Below the Land of Oz

Papajones is serving up the tastiest deals on the freshest pizza, all made with the juiciest vine ripened Spanish tomatoes. Fresh dough never frozen, made from just six clean and simple ingredients. Order now and get a delicious pizza from just ten pounds. Papajones. Better ingredients, better pizza. Selected original pizzas, exclusive additional toppings in 6th of April 26th, minimum delivery fee, 99p, participating stores terms apply. No. This is Creepy. A podcast dedicated to sharing the most famous, chilling and disturbing creepy pastas and urban legends in the world. Whether these stories truly happened or our simply fabrications is for you to decide. These stories may contain graphic depictions of violence and explicit language. Listener discretion is advised. What do you want from me? What do you want from me? What do you want from me? What do you want from me? Hey everyone. Hope you all had a happy new year. Sorry about the feed issues that have been going on. Not sure what's happening there. Gonna have to chalk it up to an act of God, right? Okay. No sense in rambling on. Let's get to today's stories. Error, error, host failed to read Patreon shout outs. Attitude adjustment recommended. Please join us in welcoming and thanking new patrons. Charles Prada. And Cassandra. Thank you, thank you, thank you. More information about support and rewards can be found at patreon.com. Return to broadcast in 3, 2, 1. Creepy presents below the land of Oz. A few months ago I moved to this tiny town in the Blue Ridge Mountains to work customer service at a Bujiski resort. Catering to the whims of their rich weekend warriors for 8 hours a day sounded awful. But the pay was well above any other seasonal job I'd had and the mountains in winter looked gorgeous online. I'm a pretty outdoorsy guy. I was anxious I wouldn't find housing before the season started so I ended up moving almost 2 months early. Which was a mistake. I don't think I've ever been that bored. Closer to the start of the season there would be other workers in their 20s milling around but until then it was just old people in a small town and mountains. At first I called or texted my friends back home every day. Just for a little human contact. But they had their own jobs and partners in lives so our communication became less and less frequent and...briefer. I couldn't blame them for that. But it still hurt. I tried to keep my spirits up. I kept reminding myself that the season would start soon and I'd make friends then. Maybe I'd even have a winter romance. At first I walked around town every day hoping to find an open bar or coffee shop to hang out at. But until the resort opened it was a ghost town. I got to the point where I'd buy something small at the grocery store, gum or candy just to make conversation with the cashier. Usually I could tell they just wanted to get me out of there and move the line along. I ended up spending a lot of time scrolling on my phone in my room and eventually I fell down the rabbit hole of Tik Tok Urban Explorers. I think it reminded me of the stupid stuff my friends and I used to do back home. And that was sort of comforting since I was hearing from them less. So maybe a weird thing to get into. But it helped me cope. For anyone who doesn't know, Urban Explorers are basically people who walk around abandoned places like malls, amusement parks, farmhouses, etc. And see what's left behind. It isn't always legal and in fact most of the time it's trespassing. In a few videos the explorers even get chased out by cops. It was part of the excitement. But the real thrill wasn't even the illegality. It was a chance that someone would stumble across something truly weird. The noose hanging from the ceiling in an abandoned LA mall, a circle of porcelain dolls arranged on an old bridge, satanic stars and red stains in the basement of an decrepit house. Maybe it's a little sick to want to see stuff like that. But I think if most people were honest with themselves, they'd admit that the freaky stuff is usually the most interesting. And maybe some of the stuff is staged. But maybe some of it isn't. And what's below the land of Oz? I know for a fact that can't be staged. I first learned about the abandoned Wizard of Oz theme park from a Tik Tok creator with the username Herbex. His profile picture was his username in the font of the FedEx logo. He was one of my favorite urban explorers because he always seemed to be somewhere new and abandoned. Water parks, hospitals, toy stores. But when he posted the Land of Oz video and I saw that location was set in North Carolina, I was even more engaged. For a second, before I noticed that the caption was throwback, hopefully we'll be back soon, I even fantasized about messaging to see if you wanted to meet up and explore together. The video didn't have any narration or natural background noise, and the whole crew wore rubber Halloween masks to help maintain anonymity. Instead of the actual video audio, the song Carolina in my mind played in the background slowed down to .5 speed so James Taylor's voice sounded like an ominous chant. The video was only lit by bright flashlights the crew brought along, which illuminated a decrepit yellow brick road that seemed to disappear into the void. There was a quick cut, and suddenly the screen was filled by an up-close shot of an abandoned munchkin statue's face, which made me jump a little. It stood only about waist high, and its bright colored paint was coated with dirt, with some areas peeling away. The orange wig that hung to its head by a thread was sun-fated and grimy. But what made me jump was the black hole in the face where one of the eyes used to be. The cameraman placed his finger on the lid of the other eye to make it blink. It was connected to the face like a baby doll's eye. Similar statues followed, but the camera didn't linger on them long. In the next clip, the crew walked up a steep dirt hill toward a tall structure. Now it was hard to make out precisely what it was in the dark. This was clearly not a place the patrons were meant to access even when the park was open. At this point, it was heavily overgrown with vines crawling up the trees and tangling themselves around the crew's feet. One guy tripped and would have rolled down the hill if the girl behind him hadn't caught his wrist at the last minute. At the top of the hill, the camera panned up to the abandoned witches' castle, although it looked large from