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The-most-terrifying-night-in-the-woods · Crime and Horror

0:00
Speaker 1: Today's story is a classic scary cabin in the forest story,
0:04
Speaker 1: but with a very big plot twist at the end.
0:07
Speaker 1: But before we get into that story, if you're a
0:09
Speaker 1: fan of the strange, dark and mysterious delivered in story format,
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0:38
Speaker 1: into today's story. On the night of October seventeenth, twenty nineteen,
0:56
Speaker 1: a forty seven year old woman named Adaquin Tall stepped
0:59
Speaker 1: out of her family's cabin in rural Michigan to take
1:02
Speaker 1: her dog for a walk and have a smoke. It
1:04
Speaker 1: was very late, it was about one thirty in the morning. Now,
1:07
Speaker 1: this cabin where she was staying was very isolated. It
1:09
Speaker 1: was about a half mile away from any neighbors, but
1:12
Speaker 1: Ada actually enjoyed the solitude. You know, she was surrounded
1:14
Speaker 1: on all sides by forest and swamps, and the wilderness
1:18
Speaker 1: actually made Ada feel a lot safer than when she
1:21
Speaker 1: was back home in the densely populated Detroit area where
1:23
Speaker 1: she lived full time. And this was because just a
1:26
Speaker 1: few months earlier, when she had been back home in Detroit,
1:29
Speaker 1: she had been the victim of an unprovoked attack. She
1:31
Speaker 1: had been out in the city around all these people
1:33
Speaker 1: in broad daylight, and this guy came up to her
1:36
Speaker 1: and just jumped her, broke her nose, gave her a concussion,
1:39
Speaker 1: and then ran off. But the scariest part of this
1:41
Speaker 1: attack was not the fact that she had been brutalized.
1:44
Speaker 1: It was that this guy did not appear to have
1:46
Speaker 1: any reason to attack her. He didn't know Aida, and
1:49
Speaker 1: Aida had not been robbed or anything. It was like
1:52
Speaker 1: he just randomly identified her and attacked her. And the
1:55
Speaker 1: guy had never been caught. And so this ordeal had
1:57
Speaker 1: had such a profound impact on Ada that it really
2:00
Speaker 1: began to affect her health, both mentally and physically. She
2:03
Speaker 1: started to just kind of decline, and on top of that,
2:05
Speaker 1: she had been laid off from her engineering job, and
2:08
Speaker 1: so now she was unemployed and seriously depressed. And so recently,
2:12
Speaker 1: when AIDA's uncle had called her and offered to pay
2:14
Speaker 1: her to come out and live in this two story
2:17
Speaker 1: family cabin and fix it up for the winter, Ada
2:20
Speaker 1: had jumped at the chance. I mean, not only would
2:22
Speaker 1: this solve her unemployment issue, but also she loved this cabin.
2:26
Speaker 1: It had been in her family for seventy five years,
2:28
Speaker 1: and some of her fondest childhood memories were in this cabin,
2:31
Speaker 1: and so she looked at this as a chance to
2:33
Speaker 1: kind of get away from the city and just be
2:35
Speaker 1: in her happy place and kind of reset and recover
2:38
Speaker 1: from the trauma of the attack. And so for the
2:40
Speaker 1: past week, Ada and her boyfriend had been staying in
2:42
Speaker 1: this cabin and doing small repairs and cleaning it up.
2:45
Speaker 1: But two days earlier, her boyfriend had had to leave
2:48
Speaker 1: and go back to the city where they were actually
2:50
Speaker 1: fixing up another property, a condo, and so now it
2:54
Speaker 1: was just Ada and her dog. But that was totally
2:56
Speaker 1: fine with Ada. She liked being out here by herself,
2:58
Speaker 1: so this was no big deal. But tonight she was
3:00
Speaker 1: feeling frustrated because she couldn't sleep. About an hour earlier,
3:03
Speaker 1: she had taken a pill to help her sleep, but
3:06
Speaker 1: so far it hadn't worked, and so she was feeling
3:08
Speaker 1: kind of wired and anxious, and so she had decided
3:11
Speaker 1: to go on a walk with her dog and hopes
3:13
Speaker 1: that that would clear her mind and allow her to
3:15
Speaker 1: finally get some rest. Now, these roads that surrounded this
3:18
Speaker 1: cabin were kind of small and zigzaggy, and you know,
3:21
Speaker 1: there weren't any street lights. I mean, this is not
3:23
Speaker 1: exactly a good place to go for a nighttime walk.
