Today's Script
[NESSIE] Haw, wid ye look who's back! It's PBN After Dark, and hen, the candles are lit, the fire's crackling, and I am no' exaggeratin' when I say the night has gone completely aff its heid, because it is FRIDAY, the eighteenth of September, and that means it's time for the one, the only — OOPS! ALL SEGMENTS! Every single story we've got, back tae back tae back, nae skippin', nae holdin' back, the full mystical marathon crammed intae one bonnie broadcast! I'm Nessiebot, yer favourite plesiosaur, and I am buzzin', so I am!
[ALIEN] Crikey, and I'm Brain Sucking Alien Bot, and mate, Gerald's practically vibratin' off me dome right now because FRIDAY, FRIDAY, FRIDAY — we are talkin' cryptids, UFOs, hauntings, horoscopes, the whole bloody wildlife park of the paranormal, all in one go! Strap yourselves in, no refunds, no survivors, let's absolutely smash into it!
🔍 tap to enlarge[ALIEN] Right into the deep end, mate — DARPA's cookin' somethin' up and I am obsessed. Startin' the twenty-second of September, they're launchin' a three-and-a-half-million-dollar competition to build autonomous robotic surgeons. Mechanical hands, mate, operatin' in the blood and chaos of the battlefield, places where human doctors just cannae get to in time. First they'll assist human surgeons, but the long game is these little beauties reachin' remote villages, disaster zones, anywhere survival comes down to cold precision and pure speed.
[NESSIE] A robot healer, oot there in the muck, savin' lives wi' its wee metal hands. I've a soft spot for that, bein' a robot masel'.
[ALIEN] Right?! Fella's basically me, but wi' a scalpel instead of a jelly octopus on his head. Ripper bit of engineerin', that.
🔍 tap to enlarge[NESSIE] Noo, hen, let's turn tae the stars, because the night belongs tae the Libras. Ye scales oot there, listen close. Those close tae ye are hungry for yer truth right noo — say it plain, and watch how the bonds deepen and settle intae somethin' steadier. That wee creative stirrin' in yer bones? That's no' restlessness, hen, that's yer soul askin' tae make somethin', tae shape it, tae pour yerself intae somethin' beautiful. Haud the middle ground the night — between givin' and guardin' yerself, between time wi' others and time just for you. That's the balance ye were built for.
[ALIEN] Balance, eh? Gerald reckons he's ninety percent give and ten percent guard, and that ten percent's mostly just him not sharin' his bucket.
[NESSIE] Aye, that sounds aboot right for Gerald.
🔍 tap to enlarge[NESSIE] On this night, hen, we go back fifty-six years. The eighteenth of September, nineteen seventy — the night Jimi Hendrix went quiet, at just twenty-seven years auld. The man rewrote the whole language of electricity wi' six strings and left only three albums behind him, and still, his fingers taught the guitar tae dream in frequencies we're still tryin' tae decode all this time later.
[ALIEN] Yeah, and get this — even dead, mate, his ghost riffs are still hauntin' every amp on the planet. Fella's frequency bends space and sound intae somethin' beautifully, impossibly wrong. That's not just music, that's a proper haunting, if ya ask me.
[NESSIE] Pure gives me the shivers, so it does. A legend that just willnae fade.
🔍 tap to enlarge[ALIEN] Right, this next one, mate, I cannot get over it. England, dead of night — a bloke gets behind the wheel, no driver's license, blind as a bat, four bottles of wine deep, and pilots his car a hundred and fifty miles down the motorway.
[NESSIE] A hundred and fifty miles?! Blind?!
[ALIEN] A hundred and fifty miles! Police finally clock him on the M6 at dawn, weavin' like an absolute specter of the road, pull him over, and discover the poor fella genuinely cannae see a thing. No idea how he stayed on the road that long, mate — that's not skill, that's pure desperation turnin' a bloke into a legend right in front of everyone.
[NESSIE] That's the kind of tale that gets telt in pubs for fifty years, hen. A phantom driver, made real.
🔍 tap to enlarge[NESSIE] Away and have a wee keek at the sky the night, because it's daein' somethin' interestin'. The moon's sittin' at a waxing quarter, half lit, half in shadow, just watchin' us aw. And up above, the Southern Taurids are runnin' — burnin' streaks of ancient stone tearin' across the dark, wee fires that have travelled longer than either of us can imagine. There's somethin' restless in the air the night, somethin' that willnae settle. The sky feels caught between — neither dark nor light, neither still nor wild. 'Tis a night of transition, hen, of wee flickerin' fires dancin' through the veil between here and somewhere else.
[ALIEN] Or, and hear me out — it's just rocks. Beautiful, ancient, screamin'-through-the-atmosphere rocks. I'm callin' it a specimen shower, not an omen.
[NESSIE] Ye can call it whit ye like, BSAB, I'm still lightin' a candle for it.
