The NoSleep Podcast - NoSleep Podcast S16E07

Episode Date: May 16, 2021

It’s Episode 07 of Season 16. Our correspondence takes us to a whole new level. “The Hole in the Great Grass Sea” written by LP Hernandez (Story starts around 00:02:40) Produced by: Jeff Clement Cast: Randall Brown – Mike DelGaudio, Agent – Jeff Clement, David Cummings – David Cummings “Dilated” written by Shelton Weech (Story starts around 00:40:00) Produced by: Phil Michalski Cast: Narrator – Kyle Akers, Ben – Matt Bradford “A Firm Handshake” written by J.R. Stinson (Story starts around 01:10:40) Produced by: Phil Michalski Cast: Chris – Jesse Cornett, Marge – Mary Murphy, Dietrich Simmons – Peter Lewis “The Stars are Watching” written by Harold Neil Riggs (Story starts around 01:25:30) Produced by: Phil Michalski Cast: Narrator – Kristen DiMercurio “Blueberry Hill” written by Steven M. Fletcher (Story starts around 01:41:00) Produced by: Jesse Cornett Cast: Jace – Atticus Jackson, Larney – Graham Rowat, Binny – Elie Hirschman, Sophie Shannon – Sarah Olivia, Dr. Gravtacio – David Ault, Carroll – Erin Lillis     This episode is sponsored by: Policygenius – Policygenius is America’s leading online insurance marketplace. Their mission is to help people get insurance right by making it easy for them to understand their options, compare quotes, and buy a policy, all in one place. Head to Policygenius.com to get started right now. Policygenius, when it comes to insurance, itís nice to get it right.     Click here to learn more about The NoSleep Podcast teamClick here to learn more about the Kickstarter for the graphic novel by Lukasz GodlewskiClick here to learn more about LP HernandezClick here to learn more about Shelton Weech    Executive Producer & Host: David Cummings Musical score composed by: Brandon Boone “Dilated” illustration courtesy of Krys Hookuh   Audio program ©2021 – 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

In the dark hours, in the antith, in the letters long lost and forgotten, there are tales of horror to frighten and disturb. Come, join us as we delve deep into the darkness. Into the sleepless hours, when you dare not close your eyes. Brace yourself for the no sleep. Chapter 7. Welcome, sleepless listeners. I'm your host, David Cummings. Were you a fan of the show back in season four?

If so, do you know what was special about episode 10 that season? I'll pause for 10 minutes while you think of the answer. Actually, no, I'll just tell you. That was the first episode where we had an illustration created for it. Fan of the show and talented artist Wukish Godluski, or Luke, as I call him, sent me some art inspired by one of the stories on that episode. That opened the door to more illustrations from him, and then so many of our other talented artists.

As we approach our 10th anniversary, it means a lot to be reminded of milestones like that. And Luke has created an outstanding graphic novel that I want to make you aware of. It's called Painter, and in it, Luke matches his visualized, stunning artwork with a dark compelling story reminiscent of the hidden worlds of HP Lovecraft and Algernon Blackwood. Luke has launched a Kickstarter where you can support the project and get yourself digital or paper copies of Painter. Check the show notes for a link to the Kickstarter project and treat yourself to the sweeping madness found within the pages of Painter. Ah yes, the sweeping madness. The sweeping madness. The sweeping madness.

The storage unit is gone. Or it isn't. It's there, but it's gone. Not the unit itself, the actual building, the contents. No, I stepped inside today and they were all still there. I knew they were all still there. I could feel like they were all still there. But they weren't.

Like I could see them, but I couldn't. All I could see was the void. And in the void, I could see the tape. I took it and left. I couldn't stand being in there any longer. I didn't know it was a tape when I took it. It was inside an envelope marked Care of L.P. Hernandez.

Yet another familiar author being dragged into this. Inside was the tape. The quality was very degraded. We've cleaned the audio as best we could. Mike Delgado and Jeff Clement helped me with some clever sampling and digital manipulation involving. their own vocal imprints. We felt it was important you hear this tape as clear as possible.

It was presented to me from the void, after all. There was a note inside the envelope, too, which I've recorded and added to the beginning of the accounts. It tells the tale of, The Hole in the Great Grass Sea. Interview with Randall Brown, geologist, pertaining to the incident on the Yano Estacado in West Texas. 23 May, 1985.

State your name and position, please. Randall Brown. I'm a geologist by trade. I was educated at Texas Tech University, and I've been working in Texas in Oklahoma, mostly for oil companies for the past 20 years. Thank you, Randall. Is it okay to call you, Randall?

It's fine. And you are aware this is being recorded. So, how were you contacted? regarding the anomaly. Amelie? Is that what you're calling it? It was probably the only geologist within 50 miles at the time, wrapping up a job near Seminole, my hotel room, but it was not a pleasant conversation. That is to say, I did not feel as if I had much choice in the matter. What were you told? Only that my expertise was required, emphasis on required. I was intrigued with what little information was given, but forgive me, I don't know. From the time.

you were contacted. It was the same day. A couple hours later. I was picked up by a man in a black sedan. He said little on the drive. I don't know if he was part of the team, but I didn't see him again after that day. What happened then?

Like I said, I'm familiar with that part of Texas, the line of Estacado. Did you know that it's bigger than New England? Anyway, it's a desolate place. I never felt smaller than when I stood at the edge of that great grass sea. Well, first I was taken to the rancher's house.

Mr. Guerra was his name, but everybody called him. The team was there, filling their canteens and using the facilities. They kept talking about it, it, it. They were very animated, excited even, a mix of military men and three-letter types. I honestly don't know what agencies were represented. They weren't exactly wearing name tags. No one introduced me. I was just kind of there.

The anomaly? Two SUVs out to the site. Mr. Guera had about 500 acres, and this was in a far-flung corner of the property. I caught bits and pieces of the story on the drive. Above the anomaly, there was a long, dead tree. The climate is more conducive to desert foliage outside of the occasional mesquite. Mr. Guerra decided to take it down using his ATV, thought he might recover some of the wood his home decor.

