February 11, 2025 • 29 mins
Ever wondered what happens when the supernatural collides with the everyday heroism of a loyal pet? Prepare yourself as Carmen Carrion leads you through the eerie happenings in Oak Grove Cemetery, where an ordinary Belgian Malinois named Scout faces a sinister new reality. A toxic spill awakens ancient horrors beneath the earth, and Scout's supernatural instincts kick into high gear, alerting him to the unnatural danger threatening his beloved Martinez family. As the ground heaves with the restless dead, Scout's unwavering loyalty and bravery become the family's last hope against the encroaching menace.<br><br>As the nightmare spreads, Scout's world begins to unravel in the chilling chapter "The Transformation in the Basement." Familiar faces and cherished pets undergo grotesque metamorphoses, turning a once peaceful neighborhood into a realm of chaos and fear. The danger hits home when young Nina, a member of Scout's family, starts transforming right before their eyes. In this gripping tale of terror, Scout stands alone in recognizing the threat, summoning every ounce of courage to shield his family from the insidious forces reshaping their world. Join us for a tale that casts loyalty and instinct into the heart of supernatural dread, where every shadow holds a potential nightmare.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome restless souls to Carmen's Crypt.
I'm Carmen Carrion, keeper offorgotten tales and curator of
nightmares.
You've wandered into my domainwhere each week, I unearth a
fresh horror from the depths ofhuman imagination.
In these darkened halls,stories wait like hungry shadows
(00:21):
.
Each tale.
We've collected whispers ofterrors, both ancient and new,
from crumbling mansions wheresomething skitters behind the
walls to that strange textmessage you received at 3am from
a number that shouldn't exist.
So gather close, the candlesare lit, the shadows grow long
and the witching hour is upon us.
(00:42):
Are you prepared to face whatlurks in the darkest recesses of
Carmen's Crypt?
Lock your doors, still yournerves and remember here every
fear comes alive.
This is Carmen's Crypt.
Your sanctuary of scares awaits.
(01:04):
Scout knew 67 words in humanspeech.
Most were simple things likesit, stay and good boy, but he
understood more complex conceptstoo, especially protect and
family.
The Martinez pack had chosenhim from the shelter three years
ago, when he was just ayearling Belgian Malinois with
(01:24):
too much energy and a fiercedrive to guard.
They didn't know that hismilitary working dog bloodline
had given him something extra analmost supernatural awareness
of wrong things, of dangers thatnormal dogs might miss.
He had proven himself.
The night he caught an intrudertrying to break in through
(01:45):
Lucas' window, and again when hedragged Nina away from a downed
power line in the backyard.
But those threats had beensimple, natural things.
His training could handlethings that made sense in a
world of normal shadows andeveryday monsters.
Now, as Scout lay on his bed inthe corner of Lucas's room, ears
(02:05):
pricked toward the distantsound of sirens, he caught a
scent on the wind that made hisprimitive brain howl in warning
Something was coming, somethingthat violated every natural law.
Every instinct bred into hisbones, and this time teeth and
muscle and loyal heart might notbe enough to save his pack from
(02:27):
what was rising from thecorruption-soaked earth of Oak
Grove Cemetery.
But Scout would die trying.
That's what good dogs do.
Scout's nose woke him first.
The night air flowing throughthe bedroom window carried
something that made his hacklesrise, a scent that shouldn't
exist in his territoryArtificial Sharp.
(02:51):
It burned the soft tissueinside his nostrils like
invisible fire.
His eyes snapped open, headlifting from his post at the
foot of Lucas's bed.
The wrongness pulled him to thewindow.
Below his pack's yard laybathed in moonlight, but below
their fence red and yellow lightstrobed through the trees near
(03:11):
Oak Grove Cemetery, the strangesmell grew stronger, carrying
undertones of scorched rubberand something else, something
that made his stomach quenchwith primitive warning.
A low whine escaped his throat.
Lucas stirred but didn't wake.
Good, the pup needed his sleep.
Scout's claws clicked softly onthe hardwood as he padded
(03:34):
downstairs, squeezing throughthe dog door Miguel had
installed last summer.
The night air hit him like awall of needles.
The massive thing that hadbrought the wrong smell lay on
its side across Maple Street,its silver skin gleaming wetly
in the emergency lights.
Scout knew trucks.
They regularly rumbled past thehouse, but this one was
(03:56):
different.
Warning symbol Scout didn'tunderstand decorated its flanks
and from its ruptured bellypoured a liquid that moved wrong
.
Scout's sensitive eyes caughtthe way it seemed to crawl
rather than flow, how it soughtout the lowest points in the
ground with an almost hungrypurpose.
The fluid cast its own light, asickly green phosphorescence
(04:20):
that made his fur stand on end.
Worse was how it smelled likedeath and lightning and rotten
eggs all at once, with anunderlying sweetness that
reminded him of the time Nina'schocolate milk had spoiled.
Men in bulky suits that coveredtheir entire bodies were
spraying foam on the spill, butthey couldn't stop all of it.
(04:42):
Scout watched in horror asrivulets of the glowing liquid
found the old drainage channelsthat led to the cemetery.
His keen ears picked up thesound of it eating through
ancient iron grates, a hissing,bubbling noise that seemed to
carry whispers.
The cemetery soil drank thepoison eagerly.
Scout could hear it seepingdown, down, down past roots and
(05:08):
rocks, past the wooden boxeshumans buried their dead in.
But worst of all was the changein the earth's scent.
The rich loam smell that hadalways marked this territory was
transforming into somethingchemical and wrong.
And underneath that wrongness,scout's sensitive nose detected
something else, movement Deepbelow the surface.
(05:32):
Things that should lie stillforever were beginning to stir.
A new sound made his ears prickforward the subtle grinding of
old bones shifting in theirgraves.
The sound was too soft forhuman ears, but to Scout it was
as clear as breaking glass.
He backed away from everyinstinct-screaming danger.
