The NoSleep Podcast - Nosleep Podcast S2E08

Episode Date: August 12, 2012

The eighth episode of this season’s Nosleep Podcast features stories about homes with unsettling visitors, ominous clouds, and an impossibly active corpse. Highlighting horror stories from the Reddit.com horror writing community, these stories are designed to afflict your night with no sleep.This episode features these stories:The Thing in the Walls written by Jonathon Sheeran (Redditor Shilmna) and read by Chris Eddleman (Redditor TalksAtYou).Low Hanging Clouds written by T.E. Grau (Redditor TheCosmicomicon) and read by David Cummings (Redditor MikeRowPhone).My Last Night Babysitting written by Jeanna Saccomano (Redditor lemon_extract) and read by Wendy Corrigan (Redditor EchoWind).The Scarecrow Corpse written by Kristopher Mallory (Redditor stealthfiction) and read by David Cummings.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

As the sunlight fades to darkness and the frightful tales creep into your mind, it's time to give in to your fear because tonight there will be no sleep. Welcome to the no sleep podcast. I'm your host, David Cummings. It's time for episode number eight of season two, and we have four tales for you this time. I want to begin by thanking everyone for the overwhelming response when I asked you to visit our Facebook page last episode. I appreciate all the likes and messages and comments. Our audience is really growing and it's nice to know that it's mostly through word of mouth advertising. If you're able to share the podcast with friends and family, it will help spread the word about the show. Plus, we've got some exciting new stuff coming up in the next next. few weeks. I'll be launching a brand new website for the podcast, and we have a number of new

narrators joining the team. So now is the perfect time to let others know about the frightening tales we bring you here at the No Sleep Podcast. Okay, let's begin this episode with a tale about two childhood friends. Friendship among young boys usually revolves around toys, movies, and sleepovers. But as author Jonathan Sheeran explains, sometimes the sleepovers can end up being more frightening than fun. Narrator Chris Edelman reads for us the tale of why it's best not to stay at the house

with the thing in the walls. I was never the type to tell all of the weird and horrible things I've seen in my life. I've always been afraid of everyone calling me crazy. Being weird was bad enough, but crazy would make my life unbearable. But after the phone call I got today, I feel forced to tell this story at the very least. You see, my friend Josh is dead. Suicide. His parents are blaming depression after a bad set of finals last month that he wasn't able to get over. But they don't know what I know. They didn't

the phone call I got. I guess I should back up and start at the beginning, so you can understand. Josh and I were friends in elementary school. Best friends, in fact. We were absolutely inseparable. He was almost always spending the night at my house and playing G.I. Joe's and transformers with me until the wee hours of the morning. It wasn't until we were in fifth grade that I realized that I had never spent the night

at his house before. Sure, I'd been over to his house plenty of times to play, but we always went back to my house once the sun started to set. So one day, whilst playing together at his house, I told him that I wanted to spend the night at his house for once. For the most part, the day was all fun in games, to the point that it remains mostly blurred in my memories. The only parts that stick out are arguments over which was better,

Beast Wars or Transformers, and whether or not Batman could beat up Snake Eyes, the usual kid stuff. However, once the sun started to set, I could tell Josh was starting to get uneasy. He tried to convince me to go over to my house instead of staying there, but I was adamant. So we went into his room and started watching Star Wars for the hundredth time. But I noticed that Josh had the volume up as loud as it would go, and I was completely baffled as to why he would do that.

Then there was a loud bang on the wall behind Josh's bed. I jumped and fell off of the bed. absolutely terrified. I turned to Josh, but was even more shocked to see that he was completely focused on the television. I told myself I must have just imagined it. Then I heard the bang again. It was then that I noticed that Josh's hands were made into fists, and he was clenching them so hard that his hands were solid white. He was hearing the sounds too, but trying to pretend he wasn't. Since his parents were still up, I ran into the living room to tell them about the banging. They laughed it off and told me it was probably rats or some other vermin in the walls,

nothing to worry about. That comforted me for a bit, since that would also explain why Josh wouldn't acknowledge the sounds, or have me over at night. What person would want to admit they had rats in their walls? The bangs continued throughout the last 30 minutes of the movie, joined by a firm scratching sound along the wall. But with the explanation of rats, it was easy to ignore these sounds. It was only when the tape finished and Josh rushed to the VCR to put in another one that I heard

something I still can't find a logical explanation for. A voice called from the wall itself. Barely louder than a whisper, with a sickeningly sweet inflection so much so that even as a child I could hear the malice

under the thin veneer of friendliness. It's been so long. I was stormed. starting to think you didn't like me anymore. Josh froze in terror, completely foregoing his act of indifference. The voice called his name out again. Joshua, come on, old friend. Why don't you come play with me?

