The Ravine of Shadows: Dr. Lra Wen’s Encounter

For years, the disappearances in the Bluff Creek region haunted the Forest Service. Over a hundred hunters had vanished without a trace. Their camps found abandoned, tracks ending abruptly in the snow, searches yielding nothing but silence. The case files grew thicker, the answers more elusive.

Dr. Lra Wen, a botanist by training, never imagined she’d be drawn into the mystery. In April 2015, she was conducting botanical surveys under unusual circumstances. For eight months, the Forest Service had quietly asked specialists like her to document environmental anomalies—vegetation crushed in clustered patterns, tree bark stripped in vertical swaths, soil churned by something big. Always near the last known locations of missing hunters.

Lra wasn’t a tracker, but her fieldwork often put her in places few dared to go. Her reports had become crucial data points in the investigation. On that fateful day, her routine was interrupted by a silence so deep it felt physical—a stillness in the forest that signaled something large was present. Something the ecosystem itself seemed to fear.

She moved closer to marked trails, hoping for the comfort of human scent markers. But every missing hunter’s trail had ended in places just like this. That was when she heard the first footfall.

It was heavy—forty feet behind her. Lra turned, scanning the dense ferns and trees. Nothing. She waited, listening. Another footfall, closer and to her left. Not the four-point gait of a bear, nor the light tread of a deer, but something bipedal. Something walking upright. Something massive.

She began walking, then jogging, toward the nearest trail. Her GPS said she was two miles from the access road. The footfalls matched her pace exactly. When she sped up, they sped up. When she slowed, they slowed. It was too perfect to be coincidence.

Her pack contained bear spray, a whistle, and a satellite emergency beacon. But hours could mean nothing if something was truly hunting her. Was she about to meet the same fate as the missing hunters?

She angled right, trying to outmaneuver her pursuer. Each time she did, a sharp crack echoed from that direction—branches snapping, trees struck with tremendous force. It was steering her, funneling her away from safety. The message was clear: do not go that way.

Lra’s mind raced. Predators stalk prey, but they don’t redirect their quarry with such intent. Was she being pushed along the same path as those lost before her?

She broke left, pushing through ferns. Instantly, a massive shape shifted in her peripheral vision—a wall of dark fur moving between trees, accompanied by a deep, irritated exhale. She veered back to her original course, the presence resuming its measured pursuit.

Fear took over. She ran. The terrain grew rougher, moss-slick logs and tangled roots. Each stumble, the footfalls paused, waiting for her to recover. It didn’t want her injured. It wanted her mobile.

Through gaps in the canopy, she glimpsed her pursuer—a massive shoulder covered in reddish-brown hair, an arm swinging with a distinctly nonhuman gait, a head too large and robust for any known animal. The glimpses added up to a composite image that defied everything she knew about North American wildlife.

The forest funneled her into hidden pathways, undergrowth cleared or trampled. Were these the same routes the missing hunters had walked moments before vanishing? Her GPS lost signal beneath the dense canopy. She was moving steadily away from any marked trail.

A fallen redwood blocked her path. She veered right—another sharp grunt. She reversed, scrambling left. The creature was communicating, not with words, but with sound and position, teaching her the boundaries of acceptable movement.

The forest began to slope downward, trees growing larger, the terrain older and untouched. The footfalls continued, relentless, driving her deeper into wilderness that felt alien. She considered hiding, fighting, activating her emergency beacon—but none of these seemed possible.

A creek appeared, fifteen feet wide, running fast. She splashed through, pausing on the far bank. The footfalls stopped. Silence. Then, from the treeline, the creature emerged, standing fully upright—nine feet tall, impossibly broad shoulders, arms hanging past its knees, thick reddish-brown hair.

It watched her with amber eyes, perfectly still. Lra’s hand tightened on her bear spray, but she knew it was useless. The creature did not cross. It wanted her to see it, to understand what was hunting her.

Then it stepped forward, and Lra ran. The pursuit resumed, more intense. She had seen it clearly now—locked eyes with something that should not exist.

The undergrowth showed signs of regular passage—vegetation trampled into winding paths. This was not wilderness. It was inhabited territory, shaped by something intelligent.

The silence deepened. No birds, no insects, even the wind seemed muted. Lra knew enough ecology to understand: the absence of prey meant an apex predator so dominant, every other creature fled its territory.

Her legs burned, her breathing ragged. She tried to use the terrain, descending into a ravine. The creature repositioned above her, swift and sure-footed. At the top, she paused, looking back. The creature stood on the opposite ridge, studying her. It raised one massive arm and pointed—deeper into the forest.

She hesitated. The creature bellowed, a sound like nothing she’d ever heard—too deep to be human, too structured to be animal. A command, a warning, a promise of consequences. Terrified, she ran where it pointed.

The forest thinned, the air grew cooler, carrying the sweet-rotten odor of decay. The creature’s vocalizations changed—sharp, urgent clicks and pops. From ahead, she heard a response. More than one creature. She was running toward others.

The ground sloped steeply downward. Lra half ran, half slid, tumbling into a chute of mud and decomposing vegetation. At the bottom, her hand sank into something not mud—fabric, then bone.

She scrambled to her feet. Bodies. The ravine floor was covered with them—dozens of human remains, some bones, some recent. Hunting gear scattered among the dead. This was a dumping ground, a killing field.

The creature descended into the ravine, towering over her. It approached, but did not attack. Instead, it gently lifted her, setting her among the bodies. It wanted her to witness this, to understand.

Why her? Why show her the truth?

She stood frozen among the dead. The creature watched, waiting for a reaction. The bodies were arranged, limbs straightened, gear placed beside them—ritual, ceremony, symbolic thinking.

A vocalization rolled across the canopy—lower, questioning. The creature beside her tensed. Another call answered, sharper, angrier. Two giants appeared at the rim, scarred and black. The smaller creature—the one who had chased her—stood between her and the newcomers, vocalizing desperately.

The giants dropped into the ravine, confronting the smaller one. Harsh sounds, aggressive gestures. One spotted her, roaring. The giants climbed toward her. The smaller creature slammed into them, breaking their climb, but was swatted aside.

Lra climbed, using their fight as distraction. She reached the rim as the ravine collapsed behind her. She ran, tumbling down a slope, battered but alive.

For hours, she limped through the forest, haunted by what she’d seen. She thought of the smaller creature—her pursuer, her protector, perhaps even her savior. Whatever its intentions, it had made a choice no one would ever believe.

Dr. Lra Wen left Bluff Creek and never returned. Some truths are meant to stay hidden in the forest.