And we're gonna die back into the story here. Luke's gonna pick things back up. Luke, are you ready we get this lady up? We started talking walking her back. Sam and I are a little bit ahead of the three others that had found her. As we were walking back, she's just rambling to herself in a really light voice, saying, it said this, It said that. People who were what her were just trying to console her. They were saying, hey, it's gonna be okay. Your son's at the campsite a really light voice, she says, son. Everybody's being very gentle with her. She's been through a while, so nobody's saying, oh, she's a number of her son is. At this point, the lady doesn't even know her own name her Her eyes are absolutely deranged. One other group says, yes, yes, your son. She just stares and says, what's his name? Oh, your son? His name is Nick. He's just giving her the answers that she needs used to get back to reality. She's so he's doing a great job consoling her. As we're walking back, the guilt of me is rising, and all I can think about is how much I want to apologize to this park ranger being kind of disrespectful. Earlier, I was brushing him off about everything he said would happened. It's a long walk. I have a lot of time to think about what I'm going to say to them. Right when I see him, he sees the woman, and I swear to God, this man exhales for the first size as I met him. He is so relieved that she's alive. I walked right up to him. I just started apologizing to m I fully believe him. I'm sorry I did this. That's what I can do to help. He just kind of apologized for being hard on me. As he's walking away, he says, I just needed you to know how serious this situation is. Sorry for taking out you. I just hate finding dead kids. That hit me like a bomb because he knew something horrible was going to happen. He didn't know if it was going to be an Atam or kid. He said it as if it's happened before, and that he's had to find kids like that, and the idea of finding a kid in the same state that she's in was absolutely heartbreaking. So at this point, we're trying to get this lady better before her kid comes back from the excursion that they all went on. We clean her up, get her food and water, and get her some new clothes, trying to get her back to normal so the kid doesn't come back and see his mom and this horror will stay. Afterwards, we're just sitting around the campsite. She's all cleaned up and looking a bit better. She's just sitting there at her hands folding her lap and her knees touching each other, just sitting very delicately. She kind of just looking around, still very spacey. She's not talking to anybody. She's just mumbling to herself a little bit. But she seems a little bit more put together, a little bit more calm. She's pretty happy that she's back at the campsite. As the kids are coming back, the entire group is kind of expecting this big reunion moment. Everyone's expecting a warm embrace. We're all happy, everything's okay. And when the kids come back, the son walked up at the end of the campsite and everybody's looking at her, and everybody kind of goes silent for this embrace. She looks up and she kind of sees that everybody's looking at her. It's almost like she took it as a que and she scans the kids and says, nick, just really gently. We looked at the kid, and the kid's scowling at his mom like he's looking at a stranger that he doesn't like. He gestures kind of like a shrug, and then she stops scanning kids and she locks in on him. She almost stands up like a machine, just very robotically, no waste of movements, and she lifts her hands slightly after she's inviting him to come give her a hug instead of coming to give him her coming to give him a hug. The kids starts backing up, he starts crying. She says, that's not my mom anymore, and what my dad runs off. Now I look around the group. It feels so awkward and tense. Almost didn't unfold how we're expecting, and everybody has this kind of sadness on their face. Then I look and I see the park rangers face and he's looking at the woman like this his world is being tore apart. He's more anxious that seeing this entire time, and the woman of the campsite immediately go up to the mom, trying to console tell her that the kids react to trauma in different ways. He'll get over it and it's gonna be okay. Her face is expressionless, as if she's not even hearing these women and just looking right past them, and her eyes are just falling the kid. Everyone else in the campsite starts dispersing because it's a very tense moment, except for the park ranger. I see him talking to the camp guide. I seek behind the east drop a little bit see what he's saying, and he's telling the camp guy to tell call the father, telling them come pick them both up tomorrow. I can kind of tell that camp guy is not in the know because the way he's saying it tom he's saying she doesn't seem to fit to drive. He's talking as if he's not aware of the gravityest situation. The camp guide says yes and walks off. I'm still standing behind him, and he just sparks out come