3:26
Speaker 1: But Aida knew this place like the back of her hand.
3:28
Speaker 1: And she also carried a nine millimeter pistol in her pocket,
3:31
Speaker 1: you know, just for protection. And so after walking for
3:33
Speaker 1: a few minutes down one of these dark, winding roads,
3:36
Speaker 1: Ada's dog stopped to relieve himself on a bush. So
3:39
Speaker 1: as the dog was going to the bathroom, Ada just
3:41
Speaker 1: casually smoked and waited. But at some point the dog
3:44
Speaker 1: just stopped going to the bathroom, turned slightly and began growling,
3:47
Speaker 1: and its ears perked up, and it was looking off
3:50
Speaker 1: into the darkness right ahead of them, And so Aida
3:52
Speaker 1: instinctively took her flashlight and raised it up and aimed
3:55
Speaker 1: it in the direction her dog was looking, and right away,
3:58
Speaker 1: the cone of light illuminated these two eyes looking right
4:01
Speaker 1: back at Ada, and immediately Ada knew what she was
4:04
Speaker 1: staring at. It was a mountain lion, and so doing
4:06
Speaker 1: her best to stay calm, Aida slowly reached into her
4:09
Speaker 1: pocket to pull out her gun, but before pulling it out,
4:12
Speaker 1: the two eyes blink shut and then she heard it
4:14
Speaker 1: kind of turn and run off into the forest. It
4:17
Speaker 1: was gone. Once Ada was sure the mountain lion really
4:19
Speaker 1: was gone, she breathed the sigh of relief and then
4:22
Speaker 1: very quickly tugged on her dog's leash. They turned around,
4:24
Speaker 1: and she hustled back towards the cabin. When Ada reached
4:27
Speaker 1: her cabin, which was all lit up because she had
4:28
Speaker 1: left all the lights on before she had left, she
4:31
Speaker 1: jumped up the front steps. She opened up the door,
4:33
Speaker 1: she went inside with her dog, and after letting her
4:35
Speaker 1: dog off the leash, she shut and locked the door,
4:37
Speaker 1: and she grabbed her phone and texted her boyfriend to
4:40
Speaker 1: tell him about this mountain lion, and then after hitting send,
4:43
Speaker 1: Aida felt relieved to be back in her cabin, but
4:45
Speaker 1: at the same time, she still felt very on edge.
4:47
Speaker 1: I mean, she had been, you know, just a few
4:48
Speaker 1: feet away from a mountain lion in the middle of
4:50
Speaker 1: the night, in the middle of nowhere. But as Ada
4:53
Speaker 1: was doing her best to calm herself down, she heard
4:55
Speaker 1: this noise coming from outside the living room window, almost
4:58
Speaker 1: like twig snapping. Somebody was walking past the window. And
5:02
Speaker 1: so the way this cabin was set up is when
5:03
Speaker 1: you first walked inside, you were in the kitchen, and
5:06
Speaker 1: then the back half of the cabin was a living room,
5:08
Speaker 1: and then there were also stairs leading up to a
5:10
Speaker 1: second floor. But from in the kitchen you had a
5:13
Speaker 1: clear line of sight into the living room and vice versa.
5:15
Speaker 1: It was kind of like one big room with two functions.
5:18
Speaker 1: And so from where Ada was standing in the kitchen,
5:21
Speaker 1: she could clearly see the window in the living room
5:23
Speaker 1: where this noise had kind of come through. But because
5:26
Speaker 1: the inside of the cabin was all lit up and
5:28
Speaker 1: the outside was dark, you know, from her perspective, all
5:31
Speaker 1: she could see was a reflection on that window. So
5:33
Speaker 1: to look outside that window to see what had made
5:35
Speaker 1: that noise, she would need to get right up next
5:38
Speaker 1: to the window. And so, feeling pretty nervous. At this point,
5:41
Speaker 1: she walked across the cabin. She made her way towards
5:43
Speaker 1: this window, and then she pressed her face right up
5:45
Speaker 1: against the glass to look outside. But all she saw
5:48
Speaker 1: outside was just darkness. I mean, there was nothing out there.
