Episode 107: Cabin Fever
(Theme song and intro plays)
ALEX: The Black Tapes Podcast is an exploration of life, belief, faith, and occasionally the paranormal. This season we’re focusing our lens on the work of the Strand Institute and its enigmatic founder and president, Dr. Richard Strand.
Last week things took an interesting turn with Dr. Strand and the strange circumstances surrounding his wife’s disappearance, but first we head back to northern California to check on the Torres family. We’ll be telling the story of Dr. Strand and his mysterious black tapes cases in order, week to week. So if you haven’t listened to the first few episodes, go back and start there. We’ll be here when you get back. It’s the Black Tapes Podcast. I’m Alex Reagan.
(Music intro)
ALEX: Sebastian Torres went missing two days ago. His mother was waiting for him across the street from his school, like she always does, but Sebastian never came out. His teachers had no idea where he was. The school security cameras picked up nothing unusual, nobody lurking around the school grounds. An AMBER alert was issued immediately and both the California Highway Patrol and Los Gatos Police Department began their search. Because of our recent contact with Sebastian in the days leading up to his disappearance, Dr. Strand and myself were called into police chief, Stan Colins’ office for questioning.
ALEX: That was Tannis Braun. He’s one of America’s most noted psychics and parapsychologists. In the PNWS psychic episode, Braun was brought in to demonstrate his ability to a team of researchers in a laboratory at Berkeley. This was back in 1993 when he was a hot ticket on the talk show circuit. In this clip, he’s hooked up to an EEG or electro encephalogram sensor, a machine that measures brainwave patterns. In the room next door, there’s a simple wooden pinwheel, with various colors on it, the type of thing you find at the fair or in a casino. The pointer spins, randomly landing on various colors. Here he is with the researchers, trying to guess which color is on the wheel.
ALEX: Remember, Braun can’t see into the other room at all. There’s another researcher going in and out of the room, spinning that wheel after each guess. There are cameras and electromagnetic wave detection sensors in the other room. Braun gets the first one right.
ALEX: Braun was 3 for 3. This went on for 20 minutes. In the end, he got 88% of it right. Then, there was this.
ALEX: Yeah, it moved. It was fascinating. I asked Strand about it later that night when we met in his hotel room to discuss the case.
ALEX: Tannis Braun has been employed by police forces all over California and Oregon to assist in missing persons cases. In the last 15 years, he claims, and these claims are often backed up by the various law enforcement agencies of record, that he has successfully helped locate more than a dozen missing people.
ALEX: I contacted Tannis Braun through his agent. Turns out, he’s also a bestselling author ready to release his next book on paranormal phenomenon, The Ghost Within. He was familiar with the Black Tapes Podcast and he agreed to let us tag along on his search for Sebastian Torres. I asked him if Dr. Strand could come with us, but he said Strand would have to read about it in his next book. We met up on the outskirts of Portola State Park.
(theme music)
ALEX: Braun was a good hiking companion, his charming brand of self-help infomercial thinking and enthusiasm for unlocking human potential did strike me as a little hokey. But there was definitely something seductive about the man himself. When I got back to my hotel room, I went straight to my laptop. Braun was right. There were several reports of Lenin bi-locating, just before his death.
ALEX: A hiker and his dog found Sebastian Torres in an abandoned cabin in Portola Redwood State Park. Just 5 miles northeast of where Braun and I were looking the day before. Chief Colins didn’t have time to discuss the case with us, but here’s what we could gather. The cabin hadn’t been lived in for at least 65 years when the State of California took over the park. Occasionally, hikers would use the building for shelter from rain, but the cabin was so far off the main trail that most people didn’t know it was there. No one knew the history of the tiny structure. Some say a trapper lived there until the mid-1930’s, but there were no official records of ownership. Sebastian was found three days after his disappearance, alone, relatively healthy except for the fact that he couldn’t remember anything about how he got to the cabin and anything that happened while he was there. Once the initial investigation was complete, Tannis Braun received permission to do an onsite reading, to see if he could pick up anything about Sebastian’s abductor. He let me tag along.
ALEX: And I made a call of my own. I called Fred Barnes at the Three Rivers State Hospital and asked to speak with Simon Reese.
