Scary Horror Stories by Dr. NoSleep - I Explored An Abandoned Sanatorium

Episode Date: December 28, 2022

🎧 Check out The SCP Experience podcast here: https://spoti.fi/3juM1og 🎉 Ad-free episodes + bonus episodes: https://www.patreon.com/drnosleep 🎥 YouTube: https://youtube.com/c/DrNoSleep �� Send all advertising inquiries to: [e-mail] Author: John Beardify Check out more of his work Here: https://www.reddit.com/user/beardify/ New Book Release Here: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09QJXLHF4 DISCLAIMER: This episode contains explicit content. Parental guidance is advised for children under the age of 18. Listen at your own discretion. #drnosleep #scarystories #horrorstories #doctornosleep #truescarystories #horrorpodcast #horror Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to aboard Via Rai. Embarked and profite. Embarque and celebrate. Rigolet. Publiere. Savoy. Admire.

And, and enjoy. Viarai, the voice that we love. Talk to nicely. Before getting into the story, I'd like to thank my newest supporters, Juan, Jordan, and Vanessa.

If you'd like to receive access to my archive of over 50 bonus episodes and early access to podcast episodes, the link is in the description below. Sanatoriums, isolated, abandoned wellness centers from another age. For most people, they are a concept synonymous with horror. They call to mind nightmarish images.

Huge furnaces were solemn-faced nurses burned, infected human corpses, manacles that once chained mental patients to walls. Bizarre black and white photos of freakish treatment. long discredited by science. The most famous of them have seen a parade of historians, urban explorers, ghost hunters, and hobos pass through their crumbling arches. They've been transformed into movie sets, haunted houses, and even tourist attractions. Whatever fear the most famous sanatoriums once held is long gone. But there are others. The wealthy have always had secret, well-hidden spots to lock away their sick and insane.

And such places were my specialty, not for curiosity or for research, for profit. A very small but very interested market will pay top dollar for a 150-year-old straight jacket, a tuberculosis-stricken aristocrats rotting suitcase, even used surgical instruments. The more personal the artifact, the higher the finder's fee. I always made a point to take as much as I could, as soon as I could.

Nothing stays hidden for long in the information age, and better me than someone else. It's not like the dead need their possessions anymore, and besides, I don't believe in ghosts. If I did, I wouldn't have lasted ten minutes in this business. Those old sanatoriums play tricks with a man's mind. The beam of a flashlight can make the shadow of a spider or rations. appear monster-sized and horrific. Every movement shakes loose shrouds of dust and detritus. The empty hallways transform creeks and echoes into whispers,

or the sound of approaching footsteps. Then, of course, there are the physical dangers. Collapsing ceilings, psychotic drug addicts, even wild animals, as a colleague of mine discovered. He was found half eaten near the entrance of an abandoned man in Romania. A trail of his chewed-up intestines led backwards into the darkness. He'd been mauled and half eaten by a pack of dogs. Or at least, that was the coroner's explanation. I never went into such places unequipped, but nothing could have prepared me for what I found

in Eagle Ridge Sanatorium. I can't bring myself to reveal the true name or location of the place, except to say that it's in the eastern United States in one of those old wooded valleys where the nation's true rulers keep their hunting grounds and summer houses. Few people know of its existence, let alone where to find it, and the wealthy landowners nearby like to keep it that way.

Private guards patrol the valley road, searching for trespassers and illegally parked cars. Ivy covered fences, brought iron gates, The latest security systems protect the estates themselves, including Eagle Reg Sanatorium itself. Although it isn't clear exactly who pays for the upkeep of its security system, its many acres have become so overgrown during the past century that the sanatorium's true location can only be found on a few century-old maps.

I had one of them with me when I hiked across the hills into that near-forgotten valley. By doing so, I hoped to avoid the private guards and security systems alike, but I never was much of a Boy Scout. I lost my way and had to retrace my steps several times. The truth is, I stumbled onto the correct property by sheer dumb luck. At least the valley and fall was a pretty place to get lost in. With its century-old trees, clear streams, and misty meadows, I could understand why those who knew about such a pristine,

location would want to keep it their little secret. I'd been afraid that I'd find guard dogs or some other unpleasant surprise once I reached the high barbed wire fence of the sanatorium grounds. But there was no movement apart from wind and the dying leaves. The trees had grown up next to Eagle Ridge itself, a beautiful sea-shaped building done in the Art Nouveau style that was so popular at the start of the last century. I could see why it had seemed like the perfect country retreat, a place where the wayward children of the elite could recover their fragile health or sanity.

