would be to have been in my position, maybe people can start taking this seriously and digging into what's going on.
Maybe?
I don't know. I don't want this to be a rant. I want to stay focused and make sure I post exactly what I wanted to make public. All of the stress... the stalkers, the phone calls, the broken windows... I know that's all supposed to keep me off track. They want me confused, scared, and most of all they want me quiet.
There's a team of men and women in suits that I've seen at random times. Here and there. I call them "The Focus Group" because they pop up with clipboards and pens, taking notes about everything I do. They all have the same outfits, the same thick-rimmed nerd glasses, the same red pens that just scream "we're judging you".
The first time I noticed them, they were following me through the Mall. I looped and turned, trying to be SURE they were following me... and there they were, every step of the way. Days later, I spotted them again in the laundromat window across from my new apartment.
I chased one down, once. The tubbiest one. They stayed silent through the entire chase and even the scuffle that ensued. When I wrenched the clipboard from his hand, I only found page after page of off-kilter, random gibberish coupled with crude Mickey silhouettes. All in the same red ink.
I know it sounds insane, to say that a group of men and women in black are following me and taking nonsense notes, but I think that's the point. I think the idea is that it SHOULD drive me insane, and if it doesn't, you'll still think I'm crazy just for saying it.
It's a no-win situation.
I will forever regret that trip to Emerald Isle, but on the other hand I'll always be grateful to the people who have come forward, anonymously, to share their experiences with me. Whoever mailed me the suggestion box from the resort is basically my hero at this point. To read what I'd written about the place and still brave the journey... wow. I can't imagine how that felt, whoever you may be. You even left the original, corroded lock in the box so I'd know it was legit. To do all of that without even taking a look inside for yourself must've been really hard. Thank you.
If you haven't noticed, I'm treating this post a lot like my "final installment". There's a reason for that. I don't know how long I can keep subverting Disney's attempts at silencing me before some sort of final action is taken. I have no doubt that somewhere, at this very moment, someone is using my identity to commit a crime that would discredit me. That, or the men in white jackets are about to show me a lovely little padded cell. I don't know what's going to come of this, and that's the worst part I suppose. All I know is that it's coming.
So what is "Corruptus"? Well, as I mentioned it was the title of an email I received. One that was presumably deleted along with my account. It was blank, and seemed to exist for the sole purpose of placing an attached text document in my hands.
Too bad for the powers that be... I had already printed it the moment I saw it.
Not much they can do to reverse that, can they?
I should've mentioned... remember that library? I used their copier to run off a few thousand duplicates of that letter. A few hundred are stapled in random places, a few hundred were passed out to random people, and the rest... let's leave those as a little surprise. Have fun trying to stifle THAT, you horrible mouse-fuckers.
Without any more rambling, here's the letter. Word for word. It arrived from a source whose email address I won't disclose... though I assume it's an untraceable dummy account, anyway.
-----
Summation of CORRUPTUS incidents for January, 2015
For office use only. This message contains information that may be confidential or proprietary, or protected by the attorney-client privilege or work product doctrine intended solely for the use of the addressee(s) named above. Any review, disclosure, distribution, copying or use of the information by others is strictly prohibited. If you have received this message in error or without authorization, please advise the sender by immediate reply and delete the original message. All email sent to this address will be received by the Disney corporate email system and is subject to archiving and review by someone other than the recipient. Violation of this disclaimer as written will result in prosecution.
Please refer to official guidelines with relation to "known" and "unconfirmed" incident reports. Respect regulation as per ongoing and/or finalized designations.
* Known CORRUPTUS incidents up to and including January, 2015
- Treasure Island
-- Extreme agitation/inappropriate activity within Vulture population.
-- Mild to moderate agitation/inappropriate human activity.
-- Resolved CORRUPTUS: Unidentified Avian Species
Abandoned. Final.
- Disney's Pop Century Resort
-- Misplaced and mobile objects.
-- Chronological Displacement/Anachronism.
-- Unresolved CORRUPTUS: Wandering entity.
Pending.
- Disney's River County
-- Microorganism infestation.
-- Unresolved CORRUPTUS: "Clear Man" aka "See-Thru Man" aka "Friendly John".
Abandoned. Final.
- ImageWorks: The What-If Labs (2nd Floor)
-- Multiple missing persons reports regarding Dreamfinder's School of Drama.
-- Pin screen fatality.
-- Vibrating mirror sickness.
-- Unresolved CORRUPTUS: "Wily Wizard" installation
Abandoned. Final.
- Mowgli's Palace
-- Auditory hallucination and/or projection.
