The NoSleep Podcast - NoSleep Podcast S4E04

Episode Date: July 13, 2014

It's episode 4 of Season 4. We have six tales for you in this episode featuring stories about shocking stalkers, devilish diseases, and wicked woodsmen. The full episode features the following stories. The free version features only the first two tales.  "21 Day Quarantine" written by Jon Patrick and read by David Cummings. Music by Brandon Boone. (Story starts at 00:03:25) "Always Act As If Somebody is Watching You" written by Anton Scheller and read by L. Bentley & David Cummings. Music by Brandon Boone. (Story starts at 00:21:35) "Mailman" written by Jessica Spencer and read by Sean Nickley & Jenni Higginbotham. (Story starts at 00:38:00) "Hives" written by The Claverhouse Email Series and read by C.H. Williamson & Jessica McEvoy. Music by Brandon Boone. (Story starts at 00:49:25) "Paradise Pine" written by C.K.Walker and read by Jessica McEvoy & David Cummings. (Story starts at 01:11:30) "The Queen's Guard" written by Milos Bogetic and read by Brian Mansi & Caroline Breen Thorn & David Cummings. (Story starts at 01:43:30) Click here to learn more about the Anton Scheller Click here to learn more about The Claverhouse Email Series Click here to learn more about Milos Bogetic Podcast produced by: David Cummings Music & Sound Design by: David Cummings, unless otherwise noted The NoSleep Podcast uses the PSE Hybrid Library exclusively for its sound design. This podcast is licensed under a Creative Commons License 2014. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The sunlight fades to dark. To give into your fear. Or the no sleep pot. Death from internal bleeding comes quickly to those who it decides to take mercy on it. I took it at face value, and I would imagine a man standing outside my window, watching me. She hands me the usual letter she does every time I come. I, sulkily, turned back toward my truck and walk on. We tried every lotion and cream we could to stop the itching, but nothing seemed to work.

The guy said he was a writer, I insisted. He probably just wanted to write a scary story for other guests. There are about a million things I'd rather see standing in front of me at that moment. And there was only one person I didn't expect to be at the door. It's episode four of season four. Welcome to the show. I'm your host, David Cummings. We have six tales for you in this episode, featuring stories about shocking stalkers, devilish diseases, and wickets.

Well, right off the top, I want to welcome those of you who have recently discovered our show. Our numbers have really picked up momentum lately, and more and more people are downloading the episodes. I appreciate you joining us, and I'm also thankful to those longtime listeners who continue to share the show with your friends and social media outlets. If you haven't already, don't forget to leave us a nice review on iTunes and Stitcher. Follow us, like us, and all that stuff which helps spread the word. In doing so, you get to meet new people on the show, like the new narrators joining us this episode.

Sean Nickley and Caroline Breen Thorn are with us for the first time, and we welcome them to the show. Also, those of you who have listened to our second season may remember a former regular narrator, C.H. Williamson. He's moved on to bigger and better things these days, but he recently sent me a story he recorded back in season two, but never actually submitted to me. So I'm glad to welcome him back for this episode with his Lost Narration from the Vaults. So we have lots of new listeners, lots of new narrators,

and lots of new stories for you. So let's start the show. In our first tale, we get some insider information on a, very real event occurring presently in West Africa. Author John Patrick explains that the outbreak of the Ebola virus, which has currently claimed over 500 lives, is worse than originally suspected. It seems a mysterious doctor may have more to do with the spread of the disease than its prevention. You'll soon understand why working with a virus like Ebola requires a virus.

A 21-day quarantine. I've just returned from Africa. Guinea, to be specific. I was there interning for the CDC in cooperation with the World Health Organization, or W.H.O. If you haven't heard what's going on in West Africa right now, then I'll give you the quick and dirty. There's a massive Ebola virus outbreak. I worked as a tech assisting with incredibly ill. patients. Most of them didn't make it where I worked. The few that did survive were in bad

shape and would probably carry traces of their struggles with them for the remainder of their lives. It wasn't pretty. I have a degree in biology and microbiology and have been working towards a master's in epidemiology. I plan on eventually getting my doctorate, but that's neither here nor there right now. One of my professors invited us to apply for a summer internship with the CDC, working with the WHO, in an attempt to find a vaccine for the Ebola virus outbreak that's been ravaging West Africa. I put my resume in the mix and was rewarded with a spot on the trip.