(05:54):
The chemical light was seepingup now through tiny cracks in
the oldest graves, castingstrange shadows that seemed to
reach for him with hungryfingers.
The wind shifted, bringing hima blast of pure wrongness that
made him gag Rot and chemicalsand something else, something
that spoke to the deepest partof his brain Of territory
(06:16):
violated and pack threatened,scout turned and ran for home,
his paws barely touching theground.
He had to get back to his pack,had to guard them because
somehow he knew that whateverwas awakening in those
poison-soaked graves would soonbe hunting for fresh meat to
join its twisted resurrection.
(06:37):
Behind him in the depths of OakGrove Cemetery, the earth
continued to shift and bubble asancient remains began to
transform into something thatshould never exist in the
natural world.
And deep below the surface, thefirst fragments of awareness
stirred in the chemical soupthat had once been formaldehyde
(06:58):
and preservatives.
Awareness and hunger.
The first signs of what wascoming appeared three days after
the accident.
Scout had been restless,spending hours pacing between
his packed sleeping rooms atnight, drawn again and again to
the windows facing Oak GroveCemetery.
The wrong smell hadn't faded.
(07:19):
It had changed, evolved intosomething that made his teeth
ache when the wind blew fromthat direction.
Miguel and Kimberly didn'tnotice anything wrong when they
let Scout out that morning.
They couldn't smell how the dewon the grass had turned oily,
couldn't hear the absence ofbirdsong that should have filled
the dawn air.
But Scout's nose told himeverything.
(07:41):
The chemical taint had spreadthrough the groundwater
threading through the soil likepoisonous veins.
He could smell it rising fromthe earth mixing with something
else the sweet copper reek ofold decay being pulled up from
the depths.
The Martinez family went abouttheir morning routine.
Nina, her long, dark hair,still wet from the shower,
(08:05):
shoveled cereal into her mouthwhile texting.
Lucas built a fort out of toastand eggs, making Scout strain
to catch any falling scraps.
But Scout couldn't focus ontheir family breakfast dance.
His attention kept draggingback to the window, to the
cemetery, barely visible throughthe trees.
Something was moving out there,something wrong.
(08:28):
He saw the first real evidencewhen Kimberly sent him out to do
his business.
A dead robin lay in the flowerbed, its body twisted in ways
that violated nature.
The bird's chest had split open, not from impact or predator,
but from within.
Its ribcage had floweredoutward like pale petals and
(08:49):
where its organs should havebeen, scout saw only a
glistening green-black mass thatpulsed slowly in the morning
light.
The smell coming from it madehim back away, gagging
Formaldehyde and rot, somethingthat reminded him of the liquid
from the crashed truck.
Worse was what he saw moving inthe mass tiny things like
(09:12):
maggots, but wrong, their bodiestranslucent.
They worked with horriblepurpose consuming and reshaping
the bird's flesh.
Even a scout watched.
He wanted to bark to alert hispack, but primitive instinct
kept him silent.
Making noise would drawattention.
Making noise would make itnotice them.
(09:34):
That afternoon Scout watchedNina playing with her phone in
the backyard, his anxietygrowing as she wandered closer
to the fence line.
The wrongness had spread.
He could smell it in the rootsof the oak tree, see it in the
way earthworms were writhing upthrough the soil, their bodies
distended and partiallycrystallized, leaving trails of
(09:57):
luminescent slime that burnedthe grass.
A neighborhood cat appeared onthe fence and Scout's heart
nearly stopped.
Miserous Henderson's orangetabby had always been plump, but
now its body was grotesquelyswollen, skin stretched, tight
and shining like plastic.
Its movements were jerky andwhen it opened its mouth to meow
(10:19):
, scout saw that its tongue hadtransformed into something
segmented and iridescent.
But worst of all were its eyes.
They had turned milky white,with tiny worm-like creatures
swimming in their depths.
That made Scout's vision blurwhen he looked too long here.
Kitty Nina called, reaching forthe cat.
(10:43):
Scout lunged, knocking her backjust as the cat pounced.
It missed her by inches,landing where she had been with
an unnatural heavy thud.
The sound it made wasn't acat's hiss, it was the wet
clicking of mandibles.
Scout Bad dog Nina scolded, butScout stood his ground.
(11:05):
Hackles raised deep growlsrumbling in his chest.
The thing that had been a catregarded them both with those
milky eyes, its body twitchingand rippling as something moved
beneath its skin.
Finally it turned and leapedaway.
Movements still wrong, stilljerky.
(11:28):
That night Scout lay awakelistening to the sounds.
No human could hear the subtlecrunch of transforming bones in
the distance, the whisper ofthings moving through soil and,
worst of all, the wet, hungrypulse coming from the cemetery.
The chemical, sweet stench wasstronger now, carrying notes of
(11:49):
meat and metal and madness.
In Lucas's room, scout pressedclose to his young charge's bed,
every muscle tense.
Outside, through the window, hecould see pale shapes moving in
the cemetery.
They weren't human shapesanymore and they were getting
(12:10):
closer.
The deer made Scout understandjust how wrong things had gotten
.
He found it at dawn, drawn bywet, sucking sounds coming from
behind the Martinez's gardenshed.
The stench hit him firstrotting meat and chemical
preservatives mixing withsomething else, something that
(12:33):
made his primitive brain screamdanger.
The deer was still alive, ifyou could call it that.
Its flesh had gone soft andpulpy, sloughing off in wet
chunks to reveal somethingwrithing underneath when muscle
and sinew should have been.
Scout saw only glisteningmasses of tissue that pulsed and
(12:56):
shifted like worms beneath atranslucent membrane.
The animal's eyes had melted,in their sockets leaking a
yellowish fluid that smoked whenit hit the ground.
Its mouth gaped open, jawdistended and hanging wrong,
tongue split into writhingtendrils that groped blindly at
(13:17):
the air.
But worst was how it moved.
