Latest / The Mind of a Man / 5 Real SKINWALKER Encounters That Can_t Be Explained _ True Horror Stories

Transcript

5 Real SKINWALKER Encounters That Can_t Be Explained _ True Horror Stories · The Mind of a Man

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: There's a reason the Navajo elders tell their children never
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: to speak this name after dark. There is a reason
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: why entire reservations go silent when headlights catch something running
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: on two legs beside the highway at 70 miles per hour.
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: There is a reason why families abandon homes that have
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: stood for generations after seeing a face pressed against the window,
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: a face that belongs to someone they buried years ago.
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: This isn't Mythology. This isn't folklore passed down through drunken
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: campfire tailies. These are five documented encounters with something that
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: shouldn't exist. Something that indigenous cultures have feared for centuries.
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: Something that modern science refuses to acknowledge because acknowledging it
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: would mean admitting that we share this world with predators
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: who wear human skin like a costume. What you're about
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: to hear will disturb you. It should. Because these witnesses
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: broke a sacred taboo to share their stories. And in
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: some traditions... That means the Skinwalker now knows their name.
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: Sarah Chun wasn't superstitious. The 28-year-old data analyst had driven
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: the stretch of Route 191 through Arizona dozens of times
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: during her quarterly visits to see her grandmother in Bluff, Utah.
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: Sheedy heard the stories. Everyone who lives near Navajo Land
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: has heard the stories, but Sarah categorized them alongside Bigfoot
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: sightings and alien abductions. Colorful regional folklore that made for
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: entertaining podcasts during long desert drives. That dismissive attitude shattered
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: on October 13, 2019. At approximately 9.47 p.m., when something
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: began running alongside her Honda Civic at 65 miles per hour,
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: Sarah first noticed it in her peripheral vision. A dark, shape-keeping,
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: perfect pace with her vehicle along the empty two-lane highway.
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: She assumed it was a trick of the moonlight. Shadows
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: cast by the towering rock formations that lined the road
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: like ancient sentinels. But when she glanced directly at her
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: driver's side window, her blood went cold. There, running parallel
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: to her car with an unnatural, loping stride, was something
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: that looked almost human. Its body was too long. Its
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: limbs moved wrong, joints bending at angles that made her
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: stomach turn. Most disturbing was its head, which turned to
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: face her while the body continued running forward. Even through
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: the tinted window and darkness, Sarah could see its eyes
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: reflective and yellow like an animal's butt positioned. In a
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: face that was trying very hard to look human and
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: failing in a way that triggered every primal instinct screaming.
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: That this thing was wrong. Fundamentally wrong. Sarah's hands trembled
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: on the steering wheel as she pressed the accelerator. Watching
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: the speedometer climb to 70, then 75, then 80 miles
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: per hour. The thing kept pace effortlessly. It wasn't running
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: faster to keep up with her acceleration. It simply adjusted
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: its speed as if running at 80 miles per hour
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: was no different than walking. Through her rising panic, Sarah
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: noticed details that would later make her question her own sanity.
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: The creature wasn't wearing clothes exactly, but appeared to be
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: covered in something that looked like poorly fitted skin, hanging
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: loose in places and stretched tight in others, like a
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: suit that didn't quite fit. Its movements were fluid yet wrong.
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: like watching a film where every third frame has been removed,
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: creating a stuttering, unnatural motion. Sarah grabbed her phone with
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: one hand, keeping the other locked on the wheel and
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: tried to capture video. But the moment she raised the camera,
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: the creature dropped to all fours and accelerated ahead of
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: her vehicle, crossing the highway in three impossible bounds before
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: vanishing into the darkness of the desert. She didn't slow down.
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: She didn't stop. Sarah drove straight through to Bluff, covering
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: the remaining 90 miles in just over an hour. her
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: heart hammering so hard she could feel it in her throat.
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: When she finally pulled into her grandmother's driveway at nearly midnight,
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: she was shaking so badly she could barely hold her
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: phone to call inside. Her grandmother, a full-blooded Navajo woman
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: who'd lived on the reservation for 73 years, took one
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: look at Sarah's face and knew she didn't ask questions.
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: She didn't let Sarah explain. Instead, she performed a blessing
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: ceremony right there in the driveway. burning sage and cedar
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: while speaking in Dain Bazaar. The Navajo language Sarah had
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: never bothered to learn. Only afterward, once they were safely
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: inside with every window covered and door locked, did her
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: grandmother allow Sarah to speak about what she'd seen. The
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: old woman listened without interrupting, her face growing more troubled
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: with each detail. When Sarah finished, her grandmother was silent
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: for a long moment before saying something that made Sarah's
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: blood run cold for the second time that night. It
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: did unattack you, because it was Una hunting. It was
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: studying you. They do that sometimes, when they find someone
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: who doesn't believe. They want you to see them. They
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: want you to know they're real. And now that you've
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: seen it, now that you know, it knows where you live.
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: Sarah tried to rationalize what she'd seen. Maybe it was
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: a person on some kind of vehicle, a motorcycle, or
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: a TV that she hadn't heard over her car's engine.
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: Maybe it was a large animal. a wolf or coyote
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: that looked strange in the darkness, and her frightened mind
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: had transformed into something more sinister. But these explanations fell
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: apart under scrutiny. No motorcycle or a TV could have
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: moved that silently or transitioned from two legs to four
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: with such fluid ease. No natural animal had proportions like
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: what she'd witnessed, and certainly none could have maintained eye
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: contact with her while running at highway speeds. In the
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: days following the encounter, Sarah experienced phenomena that defied rational explanations.
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: She would hear scratching sounds outside her apartment in Phoenix,
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: always at 3 a.m., always in the same pattern, three
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: slow scrapes, followed by silence, then three more. Her neighbors
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: heard nothing. Security cameras in her building showed empty hallways
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: and parking lots, but Sarah would wake to find handprints
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: on her windows, smudged and greasy, with fingers that were
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: too long and joints that bent backward. She consulted a psychiatrist.
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: wondering if she'd experienced some kind of stress-induced hallucination or
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: psychotic break. The therapist was professional in kind, suggesting possible
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: explanations involving sleep deprivation and highway hypnosis. But Sarah could
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: tell the woman didn't truly believe her own theories. How
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: could highway hypnosis explain the handprints? How could sleep deprivation
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: account for the way her grandmother had reacted? Performing ceremonies
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: she'd never mentioned in Sarah's entire life. Three weeks after
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: the encounter, Sarah's grandmother called with an unusual request. She
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: wanted Sarah to attend a traditional healing ceremony being held
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: on the reservation. Sarah drove back to Utah, this time
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: during daylight hours and with a can of bear mace
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: in her passenger seat, though what good pepper spray would
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: do against something that could run 80 miles per hour
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: was unclear even to her. The ceremony was conducted by Ahatui,
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: a traditional Navajo medicine man. and involved rituals that Sarah
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: had only seen referenced in anthropology textbooks. The medicine man
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: never explicitly mentioned skinwalkers, apparently. Even in the context of
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: a healing ceremony, speaking their name was considered dangerous, but,
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: he spoke about, those who walk on four legs and two,
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: and the ones who wear stolen skins. He explained that
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: these beings were not demons or spirits, but were once humans.
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: Medicine men who had betrayed their sacred oaths and performed
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: forbidden rituals to gain the power of transformation. They could
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: take the shape of any animal whose skin they wore,
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: but the transformation was imperfect, leaving tails that observant eyes
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: could catch. Eyes that reflected light wrong. Movements that didn't
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: quite match natural patterns. Voices that could mimic human speech,
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: but lacked emotional resonance. The ceremony lasted until dawn, and
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: when it was over, Sarah felt something lift from her shoulders.
