B (15:28)

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A (15:59)

It'S not just about window treatments. It's about you. Your style, your space, your way. Whether you DIY or want the pros to handle it all, you'll have the confidence of knowing it's done right. From free expert design help to our 100% satisfaction guarantee, everything we do is made to fit your life and your windows. Because@blinds.com the only thing we treat better than windows is you. Visit blinds.com now for up to 40% off site wide plus a professional measure at no cost. Rules and restrictions apply. Part 3 the sound of meat and bone chopping filled my ears in that large, pitch black chamber. Snapping, sawing and splashing accompanied the smell of death As I lay hidden in silence. The footsteps came and went, delivering the cuts of meat to this wing of cells in the complete, consuming blackness. Whatever or whoever was feeding the aberrations in those rooms had either memorized every inch of this place or could somehow see in the facility so entirely devoid of light. I waited, my stomach growling, for what must have been a good few hours before there was a good ten minutes of silence. I breathed deeply, mustered my courage, and illuminated the grisly chamber with my flashlight. I walked on the floor, puddled red from the butchered bodies, disgusted at myself for realizing, despite the horrific odor of death, I had been breathing. I myself hadn't eaten in a very long time. I needed food and water soon or I would lose my strength. Whatever was bringing fresh kills down here was back the other way, so I decided to check the pockets of the deceased. I rifled through jeans, camo pants, khakis and shorts. There were dozens of bodies and plenty of wallets and keys. I headed out of the mess of butchery to the locked double doors, flashlight in my teeth and boots strung over my shoulders, trying one key after another for what seemed like an eternity with absolutely no luck. Frustration spilled from a deepening well of despair until I finally felt a key under the door's lock fully and exhaled in relief as it turned. I shined the beam, amazed by the sight before me. Giant vats, large cylinders of compressed gases and glass containers were lined in dozens of rows that stretched out as far as a football field. Wide metallic metallic tanks lined the walls, reflecting the LED beam of my small flashlight in the cavernous space. They were large chambers, maybe six meters in diameter, each containing a door. There were scattered black splashes of ancient blood dried on the cement floors and tossed paperwork on the long desks which divided rows of tanks that told a tale of chaos. I shined my narrow light beam to read the paperwork on the tables and floors and blinked in frozen shock at what I saw. There were countless tests of blood pressure, heart rate and radiation level monitoring, as well as packets containing the names of couples, some of full families. I flipped through a packet labeled 10 AR11 corresponding with the labels on those locked doors and it became clear. I read in disbelief as a promotional packet slid out decorated with eggshell blue, orange and brown squares in an illustration of a smiling family that was oh so 70s titled Ark Anti radiation kinetics and you'd. The informational packet from blew my mind. This was a service for perhaps volunteers, but more likely paying families to subjugate themselves to a battery of experiments for the purpose of living through an impending nuclear winter. There was a colored pencil illustration of a child with blonde pigtails in a pink bell dress hugging a cat with the caption Sally's cat Tammy is her best friend. That's because Tammy has life saving genes that can help Sally. I turned the pages in complete disbelief, not only that this was actually conceived, but in some horrific manner, possibly even achieved. I read on in amazement. A similar illustration showed an older man smoking a pipe, smiling, holding a test tube. The caption underneath read, Tom chose an entirely new protein our top scientists created to take him beyond immunity, possibly extending his life by decades. I thought of the seemingly living black fluid I saw in the other wing. I flipped through the illustrations of double helixes, diagrams and paragraphs mentioning talents and DNA zippering gene therapy and modification. The pamphlet ended showing an illustration of a family smiling, sitting in metal tanks resembling those on the massive chamber's walls. It showed them exiting with a 60 star shine to show improvement on the next frame. It didn't show the things in those chambers. I scrambled through other notes and urgent memos, one describing rapid, uncontrollable, extreme and seemingly random mutations. I looked at the memo's title, reading what went wrong? I gazed in awe at the massive facility, the ark. The ARK Lab in all its horrific glory, ushering a lucky few to the future to repopulate the world upon the event that never happened. At least not Yet I kept watching, walking through, taking it all in. The small circle beam of my flashlight was barely able to reach the walls and those metal cylinders where couples and families began the nightmarish transformation into what now sat in those cells feeding on human flesh. I kept walking, hunger