Creepy - Day 31 - The Devil's Toybox

Episode Date: October 31, 2018

How long could you last?***Written by Joel Farrelly***Check out more from Rick Coste at modernaudiodrama.com***Find more from Joel Farrelly HERE***Please consider supporting the podcast at Patreon.com/Creepypod or creepypod.com/support***You can also subscribe to us on YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQ3SrH_3fsROXFAjomKcUtw***Produced by Rick Coste***Title music by Alex Aldea***Intro/Outro Narration by Joe Stofko Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

All right, up first. If you enjoy this episode, please check out modern audio drama.com. It's the website of today's guest producer Rick Coast, who you've heard on previous episodes of creepy, including fan favorite No End House. He's a creator of so many great podcasts that you need to check them all out for yourselves. Rick's a great guy and an asset to the audio drama community.

Secondly, if you like today's story itself, please check out more from the author, Joel Farley, including his novel from the obscenely strange case files of dead things Mikey i added the link in the show notes no finally what a lot of you've been waiting to hear the winner of the creepy podcast logo design contest we got so many more entries than i ever expected it actually became a really hard thing for me to deal with i didn't expect anywhere near the turnout and it bums me out that we're only picking a single design That said, congratulations to the winner of the contest, Brett Rap. If you check out creepypod.com, Brett's design is number one on the contest page,

which is purely a coincidence based on when I actually figured out how to make a gallery on the website. Brett's design was chosen for a combination of reasons, including the clean simplicity of the artwork, our ability to easily use it on shirts and other promotional items, and the familiarity with her previous design. We also selected the design from Jeff Zornow, number 62, to use as a background art for our website. I cannot emphasize enough how difficult a decision this was. There are a dozen designs I would have loved to have used for a logo. You'll have so much talent, I'm utterly blown away.

To do some small attempt at returning the favor on the effort, what I'd like to do is keep all of your artwork up on the website as a gallery of sorts for people to see who might be interested in getting their own podcast logo, our commission, or whatever. So if you'd like me to keep the artwork up on the site, and you'd like me to add your name or website or email to the artwork instead of the numbers, please email me at creepypod.com and let me know what number was yours and what information to add.

Sincerely, from the bottom of my heart, thank you all so much for your submissions. I hope each and every one of you gets a chance to showcase your talent for the world. And that's enough for me. This is it. Day 31. Time flies, huh? Now. This is creepy.

A podcast dedicated to sharing the most famous, chilling, and disturbing creepy pastures and urban legends in the world. Whether these stories truly happened or are simply fabulous. occasions 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 31 The Devil's Toy Box Written by Joel Farrely With guest narration by Victoria

Juan, Danielle Hewitt, Adam Days, Collins Van Gordon, and Molly Langford. The Devil's Toy Box is an urban legend that savier horror fans will recognize as the inspiration for the infamous Lament Configuration from Clive Barker's Seminole Hell Razor series. Though in reality, the titular box is not a toy at all, but rather a small room where the floor the ceiling and the walls are each composed of one giant mirror. According to the legend, if you stood inside this mirror room alone for too long, supposedly the devil would show up and steal your soul. In many versions of this story, he did so by flaying you alive.

I mentioned all this because about two weeks ago, I got an email from an old friend, someone who was well-versed in my sorted past. asking if I could help out their younger sister. An 18-year-old girl who will call Aaron, located in northern Louisiana. The specific parish where Aaron live should go unnamed for reasons that will soon become obvious.

Like pretty much everywhere else, the place where Aaron grew up has its own annual haunted house attraction that went up every October. The attraction was called Farmer Graves Haunted Orchard. And in years past, it had been every bit as thrilling as that name suggested, which is to say, not very. So, for the previous Halloween, the owners decided to spice things up by building several new interactive installations, which included a windowless shack called The Devil's Toy Box. The shack housed a small room composed of large wall-sized mirrors.

