Creepy - Day 13 - Shutter & The Things We Must Do

Episode Date: October 13, 2023

Shutter***Written by: D.A.Cairns***Bonus episode: "The Things We Must Do" Written by: Nicki Brumback and Narrated by: Alicia Atkins***patreon.com/creepypod***Title music by: Alex Aldea Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

No. This is creepy. A podcast dedicated to sharing the most famous chilling and disturbing creepypastas and urban legends in the world. Whether these stories truly happened or are simply fabrications is for you to decide. These stories may contain graphic depictions of violence and explicit language. Listener discretion is advised. Creepy presents. The 31 Days of Horror.

Day 13. Shutter. Written by D.A. Karens. I've seen it before. The image is burned into my mind. It's such a vivid scar that even if I never saw it again, I would never be able to erase it from my memory. I can't tell you how many times I've regret.

regretted my decision to become a professional photographer. Although it's a perfect match for my skills and temperament, sometimes it's too much. It's too intimate. This business of capturing moments and time is both exciting and frightening. I guess that's why I can't give it up. I'm addicted to this stormy chaos within. Inside the War Remnants Museum,

crowds mill around in solemn quietness. It's a monument of propaganda despite proclaiming itself a testimony to truth and freedom. I mean, it used to be called the Museum of American War Crimes. Enough said. I'm okay on the first floor. It's a collection of news articles and advertising from the war. It's serious, but interesting and not threatening. The reason I've come is to revisit the first floor photograph

collection, which I saw several years ago on my first trip to Hocheeman City. I don't know why, though. Compulsion? A magnetic attraction? My wife has let me come alone this time. She hates the government and has often been involved in street marches. Thinking back again to my first visit had been caught up in a march. I joined in with gusto, loving my wife's political passion rather than caring about the issue.

At one point, we stopped to buy a cart in the water, and I helped my wife distribute it. I was a bit of a celebrity protester. I don't know how many videos I appeared in, but I loved being a part of it. The government was less impressed. The next day they announced that all public markets were forbidden from trading for two days. I can't bear her to look at those photos again yet, so I go outside for smoke. Rather than stand around, I walk past a row of tanks, Chinook helicopter, and an F-11 fighter, American military hardware either captured or abandoned at the end of the war.

I walk across the beautifully manicured lawn, around to the back of the museum where there's a jail cell in its original Vietnam War condition. Trying to get my mind off the photograph that I don't want to see. I look for a subject for a new one. something to focus on. I step on to the bars, look down into the cell, and feel the heavy weight of dark history. There's a Vietnamese man leaning against a wall, smoking a cigarette. His face reflects what I feel.

He seems lost in thought. I pull my can in ESO 5D Mark 4 out of my bag and line up the shot. I want to catch that sadness. Capture its color. Just as I'm about to take the shot, the man looks directly at me. His expression doesn't change. He keeps staring. I get my photo.

He knows it but says nothing. Then after one final drag on his cigarette, he drops it to the ground, grinding the butt into the dirt with his heel. He takes his time as though he doesn't merely want to extinguish the smoking leftovers. He wants to hurt that cigarette butt. shiver. He walks away in silence, giving no acknowledgement to my presence at all. I watch him walk away and examine the shot. I got it. Every now and then, I really impressed myself. It was serendipity, and I didn't have time to think much about what I was doing, but I captured something extraordinary,

an almost impossible depth of emotion in the continents. I stare at the image for a long time. And as a bonus, I've forgotten all about the photograph of Vietnamese corpses that I've been avoiding inside the museum. There's too much death here. The only other time I felt such tangible sorrow and suffering was at Port Arthur in Tasmania, a former colonial jail in the scene of Australia's worst mass murder. Everything there is covered in a heavy blanket of evil. Ironically, the physical setting is breathtakingly beautiful, much like the War Remnants Museum, which, despite being a wonderful example of French colonial

architecture, is nonetheless a chamber of horrors. Feeling unnerved, though I can't exactly say why. I pass on the War Remnants Museum. Those stomach-turning images can wait, maybe indefinitely. Other than some twisted sense of bravado, there's no reason why I should force myself to revisit them. Highland coffee is nearby, and although the thought of one of those wicked cups of weasel coffee is tempting, and I decide I need something stronger. I walk until I find a place which sells alcohol, an Aussie sports bar, just for antipodean Yahoo's.