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: a weight she hadn't consciously realized she was carrying. The
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: scratching sounds at her apartment stopped that night and never returned.
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: The second encounter happened three years earlier in rural New Mexico,
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: on a cattle ranch owned by the Morrison family, who'd
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: worked the land for four generations. Tom Morrison was 56
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: years old, a practical man who dealt in concrete realities
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: like feed costs, market prices, and veterinary bills. He had
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: no patience for what he called reservation superstitions. despite living
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: just 15 miles from Navajo land. That attitude changed forever
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: during a two-week period in August 2016, when something began
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: systematically terrorizing his livestock in ways that defied every pattern
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: of predation Tom had seen in 40 years of ranching.
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: It started with the horses. Tom's ranch ran 30 head-of-quarter horses,
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: animals he knew individually and had raised from foals. These
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: were calm, well-trained horses accustomed to the sounds and smells
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: of the desert. But suddenly they began displaying signs of
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: extreme distress. They would cluster together in the far corner
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: of their pasture, refusing to graze, their ears pinned back
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: and eyes rolling white with terror. At night, Tom could
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: hear them screaming not the normal whinny or neigh, but
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: genuine screams of animal fear that made his skin crawl.
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: He checked the pasture for obvious threats. Rattlesnakes, broken fencing,
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: Anything that might spook the herd. He found nothing. Then
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: the cattle started dying. Tom discovered the first dead cow
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: on a Tuesday morning. The Hereford heifer had been healthy
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: the previous evening during his routine check, but now lay
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: in the center of the pasture with its neck broken
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: and its body twisted at an impossible angle. What disturbed
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: Tom most wasn't just the death itself, but the details
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: surrounding it. There were no signs of a struggle. The
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: grass around the corpse was undisturbed. as if the 800-pound
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: animal had simply been lifted and dropped. More unsettling were
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: the tracks Tom found, circling the body footprints that started
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: out looking like coyote prints but gradually shifted, becoming more
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: human-like the closer they got to the dead cow. Tom
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: took photos and called animal control, suspecting perhaps a rabid predator.
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: But the officer who responded went pale, looking at the scene.
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: He took measurements, snapped his own photos, and told Tom
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: to call him immediately if anything else happened. The officer
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: was Navajo, and Tom caught him making a gesture that
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: looked like a warning sign before he left. Three nights later,
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: Tom's wife Martha woke him at 2 a.m. gripping his
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: arm so hard her nails drew blood. There's someone walking
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: around outside, she whispered. Tom grabbed the shotgun he kept
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: in the bedroom closet and moved to the window. Their
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: ranch house set on a slight rise, offering a clear
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: view of the pastures and outbuildings. The moon was three-quarters full,
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: providing enough light to see reasonably well, and what Tom
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: saw made him tighten his grip on the shotgun until
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: his knuckles went white. A figure was moving through his
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: cattle herd. From a distance, It looked almost human bipedal,
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: roughly man-sized butt. Its movements were wrong. It walked with
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: a strange, stilted gait, as if it had only recently
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: learned how to move on to legs and had UNT
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: quite mastered the mechanics. The cattle normally curious animals that
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: would approach humans for food fled from this figure in
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: absolute terror, stampeding to the far side of the pasture
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: and pressing against the fence so hard that Tom could
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: hear the wire creaking from inside his house. Tom watched
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: the figure move between his truck and barn, always staying
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: in shadow, never quite presenting a clear target. At one point,
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: it paused near the barn door and turned to face
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: the house, even from a hundred yards away, even through
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: the window glass and darkness. Tom swore he saw its
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: eyes catch the light and gleam yellow-green, like a cat's
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: eyes but larger. positioned in a face that was trying
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: to be human but missed some crucial element that would
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: make it convincing. He raised the shotgun and fired through
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: the screen of his window, the blast shattering the night silence.
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: The figure didn't run. It didn't even flinch. Instead, it
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: dropped to all fours with fluid grace that no human
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: could replicate and bounded away into the darkness, clearing Tom's
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: six-foot fence in a single leap and vanishing into the desert.
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: Tom and Martha didn't sleep that night. They sat in
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: their living room with every light burning, the shotgun across
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: Tom's lap, and Martha on the phone with their nearest neighbor,
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: five miles away. When dawn finally came, Tom went outside
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: to investigate. He found his cattle in distress, several with
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: lacerations on their flanks that looked like claw marks, others
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: with clumps of hide missing as if something had tried
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: to grab them. Near the barn door where the figure
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: had stood, Tom found more of the transforming track starting
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: as something like coyote paws. gradually shifting to something that
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: looked disturbingly human, then shifting back again. He also found
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: something that made his stomach turn, a patch of what
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: looked like shed skin, leathery and gray, covered in coarse hair.
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: Tom sealed it in a plastic bag, though he'd never
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: be able to bring himself to have it analyzed. The
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: attacks continued for another ten days, always at night, always
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: with the same pattern of that figure walking through. Tom's
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: property like it owned the place, terrorizing his animals. and
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: occasionally leaving dead livestock arranged in ways that felt deliberately mocking.
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: Tom installed motion sensor lights, set up trail cameras, even
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: slept in his barn with a shotgun for three consecutive nights.
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: The lights would trigger with no visible cause. The trail
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: cameras captured only static-filled images, or else impossibly blurred shapes
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: that looked like they were moving at high speed, even
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: though the timestamps showed only seconds between frames. On the
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: nights Tom slept in the barn, he would hear footsteps
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: on the roof nut, Animal footsteps, but something heavy walking upright,
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: pacing back and forth. For I was while Tom sat
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: below with his weapon raised and his heart hammering. Then,
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: as suddenly as it began, the activity stopped. Tom woke
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: one morning to find his horses calm, his cattle grazing normally,
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: and an absence of the oppressive dread that had hung
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: over his property for two weeks. The only evidence that
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: anything unusual had occurred was one final marker. a deer
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: carcass hanging from his barn-esque rafters, drained of blood and
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: positioned in a way that would have required a human
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: intelligence to accomplish. Tom cut it down, burned it, and
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: never spoke publicly about what had happened on his ranch.
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: He did, however, reach out to a Navajo elder he
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: knew through livestock auctions, a man named Paul Yazzie, who
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: listened to Tom's story and nodded gravely. Paul explained that
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: skinwalkers were territorial and that Tom S. Ranch apparently sat
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: on or near a route that one of these beings
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: used regularly. The elder performed a blessing ceremony on Tom S.'
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: property and told him that the attacks had likely stopped
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: not because the creature had lost interest but because it
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: had made its point this land was under its dominion
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: and Tom's presence was tolerated, not welcomed. Paul advised Tom
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: to leave regular offerings of tobacco and cornmeal at the
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: edge of his property. never to shoot at any animal
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: that displayed unusual behavior and above, or never to speak
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: about what he'd seen during the hours between sunset and sunrise.
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: Tom Morrison, the practical rancher who'd scoffed at superstitious nonsense
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: his entire life, followed every instruction to the letter. He
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: still runs his ranch today, but he has added security
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: measures that have nothing to do with keeping out human intruders.