There were four of us in total, and we all went to separate hospitals. They weren't really hospitals. It was a series of tents set up to hold the ill until they either got better or died. I know it sounds harsh, but when someone's veins have deteriorated to the point that a nurse can't even get a needle into them without them catastrophically failing, then the chances are they aren't going to make it. The reason this disease has been spreading so quickly in the area is quite simple. It's the method the indigenous people. used to bury their dead. They insist on washing the corpses before they put them in the ground.

This puts them in direct contact with bodily fluids contaminated with a virus that has at least an 80% mortality rate and can remain dormant for up to 21 days. Someone could basically be dead on their feet for three weeks before symptoms begin to manifest. Death from internal bleeding comes quickly to those who it decides to take mercy on. Others linger for weeks. I've been quarantined for the last three weeks to ensure that I was safe to return home. It was standard procedure. Anyone who was leaving the facility that had been in any sort of contact with the patients, even while wearing hazmat suits, had to wait a minimum of three weeks.

weeks before leaving. No exceptions. One of the other assistants, a local man, was informed that his wife had succumbed to an unrelated illness and that he was required to stay for three more weeks before going to be with his family. It was strictly enforced. We planned our trip accordingly and collected our data and samples in May. Having last been in contact with the patients or samples a little over three weeks ago so that we could return at the beginning of July. The doctor I was working with was a somewhat local one who seemed to have delusions of grandeur, not to mention a death wish. He was originally from Southeast Nigeria. He didn't act like the rest of the doctors and seemed to have his own bizarre agenda the entire time I spent with him.

He behaved like a normal enough person, but he would frequently disregard the strict safety rules, and, on occasion, nearly exposed himself to the virus. I watched in horror one afternoon as he removed the helmet to his mask to wipe a bead of sweat from his face. There was no earthly power that could have convinced me to remove my mask in such a situation. If someone sneezed from across the room, the microscopic beads of water could travel at upwards of 30 miles per hour, infecting him before he even had a chance to get his mask back on. We were burning bed sheets to prevent the spread of this horrible virus while he's removing his mask in patients' rooms because he's uncomfortable. It amazed me that he hadn't taken ill yet. I reported him to the W.E. WHO rep on site.

The WHO rep promptly told me that no one in their right mind would do that, and I received a verbal reprimand, but otherwise nothing happened. If he didn't care that he got infected, that was one thing, but I had no such desire. I took great care to avoid this man outside of the ward. He lived on the other side of the city. and kept mostly to himself when at the ward outside of patient's rooms. It wasn't hard. I had to have one interaction with him that I can remember. He was required, as part of our assessment of the working conditions of the healthcare providers in the facility,

to give us a cheek swab. I took this swab with the utmost care and made sure to wear a full hazmat suit. I treated him as if he were a patient. I had an excuse all prepared in case he asked. This was my standard procedure. The suits clean and I don't like taking risks. But he didn't ask. He simply smiled and stared at me with eyes that seemed to look right through me.

His eyes seemed off, but I couldn't put my finger on it. I never really got a close look at them. I burned the suit like the rest after decontamination. His sample was checked under a video microscope and placed under observation like the rest. Finally, over three weeks ago, my group had our final decontamination. We stayed quarantined in our respective facilities and studied the data, tapes, and recordings. The data was going to make a fine thesis that would probably help me greatly in the pursuit of my doctorate. Each of the four students had to provide a sample as well,

and as we were nearing the end of the three weeks, all had been deemed clean, showing zero signs of infection. Everyone was healthy, which, even with the precautions we'd taken, was a fantastic relief. The health care workers, for the most part, heart had remained unaffected by the virus. Only one of the workers became infected during our stay, and that was a known accidental breach. She'd been unfortunate enough to stick herself through the suit with a contaminated needle. Mercifully, she'd actually survived her infection and lived to give us a second sample of someone who'd beaten Ebola. We had recorded enough data and videos of the various samples we'd taken to last for months, but we were on a time schedule, so some of it

waited until we got back home. As we were leaving the facility, I noticed that the W.H.O. rep was a different one than the person who'd verbally told me to basically keep a lid on it. I questioned her, and she informed me that she'd only been assigned to this post that very day, as the last WHO rep had been killed in a botched robbery a few days prior while in Sierra Leone. I questioned her as to what she knew about the doctor who I'd been working with, and she claimed that no one under that name worked under the facility. As she flipped through the pages, she did remark that a patient under the same name had passed away very early on in the outbreak. She described him and showed me a grainy photograph of what appeared to be a man near death lying in a bed.

That was him. That was the doctor. I could see it in his eyes and I figured out why they looked odd. There were small capillaries that had burst from the infection in his eyes. The man in the picture was cremated, let me see. than six hours after the pitcher was taken as he died before they could even try to treat him. I told her of this and she made a note, but mostly told me that I was probably seeing things as this man was long dead. I told my professor and he seemed more worried than me. He'd had a similar experience during the Ebola outbreak in 1976.

