(no subject)

[11calls]

[This is from the episode 101 of the Black Tapes found here: here on Spotify or here on tbt website. Both are free to listen! The actual exchange is from 22:55 to 26:32 ]

Honestly, you still kind of can’t believe that you’re here. It’s been a month, eleven messages, seventeen calls, dropping in on Strand’s publisher, and, of course, showing up at the university. You’ve flown fifteen hundred miles on the off-chance that you would actually even get this interview. Sure, there was also Dr. DuMond and her “ghost hunting” and her seventeen books (not even counting her fiction--her “like Fifty Shades of Grey but darker and far more literary” dreck, which was frankly how you sold this trip), but every instinct in your gut was telling you that Dr. Richard Strand was the story here--not just a story but THE story, all in capital letters and underlined, and if you were to record the audio about it, you know just how you’d let your voice linger on the barely-contained excitement and promise and the absolute knowledge of that fact there.

Of course, you didn’t know that going in. It’s only after the second ghost hunter you interviews mentions Strand and his “doctorate in being a fucking asshole” in between trying to defend what even your agnostic self knows is bullshit and clumsily hitting on you in a way that has somehow even less charm than the first jerk who sent back his salad--twice. But the name--Strand--sticks with you in a way you can’t explain, and after you manage to escape Dirk Abruzzi’s wormy expression (namely, the way his eyes keep wandering to the buttons on your shirt, making you want a shower desperately), you find yourself Googling Strand as soon as you’re safely in the Uber.

A ghost hunter who doesn’t believe in ghosts to the point of putting up a million-dollar reward in exchange for proof? He would make more than just a single episode of your show--hell, he could make your show, if it were more than just “interesting people doing interesting jobs.”

Your first phone call to The Strand Institute comes as Dirk texts you his hotel room number, which you promptly delete in disgust. That disgust and annoyance is matched only by Strand’s snide assistant informing you that Dr. Strand has no interest in being interviewed--but that’s okay. It’s just the first time. You never give up after the first time.

Of course, there’s also the fact that you just never give up, in general.

Your interest in the good doctor only grows as your research deepens. There are two things you can never resist: a good voice and a mystery. Dr. Richard Strand has both in spades and aces. As your interviews grow with other people, you find yourself going back to videos of him from conferences, and you realize that if you were there and if he talked to you like that, you might have actually punched him in the face--but there’s something about the way the lights go out with an accompanying bang that reminds you of something, though you can’t quite put your finger on what it is.

By the sixth call you make to his office, you know more about the mystery of him, armed with everything that Google and the wayback machine can provide. Honestly, the mystery of him is a doozy; it makes you sit back in your chair and wonder if that’s why he’s created his institute and actually put his money where his mouth is. By the tenth call, you’ve already figured out where his publisher’s office is--and you’re in Chicago, just outside the highrise. Jenna’s sweet, and she’s a fan, and not for the first time since you’ve heard the name “Strand,” you’re struck with just how right it is.

Of course, you’ve also heard the voicemail, which makes you want to both laugh and sigh. He’s everything you’d imagined he’d be, brisk and intelligent, but what surprises you is the slight awkwardness in the way he says his name and goodbye, almost as if he thought you weren’t fully aware of just whom you’d left those eleven calls for. It could almost be endearing, in a way--if you let it be.

You won’t let it be. You’ve already given Nic the speech to keep you on the straight and narrow. The last thing you want is to get too involved in a story again and end up with your heart broken as you sit next to a grieving mother who was burying her son, next to his boyfriend burying his lover while you tried so very hard to wrap the shreds of your journalistic integrity around you. You’re too old for that, and your heart is too hardened for that now.

Or so you tell yourself. The poor soldier kid with the PTSD who just wanted to go to college and ended up taking his own life sticks with you. You don’t put up that award. You don’t deserve it.

So you’re twenty minutes early for your interview, sitting in the lobby outside of Dr. Richard Strand’s office, getting eyed by an assistant who isn’t anything like what you’d expected. You sit up straighter, adjusting the blazer of the suit that Nic was surprised you were wearing. Holding your second large coffee of the day (even before the mess of later, you still had a coffee issue) in one hand, you can’t help but make certain your PNWS journal badge is easily seen with the other.

