This week Abby and Alan present fiction and nonfiction ghost stories for you! Starting with Mornings at Madison submitted by Courtney Eastman of The Ghoul Guide. Next we read Marc Sirinsky's story, check out his work here. Followed by Nadira Jamerson's story, Survivor's Guilt. Check out Nadira's website. And finally Cooper Shreve's story, Niagara Falls and the Red Coach Inn.
Nominate your favorite 2022 horror films here.
lunaticsproject.com
Get Lunatics Merch here. Join the discussion on Discord. Listen to the paranormal playlist I curate for Vurbl, updated weekly! Check out Abby's book Horror Stories. Available in eBook and paperback. Music by Michaela Papa, Alan Kudan & Jordan Moser. Poster Art by Pilar Keprta @pilar.kep.
This week Abby and Alan present fiction and nonfiction ghost stories for you! Starting with Mornings at Madison submitted by Courtney Eastman of The Ghoul Guide. Next we read Marc Sirinsky's story, check out his work here. Followed by Nadira Jamerson's story, Survivor's Guilt. Check out Nadira's website. And finally Cooper Shreve's story, Niagara Falls and the Red Coach Inn.
Nominate your favorite 2022 horror films here.
lunaticsproject.com
Get Lunatics Merch here. Join the discussion on Discord. Listen to the paranormal playlist I curate for Vurbl, updated weekly! Check out Abby's book Horror Stories. Available in eBook and paperback. Music by Michaela Papa, Alan Kudan & Jordan Moser. Poster Art by Pilar Keprta @pilar.kep.
Hello everyone, and welcome back to another episode of the Lunatic Radio Hour podcast. I'm Abby Brer, sitting here with Alan Codan. Hello. And today we have a bit of a hybrid episode for you, but the through line is that we have four haunting ghost stories. This sounds like one of our Lunatic library episodes. It's like Lunatic library meets one of our real scary story episodes. Gotcha. So we have two fiction, two nonfiction ghost encounters. Are we doing the history of Ghost Encounters? We. Are not. So cool. This is a fast, fun, wild episode. No history to be found here. After our very overloaded October. Yeah, I think this is appreciated. Yeah. This is our rebound episode. The. Rebound episode. Our hungover on horror episode. Is that actually what we should call that? Yeah. We spent a month going crazy, making a radio drama, and we needed to do something fun and low key. I think we should call these episodes. Horror Hangover. Horror Hangover. Whoops. We got too tired and I got sick for two weeks and now here we are. Yep. But anyway, despite all that, I'm actually super excited. People really showed up when I put out the call for Ghost Stories and I'm so excited about the people that we're featuring. Three of them are brand new to the podcast, so I can't wait. Really? Yeah. That's. Cool. Yeah. All friends of Lunatic, but first time that will actually be reading their words on the air. So friends of the pod. Yeah. But from, they're going from lurker to poster status. They're going from Friends of the Lunatic Project, i e, social media friends. One of them, Mark has actually given us some of his photography before for Lunatic Magazine and Aha. Courtney. We're good friends on Instagram. So it's kind of like everybody's involved in some way or part of the ecosystem, but first time that we're collaborating in this auditory way. Well see, that's the thing. I have all these fun stories and content that I wanna share, but I don't know how to do that. You can send us an email to films about lunatics gmail.com or reach out on any social media platform and we would love to feature your work. The only thing I wanna, Two things, actually, I wanna say two housekeeping super quick. The first one, and I'm gonna post and remind everyone about this throughout the end of the year, but we are doing something super fun for the first time ever. It. Is. Yeah. We never do anything. Fun. No. The first time ever we're doing this fun thing, which is, well, I'm calling the 2022 Lunatic Horror Awards. It's all for films released in 2022. So it's categories like Best makeup, best Final Girl, Best Kill Scene, things like that. And then based on the most nominated films in early January, we will put out a Google form where you can actually vote and we'll kind of round up all the results. So just a really fun way to kind of reflect on all of out this year. I think it was a really interesting year for horror. A huge spectrum of different things came out. And I'm excited to just see what people vote for and watch those films too. I'm gonna have some trouble with this contest. You. Love to watch old. Films? Well, that's the thing. I don't feel like I've seen enough movies that came out. You never come to the theater with. Me this year. You've seen Barbarian and. X. What's X? Which one. Was that? The one we watched with the older woman? We just watched it three days ago. No, with the old woman. The slasher film, The Porn Stars. Oh, that movie that came out this year? Yeah. Oh, that was a good. Movie. And it's prequel came out this year as. Well. So I've seen two movies. Oh, I also saw Halloween ends. There you go. So I've seen three. Yeah. I think you could vote. Oh hell Razor. You saw Hell Razor. That's four. How many categories there? More than four categories. Yeah. There's a lot of categories that's you saw. Nope, that's a problem. Wait, did nope come out in 2022? Yes. Was there Kill Scene A? Nope. Yes. Was there a Best Final Girl? Yes. So I've seen five movies. Yeah. When did Lama Getten come out? No, Lama Getten Aged did not come out this year. And it does not count. We're not even going to entertain this joke that you're putting together. It's. Not a joke. What award do you think Lama Getten should win? I. Don't even know what the categories are there. Is there Best Animal Lead? There is a category that someone suggested I add most horribly or horrifyingly bad film. There you go. But it's not, that film is not from 2022, so you're gonna have to dig deeper. What if a film is re-released? No, it's gotta be original release. Unless it's like being remastered in some way. Okay. Well I I'll try, but. You have a few months so you can think about it. We. Have months. The voting for nominations will close in January and then we will vote on the finals. Really struggling with these rules here. We. Don't. Yeah, you have to leave it open through the whole year in case some really amazing films come out December 29th. Wow. Yeah. Who's gonna vote? We already have a lot of votes in. What kind of question is. That? No. Who's allowed to vote? You have to nominated to vote. No. Anybody can vote as long as you are serious. Poor enthusiast. We are the people. We are. The academy. So anybody can vote. Yeah. I'm gonna weed out the. Trolls. The trolls. Yeah. How do you troll? Well, some people have already submitted some joker. Can you vote more than once? Yes. Hell yeah. And we'll be looking for the most, right? So people will overwhelmingly vote for certain films and those will be the ones that make it to the final ballot. There's a final ballot. No, I'm just curious. You're really not. Listening. No. You said. In January, based on the nominations, we have to vote. Twice. Yes. You should nominate now. Maybe you should just wait and vote in January and you don't need to worry about nominating anything cuz you're not really a trend setter in the horror community. It seems. That's That's crazy. Voting twice. People can barely vote once and you want them to vote twice. I think people care about horror. I care about horror. So you can vote in the final. And I'm very confused by your convoluted Remanding. <laugh>.