Creepy - Creepaway Camp 2024: Day 2 - The Fog of Angel Lake & Skinwalker

Episode Date: April 8, 2024

The Fog of Angel Lake***Written by: Ranzenu and Narrated by: Danielle Hewitt***Story link: https://creepypasta.fandom.com/wiki/The_Fog_of_Angel_Lake***This story is is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike License.***Skinwalker***Written by: HolyHeretic***Story link: https://creepypasta.fandom.com/wiki/Skinwalker***This story is is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike License.***Support the show at patreon.com/creepypod***Sound design by: Pacific Obadiah Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

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Hey, John? Danielle? Where is everyone? Where the hell have you been? Oh, we were, um... Shit. What did we say we were doing? Oh, yeah, uh, getting supplies.

For three days? It hasn't been three days. Yes, it has. John, do you really think that we would just abandon you here? To fend for yourself for three days, while the rest of us party in New Orleans? Well, no, I guess that does seem a bit extreme. I guess it's kind of hard to tell how much time is passed out here, but where is everyone? Sorry, uh, what now?

The other narrators? Why were you the only one to come back out here? Oh, um, uh, it's to, uh, to let you know that, um, we ran into a bit of a delay getting the supplies, and we didn't want you to worry since there's no cell reception out here. Okay. Thanks, I guess. I really was hoping everyone would have been back by now.

It's slow going getting things set up. up doing this alone. But it looks exactly like it did when we left. Are you kidding me? No. What have you been working on all this time? I've been busting my butt trying to get the swimming ponds set up and ready. I installed the diving board and everything. What diving board? All I see is a two by four floating out in the swamp. God damn it. The string broke again? John, maybe you should take a break. You kind of put a lot of pressure on. You kind of put a lot of pressure on. on yourself when you get an idea in your head. Just slow things down.

Relax. Yeah. Yeah, that's a good idea. I've been feeling a little lightheaded since lunch. I think those mushrooms might have been off. Mushrooms? You ate mushrooms that you found out in the swamp. Which mushrooms?

Those skinny ones over there, growing next to my unresolved issues with my dad. Oh. Okay, John. Um, it's time to take a seat. Focus on something you like. Like a story? Sure, if that'll help you ride this one out.

Um, I could tell you about... Oh, the fog of Angel Lake. To this day, I still cannot comprehend what happened in that old God-forsaken town of Angel Lake. The fear and horror one felt going there. was already severe enough. But what my friend and I witnessed, and experienced, is one I wouldn't dare wish on anyone else.

We are still shaken by it, and even hearing the name Angel Lake makes us shudder with regret and loathing of that place. Often I have night terrors from the dreaded thing I saw there. None of this had started due to some morbid curiosity or some sort of legend tripping we wanted to take part in. In fact, all of this had happened just because my friend and I were curious. I was a student who had an appreciation of anthropology and history, while my friend was a passionate lover of folklore and mythology.

We both bounced various factoids of knowledge about what we specialized in. We also shared a taste for the macabre, So we often did our own research into darker and mysterious subject matters, such as Roanoke Islands' lost colony, or the hideous murders that took place in Hinterkifec. One interest we've shared our entire lives was the subject of ghost towns. To us, ghost towns held mysterious and fascinating stories of the past that no textbook could ever capture.

What made them even more enticing was that they were often left on top. touched. So everything was as still and silent as the day the villagers abandoned it. It is as if the forgotten town was a graveyard for the former life that used to have. My friend and I also enjoyed speculating the cause for the departing. If indeed we can call it that, sometimes we've read there is little to no evidence as to why a town is utterly abandoned. There are the obvious, more logical explanations, shortage of crops, famine, drought, rebellion, or sometimes simply the desire to move on. However, the ghost town of Angel Lake is notorious for having absolutely no explanation as to why it was abandoned. There are a large number of ghost towns in the world that have been

abandoned by their original denizens. But this one had a peculiar history. Very little is actually known about Angel Lake itself. My friend and I searched high and low to discover more about it. Other than a very small number of online articles, in one or two history books, the most that's been said about it is that it was established sometime in the 1800s. The town is named after the lake that resides by it and was mysteriously abandoned in 1936. It is also unknown what truly happened to the people who lived there, because it seems they had just disappeared from history. No one ever figured out what happened to them or why people suddenly left it. What little we've read detailed the so-called logical possibilities, but it also highlighted the more curious aspects. It's believed. It's

that dark occult practices had gone on there for centuries, and that may be the cause for the elusive disappearances in subsequent abandonment. What is known in recorded history was that the area was shunned by the indigenous people of the area. Tales of evil essences dwelling there were frequently recited amongst themselves. Spanish explorers who visited the region also briefly wrote accounts of strange and frightening happenings in the area, so much so, that they called the place. the lake of the diabol de los diables, the lake of the devils, due to the strange and sometimes horrifying occurrences that happened.

