Jack, you want to pick the story back up here. Okay, the sun starts coming down and the kids start coming home from battle boarding. We're coming up on dinner time and everybody meets in the common area to eat. We can't just obviously keep a mom separate from her kid without other campers getting really suspicious. So me and Sam go meet with Nick before he re enters the campsite because we just want to avoid this situation entirely. If we just get through this part, we get him in his tent, and then we're home free. We got the kids safe, and we're all good. So we're just assuming that if fall, maybe it'll follow the herd. You know, go get food like everyone else is getting food. We could just get Nick to his tent and we'll be set. So I have Sam go make a couple plates of food for us while we escort Nick to his tent. But within a couple of minutes, while Sam was getting our food and I'm getting to the tent, it must have slipped away, because when we get to Nick's tent, he and zips it. This thing that listens or it's just not his mom immediately pops out and grabs him by the arms and says, you're not gonna leave without mommy. I wish I could say I did something heroic, but I just let out a little bit of scream and a double hand gripped Nick's string backpack because I don't want to risk touching this thing, and I swung him behind me really hard because I was trying to get him. He wasn't trying to get into like a tug of war with this thing. When I tell you, in this moment, I was mortified because I was the only thing in between her and Nick. I felt fight or flight gripping in. I had to remind myself that this isn't a woman, and if it takes a step forward, I'm not flying. I'm standing here. The only words I could get out were are you good? And then it just said kind of softly and menacing. We need a long time. Don't make me scream. I bark at Nick to go get the ranger because the only thing I want at this moment is an authority figure here is like me, but I have no idea what the thing is. So Nick books it and I'm just kind of frozen there staring at this thing, waiting for it to scream and make me look like maybe like a creep or something in front of the entire camp. But it just stands there for a few moments with its eyes staring around like it's searching for something in its head, almost as if it's trying to remember something, And just like that, its eyes lock onto me, and I brace myself because I think it's gonna let out this horrific scream. I was expecting the scene that this thing is about to make when it finally explodes into a scream, But that's not what happens. You know. I get a little confused and almost a little bit relieved because in that moment, I realized that this thing only mimics sounds. This thing has no gauge of human inflection or social cues. Because the scream that it did didn't match the situation. I was expected to scream in horror, as if it was accusing me of attacking here or something, but instead it screams as as like a little girl was playing. I peak for a quick second just kind of see the camper's reactions, and I get a little bit relieved because I see a few of them are actually rolling their eyes at this point. They think really fed up with this person's behavior, and the slight relief that I had disappears immediately when I look back at it, because it abruptly stopped screaming. I could tell it didn't. It's almost like it couldn't. It understood that it wasn't working. Whatever it was trying to do, it wasn't working. And its chin tucks in a little bit and starts looking at me at the top of its eyes as if it's honing in on me. And the adrenaline my chest starts pumping because I don't know what this thing's gonna run away or attack. It almost looked a bit happy about how scared I was. It gave a little bit of a smirk and replied, are you good? In my voice with its mouth closed, exactly how I had just said it to them. It did it as if it was threatening me. If I get in the way of her leaving with Nick, it could mimic me and leave with Sam. That moment felt like it lasted forever. Finally I felt somebody grab my shoulder. I looked back at it. It's the ranger. He has this confidence in his face that he's about to just handle the situation, which makes me feel a lot safer. He loudly says, don't let this thing intimidate you. It could only take your form if it could put you in a train. And the only way he could put you in a trance is if you're at neebriate. He didn't drink anything tonight, right, I just nod ahead. No, I mean no, I been, You're good, And he looks at her and just says, go to sleep. Your husband's going to be here in the morning, and brushes her off. Her eyes light up as if she likes what he just said, and she almost scurries back into her tent. And as we're walking away, I hear repeating to herself, almost joyfully, my husband is going to be here in the morning. My husband's going to be here in the morning. We start walking away and I see Sam walking up with the plates of food. We look on his face was like, you know, hey, what happened? The ranger tells me and Sam to come eat dinner with him. We deserve a little bit of an explanation. While we're walking where we usually eat dinner, a little bit away from the campers, I see nicking between two camp guys and he's safe. So I'm a little bit more relaxed at this point, and the questions start flowing in my head. Then I'm about to ask this guy because I've got fasts. We sit down. The first question that comes to my head is, so you know what that thing is? Then Ranger says, kind of all the other rangers call it a mimic. I've heard plenty of stories about them. I've only had one other personal experience with it. My working theory is that interacting with the stairs almost calls to them. Whenever the stairs are involved, it feels like it attracts everything. We're very fortunate that we had a lucky drawl with the mimic because it could have been something so much worse. I immediately think, if we're lucky with this thing, what else is in this park? The ranger just keeps going on with the