A bloody den of horrors.
A deadly shootout fit for the movies.
A magician's greatest vanishing trick.
Are these elements of reality?
Or the workings of an active imagination.
It's time to decide the difference between fact.. and fiction.
The line that divides the factual from the unreal has long since blurred, the tales we
once thought fantastical now implanted as truth.
To decipher verity from the imagined, you must break from the ordinary and consider
a universe where the outlandish prevails.
Can you expand your mind to see beyond our perceived reality?
Can you decide what's fact or fiction?
Our first story is brought to us by a man who still seems to be haunted by his terrifying
experience.
Nelson Wynne was looking for a "pick-me-up," but not your conventional cup of coffee.
What he found as he stepped further into the unfamiliar world was so disturbing that, even
years later, he's still haunted by it.
Story # 1: The Den of Horrors Nelson wasn't proud of why he was in the rundown
apartment complex, but the stresses of life had grown so unbearable that his usual escapes
had lost their effects.
The moment he stepped through the broken door and was staring down a hallway too dim for
any feature to be distinguished, he knew he should have turned back.
But the rush he was promised was exactly what he needed, so he started down the poorly lit
row of doors, reciting the apartment number he had been given the day prior.
The silence of the building was unsettling and his own footsteps against the thin carpet
caused his hair to stand on end, electrified by his sparking nerves.
When he came upon the door sporting the number he had been provided by his shady informant,
Nelson knocked gently.
There was a soft sound stirring on the other side of the door, but nobody came to greet
him, so he knocked again.
He could hear voices, muffled and not addressing him, but as he went to knock a third time,
the lock of the door clicked.
When the painted plywood didn't swing open, he pressed his luck and wrapped his fingers
around the stained bronze knob.
It jiggled and turned without resistance, he nudged the door open and spoke through
the crack.
"Hello?"
This time, a voice responded.
"Come in."
It was hushed, as if the two were in on a secret, but Nelson complied and stepped through
the doorway, leaving the door open behind him should he need a quick exit.
Though he expected a scene of disarray, what he was met with was nothing he could have
prepared for.
"You must be the new guy," a voice spoke to him from a darkened corner, the person attached
to it slumped against a wall, a needle full of blood laying on the ground next to him.
"The one that needed an escape?"
Nelson tried to answer, but was far too shocked by the contents of the apartment to do so.
Slumped on the ground next to his contact, a half-conscious woman chuckled to herself
before picking up the needle and squirting its contents directly into her mouth.
She responded to the red liquid with an audible, pleasured groan before grabbing the host's
arm and effortlessly finding a spot to slide the needle into.
Nelson watched with wide eyes as she filled the vial before turning the needle back to
her opened mouth.
"Well?
You're not gonna experience anything from over there."
His host spoke again, and it was then that Nelson's eyes adjusted enough to see the rest
of the apartment.
He didn't know how he'd missed them, the squirming bodies scattered about the small apartment,
drawing and drinking each other's blood.
They paid no mind to him and when he didn't answer, even the host lost interest and turned
to his own subject.
Nelson could feel his stomach turning and threatening to expel everything he had eaten
that day.
Without another word or further acknowledgment from the man in the dark corner, Nelson saw
himself out of the dingy apartment and made his way back to his comfortable home, where
he brewed his third pot of coffee that day and contemplated other means of managing his
stress.
That experience would be enough to set many people straight, but did Nelson really stumble
onto a room full of so-called "vampires?"
Or is this one of our fictional anecdotes?
Let us know your thoughts in the comment section and by voting with the on-screen poll and
settle in for another shocking tale.
Sean Curtis expected this day to be like any other, but when word of a bank heist forced
him into the air to cover the event, he knew the news circuit that day would be unlike
any he had covered before.
Story # 2: The Miami Heist "It wasn't anything I had witnessed before.
At least not live," Sean sits back in his chair, running his hands through a thinning
hairline.
"We'd heard word of the heist and expected, by the time we got there by helicopter, that
we'd be left with residual footage of police escorting hostages out of the building.
But when we got in range, the scene was still incredibly active."
"Eugene Sparks and Jasper Moreno were names I'd never heard before in Miami, but as one
of them exited the bank, AK-47 in hand, I knew they were names I'd never forget.
We tried to keep a safe distance in case the worst happened, and I'm really glad we did.
We were only there for minutes when these two brazen men, sporting fatigues and homemade
body armor, started firing at police in the area."
Sean pauses for a moment and gazes at the ceiling for a moment.
"How confident they were was maybe the hardest part to forget.
Even amidst incoming gunfire from law enforcement, Sparks just strolled alongside the white sedan
that Moreno slowly drove through the parking lot.
They would move for a few feet, return fire and then continue slowly.
I think at the time I called it "cavalier."
"They were just two guys and somehow were able to terrorize the people of Miami.
And for what?
Some money?
If I recall, they were connected to the robbery of two armored cars somewhere in the midwest
and were arrested several years prior.
They were pulled over for speeding and found to have just... an arsenal of guns.
I later found out they were actually connected to two other bank robberies and the murder
of an armored car guard, but this incident trumped anything they had pulled before."