way up the hill, but close it was only about one story tall. Above the group's heads, their flashlights illuminated a prominent figure attached to the spires of the castle by thick cables. It was covered in hair matted with dirt and mold, but when the camera got to the face, it was clear that this was one of the flying monkeys from the movie. The text across the screen stated that these were once functioning animatronics. There were three more circling the structure. The music warped even more as the camera shakily approached the castle doorway, where a life-sized wicked witch sat on a broom, held up by rusted wires and pulleys with a ted bow down. The cameraman grabbed her chin and pulled her face up, and the rubber gave a little under his grip like human skin would. But after being outside for so long, the face had melted and warped, leaving it crooked on the metal skull below. The witches' eyes, similarly to the munchkins, were separate pieces, but now both were missing, leaving two empty black spaces behind. The camera jerked abruptly away from the eyeless figure at the back of the castle where one of the members of the crew was waving the cameraman over. There was a piece of plywood covering something, and one person on the team pulled a crowbar out of their backpack to pry it up. As the rotted wood splintered away, everyone abruptly backed away from the hole. White text across the video said, It smelled really bad. But eventually, the camera and flashlights moved in closer and revealed a set of stairs that spiraled down below the castle. You couldn't see where they ended up. The next clip cut to the cameraman's feet illuminated by flashlights herring down the stairs until they stepped in grimy water. The stairs continued down to a passageway that appeared to lead into a larger room, but the whole thing was flooded. There were only centimeters between the ceiling of the passageway and the water level, and the group did their best to shine their lights and aim their cameras in the small space. The camera suddenly zoomed in on a spot in the murky water. There seemed to be a dark shape underneath, but the water was too grimy to make anything out for sure. The video ended with white text on the screen. Definitely something under there will be back after the rainy season. I laid on my mattress on the floor and switched tabs to look up the land of Aja's North Carolina. Information about the park appeared, including its address, which was only half an hour away. The park was permanently closed, but website after website got me no closer to the cause. Different sites cited different vague reasons. Insufficient attendance, lack of proper permits, and the death of the owner, which was reported on Reddit. No one seemed entirely sure why the park closed. But I didn't care. I had already decided to go and check it out myself that night. It wasn't like I had other plans. As I drove through the winding mountain roads, I was too excited to feel nervous. I imagined having a cool story in the spot I had already lined up for when my potential new friends arrived at the resort. Instead of being a guy who spent his first few months in the mountain scrolling TikTok, I'd be a guy who knew the area well enough to know the best spots to hang out. That propelled me forward until I was about five minutes from the park. It used to happen when I went exploring with my friends back home too. I started getting nervous about the illegality of it. There was a feeling I was familiar with, which was why I quickly tried to push it out of my mind. I reminded myself that I could probably outrun the cops if I needed to. I parked about a ten minute walk from where the map said the entrance was, since Carl draw attention to the fact that someone was there. When I turned off my headlights, I realized how dark it was. I was in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by nothing but trees. I stepped over the car and stood there for a few minutes, just to let my breathing slow and eyes adjust while I listened to the sounds around me. It was beautiful. The only sounds were the crickets and the rustling of leaves. The air was cool and sharp, and every intake of breath made me feel more awake and alive than the last one. Like I said, I'm an outdoorsy guy, and the feeling that I was just out hiking gave me a sense of peace as I switched on my phone's flashlight and walked in the direction of the land of Oz. The entrance wasn't marked by anything except a small abandoned ticket office in the beginning of the Yellowbrick Road. The trees surrounding the park quickly blocked out the moon and stars. I checked out the munchkin statues, but I didn't linger too long. This was the same material I'd already seen in our Bex's video, and I wanted to get to the staircase. The hill up to the Witch's Castle was as steep, if not steeper, than I looked on TikTok. I ended up crawling on all fours, strands of crude divine staining my hands green as I climbed. It thought occurred to me that if I fell and got hurt, no one would know where to come to rescue me. I didn't even take a good look at the castle until I made it to the top of the hill, rolled onto my back, and caught my breath. To my right, everything looked the same as I had in the video, though less scary. The music and shaky camera work had done a lot of work for Bex's video. Though I was alone with a gaggle of animatronic monkeys over my head, and a half-melted witch to my right, I didn't feel afraid. It was definitely weird, but in a cool way, like an abandoned piece of history. I stood and walked over to the Witch to get a better look. Though it was just a half-melted animatronic, part of me felt like I was looking at a sculpture. There was a level of artistry there that made it clear someone had put a lot of time into its creation. I felt a sudden sense of respect for the people who had so carefully constructed something that I was just going to stand at the top of a hill in a little-known theme park. Finally, I made my way to the back of the structure, where the piece of plywood was still cast aside. When I leaned over the black hole to peer down the staircase, a blast of humid, putrid air struck my face. Bex hadn't been kidding. The staircase stank. I lifted my shirt, covering my nose and mouth, and started recording a video with flash on my phone before making my way down. After only a few stops, I was drenched in sweat. I took that as a bad sign. Maybe the water from the rainy season