The NoSleep Podcast - S20 Ep21: NoSleep Podcast S20E21

Episode Date: March 3, 2024

It’s Episode 21 of Season 20. Come join us around the campfire for tales about gods and monsters.“Herders” written by William Meikle (Story starts around 00:03:40)Produced by: Jeff ClementCast: Narrator – Erika Sanderson, Brian – Jake Benson, Dave – Guy Woodward“Terms and Conditions” written by Seann Barbour (Story starts around 00:32:00)Produced by: Phil MichalskiCast: Narrator – James Cleveland“The Mirabelles” written by Dixon March (Story starts around 00:45:25)Produced by: Phil MichalskiCast: Narrator – Erin Lillis“My Soul to Keep” written by Ray Tardigrade (Story starts around 01:05:00)TRIGGER WARNING!Produced & scored by: David CummingsCast: Narrator – Jeff Clement“My Pastor Brought Something Strange to Church” written by Ryan Millhollin (Story starts around 01:21:10)Produced by: Phil MichalskiCast: Shelly – Sarah Thomas, Pedro – Atticus Jackson, Pastor Tim – Peter Lewis, Momma – Erin Lillis“Temple of the Satyr and the Nymph” written by Lisel Jones (Story starts around 01:37:15)TRIGGER WARNING!Produced by: Jesse CornettCast: Laurel – Penny Scott-Andrews, Giles – David Ault, Kayli – Ash Millman, Documentarist – Andy CresswellThis episode is sponsored by:Tender Beasts - Tender Beasts by Liselle Sambury. If you like mind-bending YA psychological horror stories that keep you up at night, you donít want to miss Tender Beasts. Available wherever books are sold!Click here to learn more about The NoSleep Podcast team Click here to learn more about William Meikle Click here to learn more about Seann Barbour Click here to learn more about Ryan Millhollin Executive Producer & Host: David CummingsMusical score composed by: Brandon Boone“Temple of the Satyr and the Nymph” illustration courtesy of Jen TracyAudio program ©2024 – 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.

From our earliest days, we've gathered around the fire for warmth and comfort. But beyond the light of the dying embers, there is the darkness. And it's in the darkness of the night where we find ourselves, waiting, yearning for the dawn to banish our fears. But our campfire holds more than fireless. for with us you will hear the tales that make the nightmares engulf you and you dare not close your eyes brace yourself for the no sleep podcast welcome to the no sleep podcast i'm your host david cummings as you know i have often recommended things to our listeners like podcasts movies tv shows books projects that I've enjoyed and that I think you might enjoy as well.

I recently finished reading a book that I thought was excellent. But, full disclosure, the book was sent to me to read, and we are doing a paid promotion in the ad on this episode. So all I'm going to say is that if you're a premium member or you're someone who skips the ads, shame on you. I'll just encourage you to check the show notes to learn more about the Y.A. horror novel by author Lizell Sambury, called Tender Beasts. I think a lot of you will enjoy it.

Now, let's get into the spirit of the show. And by that, I mean, let's get spiritual. I think it's safe to say that every person has a spiritual side to them. For some, it's a deep appreciation for the outdoors and nature. For others, art can connect with their spiritual side. And, of course, for so many, their spiritual side is closely connected to a religion or a faith in a higher power. Belief in deities and spiritual entities can bring a lot of comfort and guidance to certain people.

But, of course, the belief and deep-seated faith people have can be exploited to darker ends. Now, we're not here to bash religion, but we know how horror themes often delve into that fine line where the good and the light clash with the evil and the dark. It's rarely religion itself that is the focus of the horror. It's how some people use it against others. Think of a finely honed sharp chef's knife. It can be used to slice and dice food into a delicious meal, but put that knife into the hands of a maniacal killer,

and you get delicious horror. So in the same way the knife can be used for good or evil, religion, faith, and one spiritual side can be sources of horror. And so, I guess your prayers have been answered, because this episode has tales which find horror in the pews, the temples and the heavenly realms above. We have faith that you'll find them to be a goddamn horrifying delight. And now the sun has set, the fire glows bright.

Brace yourself for the darkness of the night. In our first tale, we meet an archaeologist called to a Scottish farm after an ancient structure was unearthed, and the markings he discovers seem to reveal a strange code. And in this tale, shared with us by author William Meekle, we'll learn how the code itself leads to a much more gruesome discovery. Performing this tale are Erica Sanderson, Jake Benson, and Guy Woodward. So the countryside has its farmers, but it also has its herders.

No limbs, no limbs, no head, no head. Left arm gone, left leg gone. No legs, no head. The stick figures on the screen frustrated him every bit as much as they had when he'd originally seen them on the newly exposed wall at the dig site. At first he'd been excited, thinking them to be a simple code, ranks of figures that with a bit of work could easily be interpreted as a message from the people who had lived and died here all those years ago.

But if it was a code, it proved to be one that was beyond Brian Meadows' ability to crack, beyond anyone's ability to crack from what he could gather. Not for the first time in the past fortnight. He left his trailer in a grump and headed down the winding track that led into Moffat for something he knew he could always rely on. The ram's head was almost empty, which was just fine by him.

