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It was my best friend Luke's idea
to form our own detective agency, inspired

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by the shows we loved watching together. We lived on Brook Street in a

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small town in Oregon, so we
called ourselves the brook Street Sleuths. We

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advertised our services on the community board
in Elmer's Market, which usually cost twenty

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five cents a week, but mister
Elmer kindly allowed it for free. We

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worked on various cases in the space
of a month or so over one summer.

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Who's been taking the blackberries from Miss
Jacob's brambles? Solved almost everyone who

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passed by? And lots of chipmunks? What made the small hole in Lowry's

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front yard solved a chipmunk? Yeah, we had an abundance of chipmunks in

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town, but not all the mysteries
involved the little critters. They were clearly

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not miss to the adults who hide
us. But the best thing about living

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in that kind of community was the
willingness of our neighbors to contribute to our

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idea of fun. Luke and I
were rewarded with many sodas and candy bars

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for our slothing skills. Despite our
success rate, the brook Street Sleuths was

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a short lived agency. Our last
ever case began with a very real mystery,

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where is mister Page's dog? Frank
Page was a retired widower then happened

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to be my next door neighbor.
His dog, Milo, a Yorkie,

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was what Frank referred to as a
pain in the proverbial. Milo was an

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expert escape artist. He was always
getting out of the yard and causing mischief

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in town, but would usually come
back home with his tail wagging after an

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hour or two. One evening,
we could hear from calling for Milo from

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the doorstep. He had escaped as
perr, but it had been several hours

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and he still hadn't returned. My
dad offered to drive around the neighborhood to

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look for him, but had no
lock. The next morning, I helped

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Frank make a missing poster. We
stuck a photograph of Milow on a sheet

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of paper using a glue stick,
and I neatly wrote the details underneath in

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black marker, as dictated by Frank. Then we went to Elmer's Market to

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use the photocopier and made ten copies. It should have cost us a dollar,

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but mister Elmer said there was no
charge and wished us luck in finding

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him. Frank bought me a Cohler
as a thank you. You're a good

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kid, Ricky, he said,
patting my back. I could hear he

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was upset. We'll find him,
mister Page, I said, The brook

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Street sleuths are on the case.
He chuckled. He's a piece of work,

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but I'd be lost without him.
I'll go knock for Luke just as

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soon as we've put up these posters. We left one on the board in

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Elmer's, then stuck the remaining posters
on telegraph poles earned the two bus shelters

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in town. I asked Frank if
I could keep hold of the original photograph

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of Milo. That way I could
show it to the local residents during our

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investigation. Before I knocked for Luke, I went back home to tell my

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parents. Don't wonder too far,
Ricky said, Mom, and stay out

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of the woods. I don't like
the thought of you boys in there alone.

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There was a woodland area that lined
the back of town. I absolutely

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planned on looking in there. I
told my mom I wouldn't though, of

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course. I grabbed my bike and
rode to Luke's to fill him in on

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the details. We rode around town
and knocked on doors, asking if they'd

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seen Milow. It was mostly unsuccessful, but one lady had some potentially useful

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information now that I think about it, she said on a doorstep, I

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did see a little dog snifing around
the brambles and Maple Road yesterday. Thank

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you, ma'am, said Luke.
We discussed it as we retrieved our bikes

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from the end of the driveway.
There are two houses on Maple Road with

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brambles in the yard, he said, Miss Jacobs, I said, and

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the Deans. Why did it have
to be the Deans. The Dean family

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were not known for their warm community
spirit, especially the oldest son, Tommy.

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He was a senior and notorious trouble
maker who had caused Luke and I

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a lot of grief. The family
also had a much bigger, meaner dog

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that would probably treat Marlowe as a
snack. We'll go to miss Jacob's house

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first, said Luke. If we're
lucky, we won't have to go to

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the Deans at all. We left
our bikes on the sidewalk and knocked on

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Miss Jacob's door. Well, she
said, warmly, if it isn't the

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Brook Street sleuths, Hello, Miss
Jacobs. We said in unison, what

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can I do for you? Boys? We're looking for my neighbor, mister

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Page's dog, I said, showing
other photo. He went missing yesterday afternoon.

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Oh no, she said, I'm
familiar. I sometimes see him in

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the yard by the brambles, but
I haven't seen him for days. Thank

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you anyway, Miss Jacobs said,
Luke, of course, she said,

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I'll keep my eye out. Oh
and help yourselves the blackberries. As we

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walked down Miss Jacob's pathway, we
looked at each other with concern, knowing

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we now had to visit the Deans. We took the opportunity to eat a

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few of the ripened berries before braving
it, then wheeling our bikes to their

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house. The yard wasn't as kemp
as the others in the neighborhood. It

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was overgrown and there were scraps of
metal from various vehicles darted around like a

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junk yard. We slowly walked up
the path. As soon as we knocked

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on the door, there came loud
barking from inside that made us jump,

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followed by shouting. The door flew
open and mister Dean was standing there holding

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back their monster of a dog by
the collar. We just barking at us

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like crazy. Shut the hell up, he yelled down at it. It

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quietened down but growled under its breath. What do you want, oh,

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sir, I stuttered. We're asking
around to see if anyone has seen my

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neighbor's dog. I took out the
photo he went missing yesterday. But what

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makes you think I had anything to
do with it? He snapped. It's

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not like that, Sir, said
Luke. We're just asking if you've seen

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him, that's all. He sometimes
wanders around the neighborhood. Who do you

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think you are, he said,
Columbo or something. Luke and I turned

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to each other like it had been
a bad idea. I'm sorry to have

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bothered you, Sir, I said, turning to leave. Believe me,

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he said, if that rat had
been anywhere near here, Cain would have

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sorted it out. The dog started
barking again, and we hurried back down

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the path. I don't want to
see you boys on my property again,

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he yelled after us. I won't
hold him back next time, he laughed

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loudly. As we quit rode away, my heart beating hard. We stopped

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around the corner to catch our breath. Then we started to laugh uncomfortably.

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God, I hate that family,
said Luke. We heard the roar of

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an engine, and a ross bucket
of a car came hurtling around the corner,

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its tires screeching on the road.
It was Tommy Dean behind the wheel.

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When he noticed Luke and I,
he gave us the finger and sped

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away out of sight. So suspicious, I said, but maybe too obvious?

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Luke shrugged. They're assholes. But
I think we need to investigate more

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first, When it felt like we'd
exhausted all avenues in town, I suggested

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we look in the woods. Luke
was apprehensive, as like me, he

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was forbidden from the woods without an
adult. But it seemed logical that a

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dog would be drawn to the woods, especially with all the chipmunks the chase.

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If we do find Milo there,
I said, we'll just pretend we

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found him some place that won't get
us in trouble. We looked round for

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an hour or so, shouting Milo's
name from time to time. He got

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to the point where we figured if
Milo was somewhere he could hear us,

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he would have made himself known by
now. Before we left, we both

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confessed to kneading the bathroom badly,
so we went in opposite directions to find

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a secluded spot to pe. Ricky. I heard Luke scream. After a

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few minutes, I quickly finished and
retrieved my bike. Where are you,

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I yelled, my nerves on edge
over here, I saw him standing in

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a small clearing and rushed over.
What is it? I asked, out

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of breath. He didn't answer.
Luke had found what look like the sight

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of a sacrificial ritual. There were
strange symbols drawn onto several tree trunks,

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and what appeared to be blood.
In the center was a slab of stone

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with a chalk drawing of three triangles, all pointing the same way but overlapping

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each other. In the center of
that was a severed animal paw. It

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had the same auburn colored fur as
Milo's. Oh my god, I said

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quietly. I really want to leave
now, said Luke in enormous whisper.

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I nodded, YEA, come on. As I went to pick up my

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bike, I saw a small satchel
sitting by a log I walked over to

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it. Luke, spotting it too, leave it, Ricky, He said,

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it's evidence. I said, about
to pick it up, but then

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I remembered not to contaminate it.
I used the stick to lift the flap

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open and peek inside. There was
a pack of cigarettes and some school textbooks

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seenior biology and math student. I
said. I found a large leaf and

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used it to cover my fingertips,
opening the first page of the biology book

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written in pencil in the top right
corner Tommy Dean. A shiver went through

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me, as I told Luke,
we got on our bikes and rode like

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the wind, heading straight to the
Sheriff's office. We burst in and both

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started yelling whoa fellas, said Deputy
Campbell from behind his desk. Calm yourselves,

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now, what seems to be the
problem. We explained everything. Luke

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and I were escorted back to the
woods to show the deputy what we had

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found. Sweet Mother of Jesus,
he said, calling it in. It

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was a search conducted at the Dean's
house. Inside Tommy's bedroom, they not

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only found an ancient book of the
occult containing the very symbols found at the

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scene, but also Milo's Carla.
Apparently, he protested his innocence as they

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took him in for questioning. I
heard all of this through the walls as

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My parents talked about it that night, having been banished to my room.

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Poor mister Page was devastated. The
disturbing nature of it rocked our sleepy community.

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But Luke and I were commended for
our help in the investigation. We

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both received honorary badges from the Sheriff's
department, making us feel like real investigators.

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After a couple of days, Miss
Jacobs required our services again. My

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mom was reluctant for me to carry
on playing detective, as she called it,

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but my dad talked to her.
Around Luke and I went to visit

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Miss Jacob's late afternoon and were greeted
by a wonderful smell. Take a seat,

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boys, she said, I begged
you a BlackBerry pie cal let her.

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Thank you for your services to the
community. Thanks, Miss Jacobs,

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we both said together, excitedly,
sitting in the dining table, where a

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warm pie sat in the center.
She cut two slices and plated them up,

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handing us one each by an appetite, She smiled, taking a seat

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as we started talking into the delicious
pie. Well done on your investigation.

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That must have been quite a shock
discovering such a gruesome scene. Luke nodded,

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it was scary. It wasn't it
ricky? Yeah, I agreed,

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but we handled it like professionals.
She chuckled. I'm sure you did.

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I always knew that Tommy Dean was
a rotten apple. I can't help but

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wonder what it was all for,
though I sacrifice that little dog. We

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looked at each other and shrugged with
mouthfuls of pie. And those symbols,

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what did they mean? My dad
said it was devil worship, said Luke.

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I'm sure he's right, She said, to think I'd only seen that

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poor dog a few hours before Tommy
took him. I can't help but think

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I could have done something to help. You couldn't have known, miss Jacobs,

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I said, it's not your fault. She patted my hand. Thank

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goodness, you heroes found those school
box of his had the scene. Imagine

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what else he could have done if
it weren't for you, I tried to

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think. Luke and I looked at
each other and smiled with pride. Excuse

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me a moment, she said,
I'll be right back. We're heroes,

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I chuggled. When she'd left the
room. We found the villain and saved

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the day, Luke giggled. As
we kept tucking in, I couldn't help

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but feel like something wasn't quite right. Then it hit me, Wait,

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didn't Miss Jacob say she hadn't seen
Milo for a few days when we were

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investigating. He shrugged, Yeah so, but she just said she saw him

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a few hours before Tommy took him. His brow furrowed. Oh yeah,

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she's an old lady, though,
Ricky, my grandma is very forgetful.

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I contemplated it, but it still
didn't feel right. My eyes widened.

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The Sheriff's department didn't release the evidence, I said, quietly, how does

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she know about the books? Luke's
eyes widened to match mine. As Miss

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Jacobs came back into the room,
Will you look at that? She said,

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you've almost finished your pie. Let
me cut you another slice. No,

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I said, clearing my throat.
It was delicious, but very filling,

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very well, she smiled, let
me take this dish away. Then

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when she lifted the pie dish,
Luke and I both stared in horror.

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Scratched in the wooden table with three
triangles overlapping each other. Oh yes,

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she said, there was a mystery
for you to solve, A mystery ingredient.

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I wonder if you've got the detective
skills to work it out. Luke

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looked at me like he was about
to cry, and I felt exactly the

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same. He coughed a little and
put his fingers to his mouth, pulling

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something out. What is it,
Luke, she said. He covered his

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mouth like he was about to puke
hair clue number one, she said,

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and you ricky, I shook my
head. We'd like to leave now,

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Miss Jacobs, nonsense, she said. She took my plate away and put

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the pie dish in front of me. Go on, have a look.

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I looked at Luke, who was
clearly terrified. My hands were shaking as

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I picked up the fork and pulled
pieces of pastry away. As I searched

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the thick, dark purple filling my
fork made a clink sound. I picked

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it out with my fingers. I
could instantly feel what it was, a

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long canine tooth. I threw it
across the table and pushed myself back,

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grabbing Luke's arm. As you made
a run for the door. It slam

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shot, and the light that had
been coming through the windows dimmed. The

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symbol on the table began to glow
as if it was drawn in embers.

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Luke and I had her arms around
each other as we sniveled, not being

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able to comprehend what was happening.
Miss Jacob smiled from across the room,

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her hair flowing as if caught in
a breeze. What are your findings,

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she asked. The brook Street sleuths
must be able to figure it out.

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You killed mylow, I shouted,
and the thought of it made me sick.

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00:19:03,240 --> 00:19:08,279
Bravo, she clapped, Make the
sacrifice, feed the innocent. But

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00:19:08,920 --> 00:19:15,480
why, screamed Luke. I am
far older than any human should be.

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00:19:15,400 --> 00:19:22,799
She cackled, that takes a bit
of dark magic to maintain. She grabbed

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00:19:22,880 --> 00:19:26,119
Luke and I tried to pull him
away from her, but with a flick

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00:19:26,160 --> 00:19:30,200
of her hand, I was forced
against the wall. She threw him down

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00:19:30,240 --> 00:19:34,319
onto the symbol, and he screamed
out as smoke began to rise around him.

211
00:19:34,920 --> 00:19:40,720
It burns, he screamed in pain. Leave him alone, I cried,

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00:19:41,079 --> 00:19:45,599
but she turned to me. The
features that made her Miss Jacobs faded,

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00:19:47,240 --> 00:19:52,680
revealing something ancient and decayed. Blue
skin hung from visible bones, empty

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00:19:52,759 --> 00:19:57,759
sockets, wispy strands of hair,
teeth surrounded by split, leathery gums.

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00:20:00,119 --> 00:20:06,640
Your next ricky. She yelled deep
and demonic. Her mouth opened wide,

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00:20:07,119 --> 00:20:11,720
and she took Luke's whole head inside. His arms and legs began to kick

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00:20:11,759 --> 00:20:17,000
about as I could hear muffled groans
coming from inside her. There were snapping

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00:20:17,039 --> 00:20:22,720
sounds as part of her dislocated like
a snake to swallow him whole. Before

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00:20:22,799 --> 00:20:26,880
long, his shoulders could no longer
be seen. She made greedy, guturnal

220
00:20:26,960 --> 00:20:33,720
noises as she forced his body down
her throat. I was paralyzed against the

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00:20:33,759 --> 00:20:38,200
wall, forced to watch as my
best friend was eaten alive. I could

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00:20:38,240 --> 00:20:45,160
feel my mind snapping like her ancient
bones. Luke's legs were still kicking as

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00:20:45,160 --> 00:20:51,000
she reached his knees, and her
long bony fingers gripped around his ankles to

224
00:20:51,079 --> 00:20:57,920
push the last bit of him inside. There came a loud bang, something

225
00:20:59,000 --> 00:21:03,799
that startled her as well as me. The doors of the dining room flew

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00:21:03,839 --> 00:21:10,160
open, and three officers burst into
the room, led by Deputy Campbell Jesus.

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00:21:10,599 --> 00:21:15,200
He yelled, taking aim at what
was once Miss Jacobs. She wretched

228
00:21:15,480 --> 00:21:19,640
and Luke's whole body slipped out of
her, collapsing on the table in a

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00:21:19,640 --> 00:21:25,759
cocoon of translucent goo. I fell
from the wall and hit the floor hard

230
00:21:26,079 --> 00:21:30,720
as the officers opened fire on her, forcing her back with a multi layered

231
00:21:30,759 --> 00:21:36,640
scream. The window shattered and natural
light poured in, making a scream even

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00:21:36,759 --> 00:21:41,880
louder as if burnt by the rays. I ran to Luke and pulled him

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00:21:41,880 --> 00:21:47,640
from the table, relieved when he
was still breathing. The glowing symbol was

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00:21:47,640 --> 00:21:52,279
fading, and with a final shriek, the former Miss Jacobs became a cloud

235
00:21:52,319 --> 00:22:00,559
of smoke that was seemingly sucked into
the symbol. Then everything when deathly silent

236
00:22:00,640 --> 00:22:06,720
for a few seconds. As it
happened, Tommy Dean had managed to convince

237
00:22:06,759 --> 00:22:11,880
the sheriff to investigate Miss Jacobs.
He insisted that he had seen her on

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00:22:11,960 --> 00:22:18,359
his property and that is satchel couldn't
be found afterwards. Thank god he did,

239
00:22:18,880 --> 00:22:22,880
because Luke and I would not be
here today if it wasn't for him.

240
00:22:23,759 --> 00:22:30,000
We carry the mental scars, but
we live. Suffice to say,

241
00:22:30,960 --> 00:22:47,519
the brook Street Sleuths were no more
after that day. I never grew out

242
00:22:47,680 --> 00:22:52,240
of my cartoon phase. From an
early age, I was drawn into the

243
00:22:52,319 --> 00:22:57,119
colorful characters and upbeat voices. This
is what led me to deep dive into

244
00:22:57,119 --> 00:23:03,039
the creative process behind them in my
teenage years and pursue it as a career

245
00:23:03,079 --> 00:23:07,759
as an adult. When I landed
my first animation job, it was a

246
00:23:07,839 --> 00:23:11,559
dream come true. I knew the
hours were long, the time was thankless

247
00:23:11,599 --> 00:23:17,279
compared to the more public names that
do the voices and direction, but this

248
00:23:17,720 --> 00:23:22,359
is what I wanted to do.
However, as my time went on with

249
00:23:22,440 --> 00:23:27,400
a fresh start up, I started
to notice something strange about my co workers.

250
00:23:27,920 --> 00:23:33,279
For starters, the team was small. You would think this would be

251
00:23:33,319 --> 00:23:37,559
a bottleneck for output, but the
team was efficient. They'd work late in

252
00:23:37,720 --> 00:23:42,720
the night and be there for days
that they weren't scheduled. I never knew

253
00:23:42,759 --> 00:23:48,160
how early they showed up. All
I knew was that it was earlier than

254
00:23:48,160 --> 00:23:53,039
me, no matter what time I
started. This is often seen as a

255
00:23:53,079 --> 00:24:00,519
negative in the animation industry. Overworked
and underpaid is a common sentiment. However,

256
00:24:02,160 --> 00:24:07,319
this wasn't some strong arm move by
management. It was completely voluntary.

257
00:24:07,559 --> 00:24:11,160
Whenever I asked any of them what
they were working on, they'd be vague

258
00:24:11,240 --> 00:24:17,599
and quickly changed the subject. This
kind of evasive behavior was from the whole

259
00:24:17,640 --> 00:24:22,359
team. But the strangest one of
all was the company's founder, a man

260
00:24:22,720 --> 00:24:29,319
named mister Jones, who was always
in his personal office, door permanently closed

261
00:24:29,519 --> 00:24:33,799
besides his goings in and out working
on some exclusive project. No one was

262
00:24:33,839 --> 00:24:38,200
allowed to see, and it seemed
it was only me that was curious.

263
00:24:40,319 --> 00:24:44,880
He was a cold and calculating man, dead eyes, but he held himself

264
00:24:44,920 --> 00:24:48,440
in a strong manner. No matter
how much I tried to justify this as

265
00:24:48,519 --> 00:24:52,839
him just carrying himself the way a
leader should, I always got a strange

266
00:24:52,839 --> 00:24:59,079
feeling about him. As I continued
to work with the other members, I

267
00:24:59,160 --> 00:25:03,000
quickly picked up on how talented they
were. It was how we got away

268
00:25:03,039 --> 00:25:07,960
with such a small team despite the
heavy amount of projects we took on.

269
00:25:08,359 --> 00:25:14,640
They were multi specialists too, colorists
doing shading, the sound team picking up

270
00:25:14,640 --> 00:25:18,400
for the animation, tween us pitching
in for direction. There was never a

271
00:25:18,480 --> 00:25:23,039
dropped beat in the flow of work, which made me feel pale in comparison,

272
00:25:23,480 --> 00:25:30,039
having only specialized in animation. Despite
their chemistry, everyone seemed distant,

273
00:25:30,599 --> 00:25:38,359
almost robotic communication was just one step
away from nonverbal. The startup was advertised

274
00:25:38,359 --> 00:25:42,559
as new, but they acted like
they'd been working together for a lifetime.

275
00:25:44,559 --> 00:25:48,240
The moment things began to unravel was
when I had a meeting with the elusive

276
00:25:48,359 --> 00:25:53,079
mister Jones. I was summoned to
his office to discuss a project I was

277
00:25:53,119 --> 00:25:57,519
working on. As I entered,
I couldn't help but feel a sense of

278
00:25:57,519 --> 00:26:03,359
a knease. I felt this was
all of a sad to discuss my lack

279
00:26:03,400 --> 00:26:07,440
of chemistry with the team. This
was the first time I'd seen any one

280
00:26:07,519 --> 00:26:12,680
besides mister Jones enter what was deemed
his space, and it was me that

281
00:26:12,839 --> 00:26:18,400
had the honor of crossing the threshold. Mister Jones sat behind his desk,

282
00:26:18,880 --> 00:26:25,039
his eyes cold and calculating as he
looked me up and down. He didn't

283
00:26:25,039 --> 00:26:30,000
say a word for several moments,
and the silent beats were almost suffocating if

284
00:26:30,039 --> 00:26:37,319
this was some kind of CEO scat
tactic he was working. Finally, he

285
00:26:37,400 --> 00:26:45,559
spoke, I've been watching your progress
on your project and I must say that

286
00:26:45,680 --> 00:26:52,400
I'm impressed, he said, his
voice barely above a whisper. Your work

287
00:26:52,640 --> 00:26:56,200
is truly exceptional, and I think
you have the potential to be one of

288
00:26:56,200 --> 00:27:02,200
our top animators. I can't help
but feel a sense of pride at his

289
00:27:02,279 --> 00:27:06,960
words. All the extra time the
others put in yet I was the one

290
00:27:06,960 --> 00:27:10,440
that stood out. It was a
boost to my ego, to say the

291
00:27:10,519 --> 00:27:14,599
least. Maybe the others were spread
too thin, covering for each other,

292
00:27:15,079 --> 00:27:19,039
and I managed to stand out in
my one true field. But I couldn't

293
00:27:19,039 --> 00:27:23,559
shake the feeling that he was hiding
something from me. Thank you, mister

294
00:27:23,640 --> 00:27:29,279
Jones, I said, trying to
keep my voice steady yet polite. I'm

295
00:27:29,440 --> 00:27:34,200
glad you're pleased with my work.
Oh I'm more than pleased, he replied,

296
00:27:34,480 --> 00:27:38,640
his eyes narrowing. In fact,
I think that you're ready to take

297
00:27:38,680 --> 00:27:42,799
on a special project for me,
a project that will take your skills to

298
00:27:42,920 --> 00:27:49,000
the next level and truly showcase your
talent. I was about to ask him

299
00:27:49,039 --> 00:27:53,359
more about the project, but before
he could speak, he stood up from

300
00:27:53,359 --> 00:27:57,960
his desk and walked over to me. He placed his hand on my shoulder

301
00:27:59,440 --> 00:28:04,720
and I could his cold clammy fingers
gripping me tightly. You will work on

302
00:28:04,759 --> 00:28:08,880
this project, and you will not
speak of it to anyone outside this company,

303
00:28:10,480 --> 00:28:17,400
he said, his voice low and
menacing. Do you understand, I

304
00:28:17,480 --> 00:28:22,559
nodded, feeling a sense of fear
coursing through my veins. I didn't know

305
00:28:22,599 --> 00:28:25,960
what he was planning, and he
gave no hints to what was about to

306
00:28:26,039 --> 00:28:32,039
come. Mister Jones didn't make me
sign any NDA's but I still felt the

307
00:28:32,079 --> 00:28:37,880
pressure of legal come down if I
were to breach this verbal agreement. As

308
00:28:37,920 --> 00:28:41,880
I worked on the special project for
mister Jones, I couldn't help but notice

309
00:28:42,039 --> 00:28:48,160
that there was something strange about the
entire situation. For one, I was

310
00:28:48,240 --> 00:28:52,400
never allowed to see any other final
animations that were created by my new personal

311
00:28:52,440 --> 00:28:57,279
team. Whenever I asked about them, I was met with yet more vague

312
00:28:57,279 --> 00:29:02,920
answers and quickly read a eggs it
to another task. I tried to brush

313
00:29:02,960 --> 00:29:07,319
it off as just the way things
were done at the company, but as

314
00:29:07,359 --> 00:29:11,039
time went on, I couldn't shake
the feeling that there was something more sinister

315
00:29:11,240 --> 00:29:17,599
at play. I started to notice
that the other members outside my team were

316
00:29:17,640 --> 00:29:22,599
acting strange as well. They were
even more secretive than usual, and they

317
00:29:22,680 --> 00:29:26,839
always seemed to be on edge around
me. I tried to talk to some

318
00:29:26,880 --> 00:29:32,440
of my coworkers about it, but
they all shut me down. They told

319
00:29:32,519 --> 00:29:37,480
me that I just needed to focus
on my work in a manner that was

320
00:29:37,519 --> 00:29:42,359
the closest human from any of my
interactions. I couldn't shake the feeling that

321
00:29:42,480 --> 00:29:48,799
something was off. I knew that
I needed to find out what was really

322
00:29:48,839 --> 00:29:52,839
going on, but I didn't know
how. I was already making myself a

323
00:29:52,880 --> 00:29:59,359
target with my questions. I was
stuck working on these special projects for mister

324
00:29:59,440 --> 00:30:03,559
Jones, and I was afraid of
what would happen if I tried to dig

325
00:30:03,599 --> 00:30:08,039
too deep. Something I picked up
after a few projects was that I never

326
00:30:08,119 --> 00:30:12,720
knew who the clients were that commissioned
the animations or where they were going once

327
00:30:12,759 --> 00:30:18,720
they were finished. Whenever I asked, I was yet again met with more

328
00:30:18,759 --> 00:30:22,599
avoidance. I added it to yet
more things I'll never get to know,

329
00:30:23,359 --> 00:30:29,799
But I couldn't shake the growing curiosity
behind this company. The questions that true

330
00:30:29,839 --> 00:30:33,920
to the forefront of my thoughts was
what were these animations being used for?

331
00:30:36,920 --> 00:30:40,920
One day, while working on a
project, I stumbled across a stack of

332
00:30:40,960 --> 00:30:45,160
papers on mister Jones's desk. It
was a rare time I was permitted to

333
00:30:45,319 --> 00:30:49,240
enter a space since there were some
machines in there that had niche uses,

334
00:30:49,680 --> 00:30:55,720
and was tasked to get one.
The papers were all in voices and receipts,

335
00:30:56,279 --> 00:31:00,920
and they were addressed to various government
agencies from around the world. I

336
00:31:02,000 --> 00:31:06,240
was stunned. I knew the clients
must have been high profile for the boss

337
00:31:06,279 --> 00:31:08,960
to make us churn them out with
such urgency, but I didn't know he

338
00:31:10,079 --> 00:31:14,920
went this deep. With this snippet
of an answer, A flood of more

339
00:31:15,000 --> 00:31:18,680
questions rushed at me, and it
got to w Renchel. When I looked

340
00:31:18,720 --> 00:31:26,960
closer, the specific agencies listed were
from branches i'd never heard of, acronyms

341
00:31:26,000 --> 00:31:32,599
that weren't the obvious culprits to common
online conspiracy theories, names that sounded like

342
00:31:32,680 --> 00:31:37,680
something from a sci fi movie.
I quickly left with the equipment I needed

343
00:31:37,880 --> 00:31:41,359
and hushed up about it, having
learned to stop asking questions at the workplace.