They never truly described what had happened that led them to leave it. The Spaniards found it so frightening that they quickly abandoned the place for hundreds of years, until it was renamed Angel Lake, by English-speaking settlers, who learned of the name and changed due to a offending their religious views. Legend has it that numerous witches' sabbaths happened near the area of Angel Lake, and that it ultimately led to the people being kidnapped and flown away into the night by gargoyles and winged devils. Others say extraterrestrials came down from the stars, and abducted

the human populace. Sturred by this strange tale and being lovers of history and folklore, my friend and I decided to travel to Angel Lake to explore it, and perhaps discover why the folks of the place had moved elsewhere. It wasn't too far from our hometown, so it was possible to make it in a few hours. We would end up regretting that decision for the rest of our lives. This foolish decision did not come from just the urge to explore. We had planned on taking a few snapshots of old artifacts, and perhaps touring the old decaying buildings. What awaited us is nothing I can truly explain to this day,

nor is it something I wish to relive again. I would highly advise anyone to steer clear of Angel Lake and let it rot. It is a breeding ground for nightmares and evil. I wouldn't dare wish this experience on anyone else. During the drive, my friend and I eagerly discussed our theories about Erie Angel Lake. Being students, we were trained to study and analyze situations with rationality and critical. thinking. Naturally, we were willing to take anything with supernatural qualities attributed to it with a grain of salt. Between the two of us, however, my friend was the more superstitious. It wasn't

in the sense of him reading and following horoscopes or believing in magical horseshoes or something ridiculous like that. Instead, he seemed to believe that not everything had a truly scientific explanation, and that there were many things in this life that the scientific method alone couldn't explain, no matter how much we wanted to. But after I explained what we had seen, I don't think either of us can truly choose to believe anything rational anymore, whether it was scientific or otherwise. The further we drove on,

the more decrepit and strangely silent the place seemed to get. In fact, at one point, I had rolled down the window only to hear nothing but the deathly silence of the area. If any animals were making noises, they were hardly detectable other than a brief rustling of grass. We had traveled during the late afternoon hours, so that by the time we arrived at Angel Lake, it would be evening.

I can say now that this turned out to be our gravest mistake, along with even daring to travel to this accursed city. We did it for the sake of creating a foreboding and haunting atmosphere. But what an idiotic move. It wasn't until we were close by that we suddenly began to feel the true loneliness and isolation of this town. Miles and miles of road stretched on, and with each mile, the road became less maintained, cracked, and cared for. We drove past forgotten valleys in shadowy mountains. and the grass became unkempt and overgrown.

Eventually we began to spot unpleasant little ancient run-down cottages here and there, scattered around the now-dirt roads. Our vehicle rocked violently against the bumpy and ragged path. We became excited as a few of these old cabins appeared authentic and rustic, perhaps dating back to the 19th century. I quickly snapped a few pictures of it with my phone. These must have been the folks who decided to have a simple living, during the time, and not move into the industrialized portion of Angel Lake.

At one point, my friend had no choice but to park the car, and we had to continue our travels on foot, seeing as the path became too difficult to traverse through by driving, the moment we shut the doors of our car, we immediately felt the atmosphere of decay. The trees, plants, and grass, appeared gloomy and moist from rain that had fallen a few days earlier. earlier, and any animals we heard around were furtively scurrying or climbing up tall black trunks. The ground was very muddy, and we could hear the faint twittering of unknown birds in the distance. Finally our eyes landed on a small, dark town located at the end of this virgin forest.

