The Brumwicher Incident

To maintain the protection of those infected and those inquisitive souls who might wish to seek out the validity of the following document, the names of all people and places have been changed. We request that you do not attempt to investigate further.

From news reports at the time, it was said to have been the result of a freak storm several miles away shedding debris, however no such storm has yet to be reported. One Bromwicher resident claimed in the early hours of the event that “those religious fanatics what shout at folks going about their days with their signs” took it upon themselves to claim that it was “an act of god”, however there is no documentation to suggest which god it was they concluded was causing the act. Within the first two hours of the event (an unconfirmed source claimed continued efforts until the third continued day) scholars from two prominent universities nearby attempted to reach the town to conduct research, however each attempt proved to be unsuccessful.

Dr. A. Caimbuel of Aempleworth University of Agricultural and Biological Sciences, who was one of the first to attempt to reach Bromwicher reports: “It is not as if I was unfamiliar with the area, yet it was as if there was something trying to keep us away. Familiar roads wound in a way that I cannot recall seeing before or since that day.” Similar accounts were reported by a trucker who found himself turning one corner and straightening on what he insists was a completely different stretch of road.

The following is an account shared by Mr. Robert Aneswood, a lifelong resident of Bromwicher:

“We didn’t think nothing of it when it first started, y’know? I was out in the yard while my wife –“ (Mr. Aneswood required a moment to collect himself at the mention of his late wife) “-Sorry, it’s just all very… Anyhows, it was just any other Wednesday afternoon when it started. They was pretty little things too, bit bigger than the daisies we had popping up in the spring. I thoughts to myself it was a little odd, ‘cause it was nearing on winter so I couldn’t think of where they came from. There was only a couple of them at first, the little flowers drifting down from the sky. Mags’d always known more than I did when it came to flowers and all that, so I asked her about them, and she didn’t think they was too strange. Did say the – oh you know, that little yellow bit in the middle? – that bit was a bit too big for the size of the petals, but she didn’t think that was all that much of anything.

I figured they’d been caught by the wind or some such so we didn’t fuss too much about the flowers dropping in the yard like that. Wasn’t ‘til I went down to town, I had to pick up the Jones’ boy ‘cause his parents were caught out at the time, that I realized they was everywheres. I remember the year before, the year with the awful winter, the way streets looked when the snow built up, and it was looking just like that then.

I ran into Bill when he was out sweeping the front of the news agency, trying to keep a path open and all that.

“You ever seen nothing like it, Rob?” he says to me, “Been comin’ down all day too. Damned nuisance, it is!”

Of course, that was what it was at the time, wasn’t it? Just a bit of a bother at most. But it looked so pretty, coming down like that. Gods, if I knew then what I knew now, I’d’ve told those young ladies to stop playing with those damnedable things… But we didn’t know, did we? How could we? Oh, God! And now it’s too late, the sorry bastards are all dead! Dead and there was nothing any of us did to stop it!”

It was at this time that Mr. Aneswood found himself incapable of continuing to recount his experiences.

As he claimed, he was among the small group of survivors of the incident.

From information gathered from both fleeting firsthand observations and the few tests run following the event (all undertaken on-site as the flowers were reported to shrivel to a state of uselessness once they were removed from the vicinity) suggests that the initial ‘downpour’, as it has been dubbed, of the presently unidentified flower species lasted for a duration of three days. Upon the fourth day (some claims said mid-morning, while others claimed it was not until later in the afternoon, leading to an assumption that the time frames were dictated by the times the flowers had first landed) a rapid decomposition struck the flowers. It is suggested that this was a crucial step in the germination process as it allowed the seeds (proposed to be the cause of the peculiar shape of the gynoecium) to spread throughout Bromwicher. Presuming that germination commenced following the dispersion of the seeds, the growth of the resulting plants, considered alarming in its rapidity according to witnesses, took approximately one week for the plants to reach a uniform height.

The following account from Dr. Caimbuel, who graciously agreed to be a part of the investigative team despite her previous experiences in doing so, discusses the nature of the flowers in their maturity:

“I presume you would prefer my account to be delivered in Layman’s terms?” (There is a pause here as confirmation is given) “As I had previously mentioned, I was well acquainted with the area and so my first, thwarted, attempt to examine the phenomena had me rather thrown, so I can imagine you understand my hesitancy to agree to lead a team there once the few residents that were accounted for appeared in Prickleheath. Likewise, I can presume that you understand the scientific curiosity that ensured I could not refuse.

