Through its Facilities, Programs, and Services, the Pendleton provides Residents with time, space, and opportunity to Reflect. However, the Rehabilitative efforts of the Institution can only go so far. Resident Reflection shall be the sole responsibility of both Resident and Reflection in parallel with each particular Sin.
WHEREVER YOU GO, HERE YOU ARE
–––
Written by Alexander Williams. Starring Natalie Morales, Miguel Perez, Sandra Valladares, Blaire Chandler, Morgan Brown, Jeff Bowser, Sunday Boling, Erin Aster, Raphael Corkhill, Joseph Whipp, Rachel Rosenbloom, Chris Jai Alex, Jay Jones, Anna Homler, and Wilbur Fitzgerald.
–––
Thirteen Days of Halloween tennance, a co production of iHeart three D Audio Blumhouse Television and Grim and Mild from Aaron Mankey Headphones recommended. Listener discretion advised.
And so finally I was free, but I was hopelessly lost.
At first.
The motivation was simple, hat as far as fast as fucking possible from that island. I remember the moment I finally lost sight of it, and there was nothing but water on every horizon. I didn't know how to navigate at sea, and even if I had, I had no idea where in the world I was. So I picked a direction and followed it, and I kept a record. Day one escaped hill. The days were long, the moon was bright. I slept as little as possible, and I ran as long as I could, and day two I ran out of gas. There were some provisions on the lifeboat and I rationed everything out, but it wasn't enough to start with. Day three out of food, day four out of water. Things start to get hazy after that, and there was no escape from the sun. The fifth day was the storm. All I could do was keep the rudder in my grip. I managed not to capsize, but lost both my paddles and the remainder of my strength. Six sunburnt, sleepless, starving, and dehydrated. This is where my recollection and my logs fail me.
I am dying.
Somewhere in there, I lost consciousness.
That I lost somebody, Crystal.
I mean, it was a surprise to wake up at all. At first I could only tell that it was a hospital. It turned out I was in Colombia, service on.
This stance loc paso.
Bass Amilia.
Uh, yes, yes, familia. Yes see. Even before I was abducted, it had been a long time since I talked to mom and Dad. Luckily they haven't changed their number since nineteen ninety seven.
Hello Mom, Mom, it's fiery.
Is did you say?
Is that really? Yeah? Mom, it's me, give me the phone.
Who is this Dad?
It's sign? No Dad?
Is it really.
Sor yeah, Dad, it's me.
It's a It's a long story, but it's over now. Turns out i'd been missing for a year. Everyone thought I was dead. Mom and Dad offered to wire me some money. Wanted to get me home right away, but it turned out to be more complicated. Guista this ah grasias monsrat grasias port toda todos SuDS Ancio tom Buenos go Migo, with no identification and no record of my entry in South America. Proving my identity to the FEDS turned out to be tricky, and it kept me in Colombia a full another year.
Grace gaze, this.
Ya been alm espero cassi casi. I never got to thank the fishermen that rescued me some two hundred kilometers from shore, unconscious and adrift, probably within an inch of my life, but I had an approximate location of where they picked me up. Very little else survived of my trip. I had lost the key, I had lost the map. The only evidence I had of my experience was the library book, swollen and weather worn, my notes scribbled within the margins. Greo, gracias, gracias milgrasi.
Aquista, Hi.
Sayuri Rodriguez. It's funny how sure of yourself you can be going into something, and how much that can change by the time you make it out the other side. Well, maybe my name really was was Rodriguez, and it had been the whole time, And somewhere along the way I had just gotten confused. Something in the trauma, in the abduction hell in the drugs had noted a screwless. I know it didn't make any sense, and I knew that at the time, but I buried the logic beneath my feelings. For the first time and longer than I could remember, everything felt right with the world, and I just wanted to go home.
Wellscenta Aurembarcanoasa, Washington, DC.
The trip terrified me, not only having to prove who I was time and time again.
Your name is Rodriguez, it is yeah, is the name you were born with?
Yep?
Well, mister Rodriguez. What was the reason for your travel?
But also even before all of this, I hadn't seen my parents and well, you can just pull over here, I'll walk the rest of the way.
Here we go.
I was surprised to see my key still worked. Maybe I should have knocked hello, Mom, Dad?
Sayuri is that her?
Who are you?
Can I help you?
Mom?
Dad? I know it's been a long time, but.
I don't know you.
Are you telling me you're the one we've been and sending money?
Dad?
I don't know how you've found out about us, how you've thought you would pull this off.
But whoever you are, you've taken everything You're gonna get I can.
Only imagine what you've gone through. But it's me, Sayuri.
You don't even look like hergency.
There is an intruder in our own.
