The Best of 2024 Special Part 2 (Sn. 18 Ep. 27)
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Good evening and welcome to Monsters Among Us. I'm your guide, Derek Hayes. Happy New Year once again, folks. I'm back with that best of 2024 part two that I promised. An episode jam-packed with the most popular calls of the past calendar year.

Stretching all the way back to season 16, episode 12. The best of, so to speak. Fear-inducing entries, like Andrew's, out of Northeast Ohio.

Hey Derek, my name's Andrew. So this takes place kind of in your neck of the woods. I'm from Northeast Ohio, from a relatively big steel town about half an hour west of Cleveland. You may be familiar with the area, I'm not sure. So anyway, this takes place in the early 90s. I was probably five years old, maybe, at the oldest. And

And I was hanging out with one of my first friends that I had met through preschool. We were at his house and, you know, doing the normal things that five-year-olds do. We were just playing with, I believe, Ninja Turtles action figures and watching his older brother play the first PlayStation, I believe. May have been Super Nintendo, I'm not sure.

Anyway, as children do, we were running around the house and, you know, we pretty much had free reign. His parents were pretty relaxed with that type of stuff. They weren't very strict, but there was always one room in the house we weren't allowed in. And that was the parents' bedroom, which isn't too out of the norm. You know, lots of parents don't like kids, especially someone else's kids running through their bedroom. So, of

Of course, what do little kids do when someone tells them not to go in their bedroom? Well, they go in their bedroom. So one day I was at his house and I was very curious to the fact that my friend seemed to be the only child I had met who didn't want to go into their parents' room or, you know, try to find his Christmas presents or, you know, something like that. And so...

And

And me being the curious rule breaker that I was, I decided to crack open his parents' bedroom and take a peek inside. Now, his parents were not in the bedroom. His father was not there, I believe, was at work, and his mother was somewhere in the house cleaning or cooking or, you know, attending to the other children or something. She was a great mother and amazing art teacher.

She always reminded me of David Bowie. And she was insanely smart and insanely artistic. And this kind of goes into the next part of the story.

So when I opened up her door, the first thing I saw was her entire room, all at least three if not four walls were completely covered in large, what I assume to be tribal masks of some sort, like the ones you see in Africa and some parts of Asia and Native Americans with the large misshapen facial features and strange...

You know, giant masks with pointed heads and all types of shapes and sizes. But that's not the crazy part. As soon as I opened that door, it was like a cacophony of voices. I heard...

loud. Many voices talking over each other and it wasn't necessarily angry or shouting, it was like, uh... It was like being in a crowded lunchroom or in the middle of a mall or something, like everyone trying to talk over each other and...

get their point across or perhaps some type of debate or something. And they were all speaking in foreign languages. I could not understand what anything was being said other than it wasn't directed at me. It didn't feel like that they were talking amongst themselves and just so many voices to where it was almost deafening.

And you can imagine, I immediately slammed the door. And the first thing I did was run to my friend and ask him if he'd ever seen that and if he'd ever gone in his parents' room and what the heck is up with these masks. And, you know, I'm only five years old. I think if I remember right, I was almost on the verge of crying. I was so not necessarily scared, but just I didn't understand anything. I didn't understand what was happening. And to my surprise, he...

And again...

It was such an odd feeling. There was no feeling of menace or anger, but just that feeling of, you know, when you're a young child and you know you've seen something that you shouldn't have. That somehow you were in trouble even though it hadn't happened yet. You knew it was coming.

Nothing ever happened. I never got in any trouble. I don't believe his parents ever found out. I don't think he ever told his mom I looked. And I know there's not too many details with this story, but I just thought it was strange that all of the supernatural, paranormal podcasts and stories I've listened to over the years, you know, I like to...

Like a lot of your listeners and yourself, I like to consider myself, you know, a hopeful skeptic. I don't believe right off the bat, but, you know, I'm open to lots of theories and things that haven't been explained yet. And anyway, to my knowledge, I have never heard another story about masks talking.

And, you know, I don't know too much about, you know, I'm just an average white guy. I don't know too much about tribal cultures of any nation or anything like that. But they certainly seem to have some air of spirituality among them. The way they were talking amongst each other in these foreign complex languages and talking over each other. And it was like hearing gods debate something or something.

Every voice had a personality just like the mask. You know, every mask was different and every voice was different. So anyway, I just thought if any of your viewers out there or listeners or anyone has ever experienced something like a talking mask or a tribal-looking mask doing anything, I guess it doesn't necessarily have to be tribal, but these were, they seem to, if I can remember right, mostly made out of wood and natural resources, I believe.

I wouldn't doubt if they were real and actually sourced from somewhere. I'm not sure about the ethics of that today, but knowing his mother and how eclectic she was, I would not doubt that some of them, if not all of them, were real. So anyway, if anyone has ever come across Talking Masks, I'd like to hear it. Thanks, Derek. Thank you, Andrew. Now that call originally aired on Season 17, Episode 16, so you can go back and hear the full commentary I gave on this story originally.

And that applies to all calls shared here this evening. Just look up that number. Now, as a collector of oddities like these, not quite to this extent in focus, but I do collect a lot of weird things. And I patiently wait for the day that something weird like this happens to me. Now, so far, I'm in the clear. Outside of a prop doll that I have from a popular horror film, nothing around here seems to move on its own.

But then again, I might not have the talents that Andrew seems to have. Perhaps that's the missing element here. Well, either way, thank you again, Andrew, for kicking us off with a real thriller of a call. We appreciate you calling in. Now, folks, we need to take our first quick break here, but I'll be right back with an entry that just might keep you out of the water. I'll be right back.

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Now with the first of many monster encounters I have to share with you tonight. From Season 17, Episode 5, please welcome back RB from the Commonwealth of Virginia.

Hey, Derek. I'm going to stay anonymous, but you can call me RB. I found your podcast probably two to three months after this occurrence. I wasn't really into these podcasts or anything, but when something happens, you start to look around to figure out what other people are seeing and what things might be.

I'm in very, very rural Virginia, but I'm on the waters of the Chesapeake Bay. You can take one look at the bay and you'll see that there's all kinds of finger rivers and everything like that. I don't want to say exactly where this took place, but let's just say it was very rural fishing, farming community.

So, like I said, it occurred probably September or October of last year, 22. I'm an avid kayaker, retired military, spent a lot of time overseas, never seen anything like this.

So, I'm in my kayak and I've got my dog with me. He's very, he's probably 100 pound, 110 pound German Shepherd. And we're out, I've paddled way up a river at a tributary to the point where I am pretty much in the wilderness.

No more houses, no more docks, you know, less that. Probably a half mile, mile I go. And I'm just in kind of fingers of, you know, salt water. But I'm in the wilderness. I'm surrounded by trees and hills and stuff and, you know, marsh grass, of course, that kind of thing.

We went out probably half hour, 45 minutes, something like that. And I decided to take the kayak as far up as I could go and do a little bit fishing there, you know, before you start hitting the areas where it's more fresh than salt. And you're trying to just kind of see how far you can go and see what kind of fish you might be able to catch, that kind of thing. So I kind of came to the end of as far as I was going to get in my boat.

probably was high tide at the time. But the reason I stopped is clearly the river ended, but the water is still probably, I have no idea, deep where I'm at in the center. And I'm just sitting there fishing. It's getting close to dusk.

You know, you're in that pretty golden hour, it's fall, trees are beautiful, sky's pretty, and just kind of dozing off, you know, thinking to yourself about whatever you think about when you're chilling, fishing.

I might have even dozed off and my dog starts barking fanatically and he's a real calm boy, doesn't do this kind of stuff, kind of knocks me out of my wall and I start looking around. He's barking at the water. I just glance back and I look down and there is this thing that

Looking back at me. Humanoid...

for sure looks like a reptile almost like uh after doing some some research that i don't really know that i mean i guess you could say it was a mermaid but i mean if mermaids are full-on evil beings at this thing i'll try to describe it for you i found some research and saw something in japan called the kappa it kind of looked more like that than anything only

I say that because this thing kind of looked like a turtle in other than, I mean, the eyes were wrong. The face was wrong. Skin was right. Didn't really have a nose. Did a greenish brownish dark skin. It looked very, very reptile. But the eyes, the eyes had, they were snake eyes at yellow diamond slit. About as far apart as you see on any person.