kicking me as I saw a desk on which sat a bowl of ancient hard candies. I ran over and ate the entire stale clump, nearly chipping a tooth, and then continued past desks of gyroscopes, blood centrifuges, monitoring equipment and the likes. I froze upon hearing keys jingling and a press of the metal bar, and I heard the door behind me open. I heard footsteps slap the floor in pursuit. As I ran, I realized I had no idea where I was running to. I was stuck. I was about to die. I was about to end up on that pile in the other room. My brain screamed run. And I ran. I made it to the other side of the giant room to another door made of wood with a knob and chipped screw holes. My pursuer was nearly upon me as I tried the door, twisting the knob and pushing it open. I entered and slammed the door behind me, scrambling my hands on the brass knob and luckily finding a lock which I turned hastily. Pounding shook the door on which I leaned low to the ground. I shined the light to find a nicely decorated lobby, quaint and ornamented with rounded furniture with peg legs in the usually quirky colors of the seventies, far more sinister. Lit by that single beam of my flashlight, I saw more pamphlets and plastic holders on the desk and finally realized this was where their journey began, greeted by a heavily hair sprayed receptionist. Most importantly, I saw the glowing orange ring on the elevator door's frame. The wooden door I entered from was clearly not going to hold what had discovered my presence for long, so I ran to the elevator, mashing the glowing button. I hadn't even considered the fact that this facility had power, but I realized this could have been my end, had it not. I entered the dim yellow light of the elevator, hearing music and a jiggling of keys from outside the door I had come from. Fuzzy jazz flute Heavy elevator music played on speakers as my pursuer entered through the wooden lobby doors with wide, wide eyes reaching out to me with open hands. A normal looking man, aside from his milky white eyes, perhaps in his mid-60s, ran into the room screaming just as the doors began to close. I slammed the button and watched as the door shut in the nick of time. I breathed deeply and slid to the floor and sat to put my hiking Boots back on, exhausted, I finally registered his muffled voice and what he was screaming. They are loose down there. From higher and farther away, the elevator was moving not up, but down. Part four, an instrumental version of a 70s song I vaguely recognized, fuzzed from the speaker in the elevator as it descended. I stood on a handrail and tried to open the locked ceiling hatch I had read only existed in older cars, shaking it and hitting the lock in vain. There was soon a muffled sniffling, then scratching from the hatch, then the creak of metal bending, and a small black triangle began to appear from its corner. The triangle grew in size to reveal long, malformed teeth in the gap. Something powerful was prying the hatch open. I rushed to the front of the elevator car and pounded the open door button as sweat beaded my forehead. The music crackled before squealing with a deafening screech of feedback. The noise stopped that thing's act of ripping open the car like a sardine can, and it seemed to retreat. My palms squeezed over my ears and I slipped, slid to the floor until the sound stopped and a staticky voice spoke to me over the dated speaker system. Listen. You are in very serious danger. The voice spoke as I looked up to see long fingers like articulated drumsticks emerge from the shadow. I watched helplessly as they reached from the black opening and returned to prying the roof hatch open. I yelled for help, asking for the man to make the noise that seemed to repel the thing, but it was clear the speaker was merely that, a speaker. There was no phone or intercom device, just open, close, and the two floors. I was trying to figure out how to make a last ditch makeshift weapon. The elevator stopped and the doors slid open. I looked out in utter confusion, trying to understand what I was looking at. There was a road separating two rows of housing that extended into the space under an eerie domed ceiling that was painted and lit like a sky. More rows of housing units and streets continued to my right. It was like an overly exaggerated nuclear family suburb with actual white picket fences and astroturf lawns. All of the small houses were Easter egg colors, throwback ranch homes from a different era. I walked out of the elevator, feeling the bounce of the black rubber streak beneath my boots, and I hurried to the first house, peering in the windows. It was dimly lit but appeared to be vacant, and I rushed in the door, which was unlocked, twisting the lock as I heard the metal clang of that thing from the elevator roof landing on the floor of the car. I kept as silent as possible as the long horrid shadow of the thing walked by the window to my side. My back was to the door and I stared at the overlapping colored ovals of the wallpaper that opened to a small kitchen. I then noticed the mirror on the wall that revealed a view of outside the window behind me and I finally saw that thing from the elevator. It was horrific, tall and bony with multiple rows of elongated human teeth, teeth spilling out