You may have heard of the Farnsworth experiments . My dad was one of the scientists involved . He rarely talked about it , and when he did he always said the rumors were overplayed . The team tried and failed , nothing more to it . He seemed to get annoyed at me asking him about it . When I kept it up , he eventually told me a brief account of what happened . It was the mid 80s and he was living in Albany , New York , pursuing his phD . This was a year or two after I was born . He began work on a government funded research project . The experiments were to be done under absolute secrecy . The goal was to test a 15 year old hypothesis that previous to this point seemed untestable . If it were true , then time travel was possible . They spent nearly a year working on the project , known only by it 's codename Farnsworth . They tried and tried , but found nothing . Then the project ended . There were no deaths or disappearances . There were no strange events around the region . The reason the government denied the project 's existence was purely embarrassment over funding something that in hindsight seemed so ridiculous . It felt good to know the truth . Whenever I heard someone retelling the story , I wished I could tell the real version , but I promised dad I wouldn 't , for the sake of his career . For the next few years , I didn 't really think about it . It was one little story , among many , sitting in the back of my mind . I went off to college , lived life , and never gave it a second thought . A few months after I graduated , I drove up to Boston for Thanksgiving of ' 06 . Dad still lived in the same house that we lived in since I was maybe 10 . Thanksgiving this year was smaller than years before . I was just me , dad , and my older sister Kate . It was a normal thanksgiving meal . Peas were in short supply , but I never much liked them anyway . Looking around the table , I felt deja vu . We all sat in our usual chairs , clustered around the part of the table not covered in papers and screens filled with incomprehensible equations . It nice to be back . Just when the meal was drawing to a close , there was a knock on the front door . I went to go open it . It was a man , maybe 60 years old . He looked very worn out . His grayish hair was a mess . He was unshaven . My dad came over and said , They walked away quickly . Kate and I waited for them to come back , very curious about what was going on . She seemed to remember him , just barley , from back in Albany . She must have been around four or five at the time . We kept looking down the hall to dad 's office , the door remained shut . No words possible to make out . After what felt like half an hour , Kate said , She led me upstairs to her old bedroom , situated right above dad 's office . She motioned to be quiet and pointed to a vent in the corner of the room . From it we could hear the muffled conversation . They were speaking in jargon . I heard a lot about oscillations . After maybe two to three minutes , I heard Bill Benson shout , I got up from the floor quickly , hitting my head on a shelf with a loud thud . I heard the conversation stop . As me and Kate walked as quietly out of the room as we could , we heard footsteps downstairs . As we descended the old wooden flight of stairs , dad walked into view . He told us to sit down at the table . We went back to the dining room . Bill Benson sat too , taking some old notebooks off the seat of his chair and putting them on top of the cluttered side of the table . Dad took a deep breath and started to speak , " You know how I 've said I worked on the Farnsworth experiments when you both were really little . When I told you we failed , that was a lie . It worked , better than anyone could have expected . But there was a problem . A big problem . And now we don 't talk about it , we think about it as little as we can , and we never go back . That 's why we moved away from Albany . Now Bill 's problem is he went back . He shouldn 't have . We can 't get ourselves back involved . " " For your own good , don 't try any detective work . Live like I live , live like nothing ever happened . Those of us who ignore the past are fine . Now we are going to eat dessert like nothing happened . And we 're going to forget , OK ? " " I can 't just leave it like this , I tried for years . We have to find the ones they took . Emily might be out there , don 't you want to find her . " He got up and walked through the adjoining living room and out the door , into the light snow . Dad took a deep breath and didn 't speak for maybe a minute . The he spoke , A few weeks later , after I had gotten over the shock of that night , I did some research on Bill Benson . At first I couldn 't find anything referencing him from within the past ten years . I found an old webpage for a university that listed a William C . Benson as a professor . The photo was definitely him . I ran the photo of him through face recognition and found two matches . The first was old . In it were five people , some in lab coats . Benson was on the left , looking much younger . His hair was neat . He was wearing street clothes , also neat . On the right were two women I didn 't recognize . They were the oldest of the group . In the middle were my parents . Dad , who looked nearly the same as after all those years , and mom , who I only remember from pictures . Above them was a banner saying Happy New Year ' 85 . The photo was taken a few months after I was born . I saved it . I then opened the second match . This picture of Benson must have been more recent . He looked like he had on thanksgiving , but older . His hair was grayer and longer . The photo had been taken in the dark with a flash , making the background hard to make out . The thing that struck me most about that picture was the look of absolute terror on his face . I closed the photo quickly . I saved it too . I then noticed that they came from the same source . It was a blog with the two photos as the only posts . There were no dates posted on posts . Whoever made the blog must have disabled them from showing . As the weeks and months went by , I tried to forget all that had happened . Whenever I did think about it , I found myself filled with an equal mix of fear and curiosity . Forgetting over time became easier . I got a job in Tampa Florida . I was in and out of two relationships . Kate was living in New Jersey , working on her residency at big hospital . We never talked about it . I assumed she was trying to forget too . Dad never said anything about it . He was completely normal . I took up photography as a hobby , and was becoming pretty good . Four years after I met Benson , the family got back together for thanksgiving . I flew up from Florida to participate . This time there were more people . My aunt and uncle , a cousin , and Kate 's fiancee all showed up . It felt strange entering that old house . The memories flooded back to me . I was the last to arrive . The large dining room table was cleared of the clutter that had filed much of it in the past . I realized I was later than I thought , as thanksgiving dinner was nearly underway . I sat on the last untaken chair , the same chair Bill Benson had sat on . Any anxiety I felt began to fade after a few minutes . It was nice . I was with family . Dad was chatting about the goings on at MIT , his research , who was getting tenure . The usual things . I occasionally thought I heard some nervousness in his voice , but it was too subtle to really tell . We ate pumpkin pie . The next day I returned to florida . I felt relieved to step back into the warm Florida air . Two months later I got a call from Kate . Dad had disappeared . He hadn 't been coming into work . He wasn 't at his house . His car was in his driveway . There was a search for him . I flew out immediately . They combed the area . They scoured databases , but even with his name , face , thumbprint , and retina , they found nothing . After a month , they stopped looking . He was presumed dead . I wanted to tell the police everything I knew , but they wouldn 't believe me . Calling the Farnsworth experiments into it would be like blaming his disappearance on a UFO or the Bermuda triangle . I did tell them about Bill Benson . I said that if he was alive and anyone knew where he was , Benson would . I told them he was a professor at a local college around 15 years ago , but I didn 't remember which one . They quickly found it , Bridgewater State University . He taught physics and math there for ten years , before resigning . It was clear he hadn 't had any professorships after that . He 'd complete dropped off of everyone 's radar . The one piece of information they could find about him was an apartment he had rented five years ago . It was in Albany New York . They couldn 't get any other information . To them , Bill Benson was a dead end . I knew dad was alive . He must have decided to go back , just like Bill . I had to find my dad and try to pull him out of whatever he was putting himself into . On February 16 , I decided to find Benson myself . In early morning I packed up my luggage and checked out of my Boston hotel . I scraped the ice off the windshield of my rental car and set off towards Albany . I didn 't tell anyone where I was going . The drive was a little under three hours . When I got there I checked into another hotel . I used a fake name . I don 't know why I did it , it just felt like the right thing to do . Later , I made my way to his old apartment , bringing my camera with me . After a short drive I found the building . I parked and walked in . I made my way to the main office and walked in . " You could talk to his old next door neighbors . He lived in apartment 108 , the people in 107 still live there . I hope they find your father . " I thanked her and left . After a quick look around I realized 100s were the basement . I walked down a short flight of stairs and into a long hallway . 107 was easy to find . I knocked on the door . The residents were a couple in their early 30s . A man and a woman named Kimberly and Al . I talked to them for a few minutes . They saw Benson as a bit of nut . They barley talked to him besides greetings in the hallway . As I was about to leave , Kimberly seemed to remember something and told me to wait . She ran into the apartment and came out a minute later with a small taped shut cardboard box . I thanked them both and returned to my car , ripping through the tape key . In it was a ridiculously old looking cell phone , a photograph , and a few pieces paper . I looked at the photograph first . I knew that photo . It was the New Years day photo . The exact same photo I had seen on the internet four years previously . Memories came flooding back . I thought of the day Bill Benson came to thanksgiving dinner , and what he had said . I took a deep breath . I looked at the papers . Sheet after sheet of random notes and equations . I then flipped open the cell phone . It turned on . I opened the list of contact , only one was listed . It was cell phone number under the name " call " . I did . It rang , once , twice , three times , then I heard a voice . The call cut off . I knew it was Bill Benson . I remember his voice clearly . I put the