every single person or more or less every old-timer in the rural parts of western virginia
have their own version of what happened hell even if half the young people knew
what the elders had known for a very long time here in virginia they would never want
to go camping ever again it's like a game of he say shisei really just passed around his rumors
until you go and find out for yourself in 2014 i ventured off with a few friends
henry andrew sarah and jessica out into the wilderness where we went camping for the weekend
me and my friends had packed our bags packed enough food to last us for days
equipment flashlights radios everything you can possibly think of and especially after watching a
lot of horror movies and seeing what happens in the middle of the woods if you're left without
equipment of course things could really end up going south if you're not well prepared this was
all my friend sarah's idea as of course it was her 26th birthday and being that she was dating one of
my best friends andrew at the time we couldn't just say no to her and not fulfill her wish
so we ended up taking the weekend off from our jobs school just to venture out
for the weekend get away get some fresh air just re-energize before going back into the real world
just having to talk about this now to strangers that i don't even know really gives me anxiety
and i'm hoping that after this i don't fall back into the vice grips of depression but
this is my story in may of 2014 on a particular friday myself and four of my friends ventured
out into the wilderness of virginia which we only expected to stay for the weekend
leaving sunday morning which gave us the opportunity to catch up for the week ahead
now to skip through all the boring parts of us having to get there once we had arrived to this
specific location and the minute we got out the car i immediately knew something was off
the atmosphere the vibe it was just too quiet of course i ventured out into the woods before but
nothing really like this the wilderness it was dense and especially in the night one
of my worries were if someone were to get lost it would be incredibly hard to find them considering
how dense the woods were which shortly after once we were done setting up camp my friend henry had
stumbled upon an opening that seemed to have led inside of some cave i didn't really know what to
expect i mean caves really aren't my thing i've seen lots of movies where people get trapped in
caves and i wasn't trying to go inside of this one my friends were kind of excited and for no
reason at all i mean it's just a cave what more can really lie inside this cave other than just
bats and lots of dirt and insects perhaps and i really had no interest of going inside
my friend sarah kind of tempted me and the rest of us and going inside just to take a look
and at that point i seem to have been the only one that disagreed and wanted to go inside my friends
kept pressuring me and calling me names of course jokingly so i ended up simply going with the flow
and followed them inside once inside i had this painful feeling in my gut that something was off
of course in the beginning the cave looked massive and my friends wanted to go deeper
inside luckily enough we were prepared we had cell phones flashlights and my friend henry had a knife
so if worse came to worse and we came across some giant mutant bat at least we had the means
to defend ourselves by having a weapon with us as we kept going deeper inside the cave however
we began to smell something and it smelled like rotten flesh almost as if something had died
inside really no surprise it's a cave after all so we just all assumed that a random coyote or
wolf must have died inside and as we kept going deeper and deeper into the cave i went to turn
around to talk to my friend andrew and having to ask him for a bottle of water being that he
was carrying the most amount of equipment and i knew that he had been behind me the entire time
but when i turned around to ask him he just wasn't there i quickly told the group ahead of us hey
where's andrew as sarah went on to ask wasn't he behind you as i replied well yeah or i mean
andrew originally the first thing that crossed my mind was he was probably going to play a prank on
us and scare us in the dark i mean it wasn't dark enough within the cave for us not to see but still
dark enough for someone to hide in the shadows while we're standing there unsuspective of what's
watching us from the other side and being that now one of our friends just suddenly went missing
it was best if we took our interest in leaving the cave before things really got worse but not
before trying to find andrew and the first thing i said to the group was okay well be prepared
he's probably going to play a prank on us as sarah insisted no andrew doesn't play pranks he's not
a prankster as i insisted well of course back in middle school he used to play pranks all the time
as sarah gave me reinsurement this is not middle school he's grown out of that and for him just
to go missing or walking away like that is completely out of his character as we began
to look around we began to hear something it sounded like something was being torn gagging
we can hear squirms in the dark but really we had no idea what it was but then i started to
hear sounds that eerily enough sounded like gargling as if someone was drowning but
we weren't near any water i mean sure the cave was steep but not steep enough for there to be
water so where was that gargling coming from as i quickly remembered that i had a flashlight on me
i turned it on and began to shine my light in the dark i really couldn't see much
until i quickly noticed from the corner of my eye that something had whizzed past me and it was fast
i couldn't tell what it was but i know that whatever it was it had to have been dragging
something with it perhaps maybe a carcass was that the smell of the animal that perhaps had died
inside maybe we had stumbled across a bear and if that was the case we were not prepared for a bear
but only then i really wish what i saw was a bear but it wasn't as i quickly had turned the
corner to see what exactly had moved i noticed that whatever had ran past the corner of my eye
definitely had been dragging something as i began to follow the trail only then i saw andrew's watch
and then one of his sneakers originally i really thought he had been playing a prank
but as i continued to follow and as i continued to go deeper in the cave
suddenly to my horror i saw andrew's body there but there was something on top of it
something big it was dark and slimy looking i couldn't believe what i was seeing i was really
hoping that this was a prank the gargling that i heard the tearing sounds that i heard
that was coming from andrew andrew was gargling on his own blood and his flesh being torn apart
