Haunted Cosmos - Lost On The Mountain

Episode Date: October 2, 2024

Please enjoy this tenth inter-season episode of our Patreon exclusive show, The Dusty Tome. In this episode, we finish talking about being alone!Love Haunted Cosmos? Get access to our exclusive show, The Dusty Tome, early ad-free access to main episodes, monthly AMA's, and livestreams with Ben and Brian by becoming a patron of the show: https://www.patreon.com/c/HauntedCosmosBuy the Haunted Cosmos book: https://www.newchristendompress.com/cosmos PS: It's also available as an audiobook!Want to keep nefarious fairy Bigfoots away and also avoid icky seed oils, preservatives, artificial colorants, and other nasties in your daily shower routine? Then check out the vast array of homemade soaps from our friends at Indigo Sundries Soap Co.! Go to indigosundriessoap.com to learn more—and as our gift to you, use code HAUNTEDCOSMOS for 10% off your whole order!This episode is sponsored by New Dominion Design Co. Visit their website here and learn more!This episode is sponsored by Backwards Planning Financial. Visit Joe's website here or give him a call (615-767-2555).This episode is sponsored by Squirrelly Joe's Coffee! Visit their website here to get your first bag free!  Share Coffee. Serve Humbly. Live faithfully.Finally, this episode is sponsored by Gray Toad Tallow. Visit their website here and use COSMOS15 at checkout for 15% off your order.Did you know that supporters of the show at our Sasquatch Photographer Tier and above (yes, that is its actual name) can listen to entire episodes early and ad free? That's right! And that's not all: Patrons at every level gain access to our patron-exclusive show, The Dusty Tome, with bonus stories, Q+A, and more.Support the show

Welcome. We've made it at last, the 10th and final installment of our interseason Dusty Tome releases before the release of Season 4 of Haunted Cosmos. We are really, really getting excited for you guys to hear these episodes. Right now I'm actually deep into writing the fourth episode of the season, so we're well ahead of the game. And I genuinely think this is some of our best work. Patrons have already been listening to and watching episode one of season four. and they seem to be really digging it. So hopefully they like episode two as well when we give that to them. And I just can't wait for you guys to hear it. So thanks for sticking it out for these 10 weeks. Just so you guys know, we're going to have a week off next week. So there's not going to be any release on our feed. And then season four, episode one, will be dropped to the public to all of you Wednesday, October 16th.

So just be on the lookout for that. Some more exciting news before I stop rambling. and we just get into the good stuff. We finally have our book, Haunted Cosmos, doing your duty in a world that's not just stuff, available for pre-sale. So go to Newchristinapress.com slash cosmos to take advantage of that presale,

guarantee that you get your book in your hands well before Christmas time or in the hands of a loved one that you want to give it to as a gift. And the link is, again, newchristin-impressed.com slash cosmos. That link will be, in the description of this show. So if you're interested in Haunted Cosmos and think that you'd

like a book that Brian and I both wrote together, then hey, check it out, see if it's for you, and take advantage of that pre-sale opportunity. I think without further ado, it's time to just get into this show. Thanks again for being patient with us in this season break. Can't wait to see you guys so soon, just two weeks from now for Season 4, Episode 1. This episode is brought to you by Indigo Sundry Soap Company, Backwards Planning Financial, New Dominion Design Company, Grey Toad Tallow, Squirrely Joe's Coffee, and our supporters at patreon.com. Everybody sit back, relax, and enjoy the show. Brandon Day and Gina Allen, a young couple from the bursting Metropolitan of Dallas,

had arrived in Palm Springs a couple of days earlier. They came for a financial convention that Brandon's company was involved in. In between networking events and main conference sessions, the couple had thus far been diligent to get out of the hotel and conference center bubbles in order to see more of California, a place totally new to both of them. And this day was no different. The conference activities ended a bit earlier. The quick trip to the hotel room to get changed into hiking clothes got their blood pumping and bodies ready to take a few hours stroll in the western wilderness. Before they knew it, they were arm in arm on the tram heading from Palm Springs up towards the upper reaches of the mountain just to the west of town.

