Bailey Gaus

A depressed woman takes her dog on a hike at a new location. Her dog runs off and while chasing after it, she is confronted by a being in the woods.

Disclaimer: depictions of animal cruelty and violence

I always envisioned life looking different for me by the time I turned 28, but the reality is that life is unpredictable. I had gone through a divorce a year ago and the feelings of depression and loneliness had become overwhelming. I tried a few different medications after seeing a therapist, but the side effects outweighed everything else. So, my therapist recommended that I get a pet and that’s how I ended up with my dog Sophie. I was hesitant at first because I can barely even keep houseplants alive, but decided my therapist probably knows what the hell she’s talking about. I was paying her quite a bit of money, after all.

Sophie wasn’t the most well behaved dog at the shelter, but she had the prettiest white and brown fur. She was a young border collie with lots of love and energy. I did research on certain breeds that enjoy hikes and that was at the top. I wanted a dog that I could take on trips. Plus, it would help me feel a little more safe while hiking and walking trails alone. I started doing it as a way to escape after the divorce and it ended up helping with my mental and physical health.

It was normal for me to travel on the weekends to my favorite local trails and Sophie fit right in. She became used to the routine of traveling on the weekends, and this weekend we were headed to Rend Lake near Mount Vernon, IL. It was about a 5 hour drive from Chicago, IL, and to be honest, I just needed a break of normal life.

I stopped twice along the way, once at a gas station, and again at a rest stop. I got out and walked Sophie around a grassy area and let her run for a while. She loved to play fetch with a tennis ball and I loved to watch her run. We had created a strong bond within the last 6 months and she trusted me completely. I could let her run without a leash and she would always come back.

We didn’t stay longer than 30 minutes at the rest area before we got back on the road. I grabbed a bite to eat before we got to the house we rented. The house itself wasn’t too special, but it had an enclosed backyard, so I let Sophie run around while I brought my suitcase and other belongings inside. Around 3:00 PM I decided to hit up one of the trails near the lake. I changed clothes, put my hair up, got my backpack ready, gave Sophie some food, and we loaded up into the car.

It took about 20 minutes to make our way to Rend Lake and the drive was beautiful. It was an old historic town with lots of murals on brick buildings. I drove by a few coffee shops that looked like they’d be a nice place to hang out at. “Maybe I’ll stop by one tomorrow morning,” I thought to myself.

As I parked in the public lot at the trail, I couldn’t help but just stand outside of the car and stare out into the woods. There were a number of other people here doing the same thing, just admiring the view. I took my phone out of my pocket and took a few pictures, but realized I forgot to charge it and the battery was at 20%. 

“That’s okay, I’ll just have to use it sparingly. Plus, the point of this is to escape normal life, right?” I mumbled to myself as I walked to the other side of the car to let Sophie out.

I put the leash on Sophie and she sat patiently by the side of the car while I put my backpack on and changed my shoes. We walked over to a visitor sign that had pamphlets and trail maps and I grabbed a few before walking over to a picnic table to look at them. We didn’t have a lot of time since it was already 5:00PM and the sun was supposed to set around 7:00PM. I decided to hike the 4 mile trail, which should give us plenty of time to walk, venture into the woods some, turn around, and make it back to the house before it gets too dark out.

It was a trail for both hikers and bicyclists and was mostly paved, but there were some sections that forked off into other sections that weren’t paved. Spring flowers were beginning to bloom and the grass was just becoming a luscious green color. It was an easy trail to walk with lots of beautiful old trees to admire. It was so nice to catch some fresh air and sneak away from the city for a bit. And I liked that there weren’t many people on this trail. Only a handful walked, while others rode their bikes. Sophie was content and well behaved as usual. After an hour, we stopped for a short break. Sophie started panting really hard, so I grabbed her dog bowl out of my backpack and gave her some water while I drank out of my own bottle.

I pulled out the map to see if I could locate where we were. There was a fork in the trail up ahead that branched out a little into the woods. I decided that it would be a good time to sneak off of the trail and try it out. According to the map, we were not in a hunting zone, and I wasn’t planning on venturing out too far. That’s all I was really worried about so there was really no reason to not do it.

We both started walking toward the dirt trail. I looked behind us to see if there were any other hikers, but there weren’t. I pulled my phone out to check the time and it was 6:45PM. “After a few minutes or so, we should plan on heading back. The sun will set soon.” I said to Sophie. She licked my right hand in response.

