Original subtitles

[ Police radio chatter ]

♪♪

NARRATOR: In this episode of "Paranormal 911"...

I saw a dark hooded shadow.

[ Screams ]

[ Siren wails ]

Stay with me.

ZAVALA: At that last second that he knew

that he was going to breathe the last breath of his life...

S-Stay with me.

[ Speaks Spanish ]

...it felt like something had gone through me.

[ Woman screams ]

FINCH: I heard a scream.

This is impossible because the only ones that have the keys...

is us.

ZAVALA: He's looking at me with this stone-cold look.

[ Tires squeal ]

It was the victim from the accident.

FINCH: This thing wants to do me harm.

ZAVALA: I basically live with constant fear.

Aah!

FINCH: I couldn't get out.

[ Screaming ]

I thought I was going to die.

[ Siren wailing, engine revs ]

WOMAN: Oh, my God!

MAN: 911 -- Please state your emergency.

I think it's a ghost! [ Creature snarls ]

[ Screams ]

♪♪

[ Gun cocks, fires ]

[ Woman screams ]

♪♪

♪♪

Come on, you can admit it. You had a good time, right?

Come on.

Okay. Okay. My friends were wrong.

You're not a complete ass. Just mostly.

♪♪

No. Your friends are right.

[ Screaming ]

[ Horn honking ]

♪♪

[ Horn blares ]

♪♪

♪♪

[ Phone clicks, dial tone ]

NARRATOR: It's another busy and late night on patrol

for university campus

security officer Brittany Finch and her partner.

FINCH: I am a behavioral health associate now,

so I work with mental illness of all kinds.

But at the time of this incident,

I was a campus security officer.

Campuses can get out of control very quickly,

especially in this day and age.

My job was to primarily keep the students safe,

as well as the staff.

MAN: Unit 12 come in.

We have reports of an assault

at Hastings Dorm southwest parking lot.

Yeah, we're -- we're on our way. Copy that.

NARRATOR: The urgent 911 call

is coming from a remote part of the campus

that hasn't been active for decades.

I heard rumors about this building

before I even started this job.

♪♪

[ Growl ]

[ Wind gusting ]

♪♪

[ Scream ]

Doors closing and opening, accidental deaths.

I asked questions to my supervisor,

and he said there had been students

that had reported a hooded figure floating around campus.

♪♪

That's got to be it right there.

NARRATOR: The officers arrive at the remote location

and are shocked by what they see.

♪♪

[ Horn honks ]

Oh, my God.

We saw one student slumped over the steering wheel.

Very, very bloody.

[ Police radio chatter ]

♪♪

I've got a pulse. He's unconscious.

NARRATOR: The student is seriously injured

with undetermined injuries.

So Finch and her partner

immediately call police and ambulance,

but they're clearly not alone in this isolated parking lot.

Someone else is still out there.

This was possibly a witness that had seen what had happened.

Hello?

[ Woman sobbing ]

Campus security, you're safe now.

NARRATOR: Finch searches for the hysterical 911 caller.

FINCH: I'm responsible for making sure that she's okay.

Oh, my God. Are you okay?

Please help us. Help us.

We were attacked, we were attacked, we were attacked.

It's going to be okay. It's okay.

Listen. Listen to me. Look at me, look at me.

Look at me. It's gonna be okay.

When it comes to any kind of law enforcement,

you have to be able to really keep your composure

and you have to be able to help and be effective

in what you do, get your job done.

Just come with me. You're safe now. It's okay.

It's okay.

NARRATOR: The student tells Finch

she saw a black hooded figure that fled to the parking lot

closest to the old dorm building.

As police and paramedics fly to the scene...

Hello?

...Finch's partner remains with the victim,

but she's determined to find the attacker before he can escape.

FINCH: Hello? We have Tasers and pepper spray.

But even if I were armed, I'd still be vulnerable.

♪♪

FEMALE VOICE: Join me. I will take you there.

I heard a female voice.

Hey.

Whoever you are, show yourself.

♪♪

[ Breathy laughter ]

♪♪

Who's there?

I felt something watching me.

Join me. I will take you there.

I don't know where it came from,

what it was about, but it was that feeling.

It was like somebody is watching me.