Or how fun it is to play with me. Why don't we do it again? The new tape dropped out of John. Josh's hand and it clattered to the ground. The sound must have broken the icy grip of terror on him because he immediately scrambled to put the tape in the VCR and resume playing the loud movie over the thing's words. Sure enough, as soon as it started, the voice stopped,

but not before letting out an exasperated sigh. For the rest of the night, that was our routine, watch a movie nice and loud and get in another tape before that thing could start talking. But it was around 2 a.m. when I was forced to break the routine. I had to pee desperately, and I couldn't just go in Josh's closet or anything, so I was forced to trudge to the bathroom down the hall from Josh's room.

It wasn't a long walk or anything, but in that house with the thing in the wall, I didn't want to take a step outside of the light. Still, I did what I had to do and did my business without incident. However, when I was done, I noticed that the door to the bathroom was open. just a crack, when I knew I had closed it. It was then that I heard the voice. Since Joshua won't play, perhaps you'll be my new friend.

I have so many fun games for you. I started screaming in absolute terror and didn't stop until Josh's parents came into the bathroom after me. I begged them to take me home, and what little coherence I could muster, babbling about the things I was. I had heard, but his parents didn't believe me. They claimed I had just had a nightmare and needed to go back to sleep. I begged them to ask Josh, knowing that my friend would authenticate my

story, but he didn't. I made a vow that night never to speak to him again. I held to that vow for over ten years, until a few weeks ago he called me late at night. He was sobbing uncontrollably and babbling about the pair of yellow eyes that he saw every night now. He said the voice wouldn't stay in his walls anymore and it was following him everywhere. He tried to tell me about the horrible things it would do to him, but at that point I had my final vengeance for his slight all those years ago. I hung up on him. I regretted it already later that night, when in my dreams I remembered the most horrifying part of the bathroom encounter. I didn't just hear the thing's voice.

I had the misfortune of seeing the damned thing. It was short and squatty with a huge head with a large set of sharp yellow teeth. The worst part was those eyes. The tiny little eyes that had absolutely no touch of humanity in them that would haunt my dreams forevermore. I had never told anyone about them, but that's how I knew that Josh wasn't crazy. The yellow eyes he saw following him everywhere

were the ones I had seen in the bathroom years ago. Two days later, his mother called me to tell me about his death. My guilt was completely overwhelming. It was truly all my fault for not standing by him that night when he needed me. I cried for two days afterwards, knowing that if I had been able to put my grudge behind me, a family would still have their little boy right now. As horrified and depressed as that realization made me, the worst was yet to come. His funeral was yesterday, but that night I got a text from Josh's phone.

It was a simple question, yet it haunted me to the point where I did everything I could to get off of the grid and go unnoticed. The text read, How thick are the walls in your house? There's a disturbing trend that is all too real in many parts of the world these days. the specter of drought that threatens to disrupt the food supply for millions of people. In our second tale, author T.E. Grau takes us into the future when drought and a dearth of rain is an all-consuming reality. When some rare yet promising signs of rain suddenly appear one day, it stirs thoughts of renewal for the parched land. I'll read for you the story about what happens when people pin their hopes on the low-hanging clouds.