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: Iron horseshoes nailed above every door, salt lines across every threshold,
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: and sage bundles that he burns religiously at dusk. His
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: neighbors think he's become paranoid in his old age. Tom
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: doesn't bother correcting them. He knows what walks his land
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: after dark, and he knows that there are some things
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: worse than being called paranoid-like. Being unprepared for the night
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: when that thing decides to come back. The third encounter
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: takes us to the mountains of southern Utah, where what
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: should have been a peaceful camping trip turned into a nightmare.
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: Jake Rodriguez and his girlfriend Amanda were experienced outdoorsmen, both
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: in their early 30s. who regularly spent weekends hiking and
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: camping in the Southwest's most remote locations. In July 2018,
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: they planned a three-day camping trip to a location near Blanding, Utah,
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: on public land. That bordered the Navajo reservation. They'd researched
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: the area carefully, obtained the necessary permits, and informed family
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: members of their exact location and expected return date. Everything
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: went perfectly for the first day and a half. They
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: hiked to a secluded canyon where they set up camp
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: near a seasonal stream, spent the afternoon photographing rock formations
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: and wildlife, and cooked dinner over their camp stove as
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: the sun set behind the canyon walls. The trouble started
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: that first night, around 11 p.m., when Jake woke to
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: the sound of something circling their tent. At first, he
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: assumed it was a coyote or fox, curious about the
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: smell of their food. Even though they'd properly secured everything
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: in bare canisters, as per wilderness protocol, But as he
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: lay in his sleeping bag listening, Jake realized the footsteps
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: were wrong. They were too heavy, too deliberate, and they
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: were walking in a perfect circle around the tent, always
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: maintaining the same distance, never getting closer or farther away.
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: Jake unzipped the tent's rainfly slightly and shined his flashlight
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: into the darkness. The footsteps stopped immediately. In the beam
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: of his light, Jake could see the canyon walls rising
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: on either side. The scattered scrub brush... His and Amanda's
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: hiking boots lined up outside the tent bed noni mal.
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: He kept the light sweeping back and forth for several minutes.
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: But whatever had been circling their tent had vanished silently.
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: Jake convinced himself it had been a dream, or maybe
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: a small animal that the flashlight had scared away, and
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: went back to sleep. But Amanda had been awake too,
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: and she whispered that she D also heard the footsteps,
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: and that they D sounded like a person walking upright,
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: not an animal on four legs. They didn't discuss it further.
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: both of them trying to rationalize the experience, both secretly
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: unsettled but not wanting to alarm the other. The second
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: night was when everything fell apart. Jake and Amanda had
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: hiked during the day, summited a nearby peak, and returned
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: to their campsite exhausted and ready for sleep. They had dinner,
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: secured their food, and were in their tent by 9 p.m.,
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: hoping to wake early for sunrise photos. Jake was pulled
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: from sleep sometime after midnight by Amanda shaking him violently.
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: There's something outside, she hissed. It's trying to talk. Jake
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: listened it. Over the sound of wind in the canyon,
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: he could hear a voice calling out. At first, it
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: sounded like someone shouting for help, a woman's voice echoing
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: off the canyon walls. Hello? Is someone there? I'm lost.
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: Please help me. Jake's first instinct was to unzip the
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: tent and help whoever was in distress. But Amanda grabbed
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: his arm. Listen to it, she whispered urgently. Really? Listen,
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: Jake froze. The voice was calling for help, forming the
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: right words. But something about it was fundamentally wrong. There
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: was no emotion in it. The words came out in strange,
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: stilted rhythms, like someone who'd learned human speech phonetically but
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: didn't understand the meaning behind the sounds. And underneath the words...
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: Jake could hear something else a-clicking, chittering noise, like the
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: sound insects make, as if the voice were being produced
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: by something that didn't have human vocal cords and was
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: struggling to mimic them. Hello? Is someone there? I'm lost. Please,
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: help me. The exact same words, in the exact same tone,
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: repeated like a recording. Jake grabbed his flashlight in his
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: hunting nifepetho defense. He knew, but it was all he had.
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: The voice continued. moving around their campsite, always staying just behind.
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: beyond the reach of visibility. Hello? Is someone there? I'm lost.
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: Please help me. And then, horrifyingly, it added new words.
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: Words that made Amanda stifle a scream. Amanda. Jake. I
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: can see your tent. Why won't you help me? Neither
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: of them had spoken their names aloud since arriving at
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: the campsite. There was no way anyone could know who
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: they were unless they'd somehow found their permits, or unless
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: Endless thought made Jake's blood run cold. This thing had
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: been watching them, learning about them, preparing. The voice began
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: to change. It shifted from a woman's voice to a
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: man's voice, then to something that sounded like a child,
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: then to something that wasn't quite any of them. Jake. Amanda.
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: Come out. We want to see you. We want to
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: meet you properly. We. The voice had said we. Jake
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: made a decision. He grabbed their packs, already loaded with
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: their essential gear, and told Amanda they were leaving immediately.
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: She didn't argue. They put on their boots inside the tent,
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: shouldered their packs, and Jake unzipped the tent entrance, knifing
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: one hand and flashlight in the other. The voice had
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: fallen silent. which somehow was worse than the talking. They
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: emerged from the tent into the canyon night, and Jake
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: swept his flashlight in wide arcs. Looking for the source
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: of the voice, what he saw instead stopped him in
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: his tracks. Standing at the edge of their campsite, just
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: beyond the ring of stones where they'd made their fire,
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: was a figure. In the flashlight beam, it looked almost
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: human tall. Thin. Wearing what might have been clothes or
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: might have been badly preserved skin, Jake couldn't tell which.
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: Its arms were too long, hanging past its knees, and
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: its head tilted at an angle that was wrong, cocked
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: to one side like a curious dog but rotating too far,
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: nearly ninety degrees. Most horrifying were its eyes, large and reflective,
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: catching Jick's flashlight and throwing it back in a green-yellow
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: gleam that made him think of predators, of things that
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: hunted in darkness. The figure took a step forward, its
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: movement jerky and uncoordinated, and opened its mouth. The voice
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: that came out was the same one they'd heard calling
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: for help, but now Jake could see that the mouth
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: wasn't moving in sync with the words, like a badly
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: dubbed foreign film. Why are you leaving? We haven't finished talking.
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: Jake didn't respond. He grabbed Amanda's hand and they ran,
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: abandoning their tent and most of their gear, keeping only
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: their packs and Jake's flashlight. They ran through the canyon
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: in the darkness, stumbling over rocks and brush. driven by
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: pure animal panic. Behind them, they could hear something following,
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: not running but walking at a steady pace, that somehow
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: kept it right behind them no matter how fast they moved.
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: They could hear it breathing wet, raspy breaths that sounded
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: too large to come from human lungs. They could hear
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: it speaking in that flat, emotionless voice, saying things that
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: made no sense, fragments of conversation, lines from commercials. Someone's
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: phone number repeated over and over, the child's laughter that
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: went on too long and rose in pitch until it
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: became a shriek. Jake and Amanda ran for what felt
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: like hours, but was probably only forty-five minutes, following the
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: canyon downstream toward where they'd parked their truck at the trailhead.
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: The sounds of pursuit faded gradually, and by the time
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: they reached their vehicle at nearly three a.m., the only
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: sounds were their own gasping breaths and the desert wind.