<Laugh>. Okay. I think a lot of people out there are gonna get it though. So I think we can move on from this. All right. But if you follow us anywhere on social media, we're posting reminders to get your nominations in on Twitter and on Instagram, on Facebook our newsletter. So make sure you follow us, all those places. Shall we get into our first story, please? Okay. What is this about Ghost Stories. Ghost Stories? Yes. Okay. Do you need<laugh>? You really? Gimme a second. You okay. You really threw me with this contest.<Laugh>. Getting. Okay, so we're back to Ghost Stories or what we're gonna call it. Horror Hangover. Horror Hangover. Ghost Stories. Hangover Ghost Stories edition.<Laugh>. Yeah. Before we get into the first story, quick reminder for all of our patrons, the November Horror movie Club movie is the Old Ways from 2020. Not so. 2020. So we can't vote for it. That's right. That's right. It doesn't qualify for the 2022 Lunix Horror Awards. The Loos. The Loos. <laugh>. That's cute. That's gotta be an award already. Probably. I'm sure. How Horror Movie club works for anybody interested is that on Patreon? Every month Alan and I each submit several films and patron's vote, and then we watch that film, we record a bonus podcast episode, all about that one film. Everybody else watches it and we go to Discord and talk about it. So. Oh, it's like on pa, Your contest is on Patreon where we nominate and then vote sorta. No, it's different, but that's okay. I'm getting closer. I'm You're trying. You're trying. But anyway, if anybody would like to join us and join the Horror Movie Club monthly Cycle, come over to Patreon. The links are in the description of this podcast. We have a lot of fun with it. You also get a pin. Yeah. You, Oh, that's very true. So we have this promotion running, I suppose right now where because we have a certain number of patrons, we owe everybody a pin. I'm actually about to send out the packages. The design is our lovely logo designed by PR Cap and the pins. I'm really proud of myself actually. It's my first time working with a metal design shop to create pins, and I'm so thrilled with how they came out. The logo looks great. They're really kind of heavy duty. They feel nice, so I'm really happy about that. But the only way you can get yourself a Lunix Radio hour pin is simply by joining our Patreon at any level. So $1 a month and the bonus content and the merch will flow endlessly. Or you can break in here and rob us. Yep. You could do that too. There's lots of pins in this time. We should do a home invasion episode. No. <laugh>, I hate, That's like my biggest fear. Trigger warning. Yeah. I don't know if I wanna fuck you. Maybe you can do that with someone else. No. All right. Shall we pivot here. Please? This is too overwhelming. I am very honored to introduce this first story. It is submitted to us by Courtney Eastman, who I am a super fan girl of on social media. Courtney goes by the GH Guide on all like Instagram, Twitter, everywhere. Oh, I know the Google guide. Yeah. You have the Google guide stickers on your cases. Yeah. We love Courtney. She is just amazing. She travels everywhere. She explores the most haunted paranormal places and posts the best spookiest content. So please follow her. And it really is so exciting to have this story from her, and I hope that very soon we'll be able to welcome her as a guest on Lunatics Radio Hour. Okay, so for this first story who's. Read. The first story? You're doing it. I'm gonna do this one. Yeah. You want it? I want it. I wanna read Courtney's words to you. I wanna see if of course you can. If I record, if can channel Courtney to convince you in the paranormal. You. Get all the good ones.<Laugh>, You got some good ones coming. Don't you worry. Titled Mornings at Madison. After a long night spent investigating an old state home, the sun had arrived and I found myself getting barely two hours of sleep in the cold lobby of the Madison Seminary in Madison, Ohio. With the sound of the birds and the early morning sun coming through the back door slowly stirring us awake. The bittersweet realization of this being the last restless morning spent inside an obscure location for the ghost hunting season swept over us as we dragged our feet getting out the door, though before we could part ways, until the next time myself and my friends could get together for another night of chasing ghosts, There had been a piece of equipment lost from the night before somewhere within the seminary, Knowing breakfast at the small diner down the road had been hanging in the distance. Myself and my friends decided to take on a last walk through the location, giving ourselves another excuse to waste some time before our departure. Starting the search over on the Civil War side of the building, we began to glance over each room for the missing spirit box, all while taking this chance to get the last minute footage we wanted to get for the haunt. Coming up short, we moved on towards the Ohio cottage portion of the building and scanned over the dining room before moving to the only staircase in that section. As the three of us walked up the first set of steps, my friend Deanna looked back to myself and her husband and had asked if we wanted to split up and each take a floor so that we could head to breakfast sooner, easily on board with the idea. I claimed the second floor while she and her husband went up to the third and the top floor asylum. Though I am not a fan of being alone at times, I didn't find anything strange or off feeling about this morning. At least not yet. It was easy to push the creep factor this building tends to carry as the early morning sunlight illuminated. Its usual dark corners and our minds task to find the little black radio. As I moved through the second floor, I could hear the footsteps and the creaking floorboards Deanna moved through the third floor. However, after a minute or so, everything had fallen silent since I had been lagging behind, gathering the last handful of shots I could steal of the rooms I cleared, I assumed the fallen silence was due to Deanna moving to the other side of the floor or even upstairs to the asylum floor to meet her husband. With no luck on the second floor, I ventured up the next flight to the third floor where I believed I'd run into Dean. But as soon as I stepped onto the floor and began walking around, I couldn't find her. I let it roll off my shoulders and continued to get whatever footage I wanted before I had eventually meet up with them. As I took a few videos and photos for future projects, I could hear the sound of doors closing or what seemed to be some kind of pounding coming from the asylum floor upstairs, a floor which is said to be the most active in the building still, I continued to brush off the noises and kept doing my own thing as I cherished the last little moments I had with this building. But then it happened again and again. The pounding and movement sounded as if it was moving around on the floor above me, creaking With each step taken, closing of doors that followed, and even faint muffled words being spoken only furthering my belief for one of them to be up there doing something. Once again, I kept my head down and moved throughout the floor trying to pay no mind to the noises. After I had gotten the content that I needed to make it. Through the winter months of the off season, I began to walk back to the only staircase that was in the Ohio Cottage portion. Assuming that I'd meet up with my two friends upstairs, though, as