My Cameras Caught Bigfoot Right Before It Saved Me From a Terrifying Attack – Sasquatch Story

Guardian of the Appalachian Night

Prologue: The Edge of the Wild

I never thought I’d be the one telling this story. For three years, I lived alone in a small cabin at the edge of an Appalachian mountain town, more surrounded by forest than civilization. It was peaceful there—at least, it was until the nightmares began. What happened to me in those woods changed everything I thought I knew about what exists out there in the darkness.

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This is the true account of how a Bigfoot saved my life from something far worse than I could have ever imagined.

Chapter 1: The Cabin and the Nightmares

My cabin sat on five acres at the very edge of town, backed up against thousands of acres of dense Appalachian forest. The nearest neighbor was half a mile down a dirt road. I’d bought the place cheap—most people didn’t want to live that isolated—but I loved it. The quiet, the trees, the wildlife. Of course, living that close to the wilderness came with challenges: bears wandered through my property, wild boars tore up my garden, deer ate everything I tried to grow, raccoons got into my trash no matter how I secured it.

So, I did what any sensible person would do and installed security cameras all around the property. Eight cameras total, covering every angle of the cabin and the immediate clearing. I checked those cameras every morning like clockwork. It became part of my routine: make coffee, check the cameras, see what visited during the night. Most mornings it was just deer or the occasional black bear passing through. Sometimes a fox or coyote. Normal mountain wildlife. Nothing unusual.

For two years, life was simple and predictable. I worked remotely as a software developer, spent evenings on the porch watching the sunset, and slept soundly every night. The isolation never bothered me. If anything, I thrived in it.

Then, about three weeks before everything changed, the nightmares began.

Chapter 2: The Dream That Wouldn’t Leave

The first nightmare hit me like a freight train. I woke up at 3 a.m. drenched in sweat, my heart hammering in my chest. In the dream, something massive was moving through the trees toward my cabin. I couldn’t see what it was—only shadows and movement, and the sound of branches snapping under heavy weight. The thing was getting closer, and I knew with absolute certainty that when it reached me, something terrible would happen.

The details of the dream were vivid in a way normal dreams never are. I could feel the cold mountain air on my skin, smell the pine trees and damp earth. The sounds were crystal clear, each snap of a branch distinct and directional. I knew exactly where the thing was coming from, could track its progress through the forest by sound alone, and I was paralyzed, unable to move or call for help or do anything except wait for it to arrive.

I tried to shake it off—just a bad dream. I drank some water, checked the cameras on my phone, saw nothing unusual, and went back to bed. But sleep did not come easy. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw those shadows moving between the trees.

The second night, the same dream came back. Same massive presence moving through the forest. Same feeling of dread. Same moment of waking up in terror before it reached the cabin.

This time, I was more shaken. Two nights in a row felt like more than coincidence. I tried to rationalize it—maybe I’d watched too many horror movies, maybe the isolation was getting to me, maybe I was stressed about work. But none of those explanations felt right.

By the third night, I was already dreading going to sleep. I stayed up late watching television, scrolling through my phone, doing anything to delay the inevitable. When exhaustion finally forced me to bed around 2 a.m., I fell asleep immediately. The nightmare was waiting for me.

This time, the presence in the dream was closer than before. Close enough that I could hear its breathing, heavy and rhythmic. Close enough that I could feel its weight shaking the ground with each step. But still, I couldn’t see it. Just movement in the darkness, coming for me.

And the fourth night and the fifth—every single night for three weeks, the same dream: something huge moving through the trees, getting closer each time. The feeling of being hunted became so real that I started waking up certain I could still hear branches breaking outside my window. I would lie there in the dark, listening, trying to separate dream sounds from real sounds, never quite sure which was which.

By the second week, the dream had evolved. Now I could see glimpses of the thing through the trees. Just flashes, quick impressions that disappeared as soon as I tried to focus on them. Dark fur, massive shoulders, eyes that caught the moonlight and reflected it back—but never a clear view, never enough to identify what I was seeing.

I became obsessed with checking the cameras. Every morning, I would review the footage from the night before, scanning for anything unusual. Bears, deer, raccoons—nothing out of the ordinary. But the nightmares continued, relentless and vivid.

Chapter 3: Descent into Fear

I was losing sleep, running on maybe four or five hours a night, jumping at every sound. The exhaustion started to affect everything. My work suffered. My appetite disappeared. All I could think about was that dream and the terrible certainty that something was coming for me.

