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I'm Amy Nicholson, the film critic for the LA Times. And I'm Paul Scheer, an actor, writer, and director. You might know me from The League, Veep, or my non-eligible for Academy Award role in Twisters. We come together to host Unspooled, a podcast where we talk about good movies, critical hits,
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Fear Daily is the brand new retro horror show that fans of the Magnus Archives, Black Tapes, and Archive 81 have been waiting for. Every day, from Monday to Friday, Fear Daily brings you two new stories of hauntings, monsters, cults, and killers, all from the 1990s or before. Some of them might even be true, if you know where to look.
Written by Brennan Storr of the Ghost Story Guys podcast, and narrated by Brandon Shecksnyder, creator of Southern Gothic, Fear Daily is pure, handcrafted horror from two veteran storytellers. With most episodes clocking in around 25 minutes or less, Fear Daily is bite-size horror at its very best. So, without further ado, please enjoy this episode of Fear Daily. And if you like what you hear, check it out and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.
from all over America to talk about... their ghost stories over time those communities all went dark except for one lone server that continues to operate somewhere in an unknown part of pennsylvania's rust belt a relic of 1990s veiled in mystery it is a digital archive of humanity's strangest encounters with the unknown as told by the people who experience them My name is Brandon Shecksnyder, and you are listening to Fear Daily.
together user altmelody posted August 9th 1998 From the ages of 11 to 14. aunt's house and great neck. It wasn't by choice, not that kids that age get a whole lot of choice in how their affairs are managed. My mom looked after me for the rest of the year while working full-time, so I guess she figured it was a way for her to get a little time off without... having to take me out of school. She probably also worried about the kind of things I'd get up to if I was left alone in the city.
It makes sense to me now that I've got a little distance from it. Back then, I hated it. In the run-up to the holiday, my friends would talk about the things they were going to do together, seeing Madonna and Bon Jovi at the Garden or... having sleepovers and what did I have to look forward to?
piano lessons and walks along Manhasset Bay with Aunt Amy. It wasn't that it was torture or anything. It just wasn't Madonna. I never minded going there with mom for Christmas because Not as much was happening at home when my friends would disappear into the cocoon of their family lives for a couple weeks. Besides, Aunt Amy had lived alone since Uncle David died in 1975, and even a selfish teenager knew you didn't leave family alone on the holidays.
They had a beautiful house across from Plum Point with big windows that looked out over the water. Sometimes at night, the three of us would all just sit there in the living room with lights off, Aunt Amy playing David's favorite songs on the piano while outside. snowflakes blanketed the bay. This past Christmas, we got a call from the Great Neck Police to let us know that Aunt Amy had passed.
The piano had been a focal point of her life, so I suppose it's only fitting she died sitting there, her hands resting on the polished ivory key. Being in Amy's house without her there wasn't as strange as I had expected. At least once during every visit, she'd run out to what had been David's favorite deli on Middle Neck Road and bring back dinner.
Standing in the living room with Mom as the afternoon light faded, I half expected her to walk in, shaking the snow from her hair. Of course, she was never going to walk back in there again. The kitchen was empty. Countertops wiped clean before her heart had given out. Mom and I couldn't bring ourselves to touch Amy's belongings that first day. Instead, we decided to have a meal in her honor.
The deli is still there, so we ordered the same thing she always used to. A pound of turkey, a pound of roast beef, a dozen slices of seeded rye, gravy. The elderly man behind the counter looked up from where he was writing our bill. He knew exactly who we were and offered his condolences. When our order was bagged and ready, he held his finger like he'd forgotten something. He kneeled down out of sight, knees popping audibly, and when he came back up, there was a can of baked beans in his hand.
Sometimes, he said, David used to like beans. Back at the house, Mom and I ate silently in the high-ceilinged kitchen. We'd made it back just ahead of the blizzard the radio had been threatening all day, and now wind howled at the double-paned windows. Once dinner had been finished and the leftovers packed up, we turned off the pot lights above the kitchen aisle and plunging the house into total darkness.
Together, we went into the living room and sat on the bay window's long bench seat to watch the storm. I leaned my head back against Mom's chest, listening to the tick of the clock. I miss her. Mom wrapped her arm around me. Me too, baby. We cried ourselves. I was laying on the bench seat in Aunt Amy's living room as wind whipped thick snowflakes back and forth across the bay. Next to me, I could feel the rhythmic rise and fall of Mom's chest as she slept.
Behind us, Aunt Amy was playing Leo Ornstein's A Morning in the Woods. My chest clenched with emotion and the tears came again. Wiping them away, feeling the hot liquid against my fingertips, I realized it wasn't a dream. I was wide awake but- the music continued to play. I so desperately wanted to look behind me to know if Aunt Amy was there.
sitting at her piano the way she always had, something told me not to turn that to see would be to bring this moment to an end. And I knew I didn't want that. Instead, I lay back on mom who shifted against me, getting comfortable again. Could she hear the music too, I wondered. Would she remember it all as a dream? I'd never ask. I breathed deeply, letting the music fill the silence as... The three of us watched the snowfall one last time.
subject gumdrops user quiet witness posted October 3rd 1996 The parking lot was full of media vans this morning. pack of blow-dried hairdos trying to get as close to the apartment building as the police cordon would allow. Word had spread quick. The gumdrop killer strikes again. This time, he left behind more than his usual locked door mystery. He left behind a living victim.