NARRATOR: Unarmed and completely exposed...

Whoever's there, show yourself.

...Finch could be attacked at any second.

Join me. I will take you there.

♪♪

I saw a dark hooded shadow.

Hey! Campus security!

NARRATOR: Finch gives chase.

Stop!

♪♪

NARRATOR: But in an instant, it disappears.

I blinked and it was gone.

NARRATOR: With police still racing to the scene...

Whoever's there, show yourself.

...Finch remains vulnerable

to a violent assault from this shadowy figure.

FINCH: Of course you're nervous.

You don't know, the unknown is scary for anybody.

I wanted to make sure this wasn't a threat,

this wasn't somebody that shouldn't have been there.

♪♪

In this line of work, you have to you --

you have to get your [bleep] together and you have to be able

to do your job regardless of your fears.

♪♪

[ Sharp clack ]

♪♪

This shadow figure that I saw was wearing a black cloak,

and he had a hood over his head.

I could not make out any face. It was just black.

I was trying to figure out what this was.

Don't move.

[ Screams ]

NARRATOR: At a university campus in Western New York,

overnight security officer Brittany Finch

responds to a call

at an abandoned dormitory with an evil past.

FINCH: God.

There's been a vicious assault.

Please help us!

After finding and calming the young female witness...

It's all right.

...Finch is led into a dark labyrinth...

Stop!

...by a shadowy and foreboding presence

that may just kill her.

I was so terrified

because I felt like,

whatever this thing is wants to do me harm.

♪♪

[ Screams ]

Hey, hey, hey, hey! It's me. It's me. It's me. It's me.

Don't worry, don't worry. What's up?

I -- I just thought I -- I just thought I s--

♪♪

NARRATOR: Then... [ Woman screams ]

...a blood-curdling scream rips through the night.

MAN: Sounded like it was coming from the old dorm.

It seems to come from inside this abandoned building.

FINCH: Okay.

With EMS and police on the scene treating the victims,

the security officers ignore the legend

of this building's dark past

to search for another potential victim of this violent attacker.

[ Woman screaming ]

-Go. Go, go, go. -Let's go.

FINCH: I heard a scream.

The scream was so loud, it was so ear-piercing.

♪♪

[ Screaming continues ]

Hey! Don't worry. We're coming.

[ Screaming continues ]

♪♪

The first thing that's on the wall is a large pentagram.

And it said, "Get out while you can."

What is this?

I've heard stories about this place.

The reason that this was shut down

was because students were practicing evil.

[ Indistinct chanting ]

They actually closed it down after an incident

that happened in there.

STUDENTS: ...to call upon the dead.

There was satanic rituals going on,

and they were worshiping something evil

up there in the '70s.

STUDENTS: Walk with us, walk with us.

We call upon the dead.

FINCH: And then there was a tragic death

that happened in one of the rooms.

STUDENTS: Walk with us, walk with us.

[ Distorted ] We call upon the dead.

[ Screams ]

30 years.

Oh, where the hell was that coming from?

Right after that happened, they moved people out quickly,

and it was lock and key.

You go north, loop around. I'll go south.

-Okay. -Be careful.

♪♪

BREWER: This can be very dangerous, for instance,

if this is a space where dark ceremonies

or rituals took place.

Once you summon something greater than yourself,

perhaps opening a door to the spirit world,

we understand so little of those other realms,

we have no guarantee that we can ever close that door.

And we don't know what's on the other side,

what's waiting for us.

♪♪

NARRATOR: The deeper she moves inside the decaying dorm,

Finch's sense...

FINCH: Hello?

...that something evil is lurking in this building grows.

♪♪

[ Whispering ] You're daughters of Satan.

NARRATOR: The ghostly female voice leads Finch

to a female dorm room

that's been long since abandoned.

♪♪

A terrifying time capsule that may just hold clues

to this dark mystery.

Finch spots faded photographs

that appear to have been hanging here for decades.

They reveal the young students that once lived here

and give clues to their evil experiments.

♪♪

What the hell is going on?

♪♪

Hello?

♪♪

[ Woman screams ]

FINCH: Again, heard, like, just this blood-curdling scream.

And it was a scream that was, "I'm in trouble."