I stopped going into town except when absolutely necessary. The drive felt like wasted time—time I should be spending watching my property. I let my garden go. I stopped answering calls from friends and family. My entire existence narrowed down to the cabin, the cameras, and the nightmares.

I started seeing patterns in the camera footage that probably weren’t there—a deer that appeared three nights in a row at the same time must mean something, right? A branch that looked broken in one frame and whole in another must have been disturbed by something large. I was grasping at straws, trying to find evidence that would explain the dreams, validate the fear that was consuming me.

My work performance got so bad that my boss sent me an email asking if everything was okay. I lied and said I had the flu, was recovering but still felt weak. The truth was too absurd to share. What would I say? That I was being haunted by nightmares about something in the forest? That I was spending eighteen hours a day reviewing security footage of nothing but wildlife? That I hadn’t slept properly in weeks?

By the third week, I looked like a different person. My face was gaunt from not eating. Dark circles ringed my eyes. My hands had developed a constant tremor from too much coffee and too little sleep. I’d lost fifteen pounds. When I caught a glimpse of myself in the bathroom mirror, I barely recognized the hollow-eyed stranger staring back.

Chapter 4: The Warning

After two weeks of this, I drove into town to pick up supplies. I stopped at the only bar in town, a small place where locals gathered. I sat at the counter nursing a beer and talking to a friend about nothing in particular. The exhaustion must have shown on my face because he asked if I was feeling all right.

Without really thinking, I told him about the nightmares. How I kept dreaming about something in the forest coming toward my cabin. How I couldn’t shake the feeling that something was watching me from the trees. How I was barely sleeping anymore. The words tumbled out, and once I started talking, I couldn’t stop.

My friend tried to be supportive, but I could tell he thought I was overreacting. “Maybe you should see a doctor,” he suggested. “Maybe you’re working too hard. Maybe you need a vacation.” All reasonable suggestions that completely missed the point.

An old woman sitting two stools down overheard me. She was probably in her seventies with long gray hair and sharp eyes. I’d seen her around town before but never spoken to her. She turned to look at me, and the expression on her face made me go quiet. It was not pity or concern or amusement—it was recognition, like she knew exactly what I was talking about and took it deadly seriously.

She slid off her stool and walked over, standing right next to me. Up close, her eyes were intense, almost uncomfortably so. They held mine without blinking, and I felt like she was looking through me rather than at me.

“Be very careful,” she said, voice low and serious, barely above a whisper. “There is a reason the first people who came to these mountains were afraid when they arrived. There are things in these old forests that have been here far longer than any of us. Things that do not want to be found. But sometimes they find us instead.”

I tried to laugh it off, make a joke about mountain superstition, but she did not smile. She just held my gaze for a long moment, then leaned in closer. “Your dreams are trying to tell you something,” she said. “Listen to them. Prepare yourself. And whatever you do, do not trust voices in the dark that sound like people you know. Not everything that speaks with a familiar voice is what it claims to be.”

Then she turned and walked back to her seat, not looking at me again.

Her words rattled around in my head the entire drive home, mixing with the exhaustion and fear until I couldn’t tell which thoughts were mine and which were echoes of her warning.

Chapter 5: The Camera Footage

That night, the nightmare came again. But when I woke up, I couldn’t shake the feeling that the old woman knew something I didn’t.

On the fifth night after meeting her, I had the nightmare again. Three weeks of the same dream every single night—I was exhausted, running on fumes, barely able to function during the day.

When I woke up that morning, I grabbed my phone and opened the camera app before I even got out of bed. I started scrolling through the footage from the night before, expecting to see the usual parade of deer and raccoons. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.

Then I reached the footage from camera three, the one mounted on the northwest corner of the cabin, and my blood went cold. The timestamp read 3:47 a.m. In the frame, illuminated by the infrared light, was a face. Not a bear, not a person—something else entirely.

The creature was massive. Dark matted fur covered its face and head. Its features were humanlike, but definitely not human. The eyes caught the camera light and reflected back with eerie intelligence. The nose was flat and broad. The mouth was set in what almost looked like contemplation.

It was looking directly at the camera, studying it—a Bigfoot. I was looking at footage of an actual Bigfoot standing fifteen feet from my cabin, staring at the camera like it knew exactly what it was.

My hands were shaking as I watched the rest of the clip. The Bigfoot looked at the camera for about eight seconds, then turned its head slowly to look toward the forest. Then it simply walked away, disappearing into the darkness.

