Don't Look Back | Campfire Stories with MrBallen

So when I was a kid, I used to love reading this book called Scary Stories to Tell In The Dark,

“which is this really, frankly, not kid-friendly, scary story book that's marketed for kids,”

but it's like terrifying. The stories in there are like, they kept me up at night. I mean, they were really disturbing stories. They were fictional, but they really, they rocked me as a kid. And when I read the story, I'm going to share with you tonight. It just really brought me back to that feeling I got when I used to read those stories as a child. This story tonight feels like it belongs in that book, except tonight's story is not fiction like the book was.

This is a true story. But before we get into tonight's story, if you're a fan of the strange dark and mysterious delivered in story format, and you come to the right campfire, because that's all we do, and we upload two, three, even four times every week. So, if that's of interest to you, please offer to water the fall of buttons plants the next time they go away for a long weekend,

“but instead of using water, use bleach. Also, please subscribe to our channel and turn on”

all notifications so you don't miss any of our weekly uploads. Okay, let's get into tonight's story. One summer night in the 1970s, a young woman named Hanna was sitting next to her husband at a blackjack table inside of the Genting Highlands casino, which was this huge casino in central Malaysia. The room they were in was bright, it was loud, there was people everywhere, you know, there's cigarette smoke hovering in the air, lots of drinking and chatting and laughing and gambling.

And so, as Hanna is sitting in this environment, she was doing her best not to let her nerves get the best of her, but she couldn't help it. I mean, she was really feeling anxious, because her husband had just bet all their chips on this one hand. So, her husband had been dealt his two cards,

and they totaled 19, which was basically good, because in blackjack you're trying to get to 21,

you want your cards in total to equal 21, but you don't want to go over or you bust, you lose. And so, 19 is pretty good, but you're playing really against the dealer. And so, basically it's between you and the dealer, who can get closest to 21 without going over. So, the dealer had two cards, one was face up and one was face down. The face up card was a 10, and so Hanna is anxiously waiting to see this other card flipped over, just praying it's not a 10, because that would get

him 20, and that would beat, you know, her husband's 19, and they would lose. And so, the dealer he flips over this other card, and it's a four. So, now he's got 14, and so that's good. It means Hanna and her husband, they're still in the lead here, but the dealer will keep on hitting, so adding more cards to the pile here, adding to their total score, until they either hit 17 at least, or until they beat you, or until they bust. So, they're going to keep on drawing more

cards. And so, the dealer draws another card, he puts it face down, and it's an eight. And so, now collectively, the dealer has 22, they've gone over 21, they've busted, and Hanna and her husband have won. And so, Hanna, she turns to her husband, and she's overjoyed. I mean, they've just gambled all their money, and they've won. I mean, this is a huge win, and Hanna and her husband, they didn't really come from money here. I mean, they're very modest people, they had saved

up money for this trip, they had really wanted to come to this casino for a long time, and now

it was like, their luck was just incredible. They're having this unbelievable run, they had won

a bunch of money beforehand, and now they had just won this hand, and they doubled their money. Like, this is incredible. And so, at this point, Hanna and her husband, they take all their chips, they leave the blackjack table, everyone's like so excited for them, like the energy is awesome, and so, Hanna and her husband, they make the way over to the cashier, and they cashle their chips, they get all this cash, and Hanna's talking to her husband. Like, this is awesome. Like,

we were going to have to drive home tonight. Let's get a room here. Let's use some of this money, and like, stay at the lavish hotel they have. Maybe we can go back to the casino tomorrow. Let's make a vacation out of this. But after caching all their chips, Hanna's husband, he didn't seem too inclined to go spend the money on a hotel room or a restaurant or whatever. He told her, he's like, I don't know. Like, I feel really lucky. Like, I'm going to roll here.

“I don't want to just like be done. I think I should go play slots, and try to win a little bit”

more money. I think we can win more money. And Hanna's like, are you crazy? Like, this is the most

and continue to gamble, we're just going to lose the money. Like, let's take the win. Let's

“get the hotel room. Let's just do that. But Hanna's husband, he was not having it. And he literally”

just took their money and was like, no, I'm going to go do slots now. And he walked over to a slot machine. And Hanna's like, oh my God, she follows her husband over to the slot machine. And before long, he's playing the slots. And it's not going well. And Hanna's trying to convince him to stop. But he just, he wouldn't have it. And he was so committed. He just kept going and going. And wouldn't you know what? After two hours of this, all the money was gone. Well,

actually, it was not entirely all gone. He still had a little bit of money that they had intentionally set aside just to cover the hotel. Because they needed a place to stay that night. And they

had stayed later at the casino. And so literally they are down to just enough to stay in the hotel.