That's how Aaron heard it described. anyway. She'd never been inside the toy box herself. Farmer graves closed less than a week after opening, a result of the numerous people who'd been hospitalized after going inside the devil's toy box attraction. Aaron didn't get a chance to try out the box for herself before the closure, but she'd heard countless stories about it from her classmates at school. Apparently, no one could last longer than five minutes inside the room. There was even a large timer set up beside the building that showed the current occupant's length of stay under a second clock displaying the longest recorded time up to that point,

which maxed out at just over four minutes before the attraction finally closed. The man who managed to last that long, Roger Heltz, age 52, father of three, have been reduced to a wide-eyed mute. To this day, he still hasn't said a word. One woman suffered a heart attack after just 90 seconds inside the box. A 17-year-old boy had to be dragged out, kicking, and screaming. The boy was from a nearby parish and hadn't gone to Aaron's school. Though her friend Celeste claimed her parents were friends with the boy's mom,

They went to his funeral when he killed himself two weeks later. Whatever the truth of the matter, town officials were quick to act and getting farmer graves shut down. Of course, that didn't stop people from talking about the now infamous attraction, which they began to do almost immediately. For the next month or so, it seemed like the toy box was the only thing on anyone's mind. And it would come the stuff of legend and a legend. Of course, it didn't take long for the local kids to start venturing out to the orchard at night to see the box for themselves. Farmer Graves' haunted orchard was owned by a middle-aged

couple named Will and Darlene Sawyer. When the town council ordered the Sawyers to shut the place down, they were so pissed about the ruling, they left most of the attractions still standing, including the devil's toy box. The actual orchard was on a plot of land located at the rear of the Sawyer's property and was only accessible by a narrow two-way dirt road. One night, several seniors at Aaron's school snuck out to the Sawyer's property on a dare and claimed they found the toy box's entrance padlocked, but then Will Sawyer showed up out of nowhere and asked them if they wanted to go inside.

Will's sudden arrival had startled the young men, but once they realized that he wasn't mad at them for trespassing, and in fact seemed genuinely happy to see them, the guys decided to take him up on his offer to have a go inside the box. Of course, they chickened out as soon as well unlocked the door, and it seemed to swing open on its own, like a hungry mouth at the sight of food. That's how the rumors of the...

about midnight screenings of the devil's toy box began to circulate. Most of the people who ventured out there afterwards claimed they encountered Will Sawyer after waiting beside the toy box for an unspecified length of time. A few even said they went inside the box, but these claims were always dismissed as bullshit and came out of the box that was coherent enough to talk about it. Last week, Aaron's boyfriend Troy went out there with some of his idiot friends and Aaron hadn't seen him since. his parents reported him missing

and Aaron even told the cops about the rumors surrounding the toy box but they barely seemed to be listening now Aaron was going crazy worrying about Troy and of course she was hoping I would be intrigued enough by her story to come out with her to investigate farmer graves because she was too scared to do so by herself Aaron's location was only a three-hour drive from New Orleans so I asked my friend Jason and his girlfriend Gretchen to take her ride with me.

This way, I wouldn't feel so weird about driving all the way to see an 18-year-old girl I didn't know. We rolled into town at about 5 p.m. that Saturday and met up with Aaron at the McDonald's, as she called it. I laughed when I first heard her say that and immediately felt like an asshole for thinking it was funny that Aaron's town only had one McDonald's. Our meet and greets started out a little awkward on account all the stairs we were getting from the rest of the restaurant. Then again, four strangers driving into town to meet a teenage girl at the McDonald's would do that. Thankfully, Gretchen was there to diffuse a situation with one simple question. Did you make that? She pointed at Aaron's backpack, which was actually a stuffed doll that I recognized as Lumpy Space Princess.

From the cartoon adventure time. Only most of the stuffing have been removed. And a purple pouch had been sewn into it that sealed clothes by a matching purple zipper. Straps were made out of old retro-looking seatbelts. Aaron nodded, and Gretchen's jaw dropped. Oh, my God. Will you make me one? Will you make me two?