here. That's one of those moments when you're like when you're sitting in the back of class messing around and your teacher's writing on the white board and they call out your name without even looking at you, sent chills out my spine. I just immediately walk up to the ranger and say, what do you want me to do. I'm in full soldier mote at this point in time, because this is my fault. I want to help. I want to fix things. He starts speaking to me very firmly. His eyes are completely locked in on the mom. He's not even looking at me. He then says, all keep eyes on her. You take care of the kid. The father can't get here until tomorrow. By no means does she interact with this kid until he gets here. Do you understand me? He doesn't want to lie to this kid. He has to entertain him. Mind you, He's been working with kids forever. So then he says, at this point, I know that I had to build up a comfortable relationship with the kid, which I wasn't worried about. When I get to Nick, he's playing bags with himself off to the side. I just walk up and I say, best two out of three. I start cracking jokes. It's easy to make kids laugh, it's easy to make kids forget what's going on. We're having a pretty good time until one of the other kids walks up and put both of his hands over his face. Are you gonna cry again and starts laughing and runs off. I look at Nick and I ask what was that about. Nick says, I told him who my mom left with last night. I asked, who did your mom leave with last night? He told me he saw her holding hands with a man as she walked into the forest last night. What did he look like? And Nick just holds up his thumbs and rubs it. Says, his face looked like I have no clue what that means. So I immediately start asking follow up questions what color was his skin and what was he wearing? And Nick just goes he was completely pale. I said, did he have any distinguishing facial features like his eyebrows with the bushy, bright eyes, big nose, anything like that. He told me he didn't have any of those at all, no features at all. I'm thinking, apparently there's some weirdo walking around in a mask drawing women in the woods in the middle of the night. Inside, I'm freaking out, but I don't want to. I don't want Nick to see that, so I start reassuring him, letting him know that he's safe and we're not going to let that man hurt you. He's not coming back. I want to keep distracting him and giving him a fun time, but I need to go report this back to Sam. So I make an excuse to go back to the tent. I give Sam a nods signaling we need to talk. The second the tent zips closed and I'm about to start speaking about everything, all this new information I just learned about, Sam cuts me off. I go, I have so much to tell you, he said me. First, he has a guilty look on his face and says to me, I've been spying on her. And I know this is gonna sound weird, really weird, but I was in the group with her, and you know when people are in a group in that moment when everybody starts laughing and then one person is left laughing when everybody else is stopped, Well, that happened. She was a last one laughing, and I looked at her, and for a split second, she was still laughing, but her mouth was closed and she wasn't moving at all. Nobody else saw it but me, and it irked me so bad. I haven't been able to stop watching this woman or leaf make sure she's not been left alone with the rest of the day, I've been spying on her the entire time. I'll be honest. I wasn't fully sold on this idea, so I asked, Okay, like Sam, what has she been doing? He replied, when there's nobody around her, she sits motionless, motionless, and I'm not talking about relaxing. I'm talking about this woman is not moving at all. I said, what do you mean if nobody's around, you've been following her around. He then holds up a pair of binoculars, and I could tell he was a little proud to show me of the commitment he had to do the spy work. And then he says, I've been watching her with these. I watched her for thirty minutes straight. She did not move, she did not blink, she was not breathing. She looked like an empty vessel. And then when somebody walks near her, she starts blinking. Then she forces out a weird smile. She starts looking around as if she's taking in nature, and then she starts fake breathing. Imagine a mime pretending to pretending like he's breathing and then holding back saying anything more. So I told him, bro, just spit it out. I can tell you have something more to say. As he went quiet, he explained, you know, you know how she was saying, it's telling her to do this, it's telling her to do that. I don't think it's it telling her to do anything. I think she is the it. I don't even get a feeling Sam about all the smooth faced man stuff that Nick had told me before. He says, we got to tell the ranger right now. I got up and followed. We walked up to the ranger and Sam just starts pouring his heart out about all the evidence that he's found throughout the day, and the ranger was listening, patiently, nodding, and then right when Sam