They looked intelligent and evil at the same time. And I could see its mouth. Lips were kind of pursed, but you could see just through, and you could see, like, bro, a shark teeth, almost like you would see on, like, a fish or something. Man, it must have been, like, a hair away from the surface. Like, you're about to—you say you've been swimming, and you're about to—underwater, and you're about to come up.

but stop this thing was i could have touched it it was just below the water line at the head the nose and i couldn't the water's the brackish dark i couldn't see beyond the shoulders but i saw it it burned into my mind for some reason i got a feeling that this thing may have been female if that's even possible

I don't know, it just may be the way the neck and shoulders were more feminine, even though it was like...

If that makes sense. I don't know. By the time you would get to where... I could tell by the shape of the shoulders and the neck, and you lost visibility after that. Now, that said, I'm giving as much detail as I can. This was quick. This was quick because I was scared. I got scared real quick. And then I saw on the surface. It was ridiculous. It was almost like an 80s horror movie, like...

Like where they put piranhas in the lake or something. I think there was one like that. And I saw water, like little, you know, when something's moving under the water, you see it coming towards you. From seven different places, I could make out things coming my direction. Now, that said, they could have just been minnows on the surface. You know, that's probably what it was. I don't know. The way my dog was freaking out, what I saw, I just probably turned white and I began to paddle.

for my life. As fast as I could, get out of there. Two coves later, the ripples quit following our direction and just kind of disappeared. Yeah, I guess that's pretty much the end of the story. I wouldn't go anywhere near that body of water for...

I've been back close to it since once or twice, you know, probably in the beginning of the spring or the summer. I just kind of stay away from the area now. Yeah, that's it. That's my story. Some kind of mirth thing in the

Thank you, Arby. Now, like I said on the last episode, I love a good monster story. And water monster stories are some of my favorites.

And this gem here from RB did not disappoint. Now, the wife and I do a lot of kayaking on our lake here in the mountains in California, when we find the time, that is. And I can tell you, I think about this entry nearly every time we're out there anymore. Just when you thought it was safe to get back into the water, something unexplainable swims under your boat. Truly, the stuff of nightmares. So thank you again, RB, for being one of our best of callers of 2024.

Now, folks, if you have a story you would like to share, maybe a potential best-of story, call our hotline at 888-608-NIGHT. That's 888-608-N-I-G-H-T. Or record your story on your phone and send it to me as an email to MonstersAmongUsPodcast at gmail.com. And don't forget to call from a quiet place and to finish your story, even if that means you have to call back in a second time. Don't worry.

I'll splice it all together for you. Now this next one garnered more than a few comments when it was released on season 18, episode 9. Nicole from Colorado is back with her story of what I can only assume is a glimpse into an alternate reality. Welcome back to the program, Nicole. Hi Derek and team. My name is Nicole and I'm calling from Denver, Colorado.

So I have a story from my grandmother. She passed away when I was just six years old. So I was too little for her to tell me the story directly. But I grew up with my mom telling me this story many, many times. So basically back in the 70s, my grandparents lived in Norwalk, California.

And one night they decided they needed to go run an errand. They needed to go to the grocery store. So my grandmother, my grandfather, and my cousin, who was just a little girl at the time, got in the car, went to the grocery store. On their way home, they stopped at, now I believe it was a railroad crossing, but it could be a red light. That's the only detail. I don't remember for sure. Unfortunately, my mother passed away in 2017, so I'm not able to ask her.

So they were stopped either at this railroad crossing or a light. And they noticed, my grandparents noticed, that cars parked on either side of them were all older model cars, like probably from the 40s and 50s. And that everybody occupying these cars, men, women, and children, they all looked dead.

They were all slumped over. Their skin had like a pale or greenish pallor to it. No one was moving. They were all dressed in clothes which would line up with the 40s and 50s era. And again, nobody was moving. Everybody was just like slumped over in these cars, appearing to be dead. And there were several cars again. Needless to say, this really freaked out my grandparents. They got out of there as soon as they could and went straight home.

Now, my mother had stayed home. She had not gone with them to the grocery store. But she recalled clearly, even though she was just a kid, she recalled that when my grandparents got home, she remembers they were both shaken and visibly upset and frightened. She had never seen her parents frightened like that before. So it was quite upsetting to her. And she knew something serious had to have happened. My grandmother called the police and reported what had occurred.

And later on, she was contacted by the police department and told that an officer or officers had gone out to investigate, but they did not find anything. No old fashioned cars, no appearing to be dead people in the cars at that spot. Nothing. So over the years, you know, my family and I, we've always questioned could this have been an elaborate prank?

But, I mean, it's not quite logical. I mean, who would do such an elaborate prank? What would be the purpose? How would you get kids involved to the point where they would sit there still and pretend to be dead? I do believe that there are things out there that we don't understand, but I am somewhat of a skeptic. So if there's a logical explanation...

I'm happy to find one. But my grandparents were convinced that those are real corpses in the cars and that it was something unnatural. So yeah, that's one of my interesting family stories that's been passed down through the ages. I just want to say, Derek, I love your show so much. Thank you for all your hard work. I am a Patreon supporter and I've been listening to you for a couple years now and you are absolutely my favorite podcast. Thank you so much. Take care.

Thank you, Nicole, for the story, the kind words, and most especially for joining us on Patreon. Now you can visit patreon.com and search for Monsters Among Us. Or if you're listening on Apple, click the subscribe button at the bottom of our homepage to access paid content there. Even if you only join for a couple of months, that goes a long way to help the show grow. And I know we talk about growth quite a lot here on the program. And this year we did a lot of it.

it was a very busy year for us here in the studio in 2024 we started doing two episodes per week a tradition that i aim to continue into the new year we launched a spin-off program monsters among us jr with co-host delaney powers our most popular episode was the government worker special and we released shadows in the desert high strangeness in the borrego triangle on several major streaming platforms

You can watch it for free on Tubi right now, by the way. And I appeared on the television program Beyond Skinwalker Ranch to discuss said Borrego Triangle. But the sky is the limit here. And thanks to each of you, the sky is again the limit in 2025. Now I'll be right back with more spooky best of calls right after this. Ohio State, I think comes away victorious. Here's the best part.

Now this next entry aired on a bonus episode, season 17 episode 19.5 and comes to us from Sal in Parts Unknown. Hi, how you doing Derek? My name is Sal. I used to work for the fire department. I just retired on December 29th of last year. When I was working for the fire department, I worked on an ambulance for 16 years.

in the early 90s all the way to the mid 2000s. While I was working one day in the late 90s, we had a call of a motor vehicle accident

on the Grand Central Parkway. It was a clear night and it involved three teenagers, I guess. Me and my partner took the driver. We put him in the back of the vehicle because he was in respiratory arrest. He received some head trauma. While driving, I guess he was speeding or something. He must have did something wrong, but there wasn't too much traffic and somehow he wound up hitting a pillar. This was by 82nd Street. I believe it's exit 5 on the Grand Central headed towards the Triborough Bridge.

As we're working on him, we had two other patients in there, but they were alive. There were firefighters on the scene, so they jumped in the back of the vehicle to help us out. Now, I'm taking care of the patient. I'm wiping the blood off his forehead. I realized that he was in a respiratory cardiac arrest. I started to ventilate him while one of the firefighters started doing CPR. As he was doing his compressions,

a gentleman and it was really weird out of nowhere very well dressed was by the back doors and asked us hey man is he gonna be okay and i gave him the answer that i usually give we're doing everything we can because it was truthful we were doing everything we can to bring this kid back as i'm working on him ventilating him while the firefighters doing cpr i noticed something really strange

that the dude that asked if he was doing okay looked just like him and was wearing the same clothes. So I look at the firefighter and I go, "I heard there was only three people in that vehicle." And he goes, "Yeah, that's what I heard." Transported him to the hospital, never thought about him again.

When I ran into that firefighter again by the firehouse, I asked him a question about it. "Wasn't it weird that guy?" He goes, "Yeah." And he acknowledged that he did see him too. And I was like, "That's so weird that the guy was wearing the same stuff that he was wearing." And he also asked if he was a family member. And I was like, "I didn't see him at the hospital, but I do think it was kind of strange that the dude that we were working on looked just like the gentleman."