344
00:31:42,920 --> 00:31:47,680
When I got home, I searched
all the names I could remember online,

345
00:31:48,519 --> 00:31:52,440
but nothing showed. I tried pairing
it with the respective countries, and

346
00:31:52,519 --> 00:31:56,920
it still came up blank. I
knew they must be real, because the

347
00:31:56,960 --> 00:32:05,680
animations had to be going somewhere,
so I tried the most direct answer I

348
00:32:05,680 --> 00:32:10,799
could think of. I made sure
to remember a specific branch, one based

349
00:32:10,799 --> 00:32:16,119
in my own country. My plan
was to call the public government number and

350
00:32:16,240 --> 00:32:21,920
asked to be put through to the
specific branch. I dialed the number,

351
00:32:22,279 --> 00:32:27,960
my heart pounding in my chest.
I was nervous as the phone rang,

352
00:32:28,319 --> 00:32:32,240
I waited anxiously for someone to answer. When someone picked up, it was

353
00:32:32,279 --> 00:32:37,200
a polite woman asking how she could
help me, and I nervously asked to

354
00:32:37,240 --> 00:32:43,799
be put through. Without a response, I was met with a strange clicking

355
00:32:43,839 --> 00:32:50,960
sound and a high pitched tone.
I was terrified, in a panic,

356
00:32:51,079 --> 00:32:53,960
I hung up the phone immediately.
I didn't know what was going on,

357
00:32:54,519 --> 00:32:59,400
but I knew that I needed to
be careful. I didn't want to put

358
00:32:59,480 --> 00:33:04,960
myself in any real danger. I
tried to think of more ideas and left

359
00:33:05,000 --> 00:33:08,400
it for the night. The next
day, as soon as I showed up

360
00:33:08,440 --> 00:33:15,759
for work, mister Jones called me
into his office. He straightway let me

361
00:33:15,880 --> 00:33:22,319
know that I was fired. He
gave some vague reasons about my performance not

362
00:33:22,359 --> 00:33:27,240
being up to par, which I
felt couldn't be true. I'd been praised

363
00:33:27,279 --> 00:33:31,319
not too long ago about my outstanding
performance, and my workflow hadn't declined since

364
00:33:31,359 --> 00:33:37,680
working the new position. In fact, it might have improved. I immediately

365
00:33:37,759 --> 00:33:42,839
knew it was connected to the phone
call i'd made. I was angry and

366
00:33:42,960 --> 00:33:47,119
upset at having lost my first animation
job. But I knew there was nothing

367
00:33:47,119 --> 00:33:52,759
I could do. I bagged up
my things and left the office, feeling

368
00:33:52,799 --> 00:33:57,440
a sense of dread. As I
left, I was watched by the others

369
00:33:57,519 --> 00:34:02,440
in a cold silence, their emotionless
stairs piercing through me, though not with

370
00:34:02,559 --> 00:34:10,679
inflictions of embarrassment, but rather a
sense of malice. After being let go,

371
00:34:12,079 --> 00:34:15,760
I continued to look for a new
job, but I struggled. I

372
00:34:15,840 --> 00:34:20,559
tried to use the old company as
a reference, but quickly learned that it

373
00:34:20,599 --> 00:34:24,599
was impossible. When I called the
company for a referral, the calls never

374
00:34:24,639 --> 00:34:29,760
went through. I went back to
the office, but he was vacated.

375
00:34:30,719 --> 00:34:35,280
Not even a drop of ink was
left. I searched online for more information,

376
00:34:35,840 --> 00:34:39,079
but the sites were now blank.
It was as if the team never

377
00:34:39,159 --> 00:34:44,679
existed. I didn't know what was
going on, so I tried to dig

378
00:34:44,719 --> 00:34:49,679
deeper and look for the clients that
I remembered from the papers, but it

379
00:34:49,719 --> 00:34:54,000
was impossible. I tried to do
research about my old animation company, trying

380
00:34:54,039 --> 00:34:59,119
to uncover what was really going on, but the more I looked, the

381
00:34:59,159 --> 00:35:05,440
more frustrated I became. They covered
their tracks well if I couldn't find anything

382
00:35:05,480 --> 00:35:10,880
out. While working there being this
distant made everything much harder. Meanwhile,

383
00:35:12,079 --> 00:35:15,239
I was still on the hunt for
a new job. I struggled to explain

384
00:35:15,280 --> 00:35:21,280
the gap in my work history between
now and my education. Whenever I mentioned

385
00:35:21,280 --> 00:35:25,480
the company, potential employers would look
at me with confusion. I started to

386
00:35:25,519 --> 00:35:31,360
feel like I was going crazy.
However, one day, while I was

387
00:35:31,360 --> 00:35:37,639
being interviewed for another fresh animation team, I mentioned them again. The interviewer

388
00:35:37,719 --> 00:35:42,599
looked at me with skepticism and told
me he hadn't heard of them before.

389
00:35:43,760 --> 00:35:47,239
I was getting frustrated. I was
about to explain further when a worker who

390
00:35:47,280 --> 00:35:53,679
was passing by overheard our conversation and
nodded his head. I went on to

391
00:35:53,719 --> 00:36:00,679
bond the interview as usual and left
when outside worker quickly rushed over to me

392
00:36:01,000 --> 00:36:07,119
and handed me a slip of paper
with his contact information. Please you have

393
00:36:07,199 --> 00:36:12,039
to reach me, the worker said
urgently. I used to work there too,

394
00:36:12,440 --> 00:36:15,280
was all he said, as he
rushed back inside. Leave me standing

395
00:36:15,320 --> 00:36:20,760
there with the slip of paper in
my hand. When I got home,

396
00:36:21,039 --> 00:36:24,480
I stared at the slipper paper that
was given to me. It was obvious

397
00:36:24,599 --> 00:36:29,239
he did it all in a rush. As the paper was hastily ripped from

398
00:36:29,280 --> 00:36:32,280
one of the work documents he was
carrying, and the penmanship had holes from

399
00:36:32,320 --> 00:36:37,159
how it was written, most likely
on the palm of his hand. I

400
00:36:37,199 --> 00:36:42,599
didn't know if I could trust him, but if I wanted to investigate further,

401
00:36:43,159 --> 00:36:46,599
I knew I had to take the
plunge, so I decided to take

402
00:36:46,599 --> 00:36:52,000
the risk and contact him. I
sent him an email and waited anxiously for

403
00:36:52,039 --> 00:37:00,079
a response. A few hours later, I got an answer. All it

404
00:37:00,119 --> 00:37:05,119
contained was a link to a small
website that documented one of the animations I

405
00:37:05,119 --> 00:37:09,719
had briefly worked on. The website
was some small conspiracal site that looked like

406
00:37:09,760 --> 00:37:15,559
it was made with the most basic
templates, but what I read was wild.

407
00:37:17,079 --> 00:37:22,320
It tried to correlate the animation releases
to a major political event and one

408
00:37:22,360 --> 00:37:28,880
off is a coincidence, But every
example given was so specific to each country

409
00:37:28,960 --> 00:37:32,880
an event. I now knew more, but I had no idea where to

410
00:37:32,920 --> 00:37:38,280
go from here. My curiosity was
always thirsty, and this did nothing to

411
00:37:38,360 --> 00:37:45,360
quench it. I was craving more. After this, though, my attempts

412
00:37:45,400 --> 00:37:51,639
to contact the worker failed. I
started to get worried, so I decided

413
00:37:51,639 --> 00:37:54,360
to try to call the company where
the worker was from, hoping to find

414
00:37:54,360 --> 00:37:59,960
some new contact information, But when
I died the number, I was met

415
00:38:00,119 --> 00:38:05,000
with a strange clicking sound and a
high pitched tone. I lugged them up

416
00:38:05,320 --> 00:38:13,119
and they too disappeared. After my
attempts to contact the worker failed, things

417
00:38:13,159 --> 00:38:19,519
started getting weirder. My friends and
family seemed to be avoiding me. Whenever

418
00:38:19,559 --> 00:38:22,840
I ran into them in town,
they would walk away from me, as

419
00:38:22,880 --> 00:38:25,800
if they didn't want to be seen
with me. It was as if I'd

420
00:38:25,840 --> 00:38:30,400
somehow become a pariah, and the
thought made me feel isolated and alone.

421
00:38:31,719 --> 00:38:36,719
Even when I went to the store
to buy groceries, the cashiers would barely

422
00:38:36,760 --> 00:38:40,199
acknowledge me. They would wordlessly serve
me and take my money, but they

423
00:38:40,199 --> 00:38:45,440
wouldn't make eye contact or engage in
conversation. It was as if I was

424
00:38:45,519 --> 00:38:51,599
poisonous air breath held until I was
safely away, and the thought made me

425
00:38:51,639 --> 00:38:57,719
feel like I was losing my mind. And after everything, I was still

426
00:38:57,800 --> 00:39:06,559
unable to find any solid information on
my own until one night I was flipping

427
00:39:06,599 --> 00:39:09,880
through the channels or watching TV,
and I came across an advertisement for a

428
00:39:09,960 --> 00:39:15,599
worldwide premiere of a new cartoon.
The cartoon was going to be translated into

429
00:39:15,719 --> 00:39:22,199
multiple languages and broadcast around the world, and as I watched the advertisement,

430
00:39:22,119 --> 00:39:28,400
I recognized some of the countries listed. They were the same countries that were

431
00:39:28,440 --> 00:39:34,719
listed on the papers I had found
on mister Jones's desk. My eyes widened.

432
00:39:36,039 --> 00:39:38,440
I don't know what's going to happen, but I can't shake the feeling

433
00:39:38,639 --> 00:39:45,280
that something terrible is going to happen. The worldwide premiere of the new cartoon

434
00:39:45,559 --> 00:39:51,079
is fast approaching. I don't know
what kind of effect this cartoon is going

435
00:39:51,119 --> 00:39:54,559
to have on its viewers, but
it's going to be something that's going to

436
00:39:54,599 --> 00:40:02,400
happen on a grander scale than anything
we had done before. I can't help

437
00:40:04,159 --> 00:40:19,960
but worry about the future. We'd
all heard the urban legends, heeded the

438
00:40:20,000 --> 00:40:24,440
warnings, followed the rules to a
t. Well, most of us there

439
00:40:24,599 --> 00:40:31,079
is Christian and I weren't like normal
kids. We were always getting into trouble,

440
00:40:31,760 --> 00:40:37,320
from playing hockey to shoplifting to going
on joy rides. We did it

441
00:40:37,400 --> 00:40:44,320
all. We were, without a
doubt, the most despised preteens in town.

442
00:40:45,840 --> 00:40:50,639
Little do we know all that mischief
would inevitably lead us to the worst

443
00:40:50,719 --> 00:40:54,400
day of our lives. God,
I wish I could take it back.

444
00:40:58,119 --> 00:41:04,239
People in my town were always very
superstitious. Not like, oh, you

445
00:41:04,360 --> 00:41:07,760
spill the salt, throw a pincher
over your left shoulder superstitious. No,

446
00:41:09,039 --> 00:41:15,440
something happened here a long time ago, something sinister, something that still bears

447
00:41:15,480 --> 00:41:22,719
its burden, and the townsfolk half
a century later. You see, back

448
00:41:22,760 --> 00:41:29,519
in the seventies, kids started going
missing, with disappearances always occurred at night,

449
00:41:30,960 --> 00:41:37,280
always, and always in the same
fashion. Parents would lock their homes

450
00:41:37,320 --> 00:41:42,000
down tighter than Fort Knox, only
to find the front door hanging wide open

451
00:41:42,079 --> 00:41:46,840
the following morning. The kidnappings were
beginning to pile up. At the same

452
00:41:46,880 --> 00:41:52,880
time that nightly reports of an ice
cream truck circling neighbourhoods began to flood into

453
00:41:52,960 --> 00:41:59,119
the police station. Every time the
authorities were called, the truck would be

454
00:41:59,159 --> 00:42:04,960
gone when they arrived, no matter
the response time. The strange thing was,

455
00:42:05,920 --> 00:42:09,480
we didn't have an ice cream truck
in the seventies. Hell, we

456
00:42:09,559 --> 00:42:15,480
still don't. This has always been
the kinder place where everyone knows everyone,

457
00:42:16,239 --> 00:42:22,519
and none other families in town have
ever owned an ice cream truck. Naturally,

458
00:42:23,000 --> 00:42:29,719
people began to associate the truck with
their disappearances. Obviously, people tried

459
00:42:29,719 --> 00:42:35,639
to catch the mysterious abductor behind the
wheel. That when the adults started going

460
00:42:35,719 --> 00:42:43,400
missing, no one whoever confronted the
driver was ever seen again. The fear

461
00:42:43,599 --> 00:42:49,480
was beginning to reach a boiling point. People panicked, families with children started

462
00:42:49,480 --> 00:42:53,599
packing their things. Even some people
without families at all were looking at relocating.

463
00:42:55,159 --> 00:43:00,280
And then, just when nearly half
the population was about to split,

464
00:43:02,079 --> 00:43:08,679
it stopped the almost nightly kidnappings,
the sightings of the ice cream truck,

465
00:43:09,639 --> 00:43:17,639
all of it. The townsfolk never
truly recovered. I mean, how could

466
00:43:17,639 --> 00:43:23,440
they After that, Most families of
the victims moved away, eventually losing any

467
00:43:23,519 --> 00:43:29,119
hope of ever seeing their loved ones
again. Can't say have blamed them.

468
00:43:30,159 --> 00:43:34,880
I wouldn't have stuck around after that
either. The ones who did stay grew

469
00:43:34,960 --> 00:43:39,599
paranoid, so they did everything in
their power to ensure that nothing similar would

470
00:43:39,719 --> 00:43:46,800
ever happen again. That, unfortunately, manifested into an extremely strict set of

471
00:43:46,880 --> 00:43:53,480
rules. Girls aren't allowed to walk
anywhere alone. The doors and windows that

472
00:43:53,559 --> 00:43:59,719
every house must remain locked at all
times, and of course, no one

473
00:44:00,000 --> 00:44:05,679
a loud outside after dark for any
reason. The town shuts down well before

474
00:44:05,719 --> 00:44:10,920
sundown as a not so subtle a
reminder. Growing up, I always thought

475
00:44:10,960 --> 00:44:16,559
the stories when nonsense. I thought
he was just another lazy excuse for parents

476
00:44:16,840 --> 00:44:22,119
to keep a close eye in their
children to prevent us from causing mayhem.

477
00:44:23,280 --> 00:44:30,519
I should have listened, Sarah for
the last time. I'm not sneaking out

478
00:44:30,519 --> 00:44:35,519
with you tonight. You know the
rules. Christin whispered, tapping the eraser

479
00:44:35,559 --> 00:44:40,480
on his pencil against his notebook absent
mindedly. Come on, this is the

480
00:44:40,519 --> 00:44:45,840
one rule we haven't broken yet.
You spray painted off as a Dawkins police

481
00:44:45,880 --> 00:44:50,320
cruiser, and this is what you're
afraid of. I'm not scared. This

482
00:44:50,480 --> 00:44:53,840
is different. It's something sacred.
You've lived here for just as long as

483
00:44:53,880 --> 00:45:00,360
I have. You should know that
he hissed, pretending the dial into Missus

484
00:45:00,400 --> 00:45:06,239
Huckabee's my numbing lecture on mitosis.
Aren't you at least a little curious?

485
00:45:06,920 --> 00:45:10,039
You can't seriously tell me you'd never
wondered about going out at night. There's

486
00:45:10,039 --> 00:45:15,440
got to be something more than they're
letting on. Sarah. I'm not going

487
00:45:15,480 --> 00:45:17,920
with you. If you want to
risk your life by going out after dark.

488
00:45:19,280 --> 00:45:22,920
Go right ahead, but leave me
out of it, Christian said,

489
00:45:23,119 --> 00:45:29,039
with a stern finality in his tone. I never seen him so serious about

490
00:45:29,079 --> 00:45:36,760
anything before, and that frightened me. Remodeled to the remainder of the class

491
00:45:36,800 --> 00:45:42,199
in silence. Christian gave me the
cold shoulder. All day. I was

492
00:45:42,239 --> 00:45:46,639
beginning to wonder if I'd overstepped.
I'll give you some time to blow over.

493
00:45:50,000 --> 00:45:53,639
I had just finished cramming my textbox
into my locker when Christian approached me.

494
00:45:54,960 --> 00:46:00,760
I jumped, nearly dropping my backpack. I hadn't expect to see him

495
00:46:00,760 --> 00:46:04,679
again that day. What's up,
dude, thought you're going to make me

496
00:46:04,719 --> 00:46:09,800
walk home alone? He locked eyes
with me, sending a chill creeping up

497
00:46:09,840 --> 00:46:16,039
my spine. A bit of determination
was scrawled across his visage. I'll go

498
00:46:16,119 --> 00:46:23,119
with you. I was taken aback. It'd been so adamant earlier. What

499
00:46:23,320 --> 00:46:28,639
changed? Are you sure? I
mean, I don't want to go if

500
00:46:28,679 --> 00:46:32,920
you're not comfortable with it, I'm
sure I have to know, he said,

501
00:46:34,039 --> 00:46:37,719
averting his gaze. Okay, we'll
meet at your house at midnight.

502
00:46:38,599 --> 00:46:45,440
Sound good? Yeah? Christian sheepishly
glanced up at me. And you didn't

503
00:46:45,480 --> 00:46:50,559
seriously think i'd let you walk home
by yourself, did you, I giggled,

504
00:46:50,760 --> 00:46:57,760
flashing him a grin. No,
I guess I didn't. Christian was

505
00:46:57,800 --> 00:47:02,000
seemingly back to his old self and
the way from school. I listened intently

506
00:47:02,199 --> 00:47:07,119
as he babbled on about his latest
revenge scheme. He was planning on setting

507
00:47:07,159 --> 00:47:12,760
off a fart bomb in Becky Nelson's
locker for snitching on him. I didn't

508
00:47:12,760 --> 00:47:15,920
care if I was being suckered into
another one of his devious pranks. I

509
00:47:15,960 --> 00:47:22,039
was just happy that things were back
to normal between us. I'm gonna make

510
00:47:22,079 --> 00:47:27,920
a pay christianist smashing his fist into
his palm. Can't wait to see the

511
00:47:28,000 --> 00:47:32,039
lock on her ugly assed face.
Anyway, I'll see you tonight, I

512
00:47:32,119 --> 00:47:38,559
said, as I trudged up my
driveway. You bet. We waved goodbye

513
00:47:38,639 --> 00:47:45,280
to each other, and I watched
as Christian continued down the sidewalk. Midnight

514
00:47:45,400 --> 00:47:52,599
couldn't come quickly enough. I giddly
awaited nightfall. I felt as though my

515
00:47:52,679 --> 00:47:58,519
heart would burst from my chest at
any given moment. My adrenaline always spiked

516
00:47:58,719 --> 00:48:04,880
before one of our little misadventures.
I was watching the time like a hawk.

517
00:48:06,039 --> 00:48:09,039
My parents had already turned in for
the night, so I was left

518
00:48:09,079 --> 00:48:16,280
to my own devices. That was
a dangerous game. My eyes were glued

519
00:48:16,320 --> 00:48:23,079
to the numbers of my phone screen. Eleven fifty eight pm. It was

520
00:48:23,239 --> 00:48:34,960
so close, and that's when I
heard it clunk. Something hard pelted my

521
00:48:35,039 --> 00:48:38,920
window. My eyes grew wide,
and a smile inched across my lips.

522
00:48:39,119 --> 00:48:45,840
As I raised to the sauce.
Christian was standing outside, his arms cocked

523
00:48:45,880 --> 00:48:51,320
like a quarterback. Oh there you
are, hey, he said, dropping

524
00:48:51,320 --> 00:48:53,800
the rock in his hand. Dude, you skip the hell out of me.

525
00:48:54,239 --> 00:48:58,320
Weren't we supposed to meet your place? And why didn't you just text

526
00:48:58,320 --> 00:49:02,719
me like a normal person. Sorry, I got restless, he muttered,

527
00:49:02,880 --> 00:49:07,119
staring at his feet. My parents
took my phone last week. Remember.

528
00:49:08,079 --> 00:49:15,039
Oh yeah, I'm not sure I've
forgot Coming down, I said, cautiously,

529
00:49:15,079 --> 00:49:19,920
climbing out and steadying myself on the
step ladder that I strategically placed below

530
00:49:19,960 --> 00:49:23,840
my window. I hopped down from
the last step, landing in the grass

531
00:49:23,880 --> 00:49:30,000
with a soft thumb. Ready,
I said, eager to set off.

532
00:49:30,199 --> 00:49:36,440
Yeah, let's go, Christian said, taking my hand. I blushed,

533
00:49:36,559 --> 00:49:40,800
and he quickly recoiled. Even in
the dim yellow light provided by the street

534
00:49:40,840 --> 00:49:45,960
lamps. I could tell that his
face was bright red. Ah Um,

535
00:49:46,159 --> 00:49:50,679
I'm sorry. I didn't mean to
do that. I just want to get

536
00:49:50,719 --> 00:49:52,960
going, is all. No,
No, you could, I get it.

537
00:49:55,239 --> 00:50:01,239
There was a long, awkward pause
before Christian spoke off, So where

538
00:50:01,239 --> 00:50:07,079
are we going? Aha? I
don't know. I hadn't thought this fire

539
00:50:07,079 --> 00:50:10,719
ahead. Where'd you want to go? How about the park might be kind

540
00:50:10,760 --> 00:50:15,159
of fun with no kids around the
park. It is lead the way,

541
00:50:16,000 --> 00:50:22,320
I said, dramatically, extending my
arm. A big goofy grin plastered itself

542
00:50:22,360 --> 00:50:29,599
on Christian's face as he willingly obliged. We walked in silence, drinking in

543
00:50:29,679 --> 00:50:35,119
the scene around us. We passed
by dozens of houses, their looming presents

544
00:50:35,239 --> 00:50:39,440
lending and unsettling air to the stillness
of the night. The faint light cast

545
00:50:39,480 --> 00:50:45,599
an eerie glow that glinted off their
windows, making my blood run cold.

546
00:50:46,960 --> 00:50:53,360
Another strange thing I noticed was that
it was deathly quiet. The only sounds

547
00:50:53,360 --> 00:50:59,599
we heard were our own light footfalls
against the pavement and the blood rushing in

548
00:50:59,639 --> 00:51:05,119
our ears. There were no noises
from creatures of the night, no bugs,

549
00:51:05,360 --> 00:51:12,039
no frogs, nothing. We couldn't
even hear any crickets chirping, and

550
00:51:12,119 --> 00:51:16,559
that sent a chill down my spine. I was sweating bullets by the time

551
00:51:16,599 --> 00:51:22,480
we arrived at the playground. Christian
looked and fazed, but I highly suspected

552
00:51:22,639 --> 00:51:28,880
that he was putting on a front. Don't get me wrong, Christian was

553
00:51:28,960 --> 00:51:32,800
one tough cookie, but truth be
told, I was the braver of the

554
00:51:32,840 --> 00:51:37,960
two of us. Usually, if
I was feeling on edge, he'd be

555
00:51:38,079 --> 00:51:45,599
ten times worse off. We plopped
down and adjacent swings. I cringed as

556
00:51:45,639 --> 00:51:51,199
the rusted metal swing set creaked and
groaned under our weight. Even though we

557
00:51:51,239 --> 00:51:55,119
were alone, I couldn't shake the
feeling that we were being watched, like

558
00:51:55,199 --> 00:52:01,239
something sinister knew we were there.
I shuddered at the thought that something evil

559
00:52:01,320 --> 00:52:07,119
might be lurking in the darkness,
waiting for the perfect moment to strike.

560
00:52:08,199 --> 00:52:14,000
I told myself that I was freaking
out over nothing, but I couldn't stop

561
00:52:14,119 --> 00:52:20,519
intermittently peeking into the shadow veiled trees
behind us. I was seriously beginning to

562
00:52:20,519 --> 00:52:25,920
regret leaving the safety of my home. So, Sarah, is it just

563
00:52:27,039 --> 00:52:32,880
me or is this place, this
town? Does it feel like there's a

564
00:52:32,960 --> 00:52:38,679
presence, you know, like we're
not the only ones out here. He

565
00:52:38,760 --> 00:52:43,440
kept his voice hushed, like he
was afraid that someone else would hear him.

566
00:52:44,559 --> 00:52:49,800
Yeah, I feel it too.
It's really creepy, I said,

567
00:52:50,239 --> 00:52:55,079
sensing the oppressive way of that feeling
slightly lift from my shoulders. It was

568
00:52:55,199 --> 00:53:01,639
nice to know a Christian felt it
too. Christians stared off into the mulch

569
00:53:01,639 --> 00:53:07,320
at our feet. He looked lost
and thought as if his body was there,

570
00:53:07,840 --> 00:53:13,079
but his mind was in some far
off dimension. You know, I

571
00:53:13,159 --> 00:53:16,400
wasn't originally planning to come with you. There's a reason I chose to come

572
00:53:16,440 --> 00:53:23,159
out to night, he sighed,
a very ambition written across his features.

573
00:53:24,360 --> 00:53:29,519
There was something who was hiding from
me, but I good sense that he

574
00:53:29,599 --> 00:53:34,679
was slowly mustering up the courage to
tell me what it was. So,

575
00:53:35,440 --> 00:53:38,079
I know you've all heard the stories
about the ice cream truck that went around

576
00:53:38,079 --> 00:53:43,119
abducting kids in the seventies, and
I know that you think it's all a

577
00:53:43,119 --> 00:53:51,840
pile of steaming nonsense, But it's
not, he paused, searching my face

578
00:53:51,880 --> 00:53:55,639
for a reaction. How can you
be so sure? We went a life

579
00:53:55,679 --> 00:54:00,079
back then. So my uncle was
one of the two who were kidnapped.

580
00:54:02,360 --> 00:54:07,519
My heart plummeted into my gut,
not for the fact that Christian was related

581
00:54:07,559 --> 00:54:15,360
to someone who was taken, but
that the stories were true. Christian,

582
00:54:15,760 --> 00:54:21,960
I'm so sorry. I didn't know. It's okay, he said, interrupting

583
00:54:21,960 --> 00:54:25,480
me again. He was three when
it happened. It's been decades, but

584
00:54:27,039 --> 00:54:30,199
I don't think Dad ever really forgave
himself. He was only five at the

585
00:54:30,239 --> 00:54:35,679
time, but he feels like he
should have done more. He won't tell

586
00:54:35,719 --> 00:54:39,440
me that, but I know I
can see it in his eyes. It

587
00:54:39,519 --> 00:54:46,559
still tears him up even now.
The tear began to trickle down Christian's cheek,

588
00:54:47,480 --> 00:54:52,079
but he quickly swiped it away.
I know it's stupid of me,

589
00:54:52,719 --> 00:54:57,559
but I just had to know if
it was true, if that thing was

590
00:54:57,599 --> 00:55:01,599
still around. I was honestly so
hoping that it would be. I know

591
00:55:01,679 --> 00:55:06,639
I don't stand much of a chance
of killing whoever's behind it, but this

592
00:55:06,760 --> 00:55:13,159
might help a bit, right,
He gragged a smile and flashed the sharp

593
00:55:13,360 --> 00:55:17,039
black switchblade. Yeah, I think
that would help your chances a bit,

594
00:55:17,440 --> 00:55:22,679
I juggled. You know, I
wouldn't let you fight alone either. Hate

595
00:55:22,679 --> 00:55:25,360
the bursty bubble, though I don't
think it will run into that thing tonight.