I sat there in bed, frozen, replaying the footage over and over. This was real. This was not a nightmare. There was a Bigfoot on my property, close enough to touch my cabin wall. And suddenly, I knew the nightmares were not just dreams. They were warnings. This Bigfoot creature was what had been moving through the forest in my dreams. It was coming for me. And now it had found me.

Chapter 6: The Attack

That night, I didn’t even try to sleep. I turned on every light in the cabin and set up my laptop on the kitchen table where I could watch all eight camera feeds at once. My hunting rifle sat within arm’s reach, loaded. I made pot after pot of coffee and forced myself to stay awake, watching those screens.

Hours passed. The cameras showed nothing but the usual nighttime activity. A deer walked through at midnight. An owl flew past camera five. Normal things, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that something was out there watching, waiting just beyond the range of the cameras.

By dawn, my eyes were burning and my body ached from sitting in the same position for so long. Nothing had happened. No Bigfoot, no movement in the trees, just a quiet night in the mountains. But I did not feel relieved. If anything, the lack of activity made me more anxious.

The second night was worse. I was running on pure adrenaline and fear, seeing shadows in every corner, jumping at every creak of the cabin settling. I sat at that table again, watching the cameras, the rifle across my lap. My eyes kept playing tricks on me, turning tree branches into reaching arms, making me think I saw movement where there was none. Again, nothing happened. Just another quiet night.

By the third night, I was barely functional. I had not slept more than three hours in the past seventy-two. My hands shook constantly. My vision was blurry. I sat in my living room, the camera feeds open on my laptop, but I could barely focus on the screens anymore.

Around 2:30 a.m., I heard it. Footsteps outside—not bare footsteps, not deer. These were heavy, deliberate, bipedal. The sound of something massive walking on two legs, slowly circling the cabin.

I lunged for my laptop, pulling up the camera feeds. Every single screen showed the same thing: no signal. All eight cameras had gone dark at the same moment. The lights in my cabin were still on. The laptop was still running. The power had not gone out, but every camera was dead, showing nothing but that stark message: no signal.

The footsteps continued outside, moving from the north side of the cabin toward the east side. Slow, patient. Whatever was out there was taking its time, and it did not care if I heard it.

I grabbed my rifle and backed away from the door, putting the couch between me and the entrance. My heart was hammering so hard I thought it might break through my ribs. The footsteps reached the east wall and paused. Then I heard it—a sharp scraping sound against the wooden exterior of the cabin. The scratching was like nothing I had ever heard. It sounded like long claws or nails dragging slowly across the wood, leaving deep grooves. The sound made my teeth ache and my spine go rigid.

The scratching moved along the east wall, methodical and deliberate, not frantic or aggressive, but patient. Whatever was making that sound was in no hurry. It knew I was inside and it knew I was not going anywhere.

The sound reached the front corner of the cabin and began moving along the front wall, getting closer to the door. I could track its progress by the noise. Scratch. Pause. Scratch. Pause. Coming closer.

I raised the rifle, aiming at the door, my finger on the trigger. My hands were shaking so badly I could barely hold the weapon steady. The scratching reached the door frame and stopped. Silence. Complete and absolute silence. No footsteps, no scratching, no sound at all except my own ragged breathing and the pounding of blood in my ears.

I stood there for what felt like an eternity, the rifle aimed at the door, waiting for whatever came next. My legs were cramping. My arms ached. But I did not dare move.

Then I heard the voice. It was calling my name. From right outside the front door, a woman was calling my name. But not just any woman. It was my wife—my wife who had disappeared two years ago on a solo hike in these same mountains. My wife who the search teams never found. My wife whose body was somewhere out there in the wilderness, never recovered.

The voice kept calling my name over and over. “Please open the door. I am so cold. Please let me in. I am right here. Just open the door.”

Part of my brain knew this was wrong. Part of me was screaming that this was impossible, that this was a trick, that I needed to stay away from that door. But another part of me, the part that had spent two years hoping against hope that she might still be alive somewhere, wanted desperately to believe it was really her.

I lowered the rifle slightly, taking a step toward the door. The voice sounded exactly like her—the same cadence, the same gentle tone. But there was something slightly off about it, like someone playing a recording through a speaker with bad quality. The words were right, but the sound was wrong.

“Please,” the voice said. “I’m so cold out here. Let me in.”

I was standing right at the door now, my hand on the lock. Tears were streaming down my face. I wanted so badly for it to be her. I wanted to open that door and see her standing there alive and whole.

“Is it really you?” I said through the door, my voice shaking.