Gretchen asked. Sure. As long as you provide the supplies. Aaron said laughing. Deal. Gretchen was grinning ear to ear as she turned to face me. You have to help this girl? So she can make me tiny adorable backpacks.

It was a little after 10 p.m. when we neared the end of the narrow dirt road that led to farm her graves haunted orchard. We parked beside the tall wooden archway that designated the orchard's front entrance. I handed out flashlights from the small stash to them in my trunk, and then we started inside. The place looked about how I expected it. two. A roll of brightly-colored plywood shacks lined a vacant field beside several rolls of Tsushima trees that have been covered in fake cobwebs and scary decorations. Each shack had a sign displaying the name of a different attraction. There was horn toss, which, judging from the illustration on its side, was a ring-toss game where you tried to throw halos onto a demon's

horns. Werewolf bowling, which was anyone's guess, and my personal favorite, the exorcist, which was a mounted squirt gun game that had several wood cutouts linda Blair's face as its targets. Cartoon water tanks were painted below each of the mounted squirk guns that were labeled holy water. The devil's toy box was the last shack in the row. It was painted a bright fire engine red in the door, which made up one entire wall of the small structure, was padlocked shut. Someone had stacked a dozen or so rusted folding chairs against the side of the toy box. Aaron grabbed one of the chairs and began to unfold it, she said. Now we wait.

How long? Gretchen asked. It varies, but hopefully not forever. Aaron motioned at the thick patch of wilderness to our left, and I turned to see a window glowing out there in the distance. in darkness. See it? That's the Sawyer House. They must know we're here.

And that's a good thing? Gretchen's tone was tense, and she had a look on her face that said she just realized how much she didn't want to be doing any of this. Before Aaron or I could answer, she turned to Jason and asked. Baby, will you walk me back to the car? Jason gave her an irritated look. What? Why?

Because all of this just got too real. You knew what? what we were coming out here to do. I explained it to you in vivid detail. Jason, please? No, it's bullshit, Gretch. You do this every time. I know. This is the fucking Avengers sneak preview all over again. I miss everything cool. I'm sorry. She batted her eyes as she gave Jason an adorable frown Gretchen had honed over many years of getting her way. Jason let out an exasperated sign I handed him the keys to the car. I'll be right back. I pulled out a chair and took a scene next to Aaron as we watched the beams from Jason and Gretchen's

flashlights shrink off into the darkness. The thought came to me just then, as if this didn't already resemble an episode of Scooby-Dill. Now we're splitting up. That's just asking for it. As soon as the words crossed my mind, we heard the crunch of approaching footsteps. Aaron and I stood in unison and exchanged a panic glance before she was. turning to face the forest bordering the orchard. A middle-aged man with long scraggly hair emerged out of the wilderness and into range of our

flashlights. He was holding an electric lantern and wearing an open bathrobe over a dirty white undershirt and sweatpants. Will Sawyer was basically Vincent Price if he'd starred in a big Lubowski. He smiled and gave us a thumbs up, as he said. You here for the box? Sort of. And Will gave her a look like he had no idea what that could possibly mean.

Have you seen this guy? I held up the photo of Troy that Aaron had texted to my phone as Will started to approach us. He squinted at the picture. Hmm. Maybe. When was that? A couple weeks back. He was the one that went in the box. Most won't go inside anymore.

It lasted almost three minutes. Then he ran off screaming. Aaron let out a sharp gas. Ran off? Ran off where? Will pointed his thumb back at the dark patch of wilderness behind him and replied. Into the fucking woods! Where you think?

I opened that door and came shooting out and Dick Flabbing naked from the waist down. Had his boxes on his head and his pants wrapped around his neck like a scarf. It was honestly pretty funny. Aaron covered her mouth with her hand as her eyes began to wot with tears. Will grinned and said, You want to see inside? We aren't here for the box. I said, stepping in front of Aaron and glaring a will.