ALEX: I called back but Barnes told me Simon had been taken to his room and sedated. I went back through the photos on my phone, but I didn’t find anything new. I wanted to take another look at that cabin. And I needed a fresh set of eyes.
ALEX: And there it was. With the sun low on the horizon, the light came through a small cross section of cracks in the boards on the window. And on the opposite side of the cabin, clearly by design, the light hit the wall in the shape of a cross. Right in the middle of the arrangement of strange numbers and symbols.
ALEX: That was Richard Strand’s daughter, Charlie. She left that message with somebody at Pacific Northwest Stories a few days ago, while I was away in California. As soon as I got the message, I called her back.
ALEX: Let’s get back to the story of Sebastian Torres, found in the middle of an abandoned cabin, surrounded by sacred geometric symbols.
We did everything we could, but unfortunately, both of Sebastian’s parents have refused to speak with us. They said they just want to put all of this behind them. Nic says he’s just happy they’re not sueing. The police claim to have a few leads but so far no suspects. Chief Colins has warned us to, quote, stop getting in the way of the investigation. So where does that leave us? What does it all mean? Are there some mysteries that we’ll just never be able to solve? I can’t accept that. This stuff is too fascinating, I’m not ready to stop digging. Not even close.
ALEX: Next time, we discover that there may more than one kind of Ouija board. It’s the Black Tapes Podcast, I’m Alex Reagan. We’ll be back again in two weeks.
(music)
ALEX: Thank you so much for listening to the black tapes podcast, if you enjoy our show, please rate and review on iTunes, Stitcher, or wherever you found us. The Black Tapes Podcast is a National Radio Alliance and Minnow Beats Whale production, recorded in Seattle and Vancouver. Produced by Nic Silver, mixed and engineered by Alan Williams and Samantha Paulson. Edited by Nic Silver and Alex Reagan. Executive producers Paul Bae and Terry Miles.
ALEX: The Black Tapes Podcast is an exploration of life, belief, faith, and occasionally the paranormal. This season we’re focusing our lens on the work of the Strand Institute and its enigmatic founder and president, Dr. Richard Strand.
Last week things took an interesting turn with Dr. Strand and the strange circumstances surrounding his wife’s disappearance, but first we head back to northern California to check on the Torres family. We’ll be telling the story of Dr. Strand and his mysterious black tapes cases in order, week to week. So if you haven’t listened to the first few episodes, go back and start there. We’ll be here when you get back. It’s the Black Tapes Podcast. I’m Alex Reagan.
(Music intro)
ALEX: Sebastian Torres went missing two days ago. His mother was waiting for him across the street from his school, like she always does, but Sebastian never came out. His teachers had no idea where he was. The school security cameras picked up nothing unusual, nobody lurking around the school grounds. An AMBER alert was issued immediately and both the California Highway Patrol and Los Gatos Police Department began their search. Because of our recent contact with Sebastian in the days leading up to his disappearance, Dr. Strand and myself were called into police chief, Stan Colins’ office for questioning.
- COLINS: I appreciate you both coming in like this.
- STRAND: Anything to help.
- ALEX: Yes, of course. You have any leads?
- COLINS: All we know is that at 3 p.m., two days ago Sebastian Torres was seen putting on his jacket in the cloakroom at his school. He asked to go to the restroom on the way out, the monitor saw him go into the restroom, and when he didn’t come out, she went to check on him. But he wasn’t there. And no one saw him leave.
- ALEX: Could someone have abducted him and taken him through a window or something?
- COLINS: Only if the abductor was a skinny, six year old with a ladder. That window is tiny and 5 ½ feet off the ground. There’s no way an adult could fit through there. I’m not sure about Sebastian.
- ALEX: Well, how can we help?
- COLINS: Well, I understand Sebastian was on your television show.
- ALEX: It’s a podcast.
- COLINS: A what?
- ALEX: Radio. For the internet.
- COLINS: And I hear the subject matter of your show is kind of… dark.
- ALEX: It’s more of a documentary series.
- COLINS: Whatever it is, Maria Torres seems to think that you broadcast an interview with her son, without her permission and that could have sent some religious nutjob in Sebastian’s direction.
