Latest / Stories from the Dark / Horrifying Stories About Haunted Houses

Transcript

Horrifying Stories About Haunted Houses · Stories from the Dark

0:23
Speaker 1: I got a little war story for you from my
0:25
Speaker 1: time in Afghanistan. and I'm pretty sure it's not going
0:29
Speaker 1: to be like any war story you've heard before. Because
0:32
Speaker 1: while some scary stuff happened to me and my guys
0:35
Speaker 1: out there, none of it gives me the creeps quite
0:37
Speaker 1: like this still does, even all this time after. I
0:41
Speaker 1: was a first lieutenant back then, fresh into my second
0:44
Speaker 1: deployment with Charlie Company of the 3rd Battalion, 5th Marines.
0:48
Speaker 1: We'd been in Helmand Province in southern Afghanistan since the
0:51
Speaker 1: fall of 2010, tagging in and out of that slow
0:55
Speaker 1: grind through the central Helmand River Valley. or what the
0:58
Speaker 1: British had been calling the Green Zone. By the time
1:02
Speaker 1: we occupied that compound outside of Songin District Center, most
1:06
Speaker 1: of the major clearances from Operation Mashtarak were over and
1:10
Speaker 1: done with, but the residual Taliban activity never really quit,
1:14
Speaker 1: so snipers and IEDs were a constant threat. Civilian compounds
1:20
Speaker 1: were the safe zones, generally speaking anyway, and so we'd
1:23
Speaker 1: hop from one to the other while on patrol... and
1:25
Speaker 1: if we found one with certain tactical advantages, we'd often
1:29
Speaker 1: return to it to bed down for the night. And
1:32
Speaker 1: then one day, while out on patrol, we spotted a
1:35
Speaker 1: particularly juicy location. The compound sat on the edge of
1:40
Speaker 1: a dried-up wadi, about six clicks southwest of the district center,
1:44
Speaker 1: and not far from the older British positions that had
1:47
Speaker 1: been occupied there years before. Now, it wasn't exactly glamorous.
1:51
Speaker 1: Mud walls, a couple of collapsed buildings, and Well, that
1:55
Speaker 1: still worked if you don't mind the taste of diesel
1:57
Speaker 1: and human waste. There was a small cemetery on the
2:00
Speaker 1: low rise to the north with maybe like 20 to
2:02
Speaker 1: 30 graves, some of which were marked with stacked rocks,
2:06
Speaker 1: others just low mounds of dirt with sticks driven into it,
2:10
Speaker 1: and the idea being that you could fix the grave
2:13
Speaker 1: up once you had the money, but not many did.
2:15
Speaker 1: It was dumb, but we didn't care. It had clear
2:19
Speaker 1: fields of fire and solid walls, which made it perfect
2:22
Speaker 1: for a temporary patrol base while we worked the surrounding villages.
2:26
Speaker 1: On the second day there, I took a small group
2:28
Speaker 1: of guys out to the nearest cluster of compounds to
2:31
Speaker 1: do the usual, hi, how are you stuff. During one
2:35
Speaker 1: such meet and greet, an older Afghan guy with this
2:38
Speaker 1: milky eye pulled me aside after the Terp was done
2:41
Speaker 1: translating the usual complaints about us messing up people's fields
2:44
Speaker 1: or attracting Taliban to the area. And through the Terp,
2:48
Speaker 1: he told me the compound that we were occupying wasn't empty.
2:53
Speaker 1: I assured him it was, and that it was empty
2:56
Speaker 1: when we got there, and the only people there now
2:58
Speaker 1: were my platoon. But when that was put to him,
3:01
Speaker 1: he and the Terp ended up arguing about something. I
3:05
Speaker 1: told the Terp to do his job and translate, and
3:07
Speaker 1: so he did. And that's how the old man told
3:09
Speaker 1: us it wasn't men he was talking about. It was djinn,
3:14
Speaker 1: what they call evil spirits over there in that part
3:16
Speaker 1: of the world. The Terp couldn't keep the smile from
3:20
Speaker 1: his face as he talked, but the old man didn't
3:22
Speaker 1: find it funny at all. He said the locals left
3:25
Speaker 1: the place alone because the djinn didn't like people staying
3:28
Speaker 1: there overnight, especially people who came carrying weapons like we were.
3:33
Speaker 1: I thanked him for his concern, gave the standard, we're
3:35
Speaker 1: here to help, line, and then moved on to the
3:38
Speaker 1: next guy. Because honestly, I didn't know what else to
3:41
Speaker 1: tell him. The aim of the game was to keep
3:43
Speaker 1: the locals on side, so I played it on the
3:46
Speaker 1: side of polite. But that evening at the patrol base,
3:49
Speaker 1: when I briefed the squad leaders, I told them what
3:52
Speaker 1: the old man said. And when they were done laughing,
3:56
Speaker 1: Doc said it was probably the hashish talking. And then
4:00
Speaker 1: one of the squad leaders suggested that if the guy
4:02
Speaker 1: was secretly hostile to us, it might have been his
4:04
Speaker 1: special way of telling us that we were right where
4:07
Speaker 1: we wanted to be. That our choice of compound was
4:10
Speaker 1: a good one. The rest of the platoon picked it
4:13
Speaker 1: up by word of mouth, but nobody took it seriously.
4:16
Speaker 1: We all heard ghost stories at every fob from Leatherneck
4:20
Speaker 1: to Dwyer, and nobody's ever seen anything that couldn't be
4:23
Speaker 1: explained by heat, fatigue, or somebody's bad dreams. And boy,
4:28
Speaker 1: were there bad dreams. That second night, the wind came
4:31
Speaker 1: up out of the desert, carrying that god-awful grit that
4:34
Speaker 1: somehow got into everything. I had two teams on the
4:38
Speaker 1: compound walls, one on the southern approach covering the wadi,
4:42
Speaker 1: with the other watching the cemetery hill. The radios were quiet.
4:46
Speaker 1: just the usual check-ins every 30 minutes, and I was
4:49
Speaker 1: in the main building going over the next day's route
4:51
Speaker 1: with the platoon sergeant when the first burst of fire
4:54
Speaker 1: cracked out from the northern wall. Immediate action drills kicked in.
4:59
Speaker 1: Men were moving, calling out sectors, and I was out
5:02
Speaker 1: the door with my rifle up before the echo finished
5:05
Speaker 1: bouncing off the mud walls. A corporal had opened fire
5:08
Speaker 1: from the northern position, but instead of engaging outside the compound,
5:13
Speaker 1: he'd engage something inside it. I saw him. He was
5:18
Speaker 1: right there. He was yelling. We later found out that
5:22
Speaker 1: he'd spotted an Afghan with a sword creeping through the compound.
5:26
Speaker 1: He got that right. A goddamn sword. But after he
5:30
Speaker 1: opened fire, there was nothing there. Just the dark and
5:33
Speaker 1: the wind. No movement. No sword-wielding warrior. Nobody. But behind
5:40
Speaker 1: the non-existent target, the corporal swore he saw, two of
5:44
Speaker 1: our guys were now down. A lance corporal had taken
5:47
Speaker 1: a round through the left shoulder, while the PFC caught
5:50
Speaker 1: one in the thigh. Both were conscious and cursing, which
5:54
Speaker 1: was good, but with blood already soaking their utilities and
5:58
Speaker 1: we needed to act fast. We got the corpsman on
6:02
Speaker 1: them quickly, who applied pressure dressings and then a tourniquet
6:05
Speaker 1: on the PFC. The corporal who opened fire had his
6:09
Speaker 1: rifle taken away from him once he realized what he did.
6:12
Speaker 1: But later, when I suggested his eyes had been playing
6:15
Speaker 1: tricks on him, he swore he'd seen something. This was
6:19
Speaker 1: an experienced Marine too, not some boot fresh out of
6:23
Speaker 1: training with an itchy trigger finger. But I did what
6:26
Speaker 1: 9 out of 10 platoon commanders would have done, and
6:29
Speaker 1: I got him out of there out of fear that
6:31
Speaker 1: he was cracking up. We did our due diligence, of course,
6:34
Speaker 1: and swept the area with NODs and white light, but nothing.
6:39
Speaker 1: No tracks in the dust that weren't ours. no blood
6:42
Speaker 1: except for that of my own marines, and certainly no
6:45
Speaker 1: sword-wielding maniac intent on chopping my guys up. Once the
6:49
Speaker 1: two wounded were stable enough, I called it in, then
6:52
Speaker 1: dust-off came in from Bastion about 40 minutes later. They
6:57
Speaker 1: took our wounded guys out and thankfully both ended up surviving.