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: They threw their packs in the truck bed and drove
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: without stopping. until they reached Blanding where they pulled into
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: a gas station and sat in the parking lot, with
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: the doors locked until sunrise too frightened to even speak
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: about what they'd experienced. They reported the incident to local authorities,
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: framing it as a suspicious person at their campsite. But
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: Jake could tell the ranger who took their report didn't
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: believe they'd encountered a human. When Jake mentioned the voice, mimicry,
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: and the figure's strange movements, the ranger's expression shifted from
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: professional skepticism... something like recognition. He asked if Jake was
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: familiar with Navajo traditions, if he knew about the beings
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: that the indigenous people of this region feared and refused
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: to name. Jake said he wasn't, and the rangers simply
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: nodded and advised them never to camp in that particular
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: canyon again. Especially not alone. Especially not at night. Jake
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: and Amanda never retrieved their tent or the gear they'd abandoned.
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: They discussed going back with a larger group during daylight hours,
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: but every time, They seriously considered it they would remember
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: that voice calling their names. Remember, those eyes reflecting green
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: in the flashlight beam and the conversation would end. Three
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: months after the encounter, Amanda admitted that she still couldn't
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: sleep without every light in her apartment turned on. She'd
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: started seeing a therapist for anxiety and nightmares. Though she
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: couldn't bring herself to tell the therapist the true source
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: of her true mahow. Could she explain that she'd been
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: stalked through a canyon by something that wore humanity like
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: a poorly fitted mask? Jake threw himself into research, reading
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: everything he could find about Skinwalker legends, trying to understand
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: what they'd encountered. The descriptions matched too perfectly to dismiss.
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: The mimicked voices. The unnatural movements. The sense of intelligence
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: and malicious intent. He learned that according to Navajo tradition,
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: Skinwalkers were witches who had achieved the ability to transform
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: by committing acts so evil that they broke their own
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: humanity murder of close relatives, desecration of sacred sites, rituals
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: involving human remains. They wore the skins of animals to
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: take their forms. But the transformation was always imperfect, because evil,
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: no matter how powerful, could never perfectly imitate the natural
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: world's innocence. Jake also learned something that chilled him. Some
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: traditions held that once a skinwalker had identified you, had
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: learned your name, and seen your face, it could find
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: you anywhere. The distance didn't matter. It could show up
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: at your home, your workplace, anywhere you felt safe. Because
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: to a skinwalker, space and distance operated differently than for
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: ordinary humans or animals. Jake started noticing things after that.
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: Shadows had moved wrong in his peripheral vision. The feeling
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: of being watched when he was alone. Once, he swore
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: he saw something standing in his backyard at 3 a.m.,
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: something tall and thin that vanished the moment he turned
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: on the porch light. He never told Amanda about these incidents.
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: She was struggling enough with her own trauma, but Jake
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: began carrying sage in his pocket, a practice he'd read
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: about in his research. He had a medicine bundle made
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: by a dine healer he found through an online forum
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: for people who'd had similar encounters. He performed smudging rituals
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: in his house every new moon. burning sage and cedar
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: and saying prayers he'd learned phonetically without fully understanding their meaning.
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: His friends thought he'd become paranoid or obsessive. Jake didn't care.
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: He'd seen something in that canyon that shattered his understanding
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: of reality, and if performing these rituals made him feel safer,
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: if they gave him some sense of control over a
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: situation that had left him feeling utterly helpless, then he
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: would do them religiously. The fourth encounter takes place in
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: an unexpected setting not the remote desert or isolated canyons.
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: but a hospital in Colorado Springs, where a night shift
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: nurse named Patricia Williams experienced something that would end her
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: 20-year nursing career. Patricia was 52 years old, a veteran
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: of countless night shifts in the ice, comfortable with the
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: rhythms of the hospital after dark. When most of the
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: staff went home and the building settled into its nighttime quiet,
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: she'd seen patients die, had comforted grieving families, had witnessed
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: the full spectrum of human suffering and resilience. Patricia considered
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: herself unflappable. Grounded in medical science and rational thought, that
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: worldview collapsed during a two-night period in November 2017, when
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: something that was definitely not a patient began appearing in
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: the ICU's hallways. It started with reports from other nurses
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: that a patient's family member was wandering the halls, ignoring
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: visiting hour restrictions and entering rooms where they weren't authorized.
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: Security was called multiple times, but whenever guards arrived... The
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: mysterious visitor had vanished. Patricia was working the Wednesday night
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: shift when she first encountered the intruder. She was doing
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: her midnight rounds, checking on her six patients, when she
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: noticed someone standing at the far end of the hallway,
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: near the supply closet. The figure was tall and thin,
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: dressed in what looked like oversized clothes that hung awkwardly
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: on its frame. Its posture was wrong shoulders hunched forward
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: too far, had tilted at an odd angle as if
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: it were listening to something no one else could hear.
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: Patricia called out, asking if she could help them find something,
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: but the figure didn't respond. It simply stood there, motionless,
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: facing away from her. Patricia felt a prickle of unease,
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: but approached anyway, though. ICU was a secure floor, and
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: whoever this was should not have been able to access
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: it without going through the locked doors at the nurse's station.
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: As she got closer, maybe twenty feet away, the figure
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: turned to face her, and Patricia's professional composure shattered. The
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: face was wrong. It looked human at first. Glanced to eyes.
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: A nose. A mouth, but... The proportions were off. The
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: eyes were too far apart. The mouth too wide. Stretching
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: across the face in a way that reminded Patricia of
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: a snake unhinging its jaw. And the skin had a strange,
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: waxy quality. Like a department store mannequin. Not quite matching
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: the text. of living flesh. Patricia stopped walking. Every instinct
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: screamed at her to run. But a rational mind kept
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: insisting this had to be a person. Maybe someone with
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: a medical condition that affected their appearance. Someone who was
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: lost and confused. Can I help you find someone? She asked,
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: her voice steadier than she felt. The figure's mouth opened,
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: and a voice came out that sounded like it was
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: being played through a broken speaker, crackling and distorted. I'm
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: looking for my mother. She's here. She's dying. The words
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: were right, but the delivery was flat, emotionless, like a
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: child reciting memorized lines without understanding them. Patricia checked a
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: mental roster of patients. There was a woman in room
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: 14 who was indeed dying, elderly and with no family present,
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: according to her chart. What's your mother's name? Patricia asked.
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: The figures had tilted further. rotating at an angle that
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: made Patricia's stomach lurch. Mother? It said. Her name is Mother.
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: Can I see her now? Something in Patricia's mind screamed
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: that this was wrong, that she needed to get away
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: from this thing immediately. She took a step backward, and
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: the figure took a step forward, matching her movement perfectly,
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: like a mirror image. I just need to see her,
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: the voice said, and now it was changing, becoming higher-pitched.
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: Almost childlike. Please, let me see my mother. I've come
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: so far. I've been walking for so long. Patricia's hand
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: found the panic button on her badge at direct line
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: to security end. She pressed it. The figure's eyes, which
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: had been staring at her with an unsettling intensity, suddenly widened,
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: and it smiled. The smile was the worst part, far
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: too wide, revealing teeth that were too white and too uniform.
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: like perfect squares of ceramic tile arranged in neat rows.
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: You shouldn't have done that, the voice said. Now deeper.
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: Now almost growling. We were being polite. We were following
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: the rules. We. Why did it keep saying we? The
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: figure moved toward Patricia, and the movement was all wrong it.