- ALEX: Well, we had her permission and I don’t see how our show could have that kind of impact. Like I said, it’s a…
- COLINS: Documentary series, right. You don’t think it’s possible that you might unknowingly influence the listener?
- STRAND: This is the attitude that has video games responsible for societal violence, it’s wrong thinking.
- COLINS: (scoffs) It’s as simple as bad people doing bad things, is it?
- STRAND: This goes back, well before Alex met Sebastian. His mother complained of feeling followed, that someone was stalking her son.
- COLINS: We already spoke to the father.
- STRAND: That’s not what I meant.
- COLINS: Robert Torres has an alibi.
- ALEX: Have you looked into Maria’s claims of a shadowy figure stalking her son?
- COLINS: Who called who in for questioning here?
- ALEX: I’m sorry.
- COLINS: A shadowy figure doesn’t sound good on an APB.
- ALEX: Right.
- COLINS: Are there any listeners who maybe took an unusual level of interest in your story? You know? Stalker types?
- ALEX: Nope. Not this time.
- (phone beeping)
- COLINS: Excuse me.
- COLINS (on phone): Yeah? Yeah?! Okay, tell him to come in.
- COLINS: I assume you two will be heading back to Los Angeles.
- ALEX: That’s it?
- COLINS: We’ll get in touch if we need to speak with you again.
- ALEX: We’re not from Los Angeles. You have our cellphone numbers. We’re staying at the Radisson until Sebastian shows up.
- COLINS: Well, let’s hope he does. Continental breakfast at The Radisson ain’t what it used to be.
- (footsteps, door opening and closing)
- TANNIS: Dr. Strand.
- STRAND: Braun.
- ALEX: Uh…hi? I’m Alex.
- TANNIS: Tannis Braun. How are you doing, Richard?
- ALEX: It was nice to meet you.
ALEX: That was Tannis Braun. He’s one of America’s most noted psychics and parapsychologists. In the PNWS psychic episode, Braun was brought in to demonstrate his ability to a team of researchers in a laboratory at Berkeley. This was back in 1993 when he was a hot ticket on the talk show circuit. In this clip, he’s hooked up to an EEG or electro encephalogram sensor, a machine that measures brainwave patterns. In the room next door, there’s a simple wooden pinwheel, with various colors on it, the type of thing you find at the fair or in a casino. The pointer spins, randomly landing on various colors. Here he is with the researchers, trying to guess which color is on the wheel.
- RESEARCHER: Okay, Mr. Braun, are you ready?
- TANNIS: Ready.
- (sound of wheel spinning)
- RESEARCHER: What color do you see?
- TANNIS: Red.
ALEX: Remember, Braun can’t see into the other room at all. There’s another researcher going in and out of the room, spinning that wheel after each guess. There are cameras and electromagnetic wave detection sensors in the other room. Braun gets the first one right.
- (wheel spinning)
- RESEARCHER: Good. How about now?
- TANNIS: Yellow.
- RESEARCHER: Very good.
- (wheel spinning)
- RESEARCHER: Now?
- TANNIS: Green.
- RESEARCHER: Impressive.
ALEX: Braun was 3 for 3. This went on for 20 minutes. In the end, he got 88% of it right. Then, there was this.
- RESEARCHER: Now?
- TANNIS: Yellow.
- RESEARCHER: Mr. Braun, do you feel like you are seeing the colors, as you do with your eyes?
- TANNIS: Yes.
- RESEARCHER: How is that done in your opinion? How do you think you’re able to do this?
- TANNIS: It’s easy. I’m in the room.
- RESEARCHER: You’re…in the room?
- TANNIS: Yes. I’m standing in front of a wheel, like you see on Wheel of Fortune, but it’s much smaller. Maybe the size of a large party tray. There appears to be some kind of small, electronic device to the right of it?
- RESEARCHER: Yes, that’s our EMF sensor.
- TANNIS: Fancy.
- RESEARCHER: Mr. Braun?
- TANNIS: Yes?
- RESEARCHER: Do you actually feel yourself in the room? Physically?
- TANNIS: Yes.
- RESEARCHER: Do you think you can move anything in there? Don’t exert yourself. Just relax, and concentrate.
- (sounds of something moving)
- RESEARCHER: Oh my god.