Thank you Sal. Now I'm sure there's no doubt why this story was selected as one of this year's best of entries. It seems like Sal witnessed the making of a ghost. Incredible stuff. So thank you again Sal.

for sending it in now folks this next entry originally aired on a beyond episode the after show you can access by joining us on apple subscriptions or patreon the episode was an after dark installment where i share some of the more risque calls that i've received and while i suppose the setting of this call does meet those parameters i don't think it's quite after dark enough that i can't share it with you here tonight

So that's my very vague way of introducing Dave's call. From the Beyond portion of Season 18, Episode 3, calling in from New York. So I'll just say my name is Dave from Long Island, New York. Actually, Atlantic Beach, Long Island, New York. It's kind of important. So this is going back to 1999. I was in, I think I was 21 or something like that.

I have to say I'm very skeptical on most stories while entertaining. I just find them hard to believe and usually some kind of scientific explanation is there, but there are times when things do happen and so it's hard for me to talk about because I am a skeptic. I gotta tell you, your show is amazing.

But most of the time I find a reason or there's some kind of answer to why it happened. But anyway, my story is I was dating my wife at the time and we had just gotten back from Lake George. Again, I'm a lifeguard and this is the end of the summer.

In fact, it was the last day of Labor Day. We had gone to Lake George for Labor Day. So I had already finished. Pretty much lifeguarding was over. I think there was like two or three weekends after Labor Day that beach was open. Beach guard, by the way. But I even worked those last few days. So Atlantic Beach is a small little beach town. A handful of us, you know, teens were lifeguards. And we surfed most of the time.

Anyway, so we knew all the business on the beaches. Atlantic Beach is a summer town, really. It comes to life. It's got a ton of beach clubs.

In fact, there's a beach club called Catalina Beach Club that has been in a ton of movies, like Goodfellas, etc. So it's the end of the summer, Labor Day, and my wife and I, then-girlfriend, come back from Lake George, and I have an idea. You know, we got back, it was about 8, 9 o'clock at night, so I said, let's go down to the beach while it's still nice and warm out, and then we'll go...

We used to sleep on the beach, not even camp out. I mean, literally just sleep under the stars. There were a couple of little spots in the dunes that a lot of lifeguards would hang out and do extracurricular activities. So my girlfriend, now wife, and I decided that it would be a great idea if we went down to the beach. We started to decide that we were going to go ski dipping in

And one thing led to another and whatever. We do what young people, teenagers do. And my wife's face turns completely like white and terrified. And I'm like, what happened? What are you doing? What are you looking at? And she tells me she saw a little girl. It's 2 a.m. at this point. Most of the beach clubs, there's no beach club in that area that you can sleep at.

There's one, but it's a mile away. And there's only a handful of people that sleep at these beach clubs. So we're in the dunes. There's nobody around. And my wife says she sees a little girl, a little blonde girl. So I think she's nuts. We're in dunes. I mean, it's hard to get to where we are in these dunes. It's quite a walk, and you kind of have to know where it is to find it. Like I said, it's where all the mainly lifeguards would go and hang out.

either on their break or nighttime when there was nowhere else to go.

So I start looking around and I see the little blonde girl. She's talking about walking towards the water. So I'm like, we have to get her. We have to stop. You know, she can't jump in this water. It's nighttime and she's walking towards the ocean. She couldn't be more than six or five, six. So we were quite a ways away. And I could tell it's a young girl. I just really couldn't make out any details. Like I could see blonde hair. I looked like she was wearing like a one piece bathing suit.

So I start to try to scream to her, you know, to get her attention. And this girl walks into the water and is gone. So 1999, you know, it's a different world back then. I think I had a flip phone, maybe. I don't even remember. But we ran to the water, obviously. And there wasn't even a week. I mean, it was one of those nights where there was no surf.

The water, it was like a lake. I naturally went in and I swam around a bit. But, you know, it's creepy going in the water at night. And what I just, I just couldn't wrap my head around what I just saw. So, you know, I start saying to myself, maybe I didn't see that, but we saw it.

So my wife decides that it's best we go tell Atlantic Beach has a security guard. We go and tell him he insists that he calls a cop. So they call the police and Atlantic Beach has their own rescue unit. So rescue comes. They decide that they're going to get a helicopter. So this is on record. FYI, you can verify all this. And it turns out

And I only found this out after the rescue showed up. Over the weekend, a little blonde girl had drowned right on that same block at the same beach entrance that we were at. I'd rather leave that anonymous because I don't

You know, it was a local little girl. But my wife and I hadn't known that at this time. And at that time, she was my girlfriend. But we didn't know that a little girl drowned. We were in Lake George. And, you know, it was a different time. You couldn't go on social media or Google and all that good stuff. So we got back so late. We hadn't seen any friends. No one told us any of this happened. Yeah.

We knew the girl's parents and actually older brother. He was a young kid, a little surf grom. And I had no idea that happened. So now, having told the cops and the rescue unit, they're looking for another little girl now, another little blonde girl. And people think that we're playing a prank or whatever.

trying to be jerks. I'm not really sure exactly what they thought, but, you know, I didn't live this down for a long time. People thought I was a real idiot for doing that. Again, we hadn't even heard that this girl had drowned, let alone on that beach. So, I don't know. It's really hard for me to wrap my head around it.

Saying that we saw her? I don't know. It's such a crazy thing. But I'd have to go as far as to say that my wife and I saw the ghost. This little girl. I have no other explanation for it. I've thought of a million things and...

Unless the coincidence is that some little girl escaped her parents at 2 o'clock in the morning from one of the beach clubs, because they would have known her if she was a local little kid, came all the way to the beaches by the dunes, which were very far away from any beach clubs, and decided to punk us and not even say anything. My wife just happened to see her walk by.

And then disappearing to the ocean, I mean, it's just such a hard thing to wrap my head around. Anyway, thank you, Keep It Up. You have a great podcast, and I really didn't even want to call this story in because it brings up so many bad memories, and it sounds so crazy when I even hear myself saying it, but maybe you could use it. Thanks. Thanks.

Thank you, Dave. And thank you for sharing the story despite the obvious difficulty in doing so. And while I understand why sharing it might be tough, as a collector of ghost stories, I must say it's a really good one. And it was good enough to be named one of this year's Best Of Calls. So thank you again for your bravery and for ringing in, Dave.

Now we didn't hear a whole lot from her old friends the mirrored men this year, which is suspect, though they did make a few appearances here and there. But one story in particular, featuring this terrifying trio, did stick in my craw, and that was Malachi's entry out of the Buckeye State of Ohio.

Hey, Derek. My name is Malachi. I'm from Mutual, Ohio. It's a little tiny town, population of like 126, I think. Anyway, I was listening to the boys over at Kryptonaut, and they were talking about this Australian trooper that's seen these two guys that look exactly the same. And I heard your name on a podcast come up, and I was like, well, I need to check that out. So anyway...

I used to work night shift, a really weird shift. I got off at 3.30 in the morning. And I'm driving home, and it's super foggy outside. Really, really, really foggy. And I had this huge lifted Jeep. I have the top off, light bar on, you know. And I look over at the side of the road, and there's these three guys walking. They have, like...

I don't really know how to describe it. Like black robes on, weird looking robes. Like, I don't know, man, like a monk.

so, you know, I'm a metalhead. I'm like, oh, this is pretty cool. So I'm going to stop and talk to these guys, see what they're doing. You know, I was probably listening to some black metal crazy band at the time driving home. And I noticed that they're all three, the weirdest thing ever. It's like, almost like watching like a, like a military formation. They're all stepping at the same time. Both feet are hitting the same time. The arms are moving at the same time. And as I like,

slow my geek down and I pull up next to them I look and I can't really make out a face I can't really make out anything but they all three look at me at the same time the next thing I know

It's like 11 a.m. the next day. I don't remember how I got home. I don't remember the rest of the drive, which, you know, I can chalk that up. Sometimes driving that late at night, I would get tired and almost doze off. But hearing about the Meard men really creeped me out, man, because I think I've seen some. Anyway, thank you for your time. Bye. Thank you, Malachi. Folks, if you're sitting on any Meard men stories, you better get them in.