The legs had split and fusedbones liquefying and reforming
into too many joints, allbending the wrong way.
As Scout watched, horror struck.
Its neck began to unravel likewet paper, spraying a mist of
(13:38):
chemical-tainted blood.
The spine was exposed, but itwasn't bone anymore, it was
something soft and ropey thattwisted with horrible purpose.
A sound made Scout whirl around.
Nina stood at her bedroom windowgetting ready for school.
His pack was still actingnormal, unaware of the horror
(14:01):
spreading through theirterritory.
They couldn't smell how thechemical taint had saturated the
soil, couldn't hear the wet,meaty sounds of transformation
happening beneath their feet.
The basement was the worst.
Scout could smell the wrongnessseeping up through the
foundation.
Sometimes in the darkest cornerhe caught glimpses of something
(14:24):
growing Wet, fleshy masses thatpulsed in rhythm with the
distant throbbing coming fromthe cemetery.
He had tried destroying them,clawing at the walls until his
paws bled, but Miguel hadscolded him and blocked off
access to that corner.
That afternoon Scout noticedsomething wrong with Miserous
(14:46):
Henderson's son, tommy.
The boy had been playingbasketball in his driveway, but
his movements were jerky andwrong.
When he turned to wave at Nina,scout saw that the skin around
his neck had begun to bubble andsplit, forming weeping sores
that leaked a familiar yellowfluid.
The smell coming off him waslike formaldehyde and spoiled
(15:09):
meat.
Nina didn't notice, but Scoutdid.
He saw how Tommy's fingers hadstarted to melt together, the
flesh becoming soft andtranslucent, saw how his eyes
had developed a milky film thatdidn't quite hide the something
moving behind them.
The boy's transformation hadbegun that night Scout heard it
(15:36):
the wet, sliding sound ofsomething massive moving through
the sewers beneath their street.
His ears picked up the meatypop and squelch of changing
flesh, the soft patter ofdripping fluids and, underneath
it all, a pulse stronger nowcoming from the Oak Grove
Cemetery.
(15:56):
The corrupted deer had beenjust the beginning.
Now Scout could smell othersneighborhood pets, wild animals,
even humans, all starting tochange the chemical catalyst
from the crash was spreading,turning living tissue into
(16:16):
something that violated everynatural law.
When Lucas came downstairs for aglass of water, scout pressed
against his legs, whining softly.
He could smell the taint in thetap water.
Now see the oily film it lefton surfaces.
His pack was drinking it,washing in it, unaware of how it
(16:39):
was preparing them fortransformation.
Through the kitchen window,scout saw movement in the
cemetery.
Pale, glistening shapes rosefrom the oldest graves, their
forms constantly melting andreforming like candle wax.
They weren't human anymore.
They were something new,something hungry, and they were
(17:01):
coming closer, drawn by theliving flesh they needed to
complete their metamorphosis.
The chemical, sweet stench oftheir approach made Scout gag,
but he stood his ground.
He was the pack's protector.
Even if he had to face thesehorrors alone, he would find a
way to save his family from thecorrupted thing that was
(17:23):
spreading through their world,consuming and transforming
everything it touched intomonstrous new forms of existence
.
In the basement, somethingpulsed in the darkness, wet and
hungry, growing stronger witheach passing hour.
Nina's transformation began atdinner.
(17:43):
Scout smelled it first, thatsickly sweet chemical reek
suddenly blooming under her skinlike a rotten flower.
She was picking at herspaghetti when the first spasm
hit.
Her fork clattered to the plateas her fingers began to soften
the bones beneath turning liquid.
(18:04):
Nina Kimberly reached for herdaughter, but Scout was already
there.
Hackles raised, watching inhorror as the change accelerated
.
Nina's scream turned wethalfway through, her jaw,
distended with a meaty pop,teeth falling like rain onto her
(18:26):
pasta as new ones, jagged andnumerous, punched through her
gums and numerous punchedthrough her gums.
The smell of formaldehyde anddecay filled the kitchen as her
flesh began to ripple and split.
Oh God, miguel grabbed Lucas,pulling him back as Nina's arms
(18:47):
elongated, the skin becomingtranslucent enough to see the
writhing masses beneath Her eyesrolled back, revealing only
yellowed whites that began toleak a viscous fluid.
Scout's protective instinctsscreamed as Nina's body started
to lose cohesion Her torso splitvertically, ribs spreading like
(19:08):
wet paper to reveal somethingpulsing inside, something that
had once been organs but was nowa mass of glistening tubes and
questing tendrils.
The stench of chemicalpreservation mixed with the
copper tang of blood.
Kimberly lunged for herdaughter, but Scout intercepted
(19:28):
her, knocking her back as Nina'sform collapsed entirely.
What rose from the puddle ofliquefied flesh was no longer
human.
It moved on too many limbs, itsbody, constantly shifting and
flowing like melted wax.
Nina's face remained stretchedacross a surface that rippled
(19:49):
with hungry purpose.
The thing that had been Ninalurched toward Lucas, but Scout
was there, teeth bared.
He could smell the cemetery'sinfluence in her, now the same
wrongness that had been growingbeneath their feet.
His barks echoed through thehouse as Miguel and Kimberly
fled upstairs, with Lucas,leaving Scout to face this
(20:12):
horror alone, led upstairs withLucas, leaving Scout to face
this horror alone.
The basement called to them.
Scout could smell how thewrongness had concentrated there
, forming something vast andhungry.
In the darkness, ninus'transformed body oozed down the
stairs, leaving trails ofdissolving flesh that smoked
against the wood.
(20:33):
The thing in the basement cornerhad grown.
What had started as smallfleshy masses had become a
pulsing mountain of corruptedtissue, tendrils of
chemical-soaked meat writhedfrom its surface and in its
center Scout saw something thatmade his primitive brain recoil,
(20:53):
a core of concentratedwrongness, glowing with the same
sickly light that had pouredfrom the crashed truck.