Rain was coming, but it never rained here. Not anymore. Not since the Lakers snagged four crowns in a row back in the teens. But this morning, it definitely felt like rain was on the way. Odd. From what Nick could remember of the wetter days, this had all the markings of a real downpour. Dawn exposed a charcoal sky stretching from hilltop to horizon, poised to unleash a holy baptismal on this parched city, teetering at the edge of the undrinkable sea. Untamed water was a childhood dream.

swimming pools, raging waters, even the oscillating fountains at the grove. Everything was green, flecked by streaks and blobs of bright blue. But now, the landscape was a pantomime of how it once was. A mockery. Lawns were an exercise in green paint. Flowers, a forgotten. song. These were the dry times, with plumbing kept to a rational trickle, fed by far away river water, hijacked three states upstream. Nick knew this. It was drilled into his bones,

passed down by the elders, who wept when they spoke of the rain, stepping in for God by leaving drops of wet, salty guilt on the pavement. Every generation ate away at the future of their progeny. This was the way of man. But today, people were placing pots and buckets and anything else capable of collecting volume on their porches and stoops. Today, it was bound to rain. It had to. The land couldn't wait any longer. Nick left for work as early as he could once he glanced out the window. Traffic, with the added shock of an historic rain, would be murder today. The house that he shared with his wife was situated up on the western hills overlooking the city,

and the clouds seemed to bear down on this high vantage point, like a month. moist, fuzzy blankets. Nick wanted to stay home, wake his girl, and marvel at this breathtaking anomaly, but he had to make his 9-15 client meeting with some asshole comedian from Tel Aviv. Comedians always turn out to be assholes. Being from Tel Aviv was just a bonus. And Nick was jockeying for a raise, so. being late was out of the question.

With one eye cocked above, Nick dashed out of the house while his wife still slumbered under the stout wooden beams that ribbed their high ceiling. Like being in the bowels of a Viking longship. She slept better in the morning. During the night, when she was alone with the dark,

She heard screams coming from the hills above. Could be coyotes, could be worse. The whispering city never gave clues. As Nick wound down from the hills and into the chattering teeth of Sunset Boulevard, he noticed that the traffic was unusually light, even for a Monday. As if everyone decided to declare a night, a holiday and stare up at the weirdness in the sky. Groups of excited people gathered on street corners,

ooing and awing and snapping photos. Nick craned his neck out the car window, looking at the dazzling cloud cover, topping the high peaks above his neighborhood. It was extraordinary. Clouds. Actual fucking... clouds, descending on Los Angeles, threatening renewal, relief, and overdue scrubbing.

Nick just stared and contemplated pulling over and joining the underemployed gockers. But it was Monday, and a surly Israeli comedian was heading toward his office, probably from a better neighborhood. Couldn't be late. Not even today. Nick drove down the mostly deserted streets, heading towards Century City, which had the dubious distinction of being the highest concentration of lawyers in the country west of New York City. The East still got rain, sometimes, and more lawyers. Yet they still came to L.A. to complain. Where was everyone?

Heading west up Olympic, Nick looked up toward his destination, as he did every morning, gauging the minutes he'd be late by the distance from his 20-story office building that always waited just a few more miles ahead. but today his building was cut off at its midsection, obscured from view by a swath of low-hanging clouds, a creamy frosting of pure white, rimmed century city under a black sky. It was beautiful, the contrast. Cars were stopping in the middle of the street now, and people got out to see this miracle forming above them.

They needed to see it without glass between them. Nick swerved around people and cars. 909. Six minutes to go. About a mile out from work, Century City loomed larger now. And Nick saw things falling from the buildings. From his building. Did someone toss something out the window?

But the windows didn't open anywhere. He was just blocks away when he noticed, in a detached way as if watching it all on television, that the tops of the buildings had been sheared off at the lowest lip of the cloud. Now it was raining, raining sparks and dust and floating paper, body parts and shrieks. Just like the old footage of that day called 9-11, Nick saw in grade school social studies.

Nick crushed his brakes. Tires screeched. Panic seized him. He looked around and noticed the layer of pure, impenetrable white, covering everything above 100 yards as far as he could see. Buildings, phone towers. the topless mountains in the distance. Nick choked, spun his car around with jerky, frantic movements,

and gunned his engine, heading back the way he came. The stunted buildings grew small behind him. He dialed his phone with a quivering thumb, trying to reach his wife. He had to reach home, reach her, sleeping inside the Viking. long ship. Had to. Nothing. No service. The clouds took it away. He sped on like a madman, slaloming through stopped cars, screaming people. Owls. Reach her. Nick turned a corner

