The Hike
On July 15th of last year I broke my leg. It was the worst break I’ve ever experienced – hell, ever even seen. On the same day, Derrick Mulgrew went missing along with two other hikers. As I lay in the parking lot, staring at the jagged piece of bone sticking out from what used to be my shin, no one in the world could have convinced me that I was lucky to have tripped. Now I whole-heartedly believe that was the case.
I never met Derrick, but I would have were it not for the fall I took mere minutes before we were to be introduced. Likewise, I never met any of the other hikers in the group. They were waiting for me and my roommate, Alex. I think if I had made it into the woods that day, I would probably be dead right now.
Let me stop here to say that I’m probably the worst person to be telling this story. Not only was I hospitalized and strung out on pain killers when it happened, but I have very little information on the events leading up to this “hiking” expedition. I was invited, but only as an afterthought on the day of, and even then it’s not exactly like I was welcomed into the party with open arms. I didn’t take an interest in the string of “coincidences” that followed until it was too late, and what little information I do have access to is, well, little.
I will tell you everything that I can, however. Just recently I’ve realized the importance of what’s been happening and despite not feeling particularly qualified – I’m the only one left to attempt to make this public.
From what I’ve gathered, Derrick was the leader of some sort of adventure group originating in Colorado. They were pretty hardcore – or at least that’s the impression that I got from them. I think it’s a fair assumption considering that he got every single member to commit to drive up to Northern Ohio for this one hike. That’s not exactly an overnight trip, and it was all to hike a trail that, to me at least, seemed rather unexceptional.
There was something special about the location and aside from outlandish cult and monster theories I have no idea what that might have been. Even at the time it seemed strange that some hiking trail I’d never heard of was worth them coming all the way up here for. When Alex explained it to me, he said something about it being “uncharted.” I argued that it couldn’t be uncharted if there was already a hiking trail there, and he assured me that Derrick would be able to explain it better, which I took to mean he had no idea. At the time, I just didn’t think it was important to press the issue, though now I wish I had.
Alex’s invitation had come on short notice. The night before the trip he received a call from Derrick saying that one of their party members, Ashley Simmons, was unable to make it. Alex was invited to tag along in her place. The first I heard about it was the following morning.
I woke up early to find Alex packing up a bunch of camping gear, which was when he offered to bring me along. Normally I’d have said no, but my car had been in the shop all week and Alex was essentially my ride everywhere until it was fixed. If he was going I could either go with or hole myself up in the apartment with Netflix for the weekend, trying to stave off boredom. Netflix lost, but only barely. Alex assured me he had enough equipment for the two of us, so I agreed to go.
The trip up there was pretty nice. Our place was a couple hours south of the site and we spent the drive blasting music, joking, and talking about the people we’d be meeting up with. He told me with a nostalgic fondness all about Derrick and the trouble they used to get into as kids. It sounded like I was really going to like the group, and for just a brief period of time I was optimistic about the weekend.
The only direct encounter that I had with Derrick, or any of the group members for that matter, was when we got a phone call from him at exactly 12:00pm. Since Alex was still driving he set the call to run through Bluetooth.
“Hello?”
“Where are you?” Snapped a man’s voice through the speaker. He sounded annoyed, borderline angry. I glanced up just in time to see concern flash across Alex’s face.
“We’re on our way,” Alex said apologetically. “Maybe five or ten minutes out? We took the wrong exit and had to-“
“Just get here. It’s time to start.” There was a brief pause. “What do you mean ‘we?’”
“Oh, yeah. I forgot to tell you. I invited my roommate, Stacey. She –“
“I didn’t tell you to invite people.” The voice at the other end of the call was practically shouting at this point. Then he muttered to himself. “Eight. We were supposed to have eight people.” There was the distorted sound of another voice in the background, but I couldn’t make out what was being said. “Just get here soon.”
He hung up, and thus concluded my only interaction with Derrick Mulgrew, ending as suddenly as it had started.
I looked once more to Alex who looked absolutely baffled by his friend’s attitude. I didn’t have to ask why. The man we had just spoken to was nothing like the well-mannered and easy-going friend that had been described to me. He said nothing, and it wasn’t long into the silence before I spoke up.
“I’m sorry.” The invitation had seemed so genuine; I had never expected that my presence might be so ill-met by the party leader. “Look, if you want to you can go ahead and I’ll just-“
“You’ll just what? Stay in the car all weekend?”
I thought about it. “You can give me your keys, I’ll drop you off and then come back to get you.”