It was a heart, a new heart fora new kind of life, born from
chemical preservation androtting flesh, and it was
calling its children home.
Nina's form shuddered andflowed toward it, drawn by its
(21:17):
pulse.
Through the basement window,scout saw other shapes
approaching, the corruptedremains from the cemetery, the
transformed animals and humansall converging on this point of
twisted rebirth.
But they hadn't counted on adog's loyalty to his pack.
Scout launched himself at theheart, ignoring the tendrils
(21:41):
that whipped at his fur.
His teeth found purchase insomething soft and vital.
The taste was indescribableFormaldehyde and decay, and
something even more rotten,something that should have
remained buried.
But Scout held on ripping andtearing as the massive flesh
(22:02):
mass convulsed around him.
Nina's transformed body triedto stop him, but her new form
was unstable, still adapting.
Scout's primal instincts guidedhim as he fought, targeting
anything that moved with savageefficiency.
Above he could hear Miguelworking to start a fire,
(22:24):
following Scout's earlierattempts to destroy the growths.
The smell of gasoline cutthrough the reek of corruption.
The heart burst under Scout'sassault, spraying
chemical-tainted gore across thebasement.
The reaction was immediate.
Every transformed thing inrange began to collapse, their
(22:45):
borrowed animation failing asthe central core died.
Ninus' twisted form dissolvedinto a puddle of rapidly
decaying tissue.
The massive flesh mountainshuddered and began to deflate
like a punctured blister.
As Miguel's fire caught holdabove, scout limped up the
basement stairs, his fur mattedwith substances that defied
(23:09):
description.
The corrupted flesh was burning, filling the air with toxic
smoke.
But the wrongness was finallydying.
Scout could smell it retreating, the chemical poison weakening
as natural decay reasserteditself.
He found his pack huddled inthe front yard watching their
(23:30):
home burn, lucas's arms wrappedaround Scout's neck and for the
first time since the truckcrashed, scout allowed himself
to relax slightly.
They had lost Nina, but therest of the pack was safe.
The thing in the cemetery wouldrot away naturally now, its
(23:50):
chemical animation destroyed.
But that night, as fire enginesdoused the last of the flames,
scout's nose caught something onthe wind, a whiff of
formaldehyde and sweet decaycoming from somewhere new in the
city, somewhere else where thebarrier between life and death
(24:10):
was beginning to dissolve.
Three months after the fire,scout still patrolled their new
apartment complex with obsessivededication.
The Martinez family hadrelocated to the city's east
side, as far from Oak GroveCemetery as they could manage.
The insurance money hadn'tcovered much, but it was enough
(24:32):
to start over, away from thememories, away from the mass
grave that had claimed Nina.
But Scout knew better than torelax.
He smelled it first in thebuilding's laundry room, that
familiar sweet chemical tangmixing with the scent of dryer
sheets and fabric softener.
It was subtle, barely there,but it made his hackles rise.
(24:57):
The water it was in the wateragain.
That night Scout paced theapartment restlessly, watching
Lucas sleep.
The boy still cried for hissister.
Sometimes Kimberly and Miguelnever talked about what they had
seen, about how Nina's fleshhad melted and reformed into
(25:19):
something that denied nature.
They didn't discuss the mass ofcorrupted tissue they had found
in the basement or the thingsthat had risen from the cemetery
.
Humans were good at forgettinghorrors too big to face.
But Scout remembered, and nowhe could smell that wrongness
again.
Remembered, and now he couldsmell that wrongness again.
It was different this time,slower, more insidious.
(25:43):
The chemical taint had foundits way into the city's water
system, spreading through pipesand drain systems.
Every time someone took ashower or ran the dishwasher,
microscopic particles of thepreserved corruption worked
deeper into their flesh.
Scout saw the signs appearingin their neighbors.
(26:03):
Miserous Alvarez and 4B haddeveloped a limp, her ankle
swelling with something thatmoved beneath her skin.
The Baker twins on the secondfloor had started speaking in
unison, their voices taking on awet, bubbling quality, and
sometimes late at night Scoutheard sounds from the walls, the
(26:25):
subtle squish and pop of tissuebeginning to transform.
The maintenance man found thefirst growth in the basement
yesterday a small glisteningmass of flesh clinging to a
water pipe.
He had scraped it off, cursingabout mold, not noticing how it
had tried to crawl up his arm.
Scout had watched from thestairs, remembering the horror
(26:49):
that had claimed Nina, knowingit was happening again, but this
time would be worse.
The chemical corruption wasn'tconcentrated in one place
anymore.
It had spread through thecity's veins of copper and steel
, seeping into homes andbusinesses, pools and fountains.
Scout could smell it everywherenow, that sweet reek of
(27:13):
preserved decay.
That evening, as Lucas satdoing homework, scout noticed
the boy's fingers leaving wetmarks on his papers.
The skin was becoming soft,starting to weep that familiar
yellow fluid.
Kimberly was in the shower,unaware that the water running
down her back carried particlesof twisted life, eager to remake
(27:36):
her flesh, and Miguel's eyeshad developed that milky sheen
that Scout remembered from TommyHenderson.
Scout pressed his nose againstLucas's hand, whining softly.
The boy's scent was changingthe chemical sweetness blooming
under his skin.
Soon the transformation wouldbegin again, and this time there
(28:00):
would be no escape.
No fire could burn out aninfection that had spread so far
.
Through the apartment window,scout watched the city lights
flicker.
Somewhere in the distance, asiren wailed, the sound
distorting into something wetand organic.
The corruption was spreading,patient and hungry, carried by
(28:23):
every drop of tainted water.
Scout laid his head on Lucas'lap, feeling the boy's flesh
beginning to shift beneath hispalm.
He would stay with his packuntil the end, watching as
humanity dissolved and reformedinto something new, something
preserved, something endless.
In the bathroom, the showerkept running and Kimberly
(28:48):
started to scream.
And so, dear listeners, weemerge from another dark corner
of Carmen's crypt.