“Yes,” the voice said calmly. “Open up. She is cold. She…” Not “I am cold.” “She is cold.” That should have stopped me. That one word should have been enough to make me back away from the door. But the exhaustion and grief and desperate hope clouded my judgment. I was not thinking clearly. I just wanted it to be her.

I unlocked the door.

The door swung open and I looked into the face of a nightmare. The thing standing on my porch was not my wife. It was not even remotely human.

The creature stood in an unnatural crouch, maybe seven feet tall even bent over like that. Its skin was a sickly white, completely hairless, stretched tight over bones that seemed too long and angled wrong. The arms extended down past where knees should be, ending in hands with fingers like broken tree branches, each tipped with a black claw.

But the face—the face was what made my mind want to shut down completely. The eye sockets were hollow pits that somehow still contained eyes, pale and luminous, glowing with a sick yellowish light. The mouth was stretched impossibly wide, filled with teeth that were cracked and brown and broken. The whole face looked wrong, like something wearing a mask of human features but not quite getting the proportions right.

Those glowing eyes locked onto mine and the creature began to move forward into my cabin.

I stumbled backward, too terrified to even scream. My legs hit the couch and I fell, landing hard on my back. The rifle clattered away across the floor. The creature kept coming, those two long arms reaching toward me, moving with a horrible fluid grace. I was going to die. In that moment, I knew with absolute certainty that this thing was going to kill me, and there was nothing I could do to stop it.

Then I heard the running footsteps. The sound came from the forest, thunderous and getting closer fast. Something massive was running at full speed toward the cabin.

Through the open door, I saw a dark shape burst from the treeline, moving faster than anything that size should be able to move. The Bigfoot hit the skinwalker like a freight train. The impact happened so fast I barely registered it. One second the skinwalker was reaching for me. The next it was gone, yanked backward out of the doorway by massive hands. Both creatures tumbled off the porch and into the clearing beyond.

I scrambled to my feet and ran to the door, unable to look away from what was happening in front of my cabin.

The Bigfoot was enormous, at least eight feet tall and covered in thick, dark fur. It had the skinwalker pinned beneath it, one massive hand around the creature’s throat. The skinwalker was thrashing and clawing, but the Bigfoot was stronger. They rolled across the ground, and suddenly the skinwalker broke free and scrambled toward the treeline. The Bigfoot was right behind it, and both creatures crashed into the forest, disappearing into the darkness.

The sounds that came from those trees will haunt me for the rest of my life. Deep, powerful roars echoed through the forest. The Bigfoot was making sounds that were part animal, part something else entirely—protective, enraged, primal. And the skinwalker was screaming, a sound like metal scraping against metal, high-pitched and horrible, making every nerve in my body light up with instinctive terror.

I could hear branches breaking, trees shaking, the impact of massive bodies slamming into wood and earth. The fight moved deeper into the forest, the sounds becoming more distant but no less terrifying.

I stood there in my doorway, frozen, unable to move or think or do anything except listen to that nightmare battle happening just beyond my sight.

The fight lasted maybe five minutes, but it felt like hours. The roars and screams gradually moved further away until they were just faint echoes in the distance.

Then silence. Complete and absolute silence. No more roaring, no more screaming, no sound of movement in the trees, just the quiet of the mountain night.

Chapter 7: The Aftermath

I didn’t know which creature had won. I didn’t know if either of them had survived. All I knew was that I was still alive, standing in my doorway, staring into the dark forest.

I sat on my cabin floor, back against the wall, rifle across my lap, staring at the open door. I couldn’t bring myself to close it. Some part of me needed to see what was out there, needed to know if something was coming back.

The night crawled by with agonizing slowness. Every sound made me jump. Every shadow looked like it was moving. I kept expecting to see those glowing hollow eyes appear in the doorway or to hear my wife’s voice calling to me again. But nothing came. The forest remained silent and still.

When the first light of dawn started filtering through the trees, I finally felt my muscles begin to unclench. I had made it through the night. Whatever had happened out there in the forest, I was still alive.

As the sky grew lighter, I forced myself to stand. My legs were stiff and my whole body ached. I walked slowly to the doorway, rifle raised, and looked out at my property. The clearing in front of my cabin looked like a war zone. The ground was torn up, deep gouges in the earth where something heavy had been dragged. Branches were broken and scattered everywhere. Small patches of dark liquid stained the fallen leaves, though I couldn’t tell if it was blood or something else.