Pacific Northwest Stories is one of the most respected news agencies in the country, and you know that by the awards that dot your tiny office back in Seattle. The awards and the headhunter notices in your inbox remind you that could go somewhere else, and they remind your executive producers as well. That’s why they’re getting you back into the field with this silly idea of yours and Nic’s--along with your own probably equally silly notion of Strand. Like Nic, Terry and Paul both think you’ll be back and moving onto geocachers next week.

Even then, you know you won’t be.

Still, even you’re surprised when he comes into the waiting room. He’s wearing politeness like armor, and you’re startled by the foot he has on you when you rise to shake his hand. In the videos, the presence he exuded was always larger than life, and you’d thought that it wasn’t fair he should actually be a giant to go along with all that--but it’s only for a second, because your eyes are focused on his, and your first reaction is so quick it barely registers in your brain:

Jesus, someone could actually drown in his eyes.

But professionalism is your own armor, as is the kind energy of your smile as you thank him for seeing you, even though you both know that it’s the last thing he wants to do.

His office is large and impressive and everything that you’d expect from the man in the tailored suit with the million-dollar prize. You already know you’re going to describe him in the show: his (startlingly amazing) sharply intelligent blue eyes and wry smile and look like he knows something you don’t. The first thing he says to you after you hit play on your recorder is a jab at people listening to the radio, and you’re prepared for that. You’re always prepared to explain what a podcast is, even in this age of Serial. But Strand’s tone is one that you’ve always called ‘professional flirting,’ and you let him set the mood, responding to it in kind.

There’s things he says that you already know, soundbites that he’s made in the past about parapsychology not being a real science, about his multiple PhDs from Yale. You’ve already done your homework, after all; this isn’t your first rodeo,. You already know that he’s going to say there’s no such thing as ghosts; it’s hard-written into the skepticism he wears on his sleeve like the heavy, expensive watch and the bylaws of his institute.

He’s still talking.

“Isn’t there enough wonder and beauty in the world without having to invent magical mythical creatures and spirits to enhance it? I understand humanity’s need to assuage our fear of mortality, but if we spent half the money we spent on religion on science? We’d have a colony on Mars, and we probably would have cured death and aging by now.” It all sounds too rehearsed, as polished as the wood on the top of his desk. Honestly, it almost feels like a pick-up line to you, one well-loved and easy. It’s almost like he doesn’t need you to be connected to the recorder that you’ve set between the two of you.

Stillness isn’t something that’s ever come naturally to you. In the editing booth, in front of the computer, and yes, even when you were making those eleven calls to this man, you were on your feet and moving. It’s a familiar feeling as you stand up while he’s still giving his treatise on beauty in the world. You don’t need to be his audience for this--besides, your attention is elsewhere, drawn to the wall-to-wall bookshelves that are filled with hundreds of white VHS cases that remind you of the Disney movies that always stuck out a bit too far from the entertainment center in your family room.

Each one is labeled; the labels are definitely more interesting than the canned response he’s giving you that seems more at home in a bar than here in an interview. Poltergeists’ Dinner, The Haunting of Mr. and Mr. Smith, The Witch of Wal-Mart 5. The three of them have excellent names, ones that lead you to want to know more about their stories, and you wonder if Dr. Strand has more of a flair for the dramatic than he happens to let on. So you ask him maybe the first real question of the interview:

“What are these?”

Hundreds of white VHS cases tell the stories of hundreds of closes cases from the last two years alone--apparently, this is standard for him and his Institute. It’s rather impressive, even for you and your love of ghost stories. He gives you permission to open one--it’s on aliens, or maybe ghosts--and you find a USB drive, pictures, and various case notes. It’s brief but meticulous, just like the man himself.

He walks with you, perhaps a step behind, and you can smell his cologne--it’s a good one, expensive, with notes of scotch and something sharp. Below it all is a note that makes you think impossibly of home. There’s a second before you turn away to pick up a piece of equipment when you just want to go up on your tiptoes and press your nose against his neck, to trace it with your tongue to see if the home is the cologne or the warmth of his skin calling to yours.

