Loading summary
Transcript196 lines
- [00:00]
Ben
This episode of Haunted Cosmos is brought to you by Mount Athos Performance. Indigo Sundries Soap Company Design Butter Gray Toad Tallow Stone Crop Wealth Advisors and our supporters@supercast and patreon.com.
- [00:45]
Brian
Russia it is a country bigger than three continents, and it is a dark place. Or so it seems to be. It seems to me so unknown, a fairy tale place stuck in a different time and world where immeasurable wildernesses are interrupted by the odd settlement. And those settlements could range from a few ramshackle houses to forgotten brutalist concrete ruins from a checkered past and even up to colorful castles that inspire the mind. It's a dream world, an ocean of unknowns painted green and brown and gray. It is a rope tugged between the two poles of Europe and Asia, the Great west, the greatest of the East. And the strain of this tug of war has left its marks on the land, a tossing here and there between pagan history and Christian settlement, and godless communist uprisings has beaten the country to a pulp time and time again, leaving it bloodied in the face and bleeding out from the vitals. Yet it remains. It lingers on, sometimes confusedly, dancing its dance of Orthodoxy and dealing still with the rampant sin that few have been immune to in this modern age. Even its modernity shows signs of its incompleteness, for that is what Russia really feels like incomplete somehow. The metropolitan titans of Moscow and St. Petersburg shine with lights as bright as any major center of modern human development in our day. But bright as they may be, they cannot cover up the shadow over the bulk of the land again. It's like a fairy world, caught between what modern man wants to pigeonhole it into and what it actually is, what it perhaps used to be. And despite the body of glorious work it really can point to in the past, its courageous stands against the onset of Islam, its conquering of the Mongol hordes by the Christian czar, its tragic fight to the death in the first great war to end all wars. The thing it is perhaps most known for is a thing entirely separate from it, its time as the same land that bore the name of Soviet Union. The scars of the Iron Curtain remain today, both in its infrastructure and its lineages of people. How far back did Lenin and Stalin and the Bolsheviks set those Rifian countrymen? Well, who can say? But it must certainly be a long way. It was in this way, a library of Alexandria writ large, burning in the fires of a communist realm, losing uncounted volumes of tradition and knowledge and wealth and ethos with each passing minute that time of mystery, of debauchery, of death and of intrigue is perhaps what fuels so much natural speculation about what sorts of things could be lurking in that place that we haven't seen before. But it isn't just that. There's something in Russia's deep past that paints it all fuzzy as well. In southern Siberia, tucked tightly into a limestone cave, scientists found a fragment of bone in 2008. They took it for study, thinking it may be the remains of some very early human survivors in the region. But what they found struck them dumb. Closer inspection made them wonder whether or not the bone fragment was human at all. The DNA tests were all over the place, leading them to believe the finger belonged to a young female who was more related to Neanderthals than modern man, but who was nonetheless not a Neanderthal. Eventually, this subspecies of man, for that is what the materialist scientists called them, took on the colloquial name the Denisovans, after the cave in which they were first found. A race of humans or humanoids from the deepest stretches of time that could be imagined. And my disagreements with the evolutionary narrative and timeline aside, it is a fascinating find. Some other ancient cultures talk about a people who some think to be the old Denisovans, sages from the far north who bring knowledge and technology to the budding man in the Fertile Crescent. Giants and demigods of great power and lore. But of course, this is probably an overblown thing among the Graham Hancocks of the world. I would place very little stock in it and think it relies too much on a deep time view of history that I flatly rejected. However, it can't be denied that it is fascinating. Perhaps it betrays a longing in the collective subconscious of man to make sense of all the strangeness that comes to us from the badlands of Russia, because, my goodness, there is a great deal of strangeness there. In 1953, Vinyamin Dodin was wasting away in exile in the rugged lands of southern Siberia. In his past life, he had been a prominent Soviet scientist and lecturer whose contributions to the defense sector and the college education of the USSR's youth could not be overstated. In 20 years, he had authored 26 books on a wide range of engineering adjacent topics while teaching military engineers. But in 1940, that life came to a violent end. He somehow ran afoul of the government. The reasons for this falling out are unclear. Perhaps he discovered something he didn't like and threatened treason. Perhaps he said the wrong thing to the wrong person in the wrong tone, with no ill intent at all, whatever it was. Doden learned firsthand of the knife's edge. Everyone walks along at all times. Under a totalitarian communist regime. For 12 years, he drifted from Google gulag to gulag and prison to prison. He was put to harsh labor in even harsher elements and watched other prisoners he had come to love as comrades die under the iron rod of evil that was a constant black cloud above their country. Finally, he was placed in exile in a small hut next to a river called Ishimba, which was in a place whose precise location is difficult to determine from reports. It was either in the backwoods woods to the neighboring city of the modern day Zeleznahorsk, or it was in a defunct and abandoned territory to the north and west of Kirovskill. For my money, I'm going with the latter solely for the reason that it is a blurred out spot on Google Earth and therefore must have something to hide. At any rate, Dodin began living out his days in lonesome solitude in his hut on the banks of the small river. Too valuable to kill, too risky to keep near anyone else. And over a short course of time, the man started to settle into his new life. He learned to embrace the quiet, and he learned to find fulfilling enough company in himself and the animals that frequently came near to his home. He foraged and hunted. He cut wood and stoked a constant fire. He fished in the Ashimba and explored the forest. But he never got too close to the only settlement that was close to him, a place forgotten to time called Oimoilon. It is said in this place the Soviets would carry out unrecorded experimental weapons testing. Dodin did not know for sure whether those rumors were true, at least not at first. But he did think it strange that his overlords would let him live so close to a place with such a reputation. Yet he contented himself with exile and did not seek to thwart whatever it was the regime was or was not doing in Oimoilan. He had made peace with his life, but the objective truth was that it was no life at all. A part of him still knew that, and it aided his mind like a virus. On a June evening, Dodin walked on the shores of his river towards the alcove in the trees that contained his hut. The humidity of the day had given way to an almost crisp breeze as the last traces