The NoSleep Podcast - NoSleep Podcast S10E22

Episode Date: April 22, 2018

It's episode 22 of Season 10. On this week's show we have five tales about classified confessions, lethal lumber, and sinister spaces. "The Classifieds"† written by Henry Galley and performed by David Cummings & Peter Lewis. (Story starts around 00:02:20) "Driftwood"‡ written by Manen Lyset and performed by Armen Taylor & Peter Lewis. (Story starts around 00:32:00) "What Became of Lavinia Cartwright"† written by S.H. Cooper and performed by Jessica McEvoy & Kyle Akers & Addison Peacock & Nichole Goodnight & Erika Sanderson. (Story starts around 01:08:30) "The Price of Truth"¤ written by H.G. Rann and performed by Nikolle Doolin & Mike DelGaudio & Mick Wingert & Atticus Jackson. (Story starts around 01:25:50) "The Wormhole Past Jupiter"† written by Jesse Clark and performed by David Ault & Erin Lillis & Jesse Cornett & Matthew Bradford & Dan Zappulla & James Cleveland & Addison Peacock & Erika Sanderson. (Story starts around 01:52:30) Click here to learn more about the voice actors on The NoSleep Podcast   Click here to learn more about Armen Taylor   Click here to learn more about Henry Galley   Click here to learn more about Manen Lyset   Click here to learn more about S.H. Cooper   Click here to learn more about Jesse Clark   Executive Producer & Host: David Cummings Musical score composed by: Brandon Boone Audio adaptations produced by: Phil Michalski† & Jeff Clement‡ & Jesse Cornett¤ "Driftwood" illustration courtesy of Jörn Heidrath Audio program ©2018 - Creative Reason Media Inc. - All Rights Reserved - No reproduction or use of this content is permitted without the express written consent of Creative Reason Media Inc. The copyrights for each story are held by the respective authors.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The following audio horror presentation is intended to frighten and disturb. Join us on this dark and unsettling journey at your own list. Because behind these doors, there will be no sleep. Brace yourself for the No Sleep Podcast. It's the No Sleep Podcast. I'm David Cummings. Thanks for joining us. On the show this week, we have five tales about,

classified confessions, lethal lumber, and sinister spaces. It's my pleasure to introduce you to a new voice actor joining us. Armand Taylor can be heard on this week's second tale, and we're thrilled to have him with us. Originally hailing from Seattle, Washington, Armin now finds himself in Los Angeles, locked inside a small padded room, talking to himself in strange voices. Sounds familiar. These voices are very pleased to have made their way to the haunted world of no sleep, where they get to play alongside other strange voices. So very true. As for Armin, well, he's still locked inside that small padded room, which is exactly where the voices want him to be. It's great to have you and your voices with us, Armin. Please give them our thanks. You know, learning about Armin's

acting experience reminds me how fascinating I find the careers of other. voice actors. We all come from such different backgrounds and experiences. We have all done other things and worked other jobs prior to scratching that voice acting itch in our lives. Even me, even though I had a connection to horror long before I had one to voice acting. You know, something I rarely do is talk about my life before the No Sleep podcast. Let's just say that I've had numerous strange encounters and incidents that fueled my love of horror. I won't go into them all today. This is just a little teaser for you. But something I've wanted to bring up on the show for a while is the time I spent working for a certain popular, um, classifieds website. Now, I'll confess when I worked there, I was already well on my way to becoming the horror officianto I am today, and my colleagues, and more importantly, my bosses, knew this.

It was never explicitly stated that I worked the weird ads, but it was. is sort of an unspoken thing. I was responsible for, well, the X-files of this website. Spooky David Cummings, the guy who handles the strangest of the strange, the bizarrest of the bizarre. Most of the time I could explain the ads away and file them under misunderstandings or unfortunately worded, but occasionally I had to assess an ad that left me utterly speechless, unable to find a logical explanation behind it. Other times, well, I had to take it a little further. My non-disclosure agreement with this company is up,

and while I won't be naming them out of respect, I do have clearance to share a few of the more troubling ads I dealt with in my time working there, such as this one. I have omitted some of the personal details and, of course, the pictures that the seller had included, but aside from that, this is the full, and unabridged transcript of a post entitled,

For Sale, Healthy 5-year-old Girl, free to a good home. Our daughter, Amelia, is the sweetest little angel you'd ever meet. We adopted her from a local halfway home when she was just five years old, and we've loved her ever since. She's got long, blonde hair, blue eyes, and the cutest little button nose you ever did see. We've included a few pictures of her at the bottom of the ad.

She's 39.5 pounds and 42.5 inches tall, not to mention very cooperative. I know every parent thinks that their child is special, but there really is no other child quite like Amelia, and the years you spend with her will be the best of your life. That much I can absolutely guarantee. We've had her for over a decade now, and there's not been a day that goes by where we haven't felt as though our lives have been enriched by her presence. She's a very precocious girl, so very smart and eloquent, especially for a five-year-old. These years have just flown by for us, and if you think you can provide for her, you'll know this joy too.