contents of the box in my camera bag and the made my way by foot to the park . After a bit of walking , I saw a fountain in the distance . Snow lightly fell . As I got closer to the fountain I realized it was off , presumably for the winter . I brushed the snow off a bench and sat down waiting . After about 10 minutes , I saw someone walking towards me out of storm . It was him . Bill Benson sat down . He looked older than when I last saw him . His hair was completely gray . It looked like he hadn 't cut it for a while . He finally said , " I don 't want to get you involved . I 'm sorry I brought you into this , and I 'm sorry I brought your John back into it . He was the only one of us who made a clean break . " And with that he left , running away without another word . I snapped a picture of him as he disappeared over a hill . I looked to the ground and saw his footprints in the snow . I started following them before they were filled in . It felt like I had been following those footprints for an hour . They just kept going . Faint , but not quite filled in . I finally stopped to catch my breath . I was thinking Bill Benson must be keeping in great shape . He , in his 60s , was easily outpacing me , a 26 year old . Then a more unnerving thought came to mind . Washington park was less than half a square mile large . But I had been going straight for what must have been well over a mile . I wasn 't going in circles , was I ? I also hadn 't seen the road in a long time . I began to look around . I was in the middle of a snowy wilderness . I was just in a city . How could I be here . The snow was starting to get pretty light . I pulled out my cell phone , no reception . Bill 's cell phone , no reception . I looked at the footprints . They were almost gone , but not quite . I kept going for maybe 20 more minutes until I found where they were going to . They stopped at an old building made of sheet metal . It looked to be two stories . It had one window and one door . That building gave me the creeps . I pulled out my camera and snapped a picture of it . I walked the perimeter , but saw no other ways in . My head hurt like crazy . It was dark . Night . What the fuck just happened . Night . I was lying in the snow . I tried to think back . The last thing I could remember was the strange building . I took out my phone and looked at the time . 2 : 28 AM . I used the glow of my phone as a flashlight , illuminating only a few feet in front of me . The only thought in my head was get the fuck out of here . I didn 't know how to get back . I was shivering . I touched my head , feeling a sharp pain . I shined the phone light on my hand and saw blood . I decided just to start walking . I couldn 't stay in one place . Every time I stopped I felt like I was being watched . Eventually I saw a light in the distance . I felt a tremendous feeling of relief . It was civilization . As I grew closer , the light grew brighter . Only one light . It certainly wasn 't downtown Albany . Maybe it was a farmhouse . Somewhere warm and safe . I began to run , cellphone outstretched . I felt a sinking feeling as the source of the light grew more apparent . It was the sheet metal building . The light was coming from the one window . Then it turned off . The only light coming from my cellphone . The woods were completely still . I was frozen in place . I didn 't want to make a sound . The one door began to open , and I heard a familiar voice . It was Bill . I walked in and following Bill . It was warm inside . The room was large and devoid of any furnishings . There were two flights of stairs , one going up and one going down . " Yes , exactly " , said Bill , " Our lab was downstairs . Everything down there has been broken for a long time though . " " How did I get here from the middle of a city ? " I asked . He walked took flight of stairs that led up . After a minute or two I walked over to those stairs . I could see Bill boiling water on a wood burning stove . I walked over to the other staircase . I shined my phone light down the stairs , revealing an old wooden staircase . I flicked a light switch , causing the room to fill with light . It was a laboratory , with many devices I didn 't know the purpose of . I nervously walked through it . On the other side of the lab was another door . I tried it , it opened without resistance . I flicked another switch and saw another lab , very similar to the first , but a little bigger . I noticed a banner on the far wall . It was old and faded , but I could still make out what it said . Happy New Year ' 85 . I noticed on one table was an old notebook . I picked it up and opened it . It was lab notes . I began to read . A lot of it I didn 't understand , but one section was relatively clear . It was a series journal entries by one of the scientists . I don 't have the notes , but I 'll try my best to summarize what I read . Early entries are calm and optimistic . Lots of technical stuff . They ate pizza one night . Then there are the next few entries , more spaces out . They are mostly talking about an issue with oscillators . The tone is wearier . Then there 's a three month gap . The next entry was the last , and I remember it clearly word for word . It said " We 're being watched , I know it . I hate that hole " . I didn 't know what exactly it meant , but all my nerve seemed to leave . I wanted to go back upstairs . But first , I would take some pictures of the journal . It would only take a second . I took the camera out of my camera bag and turned it on . On the screen were flashing words , " out of memory " . That was strange . To fill my memory