♪♪

[ Door creaks ]

♪♪

NARRATOR: She finds nothing,

but the inexplicable voices and screams

lead her even deeper into the building,

unwittingly inching her closer to the source of this evil.

FINCH: Nobody was in there.

♪♪

♪♪

[ Water running ] And then I heard water running.

♪♪

The sink was running.

NARRATOR: Finch instantly realizes

that it's not water that's running at all.

FINCH: There is blood coming from the sink.

How is this blood even possible?

Join me.

I heard something.

Hello? [ Indistinct whisper ]

And it was like a very faint voice.

Couldn't make out any words.

This is campus security. We're here to help.

[ Indistinct whispering ]

If you're hurt, say something.

The voice that I heard was a very soft female voice.

Hello?

NARRATOR: Finch follows the desperate-sounding voice

to the far end of the wing and into a room

that hasn't been entered for nearly half a century.

[ Indistinct whisper ]

She's confronted by the shocking remnants

of malevolent and evil activity

that once occurred here.

I pointed at my light up at the wall and it said "666."

The number.

Which is pretty familiar with the devil.

[ Gasps ]

It was at that point in time that I knew that this room

had some significance to whatever happened years ago

up there.

♪♪

Join me. I'll take you there.

♪♪

STUDENTS: We call upon the dead.

Join me.

I will take you there.

We call upon the dead.

Join me.

Oh!

I will take you there. [ Clatter ]

[ Screaming ]

♪♪

FINCH: The shadow that I saw at the accident

was standing in front of the door,

and I couldn't get out.

[ Gasping ]

Physically, my breath was taken from me.

It felt like somebody was sitting on my chest.

[ Indistinct chanting ]

What do you want from me?!

[ Sobbing ]

No!

♪♪

It was that young girl that had passed away there.

♪♪

I tried to scream. I tried to scream for help.

I tried to scream, and nothing was coming out.

NARRATOR: At the scene of a violent, mysterious assault.

university campus security officer Brittany Finch...

[ Finch screams ]

...is in pursuit of a dangerous dark figure...

♪♪

...inside an abandoned dormitory that was chained up

after satanic rituals resulted in the death of a young student.

Now trapped... [ Screams ]

...she finds herself face to face with a hooded entity...

[ Sobbing ] No!

...the spirit of the girl

who died in this evil room decades earlier.

♪♪

FINCH: I tried to scream. I tried to scream for help.

I tried to scream and nothing was coming out.

I couldn't move.

[ Gasping ]

STUDENTS: We call upon the dead.

We summon the gods of the underworld.

Walk with us, walk with us.

[ Whimpers ] We call upon the dead.

We summon the gods of the underworld.

Walk with us, walk with us.

We call upon the dead.

FINCH: I'm witnessing with my own eyes

almost a recreation of what happened that night.

♪♪

STUDENTS: We call upon the dead.

[ Screams ]

[ Screams ]

We call upon the dead.

♪♪

NARRATOR: In an instant, she's back in the present.

BREWER: Entities can hijack our perception.

They can show us what they want us to see.

You might think of all the electrical

impulses of our brain,

so you might think of this entity as kind of like a hacker

able to hack into that signal of ours

and insert images in order to seduce us,

to goad us, to get us to do its bidding.

FEMALE VOICE: Join me.

[ Gasps ]

I will take you there.

I was so terrified

because I felt like this entity wants to do me harm.

And it was something that I felt to my bone.

♪♪

[ Whimpering ]

Join me. I will take you there.

STUDENTS: We call upon the dead.

We summon the gods of the underworld.

Walk with us, walk with us.

-We call upon the dead. -Join me.

-Oh, oh, God. -I will take you there.

NARRATOR: The malicious entity

begins to overpower Finch's body.

I thought I was gonna die.

I thought I was gonna die up there.

-Walk with us. -Join me.

[ Whispers indistinctly ]

Our Father who art in Heaven, hallowed be thy name.

Thy kingdom come, thy will be done,

on Earth as it is in Heaven.

I just started praying. I didn't know what else to do.

[ Sobbing ] Sam!

Sam, I'm in here!

Sam! [ Sobbing ]

Stop! Are you okay?