596
00:55:27,960 --> 00:55:31,440
Yeah, you're probably right, Christian
said, standing from his swing.

597
00:55:32,599 --> 00:55:42,519
Let's go home works for me.
I've seen enough. I joined him and

598
00:55:42,599 --> 00:55:46,280
we began to make our way back
towards our houses. We'd only made it

599
00:55:46,320 --> 00:55:54,480
to the street when I heard it, a jingle. The sound sliced through

600
00:55:54,480 --> 00:56:01,679
the silence like a rusty knife.
It was slow, but something about it

601
00:56:01,840 --> 00:56:10,360
was wrong. Christian and I glanced
at each other, eyes wide as saucers.

602
00:56:12,239 --> 00:56:15,920
My heart thumped furiously against my chest. As it grew closer. It

603
00:56:16,000 --> 00:56:21,920
blared, the tune of London bridges
falling down, intertwined with the sound of

604
00:56:21,960 --> 00:56:25,920
a jack in the box cranking up, sending waves of panic rippling through me

605
00:56:27,119 --> 00:56:35,280
at every interval. And then it
slowly rolled into view. A white truck

606
00:56:35,519 --> 00:56:39,280
rounded the corner to the street we
were standing on. A comically large pink

607
00:56:39,320 --> 00:56:45,079
ice cream cone was perched to the
top it, facing the sky like a

608
00:56:45,199 --> 00:56:50,440
rocket ready for lift off. The
windows were tinted to the point that I

609
00:56:50,480 --> 00:56:55,000
couldn't see who or what was behind
the wheel. I wanted to run,

610
00:56:55,519 --> 00:57:04,440
to scream, to hide anything,
but I was paralyzed with fear. The

611
00:57:04,559 --> 00:57:09,800
truck crept closer and closer, dread
seeped into my bones. I didn't know

612
00:57:09,840 --> 00:57:19,519
what to do. Eventually it passed. I gawked at it, drinking in

613
00:57:19,639 --> 00:57:25,920
all the different selections pasted on the
side, and then it stopped directly in

614
00:57:25,920 --> 00:57:31,000
front of us. The music cut
out, bathing the night, and then

615
00:57:31,119 --> 00:57:37,960
all encompassing silence. My breath hitched
in my throat, waiting for something to

616
00:57:37,000 --> 00:57:43,559
happen. Without warning, the back
doors of the ice cream truck swung open.

617
00:57:45,760 --> 00:57:51,760
I looked at Christian. His horrified
expression had melted into one of curiosity.

618
00:57:52,519 --> 00:57:55,599
He began to make his way toward
the open truck. His legs moved

619
00:57:55,599 --> 00:58:00,760
like they had a mind of the
roan, dragging himself closer and closer.

620
00:58:01,280 --> 00:58:07,079
To this day, I don't know
why, but I didn't even try to

621
00:58:07,079 --> 00:58:16,239
stop him. Now I joined him. I can't explain it, but there

622
00:58:16,280 --> 00:58:22,960
was something alluring about that truck,
something that effortlessly took hold of me and

623
00:58:22,039 --> 00:58:29,400
pulled me in, and I was
powerless to stop it. We both tentatively

624
00:58:29,639 --> 00:58:35,679
walked closer, coming to a halt
directly behind it. I paid inside my

625
00:58:35,760 --> 00:58:43,559
mouth agape. It was spotless,
a sparkling white interior with rows upon rows

626
00:58:43,559 --> 00:58:49,679
of freezers shined inside, you boasted
every flavor of ice cream you could imagine.

627
00:58:51,199 --> 00:58:54,760
At that moment, I wanted nothing
more than to step into the back

628
00:58:54,800 --> 00:59:01,079
of that truck and try every variation
of ice cream had add to Nothing bad

629
00:59:01,119 --> 00:59:07,400
would happen. It was just an
ice cream truck, after all. Christian

630
00:59:07,480 --> 00:59:13,199
stepped in before I could react.
He turned back to me, out stretching

631
00:59:13,199 --> 00:59:20,519
a hand to hoist me up.
I didn't even have a chance to take

632
00:59:20,599 --> 00:59:28,840
it. The doors suddenly slam shut, locking Christian inside. I'll never forget

633
00:59:28,920 --> 00:59:32,039
the look of abject fear on his
face. In that split second before the

634
00:59:32,079 --> 00:59:37,719
doors closed, I was ripped from
my stupor as the ice cream truck flowed

635
00:59:37,719 --> 00:59:43,880
it down the road. Its tires
squealed as it went, leaving me standing

636
00:59:43,920 --> 00:59:50,000
alone under a street lamp. I
broke down, fat tears streaming down my

637
00:59:50,079 --> 00:59:54,440
cheeks as I bolted home. I
couldn't lose Christian. He was the only

638
00:59:54,480 --> 01:00:00,800
real friend I'd ever had. I
burst through my front door, or spooning

639
01:00:00,880 --> 01:00:05,360
nonsense to my parents as I crumbled
to the ground of their feet. I

640
01:00:05,400 --> 01:00:08,239
didn't care if I'd get in trouble
anymore. I just wanted to find a

641
01:00:08,280 --> 01:00:15,400
way to bring my friend back.
The police were called, Christian's parents were

642
01:00:15,440 --> 01:00:22,719
notified, and a search party was
assembled. I don't think I need to

643
01:00:22,760 --> 01:00:30,360
tell you that they didn't find him. Christian is still missing to this day.

644
01:00:30,480 --> 01:00:35,840
I was never the same after that. It didn't matter how much time

645
01:00:35,880 --> 01:00:40,519
passed, how many therapy sessions I
attended, how hard I tried to forget.

646
01:00:42,719 --> 01:00:50,159
That image of Christian's terrified face is
still burned into my memory. But

647
01:00:50,639 --> 01:00:55,079
there's something that chills me even more
than that look of pure dread scrawled across

648
01:00:55,079 --> 01:01:02,599
my best friend's countenance, something that
I still can't can't comprehend. When I

649
01:01:02,719 --> 01:01:09,320
peered into the back of that ice
cream truck, there was no one behind

650
01:01:09,360 --> 01:01:16,920
the wheel. So why am I
telling you this? Why? Now?

651
01:01:19,800 --> 01:01:25,440
Well, my son went missing last
night. I awoke with a start next

652
01:01:25,440 --> 01:01:31,559
to my snoring husband. A sinking
pit of dread sank into my stomach when

653
01:01:31,599 --> 01:01:40,159
that horrible tune met my ears,
London Bridge is falling down. I raced

654
01:01:40,159 --> 01:01:46,199
to the front door, who was
wide open. I watched helplessly as my

655
01:01:46,320 --> 01:01:52,440
baby boy climbed into the back of
that truck. I couldn't even scream.

656
01:01:53,400 --> 01:01:58,280
I was rooted in fear, just
like I had been on that night two

657
01:01:58,360 --> 01:02:05,480
decades ago. A surge of panic
coursed through my veins like venom, because

658
01:02:06,239 --> 01:02:10,280
as the ice cream truck sped away
with my child, I noticed that the

659
01:02:10,280 --> 01:02:20,119
window was rolled down, and I
swear for a split second I saw Christian

660
01:02:20,559 --> 01:02:36,119
wink at me from the driver's seat. I'm never quite sure if I was

661
01:02:36,159 --> 01:02:39,519
just stupid when I missed the signs, or if I'm just a normal person.

662
01:02:42,039 --> 01:02:45,159
Sarah I was very sweet on the
surface. She ticked all the boxes,

663
01:02:46,199 --> 01:02:52,119
even if she was a bit awkward, But so what people are awkward?

664
01:02:52,679 --> 01:02:57,119
I tried to look past the little
things. I mean, we can

665
01:02:57,119 --> 01:03:01,079
all be a bit weird, can't
we, especially when we get nervous.

666
01:03:01,719 --> 01:03:07,559
But Sarah was odd in a way
that, in hindsight, maybe I should

667
01:03:07,559 --> 01:03:14,559
have taken more seriously on their own. All the little signs seemed quite innocuous

668
01:03:15,320 --> 01:03:19,480
at the start. She was very
hands on during dates, pinching and grabbing

669
01:03:19,519 --> 01:03:24,679
and winking. She'd make these hilarious
innuendos and constantly towed the line of what

670
01:03:24,960 --> 01:03:30,159
was and wasn't appropriate. I like
a woman with a dark sense of humor,

671
01:03:30,960 --> 01:03:37,119
and she had that in spades,
but she pulled away if I tried

672
01:03:37,159 --> 01:03:43,119
to reciprocate. And I realized early
on that intimacy wouldn't be on the cards

673
01:03:43,119 --> 01:03:47,280
for a long time, and I
was fine with that. I wasn't in

674
01:03:47,320 --> 01:03:54,239
a hurry. And yet she continued
to send mixed signals. She'd ask for

675
01:03:54,280 --> 01:04:01,000
photos almost every night. Girls don't
normally ask for full length. It was

676
01:04:01,039 --> 01:04:05,360
weird, and taking a good picture
wasn't as easy as I thought it would

677
01:04:05,360 --> 01:04:10,880
be. I always thought I looked
weird in that kind of full body vertical

678
01:04:10,920 --> 01:04:15,679
picture, but she was always happy
with what I sent. She had a

679
01:04:15,679 --> 01:04:20,079
lot of requests. One was to
see me lying on the floor, eyes

680
01:04:20,119 --> 01:04:26,000
closed, arms to either side of
my back. She liked that. One

681
01:04:27,199 --> 01:04:30,000
one time she made me do a
strip tease with a white sheet, slowly

682
01:04:30,039 --> 01:04:35,239
pulling it down in one picture after
the other. This went on for the

683
01:04:35,280 --> 01:04:40,719
first month. I'd say I sent
her pictures, she sent me some.

684
01:04:41,440 --> 01:04:45,880
We talked a lot about what we
each wanted. It was kind of fun

685
01:04:45,880 --> 01:04:49,559
and kinky, like we were taking
turns being each other's long distance model.

686
01:04:50,599 --> 01:04:54,960
And as a guy, I don't
usually get to enjoy the feeling of being

687
01:04:55,000 --> 01:04:59,559
a promiscuous object. I normally feel
like my sexiness is tied to some kind

688
01:04:59,559 --> 01:05:03,840
of perform moments. It was novel
and exciting to be valued as just a

689
01:05:03,880 --> 01:05:10,800
physical being. We never really figured
I had an exhibition at Streak, or

690
01:05:10,800 --> 01:05:15,400
that that was something that women wanted
much of, But she did and I

691
01:05:15,480 --> 01:05:21,119
didn't dislike it. Sharing all this, we continued to meet up once or

692
01:05:21,119 --> 01:05:26,480
twice a week for food. It
seemed like we had a little thing going

693
01:05:27,000 --> 01:05:32,320
that might one day become something real. We never did spend the night together.

694
01:05:33,440 --> 01:05:36,360
First time I thought it was going
to happen was after I sent a

695
01:05:36,360 --> 01:05:41,599
photo of me lying on my kitchen
floor. The white towels freezed my ass

696
01:05:41,599 --> 01:05:45,960
the whole time. An hour after
I sent the photo, she appeared on

697
01:05:45,039 --> 01:05:50,840
my doorstep without warning, hair soaking, wet and smelling of booze. As

698
01:05:50,880 --> 01:05:55,440
soon as she saw me, she
grabbed me, guided me to the sofa,

699
01:05:55,960 --> 01:06:01,039
then climbed on top and started kissing
me hard. She was handsy,

700
01:06:01,800 --> 01:06:08,000
but it never went past over the
clothes stuff, just hot, heavy,

701
01:06:08,079 --> 01:06:15,159
and well, not all that good. Do you ever wonder if some people

702
01:06:15,159 --> 01:06:19,199
are bad at intimacy stuff because no
one tells them the truth. It was

703
01:06:19,239 --> 01:06:23,920
like she was trying to suck the
air out of my lungs. I've had

704
01:06:23,920 --> 01:06:28,480
better kisses off my dog. She
got a lot of points for enthusiasm.

705
01:06:28,639 --> 01:06:31,840
Don't get me wrong, I've never
had anyone grote me and touch me with

706
01:06:32,000 --> 01:06:38,800
such raw passion before. But whenever
I tried to match her energy, it

707
01:06:38,880 --> 01:06:43,960
got the sense she didn't really care
for it. She never reacted or moaned

708
01:06:44,440 --> 01:06:49,000
or gave off nonverbal cues to be
like do that more. It was all

709
01:06:49,039 --> 01:06:56,400
about her touching me, never vice
versa. After maybe twenty minutes of this

710
01:06:56,599 --> 01:07:00,159
over the clothes fumbling, she asked
me to lie down on the floor or

711
01:07:00,440 --> 01:07:04,960
I had no idea where this was
going, so I did. Can you

712
01:07:05,760 --> 01:07:12,239
hold your breath, she asked as
she looked down at me. All of

713
01:07:12,320 --> 01:07:15,119
a sudden, I felt very small, and there were lots of thoughts going

714
01:07:15,159 --> 01:07:19,119
through my head. I'm pretty sure
there was nothing I wouldn't have done for

715
01:07:19,199 --> 01:07:25,800
it in that moment, although not
necessarily because I wanted to. It was

716
01:07:25,880 --> 01:07:30,760
just an intensity to ustare and shrunk
me down until I was the size of

717
01:07:30,800 --> 01:07:36,800
an ant. So I held my
breath. I held it so long my

718
01:07:36,880 --> 01:07:43,559
lungs burned and my head swam until
I couldn't do it any longer. When

719
01:07:43,599 --> 01:07:46,760
I opened my eyes, she was
looking down at me with so much hunger

720
01:07:46,800 --> 01:07:54,440
in her eyes. I actually got
a little scared. Admittedly, I sort

721
01:07:54,440 --> 01:08:00,559
of liked it. She paused for
a moment, drinking me in, and

722
01:08:00,599 --> 01:08:03,880
then said she had better get going, she had work in the morning.

723
01:08:05,320 --> 01:08:09,719
We kissed at the door, and
her hand roamed all over my back.

724
01:08:11,280 --> 01:08:15,600
I was called by that point,
and her hands felt so warm I swore

725
01:08:15,720 --> 01:08:24,199
something was about to happen, but
she simply left me standing there. It

726
01:08:24,319 --> 01:08:29,479
was confusing and frustrating, so much
so I almost didn't call her back.

727
01:08:30,760 --> 01:08:34,479
But she had a kind of commanding
energy about her, a deep awareness of

728
01:08:34,560 --> 01:08:39,760
what she did and didn't want.
That It was just enough for me to

729
01:08:39,840 --> 01:08:45,640
keep replying to her text After that
night. I always laid on my kitchen

730
01:08:45,680 --> 01:08:48,520
floor when she asked for a photo, but it never really had the same

731
01:08:48,520 --> 01:08:54,600
effect of getting her to my door
step. Still, she became a regular

732
01:08:54,640 --> 01:08:58,720
fixture in my life, and pretty
soon I hoped we might get close to

733
01:08:58,840 --> 01:09:02,760
something a bit more serious. I
looked for signs that she thought the same

734
01:09:02,840 --> 01:09:09,840
thing, but the going was damn
slow. By the time winter rolled around.

735
01:09:10,239 --> 01:09:14,000
We'd been on and off for six
months, and just about the only

736
01:09:14,039 --> 01:09:17,880
thing that actually changed was the way
she kept holding my hand. She'd take

737
01:09:17,920 --> 01:09:23,199
my cold hands between her own and
hold them against her cheek and neck,

738
01:09:23,760 --> 01:09:29,840
maybe even a chest at times.
It was quite nice. It took a

739
01:09:29,880 --> 01:09:34,039
while, but I managed to swing
her around into another home visit. You

740
01:09:34,079 --> 01:09:39,479
can guess what I was hoping for, but she actually made us spend most

741
01:09:39,520 --> 01:09:44,039
of our time out on the balcony
watching the stars, cuddling together in the

742
01:09:44,119 --> 01:09:48,039
freezing cold. She made me give
her my jacket as well, even when

743
01:09:48,079 --> 01:09:53,159
I offered to get a one from
inside, it had to be the one

744
01:09:53,279 --> 01:09:59,000
I was wearing, and she wouldn't
let me replace it. By the time

745
01:09:59,039 --> 01:10:01,560
we went back in, I felt
like I was close to getting pneumonia,

746
01:10:02,359 --> 01:10:08,520
and the shock of the warm air
left me feeling dizzy. Lie down,

747
01:10:09,039 --> 01:10:13,800
she begged me, Lie in the
floor. I have an idea. I

748
01:10:13,920 --> 01:10:18,039
was shaking by this point, the
tips of my fingers ice blue. When

749
01:10:18,039 --> 01:10:23,439
she came back over, she had
a glass of red wine. She stood

750
01:10:23,479 --> 01:10:27,760
over me, warming the glass in
her hands before giving me clear instruction.

751
01:10:29,279 --> 01:10:33,000
Sip some, she said, and
keep it in your mouth. Close your

752
01:10:33,000 --> 01:10:40,119
eyes, don't open them, and
don't swallow the wine. I don't even

753
01:10:40,199 --> 01:10:44,800
like wine, and I was pretty
irritated by the whole thing. But there

754
01:10:44,800 --> 01:10:48,800
was a tension in the air,
something about her electric anticipation that infected me.

755
01:10:50,239 --> 01:10:55,000
I didn't know what was happening,
and in the past, when I

756
01:10:55,039 --> 01:11:01,520
felt that way, it sometimes led
to me having new and exciting experiences out

757
01:11:01,520 --> 01:11:08,720
of nowhere. She kissed me,
pushing her tongue into the lukewarm wine until

758
01:11:08,720 --> 01:11:14,560
it dribbled messily out of the corners
of my lips. At the same time,

759
01:11:14,840 --> 01:11:17,319
and in one swift motion, she
pressed the heel of her hand into

760
01:11:17,319 --> 01:11:21,439
my diaphragm and pushed so hard that
the wine gushed out of my mouth and

761
01:11:21,479 --> 01:11:29,760
into hers. I started coughing.
She did too. My immediate reaction was

762
01:11:29,760 --> 01:11:35,119
that kind of irritation you can't hide. It actually ticked me off. It

763
01:11:35,199 --> 01:11:40,760
was surprising in all the wrong ways, and given what I may be hoped

764
01:11:40,760 --> 01:11:45,600
to was coming, it just meant
all the disappointment turned into outright frustration.

765
01:11:47,039 --> 01:11:53,199
All I'd wanted was a normal kiss, some sign of basic normal affection.

766
01:11:54,439 --> 01:11:57,720
Did she even realize how terrible I
felt? Have to freeze my ass off

767
01:11:57,760 --> 01:12:00,800
on the balcony so she could feel
like some gentle I was given her my

768
01:12:00,880 --> 01:12:05,960
jacket. I pushed her off me
gently but firm. Let's not do that

769
01:12:06,000 --> 01:12:11,199
again, I said, choking at
the words. What were you trying to

770
01:12:11,239 --> 01:12:15,319
do? Nothing? She cried,
It was nothing, just something different.

771
01:12:17,439 --> 01:12:23,800
She seemed sincerely, regretful and sorry. But I was half naked, horny,

772
01:12:23,960 --> 01:12:29,239
irritated, and freezing cold. I
didn't ask her to leave, but

773
01:12:29,359 --> 01:12:34,359
she clearly sensed the changing atmosphere and
made some excuse. I wiped myself down

774
01:12:34,640 --> 01:12:40,199
while she went to the toilet,
and when she emerged, I greeted her

775
01:12:40,359 --> 01:12:45,000
with her handbag and keys. I
didn't even walk her to the door.

776
01:12:45,319 --> 01:12:48,880
Instead, as she looked at me
with a sort of sad pow from the

777
01:12:48,960 --> 01:12:56,079
door, I simply ignored her and
began to mop the kitchen floor. Looks

778
01:12:56,079 --> 01:13:01,199
like a damn murder scene, I
grumbled. She may have said something before

779
01:13:01,239 --> 01:13:05,319
she left, but I didn't look
up until I heard the door close.

780
01:13:08,079 --> 01:13:13,840
After that, we didn't speak for
a while. Now, this is a

781
01:13:13,960 --> 01:13:17,159
very typical thing for me to do, but over the next few days I

782
01:13:17,239 --> 01:13:23,079
did a little retrospective on our dates
and realized I'd beden the one putting in

783
01:13:23,159 --> 01:13:28,399
all the work. It was always
me escalating, asking for dates, phone

784
01:13:28,399 --> 01:13:32,239
calls, trying to move things between
us forward. I figured if there was

785
01:13:32,359 --> 01:13:36,960
any chance of a real relationship,
then she'd have to just come back and

786
01:13:38,039 --> 01:13:42,760
apologize and explain her behavior and be
the one to reach out for once.

787
01:13:44,199 --> 01:13:47,479
Of course, at the exact same
time, I couldn't get her out of

788
01:13:47,520 --> 01:13:53,720
my head. Maybe she'd just been
clumsy. I thought, maybe she was

789
01:13:53,840 --> 01:13:59,119
nervous. I couldn't get my head
around the wine thing. It seems so

790
01:13:59,239 --> 01:14:04,039
random. I'm more familiar with the
usual BDSM stuff people like. If I

791
01:14:04,039 --> 01:14:08,760
could have pinned her actions down to
some specific kink, I could have more

792
01:14:08,800 --> 01:14:14,840
confidently figured if we were compatible or
not. But without more information, I

793
01:14:15,000 --> 01:14:19,800
was just well and truly confused.
I wanted to like her, but if

794
01:14:19,840 --> 01:14:24,880
there was no chance of us working
out, if we were just incompatible,

795
01:14:25,479 --> 01:14:30,079
then I wanted closure. As it
was, I didn't have a clue what

796
01:14:30,119 --> 01:14:35,960
we were, but what the hell
we've been doing either way? When she

797
01:14:36,079 --> 01:14:41,720
finally text asking if I'd like to
pick her up after work, I agreed.

798
01:14:43,000 --> 01:14:46,279
I wanted closure, and maybe I
imagined it, but something about her

799
01:14:46,319 --> 01:14:53,119
tone seemed a little contrite. Her
feeling was reinforced when I met her in

800
01:14:53,159 --> 01:14:57,640
the parking lot of the hospital where
she worked, and I found her sitting

801
01:14:57,640 --> 01:15:01,960
on the hood of her car in
a breath taking red dress. As soon

802
01:15:01,960 --> 01:15:05,279
as I was out of the car, she took my hand and told me

803
01:15:05,439 --> 01:15:10,760
she'd set up a little date for
us, something special, and that she'd

804
01:15:10,760 --> 01:15:15,319
finally make it all up to me. The way she kissed me, the

805
01:15:15,359 --> 01:15:19,239
way she guided my hand along a
waist, there was something so utterly different

806
01:15:19,319 --> 01:15:25,399
about it, so committed that I
immediately knew she wanted to go the whole

807
01:15:25,479 --> 01:15:30,479
way. I could just tell she'd
finally made a decision, a threshold had

808
01:15:30,520 --> 01:15:36,239
been crossed, and I wanted to
go see where this would lead. She

809
01:15:36,279 --> 01:15:41,479
didn't work at the hospital itself,
but rather took me off to a building

810
01:15:41,600 --> 01:15:45,399
on the same ground. It was
a quiet, little red brick thing,

811
01:15:45,199 --> 01:15:49,520
just two floors from the outside,
and I wondered what it was exactly that

812
01:15:49,640 --> 01:15:55,920
she did. Inside. There was
a chemical smell I was pretty overwhelming,

813
01:15:56,800 --> 01:16:00,479
but at first glance it seemed like
a simple GP office. There was a

814
01:16:00,479 --> 01:16:05,479
little reception area with one or two
chairs, a small countertop with some computers

815
01:16:05,560 --> 01:16:11,119
and a bunch of back offices.
This was after ours, so no one

816
01:16:11,199 --> 01:16:15,600
else was there, only a few
dim lights in the reception area. Everywhere

817
01:16:15,600 --> 01:16:21,279
else was dark. She quickly disappeared
upstairs, telling me she was going to

818
01:16:21,319 --> 01:16:26,279
slip into something more comfortable, and
I settled down for a short wait.

819
01:16:28,079 --> 01:16:30,079
At least she locked the door behind
us so no one else could come in.

820
01:16:31,399 --> 01:16:36,000
I took that as a good sign, but I still felt pretty uncertain.

821
01:16:38,720 --> 01:16:42,359
Where were we and why the hell
did she pick this place for our

822
01:16:42,439 --> 01:16:46,680
date. I tried to sit down, but it felt too strange, like

823
01:16:46,760 --> 01:16:51,159
waiting for the dentist, so I
stood and shoveled around a bit instead,

824
01:16:53,039 --> 01:16:59,039
listening to the muffled dumps of whatever
the hell she was doing upstairs. Outside,

825
01:16:59,359 --> 01:17:02,840
it was starting to get dark,
Fewer and fewer cars were going past,

826
01:17:03,760 --> 01:17:09,439
and it was raining heavily, all
of which made that little room feel

827
01:17:09,560 --> 01:17:14,600
even like a lonely little corner of
the world, well hidden and out of

828
01:17:14,600 --> 01:17:18,560
the way, even though the hospital
was clearly visible, with heavy traffic not

829
01:17:18,680 --> 01:17:26,119
far behind it. There wasn't much
else to do except snoop, and I

830
01:17:26,199 --> 01:17:30,039
quickly noticed the door had been left
slightly Ajar like someone had forgotten to shut

831
01:17:30,079 --> 01:17:35,039
it. It was the only door
I could reach without climbing over something,

832
01:17:36,520 --> 01:17:43,760
so my curiosity got the better of
me. I approached it and got maybe

833
01:17:43,760 --> 01:17:48,119
two feet away before I realized it
was the source of that damn chemical smell.

834
01:17:49,760 --> 01:17:55,039
Once I realized that I had to
take a look inside, just so

835
01:17:55,079 --> 01:17:59,800
I could know for sure what the
hell it was, I tried pushing it

836
01:17:59,880 --> 01:18:03,840
up open an inch or two and
peeking inside, but it was pitch black

837
01:18:03,880 --> 01:18:09,079
in there. So I pushed it
open a little further, and using my

838
01:18:09,159 --> 01:18:13,680
phone light, I saw that there
were a set of stairs going down into

839
01:18:13,720 --> 01:18:19,319
a basement. More thumps from upstairs
told me she wasn't going to come down

840
01:18:19,439 --> 01:18:26,039
anytime soon. I had time to
check, so I went down a step

841
01:18:26,279 --> 01:18:30,600
and tried seeing if that helped,
but there was nothing. So I went

842
01:18:30,640 --> 01:18:36,600
down another and then another, until
suddenly a set of automatic lights came on,

843
01:18:36,920 --> 01:18:42,359
with a loud thung and the rising
whine of fluorescence coming to life.

844
01:18:44,680 --> 01:18:49,079
I'm not sure what I expected for
what I saw. At first, it

845
01:18:49,199 --> 01:18:57,720
left me dumb struck, but then
I don't know. It was a sterile

846
01:18:57,800 --> 01:19:02,439
room with white speckled tiles. A
few countertops running along the walls covered in

847
01:19:02,560 --> 01:19:09,399
silver instruments. I didn't recognize one
wall covered in a regular grid of metal

848
01:19:09,439 --> 01:19:15,800
cupboard doors and three steel slabs in
the center of the room. One of

849
01:19:15,840 --> 01:19:21,439
them was occupied a vaguely human shape
covered by a white shroud a lone foot

850
01:19:21,439 --> 01:19:26,880
of a man sticking out of the
bottom. Something about the strange coloring and

851
01:19:26,920 --> 01:19:32,039
texture of the skin immediately let me
know he wasn't having a nap. That

852
01:19:32,680 --> 01:19:39,960
and the toe tag was a pretty
obvious clue. It was a morgue.