In the interest of full disclosure, there are a few things I should definitely tell you about being Amelia's parent. She's had plenty of moms and dads throughout her lifetime, so she's gotten very good at being a daughter. but I can't say I recommend taking Amelia into your loving home if you've never had a child before. Kids, even kids as sweet and caring as Amelia, can be a real handful sometimes. We adopted her after our previous foster child, Daniel, moved on to his new home. We've looked after many kids over the years, most of whom had been adopted around when they turned five, and we decided it was time to settle down, become adoptive parents ourselves. All our fosters had been young, so we decided to adopt an older child, and by some fantastic

stroke of luck, Amelia was the one to fill the gap in our hearts. You'll find that for a five-year-old, Amelia is quite brilliantly talented at a number of different pursuits. She can paint and write and play music like some Renaissance virtuoso. She tells us that it's because she's had plenty of time to practice, and after a few weeks of being her new parents, we definitely believed her. However, Amelia's greatest talent, the thing that makes her so very special, is that she can tell you things that you haven't thought about in years. On the day we adopted her, she perfectly recounted a weekend I'd spent at Lake St. Clair with my parents when I was her age. It was something that I didn't even remember, but she told

the story like she'd been there, watching it the day before. The nights flew by, a as my wife and I listened intently to our little angel perfectly reciting our old memories of fondly remembered weekends and passionate Friday nights. It was so brilliant at first, and really it still is. She was able to tell us every minuscule detail of memories long forgotten. Of course, more recently, I realized that we had the cause and effect all mixed up. Amelia wasn't telling us about these memories because we'd forgotten them. we were forgetting them because Amelia was telling us about them.

It was amazing, honestly, as though she'd just plucked them from our heads and read them out like words on a page. She did this for some time, and I can't say I remember a great deal now, beyond the memories of our time with Amelia. She took those all away from us. I'll admit that we've slowed down since Amelia came into our lives, too. She was always so bubbly and energetic, always bouncing off the walls, but my wife and I started getting so tired. As the years marched on, we just seemed to shrink and wrinkle and creak. Losing hair, our skin becoming baggy and liver spotted, our joints developing advanced arthritis. We look more like we're 80 than 30.

But Amelia, she always stayed the same. The same beautiful, intelligent, spellbinding, five-year-old girl. We didn't regret giving her our years and our minds. On some subconscious level, we knew she'd use them better than we ever would have, even if she never grows up. We're getting old now, though. All in all, we were lucky to reach 34, but I'm not optimistic about 35. We're too frail, too infirm to take care of Amelia anymore, and we couldn't bear to let her see us whizzing away into total nothingness, that just wouldn't be right for a parent to do that to their child. So please, if you think that you can provide a loving home for our little girl, contact us,

and we'll see what we can sort out. Please don't hesitate. Time is a factor here. No little girl should ever have to live without parents. Please don't contact us with any unsolicited offers or requests. Positions only. Well, let's see. This next little gem was posted in the men-seeking women section, a place typically reserved for harmless perverts and the occasional sex criminal. Normally they're a laugh to look at, and sometimes they're even a little heartwarming. The following ad, titled, In Want of a Warm Body Against Mine, was neither.

After reading it, I reported it straight to the authorities, trying to avoid. avoid having another serial killer headline on our hands, but nothing was ever found. You'd best see for yourself why I did that. Once again, contact details have been redacted. The world is a lonely place, full of lonely people. I take the bus most days, and when I look around, I only see gray, vacant faces looking back at me, wishing to be anonymous, unseen. We're isolated, pushed into cubicles like.

like sad little pills in an elderly woman's Monday to Sunday medication box. Divided. We're all screaming for help in silent voices, speaking different languages, spouting desperate gibberish like we stand around the ruins of the Tower of Babel, praying that one day someone will understand us. I'm so sick of being I, being me, experiencing the dull ache of being alone, eating me like cancer eats children.

What I'm looking for is a woman who's willing to take a chance on becoming us. In a way, most people are far too brainwashed to even consider. Have you heard of Janus, the two-faced Roman god? Unity and duality. Have you heard of the Greek legend that we were all once beings with four legs, four arms, two heads and two hearts, fused together by nature and birth, that those spiteful ones upon Mount Olympus, they feared our power, and so split us all in twain,

condemned us to search the world for our other half, so we can hold each other close and pretend we're one again, like the days before. What I'm suggesting here is very simple. We stop pretending. The technology has always been there, just none of them been brave enough to use it. My fantasy began very simply when I was just a boy, when I put sleeping pills in the family dog's food and bound him to my chest with duct tape. I felt his heart beat against mine, his lungs force out stale air, and for the first time I knew what it was to be whole. But that was so basic, so impermanent, so unfulfilling.

I realized that sewing would be a more permanent way to get what I needed. but the pain would always be too great to follow all the way through with my procedure. When mom and dad died, I inherited our old dog and also bought a new one. When I sewed them together, flank to flank, they experienced some errors in functionality, both pulled in different directions rather than collaborating as they should, and so the skin of the older dog was damaged in the struggle. However, very recently I discovered a method of ensuring perfect, synthesis. Without giving away too much about myself, I teach chemistry as a day job, and so,

naturally, I have a wide knowledge of and interest in various obscure compounds. So when I happened upon a protein agent tested in World War I for the purpose of binding together wounds, I realized I had something. After a generous amount of tinkering, I was able to fuse two mice, before graduating to larger rodents and eventually dogs. If the animals are properly sedated and the chemical is applied topically on the two connecting surfaces of the subjects, then synthesis begins occurring properly within a couple of hours. Eventually, and with continuing doses of chemicals designed to induce a more euphoric effect, the animals are indelibly combined into a greater, happier being.

Of course, being a man of science, I know that the results of animal experiments can't necessarily be generalized to humans, so I took things a step further. Two lovebirds in my class have been experiencing the fusion process in a secure room of my home for the last few weeks, along with the same doses of sedatives and euphoria-inducing chemical cocktails. Both are still alive and healthy, if not technically responsive to outside stimuli. Their joy is more in their inward connection with one another anyway. This, my potential lady love, is where you come in. Having now perfected the procedure, I long to go back to the healthy on days of before our ancestors ever invoke the wrath of the gods.

