The final episode of the Xylophobia season presents a radio play written by our podcast guest curators, SUBTERRA: Marie-Chantal Hamrock and Astrid Björklund.

Told through the voice of the Narrator, we are presented with an eccentric cast of characters living and contending with an ever diminished and hostile landscape, made up of old mines, towering blast furnaces, an inexplicable blackness which seems to spread insidiously, and a strange red substance that emanates from the earth.

Among the characters are an unnamed man who searches in desperation for 'that place' using an old ironstone amulet; Niko and Launo are two hardened characters who seem to have strayed from their community and traverse this landscape alone, speaking wistfully of old times; The Withered Arm is a disembodied human arm working as a barmaid in the Inn of Ill Omens with its ever decreasing customers sadly sipping from their worthy pints; The Strange Man seems to know something sinister no one else does and plays cruel tricks on those around him. And finally, the Fermyn is an ethereal character who cannot be described in words and has no discernible form but somehow seems to know more than anyone else about the nature of this dark world.

… All the while the narrator begins to lose her grip on reality and starts to question her very own existence.

Please note: This episode is binaural/atmospheric recording best listened to with headphones.

More at: ⁠⁠https://fermynwoods.org/fermynwoods-podcast-24-subterra

The accompanying visual is a video response to the episode, by artist Sapphire Goss