But remember the horrors you'veheard tonight are merely echoes
of the terrors that await inthe shadows of your own mind.
(29:09):
If you enjoyed your stay in thecrypt, why not invite a friend
to join us next week?
After all, fear is best whenshared.
Leave a review, if you dare, orshare your own tales of terror
on my social media.
Who knows, your nightmaresmight just become my next story.
(29:30):
Until next time, keep checkingunder your bed and remember.
Bed and remember.
In Carmen's Crypt, every fearcomes alive and no one is truly
safe.
Sweet dreams, if you can stillsleep at all.
Welcome restless souls to Carmen's Crypt.
I'm Carmen Carrion, keeper offorgotten tales and curator of
nightmares.
You've wandered into my domainwhere each week, I unearth a
fresh horror from the depths ofhuman imagination.
In these darkened halls,stories wait like hungry shadows
(00:21):
.
Each tale.
We've collected whispers ofterrors, both ancient and new,
from crumbling mansions wheresomething skitters behind the
walls to that strange textmessage you received at 3am from
a number that shouldn't exist.
So gather close, the candlesare lit, the shadows grow long
and the witching hour is upon us.
(00:42):
Are you prepared to face whatlurks in the darkest recesses of
Carmen's Crypt?
Lock your doors, still yournerves and remember here every
fear comes alive.
This is Carmen's Crypt.
Your sanctuary of scares awaits.
(01:04):
Scout knew 67 words in humanspeech.
Most were simple things likesit, stay and good boy, but he
understood more complex conceptstoo, especially protect and
family.
The Martinez pack had chosenhim from the shelter three years
ago, when he was just ayearling Belgian Malinois with
(01:24):
too much energy and a fiercedrive to guard.
They didn't know that hismilitary working dog bloodline
had given him something extra analmost supernatural awareness
of wrong things, of dangers thatnormal dogs might miss.
He had proven himself.
The night he caught an intrudertrying to break in through
(01:45):
Lucas' window, and again when hedragged Nina away from a downed
power line in the backyard.
But those threats had beensimple, natural things.
His training could handlethings that made sense in a
world of normal shadows andeveryday monsters.
Now, as Scout lay on his bed inthe corner of Lucas's room, ears
(02:05):
pricked toward the distantsound of sirens, he caught a
scent on the wind that made hisprimitive brain howl in warning
Something was coming, somethingthat violated every natural law.
Every instinct bred into hisbones, and this time teeth and
muscle and loyal heart might notbe enough to save his pack from
(02:27):
what was rising from thecorruption-soaked earth of Oak
Grove Cemetery.
But Scout would die trying.
That's what good dogs do.
Scout's nose woke him first.
The night air flowing throughthe bedroom window carried
something that made his hacklesrise, a scent that shouldn't
exist in his territoryArtificial Sharp.
(02:51):
It burned the soft tissueinside his nostrils like
invisible fire.
His eyes snapped open, headlifting from his post at the
foot of Lucas's bed.
The wrongness pulled him to thewindow.
Below his pack's yard laybathed in moonlight, but below
their fence red and yellow lightstrobed through the trees near
(03:11):
Oak Grove Cemetery, the strangesmell grew stronger, carrying
undertones of scorched rubberand something else, something
that made his stomach quenchwith primitive warning.
A low whine escaped his throat.
Lucas stirred but didn't wake.
Good, the pup needed his sleep.
Scout's claws clicked softly onthe hardwood as he padded
(03:34):
downstairs, squeezing throughthe dog door Miguel had
installed last summer.
The night air hit him like awall of needles.
The massive thing that hadbrought the wrong smell lay on
its side across Maple Street,its silver skin gleaming wetly
in the emergency lights.
Scout knew trucks.
They regularly rumbled past thehouse, but this one was
(03:56):
different.
Warning symbol Scout didn'tunderstand decorated its flanks
and from its ruptured bellypoured a liquid that moved wrong
.
Scout's sensitive eyes caughtthe way it seemed to crawl
rather than flow, how it soughtout the lowest points in the
ground with an almost hungrypurpose.
The fluid cast its own light, asickly green phosphorescence
(04:20):
that made his fur stand on end.
Worse was how it smelled likedeath and lightning and rotten
eggs all at once, with anunderlying sweetness that
reminded him of the time Nina'schocolate milk had spoiled.
Men in bulky suits that coveredtheir entire bodies were
spraying foam on the spill, butthey couldn't stop all of it.
(04:42):
Scout watched in horror asrivulets of the glowing liquid
found the old drainage channelsthat led to the cemetery.
His keen ears picked up thesound of it eating through
ancient iron grates, a hissing,bubbling noise that seemed to
carry whispers.
The cemetery soil drank thepoison eagerly.
Scout could hear it seepingdown, down, down past roots and
(05:08):
rocks, past the wooden boxeshumans buried their dead in.
But worst of all was the changein the earth's scent.
The rich loam smell that hadalways marked this territory was
transforming into somethingchemical and wrong.
And underneath that wrongness,scout's sensitive nose detected
something else, movement Deepbelow the surface.
(05:32):
Things that should lie stillforever were beginning to stir.
A new sound made his ears prickforward the subtle grinding of
old bones shifting in theirgraves.
The sound was too soft forhuman ears, but to Scout it was
as clear as breaking glass.
He backed away from everyinstinct-screaming danger.
(05:54):
The chemical light was seepingup now through tiny cracks in
the oldest graves, castingstrange shadows that seemed to
reach for him with hungryfingers.
The wind shifted, bringing hima blast of pure wrongness that
made him gag Rot and chemicalsand something else, something
that spoke to the deepest partof his brain Of territory
(06:16):
violated and pack threatened,scout turned and ran for home,
his paws barely touching theground.
He had to get back to his pack,had to guard them because
somehow he knew that whateverwas awakening in those
poison-soaked graves would soonbe hunting for fresh meat to
join its twisted resurrection.