He began to ask the man's name, but then stopped. We were sitting in a transport when he walked by. We both caught sight of him, and as the transport wheeled away, we could see the doctor bored a separate one headed off sight. As part of our journey, we were headed to sea for a ride to a neighboring, unaffected village before heading home. My professor contacted the WHO rep when we arrived on our ship. She sent us his picture and my professor turned pale. He wasn't a tan man to begin with as he was already in his 60s,

but what color he had drained from his face when he saw the picture. It was the same seemingly dead man who'd impersonated a doctor back in 19, He was sure of it. As best as we could tell, he was already long gone. We had no way of knowing where exactly, except that the transport he was on went directly to the airport. We didn't know what to do, so we turned to analyzing the samples and the data we'd collected before our quarantine. The samples had long since been discarded, but the video recordings are, of the samples under a microscope still needed to be analyzed. I went directly to the mystery

doctor's sample, Dr. Akachi, as he was called. I put the recording of his sample up to analyze and started to research his name. I couldn't find anything, aside from a few mad scientist types in various anime genres. I did a search on just the surname, as the name. I did a search on just the surname, as that was all I had to go on and found something interesting. His name roughly translates to the hand of God. When I thought of that, it explained a lot about his demeanor. He would frequently refer to himself as the one who does God's work. I'm not sure he was talking about healing anymore.

Suddenly my computer began to light up with alerts. The good doctor's sample was off the charts infected. I'd sped the recording up a great deal, and by the time it neared the end, he went from a perfectly healthy individual at day 20 to living zombie at day 21. He had enough Ebola virus in his system that I thought at first someone had made,

switched the samples without anyone noticing until I checked and double-checked the records. The sample dish hadn't moved once. According to the logs, kept by AIDS who weren't always medically trained, his blood pH dropped from 7.4 at day 20 to less than 5.0 by day 21. Immediately I contacted my professor who told me not to call anyone else. We reported it directly to the highest ranking person we could find at the CDC. That was our mistake. They told us that such information, if unfounded, could cause a global panic.

They told us that it wasn't possible that his blood could be acting like this, and he still be walking upright, but we saw it. They told us we weren't to contact anyone else on the matter. I returned home to find my apartment ransacked. My computer's gone. Everything I'd taken to the CDC was gone. I keep a hidden hard drive under my bed that stored basically everything as a backup,

and even this had been fried. My email accounts had all been hacked and wiped, and I basically had to start over my master's thesis. I've done so by taking a look at cases resembling hemorrhagic fever outside of Africa. I noticed a trend in a few developed countries, mostly in Asia and Russia. But before I got too far, I was shut down again when I thought I found a case in North America. It looked like a Canadian bush pilot had come down with something resembling Ebola after flying a man from a remote area in the Yukon into Yellowknife. Another bush pilot from Alaska had died in a similar manner, but he'd been in the field so no samples had been taken, and the body had been unceremoniously burned to prevent spread. This was as far as I got before I was attacked by.

two large men and robbed at gunpoint. Again, I lost everything. I returned to my apartment to find the door kicked in and my newly purchased laptop gone. That evening, I was informed via a close friend that my professor, the one I'd been working with, had died of a heart attack during an attempted robbery. I couldn't even go to the funeral because he had no living relatives, and his body was taken by the CDC owing to his close proximity to the virus, even though that wasn't what killed him. I know I should stop. Twice in three days, I lost basically everything of value that I owned, but the man the pilots had given a ride matched the description. to a tea, right down to the blood-red eyes.

The CDC and WHO are afraid of a global pandemic, because Ebola has no cure. It's the perfect humanity killer. If an outbreak hit the United States, it could take 60 to 80% of the population within weeks, months at best, and even with all the health. care we have, there's nothing we could do to stop it. They don't think it'd be possible for the disease to spread to North America. I think it's already here. As parents, the desire to raise your child to be a proper, respectful individual means you need to instill in them reminders of how to behave. But as author Anton Scheller writes, one woman shares the events of her life,

from her childhood to present day, about a mysterious person who always seems to be watching her. Narrator L. Bentley reads the tale for us about how this woman's fear turned from imaginary to something very real. And it's all because her mother once taught her, always act as if somebody is watching you. She sat at the table with the stiff grace of an English woman from the 1920s. Her back was straight, the shoulder-length hair thrown behind her shoulder, and the hands folded neatly in her lap. When I was small, Michelle began. My mother used to tell me to always act as if you were not alone.