Originally I thought we'd be thrilled to explore this age-old town and investigate what happened to it. for some reason, both my friend and I felt hesitant to step foot inside. As outlandish as this sounds, we felt a sort of unwanted presence emanating from it. The more we gazed at it, the more we felt slightly afraid. I did my absolute best to hide it, and I noticed my friend's fears because he was as fretful to enter as I was. He turned to me and asked if I was coming along and what I was waiting for. I lied and made up an excuse that I was simply observing the town. We both exchanged unsettled laughs and went in as if we were both untroubled. The streets were filled with old

architecture and desolate houses. There were still signs from old shops hanging up, and the residential homes still had wooden furniture on their verandas. It felt so strange to be here. Often when we walked through neighborhoods. We expect to see the windows lit up or people walking down the road. But here it felt so empty and forlorn. It was very unnerving to imagine what had caused this little place to be forgotten. We knew we could go inside any of these buildings that we liked and rummaged through the things they contained. But there was something curious about these houses that left us feeling, fearful of them. It was as if there were still things. things dwelling in there, hiding in the darkness and waiting for someone to enter it.

It sounds silly, yes, but it felt that way. The fact that the sun had gone down, and the sky was beginning to darken, made it seem even more grim and devoid of life. As we marched our way through the dead streets, we snapped more photos and pointed out the little stores and houses we found interesting, and remarked on their archaic appearances. I believe that secretly my friend was pointing at places and objects just to fool me into thinking he wasn't afraid. But the truth is, it was so powerful I could sense it. We were both very afraid, and I believe we both began to regret coming here at this late hour. Regardless, there was something that enticed my curiosity and that I simply had to search it.

It was an old rectangular building in the town's plaza. The sign on top of it read. said, Angel Lake newspaper agency. I pointed it out and my friend became excited as well. Inside there would surely be valuable sources of information revealing how life was here, and perhaps shed light on some of the citizens in its history. We both pushed open the decrepit old door

and entered into the small office-like place and stared in complete amazement at the old tables, typewriters and file cabinets that were knocked over and scattered all over the room. We instantly began scavenging through old papers and furniture. We found numerous unfinished newspaper articles detailing the events going on in the nation, and many tidbits of local news during the 1930s. It was evident by this that the journalists who were writing these must have got up and left suddenly.

It left us with a slight unnerved feeling as we continued to look through everything. I then ventured inside another room, and I believe this to have been the editing room. There were numerous front-page articles taped to the walls and two windows looking out onto a large tarn. The tarn was Angel Lake itself, which this town was named after. I got to what I believed would be the newspaper editor's desk. There was a large stack of newspapers on top of it, neatly arranged and untouched. I looked back at my friend and saw he was just tossing papers around and going through the contents of a desk. It felt amazing for a brief second.

I was holding in my hands a newspaper that had been written nearly 80 years ago. It still felt as fresh as the day it was off the press. I read the headline, the year being 1936 according to the paper's date. and I felt a pang of fear churn inside me. It read, Strange fog spotted in middle of Angel Lake. As I finished reading those words, my eyes shifted over to the large lake at the window.

As I studied it for a moment, the water appeared more shadowy and still than any other lake I'd seen in my life. It had a sort of haunting quietude to it. I then turned my attention, back to the newspaper once again and began to read. On October 11th, an unexplainable fog was spotted growing in the middle part of Angel Lake. People say it seemed to have come from nowhere, and witnesses who live nearby claim to hear

strange and frightening noises coming from the lake itself. Unexplainable lights seem to radiate from the core of the fog that is building on the water. Local law enforcement and fishermen have attempted to go out and see what the source of this unexplainable mist is, but they claim there seems to be a horrible odor emitting from it that prevents them from getting any closer. They will attempt to explore it at a later date, in which they hope that the terrible scent has subsided. This story had me captivated. As I looked down to read more of the newspapers, I realized that there were more articles of this event. Each article was dated only days later from the one I just read. I quickly snapped them all up

in chronological order. I was both excited and unsettled by what I had just read. The next article said the following. On October 19th, the fog has nearly covered all of the lake and has reached the shore and even extended into the neighboring woodlands. People are beginning to fear that it will enter the town itself. It seems that the way, as it is not receding at all, but has instead grown thicker, citizens are complaining to the mayor and other elected officials that the awful scent has begun to disrupt their daily lives.