The first beer went down quickly, the second a bit slower, and by the time he got to his third, he was getting his equilibrium back. It was a state he'd found increasingly difficult to maintain in the roller coaster that was their first month on the dig. It had started with hope. The local farmer's discovery of a previously unknown Roman structure

in a copse by the side of a field had made the papers and enabled Brian and his team to rustle up enough cash for an exploratory dig. He'd come down from Glasgow with four post-grad researchers, three trailers, and a lot of that aforesaid hope. Then it had started raining. The first two weeks were spent in a muddy field in daylight and a rowdy local bar in the evenings. But although the work was slow and heavy going,

it was becoming clear that they were definitely onto something as the remnants of walls, rooms, and evidence of long occupation began to emerge from the soil. There was more hope, especially from Brian who began to dream of the big find, a mosaic floor maybe, or a hoard of jewelry or silver. The day it stopped raining was also the day of their breakthrough into what proved to be a large chamber

under what they thought to be the main floor. There was no treasure. In fact, Brian thought they'd got nothing until he'd washed the walls down and found that all of them, even the floor, were covered in line after line, of three-inch-high stick figures, most of them missing either limbs or heads or both.

No limbs, no limbs, no head, no head. Left arm gone, left leg gone, no legs, no head. Now, even after a farther two weeks' investigation and the closing of the dig site to leave Brian the sole researcher remaining, all he had to show for the work was a couple of thousand stick figures that he'd scanned into his laptop, and an ever-growing sense of frustration that was leading to nightly drinking

in the hope that sleep might bring oblivion. He was finishing off his third pint when someone spoke behind him. You look like a man who needs another pint. You look like a man ready to bite me one day. Kelly 80, please. Brian watched Dave Smith make his way to the bar. Dave was the local policeman and had become a drinking buddy of Brian's

these past few weeks. Dave told him the local gossip and Brian bought him a beer. They both seemed happy with the situation and Dave was probably the only person who knew how much the frustration had been eating away at the archaeologist. Still getting near here.

It's not even as much fun as banging a heed against a brick wall. I've got that talk. to give in the church hall tomorrow night and I've got a buggerald to tell them or show them apart from photos of muddy students and these blasted stick figures I canny make keyed no tail of. I wouldn't worry about them meeting

they'll be neither apart for me and a couple of old biddies who think it's bingo night. Brian had turned to Dave ten days ago in the hope that a fresh pair of eyes might help. I'm no Sherlock Holmes but I like puzzles, leave it with me. But Dave hadn't got anywhere either and neither had the folks back in Glasgow

who were also looking at. it. The wee figures just kept dancing on the pages as if taunting them. At the same instant, Brian had that thought. Dave sat down and drummed out a beat on the table with a palm of his hands. A habit the cop had that Brian hadn't paid much attention to until now. Dancing. Drumming? Could it be that simple? Ten minutes later, he was back in his trailer with a bemused Dave in tow. Whiskeys in the cupboard, pizza in the freezer, and he came with the maker of us. Give me ten minutes with this. I've got an idea.

It took 20 minutes in the end, by which time Dave had got through most of the pizza and a good part of the whiskey. Brian had been too excited for either. I think I've got it. He finally looked up from the laptop. Okay. Dave handed him a glass with three fingers of scotch in it. Start at the beginning, remembering that I'm just a country copper. Brian smiled.

Right, you are. I've told you already that I think the site was a wee fort, more of a keep really, an outpost on this side of the wall at the time when the Romans were just starting to move further north. Everything we found suggested the legionaires here were Syrian conscripts, mounting people originally. They kept goats and sheep judging by the amount of bone we found, and now, judging by this, I'd say they'd like to make music too. What do you mean? Brian waved a sheaf of printed papers.

Wasn't he a code at all? Not any kind of writing. It's a transcript of a rhythm. A drumbeat. It took some trial and error and a wee bit of code in the computer. But I've got it. Once a suss that it must be six beats to a bar and that each figure represented any one of six different beats within the bar.

All I had to do was find a place to start it. Then it all just fell into place. Listen. He turned on the laptop speakers and set a programme running. The trailer filled with a drumbeat. It wasn't anything you'd fancy dancing to, but there was an urgent quality to it, a drive that made Brian think it had a definite purpose. The trailer began to vibrate in time.

First the cut three in the drawer, then the plates by the sink. The light faded and brightened, and the whole trailer yawed and pitched as if suddenly launched into the sea. Brian's stomach lurched, and he tasted whiskey as it threatened to come out faster than it had gone in. On the hall! Dave had to shout to be heard. over a beat that was now amplified tenfold and booming. Switch the bloody thing off! Brian reached over and stopped the programme.

The trailer fell silence, say for one last rattle of the cutlery in the drawer. Okay, Neil. Take me a favour, Brian. Don't switch that on again. I need to. That's an important discovery. Maybe no so much of discovery as you think. What do you mean by that?

I mean I've heard it before. The policeman held up a hand as if to block the protest he knew was coming. You'll need to trust me on this. There's something I need to tell you and something I need to show you, but it'll have to wait until morning. I'm not going off half cocked in the dark

where I barely a bean and whiskey in me. I'm off to bed to have I think. Come down to the station in the morning, I'll stand for a bacon rolling coffee, and I'll tell you then. Just promise me you won't play it again until we've talked. Brian grudgingly gave his promise.

After Dave left, he looked over the printed output of the figures again, but didn't switch on the program. Even so, he felt the beat grow in his head, an earworm as bad as any catchy pop song that threaded its way in and around the empty spaces inside him, and threatened to have him vibrating and rocking again. He tuned it out with the help of a large whiskey,

and managed to sleep fitfully, but woke with the rhythm still ringing in his ears. The beat was still there, a dull throbbing reminiscent of a hangover at the back of his head, when he went down the hill to the small, police station. Dave was waiting for him in the hallway and thrust a bacon roll and a plastic cup of coffee at him. Don't say I never get you in. Mully you on the move. It's just a wee walk, then all will be revealed. They talked about the quality of both the bacon rolls, excellent,

and the coffee, shite while they strolled. It was obvious Dave didn't want to discuss much of anything else at that point, and the thumping in Brian's head was making it hard for him to concentrate on anything but breakfast in any case. He was surprised when Dave stopped them by a small stone building above a steep riverbank. Brian had passed it many times without paying it much note. It was little more than four rough sandstone walls and a sagging slate roof,

typical of the overwintering farm sheds that dotted the landscape in the area. Dave took a small torch from his inside pocket and waved Brian into the doorway. It was dry inside. A chamber some 16-foot, feet long by ten wide, dry straw on the floor and empty. So what's the story?