He shook his head. “By the time you drive home and back, that’ll be four hours in the car by yourself this weekend and another two to take me back. I’m not going to make you do that.”
“I could go back the last town; get a hotel room for the weekend. That could be fun.”
He dismissed that as well. “Don’t worry about it. I’m sure Derrick doesn’t mind you being here.”
I wasn’t convinced. “It definitely sounds like he minds.”
“Nah. I know him. He’s probably just got a stick up his ass about something else. Who knows? Maybe it’s Ashley dropping out- maybe she went home because they’re fighting or something. He’ll lighten up once we get going, don’t worry.”
I didn’t have Alex’s confidence about the situation, but we were nearing the parking lot and I didn’t see the use in arguing the point further.
It looked more or less like a normal park to me, and I remember thinking it was much tamer than I had been led to believe. The forest was thick, but there was a distinct trail complete with an entrance marker and a restroom a few feet before the tree line. It looked more or less exactly like a Metro Parks trail. The only difference that I could see was that it looked like it had been abandoned for some time. There were thick cobwebs on the sign and building, but everything else seemed standard.
Alex parked the car on the far side of the lot where the other vehicles were lined up. Considering we’d already been scolded for tardiness I thought it might have been wiser to park closer to the trail, but I said nothing, and in retrospect I’m glad. He sent a quick text to Derrick saying we were there and about to unpack our stuff.
“Did they start without us?” I asked. Aside from the cars I could see no sign that anyone else was there.
“No, there’s a clearing a little ways down the path, that’s where we’re supposed to meet up.”
I accepted the explanation readily enough and got out of the car to help unpack our gear. It felt like we were bringing an awful lot of stuff for a weekend hike that started so late into Saturday, but I was determined not to complain. Being an extra wheel with borrowed camping supplies already had me feeling like a burden and I didn’t want to add to that sensation. By the time I had my pack strapped on however, I was starting to doubt whether or not I was physically ready for the trip. My volleyball days were starting to feel further behind me than I had realized, and I was already struggling with the weight. At that point I couldn’t help but again question my decision to go.
Alex closed the trunk, locked the car and we set out. He kept checking his phone, and I assumed that it was to see if Derrick had responded yet. While I was watching him watch the screen I saw a spider out of the corner of my eye. I don’t exactly think of myself as having arachnophobia, but the size of the thing was more than enough to startle me. It was also colored unlike any spider I had ever seen, its skin looked almost human and its body looked far too large to be supported by the spindly legs it was racing across the pavement on. I was unable to tear my eyes from the thing and while I walked forward distractedly my leg caught on an unknown object, causing me to fall.
I could hear my bone crunching and the rest of the world ceased to exist as the pain hit. The hike, Alex, even the monstrous spider, was all completely replaced with a blinding pain that ran all the way through my right side. My vision was temporarily lost and I was barely conscious by the time my body fully hit the ground.
When the world came into focus again I remember thinking that I was somehow on fire. I was lying on my back with Alex just behind me repeating my name over and over again.
“Stacey. Stacey, are you okay? Stacey?”
I was far from okay but I felt pressured to respond, if just to make him shut up. I managed a weak nod.
“An ambulance is on the way,” he told me.
Things were still blurred around the edges of my vision, but even what I was able to see of my leg was more than I could handle. The entire limb was twisted away from me at an unnatural angle and I could see a bit of my bone through the soggy, reddish purple mess of my jeans. There was so much blood. I remember thinking that it was too much, and that I was dying. I was so caught up in the horror of my injury and the blood that I barely noticed as Alex stood.
“I’ll be right back, Stacey. I have to go see if anyone in the group can help.”
“Don’t leave,” I begged him, but the words jumbled and my voice cracked. I was left staring at the sky in pain for a few minutes that felt more like hours. Alex made it back shortly before the ambulance arrived, unaccompanied and looking almost as sickly as I felt. As they loaded me up my leg shifted and the pain was enough to send me fully and mercifully back into unconsciousness.
I’m not exaggerating about the break. I was in and out of the hospital for months as it took a series of operations to repair the damage. I had to have steel rods inserted as the bone grew back together, had to have them adjusted and then eventually removed. I had months of physical therapy and I’m still limping to this day.
The damage inflicted absolutely baffled my doctors and they spent countless hours trying to figure out at what angle I could have fallen to warrant an injury that they said would be more indicative of a car-crash than a fall. I had to undergo a series of tests to see if I was predisposed to any bone-related conditions, which I was not. I was also not much help. Apparently the excuse “I didn’t see how I fell, I was looking at a really big spider when it happened” wasn’t something they could put on their charts.