I think I can speak for most of us when I say we're all itching for more. So thank you again, Malachi, for sharing your brush with these mystery men. Now, folks, another thing that I did a lot of this year was guest appearances, especially with the release of Shadows in the Desert. So here's a punctuated list of all the shows yours truly did a guest spot on this year. And I dare you to check them all out.

Darkness Radio Graveyard Tales Expanded Perspectives Bigfoot Collectors Club Alien Theorist Theorizing Cryptonaut Podcast Into the Fray Hysteria 51 Project Skeptic Zeng This Hollow Sky Podcast I Like to Watch Podcast Stories with Sapphire Woo Woo with Rachel Dratch The Ghost Story Guys A Psychic Story Belief Hole Podcast

And finally, Hillbilly Horror Stories. Now sadly, we recently lost the host of Hillbilly Horror Stories. Jerry Pauly passed away just a few weeks ago. Now our thoughts and good vibes go out to his wife and co-host Tracy, and the entire Hillbilly Horror Stories family. Jerry was a fun guy, and he will be missed. Now onto a little lighter note. Another best of entry.

This one from all the way back on Season 16, Episode 14. Please welcome Oberon back to the program.

Hi, my name's Oberon and this story takes place in Plymouth, Michigan. It is my childhood home, in fact. So where we begin is Plymouth, Michigan for a hot second was just farmland. The community started to grow. I'm not entirely sure when, but my dad remembers when it was still a dirt road community. So my parents moved into that house around the time I was two years old, right before my brother was born.

And that house always had its own personality. There were a couple of weird things, but I'm going to focus on one spirit in particular. And the first story starts when I was four years old.

So just to give you a quick layout of this house, we were in a tri-level. So my parents' bedroom was straight up a flight of stairs and directly down from that was a closet with just a little hallway that divided the kitchen, which is on the right-hand side, looking down from the steps, and the living room, which is on the left-hand side.

When I was little, I would have a hard time sleeping through the night. So my parents had a little sleeping bag just on the floor because I was too big and I would steal all the covers. And so they would post me up on the floor.

And that little sliver was right in front of the door, which was obviously looking down the flight of stairs. And this experience I wrote off for a while because I didn't feel it was legitimate based off of what I'm about to describe to you. So I was about four, laying on the floor, having a hard time going to sleep. And I decided it was a good idea to play this game called Let's See If Someone Appears at the Bottom of the Stairs.

So I would lay down, keep my head down, and raise it up really quick and look at, like, that little landing near the closet. And there'd be no one there. I would kind of repeat the same process. And there was one point I waited a really long time. And I shoot up, and I'm staring at the closet, waiting. And I get what I asked for. Coming from the kitchen is this...

six foot tall shadow figure and he limbers in one step, two step, very slow. He stops

dead in front of the closet. And I'm kind of getting chills actually telling you this story, but he stops right in front of the closet. He's still, and his head's kind of down, and it's a profile shot, and he's still facing the living room from the kitchen in which he just walked out of. And slow, slow, he turns his head up,

and looks at me directly for about five seconds, and I'm quiet as he looks at me.

And he slowly turns his head back, faces forward towards where he was, takes two big, slow, lumbering steps into the living room. And I slam my head down. I go to sleep for the rest of the night. And I wrote it off because of the circumstances surrounding it. But then I turned to legitimizing it with my next experience.

I did want to include some further details of really the events. So I was young when these things happened, but this was like under 2010, early 2000s is kind of when this was happening.

That kind of brings us to our next story. So I told you that I completely wrote off the first one because I felt like I was a dumb child playing a dumb game. And that leads me to this encounter, which I was not a dumb child playing a dumb game. In fact, I was about 10 years old and I remember I was having a dream.

and people were in my house for some sort of gathering, but I had something like the next morning and I had to go to sleep early. And in my dream, I very much remember there was this moment where it was me sleeping in, I had a loft bed at the time, and there was a cutout on both sides where you could place the ladder accordingly.

And in my dream, I'm sleeping and it's like a corner shot of my room and it's empty aside from me sleeping and it's pitch black. And in my dream, my dad starts waking me up and he's, I can see him, he's shaking me and he's saying my name and he's trying to get me up. And then it's black, pitch black. And I still hear my dad calling my name and I open my eyes and I realize

see my father and he is staring at me through the cutout of where that ladder isn't on the one side but right near my face and he's staring at me and he startled me but he's like looking at me with this fire and this intensity and he's not blinking and he's not moving and the only way I can describe it is like if you pause the TV screen that same sort of like static still

unnatural movement or lack thereof. And I am startled, but I'm like, what the, like, you know, like what, what's going on here? And I sit up in my bed, I sit up physically and I remember kind of like grabbing my arm a little bit and I'm, I'm realizing I am awake.

And I'm like, okay, no, like maybe you're not awake. Maybe this is still a dream. Like he'll be gone when you look back. So I turn my head over my shoulder and he is still there and he is static. He has not moved from the position he was staring at me at. He has not moved his eyes off of me. He's just staring straight at where I was and

And so I turn my head back and I'm like, okay, that's, that's weird. Well, what's he doing then? Like, I'm trying to make sure that this is like actually happening. I'm like, okay, give it another second. I turn my head back. He is still there. And I look forward again. I'm like, this is like, okay, this is weird. And I audibly, audibly say, dad, dad.

because I'm confused about why he's doing this and why he woke me up like this. And I'm waiting for him to move or say anything. And he just won't.

And I'm looking over my shoulder at him again for this final time. And I kind of see him like, it was like a piece of his shoulder kind of like flicked out like a pixel dying on a TV, like that kind of just nothingness. And his form started to kind of

do that completely. And he turns basically into this black mass and he creeps

across my room and into my vanity that I had with my big mirror. And I remember sitting there and just being so awestruck because I'm like, there is no way this happened. I was waiting to wake up again, to be completely honest. I was waiting to wake up again from this dream.

And I don't. And I stared at that mirror for five minutes waiting for something to either come back out of it or like something to change or just any sort of response. And as soon as I realized

Oh, that just happened. And I am freaking out. I jumped off of my bed, like down from the ladder. I was in gymnastics. I was in really good shape at the time. So that was no problem of a jump for me. But I jumped straight down four feet from my bed, take no eyes off.

off of that mirror as I run around the corner from my room into my parents' room. And this was the first time I've been on the floor of my parents' room in forever because I'm 10 years old and I had very well grown out of that by that point. I run into my parents' room and I throw my pillow down and...

lay my blanket down and my dad sits up and kind of looks at me sideways. And he was obviously asleep in his bed the entire time that occurrence happened.

That story freaks me out still to this day. I've had quite a few ghostly encounters, but like nothing has ever happened with that figure since we've moved out of that house. But his presence was very oppressive the entire time I lived there. I never felt like I was alone and not in the comforting way. I just always felt like I was being watched.

So I think that that guy would still be tied to the property. But I just wanted to share that with you. I had a friend turn me on to your podcast and encouraged me to share this story with you. I hope that you can make some good use of it or it helps explain some things for other people. Keep on doing what you're doing and thank you for giving me a place to share. Bye. Thanks, Oberon. What an incredible entry.

Shadow Men, while popular and well-represented here on the program, are very mysterious. And I know I've said it before, but it bears repeating. Each new experience goes further to continue the intrigue, rather than shine light on it. But despite that, we thank you again, Oberon, for calling in. ...and fans would follow. Understanding certified...

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Now earlier in the show, I'd mentioned that tonight's installment is filled with monsters. And I didn't lie either. Here with his contribution from Season 16, Episode 15, is John from South Carolina. Hey, this is John from South Carolina, Aiken, South Carolina.

It was around 2017 when I had this experience. I was actually staying in Augusta, Georgia, but I was coming to South Carolina every day. In the neighborhood I used to stay in, South Carolina, a lot of my friends were seeing this big deer lately and stuff. So one night I had went out. I was going back to Augusta, and it's like some dark back roads. As I'm coming down the street,

I noticed, like, a deer, like, by the stop sign. And I'm like, oh, that must be that big deer everybody's been talking about. I'm like, oh, he should... Right beside the stop sign, I'm like, oh, he about to run off, like, as I get closer.

So as I'm coming down the hill, I notice it's still standing there. And I'm like, oh, it's on two feet. And it's staring straight at me. So as I'm coming down, I wouldn't even look. And I get to the stop sign. I'm making sure, because either you got to turn right or left. And I'm looking for lights, because I just want to go on out, because it's like I can't believe what I'm seeing. Two feet.