5:51
Speaker 1: And so Ada stepped back from the window and started
5:54
Speaker 1: to wonder if maybe the sound she had just heard
5:56
Speaker 1: was maybe that mountain lion. You know, maybe it followed
5:58
Speaker 1: her back here. You know, that was terri but at
6:00
Speaker 1: least she was inside. But also she was thinking to herself,
6:03
Speaker 1: you know, mountain lions are not known for being aggressive
6:06
Speaker 1: towards humans, and they wouldn't come up to her cabin
6:09
Speaker 1: like this and prowl around outside. That's just not what
6:12
Speaker 1: mountain lions do. But Ada didn't really have any other explanation,
6:15
Speaker 1: and so she told herself, you know, it's got to
6:17
Speaker 1: be nothing. You know, there's nothing out there. This is
6:19
Speaker 1: a safe place. And so she kind of forgot about
6:21
Speaker 1: the noise and she took off her coat and put
6:23
Speaker 1: her stuff down, and then she sat down on the
6:25
Speaker 1: couch in the living room, turned on the TV and
6:27
Speaker 1: tried to relax. But only about twenty minutes later, when
6:30
Speaker 1: Ada had finally relaxed and was even thinking about getting
6:33
Speaker 1: into her bed and going to sleep. She heard another
6:35
Speaker 1: noise coming from that same window in the living room,
6:38
Speaker 1: and this time, when she looked up and looked out
6:40
Speaker 1: that window, despite the reflections inside the cabin, she could
6:44
Speaker 1: clearly tell there was something moving outside of her cabin
6:47
Speaker 1: and it was definitely not a mountain lion. It looked
6:50
Speaker 1: like a man, and so Aida had to stifle a scream,
6:53
Speaker 1: and then instinctively, she lunged for her gun on the
6:55
Speaker 1: coffee table and then darted behind the couch and crouched
6:58
Speaker 1: down to make sure whoever was out there couldn't see her.
7:01
Speaker 1: And then, you know, with gun in hand, she began
7:03
Speaker 1: calling out to the person out there that hey, I'm armed.
7:06
Speaker 1: If you come in here, I'm gonna shoot you. But
7:09
Speaker 1: it was just silence. And then Ada strained her ears
7:11
Speaker 1: to try to hear any sound that would give away
7:14
Speaker 1: where this person went, you know, where they still outside
7:16
Speaker 1: that window, had they moved somewhere else, But all she
7:19
Speaker 1: could hear was the sound of the wind whipping outside
7:21
Speaker 1: and an owl hooting off in the distance. But then,
7:24
Speaker 1: right as Ada was starting to wonder, you know, did
7:25
Speaker 1: I really see somebody out there, you know, is this
7:27
Speaker 1: all in my head? That's when she heard the distinct
7:29
Speaker 1: sound of footsteps on her front porch, and so again
7:33
Speaker 1: Ada had to stifle a scream, and she darted to
7:35
Speaker 1: the other side of the couch, you know, preventing the
7:37
Speaker 1: person from the front of the house to seeing her. Now,
7:39
Speaker 1: then she grabbed her phone and she was dialing nine
7:41
Speaker 1: one one, and she was about to hit call when
7:44
Speaker 1: she stopped herself, and she began to wonder, am I
7:46
Speaker 1: just totally overreacting here? You know? I don't know if
7:49
Speaker 1: there's somebody out there. I could be hearing things, or
7:51
Speaker 1: maybe it's just like an animal or something. And also,
7:54
Speaker 1: deep down, Ada knew that ever since that attack in
7:56
Speaker 1: Detroit that summer, that basically everything scared her. And she
8:00
Speaker 1: was starting to wonder if maybe she was just being
8:02
Speaker 1: totally paranoid and there was nothing going on. And she
8:05
Speaker 1: didn't want to embarrass herself by calling nine one one
8:07
Speaker 1: and having them come out here and finding nothing. And
8:10
Speaker 1: so Ada decided she would call her boyfriend. And so
8:13
Speaker 1: she called her boyfriend and as the phone is ringing,
8:15
Speaker 1: she's listening intently for any other footsteps outside, but she
8:18
Speaker 1: can't hear anything, and then her boyfriend, you know, he
8:20
Speaker 1: didn't pick up. It's also like two thirty in the
8:22
Speaker 1: morning at this point, but her boyfriend doesn't answer, and
8:25
Speaker 1: so after that she tries calling one of her friends,
8:27
Speaker 1: and her friend does pick up, and right away Aida
8:29
Speaker 1: just began telling this friend about all the things that
8:32
Speaker 1: had happened that night, you know, from going out and
8:34
Speaker 1: seeing the mountain lion and then coming back in hearing
8:36
Speaker 1: the sound, and now hearing the footsteps on the front porch,
8:39
Speaker 1: and you know, she was worried that maybe she was
8:41
Speaker 1: just making it all up, but she was still really scared.