As I said before, this world is such a lonely and terrible place. But I feel as though if I can just connect with someone, physically, emotionally, spiritually, I can finally find some kind of peace. Of course I'd prefer that you be willing, but it isn't mandatory, so choose fast. As sad as they seem, there are women on my commute whose beauty captures my imagination, should I not get a response on here in time. I can scarcely conceive how beautiful we'd look as one being, but I'm sure I'll soon find out. Please don't contact us with any unsolicited offers or requests.

Well, I'll admit, after the ads about the mysterious child and that last guy's peculiar experiments, the job started to become less fun and more, well, genuinely unsettling. The site was location regulated, so none of the ads were posted ridiculously far away from one another. But the locations provided in the two prior posts were no more than 30 miles apart. I'm no conspiracy theorist, but I felt like there had to be some kind of hidden pattern to these weird, inexplicable advertisements. The post I'll share with you now, with the comparatively innocuous title of Shared Living Environment, New Housemate Wanted, is no exception.

It happened within a 30-mile radius of both of the previous ads, though once again the phenomena presented here appears to be entirely different. This one was posted in the Room's Shared section, an easy way for Woodpe. landlords to rope in some new tenants. While I initially found no clear reason to delete this ad, as sane as it was, it didn't necessarily breach any of our content policies, I received a stern email from one of my supervisors advising me to do so. I'll let you decide why that may have been. All potentially identifying information has been omitted or changed. Hey everyone. Me and my buddy, Trevor, our college student.

renting rooms in a mid-sized suburban home in... It used to be us and our other friend, David, but he's not around anymore, which means a wonderful new living opportunity for you. We'd prefer it if you were enrolled at... Because we'll have more to talk about, but since we can only afford this place when the rent's being split three ways,

pretty much anyone is welcome. Though we're college students, we don't tend to have house parties. The whole environment is pretty chill, aside from the talking room. If you have the cash and are cool with coming to an open house day to check out the room, then we'd be more than happy to get all the paperwork sorted out. You'll be staying in the talking room,

a 17 by 15 high-ceiling bedroom in the top left corner of the house. Don't be put off by the name. It's just something David took to calling it while he lived in there, and the name just kind of stuck. It's got a nice ring to it, don't you think? Trev and I are cool guys, too. Very friendly and easy to get along with. If you like Game of Thrones and watching football, chances are that we'll have a great time together. Of course, you'll have plenty of time to get to know us when you come visit the house.

Okay, I guess now is the time to address the elephant in the room. You've probably heard about what happened to our roommate, David, but let me tell you, all those news reports were grossly exaggerated. I mean, what can you expect from news? newspapers these days, other than sensationalistic headlines and airy bullshit. It's how they sell copies in the internet age. People find it hard to get past the whole number eight cannibal thing. It's true that David's tragic breakdown happened on a number eight bus, but all he did was bite. He never actually ate any of the poor guys sitting next to him, and it wasn't a knife that he put in the guy's eye either.

It was a screwdriver. Oh, the papers can throw around maniac and tweak her all they like. But the reality is that David was a nice guy who never, ever took meth or any of that shit. He just got into an unfortunate situation. Not that I blame the cops for shooting him, though. When a man's out of control, he's out of control. Nothing like that is going to happen to you, though. It's just something that's better out of the way early on,

so our friendship here isn't built on any pretense. Besides, David took up smoking. We told him that the talking room wouldn't like that, that it'd feel the need to hurt him for it, but he didn't listen. We both know that you're going to learn from his mistake if you choose to stay here. See, the talking room is mostly harmless and very spacious. It can tolerate posters, wall art, and the TV at any volume. It just can't abide smoking.

The beauty of the talking room is that it's very spacious. vocal. It gives you plenty of warning when you're doing something that it doesn't like. So far, we know it's mostly offended by smells rather than sights or sounds. So be sure to shower regularly. You don't want it to have a bad impression of you from the outset. David had learned to cope with living in the talking room, but he got too complacent, like someone keeping a tiger for a pet. He forgot that it's naturally a predator, and any moment that it's not fulfilling that purpose is a courtesy. I don't mean to sound all melodramatic here, but you need to know all this stuff if you want to move in with us.

Trev and I wouldn't want you to end up like David for something as silly and minor as an annoying habit. When you move into the talking room, you'll start to hear a little whisper in your head. Like when you're wearing in-ear headphones. It's important to note that you're not going crazy. It happens to everyone in the talking room. And eventually you'll just tune it out and it'll become white noise like everything. else. Sometimes it'll vie for attention, speaking loudly and coherently, and sometimes it can be a little immature, throwing mean personal insults, imitating the voices of loved ones, and dredging up nasty

shit from the past. But you'll learn to ignore that, too. It's really not much of a problem. Honestly, the only thing that you really need to remember, above all else, is to not open the closet door. The talking room will tell you to do it a lot, and boy, can it be persuasive. But you've got to trust us when we tell you that you should stay the hell away from that door. It's bad news, and whatever's behind it is even worse news. The only person who ever opened that door was David, and an hour afterwards, he decided to board a number eight bus. All that aside, we'd really appreciate it if you'd consider living with you. with us. We're cool guys in a cool house with great neighbors, and I guarantee we'll have many

fun nights together. If you're in need of the kind of housing we're offering here, apply fast, because if the talking room gets lonely, whatever's in the closet might try to open the door, too. Please don't contact us with any unsolicited offers or requests. Hmm, weird. Well, look, I won't lie. The chap being called David unsettled me at the time. I remembered reading about that case in the paper, too. Some guy had just started eating another fellow on the bus after stabbing him in the eye with a knife. Although, according to the ad, the details had been exaggerated. He didn't actually eat the other guy, just bite him a lot.