NARRATOR: Finch's partner appears...

Come on, come on, come on.

...forcing the apparition to retreat.

♪♪

BREWER: There are cult members who are practitioners of the dark arts

who have sacrificed themselves in order to gain

kind of a spiritual immortality

in order to work from the other side.

[ Screams ]

This entity not only sought power, but immortality,

and one of the ways that might have been granted to it

was to remain earthbound,

to suck the life force out of individuals

that crossed its threshold.

I got you. Don't worry.

FINCH: When he saw me, he thought something really,

really bad happened to me. It literally had to carry me.

I had no strength.

He literally had to carry me out of that building.

I'm in law enforcement and I'm tough and this was...

I -- I felt so helpless.

I've just never felt that helpless in my life.

NARRATOR: Officer Finch and partner are powerless to do anything

but struggle to make sense of what they've just experienced.

The psychological effect that it had on me was profound.

It made me question so much in my life.

I mean, this has stayed with me for -- for years.

[ Indistinct chanting ]

But I know that it happened.

I saw it with my own eyes, I experienced it, I felt it.

♪♪

The paranormal exists.

There are forces

beyond what the eyes can see.

There's absolutely good.

And -- And then there is evil, with-- without question.

[ Screams ]

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

[ Chuckles ] So your mom. I'm going to go and see Maria.

I know. She's the life of the party.

[ Laughs ]

You know, she's so excited to see you.

[ Laughing ] I know.

ZAVALA: It was the summer. Me and my wife are driving.

And, you know, me and her,

we're just talking and listening to the radio,

you know, just, you know, being just a happy family.

She's going to ask me to dance and sing with my accent.

[ Laughter ]

[ Techno music plays ]

I can remember it was a gray car

and there was three guys.

You know, they were laughing, listening to music.

They were just being loud and, you know, everybody's having a good time.

It's Friday. Everyone's happy they got paid.

I do love you.

[ Laughter ]

♪♪

I locked eyes with them.

Just for that split second, you know.

[ Laughing ] Hey.

♪♪

It's just like a picture in my head.

What was that?

Dudes being dudes, you know? [ Chuckles ]

Yeah, you wish you were with them.

Honey, no.

No, I'm with you. That's where I want to be.

I didn't think nothing of it at the moment,

but I had just that -- that feeling.

♪♪

Like, why did the image stay locked in my head?

Wasn't the last time I was ever going to see him.

♪♪

[ Conversing in Spanish ]

♪♪

[ Horn blaring ]

[ Tires squeal ]

[ Screams ]

[ Phone rings ]

♪♪

♪♪

[ Phone clicks, dial tone ]

NARRATOR: An emergency call suddenly forces firefighter

Hector Zavala away from a day off with his wife.

My pager goes off, so I start --

you know, I start hauling ass to the station.

[ Siren wails, horn honks ]

NARRATOR: An eight-year Army veteran

who served in Iraq and Afghanistan,

Zavala has thrust himself back into an intense,

life-threatening world because he needed to.

ZAVALA: Becoming a firefighter made me feel alive again,

to know that I could do something positive.

[ Siren wailing ]

This is unit four. We're approaching the scene.

WOMAN: Stand by for further detail.

10-4.

ZAVALA: It was one-car accident

and one entrapment and one other one was a 10-50,

which is a -- which is a casualty.

We're approaching the scene, boys.

Hang tight.

[ Siren wailing ]

♪♪

Oh, right. I recognize that car.

It hit me like realizing, like, wait a minute,

you know, I was just here. This is the same car I saw.

♪♪

NARRATOR: Zavala must get in fast, trust his training,

and save the lives of the crash victims.

♪♪

The accident is horrific.

Are you okay? Look at me. Look at me.

The driver survived, but the car spun around

and it hit a telephone pole.

The passenger, when he hit...

that was it.

♪♪

The guy in the back...

♪♪

...he was pinned between the driver's front seat

and the -- and, basically, the trunk.

I got to get this door popped open.

Just hang tight, hang tight.

NARRATOR: The firefighters race to get him free.

ZAVALA: You really don't think.

You're more in the moment of I got to get this guy out.

I got to help, you know, I got to help the victim.