You really don't know me, do you.
How did you think you get foolish guys like you didn't even try.
I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'll go.
I hope you pay for this. I hope they looked you away forever. I hope you.
With nowhere else to go. I did something probably only psychopaths and victims do. I returned to the scene of the crime. Well, my car is still here.
Huh.
That's the most parking tickets I've ever seen.
Good morning, good afternoon, Hi coffee, it's for.
The customers, right, thank you?
Sugar's in that?
Never mind you found it?
Tell me is the manager in? I'm sorry, no, and I never really know when they'll be here? How long have you worked here?
Almost two years?
What's your name?
Maddie?
Hi, Maddie. I'm sorry, Oh man, that is good coffee. I had nothing to offer, no reason, no cover, not even a bribe. Maddie had no reason to help me, but she did.
No sorry, uh no customers under the name Talbot, am I spelling.
It correct me.
That would be my guess. It was probably expecting too much. Wait, I totally forgot there was a camera in here. Any idea how long the footage stays backed up? Two year old security footage seemed like a slim chance, especially given my luck that day.
And yet.
I was just curious if your boss was in you see, I have a return A return, Yes, we don't really take well, that's why I wanted to come in person, sort of a special circumstance. Okay, okay, you have it with you in my car. Your car should be pretty easy for you. I balked, right in front, right, sure, why not?
That's it? What about the parking lot?
I think it's motion detected just for this room.
Who is she.
Someone that's in trouble?
Go on the back.
I'll cover you.
Thank you?
But why I don't know what happened to your friend.
I hope she's okay, but you seem like you need help to and I'll.
Go Hello, miss, I was wondering if you could hello Hello. I was wondering if you could answer a few questions for me.
You're not this isn't about those library books and a version.
Oh I'm so sorry that.
The truth is I.
Lost one and I no, no, nothing like that.
Listen, have you seen a woman come in here?
A woman in here?
Why? Yes?
Lots today, just now today? No, not today.
There wasn't a dark haired woman in here just before me? Maybe said she used to work here?
Mmm, no, don't think so? Uh what she do?
Miss? Do you have access to the footage from this camera?
That? Oh? No, I don't want you to be mad? Why because it it doesn't work?
I'm sorry.
Oh okay, pull it together, no crime.
Nice job, Maddie. Oh you one?
Okay?
Come on, old car, Yes, fucking corse of God never fails. Now, I'll better see about these parking tickets. Whoops, added to my sentence. So things weren't perfect, really, they were pretty fucked up. I had lost my family, lost my identity. I was on the run from the cops and no doubt others. But I was free and I intended to keep it that way. If anything that I remembered had actually happened to me, trying to convince anyone of it would sound fucking crazy. I felt crazy, but also elated. I knew I could never go back to my old life. But you know, what my old life sucked. The universe is said not to give many second chances, and I intended to use mine to the fullest. The little money I had left stolen, I guess from the family. Rodriguez brought me all the way west, and I didn't stop until I hit the ocean, back against the wall. It had gotten me out before I found myself in a nice town, big enough to blend in, but small enough not to get lost.
Go to an Americano for say uri.
Sure, I never had much of a career, no real specialties, but I found at least one thing I was good at.
First of all, put these on.
So take one of these, line.
It up and.
Like that, Wow, have you done this before?
I started working on the ground floor of a metal shop, and a few years later I was running it.
How's that boss?
Smooth edges, clean cut, goodn't work? Just keep following that template. Today you make these and tomorrow new day, new part. This life was good. Frankly, I didn't like thinking about the other. I could almost convince myself that it didn't happen, that I had lost my mind, nothing more than a fever dream, a nightmare. But sometimes I couldn't help myself. Pendleton Rehabilitation Center. I don't know what I expected, Drug rehab Senior Center, Animal sanctuary.
Oh, look at the owl?
Not even what I was looking for. Handleton, Secret Island Prison. Um, oh, where's this Indiana? And what did I have to go on? A handful of jargon? A collection of first names?
Oh?
What was it?
Doctor Ralph Stanley? Even if I could find something, what would I do with it?
MD?
LPC E and T? Who is that? Okay? Okay? Is there a pick?
Yeah?