About 5 minutes into our walk on the dirt path, Sophie turned around and tried jumping on me. “Sophie, come on. Stop.” I said while pushing her away. “Down! We’ll be heading back to the car soon, I just want to look out here.” I said to her as she started growling, which she rarely did, if ever. 

“What’s wrong, girl?” I asked. I knelt down and put a hand on her back, trying to calm her down. She turned her head and licked my cheek. “Is this what you want?” I asked as I unlatched the leash from her collar. But as soon as I stood up, she bolted off into the woods. 

“Sophie!” I yelled as I started jogging after her. “Sophie! Come back here!” I checked my phone and saw it was at 5% and it was already 7:15PM. The sun had started to set and I looked around and yelled, “God fucking dammit!” 

I was running after her by this point and felt my chest tighten with anxiety. “Please, not an attack right now,” I thought to myself. I stopped to catch my breath and put my hand on my chest. I know cell service sucks out here, but I decided to see if I could get enough service to track the AirTag on her collar, so I took my phone out of my pocket.

I opened the Find My app on my phone and saw that there still wasn’t any service. Even if I kept running after her in the direction she was running in, there’s a possibility that she changed directions. 

“What if I climbed a tree and held the phone up high?” I said to myself. I glanced around for a tree with lower branches and finally found one that looked like I could climb it. I took my backpack off and started climbing, but stopped about halfway up. I took my phone out of my pocket, opened the Find My app again, and held it above my head for a few minutes. I called out Sophie’s name a few times while I waited.

When I felt enough time had passed, I checked the phone and saw that it had actually loaded and I had one bar of service.

“Holy shit!” I said to myself, “I can’t believe this actually worked!” I checked the location and it looked to be about a half mile or so away. “What the fuck?!” I said. “What the hell is she doing?!” I took a screenshot of the location, got down from the tree slowly. The last thing I needed was a twisted ankle. 

When I got to the ground, I swung the backpack over my shoulder and started walking in the direction of her AirTag location, hoping I was headed the right way. The Find My location wasn’t working well enough for me to glance at it to ensure I was walking the right way. “Battery life is still at 2% and it’ll be completely dark out soon. Why didn’t I just wait until tomorrow morning to come out here?” I asked myself. 

Suddenly, I heard a dog bark and then an unsettling yelp. I immediately knew that it was Sophie. It had to be her unless there was some other dog out here in the middle of these woods.

“Sophie! Come here girl!” I yelled as loud as I could with my hands cupped around my mouth, running in the direction that I thought the yelp came from. My feet crunched over the dead leaves on the ground and the sun was almost completely set. I had a sinking feeling in my stomach that I was going to be out here all night. 

“FUCK!” I yelled, “SOPHIE!”

I was still running when I heard a low growl, but couldn’t tell which direction it was coming from. I instantly stopped moving and held my breath. The sun had set completely by this point, making it difficult to get a good look of things, and I felt the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. I looked around only moving my eyeballs, but couldn’t see anything other than the trees. Wait. Is that something hanging from a tree?

I walked closer to the tree and realized that it was an animal hanging and the left leg had rope tied around it. It was too small to be a deer, but it looked to be hairless. “What in the hell is this and who would do this in the middle of these woods?” I whispered to myself. I felt fear spread throughout my body. “Whoever did this is probably close by.” I thought to myself.

Since the sun had set, it was difficult to see everything in great detail, but as I reached out to touch it, I realized that it was still breathing low, staggered breaths. “This thing had been hung upside down to die? What kind of sick fuck would do this? Poor thing.” I thought as I glanced around again, and not seeing anything out of the ordinary besides, you know, this fucking animal hanging from the tree. “This is some The Hills Have Eyes type of shit and I am not here for it.” I whispered to myself while shaking my head. I reached up to try and untie the rope, but that’s when I realized that it wasn’t a hairless animal. 

“What the fuck?” I asked myself.

I took my phone out and turned on the flashlight. This animal had been skinned. It was dark, but the phone light revealed the wet flesh and muscles. The smell of pennies hit my nostrils and it shone a glistening red and pink against the light. I felt my stomach churn. Moving the light further down the body of the animal, I noticed that there were tufts of fur on the leg that it was hanging from, and the fur was the same color as my dog. I reached up to untie the rope and realized it was a dog paw. This was a dog that had been skinned. 

This was Sophie and she was still alive.