of the sun sank below the western inferno of trees. That same breeze, a torrent higher up in the heavens, had chased away all the clouds and faint pricks of twinkling light could already be seen dancing beside the moon in the royal blue sky. Night was coming on fast, but it was not there yet. Doden climbed a small hill which he knew would allow him to look over the river and trees for miles. On the opposite bank it was a small bald meadow of shinhai grass and wildflowers and scattered granite boulders from some disaster of yore. Often he would see deer there, but not on that night. While he climbed, he began to experience a ringing sensation in his ears. He was not hearing the ringing per se. Rather, he was experiencing it inside of himself. He figured it for a change. In his hearing that is always accompanied by a whine of recalibration from the brain. Only it didn't stop. The ringing grew in volume as he summited the knoll, and he soon discovered what he thought to be the source. But just what the source was, he couldn't actually say. I know it's confusing. Above the trees, over the river, a line of sight blocked by the sloping hill until moments before, there was a massive cylinder floating in the sky. It sang out with a hum that sat down deep beneath the high pitched whine he could still feel inside of his head in that first moment of seeing the strange thing. He also realized that nothing else was making noise in the forest of his prison. No bugs, no nesting birds or night owls, no rustling rabbits or squirrels. His world was eerily devoid of any noise besides the humming and the ringing. He turned his focus back to the unprecedented thing he spotted in the sky. The tubular body was turning quickly about itself. On its outside, it was entirely blank. Not a seam could be seen on the massive thing, save a sort of perforated ring around its perimeter near what Dodin assumed to be its aft side. In the growing darkness, it seemed to him to glow somehow in a dull, dim light that pulsated with the body's own rotation. As his eyes adjusted to the oddity, he found that he could send suddenly see inside of that aft end, the. The end closest to him, as if it was hollowed out and like a limbless tree that was opened at one side. Now, caught as if in a trance and unable to look anywhere else, Dodin watched as the craft moved towards him in the right mind he had remaining. He assured himself that what he was seeing was a test flight from some top secret aircraft being developed at Oimoilon. But he couldn't shake the worry that it was perhaps more than that. Or if it was that, that it was no mere test flight, and that it carried a payload meant for his ultimate destruction. But any doom he waited for never came. Instead, what happened next was entirely unpredictable. A solid disk, a few meters thick, but nearly as wide in diameter as the main cylinder slid out from the open end that faced Dodin. It spun and hovered near the craft as it reoriented itself to be perpendicular to the ufo, such that its two faces were pointed, one towards the sky and one towards the earth. Then it rocketed into the heavens and vanished entirely out of sight in an instant. Doden had never conceived of such motion before. He watched on, the noise in his head growing rougher and harder to endure. More disks exited the cylinder and flew up quickly, as did the first. Then, unceremoniously, the open end of the object closed, and the massive thing flew away into the night until it too vanished, but much more slowly. As Doden snapped out of his stupor, he began to hear the sound of animals again. The familiar noise of the breeze brushing reeds and grasses against one another were like white noise to his now immense fatigue. Suddenly he felt his body back grow warm, and he watched his shadows stretch out before him towards the west. He turned quickly to find that the sun was rising far away behind him. He had stood there watching this thing, an event he thought was only mere minutes for the entire night. He walked the short distance to his hut down the hill, too tired to think of what he had witnessed. When he arrived inside, he threw himself automatically down on a caught and slept in a dreamless sleep until the long summer day had gone deep into the afternoon. When he woke, he didn't have any conclusions. Indeed, he had few coherent thoughts about the matter at all. But he did have an irresistible urge to return to that hill again, to watch and wait should the strange craft come back. And it did. For many nights in a row, Dodin observed and documented the object with the vanishing discs that exited it. He took photographs. A thing that was perhaps the bravest thing Doden ever did in his life, given the circumstances and estimated the size and propulsion methods and purpose of whatever it was he was looking at. But these were mere guesses, and uneducated ones at that. Dodin knew nothing man made could move the way that this thing did, this zeppelin from another world. As the encounters piled up, the disks that exited the craft began to diminish in size, until they poured out at a size of what Dodin thought was 80ft in diameter compared to the much larger cylinder that he figured for over 650ft in diameter. As his nerve grew and he shook the trance that tempted him to hold still. Anytime he saw the object, he started trying to approach it closer. These attempts failed. However, each time Dodin began to descend the hill towards the thing, he became violently ill and suffered sharp pains in every single joint on his body. The thing had defenses, or some offensive, malicious wish to oppress him. Each time he came within range, one or the other or both must have been true. And then one day, the encounter stopped. Life went on for Dodin, back to the solitary monotony of exile in a forsaken land, until about a month after all of these things took place, KGB officers arrived at Dodin's door to rudely wake him one morning. Hearing the voices made him sure they had come to kill him. But they had not. They questioned him extensively about the things he had seen. He saw no compelling reason to lie, as death was nearly welcome to him at that point. And they took his camera from him and smashed it into some rocks outside before ripping up the film into tatters. Of course, he. This caused Dodin to conclude that he had seen some very secret military operation or test taking place. He assumed his life was spared out of goodwill or out of some remaining respect for the work that he had once done. Later, however, he was proven wrong. Later on, a man named Cheveleyov discovered the truth. Deep inside the records of the unrecorded site near Oymoylan that he had uncovered during. During the chaos of the toppling regime, he found reports of the very same events Dodin had written down in his journals. The reports, far from clearing the air, added instead to the dread of it all. The military had seen the craft and its disk children as well. They had feared them. They had experienced radio jamming and electromagnetic anomalies under the object's onset. They had even ordered the full evacuation of all personnel in the area. All except Dodin, of course. At one point, it was said they even tried to engage with the object to defend themselves. Two fighter jets fired missiles directly upon it, only to have the missiles turn course directly down to the earth at the final moments before impact. To this day, nobody knows what was seen over the trees of Siberia on those summer nights in 1953.