card up you would need a ridiculous number of photos . It was barley 7 percent full when I 'd last looked . When did I last use the camera ? Before I blacked out . I heard faint footsteps from far away . My mind was now focused on this new peculiar problem . I began to scroll through my photos . Each picture had a number , the date it was taken , and its size on the screen around it . There was the picture of Bill 's old apartment building . There was Bill running over the hill . There was the metal building . There it was again , and again . How many pictures of it did I take . I must not have blacked out . I lost a portion of my memory . I Kept clicking through the pictures . I must have been taking them like mad . In the pictures , I walked back into the woods . There were ten or twenty of snow and trees . Then one of a man , Bill . He looked mad . I couldn 't remember any of this . I 'm guessing he was mad that I followed him . He calmed down in the next few pictures . We then showed up back at the metal building . I had no idea why we went back . Bill opened the door and we went in . " Coffee 's getting cold ! " The next few pictures were of the ground floor of the metal building . But it was filled with furniture . All of it looked like it had been falling apart for a long time . Where did it all go ? I felt a chill go up my spine . The next photos were of the first lab . I must have been trying to document every machine . Finally I got to a photo where Bill reached for the door to the second lab . The room I 'm in now . I must have gone through the same routine . Photographing everything . There was the banner . There were the lab notes . Then , one photo showed up that confused me . It was of another door . One I didn 't see anywhere in the room . The file size on this photo was 15 . 3 gigabytes . The file sizes were expanding with each image . The next was a look at the door from farther away . Then one of Bill opening the door , obviously straining himself . The screen on my camera labeled this photo as the fourth from the last . Three more . I pushed the button to see the next . It was Bill . He looked terrified . And then it hit me . This was the same photo I saw online four years ago . The background was too dark to make out what was in the third room . Whatever it was it was horrible , I could see it in his eyes . How could he be so calm after what he saw . How could he say everything was safe . My fingers shook , but I managed to move on to the next picture . It was a hole . Going deep deep down . The instant the light from the photo hit my eyes I felt a horrible feeling . I knew something was out there . Watching me . I felt it . I felt watched from every angle . I quickly pushed the button , I could 't stand looking at that picture for another second . The camera started loading the last picture . What flashed onto the screen shocked me more than anything in my life . Bill 's dead body , lying next to the whole . He was covered from head to toe in scratches and wounds . A pool of blood had formed around him , dripping down into the hole . The same expression from the previous photo locked on his pale dead face . I almost threw up . I pulled the batteries out of the camera . I felt too week to move . Then another thought came to mind . If Bill Benson was dead , who was it I had been taking to the last few hours . Who was it whose footsteps were coming from the second lab . I felt the watching return . There was nowhere I could hide . I heard the footsteps grow louder . Bill , whatever thing was impersonating him was standing in the doorway . I could see through the disguise . The form I once saw as Bill was composed of grey wisps and tendrils , somehow forming one creature . Now I could see what was watching me . More and more of them Became clear . They moved in on me from all directions . They seemed formed themselves into millions of arms each grabbing me . I struggled with all my might , but I was helpless . They felt cold and horrible . Then they started to pull me across the room . I managed to get one glimpse of where they were pulling me , an open door . They were pulling me towards that hole . I struggles as they dragged me through the small doorway , past Bill 's body , closer and closer . Then they stopped . I don 't know how long I was held there . All I know is eventually I passed out from exhaustion . I woke up in a field . I was alive . I still felt watched , but I was alive . Today , I 'm back to living my life , the best that I can . They spared me . I don 't know why . Now I 'm under a sort of house arrest if you will . I 'm somewhere where I can 't make trouble . I 've been here three years . It 's now 2013 . I have a job , an apartment . They 're always there in the corner of my eye . Watching me . Every day . I haven 't told anyone . I don 't know why they do different things to different people . Some they watch , some they kill , and to some they do much worse . I 've now concluded that the The Farnsworth experiment sought to find a means of time travel by drilling through another reality . But nobody considered what inhabitants it might have . I 'll end with a brief statement to the people who were in my old life . My name is Robert Lawrence Bowen . I was born in 2084 . I 'm 29 years old . Dad , if you 're reading this , take your own advice . Kate , don 't come for me . That also goes for everyone back in Florida . By the time any of you read this I 'll be dead . Don 't try to save me . Don 't try to change the past , they won 't let you . The Farnsworth experiments have had many victims , don 't let yourself become one . You may have heard of the Farnsworth experiments . My dad was one of the scientists involved . He rarely talked about it , and when he did he always said the rumors were overplayed . The team tried and failed , nothing more to it . He seemed to get annoyed at me asking him about it . When I kept it up , he eventually told me a brief account of what happened . It was the mid 80s and he was living in Albany , New York , pursuing his phD . This was a year or two after I was born . He began work on a government funded research project . The experiments were to be done under absolute secrecy . The goal was to test a 15 year old hypothesis that previous to this point seemed untestable . If it were true , then time travel was possible . They spent nearly a year working on the project , known only by it 's codename Farnsworth . They tried and tried , but found nothing . Then the project ended . There were no deaths or disappearances . There were no strange events around the region . The reason the government denied the project 's existence was purely embarrassment over funding something that in hindsight seemed so ridiculous . It felt good to know the truth . Whenever I heard someone retelling the story , I wished I could tell the real version , but I promised dad I wouldn 't , for the sake of his career . For the next few years , I didn 't really think about it . It was one little story , among many , sitting in the back of my mind . I went off to college , lived life , and never gave it a second thought . A few months after I graduated , I drove up to Boston for Thanksgiving of ' 06 . Dad still lived in the same house that we lived in since I was maybe 10 . Thanksgiving this year was smaller than years before . I was just me , dad , and my older sister Kate . It was a normal thanksgiving meal . Peas were in short supply , but I never much liked them anyway . Looking around the table , I felt deja vu . We all sat in our usual chairs , clustered around the part of the table not covered in papers and screens filled with incomprehensible equations . It nice to be back . Just when the meal was drawing to a close , there was a knock on the front door . I went to go open it . It was a man , maybe 60 years old . He looked very worn out . His grayish hair was a mess . He was unshaven . My dad came over and said , They walked away quickly . Kate and I waited for them to come back , very curious about what was going on . She seemed to remember him , just barley , from back in Albany . She must have been around four or five at the time . We kept looking down the hall to dad 's office , the door remained shut . No words possible to make out . After what felt like half an hour , Kate said , She led me upstairs to her old bedroom , situated right above dad 's office . She motioned to be quiet and pointed to a vent in the corner of the room . From it we could hear the muffled conversation . They were speaking in jargon . I heard a lot about oscillations . After maybe two to three minutes , I heard Bill Benson shout , I got up from the floor quickly , hitting my head on a shelf with a loud thud . I heard the conversation stop . As me and Kate walked as quietly out of the room as we could , we heard footsteps downstairs . As we descended the old wooden flight of stairs , dad walked into view . He told us to sit down at the table . We went back to the dining room . Bill Benson sat too , taking some old notebooks off the seat of his chair and putting them on top of the cluttered side of the table . Dad took a deep breath and started to speak , " You know how I 've said I worked on the Farnsworth experiments when you both were really little . When I told you we failed , that was a lie . It worked , better than anyone could have expected . But there was a problem . A big problem . And now we don 't talk about it , we think about it as little as we can , and we never go back . That 's why we moved away from Albany . Now Bill 's problem is he went back . He shouldn 't have . We can 't get ourselves back involved . " " For your own good , don 't try any detective work . Live like I live , live like nothing ever happened . Those of us who ignore the past are fine . Now we are going to eat dessert like nothing happened . And we 're going to forget , OK ? " " I can 't just leave it like this , I tried for years . We have to find the ones they took . Emily might be out there , don 't you want to find her . " He got up and walked through the adjoining living room and out the door , into the light snow . Dad took a deep breath and didn 't speak for maybe a minute . The he spoke , A few weeks later , after I had gotten over the shock of that night , I did some research on Bill Benson . At first I couldn 't find anything referencing him from within the past ten years . I found an old webpage for a university that listed a William C . Benson as a professor . The photo was definitely him . I ran the photo of him through face recognition and found two matches . The first was old . In it were five people , some in lab coats . Benson was on the left , looking much younger . His hair was neat . He was wearing street clothes , also neat . On the right were two women I didn 't recognize . They were the oldest of the group . In the middle were my parents . Dad , who looked nearly the same as after all those years , and mom , who I only remember from pictures . Above them was a banner saying Happy New Year ' 85 . The photo was taken a few months after I was born . I saved it . I then opened the second match . This picture of Benson must have been more recent . He looked like he had on thanksgiving , but older . His hair was grayer and longer . The photo had been taken in the dark with a flash , making the background hard to make out . The thing that struck me most about that picture was the look of absolute terror on his face . I closed the photo quickly . I saved it too . I then noticed that they came from the same source . It was a blog with the two photos as the only posts . There were no dates posted on posts . Whoever made the blog must have disabled them from showing . As the weeks and months went by , I tried to forget all that had happened . Whenever I did think about it , I found myself filled with an equal mix of fear and curiosity . Forgetting over time became easier . I got a job in Tampa Florida . I was in and out of two relationships . Kate was living in New Jersey , working on her residency at big hospital . We never talked about it . I assumed she was trying to forget too . Dad never said anything about it . He was completely normal . I took up photography as a hobby , and was becoming pretty good . Four years after I met Benson , the family got back together for thanksgiving . I flew up from Florida to participate . This time there were more people . My aunt and uncle , a cousin , and Kate 's fiancee all showed up . It felt strange entering that old house . The memories flooded back to me . I was the last to arrive . The large dining room table was cleared of the clutter that had filed much of it in the past . I realized I was later than I thought , as thanksgiving dinner was nearly underway . I sat on the last untaken chair , the same chair Bill Benson had sat on . Any anxiety I felt began to fade after a few minutes . It was nice . I was with family . Dad was chatting about the goings on at MIT , his research , who was getting tenure . The usual things . I occasionally thought I heard some nervousness in his voice , but it was too subtle to really tell . We ate pumpkin pie . The next day I returned to florida . I felt relieved to step back into the warm Florida air . Two months later I got a call from Kate . Dad had disappeared . He hadn 't been coming into work . He wasn 't at his house . His car was in his driveway . There was a search for him . I flew out immediately . They combed the area . They scoured databases , but even with his name , face , thumbprint , and retina , they found nothing . After a month , they stopped looking . He was presumed dead . I wanted to tell the police everything I knew , but they wouldn 't believe me . Calling the Farnsworth experiments into it would be like blaming his disappearance on a UFO or the Bermuda triangle . I did tell them about Bill Benson . I said that if he was alive and anyone knew where he was , Benson would . I told them he was a professor at a local college around 15 years ago , but I didn 't remember which one . They quickly found it , Bridgewater State University . He taught physics and math there for ten years , before resigning . It was clear he hadn 't had any professorships after that . He 'd complete dropped off of everyone 's radar . The one piece of information they could find about him was an apartment he had rented five years ago . It was in Albany New York . They couldn 't get any other information . To them , Bill Benson was a dead end . I knew dad was alive . He must have decided to go back , just like Bill . I had to find my dad and try to pull him out of whatever he was putting himself into . On February 16 , I decided to find Benson myself . In early morning I packed up my luggage and checked out of my Boston hotel . I scraped the ice off the windshield of my rental car and set off towards Albany . I didn 't tell anyone where I was going . The drive was a little under three hours . When I got there I checked into another hotel . I used a fake name . I don 't know why I did it , it just felt like the right thing to do . Later , I made my way to his old apartment , bringing my camera with me . After a short drive I found the building . I parked and walked in . I made my way to the main office and walked in . " You could talk to his old next door neighbors . He lived in apartment 108 , the people in 107 still live there . I hope they find your father . " I thanked her and left . After a quick look around I realized 100s were the basement . I walked down a short flight of stairs and into a long hallway . 107 was easy to find . I knocked on the door . The residents were a couple in their early 30s . A man and a woman named Kimberly and Al . I talked to them for a few minutes . They saw Benson as a bit of nut . They barley talked to him besides greetings in the hallway . As I was about to leave , Kimberly seemed to remember something and told me to wait . She ran into the apartment and came out a minute later with a small taped shut cardboard box . I thanked them both and returned to my car , ripping through the tape key . In it was a ridiculously old looking cell phone , a photograph , and a few pieces paper . I looked at the photograph first . I knew that photo . It was the New Years day photo . The exact same photo I had seen on the internet four years previously . Memories came flooding back . I thought of the day Bill Benson came to thanksgiving dinner , and what he had said . I took a deep breath . I looked at the papers . Sheet after sheet of random notes and equations . I then flipped open the cell phone . It turned on . I opened the list of contact , only one was listed . It was cell phone number under the name " call " . I did . It rang , once , twice , three times , then I heard a voice . The call cut off . I knew it was Bill Benson . I remember his voice clearly . I put the