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: Didn't walk so much as glide, its legs moving but
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: not in sync with its forward motion, like a video
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: game character with broken animation. Patricia ran. She sprinted back
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: to the nurse's station, where two other nurses were working,
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: and when she looked back, the hallway was empty. Security
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: arrived within minutes, but a sweep of the entire ICU
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: floor revealed no unauthorized persons. The doors were still locked
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: and could only be opened with a badge or from
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: the inside. There was no way someone could have entered
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: the floor without being logged in the security system. Yet
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: Patricia and two other nurses had reported seeing someone who
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: didn't belong. The hospital's explanation was stress, collective hallucination, Perhaps
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: a patient who'd become disoriented and wandered out of their
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: room before finding their way back. But Patricia knew what
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: she'd seen. And more importantly, she knew what she'd felt.
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: That primal, lizard-brained terror that comes from being in the
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: presence of a predator. Something that sees you as prey.
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: The next night, Patricia almost cold and sick. But twenty
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: years of professional dedication won out over her fear. She
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: returned to work. determined to prove to herself that she'd
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: simply experienced a stress-induced hallucination brought on by exhaustion and
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: too many consecutive night shifts. That rationalization lasted until 2 a.m.,
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: when the same figure appeared again, this time standing directly
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: outside room 14, the room of the elderly woman with
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: no family. Patricia was at the nurse's station, 60 feet away,
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: when she saw it. The figure was pressed against the
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: window of the patient's door, face against the glass. staring
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: into the room with an intensity that was deeply disturbing.
• 33:31
  Speaker 1: Patricia grabbed the phone to call security, but before she
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: could dial, the figure's head rotated not the body. Just ahead,
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: 180 degrees, to look directly at her. The mouth opened,
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: and even from that distance, Patricia could hear the voice,
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: not shouted but somehow carrying perfectly down the hallway. She's
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: ready now. We've been waiting so long. It's finally time.
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: Patricia watched in horror as the figure reached for the
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: door handle. The door was locked. All ICU rooms could
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: only be opened from the outside with a badge, but
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: the handle turned anyway, and the door swung open silently.
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: The figure entered the room, moving with that same gliding,
• 34:12
  Speaker 1: unnatural motion. Patricia hit every panic button at the station
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: and ran toward the room, her fear overwhelmed by her
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: duty to protect her patient. When she burst through the door,
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: the room was empty except for the patient. who was
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: sitting up in bed despite being comatose for the past
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: three days. The elderly woman was staring at the corner
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: of the room with wide, terrified eyes. And she was
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: speaking in a language Patricia didn't recognize. Not English. Not Spanish.
• 34:38
  Speaker 1: Something that sounded Native American. Security arrived and found no intruder.
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: No sign that anyone had entered the room. But the
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: patient remained conscious and agitated. Kept trying to climb out
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: of bed. Kept pointing at the corner and saying words
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: Patricia couldn't understand. They sedated her. and she slipped back
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: into unconsciousness. But not before grabbing Patricia's arm with surprising
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: strength and whispering in clear. English. Do you want to
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: let her wear my skin? Please, don't let her take
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: my skin when I die. The woman died six hours later.
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: Adon and Patricia was there when it happened. The moment
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: of death was peaceful, the patient simply stopping breathing, her
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: heart monitor going flat with that long, sustained tone that
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: Patricia'd heard thousands of times in her career. But as
• 35:28
  Speaker 1: Patricia reached to turn off the monitor, she saw something
• 35:31
  Speaker 1: that made her blood run cold. In the window of
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: the patient's room, reflected in the glass, with a dawn
• 35:38
  Speaker 1: light behind it, was a face, not human, not quiet.
• 35:42
  Speaker 1: It was pressed against the outside of the window impossible.
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: Since they were on the fourth floor and it was
• 35:47
  Speaker 1: smiling that two-eyed smile, and its eyes were fixed on
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: the dead woman's body, Patricia spun around, but there was
• 35:55
  Speaker 1: nothing behind her. She looked back at the window, and
• 35:58
  Speaker 1: the reflection was gone. Patricia Williams submitted her resignation that afternoon.
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: She didn't give two weeks' notice. She didn't explain her
• 36:05
  Speaker 1: reasons beyond personal health issues. She simply walked out of
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: that hospital and never returned, abandoning a career she'd dedicated
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: her adult life to, because she knew with absolute certainty
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: that what C.D. seen was real and that remaining in
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: that place meant risking another encounter with something that shouldn't exist.
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: She later learned through a former colleague that the hospital
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: had a history of strange occurrences on the ICU floor,
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: always during night shifts, always involving reports of an unauthorized
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: visitor who would appear in the days before a Native
• 36:34
  Speaker 1: American patient died. The hospital administration had worked to keep
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: these reports quiet, attributing them to staff stress and superstition.
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: But among the night shift nurses, there was a shared understanding.
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: Something stalked that floor, something that waited for certain deaths,
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: something that wanted to be present. when those souls departed.
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: Patricia moved to Florida, as far from the southwest as
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: she could get while remaining in the continental United States.
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: She took a job at a clinic, working only day shifts,
• 37:04
  Speaker 1: never nights, never in a setting where she might encounter
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: that thing again. But sometimes, in the moment between waking
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: and sleeping, she still sees that face pressed against the window,
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: still hears that voice saying, it's finally time. The fifth
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: and most disturbing encounter comes from the Navajo Nation itself,
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: from a family who has requested that their real names
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: not be used. We'll call them the Bege family. Father John,
• 37:30
  Speaker 1: Mother Linda, Teenage son Marcus, and nine-year-old daughter Sophie. In
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: February 2020, the Beges experienced a series of events that
• 37:39
  Speaker 1: would ultimately force them to abandon their home of 15 years,
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: a house that had been in Linda's family for three generations.
• 37:47
  Speaker 1: It began with Sophie's imaginary friend, Children having imaginary friends
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: is normal, even healthy, a sign of creative development. Melinda
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: grew concerned when Sophie's imaginary friend became an obsession. The
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: girl would spend hours talking to empty corners, would set
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: extra places at dinner, would wake up in the middle
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: of the night and be found conversing with something the
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: rest of the family could unsee. Linda asked Sophie about
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: her friend, and the girl's description made Linda's grandmother instincts
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: flare with alarm. His name is Tolman, Sophie said. He
• 38:18
  Speaker 1: wears old clothes that don't fit right, and he knows
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: things about our family. He knows Grandma's real name, the
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: one nobody uses. He said he's been watching us for
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: a long time, waiting for someone who could see him.
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: He says he's lonely. Linda consulted with her mother, a
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: traditional Navajo elder who still participated in ceremonies and maintained
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: the old practices. When Linda described Sophie's imaginary friend, her
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: mother's face went pale. She asked specific questions. Did this
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: tall man ever ask to come inside? Did he ever
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: ask Sophie to go somewhere with him? Did Sophie feel
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: cold when he was near? Sophie answered yes to all
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: three questions. Linda's mother performed a blessing ceremony on Sophie
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: that evening, but the girl fought it, screaming that they
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: were hurting tall man, that he was her friend and
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: they were being mean. The ceremony was completed, but that night,
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: the entire family was awakened at 3 a.m. by the
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: sound of something walking on their roof. Not an animal, though.
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: footsteps were too heavy, too deliberate, pacing back and forth
• 39:21
  Speaker 1: in a pattern that sounded like someone walking upright, taking slow,
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: measured steps from one end of the house to the other.
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: John grabbed a flashlight. and went outside. But when he
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: shined the light on the roof, there was nothing there.