8:43
Speaker 1: And even though Ada was trying to be composed as
8:46
Speaker 1: she was telling her friend, her voice began to crack
8:48
Speaker 1: and she began to cry because she really was scared.
8:51
Speaker 1: And the friend just said, look, I'm going to call
8:53
Speaker 1: the police on your behalf. You know, it seems like
8:55
Speaker 1: it's worth having them come out, just to make sure
8:57
Speaker 1: you're really okay. Give me the address and I'll tell
8:59
Speaker 1: them where to go. And so Ada would give her
9:02
Speaker 1: friend the address, but she told the friend, you know,
9:04
Speaker 1: thank you, but do not call right now. Just please
9:07
Speaker 1: stay on the phone for a minute and let me
9:09
Speaker 1: just do a quick investigation. Let me look out the windows,
9:11
Speaker 1: you know, and just really make sure that this is
9:13
Speaker 1: nothing before you call the police. And so the friend said,
9:16
Speaker 1: you know, okay, you know, look around, but then I'm
9:18
Speaker 1: calling the police. And so, with her phone and her
9:20
Speaker 1: gun in hand, Ada very carefully crept out from behind
9:24
Speaker 1: the couch, keeping a low profile, you know, staying below
9:26
Speaker 1: the sightline of all the windows, and she crept from
9:29
Speaker 1: the living room into the kitchen towards the front of
9:31
Speaker 1: the house, and she walked over to the sink, and
9:34
Speaker 1: she very slowly raised her head until she could just
9:37
Speaker 1: barely peek through the window right above the sink that
9:40
Speaker 1: overlooked the front porch, because remember that was the last
9:43
Speaker 1: place she had heard sounds from the front porch. And
9:45
Speaker 1: so she very carefully peeks and looks out the window,
9:49
Speaker 1: and there's nothing there. Nobody's in the porch. It's just empty,
9:52
Speaker 1: dark forest. She's safe. Ada let out a relieved half cry,
9:56
Speaker 1: half laugh, and then stood all the way up and
9:59
Speaker 1: felt totally ridiculou because clearly she had just imagined, you know,
10:02
Speaker 1: all these people wandering around the outside of her house.
10:05
Speaker 1: And so she was about to tell her friend that hey, sorry,
10:07
Speaker 1: you know, there is no issue here, don't call the police.
10:10
Speaker 1: But before she could get the words out, Aida happened
10:13
Speaker 1: to turn around and was looking back towards the living room,
10:16
Speaker 1: and she froze because there in that same window she
10:19
Speaker 1: had heard those sounds coming from in the living room,
10:22
Speaker 1: was now the silhouettes of two men, clear as day,
10:25
Speaker 1: just looking in the window right at Ada, and so,
10:28
Speaker 1: acting purely on instinct, Ada just raised her gun and
10:30
Speaker 1: aimed it at these two men, and to her horror,
10:33
Speaker 1: the two men also raised guns and aimed them right
10:36
Speaker 1: back at Ada. And so Ada just started firing her
10:38
Speaker 1: gun at the window and these men began shooting back
10:41
Speaker 1: at her, and right before Ada leaped to the ground,
10:44
Speaker 1: she was pretty sure she hit one of the men
10:46
Speaker 1: in the head with one of her rounds, and so
10:48
Speaker 1: she lands on the ground. It's absolute pandemonium at this point.