But it's so breathtaking. The man said as he gestured toward the toy box's wide door, which slowly swung open. The interior was shrouded in darkness, but I could still see something vaguely human-shaped moving around inside the box. Yeah, fuck that. Run! I grabbed Aaron by the arm and pulled her along with me as I sprinted away from the toy box. box. I could hear something chasing after us as we ran back toward the orchard's entrance, and I

say something, because it certainly didn't sound like a person. What I heard weren't footsteps, but rather one long scraping sound, accompanied by a wet breathing that reminded me of a panting dog. Thankfully, Jason heard me scream just as he and Gretchen reached my car. They turned to spot me in Aaron running towards them. with identical expressions of pants-shitting terror. Jason most got a glimpse of the thing chasing after us, too, because his own face went pale.

He quickly unlocked my car and threw himself behind the wheel, screaming for Gretchen to get in. She hurried into the passenger seat, and the moment she buckled her seatbelt. He started the engine and accelerated toward us, closing the gap in a matter of moments. Jason slammed on the brakes as he neared. The car screeched to a halt inches away from us.

I went to open the back passenger door, but it was locked. So was there inside. I banged my fist on the window and pointed down at the locking mechanism. Jason mouthed. He turned and scanned the door controls on the driver's side, looking for the master's switch. The scraping sound was growing closer, but I refused to look back and banged on the window once more. A frustrated Jason leaned into the backseat and unlocked the door manually. But by then, I can remember something.

I was drinking me back through the woods. I wasn't aware of much else. Beyond the vague impression that I had been stung by an insect with some kind of paralytic venom, I felt a rush air hit my face as the door swung shut. It came on, and I realized where I was. Inside, the devil's toy box. The room's construction was actually pretty impressive.

The floor was a thick sheet of transparent plexiglo. glass layered over a mirror identical to the ones that made up the ceiling and the walls. With the door shut, the mirror on its other side was just as seamless as the rest. Thin fluorescent bulbs ran between the crevices where each mirror met the next, washing the room and its endless reflections in a pale yellow light. I made the mistake of looking down at the chasm of reflections below me and almost fainted. I shut my eyes and held out my hands. feeling for the nearest wall.

I leaned against it while trying to force my head to stop spinning. Something was whispering my name. I opened my eyes to see my reflection smiling at me as it said. You're here. I let out a startled scream and backed away from the mirror I was leaning against. Something was moving around behind my reflection. It was hard to see what it was at first, but something was climbing up through.

through the corridor of my reflections, making its way towards me. As it got closer, I saw that the something was me. Well, not exactly. His features were too blurred, as if this reflection of me had been so far back that its face had been reduced to a distorted mess. That was the Joel that was coming for me. I began to bang on the entrance wall. which felt padlocked into place. I let out a frustrated scream and finally turned to face the thing coming for me,

only defying my reflection had returned to normal. There was no longer a blurry me in the mirror. I let out a reflexive sigh of relief. A beat later, it emerged from the mirror beneath me and grabbed onto my legs. And Aaron shot me a panicked look. We were still seated outside of the toilet. toy box. Sorry. I must have knotted off. Aaron opened her mouth. She hesitated before replying. I'm worried about your friends. I erupt my eyes. Why? How long have they been gone?

A while. Almost 30 minutes. I pulled out my phone to check the time, confirming what Aaron had said and I sighed. Guess we should go check on them. As Aaron and I started at the path back to, towards the entrance of the orchard. I nodded in the direction of the Sawyer house. You think he's going to show? Aaron thought about it for a moment and nodded. I hope so. If not, I don't know what I'll do.

I glanced at her, worried that Aaron was about to start crying. But the look on her face was when a stoic acceptance. Just as I realized that I was staring at her, Aaron looked up at me and we exchanged a moment of awkward eye contact. I smiled to try and play it off as I quickly faced forward. It was then that I realized we had lost our way in the dark, and it somehow ended up in the dense patch of woods at boarded the orchard.

