People have a lot of words for what I did like vulture, muckraker, and hack, but I was an investigative journalist. You name it, I’ve covered it. Gang activity, sex crimes, domestic abuse—as the saying goes, “If it bleeds, it leads.” Yeah, I’m not exactly proud of all of the work I’ve done, even if my articles have helped put away a lot of scummy people. However, there is one case in particular that I’ve never bothered to publish. I was doing a piece on a 19-year-old murderer by the name of Lucas Ackerman. I found an audio file in my email from an anonymous address. The sender told me that this file had some vital information related to him. They told me to do with it as I will, so long as I listened to it first. So I did, and God as my witness, I would give anything to scrub it from my mind.
sound of tape recorder clicking
Ramirez: It is Thursday, the 23rd of April, 1987, at 12:15 PM. I am Dr. James Ramirez of [REDACTED] Mental Health Facility, here with the patient, Lucas Ackerman. Hello, Lucas.
Ackerman: H-hello, Doctor.
Ramirez: There’s no need to be nervous, son. I’m only here—
Ackerman: To help? You can’t help me, Doctor.
Ramirez: Why do you say that?
Ackerman: It’s because of Dr. Strings. There, see? You don’t believe me. You can’t.
Ramirez: Try me.
Ackerman: You promise you’ll at least give me the benefit of the doubt, Doc?
Ramirez: I promise.
Ackerman: No matter how crazy it sounds?
Ramirez: Within reason.
Ackerman: sigh Okay. So, I was about seventeen. My mom and my dad, they’d just finalized their divorce, and I spent the weekends with my dad. Yeah, growing up with them wasn’t exactly easy. They were arguing all the time. I almost wish it was just yelling, hitting, and breaking shit, but their way of arguing started with really, really passive-aggressive stuff. Like, Dad would come home, say, “Oh, look. Someone forgot to do the dishes,” while looking directly at Mom, or Mom would say, “Did someone not get the groceries?” Then they’d just…they’d talk in hushed voices, but I could tell they were really angry with each other. Worst of it was when I’d try to break it up, though. One of them would talk about how the other was apparently “hurting” me.
Ramirez: Did they?
Ackerman: Huh?
Ramirez: Hurt you, I mean?
Ackerman: No, never. Not directly They were always nice to me, always telling me they loved me, promised they’d support me, all that. Thing is, they always did it in a— I guess the best way to put it was that they were, uh— They were—
Ramirez: Pandering?
Ackerman: snaps fingers Pandering! Yeah, that’s it exactly! Goddamn, Doc, I’ve been trying to think of a good word for it for years! Thanks.
Ramirez: I’m glad to have given you such clarity. How exactly did they “pander” to you, if you don’t mind?
Ackerman: Oh, y’know, one of them might tell me they loved me right in front of the other, like they were trying to show them up, trying to say they loved me more, shit like that. They’d buy me all kinds of stuff for my birthday, always trying to outdo each other.
Ramirez: It sounds difficult.
Ackerman: scoff Exhausting. Even now, I’m not sure if they really loved me or if they just wanted me to think so, or couldn’t stand to think of me loving the other parent. D-does that make sense?
Ramirez: I’ve had a number of patients with cases similar to yours. In my experience, it’s painful to listen to. Unfair, as well. I couldn’t imagine my own… Never mind, I digress. If you don’t mind, I’d like to move on to the incidents. Only if you feel comfortable with that; no rush.
Ackerman: deep breath Right. Dr. Strings. Like I said, my parents were divorced, I visited my dad on weekends. When I first saw him, it was the night of my seventeenth birthday. I saw him in a sleep paralysis episode that night. You know the drill with sleep paralysis: both asleep and awake, can’t move, seeing stuff that belongs in dreams, yadda yadda. I saw the strings first. I saw thin strings lowering from my ceiling. No demons, no monsters, not yet; just strings. They lowered to various parts of my body, my legs, arms, mouth, eye lids, etc. I could feel the strings brush against me every night it happened.
Ramirez: How often was this?
Ackerman: Not often at first, but eventually it was happening about every two weeks, then every three days, if I had to guess. I wasn’t scared at first, just confused. Then one night, I felt one of the strings wrap around my big toe. Then it moved. It was— I didn’t know how at the time, but who or whatever was on the other end of the strings just moved my toe. The same thing started happening with my other toes, then my fingers. Then one night, I felt a string tugging at the corner of my mouth. It pulled it up more than I thought should have been possible. Then another string did the same thing to the other side. It was making me smile, Doc. The fucking thing was making me smile. That night was also the first time I saw it.
Ramirez: Dr. Strings?