(06:37):
Behind him in the depths of OakGrove Cemetery, the earth
continued to shift and bubble asancient remains began to
transform into something thatshould never exist in the
natural world.
And deep below the surface, thefirst fragments of awareness
stirred in the chemical soupthat had once been formaldehyde
(06:58):
and preservatives.
Awareness and hunger.
The first signs of what wascoming appeared three days after
the accident.
Scout had been restless,spending hours pacing between
his packed sleeping rooms atnight, drawn again and again to
the windows facing Oak GroveCemetery.
The wrong smell hadn't faded.
(07:19):
It had changed, evolved intosomething that made his teeth
ache when the wind blew fromthat direction.
Miguel and Kimberly didn'tnotice anything wrong when they
let Scout out that morning.
They couldn't smell how the dewon the grass had turned oily,
couldn't hear the absence ofbirdsong that should have filled
the dawn air.
But Scout's nose told himeverything.
(07:41):
The chemical taint had spreadthrough the groundwater
threading through the soil likepoisonous veins.
He could smell it rising fromthe earth mixing with something
else the sweet copper reek ofold decay being pulled up from
the depths.
The Martinez family went abouttheir morning routine.
Nina, her long, dark hair,still wet from the shower,
(08:05):
shoveled cereal into her mouthwhile texting.
Lucas built a fort out of toastand eggs, making Scout strain
to catch any falling scraps.
But Scout couldn't focus ontheir family breakfast dance.
His attention kept draggingback to the window, to the
cemetery, barely visible throughthe trees.
Something was moving out there,something wrong.
(08:28):
He saw the first real evidencewhen Kimberly sent him out to do
his business.
A dead robin lay in the flowerbed, its body twisted in ways
that violated nature.
The bird's chest had split open, not from impact or predator,
but from within.
Its ribcage had floweredoutward like pale petals and
(08:49):
where its organs should havebeen, scout saw only a
glistening green-black mass thatpulsed slowly in the morning
light.
The smell coming from it madehim back away, gagging
Formaldehyde and rot, somethingthat reminded him of the liquid
from the crashed truck.
Worse was what he saw moving inthe mass tiny things like
(09:12):
maggots, but wrong, their bodiestranslucent.
They worked with horriblepurpose consuming and reshaping
the bird's flesh.
Even a scout watched.
He wanted to bark to alert hispack, but primitive instinct
kept him silent.
Making noise would drawattention.
Making noise would make itnotice them.
(09:34):
That afternoon Scout watchedNina playing with her phone in
the backyard, his anxietygrowing as she wandered closer
to the fence line.
The wrongness had spread.
He could smell it in the rootsof the oak tree, see it in the
way earthworms were writhing upthrough the soil, their bodies
distended and partiallycrystallized, leaving trails of
(09:57):
luminescent slime that burnedthe grass.
A neighborhood cat appeared onthe fence and Scout's heart
nearly stopped.
Miserous Henderson's orangetabby had always been plump, but
now its body was grotesquelyswollen, skin stretched, tight
and shining like plastic.
Its movements were jerky andwhen it opened its mouth to meow
(10:19):
, scout saw that its tongue hadtransformed into something
segmented and iridescent.
But worst of all were its eyes.
They had turned milky white,with tiny worm-like creatures
swimming in their depths.
That made Scout's vision blurwhen he looked too long here.
Kitty Nina called, reaching forthe cat.
(10:43):
Scout lunged, knocking her backjust as the cat pounced.
It missed her by inches,landing where she had been with
an unnatural heavy thud.
The sound it made wasn't acat's hiss, it was the wet
clicking of mandibles.
Scout Bad dog Nina scolded, butScout stood his ground.
(11:05):
Hackles raised deep growlsrumbling in his chest.
The thing that had been a catregarded them both with those
milky eyes, its body twitchingand rippling as something moved
beneath its skin.
Finally it turned and leapedaway.
Movements still wrong, stilljerky.
(11:28):
That night Scout lay awakelistening to the sounds.
No human could hear the subtlecrunch of transforming bones in
the distance, the whisper ofthings moving through soil and,
worst of all, the wet, hungrypulse coming from the cemetery.
The chemical, sweet stench wasstronger now, carrying notes of
(11:49):
meat and metal and madness.
In Lucas's room, scout pressedclose to his young charge's bed,
every muscle tense.
Outside, through the window, hecould see pale shapes moving in
the cemetery.
They weren't human shapesanymore and they were getting
(12:10):
closer.
The deer made Scout understandjust how wrong things had gotten
.
He found it at dawn, drawn bywet, sucking sounds coming from
behind the Martinez's gardenshed.
The stench hit him firstrotting meat and chemical
preservatives mixing withsomething else, something that
(12:33):
made his primitive brain screamdanger.
The deer was still alive, ifyou could call it that.
Its flesh had gone soft andpulpy, sloughing off in wet
chunks to reveal somethingwrithing underneath when muscle
and sinew should have been.
Scout saw only glisteningmasses of tissue that pulsed and
(12:56):
shifted like worms beneath atranslucent membrane.
The animal's eyes had melted,in their sockets leaking a
yellowish fluid that smoked whenit hit the ground.
Its mouth gaped open, jawdistended and hanging wrong,
tongue split into writhingtendrils that groped blindly at
(13:17):
the air.
But worst was how it moved.
The legs had split and fusedbones liquefying and reforming
into too many joints, allbending the wrong way.
As Scout watched, horror struck.
Its neck began to unravel likewet paper, spraying a mist of
(13:38):
chemical-tainted blood.
The spine was exposed, but itwasn't bone anymore, it was
something soft and ropey thattwisted with horrible purpose.
A sound made Scout whirl around.
Nina stood at her bedroom windowgetting ready for school.
His pack was still actingnormal, unaware of the horror
(14:01):
spreading through theirterritory.
They couldn't smell how thechemical taint had saturated the
soil, couldn't hear the wet,meaty sounds of transformation
happening beneath their feet.