The sanatorium sea-green paint had flaked away with time. It fell like the leaves of the trees that grew through the building's broken windows. The gaps in its once colorful roof tile reminded me of hammer-smashed teeth, and as I stepped onto its column to patio, I felt a chill run up my side. spine, a sort of premonition. I suddenly felt sure that if I walked into Eagle Ridge Sanatorium, I wouldn't come out as the same man if I came out at all. I exhaled, turned on my flashlight, and reminded myself that it was just a building, a building that had the potential to make me very, very rich. As far as I knew, no one had been inside Eagle Ridge since it had closed suddenly under

mysterious circumstances in 1912. As an exclusive invite-only institution, it had never appeared in public record. The long silence of the years and the private security firms nearby had seen to it that the place was almost completely forgotten. Its doors had once been glass, and when I stepped through their hollow frame into the lobby, there wasn't a single broken bottle, hobo campfire, or word of graffiti to be found. It was a little unnerving, how intact everything was. From the antique cash register to the heaps of moldering blankets on their brass trolley, it felt

like the occupants of Eagle Ridge Sanatorium had only just left. Unfortunately for me, they seemed to have taken all their belongings with them. After crossing the faded mosaic floor of the lobby, I had three choices. I could continue down the corridor, descend to the spa rooms in the basement, or take the stairs up to the living quarters. The high-ceilinged rooms of the first floor looked empty and unpromising, and there was something about the dripping darkness of the dark stairs that I didn't like at all. Surely there was nothing of value down there. I proceeded up to the living quarters, 30 empty rooms, all disturbing in their sameness.

Each one featured a single bed, a dresser, a desk, and a chandelier. There were no padded walls or radiator chains here, but nor were there any signs of life. No old coins hidden in a tobacco tin. No black and white nudes stuck beneath bed frames. No gold-buttoned vests forgotten at the bottom of a wardrobe. It made me wonder exactly what sort of people had stayed at the sanatorium. And why?

I'd never found any mention of the Eagle Ridge treatment in what little information I'd been able to find, and that little detail suddenly felt very, very important. They're still here, a little voice in the back of my mind whispered, they're going to come marching in rows up that double staircase, and when they find you here, I shook my head, trying to snap myself out of it. After all, I'd only explored the second floor so far. Maybe I'd find some surgical instruments in the rooms downstairs. Or in the spa and sauna rooms at the basement.

I shuddered. The thought of going down there, among tubes of black water and moldy tile tunnels, filled me with indescribable dread. Maybe that's where they're all waiting. More to quiet such irritating thoughts than anything else, I began searching for hidden compartments. Eagle Ridge was a place for the elite, after all. a class of people who often kept a secret stash of gold or jewelry to use for gambling or for bribing the staff.

I was comforted by the hollow echo of my knuckles on the wooden furniture and plaster walls. They reminded me that I was alone in the derelict sanatorium, and after my earlier jitters, that was a pleasant thought. I walked from room to room, feeling around and tapping in the most likely places, on the underside of desk. drawers, behind the medicine cabinet, or beneath heavy furniture. The quiet beauty of the place was striking, but only deep into my curiosity about what its purpose could have been. Eagle Ridge was too open and pleasant for an insane asylum, yet too sterile and impersonal for a convalescence ward. What on earth happened here? I was still wondering when I began to notice an uncomfortable pattern. Sometimes, when I knocked on the wall, I thought I heard something knocking in reply

from the depths of the sanatorium. I knew from experience that it was most likely rats or air in the pipes, but still. Finally, I hit pay dirt. The wall behind a bed in the 20th room sounded hollow. I wasted no time battering open the little compartment, but to my disappointment, it contained only an old leather-bound book and writing materials. A cloud of dust rose up when I sat on the bed and began to flip through what I'd found. It appeared to be some kind of diary. January 14th, 1912. I suppose I always knew that my father was a powerful man, a man who could have others locked away, who could play the law like a piano to deprive those who displeased him of their rights and autonomy. I simply never imagined.

he would do such things to me. I admit that my mouth seems to speak on its own at times, and I often fail to behave as I ought, amongst proper company. But I am not mad. What my father hopes to achieve by sending me here, I cannot imagine. We aren't allowed to bring anything with us, not even our clothes. The sanatorium provides everything, from toothbrushes and soap to the ridiculous white pajamas were expected to wear. Such a uniform makes a man feel like a prisoner,

or a lunatic. At first I feared that I would be subjected to any number of other humiliations at Eagle Ridge. That rough-handed nurses might swaddle me in blankets, or force me to swallow strange purgatives. But there are no locked doors at Eagle Ridge. We are free to come and go as we please, because even if we left, where would we go? Our families have stripped us of our legal independence. There is no need for gates or walls, because our prisons are something we were born with. I dare not share these thoughts with the others.

