CreepsMcPasta Creepypasta Radio - "I’ve Been a Homicide Detective for Twenty Years. I’ve Never Seen a Case Like This" Creepypasta

Episode Date: May 17, 2025

LISTEN TO CREEPYPASTAS ON THE GO-SPOTIFY► https://open.spotify.com/show/7l0iRPd...iTUNES► https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast...CREEPYPASTA STORY►by Saint ZanderCreepypastas are the campfire tales of the internet. Horror stories spread through Reddit r/nosleep, forums and blogs, rather than word of mouth. Whether you believe these scary stories to be true or not is left to your own discretion and imagination. SUGGESTED CREEPYPASTA PLAYLISTS-►"Good Places to Start"-    • "I wasn't careful enough on the deep ...  ►"Personal Favourites"-    • "I sold my soul for a used dishwasher...  ►"Written by me"-    • "I've been Blind my Whole Life" Creep...  ►"Long Stories"-    • Long Stories  FOLLOW ME ON-►Twitter:   / creeps_mcpasta  ►Instagram:   / creepsmcpasta  ►Twitch:   / creepsmcpasta  ►Facebook:   / creepsmcpasta  CREEPYPASTA MUSIC/ SFX- ►http://bit.ly/Audionic ♪►http://bit.ly/Myuusic ♪►http://bit.ly/incompt ♪►http://bit.ly/EpidemicM ♪This creepypasta is for entertainment purposes only

I pulled up to the address, engine running long enough for the radiator to tick in protest. The building stood four stories high, concrete worn down to a grey so lifeless it blended with the sky. Cracks ran up the facade and narrow diagonal patterns. Someone had patched over the large ones with foam sealant, but the rest looked untouched. A handful of rusted window units buzzed on the upper floors and thin faces hovered to behind curtains, peering out to the street. Some disappeared when they saw me in plain clothes, others didn't bother hiding. Yellow tapes stretched across the entrance. Two uniforms stood beside it, looking like they hadn't slept in days. One of them nodded when he saw me approach and lifted

the tape. Detective Hanley, I said, flashed my badge before he could ask. Yeah, upstairs, third floor, Unit 3C. You'll want to see it yourself. I didn't say anything back. He looked relieved by that. The stairwell reeked of mildew and detergent. Cheap industrial cleaner from the smell of it. Someone had made a half-baked effort to mop the blood trail

that leaked from under the victim's door and ran down to the base of the steps. Rats scurried and ran deeper into the building as I made my way through. through. Unit 3C was open, held that way by a folding wedge jammed under the hinge. Two more officers stood inside. They didn't bother with pleasantries. One was busy writing in a small flip notepad. The other looked pale. His arms crossed tightly over his chest. I stepped in and scanned the room without touching anything. The air in the room was thick and humid. She'd been thrown into the far corner of the living room. What used to be a human body was now a crushed heap. Limbs, neck flattened at an angle that suggested a spine had snapped

halfway down. Her jaw hung off by the muscle. This was done by a blunt object. Blood covered the vinyl floor in white splashes and thick streaks. Some had dried at the edges. Some were still tacky. She was missing an arm. I kept my breathing slow and even. The walls were intact and there was no overturned furniture, shattered lamps or picture frames. Nothing suggested she'd fought back. She died exactly where she stood. This didn't seem like a fight gone bad. This didn't seem like a fight gone bad. more like a one-sided beat down. Who found her? I asked. One of the uniforms spoke up.

Neighbors, two doors down. She called when she heard screaming. Time. 1026. Front door locked. Yeah, no sign of forced entry. The chain was still set when we arrived. We had to kick it.