I guess that makes it much better, huh? Anyway, there's one more I want to share with you. It was by far the most unsettling ad of my career there, and the one that caused me to quit, determined to pursue me. my dream of becoming a world-renowned celebrity lifestyle guru. Obviously, that didn't happen, and now I'm a podcast host, but it's always good to follow your dreams. Okay, this article was entitled, I Need Someone to Kill My Baby, Prior Experience Not Required. It featured the text I'm presenting to you here, as well as some very grainy and poorly taken photographs of an infant child.

It was posted in the strictly platonic section before I deleted it for potential causation of child endangerment and handed over all the details to the police. The outcome of the case was not what I expected. Here we go. My baby is not my own. Everyone says it looks like my own, but they don't understand. They've not carried it inside them for nine months. I know when the damn thing is mine. Little Joseph, my real child, was snatched from the maternity ward and replaced with this monster.

I've researched all the details quite extensively, and there are many different names for these usurping bastards, but the one I'm going to use is changeling. My child has been replaced by a changeling. Still, imposter or not, it looks exactly like my darling little Joseph, and I just haven't got the heart to kill it myself. I know that before I can accept the reality of this situation, the changeling needs to be dead and burned. That's where you come in. I've been saving up for months now, and I'm willing to pay you $2,000 to do the job for me.

I really don't care all that much about how you do it. Drown it in a bathtub, cut its little head off with scissors, throw the squealing little bastard into the furnace. I don't care. I just want it out of my life now. because I can't fucking handle it anymore. I don't want to see what you've done or know what you've done. I just want to know for certain that the monster is dead and that I can carry on with my life. You're probably thinking I'm some crazy bitch that I'm the one who needs the help here,

just like everyone else. But frankly, I don't give a fuck about what people think of me anymore. The changeling thinks it can pull the wool over everyone's eyes, but my eyes are open. It won't be drinking my milk or living off my warmth. I won't let this little monster steal all the love and care that was meant to be my little Joseph's. When I was about to come home from the hospital with my husband, the nurse handed me the changeling. Thinking it was Joseph, I took it up into my arms and hugged it properly for the first time. And it felt like a leather sack full of wriggling maggots pulsing against my chest.

I dropped the disgusting creature out of shock, and it started screeching and howling like some terrible animal. The nurses and my husband scrambled over to grab it off the floor, totally unaware, but even then I knew that something was wrong, that this thing was not my child. Part of me was hoping that my husband would see it too, but he never did, and now I'm having to go behind his back. Eventually, my husband's paternity leave ran out, and he had to go back to work. leaving me at home with the vermin. The crying only seemed to get louder once he'd left.

It was fucking maddening, all that bawling and keening that seemed to ooze through the walls. I knew my little Joseph would never torture me like that, like that evil little bastard did. The creature always looked too pale to be Joseph, its eyes too deep, its lips too thin. I refused to feed it, and it just got thinner and uglier as a result.

like I was starving it out of its cunning disguise. My husband called me a monster for doing it. Me, a monster. The changeling had him wrapped around its tiny fingers, him and all the others. It wanted to get me alone. It wanted to drive me mad. At night, when everyone else was asleep, I could hear the changeling whispering to me through the walls.

It had called me a cunt. It'd call me a stupid fucking whore. It knew that I was onto it. It knew that when I heard its deep, labored breaths at night, that those weren't the breaths of a child. They were the breaths of an inhuman monster. The changeling. It wants me to kill myself.

It's told me so many times at night, whispering in its deep voice through the walls. But I won't listen. No, no, not me. That bastard has no power over me. but I need you to strike the final blow for my own sake, for the sake of my own humanity. Like I said, the money is good, and if you're willing to help me with this nightmare, then it can all be yours. But there's a time limit, because if nobody replies to this ad in the next few days,

I think I'm going to have to pluck up the courage to do the deed myself. I'm not going to let this thing drive me crazy. Please don't contact us with any unsolicited offers. Tragic, right? A clear case of post-natal depression causing a mother to see things that weren't there. Yeah, that's what I thought, of course. That's why I reported the post. I had a buddy in the police department back then.

He's... Well, he's not around anymore, for reasons unrelated to, but no less creepy than this instance. He was the one who dropped around. to visit this family upon receiving my report. What they found, well, was not what I'd feared. Indeed, the baby was perfectly healthy. Rosie cheeked and laughing, my buddy said, constantly laughing, he added. The mother, however, was missing. Her husband seemed completely unconcerned about this. In fact, my buddy said he detected a glazed, almost trance-like feel to the husband's tone when he announced that his wife had disappeared,

a fact he'd neglected to report to the cops. Of course, this got my buddy suspicious, and he asked to look around the house. It was in the baby's nursery that he found it. A pile of bones stripped clean, sitting stacked in the baby's crib. Adult female bones, later identified as belonging to the mother.

As far as I understand, The husband was taken into custody, and the baby, well, he was placed into care. My buddy and I agreed, though, they'd gotten the wrong guy many years ago. Sometimes I wonder where that baby is now. I forgot to turn my phone off. Hello, Creative Reason Media, all rights reserved. David Cummings speaking. I roll on today's show and ready to go.

Oh, that's great, Peter. Thanks for letting me know. Just one more thing. That copy of my birth certificate you wanted for, let's see, admin purposes. I'm afraid it's, no, oh, it seems my... Oh, no, no, Peter, that's fine. That's just fine. Not an issue.