ALEX: Yeah, it moved. It was fascinating. I asked Strand about it later that night when we met in his hotel room to discuss the case.
- STRAND: He’s a fraud.
- ALEX: He seems harmless enough.
- STRAND: That’s the gift of the charlatan, they ease you into a sense of trust, take your eyes off the manipulation. It’s what magicians call misdirection.
- ALEX: He’s faking it?
- STRAND: Yes.
- ALEX: You know the police brought him in to help find Sebastian.
- STRAND: They also brought him in to find DB Cooper.
ALEX: Tannis Braun has been employed by police forces all over California and Oregon to assist in missing persons cases. In the last 15 years, he claims, and these claims are often backed up by the various law enforcement agencies of record, that he has successfully helped locate more than a dozen missing people.
- ALEX: Why would the police bring him in if he didn’t actually help in some way?
- STRAND: Tanis Braun is actually an outstanding detective.
- ALEX: That’s it? An outstanding detective?
- STRAND: He claims he’s had this so-called gift his entire life, and yet it wasn’t until the late 90’s that he found any success tracking down missing persons.
- ALEX: So he’s a late bloomer.
- STRAND: And then there’s the internet.
- ALEX: You think he’s just using the internet to find these people?
- STRAND: The information superhighway became super at precisely the same time Braun became successful. Our personal information was being encoded and uploaded in bulk. Laymen had access to information that was previously unattainable.
- ALEX: I suppose, but…
- STRAND: But what?
- ALEX: Well, there was this experiment done at Berkeley, where Tannis Braun was in this room…
- STRAND: (laughs) The one with the colored wheel?
- ALEX: Yes.
- STRAND: In the world of paranormal research, they call that bi-location, the ability to be in two places at once.
- ALEX: Okay, so, how was Braun faking it?
- STRAND: Have you heard of the Braun Institute for Higher Learning?
- ALEX: No.
- STRAND: It’s his foundation, it’s a nonprofit. But an unauthorized consumer report revealed they make a lot of money from celebrities. Take a look at his client list- its impressive how many famous people fall for this.
- ALEX: But what does any of this have to do with-
- STRAND: His foundation funded that experiment.
- ALEX: Really?
- STRAND: Well, not directly. But they support the American Institute for Psychic Research, and they conducted that experiment.
- ALEX: So…you think they lied.
- STRAND: Let’s say I’m not sure their controls were as tightly monitored as it should have been.
ALEX: I contacted Tannis Braun through his agent. Turns out, he’s also a bestselling author ready to release his next book on paranormal phenomenon, The Ghost Within. He was familiar with the Black Tapes Podcast and he agreed to let us tag along on his search for Sebastian Torres. I asked him if Dr. Strand could come with us, but he said Strand would have to read about it in his next book. We met up on the outskirts of Portola State Park.
- ALEX: You think Sebastian might be here somewhere? In the park?
- TANNIS: It’s one of the possibilities.
- ALEX: Despite what Dr. Strand says about him, Tannis Braun doesn’t seem like the type of person that would want to profit from others’ misery. He’s tall, almost as tall as Strand himself, and he walks carefully as if he’s perpetually looking for lost keys. But the thing I found most striking were his eyes, even when he wasn’t smiling his eyes made you feel like he was.
- ALEX: So…why here exactly? Is there something about this area of the park in particular?
- TANNIS: When psychics are asked to help find missing persons, we usually start by meeting their loved ones, those closest to the missing. In this case, that was his mother, Maria Torres. We ask to see their photographs, their diaries, their personal belongings…
- ALEX: Social media?
- TANNIS: Everything, yes. Anything to get a sense of who that person is- their essence. Then I focus and try in a manner of speaking to try and find their spirit.
- ALEX: That sounds challenging.
- TANNIS: It is! Think of the area we have to cover.
- ALEX: So, to be clear, are you saying that you had visions that led you here to the park?
- TANNIS: More like a pull. A feeling that I should be coming this way. I drove east from the city and found myself further from the spirit. As I drove back west, I began to feel closer to him.
- ALEX: When I see psychics on tv shows helping out police, I often see them talking about visions and dreams of the victim’s location.