- [16:34]
Ben
Kamchatka is one of the furthest places east in the world. It is a forgotten peninsula pushing into the Pacific off the northern tip of Russia, with a massive bulk of sea between it and the mainland. It itself is a massive thing as well, covering an area of almost 180,000 square miles and containing on its surface an incredibly diverse collection of geography, flora and fauna. One section of it, for example, is a string of dormant volcanoes that lie in its southern portion and eastern coast. It is as close to a real life Mordor as one could possibly imagine, with enormous peaks soaring up from sea level to nearly 12,000ft, and then almost going completely back down to sea level in the valleys between. 16 such volcanoes overpower this landscape lost to memory, sending out their geysers like capillaries into the area surrounding them. A root system of hellish power veiled by a place frozen over completely for much of the year. In the very center of this ring of fire is there lies a lake named Konotskoye, whose outlet stabs between two mountains and flows directly into the Pacific Oceana Kalikiria if ever there was one, in the elder days of our middle Earth. And this lake is the eye of a nature preserve that envelops the mountains around it and even the valley of geysers cloaking their perimeters. It's one of the most untouched places in the world by man. But even here, traces of a forgotten path past can be seen in the form of old radio towers and sheds, no longer used and derelict after too many winters. For that, and for its apparent absence from man's entire history, it feels like a different planet entirely. It is cold in the waters of Kronoskoe. Even at the height of summer, they never get over about 60 degrees Fahrenheit. In the winters, the entire surface freezes to a deep depth of over a yard. Thick solid ice over a living place, giving only the appearance of death. Given the history of the place, or lack thereof, and its protected nature preserve status, it primarily serves as a massive laboratory for geologists and biologists of various disciplines. These scientists come expecting little action outside of whatever niche specialty excites them. Them do their business as they receive funding from larger universities and government ministries, and then leave the place much how they found it, entirely on its own. The illusion of nature's sole rule here dominated their romantic opinion of the peninsula for centuries. That was until the year 1970. In that year, a small group of hydrologists, four to be exact, were performing tests in Lake Kronoskoye under the banner of their sponsor, the Leningrad Hydrometeorological Institute. Three of these investigators were still graduate level students at the school, one of whom was named Valentin. The other two students have not been named in the records. The fourth member of the party and its leader was a recent graduate named Argokov. Given their desire for actual liquid to work with, they were there in the middle of August, marveling at the sharp Technicolor contrasts of deep blue, dreamlike green, and rugged black mountains with pure white on top around them. Near the end of their trip, the team of four entered the same motorboat together on an especially pleasant day. The research had gone well, while not exciting, and the nerves they all had in the early stages of the expedition had long since vanished, being replaced by quiet confidence in their competence as researchers and an eagerness to show off their findings. When they arrived back at school some days later, all that remained was to enjoy the final stretch of the trip and collect the final bits of data needed to round out the research and make the most of their funding. But not too much. After all, if they ever wanted to return to the crystalline waters of Kronoskoye, they'd have to prove only enough to prove that more work needed to be done, and, of course, by them. And so they padded along on top of the water to the tune of an old outboard. The breeze was at their backs, creating little ripples of chop in the water. But it was by no means a rough day. The four students, the four friends, laughed and talked and held their noses a bit high at the thought of the exclusivity of the group ever to have seen this place, let alone drive a boat across its surface. But with a sudden start, the mood changed. The wind seemed to still and stop in a single moment, forcing them to notice the silence all around them. It made the little engine after them sound like a diesel train, letting the world and any watching spirits know where they were, as if, strangely, they weren't allowed there. The student closest to it shut the engine down. The boat lunged forward and dipped its nose before bobbing up to right itself. No sound at all. Even the rumble of the geysers in the adjacent valley had gone still. No birds sang on their way to the sea, no echoes of waves lapping on the shore behind them. Then, as if summoned by the stillness, the group watched from their boat, which felt so insecure to them now as a great silver dome of water began to rise up about a half mile away from them. It bulged up slowly, a bone spur on the heel of the world, until it became its own detachment from the world, a pearlish and silvery oval thing. It was, they reckoned, at least 150ft in diameter at its thick middle. Something about it, something that transcended the pure surprise of it, terrified the researchers. The curiosity of the sudden quiet had been replaced with the new, nauseating weight of pure dread. The thing continued to slowly rise, hovering and humming but with a sound that one felt more than heard, the man in the back ripped hard on the motor's cable and snagged the reverse gear, slamming it home with a twist of his wrist. But as the boat started to back away at what they all felt to be far too slow a speed, the object started to crawl from hundreds of feet in the air towards them. As it did, the boat's motor stalled. The students, nearly paralyzed with fear, but not quite. Each grabbed an oar stashed on the bottom and began to frantically row. For another moment the surreal object continued to pursue them, but then it abruptly stopped and in the very same moment started moving the other way, out towards the desert of the Pacific and then on to the Bering Sea. After about a minute and a half of them rowing and watching the thing slowly hover away from them, it shot as if from a gun towards the north and east and disappeared from view. All in an instant. A second after it was gone into the void of the sky, the boat's motor spontaneously started again, still in reverse gear somehow and took the children back to shore, the shore which now made sound again as it fought the waves. The following year, according to later reports and affidavits from Agnarov, two of the team members died under strange circumstances. Their causes of death were never determined.