853
01:19:41,279 --> 01:19:45,439
She worked in the morgue, and
it was here, of all places she'd

854
01:19:45,439 --> 01:19:51,119
decided to set our final date.
My initial reaction was to want to go

855
01:19:51,199 --> 01:19:56,960
upstairs and confront her, get angry, let it out, and just leave

856
01:19:57,119 --> 01:20:03,000
after making her unlock the door.
But something stopped me. I can't say

857
01:20:03,000 --> 01:20:08,600
for shore what. As quickly as
it came, the anger left me,

858
01:20:09,159 --> 01:20:14,399
and I was left with a kind
of horrified curiosity, an idea I couldn't

859
01:20:14,439 --> 01:20:18,760
even put to words in the privacy
of my own head. Instead of turning

860
01:20:18,760 --> 01:20:25,039
around and leaving, I waited a
few seconds to make sure she wasn't coming

861
01:20:25,079 --> 01:20:30,079
down right behind me, and I
began to descend the rest of the way.

862
01:20:31,199 --> 01:20:35,479
The walk to the body felt like
a ten mile hike. Every step

863
01:20:35,640 --> 01:20:42,880
was too loud, every breath a
nervous shivering exhulation. The elecant might burst

864
01:20:42,920 --> 01:20:47,920
into a gasp at any moment.
I was terrified. I couldn't help but

865
01:20:48,000 --> 01:20:54,000
imagine that faceless shape turning to look
at me, or sitting upright in one

866
01:20:54,079 --> 01:21:00,720
smooth motion. I quickly realized why
ghosts I stereotypically portrayed as walking sheet.

867
01:21:00,880 --> 01:21:05,880
Someone must have had the same thought. I had the imagined scene of a

868
01:21:05,960 --> 01:21:12,439
shroud covered body moving swiftly towards you
in the dark. Hell of a time

869
01:21:12,479 --> 01:21:16,520
for my brain to play those kinds
of games with me, But that curiosity

870
01:21:16,640 --> 01:21:23,520
drove me on. I couldn't walk
away, not now. Before I knew

871
01:21:23,520 --> 01:21:27,600
it, I was stood by the
body, and with a shaking hand,

872
01:21:28,680 --> 01:21:38,720
I pulled back the sheet. He
looked like me vaguely. I think we

873
01:21:38,800 --> 01:21:43,720
would have probably been a close match
before the bloating same hair, collar,

874
01:21:43,920 --> 01:21:47,920
same face, shape, same ethnicity, age, so on. For a

875
01:21:47,960 --> 01:21:53,880
moment, I considered the idea that
maybe Sarah was just a very weird woman.

876
01:21:55,279 --> 01:21:59,479
People get desensitized to this kind of
stuff all the time, and to

877
01:21:59,560 --> 01:22:02,640
her the building were in might just
be a nice empty place to bring a

878
01:22:02,720 --> 01:22:10,000
date. But that body on that
slab, I don't know how to describe

879
01:22:10,039 --> 01:22:15,199
it, but it set something off
in me, a kind of slow rising

880
01:22:15,319 --> 01:22:19,800
dread. I'm not sure why I
did what I did next, but I

881
01:22:19,800 --> 01:22:25,760
couldn't stop thinking of that strange night
when she pushed against my chest and sent

882
01:22:25,840 --> 01:22:33,800
wine dribbling out my mouth, so
utterly bizarre. But maybe I placed my

883
01:22:33,840 --> 01:22:40,359
hand against the man's cold flesh,
heeled to the diaphragm and applied pressure.

884
01:22:42,520 --> 01:22:46,640
He animated like a puppet, a
brief gasp of air, followed by curdled

885
01:22:46,680 --> 01:22:54,800
blood flowing out of his mouth.
Black and yellow and red halletts, platelets,

886
01:22:54,800 --> 01:22:59,840
and plasmas separated with time into a
thick soup. When the smell hit

887
01:22:59,880 --> 01:23:03,880
me, I couldn't help but be
sick, and as I hunched over the

888
01:23:03,920 --> 01:23:09,479
nearby drain and emptied my body of
all my vomit and bile, images of

889
01:23:09,520 --> 01:23:14,760
my time with Sarah flashed through my
mind. The photos of me nude lying

890
01:23:14,800 --> 01:23:17,560
on the white tile floor, the
use of the blanket to cover my chest,

891
01:23:18,239 --> 01:23:23,720
her vexation, and my cold hands
A night spent freezing in my balcony,

892
01:23:24,239 --> 01:23:27,800
filling my mouth with wine and forcing
it back out with a shove to

893
01:23:27,880 --> 01:23:33,000
the chest. I lugged at the
body and quickly understood how and why she

894
01:23:33,159 --> 01:23:40,319
discovered what happens when you apply pressure
to the chest. The image was crystal

895
01:23:40,359 --> 01:23:45,520
clear in my mind. The mental
image of her slender frame straddling the bloated

896
01:23:45,520 --> 01:23:53,000
men before me was as unpleasant and
inescapable as nails and a chalkboard. Unable

897
01:23:53,079 --> 01:23:58,840
to shake it, I hunched over
once more and was sick again, this

898
01:23:59,039 --> 01:24:03,159
time until my eyes watered and there
was nothing left but saliva and bile.

899
01:24:05,039 --> 01:24:13,159
I felt violated. I wanted to
leave. I no longer felt angry or

900
01:24:13,199 --> 01:24:17,439
confused. Instead, every moment of
the last six months fell into place,

901
01:24:17,960 --> 01:24:25,359
and a pattern emerged that terrified me. She wasn't meandering or clueless. Everything

902
01:24:25,439 --> 01:24:29,920
she'd done had been moving towards this
one night, with me here, locked

903
01:24:29,920 --> 01:24:33,359
in this place, with no one
to call for help. I'd blundered into

904
01:24:33,399 --> 01:24:39,960
what might just be the most dangerous
situation of my life. And now I

905
01:24:40,079 --> 01:24:45,439
was too deep into the trap to
just blindly panic on the ground and inner

906
01:24:45,520 --> 01:24:50,439
room with only one exit, I
had to be careful. She was up

907
01:24:50,479 --> 01:24:58,279
there somewhere, maybe clueless about what
I'd realized, maybe not. She seemed

908
01:24:58,279 --> 01:25:01,159
small enough, but a through glanced
at some of the glinting blades on the

909
01:25:01,199 --> 01:25:06,079
nearby work surface told me she didn't
have to be a bodybuilder to hurt me.

910
01:25:08,439 --> 01:25:12,560
Any one of those razor sharp instruments
could work its way into the meat

911
01:25:12,600 --> 01:25:18,119
of my neck with very little effort. Sooner or later she'd realize where I

912
01:25:18,279 --> 01:25:23,760
was. Sooner or later, this
plan of hers had to have an endgame.

913
01:25:25,239 --> 01:25:29,520
I looked up the stairs. If
she came down from the top floor,

914
01:25:29,960 --> 01:25:32,239
she'd see the lights from this room, and it would be obvious to

915
01:25:32,359 --> 01:25:39,520
anyone where I'd gone. I was
torn. Do I go up and pretend

916
01:25:39,560 --> 01:25:44,119
I saw nothing? I thought about
having to go up there and lie my

917
01:25:44,159 --> 01:25:48,000
way through some aw good encounter.
Oh, I'm feeling a little unwell.

918
01:25:48,119 --> 01:25:55,359
I have to skip polite smile,
nod. Could I stomach even that brief

919
01:25:55,399 --> 01:26:00,239
exchange? And that's if she bought
it, and it required that the next

920
01:26:00,239 --> 01:26:04,880
step of a planet involved me conscious
or alive. I thought of her attacking

921
01:26:04,920 --> 01:26:10,319
me out of nowhere with a scalpel, silently dragging it across my throat,

922
01:26:10,960 --> 01:26:15,760
letting that surgical blade bite into cartilage. She was small, but so what.

923
01:26:17,159 --> 01:26:20,199
I had no idea what she was
planning or where she was lurking.

924
01:26:21,479 --> 01:26:27,479
Walking into an ambush and toughing it
out didn't seem like the best of plans.

925
01:26:28,199 --> 01:26:32,640
What I wanted was distant. I
just needed a door or a window.

926
01:26:33,600 --> 01:26:40,119
I just had to avoid her.
My first instinct had been to get

927
01:26:40,159 --> 01:26:44,039
out of the basement, and I
wanted to go with it, but the

928
01:26:44,119 --> 01:26:47,760
strange sounds coming from upstairs made me
think she might have finally come to find

929
01:26:47,800 --> 01:26:55,119
reception empty. Terrified, I looked
around, desperate for some way out or

930
01:26:55,159 --> 01:27:00,039
maybe even a good hiding spot.
Just about every bad idea you can I

931
01:27:00,039 --> 01:27:03,479
think of went through my head,
including swapping myself out for the corpse.

932
01:27:04,640 --> 01:27:09,680
I nearly laughed at the stupidity of
it, but my attention had been pulled

933
01:27:09,680 --> 01:27:14,359
to the mog drawers, and with
a sinking feeling in my gut, I

934
01:27:14,439 --> 01:27:18,479
slowly realized there was nowhere else in
that room large enough to hide a person.

935
01:27:20,640 --> 01:27:27,880
Michael. The voice was muffled and
distant, but I could tell she

936
01:27:28,000 --> 01:27:32,279
was finally looking for me. This
was really fast becoming a now and never

937
01:27:32,399 --> 01:27:38,760
moment. With a deep breath,
I pulled at the first drawer I saw,

938
01:27:39,439 --> 01:27:43,960
and felt bittersweet relief that it was
empty. I wasn't sure I could

939
01:27:43,960 --> 01:27:48,359
go through with this, but at
least it hadn't been already occupied with a

940
01:27:48,439 --> 01:27:54,720
rising gorge. I climbed inside feet
first, slid myself back into the darkness,

941
01:27:55,199 --> 01:27:58,319
try my best not to think of
a pair of cold hands snatching my

942
01:27:58,319 --> 01:28:03,359
ankles, and then quickly pulled the
door shut. I'd barely heard a click

943
01:28:03,720 --> 01:28:09,479
when there came the sound of footsteps
down the stairs. They stopped halfway,

944
01:28:10,239 --> 01:28:15,039
and I clearly heard a hiss damn
under her breath before turning back around and

945
01:28:15,079 --> 01:28:20,399
returning upstairs. She must have figured
I'd seen the bodies and run off somewhere

946
01:28:20,479 --> 01:28:26,159
else. Wherever that might take her, it had at least brought me time.

947
01:28:28,239 --> 01:28:31,239
I opened the door using the internal
latch, while pushing aside more bed

948
01:28:31,319 --> 01:28:36,840
questions of why that feature was even
necessary, and stepped out as quietly as

949
01:28:36,880 --> 01:28:43,199
I could onto the tile steps.
After that, I scaled the stairs as

950
01:28:43,239 --> 01:28:45,760
silently as I could manage, and
made my way to the door at the

951
01:28:45,760 --> 01:28:50,000
top of the basement. She had
thankfully left it a char once again,

952
01:28:51,319 --> 01:28:56,000
bit of a habit of hers,
I assumed, and peeped through into the

953
01:28:56,079 --> 01:29:01,039
darkness beyond. In the time I
m had been in the basement, the

954
01:29:01,159 --> 01:29:05,960
sun had fully set, and now
there were only the lights of passing cars

955
01:29:06,000 --> 01:29:12,880
to illuminate reception. Bright and ber
light with hard edges swept across the room,

956
01:29:13,640 --> 01:29:19,439
one after the other with strange irregularity. They made for an unpredictable insight

957
01:29:19,640 --> 01:29:27,119
into the room's components, a chair, a computer, a countertop. I

958
01:29:27,119 --> 01:29:30,279
had to squint and wait patiently for
a few of them to go by before

959
01:29:30,319 --> 01:29:34,600
I realized one of the back office's
doors were open, and there was the

960
01:29:34,640 --> 01:29:42,680
sound of frustrated footsteps coming from within. She was distracted, and this was

961
01:29:42,720 --> 01:29:48,439
my best chance of getting out.
I tiptoed out of the basement and listened

962
01:29:48,439 --> 01:29:55,800
carefully. She occasionally hissed an angry
refrain to herself, opening what sounded like

963
01:29:55,920 --> 01:30:01,239
cabinet doors. Why you doing this, Michael, she whined, and I

964
01:30:01,279 --> 01:30:08,359
was surprised that she sounded not malevolent, but sad and pitiful, like an

965
01:30:08,399 --> 01:30:15,840
upset teenager. She was genuinely confused
by my reaction. For a brief moment,

966
01:30:15,279 --> 01:30:18,560
I dared to wonder if my imagination
had gotten the better of me.

967
01:30:20,560 --> 01:30:27,000
Right there on the counter was a
bottle of wine and two glasses. Maybe

968
01:30:27,039 --> 01:30:30,319
she really was just intending for a
normal date, and I'd made connections that

969
01:30:30,399 --> 01:30:35,960
were never really there. But in
my mind I saw that corpse bloated and

970
01:30:36,000 --> 01:30:44,399
bloody once again, and ultimately decided
I was better safe than sorry. A

971
01:30:44,479 --> 01:30:48,039
quick check at the front door showed
who was still locked, and so with

972
01:30:48,159 --> 01:30:54,199
nowhere else to go, I went
up another floor, careful to stop every

973
01:30:54,239 --> 01:31:00,399
step or two and listen for signs
she had changed course. Thankfully, I

974
01:31:00,439 --> 01:31:02,359
was at the top step by the
time I heard her leave the office and

975
01:31:02,560 --> 01:31:09,119
enter another Come on, she cried, why are you being like this?

976
01:31:11,880 --> 01:31:15,159
I wasn't sure what my game plan
was. I figured my best chance was

977
01:31:15,159 --> 01:31:19,920
a window. I was already trying
to start tearing the top floor apart when

978
01:31:19,960 --> 01:31:25,520
I was stopped dead in my tracks
by what I saw. There were a

979
01:31:25,520 --> 01:31:29,439
few rooms on the top floor,
but only one of them had an open

980
01:31:29,520 --> 01:31:33,880
door and the lights turned on.
What I saw inside hit me so hard

981
01:31:34,439 --> 01:31:41,479
I stopped dead in my tracks and
led out a gasp. It was covered

982
01:31:41,720 --> 01:31:47,039
in plastic crap. Top to bottom
floors, walls, and ceiling. The

983
01:31:47,119 --> 01:31:50,960
small white table had been set up
in one corner, and on it lay

984
01:31:51,000 --> 01:31:57,960
three open pill bottles, a hack
saw, and several scalpels. Seeing all

985
01:31:57,960 --> 01:32:01,920
that stuff, getting such an upfront
sight into what she had planned, it

986
01:32:01,960 --> 01:32:08,079
all made my damn skin crawl.
That and the bottle of lotion made me

987
01:32:08,119 --> 01:32:13,920
want to be sick. Suppressing the
urge to gag, I decided none of

988
01:32:13,920 --> 01:32:17,680
that really mattered, because and this
wasn't a great surprise. She had picked

989
01:32:17,680 --> 01:32:23,800
a room with a large and easy
to open window. I pushed the side

990
01:32:23,800 --> 01:32:28,239
of the plastic sheeting and opened it
to find the drop below was in anywhere

991
01:32:28,239 --> 01:32:31,079
near as bad as the thought of
spending another second in that damn room.

992
01:32:32,560 --> 01:32:38,920
I began to climb out, got
one leg through, carefully balancing so that

993
01:32:39,000 --> 01:32:43,840
if I fell, I'd minimize injury. When I heard a sound by the

994
01:32:43,880 --> 01:32:53,079
door, the crinkling of plastic,
the gentle glide over door, I turned

995
01:32:53,239 --> 01:32:57,880
and saw her standing in the dark
hallway beyond. It was hard to see,

996
01:32:57,920 --> 01:33:01,880
but she wasn't grinning like a maniac
or waiting with a knife. More

997
01:33:01,960 --> 01:33:11,119
than anything, she just looked disappointed, maybe even frustrated. In hindsight,

998
01:33:11,359 --> 01:33:15,319
it made sense she'd spent a long
time setting this up, not just the

999
01:33:15,399 --> 01:33:20,199
room with a plastic sheeting, but
the entire relationship had been built carefully around

1000
01:33:20,239 --> 01:33:26,880
that night. I expected her to
crack break, come at me, screaming

1001
01:33:26,920 --> 01:33:31,439
and slashing with some hidden blade,
but she only shook her head and quietly

1002
01:33:31,520 --> 01:33:40,640
mewed, it's not my fault.
I considered her reply, but found none

1003
01:33:40,680 --> 01:33:45,000
to be fitting. I jumped and
landed safely below with a bit of a

1004
01:33:45,079 --> 01:33:50,279
knee shaking thumb, nowhere near as
bad as the shin splintering worst case scenario

1005
01:33:50,399 --> 01:33:56,520
I kept imagining. Then, with
a deep breath, relishing with the smell

1006
01:33:56,560 --> 01:34:01,760
of fresh air, I ran as
quickly as I could towards the hospital and

1007
01:34:01,800 --> 01:34:08,479
the lot where my car waited.
You know, you might not be too

1008
01:34:08,520 --> 01:34:12,680
surprised to learn this, but there
wasn't actually much I could prove when it

1009
01:34:12,720 --> 01:34:16,279
was all over. By the time
the police visited the morgue, it was

1010
01:34:16,319 --> 01:34:21,039
apparently back to normal. Her side
of the story was that I'd insisted on

1011
01:34:21,159 --> 01:34:26,399
visiting the morgue out of curiosity and
got upset when she didn't want to stick

1012
01:34:26,439 --> 01:34:30,760
around. It was kind of hard
to prove anything else. I had no

1013
01:34:30,880 --> 01:34:36,079
injuries, no evidence of intent or
anything else other than a suspicion of some

1014
01:34:36,119 --> 01:34:42,560
pretty mess behavior. In the end, the best the police were willing to

1015
01:34:42,600 --> 01:34:45,800
do was hook me up with a
lawyer who dealt with restraining orders, and

1016
01:34:45,880 --> 01:34:51,680
he told me I need some evidence
of actual harassment. Well that, and

1017
01:34:51,720 --> 01:34:56,640
the main gist of his advice was
actually for me to stay away from her,

1018
01:34:56,840 --> 01:35:00,359
because, if anything, it would
be a hell of It's a lot

1019
01:35:00,359 --> 01:35:03,560
easier for her to convince people I
was the problem and not the other way

1020
01:35:03,600 --> 01:35:10,039
around. I didn't have much choice
in the end except to move on,

1021
01:35:11,520 --> 01:35:15,079
and all told, I was just
happy to have made it out alive,

1022
01:35:15,039 --> 01:35:20,199
even if the thought of her out
there made me deeply anxious. I had

1023
01:35:20,199 --> 01:35:26,439
to assume she'd go looking for another
target since I'd wised up, although I

1024
01:35:26,479 --> 01:35:30,680
hoped that maybe the close encounter with
me would stop her from trying again.

1025
01:35:31,640 --> 01:35:38,239
As for me, I deleted my
Tinder profile, having decided that internet dating

1026
01:35:38,439 --> 01:35:45,600
would never be a thing for me
again. But the nightmares persist, and

1027
01:35:45,680 --> 01:35:50,600
I often think of her standing there
in the doorway. She didn't look half

1028
01:35:50,640 --> 01:35:56,520
as upset as I might have thought. The whole thing was like I'd been

1029
01:35:56,560 --> 01:36:01,640
a bit naughty. There she was
aspiring murder, moments away from executing a

1030
01:36:01,680 --> 01:36:08,159
plan that had been months in the
making, and she'd stood there like it

1031
01:36:08,199 --> 01:36:13,000
was all nothing but a miner set
back. It just didn't make sense,

1032
01:36:14,640 --> 01:36:19,000
and like everything with Sarah, I
struggled to move on from this peculiar behavior

1033
01:36:20,680 --> 01:36:29,079
until I got an answer. Well
to day, I finally got it when

1034
01:36:29,079 --> 01:36:33,199
I woke up and felt something strange
by my feet. I pulled back the

1035
01:36:33,199 --> 01:36:40,640
sheets and saw something that made my
heart sink and a cold sweat form on

1036
01:36:40,720 --> 01:36:48,600
the back of my neck. I
was wearing a toe tag. I think

1037
01:36:48,760 --> 01:36:55,520
I might have underestimated her patience,
and I am starting to appreciate just why

1038
01:36:55,560 --> 01:36:58,960
she found that night in the morgue
to be a little more than a set

1039
01:36:59,000 --> 01:37:05,239
back on attack itself. My name
is scrawled on one line, and on

1040
01:37:05,319 --> 01:37:14,520
the date of death below she had
simply written. In just a few days,

1041
01:37:24,800 --> 01:37:28,960
I got a job in San Diego
not too long after the pandemic settled.

1042
01:37:29,960 --> 01:37:33,800
It was in exciting time, but
I was also anxious about finding a

1043
01:37:33,800 --> 01:37:40,000
place to live. I didn't have
that much saved up, so I had

1044
01:37:40,039 --> 01:37:45,000
to find somewhere a bit more lenient
to newcomers. I signed up to all

1045
01:37:45,119 --> 01:37:48,439
kinds of lists and tenant groups,
but most leads were dead in the water.

1046
01:37:50,039 --> 01:37:55,479
The only places within my price range
had in no pets policy, and

1047
01:37:55,560 --> 01:38:00,720
I couldn't bring myself to re home
my cat, Marmalade. Poor thing was

1048
01:38:00,840 --> 01:38:05,880
just a year old and a complete
mama's girl. After weeks of searching,

1049
01:38:06,399 --> 01:38:12,159
I stumbled upon a landlord with a
vacant spot. He hadn't even got the

1050
01:38:12,199 --> 01:38:15,920
time to list it. All I'd
seen was a post about a cheap apartment.

1051
01:38:17,399 --> 01:38:24,279
I messaged him spontaneously and asked about
it. Turns out the previous tenant

1052
01:38:24,359 --> 01:38:29,159
had passed away. It was on
the fourth floor, not too far off

1053
01:38:29,239 --> 01:38:35,239
Main Street, and surprisingly cheap cat
friendly too. He offered me a deal.

1054
01:38:36,399 --> 01:38:42,239
If I paid for the clean up
crew, the place was mine.

1055
01:38:42,520 --> 01:38:46,800
I couldn't say no. Once the
place was cleaned up, I met up

1056
01:38:46,840 --> 01:38:51,960
with my new landlord and got the
keys handed to me. My new place

1057
01:38:53,079 --> 01:38:57,760
was on the top floor of this
beautiful old building made somewhere back in the

1058
01:38:57,760 --> 01:39:02,960
fifties. Cools stone, tarred floors, spacious ceiling, and plenty of sunlight

1059
01:39:03,239 --> 01:39:09,560
coming in from the body sized windows. There was a sort of French balcony

1060
01:39:09,880 --> 01:39:14,640
with a little space to smoke or
a mini garden. There was a large

1061
01:39:14,680 --> 01:39:18,479
living room area, a tiny kitchenette, and a cramped little bedroom on the

1062
01:39:18,520 --> 01:39:25,880
sunny side. It wasn't much,
but I could see myself growing attached to

1063
01:39:25,960 --> 01:39:31,000
it. You could tell it was
old, though. There were all kinds

1064
01:39:31,000 --> 01:39:36,039
of little quirks, a lock that
you had to jiggle, pipes that rumbled

1065
01:39:36,039 --> 01:39:41,640
a little whenever you took a shower, and you could immediately tell if one

1066
01:39:41,640 --> 01:39:47,039
of your neighbors was smoking because of
the terrible ventilation. It was far from

1067
01:39:47,079 --> 01:39:54,039
perfect, but for that price,
at that location, I couldn't ask for

1068
01:39:54,119 --> 01:39:59,079
a better deal. The one thing
that dated it more than anything else,

1069
01:39:59,079 --> 01:40:06,319
however, was the strange seventies wallpaper. This intricate floral pattern covered most of

1070
01:40:06,359 --> 01:40:12,399
the living room, along with the
western wall of the bedroom, a dark

1071
01:40:12,399 --> 01:40:17,880
gray bass collar with lines of white
rose, tulips, sunflowers, all in

1072
01:40:17,960 --> 01:40:25,600
variations of silver and blue. It
was beautiful in a sort of primitive Art

1073
01:40:25,640 --> 01:40:30,680
Deco kind of way, but you
could tell it was old. I promised

1074
01:40:30,680 --> 01:40:36,119
myself to get it replaced if I
were to live there long term. It

1075
01:40:36,159 --> 01:40:41,079
didn't take long to move in.
I didn't have much in the way of

1076
01:40:41,119 --> 01:40:45,079
furniture, and I didn't really have
the money to bring in something new.

1077
01:40:45,279 --> 01:40:49,600
I figured I'd settle for what little
I had for the time being, instead

1078
01:40:49,600 --> 01:40:55,840
of focusing on getting used to my
new job. I was working as a

1079
01:40:55,880 --> 01:41:00,199
full time consultant for a telecom company, mostly focusing on process management. In

1080
01:41:00,239 --> 01:41:06,520
evaluation might not sound that interesting,
but you get a lot of wiggle room

1081
01:41:06,640 --> 01:41:12,880
to really switch things up for the
better. Postpandemic. We were on a

1082
01:41:12,960 --> 01:41:17,479
routine of a single weekly meeting and
the rest could and would be done from

1083
01:41:17,520 --> 01:41:23,159
our home office. It felt kind
of done to force people to come in

1084
01:41:23,319 --> 01:41:28,680
once a week just because, But
if I wanted the job, that was

1085
01:41:28,720 --> 01:41:34,079
the deal. Marmalade got settled in
that place long before I did. She

1086
01:41:34,119 --> 01:41:39,439
found a sunny spot next to one
of the big windows. I set up

1087
01:41:39,520 --> 01:41:43,840
a cozy basket for her to snuggle
into. I, on the other hand,

1088
01:41:44,399 --> 01:41:48,159
was having trouble sleeping those first few
nights. I lay awake at night

1089
01:41:48,640 --> 01:41:55,079
staring at the ceiling. I'd lose
myself in that view, sort of like

1090
01:41:55,439 --> 01:41:59,920
when you're looking down into dark waters. You can't really see where it is.

1091
01:42:00,600 --> 01:42:06,520
It is just this perpetual nothing,
and you can imagine it continuing forever.