still hadn't drained, the building was flooded for good. I kept walking, spiral after spiral, deeper than any sculpture I had ever been in. Eventually, I turned a corner and there I was. The room that Urbex's team hadn't been able to access. Free of flooding. At first, I couldn't tell what I was looking at. Something huge and serpentine was curled on the concrete floor, taller and wider than me, dark and iridescent. In the middle of the floor, it pushed off the concrete and arched in an S-shape toward the ceiling. I followed its path, nearly three stories over my head. When my light reached the roof, I let out a choked cry and scrambled backward. I hit my tailbone as I fell, dropping my phone. And the room went dark. I frantically ran my hands over the damp stone and finally felt the smooth rectangle in the puddle. Simply had my waterproof case. I grabbed the phone and shone the light at the ceiling again. I'd seen what I thought I'd seen. The head was huge. High above me and looked almost like a cobra rearing back. It reminded me of drawings I'd seen of sea serpents like the Leviathan. Its mouth was open wide, revealing hundreds of glittering white fangs and a red wet forked tongue. Longer scales protruded off the spine, with even more emerging from the head in complex spikes and spirals. It sat poised and stoned still, pacing the stairs I just descended. At the same time, I noticed enumerous stick wires and chains holding the creature up. Higher up, there was a rusted system of pulleys and other machinery, seemingly to make the serpent move. It took a second for my brain to comprehend that the creature in front of me wasn't real. If I thought that the witch was an artistic feat, I can't describe how impressive this animatronic was. The sheer size of it alone was insane. I sat on the steps, tailbone throbbing, and stared at the thing in awe. My breathing slowed a little, and I was struck by the thought that I hadn't seen anything about a Leviathan being part of the original exhibit. Definitely would've remembered something like this. What's more, the castle wasn't accessible to the public when the park was open. My mind filled in the blanks, though. Clearly, the park must've been working on a new exhibit that they hadn't had the chance to display before the park's closure. Once my body caught up with my brain, I could barely contain my excitement. I hurried down the last steps into the cavernous room. A smarter person might've been nervous about the structural integrity of the animatronic, giving it's massive size and the fact that part of the body was brushing against the ceiling. But I immediately approached the serpentine body. When I jumped close, it was a few feet over my head, or a rested flat on the concrete. I continued filming as I ran my hand over the cool, damp scales. Each was unique, painstakingly designed and individually added to the piece. They shown like a mixture of obsidian and opal. Curious, I pushed lightly against the body with the palm of my hand to see if there was a lighter material under the scales or if the thing was hollow. The scales were hard and sharp, and the sculpture felt heavy and solid. But I was surprised to feel a little bit of give underneath, like flesh. I went around the room, taking videos and pictures of the thing. The tail spiraled on the floor, a slippery looking fin's little higher on the poised body, and several angles of the reared black head with its white, pupilless eyes. Well, initially my goal was just to explore. My new plan was to become the next Urbex. Maybe I could even quit the ski resort job. That was when I noticed the wide hole in the concrete on the wall furthest from the stairs. It was about one story up and resembled a sewer tunnel. Metal rungs protruded from the wall, forming a ladder to the opening. I had to go in. Based on what I had already seen, I could only imagine what the next chamber held. My tailbone throbbed and across my mind again that if I got injured or stuck, no one would know where to find me. Suddenly wish I'd at least left a note on my pillow. But even if I did, who would have found it? I made my way toward the ladder. I wasn't going to back off right when it was getting good. Although I wish I had now. The rungs were covered in condensation. I carefully picked my way up, my phone sticking out of my front pocket, providing my only light. My feet nearly slipped a couple of times, but I hung on. About midway up, I heard something creak loudly behind me, like the wires holding the serpent were about to give. I whipped around a shack, but nothing had changed. The Leviathan continued to face the stairs I'd entered through. I grinned at my own nerves as I continued upward. I was hit by an even worse wave of humid, putrid air as I pulled myself over the ledge. I pulled my shirt over my nose and mouth again, which didn't do much to help. I tried to breathe as little as possible as I peered through the tunnel, which sloped steadily downward with no end in sight. The further I walked, the worse the smell got. The flies and mosquitoes reveled in the fatted air and humidity, so many that eventually gave up on swatting them away. I thought about calling it a day and turning back, but I could just see where the tunnel opened to another room. When I stepped into the room, the first thing I noticed was that a sliver of moonlight lit it. There was an opening high up on the ceiling, about the size of a well. Several humanoid animatronics were splayed out on the floor in the middle of the room. Maybe Dorothy the Scarecone the Tin Man? As I walked closer, an inch of water that covered the floor seeped into my converse and bugs bit my arms. I realized that none of the animatronics were clothed or painted. When I was a few feet away, I stopped and a few things hit me at once. The unnatural bend of the limbs and necks, the stitched up parts on the bodies where preparations at a morgue had begun, and the roaring sound coming from the sewer tunnel opposite to the one I'd entered from. I felt like throwing up or screaming, but adrenaline took over and I turned and sprinted in the direction I'd come from. The roaring got louder and louder. I'd almost reached the ladder I'd ascended only minutes before when a powerful wave of water filled the tunnel and threw me into the room below. Luckily, the chamber was already flooded. Still, when I hit the water below, pain radiated through my entire body. I didn't have time to take a breath as dirty water