contents of the box in my camera bag and the made my way by foot to the park . After a bit of walking , I saw a fountain in the distance . Snow lightly fell . As I got closer to the fountain I realized it was off , presumably for the winter . I brushed the snow off a bench and sat down waiting . After about 10 minutes , I saw someone walking towards me out of storm . It was him . Bill Benson sat down . He looked older than when I last saw him . His hair was completely gray . It looked like he hadn 't cut it for a while . He finally said , " I don 't want to get you involved . I 'm sorry I brought you into this , and I 'm sorry I brought your John back into it . He was the only one of us who made a clean break . " And with that he left , running away without another word . I snapped a picture of him as he disappeared over a hill . I looked to the ground and saw his footprints in the snow . I started following them before they were filled in . It felt like I had been following those footprints for an hour . They just kept going . Faint , but not quite filled in . I finally stopped to catch my breath . I was thinking Bill Benson must be keeping in great shape . He , in his 60s , was easily outpacing me , a 26 year old . Then a more unnerving thought came to mind . Washington park was less than half a square mile large . But I had been going straight for what must have been well over a mile . I wasn 't going in circles , was I ? I also hadn 't seen the road in a long time . I began to look around . I was in the middle of a snowy wilderness . I was just in a city . How could I be here . The snow was starting to get pretty light . I pulled out my cell phone , no reception . Bill 's cell phone , no reception . I looked at the footprints . They were almost gone , but not quite . I kept going for maybe 20 more minutes until I found where they were going to . They stopped at an old building made of sheet metal . It looked to be two stories . It had one window and one door . That building gave me the creeps . I pulled out my camera and snapped a picture of it . I walked the perimeter , but saw no other ways in . My head hurt like crazy . It was dark . Night . What the fuck just happened . Night . I was lying in the snow . I tried to think back . The last thing I could remember was the strange building . I took out my phone and looked at the time . 2 : 28 AM . I used the glow of my phone as a flashlight , illuminating only a few feet in front of me . The only thought in my head was get the fuck out of here . I didn 't know how to get back . I was shivering . I touched my head , feeling a sharp pain . I shined the phone light on my hand and saw blood . I decided just to start walking . I couldn 't stay in one place . Every time I stopped I felt like I was being watched . Eventually I saw a light in the distance . I felt a tremendous feeling of relief . It was civilization . As I grew closer , the light grew brighter . Only one light . It certainly wasn 't downtown Albany . Maybe it was a farmhouse . Somewhere warm and safe . I began to run , cellphone outstretched . I felt a sinking feeling as the source of the light grew more apparent . It was the sheet metal building . The light was coming from the one window . Then it turned off . The only light coming from my cellphone . The woods were completely still . I was frozen in place . I didn 't want to make a sound . The one door began to open , and I heard a familiar voice . It was Bill . I walked in and following Bill . It was warm inside . The room was large and devoid of any furnishings . There were two flights of stairs , one going up and one going down . " Yes , exactly " , said Bill , " Our lab was downstairs . Everything down there has been broken for a long time though . " " How did I get here from the middle of a city ? " I asked . He walked took flight of stairs that led up . After a minute or two I walked over to those stairs . I could see Bill boiling water on a wood burning stove . I walked over to the other staircase . I shined my phone light down the stairs , revealing an old wooden staircase . I flicked a light switch , causing the room to fill with light . It was a laboratory , with many devices I didn 't know the purpose of . I nervously walked through it . On the other side of the lab was another door . I tried it , it opened without resistance . I flicked another switch and saw another lab , very similar to the first , but a little bigger . I noticed a banner on the far wall . It was old and faded , but I could still make out what it said . Happy New Year ' 85 . I noticed on one table was an old notebook . I picked it up and opened it . It was lab notes . I began to read . A lot of it I didn 't understand , but one section was relatively clear . It was a series journal entries by one of the scientists . I don 't have the notes , but I 'll try my best to summarize what I read . Early entries are calm and optimistic . Lots of technical stuff . They ate pizza one night . Then there are the next few entries , more spaces out . They are mostly talking about an issue with oscillators . The tone is wearier . Then there 's a three month gap . The next entry was the last , and I remember it clearly word for word . It said " We 're being watched , I know it . I hate that hole " . I didn 't know what exactly it meant , but all my nerve seemed to leave . I wanted to go back upstairs . But first , I would take some pictures of the journal . It would only take a second . I took the camera out of my camera bag and turned it on . On the screen were flashing words , " out of memory " . That was strange . To fill my memory