I rounded the corner and pass through the threshold into the staircase, I felt my smart watch vibrate indicating that I had a message. The moment when my foot touched the bottom step on the second to last flight of stairs leading up to the asylum, I glanced down to read the message as it popped onto the small screen. It had been a text from Deanna, We're leaving to grab a table for breakfast. See you there. Instantly. I frozen place on the bottom step as my stomach dropped when the realization began to sink in. As I read over the message a few more times, trying to make sense of it all. As I tried to rationalize with myself, I thought that maybe the two of them were still up there and the message was sent on their way out and they'd head back down this way any minute. But as I stood there, looking up the last two flights of stairs, the piercing silence coming from the asylum only rang by for the minute or so that I gave it, they weren't coming down the stairs. There had been no one up there without even thinking. I turned and ran down the staircase as I still tried, rationalizing the moment with myself more with each step, barely touched on the weight down, walking back down into the lobby area, looking frantic and nervous. I gripped the handle of the door with the hope that it would fly open, and I'd be told they were still up in the asylum that I had just run from. But as the door flew open, the first two people I had seen were Dan and her husband Mark, standing by the door almost ready to leave after asking several times how long they had been standing there, in the mix of them asking me if everything was all right, I finally explained myself and what had happened as I walked the third floor by myself hoping to bump into them. The only response giving back to me after a moment of silence when I explained was that they had both come back down after they glanced over the floor, they picked for the missing spirit box and that they'd bend down in the lobby waiting for me to return for at least five minutes. What has left me so mesmerized and confused by this moment that didn't add up the floors to Madison Seminary aren't big, and the staircase echoes with each noise made inside. Why didn't I hear a single footstep of theirs or hear an uttered word in the only staircase? Why didn't I hear the clicking of her boot heels, her husband's distinct voice, or even the heavy boots he wore echoing through the eight flights of steps in the singular staircase? All I heard was the peculiar silence when it wasn't my own creeks on the floorboards or the phantom noises that came from above. Ever since that November weekend we spent here almost a year ago now, I often find myself reflecting back on this moment, what or who had been trying to get my attention up from the asylum floor, the floor that said to How is most of the paranormal activity within this location? What would've happened if I had ignored the notification coming through on my smartwatch and ventured up there to see what was going on for myself? Would someone have been waiting for me? Would I have witnessed something paranormal in terms of seeing shadows or hearing one of the infamous disembodied voices I've heard multiple times before on past visits? Was it a parting gift? Remember this location? By my travels seeing that this was the last time I'd be walking these halls for nearly a year, I suppose I can only wonder as to what had been calling my attention up in the asylum that early November morning. Maybe that's what the spirits of this former civil war home and nursing home want someone to remember them in any fashion it may be until the next time, dot. I'm sorry to have to interrupt your show, but I do have an important question for you. Do you like creepy stuff like UFOs, bigfoot, paranormal, and true crime stories? You should listen to creepy show@creepyshowpodcast.com. I'm your host, the Master of Creep. That's creepy show podcast.com.<laugh>. First thing I wanna say is that my brother actually went to school in Madison, Wisconsin. This is Madison, Ohio. There's a difference. There's two different states. Yeah. Well that's an irrelevant fact then. Yeah. But now we all know the. Fun trivia is that there's a more than one Madison. Fuck this. There's more than one. I'm done. I'm out cutting. I know, Alan, that you're a skeptic and that you won't be convinced by any story. You'll only be convinced by your real life experiences. But I'm going to tell you why I really like this story as a believer. Okay, So Courtney, first of all is somebody who spends, it feels like almost every weekend, like doing overnight paranormal investigations at these historic sites. And so for me, I really trust Courtney's opinion because I feel like more so than any other person that I know in my life, she's really in this space and would have thought of the fool proofing and dummy checks and things that we could easily try to explain away hearing things upstairs. So to me, if she says This building was cleared, then this building was cleared. And I have heard paranormal auditory things before. It's super spooky. And I like the idea kind of how she left the story, that there is this rich history and tragedy and all of these things that happened at Madison Seminary and maybe the point of these hauntings or paranormal activity is that they just wanna be remembered. They want by any means necessary, like she says, but that they just want the story to live on. And I think that's sort of beautiful. That is kind of beautiful. I'll give you that. Thank. You and thank you Courtney, for sharing this with all of us. And please everyone go follow the Google guide anywhere that you interact with social media. I do enjoy the Google guide, especially their stickers. Yeah, Alan Courtney sent us some stickers and I have some, and Alan has some on his equipment cases, so we love it. We love some spooky stickers. Indeed. Indeed. Okay, Alan, we have one more nonfiction. Okay. Well I guess we, it's not an even split, but we're now gonna read a nonfiction. Okay, so I'm next. You're next, you're up. Okay, got. It. So you are reading a paranormal experience that Mark Seki has submitted to us. So I wanna set up who Mark is, cuz I talked about this at the head of the episode. But Mark is this really cool alternative process photographer. He works in the US again, We featured his work before in Lunatic Magazine, and there's actually still digital copies of lunatics Magazine available. If you go to our website, lunatics project.com, and you click on magazines so you can see Mark's work there. Come for the spooky stories and stay for the seafaring poems by Chuck Brer. There you go. But Mark was an only featured in Lunatic Magazine. He's been in over 65 international and national galleries. So very, very accomplished, established artist. Yeah. That's great. And he recently, if you're really into photography, which I think a lot of us are, he came out with a photography book commemorating his 25 years of published work. That's amazing.