- TANNIS: And that happens, certainly, but only when the victim is in close proximity to the psychic. When I was in Sebastian’s room, I had a very strong sense that he was in the presence of something very dark.
- ALEX: His abductor? Or captor?
- TANNIS: Worse.
- ALEX: What’s worse than that?
- TANNIS: Sebastian isn’t in the presence of someone sick. I can’t put my finger on it, but I get a sense of strong deliberation and dark intent.
- ALEX: When did you know you had this- gift?
- TANNIS: When I was three.
- ALEX: You remember things from when you were three?
- TANNIS: I remember a lot of things, our brains are quite remarkable. They have so much storage capacity, amazing capabilities and elasticity, things that most of us take for granted, or more likely never think about at all.
- ALEX: Untapped potential.
- TANNIS: Exactly. I believe that all of us have this gift to one degree or another, it’s like being athletically gifted. Some people are born able to throw or run or jump, but almost anyone can learn to kick a ball. I was born with this.
- ALEX: And what exactly is… this?
- TANNIS: My brain has been unlocked. From birth. Our brains record everything we’ve ever experienced, no matter how minute. But most of us don’t know how to access those memories. Imagine your brain as a giant storage facility, most of us have experiences that we file away haphazardly, in no particular order. So when our brain attempts to go back there and retrieve a memory- it’s inefficient, unable to find it admidst the clutter. But it’s all in there, somewhere.
- ALEX: So your filing system is more… organized?
- TANNIS: Most certainly. But more importantly, my retrieval system is more efficient. At the Braun Institute for Higher Learning, we help people enhance their minds. It’s all science.
- ALEX: But what about this other thing? This ability you claim to have? To see things outside yourself?
- TANNIS: Bi-location.
- ALEX: Yes.
- TANNIS: Did you know that Vladimir Lenin had this gift?
- ALEX: Lenin?
- TANNIS: Here’s a man who led a revolution of economics and philosophy. In 1923, after having suffered 3 major strokes, he was bedridden and unable to move or speak. Yet while he was in bed being tended to by several caregivers, there were numerous reports of people seeing him in his office at Gorki working at his desk. People saw him reading in his favorite chair, others saw him going through his papers. All this just months before his death.
- ALEX: You think Lenin could bi-locate?
- TANNIS: It’s all in the history books. You see it’s all connected. Once you unlock the mind, you can achieve great things: from leading a revolution to-
- ALEX: Finding a missing boy?
- TANNIS: Let’s hope so.
- ALEX: So there I was, walking in the woods with a relative stranger, looking for a missing boy and his abductor. Not something I thought I’d be doing when I started outlining this podcast. But I felt like I was kind of getting used to this stuff. Those woods, however, that was definitely an uneasy experience. It was just so far from the highway. And so quiet.
(theme music)
ALEX: Braun was a good hiking companion, his charming brand of self-help infomercial thinking and enthusiasm for unlocking human potential did strike me as a little hokey. But there was definitely something seductive about the man himself. When I got back to my hotel room, I went straight to my laptop. Braun was right. There were several reports of Lenin bi-locating, just before his death.
- ALEX: You know Tannis Braun’s bi-locating sounds an awful lot like the Simon Reese situation.
- STRAND: Tannis Braun and Simon Reese have a lot in common.
- ALEX: You don’t like him.
- STRAND: Who? Simon?
- ALEX: (amused) You know who I mean.
- STRAND: (Strand chuckles) I don’t….not like him.
- ALEX: I’m starving. Are you hungry?
- STRAND: I could eat.
- (Sound of zipper and Alex moving away from the microphone)
- STRAND: (pause) Did you… enjoy the park?
- ALEX: I did, actually. It was beautiful.
- STRAND: Good…great. (sigh) (pause) Are you going to keep recording, or….?
- ALEX: Oh, right!
- (Strand chuckles)
- (phone vibrating)
- ALEX: Hello? Thank you.