by whatever was on top of him i was so terrified that i couldn't even scream i couldn't even move
my eyes just stared on wide open i froze my heart literally sank to the bottom of my feet
and as i was looking at this thing literally eating my friend alive this thing didn't look
like anything i've ever seen before not in any movie not in any story not in any book
this thing looked like the literal embodiment of a demon and i didn't know what it was it had
scaly-like skin it was slimy very dark its fingers were long and skinny and its nails
seemingly as sharp as knives this thing was barefoot i could see its nails just grasping
onto andrew's flesh clinging onto his body almost as if it was going to be its last meal
when i began to choke and move backwards very slowly suddenly this thing
slowly raised its head removing its drooling jaws from andrew's torso as it slowly stood up
and looked behind and when i saw this thing all i could describe was a demon i didn't know what
it was its eyes were as black as night its teeth looked like something of an anaconda and a great
white shark mixed together its jaws were huge it didn't look like this thing had any ears or a nose
but just big black eyes and the huge mouth just filled with razor sharp teeth and in between his
teeth i saw andrew's flesh his skin hanging off of his teeth blood dripping down from its mouth
i didn't know what to do so the first thing i thought about was running away which i did
and as i proceeded to do so the minute i began to run whatever this was let out a horrifying screech
this screech echoed throughout the entire cave and i literally thought my life was going to end
before my very eyes i thought that this thing was about to grab me and make me its next meal
and as i was running i can hear this thing running behind me almost as if it was running on all fours
i can hear its nails scratch against the rocks as it got closer and closer to me
i didn't know if this thing was blind i didn't know if this thing was deaf
but whatever it was it was after me i was screaming for my friends i dropped everything
i had including my backpack my phone all i really had was my flashlight and i was trying
to find my way back outside the cave but i was directionless i was screaming for my friends
hoping that someone would hear me until then i heard the scream of a woman and wherever it came
from it seemed to have been behind me somewhere deeper in the cave perhaps maybe sarah or jessica
one of them must have ventured out even deeper into the cave but if this thing was running after
me then why in the world would i be hearing these screams unless whatever was chasing me
wasn't alone perhaps there were more i didn't know what to think i didn't know if i should
have turned back in trying to help my friends during their time of need but if i were to do that
then this thing that was chasing me it would have ultimately gotten its hold on me and perhaps worse
killed me i continued to run blindly in the cave i didn't know where i was going suddenly i can hear
my friend henry from the other side of the cave he was crying out my name derek derek get out
i was running after the sound of his voice and i was hoping that i can find the exit quickly enough
for me to escape and during all of this i can hear henry in front of me just screaming out my name
while behind me i hear the screams of a woman and then as the screams intensified
that very same screech that i had heard coming from whatever it is that saw me
i heard that too except there were multiple screeches coming from multiple different
directions at that point i saw the exit and i saw my friend henry and sarah standing there
in complete tears paranoid shocked they were screaming for me to exit the cave
and as i ran out i took a look behind me and noticed that whatever it was that was chasing me
wasn't there anymore i ran out in a pool of sweat i fell down the floor my knees buckled and i
didn't know what to think anymore i was screaming at my friends while they were screaming back at me
where's jessica where's jessica as sarah had pointed out while she was crying
that while they were walking around inside the cave in hopes of finding andrew
suddenly this thing jumped down from the ceiling and latched its jaws onto jessica's face sarah in
a heap of panic didn't know what to do so she just began to run and while outside the cave entrance
panicking and trying to figure out what to do next we could hear these things inside of the cave
and we can hear jessica's screams begin to die down along with sounds of flesh being torn
we knew that whatever these things were they were feeding on her and they were
feeding on andrew i told sarah that in fact i did find andrew but whatever was left of him
we all began to break down we didn't know what to do it was only then that we understood that
both jessica and andrew were dead and if we were to tell this story to anybody they would
think we're crazy but we did go to the police we quickly jumped inside our car
and drove down to the nearest police department where we had reported what had just happened
and only then once we came down with the police and pointing out the exact location of this cave
several officers walked in with their guns flashlights but they couldn't find the single
thing i had told them that i saw andrew's watch and andrew shoe on the floor but even then the
cops came back out and had reported that they didn't find any watch and or shoe on the floor
they couldn't find a carcass they didn't find any bodies they didn't find any blood
nothing just skid marks on the floor with scratches or seemingly enough marks on the rocks
we had told them that whatever it was that was after us perhaps made those marks on the rocks
due to their nails having to be incredibly sharp looking the cops then had informed us that they're
going to conduct a full search for our friends but there was no guarantee that whatever it was
that we saw was still going to be there they began to question us and asking us if we had taken any
hallucinogens or maybe drugs and we furiously responded by saying no take notes that five
years later ever since those events none of us have been the same the police they never
found the body they never found a single thing in that cave but what stuck with us was the memory
of our friends and the memory of what we had with them before they were taken from us but also
for the memory of myself and being there for that very moment when i saw this thing lift itself up
off my dead friend's body slowly turn around and stare directly at me with such evil intent i knew
that if i did not take any action at that given point my life would have ended until this day
i will never step foot into any cave and i am never going to go within the wilderness ever again
bye