A few weeks pass like this. He isn't sent any more live statement-givers. He does find seven more non-digitizable statements.
The first was given by Lee Rentoul in 2011, a criminal with a grudge against one of the men he used to work with (Paul Noriega) for turning on him and sending him to jail. He consulted one of Noriega's victims, Toby McMullen, on revenge; Toby recommended that he speak to an old woman named Angela, who had magical abilities to hurt people. Lee agreed. Her walls were covered with framed jigsaw puzzles, and she asked Lee Rentoul for an item of Noriega's. Upon providing one (a lighter), Rentoul went home. After three weeks during which Paul Noriega seemed to be healthy, Lee Rentoul devised his own plan: Noreiga was going to be meeting alone with a fence named Salesa. Lee decided to use the opportunity to kill Noriega himself. Salesa arrived first, a tall Samoan man carrying a large box, and then Noreiga arrived, alone and limping slightly. An hour later, Salesa left, carrying the same box and looking unhappy, and Rentoul went inside. He killed Noriega, noticing several wounds that appeared to be old wounds and yet that he had never seen before (missing fingers, missing teeth, a glass eye). Five days later, he began getting packages, containing body parts; whenever he received one, he would shortly after lose the own corresponding part of his own body, the wound healing instantly. He tried to go after Angela, but when he tried to strangle her, he chewed off his own hand instead. He disappeared from his flat soon after; when the landlord went to clear out the flat, all he found was cardboard boxes. No woman matching Angela's description was able to be found.
The second statement was given by Laura Popham in 2014. Laura Popham was a caving enthusiast who usually went on one trip a year with her sister, Alena Popham. In 2014, they went on a trip to Lost Johns' Cave, taking all relevant safety precautions such as informing the CNCC and Laura's husband. The day was perfect for caving, but nobody else was there. They began to follow the map; things were normal at first, though some of the squeezes were far tighter than indicated. They began a cave dive; Alena played a prank on Laura, making her think she was trapped underwater by holding a rock above her head, and Laura got mad and asked to go back. Alena agreed, but when Laura turned away, she heard a low voice asking her how lost she was. She replied that she wasn't, but Alena just looked confused. When Laura started to head back, the underwater tunnel was far longer than it had been on the way there, and when she was finally able to surface it was into an even more claustrophobic tunnel than the one she was leaving. Laura waited there for Alena for a long time, but she never surfaced, and eventually Laura decided to continue. The passage got smaller and smaller, until the rocks started to cut into her skin, and at last she couldn't move any further; she tried to push herself backwards instead, and her feet hit solid rock that hadn't been there a moment before. Her headlight went out, and she remained there, screaming, for what felt like hours. Eventually, she saw a faint light at the other end of the tunnel. It looked like a candle flame and felt malicious, like it intended to harm her. From the same place, she heard Alena, calling for help. Unable to move, Laura just shut her eyes and wished it would go away. When she opened her eyes again, it had; she was able to move again, though it was still difficult and painful, and she was moving towards daylight. She emerged and screamed, at which point the cave rescue team found her. She had been gone for 24 hours, and Alena was recorded as a fatality. Followup research reveals that the CNCC have no record of Laura and Alena Popham going caving in 2014, but they do have records of many other people who were exploring Lost Johns' Cave on the same day. Laura was also not found aboveground; she was, instead, found a few yards from the bottom of the hole, unresponsive and kneeling next to a small pile of burned out candles that she had not packed. She became responsive only once brought aboveground. Also unmentioned in the statement is that she brought a camera; most of it is typical caving footage, but there is also a video almost three hours long, set just past 2 o'clock on the day that the sisters disappeared, in which Laura repeats "take her, not me" in increasingly panicked tones. The video itself is entirely black. (Martin declines to do follow-up research on this one, since he's claustrophobic; Tim teases him a little, but picks up the extra work.)
The third statement was given in 2015 by Carlos Vittery, an arachnophobe who claims to have been stalked by the same spider he killed as a child; no matter how many times he killed it, and despite moving houses, getting a cat, calling exterminators, etc., it kept returning. He wanted to run away from it, but felt compelled to destroy it instead, "as though willed by something else." Shortly after giving the statement, he was found dead, having choked on "foreign organic matter"; his entire body was encased in web.
The fourth statement was given by Sebastian Adekoya in 1999. The statement giver used to work at Chiswick Library when a strange book turned up: the bar code and ISBN registered as being Trainspotting, by Irvine Welsh, but the book was clearly titled The Boneturner's Tale. According to the records, the man who had last returned it was named Mike Crew. At this point, a man named Jared Hopworth entered. Jared had used to be Sebastian's friend, but since then had become a violent stalker. He took the book, intending to hit Sebastian with it, but once he had the book he got a strange look and left with it. On his way home, he noticed a rat outside of Sebastian's house that appeared to have a very strange injury: it looked as though the back half of it had been run over by a car, but there was no blood or actual visible sign of injury. Several weeks later, Jared's mom turned up at the library, her arm in a sling, in order to return the book; she swore at Sebastian, telling him to keep his books away from her son. Sebastian picked the book up with a tissue and returned it to its place. At 2 am that night, plagued by thoughts of the book, Sebastian went back into work to investigate. He returned to see that all the books surrounding The Boneturner's Tale appeared to be bleeding. Putting on gloves, he read a few pages of the strange book. It appeared to be a modern parody of The Canterbury Tales, describing the pilgrims in disturbing terms. He got sixteen pages in before he almost threw up due to the gore and closed the book. The label marking it as belonging to Chiswick Library was peeling; beneath it was the label for another library, a Scandanavian name that started with J. Jared then arrived again, or at least something that was using his voice, though he seemed larger and stranger, with additional limbs. Sebastian screamed and let him take the book. Sebastian was found dead in 2006, lying in the middle of the road; he was not bleeding, but his death was ruled a hit-and-run due to how mangled his body was.