Rats were in the apartment when we kicked it. down, though. Can't be sure how much damage they did, but she was definitely dead way before that. That narrowed things in a way I didn't like. I moved closer to the body and examined the hands. The fingers were intact, no defensive wounds. I checked the mouth, gently lifting a chin with my gloved hands to expose the teeth. Some blood, but that was from impact, not from biting or being gagged. Nothing under the nails, no debris, no hair or fibres clinging to her clothes, no bruising on her remaining hand to suggest a self-defense attempt. It was by all means just a normal apartment. One bedroom, open kitchenette, books stacked neatly on the TV stand,

a wine glass drying beside the sink. She had been living here peacefully, though a fridge looked ransacked. Whoever did this, it was definitely planned. I stepped back and let forensics take over. I needed to talk to the neighbours and potential witnesses.

The hallway was quiet when I stepped out, but not empty. A man in a grey tank top leaned against his doorway, arms crossed. His eyes looked sunken and wet. I stopped by him first. "'You're the one who called?'

He shook his head. "'No, that was Flora, end of the hall. "'But I heard it too. "'Tell me. "' Loud, fast. "'I mean, there weren't any word shouted, "'but I think I heard a silent screaming. "'But I'm not sure.

"'Definitely like thudding and crashing. "'Was that normal? "'Noise like that? He scoffed. Nah, she was really quiet. Never even heard her on the phone. Don't even think she had a partner. Rarely brought people over.

I checked his hands for any signs of bruising just in case. I asked him for an alibi. He gave me a cell phone log with a delivery time stamp. Peter arrived at 1019. I moved on. The next two neighbours offered similar stories. One woman heard thumping, thought it might be a domestic fight, but wasn't sure. The guy across from the victim was out working the night shift.

All of them knew her by first name. None of them had complaints about her, let alone hated her enough to kill her. Then there was the older woman on the floor above. She had a house dress on, bare feet, and a smell that told me she hadn't done laundry in a long time. I knew something would happen, she said, standing halfway behind a door. There's something in the walls, always scratching, always moving. You mean rats? I asked. Her eyes didn't change.

No, worse than that. I nodded, but I didn't write anything down. I chalked it up to age and isolation, a mind that had been left. alone too long. The last apartment I visited was the one directly above the victim's apartment. He opened the door, still holding his son. A boy, small enough to barely talk, faced street with tears. The father didn't look much better.

His hair stuck out in uneven clumps and his fingers trembled as he lifted the toddler from one hip to the other. you're the detective, he said. They said someone would come talk to us. Did you hear anything unusual? I asked. He nodded, slowly. It was bad.

We heard her scream. I mean, really scream. It was sharp, quick. Then there was this pounding, like it was vibrating up into our bones. He looked toward the stairs. My son started crying immediately. Then it stopped.

Did you see anyone? No, we didn't leave the apartment. Do you have cameras? No, but I've got a security cam in the baby's room with audio. It's on loop. I can send you the clip. I took his info, got the file, thanked him, and headed back downstairs. Nothing was adding up.

I asked around to see if we had any footage. The landlord had installed a half-broken DVR system five years ago after a string of bicycle thefts. One camera pointed at the building entrance, another cover the third floor hallway, focused on the victim's door. The third feed meant to show the stairwell blinked between grey screens and frozen frames.

That one was useless. I reviewed the footage from the past 12 hours inside. running it at four times speed, pausing whenever I saw movement. Ten people came and went through the front door. Four were delivery drivers, three were residents I'd already spoken with, and the rest were building staff or uniformed officers who arrived after the 911 call. When I finally closed the laptop and returned to the apartment, the fringes crew had already packed up.

The room was stripped of evidence bags and markers, the blood had dried in most places. I stood in the centre of the living room and let my eyes sweep over the corners, furniture and ceiling. Something sat wrong. I didn't know what, only that it hadn't left me since I first stepped inside. I shifted back toward the entryway and looked again. Above the living room centre, near the light fixture, something was pressed into the white stucco. I stepped closer. Among the specks of blood that had reached high on the walls and ceiling, next to the AC vent,

there was a single handprint. It stood out from the splatter. It had a clean form, but it looked to be smudged. The thumb sat at a strange angle, like whoever made it. it rotated their hand outward. I stood there, trying to make sense of it. I walked over to the far wall, stood on the couch beneath it,

and reached upward with my full height, but couldn't get within eight inches of touching the ceiling. The woman who lived here was five foot four, according to a license. She couldn't have left that print even if she stood on the furniture. I stepped down and stared at. edited again.

