LYS Podcast Episode 9

*-Intro-*

**AMANDA MORRISON (AM V/O):**
When we left you last episode, we’d just discovered two things. The first
thing, Nancy Robins, the executive who had been put in charge of the podcast
network, but had cancelled the first iteration of this show way back when,
appeared to be somehow connected to an organization we know very little about.
An organization called ‘The Bolchester Alliance’. The second thing was that
Colin had uncovered information that indicated the mysterious video we’ve been
pursuing was going to be screened here in San Francisco, sometime this evening.
We decided, no matter what, we were going to be at that screening. You’re
listening to The Leap Year Society. I’m Amanda Morrison. Stay with us.

*-End of Outro-*

**AM V/O:** Before we
get to that video and where we’re at with uncovering the screening time and
location, we’re going to take a moment to look into what we know so far about
The Bolchester Alliance. Colin, who you normally hear on the phone, was in San
Francisco. He was here because he had a screening of that video to attend. He
stopped by the studio.

**AM:** What can we
say we know with some degree of certainty about The Bolchester Alliance?

**CO:** Well, from
what we’ve been able to dig up so far, they appear to be a kind of extreme
self-help or wellness-focused group.

**AM:** That’s it?

**CO:** It looks like
there might be offices in Santa Fe, Buenos Aries, Toronto, Melbourne, Prague
and Singapore, but confirmation is hard to come by.

**AM:** You don’t talk
about the Bolchester Alliance.

**CO:** Apparently
not. What about this woman, Nancy Robins?

**AM:** Nothing on
Robins, outside of a webpage I found her name listed on. A website we believe
is connected to the Bolchester Alliance.

**CO:**
Findyournewpath.org.

**AM:** Yeah. She’s
listed, or rather, was listed as a ‘special advisor’.

**CO:** Hmm, it’s
strange.

**AM:** What?

**CO:** This website
is so new.

**AM:** Yeah?

**CO:** Yeah, it was
registered in June. There are a few cached versions of similar sites related to
this organization, but it looks like the site you found is the only thing
currently being update.

**AM:** There’s not
much here.

**CO:** And you think
Nancy Robins used to be listed in the “about” section?

**AM:** She is.

**CO:** Not anymore.

**AM:** What?

**CO:** Well if her
name was there, it’s been removed.

**AM:** No it was
there, I took a screen capture.

**CO:** Weird.

**AM:** Yeah.

**CO:** I’ll collect
everything I can find from cached versions and anything connected to
‘Bolchester Alliance’ and send it to you.

**AM:** Thanks.

**AM V/O:** While
Colin was digging into the Bolchester Alliance, Mitch was actually getting
ready to do the same thing, except Mitch was going to do it in person.

**AM:** What’s going
on?

**MS:** Well, that’s
a good question.

**AM:** What do you
mean?

**MS:** I think I’m
on standby, but I’m not sure.

**AM:** Please
explain.

**MS:** Ok well, when
I woke up this morning there was a message on my phone.

**AM:** What message?

**MS:** It was just a
URL. It was “walking on the path.com”

**AM:** Ok, and what
was there?

**MS:** It was
connected to a Tumblr. There was nothing there but a generic form. I entered
the same email I’ve been using for my pseudonym, Miranda.