You in the next story, then. Yes. Chalk that up to yet another very strange encounter with Mr. Lewis. And I guess I shared quite a bit there. Which reminds me, I need to thank author Henry Galley for reminding me about some of those strange experiences with the classifiance. It's almost like he got inside my head. Well, let's keep on going with our next tale. In it, we meet a man who enjoys walking the nearby beaches in search of washed up branches for his art project.

But as author Manonle set shares, the man finds a strange type of wood, which in turn, leads him to realize that some things are best left undiscovered. Performing this tale are Armin Taylor and Peter Lewis. So if you ever find yourself walking along a beach, think twice before you pick up some drift wood. Art was never my passion. I came into it not because I wanted to express myself, but because I like to tinker. It started off as a hobby, and it became a side job to make a few extra bucks at craft shows. What I do doesn't cost much to make. I mostly use what nature gives me.

No, no, I'm not talking about nude photography. I deal with a completely different kind of junk. I make sculptures out of driftwood. Or, I guess I should say, up until a few weeks ago, I made sculptures out of driftwood. Sometimes hobbies come to a natural conclusion when life gets in the way. Other times, you find yourself standing on the beach almost pissing yourself with fear,

and you realize, you know what, maybe I'm just not cut out for this. In my case, it was the latter. The night it happened, I was scouting out a new beach a bit off the beaten path. Without a parking lot nearby or enough of a clearing to get my car through, it was no surprise I was alone. Granted, most people don't go to the beach mid-November to begin with. Road or no road, I managed to get my four-wheeler and trailer through the brush and onto the sand. It was peaceful and quiet, with small waves gently lapping at the shore and the sun slowly descending towards the horizon.

As far as driftwood goes, I'd hit the jackpot. I'd barely made it a third of the way down the beach and had already packed my trailer to the brim. The only problem was, in my enthusiasm, to pile on as much wood as I could, I'd worn myself out. It was time to eat the meal I'd packed and then call it a night. I straddled my four-wheeler and drove farther down the beach in search of a nice spot to watch the sunset, parking near the biggest piece of driftwood I'd ever laid eyes on.

It looked like the roots of an overturned tree split evenly into two distinct sections, both reaching to the sky. The halves were further split into smaller sections, each still looking strong enough to hold the weight of a child. Okay, touch your wrists together, tilt your hands back, and spread your fingers. That should give you a pretty good idea of what it looks like. The bark was clean and smooth, like it had been sandblasted to perfection. I knew I had to take it home with me.

Even if it meant dumping everything in my trailer to make room for it, it'd be worth it. I'd use it to build my largest most spectacular sculpture yet. My brain was already swimming with ideas. But first, my stomach reminded me with a loud growl, I needed food. I sat on one of the larger branches, using the structure as a hybrid of a picnic table and throne. The wood never budged, buckled, or crackled under my weight. Solid as a goddamn rock. As I ate, I watched the ocean bathing in twilight and smiled to myself, thinking these were the kinds of sights people paid to see.

Yet here I was experiencing it all for free. I was in awe. The sun thin and spread into a shimmery in line stretching across the horizon, blocked only by a single island a few thousand yards from shore. I swallowed my last bite and got back to work. The large piece of driftwood seemed well rooted into the sand, so I expected it to be a challenge to pull it out. This was a job for my heavy-duty work gloves. So I slipped them on before wrapping my fingers around two thick branches. I steadied myself, took a deep breath, and then yanked with all my might.

No movement whatsoever. I let go and circled back to my four-wheel. The roots needed to be dug out. That's all. I rummaged through the driftwood I'd already collected for the shovel at the bottom of my trailer, and then cursed as I sliced my arm open on a sharp branch. There was blood, but the cut wasn't bad enough for me to call it quits. I did, however, wish I had gauze to keep sand from getting in.

Every granule that trickled in stung like hell. I finally pried my shovel free and stopped back to the tree. roots, taking all my frustrations out on the sand by violently scooping out shovelfuls like a dog digging up a bone. I expected to find the two halves of the roots converging into a trunk, but as I continued to dig, the space between them never diminished. A loud crack reverberated over the water, drawing my attention to the island in the near distance. The sound was followed by a few louder snaps as the silhouette of a tree came crashing down on shore and rolled into the depths, forming a large ripple that spread and merged with the ocean waves. Without a doubt, that island

had provided much, if not all, of the driftwood I'd collected. In a few weeks, months, or maybe years, that tree was probably going to wash up nearby and become the base of someone else's sculpture. My biggest mistake that night was not giving any thought to what made the tree fall. There are very few things that can take down a tree of that size, and as I dug my shovel into the sand again and felt the ground start to rumble beneath my feet, I realized an earthquake was one of those things. If it had hit the island first, then the epicenter had likely originated from the ocean. And what's the one place you don't want to be in this kind of situation? The shore. You don't want to be on the shore because often ocean quakes are followed by tsunamis. I dropped my shovel and sprinted

to my four-wheeler, but the quake intensified and I lost my footing, tripping on a small piece of driftwood by the trailer. The sting of sand in my open wound made me scream into the night. I'm sure the water carried the sound far away to some poor schmuck-out fishing who'd never know where the whale of a banshee had come from. As I tried getting back up, I felt something brushing against my legs. In panic, I jerked and looked behind me, letting out a little laugh as I realized it was only driftwood that had rolled off my trailer from all the shaking. More pieces fell and toppled on and around me,

but there was no time to pick them up. I had to get to higher ground. I pushed myself to my feet and brushed grains of sand off my arm, but I could still feel granules in my cut. Then, as though I'd gotten sucked into a shitty slapstick comedy show, I tripped a second time and hit the side of the trailer sending an avalanche of driftwood down to pelt me. The mass was so heavy I could barely breathe.

