Wilderness Mysteries Hidden Dangers and Harrowing Escapes

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Welcome to another episode of the Nighttime Scary Tales Podcast, where we explore the dark side of storytelling. Tonight, prepare for spine-chilling tales featuring original horror stories, eerie supernatural encounters, and real-life crime that reveals the darker aspects of human nature. Each story is designed to keep you on the edge of your seat long after it ends. We’d love to hear your thoughts! Share your most chilling moments by leaving a review on your favorite podcast platform. More haunting stories are coming, so keep your lights on and your doors locked. Sweet dreams… if you can find them!

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:12):
Before I joined the Park Service, I used to work
as a trail guide for a company based out of Groveland,
near eastern Yosemite. It was awesome work, and for the
most part, all the memories I have of it are
happy ones. But there's one job I remember for all
the wrong reasons. I was guiding a group of young
corporate types up Half Dome and one of those team

(00:32):
bonding exercises. A lot of jobs were kind of like that,
especially around the holidays. We'd take them up to Little
Yosemite Valley and then set them up for a night
around the campfire, and then take them up Half Dome
the next morning. This bunch, four men and three women
seem pretty average, somewhere a little more comfortable than others
being outdoors, but they didn't strike me as trouble. But

(00:56):
the next day, as we were taking a break coming
back down half day, we heard a scream. While the
rest of us rested our legs and got some water,
two of the men had gone off to take pictures
of the view overlooking the valley. Maybe a minute or
two later we heard a god awful yell coming through
the trees. Then one of the men came running back

(01:17):
looking scared to death. He said his buddy was taking
a picture near the edge of a cliff when he'd
suddenly slipped and fell. I had an idea of how
bad it was just from his expression, but when I
got there, I saw it was way worse. The guy
was lying at the bottom of a steep slope, not
quite a sheer fall off type of cliff, but all

(01:40):
the tumbling he'd done on the way down had left
him in a really bad way. He'd fallen maybe two
hundred feet down this slope. It wasn't moving, and he
wasn't making any noise. I asked the group that I
was guiding to keep away from that slope and to
gather where we'd just been resting until I got back.
I needed to run down the trail to find a

(02:01):
gentler portion of slope to scramble down so I could
administer first aid to that wounded man, and I needed
them all safe and in one place so I could
find them afterwards. Everyone agreed, except for the taller guy
who had seen the fall, as he insisted on helping
in some way. He looked to be in decent shape
and able to keep up, so we took off down

(02:21):
the trail at jogging pace as I radioed for help
from h Q. I remember as we were running, the
tall guy kept asking me about the dude that had fallen,
saying stuff like do you think he's dead? And I
told him I had no idea. Some people survived some
crazy falls, not always in one piece, but they still survive,
and this seemed to reassure him a little, but not

(02:43):
by much. As we kept running, I related a more
detailed description of our location at h Q. My boss
had been in touch with the park rangers who were
sending out at vs in a life flight. I tried
to describe where we were as best I could, but
after that came a case of trying to get the
ATV's attention when they arrived in the area so they

(03:04):
didn't roll past us and waste valuable minutes. The taller
guy and I kept on running until we found a
gentler slope we could get down, and then we made
our way down to the bottom, careful not to trip
and make our own selves casualties. At the bottom, we
ran around back to where the guy had fallen, and
when we got there, we were greeted by what was

(03:25):
probably the worst thing i'd ever seen on the job.
That fallen man had multiple fractures, severe abrations to his
face and head, and he was completely unconscious. But after
a quick check of his pulse, I found that he
was actually still alive. I radioed HQ again and told
my boss that somehow our guy was still around and

(03:47):
that was the good news. But the bad news was
that the state of his injuries meant that he was
probably quickly running out of time. My boss said that
he'd passed that on to the rangers, and then after
giving that injured man what little first we could, what
came next was essentially just a waiting game. We had
to stay put and hope either the ATVs or that

(04:08):
life light spotted us in time. It was tense, very tense,
and the taller guy kept asking is he dead? Can
you hear us? And all that kind of stuff. He
kept trying to talk to this guy, saying, You're gonna
be okay, man, just hang in there. I didn't think
the injured man could hear him, but I wasn't about
to interrupt him when he was essentially trying to make

(04:30):
himself feel better. But then after he started saying stuff
like he just tripped man. There was nothing that I
could have done. One second I was looking through my
camera and next day was just tumbling down that slope.
I tried my best to reassure him that accidents happened
in the wilderness, and he kind of echoed that same

(04:51):
point and the next thing he said, But there was
something about the way he said it that just didn't
sound right to me. And the thing he said was
it wasn't my fault. I know that makes sense for
him to say something like that, and hearing it read
out loud like that, it's probably not going to raise
any red flags for you. But at the time, it

(05:13):
sounded like he wasn't trying to reassure his buddy anymore.
He was trying to reassure himself. I've seen some pretty
bad accidents and injuries during my time, everything from animal
attacks to accidental shootings, and every single time, I'm amazed
by how selfless folks can be. They'll rip up their
own shirts and use them as tourniquets, or offer to

(05:35):
carry the injured person for miles and miles without a break.
What they want, what's good for their well being, That
isn't important anymore. Priorities have been totally re arranged, and
it's all about the injured person always, So when this
guy started talking about himself, repeating how the injured man
had suddenly slipped and it totally wasn't his fault, I'm thinking, Huh,

(05:59):
this guy is a total douche and that's legitimately all.
I was thinking that the taller guy was some kind
of self centered ahole, and I didn't devote any more
brain power to it because I had obviously more important
things to worry about. I was one hundred and ten
percent focused on the horizon, eyes and ears peeled for
any signed or sound of the ATVs or the helicopters.