The basement was the worst.
Scout could smell the wrongnessseeping up through the
foundation.
Sometimes in the darkest cornerhe caught glimpses of something
(14:24):
growing Wet, fleshy masses thatpulsed in rhythm with the
distant throbbing coming fromthe cemetery.
He had tried destroying them,clawing at the walls until his
paws bled, but Miguel hadscolded him and blocked off
access to that corner.
That afternoon Scout noticedsomething wrong with Miserous
(14:46):
Henderson's son, tommy.
The boy had been playingbasketball in his driveway, but
his movements were jerky andwrong.
When he turned to wave at Nina,scout saw that the skin around
his neck had begun to bubble andsplit, forming weeping sores
that leaked a familiar yellowfluid.
The smell coming off him waslike formaldehyde and spoiled
(15:09):
meat.
Nina didn't notice, but Scoutdid.
He saw how Tommy's fingers hadstarted to melt together, the
flesh becoming soft andtranslucent, saw how his eyes
had developed a milky film thatdidn't quite hide the something
moving behind them.
The boy's transformation hadbegun that night Scout heard it
(15:36):
the wet, sliding sound ofsomething massive moving through
the sewers beneath their street.
His ears picked up the meatypop and squelch of changing
flesh, the soft patter ofdripping fluids and, underneath
it all, a pulse stronger nowcoming from the Oak Grove
Cemetery.
(15:56):
The corrupted deer had beenjust the beginning.
Now Scout could smell othersneighborhood pets, wild animals,
even humans, all starting tochange the chemical catalyst
from the crash was spreading,turning living tissue into
(16:16):
something that violated everynatural law.
When Lucas came downstairs for aglass of water, scout pressed
against his legs, whining softly.
He could smell the taint in thetap water.
Now see the oily film it lefton surfaces.
His pack was drinking it,washing in it, unaware of how it
(16:39):
was preparing them fortransformation.
Through the kitchen window,scout saw movement in the
cemetery.
Pale, glistening shapes rosefrom the oldest graves, their
forms constantly melting andreforming like candle wax.
They weren't human anymore.
They were something new,something hungry, and they were
(17:01):
coming closer, drawn by theliving flesh they needed to
complete their metamorphosis.
The chemical, sweet stench oftheir approach made Scout gag,
but he stood his ground.
He was the pack's protector.
Even if he had to face thesehorrors alone, he would find a
way to save his family from thecorrupted thing that was
(17:23):
spreading through their world,consuming and transforming
everything it touched intomonstrous new forms of existence
.
In the basement, somethingpulsed in the darkness, wet and
hungry, growing stronger witheach passing hour.
Nina's transformation began atdinner.
(17:43):
Scout smelled it first, thatsickly sweet chemical reek
suddenly blooming under her skinlike a rotten flower.
She was picking at herspaghetti when the first spasm
hit.
Her fork clattered to the plateas her fingers began to soften
the bones beneath turning liquid.
(18:04):
Nina Kimberly reached for herdaughter, but Scout was already
there.
Hackles raised, watching inhorror as the change accelerated
.
Nina's scream turned wethalfway through, her jaw,
distended with a meaty pop,teeth falling like rain onto her
(18:26):
pasta as new ones, jagged andnumerous, punched through her
gums and numerous punchedthrough her gums.
The smell of formaldehyde anddecay filled the kitchen as her
flesh began to ripple and split.
Oh God, miguel grabbed Lucas,pulling him back as Nina's arms
(18:47):
elongated, the skin becomingtranslucent enough to see the
writhing masses beneath Her eyesrolled back, revealing only
yellowed whites that began toleak a viscous fluid.
Scout's protective instinctsscreamed as Nina's body started
to lose cohesion Her torso splitvertically, ribs spreading like
(19:08):
wet paper to reveal somethingpulsing inside, something that
had once been organs but was nowa mass of glistening tubes and
questing tendrils.
The stench of chemicalpreservation mixed with the
copper tang of blood.
Kimberly lunged for herdaughter, but Scout intercepted
(19:28):
her, knocking her back as Nina'sform collapsed entirely.
What rose from the puddle ofliquefied flesh was no longer
human.
It moved on too many limbs, itsbody, constantly shifting and
flowing like melted wax.
Nina's face remained stretchedacross a surface that rippled
(19:49):
with hungry purpose.
The thing that had been Ninalurched toward Lucas, but Scout
was there, teeth bared.
He could smell the cemetery'sinfluence in her, now the same
wrongness that had been growingbeneath their feet.
His barks echoed through thehouse as Miguel and Kimberly
fled upstairs, with Lucas,leaving Scout to face this
(20:12):
horror alone, led upstairs withLucas, leaving Scout to face
this horror alone.
The basement called to them.
Scout could smell how thewrongness had concentrated there
, forming something vast andhungry.
In the darkness, ninus'transformed body oozed down the
stairs, leaving trails ofdissolving flesh that smoked
against the wood.
(20:33):
The thing in the basement cornerhad grown.
What had started as smallfleshy masses had become a
pulsing mountain of corruptedtissue, tendrils of
chemical-soaked meat writhedfrom its surface and in its
center Scout saw something thatmade his primitive brain recoil,
(20:53):
a core of concentratedwrongness, glowing with the same
sickly light that had pouredfrom the crashed truck.
It was a heart, a new heart fora new kind of life, born from
chemical preservation androtting flesh, and it was
calling its children home.
Nina's form shuddered andflowed toward it, drawn by its
(21:17):
pulse.
Through the basement window,scout saw other shapes
approaching, the corruptedremains from the cemetery, the
transformed animals and humansall converging on this point of
twisted rebirth.
But they hadn't counted on adog's loyalty to his pack.
Scout launched himself at theheart, ignoring the tendrils
(21:41):
that whipped at his fur.
His teeth found purchase insomething soft and vital.
The taste was indescribableFormaldehyde and decay, and
something even more rotten,something that should have
remained buried.