and made a straight shot for home. Looking up into the The foothills he saw his neighborhood, or the beginning of his neighborhood. His house, further up the hillside, was obscured by clouds. For our third tale, we hear how author Gina Sakamano earned some extra money as she worked towards her Ph.D. In her role as a babysitter for a local family, she takes advantage of the quiet night's to do extra studying. But in spite of all the appealing benefits of the job, she realizes that there are good reasons

for never returning to that house. Narrator Wendy Corrigan describes for us what happened during what Gina calls, my last night babysitting. I decided to bite the bullet and returned to graduate school last fall after much wavering and second guessing. I'm sure you can understand how difficult it is to juggle a rigorous PhD program and a full-time job.

I was going to need a small source of income, but wanted something that would allow school to be my first priority. As luck would have it, a good friend of mine knew a family in desperate need of a quality babysitter. Their current sitter had recently graduated high school and was heading out of state for college. Initially, I felt a little odd accepting work as a babysitter. After all, I was in my mid-20s, a PhD student, and engaged to be married. But hell, the hours were flexible, the money was fantastic, and I could anticipate a great deal of solid study hours after the toddler was sleeping soundly. To be quite honest, it was smooth sailing from the start.

The family was overwhelmingly generous with their money, and their three-year-old daughter, Allison, was quite well-behaved, even in all her mischievous toddler glory. Over the next few months, I found myself up there several times a week, mostly relieving the mother, Renee, in the afternoons, so she could run errands and catch a coffee break. I occasionally sat on Saturdays so the parents could enjoy a date night to the movies. I wasn't especially fond of the weekend night shifts,

especially because the family lived in a large home high up in the mountains, surrounded by acres and acres of trees. During the day, their heavily wooded property was serene and majestic, but once darkness fell, it was eerie in its silence. I tried not to pay attention to the rustling of small forest animals brushing past bushes, or the sharp snapping of tree branches as the wind went about its nightly weaving. Mostly, I just tinkered around on my laptop or buried my nose in a textbook until I was relieved to go home. Everything changed this past February. It was an especially cold Saturday evening, and I was due to babysit around seven that night. Renee's husband, Eric, was out of town on business, and she was excited to share a night out with girlfriends.

Armed with a backpack of heavy reading, I had my fiancé, Mark, dropped me off on his way to the gym. The night was mellow. I heated up some frozen pizza, drew a bath with an embarrassing amount of bubbles and Elmo toys, and had the kid in bed by eight. I had an exam the following Tuesday, and admittedly had a lot of studying to conquer.

My fiancé arrived around 9.50, about 10 minutes before I was expecting Renee back home. Right at 10 o'clock, and I mean on the nose, We heard footsteps on the wraparound deck and noticed Renee making her way to the front door. I remember finding it funny that I had been concentrating so hard, I hadn't even heard her suburban drive up. Mark and I had exchanged a knowing glance

as Renee made her way into the living room where we sat. It appeared she might have had one glass of wine too many that evening because she had this intoxicating frozen grin on her face. At first, I chalked it up to her. the booze. But when the grin remained, I started to feel uncomfortable, the way an unknown stranger staring from across a restaurant can make you feel. Renée was usually very chatty, perhaps even a bit ditty, but tonight, her answers were short, but still polite enough. I began to gather my things as my fiancé continued a game of solitaire on his phone.

Renee sat at the Oak dining table, that bizarre and unsettling grin still plastered to her face and wrote me out a check. There was something painfully uncanny about her movements. They were rigid, forced, almost animatronic. By the time we got down to the driveway, my fiancé and I both had baffled looks on our faces. Renee stood in the window, smiling down on us, waving her hand back. and forth. I gave a short nod and wave, keeping my eyes on the gravel. That discomfort wasn't letting go. We walked past Renee's Silver Suburban, taking note of how absolutely dusty it was, especially strange for someone that seemed to take her car in for a wash at least once a week.

I traced my finger across the passenger door absent-mindedly, leaving a light coat of soot on the hide of my finger. Carr was filthy, like it had been through the elements. Where the hell did she go tonight? Through a sandstorm? I joked. Seriously, Mark trailed off. I'm not the only person who found that whole thing weird, right?

