MidReal Story
Buried Alive: Frantic Texts, Desperate Rescue
Scenario: Creepy 1 minute story
Create my version of this story
Johnathan Ellis
the man in the coffin, brother to Sarah and son to Michael and Linda, pale with dark circles, confused and terrified.
Sarah Ellis
sister to Johnathan, daughter to Michael and Linda, long blonde hair, worried and resourceful.
Michael Ellis
father to Johnathan and Sarah, husband to Linda, short gray hair, pragmatic and protective.
I woke up in a coffin.
I know what you’re thinking: “That’s impossible.”
But it’s not.
I was in a coffin, buried underground, and I had no idea how I got there.
The last thing I remember was going to bed in my apartment.
I had a few drinks, watched some TV, and then went to bed.
And now I was in a coffin.
I tried to sit up, but my head hit the lid of the coffin.
I reached out my hands and felt the smooth wood around me.
It was dark, but I could see a little bit of light coming from above me.
I was buried underground, six feet under at least, and I had no idea how I got there.
My heart started racing and I tried to take deep breaths to calm myself down.
But it didn’t work.
I started hyperventilating and my chest felt like it was going to explode.
I tried to push the lid of the coffin off, but it wouldn’t budge.
I tried to scream, but my voice was muffled.
I pounded on the lid of the coffin with my fists, but it didn’t help.
There was no one around to hear me.
I was alone, buried alive, and there was nothing I could do about it.
The fear that gripped me was like nothing I’d ever felt before.
It wasn’t like the fear you feel when you’re watching a scary movie, or the fear you feel when you think someone is following you down a dark alley.
It was a primal fear – a fight or flight kind of fear that makes your heart race and your breath quicken.
As I struggled to breathe, I realized that there wasn’t a lot of air in the coffin.
It was already getting hard to breathe and I was starting to feel lightheaded.
I needed to calm myself down or I was going to pass out and die in here.
I tried to tell myself that there was a rational explanation for what was happening.
Maybe it was all just a dream.
Or maybe I was on a hidden camera show and someone was going to dig me up in a few minutes and tell me it was all just a joke.
But as the air got thinner and thinner, my panic only increased.
And then, as if on cue, I heard it: footsteps.
Someone was walking above me.
My heart leaped into my throat and I screamed for help.
The footsteps stopped and I heard muffled voices above me.
“Did you hear that?Someone is down there!”
“Quick, help me get this coffin open!”
I pushed against the lid of the coffin as hard as I could and it moved an inch or two.
Adrenaline surged through my veins and I pushed even harder, but it didn’t budge.
They were trying to get me out, but they couldn’t.
They weren’t strong enough.
I screamed for help again, but no one answered.
My energy drained away and I fell back onto the bottom of the coffin.
I started to cry.
Tears streamed down my face as I realized that no one was coming.
There were people up there, but they couldn’t hear me.
They were walking away – leaving me here to die – and there was nothing I could do about it.
I screamed until my throat hurt.
I pounded on the lid until my fists were raw.
I thrashed against the walls of the coffin until my body ached all over.
But it was no use.
No one could hear me and there was no way out.
Panic was setting in.
I could feel it creeping through me like a slow tide, dragging me under with its icy grip.
It was only a matter of time before it consumed me entirely.
I moved around in the coffin, trying to get comfortable.
There wasn’t much space and the soil above me was pressing down on the lid of the coffin, making it hard to move.
But I didn’t have much else to do.
I pulled at the sides of the coffin, trying to get some leverage so I could push the lid open again.
It moved an inch or two, but no more.
I pushed against it with all my strength, but it wouldn’t budge.
It was sealed shut, trapping me inside.
I fell back again and closed my eyes.
My hands shook with fear and I could feel tears running down my cheeks.
My heart was pounding in my chest like a jackhammer, each beat sending shockwaves of fear through me.
I was going to die in here.
My heart raced faster and faster, and my breaths came in short, ragged gasps.
I couldn’t control it anymore.
Panic had taken over completely and there was no way to stop it now that it had started.
I opened my eyes again and looked around the coffin for anything that might help me escape.
And that’s when I remembered my phone.
I had put it in the pocket of my jeans before I went to bed last night.
It was still there – if I could just reach it, maybe I could call for help.
I fumbled for the phone with shaking hands and pulled it out of my pocket.
The screen lit up as I pressed the power button and for a moment the dim light was blinding.
I blinked until my eyes adjusted and then I looked at the screen.
There were dozens of missed calls and messages from my family: my mom, my dad, and my sister Sarah.
The messages started off normal – “Where are you?” “Are you okay?”
– but then got more frantic: “Johnathan, please answer!”
“We’re tracking your phone’s GPS signal!”
And then they took on a tone of pure panic: “Please don’t be dead!”
I could feel fresh tears welling up in my eyes as I read the messages.
I wasn’t sure what was going on, but I knew that I was in serious trouble.
They still thought I was missing.
They didn’t know that I was buried alive – that they were never going to see me again.
I was going to die in this coffin, and there was nothing they could do about it.