card up you would need a ridiculous number of photos . It was barley 7 percent full when I 'd last looked . When did I last use the camera ? Before I blacked out . I heard faint footsteps from far away . My mind was now focused on this new peculiar problem . I began to scroll through my photos . Each picture had a number , the date it was taken , and its size on the screen around it . There was the picture of Bill 's old apartment building . There was Bill running over the hill . There was the metal building . There it was again , and again . How many pictures of it did I take . I must not have blacked out . I lost a portion of my memory . I Kept clicking through the pictures . I must have been taking them like mad . In the pictures , I walked back into the woods . There were ten or twenty of snow and trees . Then one of a man , Bill . He looked mad . I couldn 't remember any of this . I 'm guessing he was mad that I followed him . He calmed down in the next few pictures . We then showed up back at the metal building . I had no idea why we went back . Bill opened the door and we went in . " Coffee 's getting cold ! " The next few pictures were of the ground floor of the metal building . But it was filled with furniture . All of it looked like it had been falling apart for a long time . Where did it all go ? I felt a chill go up my spine . The next photos were of the first lab . I must have been trying to document every machine . Finally I got to a photo where Bill reached for the door to the second lab . The room I 'm in now . I must have gone through the same routine . Photographing everything . There was the banner . There were the lab notes . Then , one photo showed up that confused me . It was of another door . One I didn 't see anywhere in the room . The file size on this photo was 15 . 3 gigabytes . The file sizes were expanding with each image . The next was a look at the door from farther away . Then one of Bill opening the door , obviously straining himself . The screen on my camera labeled this photo as the fourth from the last . Three more . I pushed the button to see the next . It was Bill . He looked terrified . And then it hit me . This was the same photo I saw online four years ago . The background was too dark to make out what was in the third room . Whatever it was it was horrible , I could see it in his eyes . How could he be so calm after what he saw . How could he say everything was safe . My fingers shook , but I managed to move on to the next picture . It was a hole . Going deep deep down . The instant the light from the photo hit my eyes I felt a horrible feeling . I knew something was out there . Watching me . I felt it . I felt watched from every angle . I quickly pushed the button , I could 't stand looking at that picture for another second . The camera started loading the last picture . What flashed onto the screen shocked me more than anything in my life . Bill 's dead body , lying next to the whole . He was covered from head to toe in scratches and wounds . A pool of blood had formed around him , dripping down into the hole . The same expression from the previous photo locked on his pale dead face . I almost threw up . I pulled the batteries out of the camera . I felt too week to move . Then another thought came to mind . If Bill Benson was dead , who was it I had been taking to the last few hours . Who was it whose footsteps were coming from the second lab . I felt the watching return . There was nowhere I could hide . I heard the footsteps grow louder . Bill , whatever thing was impersonating him was standing in the doorway . I could see through the disguise . The form I once saw as Bill was composed of grey wisps and tendrils , somehow forming one creature . Now I could see what was watching me . More and more of them Became clear . They moved in on me from all directions . They seemed formed themselves into millions of arms each grabbing me . I struggled with all my might , but I was helpless . They felt cold and horrible . Then they started to pull me across the room . I managed to get one glimpse of where they were pulling me , an open door . They were pulling me towards that hole . I struggles as they dragged me through the small doorway , past Bill 's body , closer and closer . Then they stopped . I don 't know how long I was held there . All I know is eventually I passed out from exhaustion . I woke up in a field . I was alive . I still felt watched , but I was alive . Today , I 'm back to living my life , the best that I can . They spared me . I don 't know why . Now I 'm under a sort of house arrest if you will . I 'm somewhere where I can 't make trouble . I 've been here three years . It 's now 2013 . I have a job , an apartment . They 're always there in the corner of my eye . Watching me . Every day . I haven 't told anyone . I don 't know why they do different things to different people . Some they watch , some they kill , and to some they do much worse . I 've now concluded that the The Farnsworth experiment sought to find a means of time travel by drilling through another reality . But nobody considered what inhabitants it might have . I 'll end with a brief statement to the people who were in my old life . My name is Robert Lawrence Bowen . I was born in 2084 . I 'm 29 years old . Dad , if you 're reading this , take your own advice . Kate , don 't come for me . That also goes for everyone back in Florida . By the time any of you read this I 'll be dead . Don 't try to save me . Don 't try to change the past , they won 't let you . The Farnsworth experiments have had many victims , don 't let yourself become one .