(06:20):
So I let the comments slide and carried on trying
to do my job. The taller guy started freaking out
again and asking me a whole bunch of questions. I
told him to shut up and check the injured man's pulse.
It was weak, but it was still there. I remember
saying a silent prayer for someone to show up soon,

(06:42):
this sort of full body sensation of like trying to
force something into being. And then, after a few more
minutes of feeling my hope start to dwindle, I heard
the sound of ATV engines getting louder and louder as
they came round that mountain. Myself and that tall man
started yelling and jumping up and down, waving our arms,

(07:02):
and then that's when they saw us. The guys on
the ATVs came in fast with a stretcher and some
first aid. They not only had the gear to stop
the injured man's bleeding, but they also had the GPS
and the radios to tell that air ambulance exactly where
it needed to land so they could get him on
board as fast as possible. It was a terrible thing

(07:23):
to happen, and all my sympathies were with that injured man.
But those rangers were incredible to watch. They kept their
heads cool while dealing with injuries so bad I could
barely look at them. And then, just as they were
getting the injured man on their stretcher, we all heard
the sound of rotor blades booming above us. As that
air ambulance flew into view. It was link seeing an

(07:43):
angel coming down from heaven. Not so much the sight
of it, of course, but the feeling I got when
I saw that crazy, brave pilot suddenly pitch and turn
the air above us. There were heroes in the truest
sense of the word, putting their own bodies on the
line just to save a few seconds, because a couple
of seconds could be the difference between life and death.

(08:03):
The helicopter landed not far from us. Then the two
rangers picked up the stretcher and then ran over to
the thing as it set down, but kept its blades spinning.
The door swung open as the rangers got close, and
then two medics hopped out to help them haul the
stretcher into the belly of the chopper, and after that
they hopped back in before the rangers backed off, and

(08:23):
after the door slammed close, they took off and disappeared
behind that mountain again. The rangers ran back over to
us as the sound of those rotor blades eventually faded.
One of them asked where the rest of the group was.
When we explained that we were further up the trail,
they gave me and the tall guy a ride back.

Speaker 2 (08:42):
Up to them.

Speaker 1 (08:43):
Then slowly but surely, they helped us all get back
down the valley floor before we made our way back
to camp. Looking back on it, I feel like I
should have noticed sooner. But it wasn't until everyone was
back at camp that I started to notice something about
the tall guy. Every other member of the group seemed devastated,
like truly heartbroken that something so terrible and random could

(09:05):
have happened to them on what was supposed to be
a fun team building exercise. But the tall guy seemed
almost and how do you really even put this distant?
He didn't seem to do any kind of grieving or
hurting on his own. He just walked around, offering cold comfort,
like it was nothing but a chance to display leadership capabilities.

(09:27):
It was strange, and even repeated what he said about
it not being his fault, and then while reassuring everyone
that there was nothing he could have done to stop
it and how just witnessing the fall was traumatizing to him,
it seemed like he was trying to divert a little
of that sympathy onto himself that time, instead of just
thinking of what an asshole, I remember thinking, Okay, now

(09:50):
this is strange. Now, don't get me wrong, I understand
that seeing something like that is a terrible thing and
it has an awful effect on a person's mind. Heck,
maybe it's just something that you had to be there for.
But take my word on the fact that something about
the way the guy was behaving just didn't pass the
smell tests, so to speak.

Speaker 2 (10:12):
It had a lot to do.

Speaker 1 (10:13):
With something i'd heard that previous night, but I'll get
to that point later on now. Anyways, I waited with
the group at the Valley campsite till their ride showed up,
and then I made my way back to head quarters
to fill my boss in on everything crazy that it happened.
I went through the whole thing with him, start to finish,
and then when I was done, I told him what

(10:33):
I'd been starting to suspect over the past couple of hours.
I didn't think the injured man slipped. I thought he
was pushed, and I thought the taller guy was the
one who did the pushing. It might sound cruel, but
my boss was a veteran ex ranger who was just
about carved out of wood, and by that I mean
he'd been there, done that, and got in the T

(10:55):
shirt too. He laughed when I told him what I thought,
and then he jokingly asked if the taller guy had
tried to finish the injured man off. When we got
to the bottom of the slope. When I told him
now that he helped me stem the bleeding and check
his pulse, he told me, HM, doesn't seem like a
stone cold killer, does he. But he didn't laugh after

(11:16):
I told him what I'd heard that night before and
was the same thing that I told the cop who
came to visit me.

Speaker 2 (11:22):
A few weeks later.