The couple soaked in the air, growingly crisp as the wheels beneath them churned up slowly, and laughed into the camera they brought with them, and that was always pointed back at themselves. Their love was a young and budding one, formed from the beauty of Gina, captivating the bravado of Brandon. It was thus far flourishing, but time would be the test of their complacency. Off they jumped from the platform upon their arrival to the high place. They traipsed first through the small woodland trail whose head lay just off to the side of the public well-trafficked area. The spotty cops of aspens and shady pines that grew between them didn't disappoint in their provision

of beauty. Though feet from a group of other tram riders they had embarked with, the couple felt totally alone, left to enjoy the solitude of nature and the pure company of one another. Golden beams, like livened wisdom, streamed through the gaps and kissed their skin with wind-swept coolness. They did not sweat under that influence, rather their delight in the day only grew. The serene sounds of chirping birds and lissom creatures poking heads out here and there from trees and hovels in the wind-dark dirt.

The rumbling tenor of a spring creek emptying itself into a waterfall somewhere in the distance prepared their souls for the glories of this spoken world. Brandon, that aging high school football star eager to show his lady the pedigree of his daunting and strength, urged her on to leave that trail in order to find the waterfall they could hear. Gina, cheeks blushing from the nightly gust of her companion, obliged and was quickly swept away by the chivalric hand of the good old boy from Texas. They weren't really outdoorsy people. After all, most of their age would have just hiked up the mountain.

The tram was filled with elderly couples or families with very young children. Brandon really had played football in his glory days and was still obviously athletic. Gina appeared the same, and it wasn't a deception. She had spent her younger years doing gymnastics and cheerleading. But school sports leader does not a bushcraft expert one make. They weren't wearing trail shoes. They didn't have a school sports leader. any outdoor brand pack with them. Their water bottle was one that looked more designed for a desk

than a tree stump, and their light windbreaker jackets were akin to what we might call Walmart specials. This is not to disparage the zeal they were feeling, but merely to contextualize it. They had no delusions of their own outdoor expertise or lack thereof. They both knew this, and were partially excited precisely because all of it was out of their element. The novelty of being in a forest on a mountainside was enough for them. Thus, their plan for a casual day of casually hiking around in the same area didn't seem too simple for them at all. It was just the right amount of adventure.

But as anyone who has spent any time in the mountains can attest to, the thin air and cold gray rocks made warm by the closer sun, takes a quick hold on the heart and tends to draw it further up and further in. They charged through the forest and down a new trail, towards where they could hear the growling waterfall. It grew louder and louder as dust kicked up from the dry western dirt to slowly cover and cake the couple's white socks. They laughed the whole way there to where the trail continued sharply back up the mountain. Clearly, it was going to loop back to where they'd started. They, though, still chasing the cascade, broke off the trail and continued straight ahead.

so close, just around a boulder here, just down and back over a cool whar there. Gina asked if they should really leave the trail. After all, they hadn't brought any food with them. This was supposed to be an outing that was to last no more than a couple of hours. Besides, Brandon had to get back that afternoon for a company dinner. But he reassured Gina that there was no way the falls were much further. They could still hear the loud chattering of other voices back where they had been. It was an easy detour. hardly a detour at all, and then they would go back to town to prepare for the night. This, he told her, might be the one thing they see that justifies them turning the camera around

from their own faces to capture something even more glorious and beautiful. She rolled her eyes and smiled. How was his flattery more sincere than flattery while still maintaining its boyish jocularity and let him drag her further along to the brush? After a few minutes had passed, Brandon stopped with a puzzled look on his face. Gina noticed it too. The waterfall didn't sound any closer than it had before. The noise hadn't diminished, but it hadn't grown either.

What had changed was that they could definitely no longer hear the voices of other travelers close behind them. They were far enough off the trail to really be on their own now. They had crossed from a quick glance off the beaten path to exonerated. expedition into a real wilderness, and they were not ready for that. As daylight waxes in the mountains, the human spirit grows more indomitable, especially if it started out the day fresh. Souls' blood pours out and feels like ethereal water nourishing everything around, including the humans caught in its rays. One feels invincible and even wise despite themselves, but the stretching shades of trees reaching for the final bits of light growing gray as the sun recedes go from peaceful to threatening in mere seconds.