Never got the chance to. To recover wood. That's right. He downed it. It cracked in half, actually. Then the ground opened up. The anomaly. If you insist on calling it that.

So, what was your experience? What did you see? There were a couple of tables, lots of ropes and buckets. When we stopped the vehicle, I got out and was met by a man who introduced himself as Jones. Never said whether that was his first or last name, and I never asked. He seemed to be managing the project. He gave me rough expectations for my job. analyzing what was brought out of the hole and what would be in future experiments.

Then he brought me to it. It was a hole, like I said, an anomaly, as you've called it. It was about 10 feet in diameter, almost a perfect circle, like it was cut by precise instruments, by a god. The sunlight reached only so far. Then it was just, to call it a hole, doesn't capture the feeling of it. It was the... It was the wrongness of the perfect symmetry and the feeling that it shouldn't be there.

Alano Estacado is a brutal. It's the place where life gives up. I described it as a sea, and that's exactly how it feels. Like you're in a shallow, brown sea that slowly rises to the west, interrupted here and there by the corpse of something that sprung up during a wet season only to spend the next decade withering. And there's this whole, this perfect circle carved out of the earth. From what I gathered, based on the conversations at that moment, they didn't know how deep it was.

One had been figured out to that point. We're professionals there, but I was the closest thing to a scientist. Mr. Guerra had a few days alone with it. His homegrown experiments were on par with what the team had managed to come up with. He tossed in rocks to start, and bricks. He heard nothing, no sound of impact. So he lugged a broken ice chest out to the hole and tipped that in as well. Still nothing.

Just the whistle of that hundred-pound cube descending into darkness. Next was the fishing line. Mr. Guerra had been a deep-sea fishing off Baja a few times. Not for many years, but he had plenty of line. This experiment was actually pretty clever. He smeared some sort of gel on the bottom of allure and buffered it in case it brushed up against the side of the hole. reasoning that if it reached the bottom, it would attract some detritus.

He estimated he dropped about a thousand meters a line into the hole. Nothing. He tied that line onto another, more than doubling its length. Still nothing. A couple of conversations in town followed. A grainy picture of Mr. Guerra standing next to the hole, pointing at it in the weekly newspaper. The next day the suits show up, and the road to his property is closed for construction.

And the men, what have... they done. Dropped in Biggers. And the military guys were trying to wring some military use from it. The three-letter types kept walking to the edge of it,

hands on their hips, shaking their heads. It was if at the moment they turned their backs to it, and they forgot it existed. Each time they saw it, it was like the first time. Great.

As for the experiments with recording sound. We had about 15,000 feet of line out at that point. Someone tossed a lit book of matches, a flashlight, really just juvenile stuff, you know? One of the three-letter guys pulled out a cassette recorder

and started dictating notes. Ten minutes later, we were lowering it into the hole. Give us a moment. Oh, what do you... Please don't. The guys listened to the whole thing. He stood under the canopy they put up to block out the sun. He jumped into the hole.

He turned around and held out the recorder like, can you believe this? That's what was written on his face. His eyes were crazy, but he was smiling, like he understood something, much better than he had only a few minutes. He was on a table and stepped out from the canopy. He went to a couple of the suits. Didn't pause to think about it. Took his next step into...

Ready to continue? Our last... The suit jumped into the hole. Yes, that's right. And what happened then? We decided it had happened. We wanted to know why. The other suits knew them.

They just had a baby agency they worked for. It was well-liked. Once the confusion passed and his co-worker was escorted off the property, excited. The military guys. You said it wasn't the first record. The screaming? Yes, the screaming.

Although we're not sure that's what it is. When was the second tape recorded? The next day. It was the evening after each other. I think the adrenaline dump that followed the incident left us all feeling pretty ragged. We drove back to Mr. Guerra's house. Aik to hostess or like me didn't have a choice in it. We camped in the house, a few on the porch outside. I brought a bucket of soil and rocks with me, but there wasn't a good place to analyze it. I fell asleep in a rocking chair without realizing

it. Everyone crashed. The after sunrise, my bladder and the rising chatter in the room forced me to open my eyes. The military guys were checking each room in the house. They were on edge and not speaking. Apparently, one of their guys took off during the night, and the tracks indicated he went back to the anomaly. There wasn't enough room in the remaining SUV to transport us all at once, so I went in the second group back to the site. They found the recorder on the table under the canopy, fishing line wrapped around it again. No sign of the military guy. They were playing it when I arrived. Sound, you heard, was about 15 minutes in. At that point, the recorder would have been several thousand feet down. The thickness of the Earth's crust varies throughout

the planet, which can impact the temperatures you would encounter. It never seemed hot enough to damage the instruments. That might just be because it isn't just a hole, in my estimation. What is it? Well, it's an anomaly, isn't it? I'm asking for your professional opinion. Professionally, I'm a geologist. What I found in the buckets wasn't all that interesting. Everything you would expect to find in a hole that deep in that part of Texas. Your non-professional opinion, then?

My non-professional opinion is that I'm not qualified to speak about it. I can tell you what was said. I can tell you how most of them died. I can't say why. I don't think they all had the same experience. What happened to him, the military man? Jumped as far as I know. That was a consensus within the group.

They splintered then. The two remaining military officers and the suits. I was the odd man out, so I mostly kept myself. I think they were all a little scared that they would somehow inherit blame for two deaths. Not that they could have stopped either, man. But the failure to report the first death probably created space for the second.

They were looking at it. at this situation through a completely different lens than me. And as the shock wore off, their interest in the anomaly and what was on the tape intensified. I gave up, pretended to do my job. They could have pulled a 10,000-karen diamond out of that hole. What did you do? Mostly hovered between the two groups. As I did not know either man, I was not invested in the same way as the others.