Like, probably standing... I was in my Tahoe, and it was taller than my Tahoe when I look out my front deal. So I didn't really stop. I was just making sure nothing wasn't coming, and I went on out there. There wasn't no other cars on the road, just me at the certain time. I went on out there.

As I go out there, I make the right. I'm going down the street and it just felt like it's in the backseat. So I'm looking back, I'm about to have a wreck. I'm looking in the mirror. I'm like, man, what was that? And I'm thinking like, was they seeing that? And they just thought it was a tall dare or whatever. So the next day I was like, hey, I seen that tall dare or whatever. Like, just see what anybody say anything. Nope.

Nobody really say nothing. So I never told nobody about it. But I know what I've seen is the

sitting there with a rack and was staring at me the whole time. It was like it was waiting on me. It reminds me of the, like, I looked online, like, the behemoth, everything that, with the pentagon on it. That's exactly what it reminds me of. Like, it was that behemoth with the pentagon on it, like, big, tall horns. And it was like, I wished I would have

Looked at more, but it was like I couldn't even look because it was like I can feel it just gazing at me. Like even when I went by the stop sign, I could feel it turn and I would just look.

And I kind of was looking out my peripheral light. I just wouldn't even look over there. And I tried to forget about it, watch something. I'm like, oh, it must be the deer. I'm tripping. But no, I know what I've seen. Anyway, that's my story. I don't know. I've been telling people lately around the neighborhood just to anybody seeing the same thing I've seen. But I haven't heard anything yet. Thank you. I mean, I enjoy your podcast. Thank you, John.

You know, I wonder if you ever did find anyone else in your area that admitted to seeing the strange creature that you did. And if you did, you'd better let us know about it. Now, John's call isn't the last monster story I have for you tonight. I also have this one that actually aired on the most recent episode of Monsters Among Us Jr., episode 17 specifically. And I just thought the call was too good not to work in here. So from the state of Illinois...

Please welcome Addie to tonight's special episode. Hi, my name's Addie. I'm 14 years old, and my mom, Stephanie, and my stepdad, Drew, are huge fans of your podcast. They fall asleep to it every night, and I always make fun of them and laugh at them.

I am a skeptical and a realist, and whenever I heard stories about anything paranormal, I would always just not believe them and kind of laugh at them because I feel like there's an explanation for everything. And that was until tonight, whenever I experienced what I did. I play volleyball, and I live on the border of Illinois and Indiana, and my volleyball is in Indiana.

So, me and my mom are on our way. It's dark outside except for the big blood moon in the sky. We're about an hour into our drive, and my mom drives a Kia, and her headlights are very bright. Whenever we drive past people, they always flash us because they think that we have our brights on. So, we're driving on this dark, isolated road. Again, the only light is from my mom's headlights and the blood moon in the sky.

And we're driving, and on the center line, we see this fuzzy black creature scurrying or something, trying to crawl. It just looked like it didn't know what to do with itself. Trying to crawl off the road, scurrying somewhere. And it was fuzzy and black, and then it...

hurries off the road and it didn't look like any animal I've ever seen before. It didn't crawl like any animal I've ever seen before. So it scurried off to the side and I quickly look out my mom's window because that's the side that it was on because she's driving. And it's standing there in the entrance of this park. Now there's two posts on either side of the entrance that are probably taller than me. I'm 5'4".

That thing just powered over them completely. If I had to guess, I'd say it was eight to nine feet. And I'm studying it, and it's white, just completely white, skinny. My mom's headlights, which are normally very annoying...

were a great help in this situation because it defined every inch of that thing. I could see its arms, its legs, its torso perfectly, and whatever it had on its body. I can't describe it. But what I can describe is its glowing eye that was facing right at our car. It was just locked in on our car. It was a turquoise color, and it was just staring. It looked like me right in the eye, and I looked at it back, and I was just locked in on this creature. And my mom's yelling, what are you looking at? Like, what was that?

what is this? And I cannot answer her. And so we drove past it and I still have no words. I can't say anything. And it takes me a little bit before I can actually describe to her what I saw. And it was a completely clear night that night. There was no rain, snow, anything. It was completely clear. So we call my stepdad through because he believes in all things paranormal. And we told him our story. He completely believed us. We just

We describe everything that we saw and then we decide that we need to research. So we spend the last half hour researching what we might have seen and the only answer that we come up with is a skinwalker. So my mom sees while she's looking at skinwalkers that if you lock eyes with it, you can become possessed by it. So,

So now she's convinced that I'm possessed by the skinwalker. I feel fine. She's very concerned. But I just wanted to come on here and share my story because... I'm the mom in the car, but I actually witnessed this creature moving and scurrying, black, fuzzy, weird shape staying in the center. I almost thought it was like maybe an animal that had been hit and was confused. But the way that it crawled...

and got out of the roadway that I was trying to avoid the kids. And then all I see is a black, like, thing kind of move in my personal vision. But I asked Addie, like, detail, like, what, like, skin texture. I could remember, but I couldn't see it. It was...

It was just white. I just saw white. That's the only thing I can describe about it. Like hair? It did have hair. It had black hair. It just wasn't where you think hair would be on a head. It didn't look like a human. It looked like it tried to be humanoid, but that was not a human. That was not an animal. I don't know what I saw. So my perspective about all things paranormal has just been completely changed. So I wanted to share my story because...

Thank you, Addie. And thank you, Mom. And like I said after I played this story over on Junior, you're definitely not possessed by anything, Addie. You simply had a cryptid encounter.

So welcome to the club. Now as for what that thing might be, your guess is as good as mine. But if anyone out there listening happened to experience the same thing on the Illinois-Indiana border, hit us up. 888-608-KNIGHT or MonstersAmongUsPodcast at gmail.com Thank you again, ladies, for calling in.

Now folks, this next entry does not detail a monster, but it does feature one of the scariest things on earth. Time. From Season 17, Episode 15. Please welcome back Angie to the program. So hey Derek and everybody listening. My name is Angie. I'm currently on a gulf of Mexico where I live now. This starts out in a small town in Minnesota called Excelsior on the shore of Lake Minnetonka.

I apologize for my voice shaking. This just happened April 2024. Totally forgot about this. Okay. So what happened is I was about 12 years old, 13, whatever. So this would have been 1973, 74. In the middle of the night, I go use the bathroom. I'm scared to look in the mirror when I'm washing my hands because of the whole Bloody Mary ghosty thing, right? I look up in the mirror and over my right shoulder, I see this old woman.

lady face. I think it's a lady. It's got like light colored hair with shiny silver streaks in it and it looked like it didn't have any eyes and it had this long craggly old face and this wrinkly lips. It was just creepy, creepy ears and I only glanced at it for a second. Of course I ran into my room, got under the covers. I was terrified. I was scared to use that bathroom mask or that.

So here it is April 2024 and I'm at the laundromat doing laundry. My car's parked out here and it's fun. I take a walk. I come back. I stick my key in the door because I'm going to unlock my car, get my laundry basket out, right? Looking back at me from the reflection in the glass, oh my god, I'm just, what's that face, right? I'm freaked out. Drop my keys. I turn around. I mean, there's

There's people all over here, right? Turn around and look, there's nobody behind me. I bend down, pick my keys up, look back in the window and realize the reflection, the creepy old lady that I saw when I was 12. That was my reflection right now today in the window.

I'm sorry. I'm like really freaked out. I mean, how do you time warp like that when you're 12? How do you see yourself when you're 62 years old? It's just a trip. Oh, what I thought was black eyes in the reflected mirror that I saw when I was a kid.

I realized I have transition lenses on my glasses, so when I looked in there, what I was seeing was just the dark lenses of my glasses I wear today. Sorry I'm freaking out, and I'm not a good storyteller, but thank you so much. Bye. Thank you, Angie. Now, I sure don't blame you for freaking out here. I typically have the same reaction when I find myself looking into a mirror these days. Aging definitely sucks.

But at the very least, your unsettling experience resulted in an amazing story. A story that even found its way onto the 2024 Best Of episode. So a big thanks, Angie, for having the bravery to call in. Now folks, I'm going to sneak in one more before we take our last ad break. And yeah, this one is another monster story. From the state of Oregon and Season 17, Episode 17.

