S1.4 The Tail End
The Other Stories | Sci-Fi, Horror, Thriller, WTF Stories
Luke Kondor
4.4 • 851 Ratings
🗓️ 5 April 2026
⏱️ 16 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The Tail End
After nearly drowning in a shipwreck, a young man mistakes a village girl for his savior, not knowing it was a mermaid from old sea lore who pulled him from the depths. Scorned, she calls upon ancient tides to claim what was promised—his heart, or his life.
Written by Mary Pastrano (www.instagram.com/MaryPWriter)
Narrated by Josh Curran
Produced by Georgia Triantafyllopoulou (https://www.instagram.com/audiogeekgr )
With music by Free Music Archive (https://freemusicarchive.org/)
And Thom Robson (https://www.thomrobsonmusic.com/)
And sound effects provided by Soundly.org
The episode illustration was provided by Matt Seff Barnes (https://www.mattseffbarnes.com/)
Joshua Boucher is our story programmer.
Jasmine Arch manages our community.
Mary Pastrano helps orchestrate the chaos.
And the show would collapse into static and screams without the ongoing work of Karl Hughes, Georgia Triantafyllopoulou, and James Barnett — AKA Jimmy Horrors.
Mary Pastrano is a writer and educator from Southern California whose work has appeared on The Other Stories Podcast and the Tales From Midnight Anthology by SurrealArts Publishing. You can find out more about her on Instagram at @MaryPWriter
Josh Curran is a narrator and writer. He has narrated many episodes of The Other Stories over the show’s lifetime. He is also the creator of the horror Audio-Drama podcast, Miscreation.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | These aren't the stories your mother told you. |
| 0:03.0 | No, these are the other stories. |
| 0:07.0 | Today's episode of The Other Stories is The Tale End, written by Mary Pistrano and narrated by Josh Curran. |
| 0:30.3 | We married, overlooking the vast Northern Sea. |
| 0:34.8 | I barely knew her, but that mattered little. She beguiled me at first sight, |
| 0:40.3 | and, not long before, had saved me from a watery end. How could I not tether my future to the |
| 0:47.7 | woman who turned my despair into possibility? I owe her my very life. Reeling from the wreckage of my ship in the worst storm of the |
| 0:57.5 | season, half dead and choking on the brackish water, she, with disproportionate strength, |
| 1:03.7 | hauled me safely to dry sands. I don't know how she did it. I'm almost twice her size, |
| 1:10.1 | and she was alone. Waterlogged and suffering |
| 1:13.4 | the lashings of a tempest, I did not question the details of my salvation. All I knew was that |
| 1:19.7 | I was spared and in the fog of awakening heard singing. I couldn't quite make out the words. In my |
| 1:27.4 | diminished state my senses were hopelessly blurred. |
| 1:32.0 | The melody, though, was hypnotic, like the haunting, flute-like strains we see men here |
| 1:39.1 | when our ships pass the rocky outcroppings near the ports. Many of us swear on Poseidon himself that |
| 1:46.3 | mysterious maidens call to us on these lonely voyages. The absence of women on trade routes can |
| 1:52.4 | drive a man to the deepest, most deviant lust. Sailor's longings are made worse by their |
| 1:58.4 | fevered imaginations. Many claim to have heard the faint beckoning of untraceable voices from shadowy, uninhabitable |
| 2:06.4 | aisles. |
| 2:07.8 | Whether there really is a seductive force preying on our wanton desires or simply the |
| 2:12.8 | pitched bird calls and utterances of sea mammals echoing off rocks in tympanic rhythm, I was never |
| 2:19.8 | certain. |
... |
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