**AM:** And?

**MS:** And now I’m
just waiting.

**AM:** You’ll let me
know as soon as you hear anything?

**MS:** You know I
will.

**AM V/O:** I went
back to the studio and waited to hear from Mitch and/or Colin. While I was
waiting, I did a deep-dive into some of the phenomena we’d been looking into.
Anything that appeared like it might be related to Dr. Taylor’s research. It
didn’t take long before I came across a very interesting story. On the 28th
of February in 2013, a man was discovered unconscious and injured in a Palm
Springs motel room. When he awoke in the hospital, he claimed he had no idea
who he was. His ID indicated that he was a US citizen named Michael Boatwright,
but that name meant nothing to the man in the hospital. Michael Thomas
Boatwright was a Vietnam was vet from Florida, but the man who woke up in the
hospital thought his name was Johan Ek. And, although his identification
indicated he was American, this man spoke only Swedish. The official diagnosis
was Transient Global Amnesia, a disorder that, according to medical
professionals, can last for several months or longer. The doctors looking after
the man believed he was living in a ‘dissociative fugue state’ and they really
didn’t understand what was going on. Could he be faking his condition, or was
this man a genuine medical mystery? Michael Boatwright spent five months at the
hospital in California before he was eventually sent back to Sweden by the
Riverside County Department of Mental Health. Back in Sweden, he disappeared
into a regular life: moved to Uddevalla, a port city on the southwest coast,
and worked as a tennis coach. His ability to speak English never returned but
he was, by all accounts, happy in his new life. About a year after all of this,
he gave an interview to his local paper, where he stated that he no longer felt
like a stranger in his own country and that he felt that he’d been born again.
So, why am I telling you this story? Well, two reasons. The first: this type of
disorder is directly in-line with everything that both Dr. Weylen Taylor and
Lane Kelly were looking into in their various experiments. And the second
reason I’m telling you this story, is that the name Johan Ek is an anagram for
Jan Hoke. Jan Hoke, you’ll remember, is the name of Patient 80. This led me
back into all of our research surrounding Patient 80. It was while digging
through everything yet again, that I found something new. In one of the records
we found connected to the psychiatric hospital where Patient 80 was initially
housed, was a document indicating a mix-up in records. According to this
document, four patient records had been mixed up and were supposed to be
modified immediately to reflect the proper subject numbers. Patient 45 was
actually supposed to be Patient 54, and Patient 80 was actually Patient 81.
Patient 80, Jan Hoke, Johan Ek, or Michael Boatwright was dead. He passed away
in 2017 in Sweden. But we knew nothing about the man whose voice we’ve been
hearing on those tapes throughout this series. As far as we knew, Patient 81
might still be alive. This made sense based on the voice in the recording.
Patient 81’s voice didn’t sound like an older man, there was no trace of an
accent, and his English was perfect. He sounded like a man in his late twenties
or early thirties. If there was a possibility that Patient 81 might still be
alive, I really wanted to speak with him to find out what he remembers about
his time with Dr. Weylen Taylor. While I was uncovering this information about
Patient 81, I received a call from Mitch. She told me I needed to get over to
her place immediately. She lives about ten minutes away from the studio.

**AM:** What’s going
on?

**MS:** I received a
text about fifteen minutes ago.

**AM:** The Bolchester
Alliance.

**MS:** Yeah it looks
like it. I have a meeting.

**AM:** Really? That
was fast.

**MS:** Yeah. It’s in
an hour.

**AM:** Where is it?

**MS:** Pacific
Heights.

**AM:** Any other
details?

**MS:** No, just the
time and the address. It’s on Pacific Ave. You wanna…you wanna tag along?

**AM:** Absolutely!
But, I don’t think that’s a good idea.

**MS:** Yeah… Oh, uh
did you bring the mic?

**AM:** Of course.

**AM V/O:** The
reason Mitch needed me to come by was to bring a tiny hidden microphone we were
going to place on her person so she could record whatever happened. While I was
giving Mitch a crash course on how to work the hidden microphone set up, I
received a text message.

**AM:** It’s Colin.

**MS:** When did he
get into town?

**AM:** This morning.
He says he has some news about the video.

**MS:** Yeah? What?

**AM:** He doesn’t
say. You want me to call him?

**MS:** Uh…no I gotta
run. Uh, but let me know as soon as you know what’s up.

**AM:** Will do!

**AM V/O:** So, Mitch
was on her way to a meeting with the Bolchester Alliance. She promised she’d
switch on her microphone as soon as she arrived. Colin and I waited together at
the studio. It didn’t take long for Mitch to start broadcasting.

*-Mitch Mic-*

**MS:** Test test
testing. Alright the levels on this thing look good. Hope you guys are getting
this. Ok I’m about to head inside.

*The sounds of many*
people chattering can be heard in the background.

**MS:** Man, this
place is huge. There are some people near the front entrance. Ok, I’m going to
stop talking to myself now. Wish me luck!

**AM V/O:** We’ll
have more from that recording in a moment. Colin had found something
interesting about Dr. Weylen Taylor and his mysterious locked room
disappearance. Dr. Taylor allegedly disappeared from his house in San
Francisco, which was under heavy surveillance at the time. Heavy surveillance
owned and operated by Dr. Taylor himself. Colin and I were sitting in our
studio in front of a bunch of scanned pages from two local newspapers. It was
information related to Dr. Weylen Taylor’s disappearance. The two reports are
similar: they both reference the locked room-style mystery at the centre of Dr.
Taylor’s disappearance and they both focus on some kind of gambling debt scenario
as one possible motive. The reason Colin was so interested in these reports, is
the gambling reference.

**CO:** According to
both articles, Taylor was playing a lot of online Texas Holdem Poker in the
years leading up to his disappearance.

**AM:** Right, it’s a
very popular game, isn’t it?

**CO:** It sure is,
but I don’t think Weylen Taylor was all that interested in playing it.

**AM:** What do you
mean?

**CO:** Well, I
contacted the owner of one of the off-shore casinos he was allegedly gambling
at.

**AM:** And?

**CO:** And they told
me that as far as they were concerned, Weylen Taylor never had an account with
them.

**AM:** What about
the other casinos?

**CO:** That’s just
it. The other casinos don’t actually exist.

**AM:** Did they ever
exist?

**CO:** No.

**AM:** So, where did
those reporters get that information?

**CO:** I was
wondering the same thing so I called and asked them.

**AM:** What did they
say?

**CO:** One of them
no longer works at the paper and the other told me that they couldn’t remember
their source, but that it was most likely the sister.