Thank God you’re good at multitasking. You push that away, hoping it doesn’t even show on your face. It’s always helpful to have something to distract you, and the moment your eyes rest on the row of black VHS cases, the story outweighs any desire you may have been entertaining for their owner. You know, in this moment, just as you knew the first day that you discovered investigating a secret, that this was going to change everything.

You hide your interest with casualness. “What are these?” you ask him.

The question, the discovery, your face, the tapes themselves...something closes him off entirely, and he snaps the door shut as politely in-your-face as Dr. Strand can manage, accompanied by a purposefully calm and neutral “nothing”--as neutral as that voice can be, though. It’s the sort of voice built for radio (or phone sex{, and you know you’re going to be hearing it again.

Especially because he was polite enough to offer a follow-up over the phone.

Or maybe he felt guilty enough; your thirty-minute sit-down had ended up taking only approximately four minutes and sixteen seconds of audio. But either way, you know you’re going to talk to him again. You have to.

And you definitely have to know just what is going on with that row of numbered black tapes in a cupboard in an office with an enigma.
Besides, if Dr. Strand thinks eleven calls is the worst you can do, he’s got another thing coming.

Comments

In person

[nobasisinfact]

When the memory comes through, Richard can't help being amused by it. It certainly isn't one he suspected Alex would enjoy others knowing about - especially the bits that even he didn't know; still, Richard can guess that, aside from the teasing which he is more than going to do to her, the whole thing is more benign than anything else that this place could have pulled from her memories. It could have been any of the numerous times that they had discussed demonic entities, the nightmares she wouldn't even tell him about, or the simple existence of Thomas Warren that would cause people to ask more questions than either of them cared to answer on the subject.

Instead of commenting, however, he watched her over the top of his book; looking to all the world as if he hadn't seen a damned thing just now. As if he hadn't just heard her thoughts on how 'deep' his eyes were when they'd first met ... or how he, apparently, was perfect for phone sex.

[11calls]

Alex probably wouldn't mind this memory being shared too much; she knows that there are far worse ones that the Sphere could show when it came down to that. However, she would be happier if it didn't show anything at all. But for the moment, Alex isn't even aware of the fact that her memory is on the network. It is, after all, not something that she's been thinking about in the slightest. Instead, she's been reading a book of her own on the sofa, and occasionally making notes on a notepad next to her. Despite Annie's message, of course she's still been investigating this; it's what she does after all.

Still, when she caught him looking at her over the top of his book, Alex raised a brow as she looked at him over the rim of her glasses with a puzzled frown. "What's up?" The question was simple and she just tilted her head at him for a moment, completely oblivious to the fact that he's aware of both how phone-sex worthy his voice is as well as the fact that Alex wanted to lick his neck within moments of them meeting.

[nobasisinfact]

It wasn't surprising that she had seen him. He wasn't trying to hide, after all. The questioning look and question itself were even entirely expected (although he was surprised that Alex hadn't noticed the broadcast yet). He watched her a bit longer before answering.

"I didn't know you wanted me to change careers."

[11calls]

The frown on her face just deepened the longer that he kept her waiting, and she'd been about to nudge him with her foot when the question came. There was no time or space for anything clever to say, because she was too surprised to do anything other than to just inelegantly blurt out: "what?" Not only was the what a question, but it was also a statement as her whole face shifted into it. That was the problem with being surprised (shocked, more like shocked really) when her face was so expressive; she couldn't hide it in the slightest. Because honestly, she had no idea what he was talking about. Richard Strand being Richard Strand meant being Dr. Strand with his three phDs from Yale and doing the whole skeptic thing to anyone who would listen.

And of course plenty of people who would not listen as well. It was part of the beauty of him being who he was of course.

Taking a little bit of a moment to recover, Alex just raised a brow at him before she asked a more full and focused and more frankly herself question than that first 'what.' "What are you talking about, Richard? Just what's in that book you're reading?" Because honestly, that was the only thing that she could think of that would cause him to make such an odd statement.

[nobasisinfact]

It wasn't a disappointing reaction. In fact, it was more satisfying than Richard had expected - which meant the next part of this was going to be even more entertaining. If just for her reaction to his uttering the term.