- [24:09]
Brian
In a world that isn't just stuff, our bodies are no different. They are embodied spirits. As part of God's creation, we are called to steward both body and soul, taking dominion over our health with purpose and care. Mount Athos Performance, a family owned company, embraces this calling. Their protein powders, pre workout formulas and supplements are crafted to build lasting strength by sourcing goat whey from their own goat farm. They deliver pure, nutrient dense products free from harmful additives. So whether you're striving for peak performance or simply pursuing a healthy life, Mount Athos equips you to cultivate strength for body and soul. Visit athosperform.com today and use code NCP20 for 20% off your order. That's athosperform.com and use code NCP20 at checkout for 20% off your order. How many demons, ghosts or vampires are lurking in your investment portfolio? If you're invested in the S&P 500, it's probably more than you think since it's full of companies that actively oppose your faith. Stonecrop Wealth Advisors is here to help. Their faith based portfolios redirect your hard earned dollars away from destructive agendas and into companies making a positive impact on society. Get the demons out of your portfolio and invest in God's kingdom while you grow your wealth. Contact Stonecrop Wealth Advisors today by visiting StoneCropAdvisors.com Haunted Cosmos investment advisory services offered through StoneCrop Wealth Advisors LLC, a registered investment advisor with the U.S. securities and Exchange Commission.
- [25:43]
Ben
Hey, Ben, I just read that our great grandparents probably experimented with butter on their dry skin as a moisturizer. Is that why you look so radiant?
- [25:52]
Brian
Maybe it's Grandma's butter recipe. Or maybe it's gray toe tallow.
- [25:57]
Ben
Their tallow products are 100% organic and naturally contain the good stuff your skin craves. No mystery there.
- [26:04]
Brian
So say sayonara, Sammy, to kitchen experiments. And say hello to healthier skin. Gray Totalo trusted by Skin envied by Great Grandma's Butter Recipe.
- [26:17]
Ben
For more information and to get a sample pack, check out graytoadtalo.com don't forget to use the code COSMOS15. That's all CapsCosmos15 for 15% off your order.
- [26:34]
Brian
Well, those were pretty cool stories, Russia, am I right? Always providing some weirdness, Russia.
- [26:41]
Ben
If you're looking for strangeness, Russia will do you a solid.
- [26:44]
Brian
We got Lake By Calling. We got Oimoylan, we got Doden. We got that last one.
- [26:49]
Ben
We got flipping USOs coming in.
- [26:51]
Brian
Hey, I was looking on Google Earth. Seriously, that island or peninsula, I can't remember the name of it now, even though you just said it over and over again.
- [26:58]
Ben
It's Russian sounding.
- [27:00]
Brian
So that's what, you know, Kamchata.
- [27:02]
Ben
Let's call it Putin.
- [27:04]
Brian
Putin.
- [27:04]
Ben
I don't know why I said Italian guy.
- [27:07]
Brian
Putin Peninsula.
- [27:08]
Ben
It's a me, a Putin, a peninsula. Go ahead.
- [27:12]
Brian
The Putin Peninsula, which is not the name Google Earth. It is so cool because it's seriously like this really green land. Because Google Earth doesn't show it with all the snow it normally has and just peppered with random volcanoes. It's not like a continuous range.
- [27:28]
Ben
Yeah, it's really cool.
- [27:29]
Brian
It looks like Mordor.
- [27:30]
Ben
Yeah, that's more. When you said that it looked like Mordor, I was like, oh, I can picture this.
- [27:33]
Brian
Yeah, it totally looks like Mordor. Yeah, very Calcarian even.
- [27:37]
Ben
What's the lake in? Is it Nurnan? Lake Nurnin.
- [27:40]
Brian
I just call her Mordor. Oh, to the. Which is how he supplied his.