7:01
Speaker 1: The Lance Corporal lost some function in the arm and
7:03
Speaker 1: the PFC walks with a limp now, but living to
7:06
Speaker 1: tell the tale is a blessing in and of itself.
7:09
Speaker 1: As for the Corporal who shot them, I had him
7:11
Speaker 1: medevac the next morning on a supply bird for evaluation.
7:15
Speaker 1: This put us three men down instead of just two,
7:19
Speaker 1: but it was better than risk him putting rounds into
7:21
Speaker 1: more of our own people. We stayed in the compound
7:25
Speaker 1: for another five days, and in that time, there were
7:27
Speaker 1: no more friendly fire incidents and no more visual contacts
7:31
Speaker 1: that couldn't be accounted for. But then the stuff with
7:34
Speaker 1: the radio started, particularly for the men posted near the
7:37
Speaker 1: northern wall, the one nearest to Cemetery Hill. They said
7:42
Speaker 1: it was like static that resolved into voices. Not English,
7:47
Speaker 1: but not usual Pashto chatter that we sometimes picked up
7:50
Speaker 1: from Taliban either. These were quieter, and some of the
7:53
Speaker 1: guys said it sounded almost like Russian a little, but
7:56
Speaker 1: it didn't sound like that to me. Men would key
7:59
Speaker 1: the handset and hear what sounded like whispering right in
8:02
Speaker 1: their ear or sometimes just breathing. One Marine swore he
8:06
Speaker 1: heard a man crying. Another said it was a woman's
8:09
Speaker 1: voice he kept hearing. only she didn't sound sad. He
8:13
Speaker 1: said she sounded like bitter, angry almost. We swapped batteries over,
8:19
Speaker 1: even handsets too at one point, but anyone who spent
8:22
Speaker 1: more than an hour on that northern position after dark
8:25
Speaker 1: ended up hearing something. We never talked about it after
8:29
Speaker 1: we pulled out of that place and moved further north
8:31
Speaker 1: toward Musa Kuala. The whole conversation centered around that corporal
8:35
Speaker 1: and the psyche vow that he was going to be
8:37
Speaker 1: run through, and everything was just... Well, it didn't fit,
8:41
Speaker 1: and so we didn't discuss it. And I spent years
8:44
Speaker 1: telling myself that it was nothing. Something messed that corporal up,
8:48
Speaker 1: be it heat or stress or just being in country
8:51
Speaker 1: too long. Nothing rationality couldn't easily explain. The same could
8:56
Speaker 1: be said for the radio noise, which could have been
8:58
Speaker 1: atmospheric interference or some local transmitter bouncing weird stuff off
9:02
Speaker 1: the terrain. And what we experienced was nothing more than
9:06
Speaker 1: a tragic instance of friendly fire, which can pretty easily
9:10
Speaker 1: happen in a place where people are tired, the night
9:12
Speaker 1: is black, and every shadow looks like it might try
9:15
Speaker 1: to kill you. That was the story I kept, officially
9:19
Speaker 1: and for myself, and it held until about three years
9:22
Speaker 1: ago when it completely collapsed around me. I was out
9:26
Speaker 1: of the Corps by then, working a civilian job, when
9:29
Speaker 1: the Lance Corporal actually reached out to me. He said
9:32
Speaker 1: there was something about that night that he hadn't told anyone,
9:35
Speaker 1: mostly for fear that he'd end up like the Corporal
9:37
Speaker 1: and taken off duty to have his brain poked and prodded.
9:41
Speaker 1: But he'd seen the same thing as him, the exact
9:44
Speaker 1: same thing, and was about to open fire himself before
9:47
Speaker 1: the corporal beat him to it from the opposite direction.
9:52
Speaker 1: The PFC wouldn't talk about it at all, and the
9:54
Speaker 1: corporal had gotten out on a medical and disappeared into society,
9:58
Speaker 1: and so there was no getting anywhere. answers from either
10:00
Speaker 1: of them. But years later, one of my old squad
10:04
Speaker 1: leaders found me at a reunion and asked if I'd
10:07
Speaker 1: ever looked into the history of the compound that we
10:09
Speaker 1: were at. I hadn't, but he had, and so he
10:13
Speaker 1: started telling me about all these old reports from whichever
10:17
Speaker 1: British unit was there back in 2009. Locals told stories
10:22
Speaker 1: about the place, about how a family had been massacred
10:25
Speaker 1: there during the Civil War years. Legend has it that
10:29
Speaker 1: the bodies of those killed were left unburied for days
10:33
Speaker 1: until someone finally went out there and put them under
10:35
Speaker 1: those rocks on the hill. I know what the after-action said.
10:40
Speaker 1: I know what I told the company commander and what
10:42
Speaker 1: went into the investigation. They were clean words that kept
10:46
Speaker 1: the machine moving. but the truth is more complicated and
10:50
Speaker 1: a lot more frightening. If I let my mind wander,
10:53
Speaker 1: I remember the look on the corporal's face. The exact look,
10:57
Speaker 1: down to every movement of his face. It wasn't just
11:01
Speaker 1: the look of a man who'd just shot two of
11:03
Speaker 1: his own. It was the look of a man who'd
11:05
Speaker 1: seen something he shouldn't. Something that looked right back at
11:08
Speaker 1: him before he flicked off his safety and opened fire.
11:12
Speaker 1: We never lost another man to friendly fire in that
11:15
Speaker 1: AO and we never occupied that compound again. And while
11:19
Speaker 1: I'll never know for sure what we encountered out there,
11:22
Speaker 1: the locals were right. It really didn't like strangers who
11:26
Speaker 1: stayed the night. I'm a physics teacher at a secondary
11:53
Speaker 1: school here in Coventry. But for a while, back in
11:56
Speaker 1: my youth, I worked as a paranormal investigator. Basically, I
12:01
Speaker 1: knew a guy who worked freelance for the 14 Times
12:04
Speaker 1: and other such publications. He needed someone to drive and
12:08
Speaker 1: load a van, and I needed the cash, and it
12:10
Speaker 1: actually proved a surprisingly steady gig. We'd visit a supposedly
12:15
Speaker 1: haunted property. talk to the owner, get a few photos,
12:18
Speaker 1: and do some background research. And then, if possible, we'd
12:22
Speaker 1: stay overnight to include a brief segment on what we experienced. Now,
12:26
Speaker 1: I didn't believe in any of it, but getting to
12:29
Speaker 1: research ghost stories for a living was really fun. What
12:32
Speaker 1: wasn't fun was interviewing the homeowners, most of which really
12:37
Speaker 1: did believe there was paranormal activity occurring at their property.
12:41
Speaker 1: Some of them were clearly suffering mental issues, so Hearing
12:45
Speaker 1: about how deluded they were was just kind of sad, really.
12:49
Speaker 1: But then there was one woman that, well, let's just
12:52
Speaker 1: say that she changed my whole outlook on the paranormal.
12:57
Speaker 1: And the job started like any other. My friend Stuart
13:00
Speaker 1: gave me a ring after hearing about a case up
13:03
Speaker 1: near Manchester, in one of those little towns that dots
13:06
Speaker 1: the M60 ring road. The homeowner had moved out almost
13:10
Speaker 1: an entire year prior, saying that she couldn't bear to
13:13
Speaker 1: live there anymore. And so after driving up to Manchester
13:16
Speaker 1: from Coventry, we met her at her mum's place and
13:20
Speaker 1: conducted an interview over some cups of tea. Her name
13:23
Speaker 1: was Lorna and she seemed like a nice normal lady,
13:27
Speaker 1: but as she assured us, that wasn't always the case.
13:30
Speaker 1: The previous year, the stress of living in a haunted
13:33
Speaker 1: house caused Lorna to suffer a nervous breakdown. All that stress,
13:38
Speaker 1: combined with not eating or sleeping properly, had her considering
13:42
Speaker 1: throwing herself out of her bedroom window. She said the
13:46
Speaker 1: ideations were so strong and vivid that it terrified her,
13:49
Speaker 1: and then following a complete mental breakdown, she went to
13:53
Speaker 1: stay with her elderly mom and had been there ever since.
13:57
Speaker 1: When we asked what form of the haunting had manifested itself,
14:01
Speaker 1: we received a rather unique answer. Most say they've seen
14:05
Speaker 1: ghostly reflections in mirrors or windows, showing people who weren't there,
14:09
Speaker 1: or sometimes these apparitions would appear to the naked eye.