Cops hated the whole gumdrop killer name, so the fact it was their own fault is kind of funny. After details of the first couple killings broke in the news, Residents of high-rise apartment towers found dead in their beds, poisoned by an unknown toxin, their eyeballs missing. A reporter from the Times had managed to catch one of the lead detectives when he was half in the bag.
The reporter asked if the police had any idea what the killer wanted with the victim's eyes, to which the annoyed cop responded, maybe he eats him like fucking gumdrops, I don't know. The rest was history. Who am I? I'm nobody, unless you're a fan of comic books, in which case you might recognize my name as the anchor on one of your semi-favorite series. If you're not familiar with my business, an inker is someone who interprets the original artist's graphite work and, you guessed it, ink.
There's more to it, but I'm not here to give lessons on the finer points of the comic book industry. You've got Kevin Smith for that. I'm here because... I'm one of only two people alive who's seen the gumdrop kill. No, this isn't a confession. I'm not a killer of anything. It's hard for me to swat flies since I've always figured they've got as much right to be around as I do.
Lord knows, Lord knows, I wouldn't have made it out of short pants if the rules allowed for beating me to death as soon as I got annoying. The detective who interviewed me till sunup asked me not to speak to the media, and I won't. The last thing I need is that kind of attention. The only reason I'm posting this here is because if anything happens to me, I like the idea of my story not getting buried in some cardboard box at an LAPD lockup.
Why would anything happen to me? Because the gumdrop killer saw me too, and I'm not convinced the cops can do much against something like that. I'll start at the beginning. I moved into this a year ago after one of my dates pointed out that an invitation back to the house a grown man shared with his mother was always going to get an automatic no. It's a two-bed, two-bath, and a 20-story new build, so I'm the first person to live in my apartment, same as my neighbors in theirs.
The Comstocks, the couple visited by Gumdrop last night, had only bought their place last month. I hadn't met them before last night when I watched him die as something barely human plucked out his eye. The thing about living in a modern building like this is that everything looks the same. Same carpet on every floor. Same gray paint on the walls. Even the same apartment numbers, just with a two-digit prefix beforehand to denote the floor number. I'm 1020, my neighbor is 1022, and so on.
The Comstocks have, or at least had, apartment 1122. one floor above me. That's why when I stumbled out of a cab into the lobby of our building last night and hit the button for 11 instead of 10, I didn't notice for a while. You know that feeling when you've really got a load on, like your field of vision narrows to a point and all you can do is move toward that point.
It doesn't matter if you're on a crowded street with cars whizzing past, the only thing you see is what's at the end of that tunnel. burrito card, a bathroom, some poor woman who hopefully spots you before you can bother her with your idiot drunkenness. That's where I was last night. Completely moved on Singapore slings and desperate to get into my place so I could take a leak. I weaved my way down the featureless hallway, saw a 20 and went for the doorknob.
The competing interests of gin and a need to urinate completely bypassed any thought of a key, and walking into a darkened apartment laid out exactly like my own meant I didn't see anything to suggest I was anywhere but home. Inside the bathroom, I flicked on the light and halfway through a deeply gratifying piss, it occurred to me that someone had redecorated in the few hours I'd been gone.
There was potpourri on the toilet tank instead of stacked up issues of wizard and- The bar of soap next to the taps was a bright pink instead of the hairy white bar of dove that did double duty between my shower and sink. Nothing will cut through a gin fog like panic, and that's exactly what I felt in that moment. This wasn't my apartment. I had just broke and entered. Well, I didn't break anything, but I doubt the cops would be that discerning when they laid charges.
my stream finally reduced to a trickle. I wondered about the etiquette of flushing while committing burglaries, and that's when I heard sounds coming from next door, the bedroom going by the layout of my own home. I thought it was people fucking, so he listened a little more. It's been a while since I've had feminine company, but even drunk me knew that the process didn't sound like what I was hearing. It sounded like struggling, whimpering, and something else.
Something wet. Carefully, I stepped out of the bathroom, wincing at how long a shadow I was casting thanks to the bathroom light. The noises continued like I hadn't been... seen and I debated just sneaking back out the door and believing whoever lived there to wonder if they were being haunted by a ghost. with an enormous bladder. My curiosity won out, however, and I creeped toward the open bedroom door.
My footsteps were almost inaudible on the linoleum floors. I inched closer to the black doorway, hearing the struggling more clearly. Something was wrong. Really wrong. Dread blossomed in my chest. A spike of adrenaline burned away the rest of my drunk. Placing my hands on the doorframe, I leaned into the room just enough for my eyes to start adjusting to the dim.
