Full Ransom Saga Documentary Transcript

Of all the places on the internet people go to find scares,  Reddit is among the most widely frequented. There, among a host of other "creepy" subreddits, lies NoSleep, a forum devoted to telling creepy stories with the motto "It's all true, even if it's not." This has led to many series and alternate reality games in which commenters take an active role in how the stories unfold.

One such series, memorialized on NoSleep's list of most fabled tales, was started sometime in 2013 by /u/capnjammer80, under the title "My Hometown Doesn't Exist."

Like most NoSleep titles, this one sounded sensational, and the content was similar to a million other similar stories: a man discovers that the town he grew up in not only doesn't exist, but possibly never has, as there is absolutely no evidence for it and nobody he talks to from the area, including commenters to the story, had ever heard of it. This was the town of Ransom, Virginia.

As a result of this discovery, he quits his job, sells his things, empties his bank accounts, and begins to drive across the country from Arizona to find the truth.

The popular story became a series, with the original poster continuing his drive while sharing not only the strange paranormal activity that befell him during his trip, including sightings of Shadow People and a particular Tall, Smiling Man that would work his way into later tales, but also backstories that provided deeper information about why this person felt individually capable of carrying out this investigation and why he would take such drastic measures to travel to Virginia without thought for a return journey.

As soon as OP arrives at the site of Ransom, things take a spooky turn as the town seems to move about in time, going from a bustling 1950's-style town, to the modern appearance it had when OP grew up there in the 80's, to a run-down ghost town, and to a field with nothing at all in it.

From here, OP seems to begin losing his mind, finds himself followed through the abandoned streets of Ransom by ominous beings made of darkness including the Tall Smiling Man, makes several leaps through time, space, and dimensions himself, and eventually begins doubting his own identity, switching back and forth between and introducing other characters from the backstories who don't actually seem to be there.

Soon before OP's arrival in Ransom, he claims its location to be off State Route 666 near the North Carolina border. Redditors find this location on Google Maps and provide images to OP. OP agrees that this is, in fact, the site of Ransom, and responds by drawing a map of Ransom to the best of his recollection over it.

Redditors soon also discover, looking at past satellite maps over the years, a strange progression that seems to show something there, fading in and out of existence, closely resembling the patterns of the streets and buildings shown on Captain Jammer's map.

Toward the end of the series, a number of Redditors make several different attempts to investigate this area, having confrontations with residents and law enforcement of a neighboring township. OP makes a post to NoSleepOOC, the out of character "meta" sub for NoSleep, claiming everything to have been false and asking people to call off their investigations into Ransom, and later another post offering a free role-playing game to make up for everyone's disappointment.

/u/capnjammer80 goes quiet for a while, then resurfaces as a normal guy, an artist and militant atheist whose wife had been diagnosed with severe fibromyalgia and whose later posts reflected a desperate need for a job and show OP becoming more and more hostile, argumentative, and withdrawn.

Finally, his posts once more disappear, for a very long time.

However, shortly before the solar eclipse on August 21st, 2017, he came back with one final post.

This one claimed that he had been forced to say it was a hoax to protect people, but that things had gotten too far out of his control and he was now pleading for help. His tone was frantic, insane, as he warned:

"Don't look at the sun in the height of the sky or the world will disperse and the end will draw nigh."

This final post, which he said would likely be his last as he was no longer staying firmly in one dimension, also contained a short poem, which read:

"Don't look at the sun in the height of the sky
or the world will disperse and the end will draw nigh.

Every one of you knows what this means.
It means something different to every single one of you.
There are Horrors in the Night that Know Your Name, and
you Do Not Know Many of Theirs.
But yOU Know Some.

A Wizard Will come who will Light the Way.
Another Will come who will Darken It.
One holds the Hand of Kali.
One stands in the Infinite Chasm.

All will know Fear and Death and Horror. The Time is Soon."

Now, here's where it gets interesting.

The initial hype had died down and /u/capnjammer80 disappeared into obscurity (the final post on /r/NoSleep garnered only 7 upvotes). However, let me take you back in time a bit, long before the initial post on NoSleep. The actual Ransom Saga itself may be false, a fictional story, but I feel it's been designed for a greater cause. Let me explain why.