14:13
Speaker 1: But Lorna told us that she'd never seen anything like that. Instead,
14:18
Speaker 1: all the manifestations she experienced came via strange radio transmissions
14:24
Speaker 1: and phone calls. The phone calls thing really threw us off.
14:29
Speaker 1: We'd heard of spirits communicating via Ouija boards, scratching messages
14:33
Speaker 1: onto paper, or even automatic writing, which is when a
14:37
Speaker 1: living person kind of taps into the spirit world and
14:40
Speaker 1: allows spirits to use their hand to write things. but
14:43
Speaker 1: we'd never heard of spirits using a telephone to communicate.
14:47
Speaker 1: And to be honest, it cast a lot of doubt
14:49
Speaker 1: onto what Lorna initially told us. Radios can malfunction or
14:54
Speaker 1: pick up strange signals, especially older models like the one
14:57
Speaker 1: Lorna admitted to using, but the phone calls. We didn't
15:02
Speaker 1: want to get a week into an investigation only to
15:04
Speaker 1: find out some local kids had been prank calling her.
15:08
Speaker 1: But then after the thing about the calls, Lorna told
15:10
Speaker 1: us something that dragged us right back into it again.
15:14
Speaker 1: She told us the haunting had really announced itself about
15:17
Speaker 1: a month after she moved in. Her phone would ring
15:21
Speaker 1: in the middle of the night, and when she first
15:22
Speaker 1: picked it up, there'd be nothing but silence. But then
15:26
Speaker 1: after a while, she'd start to hear whispers. Whispers that
15:29
Speaker 1: intensified until they frightened her so much, she just hung up.
15:34
Speaker 1: She heard the same things on the radio sometimes and
15:37
Speaker 1: said it was almost like going through the five stages
15:39
Speaker 1: of grief. First, she was in denial. and then she
15:43
Speaker 1: was angry the previous homeowner hadn't mentioned anything about it.
15:47
Speaker 1: But then came bargaining, and depression, and eventually acceptance. But
15:52
Speaker 1: that last stage only arrived once she'd done a little
15:55
Speaker 1: research into the home's history, and what she found horrified her.
16:01
Speaker 1: About 30 years before she bought it, the house had
16:03
Speaker 1: played host to a terrible murder, when one night, the
16:07
Speaker 1: neighbors heard screams coming from the home of an otherwise
16:10
Speaker 1: happy couple. They had such a reputation for being in
16:14
Speaker 1: love that no one thought to call the police at first,
16:17
Speaker 1: and it wasn't until the screams had been replaced with
16:20
Speaker 1: an eerie quiet that someone actually picked up a phone
16:23
Speaker 1: and dialed 999. The police arrived but received no response
16:27
Speaker 1: from ringing the doorbell, and so they broke down the
16:30
Speaker 1: door and began searching room to room. It was obvious
16:34
Speaker 1: some kind of violent struggle had occurred, but it was
16:36
Speaker 1: only when they got to the master bedroom that they
16:38
Speaker 1: realized just how bad it had been. The wife was
16:42
Speaker 1: lying on the bedroom carpet in a puddle of blood.
16:46
Speaker 1: She'd been strangled, her head had been bashed in, and
16:49
Speaker 1: the knife used to disembowel her was sticking out from
16:52
Speaker 1: between her ribs. The police report said her husband was
16:56
Speaker 1: sitting on the bed just feet away with the handset
16:59
Speaker 1: of an old rotary phone to his ear. People who
17:02
Speaker 1: take a life often seek advice or assistance from someone.
17:06
Speaker 1: In some cases, they want help moving a body. In
17:09
Speaker 1: other cases, they call a parent or a priest. And
17:12
Speaker 1: as you can imagine, these phone calls tend to end
17:15
Speaker 1: once the police get there. But not this one. When
17:19
Speaker 1: the police broke down the guy's door, the killer wasn't
17:21
Speaker 1: grief-stricken or wracked with regret. He was smiling. And in fact,
17:27
Speaker 1: according to the report, he was just smiling. He looked blissful. Euphoric, even.
17:34
Speaker 1: And the police tried to get his attention, but the
17:36
Speaker 1: guy didn't listen. He didn't even open his eyes. He
17:39
Speaker 1: kept them closed and kept on smiling... like whatever he
17:42
Speaker 1: was hearing on the other end of the phone made
17:44
Speaker 1: him the happiest he'd ever been. One of the officers
17:48
Speaker 1: tried pulling the phone out of his hand, since those
17:51
Speaker 1: heavy old handsets can actually do some nasty damage if
17:54
Speaker 1: they use it as a weapon, but the killer seemed
17:57
Speaker 1: determined to keep listening and kept the handset pressed firmly
18:00
Speaker 1: to his ear. Once he'd been subdued and the handset
18:04
Speaker 1: was back in its cradle, that's when he broke down.
18:08
Speaker 1: But not in guilt or grief or anything like that,
18:11
Speaker 1: not at all. He kept saying, please let me speak
18:14
Speaker 1: to her, please, as he was dragged down to the
18:17
Speaker 1: police car and taken away. Nothing about his wife or
18:21
Speaker 1: what he'd done to her, just let me speak to
18:23
Speaker 1: her in reference to whoever he'd been on the phone with.
18:29
Speaker 1: Stewart read that once the guy was in a holding cell,
18:31
Speaker 1: he slept for a full 24 hours before waking up,
18:35
Speaker 1: a mute, and he wouldn't talk to anyone, not even
18:37
Speaker 1: his solicitor, and refused to enter a plea at his hearing.
18:42
Speaker 1: The trial went ahead after he was deemed fit to stand,
18:45
Speaker 1: then he was convicted of murder and sentenced to life
18:48
Speaker 1: in prison. Everyone believed that he'd spend the next 30
18:52
Speaker 1: years behind bars, but he didn't last three months. Reports
18:56
Speaker 1: said that he was queuing to use the phone one
18:59
Speaker 1: day when the prisoner in front of him simply put
19:01
Speaker 1: the phone down, turned around, and then started strangling our
19:05
Speaker 1: silent wife-killer. The attacker crushed our man's larynx before prison
19:11
Speaker 1: officers could get to them, meaning he'd exactly zero chance
19:15
Speaker 1: of survival without receiving immediate medical attention, which, seeing as
19:20
Speaker 1: a small riot broke out, he wasn't able to receive.
19:24
Speaker 1: And the man's killer was questioned and openly admitted to
19:27
Speaker 1: what seemed like a random murder. There was just one issue.
19:31
Speaker 1: He didn't know why he'd murdered that wife-killer. All he
19:36
Speaker 1: knew is that during the middle of a call to
19:37
Speaker 1: his cousin, he'd started hearing a voice telling him about
19:41
Speaker 1: the man behind him. He was a scumbag, a woman killer,
19:45
Speaker 1: a nutcase who didn't deserve to breathe anymore, stuff like that.
19:49
Speaker 1: And then, without even questioning it, he hung up on
19:52
Speaker 1: his cousin and did as the voice commanded. And there
19:56
Speaker 1: was no further explanation. The prisoner heard a voice, then
20:01
Speaker 1: obeyed without question. But it wasn't lost on us just
20:04
Speaker 1: how similar it was to the victim's own crime of
20:07
Speaker 1: inexplicably murdering his wife. I remember how, as Lorna got
20:12
Speaker 1: to that last part, me and Stuart swapped a look
20:15
Speaker 1: that said, bloody hell, we might be onto something here.
20:19
Speaker 1: And God help us, we were onto something. It's just
20:23
Speaker 1: something that I wish that I could forget. We thanked
20:27
Speaker 1: Lorna for her time and told her that we'd be
20:29
Speaker 1: in touch to collect the keys for the overnight stay
20:32
Speaker 1: that we'd been planning. But despite having possibly stumbled onto
20:36
Speaker 1: one hell of a story, we couldn't get too excited yet.
20:40
Speaker 1: as all important fact-checking phases had yet to be completed.