The patio door was open, curtains across it, fluttering in a slight breeze. On the bed were two people. No, three. Two in the bed and one. The third figure. was barely a person. Enormous, muscled arms Pin the couple under the blankets like butterflies in a display case. Body was thick too, seeming rigid like the body of a beetle. Its legs were long and thin.
folded up under it like it was doing some kind of isometric hold. One of the figures, I'd later learn it was the husband Johnny, wasn't moving. The other is wife Anne was shaking. side to side, losing power with every moment as the third figure's head got closer to her face. The more the curtains blew, the more the light of the city filtered in, outlining the taboo.
in front of me. Something emerged from the third figure's mouth, long and slick, like a mosquito's proboscis. My stomach turned, threatening to announce my presence with a fire hose spray of slightly fermented Singapore. sling, the rest of me was frozen. Turns out, that's the third aft to fight or flight, freeze. All I could do was watch as the long, rubbery tubes split into two.
one settling on each of the struggling woman's eye sockets. There was that wet sound I'd first heard in the bathroom. I knew what it was now. sucking. The proboscis withdrew, tugging until the eyes popped right out, trailing long, thick cords of their own that could only be the optic nerves. The figure withdrew the proboscis quickly, snapping the stalks and sucking the stolen treats into its own mouth. I heard them popping wetly as it chewed. Oh, I thought dumbly. That's the gumdrop kill.
Having that conscious thought brought me back to my body, and the first thing I did was scream. Gumdrop's head snapped in my direction, his eyes a bright silver in the dark. I reacted by turning to... At the same time as I vomited what must have been a bright red fountain of pineapple juice gin and benedictine across the wall in front of me, out of the corner of my eye, I saw Gumdrop throw himself on the floor.
landing on his powerful arms. He moved toward me at an impossible speed, thumping forward like a combination of gorilla and insect. I couldn't outrun him. There was no way, but I was going to try. I passed the bathroom with gumdrops close behind. I was only feet away from the hall door. He was faster. I knew it in my heart. This was it.
Instead of feeling gumdrops landing on my back, I heard a grotesque, wounded cry, and I turned in time to see him scuttling back into the bedroom. Why wasn't he coming closer? It only took me a moment to figure it out. Shaft of light cast from the bathroom cut the hallway in half, his half and mine. Did he not like the light? He was still there, hiding in the dark. I could hear him breathe. To test my theory, I reached behind me, fumbling for the handle as I kept my eyes on the bedroom doorway.
When I found the door latch, I pressed down and pulled it open, brightness pouring in from the overlit hallway. pushing the darkness further back. For an instant, I saw Gumdrop's face, and it's gonna haunt me until my dying day. If his figure had barely been that of a person, his face was barely that of a man. Pale, blotchy, shot through with blue veins, his silver eyes. full of a deep hate I'd never known before.
Another roar followed by more frantic thumping and what sounded like one of the curtains being ripped down. People were coming out of their apartments now, drawn by the war cries next door. The cops. were not far behind, and I was held on suspicion for a couple of hours. Then a witness who lived in one of the apartments across the street came forward to say, They'd seen a man with huge arms and tiny legs climbing down the balconies on our building shortly after the screaming started.
After giving my statement, I was released from custody with the aforementioned stern warning about not spreading my story to the press. All the cops would tell me about Ann Comstock is that she survived the attack and had a crazy story about a monster kissing her husband before sucking out his eye. My guess is it wasn't a kid.
I'd bet next month's paycheck on the creature using that proboscis to inject something like a paralytic agent into his victims so he can take their eyes and whatever else it is he does to them. It's something you didn't get a chance to finish with Anne because I'd wandered into the wrong apartment. Now, the big question is, does Gumdrops know which apartment is the right one? And is he gonna come back before I can move?
Fear Daily is an independent podcast hosted by Brandon Shecksneider and written by Brennan Storr, with Joanna Smith serving as the consulting editor, audio production by Rachel Boyd and sound design by Southern Gothic Media. is a work of fiction names characters places and incidents are either products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously
dead, or to real events or locations, is entirely coincidental. Ad-free versions of Fear Daily are available now on your favorite podcast apps. For more information, visit fearedaily.com. But move fast before the server goes offline. What drives a person to kill? Is it uncontrollable rage?
Unbearable jealousy? Or is it something deeper? Something in the darkest corners of our psyche? Every Monday and Thursday, the Crime House original podcast, Killer Minds, dives... deep into the minds of history's most chilling murderers. serial killers to ruthless cult leaders, deadly exes, and terrifying spree killers.
I'm Dr. Tristan Engels, a licensed forensic psychologist, along with Vanessa Richardson's immersive storytelling full of high stakes, twists and turns. In every episode of Killer Minds, I'll be providing expert analysis of the people. Not just how they killed, but why. Killer Minds is a Crime House Studios original. New episodes drop every Monday and Thursday. Follow wherever you get your podcasts.
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