All right. All right. Go.

-Okay. -Just do your thing.

ZAVALA: All right. Okay. All right.

When we were helping him out,

my job was to make him comfortable.

[ Police radio chatter ]

You have to hold the victim's neck...

Keep breathing, keep breathing. Stay with me.

...to make sure if it is -- you know, if he's broken or --

You know, anything, just,

you got to try to make him comfortable.

Stay with me.

Can you hear me, sir?

He's going limp and he's losing color.

At that moment, he starts to go white.

You can hear me. I know you can hear me.

Woman: We're losing him. Pulse is low.

Can you hear me?

At that last second that he knew

that he was going to breathe the last breath of his life...

♪♪

he looked at me.

Sir? Can you hear me?

♪♪

Aah!

♪♪

At that moment, it felt like...

like something had gone through me.

♪♪

Am I feeling what he's feeling? Did I just...

feel the last thing that he felt?

[ Heartbeat slowing ]

Sir, can you hear me? Pulse is getting very low.

Stay with me. We're losing him.

And that was it.

Just like...

Just like a movie, it finished.

♪♪

That was the first scene that I've ever worked

that somebody actually passed away in front of me.

♪♪

I felt like I was connected with him at that moment,

the last seconds that he had.

NARRATOR: In the aftermath, Zavala is overcome by an eerie

and overpowering feeling.

ZAVALA: You know when you have that feeling

like someone's watching you?

♪♪

In the corner of my eye, when I looked

and I try to focus...

was someone standing there?

♪♪

Did it really just happen?

I don't know.

It's not a feeling I would ever want to feel again.

NARRATOR: Zavala has survived the trauma

of facing down death before,

but as he helplessly leaves the victim behind,

he knows that this one is different.

Something inside of me didn't feel...

♪♪

right about it.

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

When I got home, my wife looked at me, and she's like,

"What's the matter?" and I'm just like,

"I don't know. Just something -- something's not right with me."

That bad?

[ Sighs ]

NARRATOR: Consumed by the extreme events

and emotions of the day,

Hector has forgotten to dispose of his blood-covered

rubber gloves from the fatal crash site.

I noticed the gloves when I brought them home,

and his blood was on it.

I'm sorry, honey.

It's okay.

♪♪

Hector, are you okay?

[ Breathing heavily ]

I was terrified and having that lingering feeling of...

yeah, of sadness.

It made me wonder if what I was experiencing at the time

was because of what connection we had at the scene.

♪♪

NARRATOR: Somehow Zavala manages to fall asleep.

But not for long.

[ Gasps ]

[ Hyperventilating ]

♪♪

HECTOR'S WIFE: What's going on?

♪♪

Hector!

♪♪

♪♪

NARRATOR: Firefighter Hector ZAVALA has been haunted

by a disturbing apparition

ever since an accident victim died in his arms

and forced an otherworldly connection.

♪♪

It felt like something had gone through me.

HECTOR'S WIFE: What's going on?

♪♪

Hector!

I didn't know who it physically was at that moment,

but I knew someone was standing there.

NARRATOR: Like any former soldier who's been a battle,

Zavala systematically searches the premises.

Your training and everything that you learned,

at that moment, it kicks in.

♪♪

Found nothing, nothing was there.

♪♪

NARRATOR: But Hector still can't shake the disturbing feeling

that someone or something is inside his home.

And it could be dangerous.

[ Door creaks ]

♪♪

[ Sighs ]

My wife I thought I was crazy 'cause,

I mean, she wanted to know, was I --

You know, what was I doing? You know?

I'm sorry for waking you up, honey.

It's okay. Come to bed.

But I couldn't tell her. I just --

I didn't know how to say it, you know?

♪♪

Maybe she'd just tell me, "Oh, it's just a nightmare.

You just saw something in your mind

and you woke up from a dream,

and that's the first thing in your mind."

Who would believe me?

♪♪

It was maybe a couple of days later.

I just remember turning off the lights

and having that same feeling that someone's there.

♪♪

♪♪

I knew that I was awake and what I was seeing

and what I was feeling was real.

I knew who it was.

♪♪

It was the victim from the accident.

BREWER: This sounds like an attachment

where a spirit latches on to a person.