ALEX: A hiker and his dog found Sebastian Torres in an abandoned cabin in Portola Redwood State Park. Just 5 miles northeast of where Braun and I were looking the day before. Chief Colins didn’t have time to discuss the case with us, but here’s what we could gather. The cabin hadn’t been lived in for at least 65 years when the State of California took over the park. Occasionally, hikers would use the building for shelter from rain, but the cabin was so far off the main trail that most people didn’t know it was there. No one knew the history of the tiny structure. Some say a trapper lived there until the mid-1930’s, but there were no official records of ownership. Sebastian was found three days after his disappearance, alone, relatively healthy except for the fact that he couldn’t remember anything about how he got to the cabin and anything that happened while he was there. Once the initial investigation was complete, Tannis Braun received permission to do an onsite reading, to see if he could pick up anything about Sebastian’s abductor. He let me tag along.
- ALEX: So…how do you know Dr. Strand?
- TANNIS: I don’t. Not really.
- ALEX: But you’ve met. You recognized each other immediately.
- TANNIS: We’ve crossed paths several times of the years. Debated at conferences, always in a professional context. Yet, every time I try to arrange a meeting, even something social, he ducks me. In ten years, we’ve never sat down for coffee.
- ALEX: I think he drinks tea.
- TANNIS: Ah! That must be it!
- (Alex chuckles)
- TANNIS: Here we are.
- ALEX: So the officer outside said they found him here about noon, in the middle of the room. Just sitting in a chair, not tied up or anything. The door was unlocked. (pause) And these drawings- so eerie. Someone has a thing for creepy circles, but these other ones….I don’t know. (pause) Tannis?
- ALEX: Tannis Braun was standing in front of the wall on the dark side of the cabin, away from the light. I walked up to him. He seemed…entranced. He was just staring at something on the wall, lost in thought or contemplation. And that’s when I saw it.
- ALEX: Oh my god!
- TANNIS: You recognize it?
- ALEX: Yes! I’ve seen this exact same drawing. In Sebastian Torres’ bedroom. He drew it in black chalk or something in the back of his closet. It was smaller than this, though.
- TANNIS: Sebastian Torres didn’t draw this. And he didn’t draw the symbol on his closet either.
- ALEX: Okay, if Sebastian didn’t draw this, who did? (pause) It kind of looks like a….face. (pause) Are you okay? You’re kind of freaking me out here.
- TANNIS: This place is not (pause) good.
- ALEX: What do you mean?
- TANNIS: Something else is here with us.
- ALEX: It’s just us and the officers outside.
- TANNIS: It’s so… dark.
- ALEX: Maybe we should leave.
- TANNIS: It’s him!
- ALEX: Him who? The face in the drawing? Is it the face on the wall? Have you seen it before? TANNIS? What is it?
- TANNIS: It’s coming!
- ALEX: What’s coming?!
- STRAND: A demon.
- ALEX: I went back to the hotel to show Dr. Strand the photos of the crime scene. I thought he’d be as excited about this as I was, but he wasn’t particularly impressed.
- ALEX: A demon? Why does it always have to be a demon?!
- STRAND: (Strand laughs) It looks like somebody may have been trying to summon a demon.
- ALEX: You’ve seen this before?
- STRAND: You see the numbers on the side there?
- ALEX: Oh. Those are numbers?
- STRAND: Yes. Look at the configuration. How they’re arranged.
- ALEX: Yeah, I’m not sure I get it.
- STRAND: See how they’re placed around and outside the face? Here. It starts here.
- ALEX: Strand traced with his finger a pattern on the photo. The numbers were arranged randomly far outside the perimeter or the drawing
- STRAND: You see?
- ALEX: I’m sorry, I only see your finger.
- STRAND: It’s a pentagram. The face is exactly in the center of it.
- ALEX: Oh.
- STRAND: You see it now?
- ALEX: Yes.
- STRAND: It’s demonic. That face- it’s what’s known in ancient literature as an elemental.
- ALEX: An elemental.
- STRAND: There are so many names for it. Asog, Aka Manah. Grigori.
- ALEX: Grigori? That sounds familiar.
- STRAND: That was the demon Father Vincent claimed to have encountered. We heard it on the tape.
- ALEX: Oh. So this is the same demon?
- STRAND: The same arch demon, actually. Maybe. Whoever kidnapped Sebastian has a dangerous obsession with sacred geometry and demonic symbols.
- ALEX: Sacred geometry? Wasn’t Simon Reese involved with that?
- STRAND: Simon Reese was obsessed with it.