Speaker 1 (11:24):
My boss gave me the heads up that someone was
about to call, and when he told me it was
the cops, I felt like every dark suspicion of mine
had been confirmed. At once, two detectives stopped by to
ask me a bunch of questions, and I didn't tell
him outright because I knew that they had their list
of questions to ask me. But when it came to

(11:45):
the question of me noticing anything suspicious during the night
before the accident, I gave him both barrels. I told
them how that previous night, the tall man an injured
man went off to talk in private. I told them
to day close and to come back to the fire
as soon as possible, but they didn't listen, and then

(12:05):
after some time I decided to go look for them.
I walked off the direction they'd gone and although I
couldn't see him right away, I heard him loud and clear.
They were trying to keep their voices down, but they
were clearly having some kind of heated debate. And I
don't want to say that they were yell whispering, because
that sounds kind of dumb, but it clearly was loud.

(12:26):
I got closer and closer, hoonying in on the sounds
of their voices, when I suddenly heard one of them
say something along the lines of, oh, is that it
you and me?

Speaker 2 (12:35):
Out of the way? Well, good luck, buddy.

Speaker 1 (12:39):
The other guy cut back in with this reassuring tone
to his voice, but I didn't catch anything he said.

Speaker 2 (12:44):
After.

Speaker 1 (12:44):
I called out to them both to come back to camp,
and they assured me that they'd return in a minute
or two, which they did, and I put their discussion
down to something to do with business. It didn't occur
to me that out of the way might mean physically
out of the way and not just sort of like
fired or laid off. When I mentioned that thing about
the out of the way argument, both the detectives stopped

(13:07):
writing notes, and they sort of gave each other this
sort of look. They didn't come out and say it,
but I could tell that they had their own suspicions
about the accidental fall. But what they did tell me
was how the injured guy was in a coma, meaning
he wasn't talking to anybody any time soon. It was
a relief to hear that he'd survived, but it sucked

(13:28):
hearing that he hadn't all the way survived, you know.
But that's why they were talking to me instead of
just asking the guy if he had really slipped or
if he had been pushed. After thanking me for my time,
I helped them out of the trailer and then call
my boss to tell him everything that had been said.
I guess it was a little I told you so moment,
because those guys were quite clearly about to launch some

(13:52):
kind of attempted murder case. And although I don't know
how it all panned out for them or if the
injured man ever woke up from his coma, my mind's
already made up. I think that not only was there
an attempted murder during one of my guided hikes, but
I got a front row seat to watch that psychopath
try and worm his way out of it. Okay, I

(14:21):
guess this is kind of two stories for the price
of one. But the first one is kind of an
explainer that's also kind of upsetting, so I just breezed
through it to get to the stuff that actually matters.
And for the record, I'm a woman and I was
still a twenty year old college student when this happened
to me. I used to work as a trail guide
way down South, taking folks out into nature reserves to

(14:43):
make sure that they see all they want to see
without getting themselves lost. One day, I was out walking
my dog down one of the trails when I heard
a gunshot my dog and I went to investigate because
hunting is super not legal in that nature reserve, and
that's how we found ourselves a po doing something despicable
to an innocent animal, and I ran back to my

(15:04):
cabin called the rangers, and then within just a couple
of hours, the guy was actually in cuffs. And it
felt like an incredible achievement, knowing that we'd help put
someone who threatened the animals behind bars. But one of
my fellow guides seemed a little less enthusiastic about it
than the rest. I figured that she was maybe a
little jealous or something like that, and now I know otherwise. Regardless,

(15:29):
I rode that wave of good feeling for about a
week or two, but after a while everything went back
to normal and it kind of faded into the background.
Six weeks after the poaching arrest, I got a guiding
job for a solo hiker. We mostly dealt with groups
of people, be it families or classes of middle school kids,

(15:50):
but requests for solo guides weren't entirely unusual. Some folks
wanted to go hiking, they just didn't have anyone to
go with, and that was one of our company's selling points.

Speaker 2 (16:00):
We'd get the odd.

Speaker 1 (16:01):
Older gentleman coming in to book a guide because he
wanted to go visit a trail he'd visited during his
younger years. And at the same time, those could be
the easiest and the most rewarding assignments of all. The
pace wasn't too hard, and seeing how happy they were
when you arrived at a certain creek, valley or waterfall
it was priceless. And that's why I didn't hesitate when

(16:23):
I saw the single name appear on my schedule for
the week. Mister Cliff was all that read, and when
I asked what reason he'd given for requesting a guide.
I was told he was a gentleman in his fifties
scouting locations for a photography project he was planning. I
thought that sounded really cool, and when mister Cliff arrived

(16:43):
on the day of the hike, he was just as
nice as I expected. He was a widower with grown
up kids who picked up photography as a way of
occupying himself. He lived locally, but since he wasn't as
surprised as he used to be and didn't know the trails,
he figured it wouldn't hurt to pay for a trail
guides so he can enjoy a little company during his walk.
We worked out a route at the office, one that

(17:05):
had take around four hours there and back, and then
we hit the trails at a round eleven a m.

Speaker 2 (17:11):
He said Cliff was his.

Speaker 1 (17:12):
First name, and that he'd worked as a trucker for
most of his adult life and til a work related
injury just put him on workers comp That was the
reason he wasn't as mobile as he used to be,
and why his kids thought it'd be safer for him
to enlist the help of a trail guide. He was
great company too, and asked me a bunch of questions
about my life and the plans I had for it.