But Scout held on ripping andtearing as the massive flesh
(22:02):
mass convulsed around him.
Nina's transformed body triedto stop him, but her new form
was unstable, still adapting.
Scout's primal instincts guidedhim as he fought, targeting
anything that moved with savageefficiency.
Above he could hear Miguelworking to start a fire,
(22:24):
following Scout's earlierattempts to destroy the growths.
The smell of gasoline cutthrough the reek of corruption.
The heart burst under Scout'sassault, spraying
chemical-tainted gore across thebasement.
The reaction was immediate.
Every transformed thing inrange began to collapse, their
(22:45):
borrowed animation failing asthe central core died.
Ninus' twisted form dissolvedinto a puddle of rapidly
decaying tissue.
The massive flesh mountainshuddered and began to deflate
like a punctured blister.
As Miguel's fire caught holdabove, scout limped up the
basement stairs, his fur mattedwith substances that defied
(23:09):
description.
The corrupted flesh was burning, filling the air with toxic
smoke.
But the wrongness was finallydying.
Scout could smell it retreating, the chemical poison weakening
as natural decay reasserteditself.
He found his pack huddled inthe front yard watching their
(23:30):
home burn, lucas's arms wrappedaround Scout's neck and for the
first time since the truckcrashed, scout allowed himself
to relax slightly.
They had lost Nina, but therest of the pack was safe.
The thing in the cemetery wouldrot away naturally now, its
(23:50):
chemical animation destroyed.
But that night, as fire enginesdoused the last of the flames,
scout's nose caught something onthe wind, a whiff of
formaldehyde and sweet decaycoming from somewhere new in the
city, somewhere else where thebarrier between life and death
(24:10):
was beginning to dissolve.
Three months after the fire,scout still patrolled their new
apartment complex with obsessivededication.
The Martinez family hadrelocated to the city's east
side, as far from Oak GroveCemetery as they could manage.
The insurance money hadn'tcovered much, but it was enough
(24:32):
to start over, away from thememories, away from the mass
grave that had claimed Nina.
But Scout knew better than torelax.
He smelled it first in thebuilding's laundry room, that
familiar sweet chemical tangmixing with the scent of dryer
sheets and fabric softener.
It was subtle, barely there,but it made his hackles rise.
(24:57):
The water it was in the wateragain.
That night Scout paced theapartment restlessly, watching
Lucas sleep.
The boy still cried for hissister.
Sometimes Kimberly and Miguelnever talked about what they had
seen, about how Nina's fleshhad melted and reformed into
(25:19):
something that denied nature.
They didn't discuss the mass ofcorrupted tissue they had found
in the basement or the thingsthat had risen from the cemetery
.
Humans were good at forgettinghorrors too big to face.
But Scout remembered, and nowhe could smell that wrongness
again.
Remembered, and now he couldsmell that wrongness again.
It was different this time,slower, more insidious.
(25:43):
The chemical taint had foundits way into the city's water
system, spreading through pipesand drain systems.
Every time someone took ashower or ran the dishwasher,
microscopic particles of thepreserved corruption worked
deeper into their flesh.
Scout saw the signs appearingin their neighbors.
(26:03):
Miserous Alvarez and 4B haddeveloped a limp, her ankle
swelling with something thatmoved beneath her skin.
The Baker twins on the secondfloor had started speaking in
unison, their voices taking on awet, bubbling quality, and
sometimes late at night Scoutheard sounds from the walls, the
(26:25):
subtle squish and pop of tissuebeginning to transform.
The maintenance man found thefirst growth in the basement
yesterday a small glisteningmass of flesh clinging to a
water pipe.
He had scraped it off, cursingabout mold, not noticing how it
had tried to crawl up his arm.
Scout had watched from thestairs, remembering the horror
(26:49):
that had claimed Nina, knowingit was happening again, but this
time would be worse.
The chemical corruption wasn'tconcentrated in one place
anymore.
It had spread through thecity's veins of copper and steel
, seeping into homes andbusinesses, pools and fountains.
Scout could smell it everywherenow, that sweet reek of
(27:13):
preserved decay.
That evening, as Lucas satdoing homework, scout noticed
the boy's fingers leaving wetmarks on his papers.
The skin was becoming soft,starting to weep that familiar
yellow fluid.
Kimberly was in the shower,unaware that the water running
down her back carried particlesof twisted life, eager to remake
(27:36):
her flesh, and Miguel's eyeshad developed that milky sheen
that Scout remembered from TommyHenderson.
Scout pressed his nose againstLucas's hand, whining softly.
The boy's scent was changingthe chemical sweetness blooming
under his skin.
Soon the transformation wouldbegin again, and this time there
(28:00):
would be no escape.
No fire could burn out aninfection that had spread so far
.
Through the apartment window,scout watched the city lights
flicker.
Somewhere in the distance, asiren wailed, the sound
distorting into something wetand organic.
The corruption was spreading,patient and hungry, carried by
(28:23):
every drop of tainted water.
Scout laid his head on Lucas'lap, feeling the boy's flesh
beginning to shift beneath hispalm.
He would stay with his packuntil the end, watching as
humanity dissolved and reformedinto something new, something
preserved, something endless.
In the bathroom, the showerkept running and Kimberly
(28:48):
started to scream.
And so, dear listeners, weemerge from another dark corner
of Carmen's crypt.
But remember the horrors you'veheard tonight are merely echoes
of the terrors that await inthe shadows of your own mind.
(29:09):
If you enjoyed your stay in thecrypt, why not invite a friend
to join us next week?
After all, fear is best whenshared.
Leave a review, if you dare, orshare your own tales of terror
on my social media.
Who knows, your nightmaresmight just become my next story.
(29:30):
Until next time, keep checkingunder your bed and remember.
Bed and remember.
In Carmen's Crypt, every fearcomes alive and no one is truly
safe.
Sweet dreams, if you can stillsleep at all.
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