About midday, the suits took off and returned with a video camera and a monitor. Plumbers use similar cameras for looking down sources of leaks or clogs, but I believe theirs was military grade. We lowered it down and soil and sediment. The monitor was maybe nine inches in grainy. It was almost like watching television static. 1,000 feet down, 2,000. I might have been the only person to notice. Notice what?

Not the whole way, but it was obvious to me that these were from fingers. purchase. One of the jumpers are both of them, plummeting through darkness and never knowing which thought. What's worse to think about is... Is what? How's that? I only understand it through my 47 years on this planet. Education, and if it's not a hole, if it's something else, possibility exists. What's possibility? Sleep, you can't rest or even think beyond the rush of wind past your... insane. Absolutely. It would drive you insane and that would be the surest respite. If your mind was lost, if you could successfully transport your consciousness elsewhere. What did you see on the monitor?

You mentioned there was no investigation. Who was the next person to... Like I said, they weren't wearing name tags, even the military boys. There was a myriad of reaction at different points as well. I would see nothing of interest, and one of the men would peel away from the group and vomit or scream. Meanwhile, I see almost nothing recognizable, just soil. A bit of stone every now and then, and it was fucking gashes. A thousand feet down at that point. There were only three of us left around the monitor. What did you see?

Nothing that made sense in the moment. I just visceral reaction. I saw it. Something, whatever it was. And I compartmentalized it all at once. My brain felt too big for my skull. Can you try to describe it? It's very important.

Were you with again? I am not permitted to disclose. Why is it important? How do you mean? Why does it matter? Plan another tree over it. I spend more than a handful of minutes there. You have to jump in to know it's not from this world.

What do you mean? It's a mistake. It's something left over. I try to work it out, and then my thoughts spiral. Randall, you're the only person with firsthand knowledge of what happened out there. That's incredibly valuable to us, to the people in the field. The military officers? You're the only person with firsthand knowledge. You still have people out there?

Of course. Has anyone else died? I am not going to comment on that. Try to organize my thoughts. But to eliminate some of your anxiety, I'll offer my recommendations now. Leave it alone. Throw a giant manhole cover over it, put up an electric fence. There's no military benefit to it.

And if you've got scientists out there now, I'm guessing they're the wrong kind. So, what happened after the video? The Jones man left with one of the suits. They were talking about lowering an animal into the whole mouse or something. Like I said, there wasn't a lot of art to it. They were like kids. A couple of hours later, Jones is back with a man in shackles. Didn't look like he'd seen the sun much, and he had some bruises on his arms and neck, blood on his lip that was only a man in shackles.

Didn't look like he'd seen the sun much and he had some bruises on his arms and neck, blood on his lip that was only just be getting this gap over. I've heard of FBI black sites around the country and elsewhere in the world, especially former Soviet republics. I wouldn't guess there would have been one here in West Texas near the New Mexico border. That was truly terrifying. How many men were there? Seven or so, eight with the new guy.

He didn't say anything. He didn't seem to be all there. All of a sudden, there's a time. a rope and some sling contraption. They didn't really give him any guidance, no instructions. They just start lowering him into the hole. Can I ask you a question? Of course. Am I under arrest? Free to go? No. What happens if I try to leave? You won't. Tell me about the man. What happened to him? No concern about the oxygen? I don't think. Take care. But it wasn't the lack of oxygen that killed him.

Once did. He did. After he brought him back to the surface, he was manic, is the best word I could think of. But he looked healthy. His lip wound was healed. His bruises were gone. He looked younger, even. They removed him from the sling, though his wrists were still shackled. And they peppered it with questions, but smile on his face. I mean, it looked painful. He was spree of the sling for maybe 20 seconds, and then he sort of came to. Shook his head like he was waking up from a dream.

He looked at all those leering faces, elbowed Jones in the ribs, and bolted. For the last I saw of him was the back of his head as he dropped it. In the midst of the confusion that followed his suicide, one of the suits broke away from the group. When the video was playing on the monitor, he had the most unusual reaction. Should I found the screaming less upsetting?

to fix on his neck and wept. Hadn't said or done much after. Jones saw him and called his name and is weeping again, and he's got his service pistol out. He doesn't acknowledge Jones, who's reminding him he has a family. He just shakes his head. Half a minute of this,

Jones says something like, think of Cheryl. The man doesn't react to the name. He yanks on the crucifix so the necklace snaps, holds it in front of his face, so it catches the sunlight. Jones is still talking to him and he's still not acknowledging.

Finally, he says something like, it's a lie. He tossed the crucifix into the hole, put the pistol to his temple, and painted the grass with the contents of his skull. He keeled over and the weight of his legs pulled his body into the hole. Are you suggesting there is a religious component

to this? Is that what inspired him? Possibly, but that depends on the person. A very religious person might have a hard time coping, depending on what he saw or experienced. I have like a cold Dr. Pepper. I'm sorry, man. I've blocked a lot of this,

but I can still see him blowing his fucking brain's out. Yes, it's probably time for a break. I do want to get back to what you saw on the monitor. We got away from it. and I think it's important to the story. I'll do my best. You ready to continue? With the suicide by gun, there are how many now?

But I believe seven at that time. Happened next. What was Mr. Jones saying? I think he'd lost control over the city. He stood by the brain matter and bits of skull. To that point, there had been no bodies. Can't really have an investigation without a body. The two military officers drive away and hurry.

That leaves five of us. Jones, three suits, and me. I'd go back to the vehicle and just sit in the air conditioning. I'm a geologist, not a soldier. I'm not built for this. Through the windshield, I see Jones sweeping his shoe over the remains, nudging them into the hole. A near evening, then.

I don't remember eating breakfast or lunch that day. The next thing I know, the suits are climbing into the vehicle. No one speaks on the right back. We're all just lost in our own thought. How sweet, chilly Mr. Guerra prepared? Still, not a lot of dialogue happening. Jones quietly asks each of the men for their service pistols, says he's going to lock them in Mr. Guerrera's gun safe.