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: The footsteps continued inside, right above their heads. Now accompanied
• 39:38
  Speaker 1: by a voice that sounded like it was speaking through
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: the walls. Soph, come outside. We need to talk. They
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: don't understand us. The family huddled together in the living
• 39:51
  Speaker 1: room until dawn. When the sun finally rose, they found
• 39:54
  Speaker 1: handprints all over their windows. Inside and outside handprints, with
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: too many fingers, with joints that bent wrong. The attacks
• 40:02
  Speaker 1: escalated over the following weeks. The family would hear Sophie's
• 40:05
  Speaker 1: voice calling from outside the house, asking to be let in.
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: Even though Sophie was standing right next to her parents,
• 40:12
  Speaker 1: they would see figures in their peripheral vision, always just
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: out of direct line of sight, always watching. They're livestock chickens,
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: and goats begun dying in ways that defied natural explanation.
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: Arranged in patterns that seemed deliberately symbolic. Marcus, the teenage son,
• 40:30
  Speaker 1: began sleepwalking, and his parents would find him standing at
• 40:34
  Speaker 1: the front door in the middle of the night, hand
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: on the doorknob, about to open it. When they'd wake him,
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: he'd have no memory of leaving his bed, but would
• 40:44
  Speaker 1: say he'd have been dreaming about someone calling his name.
• 40:47
  Speaker 1: Someone who needed help. John installed security cameras around the property,
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: thinking that video evidence would either prove they were dealing
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: with a human intruder or demonstrate. That stress was causing
• 40:59
  Speaker 1: them to imagine things. What the cameras captured was worse
• 41:02
  Speaker 1: than either possibility. The footage showed figures approaching the house
• 41:06
  Speaker 1: at night, but the figures moved wrong. They would be
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: standing in one spot in one frame, then impossibly far
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: away in the next, as if they could teleport or
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: move faster than the camera's refresh rate could capture. Their faces...
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: when they turned toward the camera, were blurred and distorted,
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: like the camera couldn't properly focus on them. But their
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: eyes always came through clearly reflective, glowing, inhuman eyes that
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: stared directly at the lens. On one recording, the family
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: watched in horror as a figure approached their front door,
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: reached out a hand that seemed to stretch and elongate
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: like rubber, and touched the doorknob. The moment it made contact,
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: every camera in the house cut to static for exactly
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: three seconds. When the feed returned... The figure was gone,
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: but the front door was open. Despite being locked from
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: the inside, the Begays knew they couldn't stay. Linda consulted
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: with tribal elders, and the conclusion was unanimous. Their home
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: had been marked by a skinwalker, possibly because it sat
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: on a location that had spiritual significance, or possibly because
• 42:05
  Speaker 1: some member of their family had unknowingly offended one of
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: these beings. The elders explained that once a skinwalker had
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: focused its attention on a family, especially a family with children,
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: The harassment would continue and escalate until either the family
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: left or someone was seriously harmed. There were ceremonies that
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: could offer protection, but protection wasn't the same as removal.
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: The entity would still be there, still waiting, still watching.
• 42:29
  Speaker 1: In March 2020, the Bege family moved off the reservation,
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: leaving behind a house that Linda's family had occupied for
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: nearly 70 years. They told their extended family it was
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: for better job opportunities, for better schools for the children.
• 42:43
  Speaker 1: But the truth was understood without being spoken. They had
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: been driven from their home by something that predated modern civilization.
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: Something that laid claim to that land long before any
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: house was built there. Sophie stopped talking about Tall Man
• 42:56
  Speaker 1: after they moved, but she developed a fear of windows
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: that persists to this day. She refuses to sleep in
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: any room with uncovered windows, insisting that the curtains be
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: drawn tight, because she says sometimes she still sees him
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: standing outside, watching, waiting. Marco Snow in college has recurring
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: nightmares about the nights he spends sleepwalking. And in therapy,
• 43:17
  Speaker 1: he has revealed memories that do not match his conscious
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: recollections memories of standing outside, his house in the darkness.
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: Of being surrounded by figures that looked human but moved
• 43:27
  Speaker 1: like animals. Of hands touching him that felt cold and wrong.
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: Of voices speaking to him in a language he shouldn't
• 43:33
  Speaker 1: understand but somehow did. Telling him secrets about death and transformation.
• 43:38
  Speaker 1: Promising him power if he would only walk away from
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: his house and into the desert. The Big A family's
• 43:43
  Speaker 1: experience raises disturbing questions about the nature of Skinwalker encounters.
• 43:47
  Speaker 1: Unlike the other cases we've examined, this wasn't a brief
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: sighting or a single night of terror. This was sustained
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: harassment over weeks, targeted at a specific family, escalating in
• 43:59
  Speaker 1: intensity as if testing boundaries and searching for weaknesses. The
• 44:03
  Speaker 1: focus on the children, particularly Sophie, suggests a predatory intelligence,
• 44:09
  Speaker 1: an understanding that children are more vulnerable. more open to manipulation,
• 44:13
  Speaker 1: less likely to be believed if they report what they're experiencing.
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: Skinwalker lore speaks about these beings' ability to corrupt, to
• 44:21
  Speaker 1: turn people away from their families and their humanity. Was
• 44:24
  Speaker 1: Sophie genuinely seeing something? Or had the entity found a
• 44:28
  Speaker 1: way to project itself into her mind? Were Marcus's sleepwalking
• 44:32
  Speaker 1: episodes natural parasamhya? Or was something calling to him, pulling
• 44:37
  Speaker 1: him toward the door and the darkness beyond? These questions
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: haunt the family still, and they've chosen to share their
• 44:44
  Speaker 1: story as a warning to others who might experience similar phenomena.
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: If your children begin talking to imaginary friends who know
• 44:51
  Speaker 1: things they shouldn't, if you find yourself waking at the
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: same time every night to sounds of footsteps and voices
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: if you feel watched in your own home by something
• 44:58
  Speaker 1: that remains just out of sight, these may not be
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: products of stress or imagination. They may be signs that
• 45:04
  Speaker 1: you've attracted the attention of something ancient and malevolent. So
• 45:08
  Speaker 1: what are skinwalkers? Really? The five encounters Ivy shared represent
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: only a fraction of the reports that emerge from the
• 45:15
  Speaker 1: Southwest every year, most of which are never publicized because
• 45:19
  Speaker 1: witnesses fear ridicule or more seriously fear attracting further attention
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: from these entities. Within Navajo culture, skinwalkers are not cryptids
• 45:29
  Speaker 1: or mysterious animals. As specifically identified as humans, who have
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: gained the power of transformation through the practice of the
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: worst form of witchcraft. These are people who have broken
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: the most fundamental taboos of their culture, who have committed
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: acts so evil that they've severed their own connection to humanity.
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: The transformation power is not a gift, but a corruption,
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: a twisting of natural law achieved through ritual murder, desecration,
• 45:53
  Speaker 1: and the literal wearing of animal skins that have been
• 45:56
  Speaker 1: prepared through forbidden ceremonies. This explanation that skinwalkers are evil
• 46:00
  Speaker 1: witches who can transform is consistent across Navajo, Hopi, and
• 46:04
  Speaker 1: other southwestern indigenous traditions. But this cultural explanation doesn't satisfy
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: those who V.A. encountered these beings and struggled to reconcile
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: what they witnessed with any rational framework. How can a
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: human run at 80 miles per hour? How can someone
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: scale a four-story building to press their face against a window?
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: How can a figure move in ways that defy physics?