filled my nose and mouth and pushed me under. I panicked. My limbs flailed, seemingly unaligned with what my brain needed them to do. I couldn't tell which way it was up or down, and I was sure I'd drowned with the force of the waterfall above me. It took everything in me not to breathe in more water as I was overwhelmed by the primal desire to take something into my lungs. I didn't know if it was my brain or a higher power, but a quiet, calm voice in my head reminded me of how I'd been taught to escape rip currents as a kid. Swim sideways instead of against them. I swam to the side before attempting to rise again and finally broke the surface. I gasped for air. My phone, which was somehow still in my pocket and recording, let the room dimly from underwater as I frantically tried to exit. This is when I noticed that the serpent was gone. Only the chains and wires hung from the ceiling. The force of the water pulled it under. The water level was quickly covering the entrance to the stairs. Soon I'd be stuck in the room until it drained again, with not much of a chance of getting out alive. I swam towards the door as quickly as I could until my hand slapped into something soft and pliable, covered with wiry hair. A man's chest, one of the bodies from the other room floated in front of me. The roar of the water was so loud that I don't know if I screamed. In the dim light, I could see that the mortuary stitches hadn't held the head and one of the legs were missing from the cadaver. I shoved the shoulder out of my way hard, trying not to look at the viscerines at the gaping neck as I did. I think I finished my swim, crying. At the doorway, there was only a small gap left to breathe through. I was making my way through when I heard a roar behind me, louder than the water. I turned around in time to see the leviathan breach, open mouthed and snap its massive jaw shut on the torso that had pushed away. I could see the remaining leg hanging out from between its teeth. The empty eye glowing as the creature dove beneath the water, its serpentine body and tail falling behind. The waves that followed knocked my head against the top of the doorway, hard. My vision went white and I saw stars for a minute. I could feel hot blood dripping down my head. Ignoring the pain and my fear of drowning, I took a deep breath in the small pocket of air that remained. I ducked under the water and swam through the flooded passage, finally throwing myself under the dry stairs on the other side. I ran out of the park as fast as I could. I was convinced the flying monkeys or munchkins or witch would come after me next, but they all remained statuesque. I didn't stop running until the park was far behind me. Gasping for breath, I walked the remaining distance to my car in a daze. On my way to the police station, I realized my phone was gone. The police obviously didn't believe me. I was babbling about dead bodies and sea serpents and I had a head injury. Plus, I'd been trespassing, so technically I was the only criminal they knew of. Still, they must have felt bad or figured something happened given the frenzied state I was in. And they sent officers to the park to check it out. The sheriff tried to get me to go to the ER in the meantime, but I insisted on waiting until the officers finally returned. When they did, they told me that there was no stairway or underground rooms anywhere around the castle. I was about to accuse them of lying, yell that they probably hadn't even gone to the park, until one of them handed me my phone in a plastic bag. He said they found it at the back of the castle. I was ecstatic. Here was my proof. I quickly pulled it open and turned it on, but it wouldn't light up. That's when I noticed the case had cracked. The whole thing was waterlogged. Defeated, I accepted their offer of a ride to the hospital. The doctor has diagnosed me with a mild concussion and sent me home with instructions to return if my pain got worse. I'm going to find a way to get that video. Google told me to put my phone in rice to draw out the water, which I didn't have a lot of faith in, but I tried anyway. It didn't work. Now I'm reaching out to every remotely techy person I know to help me recover the footage. About a week after the doctor sent me home, the cut on my head got worse. It was inflamed and was in pus. When I returned to the hospital, the doctor said he usually only saw infections like mine in morticians. When they'd have a wound exposed to necrotic flash. Oh no. I forgot the patrons, didn't I? Please no. I promise I'll do better. I uh, uh, um, up next. What begins as grief, fueled nostalgia becomes a chilling night where music, memory and the woods behind his home blur into something far darker. From writer Mark T. Bates, a narrator by Jimmy Ferrer, creepy presents, snow. 31st of October 1987. Danny looked out of his bedroom window, snow fell lightly onto the glass. His brother, Sony Woffman, clasped tightly in his palm. His dead brother's missing portable tape player, which had now appeared without rhyme or reason in a box under his bed. No detach to the box and unmistakable handwriting of his brother, which simply said, play me at midnight if you want me to come home. Looked out of the window into the night, snow fall glistening against the moonlight. And he stood mesmerized, unable to think clearly, not knowing what to do for the best. Should I tell my parents what I have found? I don't think Mikey would want me to. Danny was just 12 years old when his other brother, Mikey Wolre, was burned to death in an abandoned wooden building a year ago to this day. A hunt that sapped deep in the forest, which was behind their parents' New England home. Mikey was 16 at the time. Vocalist and guitarist in a thrashed metal death band called Demon Blood, a leader of a gang of slacker teenage heavy metal fans in their town's high school. Gang who wore denim jackets, adorned with Metallica, Slayer and mega death batches, whatever the weather. Mikey and his group of friends had spent Halloween evening of 1986 terrorizing the local neighborhood by trick or treating. Well, mostly tricking as they drank beer and ran amuck through the town. They had headed into the woods armed with a bunch of guitars, planned to sit around the campfire, play music and smoke pot all night. They had made the abandoned wooden lodge in the woods their own. The devil's hut, as they called it, was a good 15 minutes walk south in the woodland. It sat by a