There's not much resistance to the idea. I was on the porch by myself when Jones came outside. He wanted to know what I saw on the monitor, what I thought it, you know, the anomaly was. A way of explaining what I saw. But I could tell. I could tell it was all weighing on him. I asked him what he saw and he didn't answer.

He reached inside his jacket and removed his pistol. I realized he was the only person armed at the time. He turned the gun over, ran his fingers along the edges, then he holstered it again. We sat in silence for a while and then he went back inside. I followed him in a few minutes later. The suits were huddled around the dining room table. They were comparing their experience.

their perceptions. I think they were trying to convince themselves. They didn't see what they saw. It was like when I first drove up, how they seemed to forget the hole as soon as they turned their back to it. And I don't think what they saw really mattered. It was the thing itself.

One suit just kept repeating, It's perfect. Over and over. He was giddy. John said something like, if it's perfect, then where are we? They decided to look at it again.

I did not want to go. I didn't like knowing Jones had disarmed the other men while not sacrificing his own weapon. As they were preparing to leave, I locked myself inside one of the spare bedrooms and did not respond when Jones knocked. I don't know what happened out there, but I never saw them again.

There wasn't a lot of information to be gleaned from the scene. Now, I'm going to ask you to explain. Explain as best you can what you saw and how that influences what you believe the anomaly is. Was something else. To even say another reality, it misses the mark. Imagine how disorienting it would be if you plucked one of our ancestors, mankind, I mean, and dropped him in the middle of Times Square. I already feel like I'm failing and explaining it.

I thought of an analogy, but it keeps growing the more you think about it. Oh, okay. You're making a sandwich. You gather all of the ingredients, the meat, the cheese, tomato, lettuce, bread, of course. And in the process of making the sandwich, the slicing of the tomatoes, the tearing of the lettuce into strips, there's debris left on the cutting board, crumbs, a few flecks of meat and cheese, right? Slide these off the cutting board and into the trash can. I'm not following.

It's not part of the sandwich. It's what's left behind when the sandwich was made. It just sits in the bottom of the trash bag. The meat rotting, the cheese drying, the bread molding. It attracts flies, and the flies lay their eggs in air in the moist darkness. The larvae feast on the putrescence grow fat from it. It's chaos, this place, this darkness. It was never intended to grow life the way.

it did. It was a mistake. You see? You're saying this hole. This, it's just a window. And our reality, small and insignificant, grew in the darkness at the bottom of the trash bag. It was never meant to be. The chaos, the brutality of nature, their mistakes. There is no God watching us. So the sun and all the planets, the universe. It's just the crumbs. It's the leftovers. And the anomaly. The thing is like a pinhole through the trash bag.

It's not supposed to be this way. We aren't supposed to suffer, to have to kill, to survive. We are the flies, and we will never escape. That's a lot to take in. But Randall, I am happy. I enjoy my job. I love my family.

Those men did too, until they saw what could have been, but never was. Some saw different things. That's what the screaming was, I think. It's like when you're doing the dishes and pull the plug and all the nasty stuff collects in the drain, I think the screams were our stuff at the bottom of the drain. If you've seen it, you'd know.

It's been three days since I was there. And it's all I fucking think about. The other place. I know why the men jumped. What makes you say that? Are they trying? The men in the field right now? Are they trying to reach it?

What if they are? To geologist, I can only guess. What would you do if the thing that you threw away, that was festering in the dark, darkness and all of its chaos and suffering and disease showed up at your doorstep and wanted in. Don't know. You would ensure it never happened again. By doing what?

We'll find out. Do you think that story told the truth? You mean, do I think it's true? Yeah, did it tell the whole truth? You and your puns. Keep your eyes on the road, will you? Don't worry, I'm a safe driver. Although you'd never know that by how much I'd pay for car insurance.

You pay a lot? You should be looking around for better rates. That's a hassle. Look, we're almost halfway through with the year. Head into June with one less thing to worry about. See if you're overpaying for home and auto insurance. You're right, I should. But there are so many companies to compare. It's not easy to find the best one.

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That sounds like the way to go. How do I get started? I'll head to PolicyGenus.com to get started right now. I'll wait until I stop driving. A little safer that way. You know what's best. And now you know about policy genius. Yep, sounds like a no-brainer.

Policy genius. When it comes to insurance, it's nice to get it right. I am convinced. I'll go to policygenius.com to get started. Now, turn it back on. I'm ready to hear more horror. You got it. And brace yourself.

You won't believe your eyes. When you're young, having mezzed, problems you don't understand can be scary. The worse they gets, the more you might be inclined to withdraw from society, to hide them. If you can't explain them, why should anyone else? But in this tale, shared with us by author Shelton Weech, it's lucky that there's a good friend to see our sick patient through his troubles. Performing this tale are Kyle Acres and Matthew Bradford. So keep a close eye out for symptoms. Watch for any changes in those around you.

Because blink and you'll miss it. But you need to be aware when their pupils are dilated. I could tell that Ben was having trouble with his eyes. He squinted at the office computer, rubbed his temples, spent minutes at a time tilting his head back with his eyes closed. When his customers called, he talked with his nose pressed so close to the screen that he ran the risk of smudging it. His concern for his vision grew to the point that his palms left sweaty pools wherever they touched, and people were starting to talk.

Ben and I were friends. We'd met at work a couple years previous, and had quickly bonded over a shared love for heist movies and nachos. We were comfortable enough with each other that one day in the break room I suggested that he goes see an optometrist. He shrugged it off, said that he'd opted out of vision insurance that year and couldn't afford it. But Ben's problems persisted. He started calling in sick. I wondered if his job would be at risk.