It felt deliberate. Killers who left signatures weren't new. It was uncommon but not unheard of. The FBI maintained a database of those who used them. Symbols, poses, words, even objects placed at the scene. There was a chance this was meant to be a message. I tried taking the fingerprints from the hand just in case, but I knew it would be fruitless.

I took photos from three angles and left a notation in the case file. I told the uniforms outside that I wanted a patrol unit to do regular sweeps of the building, especially at night. No one had seen anything. That didn't mean it wouldn't come back. As I headed out the door, I couldn't help but take one more glance at the ceiling. I spent most of that night at home, glued to my desk, the lamp's buzz crawled into my ears, and the glow of the monitor drained the rest of the room in shadow.

Samantha Hortega, age 32, no criminal history, worked data entry for a mid-size insurance firm downtown and lived alone. She paid rent on time and didn't have a boyfriend listed on her tenancy records. social media pointed to a quiet life she posted about a cat pictures of coffee and the occasional meme no angry exes no unhinged comment threads nothing that hinted at trouble I pulled her work records next

her supervisor said she was consistent kept to herself and always polite co-worker said she skipped happy hours but always brought cupcakes to office parties she'd been caught stealing milk from the staff ridge but that was the most scandalous thing anyone could offer I went through a message records which yielded more silence

her parents had texted her the night before her death about a recipe her father made a joke about finally learning how to poach an egg there wasn't a single name in a life that raised a red flag the only thing I had to go off now was the handprint left at the scene. I flagged the precinct's patrol schedule and ensured the 43rd street walk-up

was assigned nightly drive-bys. Then I closed everything down and tried to sleep. Didn't get much. A week passed. The fingerprints I attempted to get returned nothing. The blood sampled from the handprint was Samantha's. It was early afternoon,

When my phone went off, Detective Hanley, the officer said, we've got another one. Same building, Unit 4C. I didn't ask any more questions over the phone. I grabbed my coat and left. When I pulled up to the building, the entire front entrance was flooded with activity. Two squad cars blocked traffic. The flashing lights lit up the cracked facade of the structure. painting it in bursts of blue and red.

I spotted Officer Geller near the stoop, holding a bundled infant close to his chest. The child was shrieking, eyes swollen, and face stained with tears. Geller wasn't built for this kind of thing. He looked more panicked than the kid. I stepped out and headed up. I was already getting sick. Inside the building, I was immediately met by rats.

again, the rodents seemed to be multiplying greatly each time I came here, perhaps because of the bodies, a new food source. Regardless, the scene was already controlled by the time I got there. The door to 4C stood wide open, a uniform stationed at either side, neither looking up as I passed. Inside, the walls held the same stale yellow as the floor below. The carpet was old, stretched out in places. The body lay against the bedroom wall. I recognised the man immediately. He was the one who had answered the door while holding his son.

His neck had been snapped and driven downward with so much force that he had cracked the floorboard beneath him. One arm had been dislocated and bent behind his back, the other stretched outward, twisted at the wrist. His ribs had been crushed inward. One shoe had come off and lay across the room. But the worst part was that his entire head was missing. A second officer walked over, adjusting his gloves. There were rats everywhere when we came in.

We counted dozens before they scattered. They came pouring out of somewhere. We couldn't keep track. Did you make sure they didn't contaminate the crime scene? I asked. For the most part, we arrived here quickly, so it's safe to say the killer is the one who took this poor guy's head off. The apartment itself was undisturbed.