I stepped off the porch carefully, the rifle still in my hands, and walked to the nearest patch of disturbed ground. The gouges were deep, carved into the packed earth by something incredibly strong. I knelt down and touched the edge of one with my finger. The soil was torn and compressed like massive hands had dug into it during a struggle.

Following the trail of destruction, I walked toward the treeline. More broken branches, more torn earth. A small sapling was completely uprooted, lying on its side with the roots exposed. The bark on several larger trees was gouged and scraped, some of it hanging in strips. Whatever battle had happened here, it had been violent and primal.

I found tufts of dark fur caught on rough bark. Bigfoot fur, I assumed. Though I had no way to be certain, the strands were thick and coarse, nothing like human hair. I collected a few pieces and put them in my pocket, evidence of what had happened, even though I had no idea what I would do with them.

I stepped out onto the porch and walked slowly around the cabin. On the east wall, I found the scratches. Deep grooves in the wood, four parallel lines dragged all the way along the wall. Whatever had made those marks had claws like knives, but there was no sign of either creature. No bodies, no tracks I could identify. Just the evidence of the fight and nothing more.

Chapter 8: Gratitude

I went back inside and checked my cameras. They were working again. All eight feeds showing clear images of my property. I pulled up the recordings from the night before and scrolled to 2:30 a.m.—right when I had heard the footsteps. Nothing. The cameras showed nothing but darkness and then that no signal message. They had all gone dark at exactly 2:28 a.m. and come back online at 6:02 a.m., right around sunrise. During that entire window, they had recorded nothing.

But I noticed something else. At 12:47 a.m., hours before the cameras went dark, there was footage of the skinwalker approaching my cabin. The creature moved with that same unnatural crouch, its white skin almost glowing in the infrared light, making it look like a ghost or a specter. It circled the cabin once, staying just at the edge of the camera range, like it was studying the building and looking for weaknesses. Then it disappeared from view, vanishing into the forest.

And at 12:35 a.m., twelve minutes before the skinwalker appeared, there was footage of the Bigfoot. It stood at the edge of the clearing, partially hidden by trees, watching my cabin. Not moving, not approaching, just standing there in the shadows, completely still. It stayed there for almost two hours, just watching, waiting. The timestamp showed it was still there at 2:26 a.m., two minutes before the cameras went dark.

I watched this footage over and over, trying to understand what I was seeing. The Bigfoot had known the skinwalker was coming. It had positioned itself between the skinwalker and my cabin hours before the attack. It had stood guard in the darkness, waiting for the moment when I would be in danger. The Bigfoot had been protecting me—not hunting me, not planning to hurt me, protecting me from something far more dangerous than itself.

Chapter 9: Goodbye

I spent that entire day in a daze, trying to process what had happened. The pieces slowly came together in my exhausted mind, forming a picture that should have been impossible but was undeniably real.

The Bigfoot had never been hunting me. The nightmares were not about the Bigfoot coming to get me. They were warnings. My subconscious had picked up on something wrong, something dangerous in the forest and tried to tell me through dreams.

The Bigfoot had appeared on my camera, not as a threat, but as a guardian. It had been checking my defenses, making sure I was protected. When it looked at the camera, it was not studying me. It was studying the area, looking for weak points, planning how to keep me safe. That long, steady gaze had been assessment, not aggression.

And when the skinwalker finally came for me, the Bigfoot had been ready. It had waited in the trees for hours, watching, and struck the moment I was in danger. The moment that door opened and the skinwalker began to enter my cabin, the Bigfoot had charged. Not a second too early, not a second too late. Perfect timing, born from hours of patient observation.

That massive creature, that thing I had feared for three weeks, had saved my life. It had fought something terrifying and dangerous to protect a human it had no obligation to care about.

The question was, why? Why would a Bigfoot creature care about protecting a human? Why would it risk its own life fighting a skinwalker for someone it did not even know?

I had no answer. I still do not have an answer. Maybe the Bigfoot saw humans as part of its territory, something to be protected like any other living thing in the forest. Maybe it had its own code of behavior that included defending the helpless against predators. Maybe it just did not like skinwalkers and would have fought it regardless of whether I was involved. But whatever the reason, the evidence was undeniable. The Bigfoot had chosen to help me. It had made a decision to intervene when it could have easily stayed hidden and let nature take its course.

Epilogue: The City and the Shadows

Two months after the attack, I made the decision to move. I could not spend another winter in these mountains, in that cabin, waiting for the skinwalker to return. The beauty of the wilderness meant nothing when I was too terrified to enjoy it.