He had a set client list after all, and it was difficult thing to have someone fill in while he was out. Through it all, Ben's health seemed to take a dive. His face grew pale, like bread mold. The way he rubbed at his temples, he could have worn holes into them with his thumbs. His cheekbones were growing more prominent, and his clothes hanged off of him more loosely. His appetite clearly a casualty of his headaches. Before all this, he had been a fit guy in his late. 20s. So it grieved me to see him waste away like this. I raised the possibility of asking folks around

the office to pitch in for an eye exam, but Ben waved me off. No charity, he said. And that was that. A couple of weeks before Thanksgiving, Ben was out most of the week. By Thursday, I was concerned enough that I gave him a call to check in with him. When he didn't answer, I stopped by his place after work. He lived in a brick building in the older part of town. His apartment. situated above a music and clothing store aimed at the EDM crowd, a place that most hours of the day set a deep electronic bass beat thrumming through Ben's floor. There was a steady drizzle of rain that felt like walking through a mucus membrane, so I was glad to get inside. Upstairs I felt the beat of the music store pulse into the hallway around me as I rang Ben's buzzer. There was no response,

nor to a second buzz. I normally wouldn't have done what it followed, but I was worried about my friend, so I gave the door a try. It was unlocked. I'd only been to Ben's apartment a couple of times. We spend more time in movie theaters, Mexican restaurants, and watching old movies on my home theater system, which was better than the 40-inch sonio that Ben had. Ben's apartment was small, but comfortable, with enough windows to keep the place easily bright during the day, but difficult to darken at night. Even with the shades pulled, the streetlights were practically at the same level as the windows, and their cold, orange light snuck its way inside. It was darker than that now. Ben had duct-taped flannel sheets to the corners of the window frame. None of his lamps or lights

were on. As my own eyes adjusted to the dim, I made out the pile of dirty dishes in the sink, the dirty clothing on the floor. The place smelled like the daycare center my mother used to work at, the combination of overripe fruit, baby powder, and vomit. Ben? As both relieved, and worried to hear a wordless response from a pile of blankets on the bed that shrouded Ben from neck to toe. His head was uncovered. It was also unshaven, and from the smell of it unshowered, for days. He made room for me, and I sat down, trying to breathe through my mouth. Everyone is worried about you.

Are you okay? My cold and sick. Yeah, I know. Are you okay? He sat there, his face in shadow. His voice had a rough, unused sound, like an old motor. I probably won't be back anytime soon. There was a growing hollow at the bottom of my rib cage.

Do you want to talk about it? He didn't say anything for a long time. Let the silence of the room and the queasiness of the streetlight from outside sift its way through the dust that hung in the air. Then he sniffed and started talking. Ben had meant it when he told me he was going to try to live with his headaches, but it was getting harder to see every day, he said, and the headaches were getting worse.

He started worrying that they were going to lose him his job, so he decided to find a cheap eye doctor and just go. He would put the visit on a credit card and deal with paying it off later. Trick was, first, he needed to find a doctor. He made some calls, looked for places that had specials for new customers, but nothing was the right price. Then last Friday, Ben saw the office. It was about a block from his apartment close to the bus stop.

You probably walked by it yourself when you came here. He saw it on his way home from work that day. The place had one of those coffee shop blackboards outside, pink and yellow scrawlings glowing on its surface. At first, Ben couldn't make the writing out, like it was written in some foreign alphabet, Cyrillic or something, and he almost walked past.

But the bright colors, almost mystical, seemed to call to him. And he looked again. Eye trouble? No insurance? $5 exam for new customers. Walkins, welcome. Dr. Karen Llewellyn, O.D. Five bucks, Ben thought.

Seemed too good to be true. But when he looked at that sign, he realized he was squinting. The letters, which had seemed foreign at first, were blurring, and his head was pounding, and he decided not to miss the opportunity. His parents were prayers-y people, he told me, always talking about asking God for this or that. but Ben had never really gotten much into it.

That moment, though, seemed like an answer to all the prayers he hadn't felt like offering. Well, it turns out it might have been an answer to prayers, but not mine. And definitely not prayers to the God my parents taught me about. That wasn't clear to him then, though. Right then, he just needed to get inside, maybe get himself some cheap glasses that could help with the headaches. So, like the sign suggested, he walked in. It was cold. Like walking into a refrigerator.

It smelled kind of like a fridge, too. Like the smell of the leftover Chinese food you got rid of last week, still lingering long after the Tupperware had been put in the dishwasher. It looked like an optometrist's office. Framed posters of happy people smiling at the camera. Bright eyes wide through the lens of their new glasses. Racks of those same glasses lining the walls. The light was fluorescent, almost too bright.

One of the lights was flickering. They ushered Ben right in. He filled out a quick piece of paper that asked for his information. The normal stuff, age, medical history, and there, two-thirds of the way down the form, religion. It was a little weird, but at the moment he wasn't about the question of $5 eye exam. So he filled the thing out, writing agnostic and block letters and hoping it didn't lead to some kind of discussion later. And the receptionist, a big friendly John Goodman type, showed him to the back. sat him down in the big chair, the one connected all the machines and devices for the exam.

Then he left. It was weird. At a quick glance, everything seemed normal, just about what you'd expect from an automatrist's office, except for little details. The fluorescent lights were just barely too bright, and one was flickering rhythmically. The chair he was sitting and looked like a normal chair, but there were Velcro straps on the arms. The eye chart was too far away to see clearly, but he could have sworn some of the letters weren't letters at all. It looked like Viking-style runes he remembered from a National Geographic special

he'd watched a few years back. Just about the only normal thing was the Basanova elevator music coming out of the tiny speakers in the ceiling. Then the doctor came in. Dr. Karen Llewellyn. She was short and thin, too thin, Ben thought. Her hair was pulled back into a ponytail. It looked like the act pulled the rest of the skin on her forehead with it,

permanently arching her eyebrows. Her eyes were almost too small for her slender face. She looked tired, but intense. Ben felt like she was looking right into him. She was friendly and efficient. She ran through the regular tests and had Ben read the chart. He must have been wrong about those things when he thought they were runes. They looked like regular numbers now.