No forced entry, no sign of struggle, exactly the same as the other scene. I subconsciously glanced toward the ceiling, expecting to see a handprint. Though this time, I didn't find one. I made my way deeper inside the apartment, looking for any clue that might have been left by the killer.

Inside the living room, above the couch, right next to another AC vent, sat another handprint. This one, however, wasn't smudged. It was as clean as a bloody handprint gets, unlike the previous one. I stood beneath it, and stared.

My jaw clenched. I hated it. There was something that felt smug about all of this. It was set there like punctuation. The sentence had ended, and this was how they signed it. I wanted to drag a chair over and scrub it off with my bare hands. I wanted it gone.

It felt like a taunt. It was impersonal, and this confirmed it. These weren't crimes of passion. I'd stood across from this man days ago. He'd held his son and tried to stay calm while I asked if he heard anything strange. Now his body was broken and cooling on the floor. If this was the game he wanted to play...

I'd play it. I dragged a chair over and reached up to the handprint to collect blood samples and fingerprints. I stared at it briefly. Then shifted my attention to the vent beside it. The grill was crooked. One of the screws nearly halfway out the wall, but it looked more like it was ripped out of the wall rather than unscrewed.

The rest wobbled when I tapped it. It had been opened. There was no dust anywhere to be found. Someone had definitely tampered with it recently. The opening wasn't large. no person was squeezing through that unless they could fold their ribs but something had definitely pushed its way through

I reached up pinching the side of the cover with two fingers and pulled the vent gave with a low pop a draft of cold air moved against my face inside I saw darkness thin ridges of metal tubing ran along the bottom

bottom, but nothing else stood out at first glance. I leaned in. The smell hit me hard. Dry urine, fur, something deeper behind it. Fungal, wet. Something had been nesting inside the shaft. My flashlight couldn't reach the bend in the ductwork, but I could hear movement further in, a soft shifting sound.

I narrowed my eyes, took a breath, and slid my hand inside. Almost immediately, something bit down. I yanked my arm back hard, pain flared from my wrist. My glove was torn near the edge and blood welled up in a thin line across my forearm. God damn rats, I mumbled to myself, feeling stupid for even bothering. I review the security camera footage, knowing I'd find nothing. I leaned back in the chair and watch the grainy loop for another few seconds before killing the monitor. The neighbours have come and given their testimonies willingly now.

None seem suspicious. Back at the precinct, I printed both photos of the handprint, lined them up side by side. I heard someone knock gently at the open door behind me. One of the officers leaned inside. That handprint again? He said, we saw it in the first one too. That one looks cleaner, though. You got the fingerprints?

The officer asked. Yeah, waiting for the results, I responded. You think it's a signature? I didn't answer at first. I pointed to the photos. Look, I'm not sure what it is, but... The first victim was in 3C, the next one in 4C. Now, we're looking at two murders, same layout, right on top of each other,

and this sicko keeps leaving a handprint on the ceiling. Is it supposed to be pointing toward the next murder? The officer leaned closer to get a better look. You think there's a pattern? I think so. He looked at me, puzzled. I folded the photos, took them into the case file, and stood. Get me the contact for the tenant in 5C.

I want them out by tomorrow. The results from the fingerprints came back before I could arrive at 5C. It was human, female. The software matched it against the national database and the ID pinged immediately. It was her. Samantha Ortega, the first victim. I sat with a phone in my lap, eyes from her. forward, staring at the dashboard, but not really seeing it.

My first thought was a mistake. Some lab tech mislabeled a sample, or the swab had been contaminated by the crime scene itself. But that wouldn't explain the location. She couldn't have reached that high up on her own ceiling, let alone another apartment. She'd been dead a week. It started to settle in. Someone had taken her arm and used it, pressed it into the wall, forced a dead fingers flat, made the handprint themselves. It had to have been done shortly before we arrived too.