Definitely not him? All right, we're done. Maybe it was just morbid curiosity, or because I was still looking over my shoulder waiting for them to take me again. But more likely it was guilt about what I left behind and who. Even if the logic in my head said no, I knew my spirit would never be whole unless I exhausted every possible option. There was one thing I had to build up, the courage to try. Turns out, Alexander Talbot's not that common a name. Frankfurt, Cyprus. Most of the ones born in this century seemed like dead ends. Facebook LinkedIn my Space, geo cities, how about the Yellow Pages? In a way I wish I had never kept whereuse by country, use my state because I found him. Oh shit, there was an Alexander Talbot listed in Santa Monica, California. What a watch it, fucking lunatic. I don't know what I was thinking. Maybe that if I proved to myself that the only lead was cold, I would be able to leave this all behind for good. His last known address brought me far away from the seaside villas and hilltop mansions, a place no one would ever choose unless they had nowhere else to go. Burned out shacks, filled with trash and flooded by seawater, people squatting in the wreckage. And that's where I found him, spress and cheese, clad in rags, cut lesions, unwashed, unshaven, and drunk out of his fucking mind, but still technically alive.
Who do you work for?
You work? Yes?
I do work any kind?
What do you need?
You abduct people?
Abduct?
Abduct?
You don't remember me?
You?
Oh sure sure I do?
And and and how of the years.
You kidnapped me?
I did you threw me in the back of a van?
Fan? I can maybe work on a van.
You want to show it to me?
Where is the pen, pen, I haven't got a pens.
You have a pen?
Maybe we could write something down the.
Pendleton Rehabilitation Center?
Where is it?
Rehabilitation and sounds like a prison?
You are, Alexander Talbot?
I am, I mean, I am, I can be.
What the hell happened to you?
To me?
Me? I?
You know?
I meant to write it down and phone we had a pen.
I thought you died died me? No, not me?
I healthy as well.
Maybe maybe that was the other the other, the other?
What the other? What?
Yes?
Yes, I believe that's right.
We are never alone.
You know?
What did you say?
Just like you aren't?
Just like I'm not.
None of us are.
Who remind me?
Who did you say?
It was abducted?
I remember thinking I would have preferred a dead end. Talbot couldn't help me. He only raised more questions.
Please miss anything you can spare, just trying to.
Get back on my feet.
In reality, we each owed each other a debt. His to me was too great, but mine to him I could afford. Here is fifteen dollars and sixty cents. I wish I had never gone looking. I appreciated what I had instead of focusing on what I didn't. In this my second life, I had learned more about myself, about who I was, than ever before. But I knew that in the first I had left a part of me behind, and I would never be whole until I found it. Are we really never alone?
We are not. There is always someone beside us, near us, lifting us up when we fall, watching over us from above.
I haven't been in a place like this.
For a long time, and yet he is watching you all the same.
Yeah, I wonder about that.
Something weighs on you, my child, heavy on your spirit.
You believe, don't you? That our lives are faded, that all of this has already been written.
I believe God has a plan for each of us.
Then how do you access that information? How do you navigate that course?
The map is faith, The key is prayer.
Yeah, well, what if you pray and God doesn't answer?
He will.
The trick is will you be brave enough to listen even if you don't like what he has to say.
I had to make a decision between what I knew in my head to be safe and what I felt in my heart to be right, even if it scared the shit.
Out of me.
Where do we start here? East coast of Colombia, near the Panama border.
You said you were at sea for six days, seven motored for two, paddled for four, a drift.
For one more or less.
You said the rudder was intact when you could steer.
Were you able to plot a course east into the sunrise? Best I could manage? See?
With nominal wind and sea currents, I guess you averaged between seven and ten knots.
You said you experienced a storm, Yes, a bad one.
Okay, so that's white in our margin. Well, given all we know, it's seen. Your point of origin was somewhere in here eastern Pacific, north of the equator, within a range of two hundre kilometers the eighty six meridian, give or take.
Are there islands out there?
There are the Galapkos, But that would have been just as far as Columbia, and in the opposite direction.
How much for the map, let's do it? My plan only had one step find the island in the unimaginable event that that might be possible. Then we'd figure out what was next. You could say I was operating on faith.
Yeah, I know it. Well slide.
If that unless we get lucky. I made six trips like this, each time targeting a different coordinate and winding outward in a search pattern. Every time nothing. And then on the seventh wait, what's that?
Did the degree starboard?
That little speck It's not on the.
Map, but that ran.
The pilot lowered the bird in a spiral. Every step down it came more into view, rocky coasts, green vegetation, and in the center a stone structure like a colonial fortress. It's maze run between three concentric circles, with one tall tower in the center. I had never seen it like this. There could be no mistake.
That's it.
Hey, do you read me? I said, that's it?
Oh you sure?
Yes, I'm sure, no doubt. Well I have to ask you should be there?
Why did you come back?
What?
Why do you always come back?
Right? Gris in the entire history of this place, however long and fucked up that might be, I gotta believe I'm the only person that managed to both break out and smuggle myself back in. I'm sorry I left you here. I always knew you would come back. How long have they had you in the dungeon for ever since? Well, they can't keep us here forever. As far as I'm concerned. Nothing has changed. It might take a while, but we already know everything. We need to escape and the next time, no matter what, we go together. I like that, But don't you feel like you are missing something? What I feel like?