Dave washed an oval of light over the far wall that had been in deep shadow until then. Ryan's breath hitched. Depicted there, in what looked like black paint, were four stick figures, each a foot high. No head, no legs, no left arm, no right leg. Dave moved the beam upwards. Above the stick figures was a huge, crudely depicted head of a ram, horns curving up into the darker shadows in the rafters, black eye seeming to stare directly into Brian's soul.

The thumping in his head rose again, the beat pounding, his guts roiling. He barely made it to the doorway before his bacon roll and breakfast made a reappearance in one hot steaming bundle. I'd you tell me last night, didn't you? Brian recovered enough to accept a smoke from Dave. They stood away from the doorway, taking in a view over the rolling hills to the south.

My discovery isn't a discovery at all? I don't know about that. I do know nobody stuck near your sight for a whine of years. So how did somebody know about the stick figures? What's the story? Maybe coincidence, maybe something else. It's time for the tell part. But for that I'll need a beer.

Come on. I'm off duty and the ram will be open with the time we get there. It's my shout. They were the only customers in the large bar. Brian didn't usually start this early, but the sight in the barn had shaken him and the thump of the beat was still there behind his eyes, lessening slightly as he made his way down his beer.

Dave got half his own pint down before speaking. It was ten year ago. I was a young copper way behind the years on the night shift and we got a call about kids causing bother out of you and barn. I thought on the way there that I was going to be breaking up a rowdy beer potting lassie's party It's not as if we didn't get her fair share of those in these parts What I found was something different to all together I heard the drums for near half a mile away

Ryan started nearly spilled his pint Aye, the same as you've got on your wee laptop My guts were fair boiling as I went up to the door I shouted out as you do But didn't get an answer Apart for the fact that the drumming stopped and everything went quiet. I think I preferred the drums there in what was no near pitch dark. My horns were shaking as I got the torch on and went inside. There was

nobody there. There was, there's sign there had been a party. What there was, was the same drones on the wall I just showed you. That and a big dead ram, lying there below the drones, still worn. His blood looking black in the torchlight where it pulled on the ground. Dave downed the rest of his beer in one, and without asking, went to the bar for two more. He continued on when he returned. And that's no all. I asked the route, none too discreetly. For my sins, I get caught in to see the boss.

There I go yet another story, and was told to keep my mish up if I came when it was good for me. I'm telling you new for your own good. Let it lie, Brian. What lie? You've telling me a load of fuck hollow so far. Dave's answer threw Brian off for a while As it seemed to come from nowhere Towns have got masons The country has herders

What hell does that mean Dave took another deep slug of beer Before replying And when he did his voice was low Even though there was no one else to hear Tradition That's what I'm talking about Old words, old rituals

Handed down over the years we're watching over the flocks in the hills There's been herders here ever since the land was cleared Since even before you're romans if the stories are right Rituals? You mean the stick figures and the drumming? It's a folk memory, is that what you're saying? Aye, and it's one folks on heroes would rather keep to themselves They've got a way of day in things A way of keeping the flock protected

Just let it be I'm telling you the same way I was tell For you ain't good Brian didn't push the matter He was surprised Dave was so serious about it, but not surprised enough to take his friend's advice. He had a talk to give that night in the church hall and had nothing but the stick figures to talk about.

How can there be? Brian went back to the dig sometime later, belly full of beer, head full of drumming. He stood for a while at the edge of the site, looking down into the chamber, but was forced to retreat to the trailer when the beat ramped up and the engraved figures on the wall and floor appeared to dance and jig in time. He made a pot of coffee, sat at the laptop,

and tried to compose a coherent presentation for his talk that evening. But the beat would not let him be. A constant drumming in his head that he started to tap out with his fingers as he typed. And after he pushed the laptop away and started it on the scotch, it got little better. His fingers wrapped the rhythm out on the side of his glass or on the table on which he sat. He knocked back nearly a quarter bottle of liquor in short order and took to bed. Sleep came slowly. And when it did, his fevered dreams were populated with seried ranks of figures dancing across the screen of his mind.

No limbs, no limbs, no head, no head. Left arm gone, left leg gone. No legs, no head. He woke with a mouth that felt like a badger had shit in it and a head full of tiny drummers. Toothpaste took care of the taste. but the drummers were still there as he began to gather his things together for the evening's presentation. He was going to have to wing it for the most part. His notes were a mess.

But he had the slides on his laptop. His wee projector would work just fine, and as a university lecturer, he was more than experienced enough in talking on the fly and responding to changing circumstances. He was still trying to convince himself of that, as he made his way back down the hill to town, his footsteps beating out the rhythm on the road surface. It was getting dark by the time he reached the town.

The gaudy lights in the ram called him, offering solace in more beer, more scotch. But that was another thing he was more than experienced enough in. More booze now was the last thing he needed. He lowered his head and quickly made his way to the small church hall. He turned the door handle and pushed. The door opened, light too bright inside, sending his pounding headache up another notch.