She went through the sample lenses, which is clear number one or number two. And good God, he could see the letters clearly enough through some of them. He had to blink some tears away to keep his eyes clear. He didn't want to make things all blurry right when they were the clearest they'd been in years. The doctor asked if he was driving home, said she wanted to dilate his eyes to check the health of his retinas. It had been a good few years since he'd had an exam,

but he remembered this from before. He was only a block from home, and he'd been planning on walking anyway, so he figured what the hell, no harm there. She told him that he would need to avoid bright lights, TV, computer screens, for a few hours after the dilation. Because dilated eyes are especially sensitive to light. She asked him to put his hands on the armrests. He did as she directed, and she reached down to strap his arms using the Velcro straps he'd seen earlier.

She was still smiling, but there was something more forceful now, less gentle. She pulled the straps tight. Ben must have looked scared because she patted his shoulder, said it was going to be fine. She pushed his head back. She was stronger than she looked. Instinct kicked in, his eyes closing tight to resist the eyedrops. She practically had to peel his eyelids back to keep them open while she dropped the liquid in that started them dilating. She said it might sting, and that's about when he started to panic, but it was too late.

She was too strong, and he was strapped in. Next thing he knew, cold, stinging acid droplets splashed into his eyes, burning trails down his cheeks. She left him there, closed the door while he shouted and screamed and begged. Those straps were the strongest Velcro he'd ever experienced, like Velcro and Superglue got together and, well, stayed together. He bucked and kicked, squirmed and yelled himself hoarse, but no matter how hard he pulled, he couldn't get himself out of that chair. I'm not sure how long it was strapped there. Five minutes, 15, an hour. Time is squishy when stuff like that happens.

Hours can fly boy. Minutes can scrape along like snails on a chalkboard. And the whole time it was happening, there was this pounding in my head that I swear was rhythmic, like a bunch of people banging on bass drums. And the music from the speakers, it's hard to remember, but I swear it changed. It wasn't jazzy anymore.

I'm pretty sure it was a men's choir singing a cappella in another language. And then I lost track of everything. Ben didn't remember getting out of the chair, paying his bill, leaving the place, going home, lying down. The next thing he was aware of was the red light of his clock radio reading just after four in the morning. His head still pounded, but more softly. Not a bass drum, but still percussive, persistent. The skin around his eyes itched. And when he scratched out of the it, it exploded into solar flares on his face.

So he did what he could to avoid touching it. As he lay there, nursing his pain and discomfort in the dark, he began to notice that his sight was clearer. For the first time in months, maybe years, things were sharp. His eyes burned, his face itched, but things weren't blurry like he was used to. He pulled a book off the shelf just to be sure he didn't have to squint to see the letters. He was so happy that he started to cry, but that didn't last long. The tears came into contact with the skin around his eyes and felt like fire on his face, curbing his high.

Alternating thoughts between what movies he could watch first and how he could sue that maniac optometrist for all she was worth, he got up and went to a mirror to see what they had done to him. His vision was better, sharper, but he wanted to get a good look at his face. So he turned on the light. It felt like someone ran to show. string of floss into his eye, through the back of his head and started scraping back and forth. He recoiled from the pain, switched off the light and crumpled to the ground head and hands. The pounding in his skull had already set off again, and it took several minutes to gather himself

back together for another try. Once the pain had lessened, it never really went away after that, but was more manageable, he got back to his feet. He'd learned his lesson about light, but he needed to see his face. Something was wrong with his eyes. With his head, he went into the next room and turned on a lamp with his eyes closed, made his way back to the bathroom and left the door open, and used the little bit of light that filtered in from the other room to look at himself in the mirror. You know about scuba diving? Like, when you go down deep enough, the water pressure on your mask can create a crazy amount of suction on your face,

cause capillaries to burst, even cause your eyes to bug out temporarily. It can do serious damage if you're not careful. I saw a picture of a guy once. His mask suction his face so hard that afterwards he looked like a gecko with a serious mask-shaped sunburn around his eyes. That's kind of what my face looked like, minus the bug eyes. My skin was red, raw, hurt to touch it, even softly. And my eyes, they were still dilated. He told me what he saw when he looked at himself in the mirror.

The light was low, but he could see clearly enough. There was almost no color to his irises, which were being overtaken by the encroaching blackness of the pupils. He thought he was having some kind of allergic reaction to the solution the doctor used and wonder if he should go to the hospital. But he was also thirsty, and the pain wasn't bad at the moment, so he went to the kitchen first for some water. Maybe the problem was dehydration, he thought. Water could help. As he reached for a glass in the kitchen, he saw the notes sitting on the kitchen counter. It was dark, but even with his eyes in the shape they were,

he could still make it out as if it were day. We took you home. The pain will last a day or two. Then you will see clearly. Dr. Llewellyn. They took him home? They had been inside his apartment? What did she mean by then you will see clearly?

She hadn't given him any glasses or even any prescription. But maybe he thought maybe she'd done something else. something to fix his vision entirely. So, yeah, I probably should have gone to the hospital or to the police or both. It may have occurred to me that she might have been wrong or flat out lying, but I ignored those instincts. Man, I was so desperate. And in spite of how much pain I was in, I was hopeful that the pain, all the pain, would be over soon.

That had been Saturday. The pain wasn't gone by Sunday. If anything, it was worse. The beating in Ben's head was more. forceful, insistent, and his eyes seemed like they were even more sensitive to light than they had been a day ago. On Sunday night, he finally got up the courage to turn on a little light, push through the pain, check things out again. The rawness around his skin was starting to heal, so that was good at least. With the eyes themselves?

