I think I encountered a Wendigo
At the ripe old age of twenty-two I was driving in Northern Michigan on a cold Tuesday evening in the month of November just about a week before Thanksgiving in the year of 2018. I stopped off a blacktop road onto gravel which I followed just far enough to get my 2016 Ford pickup out of immediate sight should a cop turn his headlights down the road in my direction. As soon as my truck turned a corner I slammed on the brakes and the thing came to a sliding halt. Quickly I jumped out of the truck remembering to lock the door more out of habit than any other reason. Then I was climbing over an old barbed-wire fence and unzipping while at same time glancing over my shoulder to look for any sign of lights coming this way. There were none. It was a crisp and breezy evening that accompanied a moon that wasn’t full but that still was bright enough to illuminate the night. I hadn’t even thought about grabbing a flashlight when I left the truck. It was certainly one of those times when taking care of bodily functions was more important than worrying about if you stepped in some raccoon shit or something just as silly. The night was such that it was obvious you didn’t need any artificial light to accomplish my goal. There was a clear field of vision from my location to where my truck sat waiting. So I would have been fine if I had just finished pissing and then walked back to my truck and on my way but I didn’t do that because of the girl’s voice. I couldn’t see her but she sounded like she was incredibly close, like just a few feet away from me. So close in fact that initially I was so embarrassed that I had been standing there pissing just seconds before: that it overcame my usual cautious nature. I mean she sounded like she was just on the other side of that limb that was blocking my view. So I moved the limb and that was when it became clear she was just one more step or two into the forest and then once i had moved a couple of tall weeds I could see what this girl looked like. She was saying something and I couldn’t quite make out what it was but it sounded inviting and friendly. What was she saying exactly? What I should have been asking myself was what was a female doing out here in the definition of the middle of nowhere? In the near-dark, watching me take a piss? I followed her another step, and then another. Then just as I was sure she would be behind this next patch of weeds, she was not; and suddenly I noticed that it was no longer a bright night. There were shadows towering over me and around. I felt a sense of being lost and struggled to gain my direction of where my vehicle was located. I thought i could still find my way to my truck. At the same time the girl’s voice had not grown any softer. It was louder in fact but I still could not understand exactly what it was she was saying. I took a second to look around and noticed I could no longer see my truck. While unsettling to be certain, I was still (I thought) very close to the gravel road. So I wasn’t really lost, just had that feeling because I had wondered further than I ever intended. The shadows which had overtaken me loomed ever more threateningly now that my focus was on my surroundings and not on the girl. I heard a rustling in the woods not far from my location but coming from a different direction than the girl’s voice. At that point my caution side was overtaking any interest I had in finding out what sort of attractive lady might be associated with the voice which could not be understood but was very teasing in its nature. I won’t lie. I really wanted to see her. To hear her well enough to understand what those kind, flirty sounding noises were actually trying to communicate to me but I was being saturated with adrenaline and my gears went straight to flight or fight mode. I started backing up in the direction from which I thought I had come. At that moment was when I saw it. I didn’t know what had happened to her but I had an idea that if anything did happen to her that it was this thing which was responsible. It had antlers like a deer but its face was something different. It was an animal’s skull with sickly skin stretched tightly around the bone with sunken eyes that had a faint red to them when seen in the dark. Its body was thin, almost or possibly to the point of emancipation. It had a tall stature and seemed to lurch drunkenly across the ground rather than walk. As it took a stride it seemed to jiggle in an unusual way that gave the appearance like the entire body was going to fall on over but then it would catch itself, get righted as much as I think was possible for the thing, and then it would lurch forward another step. I was terrified. Having no idea how far I had been led into the forest or for that matter if I was even still in the woods which I had started. Suddenly I felt my feet were caught up in the roots which covered the ground. Were they grasping my feet and ankles? Before i could answer the question i had asked myself in my head, the thing motioned with its twiggy-like arms with their clawed-hands: suddenly there appeared two large wolves, one on each side of its rackety body. The two new animals to arrive had the head of a wolf but their bodies were more like a mix between that of a man and a wolf. They stood upright. The upper torso was very human-like but more muscular while the lower part of their torsos had the unmistakable bent legs which are found on the back of any dog or wolf. They were covered in grey and black fur which was much healthier looking in patches on their bodies than the majority of the fur covering them. There wreaked a stench that is only found on something that has been dead a long while. The two snarled and I saw their saliva dripping from their mouths. The eyes were yellow surrounding a black, dead looking center. Their eyes were that of a shark. Dead looking and without mercy. They had a deep growl and I could see their muscles tense as they prepared to leap after me. I wrenched my feet free while not taking my eyes off the two wolf-like creatures. When the thing with antlers motioned towards me I began to turn and run. The sound of the wolf-creatures giving chase made my blood turn cold but I did not falter. Screaming as loud as possible I flew back down the path which I had previously taken my time coming up. I didn’t dare look back. At one point I thought I could actually feel the hot breath of one of those wolves on the back of my neck. I suppose it could have been my own sweat but at least at the time I thought i felt drops of its saliva fall on the nape of my neck. Now I was almost back to the gravel road where I had stopped my truck. Behind I could hear the wolves still coming after me but they seemed to be further away. Still I had the fence between me and the safety of my pickup. I heard a growl to my back and to the right so I steered left and jumped up on the fence and propelled myself onwards over the obstacle and hit the ground running. Now out on the gravel road I could see I had misjudged where my car was located and it was about half a football field down the road from where I had come out of the forest. How far had I been taken into the woods? It seemed only a few steps but obviously that was incorrect. As this was happening and I had already begun running towards my car there was something beyond the car which had come out of the forest from the same side as myself. Although it was now on all fours the black fur was unmistakable. I was certain it was one of the wolves. Where was the other one? The wolf I could see started running down the road towards me in an attempt I would assume to cut me off from reaching my car. Meantime I was already at full run and reaching into my pocket for my keys. I pulled them out just as I arrived at my car door and then began what was probably the most dramatic few seconds of a very dramatic few minutes. Out of the corner of my eye I was keeping track of that wolf as it was racing towards me. While at the same time trying to concentrate on not dropping my keys after I got the door unlocked. I was going to need them right away as soon as I got into the car. The anxiety was unbearable. The wolf sprinting towards me at full speed. Trying to get the key into its slot. Wondering if that other wolf would come charging out of the woods directly across from where I was located, my back to the spot from where it would most likely come. I wanted to just melt right there so close to safety. Just give up and let them devour me. Perhaps it was bravery, more likely fear, but somehow I managed to get the key into the door before anything had reached me. Once I got the key into the lock the door swung open and I was inside and closing that door and then locking it with my left hand and my right hand was quickly getting those keys into the ignition. I was already looking up the road when the wolf came even with my car door and I gunned the gas and almost caused myself to fishtail off the road into a wreck but I was able to get the car straightened out. I sped away from there more frightened than i have ever been in my life. Gaining control of the car and beginning to speed my way out of that area, I allowed myself to glance over towards the side of the forest where I had just come racing out. To my amazement the other wolf was so far keeping pace with my car as I picked up speed. It came jumping over the fence and angling towards me but by then I was well under way and I shot onwards through the dark never to see those things again. | |