The October Records - A Month-Long Halloween Nightmare (Episode 3) - "Night Shift"

Check out our Halloween Pop-up Channel here.

The third recording reveals the gruesome deaths of three night-shift nurses at Mercy General Hospital, found arranged on morgue tables with their eyes mysteriously missing—not removed, but as if they never existed. More disturbing still, the dead nurses continue working their shifts, caring for patients who invariably die within hours. Margaret's 3 AM investigation of the current hospital morgue confirms the impossible: the dead are breathing, speaking, and watching. Three modern nurses—descendants of the 1974 victims—have vanished, only to reappear working in the morgue, transformed into something between life and death. The hospital marks the third point of the Pattern, where the dying become the dead become the returning, and Margaret learns her role as the Blackwood witness: to document until drowning.


















Unlock an ad-free podcast experience with Caloroga Shark Media! Get all our shows on any player you love, hassle free! For Apple users, hit the banner on your Apple podcasts app. For Spotify or other players, visit caloroga.com/plus. No plug-ins needed!

Subscribe now for exclusive shows like 'Palace Intrigue,' and get bonus content from Deep Crown (our exclusive Palace Insider!) Or get 'Daily Comedy News,' and '5 Good News Stories’ with no commercials! Plans start at $4.99 per month, or save 20% with a yearly plan at $49.99. Join today and help support the show!

We now have Merch!  FREE SHIPPING! Check out all the products like T-shirts, mugs, bags, jackets and more with logos and slogans from your favorite shows! Did we mention there’s free shipping? Get 10% off with code NewMerch10 Go to Caloroga.com

Get more info from Caloroga Shark Media and if you have any comments, suggestions, or just want to get in touch our email is [e-mail]

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Calarugu Shark Media.

Speaker 2 (00:09):
Welcome to Ghost Scary Stories and the October Records, a
month long Halloween nightmare. This is episode three, night.

Speaker 3 (00:20):
Shift, October third, nineteen seventy four. Silas Crane. I've just
returned from Mercy General Hospital. What I found there? God

(00:40):
help us? All three nurses died last night. The night
shift found that dawn arranged on the morgue tables. Patricia Holloway,
Susan Cross, Jennifer Mills, all experienced nurses, all found with
their eyes missing, not torn out, not cut missing, as

(01:03):
if they'd never had eyes at all, just smooth skin
where their sockets should be. The morgue was locked from
the inside. No one had the key except doctor Ashford,
and he was performing surgery until four a m. But
here's what truly disturbs me. The day shift nurses claimed

(01:23):
they saw all three women complete their rounds this morning
after they were found dead. After they were placed in
the morgue. Patients in the cardiac ward reported Nurse Holloway
checking their vitals at seven a m. She was found
dead at five thirty. Patients who received care from the
dead nurses all died within three hours, all of them

(01:46):
fourteen patients, all drowning in their beds, their lungs full
of water, though they were nowhere near any source. The
hospital administrator wants to close the ward. Doctor Ashford refuses.
He says something is happening in the morgue, something that
started three nights ago when they brought in Eleanor Davidson's belongings.

(02:10):
There was no body, of course, just her clothes soaked
through with that black water. They stored them in the
morgue until Robert could claim them. That's when the temperature
started dropping. That's when the bodies started moving, not much,
just small changes, a hand in a different position, a

(02:32):
head turned the other way. And now the night shift
nurses are dead, but still working, still making their rounds.
The morgue has become something else, not a place for
the dead, a place where the dead prepare.

Speaker 1 (02:55):
Mercy General Hospital at three am is a liminal space,
even under no circumstances, the fluorescent lights humming, the distant
beap of monitors, the whispered conversations of the night staff.
But tonight, October third, twenty twenty five, it felt like
stepping into a photograph of itself. Everything present, but somehow hollow.

(03:23):
I'd come after listening to Silas's recording, unable to stop
myself from investigating. The Davidson House had been the first point.
The hospital I suspected would be another. The night security guard,
Thomas recognized me from library events. He didn't question why
I was there. October does that to people in Millbrook.

(03:47):
It makes the unusual seem inevitable. You hear about the morgue,
he said, It wasn't a question what's happening in the morgue.
Thomas looked down the hallway toward the elevator, his expression troubled.
Night nurses won't go down there anymore. Started three days ago,

(04:08):
September thirtieth, the temperature dropped twenty degrees. Overnight maintenance can't
explain it. The bodies, they're not staying put. Someone's moving them.
Something's moving them. We have cameras. Nothing shows on the footage,
but every morning they're different, arrange different. And the old ones,

(04:33):
the ones that have been there more than a day,
they're watching the dead. Don't watch these do their eyes
track movement, closed eyes following you around the room. Day
shift thinks we're crazy, but night shift knows. Night shift
has seen them. He gave me a key card. You

(04:57):
want to see for yourself, go ahead, but don't blame
me for what you find. The elevator to the basement
Morgue seemed to descend farther than it should. The digital
display showed b one, but the sensation was of going
much deeper. The doors opened on a corridor I remembered