You know?
Here there can be two of us, But out there, doctor wants to see you.
Wait one.
Now, Well, I imagine you had quite an adventure out there.
This ought to keep you from skipping out again, at least from my infirmary.
I don't know what you plan to do to me, but leave her out of it. She didn't do anything.
It was all me interesting. So you do see her?
Then what?
Yes?
Of course, and you hear her, hear her?
Do what side?
In that case? The experiment has been a success?
What experiment?
It's a treatment, the seven methyl Ionimo. I gather it's exceeded even my own expectation. We have so much data to analyze, but for now I think it's time to give it a red.
Nurse, what are you trying to say that this has all been a hallucination? A dream?
Sign?
Hardly than is someone gonna tell me what the fuck is going on here?
We always knew you were special.
Say you read in fact that's why you were brought here in the first place, and why you're back.
Now because of her Her. The pen collects anomalies, right, and the anomaly here is that there's two of us.
There's nothing to be prideful about one universe. In a hall of mirrors, people meet their devils all the time.
None of us are ever.
Truly low, you know, never alone.
The difference is usually they don't recover.
Some lose their minds, covell grimes.
Sometimes one must be sacrificed so the other can live to help it, and once in a very long while, someone like you comes along, able to approach the mirror and.
Step through to the other side. Imagine a world where anyone could do that. Few things could be more useful, especially in a place like the Pen. I just have to learn how to harness it.
Huh.
This has all been but a step in that process, A small step, but an important one.
In the syringe, it's more of the same drug, isn't it? No?
This time it's the end to do?
What will that do? So I listen, what is it, Lily deed?
To remember?
Remember what all of this?
This time?
Try not to forget this time?
Wait?
What is that supposed to have nothing to worry about, nothing to see, nothing, nothing to think, nothing can dream, just keep.
Sleep.
I saw her, I spoke to her. We were together. I'm sure of it.
The face and the flame.
What you looked into the heart of something powerful and saw yourself staring back. Okay, maybe let's say you're right, and what do I do with that?
What can you do? What can any of us do?
Lights out?
We'll talk about it in the morning. Okay, Okay, good night, trip.
Trip, Good night Sajurie.
M h m hmmm.
Mm hmmm. Do you I knew you'd come? You don't remember?
Do you?
Do you know how you got here?
No?
I don't think so.
Do you.
I have an idea?
Oh? Yeah, sid sid ah.
When you see when you see them, high said.
A side, You said high, I got.
A chump.
The dumb, Hid said Jim.
I sign.
Champ high said the five slang champ Hi. Then by she.
Shout chiticularly said masanich Latokia may.
See Chia see che guy you see fam.
M hm.
Sec cha kin see fam guyayya.
Lisa shasangicha Kia may see chip.
Yeaka like yeah, snatch, I see that's.
If I see I.
Said, Il Chaki STARCHI month sly.
That's true, Chip.
Slid Change, Thirteen Days of Halloween, Penance Starry Natalie Morales. Episode thirteen Penance written by Alexander Williams. Editing and sound design by Jesse Funk, featuring the voices of Miguel Perez, Sandra Viadares, Blair, Chandler, Morgan Brown, Jeff Bowser, Sunday Bowling, Aaron ast Rafael Korkil, Joseph Whipp, Rachel Rosenbloom, Chris Jy, Alex Jay Jones, Anna Hamler, and Wilbur Fitzgerald. Directed by Alexander Williams. Executive producers Aaron Mankey, Noah Feinberg, Chris Dicky, Matt Frederick and Alexander Williams. Supervising producers Trevor Young and Josh Thain. Producers Jesse Funk, rima Ilkayali, Noami Griffin, Chandler Mays, and Casby Bias. Script editing by Lauren Vogelbaum. Story consultants Ben Bolan and Matthew Riddle, Casting by Sunday Bowling CSA and Meg Mormon CSA Production coordinator Wayna Calderon. Production assistants Jenna Johnson and Winona Lowe. Theme music by Rose Azerti with vocals by Anna Hum recorded at This Is Sound Design Studios in Burbank, California. Engineered by Ross Aeronaut Special thanks to Romelia Osorio, Nathan Rule, Glen Nishida, and Rob Mosca. Thirteen Days of Halloween was created by Matt Frederick and Alexander Williams and is a production of iHeart Podcasts, Blumhouse Television and Grimm and Mild from Aaron make Learn more about the show at Grimandmild dot com slash thirteen Days and find more podcasts from iHeartRadio by visiting the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Happy Halloween.