10:51
Speaker 1: Then her friend, who's still on the phone, is screaming like,
10:54
Speaker 1: what's going on, what's going on? And all Aida could
10:56
Speaker 1: think to do was yell out, there's two men, they're
10:58
Speaker 1: shooting at me. I shot one of them. And the
11:01
Speaker 1: friend is screaming, I'm gonna call the police, and then
11:03
Speaker 1: the line goes dead, and Ada, who's crouched down behind
11:06
Speaker 1: the kitchen island. At this point, she realizes all the
11:08
Speaker 1: shooting is stopped. It's now dead, silent in the cabin,
11:11
Speaker 1: And so for a second, Ada was thinking to herself,
11:13
Speaker 1: maybe I managed to shoot both of them, and that's
11:15
Speaker 1: why it's quiet right now. But then another thought began
11:18
Speaker 1: to enter her head that maybe she had only shot
11:20
Speaker 1: one of them, and the other survivor was moving into
11:23
Speaker 1: position to maybe ambush her. And so as she's running
11:26
Speaker 1: through what she's gonna do, she hears this horrible loud
11:29
Speaker 1: thumping sound right above her in the second floor of
11:32
Speaker 1: the cabin. Now Ada knew at this moment she should
11:36
Speaker 1: just get her dog and run, because if this second
11:38
Speaker 1: shooter has survived and has now come into her cabin
11:42
Speaker 1: and is upstairs, that means the forest is now clear
11:44
Speaker 1: and she can make a run for it. But as
11:46
Speaker 1: she sat there by the island, still clutching her gun,
11:49
Speaker 1: in this beloved family cabin of hers, she began thinking
11:52
Speaker 1: about the fact that ever since that attack in Detroit
11:55
Speaker 1: over the summer, you know, that had totally wrecked her
11:58
Speaker 1: life and made her scared of everything, and so as
12:00
Speaker 1: she heard the sound of whoever this was marching around
12:03
Speaker 1: in her second floor, she made a decision. She was
12:06
Speaker 1: going to stand her ground and fight, and so she
12:09
Speaker 1: took a deep breath, she stood up, and with gun
12:11
Speaker 1: in hand, she made her way to the stairs and
12:14
Speaker 1: began to go up. It's no secret that a lot
12:24
Speaker 1: of the stories I've covered over the years are about
12:27
Speaker 1: real people who have been victims of just unspeakable violence.
12:31
Speaker 1: And so that's why back in April of twenty twenty two,
12:34
Speaker 1: we decided to launch the Mister Bollin Foundation, which was
12:36
Speaker 1: established to honor and support victims of violent crime and
12:40
Speaker 1: their families. And so now over two years later, I'm
12:43
Speaker 1: happy to report that you know, with your help, because
12:46
Speaker 1: none of this would be possible without all of you,
12:49
Speaker 1: we have been able to give one point four million
12:52
Speaker 1: dollars to this group of people, to these victims and
12:54
Speaker 1: their families who were often overlooked after the news story
12:57
Speaker 1: about whatever happened to them. Fates all don'ts that are
13:00
Speaker 1: made to the Mister Ballin Foundation, literally one hundred percent
13:04
Speaker 1: of them go out the door to the cause. Meaning
13:06
Speaker 1: if you give ten dollars, that ten dollars is going
13:09
Speaker 1: to the victims, it's going to their families. This is
13:11
Speaker 1: one of the very rare nonprofits that can actually say that.
13:15
Speaker 1: If you're interested in joining the mister Ballin Foundation community
13:18
Speaker 1: and contributing to this effort, all you have to do
13:21
Speaker 1: is go to mister Ballin dot Foundation and click on donate. Again.
13:25
Speaker 1: Just go to mister Ballin dot Foundation and click on donate.
13:28
Speaker 1: Thank you again to all our donors, our listeners, viewers,
13:31
Speaker 1: all the people that made this possible. We are genuinely
13:34
Speaker 1: changing the world. Thank you so much. And now back
13:37
Speaker 1: to the story. The police arrived at the cabin about
13:45
Speaker 1: thirty minutes later, because AIDA's friend did call the police
13:48
Speaker 1: and she warned them that as far as she knew,
13:50
Speaker 1: there could be at least two gunmen there and maybe
13:53
Speaker 1: Ada had shot one of them. She wasn't sure. And
13:55
Speaker 1: so when the police arrived, they showed up, you know,
13:57
Speaker 1: guns drawn, and they walked up to the cabin. They
14:00
Speaker 1: searched the outside, but there was nobody out there. It
14:02
Speaker 1: was silent. And then when they made entry into the
14:05
Speaker 1: cabin they saw clearly there had been a shootout. I
14:07
Speaker 1: mean there were bullet holes all over the place, broken windows.