The journey this time was unaffected, which led me to wonder about the possibility of the pollen of the plants containing a sort of hallucinogen that altered the senses and special awareness, accounting for the attempts of those to reach Bromwicher ending in failure during the initial days of this incident. I reiterate my familiarity with the place not to try and stake some claim over the tragedy, but instead to establish my horror at the state the town was in by the time we arrived. That is to assume it could be considered a town at all by that stage. It was not a very large town, but it had been so thoroughly overridden that it was a wonder that there had been a town there at all. The flowers, which I have to assume was a previously unknown genus of Bellis perennis, at what I could only guess at – and indeed pray for – maturity had grown to a height more commonly seen with a red wood, the stems having reached at times a girth as wide as tea cup’s saucer. Had I not seen it myself, I would have thought it impossible for the flowers to grow to such a magnitude in such a short period of time. I admit, I was rather fascinated by it all, and collected several specimens to take back with me to the laboratory, specimens I regret to say accounted for nothing as they promptly withered and rotted away on the way back, but this fascination was quickly replaced with a healthy amount of horror and appreciation for the fact we had chosen to err on the side of caution and don appropriate protective gear. The destruction of the buildings was upsetting enough as it was, livelihoods torn to shreds by the sheer force of the growing plants, but then there were the bodies. Like the town, they had found themselves overridden by the flowers, little white blooms growing in a macabre cheerfulness from the corpses of those who lived and died in the village. Unlike their towering counterparts, these were quite small, so perhaps the growth of the plants was defined by the surface they grew from? I regret not being able to offer any conclusive answer in regards to that, but as I have said, the plants did not last long once harvested.

 I could not help a moment of morbid pondering, wondering if they had been alive when the plants took root in their body, and I found myself more than happy to leave this unanswered. I hoped my prior hypothesis of hallucinogenic pollen was true, if not for no reason other than it might have saved the poor souls some of the suffering of their final moments. It is not safe there. A team more prepared than we were at the time might be able to find more than we did, but seeing the way the flowers sprouted from the poor woman’s body… we could not stay there any longer.”

It was at this time that the doctor concluded her recount, explaining that she felt there was a necessity for further, more extensive studies to take place in the future in order to find a conclusive answer to all that she proposed from her brief venture into what was once Bromwicher.

Following Dr. Caimbuel’s brief examination of the site, there have been no more authorized expeditions into Bromwicher. The proposal of a potential hallucinogenic pollen that could evoke a sort of disorientation in anyone even briefly exposed to the substance then poses the question that, if true, what would come of a person when the exposure was prolonged over a notable period of time? Indeed, the residents who had survived underwent a rigorous physical assessment, but when there was so little known about the circumstances of the town, even the most well trained doctor could easily miss a vital sign they did not know there was any need to look for.

Now, it was said that there were no more authorized expeditions, which was quite true, but that does not eliminate the presence of unauthorized exploration of the site. It was from one of these very unauthorized investigations that there was credence given to the theory of a kind of hallucinogenic affect caused by the flowers both in their initial ‘downpour’ period and in their subsequent maturation stage. A recording was sent in from a source that chose to remain anonymous, the claim being that it was found on an old recording device in one of the houses in Bromwicher.

This recording ran as follows:

“Oh, oh God! I don’t know if anyone will hear this - I don’t want anyone to hear it, that means someone’s –“ (The man paused, breathing heavily through what was assumed to be sobs) “-If anyone is listening, you need to stay away, for God’s sake you need to leave us! It’s been… what? A week and they’re all dead! I haven’t seen anyone in days, the flowers… Oh! There’s so many of them, I can barely breathe!” (The force of this outburst caused the man to cough, adding a certain hoarseness to the speaker’s voice for the remainder of the recording) “They’re all dead, I know they are! They’re dead! But I’m not alone! God! I know I’m not mad - but I’m not alone. They’re there, in the flowers, in the stems, in the shadows watching me. I don’t know what they want but I don’t know how long I can stay here. I can – I can see them now. Through the window. I drew the curtains, but I know they’re there still. Watching. Waiting. I need to find food but - they’re out there. They know I’ll need to leave sometime. They know! They know and they’re waiting for me! - God! - I don’t know how much longer I can hold out! Just… I don’t know. Stay away, don’t die here too. I’m… I’m sorry…”

The remainder of the recording until the tape cut out was a prolonged period of soft crying.

From the recording, Dr. Caimbuel’s conclusion of danger was well and truly verified. Whether there really was some other body present at the time of recording, which is deemed unlikely as the audio was later analyzed under laboratory conditions, or whether the young man was experiencing something due to the influence of the pollen after a prolonged period of time, there is no way of knowing without further examination of the site. The anonymous person who had sent the recording in specified that it had been found in an empty house that was, aside from one of the large flowers blooming near one of the windows, seemed otherwise untouched, which gives further credence to the belief the man was suffering from significant hallucinations at the time of the recording. The fate of the man in the recording is unknown, but as his voice does not coincide with any of those who were known to have escaped, he is presumed to be one of the deceased.

The nature of these flowers, and indeed their place of origin remains unknown, which poses a difficulty for future studies into how they are spread. Likewise, there is a difficulty in running studies on the plants themselves, as once they reach a certain, presently unknown, distance from Bromwicher they have been reported to decay to a state where very little of substance can be learned from them, presenting a possible need for a mobile laboratory to travel on-site for the duration of the trials. It, then, would be difficult to find a team willing to risk potential harm, or even death, even if it for the greater cause, ensuring nowhere of a greater population falls to ruin from the flower ‘downpour’.

All information on the Bromwicher incident is to remain classified as to avoid a public disturbance that such knowledge could cause. We thank you for doing your part in ensuring nothing reaches unauthorized persons.