(17:33):
He apologized for all the questions at one point, saying
that he didn't get to talk to people much anymore,
not since he retired and his kids moved out of town.
I told him it was no problem at all, and
I was grateful to be guiding such a friendly, conversational list.
He gave me this big, warm smile and we kept
on walking. We talked about photography for a while, and

(17:55):
he sounded really passionate about it. And then at around
an hour and thirty into the hike, just as we
were reaching the destination we picked out, I started asking
more questions about him. I'd asked him a couple of
pretty basic things upon being introduced, but since he was
a widower, I didn't want to probe too much into
his family because of how upsetting it might be for him.

(18:16):
But then as we got into the subject of family,
and after explaining my own was a mix of Irish
and Porto Rican, I asked where his family was from,
and I'll never forget how he smiled as I looked
back at him, and how he said I was hoping
this might come up. Then he explained that since it
was such a long story, we'd better wait until we

(18:36):
got to the top of the rise that we were
heading up so we could both get comfortable. I had
no reason to suspect that I was in for anything
but a good story and a well deserved rest. But
when we got to the top and we caught our breath,
things took a nasty turn. The whole hike, Cliff had
been sweet as pie, and every word he'd said had

(18:56):
a sort of cheeriness about it. But as he started
to tell tell me all about his family, his tone
of voice slowly shifted until he barely even sounded like
the same person anymore. He explained that his family had
been some of the first colonists to arrive in what
later became known as the Georgia Colony, and that they'd
lived in the area for almost three hundred years. He

(19:18):
said not all families could say that, because not all
of them lasted that long, But he and his had
faced down the natives, the British, then the Union, and
the federal government, all one after the other, and they
were still there to tell their story. I remember saying, well,
that's amazing. I understand why you guys are so proud.

(19:41):
I had no reason to think that he'd react any
other way but well to what was intended as a compliment.
And yet somehow Cliff seemed to take issue with that.
He told me, I don't think you do understand, but
you will, and then he launched back into it story
about what his family had done to survive. He said,

(20:04):
when the Natives tried running them out of their homes,
they learned how to fight. Then when the British tried
starving them out, they learned to live off the land,
just like the natives had done before. When the Union
took everything of value, they found other ways to make
their money. And since folks were always going to need
meat for their pots and furs to keep warm in
the winter time, hunting and trapping became their way of

(20:26):
keeping food on the table when times were at their hardest.
They later brewed moonshine during prohibition, but when the price
fell after prohibition was rescinded, they didn't mind, he said,
because they still had their oldest and most faithful way
of winning their daily bread by working the land that
God Almighty had given them. I might have been very

(20:48):
naive back then, but I wasn't stupid. All that mention
of living off the land and the hunting, trapping, and
skinning his family had done to make money. All that
had me thinking of one thing, that he was going
to be killing animals on the land. And when I
thought of a legal hunting, I thought of that guy
that I'd found six weeks prior, the one we'd reported

(21:09):
and had arrested after I caught him hunting on the reserve.
All that came to mind, all right, But I guess
I was still too young and naive to really piece
together what I was hearing until was far too late
to do anything about it. Cliff pointed off into the distance,
toward a hill, maybe a mile or two away, and
then asked if I knew the name of it. I

(21:29):
turned and looked at it for a moment. But as
much as I'd like to think that I knew the land,
I didn't know the hill's name. So I asked Cliff
what it was called. He said it had been called
many things over the years, but his family had always
called it home. Everything they could see from the top
of the hill that counted us home too, and although

(21:50):
many had tried, no one had ever been able to
stop living the only way that they knew how, not
the British, not the Union, and not some stuck up
Yankee college kid who thought that she ought to tell
others how to live. I turned to defend myself verbally,
of course, and that's when I saw the handgun Cliff
was holding, and panic hit me and my first instinct

(22:13):
was to run. But when Cliff raised the gun at
me and told me to stop, it was like he'd
cast some spell on me or something. My legs just stopped,
even though I wanted to keep running, like hell, And
when Cliff told me to kneel, it was like my
knees buckled upon command. I remember sobbing, like really sobbing,
and saying I'm sorry, I'm sorry, Please don't kill me.

(22:36):
I didn't know, over and over because I'd realized who
Cliff definitely not his real name, really was. The poacher
i'd reported hadn't been some lone hunter straying out of
bounds to achieve the system a little. He was part
of some organized poaching racket, and Cliff was one of
his partners. I remember how, in the middle of all

(22:58):
that begging and sow and listening to metal sounds of
the gun being loaded. I remembered my coworker's muted reaction
to the poacher being arrested during the previous month. She
knew what was going to happen, and that's why she
couldn't be happy for me, but she was still too
scared to warn me. Had she gotten a similar warning before,

(23:19):
one that she'd kept quiet about, or had she just
heard stories I'd never find out. I quit the company
the day after this whole thing happened, but up on
that hill, I didn't think that i'd live to see
that next day come at all. Cliff walked up behind
me as I kept on begging and pleading, and then
I felt him push the gun onto the back of

(23:40):
my head before I heard a loud click. I stopped sobbing,
held my breath, and I felt my whole body seize
up as each one of my final thoughts seemed to
be of my mam.

