He searched “Matthew McConnell Claypath Standedge Tunnel 26th June 2018.” This only brought up one page of results. In addition to the newspaper article, there were a number of articles, all from one other website. He clicked on the first link and went to a site that seemed like it was from the early days of the internet. At the top of the site in big red text was the masthead, THE RED DOOR. Robin was immediately suspicious—it felt like a site that housed a million viruses—but as he read the first article, it did seem to have useful information.

McConnell Pleads Innocence in the
Crime of the Century

by The Red Door 17/07/18 16.44 p.m.

Matthew McConnell, the lone survivor of the Standedge Incident, has once again pleaded his innocence, as he was transferred from Anderson Hospital to HMP New Hall. The Red Door (the only outlet to witness his arrival at New Hall [Ed: What’s up with that?]) heard McConnell’s shouts that he was innocent and didn’t remember anything after entering the tunnel on the 26th of June 2018.

You guys know I love a good mystery but the deck is stacked against McConnell on this one. There are just too many factors that go against him. You see, Standedge is, actually, a set of four tunnels. The left one is abandoned, the right two are working train lines and the ‘middle’ one is the canal. McConnell worked as a tour guide, meaning he would know this and be able to navigate the abandoned tunnel with ease. What’s more, he’d have the keys to be able to unlock the large gates blocking the tunnel entrance. And furthermore, a couple of McConnell’s acquaintances (you know, the ones that weren’t spirited away) said that the guy had a beef with the guys he went on his swan song voyage with.

Now, this is still crazy. How McConnell pulled off this crime is insane. He killed everyone, transported the bodies to a secret location, got back to the boat and cleaned up after himself, all in time to bonk himself on the head and collapse on the deck before the boat reappeared at the other end. That’s seriously wacky!

Unless... Maybe McConnell’s innocent. Maybe Tim Claypath, Rachel Claypath, Pru Pack, Edmund Sunderland and Robert Frost just simply disappeared. And whatever force evaporated them also knocked out McConnell in the process. Food for thought.

Maybe I should investigate some more! God, I love this job!

What do you guys think? Comment down below and be sure to subscribe to The Red Door feed to keep up to date with all the weird news you can handle. Peace!

The article was far less eloquent than the one from the paper, but the information still lined up. And it said that Matthew had been moved to New Hall. The same place Matthew was calling from—there was no way this wasn’t real.