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: appear and disappear without using doors mimic voices with perfect
• 46:32
  Speaker 1: accuracy some researchers have proposed alternative theories that skinwalkers are
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: not transformed humans but rather some unknown species of animal
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: perhaps a remnant population of prehistoric predators that has learned
• 46:44
  Speaker 1: to avoid human detection this theory attempts to explain the
• 46:47
  Speaker 1: physical abilities that witnesses report the impossible speed the strength
• 46:52
  Speaker 1: the way these entities move through terrain that would stop
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: a human but this explanation fails to account for the
• 46:57
  Speaker 1: intelligence that skinwalkers display, their apparent understanding of human psychology,
• 47:03
  Speaker 1: their ability to mimic human speech and behavior, their targeted
• 47:06
  Speaker 1: harassment of specific individuals and families. Other theories venture into
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: more speculative territory, interdimensional beings that can partially materialize in
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: our reality, appearing as distorted human-animal hybrids because they're attempting
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: to match our physical laws in failing or psychological phenomena.
• 47:25
  Speaker 1: Some form of mass hysteria or culturally bound syndrome where
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: belief in skinwalkers causes people to interpret ambiguous sensory data
• 47:33
  Speaker 1: as encounters with these entities. But talk to someone who's
• 47:36
  Speaker 1: experienced an encounter and they'll reject these rationalized explanations. They'll
• 47:42
  Speaker 1: tell you about the absolute certainty they felt that they
• 47:45
  Speaker 1: were in the presence of something wrong. Something that violated
• 47:48
  Speaker 1: natural law by its very existence. They'll describe the way
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: their bodies reacted. Adrenaline down. The primal fear response that
• 47:57
  Speaker 1: bypassed conscious thought and went straight to survival instinct. They'll
• 48:01
  Speaker 1: point to physical evidence. Footprints that transform. Livestock killed in
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: impossible ways. Recordings that show things moving at speeds that
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: defy physics. The truth is likely more disturbing than any
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: single explanation. That we share this world with phenomena we
• 48:16
  Speaker 1: do and understand and possibly coo in and understand. that
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: indigenous cultures have spent centuries documenting and developing protective practices
• 48:24
  Speaker 1: against entities that Western science refuses to acknowledge because acknowledging
• 48:29
  Speaker 1: them would require a fundamental revision of our understanding of reality.
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: The Navajo elders will tell you that there are more
• 48:35
  Speaker 1: things in this world than academic institutions recognize, that the
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: boundaries between human and animal, between physical and spiritual, between
• 48:43
  Speaker 1: the living and the something else, are more permeable than
• 48:47
  Speaker 1: modern society admits. But there's something else that emerges from
• 48:50
  Speaker 1: these encounters, something that the witnesses themselves are often reluctant
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: to discuss. The sense that skinwalkers are not random, not
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: simply predators hunting whatever prey crosses their path. Multiple witnesses
• 49:03
  Speaker 1: report feeling targeted, feeling like they were specifically chosen, like
• 49:06
  Speaker 1: the encounter was not an accident, but a deliberate decision
• 49:10
  Speaker 1: by an intelligence that had been watching them, learning about
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: them waiting for the right moment to reveal itself. Sarah
• 49:17
  Speaker 1: Chun felt that the creature on the highway was studying her.
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: specifically because she didn't believe. Jake and Amanda were called
• 49:24
  Speaker 1: by name in that canyon, suggesting the entity had been
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: observing them before revealing itself. Patricia Williams encountered something that
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: seemed to be waiting for specific patients to die, present
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: at a particular hospital repeatedly over years. The Begay family
• 49:39
  Speaker 1: was systematically harassed in ways that seemed designed to drive
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: them from their home. This targeting suggests that skinwalkers are
• 49:46
  Speaker 1: not simply animals operating on instinct, but are capable of
• 49:49
  Speaker 1: long-term planning, of understanding human psychology well enough to exploit
• 49:53
  Speaker 1: fears and vulnerabilities. If these entities are, as traditional lore suggests,
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: humans who have transformed themselves through evil practices, then they
• 50:03
  Speaker 1: retain human intelligence. Human malice, they choose their targets. They
• 50:09
  Speaker 1: plan their approaches. They understand that speaking to people in
• 50:13
  Speaker 1: familiar voices will create more psychological terror than simply appearing
• 50:17
  Speaker 1: as monsters. They know that targeting children will create family conflict,
• 50:21
  Speaker 1: as parents struggle to believe their children's reports. They understand
• 50:25
  Speaker 1: that systematic harassment over time is more effective than a
• 50:28
  Speaker 1: single attack in driving people away. This intelligence makes skinwalkers
• 50:33
  Speaker 1: more terrifying than any natural predator. A bear or mountain
• 50:36
  Speaker 1: lion attacks because it's hungry. or feels threatened. A skinwalker
• 50:42
  Speaker 1: attacks because it chooses to, because it derives something from
• 50:45
  Speaker 1: the fear and suffering it causes. And if these entities
• 50:48
  Speaker 1: are indeed human in origin, then the most disturbing implication
• 50:52
  Speaker 1: is that there are people among us who are capable
• 50:54
  Speaker 1: of transforming themselves into these beings, who have committed acts
• 50:58
  Speaker 1: evil enough to break their own humanity in exchange for power.
• 51:01
  Speaker 1: The traditional protections against skinwalkers are consistent across indigenous cultures,
• 51:05
  Speaker 1: and Tosu Wove's survived encounters often adopt these practices. even
• 51:10
  Speaker 1: if they came from outside those cultural traditions. The most
• 51:13
  Speaker 1: commonly cited protections include never speaking about skinwalkers after dark,
• 51:18
  Speaker 1: as this is believed to attract their attention, burning sacred plants,
• 51:22
  Speaker 1: particularly white sage and cedar, which are believed to purify
• 51:26
  Speaker 1: spaces and create barriers these entities cannot cross. Wearing or
• 51:30
  Speaker 1: carrying protective items made from specific materials silver is often mentioned,
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: as are turquoise stones and items blessed by traditional medicine people.
• 51:38
  Speaker 1: making offerings at the boundaries of your property, establishing a
• 51:42
  Speaker 1: respectful relationship with the land itself, never whistling at night,
• 51:47
  Speaker 1: as this is believed to be a way of calling
• 51:48
  Speaker 1: to these entities, avoiding looking directly at suspicious figures, as
• 51:53
  Speaker 1: eye contact can create a connection that allows the entity
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: to follow you. Most importantly, showing respect for indigenous land
• 52:01
  Speaker 1: and traditions, avoiding areas that are known to be spiritually
• 52:04
  Speaker 1: significant or dangerous, and never trespassing on reservation land. without
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: permission and proper understanding of local customs. Critics might dismiss
• 52:13
  Speaker 1: these practices as superstition, but those who face genuine encounters
• 52:19
  Speaker 1: will tell you that traditional protections are the only things
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: that provided any sense of safety or control in situations
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: where they felt utterly helpless against something that modern weapons
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: and technology could unstop. These five encounters share common elements
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: that appear repeatedly in Skinwalker reports. The targeting of people
• 52:38
  Speaker 1: who are isolated or vulnerable. The mimicry of human voices
• 52:41
  Speaker 1: and behavior in ways that are almost, but not quite convincing.
• 52:45
  Speaker 1: The physical abilities that define natural law. The sense of
• 52:48
  Speaker 1: intelligence and malicious intent. They focusing on specific individuals over time.
• 52:54
  Speaker 1: And the psychological impact that persists long after the encounter itself.
• 52:58
  Speaker 1: If even one of these accounts represents a genuine encounter
• 53:01
  Speaker 1: with something currently unknown to science... The implications are profound.