The sun's chariot makes way for the train of sunsets heavenly dust before Luna's pale face comes to sweep up the mess they made together. In the mountains, day turns to night with a little morning. Confidence turns to uncertainty in much the same way. Everyone, even the most grown-up of adults you may know, is afraid of the dark sometimes. Soon, the unfortunate reality sank in for both man and woman. It happened almost at the same time. They turned to each other and shared that knowing look of worry and uncertainty.

They were lost and were in for a cold and hungry night in this mysterious place that now seemed to want them dead and gone. With Will's churn to despair, the weakened couple with matted hair and mud-stained clothes slipped into a spot of thick-fold. and huddled close together to try and stave off the cold wind. They drifted in and out of uncertain sleep. You know the feeling you have when going to bed, before what you know will be a big day? You wonder how you'll sleep with all the nerves piling up, all the pressure bearing down. And it does take you longer than normal to get there, but eventually, through tossing and turning with a foot too hot here and an arm too cold there, you do go to sleep. For those moments of unconscious rest, the apprehension of what waits for you at dawn fades

until it becomes something less than a dream. But then you wake up, not in the morning, but in the middle of the night to use the bathroom or drink some water, and the memory of what is coming eventually awakens in your mind again. Thus, the cycle of stressful sleep only adds to the existing stress. Anxiety begets disappointment at it all not being a dream. sorrow begets despair, not a dramatic or overweening kind, but a kind of despair nonetheless. The sun will rise again, and you will have to face the thing you wish wouldn't happen, and the uniformity of nature suddenly seems unfair.

This is what it was like for Brandon and Gina, except in their case, despair was far more justified. Through especially strong gusts of wind that chilled the air to 45 degrees, and woke them up with a miserable start. They caught pockets of minutes here and there, where they knew they had fallen asleep, but real rest never came. The psyche still kept watch over all the troubles before them, and did a poor job of compartmentalizing. It would have been better if they had received no rest at all. When Dawn finally did stretch her tireless beams into their thicket of a bedroom, they had no trouble waking. How can you wake from sleep you never really had? They were struck not only by

the fact that it had not at all been a bad dream, but also by the fact that strangely, no rangers or search crews had come to rescue them yet. Could they have drifted that far from the trail? Amnesia loomed like an ivory gate that kept them free of remembering exactly how long and how far they had walked the previous afternoon. At this point, they were no doubt very hungry, but the initial stage of debilitating hunger had passed in the night, and Brandon felt especially, eager to take some kind of action. Adrenaline was coming again. He was alert.

His mind seemed clear. And so he saw to Gina's fear with words of comfort before leading them up from their spot on the mountain, somewhere near 7,000 feet in elevation, to the summit where they might find some sign of life or other trail. If rangers weren't coming for them, he would save them himself. By midday, they had nearly reached the top of the peak. For the entirety of the hike, the two had taken turns, stopping to catch breath and yell out for someone to help them. All had been in vain. And now, nearing the crested ridge that saddled up clearly to the summit, Brandon's spirit sank,

upon not only seeing no signs of anyone else nearby, but also seeing no signs of any trails at all. He wondered if they had somehow slipped into another world during the night. One where his young and flowering relationship with this girl was all the life there was. He was a green man, wandering Peralandra, hopelessly looking for a piebald man to help him. Gina was afraid and not a little bit frustrated. She was afraid at the prospect of a slow death in the wilderness, the obvious threat that haunted her steps like a stalker in the night. She was frustrated at Brandon too.

Why had he run after the waterfall? Had she even heard it? Was he imagining the whole thing? And now look at them, at Persephone's threshold suing for mercy. Why had he drug them up the mountain all day? Look what came of it, nothing, but resources lost, with nothing to show but sky. These thoughts hounded her most when she got especially tired during the hike. At her less stretched moments, she was far from unfair to Brandon.