Their greatest aspiration is to receive the blessing of Dr. Fernier and return to their inheritances. It remains to be seen if the good doctor will be capable of treating me, but I doubt it. I felt a twinge of sympathy for the nameless author of the journal, whoever he was, but that wasn't why I kept reading.

So far, the diary was my only lead. Getting to Eagle Ridge had taken considerable time and expense, not to mention risk, and I hated the idea of going home with nothing more than a sad little notebook. January 12, 1912, Nothing about this place is what I expected, beginning with the good doctor herself. Dr. Fernier is a woman, and after all the money my father pours into the campaign against universal suffrage.

At first it struck me as rather unseemly that a single woman should be alone with 30 male patients on an isolated country estate such as Eagle Ridge. But there is something about Dr. Charlotte Fernier that inspires confidence. Perhaps it's her eyes, blue-grey in color, as deep and cold as the North Atlantic. Or perhaps it's her severe blonde bun, white coat, and perfect posture. But I am inclined to think that it's her touch, when Dr. Fernier put her hand on mine and told me that recovery was possible. I believed a doctor for the first time since I was a child. After so many years of veiled therapies and medicinal cocktails, all meant to make me my father's version of normal.

Nevertheless, I must admit my confusion about what treatment at Eagle Ridge actually entails. We rise at dawn and break our fast with mineral water from the spring that flows beneath the sanatorium. I have yet to enter the spa area myself, but Dr. Fernier assures us that the same. special properties of its waters are a vital part of the healing process. Dr. Fernier then leads us in group stretches. Once finished, we work in the garden and cook a meal with the vegetables we harvest. There are no servants at Eagle Ridge, and I must admit, I felt rather degraded the first time I found myself chopping potatoes and scrubbing pots like a common kitchen boy. In the evening, the doctor takes us on a rambling, silent walk around the grounds.

By the time we return and drink our second glass of mineral water, the sun has set, and we follow it into slumber. February 2nd, 1912. I saw something uncanny last night. Although I blush at the memory of it, I feel I must record it, if only to convince myself that it was more than mere fantasy. I had just awoken from a strange dream.

In it, I floated high above my sleeping body, watching myself twitch in turn and fitful sleep. As I did, a horrific worm, the color of shadow, squirmed across the floor, up the bedpost, and onto my pillow. Although it was as long as my forearm, it somehow slithered into the ear of my body down below. I shouted desperately, trying to force my sleeping self to wake.

But as always in such dreams, my screams were silent. I woke with a hoarse throat and pounding heart, and afterward found sleep impossible. I was standing in front of the window, admiring the pale quiet of the snowy woods in the moonlight, when I heard footsteps approaching down the corridor. A madness of fear took hold of me, although I knew not why.

and I pressed my back against the wall until the sound passed by. Whoever or whatever was out there, I didn't want it to discover me awake. The footsteps were accompanied by a peculiar smell, the same earthy yet clean scent that I associate with the mineral water here. I dared to peek out into the corridor, where I saw Dr. Fernier. She was unclothed. The moonlight turned the water droplets falling from her bare skin into diamonds that shattered on the cold tile floor.

She entered a room I recognized as belonging to Richard Cleborn III, the heir to some Kentucky politician. Moments later, the man himself followed her into the corridor and down the stairs. It was as though he were sleepwalking. For a mad second I thought to follow them, but reason prevailed and I crept back to. bed, with no more proof of what I'd seen than the fast drying footprints on the tile. February 5th, 1912, I suppose I should be unsurprised by Richard's absence, after the scandalous

sight I witnessed in the corridor. Apparently, he left us before dawn that very day. Perhaps Dr. Fernier dismissed him to avoid a conflict of interest with a patient, or perhaps she simply wishes to avoid a scandal. One might imagine that such an experience would call into question the good doctor's professionalism. Yet, I cannot doubt the effectiveness of her course of treatment.

I feel healthier, stronger, and better than ever before. Who knew that there was such satisfaction in walking quietly through nature, in working with one's hands, in seeing the fruits of one's labor? What a difference from my father's drunken hunting? hunting trips and endless social events.