I slowly backed away from Sophie. I wasn’t even sure what to do. “I untie her and then what? She’d been skinned alive.” I thought to myself, “There’s nothing I could ever do to help her… other than put her out of her misery.”  I felt dizzy and then suddenly I bent over and puked onto a pile of leaves on the ground. Shaking, I wiped the tears from my eyes and the puke off of my mouth onto my shirt and stepped towards her. 

I knew what I needed to do, I just couldn’t believe this was actually happening. I put both hands on her neck and made a sudden twist with my hands, breaking her neck. I put her nose to my nose and whispered, 

“I’m so sorry, Sophie. You didn’t deserve this. You were my best friend.” I stayed like that until she wasn’t breathing anymore. I let the tears fall from my eyes but tried my best to be quiet.

“What the fuck is happening?” I whispered to myself. “What do I even do now? Whoever did this will be back soon if they aren’t already nearby. I need to take a picture of this and file a police report when I get back.” I checked my phone and the battery life was at 1% and I had no bars of service. 

“Fuck!” I said to myself. “I need to think straight right now. I will process these emotions later.” I opened the camera app and took a photo of Sophie’s body hanging from the tree. Her tongue dangling from her mouth made me tear up and feel sick again. This time with tears of anger. I couldn’t just leave her hanging there, so I decided I needed to cut her down. I’d plan on coming back tomorrow to get her body, and hopefully I wouldn’t be alone. 

I knelt down onto one knee and took my backpack off, sliding the phone into a side pocket. I reached into the middle pocket of my backpack and dug around until I found my box cutter. I stood up and used it to cut the rope around her leg. Her body made a loud thump as it hit the ground. I knelt down over the body and sobbed into my own hands. I screamed as loud and deep as I could, letting all of the air out of my lungs.

 Snot ran from my nose and I felt so much rage and disgust. But I also wanted to know why and how someone, anyone, could do this. I’m not sure how much time had passed but it felt like hours. I stood up and leaned against a tree. I was feeling dizzy again and decided to try drinking some water. Hopefully I could keep it down. I grabbed the water bottle from my backpack and took a sip.

I heard leaves crunching nearby and crouched down, leaning my back into the base of the tree and pulled my backpack closer to myself. I slid the bottle back into the side pocket of my backpack and quietly put it back on while I skimmed through the woods. I couldn’t see anything. Not only was it too dark, but the woods looked thicker than they did earlier, but maybe that was just because the light was gone. I went to stand back up when I heard heavy breathing.

I heard it again, but this time, it sounded like it was coming from directly above me. And that’s when I smelled something putrid, almost acidic. I slowly turned my head to look up even though I didn’t want to. By this point, I could feel the warmth of whatever was breathing on the top of my head.

Whatever this thing was, it growled when we made eye contact. I can only explain this as a large humanoid creature. It was too dark to see complete details, but if I had to guess, it looked to be at least 7 feet tall. Its eyes shone a bright yellow and its mouth took up more than half of its face. Its teeth were jagged and long, just like its fingers. Its hands wrapped tightly around the tree branches it was supporting itself on. It had long, sharp claws that protruded out of those long fingers that looked similar to that of a sloth. Its skin was a dark, sleek color and didn’t look like it had any fur. I couldn’t make out anymore than that before I stood up and ran as fast and hard as I could. I didn’t even know what direction I was running. My heart was pounding and soon I felt that same pounding in my head from the adrenaline.

I fought the urge to scream and told myself this wasn’t actually happening. I heard a high pitched shriek and it sounded as if trees were shaking and creaking. It was in the trees chasing me. Similar to how an ape would swing from limb to limb, except this was much larger than any ape I had ever seen, and it absolutely did not resemble an ape. It was more alien than anything. But right now I needed to focus on getting away from whatever this was. I could try rationalizing this later.

I stopped when I felt like it wasn’t chasing me anymore. Breathless, I crouched down under a fallen tree and decided I’d wait it out here until I could gather myself. I was in shape and enjoyed running, but running from something I couldn’t comprehend was a completely different story. The fear aspect of it, the additional adrenaline rush, all of it felt like too much. I took my backpack off, pulled my sweatshirt out, and drank some water. It was cold outside since the sun had set and I was drenched in sweat. I used the sweatshirt to dry my face and chest off and then slid it back into my backpack. If I was going to spend all night in these woods with that creature, I needed to have some sort of a plan. I took my phone out of my backpack, but it wouldn’t light up. It was dead. 