I didn’t think about the hike much in the weeks that followed, in fact the rest of my summer was spent in my own world of pain and self-pity. Alex was by my side nearly every day for the first week or two, but his visits grew increasingly less frequent. I attributed this to my sour attitude, and it wasn’t until sometime that November that I learned what had really been troubling him.
On July 25th, ten days after the hike, Derrick was reported missing by his girlfriend – the same girl who had dropped out of the hiking party. The police launched an investigation to find him and the other members of his group. Seven members had been in attendance. Three were found within a few days, all having been admitted to various hospitals for seemingly unrelated accidents. One had been found about two miles down the trail, dead from “natural causes.” The other three, including Derrick, were declared missing persons.
Alex was badly shaken by all of these developments, and I couldn’t exactly blame him. Even by the time he explained it to me he knew that there was something wrong, he was just missing too many pieces to fit it all together. The bits he had managed to compile made little sense, but were still quite disturbing. I was a bit shaken by the fact I had almost been included in that hike, though I didn’t feel like I had gotten out entirely unscathed.
The other two that had been declared missing were found dead by the end of the year. Another member had died on the trail, and one had died in a car accident on his way back to Colorado. By the end of the following April, everyone who had been on that hike died either of natural causes or in accidents. Derrick remains the only missing person from the group.
Weird though the situation was, there was no evidence to support that the deaths were anything more than they appeared. They didn’t seem to be related to Derrick, the hike, or even to one another. As far as the police were concerned, the whole ordeal was over and done with – an opinion which I shared.
Alex never did.
He became obsessed with finding out what happened and we soon fell out of touch. I didn’t want to discuss any of it and it seemed to be all he could talk about. He told me over and over about each accident, each death. He kept asking where we would be right now if I had never tripped. When I had the all-clear to leave the hospital I moved back in with my parents so that they could take care of me while I recovered fully – and Alex and I didn’t have much reason to stay in contact.
It sounds cold now, and looking back I wish it had been different. I had always considered Alex a friend as much as a roommate, but we were both too wrapped up in our own things.
Today’s date is August 6th. It’s been well over a year since Derrick and I almost met and I broke my leg. It’s been about six months since the last time I spoke to Alex, and until today I thought that whole chapter of my life was behind me.
So, you’re probably wondering why I’m writing this and why I’m struggling to tell a story to which I lack so much information and which I had strove so hard to put in the past. I guess the answer is that I’m writing this because I once considered Alex to be my friend.
He killed himself. The police came to talk to me about it a couple weeks ago after finding his body hanging in what used to be our apartment. I was questioned because of his cryptic suicide note which consisted of only five words and was addressed to me.
“Stacey, it’s real. It’s coming.”
I was able to shed absolutely no light on the message. Alex and I hadn’t spoken in so long and at first I didn’t even think to connect it to the hike of last year. It wasn’t until about halfway through their questioning that I recalled his strange obsession and thought to mention it.
When the officers were done talking to me they assured me that I was not a suspect. As far as they can tell, it was a straightforward suicide, and my testimony only backed up their belief that Alex was mentally unstable and had been on a downward spiral for some time. I felt terrible that I had seen the signs so early and hadn’t done anything, hadn’t even realized the extent of his madness.
They were exceedingly polite and sympathetic of my situation. They told me that they’d be in touch – Alex had apparently left some things to me that I’d be receiving once they were no longer considered evidence.
Today I got those things. The case has officially been ruled a suicide and his journals, which is what he left to me, have been released. They were delivered to me this morning. Their content is disturbing.
It turns out he was a lot more obsessed with this than even I knew. There are nine books here and each one is filled with handwritten notes about what happened, obituary clippings, medical records of the deceased, transcripts of interviews he had conducted with family members of those involved, history on the trail, local legends and various bits and pieces of what seems to be mythology. I’ve only flipped through them so far, but I feel like I owe it to Alex to go through his notes, and more importantly I’m starting to feel like his work should be shared. Whatever it is he was looking into, whatever he believes to be out there, he wanted people to know. He wanted people to be warned.
I’m going to share the more coherent bits of his creature theory here, as well as the more substantial bits of research regarding the area and the event. I don’t know how much of this I believe, if any, but I know it was important to him and I feel like it could be important to someone else.
I just can’t shake his last message to me.