-- Misplaced and mobile objects.
-- Moderate to severe agitation/inappropriate human activity.
-- Unresolved CORRUPTUS: Inverted Character
Abandoned. Final.
- The New Global Neighborhood
-- Resolved CORRUPTUS: Fiber Optic Worm (NGN C 1)
-- Resolved CORRUPTUS: Digital Howl (NGN C 2)
Resolved. Repurposed.
- Room Zero
-- Sudden-onset mass-hysteria.
-- Auditory hallucination and/or projection.
-- Unresolved CORRUPTUS: Unknown
Contained. Final.
Please note: Nara Dreamland is not an officially licensed Disney park and no information or resources are to be shared with any responsible for containing its residents.
A complete list of suspected CORRUPTUS incidents and reports may be available.
-----
It took a few readings before I could get my head around this. Essentially, if the attached file was to be believed, then the events I had experienced were not part of an isolated incident. The events within Room Zero... the Gascots... they seem like part of a much larger problem.
What is "Corruptus"?
Corruption. I mean, I don't need to run Google Translate for that, even if I felt like I COULD take a break from writing without the risk of someone finding and disconnecting me at any moment.
Corruption of what? Dreams? Ideas? Desires?
I've never been a religious man, but I was dragged to Sunday School more than enough times to know about Golden Calves. False Gods created by man... icons, graven images...
Characters. Mascots.
If you believe in the Bible at all, and I'm not sure I do, especially not after what I've seen... then maybe God wasn't angry because people worshiped other things. Maybe he was afraid. Maybe if enough people believe in something hard enough, there's a chance it will come to be. Since we're naturally flawed beings, that means there's a very good chance such a thing would become corrupted.
If you think about it, Disney's animated films have always had one overriding message.
Clap your hands and believe hard enough, and Tinkerbell will live. When you wish upon a star... anything your heart desires...
People like to say Disney has some connection to Satanism, but I never bought into that. I still don't. I think they've been trying to create that Golden Calf... a God-Idol that everyone believes in... one that everyone loves... It's almost as if any dream or idea that is shared by enough human hearts and minds has a real chance of being born into the world.
The creatures... if any exist beyond what I saw with my own eyes... I think they're the deformed half-starts. Random manifestations of some dark, unquantifiable non-life that seeped into our state of being. They're mistakes of reality. Cosmic abortions.
The Corrupted.
Did everyone in Emerald Isle harbor such a negative impression of Mowgli's palace? How potent was the fear of nuclear war on the day Room Zero became full? If you want to find Gascots and mystery voices, does that search bring about the very thing you're looking for?
How many children have been disappointed, confused, or scarred for life when they saw Mickey without his "head"?
These are questions I'm never going to be able to answer. I don't know if anyone can. Speaking personally, this will probably be the last time I talk to you about Disney and everything I've learned about them. I'm truly sorry for that, especially since there's so much more I could say... unconfirmed rumors, documents and items I received that now seem to be gone forever...
I thought they were just trying to contain that Mickey costume. I thought that's why they went out of their way to keep the public in the dark about so much. Why they coerced and bullied to get their way.
Now I realize I was wrong.
It was this, all along.
They didn't want anything like THIS getting out.
I wish you all good luck, and I know I need the same from you.
Thank you.
A Few Suggestions (An Abandoned by Disney prequel) by SlimeBeast[]
Suggestion: We could use another person at check-in during peak hours.
Suggestion: Please move the hot dog cart away from the main water slide. Also please have water slide staff keep an eye out for children who just ate. When anyone gets sick in there, three or four people have to go through it before we know about it.
Suggestion: It would be nice if we had a way to give more detailed information anonymously. Maybe private meeting time with management?
Suggestion: Need more security at south gate.
Suggestion: Music in the reptile house keeps slowing down or reversing, it's VERY annoying.
Suggestion: Please tell the mascots not to try eating in their costumes. We keep getting one in with food all over its face and we think someone's trying to be funny. The mouth opening is mesh, so eating isn't even possible.
Suggestion: Please fix the music in the reptile house, it's still driving me up the wall.
Suggestion: Guests are complaining about the amount of towels in their rooms.
Suggestion: Need a better or newer coffee machine for the break room.
Suggestion: I wasn't going to say anything becuase I'm pretty tolerant, but please stop admitting children without faces. They won't stay in the guest areas.
Suggestion: The common area could use a bigger selection of DVDs and games. The collection is already getting stale.
Suggestion: Still need security at south gate. What's cheaper, having a staffer pass by once in a while, or painting over all the vandalism?