<Affirmative>, It's a compendium of published works from 1997 to 2022. I thought this was really cool. It's not just a book of photos that you'd put on your coffee table, which I also love, but it's actually inclusive of essays and reviews and it's, it's got so much more than just photos. It's really this dynamic exploration of his work across mediums. That's a really, I I've never seen that before. It's really funny. Idea. Yeah, it's really cool. So anyway, if you wanna know more about Mark, you wanna check out his work, visit rinky.com S I N S K y.com. I'll put it in the description. But let us read his paranormal experience, which is related to art galleries actually. So okay. It all. Here you go. It all works out. Some of the details are foggy, but I remember the important parts. I was sitting in an art museum. It may very well have been the Art Institute of Chicago since I'm from town originally, or it could have been someplace else, but it was definitely a museum as opposed to a smaller art gallery. In fact, I know this because it was big enough to have very large benches for people to sit in multiple locations. One of those black leather with chrome metal jobs, you see in many American art museums. Anyway, even though I'm sure I went with some people, I was by myself and a bit tired of walking. So I sat down on one of those benches in front of a rather large painting. Being an artist, I'm embarrassed to say I don't remember what the painting was or who the artist was, but I remember it being large. As I was sitting, I started to feel the need to rest my eyes. I closed them and then was soon in that in between state, between being awake and asleep. But I remember feeling at peace somehow. And part of that is likely because a white light overtook me to the point where it majorly brightened the darkness you encounter when your eyes are closed. It was a powerful light, but felt almost gradual. Not a burst as much as a thing that took a few seconds to get to its full capacity. I remember smiling likely bigger than I do when I'm by myself. People think I'm weird enough as it is. I'm not sure how long the light stayed there, but I remember it felt like a while. Then it faded slightly before I opened my eyes and saw the room exactly as it was before I closed them. I have no idea what it was. It took no tangible or recognizable form. And I do know there were windows somewhere nearby, but I remember feeling like there's no way those windows could have had a hand in creating a light in this manner, especially considering how white it was. And the feeling I got from it was not a feeling you get from a window. I love natural light, and again, as an artist, I work with it all the time. But this was something different. Not to belabor the point, but I think the best way to describe the light was almost washing over me. It was more like that than a light bulb going from dim to bright. Started out pretty bright, but got a little brighter as it washed over me. It was also weird in that I remember it feeling like it was in front of me rather than completely around me, but the feeling was almost immersive. I definitely wasn't a child or even a teen. I think I graduated college already, I'm gonna guess late twenties, early thirties. I wish I could pinpoint it further, but that's the best I can do. It's one of those things where when it happened, it was cool and interesting and slightly bewildering, but I've grown to appreciate slash question it more in the years since, which is why my brain probably didn't put a major timestamp on. It. I do wanna call out that last paragraph you read. I had actually asked Mark as a follow up how old he was because I was curious if this happened and he was like five or as an adult. But I like the story a lot for a few reasons. One, because of this trance meditative state where he's in this place between sleep and wake, and I feel like I've the most powerful meditative experiences I've had where I physically felt something have been in that sort of in between this trance, which is something that actually comes up all the time in paranormal research using this trans state to access the. Paranormal. Isn't that the literal definition of the Twilight Zone? Oh, is. It? I think so. Oh. Cute. Maybe I just made that. Up. Nice. Call back to our radio drama that just came out though. We never say that. No, but it's similar. It's got some similarities. Sure. <laugh>. But anyway, yeah, I thought, again, big fan of Mark and so was really grateful that he shared this experience with us. What do you think? Hey, crime lovers, Eliza Knight here, I'm interrupting this episode to let you know about another true crime podcast that I host with two of my crime obsessed friends, Lori Ann Bailey and Brenna Ash. We are crime feast. Each week on crime feast, we serve up a platter of murders, mayhem, missing persons tragedies, and more feast on notorious tales ripped from today's headlines and resurrected from the past. You can find all the information about our show@www.crimefees.com. Until then, stay safe out there. We don't want you on the menu next. Now, back to your show. Mean, he wrote it from a very matter of fact, skeptical standpoint of this was a feeling that doesn't make any sense. I'm not putting anything but the facts in how I felt. I'm not putting my own interpretation on it, and I appreciate that. As a skeptic. As a skeptic from one skeptic to another <laugh>. But the fact that he identified this as some kind of supernatural experience and supernatural in just the most literal sense of the word. Totally. Some people might call it spiritual also. He was in between sleep. How often we've had weird experiences when you didn't even realize you'd fallen asleep and suddenly like, Oh, you had, Cause. That feeling of falling, I feel like always happens to Yeah. Or for me, it's when you go back to bed, you know, you wake up in the morning and you're like, Oh good, I still have 30 minutes<laugh>, and then you know, you're, I'm just gonna rest my eyes for a bit. And then suddenly you are in this full blown, crazy vivid dream. In this case, you're in public, your guard is still up slightly. Sure. But if you're tired, you're tired. And you started drifting a little bit, and I loved his description of what the light was doing of just this feel this. He wasn't observing the light. He was feeling the light, which feels like a much more a type of sensory experience that you're not just getting from viewing something unless you're like the cat sunbathing in the sunlight. You're not having this deep appreciation for when a certain light hits you in a certain way. Absolutely. It reminds me, and we've talked about this many times on the podcast, but my mom's paranormal story about when her mother passed away and she felt this light, this warmth like this, before she knew that she had died, but after she had died, felt that feeling. So that's why I'm interested in it. And again, there's some schools of thought out there. I'll say that schools of thought in the paranormal community that these trans like states or being between, in between being in the liminal space, that's when things start to happen. So I think it's super cool and I'm, again, I love when people challenge our expectations of reality I don't think any reality was challenged. I think this was very matter of fact and I appreciate that. Okay. I also think it's real. I'm just saying it's fun to live in that kind of world where these things happen. No, this is a paranormal story I can get behind. Great. No, no, we're not. Fighting. It's very relatable. You gotta stop fighting <laugh>. It's very relatable and I like that. I, it's, It's not like there I was and I heard out the window a footstep what could, it was probably a ghost. That's very rare that anyone would ever say something that dumb. But good example, you really showed me. Thank you, <laugh>. Next, I'm thrilled to introduce Nadira Jamerson, who is a horror fantasy writer. She has a novel out right now about rage and self-acceptance called I Want to Love My Own Life, which is available for purchase on her website, nadira