Furthermore, people continue to claim that bizarre, multicolored strobe light effects, flashing inside the mist are making them feel nervous. In the late hours of the night, they claimed to hear a discordant hellish noise coming from the direction of where the fog is approaching. A public announcement has been made that people should remain indoors until the fog is dispatched. I am not normally one to get superstitious or frightened by something like this, especially since I knew that this could have easily been a case of yellow journalism. But what made me get afraid were the circumstances surrounding this old ghost town. It had become abandoned, and everything was dropped, as if something sudden had happened. But what if it wasn't abandoned?

What if something horrific happened here? All those thoughts filled my mind. I suddenly looked down at the newspaper I was holding and noticed my hand quivering nervously. I didn't even notice that at first, and I quickly put it down and picked up the next paper. This one was dated November 5th. The fog has still not disappeared since it was first spotted on October 19th. The city government is still uncertain of what it is and how to get rid of it. The fog has now reached Angel Lake and has begun to crawl its way onto the streets.

Denizens are beginning to disappear under the city. mysterious circumstances. People are claiming that a few of their loved ones have gone outside to stare at the mist, and, as if under some sort of hypnosis, went into the foggy depths and never came out. The last thing they'd hear would be their loved ones let out a horrible shriek of terror, and then no trace would be left of them. The bodies of cattle, birds, and various other assorted animals are discovered dead near the deadly mist. Plants and trees are also beginning to decompose, wither away, and die when the fog approaches them. It is unknown what will be done at this time.

At this point, my friend entered the editor's office, and I immediately cried out and dropped the newspapers as he called out to me. He noticed my alarming expression and my demeanor, and asked me what the matter was. Trembling, I picked up the newspapers I was holding, and read them out loud to him. When I looked back up at him, he was just as pale and terrified

as I was. I could see the fear in his eyes, and he too appeared stricken with dread. I saw him nervously make his way over to the window, press both palms against the window pane, and stare out into the lake. I joined him there at the other window. I noticed that the trees and plants around Angel Lake appeared dead,

grotesque and lifeless. It was then that I realized that was giving this strange old town such a haunting feeling. Everything appeared barren and without life. The lake itself appeared to be a lonesome, cold abyss. The more I peered at it, the more I envisioned unspeakably abominable things hidden beneath it. Was there any validity to these newspaper pieces? Was it just an elaborate hoax?

They appear so authentic. It just doesn't make sense. I went back to the desk and picked up the next newspaper. Surprisingly, this newspaper appeared to be the last one that was fully completed. I read it out loud to my friend who had rejoined me at the desk. Only now he appeared more colorless and nauseated than before. This last article was dated November 14th. The infernal mist has begun to overtake Angel Lake.

The authorities have promptly begun evacuations of the town. The fog, although of unknown origin, has been considered, dangerous by town officials. Crops have become deformed and non-edible. Animals have also grown deformed, dying as their flesh rots away. People of Angel Lake seemingly fall under some sort of inexplicable trance that lures them into the deadly fog, and do not return. It is uncertain where they go to, or if they're even alive anymore.

The foul odor has been speculated to come from the mist itself, and has become completely unbearable. The fate of our town will be left unknown. I placed that nerve-shattering article back on the table and arranged the newspapers back in the way I found them, and perhaps the way they had been for decades. I suppose I did it out of respect for the original inhabitant who had done it that way. My friend and I exchanged very nervous glances with each other. Suddenly, this once scholarly and anthropological journey had turned into a an ominous and weird mystery. It left us both vexed and with far more questions than answers. I felt myself grinding my teeth and nervousness. My thoughts were muddled with the perplexing

accounts I had just read. My folklorist friend turned back to the window to gaze out into the hellish lake again, while I began to scan the room for more evidence as to what happened to this ghost town. As I was searching through the desks and ground, my eyes suddenly landed on an old typewriter at the corner. of the room. It piqued my interest, because it seemed to have a half-finished piece of manuscript of sorts wedged in its platinum. Not wanting to touch it due to my desire to leaving everything as authentic as possible, I stood over the device and read the hardly legible text smeared on it. To my surprise and horror, it seems to be a note, hastily written up by some unknown typist.

It wasn't formally typed to be in a newspaper. I began to read it. And after this, I began to truly feel the overwhelming essence of pure horror. The damn fog is not just vapor. It's a living thing. It's not just taking people. It's eating them. The toxic fumes are killing the flora and fauna.