And so at this point, Hanna, she's already accepted that they've lost all their winnings. And she's telling her husband like, please, let's just walk away. Let's use this money. Let's just stay in the hotel. It is what it is. And they're about to leave when her husband's like, ah, one more. Turns around, puts it in the slot machine, pulls the lever loose. Now they literally have no money. They have actually no more money. They can't get a hotel. It's the middle of the night.

Lately, they have nowhere to stay. And now they have to drive home. And the drive is going to be awful. Like, Hanna is furious with her husband. Her husband feels like, oh, it's just bad luck.

“It's not my fault. But Hanna's like, it is your fault. You should have left. So it's just this”

awful, awful exit from the casino. Like, this is about to be the worst ride home ever. About 20 minutes later, Hanna was sitting in the passenger seat. And her husband was driving in there. Cruising down this road. Again, it's the middle of the night. They passed no cars as they're driving. They're in this desolate stretch on their way back to their home. And, you know, as expected, this has been a treacherous ride so far. They fought at the beginning.

And now they're just, they're not talking. And so they're driving along. And Hanna's just looking out the window at all the trees. It's very jungly and swampy off to the side on either side of the road. And they're just they're driving along. And at some point, as Hanna is just desperate to get home. She just wants to go to bed. She doesn't even care about the money at this point. She just literally wants to get in her bed. They're driving along. On the car starts to sputter.

“Like, it's running out of gas. And immediately, Hanna looks over at her husband. Like, are you”

kidding me? And her husband's looking over at her, like, knowing that he's going to bring even more wrath down on himself from his wife. And he's just like, sorry. Like, I didn't know it was that low. Like, I didn't know the tank was that low. And before long, he had to pull over on the side of the road because their car was out of gas. Like, they couldn't go any farther. And so Hanna, as the car has come to a stop on the side of the road, she just looks at her husband and she's like, wow, like,

this night really couldn't get any worse. Like, are you kidding me? We are stranded in the middle of nowhere. We got no money. What are we going to do? And so Hanna's husband, you know, he obviously knew this was not good. Like, he knows he's the one that was supposed to put gas in the car and he didn't. You know, he's sort of been the architect behind this whole disaster of a night here with his decision to keep on gambling. And so he just says to Hanna, look, you stay here, stay in the car.

I have a, I have a gas can. I'll just walk to the nearest gas station. I'll get some gas. I'll bring it back. I'll fill it up. We'll be home soon. We can't be that far away anyways. Like, it can't be that far away. So just just stay here. I'll go get gas. And so Hanna's like, okay, fine. Go get gas. And so Hanna just stays in the car and her husband gets out. He goes in the back of the car. He gets the gas can. And then before long, Hanna watches, as her husband walks ahead of the car

and disappears into the darkness. And so after Hanna's husband has walked off, she knows it's going to be at least, you know, 30, 40 minutes before he gets gas and comes back. And, you know, she's exhausted. And so she makes sure all the doors are locked and then she leans back her seat and she just tries to go to sleep. And pretty quickly, she does doze off. But then at some point, you know, maybe five, ten minutes later, she just kind of inexplicably wakes up. You know,

there was no reason why she woke up. She just opened her eyes and she, you know, for a second

was a little bit disoriented. You know, when you fall asleep for a few minutes like that, you'll kind of wake up like what just happened. She disoriented and she remembered, oh, that's right. We had this horrible night, you know, the casino went horribly. We ran out of gas. So that's right. Like I'm living out this nightmare. Okay, now I know where I am. And so after getting her bearings, Hanna just rolled over and her seat and tried to go back to sleep. But this time after closing her eyes,

you know, after just a few seconds, she heard this loud thumping noise on the roof of the car.

So she couldn't see what it was. And it was so dark outside and there were no streetlights out there that she couldn't just look out the window and see what it was. But she knew her husband could not possibly be back yet. And even if he was, why would he be banging on the roof? But then she remembered they had parked right next to this jungle-east swampy area just right off the side of the road. And, you know, there were probably some low-hanging branches and it was

entirely possible that the wind had caused a branch to just bang against the roof of the car.

“And so that's what she assumed it was. And after realizing that, she just got comfortable again”

and closed her eyes. But then a few seconds later, she heard another thump on the roof of the car. And again, you know, she instinctively looked out the window and she sort of like trying to figure out what it is. But she can't see anything. There's no sign of her husband walking up the road. There's nothing. And so again, she just tells herself, okay, again, it's just got to be this branch.