Somebody had been making preparations. There was a white projector sheet at the far end of the hall in front of four rows of six seats. The smell of fresh brewed coffee led him to a small kitchenette at the rear, where the coffee pot sat next to polythene-covered trays of neatly cut sandwiches. He helped himself to a coffee and went back through to the hall where his clumsy drum-addled fingers fought to attach cables, turn on and focus the projector,

and get the slideshow set up on the laptop. his audience started to gather while he was preparing. At first he thought Dave was going to be proved right. The front row was filled with little old ladies who looked like they were indeed there for the bingo. Then Dave himself arrived, unsmiling and serious, with two of his fellow police officers in tow. The local minister arrived with two overly made up

and manicured middle-aged women. And lastly, the farmer whose ground brine was digging up came in, a craggy old chap with three equally craggy sons in the same mould. Brian gave it another five minutes to see if there were any stragglers, then had the minister dim the lights as he turned on the slideshow. The first slide showed the dig site as it had been before Brian arrived. He started with the history of how the site had been discovered, went on to a bit about how he'd procured the grant money to get going,

and was getting into his stride when he made the mistake of looking up. It wasn't that the audience weren't paying attention that was the problem. It was the fact that they were paying too much attention. Not to the images on the projected screen, but to Brian himself. All of their gazes fixed directly on him with unblinking stairs. He faltered, and this time it was the rhythm in his head that saved him, gave him something to focus on. He flipped quickly, on the beat each time,

through the slides of the actual progress on the dig, until he got to the first clear shot of the ranks of engraved figures on the walls and floor of the exposed chamber. As soon as the slide came up, the beat rose and swelled in his head. I believe this is the most important find in archaeology in Scotland in recent years.

The audience shifted in their seats, all at the same time, as if controlled by a puppeteer. Dave Heard will vouch for the fact that the interpretation of what these figures represent his occupied and frustrated me, he even drove me to the drink in the past week or so. He didn't get a laugh.

They shifted again as one. But I believe I've now got to the bottom of the matter. I'd like to play something for you. He looked to Dave, expecting to see disapproval in the cop's face. But like the others, Dave's gaze was still fixed on Brian as the beat came through the speakers.

No limbs, no no. No limbs, no head, no head. Left arm gone, left leg gone, no legs, no head. The audience stamped their feet in time. Despite himself, Brian clicked back and forth between the slides that showed the ranks of figures. The beat went up a notch, took on almost a choral quality that echoed and rang around the church hall. The audience added clapping to the beat, all gazes still fixed on Brian. The room swam in his vision. Getting darker, dimmer. Gutteral voices rose to join the rhythm. And from somewhere distant, as if heard in a stiff wind, Brian heard the coarse braying of a ram joining in time. He realised he was stamping his feet through, and even as he noted it,

the control for the projector dropped to the floor unheeded as he brought his hands together in clapping. No limbs, no limbs, no hands. No hands. head, no head. Left arm gone, left leg gone. No legs, no head. It felt like the top of his head was going to lift off as the beat grew and grew. The hall shook and swayed as if caught in a swell, and the voices and the drumming and the clapping and the stomping rose to a frenzy. The darkness swallowed up the light, leaving Brian alone in a vast cavern of emptiness, where all that mattered was the beat. A flock ran there, all dancing, each of them were Lost.

Lost to the dance. Brian came out of it lying on his back, looking up, not at the roof of the church hall, but at a carpet of stars dancing across the night sky. He tried to sit, and found he was restrained, spread eagle with wrists and ankles tied to metal stakes pounded into the ground. He knew immediately where he was.

He lay in the bottom of the dig site on the stone floor. And judging by the chill he felt in all extremities, he was completely naked. People stood up on the rim of the sight, ranks of them, all silent, visible only as darker shadows against the sky. The pounding of the beat had stopped, and the only sound was Brian's own breathing,

fast, terror-filled. What the fuck's going on here? He heard a thud, someone jumping down into the dig and looked up to see Dave bending over him. Thank the Lord. Give me out of you. The talk has run its course. There was no sign of amusement on Dave's face.

I told you to leave it alone, Brian. If it's any consolation, you'll be added to the flock. Have your own wee figure on the wall. You'll always be remembered. You'll always dance. Brian heard four more thuds. More people coming down into the site. Up above, the herders began to stamp their feet.

No limbs, no limbs, no head, no head. Left arm gone, left leg gone, no legs, no head. The stars danced overhead as the drums rose up in Brian's head, and despite himself, his hands and feet twitched with the beat. The herders above started to clap. The stars swirled in great spirals in time. No limbs, no limbs, no head, no head. Left arm gone, left leg gone, no legs, no head.

The ground beneath Brian bucked and swayed. The figures on the walls glowed, almost silver, dancing in the moonlight. Brian's gaze was taken by shifting in the sky overhead. The beat got louder, and the stars appeared to coalesce and form into an image he thought he should recognise. Guttle chanting joined the beat, all singing, stomping, clapping, clapping, all dancing. Somewhere a great ram barked and brayed, closer now.

Brian was aware of people bent over him, one above each of his outstretched limbs. He saw moonlight glisten off the blades of the heavy shovels they carried, felt the cold steel at his wrist as the blade was applied in a foot put down on it. No left hand. Heat left him in a rush, but he felt no pain. He was in the grip of the dance, part of the floor. He felt the pressure again.

No right hand. He looked up and saw the ram looming over him in the sky, felt himself sucked into the great black eyes as the beat filled him. Pressure at his ankles now. No feet. He smiled as the ram took him and he joined the flock as Dave's shovel was pressed against his neck, lost in the dance.