It has some sort of devilish power. It is overtaking Angel Lake. I leave this note here to warn anyone who is foolish enough to come here. If you are reading this, get out of Angel Lake now. You absolutely need to. If you wish to stay another moment, may God have mercy on. That was all that was written on the sheet before it abruptly stopped. I just stood there, quaking like a miserable cow.

at the words on the paper. I felt the slightest noise would make me jump at this point. I was intoxicated with dread. Then there came the horrid shriek of my friend who was still looking out at the terrible lake. The moment I heard his scream, I stood there frozen with absolute paralyzing fear. I had never felt such a horrible coldness. Stop every part of my body. Even my breath felt restricted. I heard him calling my name repeatedly and frantically, and the tone in his voice sounded as if he were ready to start sobbing hysterically. I managed to break out of the grip of extreme fear, and I sprinted over to my friend,

and I demanded to know what was wrong. All he did, with a terrified expression on his face, was point his fingers toward Angel Lake. Before I even looked, I had the feeling, of just wheeling around and running out of this demonic town as fast as possible. With the horror beginning to take a hold of me, I stared out the window,

and I observed the most bizarre and unexplainable phenomenon. I don't think I've ever read or seen footage of something like this. Instead of being fascinated by it, it filled me with a putrid dreading and loathing as I recall the frightening accounts in the newspaper articles, in that final message. It appeared like a milky white fog was beginning to swirl over the tarns water,

but it moved unlike any sort of mist I'd ever seen. It seemed to slither like a giant snake, as if searching for something or some other horrible thing. But what gave this fog a most terrible and bizarre quality was the eerie shifting of colors flashing vehemently inside of it. It was like multicolored lightning shining furiously inside a storm cloud. The fog seemed to be crawling towards the shoreline at a rapid pace, as if it were intentionally doing it.

I just stared at it, mindlessly and wide-eyed. I couldn't figure out if I was too fascinated or too petrified to move a muscle. All I remember was my friend screaming something at me. and I instinctively whirled around and ran along with him, tripping over what I formerly thought were treasures of this old town. I kicked aside furniture and forcefully shoved open the doors. As we ran outside, nightfall had already arrived. But what added even more fear to this already horrible situation

was that in the air, there was a noxious, vomit-inducing odor that I had never smelled before. The scent was enough to make me cough and gathers. and my eyes water. I covered my face with my sleeve, but even that wasn't enough to block out the grotesque scent. Behind us, strange strobe-like lights began to flash intensely and somewhat menacingly, as if it had located us and had a purpose of catching up to us. This encouraged my friend and I to sprint even faster, and it was near the exit of Angel Lake that we began to hear the strange guttural groaning and nerve-racking screeching erupting from behind. They sounded like howls,

but were unlike anything from this earth. The sounds were enough to drive anyone mad if they heard them long enough. Just as we reached the arboreal area and finally managed to exit that witch's town, I dared to turn my head as I continued running for my life. It was there that I spotted the supernatural fog, swallowing the entire town. Every building from the smallest to the most lofty. I saw the nightmarish vortex of colors, twisting and writhing inside of it. And for one, terrifying brief second, I thought I saw a horrible, distorted giant face in the fog, as if it belonged to some sort of enormous humanoid beast, gazing at us with bulgy, unearthly eyes. hungrily. Once my friend and I reached his car, we sped out of there, paying no mind to the speed

limits. We drove out of their grave and quiet from our ghoulish encounters with the unknown. We were so disturbed from that experience that we never truly did speak of Angel Lake again. Whenever a common fog rolls in, I find myself growing very afraid. I'm not sure if I'm afraid because it reminds me of the mist from the devilish lake. or because I feel that one coming in will behave in the same way. At night as I lay there, with my mind filled with horrible thoughts. I wonder if the people who inhabited Angel Lake had indeed escaped from the monstrous fog, or if it had eaten them, as that mysterious message in the typewriter had said,

no one has ever come forward to claim that they had lived in Angel Lake, not even an interview. No one else has ever claimed any lineage from there either. It makes me nervous, considering the possibility that perhaps the people had indeed disappeared within that fog and not fled. The thought fills me with terror and paranoia. I know I will never live that experience down. I can only hope that no one dares disturb that horrible fog of Angel Lake ever again. Did that help you take your mind off things, John?

John. John. Where did your shirt and shoes go? I sold them to the man for these magic beans. We're going to plant these beans and climb the beanstock to make a summer camp in the clouds. What shape are you? I'm not sure that even qualifies as a dad bod. John?