story. So what we do now is these things think target people that are under the influence of something. The last time I had to deal with it one it tricked this hippie guy that came here by himself. He was an easy target and I was the one. I saw him walk into the forest with it. I thought about chasing them and intervening. But once they hit the tree line, it's almost like they dissolved into the woods. Think to myself, that's exactly what Nick told me. So this ranger is definitely onto something. The ranger goes on and says when the hippie wandered back into the camp, he knew it definitely wasn't him because he was talking really formal, and this guy was the opposite of formals. Everything he did was laid back, chill, hippie vibe. We came back very eloquently, asking very specific questions in a monotone way. I knew something was wrong. He started walking around the camp asking everybody who he came here with, and he was trying to figure out if he had any loved ones or family nearby before he got taken by this thing. He was very open with me and everybody else that he was a traveling no man and he had nobody really significant in his life in general. And when all the other campers started their hike back to the lodge, he wouldn't leave the campsite and I told him I couldn't leave the campsite without everyone, and he was my responsibility. He said he can't leave the campsite without somebody that loves him. He got really frantic. It was pleaded with me to call someone for him. I told him that he need to put anyway on his emergency contact for him. There was nobody to call or were seeing the feet on his face. And the last thing that sent to me is I ran out of time, and that he backed towards the tree line. It's almost if his face dissolved and he stow and became part of the forest. And two days later we randomly found that hit be at the bottom of a pit about a mile off the campsite. The alaptops he said, died of starvation two days earlier. So it's my assumption that these things can't survive without a living hosts. They trick you, then they trap you, then they mimic you, and they try to commendment somebody to take them home. It seems like they can't leave the park unless somebody loves them escorts them out. The way she's been acting almost confirms that with me, because it seems like she's been abiding by the same rules. But we let this thing out and gets this city or town. We have no idea how much standwards this thing could do. I cut him off and I asked him how were going to get the husband to leave this lady. He confidantly says, let me handle that. We just see a focus on getting Nicked to the lodge and trapping that thing here, so to focus on finding the real her while she's still alive. Sam stands up. He says, we're going to extract Nick at six hundred, make the handoff the father, and we orchestrate a grid style search party starting east to the campsite. When Nick leaves. That gives us approximately ten hours a shurch sight before the sun goes down. Sam kind of flipped the switch and started to taking control of the situation because as core, he's a tactical minded, a well trained army ranger. He was an army ranger for about ten years. The park ranger says, we're coming up on day three. We don't fight her tomorrow, we might not find her alive. He dismisses us and tells us to get some rest. So me and Sam just clear our plates really quick to get some calories. Then we hustle back to our tents so we can get as much sleep as possible before the morning search. But once we get back to the tent, I'm just lying there with my eyes open. I've had a really tough time of sleeping. I just keep thinking about her repeating with my voice. I just can't get that image out of my head. My own voice being spoken to me. Can't express to you how eerie it is to hear your own voice when it's not coming from recording. And Sam knew exactly what I was saying, and he just blurred out, porcupine. I said, what, that's our code word, porcupine if any point we get split up or something crazy happens. You just asked you what the code word is, so you know it's me. The plan is set to be. I recognize you. Sure gives me just enough relief to fall asleep, but it sure did not stop me from having nightmares all night. Wow, that's creepy as hell. It sounds like, though, did they finally feel as if they have the situation under control? They have a plan in place. Yes, this thing needs to be taken home by someone that loves it. That's what the creature's plan is. So they're trying to find what they believe is like the host body, right, They're trying to find the actual mother. Yes, well, it's still a lot. And in order to do that, they have to continue to keep these two apart because in the morning, the next part I'm about to get into, the father is coming. And when the father gets there, they got to get back to the lodge. They got to get the kid with the father and get him out of here so he's out of danger. And at that point in time, the thing is going to really struggle to leave these woods without being able to attach itself to a loved one. So they're playing in place. They are going to get up in the morning. First thing, get that kid across the camp the forest to the excuse me, the campground, through the forest to the lodge, get it with his dad, and then they have to go find the real mother in the woods and then to go from there. They did establish a safety word. They said, hey, if something happens to us tomorrow, if we get split up, the safety word is porcupine. The reason they established the safety word is, like I said, because this thing's right, you don't know when it's that. It somehow became the host of your body, your mind. So they have a plan in place at least here. It doesn't even need to look like you, just sound like you. It could look like someone else and still sound like you, So it's like extra scary because it could be anywhere. Yeah, it's so freaky. What it copied his voice, repeated his voice, I mean what he said in his exact voice. That's that's absolutely insane. I don't know