**AM:** Weylen Taylor
has a sister?

**CO:** Allegedly,
but I wasn’t able to get in touch earlier.

**AM:** Do we know
how to get in touch now?

**CO:** We do. The
reporter provided a number.

*-Phone Call-*

**Helen Chow:**
Hello?

**AM:** Hello, is
this Helen Taylor? Hello?

**HC:** Helen…Chow,
Taylor was my maiden name.

**AM:** Oh.

**HC:** Who’s this?

**AM:** My name’s
Amanda Morrison. I’m calling about your brother, Weylen.

**HC:** Huh. What
about him?

**AM:** Well, I’m
doing an investigative podcast series into a secret society and your brother’s
work and disappearance might be connected somehow.

**HC:** Look, as far
as I know my brother didn’t belong to any secret societies outside of a
fraternity.

**AM:** Have you ever
heard of something called The Bolchester Alliance?

**HC:** No, but it
definitely sounds like some sort of cult to me.

**AM:** Do you mind
if I ask you a few questions about your brother’s disappearance?

**HC:** My brother
and I were estranged, Ms…?

**AM:** Morrison.

**HC:** Morrison. I’m
not interested in having anything to do with Weylen Taylor, I’m afraid. I’m
sorry, I’m going to hang up now.

**AM:** Could you
just tell me if you believe he was a gambler?

**HC:** He would never
gamble at cards. My brother was a lot of things, but he was cheap. Unless he
was certain that he’d win, he’d never risk so much as a dollar.

**AM:** So…what do
you think happened to him?

**HC:** Well, I’d
like to think he’d had enough of …torturing those poor people and he
disappeared to make a fresh start somewhere else, but I really don’t know or
care. Good day Ms. Morrison.

*-End of Call-*

**AM V/O:** I called
back, but she was very firm. She would sign a release and allow us to air what
you just heard, but there was no way she was going to talk further about her
brother. I asked her if there was anybody else she could think of who might
know her brother’s whereabouts, but she told me she couldn’t think of anyone.
So, that was that. Dr. Weylen Taylor’s locked room mystery was just that. We
had nothing…or so we thought. But we did have something: we had you, our
listeners. We received an email from what appeared to be fans of this podcast,
calling themselves “The Forgotten Friends of Fortune”. They sent us two video files.
The first bit of video was from what the claimed was a cloud-based security
company’s storage facility. It was exterior footage of Weylen Taylor’s
residence dated the night of his disappearance.

**CO:** It’s been
doctored.

**AM:** How can you
tell?

**CO:** It’s easy,
it’s clearly a loop.

**AM:** You’re sure?

**CO:** I’m positive.
You can tell by the shadows, see? It’s a full moon and if you’re going to
doctor footage of a moonlit night, you’re going to have to edit everything
frame by frame. Rotoscoping, landscape sculpting, you’d need comparative
footage to match the shadow movement. It’s doable, but it would be expensive
and extremely time-consuming. It’s way easier to just loop it, like this. See?
Nobody is going to go into it frame by frame and ask questions if there’s no
reason.

**AM:** But the
police had a reason. There’s no way they would just accept this fake footage.

**CO:** You think so?

**AM:** Well, what do
you mean?

**CO:** I mean this
footage came from a police server.

**AM:** Really?

**CO:** Yeah. The way
the footage has been named and catalogued, it’s definitely from the police.

**AM:** Do you think
they just accepted it as actual security footage?

**CO:** No, they knew
it was fake.

**AM:** And they
closed the case?

**CO:** I’m sure that
helped them close the case.

**AM:** What do you
mean?

**CO:** I mean, they
had fake security camera footage and a motive for him to disappear.

**AM:** Gambling?

**CO:** Sure. They
took this footage apart, found out it had been doctored; they’re still no
closer to finding Dr. Taylor.

**AM:** So the police
fed the reporter the story about the gambling.

**CO:** It fits like
a glove.

**AM:** So, why did
Weylen Taylor alter his video surveillance footage to cover his leaving?

**CO:** That’s a good
question.

**AM V/O:** It was a
good question, which leads me to the second bit of video footage we received
from our listener, or listeners, calling themselves The Forgotten Friends of
Fortune. This second video was also security footage. It was taken at a bar
somewhere. We can make out a few men sitting and having a drink. A few other
people mill about in the background, including a couple playing pool. It takes
a moment to figure it out, but once you do, there’s no denying it. One of the
people sitting in that bar is Weylen Taylor. At this point, I’d like to play
you the last bit of audio I received from Mitch.