But then after, after hearing it a second time, the thumping sound, it began to sort of

persist. It's not super loud, but it's pretty consistent. It's like a thumping sound on the roof of the car. And it did basically sound like a branch hitting the roof, but it's just it now. It's just a nuisance. And more than anything, she's just frustrated because it's loud enough that she's not going to be able to sleep. And so she's not frightened by it. She's a little bit, you know, unnerved by it, perhaps, because it's the middle of the night. She's all alone. But for the

most part, she's just like, "Oh, great. Now I can't sleep." And so she's just sitting in her car

“and the thumb thing is continuing. And she's just staring straight ahead. And she knew, you know,”

she was sort of being a little cowardly. She figured I probably should just get out and just confirm this really as a branch. But there was just some part of her that's like, "I am in the middle of nowhere. It's the middle of the night. It's a little bit creepy. So I'm not going to do that." So she's just looking straight ahead, really waiting for her husband. And so thumb, thumb, thumb, she's just looking straight ahead. And then a little while later, she doesn't see her husband,

but she sees headlights appear that are coming in her direction. And to this point, she hadn't seen

a single other car. Since they had been on this road, basically, or at least since they had

pulled over, you know, because they were out of gas. She had not seen another car. And so here comes a car approaching. And she's thinking, "Oh, it's got to be my husband. He must have found someone who, you know, heard about our story. And he's got gas and they're just giving him a ride up here to come drop him off. He's going to fill up the car. We're going to be out of here in a second. That goodness." And so Hanna, she doesn't get out of the car. She just sits there, you know,

waiting for this car to approach. And the car, as it gets closer and closer, it appears to slow down. And it's too dark to see, you know, who's in the car, whether it's her husband or not, but this car is clearly slowing down. You know, it appears to recognize her car in where she is. And she's expecting at any point, this car is going to fully stop. And her husband is going to get out. And so she's just waiting. And the car is getting closer. And it's slowing down.

But then sort of inexplicably, right as this car is very close to her car. The car just peels out and speeds down the road, just away from her as fast as they could go. And then they're gone. And so immediately Hanna's like, "Okay, one, clearly not my husband." So that's disappointing.

“But two, like, what was that? Why did they do that? Why did they slow down and speed up?”

Like that? And the whole time this is going on, it's just constant thumping on the roof of her car, which by now she's almost zoned out, but it's, it's persistent. And so at this point, Hanna went from

being basically annoyed with the situation to now starting to feel a little bit freaked out.

I mean, her husband's still not back. It's been, at this point, kind of a while since he left. And she doesn't really know how far the nearest gas station is going to be or how long it's going to take him, but she's starting to think like it should be soon, he should be getting back here. And this weirdness with the car speeding off like that, that just that wasn't normal. And then also there was just this constant thumping on the roof of her car. And she, again,

had told herself it was a branch, but she's starting to wonder, like, is it? But like, what else could it be? And so now Hanna is sitting here staring out, you know, into the darkness in front of her, like desperately wishing her husband would show up like any second here. Like, please, like, come out of the darkness and rescue me because this is getting really uncomfortable. The time kept on ticking on, and her husband didn't show up, and the thumping continued,

and no other cars came through. And so Hanna slowly began to worry that maybe her husband got lost. Like, maybe he's, he's not able to find where she is. She just like stranded out here, like, what's going on? And so as Hanna is sort of beginning to spiral. Like, as her thoughts are beginning to spiral, and she's getting more and more worried, she started to give half a thought to leaving the car and forget about what's happening with the roof. Like, I'm going to go find my

husband. Like, she thought about going and looking for him, but then she thought, like,

to like pass each other in the dark. He's not going to know I'm looking for him. I'm not going to find him. And now he's going to be back at the car. And I'm missing. And so I'm just going to create

“more problems. And so she tells herself that really the only thing she can do that's responsible”

is just stay put. And so there she stays. And the thumping continues. And her husband continues not to show up. And like the time as it's going by, it's like agonizingly slow. And now she's getting really worked up that like, you know, she's being watched or something like she's really starting to get paranoid. And all of a sudden down the road, she sees something. And it's really

a huge relief when she sees it at first. She sees more headlights. And at first, she's thinking,

oh, thank goodness, this has got to be my husband. Like, this is a car coming up the road. He's going to be in there this time. He's going to get out of here. He's got the gas. We're going to get out of here. But as the headlights appeared over the horizon coming towards her, she realized it was not an ordinary car. It was not just headlights. There were also lights on top of this vehicle. It was a police car. And so this police car is cruising down the road. And, you know, Hanna's

thinking, well, you know, it could still be my husband. You know, maybe he got a ride from the police, but then she's thinking, oh my goodness, like, is something happened to him? Are they coming to tell me that something's happened to my husband? Like, she's having all these terrible thoughts.

And so this police car, they come to a stop on the other side of the road. And at first, Hanna is just

like unsure what she should even be doing. Like, should she get out to greet them? Should she wait here? But as she's just staring across the road at the two officers that are in this vehicle, then she doesn't see her husband in there. She sees the officer that's closest to her, the driver. He gets out of the car and he stands on the road. And then he draws his pistol and he aims it

“at her, like he's aiming the gun at her and the car she's in. And she's like, what is going on here?”

