Original subtitles

Anything?

It's never the first one.

You said you saw a stroller here?

Yeah, a bunch of moms.

Like a walking group or something.

This little one looks...

delicious.

Go, go, go!

How should I carve this child?

What are you willing to give me?

Please, please, please!

Anything! Anything! I'll do anything!

Please just don't hurt my baby!

Dude, we should go.

Before, you know, she figures it out.

Oh, please! Please don't hurt my baby!

I'll suck your dick as long as you let her go!

- Michelle likes you. - No.

Then why does she go to all the lacrosse games?

Because she likes lacrosse?

She's got a nice rack. You should talk to her.

If you like her so much, maybe you should go talk to her.

Are you daring me to talk to a girl?

- Hey. - Hm?

Would you go talk to her?

- What? - Your cousin's a pussy, dude.

- He wouldn't talk to Michelle. - That's not true.

Oh, yeah? Who do you like?

- I dunno. - Bitch!

- Case closed. - No, that's not...

It's just, I haven't really thought about it.

It's cool, dude. Whatever.

Leave him alone.

Uh, I should probably get going.

- Oh, come on, man! - Um, look, I'm tired

and I have to wake up super early tomorrow, so--

"I should be getting home," he said.

"I'm a fuckin' bitch and have a bedtime."

Look, it's been a long night,

and I really appreciate you guys asking--

You're not allowed to leave.

Still gotta hit one more house.

Perfect.

Try rescanning.

Let's see what you got.

I'm watching your baby.

"I'm watching your baby"?

What are you, a fucking babysitter?

Doesn't matter, no one answered.

Yeah, 'cause it hardcore sucked. Go again.

Wait, wait, wait, say something like,

"I'm gonna carve out this one's eyeballs."

- I dunno. - "I'm gonna take

this newborn's skin and wear it as a shroud."

Doesn't make any sense. Babies don't have

- that much skin. - Just say you're gonna force

Mommy and Daddy to watch

while you kill their fucking kid.

I... I don't want to say that.

Why not? You a bitch?

- No. - You're just saying it.

Ced and I aren't gonna make you break in and actually do it.

You know that, right?

Uh, yeah. Yeah.

I'm standing over the crib.

Just watching.

Waiting to...

eat your child.

You are fucking terrible at this.

This is the last time we bring your bitch-ass out.

This kid fuckin' sucks.

Hello?

You're the ones being watched now!

Run!

You're gonna have to move

a lot faster than that!

Oh, shit!

You think those woods are safe?

Maybe I'll show you where I buried my bodies.

You're all alone now.

Holy shit!

Sweet dreams.

Please stop. I'm sorry, okay?

But we're having so much fun!

Kurt, Cedric, is this a trick?

It's Juan, over. Are you guys on?

Hey guys, are you on?

Look, I know I'm not supposed to use your private channel

for whatever, but this is an emergency.

Hey, night owl.

You heard me come in.

Yup.

Sorry, Mom.

You know what they say.

Fly high with the eagles at night--

Pick shit with the chickens in the morning, I know.

Did you have fun?

Yeah. Uh, it was great.

What'd you guys do?

Pfft, you know, biked around, just hung out.

- Cedric was nice? -Yeah.

He actually mentioned doing something today too,

'cause of all the fun.

- Really? -Mm-hmm.

I... I think maybe we're seeing a movie.

If you say so.

I should probably go, actually.

-Juan. -Mm-hmm?

If you're going to the movies, you probably need some money.

Tell everyone I say hi.

I will.

There you go. Ooh, nice one.

Hey, there.

I can't believe something like this could happen.

What happened?

Someone broke in last night.

Killed the whole family.

-Oh my God. -So much blood.

[gasps] Oh my goodness.

Okay, look,

I said I'm... I'm sorry about last night, but...

please, just-- I need you to answer me.

Ced, are you there?

Please, dude...

Please, I... I just need you to answer me.

He's still sleeping, loser. Do you know what time it is?

Okay, Kurt.

Look, you need to listen to me.

- Are you crying? - Just stop!

Dude, please, just listen.

That guy from last night...

he... he killed those people.

I... I went by there today and there were body bags.

Shut up.

I can't talk about this here. Meet me at Denbro Park.

-Daddy! -Hey, how are you?

How you doing?

Put 'er there. Good to see you.

Kurt. Where are you?

Kurt?

Mom, I need to talk to you about something!

Mom, are you home?

Mom?

Mom?

She can't hear you.

Go ahead, Juan!

Say hello to Mommy!

[police radio] 10-54.

We got the body of a young male, multiple stab wounds.

10-54.

We found a severed head here at Denbro Park.

Hey, we got another 10-54.

We got a woman who, uh... fuck, man, it's bad.

Oh, she's just...

in pieces.

Welcome back from The Void.

Thanks for watching. I'm David Cummings,

the creator and host of the NoSleep podcast.

And today we're joined by author Manen Lyset,

who wrote the NoSleep story,

"I Used to Hack Baby Monitors, One Night I Learned My Lesson,"

which we adapted into the episode titled,

"Fixed frequency."

Welcome, Manen. Thanks for joining us today.

Hi, thanks for having me.