- [27:44]
Ben
Yeah, that's how they grow their crops. They think like orcs need food too.
- [27:47]
Brian
This is the crazy thing, man. Look at the economy of Middle Earth and especially Mordor. Like, what is Sauron's agricultural method, you know?
- [27:56]
Ben
What I mean, here's what people often miss is that if you count the movies as canon, then the orcs had a concept of a restaurant because he said, looks like meats back on the menu, boys.
- [28:08]
Brian
That's true.
- [28:09]
Ben
How do orcs not get you picked? The orcs go to a. They're like, dude, let's go to Fazol.
- [28:13]
Brian
Yeah, yeah, you know, free breadsticks. I'll tell you what though, you know what I love about the books is that Tolkien does a really good job of dehumanizing the orcs to the max. Oh yeah. You know, but then, but then there's one conversation where they're standing over Frodo's body outside of she's lair and he's like, I think I'm gonna take my wife on vacation.
- [28:33]
Ben
Basically, like more or less.
- [28:34]
Brian
You're like, wait a second.
- [28:36]
Ben
Totally humanizes them.
- [28:37]
Brian
Yeah.
- [28:37]
Ben
And the next thing you know, they all kill each other.
- [28:39]
Brian
It's kind.
- [28:39]
Ben
They're Muslims.
- [28:41]
Brian
Clearly he meant them to be Muslims.
- [28:43]
Ben
I mean this isn't, this isn't. This is not a seman, but this isn't a sea where, where C.S. lewis is like, if they don't understand that the Calamans are Muslims, I will kill myself.
- [28:52]
Brian
There's two things I want readers to get. The lion is Jesus, the calormens are.
- [28:56]
Ben
Muslims, and the Muslims are stupid. Like that's pretty much Louis's view in a nutshell.
- [29:01]
Brian
Anyway, anyway, what do you think about that first story about the cigar shaped UFO and the discs flying out of it?
- [29:07]
Ben
My guy Doden, I have several, like favorite elements of a high strangeness story. One are USOs legitimately, because they're rare. They're very rare. It's like a rare charizard, which I don't even play Pokemon. No how that works. But the other is missing time.
- [29:26]
Brian
Yes, dude, missing time stories.
- [29:28]
Ben
There was a missing time story. I heard it was crazy emergency story mode. It was. This lady was in college and she was going to do a job interview and she lived in California and she was driving like an hour and a half from her university to get to this. It was a very important job interview, big opportunity for her. It was like in the film and editing world. So she had this. It was a big shot guy that was gonna interview her and like give her a shot. She doesn't own a car. Cause she like, you know, lived in the dorms, went to college. So she enlisted her friend who was another student and they both worked at the student newspaper. So they both like Were good friends, work together all the time. And he's like, yeah, sure, I can get off class early. I'll drive you up, you know, hang out, it'll be fun, come back, no big deal. So they get ready, they leave, like, make sure gonna be on time, really important la. Like the traffic is crazy in California. So they go and on the way there, they, you know, just normal drive. Everything's completely. To them, normal, with one exception. And I'll, I'll circle back to it. But they get there, to this guy's like, mansion where he's going to interview this lady.
- [30:40]
Brian
First of all, young ladies, don't ever do this. If, if you ever get an interview invite to one guy's mansion.
- [30:46]
Ben
Yeah.
- [30:47]
Brian
Like, kindly reject the interview offer. Don't do it, don't do it.
- [30:50]
Ben
Or his offices. I think it was his actual mansion, but it could have been his offices, whatever. So she gets out.
- [30:56]
Brian
Was his name Jeffrey Epstein or Harvey Weinstein?
- [31:01]
Ben
It could have been either of those. So she gets out of the car, walks up to the place, guy's not even there.
- [31:06]
Brian
Yeah.
- [31:06]
Ben
And she's like, I drove an hour and a half, you know, to get here.
- [31:09]
Brian
Yeah, what the heck?
- [31:09]
Ben
And the secretary is like, no, he just left. Like he waited for you for over an hour and he was kind of miffed that you would blow him off like this. And she was like, what do you mean, what time is it? And she's like, it's six thirty or it's like 6:15 or something. Her interview is at like 4. 4:00.
- [31:26]
Brian
Must have been a summer day, a lot of daylight.
- [31:31]
Ben
So she.
- [31:33]
Brian
I don't know why I'm suddenly being a skeptic. I believe it to the bottom.
- [31:36]
Ben
She's like, mystified, completely mystified. Goes out, scratch her head. She's like, what happened? Goes out to the car. She's been gone for like a minute. And the guy, the guy's like, what are you doing back already? Like, this is crazy. He's like, we're an hour and a half late. We're an hour late, we're two hours late. Something like that.
- [31:50]
Brian
That's insane.
- [31:50]
Ben
And the guy left and he's like, what do you mean? Did you get the time wrong? She's like, no, I got the time right. Do you know what time it is right now? And he's like, it's four. It's like 4:15, 4:00, fourth, whatever it was. And she's like, no, no, it's 6:00. They confirm it like, look at every. You know, go check other places. Anyway, they drive back to the dorm, and they're talking the whole way, like, how in the heck. What happened? How did this happen? And she's like, did anything weird happen? Like, was there a bunch of traffic and we lost track of time? And he was like, no, it was a normal drive. We left at the time of day when it was nothing strange happened. He's like, the only weird thing was that there was that car, that VW bus on the side of the road, but that couldn't have slowed us down. And she was like, what do you mean? And he's like, yeah, there was the VW bus. It had flipped over, gotten in a wreck. It was on fire. And she was like, I. I didn't see that.