clearing close to a stream that was good for fishing and paddling in, an area only accessible by torchlight once the sun had gone down. And if you knew the correct route to take. Mikey and his friends spent much of their time down by the stream, refeeding the walls of the devil's hut, covering it in various heavy metal band stickers. No one knows exactly what happened to cause the fire that killed Danny's brother that night. It is said from those who were in attendance. Gang had played their music and smoked their drugs while their campfire roared in a pit some distance from the hut. It is rumored, but not confirmed that Mikey had perhaps attempted to take the tone of the evening into a dark direction. For it is said that he had been growing fond of reciting satanic verses while he played his guitar at night. Certainly the lyrics and his songs had more than hinted at a growing fascination with the Lord of Darkness. There are supposedly police reports which confirmed that by 2am on November 1st, all attendees of his Halloween gathering in the forest had left the woods for the comfort of their own homes. Leaving just Mikey Mulray there by himself. It is said that he planned to stay there until dawn, continuing to celebrate Samhain alone with just the devil's hut for shelter. But it was just before dawn that the calls had begun to flood the local emergency services when a blazing fire could be spotted in the forest from nearby homes. A fire that was pumping thick black smoke high into the sky. By mid-morning the fire had been extinguished by the experts, but the wooden lodge had been badly burned and damaged by the flames. Flames which had also ignited a number of close trees. It was a miracle. No doubt helped by the unusually cold autumn weather, the fresh fall of snow, that an uncontrollable fire had not occurred. Golfing the wider forest and reaching out towards the neighborhood residential properties, it was very fortunate indeed, given the circumstances, that this disaster had not occurred. But, for the Mulray family, it was still an unfathomable tragedy. As it transpired, the badly charred body of their oldest son had been discovered within the ruins of the witch hut, which had caught a light. Their son Mikey was long dead when the fire crew discovered his remains, but the events leading to the fire and his tragic subsequent death, remain a mystery to this day. Yes, it had snowed on the Halloween night in 1986, and here was the particularly out of season snow once more, a year later. A steady white dust falling from the sky, beginning to settle on the floor as if it were already winter. Danny looked outside his window, much the snow fall within the forest. In the background at the bottom of his parents' garden, he caressed a tape player, his brother's beloved Walkman, not knowing what to do for the best. As tears streamed from his eyes. A few hours later, Danny was laying on his bed, staring at the ceiling. Walkman by his side, headphones resting on the pillow next to him. He had laid there silently waiting for his parents to go to bed. They had both popped their heads around his door to say goodnight around 11pm. Danny had thrown down the corner of his duvet over the tape player as they had done so. You did not want them to see it. Not that they thought they would have noticed it on reflection, or even understood its significance if they had. For it had been a year since Mikey had died. Burn to death in the Devil's hut on that snowy Halloween night. And his missing Walkman was the least of their worry or concern. Honestly, Danny didn't even think his parents would recognize the tape player as being that of his older brothers. Probably didn't even realize it was missing from Mikey's bedroom. The room they had kept virtually intact from the very last day he had occupied it. But Danny knew the Walkman had been missing. He had searched Mikey's room high and low for it. Every nook and cranny in fact, for he knew what it contained. The one demo tape that Demon Blood had recorded. The only recording Danny knew featured his brother screaming into a microphone while playing guitar. He had played it to Danny, the very afternoon before he and his friends headed out to cause havoc that Halloween evening. The evening had turned into a true nightmare for Danny and his family. Yet, now here it was. Returned after all this time. And with a note seemingly from Mikey himself attached no less. Danny had been lying on his carpet reading a copy of Rock Circus while listening to the new Death Leopard on his record player. When there, in the corner of his eye, he had seen a strange and unusual looking box poking out from under his bed. A box he knew did not belong to him. A box he knew he had not put there. So here, he now was lying on his bed some hours later. His bedside clock ticking close to midnight. Still awake. Waiting. Finally, the big hand of the clock clicked into place. Pointing vertically upwards and smothering the little hand out of view. It was midnight. It was the witching hour. And Danny had to make a final decision as to what he was going to do. He placed the headphones around his head and covered his ears with the speakers. He closed his eyes, laid back on his pillow and pressed play. Within a few seconds, the sound of the tape coming to life buzzed in his ears. Sound of guitar being plugged into an amp and the knob being turned up to ten. Blast of feedback fuzz before the noise of a symbol being hit four times, crashed alongside the unmistakable sound of Mikey's voice. One, two, three, four. Then came the explosion of noise. The stabbing of his brothers to store the guitar. The bass guitar pulsating with a dark menace. A clatter of percussion along the thumping of the drums. Music was fast. It was heavy as fuck. As heavy as anything Danny had ever heard before. Mikey had always said that he wanted demon blood to go harder than Slayer ever had. And this demo more than proved that intention. It had been a year since Danny had heard this music, courted just before his brother's death. He was pretty sure this is the only recording they had ever made. He had never heard from the other band members since the tragedy. And certainly hadn't heard anything further of demon blood in the last 12 months. But to be honest, without Mikey, there was no demon blood anyway. Danny lay there, slowly becoming lost in the music. Finally, after a couple of minutes or so, party had been waiting for came to life. Mikey started