- ALEX: So whoever took Sebastian has the same obsession?
- STRAND: Apparently. Could you send me these photos?
- ALEX: Sure.
- STRAND: I’ll call Chief Colins and let him know he was right about the religion angle.
ALEX: And I made a call of my own. I called Fred Barnes at the Three Rivers State Hospital and asked to speak with Simon Reese.
- SIMON: Hello?
- ALEX: Simon. I want to ask you something. (pause) Where did you learn all of that sacred geometry?
- SIMON: You want to see him too?
- ALEX: I’m just curious.
- SIMON: You’re not just curious.
- ALEX: Okay, um, we found numbers …on a wall… in California. A pentagram just like the ones you drew in your room. I was wondering if you could…
- SIMON: It’s not a pentagram.
- ALEX: Then what is it?
- SIMON: Were those drawings in a church?
- ALEX: Sorry?
- SIMON: Did you find the numbers in a church?
- ALEX: No, it’s not a church.
- SIMON: Are you sure?
- ALEX: Yeah, pretty sure.
- SIMON: There are many different… places of worship.
- ALEX: Not this place.
- SIMON: Well, somebody was worshipping. Something.
- ALEX: If you could give me some insight into why a kidnapper in another state would want to draw similar symbols, I’d really appreciate it.
- SIMON: Kidnapper? The boy in San Francisco?
- ALEX: Yeah, that’s right.
- SIMON: They said on the radio that he was… unharmed.
- ALEX: Yes, he’s lucky to be alive.
- SIMON: (laughs)
- ALEX: Simon?
- SIMON: He’s coming.
- ALEX: Sorry?
- SIMON: (still laughing, singsong voice) He’s coming, he’s coming, he’s coming. he’s coming. he’s coming. he’s coming. he’s coming he’s coming.
- ALEX: Simon?
- SIMON: He’s coming. he’s coming. he’s coming. he’s coming.
- ALEX: Simon! Who’s coming? What’s coming? What are you talking about?
- SIMON: He’s coming he’s coming. He’s here.
- ALEX: Hello?
ALEX: I called back but Barnes told me Simon had been taken to his room and sedated. I went back through the photos on my phone, but I didn’t find anything new. I wanted to take another look at that cabin. And I needed a fresh set of eyes.
- (phone ringing)
- STRAND: Hello?
- ALEX: Hey! It’s Alex.
- STRAND: Oh, hello!
- ALEX: Are you free tomorrow morning?
- STRAND: Why?
- ALEX: Would you mind maybe taking a little drive?
- STRAND: To the cabin?
- ALEX: The cabin.
- (crunching leaves)
- STRAND: What are we looking for?
- ALEX: I talked to Simon yesterday.
- STRAND: Simon Reese? What for?
- ALEX: Well, I wanted to know more about sacred geometry from someone who actually believes in it.
- STRAND: So you asked a mentally ill person?
- ALEX: When you put it like that! (both laughing)
- STRAND: So why come back here? To the cabin?
- ALEX: I wanted you to see the numbers in person. Before somebody painted over them.
- (leaves crunching)
- ALEX: Simon asked me if this place was a church.
- STRAND: Way out here? That would be one devoted congregation.
- (leaves crunching)
- (door opening)
- ALEX: So that’s the symbol. The face that I was telling you about. It looks just like the one in Sebastian’s closet.
- STRAND: Interesting.
- (footsteps)
- ALEX: What is it?
- STRAND: Look at the way the sunlight is coming in through the boards over that window.
- ALEX: Okay.
- STRAND: Now, look at the light that it’s casting on the opposite wall.
- ALEX: Oh.
ALEX: And there it was. With the sun low on the horizon, the light came through a small cross section of cracks in the boards on the window. And on the opposite side of the cabin, clearly by design, the light hit the wall in the shape of a cross. Right in the middle of the arrangement of strange numbers and symbols.
- ALEX: So maybe this is some kind of church.
- STRAND: Maybe. But that would mean that wall is east. Which means that this wall over here…
- ALEX: Strand was standing in front of the large black stain of a face, the one that scared Tannis Braun.
- STRAND: This is south.
- ALEX: Okay, so what does that mean?
- STRAND: It’s supposed to be a kind of…door.