I expect I shall have to return to that world in time. But after spending time here at Eagle Ridge, feel confident that I will be able to bear it with grace and a calm heart. March 8th, 1912. I am amazed by how quickly the days pass here. The seasons change, and I feel myself change along with them. I have finally begun the spa treatment. The core of Dr. Fernier's method of therapy.

The water bursts steaming from the earth, and as I soak in its warmth I can feel the strength and flexibility return to my muscles. Dr. Fernier accompanies us one-on-one during these sessions, using bars to stretch us, and high-pressure jets to massage us. Although the swimming suits she wears is perfectly modest and professional, I must confess that the scent of the water

calls to my mind that night, barely a month ago, when the doctor was bare before my gaze. More often than I would like to admit, I have stayed up long into the night, longing for a repeat of that dreamlike night. Just recently, I got my wish. Once again, the moon was full, although hidden by clouds. As before, Dr. Fernier passed unclothed to the room of one who had completed their course of treatment. In this case, it was Fred Akinridge, the brother of an industrial tycoon. Fred followed her down into the darkness,

and by morning, he was gone. I scarcely dare to hope that descending to the spa by night with Dr. Fernier is a sort of graduation ritual, a final goodbye to Eagle Ridge. Perhaps the good doctor even intends for us to discover her secret, has additional motivation for us to complete her course of treatment.

Fan of soccer, you could assist a moment historic. You could gain the bid for the final of the Cup of the World of the FIFA 2006 with Visa. It's just to have a card of credit visa BMO for participate. Inscribe you at BMO.com bar-oblique concourse. The reglements of the concourse is applicable. If so, I hope my own time will come soon. April 23rd.

1912. When will my turn come to leave Eagle Ridge? Dr. Fernier tells me that proper healing of the mind, body and soul cannot be rushed. But I am sick of waiting. It should be me whom she visits on the night of the next full moon. I fear I am becoming obsessed with Charlotte Fernier, and that if I do not leave this place soon, this absurd schoolboy infatuation will destroy all that I have achieved here. In her presence, I find myself reverting to the person I was three months ago. A babbling fool, an imbecile who cannot control himself. I am ashamed to admit my obsession even led me to violate the good doctor's privacy. Now that the weather is warming, Dr. Furnier leaves the window of her study open slightly. From the garden, it was all too easy for me to slide it open a bit wider

and climb inside. I don't know what I was searching for exactly. A token, perhaps, or a memento. A bit of titillating personal correspondence. Instead, I found only a handsome, wood-carved desk, medical instruments, books. I snapped the journal shut. Books? Medical instruments?

It was exactly what I'd come for. I could barely keep the grin from my face as I hurried down the same. stairs in search of Dr. Fernier's office. The spicy story of late-night affairs in a sanatorium might even make that old diary worth something, I thought cheerfully. There were no nameplates on the doors, but whoever had written the diary had described the study as a corner room touching a garden. I'd seen what looked like an overgrown vegetable patch on the left side of the sanatorium during my approach. The nameless author had claimed that there were no locked doors at Eagle Ridge, but the door at the left end of the hallway was bolted shut, dustless and almost polished looking.

It was also in better condition than any of the others. Ignoring that strange fact, I wedged my crowbar into the door jam and forced my way in. What I saw inside left me speechless. It was all perfectly preserved, like nothing had changed since 1912. My hands moved by themselves, shoveling one pristine, century-old antique after another into my bag. Just as the diary described, the walls were lined with elaborately carved bookshelves, and some of the books were written by the good doctor herself. Early medical texts often included an image of the author in the first pages. Eager for a look at the woman I'd read so much about, I flipped through one at random.

There was indeed a black and white photo of Dr. Charlotte Fernier. A stout, middle-aged woman with curly hair and penetrating eyes. With trembling fingers, I reopened the journal and continued the entry marked April 23, 1912. Of course, I was immediately overwhelmed by a feeling of shame and foolishness. I clambered back out of the same window I had entered. And as far as I know, my imposition was not discovered. But such incidents must not continue.

I must convince Dr. Fernier to allow me to leave. May 1st, 1912. Impossible. The unfairness of it! Over the patch of potatoes we were digging in the garden. That actor's boy, Arnold Sykes, confessed to me that he will be leaving tomorrow. Him instead of me!

And after all I've done to convince Dr. Fernier that I deserve to be this month's special dismissal. I've spent hours. soaking in that wretched mineral water, forced myself to socialize with the other boorish inmates of this miserable institution, and even helped Dr. Verniate to catalog her library. Oh yes, she laughed lightly and batted her eyelashes at me then.