I felt like I was in the clutches of a boa constrictor. I swiped chunks of wood away with my arms, kicked my heels into the sand, and that's when things took a turn for the abnormal. The drift were cracked and crunched, and I swear on my father's grave, it began moving on its own. The pieces weren't just tumbling from the motion

of the perpetual earthquake. They were coiling around my legs to keep me in place. I did what any sensible person would do in my shoes. Lost my shit. I flail, I screamed, and I might have cried a little, but nothing helped. The driftwood was climbing my legs and holding me down. My feet were going numb.

My cut was aching in pain, and I started feeling inexplicably weak to the point I couldn't lift my head anymore. To make matters worse, the earthquake was getting stronger. It ebbed and flowed as though the beach itself was breathing. From my angle, I saw my throne of driftwood being pushed skyward by something under the blanket of sand. Was this the epicenter? It couldn't be. If it was, then what had happened to the tree on the island? As grains of sand cascaded off the growing mound, I started to see what was trying to tear itself from the ground.

It was long, thick, and made of one of those millions of off-white paint colors you find at the hardware store. Maybe ivory, maybe eggshell, there were deep cuts and grooves along the surface, some big enough to stick a whole person through. It took me a moment to realize what I was looking at, probably because I'd never seen one so big before. But there was no mistaking that elongated snout and stretched inverted heart-shaped hole where its nose should have been. It was a deer skull, and what I thought were the roots of a tree were its antlers. The creature's jaw screeched in protest like rusted hinges as it slowly pried over. open its mouth and let out a loud roar. The driftwood pinning me suddenly snapped back and slithered away like snakes in the grass.

I still couldn't move. I could only watch in terror as the beast tore itself from the ground like a weed plucked from a garden. It was immense, about as long as a school bus and as tall as the highest branch. of an oak tree. In the hollows of its sockets were sizzling bright red embers that tumbled side to side as its head moved. A long, sticky tongue oozing with black drool could be seen between its chipped teeth. Whenever the deer opened its mouth, the tongue would roll out and hang limply over the side of its jaw. There was no flesh on its skull, but frayed patches of leather and tufts of fur clung to the rest of its skeleton.

They hum from its ribs, back and neck, blowing like flags in the wind. Through the bones and shrouds of skin, I could see its still beating heart dangling in its chest, though I couldn't tell you what, if anything, it was pumping. Its muscles were gone, half its organs were missing, and its veins had collapsed, hanging flat like tapeworms. It was a living, breathing nightmare, and it still, stared me down with its literal burning eyes. I don't have any money on me.

What a stupid thing to say. The deer took a few steps towards me. I expected its footfalls to shake the ground in the same way it had when it emerged, but its feet took the sand with the delicate weight of a feather. Its ember eyes cast their glow on me, making me feel like the deer in the headlights. Just beyond the brightness of its gaze, I could see and hear driftwood crinkling and twitching in the bushes. The branches surrounded us and seemed to watch eagerly, like spectators at the Coliseum.

Even if I'd been able to move, and even if I'd been given a sword to fight, I wouldn't have stood a chance in a match against the gigantic undead beast. Best case scenario? I'd die quickly, impaled by its antlers. Worst case scenario, it had used its disgusting, rotting tongue to scrape my flesh away bit by bit like licking a salt hue. The deer bowed its head towards me, and I braced myself for what was sure to be a horrific death. I closed my eyes, took a final breath, and waited. I could feel the deer's hot, wet breath in my hair. I waited

He was sure Taking his sweet-ass time I waited It was still Just breathing on me I waited I couldn't hold my breath any longer I gasped for air and open my eyes

Only to find its face Inches from my arm Our eyes The embers in its eyes grew And cast away the world around me I was standing in the forest. There was something odd about my body. I could tell everything was there, but it didn't feel like it was in the right order.

Like someone had forced mismatched puzzle pieces together. I was me, but I wasn't. I was something else. Something not human. I had become the deer. I was parched. There was a pond up ahead, but something felt off about it. The trees around it looked dead.

Their leaves had shriveled and turned brown, and their bark had broken off and lay scattered across the forest floor. My left ear twitched at the sound of a branch snapping under the weight of a squirrel. The branch and the squirrel came crashing to the ground. The squirrel survived. to the fall. It skittered to the water's edge, leaning in for a drink. I tried to scare it off, but it ignored my grunt. Something black and viscous slithered out of the water and wrapped itself around the squirrel. The rodent bucked and kicked for a few seconds,

then went to limb. I took a few steps back and watched as it decomposed. before my very eyes, leaving nothing but a skeleton behind. The bones twitched and retreated into the forest. The dark tendril snapped towards me, and I quickly ran in the opposite direction. I could hear a slinking along the forest floor trying to follow me, but I was fast and limber. I escaped across the sand bridge to the mainland. I was safe. For now, the infections.

When I craned my neck to look, I'd find the halo of withering trees around the pond had grown larger. One by one, the tree trunks eventually broke, sending a tidal wave of animals fleeing in fear. After a while, only birds were left to flee. Then, even they. disappeared. Something had to be done before it was too late. This was my land, and I was determined to protect it. I'd witnessed the destructive power of fire in the past.

For every tree and bush turned to ash, a new, stronger life grew in its place. Fire killed, fire cleansed, and fire purified. Maybe, I thought, fire could end the plague also. I waited for a storm, for lightning to strike the match. One day, the blessed storm came. Lightning split the sky, setting my world alight. The bolt struck my island, struck one of the dead trees, which burst into flame. Quickly, willing the rain not to come and douse my newfound weapon, I tore a burning branch off a tree with my bare teeth.