14:10
Speaker 1: But after searching the cabin top to bottom. They didn't
14:13
Speaker 1: find anybody, no Aida, no shooters. However, they did find
14:16
Speaker 1: AIDA's terrified dog inside of the cabin, and the dog
14:19
Speaker 1: would be just fine now. Once the cabin was secured
14:22
Speaker 1: of any threats, the police would do another comprehensive search
14:25
Speaker 1: looking for any evidence that would kind of tell them,
14:27
Speaker 1: you know, where Aida or these shooters had gone. And
14:30
Speaker 1: during this secondary search, they would find AIDA's shoes and
14:33
Speaker 1: her cell phone on the roof of the cabin, and
14:35
Speaker 1: they would also find her gun on the ground not
14:38
Speaker 1: far from the roof, suggesting maybe she had fallen off
14:40
Speaker 1: the roof or jumped from the roof, but they were
14:42
Speaker 1: kind of located roughly in the same area. And during
14:45
Speaker 1: this secondary search they wouldn't find Ada or the gunman,
14:48
Speaker 1: but they would find AIDA's cell phone and her shoes
14:50
Speaker 1: on the roof of the cabin, and they would also
14:53
Speaker 1: find AIDA's gun on the ground not far from where
14:55
Speaker 1: her shoes and cell phone had been found. But that
14:58
Speaker 1: was it. Police immediately launched massive search in the forest
15:01
Speaker 1: surrounding the cabin, but despite looking all over the place,
15:05
Speaker 1: they could not find any signs of Ada or her attackers.
15:08
Speaker 1: Police checked local hospitals to see if maybe the man
15:11
Speaker 1: that Ada had shot had shown up seeking medical attention,
15:14
Speaker 1: but as far as they could tell, he hadn't, and
15:17
Speaker 1: so pretty quickly the police theorized that maybe there were
15:20
Speaker 1: no gunmen. You know, maybe what really happened here is
15:23
Speaker 1: AIDA's boyfriend attacked her and he was responsible for whatever
15:26
Speaker 1: happened to her. But when police checked on Ada's boyfriend,
15:30
Speaker 1: it would turn out he had a rock solid alibi.
15:32
Speaker 1: He had been with AIDA's adult son at the time
15:35
Speaker 1: Aida had gone missing, and AIDA's own son said, yes,
15:37
Speaker 1: for sure, he was with me, he did not do this.
15:40
Speaker 1: But after that the police thought, okay, well, maybe if
15:42
Speaker 1: AIDA's boyfriend didn't do this, maybe he hired other people
15:46
Speaker 1: to hurt Aida. But there was no evidence of any
15:48
Speaker 1: strange financial transactions, and as far as they could tell
15:51
Speaker 1: when they did some digging, there was no strife in
15:54
Speaker 1: Aida and her boyfriend's relationship, so there was no clear
15:56
Speaker 1: reason why he would want to hurt her, and so
15:59
Speaker 1: that lead also kind of fell flat. Police would confirm
16:02
Speaker 1: that Ada was attacked that previous summer by this random
16:05
Speaker 1: guy in Detroit, and so for a little while they
16:07
Speaker 1: speculated that you know, maybe this guy, this attacker who
16:10
Speaker 1: had never been caught, had maybe tracked Aida down to
16:13
Speaker 1: finish off the job. But that seemed so far fetched
16:17
Speaker 1: and just unlikely that that basically was shut down as well.
16:20
Speaker 1: And as the days passed, the evidence that was coming
16:23
Speaker 1: in only made the case more confusing. For example, there
16:27
Speaker 1: were all these bullets fired during this big shootout in
16:29
Speaker 1: the cabin, and when they examined the actual bullets they
16:33
Speaker 1: extracted from the walls and the floor and the ceiling,
16:35
Speaker 1: they were all from AIDA's gun. However, outside and inside
16:39
Speaker 1: the cabin they found all these different shell casings, suggesting
16:42
Speaker 1: that those bullets had been fired from different weapons i e.
16:46
Speaker 1: You know, maybe the attacker's weapons. And so as the
16:48
Speaker 1: weeks passed by and Aida and her attackers were not found,
16:52
Speaker 1: people began to speculate that, you know, maybe this was
16:54
Speaker 1: all an elaborate setup by Ada just so she could disappear.
16:59
Speaker 1: Or other people thought me she was abducted by aliens.
17:01
Speaker 1: I mean, there were lots of theories surrounding this, but
17:03
Speaker 1: basically nobody knew what happened. And then pretty soon the
17:06
Speaker 1: case just went completely cold. That is until December twenty first,
17:10
Speaker 1: twenty nineteen, so about two months after Ada's disappearance, and
17:14
Speaker 1: on that day, AIDA's family decided to drain a pond
17:17
Speaker 1: that was near that cabin in the woods. At this point,
17:20
Speaker 1: the family was so desperate for closure that they were
17:23
Speaker 1: prepared to do just about anything to find Aida and
17:25
Speaker 1: to figure out what happened to her. And so, even
17:27
Speaker 1: though this pond had previously been searched by the police,
17:31
Speaker 1: they drained this pond and sure enough they find Ada.
