From the day they brought their baby boy home, a black dog named Mụk suddenly became the constant guardian of the bedroom. At first, Sơn and his wife thought it was a good sign: the dog was protecting the baby, guarding the door. But after just three nights, their peace was shattered.
On the fourth night, at exactly 2:13 a.m., Mụk stood stiffly on all fours, his fur like needles, howling in the crib next to the bed. He didn’t bark or bark—just growl, long, cracked sounds, as if something was muffling his voice from the shadows.
Sơn turned on the light and went to calm him down. The baby slept peacefully, lips quivering as if he was nursing, not crying. Under the bed, Mico’s eyes were fixed on the bed. He bent down, stretched, pushed his nose into the dusty dark space, and snored. Sơn knelt down, used his phone’s flashlight, and saw only a few boxes, spare diapers, and a thick shadow pooling like a bottomless pit.
On the fifth night, the same thing happened at 2:13 p.m. On the sixth, Sơn’s wife, Hân, was startled to hear a scratching sound—slow, deliberate—like nails pulling on wood. “Maybe it’s mice,” she said, her voice trembling. Sơn moved the crib closer to the closet and set a trap in the corner. Mụk, however, stared at the bedframe, letting out short groans whenever the baby moved.
By the seventh night, Sơn had decided not to sleep. He sat on the edge of the bed with the light off, and only the hallway light was left, casting a golden glow across the room. His cellphone was set to record.
1:58 a.m., a breeze hit the half-closed window, bringing in the damp smell of the garden.
2:10, the house seemed empty, dried out.
2:13 And Mụk jumped up—not growling right away, but looking at Sơn, pressing his nose to his hand, and urging him on with his eyes. Then he crawled down, as if stalking, and pointed his muzzle under the bed. His growl exploded—deep, pointed out—blocking something from crawling out.
Sơn raised his cellphone’s flashlight. In that brief flash, he saw movement. Not a rat. A hand—pale green, streaked with dirt—curled like a spider. The beam flickered as his hand shook. Sơn turned, and hit the cupboard. Anne stood up, asking in fear. The baby was still sleeping, and milk was wet on his lips.
Sơn snatched his son, rescued him behind his back, and picked up an old baseball bat. Mụk lunged under the bed, his growls turning into angry barks, claws scraping. From the darkness came an icy scraping sound—then silence. The lights flickered. Something retreated inside, long and fast, leaving a trail of black dust.
Hân sobbed, and she urged him to call the police. Sơn’s hands were shaking. Ten minutes later the two officers arrived. One was bent over, shining his flashlight as he moved the boxes to one side. Mụk blocked the crib, baring his teeth. “Just relax,” the officer said with a smile. “Let me check…” The bottom of the bed was empty. Only churned dust, claw marks snaking across the floorboards.
The officer’s light stopped at a crack in the wall near the headboard: the wood had been cut just enough for one hand to reach. He tapped—as if it were pointless. “There’s a cavity. Has this house been renovated?”
Sơn shook his head. After a while the child began to whimper. Mụk’s eyes lit up; he leaned his head closer to the crack in the wall and whimpered. From the darkness, a whisper emerged—raspy, human-like: “Shhh… Don’t wake him…”
No one in the house fell asleep after that whisper.
The younger officer, Dũng, called for backup. While he waited, he removed the wooden skirting at the base of the wall. Strangely, the nails were new, shiny against the old, weathered wood. “Someone tampered with it a month or two ago,” he said. Sơn’s throat went dry. He had bought the house from an elderly couple three months ago. They said they had only painted the living room and fixed the roof, not the bedroom.
Using a crowbar, Dũng removed the wood. Behind it was a hollow cavity, black as the throat of a cave. The damp smell mixed with another: spoiled milk and talcum powder. Mục pulled Sơn back, moaning. Hân held the baby, her heart pounding. Dũng explained his light inside.
“Is anyone there?” Silence. But when the beam crossed, they saw it all: small baby items—a pacifier, a plastic spoon, a scrunched-up cloth—and dozens of tally marks scratched into the wood, like a web.
When the backup team arrived, they inserted a small camera and unhooked a dirty bundle of cloth. Inside was a thick, worn notebook with shaky, feminine handwriting:
“Day 1: It sleeps here. I can hear it breathing.”
Day 7: The dog knows. It watches, but it doesn’t bite.”
Day 19: I need to be quiet. I just want to touch its cheek, hear its cry closer. Don’t wake anyone.”
The entries were short, frantic, as if written in the darkness.
“Who lived here before?” an officer asked. Sơn vaguely remembered—three months earlier, during a delivery, an elderly couple had been accompanied by a young woman. She had her head down, her hair covering half of her face. The old woman said: “She was upset, not talking much.” Back then, they still hadn’t noticed.
The camera revealed more: the cavity ran along the wall, forming a narrow hidden tunnel. In one place was a makeshift nest—thin blankets, pillowcases, empty milk cans. On the floor, a new scrawl: “Day 27: 2:13. Breathing strongest.”
2:13—The baby’s nighttime feeding time. Somehow, their child’s activities were being monitored—from within the walls.
“It’s not a ghost,” Dũng said sadly. “It’s a person.” Upon further investigation, they found broken window latches and dirty footprints on the roof behind. People had been coming in and out until recently.
At dawn, Dũng advised: “Lock the room tonight. Leave the dog inside with one of us. Let’s see if he comes back.”
That night, at around 2:13 a.m., the cloth covering the crack in the wall was pulled back. A thin hand appeared, stained with dirt. A sad face followed—sunken eyes, curly hair, chapped lips. But what struck them most was her gaze fixed on the crib, like a thirsty human figure.
She whispered again: “Shhh… Don’t wake her… I just want to look…”
It was the girl—Vy, the niece of the previous owners of the house. She lost her baby late in the pregnancy, fell into a deep depression, and somehow managed to return to this house. For almost a month, she lived in the walls, clinging to the sound of a child’s breathing as her only link to reality.
The officers gently coaxed her out. Before leaving, Vy looked back at the crib and whispered: “Shhh…”
Afterwards, the gaps were sealed and the new flooring was installed. Sơn and Hân installed cameras, but the real caretaker remained Mục. She stopped moaning at 2:13. She just lay next to the crib, sometimes snoring softly as if to say: I’m here.A month later, at the hospital for vaccinations, Hân saw Vy outside—clean, her hair neatly tied, holding a cloth doll, smiling faintly as she talked to Officer Dũng. Hân didn’t come closer. She just pressed her cheek against her baby, grateful for the sound of her steady breathing, and for the dog feeling what no one else dared to face: sometimes the monsters under the bed weren’t evil, but just sadness with nowhere else to go.