Speaker 2 (23:53):
I heard Cliff.

Speaker 1 (23:54):
Behind me say this is what we'd do to folks
like you around here. But then instead of a bang
when he pulled the trigger, instead of everything going black,
I heard another metal click at the back of my
head before Cliff took the tip of the gun off
the back of my scalp. I peed myself. I'm still

(24:16):
kind of embarrassed to say it, but it's the truth.
I heard that click and it was like a full
body release, but it was only yellow, no brown. But
I was so terrified of death in that moment that
even when it didn't come, I still peed my pants.
I think there's probably an exact medical term for what

(24:36):
happened to me in the moments after, as I heard
Cliff laughing at how scared I was. I don't want
to say it was catatonia, because I could still see
and hear everything. Okay, I just couldn't move. I could breathe,
all right, But after curling up into a ball, I
just laid there, taking shallow breaths and waiting for the
end to come. I didn't quite realize what he'd done yet,

(25:00):
as in like performing a mock execution on me. I
thought maybe his gun had jammed or something and the
shot was coming any second. But then Cliff spoke. He
told me his paw had said not to kill me,
as that had bring even more trouble down on them,
whoever them was. But he was to make it very

(25:22):
clear that if I reported any more poaching or trapping
in the areas they called home, they wouldn't be playing
pretend anymore, they'd be playing for real. And after that
final warning, the man who said his name was Cliff
left me lying there in the dirt, and I didn't
get back to the office for hours and hours because
I was way too shaken.

Speaker 2 (25:41):
To drive it. First, we called the cops.

Speaker 1 (25:45):
They searched the area and put out an APB, but
no one was ever found. The cops told us they
offered to reduce sentence to the guy who was caught poaching,
saying they'd chop his jail time in half if he
just gave them a name, but he was just stonewalling
them and said that he didn't know what they were
talking about.

Speaker 2 (26:04):
I'd like to be able to say that I.

Speaker 1 (26:06):
Went back to the trails, but unfortunately that incident marked
the end of my guiding days for good, and I
moved back to Michigan once I graduated. I've got a
pretty traumatic story to share from a couple of years

(26:28):
back when I was twenty one and still in college.

Speaker 2 (26:31):
Since we're both.

Speaker 1 (26:31):
Outdoorsy, my friend Jada and I decided to go hiking
in the Cascades one weekend and we thought it'd be
fun to hit the trails and take in the views.
So we meet Warren on the trail and he's this
good looking dude, probably in his early thirties and has
super friendly vibes. He also said that he was a
professor at Evergreen State University and knew the Cascades like

(26:53):
the back of his hand. We chatted for a few
minutes and he offered to show us around this cool
spot that he knew of. He seemed legit, clean cut, confident,
the kind of guy you'd trust, and so we both think, sure,
why not. We follow him to this nearby beauty spot
and it's honestly gorgeous, like literally perfect to take some pictures.

(27:16):
Warren's easy to talk to. He's cracking little jokes and
pointing out random plants to give us facts about, and
it was like he was giving us a private tour,
and at first it felt like we lucked out meeting him.
After maybe an hour or two, Warren offers to walk
us back to our car at the trailhead. Me and
Jada figure it was about time to call it quits,

(27:36):
so we took him up on his offer. The weather
was still great, and we're still talking back and forth
with Warren, so we're moving at a leisurely pace while
enjoying the last trail of the day. When Warren suddenly
makes a suggestion. He says, wait a second, By my calculation,
if we just hike through this section of trees here,

(27:57):
it'll take us to the trailhead without having to loop around.
Harry said something along those lines, and we trusted them,
so we figured cool, shorter walk sounds good. We started
heading off the main trail in the trees, and I
figured it'd only be a few minutes of walking or
whatever before we started to see signs of life. But

(28:17):
to me and Jada, it kind of looked like he
was leading us deeper into the woods. I got real quiet,
and Warren kept trying to keep the conversation going, but
Jada in particular got very quiet too, and she's only
that quiet when she's nervous. When she started lagging behind,
I glanced back and saw her shake her head at me,

(28:39):
signaling that she didn't want to continue. I knew exactly
what she was talking about, so I told Warren that
me and Jada weren't so sure about this short cut
and wanted to head back toward the trail. Warren turned around,
and at first he just smiled and he says, Oh,
come on, it's just a short cut. I've been here
dozens of times times. His voice was still friendly, but

(29:03):
had this weird edge to it, like he was forcing
the friendliness.

Speaker 3 (29:07):
Now.