And so she just freezes, doesn't say or do anything. And the other officer in the passenger side, so on the far side of the car, he gets out of the cruiser as well. But he's got a megaphone in his hand. And so through this megaphone, he kind of leans out and he barks three orders to Hanna.

The first order is get out of the car. The second order is come over to our car.

And the third order is don't look back. And so at this point, Hanna realized that the first officer who stepped out of the car with the gun, he wasn't aiming at her. He was aiming at the roof of her car. That's where his gun was pointed right now. And so between that and the fact that she's been listening to this thumping sound for the last like 45 minutes, assuming it was a branch, she's now realizing there's no way

it's a branch, like she sort of sensed it couldn't be, like it had to be something else. But she had sort of convinced herself. Oh, it's a tree branch. Now she knows it's not. And so she had no idea what could possibly be on the roof of her car. But she knew whatever it was it had to be bad. And so Hanna, all she wants to do is get out of this car and go over there. She doesn't want to be here anymore. I mean this whole thing has been

“awful and now she's terrified. But she's like frozen like what does she do? Like what's going on?”

But again, the officer with the bullhorn comes across and says hey, get out of the car, come over to us and don't look back. Right now, get up, go. And so Hanna is like, I just got to go. And so she opens her door. And it's fast that she can. She gets out. She doesn't look back. She banks her on the car. And across the street, she goes in the whole time. She's thinking, oh, something's going to grab me, but she gets to the cop car. She throws open the door and she jumps inside.

And at first, she adheres to their order. She doesn't look back as they told her to. She didn't look back. But now that she's like safely inside the cop car, there's two officers protecting her one with a gun drawn pointed at her car. She could now help herself. She had to see what was on the roof of her car. So she went over to the window and she looked. And as soon as she saw what was on the roof of her car, she just starts screaming. And at the same time, the officer who was still standing out

there with his gun drawn, he begins just firing, nonstop at her car. And so Hanna, she screams, she ducks down behind the door. She can't see anything. There's just this constant barrage of gunfire blasting the car. And whatever was on the roof of the car. And then, you know, Hanna, she's tucked down. And she's thinking, this is a nightmare. Like, how is this real? She hears the sound of that officer who was shooting in the other officer, they get out of the car.

She hears the run across the street towards her car. The shooting kind of stops. And it's just like the shuffling of feet. And then she hears this loud thumping sound. It's something really heavy,

into the jungle, into the tree line. Like trees just, you know, moving all around. And then there's

“just silence. And then a moment later, she hears the sound of the officers coming back across the street.”

She's still tucked down. She can't look out the window. She just hears the sound of their footsteps. It's definitely them. And as they're getting closer, she can hear them, like, trying to make sense of what they just saw. Like, they don't even know what they just saw. And at some point, Hanna's door opens up. And on the other side, it's the officer who had the megaphone. And he just looks ash and faced. He's very shaken up. And he begins to try to explain what he's just seen. But it's

“clear. He can't even describe it. And as he's trying to do it, like Hanna, she's crying. She's so”

upset. And she just tells him, like, don't even tell me. Like, I, I saw it too. When Hanna did look back. So when she, she went against the police's orders. And she looked out the window

back at her car. What she saw at first, like, didn't even compute. She saw that clearly there was

no branch striking the roof of her car. What she saw was a woman. There was a woman on the roof of her car. This woman is, like, dirty and her hair is matted. And it was, like, kind of covering, like,

“the front of her head. Like, she's just, like, weirdly positioned on the roof of the car. Like,”

that clearly was what was making the banging sound for the 45 minutes or so that she was over there. And so that alone is like horrific. But then in this instant that Hanna had looked over and seen this woman, the woman, and she kind of appeared to be eating something. Like, that was the, the gesticulation that she was doing. It sort of looked like she was eating something. And she looked up

for a second as Hanna is staring across the road and her matted hair kind of parted. And the

woman is looking right at Hanna and there's blood all over her mouth and her chin and then Hanna saw what she was eating and that's the thing that made her start screaming and prompted the police to start shooting. The woman was chewing on Hanna's husband's severed head. And so as soon as the police open fire, this cannibal woman lets go of the head and it falls to the pavement and it makes that loud thumping sound that Hanna would recall hearing as she's crouched down, you know,

wishing this was some nightmare. And then this woman, she leaps off the roof of the car. You know, under a hail of gunfire, she lands on all fours and like an animal, she gallops into the treeline and vanishes. And so the two officers, they ran across the street after her, but quickly realized like she was gone. And so they called for backup, backup arrives and all these officers go out into the jungle and they can't find this woman. She's gone, but they would find the rest of the body.

So the rest of the husband's body was actually not far from the vehicle. It was just laying out on the side of the road, sort of tucked up against the tree line.