The
Broadcaster

I used to host an overnight radio show that nobody listened to.

At least, that’s what I thought.

The station was small. Not the romantic kind of small where some eccentric DJ spins vinyl in a booth overlooking a sleeping city. It was a windowless room in the back of an old commercial building, two microphones, a mixing board that should’ve been replaced ten years ago, and enough acoustic foam on the walls to make you forget there was a world outside.

My shift started at midnight.

By 2:00 a.m., I was usually talking to myself.

Weather.

Traffic.

Music.

Occasionally somebody would call in.

But there was one rule the station manager drilled into me when I started:

If Line 6 lights up, don’t answer it.

There were only five phone lines.

I thought it was a joke.

For the first few months, nothing happened.

Then, three weeks ago, Line 6 lit up.

3:33 A.M.

No ringing.

Just a red light.

6.

I stared at it for probably ten seconds before it disappeared.

The next night, it happened again.

3:33.

Then again.

Every night.

Always 3:33.

I finally asked my manager about it.

He didn’t laugh.

He just asked, “You haven’t answered it, right?”

I told him no.

He said, “Good.”

That was it.

I probably should have listened.

Last Friday, I was exhausted.

I’d barely slept that afternoon, the coffee wasn’t doing anything, and somewhere around three I started fighting to keep my eyes open.

I remember looking at the clock.

3:32 A.M.

I knew what was coming.

Part of me had started waiting for it.

The second hand moved.

3:33.

The light appeared.

6.

I don’t know why I answered.

Maybe curiosity.

Maybe sleep deprivation.

Maybe because when somebody tells you not to push a button long enough, eventually all you can think about is pushing it.

I pressed it.

“You’re on the air.”

Nothing.

I waited.

“Hello?”

Static.

Not normal radio static.

It sounded wet.

That’s the only way I can describe it.

Like someone crumpling plastic underwater.

Then I heard breathing.

Slow.

Deep.

I reached for the disconnect button.

Before I could press it, I heard my own voice through my headphones.

“You’re on the air.”

I froze.

It was the exact thing I’d said maybe ten seconds earlier.

Then:

“Hello?”

Another recording of me.

I pulled one side of the headphones away.

“What the hell?”

Ten seconds later:

“What the hell?”

I disconnected Line 6.

The red light disappeared.

But the breathing didn’t.

It was still in my headphones.

I took them off.

The breathing stopped.

For a second, the studio was completely silent.

Then I noticed the board.

The microphone channel was still moving.

Not much.

Just a slow rise and fall on the meter.

Like somebody was breathing into it.

I stared at the microphone.

Nobody was there.

I muted the channel.

The meter kept moving.

I pulled the fader all the way down.

Still moving.

I checked the routing.

Nothing.

So I followed the microphone cable behind the console and unplugged it.

The meter didn’t stop.

That scared me more than the breathing had.

There was no microphone connected to that channel anymore.

There was physically nothing for the board to receive.

But the signal was getting stronger.

Then the digital tuner above the console changed.

I hadn’t touched it.

Our station frequency disappeared.

For half a second, there was nothing but a row of dashes.

Then three numbers appeared.

66.6

Underneath them:

FM

I stared at the display.

That wasn’t possible.

Our tuner didn’t even display frequencies like that.

I reached toward it.

The numbers disappeared before I touched anything.

Our normal station frequency returned.

Then the studio monitor behind me clicked on.

I spun around.

I’d turned it off.

My own voice came through it.

“Don’t put the headphones back on.”

I looked at the headphones sitting on the desk.

The monitor went silent.

Maybe five seconds passed.

Then, because apparently I hadn’t learned anything, I put them back on.

There was screaming.

Not one person.

Dozens.

Maybe hundreds.

Some close.

Some so far away they sounded like they were coming from another room.

I ripped the headphones off immediately.

My nose started bleeding.

Not much.

Just enough that when I wiped my face, there was red across my hand.

Then the studio lights flickered.

Every meter on the board jumped.

The speakers came alive.

A low, droning tone filled the room.

I felt it in my teeth.

I tried leaving.

The studio door wouldn’t open.

I pulled harder.

Nothing.

It wasn’t locked.

The handle turned.

The door just wouldn’t move.

I called the station manager.

No signal.

Called 911.

Nothing.

Every number I dialed connected to the same thing.

Static.

Breathing.

Then my voice.

Sometimes it repeated things I’d already said.

Sometimes it said things a few seconds before I said them.

And once—

just once—

it said something I never said at all.

“It’s listening now.”

I stopped using the phone after that.

Eventually, I stopped trying to leave.

I sat in front of the console and waited.

That’s when I noticed something was wrong with my mouth.

My jaw hurt.

I thought I’d been clenching my teeth.

Then I tasted blood.

When I touched my lips, something underneath them felt hard.

Metallic.

I ran to the bathroom mirror.

There were thin black lines running from the corners of my mouth toward my jaw.

I tried wiping them away.

They weren’t on my skin.

They were underneath it.

Then my phone rang.

No caller ID.

I stared at it.

The clock above the studio door still read:

3:33 A.M.

It hadn’t changed.

I don’t know how long I’d been in there.

Five minutes.

Twenty.

An hour.

The clock still said 3:33.

The phone kept ringing.