“Stacey, it’s real. It’s coming.”
I never met Derrick, but I would have were it not for the fall I took mere minutes before we were to be introduced. Likewise, I never met any of the other hikers in the group. They were waiting for me and my roommate, Alex. I think if I had made it into the woods that day, I would probably be dead right now.
Let me stop here to say that I’m probably the worst person to be telling this story. Not only was I hospitalized and strung out on pain killers when it happened, but I have very little information on the events leading up to this “hiking” expedition. I was invited, but only as an afterthought on the day of, and even then it’s not exactly like I was welcomed into the party with open arms. I didn’t take an interest in the string of “coincidences” that followed until it was too late, and what little information I do have access to is, well, little.
I will tell you everything that I can, however. Just recently I’ve realized the importance of what’s been happening and despite not feeling particularly qualified – I’m the only one left to attempt to make this public.
From what I’ve gathered, Derrick was the leader of some sort of adventure group originating in Colorado. They were pretty hardcore – or at least that’s the impression that I got from them. I think it’s a fair assumption considering that he got every single member to commit to drive up to Northern Ohio for this one hike. That’s not exactly an overnight trip, and it was all to hike a trail that, to me at least, seemed rather unexceptional.
There was something special about the location and aside from outlandish cult and monster theories I have no idea what that might have been. Even at the time it seemed strange that some hiking trail I’d never heard of was worth them coming all the way up here for. When Alex explained it to me, he said something about it being “uncharted.” I argued that it couldn’t be uncharted if there was already a hiking trail there, and he assured me that Derrick would be able to explain it better, which I took to mean he had no idea. At the time, I just didn’t think it was important to press the issue, though now I wish I had.
Alex’s invitation had come on short notice. The night before the trip he received a call from Derrick saying that one of their party members, Ashley Simmons, was unable to make it. Alex was invited to tag along in her place. The first I heard about it was the following morning.
I woke up early to find Alex packing up a bunch of camping gear, which was when he offered to bring me along. Normally I’d have said no, but my car had been in the shop all week and Alex was essentially my ride everywhere until it was fixed. If he was going I could either go with or hole myself up in the apartment with Netflix for the weekend, trying to stave off boredom. Netflix lost, but only barely. Alex assured me he had enough equipment for the two of us, so I agreed to go.
The trip up there was pretty nice. Our place was a couple hours south of the site and we spent the drive blasting music, joking, and talking about the people we’d be meeting up with. He told me with a nostalgic fondness all about Derrick and the trouble they used to get into as kids. It sounded like I was really going to like the group, and for just a brief period of time I was optimistic about the weekend.
The only direct encounter that I had with Derrick, or any of the group members for that matter, was when we got a phone call from him at exactly 12:00pm. Since Alex was still driving he set the call to run through Bluetooth.
“Hello?”
“Where are you?” Snapped a man’s voice through the speaker. He sounded annoyed, borderline angry. I glanced up just in time to see concern flash across Alex’s face.
“We’re on our way,” Alex said apologetically. “Maybe five or ten minutes out? We took the wrong exit and had to-“
“Just get here. It’s time to start.” There was a brief pause. “What do you mean ‘we?’”
“Oh, yeah. I forgot to tell you. I invited my roommate, Stacey. She –“
“I didn’t tell you to invite people.” The voice at the other end of the call was practically shouting at this point. Then he muttered to himself. “Eight. We were supposed to have eight people.” There was the distorted sound of another voice in the background, but I couldn’t make out what was being said. “Just get here soon.”
He hung up, and thus concluded my only interaction with Derrick Mulgrew, ending as suddenly as it had started.
I looked once more to Alex who looked absolutely baffled by his friend’s attitude. I didn’t have to ask why. The man we had just spoken to was nothing like the well-mannered and easy-going friend that had been described to me. He said nothing, and it wasn’t long into the silence before I spoke up.
“I’m sorry.” The invitation had seemed so genuine; I had never expected that my presence might be so ill-met by the party leader. “Look, if you want to you can go ahead and I’ll just-“
“You’ll just what? Stay in the car all weekend?”
I thought about it. “You can give me your keys, I’ll drop you off and then come back to get you.”
He shook his head. “By the time you drive home and back, that’ll be four hours in the car by yourself this weekend and another two to take me back. I’m not going to make you do that.”
“I could go back the last town; get a hotel room for the weekend. That could be fun.”
He dismissed that as well. “Don’t worry about it. I’m sure Derrick doesn’t mind you being here.”