I galloped as fast as I could across the sand bridge, careful not to extinguish the flame. This was my only chance to save my domain. The darkness was waiting for me in its forest of bones and decay. It had gotten bigger since we'd last met. It had grown almost as tall as me, but that didn't matter. I had fire to fight it back. A creepy dread in my guts threatened to snuff out my courage, but I kicked off the ground regardless and tackled the darkness,

offing as we both fell. It poiled itself around me like. a snake as I swung the burning branch into its sticky mass. There was no pain, just the overwhelming need to give up and give in. I felt tired, but I fought the urge to let myself sink into the exhaustion. I had the responsibility to protect my land. I couldn't let myself forget that. I used to It has fueled to keep myself fighting through my quickly-dained body. The fire was working. The darkness was weakening, but so was I.

We tussled some more. The flames spread quickly from one dead tree to the next. The darkness shriveled, twisted in agony, and disappeared into its pond. I thought I had won. I should have stayed behind to make sure my work was done, but instead I retreated back to the mainland. I didn't want to die surrounded by flames and bones. I wanted to die near my forest.

I had faith the raging fire would take care of whatever was left of the darkness. Lumping, I trotted. down the sand bridge back to the mainland. I could feel the wind blowing through the gaps in my body and fire gnawing at my flesh. That collapsed on the beach, feeling what was left of my life, draining the way. I looked back at the peninsula and, though I couldn't see the darkness through the sea of burning trees, I could feel its presence lingering in the shadows. I failed. With what was left of my strength, I pushed myself back to my feet and roared.

If I couldn't kill it, I would at least stop it from spreading farther. I reared back and stomped my hooves into the bridge. The sandy path collapsed into the ocean, turning the burning peninsula into a burning island. I surrendered myself to my fate. But death didn't come from me. I couldn't die. I'd become something else. More than just a guardian.

I was now part of the darkness I'd fought. More me than it, but... Still it. connected like a peninsula to its mainland. When the fire died and the dust settled, a new forest grew on the island for the other knee to feed off. I knew I couldn't stop the darkness, but I could and would keep a living.

My cursed half-life protecting my land. from its tendrils. I can feel it in the driftwood. I can feel it in the bones of the unfortunate birds who land on the island. I can feel it in every one of its extensions. I will burn them all. I will not let it get beyond this shore. It is my duty to protect this land. I blinked. Embers sizzled in front of my eyes. The images faded like distant memories as the deer pulled away.

I was exhausted, but I could move again. I was already standing on two feet, though my legs were shaking. What the hell was that? I didn't expect an answer, nor did I get one. The deer quietly turned its head. and looked at the island. I followed its fiery gaze. If I squinted just right,

I think I could see something moving through the trees, a kind of darkness silhouetted against the starry night sky. It's weird. I'm not even sure whether I was seeing it or feeling it. I just knew it was there. The deer knelt in front of me. I was still put off by its appearance, but I felt safe, safe enough not to flinch. What do you need?

It jerked its head aside, showing me the burning eye rolling in its socket. Fire killed, fire cleansed, and fire purified. It wanted me to help burn the driftwood, I realized. The branches were still hiding outside the light, Never too far nor too close. They were afraid of the deer, but not afraid enough to run. They wanted something. I'm bait, aren't I?

The deer stood upright. I took that as a yes. I considered my options. Running to my four-wheeler was out of the question as the deer stood between it and myself. Fleeing down the beach was pretty much a death sentence since I'd be walking right into more driftwood and pissing off the giant undead deer in the process. I could obey and casually walk to the edge of the woods, but if the deer was too slow or the driftwood too fast, I'd be a goner. I could see myself being dragged into the bushes and torn to shreds.

The water, I thought, as I looked towards the ocean. If fire was involved in this, I'd probably want to be close to the water. Plus, everything would happen out in the open, so I'd be less likely to wind up roped into the tree line. I left the deer's protective circle of light and meandered to the water's edge, not entirely convinced this was going to work. The living driftwood slithered towards me immediately, crinkling and crackling as it moved across the sand. The branches came in a horde, piling on top of one another to be the first driveting. reach me. I had my doubts the deer would rescue me. This seemed like what it wanted me to do, but I had no reason to believe I was supposed to make it out of here alive. I just had to trust

I would. The driftwood closed in on me, but just as the quickest one was about to strike, I heard a growling hiss of fire. The branches shrieked as flames tore through them in an instant, leaving the demonic deer standing alone in the cinders watching me. I turned around. Cool. Well, I'm going to go home. Its long, bony snout nudged my shoulder. What more was I supposed to do?

I'd played my part, right? The skeletal creature jerked its head towards the island. Oh, hell no. What the deer wanted, without even being asked. It wanted to finish what it had started years ago. It was a tall order, an order I didn't want to fill. And yet, it's a little hard to say no to a huge zombie deer that just saved your life from evil driftwood. The deer's four legs buckled as it laid down as an invitation to climb on.

I wasn't sure how. I'd never ridden a horse, undead or otherwise, and it wasn't like the thing had a ladder. I hesitantly reached up for one of its patches of skin, gave it a good tug to make sure it had hold my weight, and then pulled myself on its skeletal back. Sitting there was by no means comfortable, but it was surprisingly stable. I held on tightly to the old porous bones as the creature stood up and began trudging towards the ocean. It remembered exactly where the sand bridge had once been, and the ocean floor was still

more elevated there than anywhere else. At its deepest points, the water reached the deer's upper neck and my chest. At its shallowest points, only my feet were submerged. It was a slow march to the island, which gave my anxiety plenty of time to build. Every step took minutes, and every time I looked back to check our progress, we barely moved. My mind started to wander, and in my head I saw visions of the darkness clutching the roots of trees and draining the life out of them like it was sucking the flavor out of a slushy, leaving only dead wood behind. Somehow, I could taste what those trees tasted like. They were sour and grainy. They were satiating, not satisfying. Now, birds, on the other hand, birds were sweet and flavorful. But, but... But nothing as flavorful as...