- [32:43]
Brian
What?
- [32:44]
Ben
Okay, so they get back. Everybody in the office confirms. In the newspaper office, all their friends confirmed you left at this time.
- [32:51]
Brian
Yeah.
- [32:52]
Ben
Multiple witnesses. You should not have been late. Nothing happened. And so this is their theory. Okay, this is the theory. They're like, we got abducted by aliens. First of all, see our published work? Yeah, the demons. And they inserted that for him, this really, like, sharp memory as like a cut point that would distract him from the insertion and ex filtration.
- [33:17]
Brian
Right.
- [33:17]
Ben
And she didn't notice it. Like, they did it wrong or only he got that part of the code in the brain dump. And so. And they. To this day, they have no idea. This is a true story. I heard the person who experienced this, both the woman and the man.
- [33:31]
Brian
Dude, that's nuts.
- [33:32]
Ben
The man who drove her, I'm pretty sure, is the guy who wrote the script for Mothman Prophecies.
- [33:38]
Brian
Are you serious? He's like a famous. He's a famous guy.
- [33:41]
Ben
He was on Astonishing Legends. They told this story because they were friends. One of the Astonishing Legends guys, Forest, he also worked at this newspaper, went to the same college at the same time. So they kind of vaguely knew each other. They weren't good friends, but he knew the friend group, and that's how they connected later over the Mothman script. And they were like, no. Do you remember this crazy story?
- [34:00]
Brian
Dude, that's nuts.
- [34:01]
Ben
It's a crazy story.
- [34:02]
Brian
You want to know what missing time.
- [34:04]
Ben
Stories are, like, so intriguing.
- [34:07]
Brian
They blow my mind. Part of why they blow my mind. So sure, you could do, like, the demon abduction thing. And I'm, you know, some of it. I'm sure that's what it is, but it does make one wonder, like, is there a way to slip in time? Now, CR.
- [34:20]
Ben
Published works.
- [34:21]
Brian
My Favorite. Which we like, didn't answer the question.
- [34:23]
Ben
We were like, we don't know.
- [34:24]
Brian
We just asked it over and over again. My favorite Time Slippage story, maybe not my favorite, but the most well renowned is Betty and Barney Hill, their area production. You remember that? Yeah, Maybe that's a teaser. Maybe we should do that sometime.
- [34:38]
Ben
We should definitely do it, if not.
- [34:39]
Brian
For a dusty tone, then for a main show.
- [34:40]
Ben
Yeah, we, we could do more of these kind of stories. Cause there's. There's another, you know, half dozen of them that I know that are pretty. Like, you get the creepypasta ones, but the ones that are pretty well provenanced are. They're out there, dude. They were pretty compelling.
- [34:51]
Brian
There was one that I saw on Reddit, so it must be true of. It was kind of similar. They were like driving around and stuff, but it was this lady and this, this wasn't Time slippage. It was like alternate timeline kind of thing. Yeah, this lady was driving alone at night. Maybe it was a guy, I don't know, alone late at night. He was pretty much all by himself on the highway. And it was in a rural part of town. He drives past a brand spanking new gas station that is a 24 hour gas station. So it's like. Well, no one's there, but it's very well lit. He can see that the manager is inside. Like it's dark enough to see through the window and the counter's right at the front. So he sees that someone's in there. He sees that all the pumps are working and whatever. He doesn't stop to get gas though. He keeps going. Later he's driving around that same route and it's like days later, middle of the day, other cars, other people. And there is no gas station at that same spot. And the ground is untouched.
- [35:47]
Ben
Like it's pasture land.
- [35:49]
Brian
Yeah, crazy stuff.
- [35:50]
Ben
That's super creepy. Yeah, I have more stories that come to mind, but.
- [35:53]
Brian
I know, me too.
- [35:54]
Ben
But we should stop with the first story. The time slip part's crazy, but the military engage. This is another theme that you see with these stories. Even up to the, the carrier, the naval pilot recently that tracked the tic Tac object. Like, they'll get them on Raider, they'll get them on flir forward looking infrared. They'll get them on all this stuff and then they'll get them on Raider, on Raider.
- [36:16]
Brian
Okay.
- [36:17]
Ben
And then they'll, they'll lose them. I said radar, Dr. Travis. They get them on Raider, they get them on that Raider. And then Thomas Winterton and I will go up to the mesa and then we lose them.
- [36:26]
Brian
Take the ufo.
- [36:27]
Ben
We get the ufo.
- [36:29]
Brian
Oh man. Yeah.
- [36:30]
Ben
No, but those are the crazy ones to me because we spend trillions of dollars in defense stuff in ways that we don't even know about with skunk works and whatnot. And yet some of these. It makes me think that again it's like a non physical and it does.
- [36:49]
Brian
The guys that come forward, the whistleblowers if you want to call them that, that come forward and say oh no, our government is in contact with extraterrestrial entities, demons and they're trying to reproduce their technology. It does make you go, well yeah, I could see why someone would say that. I personally am like sure, of course I think that a terribly corrupt government is in contact with demons and so why would there not be some kind of technological give and take. Yeah, very fascinating stuff. Well, hey, before we close, before we.