The beat rose to a final cacophony and Dave's foot came down hard. No hands, no arms, no feet, no legs. When horror and religion meet, we know old scratch isn't far behind. You know him by many names. My favorite is Mephistopheles. Yes, Lucifer, Satan, that devilish old guy is ripe for horror. But in this tale, shared with us by author, Sean Barber,

we meet the beast himself. Odd how ordinary he seems. Performing this tale is James Cleveland. So be it an unholy deal or agreeing to install software, you'd be wise to check the terms and conditions. I know what you're thinking. Oh, please, calm yourself. I'm not reading your mind or anything so dramatic as that.

It's just obvious. you're disappointed. Anyone could see it. We've met at last, and I'm not at all what you were expecting. What was it you expected, I wonder? A man covered in red scales with big black horns. Or maybe you pictured a creature with a goat's head

and eyes filled with the wisdom of centuries. Or perhaps you. You're a classicist, and you thought I'd appear as a beautiful angel, but with dark and tattered wings. But instead of any of that, you find yourself sitting across from a man, nothing but an ordinary man. And now you're wondering, what could it mean? If the devil is but a man, then does it follow that man is the devil? Am I but a reflection of the evil lurking in all men's hearts? No. There's your answer, a simple no. I am nothing so grandiose.

The reason I appear as a man is because, well, it's because that's what I am. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that's what I was. Before all of this, I mean, You're curious, aren't you? You're wondering what I meant by that. Allow me to clear up a few things. Transparency is important, after all, in dealings such as these. It wouldn't do for you to enter into an agreement without first understanding all of the terms and conditions.

So, I'm going to tell you a story. Once I am done, it will be up to you to decide if you wish to continue. you. And if you do not, well, then you can just leave and all will be forgotten. It will be your final chance to walk away. I was born nearly a century and a half ago, to a well-to-do family. I grew up a quiet and awkward fellow. I had few friends and no romantic prospects to speak of, But that all changed during my days at university. That's when I met Paul. He was a beautiful man.

Self-assured and full of life, he was strong and dashing and so charming. When Paul smiled, you couldn't help but smile in return, no matter how dark your mood might have been. Well, I was smitten. I was far from the only one, of course. All the young women were just as over the moon for him. But it was I whom Paul took notice of, and when he did, I dared at last hope for companionship.

Paul and I grew close in a way that young men were not supposed to in those days. Oh, such relationships still happened, obviously, but they were kept to the shadows. out of polite society and especially out of the eyes of the public. I yearned to be with my pawl openly, but I knew such a thing could not come to pass. Oh, but how I adored him. My heart sang when we were together, and in his arms I found a peace and a security that I had never known before. It was a time that I wished could last forever, but nothing.

lasts forever. Not even the devil. Paul got married. I don't know if he loved her, or if it was just to keep up appearances. Didn't care. What mattered was that he said his vows, and kissed his blushing bride. A pretty enough thing, I suppose. I'll be damned if I can recall her name. And suddenly, there was no room left for me in Paul's life. Well, as you can imagine, I became quite despondent. The night of his wedding, I nearly drank myself into an early grave. The weeks that followed were a little better. I threw myself into booze and gambling and all sorts of petty vices,

but nothing could distract me from the pain or the sting of Paul's betrayal. I spent more and more time in pleasure houses. There were certain ones that were willing to cater to, to men such as me, to look the other way, regardless of their client's tastes. It was in one of those houses of sin that I found her. The devil. Yes, the devil was a woman in those days. Imagine that.

When she entered a room, she did so with a confident stride. Her head held high, and even the most headstrong and chauvinistic of men would find himself cowed by her presence. Her eyes were deep and black abysses, and to look into them was to find yourself falling forever and ever, deeper and deeper until you lost yourself in those endless depths. When she told me that she was the devil, I wanted to laugh. But the thing is, I couldn't. There was something in her expression, her bearing, her being, that demanded instant and unquestioning belief. In fact, when she declared her identity, I felt a terror well up within me the likes of which I have never felt before nor since. My rational brain insisted that it was all nonsense, but emotionally I was certain that every word she spoke was the truth.

And the devil told me her story, just as I am telling you mine. She told me of how she had lost her family in a terrible conflagration, of how she had begged and pleaded with God above to return them to her from that inferno, and of how she had cursed the Almighty when her prayers fell upon deaf ears. She told me of how she had met the devil, and of how he had offered to return her family to her, for the price of her immortal soul. When she accepted, that devil with whom she'd struck the bargain vanished,

as though he had never been there at all. Her family returned to life, and none could recall their tragic demise. She continued her life with them. But soon she found that something was wrong. Her children grew up. Her husband aged. And yet she remained the same as she ever did. In the end, she was forced to flee her home, lest she be accused of witchcraft.

That woman had made her deal with the devil. and in doing so she had taken his place. And now, if I so desired, she was offering that same deal to me. Obviously, you know how this story ends. I accepted her bargain. I wanted Paul. I wanted to be together with him again, and I wanted to hide nothing. So I agreed to trade my soul.

And we shook hands, and she dissolved away into nothingness. with a smile on her face. When I returned home that night, Paul was there waiting for me. He'd left his wife and at last we could be together. And just as I had desired it, we were together openly. None took issue of our love. Such was the power of the devil's bargain. We spent 20 wonderful years together.

You know, in all that time, he never once asked me, why I never seemed to age? He truly was perfect. He did everything for me, and he never complained. Even when I deigned to punish him for leaving me, he accepted it. My dear Paul, it was disease that eventually took him from me. The Spanish flu. Thus, I was left alone on this earth. For a century, I have wandered. I have watched the world grow, watched it change, all while I have ever remained the same. You see, there is but one thing in this world that the devil desires above all else. Oblivion. My soul is gone. The afterlife is denied to me, as it is denied to all who came before me. And the best I can hope for is to fade away and become nothing.

already I am forgotten and when I am gone only the next devil will remember me and that is why I am here tonight offering you a deal there must always be a devil I must find someone willing to take my place someone willing to sell their soul

only then shall I be free of this existence no I will never be with Paul again he is in heaven now reunited with that wife of his. I see them sometimes. Just glimpses, small peeks through the edges of reality into that hereafter which I shall never experience. They are together and happy. And I so dearly wish that I could reach through the boundaries of this realm and, strangle the both of them.