20:43
Speaker 1: It probably sounds odd for something like paranormal investigation, but
20:48
Speaker 1: we didn't just take people at their word. We put
20:50
Speaker 1: a great deal of research into the things we were told,
20:53
Speaker 1: especially when they involved some kind of documented crime that
20:56
Speaker 1: we could cross-reference, as the last thing we wanted to
20:59
Speaker 1: do was misrepresent established facts. But when it came to
21:03
Speaker 1: researching the house in question, we found what Lorna told
21:07
Speaker 1: us was only the tip of the proverbial iceberg. All
21:11
Speaker 1: that stuff about the wife murder was true. But even
21:15
Speaker 1: before that, a clear pattern of sale and resale presented
21:19
Speaker 1: itself through the home's ownership records. We found that as
21:23
Speaker 1: far back as the Second World War, the house had
21:25
Speaker 1: changed ownership as often as three times per year. And then,
21:29
Speaker 1: just like in Lorna's case, there was evidence that owners
21:32
Speaker 1: had abandoned it for long periods of time before doing
21:35
Speaker 1: it up again and selling it on. Lorna believed that
21:39
Speaker 1: her house was haunted by the spirit of the man's
21:41
Speaker 1: dead wife, who'd actually been pregnant at the time of
21:44
Speaker 1: the murder, meaning it was potentially haunted by their unborn
21:48
Speaker 1: child as well as the murdered wife. But what we
21:52
Speaker 1: found cast a great deal of doubt on that theory.
21:56
Speaker 1: As you see, back during World War II, another murder
21:59
Speaker 1: had taken place there. The mother of two, whose husband
22:04
Speaker 1: was off fighting somewhere, returned home from work to find
22:07
Speaker 1: her 17-year-old daughter had murdered her eight-year-old brother. Apparently her
22:13
Speaker 1: fingerprints were found all over the knife used to kill him,
22:15
Speaker 1: and then afterwards, the girl threw herself from her mother's
22:18
Speaker 1: bedroom window. She didn't survive the fall, had been dead
22:22
Speaker 1: for hours by the time her mother got home, and
22:25
Speaker 1: had provided no kind of explanation whatsoever in terms of
22:29
Speaker 1: notes or recent troubling behavior. But what really got her
22:33
Speaker 1: attention was this. The girl had been found with pieces
22:37
Speaker 1: of paper pinned to her dress, something she'd apparently done
22:41
Speaker 1: herself before diving headfirst out of the window, and according
22:45
Speaker 1: to reports, each of these pieces of paper had markings
22:48
Speaker 1: on them. That's all it said. Markings. Nothing about any words, pictures,
22:54
Speaker 1: or symbols, just, quote, markings. We knew we had an
22:59
Speaker 1: amazing story on our hands the moment we read that
23:01
Speaker 1: thing about the markings. All that was left to do
23:04
Speaker 1: was organize our overnight stay, and the date we picked
23:08
Speaker 1: is one that'll forever be etched into my mind. October
23:13
Speaker 1: the 4th. Exactly 32 years to the day since the
23:17
Speaker 1: man murdered his pregnant wife, and then fought the police
23:20
Speaker 1: when they tried to pull that phone from his grip.
23:23
Speaker 1: We picked the keys up from Lorna at about half
23:26
Speaker 1: four that Friday, and then after filling up on a
23:29
Speaker 1: little dinner, we drove out to the house and parked outside. Now,
23:33
Speaker 1: if you're picturing some haunted mansion-looking thing, think again. It
23:38
Speaker 1: was a quaint, detached house in a nice part of town,
23:41
Speaker 1: surrounded by other houses. And if it wasn't for the
23:44
Speaker 1: overgrown garden and peeling paint on the door, it wouldn't
23:47
Speaker 1: have warranted a second glance. But the inside was another story.
23:53
Speaker 1: The place was dusty as anything, and there was mold
23:55
Speaker 1: growing on the walls and furniture. And since the lights
23:58
Speaker 1: or heating hadn't worked in almost a year... We had
24:01
Speaker 1: to use torches to keep the place lit and extra
24:04
Speaker 1: layers to keep ourselves warm. We cleared the living room
24:08
Speaker 1: up as best as we could, then managed to find
24:10
Speaker 1: some old sheets to cover the cold, damp couch and
24:13
Speaker 1: armchair so we'd have something to sit on. And then
24:16
Speaker 1: after that, we did the only thing we could do,
24:19
Speaker 1: which was wait. To test out Lorna's claims of radio interference,
24:24
Speaker 1: I brought along a small portable FM radio that I
24:27
Speaker 1: used to listen to football. It was almost permanently tuned
24:31
Speaker 1: to five live sports, so we sat there listening to
24:34
Speaker 1: the host talking up the following day's fixtures. Now, it's
24:37
Speaker 1: burned in my brain that they were talking about Sir
24:40
Speaker 1: Bobby Robson's rejuvenated Newcastle side, and then wondering if Alan
24:44
Speaker 1: Shearer could repeat the previous season's form, and then suddenly,
24:49
Speaker 1: we heard it. The distinct sound of a girl's laughter,
24:54
Speaker 1: just at a much lower volume than the people talking.
24:58
Speaker 1: This was back before women pundits were a regular thing,
25:01
Speaker 1: so the sound of a female voice on a football-related
25:04
Speaker 1: radio show caught our attention immediately. Stuart practically lunged forward
25:09
Speaker 1: with his dictaphone in an attempt to record the laughter
25:13
Speaker 1: if it happened again, and then we stayed there, still
25:17
Speaker 1: and silent with the radio blaring until we heard it again.
25:21
Speaker 1: We actually laughed when Stu stopped the tape on his dictaphone.
25:25
Speaker 1: We've been to dozens of places and spent many a
25:28
Speaker 1: long hour listening to benign sounds like houses settling or
25:32
Speaker 1: distant foxes shagging, both of which homeowners claimed were evidence
25:36
Speaker 1: of the paranormal but were perfectly explainable. So hearing that laugh,
25:41
Speaker 1: even if it was just bleeding over from another frequency,
25:45
Speaker 1: it was just so oddly satisfying. We kept the radio
25:50
Speaker 1: on for as long as we stayed there but heard
25:52
Speaker 1: nothing else. Stuart was the first to fall asleep He
25:55
Speaker 1: always was, even if we were in some tumbling down
25:59
Speaker 1: rat infested hellhole. And so I took it upon myself
26:02
Speaker 1: to stay up, make some notes and enjoy the quiet.
26:06
Speaker 1: Now it was about one in the morning when I
26:08
Speaker 1: crept back inside after having a smoke, and then I'd
26:12
Speaker 1: just settled onto the couch to get some sleep myself
26:15
Speaker 1: when Stuart's phone started to ring. This was back when
26:19
Speaker 1: vibrating phones were really loud, so just the sound of
26:22
Speaker 1: it going off in his pocket was enough to give
26:24
Speaker 1: me a fright. but it scared Stuart so much that
26:27
Speaker 1: he almost fell out of his chair that he was
26:29
Speaker 1: napping in. We had ourselves a little chuckle as he
26:33
Speaker 1: pulled it out of his pocket, but when he checked
26:35
Speaker 1: the caller ID, he frowned. When I asked him who
26:38
Speaker 1: it was, he shook his head and said that he
26:40
Speaker 1: didn't know, and then, after pushing a button, he put
26:43
Speaker 1: the handset to his ear and said hello. I watched
26:47
Speaker 1: his face in the peripheral light of my torch and
26:49
Speaker 1: saw his initial look of confusion as he asked who
26:52
Speaker 1: was calling. Now I couldn't hear anything coming from the handset,
26:55
Speaker 1: not the faintest of voices. After getting an answer, he asked, Who?
27:01
Speaker 1: With an emphasis, like he hadn't understood what was said.
27:05
Speaker 1: But then a second later, presumably after some explanation, he said, Oh,
27:10
Speaker 1: okay then. Then settled back in his chair to listen
27:14
Speaker 1: to them speak. I thought it must have been an
27:16
Speaker 1: important call, because who else would be calling past one
27:19
Speaker 1: o'clock in the morning? I watched Stuart listening to the
27:23
Speaker 1: voice on the other end, too foggy-brained to connect the
27:26
Speaker 1: dots at first as he stared into space and concentration.
27:30
Speaker 1: But then it happened. His expression went from one of
27:33
Speaker 1: concentration to one of stupor. His mouth slowly dropped open,
27:38
Speaker 1: his eyes seemed to lose focus, and for a second
27:42
Speaker 1: I was thinking that it must have been really bad
27:44
Speaker 1: news or something. But then his face tightened up and
27:48
Speaker 1: instead of that silly, gawping look that he had, He
27:51
Speaker 1: started to grin. He turned his face towards me and
27:55
Speaker 1: when his eyes locked with mine, a chill ran through me.