They fear crossing over, so they're kind of clinging on

to any last earthly security they can.

In this scenario, Hector was that individual.

For Hector, this could be very physically

and mentally exhausting.

At that moment, it was just fear.

♪♪

♪♪

NARRATOR: Night after night for weeks,

the specter returns to haunt Zavala in his home.

♪♪

The fear is what gets you.

It was constant fear.

You could turn the light back on and...

it's gone, but once it goes off, it's still there.

♪♪

I basically live with constant fear.

Terrified. I didn't want to sleep.

♪♪

It was probably a couple of weeks later.

I couldn't take it. I -- I didn't want it.

I wanted it to end.

♪♪

He was back.

He's looking at me with this stone-cold...

look.

He was mangled the same way I saw him

when we pulled him out of the vehicle.

[ Police radio chatter ]

♪♪

What do you want from me?

You're just...screw everything, screw your training,

screw everything that you've learned,

your fire department, the Army, everything.

What do you want from me?!

I was stuck, I was locked.

So whatever he wanted

and whatever he was trying to focus into me,

he did.

They say a man can look into your soul.

That's what he was doing.

♪♪

NARRATOR: Firefighter Hector Zavala's life

has been thrown into chaos.

The spirit of a deceased car crash victim has attached to him

and turned his world into a living nightmare.

I couldn't do it anymore.

What do you want from me?

I was stuck, I was locked.

You know, I'm thinking, you know,

why did I get connected to him?

Why -- He kept showing himself around me.

♪♪

I kept telling myself there's more, there's more to it.

There's something that maybe he wants me to do.

♪♪

NARRATOR: After months of protecting his wife

from his terrifying hauntings, Hector finally comes clean.

[ Sighs ] The connection that I have

with that guy in that car

is something that can't explain right now.

I finally opened up to her and I told her

what -- you know, what I was seeing

I knew was physically real.

I'm not crazy, honey. It's okay.

To feel powerless in your own house,

you know, you're going to have to do something.

You see ghosts?

She basically said, "You know, why don't you just go back

to the crash site?

Why don't you go leave some flowers?

You know, talk to the guy. Make your peace."

♪♪

I decided that, you know, maybe it's time

that I do go back to the -- to the site where he passed away.

I was scared, but he needs to let go.

Can dwell with me forever.

NARRATOR: The accident site is still stained

with the blood of the two victims killed here.

ZAVALA: The pole was still there,

and they have a little memorial for them.

[ Breathing heavily ]

Santa María, Madre de Dios...

I understood the sadness that he was never

going to go back to see his wife or his family.

[ Speaking Spanish ]

♪♪

We're losing him. Pulse is low.

Can you hear me?

[ Gasps ]

Hector!

What do you want from me?!

♪♪

I told him, "Make your peace."

You need to go.

Sometimes a spirit might not even know they're dead.

They just know that they're in a state of emergency.

Sometimes all that's needed is a verbalization.

[ Sobbing ] You need to go and find peace

and give me my life back.

This spirit needs to be told it's time to move on.

It's okay to move into the light.

♪♪

♪♪

Where he passed away, I -- that's where I put the flowers.

♪♪

But what was it? Why did I get connected to him?

BREWER: Hector was the last person this spirit saw

before crossing over.

As a first responder,

someone who imbues qualities of compassion and safety,

the spirit probably looked at Hector

as being a very protective, safe force to go home with,

to attach itself to.

ZAVALA: I think he didn't want to let go.

At that last moment, in his very last seconds of life...

Stay with me.

...we locked eyes.

Keep breathing. I'm right here. You're not alone.

He saw, "Hey, you know what?

This is -- This is a good guy."

He saw inside me.

♪♪

[ Laughing ] Hey!

♪♪

Looking into his eyes, and he looked in mine,

I could see that he was finally ready to go.

♪♪

I'll always be connected to him, no matter what.

♪♪

After I made my peace and said what I had to say to him,

The day looked brighter.

♪♪

After that -- that experience, I realized that dead people,

they're all around us, they'll always be around us.

Even now, people say they still drive there.

Lo and behold, they see someone standing at the crash site.

♪♪

But he's not with me no more.

♪♪

♪♪