1092
01:42:09,439 --> 01:42:14,279
That first week went by in a
flash. I had my first meeting

1093
01:42:14,520 --> 01:42:19,600
and got my first assignment process assessment
at one of the branch offices in Pittsburgh

1094
01:42:20,119 --> 01:42:25,640
long distance, with an in person
evaluation at the end of a two month

1095
01:42:25,720 --> 01:42:31,279
cycle. Nothing I couldn't handle,
but said office had a sort of reputation

1096
01:42:31,439 --> 01:42:36,560
for being unmanageable. It was the
kind of assignment you throw at someone to

1097
01:42:36,600 --> 01:42:43,000
see if they got the chops for
it long term. That first day was

1098
01:42:43,039 --> 01:42:46,199
mostly meet and greets, with a
tiny after work at one of the Shek

1099
01:42:46,319 --> 01:42:51,079
downtown bars. It was mostly an
excuse the crack a few cold ones,

1100
01:42:51,119 --> 01:42:57,279
and on Monday, my colleagues were
a few decibels louder than I was used

1101
01:42:57,319 --> 01:43:02,039
to, so I ended up sitting
mostly in the background, learning to appreciate

1102
01:43:02,319 --> 01:43:09,720
a small label dark punkin ale.
The next day, I was in full

1103
01:43:09,760 --> 01:43:15,079
work mode. I set up my
laptop with a view of my awful wallpaper

1104
01:43:15,680 --> 01:43:19,399
to make it look a bit more
office like. Marmalade wasn't moving from a

1105
01:43:19,479 --> 01:43:24,600
new favorite spot by the window,
so there were no fluffy tales in the

1106
01:43:24,600 --> 01:43:28,800
way of my webcam. I had
a long talk with the branch manager,

1107
01:43:29,319 --> 01:43:32,319
along with a few technicians, to
just sort of dip my toe in the

1108
01:43:32,359 --> 01:43:39,479
water. They were all courteous enough, but I could tell they'd been put

1109
01:43:39,479 --> 01:43:44,760
through the ringer a couple of times. This wasn't their first assignment, and

1110
01:43:44,880 --> 01:43:49,399
it wouldn't be their last. By
the end of the day, I was

1111
01:43:49,479 --> 01:43:56,279
talking with one of the salesmen,
a woman named Deirdre. At that point

1112
01:43:56,520 --> 01:44:00,079
I'd been in constant zoom calls for
over four hours and my voice was giving

1113
01:44:00,119 --> 01:44:06,039
out. Deirdre could tell I was
exhausted, and we just ended up talking

1114
01:44:06,119 --> 01:44:13,159
about other things instead, my apartment, my job, my cat. I

1115
01:44:13,199 --> 01:44:17,359
had to bother Marmalade a bit just
to show off. Deirdre showed off her

1116
01:44:17,439 --> 01:44:25,479
feline companion, a three year old
rag doll named Popeye. Ironically, that

1117
01:44:25,680 --> 01:44:30,520
call ended up being my longest,
but it went by the fastest. Deirdre

1118
01:44:30,800 --> 01:44:36,800
was a gem. I spent most
of my time setting up questionnaires and mapping

1119
01:44:36,800 --> 01:44:43,119
out the overall structure, bouncing emails
all the way down the supply chain,

1120
01:44:43,720 --> 01:44:47,319
trying to get a clear picture of
the main issues. It was the same

1121
01:44:47,359 --> 01:44:53,760
old story that I'd heard a hundred
times before, management blaming the salesman,

1122
01:44:54,199 --> 01:45:00,479
the salesman blaming the warehouse, and
the warehouse blaming the technicians. There were

1123
01:45:00,520 --> 01:45:04,960
little hitches all the way down the
road, ranging from dated inventory systems to

1124
01:45:05,159 --> 01:45:12,079
useless red tape. After the first
few days, I started getting into a

1125
01:45:12,159 --> 01:45:18,720
routine pingponging between meetings and Excel spreadsheets. Marmalade and I made their apartment into

1126
01:45:18,720 --> 01:45:25,560
a proper home. Chinese taco boxes
started lining the kitchenette, and earned a

1127
01:45:25,560 --> 01:45:30,560
few extra talks with Deirdre just to
pass the slow hours. I started getting

1128
01:45:30,640 --> 01:45:36,199
used to that place, even the
awful wallpaper. I stopped hearing the rumbling

1129
01:45:36,239 --> 01:45:42,399
pipes after a while, and the
cigarette smoke from the neighbor slowly blended into

1130
01:45:42,439 --> 01:45:46,560
the background smells. I stopped waking
from cars passing on the street below,

1131
01:45:47,399 --> 01:45:53,600
and my first paycheck went into making
the living room walk like something that could

1132
01:45:53,720 --> 01:46:00,720
actually be lived in. I remember
one night when I was working over time,

1133
01:46:00,800 --> 01:46:05,319
I got a late email about submitting
a progress report, so I had

1134
01:46:05,319 --> 01:46:11,840
to stay up making a presentation.
I found myself by the opinion that this

1135
01:46:12,039 --> 01:46:15,680
was looking more and more like a
management issue. Who the hell sends this

1136
01:46:15,760 --> 01:46:20,079
kind of email at four fifty pm
on a Thursday, expecting it to be

1137
01:46:20,159 --> 01:46:27,840
done before lunch the next day.
Unbelievable. I was done by about ten

1138
01:46:27,880 --> 01:46:31,399
pm. When I shambled away from
my laptop. I picked up a can

1139
01:46:31,439 --> 01:46:39,960
of cat food for Marmalade and walked
over to a favorite window. Only she

1140
01:46:40,159 --> 01:46:45,840
wasn't there. Her bed was still
there, but Marmalade had moved to another

1141
01:46:45,880 --> 01:46:53,399
window, still sleeping soundly, but
she found a new favorite spot. It

1142
01:46:53,520 --> 01:46:58,119
felt strange in a way, like
the entire apartment had shifted a little.

1143
01:46:59,560 --> 01:47:02,680
Looking up of the wallpaper, I
could have sworn the patterns had moved.

1144
01:47:04,079 --> 01:47:11,159
It looked identical, just a bit
off. I could have sworn it was

1145
01:47:11,199 --> 01:47:19,560
different despite looking exactly the same.
It was a strange feeling. Everything felt

1146
01:47:19,600 --> 01:47:26,520
familiar with that one little twist made
it feel like a new room. Or

1147
01:47:26,600 --> 01:47:30,800
starting to doubt myself. When looking
at Marmalade out of a basket, however,

1148
01:47:31,600 --> 01:47:40,640
it was clear that something was different
in some way. The next few

1149
01:47:40,720 --> 01:47:45,279
days I started to notice this shift
in new ways. The walls would look

1150
01:47:45,279 --> 01:47:50,119
different at night, where at one
point I'd see a sunflower, I'd see

1151
01:47:50,119 --> 01:47:56,119
a rose the next day. Then
again, I wasn't ever really sure,

1152
01:47:57,000 --> 01:48:01,359
and I chalked it up to me
just not paying attention. Marmalade would move

1153
01:48:01,399 --> 01:48:08,359
from spot to spot, never really
sure what her favorite ever was. One

1154
01:48:08,439 --> 01:48:13,600
night, she couldn't settle in at
all, instead moving from one window to

1155
01:48:13,640 --> 01:48:19,119
the next, meawing at me anxiously. That night, as I lay awake,

1156
01:48:19,760 --> 01:48:25,600
out my eyes firmly fixed on the
wall, I could imagine the patterns

1157
01:48:25,680 --> 01:48:30,159
moving on their own, the many
flowers gently swaying to an invisible wind.

1158
01:48:30,920 --> 01:48:35,520
It was just that kind of unreal
surrealist thought you catch just before you fall

1159
01:48:35,560 --> 01:48:42,520
asleep. But in that moment I
could have sworn it was real living.

1160
01:48:42,600 --> 01:48:49,000
Even as I closed my eyes,
I imagined the dark gray background color to

1161
01:48:49,079 --> 01:48:55,960
be as deep as an ocean,
a darkness stretching into a distant nothing.

1162
01:48:59,319 --> 01:49:02,680
The next day, and as I
was making my morning coffee, I noticed

1163
01:49:02,680 --> 01:49:10,840
something peculiar. I stepped on a
dry blue petal. I couldn't explain where

1164
01:49:10,840 --> 01:49:15,319
it came from. I had no
flowers in my apartment, and the ventilation

1165
01:49:15,520 --> 01:49:20,000
was so bad that it could barely
rotate. Air Flower petals were out of

1166
01:49:20,039 --> 01:49:26,880
the question. Marmalade played with it
for a while, and I convinced myself

1167
01:49:27,119 --> 01:49:32,119
that it was just something I dragged
in. Still, it reminded me of

1168
01:49:32,159 --> 01:49:38,600
a flower petal from the Blue Rose
and the wallpaper. He made me anxious,

1169
01:49:39,399 --> 01:49:43,640
but I couldn't figure out why.
What was I even worried about.

1170
01:49:45,000 --> 01:49:47,680
I couldn't let that thought go for
the rest of the day that I was

1171
01:49:47,720 --> 01:49:54,840
missing something obvious, or maybe that
there really was something to my strange paranoia.

1172
01:49:56,159 --> 01:49:59,239
So at the end of the day, when I talked to Deirdre,

1173
01:50:00,039 --> 01:50:04,960
I brought it up. I explained
that there was just something inherently creepy about

1174
01:50:05,000 --> 01:50:10,720
living there, like an uncomfortable thought
tickling your neck when you're not looking.

1175
01:50:12,119 --> 01:50:17,760
Deirdre tried to reassure me a chuckle
coming through my headphones. It takes time,

1176
01:50:17,840 --> 01:50:24,000
love, she said, you just
got here. Besides, everything looks

1177
01:50:24,039 --> 01:50:29,079
strange in the dark. Yeah.
I just can't shake the feeling, you

1178
01:50:29,119 --> 01:50:33,279
know, I explained, like there's
something more to it, like what.

1179
01:50:36,279 --> 01:50:41,720
I didn't know what to answer.
As I stepped into the living room,

1180
01:50:42,399 --> 01:50:46,920
I noticed marmalade rolling on the living
room carpet, casually playing with another blue

1181
01:50:46,920 --> 01:50:53,399
petal. Turning on the lights,
I could see more of them, over

1182
01:50:53,439 --> 01:50:59,800
a dozen dry blue petals lining the
edge of the wall. Finally I could

1183
01:50:59,800 --> 01:51:05,199
tell I wasn't going crazy, This
wasn't a one time deal. That was

1184
01:51:05,279 --> 01:51:12,560
real. Marmalade didn't seem to mind, though. I'm going to have to

1185
01:51:12,600 --> 01:51:17,960
get back to you, I told
Deirdre. Something came up as the call

1186
01:51:18,119 --> 01:51:24,439
ended. I started scooping up the
petals by hand. The moment my knees

1187
01:51:24,520 --> 01:51:29,880
hit the floor, there was a
power surge. It was all so quick.

1188
01:51:30,640 --> 01:51:35,680
A flash of black Marmalade hissed.
Looking straight past me. I could

1189
01:51:35,680 --> 01:51:42,359
hear a rustling noise, like a
large animal moving through a brush. As

1190
01:51:42,439 --> 01:51:46,840
quick as it had come, it
went, leaving only a startled cat and

1191
01:51:46,920 --> 01:51:53,039
my elevated pulse behind. The lights
were slapped back on with a click,

1192
01:51:53,439 --> 01:51:59,159
blinding me. Marmalade retreated to behind
the couch while I picked up the rest

1193
01:51:59,199 --> 01:52:05,359
of the petals. For a moment, I just stood there, staring at

1194
01:52:05,359 --> 01:52:12,600
the many patterns petals in hand.
I could imagine the gray sinking deeper and

1195
01:52:12,680 --> 01:52:16,920
deeper, showing me something past the
obvious, like one of those images you

1196
01:52:16,920 --> 01:52:21,239
have to look at cross eye to
see the truth. I had the same

1197
01:52:21,319 --> 01:52:29,840
sensation like I was missing something obvious. I can imagine hearing things deep in

1198
01:52:29,840 --> 01:52:34,800
an imagined forest. I could hear
branches snapping. I could imagine the blue

1199
01:52:34,840 --> 01:52:42,840
flowers swaying in the wind, and
somewhere in that depthless dark, something roamed,

1200
01:52:44,119 --> 01:52:49,520
something looking for an exit. At
some point I snapped to attention.

1201
01:52:50,640 --> 01:53:00,359
There was a loud electronic noise and
alarm. It was already morning. For

1202
01:53:00,399 --> 01:53:04,880
some alien reason, I'd been stuck
there for hours, just staring at the

1203
01:53:04,960 --> 01:53:13,439
hypnotizing patterns, an entire night's rest
gone. It wasn't until I stepped away

1204
01:53:13,840 --> 01:53:17,960
that I realized just how exhausted I
really was. My legs had locked in

1205
01:53:18,039 --> 01:53:25,000
place, keeling me over straight to
the stone tiled living room floor. Marmalade

1206
01:53:25,079 --> 01:53:30,640
rushed over, worried about this sudden
development. I spent a few minutes just

1207
01:53:30,680 --> 01:53:35,319
sitting there, calming myself down.
The ringing from my cell phone was going

1208
01:53:35,359 --> 01:53:41,720
strong, trying to give me enough
time to shower before my first morning meetings.

1209
01:53:42,640 --> 01:53:47,640
And yet I just sat there,
slowly petting my cat, my eyes

1210
01:53:47,760 --> 01:53:55,359
bobbing in and out of sleep,
my body deprived. Where had I been

1211
01:53:55,399 --> 01:54:00,479
all night? What had I seen? Barely made it through that day,

1212
01:54:01,039 --> 01:54:05,760
having a forty five minute nap over
lunch. By the time I finished my

1213
01:54:05,840 --> 01:54:11,680
last interview, I was a shell
of my old self, barely conscious.

1214
01:54:13,039 --> 01:54:16,640
I filled Marmalade's food and water bowl
and crawled into bed with all my clothes

1215
01:54:16,680 --> 01:54:24,560
still on the moment my eyes closed, I could hear something in the distance.

1216
01:54:26,520 --> 01:54:30,279
In the half world between sleeping and
waking, I heard breaking branches,

1217
01:54:30,840 --> 01:54:39,119
owls taking flight, and something large
approaching. And despite knowing I was well

1218
01:54:39,239 --> 01:54:44,520
and truly alone, my body screamed
at me to wake, to have one

1219
01:54:44,600 --> 01:54:50,640
more loock, just in case I
did. I forced my eyes open.

1220
01:54:54,399 --> 01:55:00,600
Something sharp scratched against the stone tiled
floor, something retreating in haste, a

1221
01:55:00,680 --> 01:55:09,239
trail of dry petals leading right up
to the side of my bed. After

1222
01:55:09,279 --> 01:55:15,279
a night of dreamers sleep, I
woke up to choking on something. It

1223
01:55:15,359 --> 01:55:18,520
took me almost a full minute to
cough up a blue petal, several of

1224
01:55:18,560 --> 01:55:24,760
which had been sprinkled throughout my bed. I could have sworn. The wallpaper

1225
01:55:24,920 --> 01:55:30,000
looked a bit lighter, as if
several flowers were looking sparse. The whole

1226
01:55:30,039 --> 01:55:39,359
wall looked a bit darker. That
morning, I'd had enough. I called

1227
01:55:39,399 --> 01:55:44,239
in sick and brought up my tool
box. I started scraping off the wallpaper,

1228
01:55:44,640 --> 01:55:48,720
piece by piece across the entire apartment. I made a day of it,

1229
01:55:49,239 --> 01:55:56,560
listening to music as Marmalade looked at
me curiously. Every illustrated petal and

1230
01:55:56,640 --> 01:56:00,920
stem dropped to the floor, cut
by cut, like trimming a paper garden.

1231
01:56:02,439 --> 01:56:06,399
By the end of the day,
my wall was laid bare, revealing

1232
01:56:06,439 --> 01:56:15,159
nothing but black lead painted concrete underneath. That night, after a long shower,

1233
01:56:15,840 --> 01:56:18,560
I went to sleep with wall paper
remains still lining the edge of the

1234
01:56:18,640 --> 01:56:26,479
room. Finally I could focus,
I could look past the hypnotizing patterns.

1235
01:56:27,720 --> 01:56:38,439
It was done, gone over,
except it wasn't. As I went to

1236
01:56:38,520 --> 01:56:43,640
sleep, my eyes drifted to the
barren walls, a black, eternal night,

1237
01:56:44,840 --> 01:56:50,159
now unhindered by what little paper thin
barrier had been erected. Just looking

1238
01:56:50,199 --> 01:56:55,399
at it gave me that feeling in
my stomach. My I was falling forward.

1239
01:56:56,640 --> 01:57:00,760
Even closing my eyes felt brighter than
staring into it, like it was

1240
01:57:00,840 --> 01:57:06,159
more than a color a place.
At some point in the night, I

1241
01:57:06,239 --> 01:57:12,520
heard this loud yell. Looking up, I could see Marmalade sitting at the

1242
01:57:12,600 --> 01:57:16,560
edge of my bed, staring straight
at the wall, hissing and raising a

1243
01:57:16,680 --> 01:57:26,880
hackle's Looking straight ahead, I saw
something there, deep in the dark of

1244
01:57:26,960 --> 01:57:33,079
the bare wall. Something moved.
I swooped up Marmalade, who clung to

1245
01:57:33,159 --> 01:57:38,239
my shoulder like a parrot. I
threw on my pants shirt and got my

1246
01:57:38,319 --> 01:57:43,600
bag. I'd had enough. I
wasn't about to stick around to find out

1247
01:57:43,600 --> 01:57:48,800
the depths of what was either my
own sanity or something unnatural. Entirely I

1248
01:57:48,880 --> 01:57:55,479
didn't want to know. As I
entered the living room, I stopped dead

1249
01:57:55,520 --> 01:58:02,399
in my tracks. Every single wall
had turned and midnight black. The windows

1250
01:58:02,479 --> 01:58:08,560
had fogged up from the inside,
blocking the moonlight from peeking in. I

1251
01:58:08,680 --> 01:58:14,600
ran my hand along the wall,
looking for the door. Something cold bumped

1252
01:58:14,720 --> 01:58:23,800
against the palm of my hand her
finger. I recoiled, almost dropping Marmalade

1253
01:58:23,800 --> 01:58:29,439
in surprise. I couldn't see my
door. As I looked around, trying

1254
01:58:29,479 --> 01:58:34,399
to find my bearings. I slowly
came to the realization that nothing was quite

1255
01:58:34,399 --> 01:58:41,319
as it should. The kitchenette was
further away, the windows were further apart.

1256
01:58:41,960 --> 01:58:46,439
The proportions of the room were off
and seemingly shifting every time I blinked.

1257
01:58:47,319 --> 01:58:53,800
It was as if everything in that
darkness was untrue, malleable, suddenly

1258
01:58:53,960 --> 01:59:00,760
shifting as soon as I looked away, and so was I. Looking down

1259
01:59:00,800 --> 01:59:05,960
at my hands, they seemed different
with every blink of my eye. They

1260
01:59:06,000 --> 01:59:12,399
could be older, younger, scarred, masculine. It was impossible to tell.

1261
01:59:13,439 --> 01:59:15,439
It was just affuse, enough for
an anxious mind to fill in the

1262
01:59:15,439 --> 01:59:20,520
blanks. But it felt like more
than that. It wasn't just the fear

1263
01:59:20,560 --> 01:59:28,119
of the dark. It was the
dark changing me. Finally, I fumbled

1264
01:59:28,119 --> 01:59:32,560
my way to the front door.
I pulled it open and there was nothing,

1265
01:59:33,880 --> 01:59:41,600
just a solid black nothing. The
apartment was getting darker, Even the

1266
01:59:41,640 --> 01:59:46,399
windows were turning black. The kitchen
sink was running, pushing forth dark nondescript

1267
01:59:46,479 --> 01:59:56,079
globes, all of which had this
peculiar chemical smell like ammonia. Marmalade was

1268
01:59:56,119 --> 01:59:59,800
freaking out. She clung to me, digging her claws into my shirt,

1269
02:00:00,359 --> 02:00:04,159
hissing at something in the dark.
Whenever I turned around, the room would

1270
02:00:04,159 --> 02:00:11,199
look different, swallowed further and further
by the night. I could see vague

1271
02:00:11,199 --> 02:00:17,319
silhouette hands reaching forward, some small, some impossibly large. I can imagine

1272
02:00:17,359 --> 02:00:23,520
creatures the size of sky scrapers,
towering forward, impish, little beasts nipping

1273
02:00:23,600 --> 02:00:28,640
at my heels. I curled into
a ball on the floor, clutching Marmalade

1274
02:00:28,680 --> 02:00:33,640
close to my chest. Together we
stared down anything and everything creeping closer.

1275
02:00:35,279 --> 02:00:42,279
But I was losing My light was
dying. It was all going dark.

1276
02:00:45,039 --> 02:00:50,279
Then I felt a rumble. I'd
forgotten my phone was still in my pants,

1277
02:00:50,800 --> 02:00:56,439
bringing it out. I had a
new message from Deirdre, the little

1278
02:00:56,479 --> 02:01:00,279
screen lighting up a little bubble around
me. I wasn't even on the floor

1279
02:01:00,279 --> 02:01:04,760
anymore. I was sitting on a
pile of dry grass and blue petals,

1280
02:01:05,399 --> 02:01:10,239
and I could see the edge of
a dead field stretching out around me in

1281
02:01:10,279 --> 02:01:15,680
all directions. A wind cut through
me like cold glass, and there really

1282
02:01:15,720 --> 02:01:21,199
were things moving out there, some
big, some small, all vague and

1283
02:01:21,239 --> 02:01:28,239
horrifying, waiting for me to look
away long enough to take shape. Hey,

1284
02:01:28,279 --> 02:01:30,319
Ann, I heard you were feeling
under the weather, so I just

1285
02:01:30,359 --> 02:01:36,359
wanted to check in. Get plenty
of rest. We'll talk soon. It

1286
02:01:36,479 --> 02:01:42,439
played again and again. I filled
my head with a voice, and my

1287
02:01:42,520 --> 02:01:47,000
eyes with that little light the phone
struggled to provide. I could feel Marmalade's

1288
02:01:47,000 --> 02:01:54,119
pulls beating against my neck. Something
would brush against me a light kick against

1289
02:01:54,159 --> 02:02:00,359
my foot, footsteps rushing past.
I saw nothing, but there were there

1290
02:02:00,960 --> 02:02:06,520
hidden in the dark. We'll talk
soon, Deirdre's message repeated for the tenth

1291
02:02:06,560 --> 02:02:14,600
time. I don't know how long
I sat there, just waiting for the

1292
02:02:14,680 --> 02:02:21,920
dark to pass, but nothing came
of it. The battery was dying as

1293
02:02:21,920 --> 02:02:27,760
it reached the final few percentages of
power. There was little left for me

1294
02:02:27,840 --> 02:02:32,359
to do. The light was shrinking. I couldn't hear Deirdre's message anymore.

1295
02:02:33,119 --> 02:02:41,199
Marmalade was yelling like crazy, hissing
and striking at something unseen. As the

1296
02:02:41,239 --> 02:02:45,520
screen died, I felt the chill
of the world descend on me. In

1297
02:02:45,560 --> 02:02:53,880
the silence, I could feel something
approaching, something careful and calculated. I

1298
02:02:53,880 --> 02:03:00,399
couldn't see it, but I could
feel it smiling at me, leering eager.

1299
02:03:01,479 --> 02:03:05,880
I was panicking. My skin fell
like ice, and I couldn't feel

1300
02:03:05,880 --> 02:03:12,680
my fingers. I held Marmalade close
to me, and in a last ditch

1301
02:03:12,720 --> 02:03:18,720
effort, I flung my phone into
the dark. Glass shattered. I'd thrown

1302
02:03:18,760 --> 02:03:24,920
it through the window next to the
little French balcony. A beam of morning

1303
02:03:25,000 --> 02:03:32,960
light broke through. I turned round
to an empty apartment the layout exactly as

1304
02:03:33,000 --> 02:03:40,119
I'd remembered it, the kitchenette still
running, torn down wallpaper lining the edges

1305
02:03:40,159 --> 02:03:45,199
of the room, Marmalade's favorite bed
still by the window, and the many

1306
02:03:45,359 --> 02:03:54,199
Chinese takeout boxes still left unattended,
just as it should be, except every

1307
02:03:54,319 --> 02:04:00,960
inch of the room was covered in
dry blue flower petals. Needless to say,

1308
02:04:02,000 --> 02:04:06,600
I didn't stick around for long.
I moved out to the branch office

1309
02:04:06,720 --> 02:04:12,960
where Deirdre worked and ended up staying
there. We're still best friends to this

1310
02:04:13,079 --> 02:04:16,720
day. I haven't been able to
talk to a lot of people about what

1311
02:04:16,880 --> 02:04:23,000
happened that night. I get the
sense that whatever lived in that dark space

1312
02:04:23,560 --> 02:04:28,920
was just waiting for someone to tear
down that barrier, that hedge of flowers

1313
02:04:28,920 --> 02:04:33,600
and patterns, something waiting to pull
me into a dark place, never to

1314
02:04:33,680 --> 02:04:41,720
return. Poor Marmalade hasn't been the
same since. Her fur has turned a

1315
02:04:41,800 --> 02:04:46,479
matted orange, and she's a lot
clingier than before. She's okay, though,

1316
02:04:46,880 --> 02:04:51,359
she's a happy cat, but it'd
be a lie to say she hasn't

1317
02:04:51,439 --> 02:04:59,159
changed. The same can be said
about me. It isn't a single obvious

1318
02:04:59,199 --> 02:05:02,600
thing, but I feel like there
are things about me that aren't the same.

1319
02:05:03,960 --> 02:05:10,079
My eyes looked darker, my fingers
longer, my teeth sharper and whiter,

1320
02:05:11,800 --> 02:05:16,680
just enough for me to notice and
remember. In my new place,

1321
02:05:18,000 --> 02:05:24,520
my sleep, with the lights on, I try not to look too closely

1322
02:05:24,920 --> 02:05:40,199
at the wall paper, just in
case. When Jake told me he had

1323
02:05:40,239 --> 02:05:45,680
something to show me, I was
curious, but also a little worried.

1324
02:05:46,000 --> 02:05:50,079
It'd been my best friend since junior
high, and I loved and trusted him

1325
02:05:50,119 --> 02:05:56,239
like a brother. But I also
couldn't forget that three months earlier he'd been

1326
02:05:56,279 --> 02:06:01,000
in an institution instead of living across
town. The story of that had ended

1327
02:06:01,039 --> 02:06:08,640
up with him being diagnosed with schizophreniform
disorder and sent for impatient treatment. But

1328
02:06:08,800 --> 02:06:14,560
it started by Jake freaking out in
a college algebra class. I wasn't there,

1329
02:06:15,159 --> 02:06:19,399
but supposedly he was screaming in some
language no one understood and attacked his

1330
02:06:19,479 --> 02:06:25,159
professor, and in the days that
followed he told the doctors that it had

1331
02:06:25,199 --> 02:06:30,319
been dreaming for weeks about living in
another part of the world, though he

1332
02:06:30,479 --> 02:06:35,640
wasn't sure where. According to his
parents, he didn't remember screaming and biting

1333
02:06:35,640 --> 02:06:42,680
his math professor at all. With
therapy and meds he got better over time,

1334
02:06:43,479 --> 02:06:46,119
and if you asked him if any
of that stuff had been real other

1335
02:06:46,239 --> 02:06:50,880
than the biting, of course,
he'd look embarrassed and shake his head,

1336
02:06:50,920 --> 02:06:55,720
tell you that it had all been
crossed wise in his head, and that

1337
02:06:55,800 --> 02:07:02,279
he was better now. And I
think most people believed him. But I

1338
02:07:02,359 --> 02:07:08,399
knew Jake well, maybe better than
anyone, and I could see it in

1339
02:07:08,439 --> 02:07:14,079
his eyes when he looked my way. He was lying, or at least

1340
02:07:14,199 --> 02:07:19,800
holding something back. We started hanging
out again, fairly regularly as life allowed,

1341
02:07:20,600 --> 02:07:25,840
but I still felt tints around him, not because I thought he was

1342
02:07:25,920 --> 02:07:30,319
dangerous, but because I wanted him
to be okay, and I felt responsible

1343
02:07:30,359 --> 02:07:36,439
for watching him closely for any sign
that he still needed help. But when

1344
02:07:36,439 --> 02:07:42,039
he showed up at my apartment twenty
minutes later, I could see he was

1345
02:07:42,079 --> 02:07:46,520
excited, and it actually made me
relax a little. The meds made him

1346
02:07:46,560 --> 02:07:51,039
calmer and flatter in some ways,
and while that was probably a good thing,

1347
02:07:51,640 --> 02:07:57,239
it also made him seem different.
This was more like the old Jake,

1348
02:07:57,880 --> 02:08:01,239
full of energy and ready to tell
you. I'll show you something funny

1349
02:08:01,319 --> 02:08:05,720
or awesome. He'd referenced the video
on the phone, and when he came

1350
02:08:05,760 --> 02:08:09,600
in. I saw he had his
laptop under one arm. I raised an

1351
02:08:09,600 --> 02:08:15,119
eye, brought him what we couldn't
look it up on YouTube or something.