She kept saying it to me every few weeks, and over time the sentence changed. First it changed to Never do anything that other people would find disgraceful And then it transformed back to Always act as if somebody else is there And finally, when I was around 12 It took its final shape Always act as if somebody is watching you

Michelle's lips stretched to a slight smile I always knew she meant well My mother never wanted to try trouble me. She just wanted to make sure that I was a good child and that I was watching out for myself. But when I was small... The smile disappeared from Michelle's face. I was scared when she said it. I took it at face value and I would imagine a man standing outside my window, watching me. He had short, dark hair, bushy eyebrows and a large nose. And I imagined him looking at

at me without any emotion, most of the time. When I was playing, he would be there, standing at the window, to watch out whether I would hurt one of my dolls or draw on the table. Whenever I did something wrong, he would glare at me. And when I did something that was really bad, he would bear his teeth. And once he even hissed at me, I was scared of him. Michelle's voice was flat, as if she was reading out a cake recipe. But he always stayed outside the house or wherever I was. I knew that as long as I stayed inside, I would be safe.

That's the reason why I never played outside, and to this day I still can't enjoy outdoor sports. For a moment, the facade of Michelle's calm face crumbled, and I could see attention. A Worry in her eyes. I mentioned the man a few times to my mother, but she never took me seriously. Although once or twice I could see the worry in her eyes. But when I was around 10 or 11, the age where most children lose their imaginary friends, I lost my imaginary stalker. From one day to the other, he was simply gone.

I was relieved to say the least. He had been there as long as I could remember. and that he finally disappeared at the age where I was learning to be myself was a powerful change. For the first time in my life, I tried to break the rules. I started playing in the garden and to explore forests with my friends. My mother was shocked when I came home with my first bruises and the first ripped dress. Michelle turned her head away to focus her eyes on an unremarkable stain on the floor. But that stopped when the two guys in the same.

the car tried to grab me. I was just on my way home from a friend's place around the corner, when the red car slowly drove up to me. I felt and heard it behind me, but I didn't worry about it. Back then I hadn't bothered about the fact that my breasts had begun to grow and my figure had started to become more feminine, but I guess they had. Or at least I didn't have any other explanation for it back then. I was walking slowly, singing a song to myself, when the engine began to howl. The car sped in front of me and a tall man jumped out. He moved forward and tried to grab my arm, but I was quick enough to take a step back, and he grabbed past me and stumbled. I think that was the only reason I got away, and the fact I'd become friends with one of our neighbour's dogs.

I ran around the corner and hopped over the fence. When the man too tried to jump the fence, the German shepherd growled and barked at him and bared its teeth. The man hesitated for a while, and I could see the anger in his dark brown eyes, but finally he looked at the house, turned around and sprinted back to the car. Michelle turned her eyes back to me. Since then, I don't go out much anymore. My father became even more protective than he had to be. been before and my mother was constantly checking on me to see where I was or what I was doing.

And, over time, my mother's mantra became my mantra. Always act as if somebody is watching you. That is a good thought to have. I've been living my life in the safest way possible. I made sure never to go home alone, even during the day. I avoided meeting new people. Even at university, I chose the accommodation closest to the lecture halls, and still I mostly stayed inside. I suppose that's why I never made many friends. Michelle's eyes were wet, but she quickly pulled a tissue from her bag, turned around and dried her eyes. Then she turned back to me. I didn't like my childhood.

I was always embarrassed about the fact that there were so few pictures of me being outdoors or with friends. I know that on those occasions where I was outdoors my father took many pictures, but he always said that he had thrown them away, saying that they hadn't turned out nicely. My father wasn't a particularly good photographer, so that never surprised me. But it bothered me, even when I was a child, but even more when I got older. That is, I believed him until the end of my first year at university, until I found the five cardboard box. She said. Michelle shivered. They were in the storage room in my parents' house, and I only found them by accident when I was home for the holidays and looking for my old yearbooks.

There were hundreds of photos of all kinds. They were photos of nature, and photos of my mother and me, and some even of my father are one of my few friends in them. Michelle's face was slowly getting red. I was confused and angry. I wanted to confront my father for lying to me for so long, but then, just when I was grabbing the third box out of the shelf, I understood why. There was a picture of me,

and my mother, eating ice cream on one of our holidays to the beach. I looked as if I was nine or ten years old. But in the background, clearly standing there and staring at us, was the man from my window. I recognised the bushy eyebrows and the large nose, and even the black shirt he was wearing. I was shocked.