- [37:21]
Ben
Yeah, before we go USO and get out of here.
- [37:23]
Brian
Yeah. We did want to just quickly plug the upcoming new Christendom press conference. Safety Third Recovering the American will to greatness. I believe I'm getting that subtitle right. Is that right?
- [37:36]
Ben
That's right.
- [37:36]
Brian
Board member of New Christian Impress. You're going to want to come and for one reason and one reason only, there is going to be a massive New Christian Impress Games.
- [37:46]
Ben
Okay.
- [37:47]
Brian
That's not that you can qualify for and compete in to prove that you're.
- [37:51]
Ben
Stronger but that's the Hana Cosmos we're supposed to.
- [37:54]
Brian
We're doing a live show.
- [37:55]
Ben
Well, we're going to do a combo of new so the New Christian Impress games, there's a qualifier where you like go through this game, you know this exercise to. And if you're in the top 30 then you're going to get into the competition.
- [38:07]
Brian
You get a chance to compete and the big thing is that you have to lift Brian's mom.
- [38:13]
Ben
Dang it. He stole my joke. I was leading up to it. I was perfectly sober. Like wasn't going to get it away. I was going to say now I'm going to do the joke anyway because I tried to steal it.
- [38:24]
Brian
No, he's just copying that.
- [38:25]
Ben
That what we're going to do to try to one up the games which is attempting to steal our thunder is that during the conference we're going to be putting on a live episode of Haunted Cosmos with live sound design, live music.
- [38:35]
Brian
It's going to be awesome.
- [38:36]
Ben
It's going to be so much. We did it last year. We're going to do it even better this year. And that's the reason people are flooding Ogden, Utah from all over the world. The galaxy.
- [38:45]
Brian
It's for the live Hante Cosmos.
- [38:47]
Ben
But at the end of it, to one up the games that are trying to steal our thunder, I am going to be deadlifting.
- [38:54]
Brian
Ben's mom, Brian and I have tossed around the idea of doing some kind of physical challenge on stage.
- [39:01]
Ben
As a joke.
- [39:01]
Brian
As a joke. Because we're not going to be winners of the new Christmas.
- [39:06]
Ben
We're not going to win. Like, I'm hoping to make it into the 30 and I did the qualifying work and then the first time yesterday, I don't even know if I'd have time.
- [39:14]
Brian
That'd be a king move, dude, to make it.
- [39:16]
Ben
To make it. Like, I don't have time. And I did the workout. I did better than I expected to.
- [39:20]
Brian
Yeah, you did really good.
- [39:21]
Ben
But it was like, I'm in pain right now and I have exercise induced asthma. So if I do anything very cardiovascular, then I cough and get like swollen airways for hours.
- [39:35]
Brian
I have exercise induced asthma.
- [39:37]
Ben
Thank you, Ben, for mocking my. I'm pretty sure Brian, like, if I lifted Ben's mom, I would be coughing for hours. Okay.
- [39:43]
Brian
I'm pretty sure Brian did better in the qualifier than I could. I don't know, a month of prep. So I, you know, I kid.
- [39:49]
Ben
My pack is like my lats.
- [39:51]
Brian
Dude, that man. Anyway, hey, this man house over here did really, really good.
- [39:55]
Ben
Newchristenimpress.com 2025 link in the description. That's where you can go to get tickets to the conference. Come hang out with us in August. It's going to be a great time. Whole family's welcome. It's a family deal. Family and children.
- [40:07]
Brian
We have great family deals. Oh yeah, we have great deals for kids, you know, and I don't mean just little tiny kids, like even up to, you know, a good age where they're quite big. So, yeah, think about coming. It's going to be an awesome time. You're going to get to meet and hang out with Brian and I regularly.
- [40:21]
Ben
We'll be like signing books and doing.
- [40:22]
Brian
All sorts of stuff and signing babies.
- [40:24]
Ben
You know, I sign any baby I see.
- [40:26]
Brian
Like without asking, I sign it and then I baptize it. Wow. Yeah, hide your kids. Yeah, hide your. But not like that.
- [40:34]
Ben
From being baptized by bed. If you're a Baptist, you are indeed unauthorizedly baptized. Okay, Last thing. Speaking of baptism. Hey, Ben, can you pass me the butter?
- [40:46]
Brian
Yeah, sure, man. Do you want the white camel Butter or the Golden Cow Butter?
- [40:50]
Ben
No, not that butter.
- [40:52]
Brian
Well, what other butter is there?
- [40:53]
Ben
I'm talking about Design Butter, who specialize in digital product design. Whether it's a mobile or web app, David at Design Butter can help make sure your product is best on the market. Design Butter helps you identify problems your users are having and makes the experience better, which results in more sales, return customers, and a level of trust that makes your brand memorable.
- [41:15]
Brian
Dang. Design Butter. I can't believe it's not actual butter. Because it's so dang smooth.
- [41:20]
Ben
Sounds like they need to head to designbutter.com for more information. Ben, I wanted to talk to you about something. I'm concerned about you.
- [41:34]
Brian
What are you concerned about?