Please welcome Phoebe back to the program. Hi, my name is Phoebe. I'm from Eastern Oregon and my story takes place when I was, I think, six or seven years old. I was over at my friend's house and lived in a very small town at the time. She also lived kind of in the central part of the little town and

And we were just playing in her house, and she had this big bay window looking out. There was a driveway, and then past that, her parents had a cornfield. And the cornfield there, you know, I think, I'm trying to, I don't even know what time of year it was, maybe the end of the summertime, maybe.

It was a bright, like, sunny day. I'm pretty sure we were, like, the only ones in the house. And we were, you know, just playing on the couch. I don't even know why, but we're, you know, facing not the window. And for whatever reason, we both decide to kind of, like, I don't know if we hear a noise or not.

or if we just both get this urge to peek over the couch and look out the window. So we both look out the window, and in the cornfield, I swear, and she must have saw it too because it scared us, so we kind of tucked back under the couch, and we're both freaking out, kind of like our heart is racing, and...

Like, what was that? So when we peer over the couch, we see this, like... Well, at least I see this huge creature. You know, it's taller than the corn. And it's, like, hairy to me. And the face is, like...

not really like a human face, but just something that kind of resembles a human. I mean, to me, Ice Sweater was a Bigfoot. And I don't know if... Like, at that time...

I mean, I don't think I ever really knew what a Bigfoot was because growing up, like, I wasn't really allowed to watch TV or to really watch anything that was scary. And, I mean...

This was at least, you know, 30 years ago. So we didn't really have TV growing up. We didn't really watch movies a lot. So yeah, just to this day, I feel like I saw Bigfoot. And unfortunately, like, I don't remember really talking to her about it. And she moved away.

And I always want to, like, find her, you know, somehow and, like, you know, ask her because it always stuck with me what I saw and was it real and, you know, just the sheer, like, panic that we had. I mean, she was panicky, too, so I don't know if we were just scared because, like, I think we might have been alone in the house. I don't remember where our parents were at the time, but, so, yeah, that was my thing.

what I think was a big foot. And just, you know, when we peeked back over to the couch, like, it was gone. And I don't remember what happened after that. I don't know if we were, like, scared and then we went to go find our parents or what, but...

So yeah, that's really stuck with me forever. And I've always been very interested in Bigfoot and just scary movies and just scary different things growing up. And really interested in kind of wanting to see more. And I mean, I guess that's the only thing that's really ever happened to me. So yeah, thank you. Bye. Thank you, Phoebe. It certainly sounds like Sasquatch to me.

And the setting is perfect. Oregon is a well-known Bigfoot hotspot. So outside of some prankster in a suit, I'd say you likely saw something special that day, Phoebe. We can't thank you enough for sharing that experience here with us. Now, folks, one last break. Then the best call of 2024. We'll be right back. ...with plans to file a petition to transfer... You always get lost...

Now I know I promised that we'll play the very best call of the year, and we're going to get to that. But first I have to share this runner up. A wild series of events that will leave you confused and on the edge of your seat. Here's Kat from Colorado's Entry that originally aired on season 17, episode 11.

Hi Derek, this is Kat and I'm calling from Colorado. This story actually takes place in West Virginia, close to Morgantown, West Virginia, when I was in college way back in the 80s, so a pretty long time ago.

A friend of mine and I, a close friend, decided that we were going to take a little overnight camping trip up into the Cooper's Rock Reservoir area right outside of Morgantown. Now this place had some legends attached to it, some ghostly sightings, and the thing everybody used to say was that there were druids up there that did rituals or ceremonies

and groups and things like that and that it was haunted. I had some friends that said they spotted UFOs up there. So, you know, although we loved those kind of stories and those kind of things, you know, intrigued us, that's not why we went. We went up just to really go into the backcountry, take a night off, camp out underneath the stars near the water and then come back fresh for midterms or whatever we were doing.

So we borrowed his roommate's car and we loaded it with tents and camping stuff and snacks and an inflatable raft. And we drove up to the reservoir and we drove off the beaten path and got onto this dirt road. And my friend, he really wanted to go back into way back up into the country, into the backwoods.

And that was the plan, was to get as far away as we possibly could alone. So we went until the road stopped and we were still around the reservoir. And then we hiked in. And then we inflated the raft. We got in the raft, threw everything in the raft, and paddled even further up into the reservoir until we found the little inlet that we thought was pretty cool. And we decided we were going to spend the night there.

We set up a tent. There was nobody around anywhere. This was about as isolated as you could get with a beautiful reservoir. Trees, forest right there. There wasn't any beaches or anything around where we were. It was just this little like inlet with some outcroppings. And then we put our tent in there. Now my friend, he tied up the raft with the paddles.

So very important point later on about this.

So, you know, we're having a great afternoon. We had some snacks. At some point, we decided to smoke a little bit of pot. Now, we weren't druggies. That's not why we went up there. I was never one to do a lot of anything in college. But we did, I think, just...

had a joint with us, I think, and so we smoked a little bit and relaxed. I think he was going to put some hot dogs on, a little grill. And so I went and was sitting by the water on a rock, just watching the water. Now, it was really quiet out there.

And I started to overthink things. And as the afternoon wore on, I was thinking, wow, what if... I started to imagine these scenarios that, like, what if, you know, while we were here, you know, the world ended out there. And we were here by ourselves. And what if when we went back to civilization, nobody was there and...

And then we started talking like that, you know, whether it was the little bit of pot that we smoked or whatever, but we had this really fun conversation. One of our favorite books that we had read during that time was Stephen King's The Stand. And so we were always talking about, you know,

the plague and Captain Trips and everything else. So, um, the evening went on and like I said, we didn't, we didn't smoke any more, any more pot after that. We just ate some hot dogs or whatever and we, you know, talking. We, it was getting dark and we started a fire and,

As the evening wore on, it started to get windy. And it was very dark. And we were kind of in the forested area. And you have to imagine the trees that are in there are huge, tall trees. And this was in...

The end of September, beginning of October, I think so, it was getting chilly and there were still leaves on the trees, but it was fall-ish. And as the wind grew, it started to get colder. And not only that, but the wind started to just howl.

we could hear it coming down the coastline of the reservoir and around the whole cove that we were in. And it just started to howl around us to the point where suddenly we started, at least how this started was I started to hear what sounded like screaming in the trees. And I wasn't sure at first whether he was hearing it or not. And

There were these, it was like this whooping, screaming, like female voices cackling way up in the trees, like with the wind just howling and whipping around everywhere. And at one point there was this wicked laughter way up in the wind in the trees and I was startled. And at the same time my friend startled and I was like, you're hearing that, right?

And he's like, yeah, I hear that. And I'm like, it just sounds like people screaming and laughing up there. I mean, never in my life had I ever heard anything like that. And, you know, I'm an avid outdoors person, always have been. We had no qualms about going out into the wilderness, etc. So it really kind of freaked us out that we were hearing that. So we decided we were, you know...

We were letting our imaginations get carried away with us. And we sat around this little fire for a little bit longer. And then suddenly, out of nowhere, and I mean out of nowhere, both of us had the exact same reaction to something. And what it was, was we thought something was coming up behind us. And for whatever reason, both of us turned around.

startled and like looked at the same way as if something was like running up behind us and the wind is still whipping and howling and everything and we look at each other and we're like man I've had enough of this let's just get some sleep you know let's go to bed blah blah blah and in the morning you know we'll paddle down and we'll laugh about this or whatever we were just getting too scared

So we got inside the tent and it was one of those old fashioned tents that had the pole in the middle. And we fought with it for a good hour with the wind whipping around us and everything else. And the wind was just unbelievable until I drifted off to sleep. Several hours later, I wake up and my friend isn't there.

he's not in the tent with me and I was like what the hell so I'm laying there and it's got to be about 4 4 30 in the morning and suddenly suddenly he comes flying in the tent I mean like if he dove into the tent and grabbed me and said get up we're leaving and I was like what what what he said get up get up come on we're leaving right now get up we're leaving

And I get up and he's like, just do what I say, do what I say. And so I grab everything I could, grab the tent. He's like, don't worry about anything. We're just going to throw it in the boat. We're going to throw it in the boat. And he threw everything in the boat. The boat is right there near the water. And so he says, get in, get in there, get in. And he like throws me in this boat, this raft. And this guy, and you have to understand, the water is freezing cold, right? Right.