Before I left, I wanted to make one final offering to the Bigfoot—a proper thank you and goodbye. I cleaned out my entire freezer. Every piece of meat, every fish, every frozen vegetable. I added fresh vegetables from my garden, apples from the tree behind the cabin, even some dried goods from my pantry. I loaded everything into two large coolers and carried them to the rock at the edge of my property, right where the clearing met the forest.

Under the food, I placed a piece of paper with a simple message written in thick marker: Thank you for saving my life. I am leaving now. Be safe.

That night, I watched the cameras from inside my half-packed cabin. At 2:47 a.m., the Bigfoot appeared. It approached the rock slowly, looked at the large pile of food, then carefully moved the coolers aside and picked up the piece of paper. It held the paper for a long time, studying it. Then it set the paper down gently, gathered the coolers, and looked directly at the camera. For maybe fifteen seconds, we looked at each other through the camera lens. Then the Bigfoot turned and walked back into the forest carrying the food. I never saw it again.

My last night in the cabin was one of the strangest of my life. Everything was packed except my sleeping bag and the clothes I would wear the next day. The cabin felt empty and hollow, all the life stripped out of it.

Around 3 a.m., I heard my laptop chime with a camera alert. I pulled up the feed and felt my breath catch. The Bigfoot stood at the very edge of my property, right where the clearing met the forest. It was fully visible in the infrared light, standing upright, looking toward the cabin.

It stood there for several minutes, completely still, just watching. I watched it back through the camera, feeling an odd mixture of sadness and gratitude. Then the Bigfoot raised one massive hand, held it up for a moment, and turned away. It walked into the forest and disappeared from view.

It was a goodbye. I was sure of it. The Bigfoot had come to acknowledge that I was leaving and to say farewell in its own way.

I left at dawn the next morning. I loaded my truck with a few belongings I was taking, locked the cabin door for the last time, and drove down that dirt road without looking back. I drove for twelve hours straight, putting as much distance between myself and those mountains as I could manage.

I ended up in a small city three states away, renting an apartment in a busy neighborhood where I could see other buildings from my windows and hear traffic at all hours. The noise and light and constant presence of other people felt alien at first, but it also felt safe. There were no dark forests outside my window, no cameras to check, no mysterious creatures watching from the trees.

I still have all the camera footage saved on a hard drive. Sometimes late at night when I cannot sleep, I pull it up and watch those clips of the Bigfoot—the first sighting when it looked at the camera and I thought it was coming for me, the night it took the offerings, that final moment when it raised its hand in farewell.

I wonder if it still patrols those woods. I wonder if the skinwalker ever came back or if the Bigfoot drove it away for good. I wonder if anyone else has moved into my cabin and if they have any idea what walks through those trees at night.

Mostly, I wonder if the Bigfoot knows how grateful I am. I owe it my life. Without its intervention, that skinwalker would have killed me—probably slowly and horribly. The Bigfoot had no obligation to help me. It could have stayed hidden in the forest and let nature take its course, but it chose to act. It chose to protect me. I will never know why.

People ask me sometimes if I regret moving to that isolated cabin in the first place. They ask if I wish I had never experienced what I experienced, never seen what I saw. The answer is complicated. I regret the trauma. I regret the fear that still wakes me up some nights. I regret that I can never look at a dark forest the same way again. I regret that my wife’s voice has been corrupted in my memory, forever associated with that horrible imitation.

But I do not regret knowing the truth about what exists in those old forests. I do not regret learning that there are things in this world far beyond our understanding. And I definitely do not regret being saved by a creature that chose compassion over indifference.

The old woman in the bar was right. There are things in those mountains that have been there far longer than any of us. Things that do not want to be found. But not all of them are threats. Not all of them want to hurt us. Sometimes the scariest looking thing in the darkness is the only thing standing between you and something far worse.

I live in the city now, surrounded by concrete and people and electric lights. I am safe here. But part of me will always be back in that cabin, watching the treeline, waiting for massive footsteps in the night. Part of me will always be connected to those mountains and the creatures that live there. And part of me will always be grateful to the Bigfoot that saved my life when it had no reason to care whether I lived or died.

If you live near wild places, near old forests that have been there longer than human memory, pay attention to the signs. Pay attention to your dreams. Pay attention to the warnings from those who have lived in these places for generations. Not everything in the darkness is friendly. Not everything that calls your name is what it claims to be. But sometimes, just sometimes, the thing you fear most might be the thing that saves you when you need it most.

END