singing. No. Screaming over the music. Spitting into cipherable lyrics with pure venom. Danny smiled to himself as he allowed the voice of his brother to take over his senses. He kept the volume relatively low, as he didn't want the noise of the headphones playing to be audible enough to disturb his parents. But as he lay there, listening completely absorbed, he suddenly became aware of another sound outside of the small speakers that pressed against his ears. One, two, three, four. There was a rapping on his bedroom window. Danny's eyes shot open. He pulled the headphone from his ears and hit the pause button on the Walkman. His heart was thumping, his breathing heavy. He lay there in silence and then he came once more. One, two, three, four. Danny sat up, sweat building on his brow. And as if under some kind of trance, he found himself rising to his feet, walking slowly towards the curtain which covered his bedroom window. As he reached his destination, he drew back the curtain, half expecting to see his brother's face staring back in at him. He had seen Salem's lot after all, and feared he knew all too well how this was going to go. But there was no face there beyond the glass. He picked up a torch from his desk and shone it out into the night, down into the ground of his parents' garden, and he froze. His brother may not have been there, but in the freshly set snow that covered the path were footprints, unmistakable footprints which began at the bottom of the garden, where the edge of the woodland sat, leading all the way up to the back door of their house. Then next to the footprints, the snow was stained, stained with what looked like droplets of blood. Danny shuddered as he switched off the torch. He realized he had almost stopped breathing altogether the whole time he had been looking outside. He decided he needed to go to his parents' room, wake up his dad and show him what he had seen, to explain how he found his brother's tape player under his bed. He slowly turned away from the window, as he contemplated what his parents might say when he walked in and woke them up. But as he completed his turn towards the door, there, in front of him, no more than a few meters away, was Mikey, standing in his bedroom, looking straight at him, as if it was the most natural occurrence in the world. Danny stood frozen for the second time in as many minutes. His brother was not as he had remembered him alive. Instead, he appeared as he did in Danny's most terrifying of nightmares. His skin was badly burned, charred like Freddy from Elm Street. But, he also had a burned, almost completely bald head, with just a few clumps of random strands of singed hair remaining, where a long, dark mane once rested. But the face of this apparition was unmistakably that of Mikey's. What was left of his clothing hung threadbare from his scalded body. Some of the material melted into his flesh. All that had remained intact were his leather-docked Martin boots, the bottoms covered in snow. Snow which had been trodden across the carpet of Danny's bedroom, leaving wet footprints from the door, which stood slightly ajar where Mikey was now standing. Mikey looked into his younger brother's eyes, and just as Danny was about to scream, Mikey raised an arm and pressed a finger to his lips. Shh, little brother, come with me. Be quiet. We don't want to wake mom and dad. Mikey turned and walked towards the door, pausing a look back over his shoulder at Danny, who remained rooted in the spot. I said, come with me, little brother. He repeated, beckoning to Danny to follow him with his finger. Danny did as he was asked, but followed his brother out of the room. They quickly walked across the hall and down the stairs, with Mikey leaving wet marks on the carpet the whole way. From the bottom of the stairs they moved, almost silently, through the kitchen and out the back door into the garden. Danny followed his older brother like a faithful dog, as he had always done, before he had looked up to Mikey his whole life, worshipping the ground he walked on as he had grown up in his shadow. Once they were both outside, Mikey stopped walking, turning back to his brother as he did so. We're going out into the woods, little brother. I want to show you something. Mikey had a torch in his hand. Strange that Danny hadn't noticed it before. Turn on the flashlight, walk down the garden towards the gate, which provided access through the entrance of the forest. Danny followed it. It was cold, only wearing his faded the Goonies pajamas and a pair of old slippers. It had not occurred to him to dress for the occasion, whatever that might be. He didn't know why he appeared to be following the reanimated corpse of his older brother into the forest, place of his demise. But he followed nonetheless, hoping that if he were awake and if this was real, that it was going to end with Mikey returning home to their family, so they could all be happy once more. After trudging through the crackle of the forest undergrowth and crunching of the still settling snow on the footpath for a good ten minutes, the brothers eventually reached the spot that Danny knew he was being taken to, the clearing by a stream. Where the remains sat of the burned and decrepit lodge his brother had been cooked in a year ago. Keep following me, little brother. We just have this little bit to go. Mikey walked into the ruins of the fire damaged building, climbing over a pile of white stones as he did so. The whole hut had been surrounded by these stones, stones which appear to have been carefully laid out in a circle around the lodge. Danny continued to do as he was asked, thinking only at this point of how happy his mom and dad were going to be when Mikey returned home to them in the morning. As he stepped over the stone circle, a loud humming sound began to throb in his ears. The sound traveled across his forehead and started swirling around his brain, causing a sudden and intense migraine that felt like it was going to explode inside his head. He looked upwards as his eyes rolled backwards. His body went limp and he began to fall, straying to the outstretched arms of Mikey. When Danny's eyes opened, he found that he was lying on his back, staring directly upward towards the night sky, through the derelict roof of the Devil's hut. He was tied down, his arms and legs pulled outwards. His hands and feet were tethered to large wooden stakes that had been drilled into the ground. His body stretched