How the hell? I scanned the surrounding wilderness with my flashlight, trying to get my bearings, but I couldn't locate the orchard or any of its accompanying structures in the darkness. Then, after a bit of what I thought had been backtracking, We found ourselves at the front steps of the Sawyer House. It was a rustic white two-story. Three, if you counted it six-foot elevated, flood-proof foundation similar to a lot of the homes in the area.

The space beneath the porch was unlit and pitch black, yet staring into it. I could have sworn I saw movement under there as Aaron gestured at the house. Guess we might as well say hi. Aaron started up the front stairs before I could even be. begin to mention the many ways in which that might be a bad idea. And, without hesitation, she knocked on the front door. I muttered to myself and hurried up the stairs to stand beside her. There was a tense beat of silence, and then from inside came the sound of footsteps across

hardwood floor. The door was suddenly yanked open and a middle-aged woman with gray streaked hair and the brightest blue eyes I had ever seen, was standing there, glaring at us. This must have been Darlene. You here for the box? She said, giving both of us a cursory scan. I experienced a moment of intense deja vu, as Aaron replied. Sort of?

Darlene leaned outside and glanced around. You better come in then. Erin and I exchanged a cautious look as the woman turned and started back inside, leaving the front door open behind her. Aaron responded with a shrug that said, Fuck it. And then entered the house. As I followed her in and shut the door,

I heard something rustling in the bushes outside. Lock it, please. There's shit all in these woods. Darlene said. The rustling sound grew louder as I turned the deadbolt and it slid home with an ominous thunk. We followed Darlene into a den that reeked a wind that wreaked a weed as she gestured to a half-smoked blunt burning away in the ashtray.

Help yourself. She said, gesturing to the blunt. She took a seat on the sofa and muted the large flat screen TV mounted on the wall in front of her. Now, how can I help you? I cleared my throat and replied. We were told to expect a Will Sawyer. Is he coming? He killed himself last night.

So probably not. Oh my God. I am so. sorry. Yeah. So, how can I help you? Well, I held up my phone and showed her Troy's picture. We were wondering if you remembered seeing this guy at the orchard recently.

Darlene examined the photo. Not that I recall. But I never went out there much after the incident with the toy box. It's my fault that Godforsaken room got built in the first place. And every time I see the thing, I want to fucking cry. Aaron tilted her head, her tone curious when she asked. It was your idea to build the devil's toy box? Darlene slowly shook her head.

No. I was sick. Like really sick. And that demon, or whatever Willie summoned, told him he would make me better if we built a room of mirrors and got people to go inside it. If your friend went in there, I can tell you one of three things happened.

He's either dead, catatonic in a hospital, or out in those woods. The ones that end up out there, something happens to them. Like when a pig gets loose and grows tusks. But if it'll help, you're welcome to look for him here. Here? As in your house? Yeah. Darlene stood, slid her coffee table out of the way, and pulled the rug aside to reveal her cruxed.

crude hatch cut into the hardwood floor. Will brought a few of the ones that went in back home. I think he felt sorry for them. Anyway, he kept him down here. The woman pulled open the trap door and I was hit with a stench that was so potent. I don't know how we didn't notice it when we were outside. It was the smell of human filth and moss. Darling nodded at me.

You got a flashlight? I returned the nod and handed it to her. She switched on a light named it down at the open hatch, revealing the upturned faces of four naked, emaciated men. Any of them look familiar? One of the men hissed at us. There was more rustling sounds from outside, and then something began to scratch at the living room window.

Darling glanced at the window, as she said. You've got them riled up tonight. How long were you two out there? Before I could respond. A filthy hand with impossibly long fingers reached up and yanked me down through the trap door. I was sitting outside the toy box and Jason was seated beside me. He gave me a sideways look and said... You okay?

Yeah. Bad dream. Sorry. I was still reeling from my nightmare within a nightmare as I glanced around. Something felt off. Where are the girls? What girls? The girls.