I take a seat and a tiny waitress with jet black hair takes my order. Whiskey, straight up. I follow her with my eyes as she heads back to the bar. While she's reaching to the top shelf, standing on a stool, my vision blurs. I touch my eyes, expecting tears, but they're dry to the touch. A few more seconds pass, and it gets worse. I tell myself it's okay, but my heart is hammering in my chest. I think I'm going blind.

Suddenly, I can see again. But I'm not in the bar anymore. I'm standing at a brick wall. When I try to stand, I hit my face. My head on the ceiling. It's not a ceiling, though. It's a set of iron bars. I look up.

I'm in the cage at the War Remnants Museum. Stunned, paralyzed. I don't know what to do or how to react. It can't be real, but it feels like it. It smells dank. It's muggy and cramped. As I turn my body to get comfortable, I bump into someone. I'm too scared to look, but I do anyway.

It's the guy whose photo I took earlier. He's wearing that same grim, melancholic expression. I hear a glass hitting the table, and I can see I'm back in the sports bar. My hand is shaking as I reach for the glass. The waitress is standing there, waiting. Waiting for what? I've got a payer. I pull a 500,000 dong note out from my top pocket.

hand it to her and wave her away. She just scored a jackpot tip, but who cares? I've got other things on my mind. Trembling, I put my drink back on the table. I feel hot, and I know everyone is gawking at me, wondering what the hell is wrong with me. I concentrate on my breathing, taking slow breaths, deep breaths.

I keep doing it until the quivering subsides, and I feel confident enough to try and pick up my whiskey. My throat's a desert highway. And if I don't get something wet on it soon, I'm going to die. I'm not going to die. I'm sure I'm fine. Eventually the symptoms pass, but my mind is tied up in knots trying to figure out what happened. I've never experienced anything like this before,

so I don't know whether to dismiss it as imagined or worry about potentially fatal neural problems. The whiskey's good, but my sip doesn't cut it, so I throw down the whole glass, wave the empty in the air when I'm done. The waitress brings me another, faster than I can say American war crimes. She's after more money,

so I give her another big note. This time I hold my hand out for change. If she's disappointed, it doesn't show. The second glass of whiskey collides with the afterburn of the the first, and I'm already feeling the effects. I remember I haven't eaten anything today. I'm not smart. As I sit with my head swimming in a sea of alcohol, my vision starts to blur again. I don't want to repeat the experience, but at least I know it's coming. I've learned from the first time that I don't have much room to move, nor can I stand. The same man is in the cell with me.

I ask him what's going on. He moves his mouth, but there's no sound. I study him more closely, see the tracks of age and pain etched in his skin. He's older than I thought. I ask him again to explain what's happening. He points up, and my eyes follow his finger. There's a soldier standing right above us. There's mud compacted into the treads of his boots.

He scrapes his right foot on the bottom. bars, causing flakes of mud to fall on me. I turn my head quickly to avoid the unwanted downpour as he scrapes his left boot and like fashion as his right. I turned to the man beside me. I'm about to speak when his mouth pops wide open and his eyes squeeze shut. His skin changes color, darkening as I watch. He's screaming, but again there's no sound. His eyes pop open and I fall off my chair in the bar. The waitress is again at my side, like I'm her only customer. She puts her hand on my shoulder, asks if I'm all right. I shake my head telling her I need to go back to my hotel. I'm shuddering now as though I'm freezing, but I feel hot, too hot. She says

something about a grab, and before I know what's happening, what feels like many hands are helping me to my feet. My legs are made of paper. When my helpers realize I can't stand on my own, they ease me back into my seat. They offer me water while I wait. There's a lot of conversations swirling around me, but I can't understand anything. I'm a sign of sure of curiosity. A grab taxi pulls up out front of the bar and I'm guided to it, strong yet gentle hands supporting me on either side. The door the taxi opens, and I find myself on the back seat. Someone asks which hotel I'm staying at, but while I'm trying to remember, I return to

the cage cell. I struggle for some rational explanation. I'm not being injured. I can't be traveling magically to another place and back again. This is a psychological event, a breakdown. I'm losing my mind. The man in the cell asks me what's happening, his voice cracking like he's having a pubescent testy pop.

