Guillermo Del Toro Presents 10 After Midnight

A shooting star

crossing the vast, indifferent night sky.

Perhaps carrying an answer to that age-old question,

are we alone in the universe?

Recorded on a modest device,

stained with blood and death,

the answer is a decidedly terrifying... "no."

Our story today is The Autopsy.

And its director David Prior.

What are you doing?

Joe, what the fuck are you doing up there?

You're gonna kill us! Are you fucking crazy?

What the fuck is wrong with you, man?

You trying to kill us?

What the fuck is that?

You're so thin.

They could use you for a whip.

What's your secret?

- Ah, you know, biology. - Hell, Carl. It's good to see you.

- You too, Nate. It's been too long. - Give me that.

Oh.

Ooh. Must be exhausted.

Did you eat? I can send someone.

No, no, no. Coffee is just fine.

How's Emma?

Oh. She's well.

How are the kids?

It's an empty nest almost.

Thank God!

Yeah, and Cindy, she's in love, and...

Nate Jr. wants to be a... a lawyer now.

Oh.

Sure I can't get you something to eat?

Why don't you tell me what's going on?

What did they say in Montague?

Not too much. Ten men dead.

Nine men.

And one inhuman son of a bitch.

What would you call a man who...

As bad as that?

- What's Waddleton gonna do? - Uh-huh.

It is the position of the coroner's office,

workman's compensation law being clear, that death benefits shall only accrue

to dependents of those whose deaths arise out of the course of their employment.

Not merely in the course of their employment.

Death by lunatic does not obtain.

He just about ordered me to find cause for a second autopsy in the city.

Oh, that's Fordham Mutual talking.

Certainly it is, and they've bought every election he's ever stood.

If they had their way, the families wouldn't see a dime

to bury their men with.

It's unconscionable.

What am I gonna find, Nate?

Was there a bomb?

The investigators concluded that there was strong,

presumptive evidence of a bomb.

That's the best they could do?

- Mm-hmm. - Hmm.

- And what do you think? - I think I'm cursed.

Cursed?

Well, for laxity

and uselessness.

The innocent get punished and everything is just dust.

I... I think I'm cursed by the Lord. I truly do.

Nate, I've known you 40 years.

From the bottom of my heart,

you're not that special.

That's ego.

Who are you to claim special qualities of sin from the rest of us?

If you're cursed,

we're all cursed.

And I meant that in the nicest possible way.

You're right. I'm getting maudlin.

Mm.

Carl,

this is one of those nightmare specials.

The kind you never get to the bottom of.

Tell me what happened.

Two months ago...

...a man came up missing.

Ronald Hanley.

Mill worker, family man,

just vanishes without a trace.

About a week later,

the lady who ran the laundromat, she disappears too.

Six people, just over a month,

disappear.

This way!

My deputies and I,

we might as well have stayed in bed, all the good we did.

Nothing from the western leg, even if we pull some volunteers...

Over here! We found something.

Eventually,

we found a body.

Well, open it! What are you waiting for?

Wasn't animal work.

It was knife work.

All the edges butchered clean.

But butchered meat will bleed even after you drain it.

There wasn't one goddamn drop of blood.

It was pale as fish meat.

A cache, then?

Yeah. Yeah.

Like you might put a... a pot roast in the icebox for making sandwiches.

One more.

This arm over here.

That's it.

Okay, wrap him up.

Tie him back up in that tree.

- Yes, sir. - You men, you're hunters?

- Yes, sir. - Yes, sir.

All right. Consider yourself Posse Comitatus.

Whatever left that will be back for it.

- I need one of you, uh... - Jim Dodge, sir.

- Dodge? - Yeah.

Stake out that ridge over there. Will you?

- Yeah, and... - Owens.

- Owens. - Owens.

Uh, we need you to cover that area south there, all right?

Oh, I think the better spot's over there, sir.

It's a better view of the path there.

Yeah, well, okay. Obviously, I've got the right man for the job.

You guys will take first watch.

Lawrence, Davis, give these men your jackets.

It's gonna get cold tonight. Give them a couple radios too.

I took the film to be developed,

gave the prints to Sophie to have them telexed to every county in the state.

Okay, we're going into town.

Anything happens, anything at all, don't do a thing, just observe. Okay?

We'll be back in five hours.

Then a piss and a spit, and went right back.

Owens.

Dodge?

Dodge.

Dodge, can you hear me?

Come in, Dodge.

Motherfucker.

No sign of them at all?

I wanted to chew nails and break necks.

Next morning, I got a call from the sheriff over in Rakehell,

says our corpse resembled a man named Abel Dougherty,

a mill worker over at Conwood.

He'd been missing too.

He was last seen at a bar called Trucker's Tavern

during that onion snow we had.

- Maggie's Farm, my girl. With ice. - Got it.

And a Hamm's to back it up.

Right on. Trucker's.

Hey, Travis! Phone!

Sykes?

- Excuse me? - Eddie Sykes.

The hell are you doing here?

You got me confused with some other body. My name's Joe Allen.

The hell it is. You're Eddie Sykes.

We've been working together at Conwood for a coon's age.

Where the hell you been?

You either had too much or not enough, my friend.

Supposed to go angling for steelhead two months ago. You never showed.

Steelhead? I would've showed.

But you didn't.

Who is it you think I am again?

I thought we was friends.

Yeah, course we are.

- Where did you go, Eddie? You just up... - Like I said, I'm Joe Allen.

You're confused.

Why are you doing this?

I'll tell you,

but not here.

Somewhere quiet. We don't want these yokels hearing, do we?

It's a secret.

And we're friends, aren't we?

Good

friends.

I mean, you said so, didn't you?

Maybe we could be best friends.

- I... - Knock your beer onto the floor.

Be sloppy.

Call me your friend.

Ask me to drive you home.

Home?

Do it now.

Shit, man.

Look what you've done. Maybe you need a ride.

- No. - Let's have your keys, you big oaf.

Come on.

I'll drive you home.

Sykes was an itinerant worker.

He was reported missing nine months ago.

Told a buddy of his he was going hiking in the woods.

He wanted to check out a meteor shower.

Never came back to work.

A week later, he shows up in Bailey

under the name of Joe Allen.

I understand you've got a Joe Allen staying here?

Well, yes, he's at work right now, but you're welcome to come in and...

Mr. Allen!

Sheriff's Department!

Coming in!

Hey, didn't your mama teach you to share?

Sorry, not enough for you!