One of them being your girlfriend, Gretchen? Dude. Gretchen broke up with me like a month ago. Remember? Or is this something you're doing for your story? My what? The story you're going to write about this. You're fudging the details, which you probably should. You're gonna make up some fake reason why we're out here too? Some damsel in distress who needs you to investigate a derelict Halloween attraction?

It's definitely a lot better than saying your depressed friend asked you to drive three hours. drive three hours to see some run-down shack in the middle of the night where nothing whatsoever happened and then your friend shot himself. What? Jason slid the barrel of a handgun into his mouth and pulled the trigger. I was sitting close enough that the shot rendered me temporarily deaf. I stood and slowly backed away. My gaze fixed on the crater of blood and viscer that had been my friend's head mere moments ago.

My own head ringing like a god. God damn church bell from the large caliber handgun going off next to it. Still, finally, I forced myself to turn and watch where I was going so I could hurry up and get the fuck out of there. As I started toward the entrance, I glanced back once more. I gave my dead friend a final parting glance and halted when I saw that he wasn't there. Jason's blood and brains were still splattered across the front of the toy box. So I assumed that meant I hadn't imagined the whole thing. But the folding chair, where he had been sitting, was now void of his slumped lifeless body.

As I stood there, trying to figure out where Jason's corpse could have gone. A stream of statements smelling water splattered against the side of my face. I turned to see Jason's mostly headless body draped over one of the Exorcist's water-mounted guns, I'm not exactly proud to admit this, but I froze when I saw him, thinking that Jason had gone full on undead zombie. Though, after almost a minute of me standing there waiting for him to make the next move, I finally realized that wasn't going to happen. What I was seeing was nothing more than a dead body lying on a mounted water gun,

which meant that someone or something was out there in the darkness, moving around a 160-pound corpse and propping it up on shit simply to fuck with me. That was the realization that finally sent me running. I was in my 91 Jeep Cherokee and halfway down the unpaved road back to the highway when the Cherokee had a bump to dislodge something from its undercarriage. I pulled over and started to get out so I could take a look at what had been. And that's when I realized I was once again looking at Jason's mangled body. Moving a grown man's corpse is one thing

But moving it and then wedging it up into a car's under a carriage In the time it took me to get back to my Jeep That's crazy talk You don't like to give this part much thought Because the truth of it's kind of depressing Real life Jason had been really depressed about to break up with Gretchen And I guess I should have seen it coming And so I went back home and started to write it all down

just as Jason knew I would. I got about this far when I was interrupted by a knock on the door to my apartment. I opened the door and saw there was a note taped to the outside. There's a package for you in the lobby. It was about 11 p.m., and I was pretty sure the management of my complex had long since gone home for the evening. When I headed toward the lobby anyway out of sheer curiosity, I started down the step. Leapes leading to the first door in my complex to see Jason's mutilated body leaning against a coke machine at the bottom of the stairwell Somehow they had phoned me. I vaulted back up the stairs seeing everything in slow motion as I sprint into my apartment and locked the door

The knob began to rattle as someone tried to turn it from outside I was slowly backing away from the door when something big crashed through it No, longer my front door, but rather the inside wall of the toy box that suddenly buckled inward to reveal a familiar set of headlights. Jason had crashed my Cherokee into the side of the toy box. I spent 25 seconds inside the devil's toy box. That's how long it took for Jason to run my car into it. The Cherokee was still drivable afterwards and we probably got the fuck out of there. I dropped Aaron off at her house with an apology, explaining that there was nothing else I could do if you expected for me.

This isn't super natural. If your boyfriend's missing, you call the cops. Do I feel bad that I couldn't help her? Sure. But for what it's worth, we disabled the toy box. and probably save countless generations of dumb kids from making the same mistake as Aaron's boyfriend. The bad news is that doing so has almost certainly scarred me for life.

Even as I sit here days later, writing all this down for the second time, I'm so worried that it's not over. I'm worried that when I wake up tomorrow, it's going to be in front of that God. Damn box. For more information including pictures and

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