Speaker 1 (29:09):
Jada shook her head and then backed up by saying
she wanted to go back too, not just me. Warren
kept on smiling, but his eyes narrowed over a little
as he looked at us. He told us we were
being silly, there was nothing to worry about. But Jada
wasn't backing down. She said she wasn't taking another step
into those woods, and not a thing he could say

(29:30):
could convince her otherwise. And that's when he started to
get mean. He responds by saying, oh my god, what's
wrong with you? I said, it's fine. He tried to
smile at us after, but we heard the aggression in
his voice when he asked Jada what was wrong with her?
And that was the mask off moment for us. I

(29:53):
grabbed Jada's arm and then we turned and started quickly
walking back toward the trail we'd just bent on. But
then seconds later I heard it fast and heavy footsteps
crunching up behind us. Warren yelled, where do you think
you're going? And we sped up, almost jogging then, but
he was faster. Suddenly I heard Jada let out this

(30:15):
yelp of panic, and I felt this horrible chill go
through me. I spun around just in time to see
Warren's hand clamped around Jada's arm before he yanked her
back so hard she stumbled. She screamed at him to
let go as she tried to wrestle herself free, but
Warren was too strong. The look on his face was
totally different too, nothing like the charming guy we'd been

(30:38):
laughing with just an hour before. He screamed at us,
you're not leaving. The next thing, he shoves Jada to
the ground so hard it sounded like it knocked the
wind out of her. She sprawled in the dirt for
a second and then started scrabbling for a grip as
she tried to push herself to get away from Warn.

(31:01):
I froze for a split second, my mind going two
hundred miles an hour, thinking what the hell's going on?
Is this really happening? But it was, and I needed
to do something to stop it. I remember seeing Warren
just looming over Jada, with his fist clenched and his
chest heaving, looking like he was about to jump again,

(31:22):
and then a thought hit me right between the eyes.
I unzipped my fanny pack, fumbled past my keys and sunscreen,
and then grabbed hold of a cold metal canister of
pepper spray. I then yanked it out, pointed at Warren,
and then yelled at him to back off. My voice
shook so badly I barely recognized it, and at first

(31:43):
when he turned around, he just laughed as almost mocking
sounding cackle at me. He took a step towards me,
staring me right in the eye, and dared me to
use it. He didn't have to ask me twice.

Speaker 2 (31:57):
I pressed the.

Speaker 1 (31:57):
Button, unleashing a stream of pepper spray that hit him
square in the face. He screeched so loud and crazily
from the pain that it sounded like an animal, and
then he backed off, rubbing his eyes and face. The
pepper spray worked, but the breeze hit us too. Some
of the spray blew back in a stinging mist that

(32:18):
hit my eyes and nose like fire.

Speaker 2 (32:20):
I choked.

Speaker 1 (32:21):
Tears were forming in my eyes, and Jada got some
too as she got up and ran towards me and
was pressing her hand to her eyes as she yelled
at me to run. We knew that that was our chance,
and so we bolted through the woods, even though we
were both half blind. I remember branches whipping at my
face and snagging at my hair, but neither of us
were about to stop for anything, because behind us we

(32:44):
could still hear worn screaming stuff like run, bitches, I'll
catch you anyway. I'm not joking, and we ran to
our lungs burned and our legs were screaming, and we
kept going until we finally burst out of that main trail.
But I was so relieved I almost collapsed against a tree,
gasping for air as my eyes still streamed from the

(33:06):
stray pepper spray. But even then we didn't stop to
catch our breath for long. We kept on going back
to the car, where my hands were shaking so bad
I could barely get the key into the ignition. Jada
was frantically looking out for warn and later told me
that she was terrified of seeing him crashing through the
bushes before he attacked the car. I managed to start

(33:27):
the car. Then we got the hell out of there.
My eyes were still burning from the pepper spray, but
I didn't care. Getting out of there was the only
thing that mattered. As soon as we hit a spot
with cell service, I pulled over and Jada called nine
one one. She spilled everything while I sat there in silence,
staring out the window with eyes that were still sore
from that pepper spray. I couldn't hear exactly what the

(33:51):
despatcher said, but she sounded calm and kept Jada on
the line until the cop showed up. We gave our statements,
still in shock, and then the cop said that they'd
do everything they could to bring Warren in. We told
them about his job at Evergreen State, too, but they
later called back saying that there was no such professor
who was employed at that college, and that there were

(34:12):
two students named Warren, but neither matched our description. And
looking back, it's insane how fast our fun little hike
turned into a complete and utter nightmare. I still think
about sometimes and the thought of how he went from
charming to terrifying in a heartbeat, and how close we
came to something worse had sent chills through me. I'm

(34:34):
so glad we got out and that were both okay.
But it also taught me to trust my gut and
that if something feels off, even just a little, it
probably is. Be careful out there, especially hiking or in
places where it's just you and some Rando and Carrie Pepper.
Spray if you can. You never know when it will

(34:54):
save your life. I used to work as a trail
guide and this one time I had to scout a
trail that we didn't use much to make sure that
it was safe for a guided hike that we had
coming up. It was a simple process of checking for

(35:17):
fallen trees, washed out paths, or anything else that might
proof hazardous to the group, probably one of the easiest
things you get to do as a guide. I get
to the deepest part of the trail way out where
it's just me and the trees. I'm kind of poking
around looking for signs of trouble, when out of nowhere,
two guys step out from behind the trees. They were rough,

(35:39):
looking like they'd been out here a while, with dirty
clothes and scruffy faces. My stomach dropped as soon as
I saw them, because I could tell right away that
their intentions weren't good. One had a knife in his
hand and the other was giving me this big, creepy smile.
I remember trying my best to stay calm, but my
heart was pounding so hard I could actually feel it.

(36:02):
As they got close, the guy with the knife started
yelling at me, telling me to hand over my stuff.