into the shape of a star. His eyes started to dart around in panic. He began twisting his neck to move his head from side to side. The only part of his body he was able to move. On the wall in front of him, a spray-painted black marking loomed large. Danny recognized the graffiti as a pentagram, with what looked like the head of an animal inside. Possibly some type of horned goat. He knew his brother enjoyed drawing pentagrams, for his school books had been covered in the things, when they were provided to his parents following his death. But in this moment, he had no idea what all of this meant, or what was going to happen to him. Danny laid his head back down, his neck now aching from wriggling and writhing on the floor. He was truly captive. As he laid there looking upwards, the face of Mikey suddenly appeared above him. I'm sorry, little brother, he said. But this is the only way I could return forever. Mikey's face moved down closer to Danny's, and he kissed him on the forehead. Then he stood up, and flicked a zippo lighter around to life, so that Danny could see the flame dancing in his hand. He walked over to the wall, and he held the lighter next to the bottom of the pentagram. And within seconds, the marking went up in flames, burning perfectly bright upon the wall. Mikey turned his back to the flaming symbol and started muttering. The words were alien to Danny, complete mumbo jumbo. He pulled a can of lighter fluid from his pocket and started flicking it over the trapped body of Danny, as he continued reciting his demented prayer. Soon, Danny was covered in the fluid, the smell of sulfur burning in his nostrils. All the while, the flaming pentagram continued to blaze on the wall. Then, Mikey stopped talking. He was standing directly above Danny's head once more. He looked down at his brethren for just a moment, their eyes met. They stared at each other in complete silence. Danny could see fire burning deep in his brother's pupils. Then, Mikey dropped the lighter down onto Danny's chest, instantly setting a light on his pajama top. Danny started to cry. As the heat engulfed his body, he closed his eyes, and he screamed. Danny more entered slowly through the woods towards his home. First of dawn's light provided all the light he needed to see the path in front of him. Snow had began to melt. There was just a remaining slush of now muddy ice bordering the path he walked. Bear chested and shivering in the cold. When he reached his family home, he let himself in through the back door. Kicked off his filthy slippers and tiptoed up the stairs, so... as to not wake up his parents. Then he climbed into his bed, and once again, closed his eyes. A few hours later, Danny woke up. He lay in his bed a while, studying his hands, front and back, listening in silence as he heard movement downstairs. Clattering in the kitchen of his mom and dad, making breakfast no doubt. Pulled himself up and walked to the mirror which hung on his bedroom wall. He looked into the mirror and intently study his face. Smiled to himself, and on the reflection, smiling back. As he whispered the words, Hello, little brother. Danny recalled emerging from the cinder of the hut, as if from a cocoon before he walked home. And he knew the wooden walls of the building, and the bones of his former body would now conjoin together, as ash on the forest floor. As the faint sound of sirens rang in the distance outside, he knew it was time to go see his parents, for he had missed them this last year. Danny smiled in the mirror once more. Thank you, little brother. For now, we are one. He turned and walked slowly towards the bedroom door, glancing down at the Walkman which lay on the bed as he passed. And he began laughing. And finally, what begins as a prank-fueled game night quickly spirals into a deadly version of hide and seek when something truly answers the call. From writer AGR and narrative by Alicia Atkins, Creepy presents Perilous Pursuit. I'm sorry, I promise I'll do better next time. I couldn't believe it when Pete told us about the ritual he had found online. It could summon some sort of demon or monster that attacked anyone who saw its face. Pete said it was used as an ancient punishment. He thought it would be great for game night, so he invited several of us to play an extreme version of hide and seek with a bit of a spooky edge. His house was massive, the perfect setting for the game. I was fully convinced he was just going to prank everyone. Pete was notorious for his pranks and loved to bring his friends in on the gag. I decided to go for two reasons. The first was my interest in how he would pull off the prank, and the second was my big crush on Pete. He was happy to have me come, and I was not alone. Sarah, Michael, Dan, and Tess would also be joining us at Pete's house. Dan and I were the only ones who were interested in Pete's prank. Dan and Tess thought it would make for a fun date, and Sarah was interested in all things supernatural and occult. Everyone arrived at the house on their own. We were greeted by Pete, with a mischievous grin plastered on his face, flanked by Tanya and Herbert. They were his left and right hands when it came to pranks. Pete, Tanya, and Herbert invited everyone in the house. At the entryway, Pete laid out the rules of the game. Everyone was to be blindfolded and taken to different rooms at the house. At exactly midnight, the trio would recite the online incantation to summon the entity, and the rest of us would have to avoid the monster till 3.30am. As Pete explained the rules, Herbert closed the door behind us but didn't lock it. I figured this was all a setup for them to dress up and scare the rest of us throughout the house. Sarah was anxious, Michael was interested, and Dan and Tess were just excited to get started. Individually, we were blindfolded and taken to our starting points. When my blindfold was removed, it appeared I was taken to a house office. The room had the usual amenities, a computer, desk, shelves, etc. As I looked around, I saw a Bluetooth speaker placed in the middle of the room. It was broadcasting voices. I could make out Pete, Herbert, and Tanya as they prepared for the ritual. They began to chant, their voices echoed throughout the house. I smirked at how ridiculous and over the top it all was. The chanting was replaced with cursing, followed by their gutter screams. I heard the sound of meat slapping and strange crackles, then Herbert pleading for his life before a