He jumps in the water and he pushes me out with all of the crap in it, like as far as he can go, like as fast and as far and as hard as he can go until the water is up to his chest. And he jumps in the raft and he grabs a paddle and he starts paddling toward the middle of the reservoir.

And I'm still like, what the hell? What's going on? What's going on? Tell me what's going on. And he wouldn't say anything. He's like, just be quiet. Just be quiet. Just be quiet. And I'm like, what happened to the other paddle? He only had one paddle. And he's like, never mind. Never mind. So he paddles out to the middle of the reservoir. And it's just getting light out. So I can just see the shore. And I can just see...

you know, the water and everything. And I'm still asking him, God, what's the matter? What happened? Well, I'm scared to death. You're really scaring me. What are you, what's happening? And he says, I'll tell you when we get out of here. And so I sat in the, in the boat while he paddled down and he stayed in the middle of that reservoir and he's scanning the shoreline the whole time. And he's looking up and down the shoreline.

And we get to the place where we got into the water to begin with the day before. And he dragged everything out. He just shoved everything in the car. The car was still there. And he's, get in, get in. And he gets in the car and he drives like a bat out of hell down this road, this like dirt road, you know, from 10 miles. And I'm like, what happened? You have to tell me what happened.

So finally, I'm freaked out. Finally, he stops the car and he says, okay, I'll tell you what happened. He said, so you fell asleep. And about 30 minutes after that, I heard something weird outside the tent. And I got up to check everything. And he said the boat was gone. The boat was not on the tree.

The paddles were gone. And so he thought maybe it had come loose and it had blown away. So he went and walked up the shoreline and was walking and looking to see if he could find the boat. And he did. He found it. He found it about 100 yards away, tied tight.

to a tree not only tied to a tree but strapped to a tree someone had tied it to a tree he only could find one paddle so he untied it and he said he saw something and honest to god to this day i don't know derrick what he saw he never told me what he saw but he said it scared him enough

So that all he could think about was getting me out of there and getting me back to safety. To this day, I have no idea what he saw or what happened that night or what scared him so much to get me out of there like that. His roommate also, who was a good friend of mine, told me for years, said,

He never told him what had happened, but he said he saw something that scared him to death and that he would never, ever, ever, ever go back up there again, but he wouldn't talk about it. That's my story. I hope you liked it. Have a good night. Thanks for your show. Bye-bye. Thank you, Kat. Yet another story from this year that left me scratching my head. I still want to know what happened out there that day. What spooked the friend?

What caused the panic? What did he see? Now, mysteries like this sort of drive me nuts because I want answers. But they do make for some of the best submissions. So thank you again, Kat, for sending yours in to us. Well, folks, I fibbed just a little bit. I have one more story to share with you before our closer. But this is all sort of a package deal that you'll understand here shortly.

Now this first entry wasn't the first we've received like this, and not the first call like this to originate out of the state of Wisconsin. But before I go opening up that can of worms, first welcome Brenda from Season 18, Episode 7. Hi Derek, love your show. I finally decided to call in with my story. My name is Brenda and I'm from Milwaukee, Wisconsin. One day back in 2005,

My boyfriend then, husband now, we were by the beach by the lake, Lake Michigan. It was July of 2005. It was almost dusk and the sun was setting for sure. And I was 17 and he was 18. So we were just there by the beach and I remember we were skipping rocks or he was showing me how to skip rocks. But there was people around us before the sun set.

And one of the persons that we noticed was a guy was walking his golden retriever, and he was throwing the ball into the lake, and the dog will go in and then out the lake. And there was families around and everything. So then, because the sun was setting, people were leaving, and we were, like, almost the last ones there. So right when I was, like, bending down to get my sandals, we both turned to our right, and I want to say...

20 feet away from us, something was coming out of the water and there was nobody around anymore. So something was coming out of the water and it kind of looked like the golden retriever from earlier. I was thinking, where's the owner?

So I noticed my husband was living that way, and we were both like, okay, where's the owner? But the thing is, too, that when it came out the water, to me, it looked like the dog. And when it was coming out the water, what caught our attention more than anything was that it started growing, like, wide, like fat. I've never seen a bear in person, but...

To me, it looked like it was getting the size of a bear. And it was, like, coming out of the water in four. And then it got behind a log that was on the beach, like, just halfway there. And it got behind it, and it was still on fours. When it was halfway behind the log, it stood up. And then when it stood up, all of a sudden it was skinny, like, thin, thin.

And then not only did it stand up, but it kind of like stood up and it kind of looked like it was like in an elevator because it was getting longer. And the only thing I could think of was this thing is tall and now skinny. That's when I started freaking out. And I noticed my husband was freaking out too. And I'm pretty sure by then when it stood up, it noticed we were there. And when it stood up,

It started crawling further up to where there was like a bunch of trees. Because it's like the lake, the beach, there's like a sidewalk at the end of the beach. And then they start like a bunch of trees because you need to go up a hill to park up there, basically. So then we started getting scared. And on the way to the beach, we had to go down these long steps first.

And the thing went into those trees that are surrounding the stairs to go up to our car. So we both said, hell no, we're not going up the steps, the stairs. So then we started walking to the opposite side of where this thing was.

But when this thing went into the tree, it started like running back and forth, back and forward, left and right, like super fast, like super, super fast. And it was going our direction. So basically, as we were walking, it was in the trees walking beside us, but we were like further away.

And this thing was moving back and forth, left and right, like super fast. And we never saw its face. It didn't make a sound from the time it came out the lake. It made no sound because it was between the trees. It wasn't making like stepping noise or anything.

But then it kept following us all the way. The whole time we were walking, we were basically not talking because we knew that thing was there. And I remember my husband picked up a rock just in case the thing came out of the trees. When he picked up the rock, I remember I'm like, are you going to throw it? And he said, no, just in case.

but he never threw the rock. We just kept walking and walking because this thing, even though it was following us, we couldn't see it like a hundred percent. It was like shifting different directions, but at the same time it was following us. And maybe to put a picture in your head, have you ever seen The Flash, the TV show?

And when the flash vibrates so that they don't know who he is, that's how it looked. And that's how it was moving, like super fast. And we could see it too, but we couldn't see like the eyes, the face. And it was dark too because the sun had set.

And by the time the rocks ended, from the beach to the rocks, there was a sidewalk. So we just kept walking and walking until you land on a park. When you get to the park, that's where you start seeing houses at the other end of the beach. So then the trees ended maybe a little bit before the sidewalk started. So then that's when we just kind of looked back and looked back to see if it kept coming.

But we had to go around the park and all the way back. Everything we walked the opposite way, we had to go around to go look for my husband's car where he had parked it. But the strange thing is that there was houses behind that beach, and this thing was moving so fast. We joke about it now because it happened when we were younger, but it was scary back then.

Thank you, Brenda.

Now, if this one sounded sort of familiar, but you couldn't quite put a pin on it, let me tell you why. It's because you're thinking of an eerily similar story, also out of the state of Wisconsin. A call that I'm making our finale and the most talked about story of 2024. Kate from Season 18, Episode 3. Welcome back to the show.

Hi there. My name is Kate. I live in Eau Claire, Wisconsin. I had an encounter with something here in town that I think that you might be interested in. I

I'm not totally sure, and I've actually looked for help from different people trying to diagnose what it was. It was just as COVID had hit. So it was April 2019, and I was walking downtown with my dog. Quarantine had just hit our town, so the buses weren't running. Nobody was out. I was walking down by the river. It was about 8 o'clock at night.

And I was walking somewhere I'm very familiar with. It's downtown by Banbury Place, which is kind of a landmark in our city. But I saw a woman walking up this hill.

She looked to be like a thousand years old. She was tiny, old, decrepit. And I thought she had cataracts. Her eyes were glowing and she was carrying a suitcase behind her and she was walking up this big old hill. I thought that maybe there's like a halfway house down, like right down at the bottom of that hill. And I thought maybe she was like trying to catch a bus, but they weren't running again. Again, that quarantine had just hit our city. So nobody was riding buses, nothing like that.

So she was going up this hill and she was looking back at me. And that's when I saw her eyes and I was like, oh, shoot, this old lady's blind. Like I should help her. And my dog, I have a German Shepherd Lab and loyal to a fault. She's a wonderful dog. But normally, you know, she might bark at something that would scare her. She thought was threatening us.