1352
02:08:16,600 --> 02:08:20,239
He grinned as he said, the
laptop on the kitchen counter and opened it

1353
02:08:20,359 --> 02:08:26,159
up. Nope, not this,
it's special. On his screen was a

1354
02:08:26,159 --> 02:08:31,920
website showing what looked like video from
a camera perched high up on a pole

1355
02:08:31,119 --> 02:08:37,279
or building and pointed out over a
multi lane freeway and part of some city

1356
02:08:37,399 --> 02:08:41,520
on the far side. There,
the sun was bright and you could see

1357
02:08:41,600 --> 02:08:46,840
steady streams of cars going in both
directions, and in the upper left part

1358
02:08:46,840 --> 02:08:52,039
of the camera's view you could see
a long pedestrian bridge with people passing to

1359
02:08:52,159 --> 02:09:01,159
and fro. Oblivious to our scrutiny, I glanced at him, this live

1360
02:09:01,319 --> 02:09:07,800
or a video? Jay grinned,
it's live. It's Kuala Lumpa, Malaysia.

1361
02:09:09,520 --> 02:09:16,000
I glanced back at the video.
That made sense. It was after

1362
02:09:16,079 --> 02:09:20,439
ten at night where we were,
but it was probably the next morning there.

1363
02:09:20,640 --> 02:09:26,079
But still, I mean, that's
neat and all. But I've seen

1364
02:09:26,119 --> 02:09:31,000
city cameras before, lots of places
livestream. Now, is there some shut

1365
02:09:31,079 --> 02:09:37,039
up here? She comes? I
followed where his finger was emphatically jabbing at

1366
02:09:37,039 --> 02:09:43,359
the screen. Coming towards the camera
along the footbridge was a squat woman with

1367
02:09:43,520 --> 02:09:48,520
black and gray hair that looked to
be in her late fifties. The image,

1368
02:09:48,760 --> 02:09:52,880
while good quality, wasn't clear enough
to show a face in any real

1369
02:09:52,920 --> 02:09:58,319
detail, but a movement was stiff
and strange, as though she were aching

1370
02:09:58,399 --> 02:10:03,920
with every step on maybe had slipped
walked the entire way there. I looked

1371
02:10:03,920 --> 02:10:11,520
back over at Jake. Who is
that? He gave a small laugh.

1372
02:10:11,520 --> 02:10:15,720
I don't know a name. It
doesn't matter, but I know her.

1373
02:10:16,439 --> 02:10:20,840
She's the one I've been dreaming about
for months. My stomach began to curl

1374
02:10:20,880 --> 02:10:28,840
in on itself. Jake, have
you taken your meds today? He didn't

1375
02:10:28,880 --> 02:10:33,159
look at me, but I saw
his jaw clench and jump before he spoke.

1376
02:10:33,439 --> 02:10:37,159
I did. But it doesn't make
a difference. I'm not crazy,

1377
02:10:37,399 --> 02:10:43,199
I never was. Just shut up
and listen to me. He tapped the

1378
02:10:43,199 --> 02:10:46,760
screen where the woman had come to
a stop in the middle of the bridge.

1379
02:10:48,000 --> 02:10:50,000
This woman, I knew she was
going to come to the bridge because

1380
02:10:50,399 --> 02:10:54,520
I made her do it. I
spent half the afternoon picturing it until I

1381
02:10:54,600 --> 02:11:03,319
knew it had set in was raising
with what I should do next? Do

1382
02:11:03,399 --> 02:11:07,199
I call someone, try to get
him to go to the doctor. What

1383
02:11:07,279 --> 02:11:11,079
if he got weirder or even violent? Maybe I should just hear him out

1384
02:11:11,439 --> 02:11:18,199
and then go from there. I
don't really understand what you're talking about.

1385
02:11:18,840 --> 02:11:24,800
Still looking at the screen, he
let out a long breath. Yeah,

1386
02:11:24,279 --> 02:11:28,960
I know it sounds crazy. That's
why I want to show you. Give

1387
02:11:30,000 --> 02:11:35,279
me just the second I have to
concentrate. Jake let his arms hang down

1388
02:11:35,359 --> 02:11:41,039
by his sides as he stared intently
at the video feed. After over a

1389
02:11:41,079 --> 02:11:46,319
minute of awkward silence, he started
to raise his right hand, first to

1390
02:11:46,399 --> 02:11:50,960
his head, then above it,
stretched up and straight, like he wanted

1391
02:11:52,000 --> 02:11:56,159
to answer a question in class.
I was about to ask what he was

1392
02:11:56,199 --> 02:12:03,359
doing when I saw it. The
woman on the bridge was raising her hand

1393
02:12:03,399 --> 02:12:11,960
to heart pounding. I looked between
the video and Jake. He was raising

1394
02:12:11,960 --> 02:12:15,960
his other arm in the same way, and about three or four seconds behind,

1395
02:12:16,359 --> 02:12:20,680
the woman was doing the same thing. He turned to beam at me,

1396
02:12:20,640 --> 02:12:26,079
and to my horror, I saw
the woman turning to smile in our

1397
02:12:26,159 --> 02:12:31,720
direction as well. What the hell
is this some kind of internet trick?

1398
02:12:33,600 --> 02:12:39,279
He snorted, No trick, I'll
show you ask me to do something,

1399
02:12:39,720 --> 02:12:46,199
something simple. I don't have good
control yet. I started shaking my head.

1400
02:12:46,159 --> 02:12:50,279
Look, I don't know what this
is, but it's freaking me out.

1401
02:12:50,760 --> 02:12:54,439
Jake scowled at me. Don't be
a wass. Tell me to do

1402
02:12:54,520 --> 02:13:01,760
something, Simon says, taking his
stay back. I rolled my eyes in

1403
02:13:01,800 --> 02:13:09,680
irritation to hide my growing fear.
Fine, jump up and down, giggling.

1404
02:13:09,039 --> 02:13:13,279
He nodded and began jumping up and
down or keeping both arms up.

1405
02:13:15,680 --> 02:13:20,560
After a brief delay, the woman
started doing the same thing, and when

1406
02:13:20,560 --> 02:13:28,119
he stopped a few moments later,
so did she Okay, so how are

1407
02:13:28,159 --> 02:13:31,720
you doing it? No, I
can tell you still think it's fake.

1408
02:13:31,319 --> 02:13:37,119
Pick something else, something harder.
Look, I really don't want to.

1409
02:13:37,039 --> 02:13:45,039
His face darkened into a scowl.
Just do it, okay, gritting my

1410
02:13:45,119 --> 02:13:52,920
teeth, I nodded, Fine,
slap yourself in the face hard. I

1411
02:13:52,960 --> 02:13:56,399
thought this would call his bluff.
Either the video woman wouldn't have done that,

1412
02:13:58,359 --> 02:14:01,520
or if this was some elaborate hoax
where he paid some stranger to mimic

1413
02:14:01,600 --> 02:14:05,520
him through a hidden camera he brought
with him, or something she'd hesitate to

1414
02:14:05,600 --> 02:14:13,239
hurt herself one way or another,
it might stop whatever weird nonsense he was

1415
02:14:13,279 --> 02:14:18,960
trying to pull, But no,
he just smiled wider as he took a

1416
02:14:20,000 --> 02:14:24,800
step back and placed a hand on
the counter for support. Now that's more

1417
02:14:24,960 --> 02:14:31,439
like it. The first lap across
his face sounded loud as a gunshot in

1418
02:14:31,479 --> 02:14:35,439
the small kitchen, and he let
out a gasp of pain as the right

1419
02:14:35,479 --> 02:14:41,159
side of his face immediately started to
redden I was so focused on him that

1420
02:14:41,239 --> 02:14:45,520
it took me a moment to realize
I was seeing her mimic him in my

1421
02:14:45,600 --> 02:14:54,239
peripheral vision, same spot, just
as hard. Jeez what. He hit

1422
02:14:54,359 --> 02:14:58,000
himself a second time, even harder. She did the same, and this

1423
02:14:58,199 --> 02:15:03,359
time they were both bleeding from the
nose when they straightened back up. Stop,

1424
02:15:03,520 --> 02:15:09,560
just stop. He gave a soft
laugh, and then struck himself a

1425
02:15:09,600 --> 02:15:13,920
third time, hard enough that he
seemed unsteady on his feet. When I

1426
02:15:13,920 --> 02:15:18,800
looked at the woman, she was
holding onto the bridge railing like it was

1427
02:15:18,840 --> 02:15:22,239
the only thing keeping her upright,
I turned back to Jake and grabbed his

1428
02:15:22,359 --> 02:15:30,279
arm. Stop that right now,
you're hurting yourself and her. When he

1429
02:15:30,319 --> 02:15:33,600
grinned at me this time, I
could see a film of blood on his

1430
02:15:33,680 --> 02:15:39,880
teeth, so you believe me now, shuddering, and I gave a nod.

1431
02:15:41,000 --> 02:15:46,359
I guess so, I mean,
yes, I do stop hitting her

1432
02:15:46,640 --> 02:15:56,359
and you, I just how And
then he told me I started having strange

1433
02:15:56,359 --> 02:16:01,560
streams a year ago. It was
like falling asleep as myself and waking up

1434
02:16:01,600 --> 02:16:05,479
as another person. I've had dreams
like that before, but not this long

1435
02:16:05,680 --> 02:16:11,359
and detailed and real. I could
move around for several hours sometimes and I

1436
02:16:11,399 --> 02:16:16,720
remembered all of it. I'd go
out into the city I figured out,

1437
02:16:16,720 --> 02:16:20,680
and it was Kuala Limpo, and
when I was there, I could read

1438
02:16:20,760 --> 02:16:26,159
and understand the language, even though
I don't know any of that stuff when

1439
02:16:26,199 --> 02:16:31,600
I'm awake. But the weirdest thing
was I was always the same person when

1440
02:16:31,600 --> 02:16:35,760
I was over there, this woman
on the bridge. It was like we

1441
02:16:35,760 --> 02:16:41,600
were swapping. Now, I'm not
crazy, And for a time I just

1442
02:16:41,680 --> 02:16:46,639
assumed it was some kind of like
lucid dreaming or something. I was dreaming

1443
02:16:46,760 --> 02:16:52,000
versions of the same dream and just
fooling myself into thinking it was real.

1444
02:16:52,319 --> 02:16:58,440
This went on for months, and
then one day I dozed off in algebra

1445
02:16:58,479 --> 02:17:03,680
class. I really don't remember what
happened, because I wasn't there. I

1446
02:17:03,680 --> 02:17:07,959
don't know if this woman is normally
asleep in my mind when I'm awake in

1447
02:17:07,000 --> 02:17:13,440
hers, but this time she's sure
the hell knews something was going on and

1448
02:17:13,559 --> 02:17:16,840
freaked out. Thanks to her,
I wound up in the looney bin,

1449
02:17:18,680 --> 02:17:22,239
and now I have everyone looking at
me like I'm Jeffrey Dahmer, even you.

1450
02:17:24,920 --> 02:17:28,280
Nah, don't deny it. It's
okay, I don't blame you,

1451
02:17:28,159 --> 02:17:33,600
but I hate it too. So
I decided I needed to figure out what

1452
02:17:33,760 --> 02:17:39,239
this was and try to either get
rid of it or control it. I

1453
02:17:39,280 --> 02:17:43,559
started trying different things in the hospital, reading books on meditation and self hypnosis,

1454
02:17:45,040 --> 02:17:50,600
even astral projection. Most of it
is hippy nonsense, but I got

1455
02:17:50,600 --> 02:17:54,520
a few ideas that helped me to
focus. I started feeling like I could

1456
02:17:54,559 --> 02:18:00,520
feel her a little even when I
was awake, and over time I started

1457
02:18:00,559 --> 02:18:05,680
thinking I could maybe make her do
something if I could concentrate on it hard

1458
02:18:05,799 --> 02:18:11,440
enough. The first few tries,
well, it's hard to say. It's

1459
02:18:11,440 --> 02:18:15,399
not just in your imagination, right, I mean, how the hell am

1460
02:18:15,479 --> 02:18:18,040
I going to know if some lady
in Malaysia picks up a pencil because I

1461
02:18:18,079 --> 02:18:22,879
wanted her to. One night when
I was inside her In my dream.

1462
02:18:24,719 --> 02:18:28,760
I went walking through the city.
It was early afternoon there, and I

1463
02:18:28,799 --> 02:18:35,479
remember walking for miles until I got
to this freeway and this bridge, and

1464
02:18:35,520 --> 02:18:39,200
it was then that I saw the
camera up above. I asked the teenager

1465
02:18:39,280 --> 02:18:43,399
that was passing what kind of camera
that was, and that's when he said

1466
02:18:43,399 --> 02:18:52,440
the magic words. It's a streaming
webcam. He gestured at the woman on

1467
02:18:52,479 --> 02:18:58,000
the bridge again as she started to
wander off. I've been practicing this for

1468
02:18:58,079 --> 02:19:03,000
weeks now. It's only the third
time I've gotten her to the bridge,

1469
02:19:03,159 --> 02:19:07,559
But once she's there, I can
see that it works. And when I'm

1470
02:19:07,600 --> 02:19:13,079
done, I just kind of let
go and she wanders on back home.

1471
02:19:15,040 --> 02:19:20,399
I just stared at him. Jeez, man, that's a person, even

1472
02:19:20,440 --> 02:19:24,120
if this works, like you're saying, that's messed up to just take someone

1473
02:19:24,200 --> 02:19:31,120
over and hurt them and stuff.
Jake grimaced at me. First off,

1474
02:19:31,280 --> 02:19:35,000
saving moral judgments. You're the one
that said slap in the face, not

1475
02:19:35,159 --> 02:19:39,159
me. I've never heard her before. Oh really, what the hell do

1476
02:19:39,239 --> 02:19:43,879
you think she thinks when she wakes
up halfway across the city and doesn't know

1477
02:19:43,920 --> 02:19:48,760
how she got there. He looked
uncomfortable at that, but gave a shrug.

1478
02:19:50,760 --> 02:19:54,520
I don't know, and yeah,
I have thought about that, but

1479
02:19:54,600 --> 02:19:56,920
I don't know her, and I
don't know that she's not responsible for this

1480
02:19:58,000 --> 02:20:01,200
in the first place. Whatever it
is. What I do know is that

1481
02:20:01,239 --> 02:20:05,399
I'm not having people think I'm a
nutter butter for the rest of my life.

1482
02:20:05,120 --> 02:20:07,799
And if I don't know how to
turn it off, I'm going to

1483
02:20:07,799 --> 02:20:13,319
figure out how to prove to people
that it's real. I let out a

1484
02:20:13,360 --> 02:20:18,200
sigh. Damn, I get that. Not that I think you're crazy,

1485
02:20:18,680 --> 02:20:22,479
not really. I just thought you
had like a breakdown or something, you

1486
02:20:22,520 --> 02:20:28,639
know, But this, I don't
know that it's even safe to tell people

1487
02:20:28,719 --> 02:20:35,920
about it. He founded that,
what do you mean, Well, even

1488
02:20:35,959 --> 02:20:39,280
if you get people to believe you, does that really help you. How

1489
02:20:39,360 --> 02:20:43,280
do you know somebody won't just snatch
you up to experiment on you or something.

1490
02:20:46,639 --> 02:20:52,040
Shake's eyes widened. I hadn't really
thought of that. I nodded,

1491
02:20:54,000 --> 02:20:56,200
Yeah, I mean, it sounds
like a movie. But what part of

1492
02:20:56,200 --> 02:21:03,079
this doesn't sound like some horror movie
sci fi non sense? I reached out

1493
02:21:03,120 --> 02:21:09,040
and gripped his shoulder. Maybe just
leave it alone. I know you want

1494
02:21:09,079 --> 02:21:13,040
to like vindicate yourself or whatever,
but I know it now, and in

1495
02:21:13,120 --> 02:21:20,319
time other people will forget and treat
you normal. When he started to shake

1496
02:21:20,360 --> 02:21:24,920
his head, I gripped his shoulder
harder. And if they don't, screw

1497
02:21:24,959 --> 02:21:30,120
them. But you don't know what
this is you're messing with, and you're

1498
02:21:30,120 --> 02:21:33,440
messing with the stranger who either doesn't
deserve it or is maybe causing it.

1499
02:21:35,159 --> 02:21:41,040
Just close the door and see if
it goes away over time. Tears in

1500
02:21:41,079 --> 02:21:46,040
his eyes, he began to nod
as he leaned forward and gave me a

1501
02:21:46,159 --> 02:21:52,479
quick hug. Thanks, man,
you're probably right. When we parted,

1502
02:21:52,879 --> 02:21:56,799
I kept the smile on my face, despite the dark thoughts churning in my

1503
02:21:56,879 --> 02:22:03,280
head where the Jake I knew woud
never hurt someone else, even to prove

1504
02:22:03,319 --> 02:22:07,920
the point he was trying to make, and that when I looked over his

1505
02:22:07,000 --> 02:22:13,200
shoulder at the webcam feed, the
last time the woman had stopped wandering away.

1506
02:22:13,479 --> 02:22:20,239
She was standing further down the bridge, looking at the camera, staring

1507
02:22:20,440 --> 02:22:30,000
right at me. Two more weeks
went by, and while I didn't see

1508
02:22:30,079 --> 02:22:35,319
Jake, we taxted most days and
he seemed to be doing better. Said

1509
02:22:35,360 --> 02:22:39,479
the dreams were still there, but
he could usually get out of them after

1510
02:22:39,600 --> 02:22:43,840
just an hour or two. We
made plans to go hiking next weekend.

1511
02:22:45,120 --> 02:22:48,639
But then two nights ago, he
was banging my door in the middle of

1512
02:22:48,680 --> 02:22:54,639
the night. When I opened up, he came rushing in, covered in

1513
02:22:54,719 --> 02:23:01,159
sweat and clearly terrified someone's after me. Man I shut and locked the door

1514
02:23:01,159 --> 02:23:05,959
behind him, before turning to follow
him into the living room. What are

1515
02:23:05,959 --> 02:23:13,879
you talking about? Who's following you? He shrugged. I don't know for

1516
02:23:13,000 --> 02:23:18,079
sure. I haven't seen them good
enough. But it's the same red car

1517
02:23:18,159 --> 02:23:22,319
for the last two days, with
heavy tint on the windows. Well,

1518
02:23:22,719 --> 02:23:26,840
why don't you call the cops,
Jake shook his head. They'd find out

1519
02:23:26,920 --> 02:23:31,719
I just got locked up and think
I'm being paranoid. You're the only one

1520
02:23:31,719 --> 02:23:37,319
who knows I'm not crazy. I
nodded, okay, Well, did they

1521
02:23:37,399 --> 02:23:41,200
follow you here? I think so. I tried to lose them, but

1522
02:23:41,639 --> 02:23:48,440
I don't know if I did.
Moving past him, I went to the

1523
02:23:48,479 --> 02:23:52,920
sliding doors leading out to the balcony, opening them, I stepped out and

1524
02:23:54,000 --> 02:23:58,399
looked down into the Orange Liate parking
lot below. My heart sank as I

1525
02:23:58,440 --> 02:24:03,079
saw a red car parked next to
my own, its windows too dark to

1526
02:24:03,120 --> 02:24:11,200
see inside. Damn, Oh,
damn, damn. I looked over at

1527
02:24:11,280 --> 02:24:16,319
him, even as his face grew
tight with fear. Oh God, HiT's

1528
02:24:16,399 --> 02:24:24,760
her, She's here. He was
right. I'd been focused on the car

1529
02:24:24,799 --> 02:24:30,440
at first, but directly underneath us
was a short, older woman with black

1530
02:24:30,479 --> 02:24:35,159
and gray hair that well. I'd
never seen her clearly, but I'd seen

1531
02:24:35,280 --> 02:24:41,239
enough to know this looked like her. What was she doing all the way

1532
02:24:41,239 --> 02:24:45,680
over? She found me? I
need to go. I don't know what

1533
02:24:45,760 --> 02:24:50,280
she can do, what she's capable
of. It's not safe too, his

1534
02:24:50,479 --> 02:24:54,799
legs kicking and his chest shuddering.
I leaned over to help, but quickly

1535
02:24:54,840 --> 02:25:00,559
realized I didn't know what to do. My first thought was the corn nine

1536
02:25:00,639 --> 02:25:05,040
one one, but then I realized
how stupid I was being. This was

1537
02:25:05,079 --> 02:25:09,440
all her fault, wasn't it.
It was an a coincidence that she came

1538
02:25:09,600 --> 02:25:13,440
all this way and then he started
having a seizure or whatever. This was.

1539
02:25:15,719 --> 02:25:18,639
Anger burning in my chest. I
stood up, ready to shout down

1540
02:25:18,639 --> 02:25:22,559
at her for her to stop it, to get lost, and to leave

1541
02:25:22,600 --> 02:25:26,840
him alone, but the words died
in my throat as I saw her down

1542
02:25:26,840 --> 02:25:33,799
there, staring up at me.
Tears streaming down her cheeks. She looked

1543
02:25:33,840 --> 02:25:39,559
tight with tension as she murmured out
just a handful of words. No,

1544
02:25:39,639 --> 02:25:48,120
please, don't, I'm sorry.
Then I saw the flash of a box

1545
02:25:48,200 --> 02:25:54,719
cutter as she raised it to her
throat and slashed it wet and wide.

1546
02:25:56,799 --> 02:26:01,399
Even as she was falling over,
I saw Jake sat up and turning to

1547
02:26:01,440 --> 02:26:07,079
look at me, his face split
into a smile. Thanks for having me

1548
02:26:07,159 --> 02:26:13,360
over. I think I'm okay now. I reached out to help him mop,

1549
02:26:15,719 --> 02:26:22,120
but when he met my eyes,
I recoiled. I'm sure, I

1550
02:26:22,159 --> 02:26:31,719
am. We need to call the
police. She she's dead. He nodded

1551
02:26:31,920 --> 02:26:35,000
as he rose to his feet.
Yeah, sure, we can call the

1552
02:26:35,040 --> 02:26:41,799
authorities. They should be made aware. Another glanced my way. Are you

1553
02:26:41,920 --> 02:26:48,840
okay too? I nodded and moved
quickly off the balcony to get my phone,

1554
02:26:50,159 --> 02:26:52,600
Grabbing it up, I stepped out
of the apartment to make the call

1555
02:26:54,120 --> 02:26:58,840
and waited in the breezeway until they
arrived. Jake came out when the ambulance

1556
02:27:00,079 --> 02:27:05,200
police pulled up, and after we
both told them several times that a strange

1557
02:27:05,239 --> 02:27:09,000
woman we didn't know had hurt herself
outside, they eventually left again with a

1558
02:27:09,079 --> 02:27:15,879
body. I guess I should be
getting home too. He smiled at me.

1559
02:27:16,920 --> 02:27:22,239
Thanks again for your help. He
sounded like I helped him with his

1560
02:27:22,280 --> 02:27:28,959
car or something. See you again
soon. I forced myself to meet her

1561
02:27:28,959 --> 02:27:33,920
eyes for a moment. No,
no, I don't think you will.

1562
02:27:35,120 --> 02:27:41,440
I think it's better for both of
us if you don't. A smile widened

1563
02:27:41,440 --> 02:27:50,239
then No, perhaps not. Still
my thanks, have a good night.

1564
02:27:52,120 --> 02:27:56,879
I shut the door then and bolted
it, and even after I watched Jake's

1565
02:27:56,920 --> 02:28:01,559
car drive away, I couldn't go
to sleep. I didn't go outside again

1566
02:28:01,760 --> 02:28:09,360
until today. But then I didn't
have a choice. I was the only

1567
02:28:09,399 --> 02:28:15,879
one there, a shabby funeral for
an unknown foreigner that had inexplicably flown halfway

1568
02:28:15,920 --> 02:28:20,120
around the world to die in front
of a couple of strangers. Even the

1569
02:28:20,159 --> 02:28:26,600
government paid chaplain that did the eulogy
could only speak in vague platitudes about the

1570
02:28:26,639 --> 02:28:31,559
mysterious life and things unseen. He
came over after to offer his condolences,

1571
02:28:33,040 --> 02:28:37,840
and after an awkward pause, he
asked me how I knew the departed,

1572
02:28:39,440 --> 02:28:46,040
tears in my eyes. I lugged
up and told him he was my best

1573
02:28:46,079 --> 02:29:01,719
friend. It began with a black
bag over my head. Six or seven

1574
02:29:01,760 --> 02:29:05,520
men seizing me off the street on
my way home from work, Holding me

1575
02:29:05,559 --> 02:29:09,479
at gunpoint in the back of a
van. They explained in detail what would

1576
02:29:09,520 --> 02:29:15,239
happen to my family if I didn't
listen to them. Until that moment,

1577
02:29:15,639 --> 02:29:20,159
torture was just a word. I'd
never given it much thought. I wasn't

1578
02:29:20,200 --> 02:29:24,760
prepared to hear some of the things
they told me. By the time they

1579
02:29:24,760 --> 02:29:30,360
were loading me onto a helicopter,
I would have done anything they asked.

1580
02:29:31,479 --> 02:29:35,120
I arrived at the Black site,
kicked out of the chopper, where my

1581
02:29:35,200 --> 02:29:41,040
feet hit the hard packed, wet
mud with a splash. Black hood torn

1582
02:29:41,079 --> 02:29:45,360
off so hard it hurt the skin
on the tip of my nose, and

1583
02:29:45,440 --> 02:29:52,360
then I got my first look at
the place. Can't say if it met

1584
02:29:52,360 --> 02:29:56,879
my expectations or not. I didn't
have any idea where I was going or

1585
02:29:56,920 --> 02:30:03,040
what it was supposed to look like
when I got the Still it managed to

1586
02:30:03,120 --> 02:30:09,399
leave me feeling surprised. An abandoned
village nestled in the jungle, mostly one

1587
02:30:09,479 --> 02:30:16,520
room hovels, lots of corrugated iron. Here and there lay burned allotments,

1588
02:30:16,440 --> 02:30:22,799
dyeing pepper plants left untended, their
fruits stamped into the earth by the passage

1589
02:30:22,840 --> 02:30:28,879
of soldiers dressed in all black,
Rotten fences and troughs to feed long dead

1590
02:30:28,959 --> 02:30:35,479
pigs and goats lay smashed to pieces, and then lurking on a hill like

1591
02:30:35,559 --> 02:30:41,040
some architectural jump scare was a three
story hospital made of glass and steel,

1592
02:30:41,239 --> 02:30:46,719
stated the art, built in a
place where tarmac was just a rumor.

1593
02:30:48,239 --> 02:30:52,280
Officially, it had been put there
by a charitable nonprofit wanting to research novel

1594
02:30:52,319 --> 02:30:58,840
diseases and potential cures deep in the
jungle. Unofficially, it had always belonged

1595
02:30:58,840 --> 02:31:03,799
to the CIA, a useful place
to test strange things with pots in the

1596
02:31:03,879 --> 02:31:11,639
name, and when the time came, a useful place to dissect the impossible.