27:59
Speaker 1: Because the only way I can describe the look he
28:01
Speaker 1: was giving me is one of absolute evil. He didn't
28:08
Speaker 1: just look like he wanted to kill me. He looked
28:10
Speaker 1: like he wanted to hurt me. Hurt me badly. And
28:14
Speaker 1: from the look on his face, he'd enjoy it too.
28:18
Speaker 1: I'm not a complete idiot. I might have been slow
28:20
Speaker 1: to realize what was actually going on, but everything eventually
28:24
Speaker 1: made sense and when it did, I just dived at him.
28:28
Speaker 1: I went for the phone, lunging for it with both
28:31
Speaker 1: hands before wrenching it from his grip. I ended the
28:34
Speaker 1: call having seen an unknown unsaved number on the screen
28:38
Speaker 1: and then threw Stu's phone across the room like it
28:40
Speaker 1: was some live hand grenade. And then, by the time
28:44
Speaker 1: I turned back to Stu, he was just lying on
28:47
Speaker 1: the floor and He was shaking in a way that
28:50
Speaker 1: still gives me chills to think about. The doctors said
28:54
Speaker 1: it was a seizure caused by a combination of stress, dehydration,
28:58
Speaker 1: too much caffeine, lack of sleep, all sorts of stuff
29:01
Speaker 1: like that. They tried to tell him he was working
29:04
Speaker 1: too hard, and we were, but not to that extent.
29:09
Speaker 1: He was whisked to the hospital after I called an ambulance,
29:13
Speaker 1: and a doctor checked him over and kept him overnight
29:15
Speaker 1: on a drip. and then the following afternoon he was
29:18
Speaker 1: discharged with the aforementioned explanation. I asked Stu what he'd
29:22
Speaker 1: heard on the phone that previous night, but he said
29:25
Speaker 1: he couldn't remember. He remembered dozing off, waking up to
29:29
Speaker 1: the vibration in his pocket, and then the next thing
29:31
Speaker 1: he knew, he was waking up in the ambulance with
29:34
Speaker 1: an oxygen mask over his face. I had to talk
29:38
Speaker 1: him through what had happened, and... let me tell you,
29:40
Speaker 1: it was not a pleasant experience. He sat there in
29:44
Speaker 1: the passenger seat of the van, white as a sheet,
29:47
Speaker 1: just staring out the window as I told him about
29:49
Speaker 1: that look that he got on his face, the one
29:52
Speaker 1: that scared me half to death. I'd never seen him
29:55
Speaker 1: so shaken. Stuart was a talker, Always rabbiting with people,
29:59
Speaker 1: and it's what made him such a good interviewer, I suppose.
30:03
Speaker 1: He was a people person. But for the first time
30:05
Speaker 1: in all the years I'd known him, he just sat
30:07
Speaker 1: there in silence, pale as a freaking ghost. And then
30:11
Speaker 1: when he did speak, it was in this quiet voice
30:14
Speaker 1: thanking me for pulling the phone away from him. I
30:17
Speaker 1: dropped him off at a pub around the corner from
30:19
Speaker 1: the house and then went back to get his phone.
30:22
Speaker 1: I left it behind in the rush to get Stu help,
30:24
Speaker 1: and to be honest... I did remember it as I
30:26
Speaker 1: was climbing into the back of the ambulance with Stu
30:28
Speaker 1: on the stretcher, but the thought of going back into
30:31
Speaker 1: that house, after what he'd just experienced, there wasn't a
30:34
Speaker 1: cat in hell's chance, I'm telling you that. But the
30:39
Speaker 1: next afternoon was a nice sunny one for October, and
30:42
Speaker 1: the house didn't feel so scary anymore, even though it really,
30:46
Speaker 1: really was. Just stepping over the threshold sends shivers through me,
30:50
Speaker 1: but with the help of my torch I was easily
30:53
Speaker 1: able to locate Stu's phone. and then once I was
30:55
Speaker 1: back in the van, I opened the call log to
30:58
Speaker 1: see who had called him. There was the number, just
31:02
Speaker 1: a perfectly regular looking one, and while my first thought
31:05
Speaker 1: was to dial it, I found myself hesitating. And then
31:09
Speaker 1: for a few horrible moments, I wondered if what happened
31:12
Speaker 1: to Stu in that house that night was about to
31:15
Speaker 1: happen to me. And with that in mind, what I
31:17
Speaker 1: did next was extremely stupid. But after telling myself I'd
31:21
Speaker 1: hang up immediately if I heard anything weird or creepy...
31:24
Speaker 1: I dialed the number and put the phone to my ear.
31:28
Speaker 1: Now there were a few moments of silence as the
31:30
Speaker 1: call connected, then when I heard a voice, I actually
31:34
Speaker 1: jumped a little bit. But it wasn't a ghost or
31:36
Speaker 1: a malevolent spirit. It was that robotic lady's voice saying,
31:41
Speaker 1: the number you have dialed has not been recognized. Stu
31:45
Speaker 1: just nodded when I told him and same with Lorna.
31:48
Speaker 1: She wasn't in the least bit surprised to hear what
31:51
Speaker 1: we'd been through. She'd been living it herself for months.
31:55
Speaker 1: She thanked us for showing interest when we handed back
31:58
Speaker 1: the keys, and I'd be lying if I said that
32:00
Speaker 1: I didn't get a bit emotional. I know I welled
32:03
Speaker 1: up when I gave her a hug and told her
32:05
Speaker 1: that we'd shed as much light as possible on her terrible,
32:07
Speaker 1: terrible plight. And then it was back to Coventry to
32:11
Speaker 1: write up what we'd experienced and send off a draft
32:13
Speaker 1: to an editor at the Fourteen Times. Now when it
32:16
Speaker 1: was done, we thought it was our masterpiece, our magnum
32:20
Speaker 1: opus that'd be remembered in the field of paranormal research
32:23
Speaker 1: for years to come. but when the notes came back,
32:26
Speaker 1: they amounted to pretty much, tone it down, lads. Our
32:29
Speaker 1: readers are open-minded, but not so much their brains have
32:32
Speaker 1: actually fallen out. They said it was too much, too
32:36
Speaker 1: on the nose, and that it read like an episode
32:38
Speaker 1: of Tales from the Crypt. We fought back hard in
32:41
Speaker 1: the end. We had to admit all this segment about
32:43
Speaker 1: an overnight stay. The pieces were supposed to be frightening
32:47
Speaker 1: and interesting, not disturbing. And to confuse a serious medical
32:51
Speaker 1: episode with a haunting was downright unprofessional in their eyes.
32:57
Speaker 1: I didn't agree and I still don't agree, but we
32:59
Speaker 1: needed to get published if we wanted to get paid.
33:02
Speaker 1: The editor was very complimentary once the piece was accepted,
33:05
Speaker 1: but it didn't soften the blow, not least because the
33:08
Speaker 1: incident broke up the band, so to speak. Stu didn't
33:11
Speaker 1: want to do it anymore after that and I can't
33:13
Speaker 1: blame him. Ghost hunting isn't such a laugh when you
33:16
Speaker 1: really do believe in them and the night we spent
33:18
Speaker 1: in that house up near Manchester made a believer out
33:21
Speaker 1: of me. I suppose a good way to end this
33:24
Speaker 1: would be to give you my theory on what's wrong
33:26
Speaker 1: with that house. Because imagine after all I've said and
33:30
Speaker 1: described it might be difficult to see how it's all
33:32
Speaker 1: linked together. Some of you might even disagree with me
33:35
Speaker 1: and if so I'd love to hear it. But as
33:37
Speaker 1: far as I'm concerned I think it all leads back
33:40
Speaker 1: to what that teenage girl did during the war. I
33:43
Speaker 1: think throwing herself out that window after murdering her little
33:46
Speaker 1: brother must have done something. I mean why else pin
33:50
Speaker 1: pieces of paper to her dress before doing it? They
33:53
Speaker 1: were symbols, maybe not literal symbols on the pages, but
33:57
Speaker 1: they were symbolic of something, meaning the act itself was symbolic.
34:02
Speaker 1: And the root of the word symbolic comes from a
34:04
Speaker 1: Greek term meaning that which is thrown or cast together.
34:09
Speaker 1: The act was intended to unite her with something much
34:11
Speaker 1: bigger and much more terrible than her own mortal soul.
34:15
Speaker 1: God knows how a girl her age would find out
34:18
Speaker 1: about something like that, but whatever that girl learned, I
34:21
Speaker 1: think it enabled her to put herself into that house
34:24
Speaker 1: and in a way that science maybe just isn't ready
34:27
Speaker 1: to explain yet. I think her spirit can manifest itself
34:31
Speaker 1: electronically somehow, which explains the radios and the phones. And
34:35
Speaker 1: I think it can get close enough and talk long enough.