My throat tightened as if I was going to choke, but I calmed myself down. I told myself that I must have seen the man at the beach, and that then afterwards I imagined him at my window. I thought that clearly I must have misremembered my past, but then I found another picture in the box and then another the whole third box was full of pictures of our trips

or even at home and he was always standing in the background Michelle was shaking I never got over finding this box this man for so long I thought he was a figment for my imagination but he was real I searched through the box And every single photo had his face in it

But at least it stopped when I was about 12 There was the first picture of my ripped dress The one I ripped shortly after he was gone And he was standing in the background again But then the photo stopped And then Michelle's voice was trembling And then I pulled out of

the fourth box and the fifth box and they were filled with photos not even just of me but also of our garden or the car or even my school and in every fifth or sixth photo he was there again standing behind a corner or looking into a window the photos went up to my graduation I confronted my parents about it I shouted and screamed at them for hiding all of this from me. They explained that they had wanted to tell me, but that it would have been too painful for me, that they had contacted the police many times, and that they had even tried to catch the man themselves, but they had never managed to catch him. The photos, my dad explained, were all as evidence for the police, to convince them that they had to do more. My parents

said that the only time the police tried hard to do something was when I was nearly abducted. When the two men had grabbed me, they had even positioned officers near her house for two months, but they never caught the man. Michelle dried her eyes again. After that, I barely went out anymore. My second year of university, I basically locked myself in my room. I had one of my friends videotape the lectures, and I would watch them at night. I told two of my few friends about my stalker, but when they started to avoid me, I didn't tell anyone

else anymore. I just stayed inside and kept to myself, reading books or watching TV series. I lived like that for all of my second year and for part of my third year, and then I met Isaiah. She smiled for a moment, but that smile soon faded from her face. It was during a group project that I had to take part in. I had tried hard to get out of it. I even asked my psychologist to write me a note, but the professor was having none of it. He said I had to take part in the project, or I would fail the course. I went to the room with hesitation, and I made it clear to the others in the group that I could only meet during daytime. I told them I had a strong migraine that would always come in the evenings. But when I met them, even though they thought I was strange,

it was wonderful. They were the first people I had met in so long. and Isaiah. I just couldn't take my eyes off him when he spoke. And at those rare times when I spoke, he didn't take his eyes off me either. Michelle giggled. He walked me home after the second group meeting and asked me for a date.

At first I was reluctant. He was so different from me. But he talked me into it. He picked me up. We went to the cinema and had dinner. And for the first time in more than one and a half years I didn't think about the man. I felt safe with him. And I felt like he liked me too.

We started dating regularly, and on the fifth date he kissed me at my door. It was my first kiss. From then on I couldn't stop thinking about Isaiah. I forgot all about the stalker, but I still made sure that Isaiah always picked me up and brought me home. And one day I even told him about the stalker. And Isaiah accepted it. He said it was okay and that he would protect me from whoever the man was. I have never felt happier than in that moment when he promised to protect me.

Michelle was smiling, but tears rolled down her cheeks. This time she didn't wipe them off. I was surprised how well my parents liked him. He was so different from me, from us. But I think they were happy that I was finally relaxed and they could feel that he would protect me. But I guess his protection wasn't enough. That's why I'm here. I know I can't go out there anymore.

I know that this man will always be in my life. I just can't escape him. Michelle's body began to shiver again. It was a few weeks later when I met Isaiah's parents. He drove us to his hometown and we bought a bouquet of flowers. Red flowers for his mother. I had heard all these bad things about mothers-in-law. I wanted to make sure that we would start the right way,

that she would like me from the beginning. We arrived in the evening, just when it was starting to get dark outside. Isaiah's mother opened the door and hugged me right away. She was so happy about flowers. She even said that I had chosen her favorites. We came inside and I took my shoes off, and then I heard the soft voice of Isaiah's stepdad from the kitchen.

Are those the kids? I was beginning to tremble and I didn't know why. Isaiah's mother asked whether I was okay, but I just couldn't answer. All I could do was stare at the kitchen door. He stepped into the doorframe and said, Welcome home. And walked towards me with a wide grin on his face. I recognized him right away.

The man from the window. Our episode has come to an end. Thank you for spending time with us at the No Sleep Podcast. If you would like to learn how you can hear the full-length version of this episode, featuring many more stories, please visit the nosleeppodcast.com and click on the Season Pass link. Purchasing a Season Pass will help support everyone who contributes to the podcast, and in return you'll get 25 full-length episodes and 3.5 full-length episodes and 3-8. exclusive bonus episodes, all for only 1999.

This is David Cummings. Thank you for listening, and join us again for the next episode of the No Sleep Podcast.