- ALEX: A door?
- STRAND: See, those numbers on that wall?
- ALEX: Yes?
- STRAND: Well, I sent the cabin photos you emailed me yesterday to a friend. It’s difficult to explain, but apparently those top lines are reiterations of the Golden Ratio.
- ALEX: Okay?
- STRAND: It’s a geometric ratio that’s been obsessed over by the greatest mathematical minds for thousands of years. Pythagoras. Keppler. And the rest. There are some who actually suggested that the golden ratio has… occult properties.
- ALEX: Occult? Like devil worship?
- STRAND: There was a widespread belief that God has built the universe according to mathematical principles- principles that he created. Everything works in a logic consistent with that, in perfect order.
- ALEX: Okay.
- STRAND: But according to certain facets of the Church, Satan’s one goal has been to usurp that mathematical order. To bring chaos to that order.
- ALEX: Alright?
- STRAND: And one of the ways he’s able to do that is by using or twisting the very mathematical principles God created. This equation, apparently, is folding the Golden Ratio over and over again, onto itself.
- ALEX: How does that work?
- STRAND: I’m not a mathematician, and I’m certainly not an expert in Golden Ration geometrics.
- ALEX: Okay. Best guess?
- STRAND: That by doing this within the context of the other equations below it, someone believes they’ll be able to create a…devil’s door.
- ALEX: A what?
- STRAND: Medieval churches used to have something they called a devil’s door on the north walls of churches. When a baby was baptized, he had to have a small door or opening in the north wall of the church to allow bad spirits to escape the child.
- ALEX: So babies were baptized here?
- STRAND: Probably not. According to my friend, these equations are quite different.
- (footsteps)
- STRAND: This particular door-
- ALEX: This particular devil’s door?
- STRAND: This particular door wasn’t designed to let anything out.
- ALEX: No?
- STRAND: No. This is the south wall. This one’s made to let something in.
- ALEX: What thing?
- STRAND: Something bad. (pause) You do realize that none of this is real, right?
- ALEX: Y- of course.
- CHARLIE: Hello, this is a message for Alex Reagan. I understand that you feel you need to drag my father into the spotlight to increase your ratings or whatever, but I’d like you to stop talking about me and my mother. ‘kay? Goodbye.
ALEX: That was Richard Strand’s daughter, Charlie. She left that message with somebody at Pacific Northwest Stories a few days ago, while I was away in California. As soon as I got the message, I called her back.
- (telephone ringing)
- CHARLIE: Hello?
- ALEX: Hello, Charlie? It’s Alex Reagan.
- CHARLIE: Hi.
- ALEX: I just wanted to say, I’m sorry if this story has impacted your life in a negative way. It was certainly not my intention.
- CHARLIE: (pause) My father’s an (bleeped out) but he didn’t kill my mom. He had nothing to do with her disappearance.
- ALEX: How do you know that for sure?
- CHARLIE: I just know. (pause) I just do. Please leave me and my dead mother alone.
ALEX: Let’s get back to the story of Sebastian Torres, found in the middle of an abandoned cabin, surrounded by sacred geometric symbols.
We did everything we could, but unfortunately, both of Sebastian’s parents have refused to speak with us. They said they just want to put all of this behind them. Nic says he’s just happy they’re not sueing. The police claim to have a few leads but so far no suspects. Chief Colins has warned us to, quote, stop getting in the way of the investigation. So where does that leave us? What does it all mean? Are there some mysteries that we’ll just never be able to solve? I can’t accept that. This stuff is too fascinating, I’m not ready to stop digging. Not even close.
ALEX: Next time, we discover that there may more than one kind of Ouija board. It’s the Black Tapes Podcast, I’m Alex Reagan. We’ll be back again in two weeks.
(music)
ALEX: Thank you so much for listening to the black tapes podcast, if you enjoy our show, please rate and review on iTunes, Stitcher, or wherever you found us. The Black Tapes Podcast is a National Radio Alliance and Minnow Beats Whale production, recorded in Seattle and Vancouver. Produced by Nic Silver, mixed and engineered by Alan Williams and Samantha Paulson. Edited by Nic Silver and Alex Reagan. Executive producers Paul Bae and Terry Miles.