over each other from a massive gummy mouth under wide white eyes. The nose was a small bump above two flaring black slits on the jagged cheeked face. I realized that if I could see it, it could see me, and I stayed as still and silent as possible when a squeal rang out from the speaker system, scaring the thing that ran deeper into the development. The voice crackled on the speaker as the man spoke again. If you're alive, you need to listen closely if you want to stay that way. The man spoke. The area you are in was built to house our clients in case the anti radiation treatment went wrong, which it did. I'm the only one left maintaining this place, but I'm close to making it right again. I'm sure of it this time, he said. I realized he must be insane if he thought he could fix anything about this zoo of nightmares. I crept on the olive green shag carpet towards the kitchen as silently as possible. I was getting farther from the door but could still hear him on the announcement speakers of the enormous fallout shelter. I looked out the kitchen window that was fixed to the massive outer chamber wall. It was like a cutout display that emulated dark depth with a layered set of photos of rolling hills and trees. I shook my head and reached down to open the kitchen drawers, removing a steak knife I found inside. Use the maintenance hatch labeled A13 just a bit forward to the left. You really shouldn't have unlocked that door, the voice said gravely. I gripped the knife and slowly walked to the window, looking out to the street, seeing some emaciated form climb out of a window of one of the houses. It walked on four pale branches of flesh, limbs that twisted and curled like ram horns. Its skin was pocked with patches of sprouting bluish worms that waved slowly, resembling sea anemone. Its narrow head was inhuman and deformed, squeezed in odd place places like a tide roast. The head contained one bulging eye and two quivering circular red orifices underneath, one pea sized that widened as it sniffed the air, one larger and lined with small sharp teeth. It walked in shaky lurching movements as if unaccustomed to its own body. I almost felt sorry for whoever that had once been until I saw it. He he even vomit a red splash of bones to the astroturf grass it stood on. It raised its head and choked up a deep bark of sorts, pacing in twitchy, awkward steps. Feedback squealed from the speaker, sending it bounding out of view behind the houses to my right before the man upstairs spoke again. I've been feeding them cadavers donated to science. I don't know what you saw, but you need to trust me, the voice said. Their body seems to crave only proteins they now lack in their current forms, he continued. I mostly believed him, but I have never crossed a bridge that was half completed. I slowly exited that first house on the left, observing the space, noting ladders mostly encased in cement tubes in the far end of the street and one hatch on the left left behind the houses near me in that faux suburban nightmare. The massive space was beyond surreal, magnifying my fear with its attempt to stimulate a pleasant town from the world above, a plastic Disney esque community filled with horrific monstrosities that ate human flesh. The ear worm melody from the elevator looped in my head as I clenched the knife tight and quite quietly walked to the next house on the left. I looked in the window to see a bloated head smushing against the glass, fat as a large pumpkin whose flesh stretched so much that only pulpy red tissue was visible in the holes of a human face inflated by tumorous growth. It teetered back and forth, clearly unable to see the body below, giant and lumped with knobs of ropey varicose veins. I wasn't taking any chances going in there. It was alive and therefore clearly able to eat. I continued to the third house on the left, nearly jumping out of my skin at some deep rattled animalistic yell that seemed to come from my right. I rushed into the house and shut the door quietly, gripping the knob tightly with fear as I looked out the window, seeing no movement. I then heard a dragging sound from behind me that made the hairs on my neck stand on end. I turned to see the manic, smiling pretty face on a bald human head sliding on the floor towards me. Her wide staring eyes looked straight at me above a normal nose and a toothy mouth shivering in spasm, its body dragging behind was a long tube of flesh lined with dozens of small trudging legs resembling those of a human baby. As it slowly emerged from the kitchen, I held out my knife and opened the door as quickly as possible. That thing's mouth stretched open as it charged at me, the skin on its face peeling back entirely from the mouth as a large muzzle of tooth filled gum snapped forward like a goblin shark's attack. I barely slipped out the front door, but those lunging jaws broke, banged against it too loudly. I saw peering eyes of varying size and distance from each other blink and swivel on cocked heads from the sides of the buildings, alerted by the sound. The nightmarish earworm from the elevator looped frantically in my head, and I remembered it now. Abba's SOS Just as dozens of monstrous things emerged from shadows and came charging towards me, all I could do at this point was to run.