The deer stopped at the water's edge, snapping me back to reality. I didn't want to get off, but I didn't have much choice. The deer knelt, and I slid down its head like a child at a park. You're sure I can't just... I'm going! I'm going! Jeez! It huffed a warm puff of air on me. I'm not sure if it was meant as encouragement or as a...

warning that it was growing impatient. Either way, I started walking towards the forest. You know, for an island supposedly home to a life-sucking monster, the greenery looked fairly healthy near the water's edge. Then again, if the darkness's food supply was limited, maybe it was keeping these plants and trees as a reserve. It'd likely jump at the chance to eat me. It hadn't gotten something as big to feast on in decades. It still remembered the thirst-quenching exhilaration of larger mammals. My connection to the darkness and the deer made it very clear to me that if it had lips, it'd be licking them right now. As I ventured into the forest, I found a completely different landscape. Gone was the greenery, and in its place was death as far as the

I could see. There was nowhere my feet could fall where bones wouldn't snap like twigs beneath them. Skeletons blanketed the forest floor like snow. I didn't know how many hundreds, if not thousands, of creatures had spent their final moments here. I prayed I wouldn't join them. No one would ever be able to find my bones in this overflowing exposed graveyard. I glanced back to plead with the deer, but it was gone. If I had this strength to swim back to shore, I would have, but I barely had enough energy to walk. I tried to be quiet and not draw attention to myself, but my footfalls were sloppy and loud, and my heart refused to lower its volume. It was just a matter of time before the darkness heard the dinner bell and came for its meal.

I stopped when I saw a human skeleton leaning against a rotting log. There were too many limbs, too many fingers, too many teeth. As I took a closer look, I realized why. The limbs, the teeth, everything extra was made up of pieces of driftwood that had become fused to the skeleton. They were like leeches that had sucked out all the life and forgotten to let go once they were done with their meat. or maybe they couldn't let go. I realized then that the blanket of death under my feet was also a mixture of wood and bones. There was a crack of branches behind me and for a split second I saw myself from behind

and recognized the poor job I'd done clipping my own hair. It was like being in a dream and seeing oneself from a third person point of view while simultaneously being completely present in one's own body. I turned on my heels, but all I saw was darkness beyond the white bones and dry branches. Then, out of the corner of my eyes, I caught it moving through the trees. I froze and swallowed a knot in my throat.

I don't think the word afraid really cuts it. I was a mouse who'd been spotted by an owl. I could try to run. I could try to hide, but it was already too late. It was going to take my life, and maybe in a few years, my bones would wash up on shore like old driftwood after a storm. The creature, if you can even call it that, slithered through the branches of dead trees.

It was like oil, thick, dark, with rainbow highlights reflecting off its surface, as though it were simultaneously made of nothing and everything. As it trickled closer, I felt myself surrendering. I had nothing to defend myself against its single-minded determination. I could only stand there and resign myself to my fate. A thick, hand-like tendril stretched out towards me with a sickening, gooey sound like hands-squeezing mud. My body was numb.

My eyes locked on it, but in my head I could see it draining the life from the skeleton near the log. I was overwhelmed with the intense memory of the sweet taste it had held, and if there had been any life left in it, I think I could have made like the driftwood fused on it and tried to suck out any morsel I could. Just as the sludgy thing was about to grab me, the deer's bright glowing eyes tore from the darkness as though out of nowhere. Its antlers ripped through wilted trees penetrating the mass of multicolored blackness. The bait. Right. I was the bait. To draw the creature out of its pool. Something about the pond

protected it. But if food came into its territory after so many years of chewing on scraps, it wouldn't resist the call. Somehow I understood all this. Somehow I felt the hunger, burning desire to kill it, and the fear of my own death all rolled into one. The two ancient forces fought as I stumbled to the sidelines. The darkness lashed the deer violently across its exposed skull. The deer pinned it down with its ambers. The embers in its eyes becoming flames. The flames jumped to the trees and began to engulf the area.

I couldn't breathe. Coughing, I ran to the shore. trying not to inhale too much smoke as my vision started to blur. I woke up on the shores of the mainland, washed up like driftwood. The island had been raised to the ground. I don't know who won the fight. I went looking for the antlers in the sand, but never found them. I guess they're both gone.

It's weird, though, because it's almost like I can still feel them both. Maybe it was another draw. God, I hope not. As for me, I don't make sculptures out of driftwood anymore. I'm too afraid I might stumble on a surviving branch from the island and that I'll somehow help the darkness grow back. All I can do now is hope that the fire did its job and that the island is cleansed.

The ashes should have fertilized the soil by now. It'll take a few years for the forest to regrow. It's only then that I'll know for sure. It's time to rest on our dark journey. We thank you for joining us. If you would like to find out how you can hear the full-length versions of our audio program, please visit the no-sleeppodcast.com to learn about our season past program. 25 episodes, each over two hours long,

and three exclusive bonus episodes all for only 1999. On behalf of everyone at the No Sleep Podcast, we thank you for listening. Join us again next week when the journey resumes its descent into the sleepless night. This audio production is copyright 2017-2018 by Creative Reason Media, Inc. All rights reserved. The copyrights for each story are held by the respective authors. No duplication or reproduction of this audio program is permitted without the written consent. of Creative Reason Media, Inc.