I love exploring, I love hiking, backpacking, adventuring, anything that involves the outside. I usually only went to near by mountains in my home town of Seattle. But I had saved up some of my money. I had surprised my girl friend with a flight to New Mexico. She was extremely happy as was expected. But anyways, no one cares about why we went, in fact if I wrote the entire thing of why we went I would be dead by the end.
When we arrived we took a bus to our hotel and set up. We went to bed and woke up the next morning, we hitched a ride to the mountain range.
“So what makes you come here?” Said the man tilting his head back to look at me.
“Oh me and girlfriend love hiking and I saved up some money so I decided to go to one of the spots I’ve been waiting to go for years!” I said as I split open a smile and looked at my girlfriend.
“Oh I used to love hiking too, Wheeler is one of the best spots. Just make sure you don’t go into any of the caves there.” He said as his smile turned into a slight frown.
“Don’t worry we’ll make sure to be safe! Thank you so much for the ride!” I said as I grabbed my bag and opened the door.
“Hey come here” The man said as I walked to him “Do, not, go, into, the, caves.” He said sternly as he gripped my shoulder from the window of the car.
“Got it.” I said as I backed up slowly, looking at the man with questioning eyes. “Come on honey! Let’s go up, uhhh, why don’t you pick the trail!” I said as the car sped away, the man never losing eye contact with me.
“Let’s go up 7! It looks like the most scenic route, that okay with you honey?” She said as she turned around and looked at me.
“Yeah sounds like a plan, let’s just stay out of the way of any caves.” I said as I tried to shake off the feeling of that man.
We hiked for a few hours before needing to take a solid rest out on a small flat ground, next to a slim looking cave. I made sure to go as far away from it as I could. We ate our sandwich’s and chatted for a bit before I heard the question I was dreading.
“Do you wanna go see what’s in that cave? I dare youuuu.” She giggled before she looked at me. “Are you okay? You look stressed? You don’t have to go if you don’t want.” She said grabbing my hand.
“No no, I want to, that guy was just being really weird about the caves, I wanna see what he was talking about though…” I said as I glanced over to the large slit in the wall.
I stood up and grabbed my flashlight out of my bag.
“Wish me luck!” I said as I put one foot down the cave.
I took another step only to realize there was nothing there, I slipped and feel down the gap. I woke up a while later.
“Ugh what the hell, Cora! Cora can you hear me!?” I shouted as I looked up into the pure black hole. “Shit! I said as I turned on my light, to revel a small circular shaped room with painting on the walls. “Oh wow, cave painting, I wonder if anyone has found this before!” I said as I limped over to the paintings.
It appeared to be dozens of paintings of humans dancing around a tall human, surrounded by what looked like meats and fruits.
“Looks like a traditional sacrifice of food to a hay figure, this is really interesting.” I said as I pulled out my phone to take pictures.
*Foot steps*
I dropped my phone and yelled “CORA! IS THAT YOU!? OH CORA YOU FOUND ME A WAY OUT DIDN’T YOU I LOVE YOU SO MUCH-“ I yelled in glee as I turned around, only to see 2 white dots looking back at me from a branch of the cave my light I could not reach. “Cora?” I said as my mouth dropped into a terrified frown and looked at the figure.
The figure made some strange noises as it walked out of the dark.
It was a taller emaciated figure, with a darker colored skin tone and dents where it’s eyes should be. It looked down at me and started speaking in a language I could not understand. It reached it’s hand out, long ingrown claws on it’s hand. I some how felt calmed by it. I grabbed it’s hand and everything had faded to black.
When I woke up I was in the same cave. Dozens of small people dancing around me throwing piece of meat and apples at me. I looked down at the meat and it did not look normal, I than started to question why people are dancing around me. I looked at my finger just for my normal fingers to be replaced by claw like digits. I looked up and realized there was a rock ledge that I could grab on to, thanks to my new found height. I didn’t have time to be scared or question what was happening, what meat was that, where is Cora. I stomped over the people, a few being crushed under my feet, yet they kept dancing, I grabbed onto the ledge and pulled myself up and out of the cave. Poking my head through the slit I did not see Cora, our things were there, and there was a small red stain by the entrance.
They killed her didn’t they, I said to myself as I dropped back down the cave. I stomped and killed every person in that cave, but they kept coming, they kept coming from a small slit in the wall I could not fit through. I could not bring myself to eat the meat they are throwing at me, and I know I would be shot if I went outside, I tried speaking but I cannot understand myself.
I am now poking my arms and head out of the cave, trying to gently type this out on my phone, I had to sand down my claws with the stone so I wouldn’t break my phone, oh god it hurt. I hope that this will reach someone, I only have a single bar.
I can still hear them dancing and singing.
Please, for the love of god. Do. Not. Go. In. The. Caves.