The detail in the print, the residue. It wasn't from a week ago. This psychopath was mocking the investigation. I knocked on the door of 5C that evening. A tired man answered, eyes sunken, shirt stained with something brown near the collar. He looked at me and didn't ask why I was there. He held the door open and said his sister had room for him and his wife. They were packed in ten minutes.

I didn't have to push. Based on what had been happening here, I'm sure he was happy to get out of the building. Once the unit was empty, I called it. in, got clearance from their department, told them I had reason to believe the following incident would happen there. They gave me approval, said I had a week on sight. The only things I brought were a notebook and a loaded sidearm. I kept their door locked behind me, left the lights on, I stayed in the living room with a

radio on the counter and my badge was in reach. I didn't know if this psycho would come. I only knew he or she had come twice before and that both times no one was ready. If I were wrong, I'd waste a week, but if I were right, maybe I could save a life. All I knew was that there was some kind of pattern here, a very clear move vertically,

and I hoped I was right. I stayed up in the chair most of the night, leg stiff, hand resting near the grip of my sidearm. The patrol outside checked every two hours, radio brief, no sign of anything moving in or out of the building. I responded each time, short and clear. I watched the door, then the ceiling, then the door again. Every hour stretched.

At around three in the morning, I stood once to stretch my back and walk to the window. Not to look out, but to move. I circled the kitchen, poured a cup of cold coffee, and drank it without tasting anything. It was right after I sat down again, that I heard the noise. It came all at once. A crash, loud and sudden, something breaking against the wall, then screaming. Short, clipped, human. A voice trying to call it.

out, but getting pulled under. I froze for a second, listened. The ceiling didn't shake. The hallway was quiet. I leaned closer to the wall and heard it again. Another crash. The screaming had stopped. Then I understood.

It was next door. I stood fast, nearly knocking the chair over. My hand went to the radio. I pressed the button as I moved. to the door. Unit 5D, movement next door. I'm breaching. I didn't wait.

I unlatched the door and stepped into the hallway. The air was colder outside the apartment. The hallway lights flickered faintly. Rats poured from everywhere. But I had too much adrenaline coursing coursing through me to care about rats. They rushed along the walls in waves, scurrying across my boots. I stepped into them and made them. made my way to the unit.

Police, open the door. No response. I raised my leg and kicked at the lock. It gave on the second try. The door slammed inward and bounced off the wall. I stepped through, gun raised, badge lifted, half a warning on my lips. Then I saw it. It wasn't a person.

The thing in front of me was a shift. mass of rodents. Hundreds, maybe thousands of them packed into rough shape, a mound of matted fur and bone that stood taller than a man. Their bodies moved and sink, their limbs pushing and pulling together to mimic the form of a torso, arms and legs. It was a body made from bodies. The head wore skin, a human face.

A human face stretched across the front, torn at the edges. I recognized it. The single father, his jaw hung open, lips sagging. From the sockets of his eyes, dozens of smaller eyes blinked, each one black and glassy. The right arm was human too, pale and thin, bruised at the shoulder where it had been ripped from another corpse. Samantha's, who was kneeling on top of the man who lived there. It struck the man with ridiculous force. The body bounced beneath each strike.

The sound was sickening. Bones breaking wetly. The floor beneath them shook with each impact. I stared, dumbfounded, as it ripped an arm off the man's corpse, and the rats started to bury themselves inside the arm, adding it to their sick form. I emptied the clip into it. Each round hit, but there was no visible break in the skin. Instead, a thick black vapour hissed out from the impact sights

and drifted upward in thin, rising trails. It moved slower than smoke should of, hanging in the air before thinning and disappearing into the ceiling. Rounds tore through the air and buried themselves in the thing's mass. rats split apart and fell. Some screamed. Others swarmed in to fill the gaps, dragging their fallen inward

and disappearing into the body again. Its shape shifted and the face twisted. The mask tilted to look at me and the eyes inside the sockets blinked in unison. I fumbled for another clip. My hands didn't want to cooperate. My left wrist was still bandaged from the vent bite and the blood pulsing through it made my fingers weak.