Instead, I am confined here among you mortals. Today, men can love each other as Paul and I did. More and more it becomes accepted. They freely enjoy what I had to sacrifice everything to have. If they knew, if they only understood... Forgive me, that was... unseemly. I admit that I often become heated when my mind wanders to such matters. But there is a lesson here, is there not? The world will move on without you. There must always be a devil, yes,

but who must be the devil? That is unimportant. If not you, then I will find another. You understand now, correct? You now know the terms of what I offer. Tonight is far from the first, time that I have shared this story. Each telling before saw my audience flee from me, frightened off by the price I demanded. But not you, I see. Yes, there is resolve in those eyes. You want something. You want it truly and completely. Maybe you think you can cheat this fate, or maybe you believe what you desire will be worth this price. Who knows? Perhaps you're right. For your sake, I hope you are. So now, only one question remains. For what price will you sell your soul? College is a place where young people with open minds are there to learn and expand their experiences.

Usually, that's a good thing, but it can also mean some students are open to more extreme ideas. And in this tale, shared with us by author Dixon March, we meet a student struggling in her studies, perhaps something good could come if some new friends come to help her. Performing this tale is Aaron Lillis. So remember, not every campus group has the best intentions. You'll learn that when you hear about the Mirabels. I've seen the terrible things they do to themselves. To the people they draw under their strange, insidious cult.

The rumors are bad, but it's nothing like the truth. I found them last night. After failing yet another final, I went out drinking alone to toast the death of my academic career. When I went out drinking that night, I was alone so I could celebrate the death of my academic career. My thesis had been rejected for a third time. I bombed yet another final, and I was tens of thousands of dollars in debt just for the chance to overhear my advisor, call me a mediocre intellect and somewhat of a head case during that week's online. honor seminar. I thought it was finished. Yeah, I know what you're thinking. How reckless. It's dangerous

for a person to go out on their own inebriated in the dead of night in a city like this. But my determination to obliterate the brain cells that had betrayed me outweighed my good sense. I was out for hours, spent all the dregs of my money between the bars and the low-end liquor stores. When I opened my pockets and found them to be empty, moths fluttering out of them, I caught the late bus that would take me back to my apartment, or what I thought was the late bus, as instead of the 221, I got on the 212th, a southbound route that traveled the exact opposite direction from my home. I didn't realize this at first because I spent the ride with my eyes clamped shut and my forehead pressed against the window to fight off the waves of nausea and dizzy

spells. In this state, it was some time before I noticed my error. At one point, the bus jerked, and I woke up from my trance to see the city lights had shrunk to pinpricks in the distance. The horizon cut a jagged black edge against a starless sky. Against it, I saw shapes of ruined warehouses and silos and collapse, which meant I was headed for the old industrial district. A blighted place. All the other passengers had gotten off. and the driver and I were alone. The driver squinted at me in the rearview mirror like she wondered if I knew how lost I was.

I scrambled for the stop request. On the newer buses, it's a button, but on the 212, they keep the old pull cord, like it's the dark ages. Before I could panic effectively, the bus slowed. We pulled up screechily beside a shelter that was covered in graffiti and half lit by dying halogen street lamps.

Inside the shelter, Two figures stood in stained red hoodies. Their faces unnaturally white and placid. Both held a closed basket. Old wicker things like the kind used to pack picnic lunches or store laundry. No matter how drunk I was, I knew what they were as soon as I saw them. They were just like the rumors said. Strange, stinking figures in red hoods spotted walking around campus at night.

They left unintelligible pamphlets in bathrooms and a lot. under lecture hall seats. Have you met Mirabelle? Whenever they were cited, students disappeared mid-semester without a trace. One of those students vanished from one of my classes. Anthro 201, Religion in the occult. Cooper or Hopper or something. The instructor called their name during Roll and only silence answered.

After several breaths, another student spoke up from the back of the room. He joined them. No, someone else said. They took him. On my bus, the pair of red hoods hobbled up the steps, and I duck behind the seats to spy. I wasn't so drunk as to not recognize an opportunity. Imagine firsthand experience of an undiscovered cult and their dealings. If I followed them, found their headquarters, and the victims of their kidnappings,

it would make a whole thesis, maybe a book. Then my advisor would see what amazing things my mediocre intellect was capable of. I was so excited I nearly tumbled onto the bus floor. but I managed to stay hidden well enough. The red hoods shuffled down the aisle, without hustle or alarm, as if they thought they were alone. Through the narrow gap between the seats, I watched them walk stiffly, eyes forward in a gaze far too steady. They wore masks, I thought. Similar to those bland symmetrical disguises you get at Halloween, only more manic-esque, department-store dummy faces.

I wondered if that's where they've gotten their design. disguises from mannequin salvage from the dumpster of a dead mall. They had to have hacked the faces off to glue to themselves. Manikin murder. That thought made my booze-filled stomach turn, but I had real reason to gag when I caught a whiff of them, like feted meat left in a sewer. The worst of it came from their baskets

and the muddy, foul sludge that covered the bottoms. Ignoring this filth, the red hoods sat down and set the baskets in their laps, allowing the foul leakage to smear their pants. Even the bus driver, as desensitized as she was to all manner of passengers' bodily odors, curled up her nose. I managed by some miracle to not blow chunks and give away my position. Once the red hoods were settled, the bus resumed its slow crawl off the ends of the earth. We rocked over the road's meteoric potholes, and the bus weased and grieved.