I turn to face him, but I see a very young man, a boy, maybe 13 or 14 years old. His countenance cries, fear, and rage, but it's a battle between the two. His features twist as the emotions fight for supremacy. He asked me again what's happening, but before I can answer, I'm back in the count. The taxi putters along in the thick Hocchemen city traffic as I sit in the back floundering. I'm drowning in bewilderment. The sports bar, the taxi, the museum. Maybe I've become an omnipresent god and I just need to accept and adjust to my new powers.

What am I saying? Did I tell the driver where I was going? I tell him I'm staying at the Sherwood Suites. Saying it out loud makes me remember it's only half a kilometer from the museum. It didn't take very long to walk to the sports bar so I can't be far from the hotel. I can walk. I should walk. I want to walk.

The driver says nothing like he can't hear me or he doesn't care. We stop and he says we've arrived. I look out the window of the car, straight into the wide entry path of the War Remnants Museum. I tell him, no, this is the wrong place. I tell him it's not the hotel. He keeps saying Sherwood Suites over and over again as a constant repetitional break through my denial. I don't know what he's looking at, but it's not my hotel.

Suddenly, he's opening the door, reaching in to grab my arm. His grip is soft, but I still shake it off resentfully. I insist he takes me to the hotel. He crouches, shaking his head, so he doesn't know what to do with me. I can see over his shoulder, right behind him. Why at the museum? Why does he keep saying otherwise? I look at him.

I blink and look again. It's the man in the cage cell, the one I captured in that terrific photograph. I blink again, shake my head. He's my driver. But how? I squeeze my eyes shut because I can't bear the thought that they're lying to me. He touches me. Again, it's gentle.

Feather light. And from the touch, I get just enough courage to open my eyes. It's still him. The guy in the cell. I'm okay, he says. Then he smiles, stands up. When he steps back, unblocking my view, I can see the wide stone-framed entrance.

to the hotel. There's the comical red rug, the imitation marble stairs. I get out of the taxis staring. There are real people entering and leaving the lobby. I turn to the driver who smiles and tells me that everything will be okay now, but I'm not looking at the guy in the cage anymore. It's just the driver. Fumbling in my pocket for some money to pay him, I find a note and offer it, but he refuses. He says thank you several more times than gets back into his cab and drives off. He told me everything is okay now. I might be able to believe that, but it'll take some time. Two weeks later, after returning home and recovering from my unnerving trip,

I hear my wife calling me in a strange, shrill voice. She tells me my photographs have arrived from the developer, then asks if some of them were taken a long time ago, way before the trip to Vietnam. I tell her no and ask why. In reply, she holds one out to me with a trembling hand. I take one look and can't believe my eyes. The photo of the man standing against the wall at the prison

is my father, who had died 60 years ago, at what was referred to as the Hanoi Hilton, the harshest of the Vietnamese POW camps for your bonus episode creepy presents The Things We Must Do

Written by Nikki Brumback and narrated by Alicia Atkins For what it's worth I did try to warn you Now there's no need for such language I know it isn't polite to say I told you, but a foul mouth isn't really tolerated in these parts. I told you that, too, remember?

Back when you first moved in here? I suppose you have questions. I would, too, if I was in your place. Now, if you had listened, this would have been a much more pleasant conversation. Tradition dictates that newcomers don't get lit in on our secrets until after their first Halloween. All would have been explained in the safety of a sunny, autumn day on the 1st of November. I suppose where you come from, they don't hold much space for tradition. You city people, you bury your heads down and keep moving.

Like ants in a way. I admire that about you, really. But it's foolish to forget the dangers that lurk all around us. You tuck yourselves into your... tiny apartments and convince yourself that you're safe. The lock on the door and the soft light of the lamp will keep all the monsters at bay. Isn't that right? Well, you're not in the city now.

And us mountain folk, we remember. No one knows how long the thing's been out there. It takes the form of a woman, but it's not a woman. Not really. Some believe the thing is the mountain itself. It shows itself in a form we might recognize, but it's not quite right. There's something off about it. It's in the way the thing moves, I suppose.

No one who's ever seen its face has ever survived to tell us about it. That's what I think it is, at least. It makes sense, right? These Appalachian Mountains, we've made our homes on their back. and for everything they've willingly given, we've taken a hundred times over. How much did we think we could take? We stripped the trees from their sides, exposed their insides with explosives for the coal that lies beneath the surface.