I asked, attempting to keep my voice to a whisper. Oh, relax. She was probably just tipsy. Her smile, though, he said. closing the driver's door. We began our trek down the winding roads, towards, after a long night of babysitting out in the boonies, what I always like to call sweet, sweet civilization. The drive from their house to the freeway was dark, lined with redwoods and deer, which I

usually quite enjoyed. Tonight, it seemed endless. I had this overwhelming new desire to be on that highway, surrounded by other cars, amongst other drivers and passengers, heading into the city. We drove for what seemed like too long. Something wasn't right. I reached for my phone and glanced at the time. We were usually passing the first gas station by now. I pawed at the handle of my purse for the first time noticing the bag's weight.

Ah, I had totally forgotten my textbook. reluctant to turn around when we had already been driving for so long. I made amends with the fact that I absolutely needed that text if I had any chance of rocking my exam. Mark let out a groan as he swung the wheel, turning back the way we came. Climbing the hill to Renee's house, I saw that the suburban was no longer in the driveway.

She must have moved it into the garage for the night already. As we made our way to the deck, I saw the burgundy spine of my text on the couch through the sliding glass door. I continued to the front door and knocked three times. No answer. I knocked again and then tried the door handle, unlocked, as I usually left it while Renee and her husband were out.

We made our way into the house, making sure to keep our footsteps quiet. Sorry, it's just me. I forgot my book, I said, trying to keep my book. voice down. My fiancé was a few steps behind me, peeking around the corner. Her bedroom door is open, but the lights are off, Mark said, a confused look spreading across his face. Renee, I asked, a little louder this time. Renee, it's me. You still awake? Silence. We walked towards the kitchen, and I noticed the answering machine was blinking.

I hadn't noticed it before I'd left. There hadn't been any phone calls that night. I'm not exactly sure what compelled me to push play on that recorder, especially when, for all I knew, Renee and Allison were both asleep and could be rudely awakened. My fingers seemed to hover over that button for a mere second before I pushed it in rather aggressively. What I heard on that recording has never, ever left me.

The timestamp of the message was 1014. We had left the house at 5 after 10. Hey, sweetie, it's Renee. There's some kind of holdup on the highway here. Maybe an accident or roadwork. I'll probably be about half hour later than expected. I'm so sorry. Help yourself to some dessert while you wait.

Hope Allison didn't give you too much grief tonight. Her voice sounded cheery. Normal. Real. I looked at Mark. My heart sunk. My eyes flooded with tears. Allison! I managed to sputter. Mark disappeared up the staircase to Allison's room, taking steps three at a time. After a painfully long minute, he sauntered down the stairs, much slower than he had ascended them. She's fine, sleeping soundly.

Mark said, without emotion. Mark and I found our way to the living room, where we sat without eye contact or conversation until Renee pulled up the driveway. She seemed exhausted, glad to be home, and off the congested road. She chattered on about her evening, wrote me a check with a generous tip,

thanked me for my patience, and smiled, the kind of smile that seemed absolutely genuine and slowly faded when socially appropriate. We stumbled down to our car in a daze, passing Renee's suburban, which still gleamed from a recent trip to the car wash. I never had the heart to tell Renee what had happened that evening. I also never found the first check from the grinning woman. I ended up canceling my next two shifts, feigning sickness.

I finally emailed Renee, telling her that my program was getting especially intense and that I didn't think it best to continue sitting for them. She bought the story, and now I'm free. Free from the darkness that enveloped the home in the mountains, where I once met a woman who wouldn't stop smiling. Our final tale deals with the rather ghoulish world of medical examiners. One would imagine that working with dead bodies all day would acclimatize a person to the disturbing,

nature of a coroner's job. Author Christopher Mallory describes how during his training to be a coroner, he encountered a situation that was far more upsetting than merely dealing with the recently deceased. Allow me to describe what he went through when he had the misfortune to meet the scarecrow corpse. I'm in training to be a coroner. My education was almost complete, and I had been working a paid internship with a well-known medical examiner in the Washington, D.C. area. All that changed a few hours ago when I was fired from the office for refusing to participate in what I believe to be a cover-up. Even though they warned me about consequences for leaking any information about this case, my conscience wouldn't be clear if I kept quiet.