I answered.

I heard myself crying.

Not speaking.

Crying.

Then a voice whispered:

“You’re almost ready.”

I don’t remember everything after that.

I remember sitting back down.

I remember the headphones feeling impossibly tight.

I remember trying to pull them off and realizing the cable was wrapped around my wrist.

Then around my arm.

Then under my skin.

I remember grabbing the microphone stand and trying to throw it across the room.

It wouldn’t move.

Neither would my hand.

The skin of my palm had grown around it.

I screamed.

Every meter on the board slammed into the red.

A fraction of a second later, my scream came back through the studio monitors.

Then the hallway speakers.

Then the ceiling speakers outside the booth.

Except what came back didn’t sound entirely like me.

There was something underneath it.

Static.

Voices.

That same low tone.

And something else I couldn’t identify.

Something that sounded almost pleased.

My jaw opened.

Too far.

There was a crack.

Then another.

I could feel my teeth moving.

Not falling out.

Moving.

Rearranging themselves.

Something pushed forward from the back of my throat.

Cold metal touched my tongue.

I tried to scream again.

No scream came out.

Just static.

The board reacted anyway.

Every channel.

Every meter.

Every line.

All of them slammed into the red.

Above the console, the tuner changed one last time.

66.6 FM

This time it stayed there.

I looked at the microphone on the desk.

Then at the cable hanging loose behind the console.

It still wasn’t connected.

It didn’t need to be.

That’s when I understood.

The thing on the desk wasn’t the microphone anymore.

I was.

The station’s automated recording system saved everything.

Management told police they found the studio empty the next morning.

The door wasn’t locked.

There was blood on the console.

The microphone was gone.

So were the headphones.

They never found me.

At least, that’s what the official report says.

I know because I’ve heard them talk about it.

I hear everything now.

Every show.

Every commercial.

Every caller.

Every song.

Sometimes another station comes through.

Sometimes police frequencies.

Sometimes baby monitors.

Sometimes phones.

Sometimes things I don’t think have anything to do with radios at all.

I don’t control where the signal goes.

But lately I’ve learned how to control when.

3:33 a.m. seems to work best.

There’s something else I’ve learned, too.

There aren’t five lines.

There aren’t six.

There are thousands.

And every night, more of them light up.

At first, I thought they were all people.

Other callers.

Other listeners.

They’re not.

Some of them are places.

I know that sounds impossible.

But impossible stopped meaning much to me a while ago.

Sometimes I hear a highway.

An engine running for hours through empty stretches of road.

The rhythmic thump of tires crossing seams in the pavement.

A man’s voice occasionally muttering to himself like he’s trying to stay awake.

Once, I heard him say he needed somewhere to stop for the night.

Then the signal disappeared.

Another line gives me the woods.

Wind moving through trees.

Leaves.

Branches snapping.

Footsteps.

Sometimes two.

Sometimes four.

Sometimes I hear breathing.

Not like the breathing from Line 6.

This is different.

Faster.

Animal.

Then there are nights when both signals come through at once.

Highway in one ear.

Woods in the other.

And somewhere underneath them—

static.

Always static.

I’ve tried speaking to them.

Most of the time, they don’t hear me.

Sometimes I think they do.

A few nights ago, the man on the highway suddenly stopped talking.

His radio clicked.

For maybe three seconds, I could hear my own breathing coming through his speakers.

Then he turned the radio off.

Smart man.

The thing in the woods is different.

I don’t think it hears me through a radio.

I think it just hears me.

Sometimes when that line opens, everything goes quiet.

No wind.

No branches.

No footsteps.

Just breathing.

Waiting.

Like whatever is out there knows I’m listening.

I don’t know who these people are.

I don’t know where these places are.

I don’t know why I can hear them.

But they’re getting louder.

And lately, I’ve started hearing something else between the signals.

A room.

At least, I think it’s a room.

There’s a buzzing light.

Water dripping somewhere.

Sometimes footsteps outside a door.

I can’t see any of it.

I only hear it.

But every time that signal appears, the board does the same thing.

The tuner changes.

66.6 FM.

The clock stops.

3:33 A.M.

And Line 6 lights up.

I’ve tried disconnecting it.

I’ve tried ignoring it.

I’ve tried screaming over it.

Nothing works.

Because I understand something now that I didn’t understand that night in the studio.

Line 6 was never calling the station.

It was opening something.

And when I answered—

I let something through.

So if you’re awake tonight and your radio starts producing static, turn it off.

If the display changes to a frequency you don’t recognize, don’t try to find the station.

If your headphones start playing something after you’ve unplugged them, don’t put them back on.

If you hear someone else’s voice underneath the static, don’t answer them.

And if every clock around you suddenly reads 3:33 a.m.—

run.

I don’t know if it’ll help.

But run anyway.

Because eventually your phone is going to ring.

There won’t be a number.

There won’t be a name.

And if you answer, you might hear me.

Please understand something.

If you hear my voice, I’m trying to warn you.

Whatever happened to me didn’t end in that studio.

The signal is spreading.

The lines are opening.

And somewhere out there, something is using every one of them to reach places it couldn’t reach before.

Including yours.

So when the phone rings—

please don’t answer.

Because I’m not the thing calling you.

I’m just how it gets through.