34:38
Speaker 1: It can make people do things. I also believe the
34:42
Speaker 1: spirit has an easier time influencing men than it does women.
34:46
Speaker 1: Lorna said that she didn't experience any memory loss. Whenever
34:50
Speaker 1: she heard a strange voice in the other end, she
34:52
Speaker 1: just told them to buzz off and hung up. But
34:55
Speaker 1: she did hear the voice, and she did get that
34:58
Speaker 1: strange urge to throw herself out the bedroom window. The
35:01
Speaker 1: same bedroom window that girl had thrown herself out of
35:04
Speaker 1: all those years before. Like I said at the start,
35:08
Speaker 1: I teach now, and I'd like to think that I've
35:10
Speaker 1: settled down a bit. And so has Stuart, who now
35:13
Speaker 1: works down in London and has a wife and a kid.
35:16
Speaker 1: We still talk from time to time, but we never...
35:19
Speaker 1: ever talk about what happened in that house that night,
35:22
Speaker 1: so I'm honestly not sure how he's come to terms
35:24
Speaker 1: with it or if he's even come to terms with
35:26
Speaker 1: it at all. But what I do know is that
35:29
Speaker 1: to this day he never, ever answers calls from unknown numbers.
35:59
Speaker 1: So just to put this out there, I used to
36:01
Speaker 1: be an outlaw. Well, that's what I told myself anyway,
36:05
Speaker 1: that I was living that outlaw lifestyle. But if I'm
36:08
Speaker 1: being honest, I was just a real piece of crap.
36:12
Speaker 1: I robbed people, hurt people, and sold a heck of
36:15
Speaker 1: a lot of dope. And then I slept like a
36:17
Speaker 1: baby whenever I crashed from being dazed on the move.
36:22
Speaker 1: I was free, truly free, of guilt, of conscience, of morality.
36:27
Speaker 1: and then came the job that changed everything for me.
36:31
Speaker 1: For years, I was what was called a nomad among
36:35
Speaker 1: one-percenter biker gangs. Everyone does it differently, I guess, but
36:39
Speaker 1: in my case, I liked going out and seeing the country,
36:42
Speaker 1: earning where I could and then coming back with fists
36:45
Speaker 1: full of dollars for the club's coffers. And that's the
36:48
Speaker 1: only way you kept your nomad status if you got
36:51
Speaker 1: granted it, by being an earner. And at the risk
36:54
Speaker 1: of tooting my own horn a little too hard, I
36:57
Speaker 1: was a damn good one. I'd do just about anything
37:00
Speaker 1: if it meant getting my hands on about four to
37:02
Speaker 1: five figures, including armed robbery. And as far as I
37:06
Speaker 1: was concerned, the riskier, the better. Because the bigger the risk,
37:10
Speaker 1: the bigger the payday. And the same was true for
37:13
Speaker 1: this job right here, which turned out to be the
37:15
Speaker 1: last that I ever worked. After talking with a guy
37:20
Speaker 1: that we'll just call Red, I found out that he
37:22
Speaker 1: needed an extra gun to hit a cash truck. It
37:26
Speaker 1: was heavily guarded, and it was hauling a hell of
37:28
Speaker 1: a lot of cash, but that's not the only reason
37:30
Speaker 1: it became a target for us. The main reason was
37:34
Speaker 1: the transit company was being played by an illegal gambling
37:37
Speaker 1: cartel outside of Missouri. The company believed all the cash
37:42
Speaker 1: that they were transporting was legitimate, but in reality, it
37:45
Speaker 1: was anything but, meaning if we hit them, the cops
37:48
Speaker 1: would find them curiously uncooperative when it came to recovering
37:52
Speaker 1: what they claimed was legitimate income. Now sure, the company
37:56
Speaker 1: would be pissed, and their reputation would take a hit,
37:59
Speaker 1: but the money's real owners wouldn't want the FBI sniffing
38:02
Speaker 1: around their operation. Not unless they wanted their entire empire
38:06
Speaker 1: to crumble around them. And while they'd definitely send some
38:09
Speaker 1: of their own guys out looking for it, they didn't
38:12
Speaker 1: have the weight of the federal government behind them. And
38:15
Speaker 1: that's how the truck became a target for us, and
38:18
Speaker 1: it would have gone smooth as silk too, if it
38:21
Speaker 1: wasn't for one giant mistake. One of the guards got shot,
38:26
Speaker 1: a woman actually, and I'm not even sure how it happened.
38:30
Speaker 1: One second we were hauling bags of cash into the
38:32
Speaker 1: cars and the next there was a gunshot and one
38:35
Speaker 1: of the guys, I'll just call him Killer, I didn't
38:37
Speaker 1: know his actual name, was shouting, she tried to grab
38:40
Speaker 1: my gun, I had to, I had to do it.
38:44
Speaker 1: We sped things up, grabbing and throwing and jumping back
38:47
Speaker 1: into the cars, and then it was off to the
38:49
Speaker 1: hideout for a week to lay low until things cooled off.
38:53
Speaker 1: People we stole from would have people scouring the areas
38:56
Speaker 1: as well as nearby towns for even the faintest of
38:59
Speaker 1: traces of us. But this would be expensive, and if
39:02
Speaker 1: the cops got wind of the search, they'd realize something
39:05
Speaker 1: else was going on. And so the estimate was a
39:08
Speaker 1: week tops before they called time on their search. They
39:12
Speaker 1: wouldn't swallow the loss exactly. They'd always be pissed about it,
39:16
Speaker 1: but after about a week, it'd be way easier to
39:18
Speaker 1: move the money around and get the hell out of
39:20
Speaker 1: Dodge without being spotted by anyone. The robbery itself was intense,
39:25
Speaker 1: but moving the money was by far the hardest part.
39:29
Speaker 1: We had to abandon the stolen cars on a dirt
39:31
Speaker 1: road and then hike around 15 miles into the woods
39:34
Speaker 1: to find this old abandoned house after setting the cars
39:37
Speaker 1: on fire. That was the hardest thing I've ever done
39:40
Speaker 1: in my life, and the only thing that kept us
39:42
Speaker 1: going when our feet were blistering and muscles were cramping
39:46
Speaker 1: with the hundreds of thousands of dollars we had in
39:48
Speaker 1: those bags around our shoulders. And if it wasn't for that,
39:52
Speaker 1: I'd have given up about an hour in, but instead,
39:55
Speaker 1: we walked all day and long into the night before
39:58
Speaker 1: we finally came across the place we were supposed to
40:00
Speaker 1: be hiding out. There were four other guys with me.
40:04
Speaker 1: A guy named Red, who organized the job, and then
40:07
Speaker 1: three guys I'm just going to call Killer, Bozo, and
40:10
Speaker 1: the Kid. Killer was a killer. Bozo was as dumb
40:16
Speaker 1: as a bag of rocks and the kid, well, he
40:19
Speaker 1: could have been anywhere between 35 and 13. We'd walked
40:23
Speaker 1: all night and we were exhausted by the time Red said, Hey,
40:27
Speaker 1: I think I see something. We aimed our flashlights ahead,
40:31
Speaker 1: all of us, and lit up this absolute wreck of
40:34
Speaker 1: a cabin. It was big enough to sleep five, but
40:37
Speaker 1: it had obviously seen better days, way better days. And
40:41
Speaker 1: then once we were inside, the complaints started. The place
40:45
Speaker 1: was filthy, even by my standards, which, at the time,
40:49
Speaker 1: were very, very low. It looked like it was about
40:52
Speaker 1: to fall apart. The downstairs had old animal scat all
40:56
Speaker 1: over the place, and there were all kinds of fungus
40:58
Speaker 1: growing places, and there wasn't a scrap of furniture either
41:01
Speaker 1: upstairs or down. I remember the kids saying something like,
41:05
Speaker 1: they want us to live here? For a week? And
41:09
Speaker 1: the killer agreed and said that there must have been
41:11
Speaker 1: some kind of mistake. But to me and the bozo,
41:14
Speaker 1: it made sense. The place was such a dump that
41:17
Speaker 1: even if someone did come across it, they might just
41:20
Speaker 1: walk straight past. And then with no electricity, no phone line,
41:24
Speaker 1: and no running water, the place was like a ghost house,
41:27
Speaker 1: totally off the grid. We dumped our gear and the
41:31
Speaker 1: money in the rooms up on the second floor and
41:32
Speaker 1: then tried to get some shut-eye, and then in the morning,
41:35
Speaker 1: we got to cleaning the place up a little. But
41:38
Speaker 1: from the moment everyone opened their eyes, there was tension. Red,
41:42
Speaker 1: who'd done all the recruiting on behalf of his boss,
41:45
Speaker 1: had been told that there'd be food and water waiting
41:47
Speaker 1: for us, but obviously there was none. He was just
41:51
Speaker 1: as pissed as we were, but he didn't think that
41:54
Speaker 1: we were in the wrong place. He said he'd followed
41:56
Speaker 1: the directions to the letter and that maybe the food
41:59
Speaker 1: and water had been left somewhere nearby or something. Even
42:03
Speaker 1: if it wasn't, five grown-ass men would have no problem
42:06
Speaker 1: surviving in the woods for a week, right? And we
42:09
Speaker 1: actually didn't do too badly, all things considered. Now I'd
42:13
Speaker 1: grown up with a crazy former military dad and the
42:15
Speaker 1: kid grew up on a farm and Red liked to
42:17
Speaker 1: spend a lot of time outdoors too. And so while
42:20
Speaker 1: our first night sucked, the second was way more comfortable.