She was actually just frustrated with herself. Why had she not said she didn't want to go off the trail? Brandon would have listened. He would not have done it if he knew she really didn't want to go. And she hadn't wanted to go. But she hadn't been clear enough either. She knew that. How could he have known the truth when the feminine voice raising its concern was doing so

in a tone of joke and revelry with eyes that begged to be taken on some great adventure? She knew it was fruitless to try and measure out blame. She also knew that if she had failed to speak up then, she best not fail also. After Brandon spun around and cut his hands around his mouth and shouted out one last exasperated cry for help, she walked up to him with head bowed from the strain. She was dragging her toes with each step, too tired to lift up high enough to be free of rocks and roots. He looked at her with eyes full of shame for himself and desperate. pity for her, but she did not see. She told him she thought it would be a bad idea to stay up here for

too long. It was already past noon and would get cold soon. Brandon agreed. They had to get lower, warmer, before night fell again. They were trapped in a labyrinth of earth and tree and were resigning themselves to the truth, steadily and methodically, that they would never get out. But where to go and how far down? To their left, stretched a knife-edged ridge that was exposed and apparently led down to the mountains forested base. Somehow it seemed evil and inhospitable, even more so than the places they had already been. They pushed back down into the right then, into a valley canopied with green, that eventually dumped into a basin in the foothills very far down and on the mountain's opposite

side. As they descended, the slope grew steeper, scree fields that had been hid by the trees from above, or had otherwise been mistaken for patches of dirt, left them cut and slipping, nearly falling at points, deeper into the belly of it all. Little cliffs made by granite and limestone blocks pushed hard into the face they navigated, providing challenge after challenge. They spoke less and less, not for the anger or for fear of it, but just for pure conservation of energy. The thirst started to take hold, and, hound their heads with pikes of pain. Gina stopped and prayed, remembering her Catholic heritage for a moment of clarity.

She beseeched the help of two saints she remembered most clear, St. Christopher, patron saint of travelers, and St. Anthony, patron saint of the lost. Eventually, after another night of cold uncertainty on the side of the malicious mountain, the couple held onto vines that dropped down from an overhang into a running creek's own canyon. The drop was no more than 15 or 20 feet. It was consistently that, or greater, with vertical or greater steepness, corraling the creek in on both sides as far as the eye could see to the next bend. It was objectively a pleasant place.

A soft and fairly flat bank pocketed both sides, and the creek was flowing with steady and cold water. Of course, Gina mentioned the fear of parasites or other bacteria that could be in the water, and this did give them both paws, but soon the temptation was far too strong, and they gave themselves up to the risk, drinking in the life and refreshment like calves at their milk. They pushed down the creek, sensing a strange expectation rising up inside of them. Make no mistake, despair still had his day. Saturn's old and ugly, his high and lonely flu.

still kept them tight in his grip. But there was a small spot of light peeking out from the black clouds of their morale now. This creek, they figured, it had to lead on and down. They could follow it, free from the scree fields, and obstacles forcing them to turn around for another way

and eventually reached the bottom. They could be free, if only they could stay alive for that long. It was as these thoughts of newborn optimism budded, that they turned round to bend and saw the greatest thing either of them could ever imagine, a yellow backpack sitting bright in the ground. Brandon ran to it, and Gina followed behind as quick as she could. He tore into the bag and rejoiced as he pulled out

clothes and a compass and some other small things before lastly displaying a journal to Gina. They flipped through it and found the last entry. It was dated May 8th. At this, the Jubilee began. May 8th was that That very same day, the journal entry had been written that morning. The man was close, maybe just around the corner or off looking for some kindling. He was sure to come back for his pack. He was sure to take them to his camp. He was sure to be somewhere nearby. Maybe they could find the camp themselves.

Salvation was close at hand. But just as quickly as the orbit of Jove had pushed spring into his father's winter, the gripping cold of Saturn rushed back in view. And Gina took the journal and looked a little closer. Smudged by some water that had touched the page, she could still clearly read the faint year next to the listed day, 2005, but they were there in 2006. This entry in journal was from a year before, and it was the last one. Either the man had written it and lost it, or the man had died somewhere nearby.

Either this bag had somehow found its way here, or he had found himself here and without hope of rescue. Did they stumble upon the place that they would also die? With this thought, Gina flipped to the front cover of the journal to see what else she could find. The fruitlessness of this act did not strike her until much later. There was nothing else. Nothing they could use to help them.

No map, nothing. there was only a name scratched into the upper right corner of the page. John Donovan. Brian, I got bad news. The other day, I was using one of the big box soap products to wash myself. And I got this weird urge to go buy a Stanley cup and fill it with iced coffee. And it started to feel a little cold in the house. I just wanted to wrap myself up in like a heavy wool blanket.