*-Mitch Mic-*

**MS:** Woah, there
are a lot of people here. Oh man, you wouldn’t believe the art on the walls,
it’s insane! Right, I’ve been checked in and we’re supposed to meet the person
in charge in the large upstairs dining room. This whole vibe is kind of like
Eyes Wide Shut without the masks, but man, everybody is so elegant and smart
and…

**Woman:** Who are
you talking to?

**MS:** Uh, it’s just
a-

*-Sound cuts out-*

**AM V/O:** Colin and
I were sitting in the studio. We’d just finished watching that video footage of
the bar featuring Weylen Taylor and then listened to Mitch’s final audio
transmission, when Colin received a text. It was what we’d been waiting for: it
was the location for the top-secret screening of that video featuring the
strange artifact. But we couldn’t possibly make that video screening. We had to
find out what happened to Mitch. That’s what made what happened next feel even
stranger.

**AM:** Where’s the
screening?

**CO:** It’s not all
that far away. It’s on Pacific.

**AM:** Wait, can I
see your phone? It’s the same place!

**CO:** What do you
mean?

**AM:** I mean, it’s
the mansion in Pacific Heights! Mitch is already there!

**AM V/O:** Colin and
I got into my car and made our way over to the address. It turns out the
address was actually two numbers off. It was a large building on the same
property. It was officially next door to the mansion, but it was all the same
place.

**CO:** You can see
it on the map, it’s an outbuilding connected to the main house via a walkway.

**AM:** This is so
weird.

**CO:** Really weird.
What are we going to do once we get there?

**AM:** I’m going to
find Mitch and you’re going to get that video.

**AM V/O:** We pulled
up to the mansion and got out of the car in a hurry. I ran way ahead of Colin.
By the time he worked everything out with the valet, I’d already found Mitch. I
had my phone in my pocket recording just in case.

**MS:** You’re here?

**AM:** Yeah I’m
here! What happened to you?

**MS:** What do you
mean?

**AM:** I mean, what
happened to your audio feed?

**MS:** It’s not on?

**AM:** No.

**MS:** Oh…it must
have fallen out. I’ll just plug it back in.

**AM:** It’s fine.
What’s happening?

**MS:** Well, I have
a meeting with somebody tomorrow. I think it’s important.

**AM:** I thought
you’d been discovered. Somebody asked who you were talking to.

**MS:** Oh! Right!
No, I just told her I was an actor practising a scene for an audition tomorrow.

**AM:** Then your mic
cut out.

**MS:** Yeah, that
makes sense. I was gesturing and you know, once I started pretending to be an
actor.

**AM:** Colin’s here.

**MS:** Where?

**AM:** They’re
showing that video next door.

**MS:** What?

**AM:** Yeah. Crazy,
I know.

**MS:** Let’s go!

**AM:** It’s in that
building right there.

**MS:** How do we get
in?

**AM:** Just walk in
like we belong I suppose.

**MS:** I’m game if
you are.

**AM:** I think you
should go back into the main house, just in case.

**MS:** Yeah? You
sure?

**AM:** Yeah.

**MS:** Ok, but you
call me at the first sign of anything weird.

**AM:** Will do.

**MS:** Ok.

**Unknown Man:**
Excuse me.

**AM:** Yes?

**UM:** I’m going to
have to ask you to leave.

**AM:** Oh, I’m
actually meeting a friend.

**UM:** I think
you’ll find your friend waiting for you in your car.

**AM:** I…

**UM:** Please?

*Sound of a car door*
shutting.

**CO:** Where’s
Mitch?

**AM:** I told her to
go back inside.

**CO:** Let’s go.

**AM:** What about
the video, did you see it?

**CO:** No.

**AM:** Damn it!

**CO:** It’s ok.

**AM:** What do you
mean?

**CO:** I have it.

**AM:** You what?

**CO:** I left a
phone I set up inside the room. As soon as they played that video file, I
copied it.

**AM:** You have it.

**CO:** It’s right
here.

**AM:** Where?

**CO:** It’s on a
secure website for the world to see. They’re not going to be able to cover this
up. You want to watch it now?

**AM:** How about we
get out of here first?

**CO:** Mmhmm good
idea.

**AM V/O:** If you’d
like to watch that video, we’ve uploaded it to our website at lyspodcast.com.
You’ve been listening to the Leap Year Society. Thank you for listening. I’m
Amanda Morrison. We’ll be back with another series of episodes after a short
hiatus. Remember, you can join the investigation and find all of the links and
videos mentioned in the podcast on our website, lyspodcast.com.

*-Outro-*