(05:18):
from bringing my grandmother here years ago, but it was
different now. The lights were dimmer, the walls seemed to breathe.
The morgue door stood open. Inside, the temperature was arctic.
My breath came invisible clouds. Three bodies lay on the
examination tables, covered in white sheets. The sheets were moving,

(05:43):
not dramatically, just the gentle rise and fall of breath.
But the dead don't breathe. I approached the nearest table.
According to the tag, this was mister Jamison, aged sixty seven,
died of cardiac arrest two days ago. I lifted the
sheet slightly. His chest was indeed moving up and down,

(06:06):
rhythmic impossible. Then his eyes opened, not his eyelids, His
actual eyes opened, while the lids remained closed, as if
the eyes existed independently of the body. They looked at me,
focused on me, clouded like fog. She's coming back, mister

(06:29):
Jamieson said, without moving his lips. The voice came from
somewhere else, from the walls, from the air itself. Patricia
Holloway is coming back. She has worked to finish. I
stumbled backward into the second table. The body there, missus Chen,
according to the tag, sat up, the sheet fell away.

(06:51):
She was wearing a hospital gown that was soaked through
with black water, water that dripped upward, defying gravity. Turning
to the ceiling, three nurses for three points, she said,
in a voice like drowning. The hospital marks the convergence
where the dying become the dead become the returning. The

(07:16):
third body didn't move, didn't speak, but I recognized her,
Patricia Holloway, the night nurse who died in nineteen seventy four.
She looked exactly as she must have then, not decomposed,
not preserved, just suspended. Her eyes were missing, as Silas

(07:42):
had described, smooth skin where they should have been, but
somehow impossibly, she was watching me. I heard footsteps in
the corridor, measured professional the clip of sensible shoes on linoleum,
a nurse's walk three figures appeared in the doorway, nurses

(08:03):
in modern scrubs, but their faces. Their faces were wrong, too, pale,
too still, their eyes clouded white. We have rounds to make.
The first one said, Her name tag read s Holloway.
Susan Holloway, Patricia's daughter, I realized, who worked the night shift,

(08:25):
just like her mother had. The patients are waiting, said
the second m. Cross, another descendant. The pattern requires witnesses,
said the third J. Mills. They moved past me as
if I wasn't there, began checking the bodies, taking vitals

(08:46):
from the dead, recording measurements on charts that materialized in
their hands. Their movements were perfect, practiced. They'd been nurses
their whole lives, but they weren't alive anymore. When I asked,
when did you tonight, Susan Holloway answered, without looking up

(09:07):
from mister Jamieson's corpse. Three hours ago we were checking
on a patient in room three oh seven. The lights
went out. When they came back on, we were here,
but we still have work to do. The night shift
must continue. The patient in three oh seven, I said,

(09:27):
who was it? There is no room three oh seven,
she replied, not anymore not since nineteen seventy four, but
tonight it was there. Tonight, she was there, who eleanor Davidson.
She needed us to understand. The pattern isn't just about taking,

(09:49):
It's about replacing. For everyone taken, one returns, but they
return wrong. They return as part of the infrastructure, part
of the system. The hospital needs night nurses, so the
hospital creates them. I backed toward the door, but Susan

(10:18):
Holloway's hand shot out, grabbing my wrist. Her touch was ice.
You're the witness, she said, the Blackwood witness. Your grandmother
witnessed the second turning in nineteen twenty four. Your mother
was meant to witness nineteen seventy four, but she was
too young. So now it's you. You need to see,

(10:42):
You need to record, you need to remember. She released
me and returned to her impossible work. I fled through
the corridors up the elevator, passed Thomas, who asked no
questions about my pale face or shaking hands, out into
the October night, where the rain had started again. But

(11:05):
before I left, I stopped at the administrative office. I
needed to know three nurses had called in sick for
tonight's shift. Susan Holloway, Margaret Cross, Jennifer Mills. They'd all
complained of the same symptoms, dizziness, shortness of breath, the
sensation of drowning while dry. They never made it to

(11:28):
the hospital. Their cars were found abandoned on Route nine,
all three in different locations, all three with the engines
still running. The drivers were gone, no sign of struggle,
no note, just wet seats and the lingering smell of
stagnant water. But they were working their shift anyway down

(11:51):
in the morgue, tending to the dead, preparing them for
what comes next. When I returned to the library, I
found a medical chart on my desk, blank except for
a diagnosis written in water that was already evaporating. Condition
witness prognosis, terminal awareness, treatment document until drowning. The hospital

(12:19):
is the third point of the pattern. Three nurses taken,
three points marked twenty seven more to go. Tomorrow I'll
play October fourth. Tomorrow, I'll learn about Timothy Brennan and
his grandmother in the basement. Tonight, I'm researching the Holloway,

(12:40):
Cross and Mills families, all founding families, all with members
who work at the hospital, all with ancestors who disappeared
in October nineteen seventy four. The pattern isn't random. It's
following bloodlines, it's claiming debts that were incurred long before
any of us were born. And I'm beginning to understand

(13:03):
that every family in Millbrook owes something to the dark.

Speaker 2 (13:23):
Ghost Scary Stories is a production of Caloroga Shark Media.
Some elements of AI may have been used in this production,
but it was written, edited, mixed, and produced by Real
Live People. Executive producers Mark Francis and John McDermott