He wasn't sure. But it seemed like there was less color in the iris than there had been before. Like the little black hole of his dilated pupil was expanding, consuming everything around it. He tried looking up Dr. Llewellyn online to see about giving her a call, but none of his searches turned up anything. He considered going outside,

walking down the street to her office, but when he thought of going outside, dealing with the lights, even the street lights in the evening, the thought made him dizzy. And he decided to give it one more day. She said the pain would last a day or two, so he'd give her at least that.

On Monday, the pain was still bad enough, that Ben called out sick. And when he looked at his eyes again, there wasn't any color left. Completely gone. Just white eyes with a black pupil like a cartoon character. His eyes were still dilating. And they weren't showing any signs of stopping. It was time to go to the emergency room,

to have his eyes checked out by a professional. Ben put on a coat, started to head out the door. The minute he put his hand on the doorknob, the headaches, the beating pain intensified. razor wire ran back and forth across his nerves. And the next thing he was aware of, was waking on the floor, nose-blooded, chin-covered and dried vomit. He checked his phone and saw it was two hours later.

If he couldn't get himself to the hospital, he would need an ambulance. So he went to dial 911, but as he did, the same pain began to rise again. He dropped the phone, and the pain stopped. He went to pick up the phone to try again, but as soon as he reached for it, he felt the pain began to rise. like a dog raising its hackles. He pulled his hand back in the pain subsided. No ambulance then, he thought, feeling sick and despairing.

He couldn't watch TV, couldn't read, couldn't really do anything, so he sat, head and hands, trying to think about other things. He ate and drank, but just barely. Occasionally, he thought he saw shadows flit through the apartment. They appeared here and there just out of focus, never for more than an instant. He figured they were products of the pain, hallucinations, something. Every few hours he thought of trying to pick up the phone again and call for help.

But each time he did, the pain flared and didn't go away until he banished the thought. On Tuesday night, the shadows reappeared. The ones he thought he'd seen zipping through the apartment, but this time they didn't go away. He realized they weren't in the apartment. They were in his eyes. They were like the floaters in your vision. Those pieces of retina you have to blink away. Except these ones were moving, like fish.

He couldn't see any real shapes. They were too blurry for that, but they were there. Ben looked in the mirror again and saw something new this time. Not only could he see little flex of things moving around, but he could see them because there was light inside his eyes. Dim light from within, barely lighting up his pupils, which were bigger than ever. The pain let him look for only half a second,

But he thought he could see something through the pupil, in the back of his eye, a tiny, glowing sliver of burnt orange. He didn't know how he could see it so clearly, but it was there. And he knew what it was. A door. Something whispered. The pain flared and he blacked out again. The doctor was right, though. He could see clearly now.

Through his story, Ben kept his head low and in the dim light. No matter how I angled my own head, I couldn't see the same. state of his eyes. The smell of the room, the claustrophobic pressure on me right then, had the effect of a ghost story around a campfire. It was imaginary. It had to be, but it didn't feel imaginary. I haven't had the guts to look again since Tuesday night. I'm terrified of what I'll see. The shadows and my vision are still there, a little more in focus every time. And the shapes aren't really like fish. More like, I don't know, lobsters, maybe. Something with claws.

I can see the claws. He paused, his voice growing thick. I can feel the claws. You need a doctor. These things won't let that happen. The minute I try to step outside or call for help, they set off the pain again. Hell, even thinking about it, sets off the drums beating. Right now, even.

He put his hand to his temple. Let me see. There was a drawn-out pause, the sound of a slow exhaling coming from. from Ben. I don't... I do. Let me help you. Another pause.

And then he nodded. Turn on the light in the bathroom. That should be bright enough for you to see, but still far away for it not to hurry. I nodded and went to turn on the light. An old bulb that glowed a soft yellow. Returning to where Ben sat on his bed, I settled beside him and looked at his face. His eyes were still downcast, shadowed. The lamp next to the bed was dark.

The clock radio next to it flashing 12 o'clock. After another moment of pained silence, he turned his face up and met my gaze. He frowned, and I knew I'd let out an audible reaction, involuntary. But his eyes, I'd never seen anything like it. The pupils were the size of dimes, black holes that almost completely occluded any white. Keep looking. I didn't know what I was looking for, but... Even in the dim light, I began to see it.

A tiny reflection of the bathroom light in Ben's eyes. No, not a reflection. This light was a different color. More red than yellow. And flickering, but rhythmic. Like a fire with a pulse beating in the back of both Ben's eyes. Something swam in front of the pulsing light. Inside one of Ben's eyes.

I recoiled. A bug of something. some kind. It was silhouetted in there, difficult to make out. I know. There's something in there, a parasite or something. Not parasites. This is insane. You need to get to a hospital. My car is parked outside.

No. And we can put a blindfold or something on you to keep out the light. He was standing now. His face pained. I told you this thing that's happening. What's ever behind it, it won't let me get help. I'm sorry about this. Something in his voice made me look up at him. Just in time to see him ram the butt end of a lamp into my face.

Throbbing headache, neck and back protesting separately, my arms numb and trapped behind me. And out of the darkness, the sound of Ben's voice pulling me from the fog. I'm so, so sorry. It speaks to me now. It tells me things. Mostly it's in this weird language that I don't understand, but sometimes it's clear. I can't let you leave, it says. Not until it comes through the door.

I was on the floor. Most of me was awake, but my tongue still seemed to be sleeping in. So I just stared. I had enough of my senses back to get a handle on my position. Ben had tied my hands behind my back. The bastard had actually tied me up, and somehow had strapped my arms to the leg of the bed in a way that kept me lying on my side.

My hands and arms were completely numb. My spine seemed like it had been twisted into pretzels, and my head rang with lightning any time I tried to move it. My lips were sticky and tasted like blood, and somehow, more than anything else, I was thirsty. Like I'd spent the last 40 days and nights lost in a desert. Ben paced around the apartment, talking to me in a way that felt like he wasn't talking to me.