John. John. Holy crap! Danielle? Where'd you come from? John, I need you to take a breath. And do your best to try and remember where you are and who you are. I'm...

Not Zoltan, Master of the Panflupt? I mean... I guess you could be. I really don't know how you spend your free time. Your name is John Grills. And you run a horror podcast called Creepy. You tell scary stories. Good to know.

And who are you? I'm Danielle, one of the narrators on the podcast. How do I know that's true? How do I know you aren't someone or something else? Like what? Like a skinwalker. My father told me a story once. Oh, no.

ever forget it for a few reasons. I think it's the first story you ever told me as a child. It's also the story of how my grandfather died. But honestly, that isn't the reason. You hear stories on TV or sometimes you overhear something in a public place. People talk about ghosts and aliens and you think to yourself, I mean real, you're making it up or they're mistaken or... They're crazy.

Something like that. You just can't believe it. Until something happens. Something that brings it all together. Connects the dots in a way you didn't think of before. Maybe it happens to you. Maybe you hear the same story again and again happening to different people. It doesn't take long for the world to become a lot bigger than you thought it was.

As I said, this is a story my father told me. me. But I never believed it. Even though he swore up and down, it was true. It wasn't until I started clicking around the internet, I started to believe. I started to hear other stories like the one my father told me. Didn't take me long to believe in. The rake. That's not what my father called it, of course. He's never used the internet in his life. He wouldn't know what the consensus. is taken and naming it, when he chose to call it something other than it, or that thing, he called it Skinwalker, after an old Navajo tale's grandfather told him. But I'll tell you the story the way he told it to me.

We were out hunting one night, he'd tell me. Coyotes, we'd kill him for 50 bucks of skin. They lived on a dairy farm in Ohio. They'd kill calves sometimes. We do it every night because we needed the money. Sometimes while we were out, we'd come on a deer and kill it. Our landlord didn't mind, and it could feed our family for a few nights and save us some money. Anyway, we were done making our rounds and heading home walking, because we didn't have a car or some four-wheeler back then.

We cut through the woods, and that's when we came upon it. Blood. Everywhere. Splattered on the trees and the grass and the creek. Everywhere. At first, we figured it was a pack of coyotes. We'd seen it sometimes. They can't scavenge and start hunting deer or cattle. The worst was when they bred like feral dogs. It just wasn't like that. See, when a pack of dogs or wolves or coyotes attack something, They do it right. They'll pick off one that's weak or sick or old or just small.

They'll hunt it down, draw it into a corner, some place it can't get out of, and they'll run it right to the biggest one, the alpha. And that deer will never see that alpha. They might hear it, but I won't see it. They'll just notice that its throat's gone and it'll drop dead. It's quick. It's clean. That wasn't what happened here. Something had run up on a den of deer.

Coyotes won't attack a den, wolves neither, because they'd get too much of a fight. There were three, I think, three bodies. Just torn apart. You'd see a head here, leg here, torso there. Predators don't do that. They don't leave behind scraps. What had done this hadn't done it for food. It had done it for fun.

But we didn't know that. We saw a bunch of carcasses and we think it's something we've got to take care of. I remember my dad telling me to go home. He thought it was a pack of feral dogs. But I wasn't leaving them. And I damn sure it wasn't walking through two miles of woods alone with nothing but a 22 in a pocket knife. He was

13 at the time, so a 22 rifle was about the only gun he could reliably use. Dad had a shotgun, and I wasn't going anywhere without it. It took me a while to convince him, but finally we began tracking whatever did

that. It wasn't hard either. We just followed the blood. Either that thing bled deer before it got away, or a dragged one for a mile. I don't know. I know that I'd never seen my dad scared before that night. We started hearing noises.

I've been in a lot of woods in my life. I've been all over the world. And I ain't never heard noises like I heard that night. I heard things screaming. Heard deer and fox and rabbits and raccoons and birds just scared. Keep in mind this is maybe 12 or 1 o'clock. Except the fox and some birds. Nothing was supposed to even be awake.

But they were just awake. They were moving. I saw flocks of birds that night fly straight into trees just trying to get out of there. We came up on a pack of coyotes. We shot a couple thinking it was what we were looking for. But then we saw they were running towards us. They ran right past us. They didn't even notice.