42:24
Speaker 1: But that was the one and only night that we
42:26
Speaker 1: were even close to comfortable. The kid managed to shoot
42:29
Speaker 1: us a couple of rabbits at dawn and there was
42:32
Speaker 1: a fast moving stream nearby that we could drink from
42:34
Speaker 1: so we weren't exactly running on empty. But by the
42:37
Speaker 1: middle of that first afternoon, the hunger was starting to
42:40
Speaker 1: get to us and we were itching to get out
42:42
Speaker 1: of there Maybe shoot a deer or something so we
42:44
Speaker 1: could fill up actually. But then before we even got
42:48
Speaker 1: out there, the tension rose even more when the kid
42:51
Speaker 1: and the killer almost got into it. The killer accused
42:55
Speaker 1: him of taking his stuff, but even though whatever it
42:58
Speaker 1: was just so happened to be over in the kid's corner,
43:00
Speaker 1: the kid denied taking it. Denied it so hard in
43:03
Speaker 1: fact that he was willing to fight over it. I
43:07
Speaker 1: thought he took it too because how else did it
43:09
Speaker 1: end up there? But no one wanted to F the
43:11
Speaker 1: whole job up over some petty squabble and so we
43:15
Speaker 1: broke up the fight and then got to organizing some
43:17
Speaker 1: hunting and foraging. Now the bozo and the killer stayed
43:21
Speaker 1: behind to completely search the cabin while the rest of
43:24
Speaker 1: us went out looking for deer. We didn't find any
43:28
Speaker 1: but we bagged a few squirrels and a couple of
43:30
Speaker 1: more rabbits and so we were in pretty high spirits
43:32
Speaker 1: by the time we got back to the cabin. But
43:35
Speaker 1: that's where the good vibes ended. Bozo had been looking
43:38
Speaker 1: through a closet downstairs when he found an old journal
43:42
Speaker 1: tucked away inside. He started flicking through it for some reason,
43:46
Speaker 1: I guess out of boredom, and then after pages of
43:49
Speaker 1: all this regular journaling, he sees five words scratched into
43:53
Speaker 1: the page in big black letters. We know what you did.
43:59
Speaker 1: Bozo freaked out and for obvious reasons too. The killer
44:02
Speaker 1: told him to calm down and that it wasn't what
44:04
Speaker 1: he thought it was. And then Bozo accuses him of
44:07
Speaker 1: playing a prank in very bad taste. I don't think
44:11
Speaker 1: they came to blows, but it came close. And then
44:14
Speaker 1: when we got back from hunting, Bozo freaked out all
44:17
Speaker 1: over again. None of us thought anyone was tracking us
44:21
Speaker 1: or anything like that. I mean, the idea of someone
44:23
Speaker 1: sneaking into the cabin during the night and writing that
44:25
Speaker 1: message in a journal and then just leaving it there
44:28
Speaker 1: for us to find, it was just the dumbest thing
44:30
Speaker 1: any of us had ever heard. But Bozo was right
44:34
Speaker 1: about one thing. That writing was way, way fresher than
44:38
Speaker 1: anything else in that journal. And then when I scratched
44:41
Speaker 1: at it and it felt dusty, I raised my fingertips
44:44
Speaker 1: to my nose and smelled the smoky scent of ash
44:48
Speaker 1: on them. We ate good that night, tension or not,
44:52
Speaker 1: and we'd all collectively decided that the journal was nothing
44:54
Speaker 1: to worry about. That stuff had to have been written
44:58
Speaker 1: there before we arrived and there was no other explanation.
45:02
Speaker 1: But then there was an explanation. and that was an
45:05
Speaker 1: explanation for our stuff randomly moving around at night too,
45:09
Speaker 1: something that happened to me as well. We just weren't
45:12
Speaker 1: ready to hear it yet. We went out hunting again
45:15
Speaker 1: the next day, which I guess might sound too risky
45:18
Speaker 1: to some, but we had to be like 15 miles
45:20
Speaker 1: from the nearest dirt road. If anyone heard, they had
45:25
Speaker 1: no reason to assume that we weren't just hunters. Besides,
45:28
Speaker 1: we didn't have much choice if we wanted to avoid
45:30
Speaker 1: hiking to a general store to stock up on supplies.
45:34
Speaker 1: because given the circumstances, that was a big no-no. We
45:38
Speaker 1: split up to cover more ground, since sightings were getting
45:40
Speaker 1: fewer and further between, and then on the way back,
45:44
Speaker 1: we heard the kid scream. Me and Red ran, and
45:48
Speaker 1: then when we saw the kid running, we thought we'd
45:50
Speaker 1: been found. He kept saying, they got the killer, they
45:54
Speaker 1: got him, and pointing off into the woods. And so
45:58
Speaker 1: we ran to where the kid had seen the killer's body,
46:00
Speaker 1: but when we got there, nothing. There was no blood
46:04
Speaker 1: and no body, but the kid said, they must have
46:07
Speaker 1: moved it. But then after rushing back to the cabin,
46:11
Speaker 1: there was the killer, completely unharmed, wondering why the hell
46:15
Speaker 1: we were so freaked out. I remember when it was
46:18
Speaker 1: all explained and the killer says, oh, and I'm the liability?
46:23
Speaker 1: This idiot's seeing stuff. But that time, the kid didn't
46:28
Speaker 1: seem in the mood to defend his reputation. He seemed rattled.
46:32
Speaker 1: like really rattled, and he might have had a baby face,
46:35
Speaker 1: but he wasn't soft. And so seeing him like that,
46:39
Speaker 1: looked all freaked out, like he was scared and losing
46:41
Speaker 1: his mind, it was a hell of a thing to see.
46:45
Speaker 1: And that was the third day, and it was a
46:46
Speaker 1: rough one. We hoped the night would be a better one,
46:50
Speaker 1: and the next day being a kind of halfway point
46:52
Speaker 1: meant that spirits were pretty high. But they didn't stay high,
46:56
Speaker 1: and not after the killer started acting weird that night.
47:00
Speaker 1: It was me that had found him when I walked
47:02
Speaker 1: out of the cabin in the middle of the night
47:03
Speaker 1: to go take a piss. He was stood outside whispering
47:06
Speaker 1: to himself so loud that I don't think he heard
47:09
Speaker 1: me coming. He jumped when I quietly called out to
47:12
Speaker 1: him and then stopped whispering like I'd caught him doing
47:15
Speaker 1: something he shouldn't. I didn't ask who he was talking to.
47:19
Speaker 1: I mean, why would I? There was no one else
47:21
Speaker 1: there and so instead I asked if he was okay.
47:25
Speaker 1: He didn't answer right away. He just brought his hands
47:28
Speaker 1: up to his head like he had a migraine or
47:30
Speaker 1: something And then after a few seconds, he told me
47:33
Speaker 1: that he just couldn't wait to get out of there.