And then also, I started Googling ticket prices to Taylor Swift concerts. Ben, what are you doing? Don't you know that these big box? soap companies just jam all their soaps full of hormone-disrupting chemicals, they're probably turning you into a girl. Well, I know that now, but what am I supposed to do about it? Ben, you ignorant normie, all you've needed to do is go to indigo sundry soap.com and support a great Christian family business that's making all sorts of soaps that are completely

free of hormone-disrupting chemicals and other nasties. Okay, I am literally going to indigo sundrysoap.com right now. Tell me what to buy. Ben, what I would recommend doing is clicking on bundles and then. and selecting the best one for you. You could get the men's six-pack. You could get my favorite, the clay bundle. Ooh, I like the pipe and jug bundle. That seems cool. Or a men's six-pack, because that'll make me feel like I have something that I actually don't. So true, King. And you know what else I heard? Because they're such good friends of the show, Indigo Sundry's soap company is offering 10% off your order if you just use all caps, discount code, haunted cosmos, no spaces.

Wait, Brian, you're going way too fast. I didn't get all that. Is that information in the show description? Ben, you ignorant normie, it's always in the show description. Okay, so I'm going to go to indigo sundry soap.com. I'm going to pick the men's six-pack bundle, and I'm going to use code haunted cosmos at checkout, all caps, no spaces. And if I forgot all that, it's in the description of the show. Of course, Ben. And if you just do that, then you will stop wanting to do all of those girly things and maybe you'll, I don't know, maybe want to buy a classic car to restore or something dignified. We are living in the beginning of a new reformation. Christian content is being produced at a rapid rate.

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So head over to Squirleyjo's.com slash haunted cosmos. That's Squirrelyjo's.com slash haunted cosmos to claim your free bag of coffee. Let's flip and go. Link in the description below. I'm a poet. Didn't even know it. May 3rd, 2005,

as John Donovan grew more and more annoyed at the little specks of sharp ice pelting into his face, from the force of growing winds. He kicked himself and chastised his stubbornness. The mother and son photographers had left him for ittlewilled a couple of hours ago, and he had vastly underestimated how much worse the storm would get. At that point, he was ready to give anything to be back with them, to go with them down the mountain, to listen to their advice, anything. He had waved them off with cynical and cocky gruff, before turning to continue

into the dark white reaches of the snow-covered mountain, but he had not made it not made it far into that alien world before being forced back by the wall of heavy snow that pushed him without any breaks into submission. The storm had finally humbled him, and he turned to get back on the trail towards Ittlewild, but to his horror he could not find it. He kicked against the goads, and the goads had not changed. Donovan therefore cut side-long on the mountain, still in the worsening storm away from Ittlewild, through the clouds. Still relatively thin and gray at this altitude. He could see the much brighter and bolder lights of palm springs beneath him.

They looked warm. All that was white was lifeless and cold. Drops of dew like deathly silver, enchanting and tricking and cheating its way into the murder of Madden travelers. The yellow flashes of street lamps down there seemed to beckon him so strongly. Surely they would light the way and line the path and herald him back to safety. Surely they would not let him down, like he himself had already done. He traversed about three miles from the saddle junction he could still recognize, and into the skinny vein of Willow Creek.

From there, continuing in his traverse, turning sharper and sharper downward, Donovan had to push his weary self up and over a small ridge that was followed by a steep and eerily deep, unseen scar in the mountainside called Hidden Valley. He felt supremely alone. Walking through the whirl of icy snow with squinted eyes, he found himself squeezed between two featureless faces of gray on either side of him. It was like a hallway that led to his own hell,

further and further away from everyone and everything. He followed this one-way path against his will, but steadily found that it was leading him away from the storm. The air was warmer, and the sky was visible far to the east again. The ground was swampy from the moisture up above, and the sharp limestone talus field gave him plenty to keep griping about, but at least he was free of the bitterest cold. Finally, he slid down a glassy face, nearly vertical,