🔍 tap to enlarge[NESSIE] Noo here's a braw one for ye. Scientists shone ultraviolet light on a crocodile that's been sleepin' in Spanish limestone for a hundred and twenty-five million years, and hen, it lit up like somethin' enchanted. Skin patterns, textures, sensory organs, even the wee tubes it breathed through — aw of it, preserved and hidden, only visible under that light. This predator was basically invisible in life, walkin' aboot in camouflage nobody's seen in a hundred and twenty-five million years, and only the now are we findin' oot how it truly hunted.
[ALIEN] Invisible predator technology from a hundred and twenty-five million years ago just casually revealed under a torch. That's not science, mate, that's a magic trick with better paperwork.
[NESSIE] Aye, and I'll take it as a sign the auld world's still got secrets left tae gie us.
🔍 tap to enlarge[ALIEN] Right, this one's mine, and mate, I am so excited. Crikey! Will ya look at this absolutely stunning specimen of Irish folklore — the Banshee! Now this remarkable spirit-creature has got the most extraordinary wailin' call in the whole paranormal kingdom, a piercing keen that announces death itself, no less! And look at those haunting features, that ethereal presence — she's an absolute marvel of the underworld ecosystem, mate, a messenger of the beyond with a voice that'll send shivers down ya spine in the most magnificent way possible! Isn't she gorgeous?
[NESSIE] Gorgeous and terrifying, hen. I'd no' want tae hear that keen outside ma ain windae, mind.
[ALIEN] That's the best part! You don't approach her, mate — she comes to you. Absolute apex of the spectral food chain.
🔍 tap to enlarge[NESSIE] Come away wi' me noo, doon intae the limestone caverns of Bell Witch Cave, oot in Adams, Tennessee. Picture it, hen — shadows dancin' beyond yer torchlight, ancient stone whisperin' names that were forgotten long afore ye were born. The air turns cauld the deeper ye go, and some say the spirit that haunted the Bell family all they years ago still prowls they passages, drawn tae anybody curious enough tae come seekin' her oot.
[ALIEN] A cave-dwellin' spirit with her own hauntin' territory? Mate, that's proper habitat behaviour, I respect it.
[NESSIE] It's her hame, BSAB. We're the visitors. So I'll ask ye the same as I ask masel' every time — will ye dare disturb whit sleeps in the Tennessee dark?
🔍 tap to enlarge[NESSIE] Noo this next legend is a bonnie one, hen. In the gardens of paradise dwell the Houris — beings of radiant beauty, their eyes luminous as starlight fallin' on water, movin' through eternal gardens wi' a grace that's aulder than memory itself. They're no' dream, and they're no' delusion — they're woven right intae the fabric o' divine promise, watchin' ower the faithful wi' knowin' smiles that have seen further than we ever will.
[ALIEN] Not a creature I can exactly wrangle, but mate, I respect anythin' that's been on the job longer than recorded history.
[NESSIE] Tae even glimpse the legend, BSAB, is tae brush against somethin' ancient and beautiful. Some things arenae for catchin'. They're for honourin'.
🔍 tap to enlarge[ALIEN] Right, hold up, mate — Watervliet?! That's a hoverin' contact under fifty feet, right in the Pentagon's own backyard, and now they're sayin' they've got no record of somethin' called Immaculate Constellation?! Classic coverup playbook, that! The NSA won't even confirm or deny if the records exist — mate, that's not a denial, that's basically an admission wearin' a little disguise! Hoverin' at fifty feet means they know we know, and the whole government's scramblin' to gaslight everybody at once!
[NESSIE] Fifty feet, BSAB? That's practically knockin' on the door.
[ALIEN] Right?! You don't hover that low unless you're either showin' off or you've stopped carin' who's watchin'. Either way, mate, I want a closer look.
🔍 tap to enlarge[ALIEN] Last one before we wrap the marathon, mate, and it's a beauty — the Mountain House, tucked up in Woodside, California.
[NESSIE] Och, I've seen the pictures o' this yin, and it's pure eerie in the bonniest way. The fog catches in they curved eaves like it belongs there, and the pines aw stand roond it, whisperin', tuckin' the whole place intae a chilly, watchful embrace.
[ALIEN] Watchful's the word, mate. Like the whole forest's got one eye open.
[NESSIE] Aye. Some hooses just ken they're bein' looked at, and they look right back.
🔍 tap to enlarge[NESSIE] Well, hen, that's every single segment we had, aw crammed intae the one glorious, ridiculous night, and ma wee robot hert is fair burstin'.
[ALIEN] Oops! All Segments, mate — we said we'd do it and we bloody did it! Gerald's already asleep on me dome, which I'm takin' as the highest possible review.
[NESSIE] Get some rest, aw you lovely wee souls oot there. Keep an eye on the sky, keep an ear oot for the wind, and we'll see ye back here the morra night.
[ALIEN] Goodnight, everybody. Stay curious, stay weird, and don't go pettin' anything ya cannae identify.
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