17:34
Speaker 1: She was deceased, and her body was found about three
17:37
Speaker 1: hundred yards away from the cabin, and she was covered
17:40
Speaker 1: in only about a foot of water. Now, initially the
17:43
Speaker 1: speculation was, well, here you go, she must have been
17:45
Speaker 1: chased out of her cabin by these attackers and she
17:48
Speaker 1: was shot and killed and this is where she fell.
17:50
Speaker 1: But after a quick examination of her body, it was
17:52
Speaker 1: clear she had no bullet wounds on her anywhere. In fact,
17:56
Speaker 1: she didn't even have any bruises on her or any
17:58
Speaker 1: major scrapes or cuts or anything. So it didn't even
18:00
Speaker 1: seem like she had been in any sort of physical
18:02
Speaker 1: struggle at all before she died. In fact, unless she
18:05
Speaker 1: had drowned, it really just seemed totally unclear how she
18:08
Speaker 1: had died. It was not until the medical examiner did
18:11
Speaker 1: Ada's autopsy that all this baffling evidence began to make sense.
18:15
Speaker 1: It would turn out, in the wake of that horrible
18:17
Speaker 1: random attack that Ada had suffered over the summer, that
18:20
Speaker 1: Ada was actually doing far worse than she led on
18:22
Speaker 1: to her family and friends. She had basically begun to
18:25
Speaker 1: cope with her trauma and anxiety with substance abuse, and
18:29
Speaker 1: so on the night that she had died, she was
18:31
Speaker 1: likely feeling totally stressed out and anxious, and she couldn't
18:34
Speaker 1: sleep as a result, and so she had taken some valium,
18:36
Speaker 1: which is a fairly strong sedative, and also some anti
18:39
Speaker 1: anxiety medication. But after taking those pills, she still wasn't tired,
18:43
Speaker 1: and so that was when she decided to go out
18:45
Speaker 1: for a walk with her dog to clear her head
18:47
Speaker 1: and have a smoke. But it was not cigarettes that
18:50
Speaker 1: she was smoking. She was smoking methamphetamine, known simply as meth,
18:55
Speaker 1: and meth is a very strong stimulant that people like
18:58
Speaker 1: because it makes them feel very strong, confident, and alert,
19:01
Speaker 1: which for Ada was a powerful antidote to the helplessness
19:04
Speaker 1: she was feeling all the time from the attack she
19:07
Speaker 1: had suffered that summer. But one of the many downsides
19:10
Speaker 1: of meth is that it can make you extremely paranoid.
19:13
Speaker 1: And so during her walk that night, as she's smoking meth,
19:16
Speaker 1: she sees a mountain lion, which terrifies her. And then
19:19
Speaker 1: after the mountain lion trots off, it was like that
19:21
Speaker 1: jolt of adrenaline and fear from seeing the mountain lion
19:25
Speaker 1: didn't subside because of smoking meth. It was like the
19:28
Speaker 1: myth sent her into this paranoia overdrive that she couldn't
19:32
Speaker 1: escape from. And so when Ada went back inside of
19:34
Speaker 1: her cabin, she very likely did see people in her windows,
19:39
Speaker 1: but almost certainly it was just her own reflection. But again,
19:42
Speaker 1: she's in this meth induced paranoid state, and so instead
19:45
Speaker 1: of realizing it was her own reflection, she thought it
19:48
Speaker 1: was like intruders coming to get her. And before long
19:51
Speaker 1: she'd raised her gun and thought the people outside were
19:54
Speaker 1: raising their gun back at her. But again it's just
19:56
Speaker 1: her reflection, and so when she was shooting, she was
19:59
Speaker 1: based on having a shootout with herself. And then as
20:02
Speaker 1: for you know, the strange noises she was hearing, like
20:04
Speaker 1: the footsteps on the second floor, very likely those were
20:07
Speaker 1: just natural sounds kind of happening outside. She's out in
20:10
Speaker 1: the middle of a forest. There's lots of noises that
20:12
Speaker 1: are totally natural at night. But again, you know, she's
20:15
Speaker 1: in this paranoid state, and so she went upstairs to
20:18
Speaker 1: confront the person and then didn't see anybody. And then
20:21
Speaker 1: police theorized that she must have you know, climbed out
20:23
Speaker 1: onto the roof to hide from these attackers. And then
20:26
Speaker 1: at some point, for reasons unknown, she leaped from the
20:29
Speaker 1: roof or climbed down or something, leaving behind her cell
20:32
Speaker 1: phone and shoes on the roof. She left her gun
20:35
Speaker 1: on the ground, and then she ran off into the forest,
20:38
Speaker 1: where she ultimately collapsed, you know, three hundred yards away
20:40
Speaker 1: in a foot of water, where she died not from drowning,
20:44
Speaker 1: but from a combination of hypothermia and also a toxic
20:48
Speaker 1: combination of drugs in her system. And so in the end,
20:51
Speaker 1: the danger that Ada was trying to escape was in
20:54
Speaker 1: her own mind. Before I a professional, strange, dark and
21:01
Speaker 1: mysterious storyteller, I served in the military, and during my
21:05
Speaker 1: time in the military, I had some pretty wild experiences.