"Some 2,000 bullets were fired that day on the Miami streets and I caught every exchange
of gunfire from above.
Shockingly, there were no casualties, save for Sparks and Moreno, though something like
15 or so people were injured.
The two perps died separately, with Sparks going first from a self-inflicted gunshot.
Moreno was caught in a stand-off with police and eventually surrendered, but I remember
watching from above as he bled out on the ground from a wound he suffered at the start
of the whole ordeal."
"I've covered so many stories since that horrific scene, but that..."
He pauses to collect himself, "that was the most extreme thing I've ever witnessed.
And that probably goes for much of Miami."
Did two previously successful robbers get caught in a large shootout with police after
a failed heist?
It sounds like a scene from a movie or a mission from a video game, but does that mean it couldn't
have happened in real life?
Be sure to vote as we move onto our final story, that of a parlor magician named Oliver
Welch.
Fifteen years in the business, Welch never had an act go awry... until that most unusual
night when he pulled the greatest magic trick of all.
Story # 3: The Greatest Vanishing Act Ever Oliver was far from the greatest magician
that ever lived.
In fact, it was his shortcomings as a performer that had him recently deciding it was time
for a career change.
The problem he had was there wasn't much need for a washed-up, 40-something former magician.
So he continued his performances, each one getting more sluggish than the last.
His reviews started to dip and the gigs started to get really lame to the point where his
ego was taking a beating.
Fed up with being called out for his poor turnout and lackluster show, Oliver decided
to attempt something he never had before.
Building the apparatus would cost him, but he felt the expense was well worth it to captivate
his audience back.
Though it was far beyond anything he had attempted before, Oliver aimed to recreate Houdini's
Chinese Water Torture Cell trick.
He continued with his typical set list, enthusiastically promising the audience something truly special
at a future show.
He hyped it so much that he knew he had no choice but to master it.
The weeks passed quicker than he expected, but his confidence was at a high point and
he was ready to show off his abilities as a true magician.
Leading up to the Chinese Water Torture Cell trick, the evening was a success.
Then, at the climax of the evening, the audience watched as all of Oliver's training and practice
proved pointless.
For many in the audience, seeing a man drowning on stage was enough to sway them from magic
forever.
Others held onto their curiosities even as Oliver's lifeless body was frantically pulled
from the cell by his stagehands and dragged offstage.
As Oliver wanted, his career ended on a high note, but nobody could have expected that
it was skyrocket even more in the moments after his passing.
The magician's crew did what they could to try and revive him, but it would be up to
the emergency services that were en route to work whatever miracles they could.
When they did arrive, however, it had appeared that the Great Oliver Welch had pulled his
own wonder and, amidst the chaos of clearing out the audience and inspecting the cell to
see what had gone wrong, his body had vanished.
When his assistant and crew were questioned, they all attested without hesitation that
he was dead, though they all sheepishly admitted to turning their attention from his corpse
for one reason or another.
John Bell, the magician's manager, had already called Oliver's brother to let him know what
had happened, but wasn't sure how to handle telling him that the body had vanished.
Everyone working that night held true to their word that Oliver Welch died on stage in front
of a packed audience, and nobody had even the slightest clue what happened to his body.
Each year that passes without any sign of the magician's body, they're all left to wonder
if they had been duped and Welch was just ready for the greatest vanishing act ever.
What are the chances Oliver's body would be left alone long enough that, even if he did
fake his death, he'd be able to disappear without a trace?
Could he have had somebody helping him so he could leave his life of trickery behind
for good with one last impossible act?
Let us know your thoughts in the comment section while we get ready for the big reveal.
Are you ready to find out if you can decipher between fact or fiction?
Let’s look back at tonight's three stories and find out which were born from reality
and which were fabrications of the imagination.
Our first story was that of Nelson Wynne, a man who simply had enough of feeling stressed
and wanted an easy way to cope.
Do you think that led him to a den filled with real-life blood-loving "vampires"?
If you thought this story seemed unlikely, then you were right.
That we could find, Nelson's tale is one of pure fiction.
How about the shootout between Eugene Sparks and Jasper Moreno on the streets of Miami?
We've seen bank heists turn to lengthy shootouts in the movies, but does art really imitate
life?
The reality is, yes, sometimes it does, and this shootout really did happen.
The perpetrators were Larry Eugene Phillips Jr. and Decebal Stefan Emilian Matasareanu,
though the location was North Hollywood and not Miami.
After robbing a Bank of America, the two perps and local law enforcement engaged in what
later became known as the Battle of North Hollywood.
Estimates on the number of injured ranges from 18 to 20, and both Phillips and Matasareanu
were killed.
Finally, we have Oliver Welch's disappearing act.
They swore he was dead and yet before emergency services could arrive on the scene, his body
had vanished.
Did Welch perform the greatest magic trick ever?
Or are we spinning tall tales?
If you said this story was true, I'm sorry - it's definitely a creation of our own imaginations.
How well did you do in tonight's video?
Did you look past the deception of our world and define the oft-blurred line that struggles
to separate lies from the truth?
Let us all know in the comment section below and should you find the urge to test your
perceptions again, be sure to subscribe and join us next time when we ask you to decide
what's fact... or fiction.