Suggestion: South gate needs more security.
Suggestion: What are we doing about the profanities at the employee exit? Send security there more times of the day, or whatever.
Suggestion: Don't feel safe leaving south gate at end of shift.
Suggestion: Frank is cheating at solitare when he thinks I'm not watching. Please do something about this immediately.
Suggestion: Tell the mascots to stay out of where they don't belong. One of them keeps turning off music in the reptile house. Can't tell who because of the suit. Have a meeting or something.
Suggestion: Please give the Mascots more break time or allow them to take short breathers during work hours. Sweat and body odor are one thing, but now we keep getting the same suit full of vomit.
Suggestion: Stop Frank, he's a menace. It has now spread to Sudoku. I am not making this up.
Suggestion: Sorry to write on a napkin, but we need more suggestion cards or else somebody is stealing them all.
Suggestion: Stop the fucking music.
Suggestion: I swear, all these blank kids are getting into everything. Every time I kill one of them the others just misbehave more. I keep finding them in piles at the bottom of stairways and they think its funny. It's not funny. I can't get through.
Suggestion: We need more suggestion cards.
Suggestion: We recieved a mascot suit with paint on its gloves. Someone took it to the south gate, and the color matches what the vandal is using. Might be worth looking into. Also, where are the cards?
Suggestion: costume sticking to the sores
Suggestion: It'
s tOo hard
to writ with
this gloves on
Suggestion: Thanks for the suggestion cards! Finally! What are we doing about staffing check-in at peak hours?
Suggestion: Once more, sorry for the napkin. We're out of cards again.
Suggestion: One of the mascots cornered me in the supply closet and grabbed my breasts. I've told Michael Sheehan about it but I don't think he's going to do anything because I don't know who was in the outfit. I'm going to file a lawsuit if management continues to avoid my calls. This is a final notice. Additionally, please restock the cards. I suspect they were removed so you could discourage my reports.
Suggestion: ha ha I'm a mouse
Suggestion: FUCK YOU.
Suggestion: Someone's taking out light bulbs. I mean, just everywhere. The guests are getting increasingly angry about flipping switches only to have nothing happen.
Suggestion: When are we getting some new DVDs in the common room? I'm not complaining because they're old movies, just that plenty are scratched and don't play all the way through.
Suggestion: What's the ETA on that coffee maker?
Suggestion: The vending machines on the third floor in the guest area are constantly unplugged and the money slots are often jammed with suggestion cards. I don't even know what these cards are talking about.
Suggestion: We need more cards again.
Suggestion: Try to find Frank.
Suggestion: I will give you clues about Frank, okay?
Suggestion: Clue #1, It's cold.
Suggestion: Clue #2, It's wet.
Suggestion: We need another coat of paint on the south gate. Are you doing anything about this clown?
Suggestion: Clue #3, Flush.
Suggestion: The hot dog cart is still next to the water slide and there have been two more incidents involving children getting sick halfway through the pipe. This is really reflecting poorly on the resort.
Suggestion: I don't think youre lookng for frank!!
Suggestion: Hey, I don't want to be dick, but seriously, where are the cards? This box is pointless.
Suggestion: I keep sinking into the floor or
Suggestion: maybe it's just that I feel like it.
Suggestion: I can't get any rest because there's too much to do. Every time I lie down guests keep asking if I'm okay.
Suggestion: i can't get my head off i can't get my head off i cant get my head off i cant get my hed off i can't get my head of
Suggestion: ignore last card it was my real head i forgot
Suggestion: the costume is sticking to my sores and there are more sores
Suggestion: all i am is sores
Suggestion: the costume is breathing and if i dont match its movements i can't get any air
Suggestion: F
Suggestion: UCK
Suggestion: i keep locking the gates but someone keeps opening them again please tell them to stop doing that because it lets everyone out again and i feel that's counter productive
Suggestion: they found frank and they're going to blame me please advise
Suggestion: HAHAHAHA franks face was like a bad looking plate of mashed potatoes when they pulled him out but when i laughed at it everyone looked at me even the people with faces which is odd
Suggestion: i have to think of what to do
Suggestion: oh
Suggestion: i know hang on
Suggestion: I'm not sure if the suggestion box is the right place for this, but security isn't doing much about my complaint. Over the last couple days I've been circling the resort and counting the number of staffers. As far as I can tell, there are more mascots on the grounds than we have on payroll. Security says it doesn't make sense, but I think we have one extra.
Suggestion: please help, costumes are heavy with people inside and there's no hook left for me