finished, the ranger says, don't worry, boys, we're on the same page. There's no chance I'm letting that thing leave my park. There's no way I'm letting that thing leave my park. I'm thinking, did you just say that thing she possessed? The ranger goes on, you guys have no idea how lucky we are that the kid doesn't trust her. It is critical, absolutely critical. We do not let it get out of the park. And the only way you can get out of the park is if it manipulates a loved one to escort it out of the park. We have to keep Nick away from her. We have to keep them completely separated until the dad gets here tomorrow morning. I already told the camp guide to send all the kids paddle boating for the remainder of the day, so it has no chance of talking to him. For the rest of the day. You need to monitor her, and then when that kid gets back before the sun goes down, you need to get him to his tent immediately. This is what we gotta do. We'll be home for you once the father gets here tomorrow morning. So before I even get to really digest any of this new information that's just been sent my way, me and Sam hustle back to the common area just to keep an eye on her to make sure she's not running off. When we get back there, we see she's not dormant anymore. She's a little bit more active today, and she's walking around the campsite asking different group of campers they've seen her son. All the campers are still being nice and gentle with her because they kind of know what's happened. They're just telling her all the kids went pattle voating it's fine, they'll be back later. But by the third time of her asking each group, you could tell, you could tell and kind of see that the campers were getting a little bit annoyed to frustrated with her. She goes back up to this one group to ask them for the fourth or fifth time, and one burly country looking dude kind of blurts out, kind of in a jokingly manner, that dad getting here tomorrow won't come soon? Am I right? Then his wife or girlfriend hits him on the shoulder and told it sorry, he's being rude, honey, be patient. The morning will come very quickly. Then it starts repeating what the lady said as if it was taken in new information and formulating a new question to ask. He repeats itself three times, my husband's going to be here in the morning. My husband's going to be here in the morning. My husband's going to be here in the morning. And then she looks back at the group and asks, do you know what time my husband's going to be here in the morning, and they shook their heads no. She walked away, but a little bit more frantic this time. I don't really know how to explain it, but the only way I can explain it is that she turned more like to an active panic, as if she knows it's crunch time. She only has one day to convince this kid to take her home. She continues to walk group to group, just repeating herself, do you know what time my husband's going to get here? You know what time my husband's going to get here. It literally walks around asking the same question, getting the same answers. So, just to recap, then the Sun's freaking out when he sees her completely. That's not my mom anymore. That is not my mom. They start looking at this more. They being the park ranger, him and his friend. They're all realizing how this thing is acting weird, almost like a demonic force in somebody's body, trying to figure out what's going on. Doesn't really know who her son is, doesn't know the situation, asking a lot of questions, trying to get answers. They've called the dad to come pick the boy up tomorrow, and they have a game plan to completely separate the two until the morning because the park rangers fear is this thing can leave the park only if it's able to manipulate a loved one to take it home and then from there we don't know what terrible things would happen. Yeah, and the park rangers like general attitude is like he's seen this before. Yeah, he seems like this isn't the crazy to him, Like it's like he's been in this situation before. It's definitely saying a thing or two, but at this point and it's kind of like it goes back to the same thing we talked about the stairs in the woods. Apparently this happens these mysterious stairs in the woods, and they're dangers. They're dangerous, forced to be dealt with. Yeah, it's pretty messed up. The part where it's repeating itself over and over again that that's generally junior really terrifying, but it's doing it again as if it needs to collect this and like it has to process it, figure out what to mimic and act and do next, right, because it's like just sitting there when no one's watching it and it's not doing anything. Yeah, it's just kind of Yeah, it's just like whatever someone talks to it, it's just behave like they're behaving or something like that. It's just to pretend to be human, I guess. Yeah, it's like not even breathing when nobody's near it. It's not even moving and it's not doing anything. Then as somebody comes to near by, it comes alive, and then like almost like it snaps into character or something