1597
02:31:15,239 --> 02:31:18,959
Imagine my surprise when I was escorted
by armed men to an office with

1598
02:31:20,000 --> 02:31:24,120
my name on the door and discovered
that I was to be in charge of

1599
02:31:24,159 --> 02:31:30,920
its latest major project, head of
Research. Printed on the glass, real

1600
02:31:31,079 --> 02:31:37,479
official looking big black letters like I'd
always worked there. First thing, I

1601
02:31:37,559 --> 02:31:41,959
thought, how long do they intend
to keep me here? But that didn't

1602
02:31:43,000 --> 02:31:48,799
last long. The hospital became my
home and has been ever since. Less

1603
02:31:48,799 --> 02:31:52,879
than twenty four hours after my arrival
and I hid my feet up on the

1604
02:31:52,920 --> 02:31:58,360
desk, barking orders at lab technicians. I slipped into the role easier than

1605
02:31:58,399 --> 02:32:03,840
I'd like to add. You see, where they got me was on scientific

1606
02:32:03,920 --> 02:32:09,639
curiosity. That's how they ensured I
was on board with the project. That's

1607
02:32:09,680 --> 02:32:15,120
why they never pointed a gun at
me after day one. They didn't have

1608
02:32:15,200 --> 02:32:22,200
to. The second I saw that
thing inside the Messiah's chest cavity, I

1609
02:32:22,319 --> 02:32:28,120
was a willing asset. No more
me, only the project, the discovery,

1610
02:32:28,159 --> 02:32:33,959
and the revelations. Lying on that
slab nestled in the flesh of an

1611
02:32:35,040 --> 02:32:41,600
otherwise normal looking man was a white
hot piece of divinity, a pinprick in

1612
02:32:41,639 --> 02:32:46,280
the fabric of reality. I don't
know how else to describe it. It

1613
02:32:46,360 --> 02:32:52,200
was like I'd spend my whole life
seeing two dimensional shadows, and then I

1614
02:32:52,280 --> 02:32:58,799
suddenly got a glimpse of the three
dimensional shapes casting them. I haven't seen

1615
02:32:58,840 --> 02:33:03,360
my children since they took me.
Couldn't tell you their names. I was

1616
02:33:03,399 --> 02:33:09,319
never the same after the first autopsy. No one in that place was sane.

1617
02:33:09,479 --> 02:33:15,239
After the scalpel first bit into his
flesh, Attrition amongst the research staff

1618
02:33:15,440 --> 02:33:22,079
was incredibly high. Every day,
another nurse seized by stigmata, or a

1619
02:33:22,159 --> 02:33:28,520
once faithless lab technician struck by the
call to write the Third Testament. The

1620
02:33:28,559 --> 02:33:33,280
guards dealt with the unwilling members of
the team, Traumatized scientists and clinicians lined

1621
02:33:33,360 --> 02:33:39,559
up one by one against an exposed
brick wall in the jungle heat and shot.

1622
02:33:41,680 --> 02:33:48,079
I remember smoking in the cafeteria in
between surgeries, nervously shaking as I

1623
02:33:48,200 --> 02:33:52,959
tried to ignore the pop pop pop
of some of my more stubborn colleagues being

1624
02:33:54,040 --> 02:34:00,239
executed. And then back to work, where I suppressed the feeling that I

1625
02:34:00,319 --> 02:34:05,959
was the worst kind of traitor.
Next day there'd be new faces scrubbing up

1626
02:34:05,159 --> 02:34:09,600
and asking for orders, another pair
of hands shipped in from God knows where.

1627
02:34:11,920 --> 02:34:20,319
Back to cataloging divinity. At times
I imagine joining the objectors, the

1628
02:34:20,360 --> 02:34:24,200
people who found religion in a sterile, black ops lab. But that thing

1629
02:34:24,360 --> 02:34:31,559
we pulled out of him, that
baffling enigma that burned my eyes and consumed

1630
02:34:31,559 --> 02:34:37,000
the project. Everything we learned about
it felt like a quantum leap in our

1631
02:34:37,079 --> 02:34:43,479
understanding of microbiology. We tested everything
we could get our hands on, plants,

1632
02:34:43,760 --> 02:34:48,079
animals, humans. I tried not
to look any of them in the

1633
02:34:48,120 --> 02:34:52,600
eye, quiet people taken from some
quiet part of the earth where they wouldn't

1634
02:34:52,600 --> 02:35:00,920
be missed, all of them scared, did they know, I mean really

1635
02:35:01,000 --> 02:35:07,239
no, the suffering they were in
for definitely not. They expected to be

1636
02:35:07,319 --> 02:35:09,920
shot, I imagine, not to
wake up with the roof of their mouth

1637
02:35:11,000 --> 02:35:16,639
fined with eyeballs. I'm ashamed to
say, but those kinds of results invigorated

1638
02:35:16,680 --> 02:35:24,280
me, excited me even when it
all fell apart and I missed the evacuation.

1639
02:35:24,120 --> 02:35:30,440
I got to finally rifle through all
those classified documents where I discovered I

1640
02:35:30,479 --> 02:35:35,040
hadn't been selected because I was some
genius of microbiology, but rather because my

1641
02:35:35,159 --> 02:35:41,879
psychological profile made it clear I'd do
anything if you dangled a big enough mystery

1642
02:35:43,040 --> 02:35:48,799
in front of me. That and
the fact that I was actually quite good

1643
02:35:48,840 --> 02:35:54,920
at managing projects. Geniuses usually aren't
grad at sending out memos or keeping track

1644
02:35:54,959 --> 02:36:03,799
of performance numbers. Thankfully, I'm
no genius who was humbling at times working

1645
02:36:03,959 --> 02:36:07,479
with some of the guys down below, being senior to them, even I

1646
02:36:07,520 --> 02:36:13,239
mean, doctor Coates was probably the
smartest man I'd ever met, no real

1647
02:36:13,280 --> 02:36:18,200
academic career. Because he had a
habit of hyper fixating on things that either

1648
02:36:18,239 --> 02:36:24,440
couldn't be solved or which no one
gave a damn about. But it was

1649
02:36:24,520 --> 02:36:28,479
pretty clear this was a guy who
could have turned his brain to just about

1650
02:36:28,520 --> 02:36:33,719
anything and made a name for himself
if he was just a little more on

1651
02:36:33,760 --> 02:36:41,479
the ball. He was a NodD
and basically gave lectures. Barefoot would respond

1652
02:36:41,479 --> 02:36:46,760
to last minute marking deadlines by giving
every student to be through a stabler at

1653
02:36:46,760 --> 02:36:52,479
the head of his department. That
kind of thing. Intelligent, but not

1654
02:36:52,680 --> 02:37:01,239
particularly sensible. The project broke him, broke his worldview, broke his mind,

1655
02:37:01,280 --> 02:37:07,600
and, towards the end, even
his body. You might think the

1656
02:37:07,680 --> 02:37:13,280
problem was asking a hyper rational man
to process the divine, but if anything,

1657
02:37:13,799 --> 02:37:20,920
he processed it a little too well. He was the first person to

1658
02:37:20,000 --> 02:37:26,680
read the Third Testament without going insane
immediately insane, i should say, or

1659
02:37:26,680 --> 02:37:33,200
maybe he was always nuts to begin
with. Either way, he managed to

1660
02:37:33,239 --> 02:37:37,760
take all the random scribbles and bits
of verse that we'd collected from the personal

1661
02:37:37,760 --> 02:37:43,040
effects of the deceased and actually put
it together into a single document. Then

1662
02:37:43,239 --> 02:37:50,239
he read it and came out looking
like nothing special had happened. The next

1663
02:37:50,280 --> 02:37:58,120
guy after him not so lucky,
but doctor Coates he carried on working for

1664
02:37:58,200 --> 02:38:03,040
a few days after that, took
measurements of this, made records of that

1665
02:38:03,479 --> 02:38:09,360
slipped into the background, out of
my notice while I focused on trying to

1666
02:38:09,399 --> 02:38:13,879
figure out some way of getting the
Third Testament scanned into a computer without it

1667
02:38:15,000 --> 02:38:20,959
causing havoc a lot like the people
who read it, machines liked to give

1668
02:38:20,959 --> 02:38:26,000
out halfway through reading the Third Testament. Not Coats, though he seemed just

1669
02:38:26,120 --> 02:38:33,399
fine. I should have known better. The first clue that something wasn't quite

1670
02:38:33,440 --> 02:38:39,639
right was when I went to his
office, a cramped space with metal walls

1671
02:38:39,639 --> 02:38:46,239
and floors, no windows given it
was below ground, and a countertop full

1672
02:38:46,280 --> 02:38:50,600
of equipment. It was always a
mess in there, and usually a bit

1673
02:38:50,680 --> 02:38:58,120
smelly too, but it was usually
just that unwashed scientist smell. But one

1674
02:38:58,200 --> 02:39:01,360
day when I went to call on
him, he opened the door and I

1675
02:39:01,399 --> 02:39:07,719
got the whiff of something that was
just wrong. Smelled a little like death,

1676
02:39:09,719 --> 02:39:18,399
only not quite just different, moldy
almost. Course, he was entitled

1677
02:39:18,399 --> 02:39:22,600
to do some experimentations on his own
time, and that's what I figured it

1678
02:39:22,719 --> 02:39:28,479
was. At the time I wrote
it off, had other things on my

1679
02:39:28,600 --> 02:39:35,639
mind. Only the smell got worse
with time. Turned up day after day,

1680
02:39:37,319 --> 02:39:41,159
and each time it stung my nose
a little more, hung around my

1681
02:39:41,200 --> 02:39:46,079
sinuses a little longer, and coats. He looked a little worse for wear

1682
02:39:46,280 --> 02:39:54,319
each time too. Again, nothing
serious, the kind of thing that's actually

1683
02:39:54,399 --> 02:39:58,319
quite normal for a man like him. I'm used to seeing scientists fixate on

1684
02:39:58,399 --> 02:40:03,959
a problem, something quiet they won't
share with anyone else until they know for

1685
02:40:05,079 --> 02:40:09,680
sure what they've got. That's what
he was like, and I figured when

1686
02:40:09,680 --> 02:40:15,200
he was ready, he'd either show
me something that would blow my socks off,

1687
02:40:16,079 --> 02:40:20,079
or it'll be something stupid, like
a gourdiss microwave to evenly heat up

1688
02:40:20,120 --> 02:40:26,200
his lunch by taking it apart and
rewiring its inside. Sometimes I wonder,

1689
02:40:26,280 --> 02:40:31,600
if I caught it earlier, could
I have done something about it. Someone

1690
02:40:31,680 --> 02:40:35,479
smarter might have picked up the odd
chemical mixtures on his shelf, or recognized

1691
02:40:35,520 --> 02:40:43,719
the peculiar smells. Not me,
though, all I can say in hindsight

1692
02:40:43,600 --> 02:40:50,520
is thank god my office was above
ground. By the time his little project

1693
02:40:50,520 --> 02:40:54,920
had finished working its way through the
floor he was on, he'd killed thirty

1694
02:40:54,959 --> 02:41:00,319
six people with his homemade nerve gas. Thankfully, the facility was prepared for

1695
02:41:00,319 --> 02:41:05,280
that kind of attack, and the
automated security systems had the entire level locked

1696
02:41:05,319 --> 02:41:09,680
down very quickly, so that the
damage wasn't that bad. Could have been

1697
02:41:09,799 --> 02:41:16,520
a lot worse. But what was
weird was the venting system wasn't working.

1698
02:41:16,520 --> 02:41:22,200
Should have cleared it out and under
a day, but four hours later and

1699
02:41:22,239 --> 02:41:26,559
the gas levels were the same.
The investigation, at least at first,

1700
02:41:28,120 --> 02:41:33,520
had to happen remotely. CCTV from
his lab was spotty. Something was corroding

1701
02:41:33,559 --> 02:41:39,600
the cameras, but based on some
of his material requests, we guessed he'd

1702
02:41:39,639 --> 02:41:48,319
been culturing some unusual fungus to create
the bioweapon. Whatever it was, it

1703
02:41:48,479 --> 02:41:56,040
was potent, and we were helpless
to do anything about it. We had

1704
02:41:56,040 --> 02:42:01,000
to wait and hope to God whatever
awful thing he'd concocted would wear out on

1705
02:42:01,079 --> 02:42:05,479
its own. What little the CCTV
could capture made for a grueling sight.

1706
02:42:07,120 --> 02:42:13,399
Eight scientists dead at their desks,
slumped over, blood pouring out of their

1707
02:42:13,399 --> 02:42:18,959
mouths. The fluid looked black on
the grainy black and white monitor. But

1708
02:42:18,040 --> 02:42:24,280
what upset me more were the assistants, dozens of young men and women who

1709
02:42:24,280 --> 02:42:30,200
didn't really belong in that place.
Too much to live for and all of

1710
02:42:30,239 --> 02:42:33,520
them so scared of what was going
to happen to them, And they were

1711
02:42:33,559 --> 02:42:39,319
just lying there in the middle of
whatever it was they were doing in the

1712
02:42:39,399 --> 02:42:45,319
labs themselves, smashed beakers and machines
in disarray. In their rooms. Some

1713
02:42:45,360 --> 02:42:50,559
of them lay peacefully sleeping, others
held each other in secret, little trysts

1714
02:42:50,920 --> 02:42:56,000
they thought no one knew about.
All over the level, bodies lay in

1715
02:42:56,040 --> 02:43:03,719
the floor in strange positions, and
again the black fluid leaking from every orifice,

1716
02:43:03,959 --> 02:43:07,680
staining the floor, their faces and
their clothes, soaking their chests and

1717
02:43:07,719 --> 02:43:15,040
groins. I remember sitting there and
just watching them twitch and foam of their

1718
02:43:15,040 --> 02:43:20,479
mouths, waiting for death to finally
come. Even then the hours ticked on

1719
02:43:20,920 --> 02:43:26,760
as we waited for the systems to
purge the gas twelve twenty four forty eight,

1720
02:43:28,559 --> 02:43:35,159
nothing happened. It was like everything
in there was frozen in time.

1721
02:43:37,920 --> 02:43:43,239
And then somehow the lights on that
level went out. Emergency lighting came on,

1722
02:43:43,959 --> 02:43:50,479
bathing everything in red, but combined
with the low quality cameras, it

1723
02:43:50,680 --> 02:43:56,239
was like gazing at an old video
game, grainy, fuzzy, low resolution.

1724
02:43:56,600 --> 02:44:00,959
We figured that Coats must have rigged
up a remote timer on the electronics,

1725
02:44:01,479 --> 02:44:07,399
which wasn't a good guess since his
speciality was biochemistry and the security systems

1726
02:44:07,520 --> 02:44:13,879
were of the highest tier. But
what else could it be. Wasn't like

1727
02:44:13,959 --> 02:44:18,159
someone could have hit the circuit breaker. We knew eventually we'd have to go

1728
02:44:18,239 --> 02:44:24,159
in there sixty hours, have to
shut down. We just had to.

1729
02:44:24,559 --> 02:44:30,000
There was too much high value material
to leave behind. And there are reports

1730
02:44:30,000 --> 02:44:35,440
of strange noises down there. Guards
posted to the door heard faint sounds on

1731
02:44:35,479 --> 02:44:41,840
the other side, footsteps They reckoned. Course, I wrote that off.

1732
02:44:41,600 --> 02:44:48,280
Not a nonsense, I told myself
and them, And yet we still went

1733
02:44:48,360 --> 02:44:52,639
in armed, because well, if
Coates were smart enough to rig this whole

1734
02:44:52,719 --> 02:44:58,760
nightmare, who's to say he didn't
make a little gas mask to keep himself

1735
02:44:58,840 --> 02:45:03,760
safe. You'd think I'd be used
to working in hazmat suits, and I

1736
02:45:03,840 --> 02:45:11,399
sort of vam were going into that
seiled floor was something else. The visor

1737
02:45:11,440 --> 02:45:16,399
felt restrictive, the squeak of the
rubber suit was deafening, My breath was

1738
02:45:16,440 --> 02:45:20,280
too loud, and every time the
insuit radio came to life with one of

1739
02:45:20,319 --> 02:45:26,360
the soldier's barks, I damn near
jumped out of my skin. And then

1740
02:45:26,399 --> 02:45:33,840
the door actually opened. Nothing could
have prepared me for that. The air

1741
02:45:33,920 --> 02:45:39,479
was thick with mist, which lit
up harshly with the emergency lighting's red hue.

1742
02:45:39,719 --> 02:45:46,319
Old metal grates, vents, open
doorways, all of it either blood

1743
02:45:46,360 --> 02:45:52,680
red or completely dark. There are
far too many shadows for it to feel

1744
02:45:52,680 --> 02:45:58,280
safe. It didn't help some of
the bulbs with strobe lighting, rotating sirens

1745
02:45:58,280 --> 02:46:03,879
that lit the place up in periodic
flashes of crimson light. God. Even

1746
02:46:03,920 --> 02:46:09,079
the four soldiers next to me look
nervous. We passed more than a few

1747
02:46:09,120 --> 02:46:13,840
bodies on our way to Coats's lab. All of them lay where they'd been

1748
02:46:13,959 --> 02:46:20,479
on the CCTV, at least as
far as I could tell. Sounds stupid,

1749
02:46:20,520 --> 02:46:24,239
but I stared at a few of
them closely, just to make sure.

1750
02:46:24,479 --> 02:46:28,680
All those reports of footsteps had started
to worm their way into my brain.

1751
02:46:30,760 --> 02:46:35,360
Couldn't shake the idea we weren't alone
down there. When we finally opened

1752
02:46:35,360 --> 02:46:41,520
the door to Coats, what I
saw left me frozen to the spot.

1753
02:46:41,719 --> 02:46:46,760
The soldiers focused on the strange growth
after the corner of the room, which

1754
02:46:46,799 --> 02:46:52,959
registered to me only as a dim
sort of collection of thick fungal petals crawling

1755
02:46:52,040 --> 02:47:00,799
up the wall veins pulsing like capillaries
in the eye. But to me what

1756
02:47:01,079 --> 02:47:07,840
really hit home was the empty desk. Last time they had reliable footage of

1757
02:47:07,840 --> 02:47:11,959
that room, Coats had been lying
there dead as a dodo, blood leaking

1758
02:47:13,000 --> 02:47:18,120
from his still open eyes, pulling
on the desk and dripping onto the floor.

1759
02:47:18,200 --> 02:47:22,639
And that stain was still very much
there. There was even the faint

1760
02:47:22,680 --> 02:47:30,719
outline of where his head had been
laying, but the man himself was gone.

1761
02:47:33,239 --> 02:47:35,920
This, even more than the grotesque
thing that took up one wall,

1762
02:47:37,239 --> 02:47:41,639
terrified me. That quivering mass of
fungus was pomping out enough toxic gas to

1763
02:47:41,719 --> 02:47:48,920
kill half the base, but it
was stationary. At least in another circumstance,

1764
02:47:48,440 --> 02:47:54,120
I might have even found it fascinating. But Coats, he had clearly

1765
02:47:54,200 --> 02:47:58,959
gone off the deep end. Had
he lain perfectly still for days and end

1766
02:48:00,079 --> 02:48:05,399
to trick us, that didn't seem
right again, I thought the bodies we

1767
02:48:05,600 --> 02:48:11,120
passed the way, they looked so
still, but not lifeless, like a

1768
02:48:11,159 --> 02:48:16,719
porcelain doll. There was that slight
suggestion of something working behind the eyes.

1769
02:48:16,959 --> 02:48:22,120
What do we do with this?
One of the men asked, take samples,

1770
02:48:22,399 --> 02:48:26,520
burn the rest. I replied,
if gas levels don't go down.

1771
02:48:26,559 --> 02:48:30,159
In a week, we'll have to
purge the whole floor with phosphor us.

1772
02:48:31,040 --> 02:48:35,280
The whole time, I had my
eyes and the space around us under the

1773
02:48:35,360 --> 02:48:41,760
desk on top of the cupboards.
If Coats wasn't at his desk, where

1774
02:48:41,879 --> 02:48:46,440
was he? Where the hell did
this thing come from? The same soldier

1775
02:48:46,520 --> 02:48:50,280
muttered as he laid a series of
thermal charges on the fleshiest parts of the

1776
02:48:50,360 --> 02:48:56,239
mold. It seemed to flinch in
response to his touch, but otherwise benign.

1777
02:48:56,360 --> 02:49:01,520
Ah. He probably took some of
the subject's tissues. We know it

1778
02:49:01,559 --> 02:49:05,319
propagates unusual levels of growth in plants
and animal tissue. Explains why the cast

1779
02:49:05,399 --> 02:49:11,479
levels don't go down. What'sn't metabolizing? I gave the soldier an odd luck

1780
02:49:13,639 --> 02:49:18,399
what he said, you are the
only ones within education? Fair enough,

1781
02:49:18,719 --> 02:49:24,600
I replied, with a quick shake
of the head. It isn't metabolizing anything

1782
02:49:24,840 --> 02:49:31,200
except his tissue. It's a well, bluntly, I mean, I think

1783
02:49:31,239 --> 02:49:33,600
of the fish and the bread,
right. It's something we've known about his

1784
02:49:33,680 --> 02:49:39,520
tissue samples for a while now,
spontaneous creation of matter and energy out of

1785
02:49:39,559 --> 02:49:45,200
nothing. But to give Coat's credit, this is a pretty novel application.

1786
02:49:46,319 --> 02:49:54,719
He's created an infinite bioweapon. Why, I was about to reply, I

1787
02:49:54,719 --> 02:49:58,319
haven't. The slightest clue and a
loud bang draw attention to the doorway.

1788
02:50:00,479 --> 02:50:07,200
Outside lay a darkness broken only by
the strobing of a red light. Flashing

1789
02:50:07,399 --> 02:50:13,040
on and off. It revealed,
for just this single instant, the outline

1790
02:50:13,280 --> 02:50:18,760
of a man standing in the hallway. The soldiers swore nervously as they raised

1791
02:50:18,760 --> 02:50:24,920
the rifles. By the time the
light came back, the figure was gone.

1792
02:50:26,360 --> 02:50:30,159
Who the hell was that, one
barked, must be Coats. Another

1793
02:50:30,239 --> 02:50:33,959
replied, job's done, I cried
wad, gesturing to the charges les.

1794
02:50:35,040 --> 02:50:39,719
Get the hell out of There are
no miracles left for you. You have

1795
02:50:39,879 --> 02:50:46,879
made your own miracles. The words
were growled, so loud and deep they

1796
02:50:46,879 --> 02:50:54,000
seemed to vibrate my very bones.
The soldiers snapped to attention, but me,

1797
02:50:54,280 --> 02:50:58,760
I took a little longer to turn
back to the corner of the room.

1798
02:51:00,639 --> 02:51:05,079
I knew what I was going to
see, but God, I didn't

1799
02:51:05,120 --> 02:51:09,840
want to see it. There are
other gardens, but not for you.

1800
02:51:11,120 --> 02:51:16,879
Do not spoil the other readings.
Coats emerged from the thing in the wall,

1801
02:51:18,360 --> 02:51:24,479
pulling himself free with a wet squelch. He stood not naked, but

1802
02:51:24,600 --> 02:51:28,760
clearly naked. As his skin began
to absorb his clothes, he looked like

1803
02:51:28,799 --> 02:51:35,719
a burned victim coated in algae.
He loves you in spite of everything.

1804
02:51:37,079 --> 02:51:41,120
He loves you, and there is
a place in Heaven for you all.

1805
02:51:41,639 --> 02:51:50,760
But it is time to I can't
blame the soldier who pulled the trigger.

1806
02:51:50,959 --> 02:51:54,879
It wasn't just the fact that Coach
was speaking with a mouth that had grown

1807
02:51:54,920 --> 02:52:01,719
grotesquely across his abdomen, but rather
that the words were drilling straight into our

1808
02:52:01,760 --> 02:52:07,079
heads like some prushing off. It
made my eyes cross, my ears ache,

1809
02:52:07,239 --> 02:52:11,040
and my nose bleed. Two other
men had vomited, splatching the inside

1810
02:52:11,040 --> 02:52:18,959
of their visors with thick fluid.
They were the first to go. They

1811
02:52:18,000 --> 02:52:24,600
didn't see what hit them, and
I'm somewhat glad. Coats, angered by

1812
02:52:24,600 --> 02:52:30,920
the gunshot, moved with the elegance
of a dancer. I stumbled out into

1813
02:52:30,920 --> 02:52:35,040
the corridor as he tore them apart, his arms seemingly flowing right through their

1814
02:52:35,040 --> 02:52:41,680
biohazard suit. The remaining soldier,
the trigger happy one, was beside me

1815
02:52:41,719 --> 02:52:46,079
as I fled. It wasn't far
to the exit. I hoped would make

1816
02:52:46,120 --> 02:52:50,079
it the rest of the way without
incident, and in just a few short

1817
02:52:50,159 --> 02:52:54,120
hours I might be able to put
the few images I had of coats pulling

1818
02:52:54,200 --> 02:52:58,680
flesh and fabric apart like it was
tissue deep, into some recess of my

1819
02:52:58,719 --> 02:53:05,559
mind and just move on. But
it was only a few short steps into

1820
02:53:05,600 --> 02:53:11,000
the dark before the remaining soldier began
to fire blindly at the corridor behind us.

1821
02:53:11,920 --> 02:53:16,079
It was a mistake for him to
turn around in the fraction of a

1822
02:53:16,120 --> 02:53:20,280
second where his eyes had been turned
away, he missed one of the bodies

1823
02:53:20,360 --> 02:53:26,840
lying on the ground. I jumped, He didn't. I was dimly aware

1824
02:53:26,879 --> 02:53:31,040
of there being no one beside me, only when the gunshots grew fainter and

1825
02:53:31,079 --> 02:53:35,440
fainter. As I left him behind, one of the shots dinged off a

1826
02:53:35,479 --> 02:53:41,000
panel by my head, and to
this day I suspect it was not a

1827
02:53:41,079 --> 02:53:46,719
ricochet, but a deliberate attempt to
get revenge from me abandoning him. Still,

1828
02:53:48,440 --> 02:53:52,520
I didn't look back until I reached
the secure door. I thulmb the

1829
02:53:52,600 --> 02:53:58,719
keypad, frantically, terrified as my
ears registered the sound of approaching footsteps muffled

1830
02:53:58,719 --> 02:54:05,600
by the buy a hazard suit god. I couldn't stop myself. I looked.

1831
02:54:07,920 --> 02:54:11,440
I had nothing else to do except
wait for the security to clear me

1832
02:54:11,639 --> 02:54:15,200
and open the door, and there
was no guarantee they'd even do that.

1833
02:54:16,360 --> 02:54:20,399
I might be waiting forever, staring
at nothing as Coats came closer and closer.

1834
02:54:22,000 --> 02:54:30,360
Without even realizing what I was doing, I turned and saw the soldier

1835
02:54:30,399 --> 02:54:35,920
with a gun. Jeez. Coat's
office was out of sight, so I

1836
02:54:35,959 --> 02:54:39,479
had no idea if he repeated this
with the other two. With the man

1837
02:54:39,520 --> 02:54:46,440
I saw, he was in pieces
yellow and red in ragged strips, the

1838
02:54:46,600 --> 02:54:50,840
coat of the ceiling as much as
the floor, and barreling toward me on

1839
02:54:50,920 --> 02:54:56,200
all fours, legs and arms too
long for a normal man. Came Coats,

1840
02:54:58,120 --> 02:55:01,479
eyes wide, jawdie then did chunks
out of his head still missing,

1841
02:55:03,879 --> 02:55:09,879
but his mouth it silently spoke the
same few words, almost in time with

1842
02:55:09,920 --> 02:55:16,319
his loping gallop, over and over
and over. It would take days for

1843
02:55:16,399 --> 02:55:22,319
me to even realize what it was
he was saying. Thankfully, before he'd

1844
02:55:22,319 --> 02:55:26,959
managed to reach me, the doors
opened and a hail of gunfire filled the

1845
02:55:28,000 --> 02:55:33,680
corridor ahead. Coats, fast as
lightning, disappeared into some dark crevice,

1846
02:55:33,319 --> 02:55:39,520
and I was dragged to safety before
the worst might happen. As soon as

1847
02:55:39,559 --> 02:55:43,000
I was on the other side,
I told security to flood the place with

1848
02:55:43,040 --> 02:55:50,799
phosphorus, and everything was purged white, hot, fire and demand. By

1849
02:55:50,840 --> 02:55:56,280
the time it was over, only
metal remained, and even then a lot

1850
02:55:56,319 --> 02:56:01,639
of it had melted and cooled in
strange shapes on the floor. I also

1851
02:56:01,719 --> 02:56:05,760
went out of my way to kill
any attempts at reclaiming the lost workplace.