The events described in the backstories are, as far as I can tell, all completely true, because myself and many people I used to know around twenty years ago experienced them for ourselves. 

It started in 1993, when four sixth-grade boys went camping in the wilderness. One of them told the others about a haunted house that was within walking distance. This trip, if the stories aren't fabricated or embellished, may have caused several deaths among them, and certainly led to a life none of the survivors would have chosen. They begin having the capability to see spirits, demons, and angels, and refer to these supernatural events as "Funk" to disguise it from religious families that would persecute them if they knew the truth.

Fast forward to 1998, two years before I personally attended there myself, that two people start school at Atlantic Baptist Bible College, an Independent, Fundamental, Evangelical seminary located in Chester, Virginia. These two people, who I will refer to for now only as C and G, have a long history of study into and experience with the paranormal, supernatural, occult, cryptozoological, and cult activity. The story about the house, which came to be referred to as Montega Manor, located in the nonexistant town of Ransom, Virginia, was told about one of them (or possibly both, it's unclear), and rumors about their knowledge and skills began to be whispered among the other students.

In early 2000, C was being harassed by the college administration for forming what, in their mind, was a revolution against the school. Secretly, however, C and G had started a paranormal investigation organization referred to as "The Funk Club," to hide their activities, this time from the administration of the seminary. Apparently, everyone involved in the founding of the Club used the nonsense word "Funk" to refer to the supernatural long before any of them met.

C was suspended just before 2000 for watching the original "X-Men" movie in the dormitory (over Spring Break), and again in the first quarter of the year 2000 for listening to Johnny B. Goode, again, in the dormitories over Spring Break.

When I first arrived in the second quarter of 2000, he was a legend already. G had made certain that the stories about him circulated far and wide before he came back. There were even stories that he had healed people with a touch, made people see supernatural entities and tell the truth by uttering a word, and had performed several exorcisms already before he ever even attended seminary. There were even rumors that he had worked to take down child-kidnapping cults in Newport, Rhode Island and Manchester, New Hampshire while still in high school.

When he arrived back at school, C was made my roommate, and the Funk Club started again full swing without my knowledge. Almost everyone at the school was somehow secretly involved. No one knew of the existence of others unless they had worked directly together. They used secret codes and handshakes to identify themselves to one another. There were investigations every week with at least three different people each time, always with C and G leading the charge and showing them the ropes.

I personally didn't get involved until late 2000. That's when things started getting weird on campus. People were having supernatural experiences left and right, and that's when I began seeing shadow people skulking around campus, a phenomenon I hadn't experienced for many years. One night, as I went to the restroom, I began to hear and feel something following me, breathing down my neck, slow footsteps echoing behind me.

I ran to the bathroom, and as soon as I arrived, every stall door opened and pointed directly at me, and then slammed shut. There was something visible in the mirror as well, a tall, spindly creature made completely of shadows, visible even in the fully-lit lavatory.

The following day, I spoke with my roommate about the experience. He introduced me personally to G, and G reintroduced me to C as someone very different from the quiet, friendly guy I had roomed with the previous quarter. They told me to sit tight, because some crazy stuff was about to go down.

While I waited for them to get back to me, I spoke with many other on-campus students about the events I'd experienced, and it turned out almost everyone was experiencing the exact same phenomena, and had been for about a month. In the meantime, the Funk Club continued its investigations, and one high schooler present for an open house at the school was pulled halfway through the wall next to his bunk. That night, C and G discovered handprints and footprints about the right size to belong to a toddler on the ceiling of that room, although no children had ever set hand (or foot) in the dorm.

The Funk got progressively worse.

Finally, everything culminated one night in late 2000 in an event which every member of the Funk Club likely still remembers as the Night of a Thousand Hells. Two students had been wrestling, and while one stood there, untouched by his opponent, we all heard a loud crack and he fell to the floor, his arm shattered. We alerted the administration and called an ambulance, and after everyone left we returned to our rooms to hold prayer meetings for the injured student.