She stopped walking with me. She didn't want to get any closer to this woman because the woman was walking in the direction I was going. And my dog stopped and looked at me like, I know dogs can't talk, but she said to me, essentially like, no, no, we're not going that way. That lady looks weird. I was like, come on, dude. Like this old lady is blind. Clearly she needs some help carrying the suitcase up this hill. It's a big hill. It's pretty steep.

So I kind of dragged my dog along. She was very hesitant. And I saw this woman, again, beckoning me almost with her eyes. She would turn around and look at me. And I saw her blind ass eyes. And then she turned back and keep walking up the hill. And I started saying, hey, ma'am, ma'am, can I help you? Hello. And she didn't hear me. She kept walking. She almost sped up a little bit. I was like, hello. Hey, ma'am, can I help you? I can help you with your suitcase. I'm not kidding.

She turned back at me one more time. Eyes were glowing. They were green. And she, I know this sounds insane, but that suitcase that she was carrying turned into front legs and her legs turned into back legs and her head. It all kind of like, I know I sound insane. I'm so sorry. But she kind of morphed into this

It was a moose without antlers. Like, it was the size of a moose that she had to have been at least 10 feet tall. She just became this thing.

And jumped off into the, like, there's like a little, I don't know, like where the hell, like meets the land. I don't know. I don't know how, I don't know. It really screwed with me, but I swear to God. Her body and her head became the front. And that suitcase became either her front or back legs. I don't remember exactly. And it seems like everything stopped for just a second. She turned into this moose thing and jumped off into the trees.

And I stopped for a second. I was like, holy shit, I need to go to a doctor. There's something wrong with me. And I looked at my dog and I made the split decision just to run as fast as I could. I was heading home, which was up in the direction that she was. So I had to run up the hill where that woman was and I could hear her crashing through the trees. I was hauling ass. I was trying to run home. I had maybe six, seven, eight blocks or so to run up this hill and then run.

to where I lived with my boyfriend and my son. And the whole time I'm thinking I have to call a doctor as soon as I get home, like there's something wrong with me. I just imagined something, but my dog saw it. And I'm running as fast as I can, and this truck...

comes screeching up behind me. Once I hit the top of the hill and I turned towards my house on the street that my house was on, this truck comes screeching up behind me, slams on the brakes, and this dude says, hey, I saw it too. Run as fast as you can. I'll keep it off as long as I can. And then I didn't even have a chance to even, like, I was huffing and puffing. I'm not in the best shape, so I can't run. But I was hauling ass, so he's like, hey, I'll keep it off.

and then screeched off and he was honking his horn just beep beep beep beep around my neighborhood he drove past me two times like just driving around my neighborhood at mock speed he said I'll keep it off as long as I can get home whatever so I ran I was sobbing I was so worried that this thing was going to follow me home and I had a one-year-old son at the time and I

I was terrified and I had to let go of my dog's leash at this point. She was just running right next to me. She was terrified too. And I... I don't know, I guess when I... I'm sorry for crying. But when that guy pulled up, I was like, Like, somebody else saw that? Like, it wasn't just me? I just ran as fast as I could.

And I kept hearing him honking around the neighborhood. And then he, like, drove past me and I was running into my driveway. And I saw my boyfriend because he came out to say, hey, what is going on? And he was honking a lot. And I was like, dude, I can't even start to explain what happened. And I tried. And he was, like, inside. And I didn't leave my house for probably, like, five,

I went outside once within, like, three days. I was terrified, and the first thing I did was I ran upstairs and made sure my son was okay. I had no idea what was going on. But I made sure my one-year-old was still safe in bed, and he was. My boyfriend stood guard. Like, I was so shook. And he believed me. He believed every word I said.

And so then we left the house. Like, I finally, like, got in the car and we went to go, I don't know, like, decompress. We went to a park or something. And we drove past where it happened. And all those trees...

The good I heard crashing down were broken in half. Like something had driven through there, like something had crashed through there. Like, I'm really not making this up. I didn't imagine it. This is real. And like, I wasn't drunk. I wasn't on any drugs. I was just walking my dog. I had made that walk probably over 500 times. You know, I'd always walk her at night and I'd do the same route every single time. So I know what the trees look like.

Nothing ever weird like that has ever happened. But when we drove by and I saw those trees that were literally split in half, I was a little shook. I don't know. I'm still trying to find some peace with it, but I haven't had anything happen since. I just wanted to say I didn't know what it was. And my boyfriend, who believed me immediately, he saw how shook I was. You know, I followed up with...

as many medical professionals as I could without sounding insane. But like, I was fine. I was totally sober. And my boyfriend believed me. And he looked into it and said that, you know, he saw like something on Reddit that said, "Soon locker." And I didn't know, I had never even heard of them before.

But then when he described like kind of some of the recollections that he had seen on the subreddit, he said, it sounds like a lot like this and they're scary. They will follow you. I did not see the woman or the moose again, but like a bunch of really weird stuff happened at our house after that. And we moved out pretty shortly after. I don't know. I can't really explain it, but it wasn't safe. It didn't feel safe.

We had a neighbor who lit his house on fire as I was literally standing right there trying to talk to him. We had somebody flip a car, flip their car on our little tiny residential neighborhood street. After I had gotten this weird feeling like that place is haunted as hell.

And

And I still to this day don't know how to explain it. I haven't had any encounters with it again. And I felt bad for it, actually. And what my boyfriend told me was that what he read up on was that if you run away in fear or something from some sort of creature like this, then they might attack you. They might kill you. They might hurt you. But I offered it kindness because I thought it was this lady that needed help.

And I insisted on being like, ma'am, can I help you? And I scared her or it or whatever it is. So he's pretty staunch on the fact that he believes that I scared it with kindness, which is great. But now it took me a really long time to ever feel comfortable again.

I'm good now, but I don't know. I've tried to seek help, but I don't really know where to start. So I tried to talk to a few of the native tribesmen or women around our area, and they won't talk about it. They refuse. So I don't know what to do. I hope that you have a good day, and thank you for listening to my story. Bye. Thank you, Kate, the Moose Lady. Now, people lost their minds when this call originally aired all the way back in January.

And people had all sorts of theories. Skinwalkers, shapeshifters, witches, wizards, wendigos. Whatever it is, whatever it was, it really struck a nerve with a lot of you. And I get it. It's an insane experience. A story that might even suggest a life or death struggle. If that trucker hadn't have been there. At the very least, Kate's telling makes it seem that way.

Now regardless, Kate's call garnered the most attention this year, and it's obvious why. It's the kind of call that makes Monsters Among Us what it is. So thank you again, Kate, for submitting. And thank you, listener, for hanging out with us for this best-of episode. Now there will be no secret entry here tonight, but that feature will return on our next Thursday episode. Now we're going to take a little bit of time off here in January.

but I'll be posting Patreon unlocks until we return. So if those are new to you, I highly recommend checking them out. Now there will be no new Beyond episode tonight, but it'll be back for next week. I'll make it up to you. Now before we go, I just want to thank you all one last time for your support. Thank you for calling in to the show. Thanks for shopping in our shop, and thanks for sharing the show with friends.

We wouldn't be here without you amazing people. And on behalf of Sarah, Delaney, and myself, we thank you. And we wish you a happy and healthy new year. Now Monsters Among Us is written and produced by me, Derek Hayes. Copyright Red Crow Media. Additional support is provided by Sarah Carter Hayes and Delaney Powers. All media used in this production is done so under the protection of fair use.

give us a like and follow on our social media accounts. You can find us at Instagram and Facebook. Hop on over to YouTube while you're at it and give us a like and follow there. And if you're a supporter on Patreon or Apple subscriptions, that means you have access to our Discord server. Just check out the pin notices there for details.

Now don't forget you can catch the show every Saturday evening at 11 p.m. Eastern on the Unex Digital Network. Just visit unexnetwork.com to tune in. And lastly, tonight's score was provided by Iron Cthulhu Apocalypse, Co.ag Music, and Carl Casey at White Bad Audio. All right, folks, real quick before I duck out of here one more time, a humongous thank you for everything this year. You guys are amazing.

For now, though, have a good night, and as always, keep it spooky.