This is something people need to know. A few days ago, we received a call from the Metro Police about a possible body discovered on the red line. Since working here, we've responded to a few calls in the subway system. The first time, it was a woman who tripped over someone's rolling suitcase while trying to pass by on the escalators. She ended up with a broken neck. Twice we went out there for a heart attack. once for a late-night mugging that went bad. The poor guy was stabbed repeatedly in the stomach,

even though he handed over his watch and wallet like the mugger requested. So far I haven't seen anything especially gory, and it was a bit of a letdown when the dispatch officer said the man was found just sitting on the train. Is it wrong that I've been looking forward to a call about someone either jumping or being pushed in front? of a train. The interesting thing is the wording of the dispatch request. Possible body. If the word possible is in front of body, maybe it's the paramedics that should be responding and not the coroner's office. When we arrived, the paramedics actually were on the scene, so we figured it was just a miscommunication and we were called out prematurely. Police tape blocked off the entire station

platform. From our view at the top of the escalators, we could tell something wasn't right. The paramedics stood outside the door to the train and they weren't actually doing anything except arguing and pointing at a body slumped up against a window inside. We could have left, but since it was a slow evening, we decided to take a look anyway, just to see what was going on. As we approached, I overheard some of the conversation between the two paramedics. He's dead, right? said the older of the two. Dead people don't do that. Do what, I thought.

Once they saw us, they quickly agreed that the man was dead and promptly left the scene to us. Clearly, this wasn't a call they wanted to handle. I can understand that. The police weren't much help either. I chatted with the officers on the scene while the dock went in to take a look at the man on the train. One of the detectives commented that there wasn't any clear signs of foul play. The witnesses all claimed the guy just sat down like everyone else and then he stopped breathing. Natural causes, I thought, seemed like a pretty cut and dry case. But when I looked over my

shoulder at the dock, he seemed confused. Look at this, he said to me as I walked into the train. As I approached, it seemed like the man was just napping, like a lot of the train riders do when they know their stop won't be coming up for a while. Look at what? I asked. His eyes. The man's head was forward with his chin to his chest, so that I had to kneel down to get a good look at his face. As I'm doing this, the dock is talking out loud like he tends to do, just going over his mental checklist. Not breathing, no pulse. His skin is cold to the touch, approximate time of death six to eight hours ago.

I'm in the aisle of the train, trying to make do with a pin flashlight, since the dim lighting on the train wasn't helping things much. The man's eyes were open, and they seemed to be staring at me. It's not uncommon, so I lean in closer, hoping to figure out what it is the dock wanted me to seize. so that I don't look like an idiot. And then... He blinked. I jumped back as quick as a mongoose would jump away from a cobra.

What the fuck? I tried to say. Exactly, the doc said. Gotta be a muscle spasm, right? You would think, he says. But watch this. He grabs the guy by the hair and pulls his head back. With his other hand, he waves a finger in front of the man's open eyes,

which then began to follow along as the dock moves his finger left and right. Then the man looked at me and blinked again. Have you ever seen anything like this before? I ask. Nope. And he's dead? As a doornail. We let the officer in charge know that we couldn't determine the cause of death on site.

A full autopsy would need to be performed to make any kind of determination. She made a note in the report that this body had a tendency to follow you with its eyes and occasionally blink. Off the record, she told me that the whole case bothered her. The man, she said, didn't have any identification, credit cards, watch, jewelry, a phone, or even money. All they found on him was a train ticket, and a napkin. Once we had him back at the office, we changed into our examination coveralls. I was asked to deal with his clothing.

The man watched me the whole time as I stripped off his business suit. He even winked at me once. Also, a few odd things were noted about the clothing. First, he wasn't wearing any undergarments. Normally, people wear a t-shirt, boxers or briefs, and socks. This guy wore none of those things, but for some reason he had on two belts, one over the other. The dock switched on his tape recorder and then turned on the buzz saw. I watched as he performed the Y incision, and I made a mental note of his perfect technique so that I could try to do it better next time.