About an hour in, we heard his arm break again. Then again. Then again. It kept happening, getting louder and faster each time.

We ran out in the hall to find out what was going on. G's room was the one across the hall from mine, and at the moment all of his roommates were trying to hold the door shut. They informed us that something large, black, and definitely evil had G.

Let me add here that, at this very moment, I was aware of G still sitting by himself in the study area, even though all his roommates had claimed to have just seen him in his bed, in the room.

One student suggested C might know what to do, and they ran down the hall to get him. Just as they arrived at his door, he opened it, and he and his roommates walked out and began striding down the hall.

And C looked mad.

With the entire dorm, minus just a few, behind him, C opened the door to the room. In some versions of the story, he is said to have looked around first, noticing that the lights were on but not giving off any ambient light outside the lamp shades, and that the temperature had dropped so rapidly he could see his breath. This whole process lasted about a full minute.

What I saw was C walk in, looking from right to left around the room, and then being lifted up and thrown against the door immediately, hovering two feet up in the air.

We all ran at him, helped pull him down, and closed the door. As the door closed I swear I saw the creature being described, staring out the door and smiling directly at me.

C got up and dusted himself off, then paced the room a bit shaking his head and muttering under his breath. Many of the students, myself included, decided to try to re-enter the room and rescue G again, despite C's warnings against doing so. We crowded into the still-darkened room and began praying, singing songs, waving our hands about and cursing unseen enemies.

C burst into the room and said in a stern voice for everyone to calm down. It seems like he would have preferred to rest a bit longer, but he had to come save us from our own stupidity. He walked through the room, stopping at one student who was still holding open a Bible and stuttering through a recitation of the 23rd Psalm: "Yea though I walk through the Valley of the Shadow of Death, I will fear no evil..."

But C strode up next to him, took the Bible, closed it, and handed it back.

"Thy Word have I hid in my heart, that I might not sin against thee," he quoted from Psalm 119. "If you don't believe it has power, why would the Demon?"

He took several more steps into the room, and it seemed to get brighter and warmer the closer to the center of the room he got. He stood close to the center, held his arms out in front of him, and said:

"We've had enough of you. In my authority I command you to begone."

Immediately, the room's warmth and light came back, and the feeling of dread that hung heavy in the air cleared away. After a moment of stunned silence from the assembled preacher boys standing around in their boxer shorts and wifebeaters, G stumbled out of the bed where he'd been held by the Tall Smiling Man.

This event triggered a campus-wide scare that led to the administration cracking down against the very mention of anything supernatural, and studying it even from the Bible was prohibited. This further led to a witch hunt that got several students suspended or expelled, and ended with C being exiled by the school.

After this, C reappeared several times, with less and less frequency over the next few years until disappearing completely. He would often sneak back onto campus by being smuggled in people's trunks, and shortly after he arrived, people would always go missing for days at a time.

Partway through 2002, a dormitory student from Florida told me how his sister had been given a marionette doll by their father, a confirmed santero, which had been haunting the family and making the sister suicidal. He explained how C and G had arrived one night and literally done battle with the doll, which he claimed made its way off the wall and stole a knife from the kitchen.

The last time I ever saw C, a meeting was being called at a Denny's in Manassas, Virginia, of all who had ever been part of the Funk Club. C and D arrived once around a dozen people had shown up, along with a pretty girl in her early 20's who claimed she had been possessed so severely that EMT's arriving on scene to help her after her suicide attempt began vomiting uncontrollably. That is until the day before, however, when C and G arrived and exorcised the spirit that had held her captive for weeks.

During this meeting, it was decided on C's suggestion to change the name of the Funk Club to ESPER: Extraordinary Supernatural Phenomena Explored and Revealed.

Unfortunately, no one in that room that I know of actually ever went on any investigations or adventures with ESPER, and from that point on most of us only ever heard of G or C in rumors from old friends. The college had long been operating on a number of shady principles, the last of which was holding a fundraiser among students and their families to get one million dollars for an auditorium they had no intention of building. C discovered the school's treachery, and shortly after the school ended his career, he ended the school.