I started to type out a message back to them, but then I stopped.
What was the point?
I was six feet under the ground.
No one would ever find me here.
My fingers hovered over the screen for a moment before I turned the phone off.
The battery was already low, and I didn’t want to use up the last of my air.
Besides, what good would it do me now?
I put the phone back in my pocket and closed my eyes again.
I took a few deep breaths, trying to slow my racing heart for just a moment.
But it was no use.
I was buried alive.
I tried to remember what had happened last night, but everything was hazy.
Had I been out drinking with friends?
Had I been on a date?
Maybe someone had spiked my drink or something…
But no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t pull any memories from the darkness of my mind.
The last thing I could remember was going home, getting ready for bed, climbing under the covers with a book, and then…
And then I woke up here, in this coffin.
My mind was blank – there were no answers, just endless questions.
Questions that would never be answered because I was going to die here, alone in the dark.
I took another deep breath, but this time I could feel the air thinning in my lungs.
Suddenly, there wasn’t enough of it, and I gasped for more.
A spike of panic shot through me at the thought of running out of air altogether.
If I breathed too fast, would it make the air run out faster?
Or did breathing slower make it last longer?
I wasn’t sure which was right.
I just knew that I had to be very, very careful about how I breathed right now.
I tried to take a few more deep breaths, but the walls of the coffin were pressing in on me and making it hard to breathe at all.
My chest tightened and I swallowed back a fresh wave of panic.
There was no way I could hold my breath long enough to survive this.
But if I started freaking out and hyperventilating, I would use up all my air too quickly and die even sooner.
I closed my eyes and tried to relax.
There was still some air left in the coffin with me – I could feel the pressure changing as I breathed in and out.
I just had to be careful about how I used it.
I couldn’t waste any of it on pointless screaming or pounding on the lid.
It wasn’t much, but if I was smart about this, maybe there would be enough air left for another few hours.
The minutes ticked by slowly, each one bringing me closer and closer to death.
With every passing second the panic grew more and more intense.
It was so hard not to start screaming and pounding on the walls of the coffin.
But I knew that if I did that, I would use up all my air in a matter of seconds.
Instead, I focused on breathing very slowly and very carefully.
But it wasn’t working.
My mind was racing at a million miles an hour and there was no way to stop it now.
I was going to die.
I was going to suffocate to death down here and then my body would be rotting away and no one would ever know what happened to me.
And then the coffin would be filled in with soil and that would be it.
It would be over.
I wouldn’t make it out of this alive.
There was no way I could survive this.
But even though I knew that it was over and that I had lost this fight, I still couldn’t bring myself to give up.
Just keep breathing.
Just keep breathing…
The air in the coffin was getting thinner by the second and my lungs were burning with the effort of trying to breathe.
Just keep breathing…
Just keep breathing…
My hand brushed against something in the pocket of my jeans and my heart skipped a beat.
It took a moment before I remembered what it was – my phone!
My phone was in my pocket!
For a second I just lay there in the dark, my mind spinning.
Was it possible that this could be my way out?
Could I really get a signal down here?
Would someone answer if I called 911 or whatever the emergency services number was in my country…
Or would they just track my call and find me before it was too late?
The seconds ticked by and slowly the panic began to subside.
My fingers were shaking so badly that it took me three attempts to enter the passcode correctly.
And then suddenly the screen lit up and there was light in the darkness.
I squinted against the sudden brightness and tried to figure out where I was.
It wasn’t much – just a small sliver of light peeking into the coffin – but it was enough to illuminate my surroundings.
The walls were close enough that I could feel the soil pressing against my arms on either side.
The lid was just inches above my face, so close that I could almost touch it.
And the air, the thin, stale air that I had been struggling to breathe, was getting lower by the second.
The screen on my phone showed that the battery was at 5%.
If I was lucky, I had another 15 minutes or so before it died.
And then I would be completely alone in the dark.
I took a deep breath – there wasn’t much time left.
My hands were still shaking as I unlocked the phone and went into my messages.
There were several missed calls from Sarah, my sister, along with a string of texts.
They were short – just a few words each, but the panic in them was impossible to miss.
I could almost hear her voice in my head as I read them.
“Where are you?Please answer me.”
“Are you okay?Mom and Dad are freaking out.”
“I’m with Michael.We’re on our way back to your place now.”
“We’re tracking your phone from our car.It says you’re not at home?Are you okay?Where are you?”
“Please answer me.”
“Okay, we’re almost there.Hang in there, okay?We’ll find you soon.”
Now that I thought about it, I remembered that Sarah and Michael had gone out to dinner last night.
She must have been trying to call me because they were on their way home and I wasn’t answering the door.
And then I must have gone missing…
I felt a fresh wave of panic rising up in my chest and I had to take a few deep breaths to calm myself back down.
The screen on my phone lit up again and there were a few more messages from Mom and Dad.
“Your sister says you’re not answering your phone.Are you okay?”
“We’re on our way home now.Hang in there.”
“Your sister says she’s tracking your phone and that it’s not moving.
We’re almost home.Don’t worry, we’ll find you.”