I'm telling you, the dock is a real artist. Next came the enjoyable cracking sound as the ribcage was pried open. All while this was happening, the man's eyes watched us. I could almost swear he was smiling, too. Over the next hour, the doc made notes as he did the exam. He handed me each organ to be weighed and catalogued. There was nothing strange or out of the ordinary about any of the internal organs. Okay, the doc said.

Let's take a look inside his head. I want to see what's causing the eye movement. Listen, do you mind if we tape the eyes shut first? I'm trying to remain as professional as I can, but the constant blinking is unnerving me. The doc didn't mind, so I took some suture tape and worked up the courage to manually close the guy's eyelids and taped them down.

Immediately, They started moving fast. His whole face was convulsing and contorting itself, trying to break free of the tape. I don't think he likes that, the dock said, and then he removed the tape from the man's eyes. The violent motion stopped right away, and he winked at the dock. This isn't natural, I said. There's a scientific reason for everything. It's our job to find it.

the doc replied. But he actually fought to get the tape off his eyes. I guess he wants to watch. Now, do you want to remove the skull or should I? I'm too shaken to handle the equipment, so I watch as the dock works the saw around the man's skull. The bastard is smiling. I'm sure of it.

He's staring at me and blinking his left eye, then his right eye back and forth. I hear the familiar popping sound caused by the top of the skull being pulled off. Whoa, okay, the doctor says. What is it? I ask as I'm walking around to see what he's seeing. The man's eyes follow me, of course. I think I might have to call this one in.

Dear God, the brain was me. Missing. Doc? I said. Not now. Pack up and go home. I'll finish cleaning this up. He's saying this as he's already dialing a number on the phone.

But just go. I'll call you later. It isn't a request. I know when to shut up and listen. I make my way to the door knowing that the man is still staring at me. And don't say anything to any. anyone. The doc never called me back. Each time I tried to reach him, it went to voicemail. I tried to go back the next day, but security wouldn't let me in the building. They said I was to await

further instructions while on paid leave. That was four days ago. This morning I hear a knock at my door. It's a man who said he was with the medical examiner's office, but he looks as if he's with the CIA, FBI, NSA, or some other three-letter agency. He asks if he can come in to talk. I open the door to let him in, and as I do, I notice two other similarly dressed men sitting in a black suburban across the street. The folder he hands me is the case file for the John Doe that we found on the train. All of the notes about the eye movement and the blinking were removed.

There was no mention of anything out of the ordinary, let alone a missing brain. It's already got the dock signature on it, and this man is asking for me to sign it as well. I try to tell him the file's wrong, but he holds up a hand to stop me from speaking. This is how it happened. Sign it. He said. I ask about the dock. I want to know why I haven't heard from him. He says the doc has been let go. The way he says it makes me think the worst. I refuse to sign it and ask to speak to the director of the medical examiner's office.

The man informs me that would be impossible and that I am to be fired. But fired isn't the word he used. The word he used was terminated. He leaves when I ask him. to go, but he warns me that mentioning this to anyone would have serious consequences. As soon as the door closed behind him, I packed a bag and took off. I saw that a black suburban was parked at the end of my street, and I might just be paranoid, but I think it pulled out after I did.

Just in case I was being followed, I changed directions several times. When I felt safe enough, I pulled into a nearby residential neighborhood and found an open Wi-Fi signal. I think something strange is going on in D.C., maybe elsewhere as well. I don't know what it could be, but I feel like the doc and I stumbled onto something we weren't supposed to know about. And now we're in danger. I found the doc's home number online. When I called, it went straight to voicemail. I tried to leave a message for him, but the line went dead once I began talking.

If someone is monitoring my phone calls, it's possible my car is bugged too, and they already know exactly where I am. Again, maybe I'm just paranoid or crazy. Maybe there's a completely logical explanation for the scarecrow corpse that stares and blinks and winks and smiles. I can't imagine how anything like that could exist or why. I'm scared. Really, really scared.

I decided the only thing to do would be to write this and email it out to everyone I know. Hopefully, this information will make it to someone. If you don't hear back from me, I'm probably dead. and you'll know what I've reported is true. Our time together is drawing to a close. Thanks for listening to this episode. Join us again next time when we unleash more disturbing tales designed to afflict your night with no sleep.