Then some dears did the same. Then some rabbits, squirrels, foxes, even a couple wild hogs. These things were supposed to be eating each other. The only thing they cared about was getting out of there. We should have put it together. Then maybe whatever we were tracking, It wasn't something we were supposed to see. It wasn't something we could kill.

I don't know why we didn't just go home. I guess we were curious. I think that was my dad's nature. They go toward trouble, to fight. I hadn't known what I knew about what my father did during the war. Nature was to stay close to him. We finally did get into an open valley. It was normally a soy field, but it wasn't in season, so it was just flat dirt.

We saw tracks then, and a lot of animals fleeing the forest had paved over the land. But where that deer blood was, nothing had taken a single step. Like they were leaving it for us to find. The tracks were shallow. Whatever it was couldn't have weighed more than 100 pounds, but that didn't mean much. A bobcat weighing 40 pounds wet nearly tore my damn throat once. All that means is that it's quick and hard to hit. So we follow the tracks.

It doesn't take us long to find where it is. There's this old schoolhouse that sits on top of a hill. Half of it had been ripped out by a tornado. But nobody lived there for a long time. We got homeless people in there sometimes or druggies looking for a tornado. a safe place to shoot up. We figured maybe that was it. Maybe it was some sick kid riding a high.

But we didn't think that for long. We get within 50 yards and we hear this noise, a screeching kind of sound. It was sort of made up a two different sounds. One was a high-pitched screech. Another was a low-pitched growl. It was making both at the same time. We get within 20 yards and we hear this sound. I can remember thinking that it sounded like paper being torn apart

while someone was swinging water in a bucket back and forth. Dad looks at me, kneels down and whispers, I got to stay behind him because we're about to corner him. and the animal will fight when it's cornered, especially when it's a predator. But we can tell by the tracks that it's just one. He tells me it's probably a single feral dog, probably rabid.

The plan is to sneak up on it while it's eating and shoot it, and then keep shooting it till it don't move anymore and slit its throat. If it gets to dad, it's my job to shoot it or stab it to get it off him. So he walks up and I'm right behind him, just a tad to his side, so I can see what it is. I wish to this day I hadn't. It was leaning over a carcass, tearing off its flesh, and throws what it doesn't nibble at a side. There's blood all over the brick, glistening in the moonlight. It's pale, human-looking.

but not quite human. It had arms and legs like a human, but it sat like a monkey, hunched over. Its hands weren't normal. It had long fingers with claws at the end. So we see that. My dad hesitates. He wasn't about to fire on a person.

So he clears his throat to try to get it to turn around. I swear to God. All the noise just ceased. I had ever heard true silence before that, and not after it. But for two seconds, nothing, nothing made any noise, which made it all the louder when it turned around, making this shrill cry and jumped on Dad. He got a shot off?

I think you missed. If he hit the thing, it didn't mind, but it was on him. Tearing parts of him off. I started shooting at it with the 22 point blank, but barely bled the thing. I got off five rounds, and then I started hitting it with a gun, but it wasn't budging. Didn't even register that I was there. It clawed at my dad, taken off bits of his flesh. It started on his torso, ripping off the skin.

His tit, then I moved up, tore off his throat, tore off his nose, his eyes, and scalped him. Then I'd sort of digging in and ripping off the bottom half of his jaw, the little bones and that tube in your neck, and his ribs. I don't exactly remember what happened. But somehow my dad's knife ends up in this thing's shoulder. My dad ends up on my back. I'm running. God, I am running faster than I have ever run before or after.

And it's following me. I end up back in the woods, opposite the ones we've been in. I'm heading towards my landlord's house because it's half a mile away. I can hear this thing. screeching and moaning. I hear the tree branches crack and get thrown around. Sounds like someone's taken an axe to every single tree I pass. It's cracking so loud and often.

I ain't looking bad. Finally I trip into gravel. I look up and there's my landlord and a bunch of his buddies drinking around a campfire. I scream and I cry and they come over. I'm telling him to call an ambulance and he looks at me. And I'll never forget what he said. What is that on your back? He asks me, just as he said it, he saw.

One of those god-awful flannel shirts my dad wore everywhere. It was what was left in my dad. Most of his head, his torso, but nothing after the waste. Suddenly we hear it, screeching. He grabs me, but dad gets thrown on the ground. I'm fighting him, crying. Because I think we can still save him somehow, but my dad had been gone before I ever picked him up. He has to pick me up and throw me inside before I come with him.