The magazine slipped, clattered to the floor. It moved fast. One of its limbs swept sideways and caught me across the upper chest. The force was enough to throw me sideways into the doorframe. The corner caught me behind the shoulder. My arm went numb and I hit the floor with half my vision fading out. I tried to raise my head and couldn't. tell if the wetness on my temple was blood or sweat. I stayed like that for a few seconds. The sound

of its breathing had stopped. I heard it scrape across the floor once. Then everything went quiet. When I lifted my head again, I saw it at the far end of the room. It slid and scraped across the floor, more like a tide than a body. They gathered at the fresh arm, bulging with blood, twitching in their hold, and now fully made it part of the mass. It lifted itself with reverence, gripping the ceiling with Samantha's hand, leaving behind a handprint. It flowed into the ductwork, vanishing section by section. The last thing I saw before it disappeared was the father's head, pulled upward by the neck, as rats vanished behind it.

The patrol burst in seconds later, guns raised, shouting. They called in others, cleared the room, searched the building. There was no clue as to where the killer had gone. The apartment above was undisturbed. They kept me in the hospital for observation. I was stitched up across the shoulder, bruised along the ribs and concussed. Nothing that needed surgery, but enough to take me out of the field. The department put me on leave without asking.

Most of my time there passed in a haze of blood pressure checks, fluorescent lights and voices. I didn't speak when they asked what I saw. What would all these seasoned officers and the rest of my colleagues say? Of course they wouldn't believe me. Regardless, I had guessed wrong about ever. everything in this situation. The man had died a few feet away, one wall between us. If I'd been paying attention, I might have taken more time to figure out the details

and perhaps I could have acted sooner. I didn't. I assumed I understood what I was doing. I thought I'd figured it out. But was there even a way for me to have figured it out? At the very least, I had to put an end to it now. The building hadn't been sealed. The neighbours were still inside, upstairs, downstairs, across the hall.

Families, older tenants, students, night shift workers. I knew he would strike again. I didn't know if he was following a pattern or choosing randomly. But I didn't care. I made a few calls until I got the owner's name. He ran a property group with a voice. that never got checked. I drove across the city to a cafe he was known to visit.

I waited until he walked in and blocked his path before he could sit down. I showed my badge, lowered my voice, and told him the building was a liability waiting to burn down. I told him pest control records and a few more outright lies were falsified. Lastly, I told him that if even one more incident happened, I'd see his entire management team in front of a grand jury. I had no authority to say any of that, but I said it anyway. He asked what I wanted. I told him I wanted the building emptied.

He said that would take weeks. I told him he had until the morning. Tenants were told there had been a confirmed gas leak. People evacuated, which I'm pretty sure is due to the murder cases. and not the reasons they were actually given. Patrol officers sealed off the building. A few argued and demanded compensation, but no one stayed behind.

By the afternoon, the pest control team had arrived. I paid one of the crew leaders a few hundred dollars out of pocket to keep me updated. They pumped every floor with fumigant, every room, every vent, every closet. They opened every crawl space, broke through every wall that felt hollow. For two days the building was sealed. No one went inside except for exterminators in hazmat suits. On the third day, I got the call.

They said I needed to see it for myself. I met them at the loading dock behind the building. Two contractors stood near an open dumpster. Their face is pale, masks hanging. from their belts. Inside weren't dozens of plastic biohazard bags. Instead, it was one huge bag. Inside was a mass, swollen, diseased looking.

The stench clung to my nose and throat, even through the mask. They claimed it had a name. Rat King. It was explained to me that a rat king is a collection of rats or mice who I intertwined and bound together in some way. They also found the limbs of the victims of the serial killer in the rat's nest. Later that week, the local news ran a segment on the building. They called it the worst rat infestation the city had seen in years,

cited health code violations. The building was finally clean, however. The murder case itself sat unresolved. The killer had never been caught. But I knew better.