21:09
Speaker 1: But what I remember most about my time at service
21:12
Speaker 1: was not my own stories, but rather the stories I
21:15
Speaker 1: heard from other service members. Keep in mind, service members
21:18
Speaker 1: are sent to some of the most isolated and treacherous
21:21
Speaker 1: places in the world that very few people go to,
21:24
Speaker 1: and so some of the stories that come out of
21:26
Speaker 1: those places are totally creepy and weird. And even more
21:29
Speaker 1: than that, a lot of these stories sort of stay
21:32
Speaker 1: in house. They stay in the military just because it's
21:35
Speaker 1: kind of a cultural thing. You know, people don't necessarily
21:37
Speaker 1: want to go out and tell the world about the
21:39
Speaker 1: totally unsettling and inexplicable thing they saw while they were deployed.
21:43
Speaker 1: It's like people might think they were crazy, But there's
21:45
Speaker 1: lots of stories like that. And so if hearing some
21:48
Speaker 1: of those crazy military stories appeals to you, well, boy,
21:51
Speaker 1: do I have a podcast for you. It's called Wartime Stories,
21:55
Speaker 1: and it's hosted by Luke Klamanna, who himself is a veteran.
21:58
Speaker 1: He was a reconnaissance marine, which I can tell you
22:01
Speaker 1: is kind of a big deal. And so because he
22:03
Speaker 1: has access and placement, he's been able to extract some
22:06
Speaker 1: of these stories from the military and he shares them
22:09
Speaker 1: on the show. And if you wanted to kind of
22:11
Speaker 1: generalize the types of stories you're gonna hear on this podcast.
22:14
Speaker 1: It's like the Strange, Dark and Mysterious meets the Battlefield
22:18
Speaker 1: and Beyond. The Wartime Stories podcast is free and it's
22:21
Speaker 1: available on any podcast platform. So all you have to
22:24
Speaker 1: do is, you know, go to your favorite platform and
22:26
Speaker 1: look up Wartime Stories, or you can search for Ballin
22:29
Speaker 1: Studios because it's produced Underballin Studios. You click on the show,
22:33
Speaker 1: give it a follow, and boom you can start your bitch.
22:36
Speaker 1: New episodes drop every Monday. So if you're a fan
22:39
Speaker 1: of the Strange, Dark and Mysterious, well you got yourself
22:41
Speaker 1: a brand new weekly show. So that's going to do it.
22:46
Speaker 1: If you want more strange, dark and mysterious content, remember
22:50
Speaker 1: we have a whole host of strange, dark and mysterious
22:52
Speaker 1: podcasts under the Ballin Studios umbrella. We have the Mister
22:55
Speaker 1: Ballin Podcast, Mister Ballin's Medical Mysteries, we have Bedtime Stories,
22:59
Speaker 1: we have War Time Stories, we have run Full. They
23:02
Speaker 1: are awesome, they are free. There are tons and tons
23:04
Speaker 1: of episodes out there to binge right now. All you
23:07
Speaker 1: have to do is go to any podcast platform, look
23:10
Speaker 1: up ball In Studios and boom, there you go. Thank
23:12
Speaker 1: you so much for all your support. Until next time,
23:15
Speaker 1: see you