He and his buddies were all inside, and they're locking doors and getting guns. Landlord's asking me, what happened, what happened? But I just don't know what to tell him. You pieced enough of it all together to understand that there was something dangerous there. All the lights in the house are on. and someone calls the cops. They'll be there, but in 15 minutes. We look outside and I see a walk in front of the fire they've made.

I know what it is. One of them says it looks like an ape. Suddenly something goes through the window. We shoot at it, but ain't the thing. It's my landlord's dog. Just a body though, not his head or legs. We start pushing things in front of doors and windows when we hear something in the garage. I remember one of his friends saying that the doors were open.

We hear metal and glass just get ripped apart. We put a couch and a TV in front of the door to the garage. It banged around some more. Then it got quiet, not silent like it was before. We could hear it move around some. The guys are talking, making sure the guns were ready. Someone hands me a pistol. No sooner did I cocked the hammer back to hear something shatter upstairs.

Then we heard it screech again. Except now it was louder and didn't echo and fade out because it was inside. We all rushed to the one door leading upstairs, and we got to it just as that thing did. It opened it just a bit And four or five men just slammed into it It got its hand through Someone with a shotgun took care of that Put the barrel right up to its wrist and pulled the trigger

Cut its hand off clean Only pissed it off though It started pushing on that door a clawing We were on one side pushing as best we could and it was on the other doing the same. That wood just wasn't going to hold. So someone tells us to keep our heads down. Suddenly the top half of the door is just gone.

My ears are ringing and there are splinters everywhere. Two or three of them just unloaded on the top of that door. I don't really know where I went after that. The police got there. I was still glued to that door. What was left of it? The sun was up before they got me off it. It put me in a hospital for a while.

A lot of people talked to me, but I didn't talk back. Not for a long, long time. When I got back home, I got a job from the landlord working on the farm. We didn't talk much. Not about the thing. But I signed up for the army when I was 19, and he said, me down to drink some scotch as a send-off. I asked him right away what the police told him. The story they went with was a wild animal, probably a wolf or maybe a bear that had migrated north.

I asked him how they could say that when they had the hand. He looked at me, stunned. He tells me that hand never made it back to the station. The cop who had it in his car wrecked. Drove into a tree, died on impact. The hand was never found. Probably taken away by an animal. The cops, when they would acknowledge that the hand existed at all, said it was simply the paw of a bear that looked like a human hand. I never talked to the landlord again.

He went missing when I was in Basic. The cops never found him. They said he owed some people some. money and just ran away. I don't think it's that simple. Never went back to those woods. I wouldn't even if I had the whole goddamn U.S. Army at my back.

But that was a lie. When my mother died, I don't think my father felt he had anything left. And then he might as well settle old scores. He went to those woods. He never came back.

The FBI was called. They did a show for everyone involved. but I knew they weren't really looking. I had to get one drunk and slip him a few 50s before he finally told me that they got a few calls about those woods every year, about someone up and vanishing. But that was all they wanted to tell me.

Before he got up and left with the rest of his team, he wrote, The Rake, onto a napkin. I didn't know what it meant until I searched for it on the internet. Honestly, I would have rather not known. John, I'm not a skinwalker. We surveyed 100 people and asked them what's the most likely thing that a skinwalker would say? Show me, I'm not a skinwalker! Are you waiting for a giant game show board to appear in turnover answers?

Ah! Danielle, where'd you come from? Already, that's enough for me. I think this qualifies as my good deed for the month. Wait, where you going? Back into town To bring everyone back? Yes Wait

Before you go Oh my god John, look It appears as if your diving board is floating away No Where will the counselors lay about to sun themselves? He'll be fine My feet just touch something squishy

Was I just talking to someone? Huh Weird. I wonder when the narrators are going to come back out here with more food. I'm starving. Oh, look! Mushrooms! For more information on this podcast,

including how to submit your own story for consideration, please visit creepypod.com. You can also follow us at creepypod on social media and YouTube. All stories told on this podcast are done so through creative comments share-a-like licensing or with written consent from the authors. No portion of this podcast may be rebroadcast or otherwise distributed without the express written consent of the creepy podcast production team and the stories author.