Creepypasta stories

The BackRooms

The Backrooms is a relatively recent example of internet folklore that is still expanding its scope and mythology.
Essentially, the backrooms posit the existence of a 'place' that people can slip (or 'noclip') into and become lost or trapped. An unreality behind or parallel to this reality, The Backrooms are not inherently sinister on first viewing, as they appear to be simply unoccupied office space of banal manilla walls, long corridors and ugly carpets.
The terrifying element comes with the idea of finding yourself there unable to escape. Trapped in a labyrinth of these corridors that is unending and eternal, meaning that there is no exit and that anyone finding themselves in this other dimension will be confined there perpetually. There is also the added detail that there are 'others' or other 'things' of an apparently malevolent nature in this environment with you and that every moment you remain inside, you run the risk of encountering one of these denizens of the other place.
The Backrooms Origins
Like many creepypasta notions or ideas, The Backrooms mythos evolved from an ekphrastic exercise, that is it was a response to a piece of 'art' inspired by a single image.
This is a common occurrence in the creepypasta community with notable creepypasta stories such as Slenderman, The Rake and even the Russian Sleep finding their origins in a disturbing image for which a fictional backstory was then proposed.
On May 12th of 2019 the original 'backrooms' image of a corridor with an oppressively bright strip light, manilla walls and no furniture was posted in 4chans/x/ paranormal board in response to a request for images that were 'unsettling' or which just felt 'a bit off'. The image had initially been posted on a 4chan discussion about 'cursed images' anonymously, almost a year earlier (April 21st 2018) with no accompanying text. This is the first known posting of the image itself.
Neither the identity of question poser or the person who responded with this image in the 2019 posting is known, but we do know that it was from this posting that the 'backrooms' mythos was born as it was on this posting that the image was first paired with brief explanatory text.
The text which read
"If you're not careful and you noclip out of reality in the wrong areas, you'll end up in the Backrooms, where it's nothing but the stink of old moist carpet, the madness of mono-yellow, the endless background noise of fluorescent lights at maximum hum-buzz, and approximately six hundred million square miles of randomly segmented empty rooms to be trapped in.
God save you if you hear something wandering around nearby because it sure as hell has heard you"
created in those few short sentences enough background and suggestion to kickstart other creators into using 'The Backroooms' as a setting for their own stories or as the starting point for an exercise in world/mythos building.
The initial pairing of text with the image is interesting in a number of ways. Firstly, it claims knowledge not only of the dimensions but the features of this 'place'. It also suggests the idea that 'something' in this setting would hear you, giving the impression that you are not alone.

Following the meeting of the image with text, the idea of The Backrooms quickly spread, appearing first in another thread on /x/ with the text and image combined (on May 14th of the same year) then in /r/ Greentext where it was proclaimed to be worse than 'any creepypasta out there' and gained a great deal of visibility and acclaim. By May 18th a creepypasta based upon the concept had been posted by yourdndguy with twitter users posting animations of wandering through the infinite backrooms.
The Backrooms Creepypasta
It was approximately 12:15 when I entered the Johnson County Community Health Clinic. I was there for an appointment I had set up weeks ago, just a routine checkup. It wasn't a new place for me; I had been there a couple of times before. However, the place had an odd nostalgic feel to it, as if it were a location from my childhood or something, and I could never pinpoint exactly what this feeling was, or where it came from.
As I walked in, an overwhelming feeling of deja vu swept over me. The hum of the flickering fluorescent lights, the white tile flooring, the muted beige paint that colored the walls. I noticed that there was a TV mounted in the corner, a smaller flatscreen, that was playing a short PowerPoint slideshow on a loop of ads and events that were being held by the clinic. I passed the empty waiting area— a small area of the main room with magazines, children's playthings and blue cushioned chairs— and approached the woman at the front desk. She was sitting in her blueish gray office chair, looking at a spreadsheet on the same Windows XP desktop they've had since 2008. There was a sign-in sheet on the counter in front of me.
"I have an appointment with Dr. Pebins?" I asked.
"What time?"
"12:30," I replied.
She began typing something into her keyboard.
"Ah, yes," she responded. "Gary Johnston?"
"Mhm."
"Yes, I'll tell the doctor. Please fill this out."
She handed me a clipboard which held a simple fill-out form. I walked back to the waiting area, took a seat, and began to fill out the form.
I was about halfway done with filling in my information when I slumped back in my chair. I hadn't gotten much sleep the night prior, and I was exhausted. As I slumped back, I noticed something very peculiar— my head never hit the wall. In fact, it felt like it went in. I got up, quite frightened, and looked at the wall.
Nothing.
Not a single hole, or dent, had been made in the wall by my head.
So, I reached to touch the wall.
And my fingers went through it.

I recoiled in shock. "What the hell was that?" I thought, as I reached to touch the wall again, only to find my fingers clipped through once more.
Then, suddenly, I lost my balance, tripped, and fell directly through the wall. I fell face-first onto some dirty tan carpeting. Upon getting back up, I realized that I was in a completely different room. Well, not really a room, per se— more so a set of rooms, all of which connected by openings. The walls were covered in gross tan patterned wallpaper. There was also an overwhelming stench of moist carpet.
I turned back around and tried to put my hand back through the wall, and it wouldn't go through. "Okay, what the fuck?" I muttered. I looked back into the room. There were no windows, no doors, nothing on the walls— other than that disgusting wallpaper, of course— it was completely empty, aside from a singular plastic blue school chair. At this point, the only thing going through my mind was fear, and the repeating thought of "I need to leave" on loop in my head. I started running through the rooms, desperately trying to find an exit, but to no avail. There was no exit.
Was this my permanent location until I died? No, there had to be a way out! I wasn't just going to be left here, right? Eventually, someone would notice that I was gone!
But, nobody did.
Then, in the distance, I heard footsteps, but not those of a human's— at least not a normal human. Alongside the footsteps was a gurgling snarl, like that of an angry animal.

I began to run. I ran as fast as I could from whatever the hell was approaching me. I didn't want anything to do with it.
I ran for what seemed like forever, but I was always back in the same room I started in. At least, it looked like the same room. Not that I could tell them apart.
So, I sat down, defeated. A feeling of dread filled my body, as I started to cry. I was going to die here.
I'm still there. I haven't left. I've accepted my fate.
In fact, I can actually hear footsteps. I wonder who that is?