x renee.com, which again, I'll link everybody, promote everybody in the description of this. And she's also currently, Alan, you're gonna love this, working on a horror fantasy comic to be released next year. That's cool. Yeah, so definitely keep your eye on her website because I think we're all gonna wanna read this comic. My favorite comic of all time is Horror Fantasy. Which. Comic? That would be berserk. Not salmon. No. Oh. I mean, I like Sandman, but it's. Not my thing. Your favorite is Berserk. Sandman was my gateway. I got you a compendium of Berserk. You got me the deluxe edition. The deluxe dish. The deluxe edition. Volume one. And two. And two. That's right. Yeah, that's right. They're absolutely incredible. But. Let's not get distracted. We're here to read the dearest story. I also wish I could show everybody the very, very cool art that came with a submission. Obviously I cannot on the podcast, but it's by Jet. Swamp. You can post it on, What do you post on Instagram? I'll have to get permission from the artist. Can. You retweet them on? Well see. I'll, I'll look into it. How do you do that? How do I retweet? We don't have time to train you on that right now. That will take far too. Long. Retweet on Instagram. But you know what I'm saying. You don't retweet on Instagram, you can't repost. You can, but you have to use this app and it has this weird repost logo on it, and I would just rather get permission to post it. Organically. You can't link. Oh, I can link. I could also share another user's post into my story. What? See, this is all lost on you. There's no point. All right, so this is, again, fiction, a fiction story. I know we're can go on back and forth today, but this is a fiction story written by Nadira Jamerson. Super excited to share it with you. It is called Survivor's Guilt. Just a quick content warning on this story. There is some talk about murder, mass murder, and also some talks about attempting suicide. My body seemed to encase my organs just as everyone's body does from afar. The presentation of my skin and the familiarity of my facial movements could trick you into believing that I was just like everyone else. But if you got too close, you would start to notice some out of place characteristics. My eyes never moved or blinked when I walked. My steps were totally silent as if I was treading above air. Most notably, if you tried to push into my flesh and poke at whatever was underneath there, your finger would plunge into an odd sinking, like tapping on a bone and feeling it turned to jelly. At the touch you might gasp or poke. Again, disbelieving your own senses. Once a woman tried to hug me, but then she screamed as she felt me fold into myself between the pressure of her arms, she shouted, Oh, what are you? Are you made of mush? So very disgustedly. I replied with a frown, but as politely as I could, saying, I am not mushy, ma'am, I am just hollow beneath the surface when you squeeze me, I fall into myself. The woman's eyes went wide. Her tongue slightly dropped from her mouth. In surprise, I thought she might scream again, but she simply turned her back to me and walked away as fast as she could. I knew not how or why I was who I was. I did not even have any recollection of my own birth or any moment of my life before the confusing moment Two years ago, on the day I will never forget, I had woken up on the northeast side of town on the floor of an Arco gas station to the sound of someone honking and yelling at me, Get off the fucking ground because I almost ran you over. My eyes met the light in a confused flurry, and I could not tell if I was waking up or passing out. But then my vision focused and I found myself dressed in an all yellow suit that was horribly caked in dirt. I quickly rose from the ground and stumbled to the side of the gas station toward the entrance and out of the way of the cars. In an instant, my body started to convulse and fall over itself. At first, I thought I was vomiting up some spoiled food that I could not remember consuming until I opened my eyes again and saw rivers of red pouring from my mouth, blood splashed on the pavement below me and spread out away from my feet into a ruby lake that surrounded me on all sides. Drivers started to rush from their cars towards me. They hollered, Call an ambulance. Call nine one one. Oh my God. After that day, I was never the same. Men and women in matching blue uniforms rushed me to the hospital and did everything they could do to stop the red from spilling from my mouth and then my eyes, and even from my nose and ears. There was no use. Nurses left my room and instantly screamed in the hallways. They clutched slippery walls, trying to find their balance again. Others threw up at the site of me. I was quarantined for two days because they thought maybe I had some flesh eating virus. What else could it be? Eventually, the bleeding stopped on its own three days from the time it began. After it stopped when I could finally speak again. I was given only an hour to recover before the doctor started asking me thousands of questions from outside my plexiglass door. What is your name? They asked. I'm sorry, but I don't know, was all I could reply. Have you left the country in the last six months? They asked, and if so, where did you travel to? I'm sorry, but I do not remember was all I could reply. I stayed in the hospital for another week. The bleeding never started again, but there was something else strange happening to me. I could feel it. A fit of unrelenting queasiness churning in the pit of my stomach. Doctor after doctor came to prick me and draw my blood, but each found with a shake of their head that none would exit my body. I believe they only discharged me in the end because they were becoming frustrated with my lack of realness. They could not understand how At one moment, I was coughing up my entire insides, and then the next I was completely fine from the outside, but odd on the inside. A few x-rays were taken, and one of the brave doctors, a woman named Dr. Nicole Harper, came into my room to share the horrifying news. There appears to be she hesitated. Well, there appears to be well, nothing on the screen, nothing will show up. At first, we thought it was the machine, but we had a nurse go in and her scans came out just fine. We don't, Well, we don't know what to do because well, we can't see anything in there. No organs, no blood, no tissue, nothing. All I could respond was I understand, although I truly did not without any money and no home that I could recall the address to. I spent several weeks living on the streets. I would go to the public library and use the computers and search for any news about a man who fit my description. Maybe I hoped I had a family that was searching for me. I even went into the police station and quite nervously told an officer I think I may be missing, but the officer was unable to help me. He found no missing persons in his database that matched and age weeks pass until I finally had to accept the fact that no one was missing me at all. I had no before to go back to, Sometimes I think of myself as a ghost and sometimes I think of myself as a hollow man mostly. I think of myself quite practically as a bloodless organ list, boneless vessel of nothing. Often I wonder, what is the point of me? Why is there no one else like me? This wondering was so pervasive and so without answer that I started to get despondent about a year following the day that I will never forget. I started thinking about stopping my own life, but how I no longer