This was a boon for most students, who by this time despised the school and felt thoroughly used and abused by the administration, but at the same time, it had the unforeseen consequence of scattering the members of the Funk Club. Before ESPER had a chance to begin, it was wiped out of existence, and its members parted and went their own ways. Some never talk about their experiences from that time, some only talk about it with therapists and pastors, some have fallen completely out of contact, and a few have even taken their own lives over the years.

Much time has passed since then, but rumors of the doings of our old college friends and acquaintances have been circulating, and this is where the point of the entire Ransom Saga seems to take shape... over the years, I've heard rumors from my seminary classmates that seem to indicate that both C and G have given up the cover of religion they used for so long to protect themselves from the righteous indignation of their families and are travelling, separately, around the country for reasons unknown.

The stories that get back to those of us who attended Atlantic during those days tend to include some details that might be considered pretty unbelievable for anyone who wasn't actually a part of those strange events. Those of us who are listening have heard stories about a Wizard travelling the country. I've heard he's healed, that he's taken and given life, that he's made it rain simply by stabbing a knife into the ground, and that he's taught other people something similar to telekinesis.

This is a very unbelievable story, it would seem. It, and many other stories not just from my time with the Funk Club but also from my childhood and ever since, contain elements that I have had a hard time sharing even with the online paranormal community. In sharing the Night of a Thousand Hells story alone I've been run out of many forums, but these are events that I lived through, and that others lived through.

Our story is real, which means, every story is real.

And if that's true, then what was the point of the NoSleep story?

There are two main reasons I believe the stories were written.

1. ESPER is real, and is actively recruiting again: As I said, I personally know ESPER is real, because I was there when it was formed. However, in one of the posts in the Ransom Saga, Captain Jammer suggests that ESPER is dead and that people should not try to join it. However, I believe this is more to protect from things like what happened when Redditors started trying to investigate Ransom and find Montega Manor. I don't think ESPER ever actually died, as is evident from the many recruitment attempts throughout the years in the form of various fictional media. I believe OP knew that people who were really interested would probably private message him anyway, and he'd be able to further whittle them down to see if they were worthy.
2. The Wizards the final post of the story mentions are real: And, OP wants people to try to find them. Knowing the possible candidates, I'm sure they don't have any online accounts. Now, I know this may seem really, really unbelievable... in fact, apart from the main Ransom storyline, it is one of the least believable aspects of the story. To believe that there are people in the world who aren't just religious or spiritual, but who actually are themselves magical entities, and who have the ability to do things others would consider miraculous (including teaching others to do the same)... it is almost impossible.

But I know what I experienced at seminary, and I know that there are two people in the world right now that fit the bill. Because of this, I believe the warnings are also true... that there are dark days ahead, and that there is someone somewhere who has no love for the world and the ability to destroy it should he choose.

However, if the warnings are true, then hopefully the message hidden in the final lines of the Ransom Saga are true as well. Maybe a Wizard is coming, one who holds the hand of Kali, and who will come to save everyone.

As a final note, I'd like to point out something oddly prophetic about the final Reddit post. It makes reference to an upcoming eclipse, as mentioned earlier, and then goes on to say that anyone who looked at the sun in the height of the sky would bring about the beginning of the unravelling of the world.

This is the same eclipse from which we have a picture of President Donald Trump staring directly at the sun.

I'm hoping there's at least some truth to the story. These are dark times, and everyone needs something to believe in. Regardless, however, of whether or not the story is true, I'm still going to investigate it, and this documentary has been made with the sincere desire to find help. This is not an ARG... there will be no puzzles to solve, no games to play... but I do believe there is a great reward waiting at the end for any who succeed.

Come help me, please, and if anyone who sees this either attended Atlantic Baptist Bible College from 1998-2003 and may know anything, or was part of the original Ransom Saga, Funk Club, or ESPER, I'm begging you to come forward and help shed some light on this mystery.

"A Wizard Will come who will Light the Way. Another Will come who will Darken It.

One holds the Hand of Kali. One stands in the Infinite Chasm.

All will know Fear and Death and Horror. The Time is Soon."