Roaned, making it difficult to make out the Red Hood's conversation. They spoke in low hoarse voices, a smattering of Latin. The word sounded familiar. I dabbled in the classics department, the first of my failed programs, but I couldn't summon up the translation. At haste, Davy or Pavi, something about souls and floors. As drunk as I was, I had the sense to know I'd remember none of it if I didn't get it down, so I grabbed my phone to record the audio.

Of course, I didn't dare take a photo or video. My phone was an ancient, cracked relic that glitched whenever I opened the camera. It liked to turn on the flashlight app instead. An absolutely mad device. It always took me a moment of fumbling to get the app to work correctly, and the bright light surely would have alerted the red hoods to my presence. I didn't want to find out what happened to the students

they lured off into the dark. Actually, I did want to find out, but only as an observer, not a participant. After 20 minutes or so, the bus windows had gone black and the city lights were just dead and gone. We drove through a landscape like the surface of the moon, a darkened wilderness edged by skeleton warehouses and rubble. The bus slowed and braked beside a dark curb with no shelter. The lifeless lamp pole leaned beside a bus stop sign caked with spray paint. In sinister handwriting, the graffiti read, end of the line. Over the driver's head, the yellow digital billboard cut to the out-of-service message.

I was stranded, stranded with the red hoods. At least they hadn't spotted me. They shuffled off, knocked against each other, and their hustle to get off the bus. I followed at a safe distance as quietly as I could stumble. Once they were off-aways, I floundered off the bus and ducked. behind the ruins of a burned-out factory. The bus groaned and lumbered off, deserting me without a thought. With no headlights to guide me, I scrambled in the dark for a minute and almost lost the subjects of my hunt. After creeping around the crumbled factory wall, I saw up ahead a weedy lot surrounded by massive piles of industrial garbage.

Fires burned and still barrels around the perimeter. Figures moved, in flicking. shadows. I braced myself behind the factory ruins and watched as the figures collected together. Red hoods. Hundreds of them. In the center of the lot, they'd built a crude platform stage and were at work around it. They'd put down their baskets and were bent over, hammering and sawing, whispering hoarsely, shuffling their salvaged materials between darkly stained hands. Their bodies moved stiffly. Their masks didn't make for easy construction, I thought. They came close to smashing their own fingers and lopping off their own hands.

After a few minutes of this hazardous work, a murmur spread through the crowd, and they straightened up. After arranging themselves into rows, they lifted whatever it was they'd been building. It came into view slowly, like a sinister barn raising. At first, I didn't realize what it was. All I saw was a cobbled together frame of salvaged wood and rebar and bits of steel sheets. Ridiculous, really. The angle and my drunken state had me thinking it was a piece of ugly abstract art, towering and stained with splotches of red and bound with ropes.

At the top hung a metal sheet, its edge jagged and rusty. I squinted. It could have been a tower, an antenna, a failed ski lift, held together by madness. While I was still struggling to make sense of the bizarre work of salvaged industrial junk, the ritual began. The Red Hoods stood before their creation and started to chant in gravelly voices. The crowd stirred. The center of them parted, and through the path came a person. Maskless, his red hood lowered and his face exposed. I recognized him. It was that student who had

disappeared from my Anthro 201 course, Cooper or Hopper or something. His face gleamed with sweat, and he smiled a mad, delirious grin. His hoodie looked brand new, no stains at all. The throng chanted in unison, and this time I got the audio recorded on my phone. Amama mea, vivifika may domine secundum verbum-tum-tum-tum. At haste, pavimento, anima, mea, vivifica, me, domine, secundum-verbum tomb? Something about souls and floors and dust and revival? As I struggled to remember the translation, another Red Hood clambered up the platform. to join Cooper Hopper.

This one's hood was so red and stained, it was a deep, dark ox-blood color. The cultist slapped the student on the shoulder, then grabbed one of the ropes attached to the construction, and began to pull, hand over hand, slowly, as if with great effort. As the device cranked wickedly, my fellow student kneeled and put his head through a gap in the frame where they'd carved a splintery nook. right under the hovering metal sheet. It was then my drunk brain managed to figure out what I was looking at. Like an executioner, the cultist in the dark red hood let go of the rope,

and the blade of metal dropped. I told myself, I should do something, but it was too late. The blade landed with a sickening whack, and the students had thumped heavily into the basket waiting on the other side. His neck cleanly cut and pressed against him. the blade didn't bleed at first? His body remained still as if kissing the metal. The other cultists howled.

It was then, I blew, said booze-riddled chunks I'd held on to for so long. I lost it there in the weeds. Cleared myself of all contents that remained in my stomach. When I caught my breath again, I realized I was an idiot for not recording the whole thing. Nothing would save Cooper Hopper now, but at least I could have videowed this murder or, sacrifice, I wasn't sure which. In my rattled state, I turned my attention to the phone again and immediately dropped it. It clattered to the gravel. As the Red Hoods screamed in mad celebration,

I scrambled in the dark among the rocks and planted my hands in my own vomit once or twice. The cultists got really loud at that point, shrieking their Latin incantations, throng a lunatic's rolling in the aisles. By the time I found my phone and wobbled upright, I saw two people standing on the platform beside the guillotine. One was dark red hood with his muddy mannequin mask, and the second was Cooper Hopper. Headless. The decapitated student flopped back and forth as he struggled with his balance.