ate food or drank water, or consumed anything at all. If I did, the contents would instantly fall out of the other end of me with an embarrassing plop. Overdosing was not an option. I decided to try and cut my wrists, run a bath, play some music, count down the minutes until the end. But when I moved the kitchen knife over my skin, my skin parted, but no blood came out in the incision. I could see nothing but a dim darkness coming from inside of me. I knew then that I was completely empty. I started to wonder if I cannot die, does that mean I am dead already? After a while, it started to infuriate me. Maybe I had done something before all of the forgetfulness to deserve this, but if I could not even remember what I had done or why I had done it, was it fair to punish me so severely for it? Could I have been truly so depraved evil or altogether mad that the universe decided? There is nothing else we can think to do with you except to turn you into a dead man walking. At first, I was angry only at myself for my inability to remember, but eventually this anger was not enough to appease me. I had to turn my fury outward towards everything and everyone who represented this existence, I was cursed to experience. I began to hate the entire world and every person in it. For months, I created chaos in the streets, almost completely undetected. It was surprising, really, because I took no precautions to conceal myself or my actions. Only after three and then six, and then 10 bodies showed up in the same area. Did people really start to get nervous? Once the crimes were all linked to each other, there was no stopping. The hysteria that spread the news called it a horrific display of lawless and senseless violence. There is a new serial killer on the loose they proclaimed, and he has no victim profile. He will kill anyone. Even you. I did kill everyone. Women walking home alone at night. Taxi drivers who offered me rides in broad daylight. I even began snatching children from outside of their classrooms when no adults were looking. I did not do it to feel better. In fact, killing was a difficult and messy process that I found little joy in. Instead, I did it out of a kind of compulsion. I having forgotten every small detail about myself, still held grand illusions about the way the world worked. I thought that maybe karma or the natural balancing of the universe would take me out if I caused enough destruction. It was my only hope with each neck that I crushed between my hands and with stabbing suffocation and beating, I was simply asking to be seen. Today marks the third anniversary of that terrible day. I will always remember killing one at a time has not yet caused any higher power to notice me today, I plan to do it bigger than I ever have a last hurrah, if you will. A few weeks ago I started kidnapping children, but I refrained from killing them right away. Instead, I began a collection of sorts. I now have six little bodies all tied up in one room in my basement. My plan is to pour the gasoline I acquired yesterday from Arco on top of their tiny heads. Maybe the symbolism of it all, using the accelerant from the place I was turned into. This will have a more permanent effect on me. Maybe not. Either way at least I'll be making a statement. I'll be telling God or whoever, if you don't take me, I won't stop until I take all of them one by one. If I cannot die, I will kill brutally. Totally. And for eternity. Fucking finally. Finally, what? Some real scary shit. Well. That's good. You liked that. That's a great story. Hell. Yeah. It's a great story. We got body horror to the whole, You're so evil that your blood and organs say a heck no, and just just try to gtfo. Then you become this hollow race. Evil incarnate, but only by like, Well, why not? Let's do it. Yeah. This is rock and roll. It. Was super rock and roll. Great job. So again, first time she's being featured on Lunatic. So Thrilled is one. I think this is one of my favorite users of stories submitted so far. Ooh. Love that. Love a high praise. Yeah. So wait, there's a whole book of this. Yeah, so Nadira has a book. It's called, Again, I Want to Love My Own Life, and it's available for purchase on her website, which I'll link. Blow. And is this book a collection of Short stories? Is a novel? No, it's a novel. Okay. Yeah. So you can really dive into a world. Cuz that's the thing about this, The world is so interesting, this lifetime of this person in this state. So I'm excited to get into her writing a little bit more where you can explore it at greater depths and see where she takes. It. Yeah. I really wanna know more about this world. I know this is such a tease. I don't know if the novel is related to this or not, but we would love more of this <laugh>. My goodness. As fans, I have so many questions. So first off this, I love that this character was just, I mean, obviously they're just in the pits of despair, but in a very hollow sense. Yeah, Sorry. I mean, yes, in the a very literal hollow sense, but just like an emotionless. Well, sure of just trying to throw things at the wall and see what sticks. But this person very absolutely could have just become a superhero. Yeah, you can't die. Yeah. You can't even be noticed. Go solve, go fight crime. But no, instead, mass murder by burning children. Hell yeah.<Laugh>. Well, I do think it's almost more realistic what person goes through something that traumatic and then is like, I'm gonna be good now. No, they're like, I'm depressed. I'm being ignored by society, but I'm being ignored by God. I'm gonna fuck shit. Up. Right. Okay. So yeah, I like that one in case that was unclear. About that. Great. So I liked it too. I'm so glad. Hopefully we'll get more submissions from Nadira in the future because I. Really hope. So. Yeah, me too. We have one more story for you guys. We do one. More. Oh, that's right. We have four. We have magic four. Yes. Four just feels like a nice number. It just feels like a nice even number. It is even. Okay. Anyway, we have four stories. We have one more, and the only writer today who is returning. We have a, it's like, it's a nonfiction story, but some of the details have been changed to protect people's identities written by Cooper. Shreves Cooper has been featured on the podcast many times in the past, so I'm sure everybody is familiar with his work. You can follow him on Instagram. We will tag everything below again, but this is the first time. I will say, first time, we're getting a nonfiction piece from Cooper. So something a little bit different, and this is really sort of a lovely way to end it. I will. I'm gonna preface this, Allen, There's not a ton of action. Come on. You're an action fan. Is. There at least a small child burning.