I wasn’t convinced. “It definitely sounds like he minds.”
“Nah. I know him. He’s probably just got a stick up his ass about something else. Who knows? Maybe it’s Ashley dropping out- maybe she went home because they’re fighting or something. He’ll lighten up once we get going, don’t worry.”
I didn’t have Alex’s confidence about the situation, but we were nearing the parking lot and I didn’t see the use in arguing the point further.
It looked more or less like a normal park to me, and I remember thinking it was much tamer than I had been led to believe. The forest was thick, but there was a distinct trail complete with an entrance marker and a restroom a few feet before the tree line. It looked more or less exactly like a Metro Parks trail. The only difference that I could see was that it looked like it had been abandoned for some time. There were thick cobwebs on the sign and building, but everything else seemed standard.
Alex parked the car on the far side of the lot where the other vehicles were lined up. Considering we’d already been scolded for tardiness I thought it might have been wiser to park closer to the trail, but I said nothing, and in retrospect I’m glad. He sent a quick text to Derrick saying we were there and about to unpack our stuff.
“Did they start without us?” I asked. Aside from the cars I could see no sign that anyone else was there.
“No, there’s a clearing a little ways down the path, that’s where we’re supposed to meet up.”
I accepted the explanation readily enough and got out of the car to help unpack our gear. It felt like we were bringing an awful lot of stuff for a weekend hike that started so late into Saturday, but I was determined not to complain. Being an extra wheel with borrowed camping supplies already had me feeling like a burden and I didn’t want to add to that sensation. By the time I had my pack strapped on however, I was starting to doubt whether or not I was physically ready for the trip. My volleyball days were starting to feel further behind me than I had realized, and I was already struggling with the weight. At that point I couldn’t help but again question my decision to go.
Alex closed the trunk, locked the car and we set out. He kept checking his phone, and I assumed that it was to see if Derrick had responded yet. While I was watching him watch the screen I saw a spider out of the corner of my eye. I don’t exactly think of myself as having arachnophobia, but the size of the thing was more than enough to startle me. It was also colored unlike any spider I had ever seen, its skin looked almost human and its body looked far too large to be supported by the spindly legs it was racing across the pavement on. I was unable to tear my eyes from the thing and while I walked forward distractedly my leg caught on an unknown object, causing me to fall.
I could hear my bone crunching and the rest of the world ceased to exist as the pain hit. The hike, Alex, even the monstrous spider, was all completely replaced with a blinding pain that ran all the way through my right side. My vision was temporarily lost and I was barely conscious by the time my body fully hit the ground.
When the world came into focus again I remember thinking that I was somehow on fire. I was lying on my back with Alex just behind me repeating my name over and over again.
“Stacey. Stacey, are you okay? Stacey?”
I was far from okay but I felt pressured to respond, if just to make him shut up. I managed a weak nod.
“An ambulance is on the way,” he told me.
Things were still blurred around the edges of my vision, but even what I was able to see of my leg was more than I could handle. The entire limb was twisted away from me at an unnatural angle and I could see a bit of my bone through the soggy, reddish purple mess of my jeans. There was so much blood. I remember thinking that it was too much, and that I was dying. I was so caught up in the horror of my injury and the blood that I barely noticed as Alex stood.
“I’ll be right back, Stacey. I have to go see if anyone in the group can help.”
“Don’t leave,” I begged him, but the words jumbled and my voice cracked. I was left staring at the sky in pain for a few minutes that felt more like hours. Alex made it back shortly before the ambulance arrived, unaccompanied and looking almost as sickly as I felt. As they loaded me up my leg shifted and the pain was enough to send me fully and mercifully back into unconsciousness.
I’m not exaggerating about the break. I was in and out of the hospital for months as it took a series of operations to repair the damage. I had to have steel rods inserted as the bone grew back together, had to have them adjusted and then eventually removed. I had months of physical therapy and I’m still limping to this day.
The damage inflicted absolutely baffled my doctors and they spent countless hours trying to figure out at what angle I could have fallen to warrant an injury that they said would be more indicative of a car-crash than a fall. I had to undergo a series of tests to see if I was predisposed to any bone-related conditions, which I was not. I was also not much help. Apparently the excuse “I didn’t see how I fell, I was looking at a really big spider when it happened” wasn’t something they could put on their charts.
I didn’t think about the hike much in the weeks that followed, in fact the rest of my summer was spent in my own world of pain and self-pity. Alex was by my side nearly every day for the first week or two, but his visits grew increasingly less frequent. I attributed this to my sour attitude, and it wasn’t until sometime that November that I learned what had really been troubling him.