We're like vultures, ripping flesh from the bone, and offering nothing in return. Or, maybe more accurately, Parasites, squirming beneath their rocky, skin. For centuries now, we've been chewing on their corpses, sucking down the marrow and belching the thick black smoke of their remains into the sky. Why did we ever think we could get away with that? How could we be so complacent as to blind ourselves to the consequences of our actions? Still, there are more that believe that it truly is a woman. I suppose that wouldn't be terribly unlikely. Back when we first ventured into these hills, there was, well, we did some things we

shouldn't have. It would be easy to defend ourselves by saying that we knew no better. Our ancestors thought they were protecting their homes when they strung those women up. Witches. Bring the devil with them, you know? That's what they believed, at least. Those girls? Because that's what they really were, barely more than children. Dance naked with him below the light of the full moon, and write their name in his book. In return, he uses his wicked ways to torment the innocent, the God-fearing, on their behalf. Whatever it is, it makes a demand of us. It doesn't ask for much.

Just one night. A single night of peace and offering. In the past, this was traditionally just on the first full moon after the last harvest. Over time, it became a ritual observed on Halloween night, and the thing obliged us on our eccentricity. Maybe it never really mattered what night it fell on, just so long as it happened in this period of transition. The bit of life left over from summer is fading into nothingness.

The cold air has swept in, and the leaves of turn. falling to rot below our feet. So, as I told you when your family moved in, we don't celebrate Halloween here. It may not be written in the law books, but it is the one rule we all obey upon punishment of death. The commercialism that we see at Christmas and New Year's, it can't touch this day.

The thing will not accept any idol before it. It will not accept you making a might, of its holy day. You would bring down its rage on all of us. And I know, I know, you meant no harm. Just a few decorations, right? Just something to amuse the kids. And maybe they'll stop being so bitter about the move out here to the middle of nowhere.

It's a nice thought. Stop it. You'll only hurt yourself pulling at those ropes. I wasn't threatening your family. No harm will come to them. The thing, it only needs one, to suit the anger. Your wife and kids will be taken care of when you're gone. Think of this as protecting them.

You don't want to know what the thing is capable of, but we do. That thing, when it's angry, its anger burns steady and long. Our ancestors learn this the hard way. You see, you're not the first person to think that all of us was just some town full of uneducated, superstitious simpletons. The last time, back of my grandfather's grandfather was still just a boy, a preacher rode into town and settled down by the creek. His place has long since crumbled. But if you've been down there, perhaps you've seen the remains of a fireplace.

That's all that's left marking the spot. That year, the preacher convinced some folks that to lay out our offerings and light our candles was towing the line of devil worship. We'd bring the wrath of God down on us for the sin of it. But maybe God doesn't exist. Maybe he approved. Or maybe? Maybe the thing is just older and more powerful.

Because the wrath that has never come when we paid proper tribute, it came from the mountains that year. It rolled over us. us like a fog, sweeping in through the cracks and filling our lungs. It stole the breath from our children and our cattle. It poisoned our crops. People started dying quicker than we could dig plots. And when the next autumn rolled around, we knew what we had to do. Our ancestors, they did exactly what we're doing now.

They set up a pole, and they chained that preacher to it. His blood was worth so much more than any chicken, goat, or pig. The next summer, our gardens flourished, and our town thrived. Now, I won't pretend it's not tempting to make an offering like that every year. But we're simple, folk. We don't need much. We don't make offerings to get more than what we deserve. And we ain't cruel.

We aren't asking for luxury, just harmony. Peace. We'll do what it takes to preserve them. The sun is going down. It's almost time. You got anything you want me to tell your family? They're pretty torn up. And maybe some words of comfort would...

Really? You still don't believe it. Well, fine. That's all right. No reason for you to be concerned, then, is there? As far as you know... The sun will rise tomorrow morning, and someone will come and turn you loose. Maybe it's best you take comfort in that.

You hold on to that hope till it comes for you. Either way, I'll pass on your love to your family. I'm sorry, friend. I really did try. For more information on this podcast, including how to submit your own story for consideration, please visit creepypod.com. You can also follow us at creepypod on social media and YouTube. All stories told on this podcast are done so through Creative Commons Shera-Lite licensing

or with written consent from the authors. No portion of this podcast may be rebroadcast or otherwise distributed without the express written consent of the creepy podcast production. team and the story's author.