<Laugh>? But it to me feels like a day that I would spend, and so that's why I resonate with. It. I can't help but notice you didn't say no. No, there is no small children burning. I didn't want it. No, I'm not. I don't care about the size of the child. There's. No children burning in the story. Okay. Okay. Fine. Niagara Falls and the Red Coach in by Cooper Shreves, my friend group, has this thing called Family Pasta Night. Adam made spaghetti and garlic bread, and we all sat down at this table in the social commons of Jay's dorm and talked about our days. Everyone, except for Brian, Jay's childhood best friend lives on the same campus. He came out for pasta anyways and is coincidentally the only person who can drive and has a car. A couple weeks ago, he brought up going to Niagara Falls. He got busy with work and couldn't come hang out, but it all stayed in the back of our minds. Once we finished the family dinner, Brian looked at Jay. You guys want to go to Niagara Falls? Brian, Jay, Steve, Davey, and I all piled into Brian's car. No, Coop. You gotta get in the middle. I happen to be the smallest, and so I always get stuck in the middle seat. I was stuck in between Steve and Jay, but honestly it was so cold that I didn't mind. So everyone's been to the Falls, right? Brian asked. I have, but I don't remember it. Steve replied, Everyone grew up pretty close to Niagara Falls except for Steve. Brian and I often knew the fun places in the area, especially the haunted ones. Steve just tagged along since the area was new to him. Brian had put his playlist on in the car. Car. He's always been really into his music, dancing and singing along. Passionately, careless Whisper came on and he absolutely lost his mind. Davey who was sitting shotgun, was looking back at me and Jay with a look of absolute joy on her face. I'd forgotten that she'd only met Brian maybe twice. I could see the outline of Buffalo as we left. There's a lot of haunted places in Buffalo. Hell, one is in direct walking distance, and we nearly go every night. Niagara Falls is also a city infamous for the paranormal, at least on the American side. The state park itself is haunted. Over 5,000 people have died there. How could it not be? The most infamous ghost of the state park is that of the hat man? A man wearing a top hat and missing a leg is spotted walking around the falls. When people ask if he's okay, he disappears. I could see the beginnings of Niagara Falls coming up, the lights, the tall buildings, and the idea of being in the backseat of a car with my college friends on a Saturday night hit me. I smiled and looked at Jay who'd been sitting next to me with his hand in mind. There's a Ferris wheel. Steve yelled, poking me and pointing at the distance. It was lit up and beautiful like the rest of the skyline. I'm really glad I wasn't too distracted by the lights though. As we were driving closer, I saw a large building with English Tudor architecture and realized what it was. Dude, it's the red coach in, I yelled, hitting Jay on his arm to get his attention. Can we go? It's haunted. I looked at the driver grinning. Haunted. Hell yeah. Brian nodded. Just let me park. He seemed bouncy. We couldn't find a place to park. I guess it's pretty busy in Niagara Falls on a Saturday, especially with tour buses. Brian was driving around hands, practically gripping the steering wheel. There was a ton of swearing involved since we kept driving in circles. The city was amazing at night. Even with the background noise. Oh no. Oh, no. We don't wanna go this way. Brian yelled as we turned away from the border. <laugh>. What the fuck? Brian Davey yelled, Laughing. Despite looking terrified, we calmly drove around more. Still in search for parking. Well, this is the falls. There's nowhere to park. I guess we'll head back to my place. Brian's side, hanging his head in feet. Wait, he yelled out. Looked me in front of him. It was a sign for the state park. We can just park here. Why didn't anyone tell me that he winded? We thought you knew. Davey yelled back. I grabbed Brian's driving cat as we got out of the car. Sometimes I forget that I live in Western New York and that it's really cold here. The only person who seemed to have been prepared for the cold was Steve with his leather jacket and winter gloves. I thought the hat, a hot Cheeto's baseball cap might help keep my head warm. At least I was wearing one of Jay's hoodies, but I could feel the cold freezing my bones. We walked in the rain and missed to the falls. We were all soaking wet and freezing to death. The park was surprisingly crowded. There were people all around, all soaking and freezing. We walked closer to the falls while Steve gr There's more than one waterfall. He exclaimed. Yeah. That one's Roger, and that one's Peter. Ryan pointed with a completely straight face. Huh? I didn't know that they had names. Deer replied rubbing his thumb over the top of my hand. We didn't see any ghost at Niagara Falls. I definitely kept a lookout, but I don't seem to have much luck sometimes. What was the name of that other place? Brian asked, Walking briskly to his car. The red coach in, I replied shivering. I'd been craving new haunted spots to see, so I was practically bouncing here. Adorable. Jay smiled climbing into the car next to me. It's haunted. I replied. We should go ghost hunting sometime. Cooper, bring Jay along. Brian drove around aimlessly through the parking lot. How do I get outta here? He winded. Davey giggled. The state park signs stood in front of us now, and we all cheered in victory. We drove along the long winding road on the way back to the city streets. Oh my fucking God. Brian yelled. The headlights of his car landed on the entrance sign of the state park.<laugh>. What did you do? Dave claimed laughing so hard. She cried. I thought we got out. How did we end up back here? Brian's voice cracked. I've been in the car with Brian a couple times. He doesn't usually get lost. He's a good driver and has gps. I'm not saying that this was paranormal, but it would be pretty cool if something was trying to keep us at the park. It wouldn't be the first time a horror movie ended with a group of friends stuck in a time loop. Brian's GPS gave us directions. The Red Coach Inn, I was in the backseat, stumbled up on Jay reading an article about the place. What are you thinking, Coop? I looked at him and smiled. The inn opened in 1923, almost 100 years ago. I wondered if there would be an increase in activity next year and put it down in my brain to ask Brian to go back next year. Since it opened on August 30th, we'd be on campus. It was an eerie dark, especially in Niagara Falls. Not exactly the most reputable city around Brian's music. Echoed along with Jay singing along. We drove right up to the end. It was only slightly lit up by the streetlights and was completely empty. There were no people. The only sound was the wind gusts nearly pushing me and Davey over. It's a beautiful building. There's plants and flowers decorating the outside and lights shining from the inside. Make it look like a welcoming place, but still, something seemed off. I brushed it off. Walking closer to the building, I grabbed my phone outta my bag, handing it to Brian Here, take a picture of me. Davey stood next to me and made a goin noise. I responded with a similar goin noise. No offense, but my phone's camera's better. Brian responded handing the phone back to me. Jay grabbed it before I could preparing to take pictures of me. Davey and I posed in front of the hanging sign. You can't even touch the sign. Jay left easily reaching up to touch it. Steve did the same IPOed. We walked around the perimeter of the building and looked at the menu on the door. Although we didn't find anything, it doesn't mean we're gonna stop trying. I'd love to get back to see that place again. Maybe even stay or eat there. I know it's hard to gauge to the level of activity from the outside. My group does nightly walks on the outside of this old abandoned, insane asylum that's supposedly haunted, but we've never seen a thing. It doesn't mean it isn't haunted, though. My first question is this. Yes. I have two questions. One, let me answer them. Both is what is a Golan noise and two, what is a driving hat? We're gonna to immediately ask Cooper what a Golan noise sounds like. I'm so curious. I mean, a driving hat, I guess is just a hat you wear when you drive. Yeah, but no, there was at least a description of the driving hat, which was hot Cheetos. A hot Cheetos. Which is your favorite kind of. Chs. That is my favorite kind of Cheetos. So we love. That. Yes. I'm a big fan of the driving hat, <laugh>. Although when a driving hat was proposed, that was not what I was picturing. You're picturing a little. Like, Yeah, bell hop. The little bell hop hat. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know why, but. I think that's natural. I mean, but smaller. Like a fess. Yeah, <laugh>. Yeah. It's. Cute. If I had a driving hat, that's what I would choose. But that doesn't really protect you from the heat. In fact, it's the opposite really. But it's made for warm climates.<Laugh>, There you go. All the info you needed on a fuzz, but a goblin noise. But a goblin noise. Hey Google, what's a golin noise? Okay, so we just asked Google what a go of noise is and it played us a really terrifying go of noise. Go do. Please do a rendition.<Laugh>. You're not even trying. You do it. Commit, please. Yeah, that's better. Come. On. That's. There. <laugh>. I don't know. It's, It's like you're trying to put your foot in the accelerator and You're just like, Just touched it. Touch it with the tippy, tippy toe. Come on, you can do this. Do it again. <laugh> Cooper, please send us an audio file of what a goblin noise sounds like. We need to know. If we get it in time for launch, we will put it in. I love the cute tradition though of. We will have to do a redaction and put a goblin noise in the future episode. Yeah, yeah. Next episode. We'll come back when we have the answers from Cooper. This is what the world needs to know. We, Yeah, We need to know. We wanna make all the noises to each other. I gotta say though, I this story, I'm right there with him with the level of supernatural occurrences. You like it because you don't believe in this. Paranormal. I found this very relatable. There you go. You know, just like you're with your friends, you're driving around wearing driving hats and. Eating hot Cheetos. No, there's no hot Cheetos. I know, but I'm saying that's what would be happening if you were in the car. That's this. Sure. Well, not wanting in a car, you're hot Cheetos. You're gonna get chle dust in someone's car. That's so disrespectful. It's not my car. Not my car. Not my problem. <laugh>. But then you're trying to leave a park. You're sorry. You're kind of lost at night. Things are a little overwhelming and you're trying to leave and then all of a sudden you're back where you started. Yeah. That is spooky. That's a spooky thing. It is. And yeah, Cooper identifies it right there. It's like, I'm not saying it's something supernatural, but. It plays into the vibe of the It. Does. It's like you're ghost hunting and then, but you're just trying to get out of a supposedly very haunted place and you keep coming back to the beginning. Yeah, that's, That's spooky. Spook Town. Spook town. Spook Town Canada. Spook town Canada. Is it? Well, I think this is on the US side. Oh. Spook. Town. I think they were very clear about that actually. Oh, I've actually only been, I thought growing up that I had been to Canada. I've been to Canada now, but I thought growing up that I went to Niagara Falls on the Canadian side. So I told everyone, Oh, I've been to Canada. I've been to Canada. Turns out my dad just took us on the New York side. I've never been to Canada. I grew up New York. You're from upstate. New York? I grew up near the Canadian border. That's, Wait, you've never been to anywhere in Canada? Montreal? No. You won't take me. It's my job to take you to Canada. Okay, fine. Let's go. I wanna go to Toronto. I wanna go to Montreal. And to Victoria. Actually, I really wanna go to Victoria. Where's that? It's on the West Coast and it's supposed to be one of the most beautiful places in the country. I've heard. Good. I know. Two wonderful people from Vancouver. I know a lot of people in Victoria, which I think is close to, We could probably do Where? Where's British Columbia? I think Victoria is in British Columbia. Sorry, to Canadian listeners who are yelling at us right. Now. I've been to Alaska. That's America. I know, but that touches Canada. Yeah. Doesn't it? Yes. Touches Russia. No. Used to touch Russia. No, it doesn't touch Russia. It. Touches Canada. It used to Because of the Landbridge. Pania? No, not Pania. The Landbridge. I. Don't know what that is. There was a land bridge, manmade bridge between Alaska and Russia. Yes. So in the CRA Abbey. Is that. Real? The cradle of humanity was in the Middle East. Right? Sure. Due to the nomadic nature of early civilizations, people would spread out and there used to be a land bridge that connect Russia to Alaska. A real, a manmade bridge or a natural bridge. Natural. This was like, okay. Early. It was pania. It was when the contents just still touched. It. Human humanity did not exist in. I know, but pania, I'm saying it was shifting. There is a slight difference. Yes. In, Yeah. The continental divide. Yes. Okay. There's, There's a slight difference in the continental coastlines. Okay. But it was not. Pinching. I didn't know there was a land bridge. There was a land bridge. I. Believe you. If there was still a land bridge, I feel like things would've developed slightly differently. I think that's fair. So what happened to the land bridge? I, I'm not sure. I wonder if it's just due to differences in ocean levels or if it was. Shifting of the. Continents straight up. Yeah. Shifting continents. I'm not. Or a combination of both. Well, we'll look into that as well and come back next episode with Golan noises and with more information on the land bridge between Russia and Alaska. Great. Also, we're now back to an every other week schedule, so just a heads up on that. I'm sure you've noticed, cuz it's been two weeks since we released the radio drama. If you have not listened to the other side, the radio drama that we released for Halloween this year, please, please listen to it. I am so proud of the work, the collaboration with Sarah Luke. Every single voice actor did such an amazing, incredible job. Alan did such an incredible job with the sound design. I'm so proud of it. So please, please go listen to that if you haven't. It just really was a fun and exhilarating and fulfilling project to work on. I gotta say, as our Halloween hangover episode, I think we should just do some hair of the dog and go watch Halloween. Oh, I would love that. Yeah. Okay. Well go watch Halloween again. My favorite movie of all time. I love that you just offered that. Mm-hmm.<affirmative>, very generous of you. You're welcome. Thank you guys so much for listening. Remember to nominate your favorite horror films released in 2022. Visit us on social media to get the link to do that for the 2022 Lunix Horror Awards. The Loos. Loos, <laugh>. I love that. And we will be back in two weeks with another episode. Talk to you soon. Bye bye. Thanks for listening. If you'd like some bonus content, consider supporting us on Patreon to access our patron exclusive podcast horror movie club. Also head to lunatic project.com to check out our spooky merchant apparel. You can find us at lunatic's Project on Twitter and TikTok and The Lunatic Project on Instagram and YouTube where you'll find our short horror films Cemetery tours in so much more. And. Please rate and review a little feedback goes a long way to help us grow and get more content out there. Our cover art is by Pilar, Kepp, and musical bumpers are by McKayla Papa and Jordan Mo.