His nice red hoodie wasn't nice anymore. It was drenched in the black spray of blood. From the collar, the truncated remains of his neck stuck out. Just a bit of spine, like a white, bony tongue. Blood raged over his shoulders. His jugular spurred it onto the platform. But otherwise, he was reanimated. Alive somehow.

His headless body toddled about and dark red hood put a hand on his shoulder to steady him. I was so stunned, I just watched, completely forgetting I had my phone in my hands. Then the chanting died down. A shape moved through the cultists, small and oblong. They passed it to the platform,

hand over hand in a solemn crowd surf. Against the harsh glow of the barrel fires, it took me a minute to figure out what it was. It was a mannequin head. Not a part of the mannequin, not a hacked-up department store dummy, the entire head. Dark Red Hood took the dummy head

and placed it in the student's outstretched blind hands. Together, they got to be a little bit of, the prosthetic jammed onto the bleeding stump of his neck. It took some wriggling to get it on, and it had to be twisted just right before it faced outward. The mannequin gazed over the crowd with a bland pout, pink lips and blue eyes and plaster white cheeks. When it was steady, the executioner pulled the student's hood up over the new prosthetic and turned him to face the crowd. He was one of them now. He had just a job. He had just. The crowd bellowed and knocked against each other in their excitement.

As the recruit thought to keep on his feet, dark red hood bent behind the guillotine and pick something up, put it into the acolyte's hands. The wicker basket. Cooper Hopper held the basket aloft so everyone got an eye full of what it held. His head. His mouth slurred downward and his eyes gazed in different directions. Blood seeped from the,

ragged throat. For a moment, the cultists quieted in reverence, and I thought I might bomb again, and then a sharp peel of laughter rang out. The laughter had come from Cooper Hopper's dead mouth. It hadn't been a twitch of leftover nerves, not a chortled gasp like Anne Boleyn's final failed attempt to speak, but a full and hearty laugh. The cultists exploded in celebration, screaming their chance. Cooper Hopper's head joined them. His speech slurred, his mouth moving deliriously. At that point, every red hood in attendance held up their baskets and whisked off the lids.

Even from behind that burned-out factory wall, the stench made me gag, cloying maggot-ridden flesh from the dankest septic tank. Worse than the smell was the sight of it. The severed heads moved in their baskets, lolled around in glee as they chanted. Some heads laid at awkward angles at the bottom, and their cultist bodies had to shake the baskets to get them to face upright. Some heads had left over spines lodged in the wicker. They all grinned hideously. One cultist at the back, near me, swore and lowered his basket to adjust his face.

A sour string of cussing came from the woven wicker shadows inside. That was the head that saw me first. In my defense, I didn't make a sound. I was sucking air, mute in terror. It was my phone. I held my phone in both hands and trembled so badly that I mashed the camera app. The glitchy flashlight kicked on. A sharp flood of artificial light washed over the red hoods.

The chanting stopped dead. Silence fell hard and swift. They spun towards me. Well, they pointed their baskets at me. The mannequin heads beneath their hoods pointed blindly in random directions, as they were dumb and useless accessories only meant to fool the public to allow them to sneak onto campus to recruit more followers. But their real heads saw me.

The milky eyes squinted in rage and all those mouths attached to no throats and no lungs, somehow managed to all scream, get her. I ran, bolted desperately, and face-planted in the gravel more than a few times. I know this because I've got the scraped knees and cracked teeth to show for it, though honestly the rest of the night is a blacked-out blur.

Between the alcohol left in my system and the blind terror, I don't remember much. I don't know how I got away. I woke up in a back alley behind a convenience store near campus, sticky with sweat and vomit. my legs hurt enough to suggest I'd run several miles. After I refreshed myself with water from the convenience store bathroom sink, I hobbled in great pain back to my apartment.

Once there, I had to ask the office to let me in. My bag was gone. I must have left it with my phone in that weedy lot by the guillotine. Still, as hung over and wrecked as I was, I started outlining my new thesis right away. Didn't even shower first. What point would there be? I knew I had very little time

and there was no way my advisor could reject a paper of such tremendous academic value. Think of what it might mean for the department. My career! I'd be practically guaranteed tenure as soon as I graduated, for sure. After the sunset, I was still writing when I heard them outside my apartment door, chanting their Latin.

By that time, I'd nailed down the translation. They are saying, my soul is attached unto dust, revive me with your words. I found it in my notes from Anthro 201 in a lecture on cephalophores. You see, I've figured it all out. There's no way I'll fail now. You have to tell everyone in the department what I know. I can hear them outside now, sawing and hammering. I hear the whack of the blade as they test out their makeshift execution device.

They call out to me, using the name on the stage. student ID I left in their midst. They know my name, but more importantly, I know theirs. The guillotine, you see, had a nickname in the 17th century. It was called the Mirabelle. In the light of dawn approaches, our tales must come to an end until the next time we gather. We'll keep the fire burning until you return. That is, if you dare to remain sleepless.

The No Sleep podcast is presented by Creative Reason Media. The musical score was composed by Brandon Boone. Our production team is Phil Mikulski, Jeff Clement, and Jesse Cornett. Our editor-in-chief is Jessica McAvoy. To discover how you can get even more sleepless horror stories from us, Just visit sleepless. The nosleeppodcast.com to learn about the sleepless sanctuary. Add free extended episodes each week and lots of bonus content for the dark hours.

All for only one low monthly price. On behalf of everyone at the No Sleep Podcast, we thank you for joining us around the campfire for our 20th season. This audio program is copyright 2023 and 2024 by Creative Reason Media, Inc. All rights reserved. The copyrights for each story are held by the respective authors. No duplication or reproduction of this audio program is permitted without the written consent of Creative Reason Media,