strange rattling took over. The Bluetooth shut off after that. The police sounded legitimate, almost too good for just acting. But no, that was just what they wanted me to think. The trio was just setting the scene and stirring us up. The night had begun, and I left the office to find the others. The hallway was completely lit up with no place to hide. I was walking carefully down the hall when I ran into Sarah. She appeared nervous, so I tried to calm her down. I hugged her and rubbed her arm. I told her it was okay and explained it was just Pete playing one of his many pranks. Just as Sarah was about to calm down, there was a sound that shook the both of us to the core. I couldn't explain it. The closest thing was a blend between a roar and a shriek. Cries that appeared to belong to Dan and Tess, originating from the room at the end of the hall. There was something off. These screams respond from genuine terror, not like those you would hear at a haunted attraction. Things slammed against the walls so hard the room seemed to shake. After a few moments, everything went completely silent. I needed to figure out what was going on, so I slowly moved towards the source of the screams. Sarah was frozen in terror and held me down like an anchor. I had to pry her hands off my arms slowly. I turned towards her and when we were face to face, I saw the pure terror on her face as she looked behind me. Before I could turn to see what she saw, something bowled me to the ground as Sarah screamed. I was facedown in pain and I heard the awful sounds of bones snapping and flesh ripping. A warm liquid slowly touched my hand and it spread to my face where I could smell a metallic scent. I heard bumps grow closer as something slowly moved toward and over me. Its breath burned my skin, smelling like sulfur and metal as it walked over me. Once the thing moved on, I got up. I saw the pool of liquid was blood. Then there was Sarah, or what was left of her. She was bisected with her spine poking out of her waist. Her upper torso was completely missing. The hallway was transformed, revealing cracked walls, blood splatter and claw marks everywhere. I was stunned and had a loss for ideas as I urged my body to slowly back away from the scene. My mind was racing. It was real. It was real. Repeated over in my head. I ran towards Dan and Tess's location in the hope that the thing wouldn't return to an attack site. When I arrived in their room, my stomach turned and my gut did barrel rolls. I couldn't tell who was who or what was what. Their room was just filled with amalgam of meat and bones, which appeared to be the bodies of the couples. One was flayed of all skin and the other was missing its head. Making it impossible to identify them. My lunch forced itself up my throat and spilled onto the floor. Then there was a loud crash as the being ran towards my location with several stomps coming closer. I ran for the first hiding place, straight into a closet. Shutting my eyes and holding my breath as the being entered the room. I felt my chest tighten as I couldn't hold my breath much longer. Luckily, the creature left before I broke out into a gasp for air. I waited for five minutes, then slowly and carefully left my hiding spot. Finding Michael and getting the hell out of the house was the only thought in my head. I stepped carefully to avoid making too much noise to not attract its attention while listening for the beast's steps. I searched the various rooms of the house, whispering Michael's name. I was losing hope that he was still alive. Then I found the kitchen and I saw Michael standing in the middle of the room with a large knife. We both nearly cried at the sight of each other, but settled on a silent rough hug. We were both thinking about what to do next. Should we make a run for it or wait out the time? Michael suggested we wait in the pantry closet until the time ran out, then just run to his car. I agreed and we both just hid and waited. Our eyes were fixed on the clock in the kitchen as the hand seemed to barely move at all. Every so often, we heard the entity's footsteps all over the house, moving impossibly fast. It thrashed around various rooms. Every noise made my heart skip a beat. Time appeared to move slower and slower as we waited. Then the clock finally struck 3.30 a.m. and the beast's steps stopped. Tears washed over my face as this hellish night appeared to be over. After a few seconds of silence, Michael and I left the closet. We ran outside, bursting through the doors onto the driveway. Laughing out in joy and relief, we headed to his car. Michael smiled as he looked back at the house. Suddenly, there was a crash. Something massive smashed him into his vehicle, denting the metal and sending the knife flying across the floor. It was still here. That thing didn't leave. It would never leave me alone. My mind raced and then I saw the knife. I knew what I had to do. The only way to survive against this thing. I grabbed the knife before the creature could finish killing Michael. With extreme pain, I plunged myself into darkness. The entity and I screamed as I gouged my eyes out. I could feel the blood streaming down my face, replacing my tears of relief. I stumbled in the dark as I walked back to town. The creature's footsteps continued to trail behind me. Its breath burned my neck and smelled the blood in sulfur. Forever following me, but never able to claim me. You created common Sherelyte licensing or with written consent from the authors. No portion of this podcast may be rebroadcast or otherwise distributed without the express written consent of the Creepy Podcast production team and the Story's author. Got you. Herb? The Admitters of Bud and Herb. It's back and it brought friends. An immersive audio fiction, actual play hybrid where cozy mystery collides with creeping horror. The Peepy just froze inside my body, Herb. I ain't that true, man. Amateur cryptid hunters. Donnie, the lockdown-ill monster. Wouldn't it be amazing if we actually saw him? Professional bad decision makers. There's gonna be a lot of puke all over the place any second now. Not the ones you want. To be honest, we weren't sure if anybody was listening. But the ones you deserve on the case. Y'all do know this is an investigative funcast, right? And a living world powered by Daggerheart RPG. It's such a good story. It flames seriously. From Cinderwood Studios and Fable and Folly, listen anywhere you get your podcasts or watch on YouTube.