The Pit

In a distant land there was a small peaceful town nestled into a vibrant valley. This seemed like a perfect place almost like a piece of heaven, except that there was a dark secret hidden within this picture perfect town. There was a pit hidden within a clump of trees and while the trees looked friendly and peaceful, the pit they hid was far from peaceful. There were many rumors about the origins of the pit. Some folks thought it was an old mine, others thought it was the result of some kind of sink hole or earthquake, but regardless of the theories, nobody dared go near it. It was said that it was a bottomless pit and if someone was to fall into they would never be seen again. If the idea of a bottomless pit wasn't bad enough, every year around Halloween strange sounds would be heard near the pit and a strange glowing in the clump of trees could be seen. The towns folks dreaded this time of year because not only were they scared of the pit itself but they had to listen to the howls and screeches coming from it and the eerie glow didn't help matters much either.

As Halloween approached the noises and glowing began as always, and the folks in the picture perfect town were beginning to get nervous. If things couldn't get any worse, a band of strangers had arrived they called themselves the shadow people. Nobody in town knew who these people were or what they wanted, just that they seemed to sleep during the day and only be seen at night. The shadow people seemed to be drawn to the area around the pit. They lit torches to create a path leading to their camp site; they placed jack-o-lanterns every 15 feet around the perimeter of the site and then placed a skull between each jack-o-lantern. The folks in town began to fear these shadow people, and so against every fear they had about the pit, they sent a group to the site where the shadow people were camping near the pit.

As the group approached, fear gripped their minds and every hair on their bodies stood on end. They got to the site of the shadow people where they were greeted with open arms and invited to join them in their yearly celebration of the pit. As the folks cautiously agreed to join the shadow people, they learned that the pit they feared for so long and the noises they heard along with the glowing was nothing more than the shadow people paying homage to their ancestors who had been buried in the pit. The town folk never knew it was a burial site, and while this was a little creepy in itself, it seemed to make sense to the folks somehow. The glowing was a fire set each year as part of the celebration, the howling and other creepy noises turned out where the shadow people singing the songs of their past which from a distance could have been mistaken as howling. On the morning of Halloween the shadow people toss the skulls and jack-o-lanterns into the pit the skulls are of those who have passed away since their last trip to the pit and the jack-o-lanterns were added so that the ancestors who had passed before would see that the new arrivals meant no harm. The story of the pit being bottomless was started many generations ago in order to keep people from disturbing the remains of the shadow people's ancestors. The shadow people also explained that they meant no harm to the folks in town and would welcome them to their celebration of life.

From that time forth, the folks in town no longer feared the pit but revered it as they would their own graveyard. Yes the stories still were heard about howling in the night but these stories were more to keep kids from playing there. Though there are those in town that swear they have seen misty figures coming from the pit and other haunted tales they think may have some truth, but the pit is no longer a mystery yet it does carry some interesting tall tales. Next time you come across a pit that seems bottomless and rumors are to be heard about strange things happening near it, it could be that the shadow people have yet another burial pit and are continuing their celebration of life.