The fifth statement was given by Christof Rudenko in 2008, describing a number of strange encounters he had with his upstairs neighbor, Toby Carlisle, while living in Welbeck House in Wandsworth: terrible smells, hammering noises, stains on the ceiling, etc. He complained, but the man owned the building, and so there was nothing he could do apart from finding a different place to live. After several years of this, culminating in his ceiling caving in, he discovered that the door to his upstairs neighbor's flat was open. Inside was Toby Carslile's rotting corpse, surrounded by meat nailed to all the walls, windows, even the light fixtures. The various kinds of meat seemed to move, shift, and open its eyes; the next thing Christof remembers, the police were there and the meat was gone. In followup, Sasha discovered Toby Carlisle's financial records; he had very little income, and what he had was going to pay council tax. There are no records of him buying anything at supermarkets, delivery firms, or butchers.
The sixth statement is significantly longer than most statements. It was given in 2011 by Father Edwin Burroughs via a letter from Wakefield Prison. He discusses his time as an exorcist, particularly two incidents that occurred during this time and that led to his eventual imprisonment. He is largely unable in the letter to write the words "God", "Jesus", etc., and when he does the handwriting shows visible effort. The first relevant incident is that of Bethany O’Connor, a student who requested an exorcism/blessing at her house, 89 Bullingdon Road. He saw nothing strange there at first, though he blessed it anyway, but in her bedroom he noticed the word "mentis" ('mind' in Latin) on her wall, and she was unable to see if when he pointed it out to her. Soon after, she tried to attack a housemate with a kitchen knife, and fell into a mirror. In the hospital, she demanded that Father Burroughs come to perform an exorcism; the nurse Annie Willett relayed this to him, and he arrived soon after. During the exorcism, Bethany said “I’m so sorry, it wants your faith,” before dying. He was wracked with guilt and refused to perform any exorcisms for a time, but eventually the nurse Annie Willett contacted him again, asking him to bless the house on Hilltop Road. While there, he had an intense burning sensation, and something that was not him moved his lips and mouth to say "I am not for you. I am marked." The tree was uprooted outside and the burning sensation ended. He only got a few streets away from Hill Top Road before he fell to the ground, weeping and vomiting, unable to pray. He took out his Bible, searching for comfort, but it appeared to be stained dark. As he walked, it felt as though he had never seen the streets before. He decided to talk to a fellow priest, Father Singh; halfway through their conversation, Father Singh demands that they do it in the confessional. Inside the confessional, Father Singh recites a list of all the sins Father Burroughs has ever committed, including many that Father Singh did not know about. Halfway through, Father Burroughs notices that Father Singh's Jaipuran accent was gone, replaced with a crisp RP; stumbling out of the confessional, he sees Father Singh in the hallway outside. He stumbled through the streets for a time again until he came to The Oratory, a church on Woodstock Road. There, a tall, pale altar server informed him that it was time for him to lead mass, and he followed the other man into the church. He was given and put on a yellow cassock and stole, too confused and sick to question the color. The pews were full of ill-looking people staring blankly, and whenever any words from the Bible were read, there was only the ringing of a bell. As he began the Liturgy of the Eucharist, the pews slowly emptied, the parishioners disappearing. He bit into the communion wafer only to come back to himself, in a dingy basement, eating the skin off a bound corpse. He chose in that moment never to take further actions, as he could not trust that anything he did was having the effect it appeared to. Follow-up reveals that Bethany O'Connor was listed in living in the dorms when the incident occurred, and 89 Bullingdon Road was empty according to legal records; the person she attacked with a knife was not her housemate but a porter. Tim also discovered that, three days prior to Father Burroughs killing and eating two students, Christopher Bilham and James Mann, The Oratory received a delivery from Breekon & Hope Deliveries of a yellow stole that vanished the day after they signed for it. Father Burroughs pled guilty to all charges and is serving three life sentences.
The seventh statement was given by Moira Kelly in 2002. Her son, Robert Kelly, became a skydiving instructor with Open Skydiving, rarely coming home, until one day he showed up at her door panicking and unwashed. Once he calmed down, he explained that he had been doing a charity jump with an 85-year-old man. Just before he jumped, the old man yelled "Enjoy sky blue!", at which point he felt a wave of dizzy vertigo wash over him before jumping. He should have been falling for thirty seconds before needing to open his parachute, but before he could, the ground disappeared from beneath him. His watch stopped, and he couldn't tell how long he was falling for, but it was for enough time that he got thirsty and hungry. It felt like hours at least. He couldn't tell what direction was down, because every direction was more sky. At last, he saw the ground again, and opened his parachute. When he landed, he was greeted by the other instructor there, Sasha Fairchild. He told Robert that Simon, the old man, had left, and that it had been almost fifteen minutes. Robert quit on the spot. Moira took him out to a picnic lunch, and they spent a pleasant hour together. On the way back home, Robert was climbing a hill when he reached the top and screamed. He pushed Moira down the hill, but when he kept walking, he kept walking up, until the sky closed around him, as though it was eating him. Followup research reveals that the company Open Skydiving does not exist, and never has, though there are news articles referencing events hosted by them.
Every week, Lev's personality tests show that he's a little more open, a little less likely to get upset at seeing someone in pain. Not as much as if he had read into the tape recorder or taken a statement live. Barely even perceptible. But as a trend, it is, in fact, there.
Between the third and fourth statements, Tim takes time off sick, explaining over text to both Lev and Martin that he feels unwell, possibly with a stomach bug; after it doesn't get better, he says that he's worried he might have contracted a parasite.
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