So, Manen, you have been a part

of the NoSleep subreddit community

for many years now.

What was it that initially drew you to that community

and writing horror stories?

One of the big things that I do is,

I'll just be walking around in my normal life

and I will see something and I will think to myself,

"How hilarious would it be

"if I turned this into a horror story?"

One example of that is,

I was on the bus one day and I saw this pigeon, like,

walking off and on the curb, and I thought to myself,

"What would happen if the wheel

"rolled over it and it was hollow inside?"

So I ended up writing a story where pigeons weren't real.

Or sometimes it's just, a colleague tells me

something that happened in their life and I'm like,

"Can I turn this into something that is horrific?"

It just comes out of nowhere.

And so, you can take the-- the banal, if you will,

the ordinary, and turn it into horror.

Is it just kind of the inspiration

that kind of comes from the object,

or do you kind of have to work it and build it up

into the-- the frightening?

Usually it's-- it's-- it's-- I see the object

and suddenly I have an idea for a horror version of it.

Sometimes it's...

I have a literal wheel online sometimes I will just spin,

and it's a bunch of random objects,

and whatever it lands on,

I have to write a horror story about it.

Uh, so in that case, well, I just--

I think to myself, "What is the worst possible

"scenario that could happen with... a stapler?"

You know, or pencil, or whatever.

And then I just start writing.

It just comes from that twisted mind of yours.

It's fun. I like to make things creepy.

It's great. How did the story "Fixed frequency"

come to your mind? What was it about a baby monitor

that inspired horror in your mind?

This was genuinely my coworker who was telling me that um,

on her baby monitor,

she was hearing the neighbour singing to her child,

and the-- the neighbour was singing to her own child

and she was hearing it on her monitor.

So I told myself, "This would be a great story

"to-- to-- to turn into a creepy version of it."

And um, I-- I had heard a lot of stories about haunted monitors,

demonic children seen through a monitor,

haunted rooms seen through a monitor, and I just--

I wanted to turn the trope on the head,

of the protagonist be...

basically the antagonist in all those stories,

minus the supernatural stuff.

So, a story like "Fixed frequency,"

we have a group of young boys

and they're getting their kicks

pranking these unsuspecting mothers.

Uh, what is it about the idea that you've got these--

these boys and they're-- they're just out goofing around.

You know, they're not really recognizing the consequences

of their actions.

Did you-- Did you want to present them

as kind of villainous in what they were doing?

Or is it more just,

"Boys will be boys," just playing pranks.

Yeah, it's more of a-- a

"Teen kids will be teens," you know? Um,

This happens with every generation,

whether it's Ding-Dong Ditch or crank calls

or licking ice cream and putting it back on the shelf,

which is absolutely disgusting, uh,

there-- there will always be troublemakers,

they will always do something.

Every generation has its own way of doing a prank,

and this was the one that I went with.

With all your experience on the subreddit, is there--

are there a few things that you could identify as

something that would absolutely make a NoSleep story great?

Like, is there a certain plot style,

is there a certain writing style that--

that you know that this is gonna be a great NoSleep story?

Yes, um, I would say brevity,

um, a very uh...

conversational writing style--

Like a-- a very casual writing style,

you know, like you're telling a horror story at a campfire,

not so much the big, sprawling narratives.

There's a time and a place for everything,

but I think that on NoSleep, if you have uh, you know,

"David looked at the creature,

"his eyes twinkling with-- with the fire of passion,

"and he said this and that," like...

these are just meant to be stories

that regular humans have experienced,

and the more casual you are,

the easier it is for people to stay immersed.

Also, we love plot twists. We love um, a punch at the end.

That seems to be a big theme,

is the-- the great horror twists that come up at the end.

And do you find that-- do you sort of--

when you're writing a story, do you find that you write--

you come up with a twist that you want to work into a story

and work backwards?

Or do you kind of maybe work--

you start the story and you think,

"Oh, here's a twist I'm gonna use at the end."

A little bit of both. It depends on the story.

Some of them I'll know right from the start,

and some others I'll be halfway through writing

and I'll be telling my friend about it,

and then it'll suddenly click, I'll be like, "Oh my gosh,

"I have the best idea for the ending!"

That's awesome.

So, you have this great idea about a baby monitor

that's-- that's playing strange audio.

What was it-- were there any challenges?

What came to your mind that you thought,

"Well, I don't know if this is the direction

"I want to go with this story"?

Or did it just kind of flow all out together?

Did it-- Was it sort of fully formed in your mind?

I would say I had a little bit of trouble

making sure that the protagonist got his comeuppance

without falling into the same tropes

that I was trying to avoid while writing the story.

So nothing too supernatural, nothing too outlandish.

Uh, obviously a serial killer might be a little bit outlandish

but I like to think that at the end of the story,

when we hear the voice on the monitor,

it could be the psycho killer going to kill him,

or it could just be the next generation of kids

messing around with a-- with a baby monitor.

Manen, thank you so much for joining us today,

and thank you for being with us, and keep up the great writing.

Thank you so much. I--

I am so grateful for the opportunity,

and I am so excited to see the final product.

Thanks for watching.

We look forward to seeing you next time in The Void.