B (34:37)

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A (35:10)

Part 5 the screams alone were enough to drive me to the brink of madness as I sprinted down the rubber street of the hellish suburbia. Animal screams, some high and shrill, others rattle in gravel yells, some hissing, popping, and even an eerie whooping that might have sounded funny in any scenario other than this. I ran from the hideous things beyond nightmares that scuttled, bounded, and loped towards me from nearly every direction, even spilling out from the elevator doors. Dozens of them, massive bony jaws snapping, fat tongues flopping, and shiny wide eyes all fixed on my flesh. I saw the hatch labeled A13 just feet ahead on the left between houses. I glanced at the small crack under the hatch, seeing shadows moving, and I ran past it, untrusting. I twisted the weight of my shoulder in the last second to ram a slender, pale form that charged screaming towards me, clawing with dozens of stacked black talons that echoed all the way down the arm. Pain ignited my bicep as I headed towards the congealing splatter of remains at the end of the street above. It was a concrete tube which housed the steel rungs of a ladder. My feet slammed the rubber road as I sprinted, and as I ran I felt my lower legs sliced and licked and stung by the pursuing horde right behind me, I ran towards the feeding tube until I was tripped by something shiny and black, the shape of a rhinoceros beetle's horn. I began to fall forward as everything slowed to a crawl. I aimed my other foot far left to compensate and miraculously didn't topple, continuing to sprint to the encased ladder, which was painted to match the sky mural of the dome wall. Puddles of blood splashed as I ran, then jumped, gripping the slick steel rungs tightly to climb as fast as my body would allow. The ladder shaft stank horribly from decades of rot. I felt a deformed wide hand yank me down violently, banging my jaw painfully down on a rung. With a stunning blow, I yanked and freed my foot from the boot, and the thing let out a high, gurgling scream as it fell. I heard the falling bodies clang against the metal rungs from the tumbling creatures. I used the few seconds of breathing room to push the kitchen knife's blade all the way down between my foot and the inside of my boot. The blade now extended down from under the heel as a makeshift weapon. Just as the horde returned angrier, I felt long fingers wrap around my calf and I stomped before violently down, releasing a squeal from the elongated fanged face of that thing below. There were dozens of them, screaming things with too many black orbs of eyes and gnashing jaws. I jammed the blade into the silhouetted head with a downward stomp and climbed faster and higher into the darkness of the tube. Some of the rungs were slippery with blood, and climbing in the darkness became increasingly difficult. I finally reached the top hatch from which the man had been feeding them, and my beating heart sank down into my stomach. It was locked from the other side. The feedback squeal from the speakers blared not from above but just below me to the right, repelling the pursuing monstrosities a bit away from me once more as the voice on the system continued. I'm sorry. So sorry. You know I can't let you leave knowing what you know. All our work would be completely destroyed for nothing, followed by another feedback squeal as the speaker cut out. The slobbering, howling sounds of the horde below entered the latter well once more, echoing demented screams through the narrow space as they closed in. I stepped down on a few rungs to the source of the speaker sound and reached over in the blackness and felt a large sliding grate that seemed to be the source of the voice. There was one on my left as well, and Neither had locks. I slid open the grate that led to the speaker's sound and turned on my pocket LED flashlight and placed it pointing inward towards the voice in that duct on the right. I realized the passage might lead to that blind madman on the speaker. I slid the left one open and climbed quickly inside, removing the steak knife from my boot and using it to lift up and close the sliding vent cover behind me. I crawled away slowly and silently in the darkness as I heard scuttling, then screams through the access ladder well that had been repurposed as a food hatch. I listened with a slight feeling of vengeance as that man's screams wailed through the blackness of the space as those things devoured him alive. Once I had traveled far enough that I felt confident the light would not be seen, I powered my cell phone on and used it to illuminate the metal passage that seemed to go on forever. I was utterly exhausted and now finally out of immediate danger. My stomach growled with hunger when the grate on the end of the ventilation shaft came came into view. I exhaled heavily and crawled a bit faster. It was the same sliding kind of the others and I listened intently, phone screen off to make sure I wasn't seen content, I turned it back on, startled by the large face in front of me, a massive painted portrait on the opposite wall. It was the familiar face of that man who had left me to die in that suburban shelter, far younger and smiling as he held the test tube, but clearly him. Wood paneling and a groovy rug of swirled hues of blue decorated the space, filled with lava lamps and stereo receivers, speakers and a turntable. His office looked more like a swingers lounge than an office. I spotted the light switch, flicking it on to see the black light lit black velvet paintings of topless women. From the looks of it, his office had been untouched for the past 40 years. I did love that swanky carpet, but the rest was a bit tacky. I shuffled through the papers on his desk, reading a bit before switching off the lights and opening the one wooden door as quietly as possible. I heard saliva filled, heavy breathing in the dim hallway