- [41:36]
Ben
Every time I see you, you have more and more Indigo Sundries products. I feel like you're overdoing it.
- [41:42]
Brian
Dude. Give me one example.
- [41:44]
Ben
Dude, this is exactly what I'm talking about. Do you see? Like, where did you even get this from?
- [41:47]
Brian
What's the problem with having some soap on hand?
- [41:50]
Ben
Ben, we're at work right now. There's.
- [41:54]
Brian
You don't want to smell good at work.
- [41:55]
Ben
There's going to be no situation where you need Indigo Sundry soap at work.
- [41:59]
Brian
Have you ever gotten sweaty in this basement?
- [42:00]
Ben
Dude? Yes. Every time we're filming, I look at you and I go, he's so handsome. Well then.
- [42:09]
Brian
Well, then you're going to need some.
- [42:10]
Ben
Soap so that you don't smell as though. Do you see what's happening to you? Like, how are you even. Do you have fairies that give you this?
- [42:18]
Brian
Dude, what are you talking.
- [42:19]
Ben
Have you partnered with the Fae?
- [42:21]
Brian
No, I'm a stone cold Christian who likes soap.
- [42:25]
Ben
Dude, I feel.
- [42:26]
Brian
Wait a second.
- [42:27]
Ben
Is that Calendul?
- [42:29]
Brian
Oh, not so mad about it now, are you?
- [42:31]
Ben
They make liquid soap.
- [42:33]
Brian
You didn't know that?
- [42:34]
Ben
Dude, I didn't know that. Well, they're. Obviously, they're a sponsor of the show. You should know that I have duties and responsibilities. Not all of us can just be Indigo Sundry maxing all the time.
- [42:42]
Brian
Okay, well, since you didn't know that, I'm assuming you all also didn't know that if you use their subscription plan, you'll get 10% off of your order.
- [42:50]
Ben
10% off? 10% off their already great prices, I'm telling you. Are you kidding me? Usos. Why are they so compelling to me? Dude, I don't know.
- [43:06]
Brian
So you know, there's a big theory going around. I think Travis Taylor was the first one. I heard this from Taylor with Thomas Winterton and I. And he said that he thinks all UFOs are USOs.
- [43:18]
Ben
Interesting. So.
- [43:19]
Brian
So it's like a. They can do both. And in fact, there's massive civilizations of demons in the sea that then at times travel out of the sea.
- [43:30]
Ben
You're hearing this for the first time here on Haunted Cosmos off season.
- [43:33]
Brian
And so I don't believe that. But it's an idea.
- [43:38]
Ben
Don't believe that's true.
- [43:39]
Brian
And at the end of the day, you will see.
- [43:40]
Ben
What if it was?
- [43:41]
Brian
Part of why USOs are cool, by the way, is because the stories of them are more rare.
- [43:46]
Ben
Yeah, they're like a rare holographic charizard.
- [43:49]
Brian
Yeah. And so they're kind of. They're kind of all the same, but they're all really cool.
- [43:53]
Ben
They are cool. And I just. The thing is, like, the ocean is so mysterious. There's a reason we started this whole show with high strangeness on the high seas.
- [44:00]
Brian
Do you want to know something?
- [44:01]
Ben
Lay it on me.
- [44:02]
Brian
So I've been reading Augustine's Confessions, as one does. Yes. And he, at the very end, he does his allegorical interpretation of Genesis 1. And he's not like discrediting the historical one, he's just saying. And also this and his whole idea about the sea and the sea being first is the sea is humanity, which is prophetically alluded to all through the scriptures. The sea is the nations and the dry land is the good soul, the good soul of man that God raises up and redeems. And so it would make sense that sinful humanity as a sea harbors this kind of demonic horde within it.
- [44:39]
Ben
And that's the shark's house. That's why it's the shark's house.
- [44:42]
Brian
And so once again, Augustine vindicated.
- [44:44]
Ben
Augustine, stop winning. Challenge level impossible.
- [44:47]
Brian
Impossible Massive dubs challenge. Hey, hope you guys enjoyed this off season Dusty tome. We're going to stop recording this one and immediately record the next one. So come on back in two weeks.
- [44:58]
Ben
Reminder, if you jump on our Supercast channel, hanacosmos.supercast.com and support the show as a monthly contributor, not only do you get all these dusty tromes that we do every single week, they're not all video, but it's like a lore style podcast.
- [45:13]
Brian
Over a hundred of them.
- [45:14]
Ben
Over 100 of them you can listen to, but also we're going to be putting out this whole season upcoming On Demand. So from the day the public episode number one launches, you're going to be able to stream On Demand the entire season.
- [45:26]
Brian
Yeah, you can binge.
- [45:27]
Ben
The whole check it out.
- [45:28]
Brian
And it seriously, like, I'm not trying to blow smoke. It's shaping up to be. I'm so stoked, like, maybe our best season yet.
- [45:35]
Ben
If.
- [45:35]
Brian
If not one of them. The episodes that we've recorded already have been so fun. So hope you guys enjoy that. If you like, if. If you like that idea, you know, consider supporting us on Supercast.
- [45:45]
Ben
Smash that. Like, smash that. Subscribe, hit that notification bell, and we'll see you next time.
- [45:48]
Brian
Yep. Sa.