47:35
Speaker 1: And I told him to take it easy, that we'd
47:37
Speaker 1: only be there a few days more and that we
47:39
Speaker 1: were all getting tired of living like frontiersmen. And then
47:43
Speaker 1: when I came back from my piss, there was no
47:45
Speaker 1: sign of the killer, inside or out. He was back
47:49
Speaker 1: when I woke up the next morning, but he still
47:51
Speaker 1: didn't seem himself. And while we were out hunting, Red
47:54
Speaker 1: suggested that killing that female guard was finally catching up
47:58
Speaker 1: to him and he wasn't the remorseless killer we thought
48:00
Speaker 1: he was. And then we saw the deer. Now, it
48:04
Speaker 1: wasn't the first we spotted. It was the first that
48:07
Speaker 1: didn't bolt as soon as we saw it, though. But
48:10
Speaker 1: just as Red took aim, we heard the sounds of
48:13
Speaker 1: gunshots behind us, and it sounded like they came from
48:16
Speaker 1: the cabin. Now, we got back in time to see
48:19
Speaker 1: Bozo running towards us with blood running down his arm,
48:22
Speaker 1: and all he was shouting was, He's burning the money!
48:25
Speaker 1: He's burning the money, quick! We ran fast but the
48:30
Speaker 1: bozo stopped us before we could round the cabin saying
48:32
Speaker 1: that the killer was out front burning the cash and
48:35
Speaker 1: that he'd shoot the second he saw us. Red told
48:39
Speaker 1: me to talk to him say anything to him and
48:42
Speaker 1: then he disappeared around the other side. I did as
48:45
Speaker 1: he told me calling out for the killer to stop
48:48
Speaker 1: only to have him send a few shots from his
48:50
Speaker 1: pistol my way. He shouted about doing something that needed
48:54
Speaker 1: to be done and then he kept on talking just
48:57
Speaker 1: not to me when he kept saying, I'm sorry, I'm
49:00
Speaker 1: so sorry. I don't think I've ever wanted to do
49:03
Speaker 1: anything less, but I tried again to tell the killer
49:05
Speaker 1: to stop burning the money. The killer yelled something as
49:10
Speaker 1: he sent three more 9mm in my direction, and then
49:13
Speaker 1: he kept on yelling until a. 40 caliber round silenced him.
49:19
Speaker 1: Red had leaned around the opposite corner of the cabin
49:21
Speaker 1: while he'd been distracted, and then put a single bullet
49:24
Speaker 1: in the back of the killer's head. Seeing one of
49:27
Speaker 1: the big bags of money open by the fire, we
49:30
Speaker 1: rushed to put it out, and thankfully, the killer hadn't
49:33
Speaker 1: managed to burn very much since he didn't have nothing
49:36
Speaker 1: flammable on him. We salvaged what we could, and then
49:41
Speaker 1: dragged the killer's body deep into the woods and left
49:43
Speaker 1: it there for the animals. We ran into the kid
49:46
Speaker 1: not long after we started dragging the body, and it
49:48
Speaker 1: was him that checked the wound on Bozo's arm. That
49:52
Speaker 1: lucky son of a bitch had only managed to pick
49:54
Speaker 1: up a graze, but he was still freaked out, and
49:56
Speaker 1: we all were. The next few days passed almost without event,
50:01
Speaker 1: and the one exception being that the kid saw something
50:04
Speaker 1: while out hunting. He'd been out looking for that deer
50:08
Speaker 1: and I believe he didn't see it... and you could
50:10
Speaker 1: tell he was lying when he said that he didn't
50:12
Speaker 1: see nothing. He saw something again alright. There was no
50:17
Speaker 1: other explanation for it. And although he wouldn't even admit
50:20
Speaker 1: to it, let alone say what it was... he was
50:23
Speaker 1: acting just like he had after he saw the killer's
50:26
Speaker 1: dead body... even though the man himself was safe and
50:29
Speaker 1: well back at the cabin. He kept his crap together,
50:32
Speaker 1: thank God, and we stuck it out for those last
50:35
Speaker 1: couple of days... until one pickup day when no one
50:38
Speaker 1: showed up to collect the money and drive us out
50:41
Speaker 1: of there. By then we were tired, more tired than
50:45
Speaker 1: I'd ever been in my life actually, and hungry too,
50:48
Speaker 1: because by then it was getting hard eating nothing but
50:52
Speaker 1: meat all the time, and no matter how much we ate,
50:55
Speaker 1: it always felt like something was missing. We panicked, and
50:59
Speaker 1: in the only way we had the energy to by then,
51:01
Speaker 1: which meant leaving one man on the money with a gun,
51:04
Speaker 1: that guy being Bozo, while the rest of us split
51:07
Speaker 1: up and went looking for some kind of way out
51:09
Speaker 1: of there. It was Red who ran into the guy
51:12
Speaker 1: looking for us, and he was walking down a dirt
51:15
Speaker 1: road when he and the driver, a guy he knew,
51:18
Speaker 1: gave each other this holy crap look as they passed
51:21
Speaker 1: each other. Red hopped in and guided him to the
51:24
Speaker 1: closest pickup spot, and then once we were all back
51:27
Speaker 1: at the cabin, the driver helped us haul the money out.
51:30
Speaker 1: And that's when we found out what Red had already
51:33
Speaker 1: been told. We'd been staying, in the wrong house. The
51:38
Speaker 1: place with all the food and water, the place that
51:40
Speaker 1: was livable, Red had walked us about four miles past it.
51:45
Speaker 1: He had gotten lost, and he was just too proud
51:48
Speaker 1: to admit it, and to this day I wonder why
51:50
Speaker 1: I didn't just shoot him in the back of the
51:52
Speaker 1: head as he sat there in the front passenger, just
51:55
Speaker 1: like he'd done to kill her. But I didn't, and
51:58
Speaker 1: I just wanted to get paid and get back to
51:59
Speaker 1: my bike and go the F home, and that's what
52:03
Speaker 1: I did. The driver had already asked where the fifth
52:06
Speaker 1: guy was, and the killer, I mean, and Red told
52:09
Speaker 1: him not to worry about it and that something happened,
52:12
Speaker 1: and the driver knew what he meant and didn't ask
52:14
Speaker 1: about the killer again. When I got back, I gave
52:18
Speaker 1: a few thousand to the club and then had a
52:20
Speaker 1: sit-down with the president to tell him I was going straight.
52:24
Speaker 1: I put in enough work for him to respect my decision,
52:26
Speaker 1: especially after I mentioned my plans to open up a shop.
52:30
Speaker 1: I'd give the club 5% of my net on top
52:32
Speaker 1: of my dues just to help keep her going and
52:35
Speaker 1: then obviously I'd fix all of their bikes up free
52:37
Speaker 1: of charge too. I didn't tell him what happened back
52:41
Speaker 1: in the cabin. I'm pretty certain that he'd have thought
52:43
Speaker 1: that I was losing my marbles. And I didn't want
52:46
Speaker 1: that because what I'd experienced was no hallucination or a
52:50
Speaker 1: shared delusion or anything like that. And if it means
52:53
Speaker 1: burying it inside my head someplace so I can keep
52:56
Speaker 1: my reputation and sanity, then so be it. but I'm
53:00
Speaker 1: not the same man who walked into that cabin with
53:03
Speaker 1: a bag of money slung over his shoulder. I might
53:06
Speaker 1: walk and talk like him, but I don't think like him,
53:08
Speaker 1: not anymore. I don't laugh at the same things I
53:11
Speaker 1: used to, things about spirits or ghosts or people reaching
53:15
Speaker 1: back from the other side, because I saw it. I
53:19
Speaker 1: don't know where it came from, but I saw something
53:21
Speaker 1: reach out and touch a man I did a job with,
53:24
Speaker 1: and I'm 100% certain that it killed him too. Hey friends,
53:53
Speaker 1: thanks for listening. Click that notification bell to be alerted
53:56
Speaker 1: of all future narrations. I release new videos every Monday
54:00
Speaker 1: and Thursday at 9 p.m. Eastern Time. And there are
54:03
Speaker 1: super fun live streams every Sunday and Wednesday nights. And
54:07
Speaker 1: if you got a story, be sure to submit them
54:09
Speaker 1: over in my email at letsreadsubmissions at gmail.com and you
54:13
Speaker 1: might even hear your story featured on the next video.
54:17
Speaker 1: And if you want to support me even more, grab
54:19
Speaker 1: early access to all future narrations and bonus content over
54:23
Speaker 1: on Patreon, or click that big join button to hear
54:26
Speaker 1: about the extra perks for members of the channel. And
54:29
Speaker 1: check out the Let's Read podcast where you can hear
54:31
Speaker 1: all of these stories and big compilations located anywhere you
54:34
Speaker 1: listen to podcasts. I also have a true crime channel
54:37
Speaker 1: called Saturn Soul. All links are in the description below.
54:41
Speaker 1: Thanks so much, friends. And remember, Blue Team Sucks. Thank you.