The October Records - A Month-Long Halloween Nightmare (Episode 7) - "Sunday Service"

Pastor Williams delivers a silent sermon at St. Mary's Church while his congregation hears screaming inside their heads—he's been screaming since Thursday though his mouth continues preaching. Seven congregants from founding families stand with clouded eyes as the church fills with impossible water, the congregation breathing liquid as if it were air. Past and present collide as churchgoers from 1924, 1974, and 2025 attend simultaneously, all witnessing the same horrific service. The church, built over the site of the original compact, becomes the seventh point of the Pattern as water pours from the mouths of the chosen seven. Margaret learns the terrible arithmetic: thirty souls must be given freely, taken by force, or everyone drowns when Halloween arrives.

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Episode Transcript

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

Speaker 2 (00:10):
Welcome to ghost Scary Stories and the October Records, a
month long Halloween Nightmare. This is episode seven, Sunday Service.

Speaker 3 (00:27):
October seventh, nineteen seventy four. Silas Crane, What happened at
Saint Mary's this morning? I don't have words, but I
must document it, must make myself write it down. Pastor
Williams began his sermon at ten am. As always, the
church was full. October always brings people to church, especially

(00:52):
this October. He opened his mouth to speak the call
to worship. No sound came out his mouth, moved his
lips four but silence, complete silence. Then Missus Patterson in
the front row began screaming, screaming, screaming and screaming until

(01:13):
her husband had to carry her out. She said she
could hear Pastor Williams inside her head, inside her skull.
He was screaming, had been screaming since Thursday. His mouth
was going through the motions of the sermon, but inside
nothing but screams. Others began to hear it too. One

(01:33):
by one, members of the congregation clutched their heads, some fled,
some collapsed, but seven remained. Seven members of founding families.
They sat perfectly still in their pews, eyes clouded, white,
mouths moving in unison with Pastor Williams, mouthing words none
of us could hear. When the service ended, or when

(01:57):
Pastor Williams finally stopped moving his mouth, those seven remained still, sitting, still,
mouthing silent words. They're still there now, six hours later.
The church doors won't open. We can see them through
the windows, but the doors won't open. And there's water,
water seeping from under the church doors. Salt water in

(02:19):
a church seven miles from the ocean. Pastor Williams is
standing of the pulpit, still mouthing words, still screaming inside
the heads of anyone who gets too close. The seventh
point has been marked. The church where our founders signed
their compact. The church built over the original settlement. The

(02:39):
church that was meant to be protection has become a
mouth that speaks horrors without sound.

Speaker 1 (02:51):
October seventh, twenty twenty five, Sunday. I played the recording
at dawn alone in my office. As the first light
filled through the windows outside. I could hear church bells,
all of them, every church in Millbrook, ringing at once,
though it was only six am. They rang thirteen times,

(03:12):
then silence. Saint Mary's is the oldest church in Millbrook,
built in seventeen seventy five, one year after the founding.
The cornerstone supposedly contains soil from the Holy Land brought
by the first pastor, but there are older stories stories
about what the church was built on top of stories

(03:34):
about why the basement is sealed. Has been sealed since
eighteen twenty four. The current pastor, Williams, great grandson of
the nineteen seventy four pastor, is a young man early thirties,
full of progressive ideas about community and faith. He doesn't

(03:56):
believe the old stories. Didn't believe them. I arrived at
Saint Mary's to find the parking lot full but wrong.
Cars parked perfectly, but several were models from the nineteen seventies,
others from the nineteen twenties, all in pristine condition, as

(04:17):
if they just rolled off the assembly line from different decades.
The church doors stood open. Inside, the congregation was already seated,
but like the cars, they were wrong. Different eras of fashion,
all perfect, all new. A woman in a nineteen twenties
flap address, A man in a nineteen seventies leisure suit

(04:42):
children in Victorian's Sunday Best, all sitting perfectly still, all
facing forward. Pastor Williams stood at the pulpit, and when
he saw me, his face crumpled with relief. He walked over,
grabbed my arm. Thank God, someone who can see it,

(05:05):
someone who knows this isn't right. Where did they come from?
They were here when I arrived at five am, All
of them from every October when the pattern has manifested,
all at once, all waiting for the service. As we watched,
more people entered, current residents of Millbrook, looking confused but compelled.