On July 25th, ten days after the hike, Derrick was reported missing by his girlfriend – the same girl who had dropped out of the hiking party. The police launched an investigation to find him and the other members of his group. Seven members had been in attendance. Three were found within a few days, all having been admitted to various hospitals for seemingly unrelated accidents. One had been found about two miles down the trail, dead from “natural causes.” The other three, including Derrick, were declared missing persons.
Alex was badly shaken by all of these developments, and I couldn’t exactly blame him. Even by the time he explained it to me he knew that there was something wrong, he was just missing too many pieces to fit it all together. The bits he had managed to compile made little sense, but were still quite disturbing. I was a bit shaken by the fact I had almost been included in that hike, though I didn’t feel like I had gotten out entirely unscathed.
The other two that had been declared missing were found dead by the end of the year. Another member had died on the trail, and one had died in a car accident on his way back to Colorado. By the end of the following April, everyone who had been on that hike died either of natural causes or in accidents. Derrick remains the only missing person from the group.
Weird though the situation was, there was no evidence to support that the deaths were anything more than they appeared. They didn’t seem to be related to Derrick, the hike, or even to one another. As far as the police were concerned, the whole ordeal was over and done with – an opinion which I shared.
Alex never did.
He became obsessed with finding out what happened and we soon fell out of touch. I didn’t want to discuss any of it and it seemed to be all he could talk about. He told me over and over about each accident, each death. He kept asking where we would be right now if I had never tripped. When I had the all-clear to leave the hospital I moved back in with my parents so that they could take care of me while I recovered fully – and Alex and I didn’t have much reason to stay in contact.
It sounds cold now, and looking back I wish it had been different. I had always considered Alex a friend as much as a roommate, but we were both too wrapped up in our own things.
Today’s date is August 6th. It’s been well over a year since Derrick and I almost met and I broke my leg. It’s been about six months since the last time I spoke to Alex, and until today I thought that whole chapter of my life was behind me.
So, you’re probably wondering why I’m writing this and why I’m struggling to tell a story to which I lack so much information and which I had strove so hard to put in the past. I guess the answer is that I’m writing this because I once considered Alex to be my friend.
He killed himself. The police came to talk to me about it a couple weeks ago after finding his body hanging in what used to be our apartment. I was questioned because of his cryptic suicide note which consisted of only five words and was addressed to me.
“Stacey, it’s real. It’s coming.”
I was able to shed absolutely no light on the message. Alex and I hadn’t spoken in so long and at first I didn’t even think to connect it to the hike of last year. It wasn’t until about halfway through their questioning that I recalled his strange obsession and thought to mention it.
When the officers were done talking to me they assured me that I was not a suspect. As far as they can tell, it was a straightforward suicide, and my testimony only backed up their belief that Alex was mentally unstable and had been on a downward spiral for some time. I felt terrible that I had seen the signs so early and hadn’t done anything, hadn’t even realized the extent of his madness.
They were exceedingly polite and sympathetic of my situation. They told me that they’d be in touch – Alex had apparently left some things to me that I’d be receiving once they were no longer considered evidence.
Today I got those things. The case has officially been ruled a suicide and his journals, which is what he left to me, have been released. They were delivered to me this morning. Their content is disturbing.
It turns out he was a lot more obsessed with this than even I knew. There are nine books here and each one is filled with handwritten notes about what happened, obituary clippings, medical records of the deceased, transcripts of interviews he had conducted with family members of those involved, history on the trail, local legends and various bits and pieces of what seems to be mythology. I’ve only flipped through them so far, but I feel like I owe it to Alex to go through his notes, and more importantly I’m starting to feel like his work should be shared. Whatever it is he was looking into, whatever he believes to be out there, he wanted people to know. He wanted people to be warned.
I’m going to share the more coherent bits of his creature theory here, as well as the more substantial bits of research regarding the area and the event. I don’t know how much of this I believe, if any, but I know it was important to him and I feel like it could be important to someone else.
I just can’t shake his last message to me.
“Stacey, it’s real. It’s coming.”
This story is also available in the following locations:
About the Piece |
This piece is an excerpt from a longer project I have entitled Eight. I chose to use this on my portfolio because even though it's not something that I'm working on currently, I felt like the introduction would be a great portfolio excerpt because of how well this represents the rest of the project.
|
N/A |
Publication History |
|
Additional Information |