Speaker 2 (36:08):
He was vicious, waving.

Speaker 1 (36:10):
That big knife around, saying he'll cut me if I
don't listen. I gave him my backpack, my water bottle,
my tomagotchi, and even what little cash she had on me.
While that's happening, the other guy, the one with a smile,
was acting very nice and saying things along the lines

(36:30):
of just do what we say, sweetheart, and you'll be fine.
They tell me to turn around, and before I can
say anything, they tie a blindfold over my eyes. It
was an old rag that I remember smelled like sweat
and dirt. After that, they tied my hands behind my
back with more of that same kind of rag, probably
old torn up clothes, and then they yanked it tight

(36:52):
so it hurt my wrists. I was trying to stay tough,
but internally I was completely freaking out. I told them, hey, hey,
you can't leave me like this. There's bears out here.
If I'm tied up, I'm dead. I was hoping they'd
have a heart, maybe loosen the ropes or something, but
maybe that was the good cop having worked on me

(37:13):
a little more than I'd like to admit, because when
they heard me asking for mercy, they just laughed like
it was the funniest thing they'd heard all day. The
mean one said that ain't our problem, and then I
listened to the sounds of the footsteps crunching away through
the leaves before everything went quiet again. Once I was

(37:33):
sure they were out of sight, I started wiggling my
wrists and pulling hard against the rope. They were really
tight and it hurt like heck, but I kept at it,
and before long I was sweating, My arms were aching,
and the bindings were starting to rub my skin raw.
I tried twisting and tugging and even trying to pick
at the knots with my fingers. Then, after what felt

(37:53):
like forever but it was probably a half hour, I
finally got one hand loose. From there, I yanked the
rag off completely and pulled the blindfold away. I was free,
but I wasn't safe yet. I didn't stick around to
look for my stuff those guys might have left behind.
I just started running back down the trail as fast

(38:14):
as my legs could carry me. The whole way, I
was looking over my shoulder, half expecting those creeps to
pop out again, but I kept moving till I finally
saw the trail head in the distance. When I got
back to headquarters, my boss was there doing paperwork, and
he just about jumped out of his chair as I
burst in. I remember panting, trying to get the words out,

(38:35):
but all I could manage at first was just call
nine one one. He didn't ask questions, he just grabbed
the phone and dialed as I sat down. Then, after
handing me the phone, I spilled the whole story to
the dispatcher, the two guys, the knife, the blindfold, all
of it. My boss stood there wide eyed as I talked,

(38:57):
listening to what I've been through. He couldn't believe is
he and he told me later that nothing that terrible
has ever happened to any of his employees, past or present.
Given the severity of the call, the cops showed up quickly,
at which point I went over the story for a
second time. They asked me to go into as much
detail as possible in terms of describing the guys, as

(39:17):
well as what they said in which direction I figured
they might have gone. I did my best, but it
was all a blur. They were unshaven, wearing dirty jackets.
One was taller, the other one shorter, and I told
him about the knife and that creepy good cop bad
cop routine too, And now it seemed almost rehearsed, like
they'd done this before. The cops said that they'd send

(39:39):
a team out to search the woods, but I didn't
hold my breath. I knew those guys would probably be
long gone. As the cops left, my boss told me
to take the rest of the day off, And it
was a great guy like that, and he could see
how rattled I was. And I sat in the break
room waiting for my ride and trying to calm down.

(40:00):
But every time I remembered how they'd laughed, this feeling
of anger and dread would get all fat and heavy
in my chest, and it'd only go away if I
cried or yelled or hugged somebody. Those guys didn't care
if I lived or died, and it makes my skin
crawl to think about it today, but I still eternally

(40:20):
am grateful to God for making sure that I made
it back in one piece. Many years ago, I was
out on a trail with my group, leading them through
the woods like I done a hundred times before. It

(40:41):
was a nice day, the sun was shining and the
birds were chirping, and since we'd been hiking for a
couple of hours, I figured it was time to take
a break in a nearby stream. It's one that I
regularly stopped at with my guys, and they'd top up
their water bottles or splash their faces to keep cool,
and then, as you usual, they put down their packs,

(41:02):
pulled out their snacks, and then started chatting among themselves.
I'm keeping an eye on them, making sure nobody wanders
off or does anything dumb, like stepping on a loose rock.
When one of the guys, a guy with a big
old backpack, asks if the water's safe.

Speaker 2 (41:17):
To drink, it was a fair question.

Speaker 1 (41:20):
Nobody wants to chug something that's going to make them sick,
so I tell them I'll check it out like I
always do, And the routine was pretty simple. I walk
upstream a little, maybe fifty yards or so, to make
sure there's nothing funky in the water. Usually I'm looking
for stuff like dead birds or small animals that might
have fallen in and started rotting, because that kind of

(41:41):
thing can leach nasty bacteria into the stream, and I
ain't about to let my group get sick. On my watch,
and all my years guiding, I never found anything worse
than a few leaves or some mud, And it's usually
just a quick check to be on the safe side.
So I leave the group to munch on their granola bars,
and upstream it's gurgling along all peacefully, and I'm just strolling,

(42:04):
keeping my eyes peeled and thinking about how I'll maybe
crack a joke about how it's cleaner than city tap water.
But then I stopped dead in my tracks. Right there
in the middle of the stream, sitting in the shallow
water is a deer's head.