1852
02:56:07,159 --> 02:56:11,840
Higher ups were mad or that square
footage lost, but I said the risk

1853
02:56:11,879 --> 02:56:18,200
of contamination was too great. Of
course, I left out the part where

1854
02:56:18,239 --> 02:56:22,479
I returned one quiet night a few
days later and placed my ear against the

1855
02:56:22,559 --> 02:56:26,319
thick steel wall that I knew ran
close to one of the vents on that

1856
02:56:26,399 --> 02:56:35,440
level. It was faint, but
I heard Coates whispering. Only then did

1857
02:56:35,440 --> 02:56:39,600
I get the final clue to what
Coates had been saying as he came towards

1858
02:56:39,639 --> 02:56:46,479
me in the flashing red of that
darkened corridor. We love you, We

1859
02:56:46,559 --> 02:56:48,879
love you, We love you,
we love you, we love you.

1860
02:56:52,159 --> 02:56:56,440
Even now, the cameras showed that
level to be a sterile, hollow space.

1861
02:56:58,559 --> 02:57:03,239
But I cannot escape the feeling that
if I were to open it I

1862
02:57:03,239 --> 02:57:09,079
would see Coats come slithering out of
some long forgotten vent, perhaps worse for

1863
02:57:09,159 --> 02:57:15,799
wear given all the time that has
since passed. But Coats, nonetheless terrifying

1864
02:57:16,000 --> 02:57:20,680
and misshapen, were desperate to spread
the very Testament that twisted his mind and

1865
02:57:20,760 --> 02:57:26,600
body, that caused him to try
and breed something that might well have ended

1866
02:57:26,639 --> 02:57:31,920
the entire world. And the worst
thing of all, what he'd been saying

1867
02:57:31,959 --> 02:57:39,840
to me in that corridor. What
if it was true? What if he

1868
02:57:39,959 --> 02:57:50,559
hadn't done it out of hate but
love? And the time I assumed the

1869
02:57:50,639 --> 02:57:56,360
force we were dealing with was hostile, But what if it wasn't Everyone who

1870
02:57:56,399 --> 02:58:01,159
goes near the Third Testament kills themselves, And until Coates, I thought it

1871
02:58:01,360 --> 02:58:07,159
some kind of twisted revenge. But
what if that wasn't the case? What

1872
02:58:07,239 --> 02:58:13,360
if he wasn't doing it out of
spite or hostility? What would that mean

1873
02:58:13,440 --> 02:58:20,600
for me? Forgiveness? If so? That terrified me, because after everything

1874
02:58:20,600 --> 02:58:26,079
I'd been through, I doubted I'd
have the strength to resist that kind of

1875
02:58:26,079 --> 02:58:31,360
offer. For weeks, I lay
awake at night wondering just what the hell

1876
02:58:31,520 --> 02:58:35,559
might be in those words that could
compel people like Coats to do what they

1877
02:58:35,600 --> 02:58:43,799
did, and yet despite everything,
I still haven't read the Third Testament.

1878
02:58:46,479 --> 02:58:50,799
Coats was a genius, and he
still gave in. I know that I

1879
02:58:50,840 --> 02:58:54,639
did some pretty messed up stuff in
the name of scientific curiosity, but well,

1880
02:58:56,760 --> 02:59:01,120
I guess I'm not ashamed to say
I'm also a coward. I'm afraid

1881
02:59:01,159 --> 02:59:07,399
of dying. Curiosity can only get
you so far, and after seeing everything

1882
02:59:07,440 --> 02:59:11,719
that happened to the people who read
that thing, I couldn't bring myself to

1883
02:59:11,840 --> 02:59:18,319
risk it. Whatever the Third Testament
is, hearing it seems pretty bad for

1884
02:59:18,360 --> 02:59:24,680
your health. I don't think I
even deserve to be forgiven if that is

1885
02:59:24,760 --> 02:59:31,399
what he's offering. It was poetic
justice that out of all the people who

1886
02:59:31,440 --> 02:59:37,239
managed to make the evacuation, I
wasn't one of them. Leaving on foot

1887
02:59:37,399 --> 02:59:41,000
is hardly an option for me.
I mean, even if I had the

1888
02:59:41,040 --> 02:59:45,399
strength to hike through hundreds of miles
of rainforest, I need to reach the

1889
02:59:45,440 --> 02:59:50,440
outer fence first. And strange things
have fested in the chemical pits where they

1890
02:59:50,479 --> 02:59:54,760
disposed of the bodies, soft mounds
of ash and bone that sing from time

1891
02:59:54,799 --> 03:00:00,760
to time, exciting the birds in
the canopy to take off, make strange

1892
03:00:00,799 --> 03:00:05,840
patterns in the sky. If they
can sing, they must have mouths,

1893
03:00:05,920 --> 03:00:11,920
right, And if they have mouths, what else? I think about coats?

1894
03:00:13,440 --> 03:00:16,280
About what kind of hands would reach
out to drag me into those rotten

1895
03:00:16,319 --> 03:00:22,600
pits of long dead flesh and drown
me in filth? And I shudder.

1896
03:00:22,879 --> 03:00:28,799
I could try and sneak past,
but it really isn't safe outside the hospital.

1897
03:00:31,120 --> 03:00:33,879
It isn't safe inside, to be
fair, But what choice do I

1898
03:00:33,959 --> 03:00:39,239
have. At least there's still power, internet, food to last me over

1899
03:00:39,280 --> 03:00:45,879
a century, and security doors.
I keep everything below sub level one firmly

1900
03:00:45,959 --> 03:00:54,079
locked away. While out there well, I see things sometimes moving quickly between

1901
03:00:54,079 --> 03:01:00,719
the old buildings. The trees shake
and stir and wear. Jungle now grows

1902
03:01:00,760 --> 03:01:05,280
thick and heavy against one of the
glass walls of the hospital. The vines

1903
03:01:05,360 --> 03:01:11,840
twist and turn and spell out odd
messages. I shut my eyes firmly whenever

1904
03:01:11,959 --> 03:01:18,520
I have to pass them. And
yet even blind I can hear the tidening

1905
03:01:18,680 --> 03:01:26,680
fibrous coils as the clawing flora scratches
against the glass. They want me hungering

1906
03:01:28,079 --> 03:01:35,840
all those corpses we buried out there, rotting, breaking down, contaminated with

1907
03:01:35,000 --> 03:01:41,600
divinity. What strange waters flow through
the soil in this place. Nothing could

1908
03:01:41,600 --> 03:01:48,280
make me risk opening the doors and
try walking through that vegetation. He might

1909
03:01:48,319 --> 03:01:56,040
forgive, but I don't think my
former test subjects have. And as for

1910
03:01:56,120 --> 03:02:03,120
down below, you know, I
never met him while I was alive.

1911
03:02:05,079 --> 03:02:09,680
Don't know where they got him from, or even why. My bet he

1912
03:02:09,719 --> 03:02:16,200
ticked off the wrong people, got
shot and got back up. Maybe they

1913
03:02:16,239 --> 03:02:20,360
shot him again and he got up
again. Maybe they did it five times,

1914
03:02:20,680 --> 03:02:26,319
ten times. I don't know.
Somewhere along the lines, someone worked

1915
03:02:26,360 --> 03:02:31,680
out they had an anomaly on their
hands. Maybe I wasn't the first person

1916
03:02:31,879 --> 03:02:37,600
to even try cutting him open.
It's just weird. No one ever told

1917
03:02:37,680 --> 03:02:45,680
us who he was. We just
knew It'd be years before I wondered who

1918
03:02:45,760 --> 03:02:50,399
mothered him, loved him, raised
him. I often wonder if this was

1919
03:02:50,440 --> 03:02:54,440
the way it was meant to go, or was it just an accident that

1920
03:02:54,520 --> 03:03:01,479
he bumped into the wrong people at
the wrong time. Sire came and the

1921
03:03:01,520 --> 03:03:07,440
first thing we did was cut him
off. No wonder we failed. Things

1922
03:03:07,440 --> 03:03:13,479
in the projects started to go really
bad about six months after the first incision.

1923
03:03:13,600 --> 03:03:20,079
I turnover amongst researchers was one thing, but well, it turns out

1924
03:03:20,239 --> 03:03:26,079
a lot of the soldiers had religious
inclination. Wasn't just us dealing with visions

1925
03:03:26,079 --> 03:03:30,319
and voices. At some point they
worked out what they were part of.

1926
03:03:31,239 --> 03:03:37,920
The agency likes compartmentalization, but it
can only go so far. After the

1927
03:03:37,000 --> 03:03:41,639
religious element became clear to the guys
on the ground, things started to break

1928
03:03:41,680 --> 03:03:48,200
down. It was one thing to
control the scientists. The guards were armed.

1929
03:03:48,319 --> 03:03:56,040
When they broke, they broke hard. Most of his remains are stored

1930
03:03:56,079 --> 03:04:01,959
in the lowest level. Wrote It's
easiest to keep things cool outside. There's

1931
03:04:03,000 --> 03:04:09,079
this long corridor leading to the central
chamber, huge, wide enough to drive

1932
03:04:09,120 --> 03:04:13,079
four or five cards side by side. And that was where the first card

1933
03:04:13,159 --> 03:04:18,600
hanged himself. Simple enough, they
dragged him away and cleaned it up.

1934
03:04:20,799 --> 03:04:24,000
It wasn't long after coats. In
fact, it was one of the men

1935
03:04:24,000 --> 03:04:30,479
who saved me at the door.
Were pretty soon another two guys went down

1936
03:04:30,520 --> 03:04:35,200
there and hanged themselves, and then
five, and then eight, and then

1937
03:04:35,600 --> 03:04:39,799
top side. Some people started blowing
their brains out in their barracks in the

1938
03:04:39,840 --> 03:04:46,360
canteens, standing watch at the doors, looking out on the jungle. Cigarette

1939
03:04:46,399 --> 03:04:52,840
hanging loose on one lip seemed almost
random, except there was a clear pattern

1940
03:04:54,040 --> 03:05:00,559
of escalation when those guys started killing
their friends, that when it reached the

1941
03:05:00,600 --> 03:05:05,239
point where they couldn't ship new guys
in fast enough to replace losses. Once

1942
03:05:05,319 --> 03:05:11,280
that happened, orders started getting lost, jobs started being left and done.

1943
03:05:11,120 --> 03:05:16,000
One lab got written off because a
test subject's body was left to fester over

1944
03:05:16,040 --> 03:05:20,280
a weekend, and by the time
they got the door open there was flesh

1945
03:05:20,319 --> 03:05:24,799
growing up the walls, not enough
manpower to deal with it, so they

1946
03:05:24,920 --> 03:05:30,399
left it for another day and moved
on. Only they forgot to tell the

1947
03:05:30,479 --> 03:05:35,680
researcher who worked there, So come
Monday, he went in and had a

1948
03:05:35,719 --> 03:05:39,959
hell of a surprise. Must have
been like stepping into a wall of sour

1949
03:05:39,079 --> 03:05:45,799
dough. I can only hope he
suffocated and it was quick, but who

1950
03:05:45,840 --> 03:05:50,319
knows. Not like our stuff as
hard and fast rules. For all I

1951
03:05:50,360 --> 03:06:00,559
know, he's still in there screaming
for air. Meanwhile, that tunnel people

1952
03:06:00,639 --> 03:06:05,479
just kept going down there and hanging
themselves. I mean, every day I'd

1953
03:06:05,520 --> 03:06:09,079
wake up and I'd be down a
few researchers and a couple more guards would

1954
03:06:09,120 --> 03:06:13,719
be missing. Took a shockingly short
amount of time for most of the six

1955
03:06:13,760 --> 03:06:20,840
hundred people on site to just disappear. God knows when security stopped taking the

1956
03:06:20,879 --> 03:06:26,840
bodies down, just another job that
got lost in the grown panic. By

1957
03:06:26,920 --> 03:06:31,479
the time evacuation orders came, we
were down to a hundred people. I

1958
03:06:31,559 --> 03:06:39,680
esked themate that around four hundred ended
themselves in that tunnel. I've only visited

1959
03:06:39,760 --> 03:06:45,520
him once since the project shut down, only had the guts to go look

1960
03:06:45,559 --> 03:06:50,559
once, barely made it out alive. I felt compelled to try and face

1961
03:06:50,680 --> 03:06:56,639
up to him, acknowledged the role
I played. Only that meant actually getting

1962
03:06:56,680 --> 03:07:01,680
to the door at the end of
the tunnel, which was by this point

1963
03:07:01,440 --> 03:07:07,639
pitch black except for my torch,
and blocked almost entirely with hanging bodies,

1964
03:07:09,239 --> 03:07:13,840
so many pressed together, so close
that I had no hope of making my

1965
03:07:13,920 --> 03:07:20,799
way through without bumping into one.
Reminded me of the jungle, funnily enough,

1966
03:07:20,760 --> 03:07:26,079
of a thick, claustrophobic forest made
of dried skin and brittle ligaments,

1967
03:07:28,000 --> 03:07:35,360
different colors and shapes, and of
course different levels of decomp Some had lost

1968
03:07:35,399 --> 03:07:39,959
their noses, lips, and eyes. Others were a little bloated but still

1969
03:07:39,000 --> 03:07:46,600
recognizable. Not friends, really,
I don't think I actually made one solitary

1970
03:07:46,639 --> 03:07:54,799
friend on that project. But colleagues, people who were under my charge,

1971
03:07:56,440 --> 03:08:01,799
they looked sad. All of them
looked sad. They should have been buried

1972
03:08:01,799 --> 03:08:07,159
at home with their families, but
instead they were locked all the way in

1973
03:08:07,200 --> 03:08:11,479
the ass end of nowhere. Of
course, you can bet your ass the

1974
03:08:11,520 --> 03:08:18,280
agency will make sure no one ever
knows the truth. You know, I

1975
03:08:18,319 --> 03:08:24,799
still love contact with them. Anything
I post gets screened, arrogant assholes.

1976
03:08:24,879 --> 03:08:28,639
No that, no one's going to
take me seriously a record of this project

1977
03:08:28,799 --> 03:08:35,600
anywhere? All those people just ghosts
in a system too big for any one

1978
03:08:35,680 --> 03:08:39,879
person to keep track of it all. You know how many people go missing

1979
03:08:39,879 --> 03:08:43,879
in the United States in a year? What about Europe? Well, the

1980
03:08:43,959 --> 03:08:48,799
whole damn world. God, this
project was just a drop in the ocean.

1981
03:08:52,840 --> 03:08:56,399
I wanted to put it to bed
to see if I could get some

1982
03:08:56,479 --> 03:09:01,319
kind of answer from him. It
was that idea, trying to get some

1983
03:09:01,440 --> 03:09:05,159
resolution to this nightmare. I gave
me the strength to push past the first

1984
03:09:05,200 --> 03:09:11,760
dead body and go deeper into that
tunnel. It reminded me of trying to

1985
03:09:11,799 --> 03:09:16,079
make your way to the front of
a gig, only deathly silent, and

1986
03:09:16,159 --> 03:09:20,600
the people you barged past one gently
back and forth, the sound of makeshift

1987
03:09:20,600 --> 03:09:26,159
nooses tightening in the dark. I
think the worst part was the limited vision.

1988
03:09:28,399 --> 03:09:33,000
My light was just a lone disk, and God, it was pitch

1989
03:09:33,079 --> 03:09:37,120
black in that place, like caving, only the floor is slick and you

1990
03:09:37,239 --> 03:09:41,239
don't have to worry about a ravine. Made me think about being in the

1991
03:09:41,239 --> 03:09:46,639
bottom of the ocean with all the
corps's visibility was never more than a few

1992
03:09:46,680 --> 03:09:52,440
foot ahead. I remember panicking at
the realization I could easily get turned around,

1993
03:09:52,479 --> 03:09:58,040
And well, if all those lost
souls didn't let me go, what

1994
03:09:58,159 --> 03:10:03,440
if I wound up in circles for
hours, days, even on end,

1995
03:10:03,559 --> 03:10:09,280
just round and round. The nearest
wall could be right there and I wouldn't

1996
03:10:09,319 --> 03:10:16,559
know it. Just bones and teeth
and ribs and hanging in trails, all

1997
03:10:16,639 --> 03:10:22,360
of them called to the touch,
freezing. Obviously, that's why we'd put

1998
03:10:22,440 --> 03:10:28,600
him down there. The place was
called my own breath, visible in the

1999
03:10:28,639 --> 03:10:33,200
air, but the bodies were like
the meat you grab out of the fridge

2000
03:10:33,200 --> 03:10:39,840
in a supermarket. It was just
awful. I found the fresh ones the

2001
03:10:39,920 --> 03:10:45,799
hardest. The stomach, A really
rotten body looks almost like a prop It

2002
03:10:45,840 --> 03:10:50,079
isn't don't get me wrong. You
look at it and your brain tells you,

2003
03:10:50,200 --> 03:10:52,680
damn well, it ain't a prop. But it's a hell of a

2004
03:10:52,680 --> 03:10:58,399
lot easier to convince yourself. It's
just the thing when it hasn't got eyes

2005
03:10:58,520 --> 03:11:05,879
or skin. But the fresh ones
sometimes they still had expressions like anger or

2006
03:11:05,000 --> 03:11:11,360
sadness on their faces. They made
me feel watched. And the fact they

2007
03:11:11,360 --> 03:11:16,840
were cold and slick with condensation.
Every time I bumped into one, it

2008
03:11:16,959 --> 03:11:22,040
took everything I had not to let
out a whimper. And they moved.

2009
03:11:24,079 --> 03:11:28,159
They didn't move, not like that. But there were no drafts down there.

2010
03:11:30,000 --> 03:11:33,520
It was perfectly still. They had
been perfectly still for months after the

2011
03:11:33,600 --> 03:11:39,600
project shut down, and then I
came along and disturbed them, and it

2012
03:11:39,719 --> 03:11:45,440
was like a giant Newton's cradle.
The static system that I put energy into

2013
03:11:45,799 --> 03:11:50,760
it began to sway and twist and
bomp. I'd knock one, and a

2014
03:11:50,799 --> 03:11:54,680
fraction of a second later it would
knock me back, jostling against my cheek

2015
03:11:54,799 --> 03:12:01,680
or my arm as inertia rocked it
back and forth. Ten minutes in too

2016
03:12:01,760 --> 03:12:11,200
far to turn back. That was
when the nightmare began started small I lost

2017
03:12:11,239 --> 03:12:15,760
my ability to track what body was
where and which ones were sent swinging by

2018
03:12:15,799 --> 03:12:22,399
my own clumsy movements, and then
fingers combed my hair. I cried out,

2019
03:12:22,120 --> 03:12:28,280
Another said touched my beard, my
face. I forced myself onwards and

2020
03:12:28,399 --> 03:12:31,440
started making eye contact with one.
Too many dead men for it to simply

2021
03:12:31,479 --> 03:12:39,280
be an accident. Their expressions changed
from sullen and listless to angry and cool,

2022
03:12:39,120 --> 03:12:48,799
leering smiles and curled lips. Then
came the unmistakable sensation of someone deliberately

2023
03:12:50,040 --> 03:12:54,040
grabbing for my arm. I had
to shake it loose, too afraid to

2024
03:12:54,120 --> 03:13:00,000
look back and face the possibility that
I'd see one of them moving and scared,

2025
03:13:01,959 --> 03:13:05,520
I pushed on constantly, having to
shake cold fingers off my elbow or

2026
03:13:05,520 --> 03:13:11,879
my collar. They groped incessantly,
looking for anything to hold on to.

2027
03:13:13,120 --> 03:13:16,920
Firm grips pinched my belly, fat, my shoulders, my chest, and

2028
03:13:16,959 --> 03:13:22,079
then they started reaching for my eyes. At one point I made the mistake

2029
03:13:22,159 --> 03:13:28,440
of crying out, and a freezing
cold finger with a slightly furried texture slid

2030
03:13:28,479 --> 03:13:31,879
into my mouth. The only relief
came when I dropped to my hands and

2031
03:13:31,959 --> 03:13:39,440
knees and crawled. The entire time
my mind raised with a terrible possibility that

2032
03:13:39,559 --> 03:13:46,639
I really was just being sent in
circles over and over and over, and

2033
03:13:46,680 --> 03:13:52,079
they were never going to let me
leave. I would die down there in

2034
03:13:52,159 --> 03:13:58,040
the dark, smothered by their rotting
hands. God damn, I came close

2035
03:13:58,120 --> 03:14:03,959
to giving up. When my torch
finally alighted upon an open space. I

2036
03:14:05,040 --> 03:14:09,200
cried out, a heaving, wet
sob made of relief and joy, and

2037
03:14:09,280 --> 03:14:13,600
my muscles given new life, worked
over time to get me out of that

2038
03:14:13,719 --> 03:14:20,520
horrible nightmare and into freedom. I
didn't stop until I bumped my head against

2039
03:14:20,559 --> 03:14:24,040
the steel wall with a dull clang, and looked up to see the vault's

2040
03:14:24,040 --> 03:14:31,920
door, at last, the place
we'd frozen him. I got up,

2041
03:14:33,079 --> 03:14:37,040
with what little dignity I had left, brushed down my clothes, and risked

2042
03:14:37,239 --> 03:14:45,200
only the briefest of glances back.
The bodies looked inert now, just like

2043
03:14:45,319 --> 03:14:50,000
they had before I entered. I
could have tricked myself into thinking it was

2044
03:14:50,040 --> 03:14:56,680
my imagination. Only half my shirt
was now in tatters on the floor,

2045
03:14:56,479 --> 03:15:01,200
and I could still see strips of
it still clenched in a few of their

2046
03:15:01,200 --> 03:15:11,200
hands. I did my best to
compose myself, and I entered the vault.

2047
03:15:13,760 --> 03:15:18,440
We hadn't left him in a very
nice state. The plan was the

2048
03:15:18,479 --> 03:15:24,719
catalog everything. Yeah, we excited
the most striking biological anomalies, but the

2049
03:15:24,760 --> 03:15:31,440
remaining flesh. I mean, we
wanted to know everything, every last capillary,

2050
03:15:31,719 --> 03:15:37,159
every last cell. We wanted it
recorded. So we had this special

2051
03:15:37,239 --> 03:15:43,840
machine flown in. It works by
taking a piece of flesh and slicing into

2052
03:15:43,879 --> 03:15:48,319
a layer that's barely a micrometer thick, and depositing it into a slide.

2053
03:15:50,280 --> 03:15:56,719
That slide is digested and then stored
in specialized cold refrigeration units. Is usually

2054
03:15:56,799 --> 03:16:01,120
used on a sample not much bigger
than a potato, but for him we

2055
03:16:01,200 --> 03:16:09,239
had something specially made, frozen stood
vertigal. We put him on the machine

2056
03:16:09,280 --> 03:16:13,719
where it worked, creating about one
slice every three hours. Only at the

2057
03:16:13,879 --> 03:16:18,639
end. Well, first, no
one came to take the slides away,

2058
03:16:20,200 --> 03:16:24,879
so they had gathered on the floor
below in a terrible mess. And second,

2059
03:16:24,920 --> 03:16:31,159
no one had bothered to check if
he was still dead. Stupid of

2060
03:16:31,239 --> 03:16:37,719
us, really, of course he
came back to life, only this time

2061
03:16:37,600 --> 03:16:43,479
he didn't get to leave the cave. I often wonder if he had anything

2062
03:16:43,600 --> 03:16:50,479
left to say, but by then
the machine had reached his nose, just

2063
03:16:50,559 --> 03:16:56,000
his eyes at the top of his
head looking right at me, following me.

2064
03:16:58,520 --> 03:17:01,360
God, we made a mess of
things, didn't We made the Romans

2065
03:17:01,399 --> 03:17:07,639
look gentle in comparison. I fell
to my knees and begged for forgiveness,

2066
03:17:09,440 --> 03:17:16,680
and the worst part he gave it. Obviously not verbally, but it shouldn't

2067
03:17:16,719 --> 03:17:22,000
surprise you to know he had other
ways of putting thought to my head.

2068
03:17:22,159 --> 03:17:26,719
I was so angry at myself.
I was positive I'd find some kind of

2069
03:17:26,760 --> 03:17:35,120
punishment waiting for me. When I
didn't, he forgave me, told me

2070
03:17:35,399 --> 03:17:41,559
I was loved after everything I'd done. I mean, God, that hurt

2071
03:17:41,600 --> 03:17:48,120
the most. I didn't deserve it, still don't. And then he gave

2072
03:17:48,200 --> 03:17:54,079
me the Third Testament, or rather
the cliff notes. Not enough to drive

2073
03:17:54,159 --> 03:17:58,680
me nuts, but the gist of
it, so to speak, did a

2074
03:17:58,719 --> 03:18:03,399
numb me. Anyway. By the
time I was done sobbing on the floor,

2075
03:18:05,559 --> 03:18:13,280
I lugged up and he was gone. Nothing remained, just broken glass

2076
03:18:13,680 --> 03:18:20,159
in a machine cutting empty air.
Going back through the tunnel was no easier

2077
03:18:20,200 --> 03:18:24,280
than going in, but I hardly
remember it. I lost a couple of

2078
03:18:24,319 --> 03:18:30,719
weeks after that little trip down below, but eventually I came to in my

2079
03:18:30,799 --> 03:18:37,520
office. Now I stay above ground. I've asked for rescue, but the

2080
03:18:37,559 --> 03:18:43,440
agency feels I best serve my country
by staying where I am, making sure

2081
03:18:43,559 --> 03:18:48,559
nothing else leagues out. It's messed
up, but I think, for once

2082
03:18:50,760 --> 03:18:56,159
they might be right. I've considered
sharing what he gave me, considered even

2083
03:18:56,239 --> 03:19:01,680
putting it in bits of writing here. Might even go get the full Testament

2084
03:19:01,719 --> 03:19:07,520
and upload it, but that would
involve reading it, and like I said,

2085
03:19:07,760 --> 03:19:13,479
I'm a coward and I don't want
to die. Everyone who reads it

2086
03:19:13,520 --> 03:19:20,799
dies by their own hand. I
guess all I can say is the Third

2087
03:19:20,840 --> 03:19:28,760
Testament. It's something of a warning, an outline of what's coming our way,

2088
03:19:31,040 --> 03:19:35,399
so bad that he came just to
offer us a way out, a

2089
03:19:35,559 --> 03:19:41,760
promise that there's somewhere else, and
an acknowledgment that we're going to need.

2090
03:19:41,840 --> 03:19:48,840
It makes me think of Coats,
smartest man I ever met, whose first

2091
03:19:48,879 --> 03:19:54,920
reaction to knowing what was on the
way was to try and engineer something to

2092
03:19:54,040 --> 03:20:03,079
wipe humanity all out. Given to
what we did to him, I wonder

2093
03:20:03,840 --> 03:20:05,079
if we don't deserve it