(05:30):
They took seats among the temporal impossibilities, as if nothing
were strange. I have to give the sermon, Pastor william said.
If I don't, something worse happens. I can feel it.
The words want to be spoken. What words? He showed
me his prepared sermon notes. The paper was wet, ink running,

(05:53):
but new words were appearing underneath words in a language
that predated human speech, the same words Timothy Brennan had
been learning in his basement. I won't speak these, Pastor
Williams said, I won't. Ten am arrived the congregation turned
to face him expectantly, all of them, even the ones

(06:16):
from different decades. Hundreds of eyes, some clouded, some clear,
all waiting. Pastor Williams walked to the pulpit, opened his mouth.
No sound came out, but I heard him inside my skull,
a voice that wasn't his voice, speaking words that weren't

(06:37):
his words. The compact renewed, the pattern acknowledged, the seven
stations of drowning confirmed, we who signed in blood and
salt water, we who traded depth for surface, We who
breathe air but dream of darker waters. The time of

(06:58):
choosing approaches, Sir, from thirty one from each line, the
old agreement honored, or the older hunger freed. In the congregation,
seven people stood, one from each founding family present, the Pattersons,
the Mills, the Ashford's, the Brennan's, the Crosses, the Hendricks,

(07:21):
the Davidsons. Their eyes went white, their mouths opened. Water
poured out, not a trickle, a torrent, impossible amounts of
water from human mouths. The church began to flood, but
the congregation didn't move, didn't flee. They sat in rising water,

(07:44):
still listening to the silent sermon, still watching past to
Williams's mouth.

Speaker 3 (07:49):
Move.

Speaker 1 (07:50):
The water rose to their ankles, their knees, their waists.
I tried to run, but the doors had closed. The
windows showed not October morning, but deep water, as if
the church had sunk to the bottom of the ocean.
Fish swam past the stained glass, Seaweed pressed against the frames.

(08:12):
Pastor Williams continued his silent sermon. The water reached his chest,
mine too. But we weren't drowning. We were breathing, breathing
water as if it were air. This is what they want,
he said, and I could hear him perfectly underwater. This
is the world they're bringing, where drowning is breathing, where

(08:36):
depth is height, where the sunken rises and the risen sinks.
The seven standing congregants walked to the walls and began
drawing symbols in the water. Somehow, their fingers left trails
in the liquid itself, the same symbols from Timothy's basement.
From the pattern. They were completing something, a ritual, a summoning,

(09:03):
a transformation. Then as suddenly as it began, the water vanished,
not drained, not evaporated, just gone. The congregation sat in
dry pews, clothes untouched by moisture. The seven returned to
their seats. Pastor Williams collapsed at the pulpit. When I

(09:23):
helped him up, he looked at me with eyes that
had seen too much. Every Sunday until Halloween, he whispered,
Every Sunday, the service will get longer, the water will
get deeper. More will stand and speak, And on Halloween,
all thirty will stand. All thirty will open the way

(09:45):
unless unless, what unless someone breaks the pattern. But breaking
it means it means choosing who drowns. The compact demands
thirty souls. If not give freely, taken by force. If
not taken by force, then everyone, everyone drowns. As I

(10:19):
left the church, I noticed something. The cornerstone, the one
supposedly containing holy land soil, was cracked. Water seeped from it,
black water that smelled of centuries old decay. I took
a sample. When I examined it under the library's old microscope,
I found it wasn't water at all. It was composed

(10:42):
of microscopic words, millions of them, all spelling the same
message over and over. The pattern remembers the pattern requires
The pattern returns Saint Mary's Church is the seventh point,
the spiritual center where the Compact was signed, now transformed

(11:03):
into a beacon calling something home. Tomorrow, I'll play October eighth.
Tomorrow begins the second week when isolated incidents become interconnected. Horror. Tonight,
I'm researching the original Compact. There must be records, There
must be some way to understand what our founders agreed to,

(11:27):
what they were so afraid of that drowning thirty souls
every fifty years seemed like mercy. But I'm beginning to
suspect the truth is worse than fear. I think they
weren't afraid. I think they were hungry for something the
deep water promised, And now two hundred and fifty one
years later, the bill is coming due.

Speaker 2 (12:06):
Ghost Scary Stories is a production of Calaoga 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