Speaker 2 (42:21):
Not just any deer's head.

Speaker 1 (42:23):
It was rotten, like really badly rotten, too, And the
thing's a total mess. The eyes are cloudy, there's flies
buzzing around it, and the smell hits me like a
punch to the nose. I've seen dead animals before, but
nothing like that, because the cut where the head was
chopped off was clean, way too clean for it to
be some predatory animal. It was like someone took a

(42:46):
sharp blade, made a hunting knife, and sliced clean through
the thing's neck before they left it right in the water.
My gut was telling me it wasn't an accident. It
felt like someone put it there on purpose, like they
wanted it to be found. I figured maybe it was
a warning, though I didn't know who'd do something like
that or why. I remember standing there for a second

(43:09):
or two, just staring at it and trying to wrap
my head around what I was seeing. The water's flowing
around it, carrying who knows what downstream to where my
group's sitting, and I knew rate then we had to move.
The water wasn't safe, and from what I could tell,
neither was being there in the first place. The only
thing was I knew I couldn't tell the whole truth either.

(43:31):
Those folks were out there for nothing more than an
afternoon hike. If I told them the truth, they might panic,
and I didn't need a bunch of city people freaking
out in the middle of the woods. I put on
my calm face, the one I use when I need
to keep things under control, and then I tell them
that we need to head back to h Q. When
they asked why, I kept it simple and I calmly

(43:52):
said that I thought there was a bear in the
area and it just so happened to be rutting season,
and it's true the bears can get really deeps during
that time of year. It's a good enough story, and
bears are scary, so nobody questioned it. I saw a
couple of them looking a little nervous, but they trusted
me to keep them safe, and that's exactly what I
intended to do. I got them to grab their stuff,

(44:15):
and then we started hiking back the way we came.
The whole way back, I was keeping my eyes peeled,
checking the trees and trail for anything else weird. But
if someone was watching us, I sure sec didn't see them.
I kept quiet, but my mind was racing who'd do
something like that? Was it some hunter messing around, someone

(44:37):
trying to just scare us a little, or something worse.
I didn't know, and I didn't like not knowing, But
my job was to keep these people safe. So I
focused on that. I kept the group moving at a
steady pace, not too fast to make them worry, but
quick enough to put some distance between us and that stream.
I cracked a few jokes and pointed out some birds,

(44:59):
anything to keep their minds off that bear. They were
wary at first, but I guess they trusted me enough
that by the time we were around half way back,
they were chatting and laughing again. When we got to
h Que, I pulled the manager aside and told him
that we need to cut that trip short. I didn't
go into details about the deer head, not right away

(45:19):
at least, I just say that we spotted signs of
a bear and didn't want to take chances. He nodded,
knowing that I'd never call it quits for no reason,
and tell me that I did the right thing. We
got the group's fees refunded, no questions asked, and while
they were still a little bummed about the trip getting
cut short, they were happy to get their money back.

Speaker 2 (45:40):
A few of them even.

Speaker 1 (45:42):
Thanked me for keeping them safe, saying they'll book another
trip later when the bears aren't so active, and I
just smiled and nodded, telling them to come back anytime.
But once they're gone, I sat down with a cup
of coffee and told my boss what had really happened.
We agreed it was probably nothing, just some IDIA trying
to spoof, but as I told him, it certainly didn't

(46:02):
feel like nothing at the time. That Deer's head still
pops into my head sometimes like a message that I
didn't fully understand yet. But the bottom line is I
kept my group safe and that's all that really counts. Hey, friends,
thanks for listening. Click that notification bell to be alerted

(46:23):
of all future narrations. I released new videos every Monday
and Thursday at nine pm Eastern Time, and there are
super fun live streams on Sundays and Wednesday nights. If
you got a story, be sure to submit them over
at my email at Let's Read Submissions at gmail dot
com and maybe even hear your story featured on the
next video. And if you want to support me even more,

(46:47):
grab early access to all future narrations and bonus content
over on Patreon, or click that big Join button to
hear about the extra perks for members of the channel,
and check out the Letter podcast. Or you can hear
all of these stories and big compilations located anywhere you
listen to the podcast. All links in the description below.
Thanks so much, friends, And remember.

Speaker 3 (47:09):
Hi guys, it's me freyat and and I want to
finish my story from when I was like six. I
was walking an enchanted forest and the wind was blowing
with fear, so I ran to my cabin. I called

(47:30):
for my dad for fifteen minutes and there was no response.
So I went to the bed and found a trail
of blood leading to the bathtub. One I looked inside,
there was my dad lay laying in their dead when
a note say then with a note saying, look behind

(47:54):
my bed. So I ran to my bed, saw the
man in the picture under my bed that looked like
my dad, and he ran baby and he had a
baby in his arms and a woman right beside him.

(48:16):
And I never had a mom, and I was and
on the back said wow, I can't believe I had
a baby. And next two it was a year that
was seventy years ago. Comment comment down your comment down

(48:37):
below what your favorite story was that lechure you'd made,
good job, keep