But now? Now she tells me that my time has not yet come, and takes that moronic Sykes boy instead. I will not stand for this. I know her shameful secret, and tonight, I shall expose it to the world. My dear author, it seemed, had gone off the deep end.

The date, however, triggered something in my memory. Hadn't Eagle Ridge closed forever on May 2nd, 1912? Unfortunately, the following pages of the anonymous diary were blank. I felt a nervous knot growing in my stomach when I set it down and continued exploring Dr. Fernier's study, although I couldn't have said why, not then, anyway. Maybe the primal part of my brain was already hard at work, connecting dots and putting together pieces, but I didn't realize the truth until I found the hidden compartment inside

Dr. Fernier's desk. When I touched the inner underside of its top drawer, a heavy black volume fell into my hands. I couldn't have said what material it was covered in, only that it was unlike anything I'd ever touched before, and that I'd rather die than touch it again. When I yanked my hand away, the repulsive tome fell open to a random page. The illegible writing made my head hurt just looking at it, but the images and charts were clear enough. They were clearly the research notes of another female doctor, a doctor who discovered

an underground spring that was home to sentient, worm-like creatures. The black worms, as she called them, improved longevity and empowered the mind. Unfortunately, as her charts demonstrated, they often killed their human whose body they entered, unless that human had ingested enough mineral water to make them a suitable host. As I stepped away from the horrible book, my fingers grazed the anonymous diary. I snatched it up and flipped through its blank pages, desperate for an answer, but there were no more entries. There were, however, seven words scribbled in capital letters on the last page. not what she seems and they never left it was around that time that the tapping from the pipes began again a terrible realization struck me

what if all of the private security and fences weren't for keeping intruders like me out but rather for keeping something else in i dropped the journal and fled dr ferney a study my boots skidded on discarded papers and dead leaves as i ran for the exit in the corridor the shout of lengthened. I'd spent so much time flipping through that old diary that it was almost twilight already. I no longer cared what treasures I might leave behind at Eagle Ridge. All I wanted was to get home in one piece and forget I'd ever heard of the place. Up ahead, I could see the last of the afternoon light pouring in through the shattered main doors. Soon, I'd have the staircase and that blackened, dripping spa corridor right beside me, told myself childishly, if you don't look, nothing will be there. Of a choice, I was almost to the lobby when she walked out in front of me, just as I knew

she would. Her white, almost translucent skin made me think of cavefish and things that live blindly and lightless places. Her tangled blonde hair hung down past her waist, and her blue-gray eyes were indeed, as deep and cold as the North Atlantic. Nude and expressionless, she stood blocking my path. I thought I saw an inky-worm-like shape contort beneath the almost translucent skin of her forehead. She held a long, white finger to her lips, and I saw them all emerging from the dark spa corridor behind her, Richard Cleborn III, Fred Achenridge, Arnold Sykes, and probably the author of the anonymous journal as well. All those who had never left standing pale and naked before me. They found out in a hunting formation.

blocking my escape. I didn't hear the blonde woman's voice in my head. Not exactly. It wasn't like telepathy in the movies, not at all. Instead, an overwhelming, wordless feeling wrung the willpower out of my mind like dirty water from an old dishrag. It commanded me to crawl to the lightless source of the spring below, to become a host for the black worm. With the last of my strength, I tore the rucksack from my back and spun it like a hammer thrower, slamming its bulk into the nearest fish-pail body. The host led out a psychic scream that made my eardrums bleed, where its wrinkled flesh burst.

A black substance that reeked of earth and mineral water splattered onto the mosaic floor. I ran. Whether those things had been weakened by over a century of life in the darkness, or whether it was adrenaline that gave me the strength to evade them, I'll never know. All the artifacts and ever... evidence I'd found were left on the other side of that high barbed wire fence, and I have no plans to go back to retrieve them.

I've discovered that some places are abandoned for a reason, and that those of us who disturb their watchful rest do so at our own peril. Lazzang sur-gellied, puissance-molyne, for 15 minutes. We're doing it's their dojo. Vee the pleasure with the Ojo, the casino in-line,

that proposes the most recent machines-assizant-sou and the games of casino in direct. Profite of 50 tours gratuys on Big Bas Bonanza without exigences of mis and with payments instantanet. Hey, I've gained. Woohoo!

Senture the pleasure. Play Ojo! 108 and plus, 1, 1st, only, exclude in Ontario. 50 tours gratu on the machine to pay bays bonanza.

Depos minimum of $10. Depeas'clock. Veighed to be responsible. The conditions can't apply.