that the door opened to. There was just one small guide light in the hall ahead. Glowing orange rings trailed down a hall of elevators. Hope flooded back into my heart as I saw the sign labeled Ground Exit. Another hatch. All I had to do was get by that shadowy shape scuttling low to the ground with far too many limbs. It was spider like two sets of back legs and two sets of arms, elbows and knees pointed upward as it scampered about rapidly in the hull. The head shivered in twitching ticks that sent a chill up my spine. An open elevator shaft on the left seemed to answer my question of how it got in here. I was starving and headed back to quietly search the lab of Gabe Reverton, the name on the metal plate on his kidney shaped desk. I rummaged through the drawers and shelves of some stashed rotten foods, finding the savior of a honey jar which I once read doesn't spoil. I forced down the entire container, licking my fingers and scouring the shelves for more food, but finding none. I was going to need my strength if I was going to get past that rat rapidly moving thing that occupied the elevator bay. I scanned the room, noticing a standing flag of orange and brown hues with ARK written in a white wave of echoed outlines. I only then realized how much I was bleeding and ripped the arc flag from the brass pole, slashing it with scissors from the desk to make bandages to wrap my stinging arm and legs. I stared back now nervously at the trail leading to the duct and realized time could be short if those things followed my bloody trail. I picked up the brass flagpole, slapping the heavy metal against my hand, gauging its stopping power. I searched memos, emergency protocols in the in and out, trays of papers on his desk, reading of elevator reprogramming procedures in case of lockdown, troublesome test test results on recent mice, and other glimpses into secret workings of ark. There were Polaroid photos of small horrifying things in small tanks similar to those I'd seen in larger form, still disturbing in miniature. I found a finances sheet and was amazed at the half million dollar cost of the most basic anti radiation package offered, which grew after shelter, property rental ration packages and water, power and heating fees. This had been a multi billion dollar facility with top scientists of the era as well as clientele from around the world. I put together a dossier of the most fascinating papers, including the maps I had found that showed all of the services, client and employee access, entry entrances and exits. A quick glancing over and I realized I'd be in more risk trying to find another way out. At this point I shoved the paperwork in my pants against my back and tried to mentally ready myself. I removed a blacklight bulb, gripping the flagpole, took a few breaths and slowly opened the door once more. Hearing the wet saliva clicking from the spider like thing's toothy mandibles. I tossed the light bulb into the elevator shaft, hearing it burst and trickle fragments down deep within the creature scuttled over in thumping steps, peering over the edge to look in, and my heart raced as I seized my chance. I ran and jammed the flag pole into that thing's fleshy side, shoving it into the opening as it squealed a horrific sound. Sound. I ran to the ladder and climbed despite the burning in my muscles, higher and higher until I began doubting the shaft would ever end. I heard the squeal behind me then, and it was approaching far too rapidly as it was nearly upon me. I heard the ambiance thicken and I knew I was at the top. I shoved with all my might, expecting it to be locked. It wasn't, but it was extremely heavy. I strained and pushed until dirt spilled in and the light of the sky seeped in. I was free. The moon nearly blinded me as I lay down on the dirt and leaves that covered the thick metal hatch, and to my relief, nothing tried to open it. I caught my breath before searching the dark woods for a small boulder, which I tumbled over to cover that hidden hatch. I turned on my phone's flashlight and breathed deep, the fall air crisp and refreshing after the horrors from below. I glanced with teary eyes at the moonlit trees, the gradients of autumn leaves warming the scene with tranquility just above those unimaginable horrors below. I began the long trek back to my car, listening to the peaceful sounds of crickets and bending trees, trying not to think about what I had read on the paperwork or the horror still lurking. I was only trying to think of a warm bath and a soft bed, not what I'd seen in those notes. Trying not to think about the joint founders Gabe, Barbara and Calvin and their three other facilities.

B (47:34)

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The Sea Support for this podcast and the following message comes from America's Navy the Navy offers new graduates hands on training and experience in careers like computer science, aviation and medicine, plus education and sign on bonuses. Parents help your grads start their career today@navy.com youm say you'll never join the Navy, never climb Mount Fuji on a port visit or break the sound barrier. Joining the Navy sounds crazy. Saying never actually is. Learn why at navy.com, america's Navy Forged by the sea, it.

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A (50:35)

This episode is brought to you by FX's alien Earth, the official podcast. Each week, host Adam Rogers is joined by guests, including the show's creator, cast and crew. In this exclusive companion podcast. They will explore story elements, deep dive into character motivations, and offer an episode by episode behind the scenes breakdown of each each terrifying chapter in this new series. Search FX's alien Earth wherever you listen to podcasts, mint is still $15 a month for premium wireless. And if you haven't made the switch yet, here are 15 reasons why you should 1. It's $15 a month.

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