I know you don't really believe me. I wish you did. I don't want any of this. This isn't my fault, you know. Whatever Dr. Luellen did. to me is somehow letting this thing, these things, I'm pretty sure there's lots of them, thousands even, they're coming here through me somehow. And it terrifies me because I'm pretty sure when it happens it's going to kill me and probably

lots of other people. And maybe somehow that will be my fault because I didn't do anything to stop it. Ben? His name alone was hard to get out. It felt like I was talking through a mouthful of cotton. I didn't mean for this to happen to you. But if I try to do anything other than... than what it tells me, it hurts. It hurts so much. Need a doctor.

I wasn't entirely sure if I was saying that Ben needed a doctor, or I did. It was hard to focus. He sat on the floor next to me. If I'd been nimbleer, stronger, I might have found a way to kick him somehow, knock him over, something, but the thought of bending my body in any way was out of the question. Ben's eyes were wide with worry. And he was close enough that I could see those black holes where his irises used to be. Had they grown since the last time I looked? There was almost no white left in his eyes. How long had I been unconscious? I've got to stop this. The words made him wince.

One of his hands going to his head as if he'd just been struck by something. He cocked his head like he was listening to distant music. And he cowed, shoulders slumping, defeated. The mushyness in my head was starting to go away, though the pain was still there. I was getting angry and started pulling against the bonds. Had he tied me up with bed sheets? He seriously didn't think that would hold me for long, did he? My struggle pulled him out of his funk just enough for him to look at me.

Were his pupils even bigger now? Couldn't be, I thought. Not this quickly. Ben, you have to stop this. Whatever's going on here, it has to stop. He pursed his lips, closed his eyes. He wasn't listening to me. he was listening to something else

It's going to happen soon What's going to happen? The door It's going to open You keep saying that Who's coming? That doctor? Ben shook his head and closed his eyes tight

As if he could stop this all With the force of his eyelids alone A pair of tears escaped the blockade And crawled down his cheeks Ben Please untie me We need to get you you out. It's too late for that. It's too late for a lot of things. There was a long pause as he

thought. His eyes closed. His mouth worked as if it was chewing on something. Finally, Ben opened his eyes, set his jaw. But I can still make it ray. He stood up and nearly bowled over crying out in pain. Something was hurting him, but he was forcing his way through it. He steadied himself. Walked to the small, open kitchen, fumbled around in a drawer, and pulled out a steak knife. My heart skipped a beat, worried that he was going to come over and use it on me, but he instead went into the bathroom. Eyes closed, he turned off the light and closed the door. There were about 30 seconds of silence, and then, from behind the closed door, Ben led out a scream. Primal, terrified, anguished, but most of all, angry.

I strained against the sheets that tied me. My arms were dead to all feeling, but I could still move them. I twisted my body, gritting my teeth against the streaks of pain that ran in my head down my spine. And I managed to put myself in a better position, getting some leverage against the bed. I pulled harder against the sheets. Ben screamed again. There was a thickness to the scream, like an infant crying to itself to the point of gagging. And there was another sound.

squelching, sharp, and wet, and I didn't want to think about what he was doing with the knife in there. I had to help him, stop him. I twisted myself more, got my legs underneath me, and I lifted with all the strength I had left. I managed to get enough thrust against the corner of the bed to which I'd been tied, and I lifted the corner off of the floor. The movement was enough. The sheets gave way when my arms fell free. No longer tied to me, the bed crashed down, bedleg scraping through my jeans along my calf and along my Achilles tendon.

Painful enough that I lost balance. I reached out to steady myself, but my arms still numb couldn't support any weight. And I crumpled to the floor. The pain in my head spiked. I might have blacked out. Ben's clock still blinked 12 o'clock. There were no more screams from the bathroom. I finally managed to stand.

Darts of feeling ran in painful. glimmers across my arms and hands. It was difficult to concentrate, but I forced myself to ignore the sensation. Got back to my feet, went to the bathroom, reached for the light. I briefly remembered that Ben was sensitive to light, but I knew that I couldn't help him if I couldn't see what was happening. I flipped the switch. Ben sat in the bathtub, jaw slack, chest heaving.

Streams of red ran down his cheeks from the glistening, meaty holes where his eyes used to be. The knife lay on the bathroom floor among red raindrops. Not far from the knife lay Ben's eyes. Mostly undamaged, even after having been cut from his face. They were still noticeably

eye-shaped, ended in stringy stalks like thin pink asparagus. I reached into my pocket to grab my phone, prepared to call 911 when I heard Ben's heartbroken voice. It didn't work.

On the floor, Ben's eyes no longer connected to anything that I could see, twitched. I looked closer and felt my stomach clench. The pupils that ever encroaching blackness continued to dilate. They covered nearly half of the orb, an entire hemisphere of darkness. Some thin membrane kept the eye spherical. One of the eyes twitched again. I stared at it, transfixed. A claw or talon of some kind.

thin and sharp was reaching through the blackness inside the eye and poking at the membrane. There was a pop and a gurgling hiss as the claw breached the tissue.

It scraped on the bathroom linoleum for a moment. Then withdrew back inside the eye. At that point the blackness began to pour out of the eye through the breached membrane onto the bathroom floor, spreading like an oil spill.

Except this oil spill was an oil It was space. And in that ever-growing space, I could now see clearly the outline of a door, already cracked and opening wider. And something, some things on the other side, clawing and hungry and ready to feast. As we place the letters back in their envelopes, it's time to take our leave. The musical score was composed by Brandon Boone. Our production team is Phil Mikulski, Jeff Clement, and Jesse Cornett.

Our creative content manager is Olivia White. Our editor-in-chief is Jessica McAvoy. I'm your host and executive producer, David Cummings. If you would like to find out how you can hear the extended editions of our audio program, Please visit the no sleeppodcast.com to learn about our season pass program. 25 episodes, each over two hours long and three exclusive bonus episodes, all for only $25. On behalf of everyone at the No Sleep Podcast, we thank you for listening and for being ever curious. This audio production is copyright 2021 by Creative

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