Ackerman: That was what it called itself. It…I dunno, I guess it melted through my ceiling. It was really tall, emaciated to hell and back, naked, hairless, and with skin that reminded me of some kinda bug. It had big eyes like you’d see on a spider, and it was smiling the exact same way I was. And it had strings coming out of most of its body. The strings attached to me were moving like something inside it was pulling, and each toe and finger moved. And… Oh God. It talked to me. It told me all kinds of things it could make me do to other people and to myself. Assault, theft, arson, murder—it listed all of this awful stuff for me. Went into detail, talked about people I knew that it could hurt. It talked in this weird croaking, hissing sound, telling me that none of it was personal, it just wanted to have a bit of fun. The whole time, I was stuck grinning back at it. Then strings wrapped around my arms and legs.
silence
Ackerman: You don’t believe me.
Ramirez: No, no, it’s not that, son, I—
Ackerman: Don’t call me “son”, Doc! I-
sound of rattling chains and heavy breathing, which soon subsides
Ackerman: I-I’m sorry, Doc. I just— I don’t—
Ramirez: No, Lucas, I’m sorry. I had forgotten about why you were averse to that term. I won’t call you that again.
Ackerman: Thanks.
Ramirez: Would you like for me to stop the recording for a minute? You look like you could use some water.
Ackerman: I’d like that, thanks.
recording pauses, then resumes
Ramirez: So, are you ready to continue?
Ackerman: sigh Yeah. Yeah, I’m ready.
Ramirez: Go on then.
Ackerman: Okay. Where— Oh, right. The strings began wrapping around my arms and my legs soon after. Then Doctor Strings began testing those out. Before I knew it, I had begun getting out of bed and walking around the house, completely aware but unable to respond until it “released” me.
Ramirez: And you never told your family what was going on?
Ackerman: They caught me a couple of times. Whenever they did, they’d always be nervous. They said I’d just stand in the hallway, smiling, and I wouldn’t respond to what they said for minutes on end. I could never give a proper explanation to them. I mean, what was I supposed to say? Some spider-gremlin thing was controlling me with invisible puppet strings from the ceiling?
Ramirez: I suppose that makes sense.
Ackerman: And then that night… What I’d give to forget that night. I was at my mom’s house at the time. This was different from all the other times it had used the strings on me. This time, I had my eyes closed the entire time, but I knew what I was doing. I could feel the knife in my hand. I could hear the blade cutting through flesh. I…I heard my mom. “Lucas? Sweetie? Why are you smiling like that? Put the knife down, Lucas. Please, don’t…”
sobs
Ackerman: Then after it was done, it opened my eyes, and let go of me, just like that. She was… Oh God. She was just lying on the floor, blood everywhere, all over me. Everything after that is a blur. The arrest, the trial, being sent here, it’s a blur. There’s one thing that stands out to me, though. My dad came to visit me once. I couldn’t look at him. How could I after what I did? But then he told me that he was glad I did what I did. He told me that I did the right thing. He said he was proud of me. Leaving out just how wrong that is, there was something weird about the way he said it. I looked up and right there in front of me, my dad was grinning, just the same as I had been. The thing was there, too, and it was speaking through him. I still don’t know how he was able to bring the knife in with him, or how it took so long for guards to respond. For all I know, the thing might have taken control of the guards too. All I know was that he held a knife in his hand, and then passed it to me. He said, “I’m proud of you, son.” And just like that, the strings released him and came back to me. I think you get the basic idea of what happened next.
Ramirez: Were the strings there the first time you attacked your father?
silence
Ackerman: What do you mean, “first”?
Ramirez: Lucas, you lashed out at him when you were six. Remember when you bit him on his ring finger when he found you sleepwalking? He had permanent nerve damage in that finger for the rest of his life.
Ackerman: How do you know about that? He— Doc? Doc, what are you— Oh no. No! Please, not again! I can’t! I won’t! Just leave me the hell alone! LEAVE ME ALONE!
sounds of a struggle
Ackerman: NO! NOT AGAIN! I WON’T LET YOU DO IT AGAIN!
a window shatters, followed by Ackerman screaming, followed by a distant impact
Ramirez(?): sighs Broke another one.
end of recording
So there you have it. The case of Lucas Ackerman. Officially, the report goes that Ackerman assaulted Dr. Ramirez, and then jumped out of a three-story window to his death. The thing is, that window was reinforced. By all accounts, it should have been impossible for him to jump through it. That was why this recording was so shocking to me, and why I never released it to the public. I know many of you might say that I should have, but assuming I didn’t get laughed out of work, what could I have said? An invisible puppet demon manipulated a young man into murdering his parents, then it killed him when he stopped entertaining it? Anyway, how you view this is up to you. Whether you think “the Devil made him do it” or he was suffering from something realistic that made him snap, make of it what you will. I’ve just grown tired of carrying this story alone. It might just be the odd details associated with this case, but for years since listening to this, I’ve begun sleepwalking.