“God fucking dammit!” I thought to myself as I smacked my head with both hands.

I had no idea where I was, and with my phone dead, there wasn’t much I could do to figure out where I was…. “Unless I could locate the creek.” I thought. 

“I could maybe follow it to Rend Lake, and even if I ended up going the wrong way, the source of the creek meets up to a bridge on the trail. If I can get back to the trail, then I could get back to my car and get the fuck out of here.”

I decided that I’d stay here for a little while longer and pulled my knees up to my chest. I rested my head on my knees and leaned my back onto the backpack between myself and the fallen tree. I needed to stay awake, but I just wanted to rest my eyes for a few more minutes. I closed my eyes as I took deep, long breaths. I felt my heart rate decline and focused on the wind blowing the leaves on the trees.

I was startled awake by the sound of an extremely shrill scream that was so loud I felt it in my chest. I forced myself to stay still even though I wanted to cover my ears and run. I looked around on the ground and didn’t see anything other than the woods, but this time I knew to look in the trees. And sure enough, there was that creature again. It wasn’t in a crouched position. 

No, it was jumping from tree to tree, but the creepiest thing about this, was that there was no sound other than the dead leaves hitting the ground as they were shaken free from the trees it jumped from. Its long arms and legs made it look easier than it could ever be for the average person to attempt, kind of like a spider walking across its own web. Its eyes glowing a bright yellow and seemed to be the only thing my eyes could see clearly. It seemed to almost be smiling, as if it was enjoying the hunt. My stomach dropped. I watched it drop its long tongue from its mouth, panting as it turned its head side to side. Maybe it wasn’t smiling, maybe this is how it hunted; scent and sound. Either way, this was creepy as fuck.

I needed to run, but I needed to be smart about it if I wanted my plan to work. I wasn’t trying to end up like Sophie. I also wasn’t sure if it had seen me, but sooner or later, it would be able to pick up my scent, but I think it already has. 

Despite my legs shaking from fear and adrenaline, I stood up and started running in the opposite direction of this creature. It would make sense if I could run back towards Sophie’s body because it wasn’t too far away from the creek. I guess that’s what I’ll do.

I ran in what I assumed was the correct direction, weaving in and out of trees. Jumping over fallen limbs and rocks. There were hardly any sounds besides my footsteps which seemed odd to me, but I didn’t want to stop and turn around to look, not yet. I really don’t know how long or how far I ran, but I stopped for a moment to catch my breath. I tried to lessen my breathing as I leaned the back of my head against a tree. Eyes darting from tree to tree trying to catch the glowing eyes of the creature, but I couldn’t see anything. I didn’t hear any leaves rustling or falling from trees either. 

My breathing had slowed enough by now that I decided to hold my breath and listen as hard as I could. I closed my eyes as I held my breath, listening intently. I could hear leaves crunching far away and then an owl. And I could hear a faint sound of running water. 

That must be the creek!

I exhaled sharply and listened for the running water. I needed to figure out exactly which direction to run. I think I figured it out so I started walking, listening as I walked. No, it wasn’t this direction, I needed to go a little more to the left. 

I could hear it getting louder, which meant I was finally headed in the right direction. I was listening so hard the entire time for another shriek and trees creaking under the weight of the being, that every other sound felt louder because I was so focused on noise. I was becoming paranoid, but for a valid reason.

I climbed over a fallen tree but slipped and fell down the side of it, scraping my knee. It didn’t cut that deep, but it was enough to sting and feel uncomfortable. I could feel the warm blood oozing from the scrape. It turned cold as the wind blew against it. I knelt down and wiped it off with my shirt. I looked to my right and saw mud, and then I saw the creek bank. Somehow I had actually made it to the creek.

I watched for the direction of the current. This helped me figure out which way to head and I decided to go up creek so I could find the trail a bit easier. Going down the creek would lead me to the lake, and since it was late and dark, there wouldn’t be any people out there. There was also a break in the tree coverage above the creek which allowed for some moonlight to break through. This made it a bit easier to see when I started walking along the creek bed.

I heard the creature shriek and it didn’t sound too far away. I wonder if it smelled the blood from my knee. “Fuck! I need to run. NOW.” I said to myself through gritted teeth. I pulled the strings on my backpack to tighten the straps and started running again, but this time I had a better idea of where I was going and felt confident of making it out of here.

At least, I hoped so.