"It might be prudent to look into what this place is putting out at the moment." It's a suggestion that he knows she'll bite on. This is Alex, and Alex is the sort of woman who doesn't keep herself from her curiosity.

audio; un: justaaron

[customplates]

I know it's not any of my business, but...did you ever find out what they tapes were?

[Her never satisfied curiosity has become his own for a while, and now he couldn't help but wonder.]

audio un:pnwsalex

[11calls]

[Oh thank god someone who's not making fun of her, and who's not going to be bringing up that she things her future boyfriend is sexy for the rest of time. Right now, Aaron, Alex loves you.

There's definitely relief in her voice when she explains:]

Yeah. I called him back for the follow up and then I asked if I could see him again to take a photo because my assistant's camera equipment was stolen. And he let be back in and showed me what the Black Tapes were. They're the paranormal cases... or alleged paranormal cases he would say, that he can't solve to his satisfaction. Yet.

They're where the name for my show came from actually. The real one and not just the interesting people one.

audio

[customplates]

So...like the X Files? Are you helping him solve them? Is that why you have a new show?

[11calls]

[And Alex is just going to laugh.]

Yeah, we've definitely gotten loads of X Files comparisons. 'X Files meets Serial' actually. And yeah, that's something we're working on. Reinvestigating his old cases.

audio; un: e. raleigh

[amorea_mortuus_sum]

[ Well, Eric knows full well about distracting men. Thankfully not to this degree, and yet.. It's not hard to relate to Alex and her perseverance, and she's honestly a bit too similar to Aaron in some aspects. ]

I take it you eventually get what you were after?

[11calls]

[Alex is just going to laugh softly.]

Yeah, and then some. I got my follow up phone call, another in person interview about the Black Tapes themselves, a show, three years and now a boyfriend. So.

[amorea_mortuus_sum]

What were the Black Tapes? I assume the two of you had a lot more in common than your interest in the paranormal.

[11calls]

You know how there was the white VHS cases were the ones that he had solved? The Black Tapes are the ones that he couldn't scientifically disprove to his satisfaction. Yet.

[There is little doubt from her tone that the 'yet' is his word. Not hers.]

My show ended up being about The Black Tapes, and Richard himself, investigating those cases. He was the subject of my show for three years before we came here.

[And before she'd quit under some circumstances that she wasn't ready to go into. Yet.]

Audio | UN: RighteousFather

[10milliondollars]

So, those black cases...Was that the big thing you can't talk about?

[He'll stay away from her views on Richard. He's been in the same situation, meeting a man so striking he can't focus on anything else. He doesn't want to have to go into how that played out. He'll focus on the other interesting things here.]

[11calls]

[Alex just lets out a little bit of a sigh, because she's both glad that the Sphere decided to show this rather than one of the darker memories like it had with Simon and Richard, but wishing that it hadn't shown any at all.]

Yeah, they're definitely a big part of it honestly.

[10milliondollars]

Any chance you'll tell me what they were, at least?

[11calls]

You know how there was the white VHS cases were the ones that he had solved? The Black Tapes are the ones that he couldn't scientifically disprove to his satisfaction. Yet.

[There is little doubt from her tone that the 'yet' is his word. Not hers. But then she switches to Private.]

I actually wanted to talk to you about something.

un: TheOtter

[of_bokthersa]

I assume by the memory that your world is much like this one then. Aside from the stunningly handsome gentleman you wanted to lick, that is.

[11calls]

[Alex would like to keep her face buried in a cushion, but alas she cannot.]

This world is way more technically advanced than mine is, actually.

[of_bokthersa]

Which makes yours more advanced than mine. What were those things you and the man in your memory were looking over?

[11calls]

The video cassette cases? Er. The white and black things, I mean?

Video: theboneless

[ragnarsson]

Interesting first meeting you had there.

[Between the curiosity and being instantly attracted to the man, at least it had entertained Ivar, which was always the most important thing in his little self-centered world.]

[11calls]

[That makes Alex just laugh, and she can't help it.]

Yeah, it really was.

[ragnarsson]

Did you receive an answer to the second question you asked?

[11calls]

About the Black Tapes? Yeah. They're the cases that Strand couldn't disprove to his satisfaction. Yet.