some 15 feet onto the bank of a small creek he could hear running in the dark. He made a hasty camp that night and wallowed in self-pity while he teased himself with sleep here and there before daybreak. Upon waking, he continued on his path following the creek, but soon found that he was in far more dire of straits than he had even escaped from the previous day. Behind him was jagged wall of unfeeling stone that he rode into the creek on. He could not go that way back out. Around him was a bank of dirt mixed with rock. that was too high and too overhung for him to climb up. And ahead of him, far down the trail, the creek blazed through the mountain,

was a sheer waterfall, about a hundred feet, down to shallow water, textured and black and bumpy from the boulders that stuck up from its base. In the confusion of the storm, in the dampened sense of night, and in the passionate desperation to get to the light of Palm Springs, John Donovan had rim-rocked himself in a small, Gorgeed Creek whose only exit was a hundred-foot drop to stone. There is scant little that can be said about what happened to Donovan between this realization and the final moments of his life that would come a few days later.

We know that nine more days did pass. On one of them he fell and injured himself, though he doesn't say how bad the injury was or what had caused the fall, though it stands to reason that he had tried to climb on one of the steep banks, failed. We know that on his 60th birthday, he ate two of his remaining small handful of no more than 12 cheese crackers. We know that he tried to build a couple of signal fires, but all these failed. The snow had ended up creeping further down the mountain, and it choked out every flame with relative ease. We know he tried to signal help from Palm Springs, using his little pocket mirror on clear days, but nothing came of this either.

John Donovan presumably died on May 12, 2005. His body found its resting place, less than 50 feet away from where the young couple from Texas would find his yellow pack a year later. He laid down on the shores of a pool sitting like a quiet estuary off the side of the creek. The pool was fed by a small waterfall coming down from the steep stone walls of the canyon, around the pool, like sornish tombstones, with a warm trunks of bircheworthy. trees, and the moss covered and water-smooth boulders of granite blocks that had fallen down the mountain in times before time. Donovan's bones were covered up by the muck and shed foliage of the autumn from the year of his death, such that Brandon and Gina never actually found his body.

The molded skin of nature had covered him. Perhaps it was a mercy to the fragile couple, but had left his bag open for the world to see. After their renewed despair gave way to quiet resignation. For at this point, Brandon and Gina believed they had long run out of lucky breaks and were now certain to die somewhere close to whatever man had written in this mysterious journal. They looked into the bag once more. They turned it over and made sure to get everything out of it. As they did this, a plastic baggie slipped out from a cover at the rear of the pack and smacked softly onto the thin layer of leaves lining the creek's bank. Gina picked up the baggie to inspect its contents, and she began to laugh.

Inside the tightly zipped bag were about 20 unused matchsticks, the kind you could strike anywhere rough and dry and expect a flame to result. Brandon set to work right away, frantically building up piles of dry leaves and twigs, before turning his attention to finding sticks and branches and small but entire felled trees that might be dry enough to throw into the fire or to direct the fire towards. He would burn this mountain to the ground if it meant getting help. He struck the first match against a stone

and smiled from ear to ear at the sight of the steady flame pouring like magic from its top. One cannot help but wonder why the gods were so mad at Prometheus for what he did. Brandon threw the small fire into the larger pile of fuel and relished in the noise of crackling wood as the flames soared in moments to over 20 feet in the air. The smell of the smoke and the stinging feel of it in their eyes was a joy to both boy and girl. Before long, half an acre was burning, and still the fire spread.

The remainder of the story is predictable. The helicopters came to fight the fire and found among it a haggard couple waving at them for help. They picked them up and flew away before resuming the firefight. Gina blew a kiss to the small yellow pack she could still see on the ground and whispered a sincere thank you to the man that had left it. Three weeks later, a different rescue party went back to the now blackened cheek of the mountain where they knew Donovan would be. They found his body wrapped in a tarp and laying under mud and water of that branching

pool from the creek. His cause of death remains unknown. What is now, is that too late and with too little company, Donovan nonetheless found his way down the unforgiving door to heaven and into the warm embrace of the city lights, flashing without thought for him from Palm Springs. Want more Hunted Cosmos? Then make your way over to Patreon, where you can get early access to our content, as well as exclusive content in regular dusty tomes and monthly live streams with Brian and myself. So go to patreon.com slash hauntedcosmos and sign up now.