• 53:05
  Speaker 1: It would mean that there are predators sharing our environment
• 53:08
  Speaker 1: that we've failed to document. Entities that possess capabilities we
• 53:12
  Speaker 1: can't explain. And possibly humans who've found ways to transform
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: themselves into something no longer recognizable as human. Indigenous communities
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: have lived with this knowledge for centuries, developing complex traditions
• 53:23
  Speaker 1: and practices to protect themselves from these entities. Perhaps it
• 53:27
  Speaker 1: is time for the broader culture to stop dismissing these
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: accounts as folklore and start asking what these consistent reports,
• 53:35
  Speaker 1: spanning decades and involving hundreds of witnesses, might actually represent.
• 53:40
  Speaker 1: The five people whose encounters I've shared have all been
• 53:42
  Speaker 1: fundamentally changed by what they experienced. Sarah Choon still performs
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: protective rituals in her home five years later. Tom Morrison
• 53:50
  Speaker 1: won't discuss what happened on his ranch in specific terms,
• 53:53
  Speaker 1: even now. Jake Rodriguez and Amanda haven't gone camping together
• 53:57
  Speaker 1: since that night in Utah, and their relationship didn't survive
• 54:00
  Speaker 1: the trauma. Patricia Williams left a career she loved and
• 54:03
  Speaker 1: moved across the country to escape the memory of what
• 54:06
  Speaker 1: she saw. The Begay family abandoned a multi-generational home and
• 54:10
  Speaker 1: struggles with the guilt of leaving their ancestral land. These
• 54:13
  Speaker 1: are real people whose lives were altered by encounters with
• 54:16
  Speaker 1: something they can't explain. Something that challenged their understanding of
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: reality and left them with trauma. That therapy and time
• 54:23
  Speaker 1: have you in fully healed. You can dismiss their stories
• 54:26
  Speaker 1: if you choose. You can attribute their experiences to misidentification, hysteria, attention-seeking,
• 54:33
  Speaker 1: or delusions. But if you do, you're remaking the same
• 54:35
  Speaker 1: mistake that Sarah Chun made when she first heard about
• 54:38
  Speaker 1: Skinwalkers assuming. That what? You have you and personally experienced coup.
• 54:43
  Speaker 1: You and be real that the boundaries of possibility are
• 54:46
  Speaker 1: defined by your own limited worldview rather than by the vast, strange,
• 54:50
  Speaker 1: and often terrifying reality that exists beyond it. The Navajo
• 54:54
  Speaker 1: have a saying, some things should not be spoken of,
• 54:58
  Speaker 1: for speaking draws attention. By sharing these stories, I may
• 55:01
  Speaker 1: have drawn that attention to myself. and possibly to you
• 55:04
  Speaker 1: for listening. If you live in or travel through the Southwest,
• 55:08
  Speaker 1: particularly near indigenous lands, be aware. If you encounter something
• 55:13
  Speaker 1: that looks almost human but not quite, if you hear
• 55:16
  Speaker 1: voices calling to you in the darkness that sound familiar
• 55:19
  Speaker 1: but feel wrong, if you see something running alongside your
• 55:22
  Speaker 1: vehicle at impossible speeds, don't stop. Don't investigate. Don't try
• 55:27
  Speaker 1: to convince yourself that what you're experiencing has a rational explanation.
• 55:31
  Speaker 1: Drive away. Get to safety. Seek protection from those who
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: understand these entities. Trust your instincts when they scream that
• 55:39
  Speaker 1: something is wrong. Because those instincts evolved over millions of
• 55:43
  Speaker 1: years to keep our ancestors alive in the presence of predators.
• 55:46
  Speaker 1: And some predators don't appear in biology textbooks. The question
• 55:50
  Speaker 1: isn't whether you believe in skinwalking. The question is whether
• 55:53
  Speaker 1: your belief will matter when you're re-driving down an empty
• 55:56
  Speaker 1: desert highway at night and you see something in your
• 55:58
  Speaker 1: peripheral vision keeping pace with your vehicle. Something that turns
• 56:02
  Speaker 1: to look at you with eyes that reflect light like
• 56:04
  Speaker 1: an animal S, but are positioned in a face that
• 56:07
  Speaker 1: S trying desperately to look human and failing. The question
• 56:11
  Speaker 1: is whether you LL remember these warnings when you hear
• 56:13
  Speaker 1: your name being called from the darkness in a voice
• 56:16
  Speaker 1: that sounds exactly like someone you trust. But something in
• 56:19
  Speaker 1: your gut tells you not to answer. The question is
• 56:22
  Speaker 1: whether you LL have the wisdom to follow the protective
• 56:24
  Speaker 1: practices that indigenous people have spent centuries developing. or whether
• 56:29
  Speaker 1: you LAL dismiss them as primitive superstition right up until
• 56:32
  Speaker 1: the moment you reface to face with something that should unexist,
• 56:36
  Speaker 1: something that proves those primitive cultures understood aspects of reality
• 56:40
  Speaker 1: that our modern civilization has chosen to ignore. These five
• 56:43
  Speaker 1: encounters are not unique. They're representative of a pattern that
• 56:47
  Speaker 1: plays out across the Southwest regularly, witnessed by people from
• 56:50
  Speaker 1: all backgrounds, all walks of life, all levels of education,
• 56:55
  Speaker 1: and skepticism. The consistency of these reports across decades, across
• 56:59
  Speaker 1: cultural boundaries, across witnesses who have no connection to each other,
• 57:02
  Speaker 1: suggests that something real is occurring, something that demands explanation,
• 57:07
  Speaker 1: even if that explanation challenges our comfortable assumptions about the
• 57:10
  Speaker 1: world we inhabit. The Skinwalker phenomenon raises fundamental questions about
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: the nature of evil, the boundaries of human capability, and
• 57:18
  Speaker 1: the possibility that we share our reality with entities that
• 57:21
  Speaker 1: operate according to rules we do not understand. It challenges
• 57:24
  Speaker 1: the materialist worldview that dominates Western thought, suggesting that consciousness, transformation,
• 57:31
  Speaker 1: and the relationship between human and animal might be far
• 57:34
  Speaker 1: more complex and far more terrifying than we've acknowledged. Whether
• 57:39
  Speaker 1: you interpret these encounters as evidence of literal shapeshifting witches,
• 57:44
  Speaker 1: unknown cryptids, psychological phenomena, or something else entirely, The experiences
• 57:50
  Speaker 1: of the witnesses cannot be easily dismissed. These are people
• 57:53
  Speaker 1: whose lives have been marked by trauma, who've abandoned homes
• 57:57
  Speaker 1: and careers and relationships because of what they encountered, who
• 58:00
  Speaker 1: live with fear that persists. Years after the original events,
• 58:05
  Speaker 1: they have nothing to gain from sharing these stories, in fact.
• 58:08
  Speaker 1: Most of them risk ridicule and skepticism by speaking publicly.
• 58:12
  Speaker 1: They share their experiences anyway, driven by a need to
• 58:15
  Speaker 1: warn others to validate their own trauma. by connecting with
• 58:18
  Speaker 1: people who've had similar encounters and perhaps to push back
• 58:21
  Speaker 1: against a dominant culture that insists their experiences. Couldn't have
• 58:25
  Speaker 1: happened because they do unfit with and accepted paradigms. If
• 58:29
  Speaker 1: you've listened to this entire account and felt that chill
• 58:31
  Speaker 1: of recognition, if details from these encounters resonated with experiences
• 58:35
  Speaker 1: you've had but never spoken about, know that you're not alone.
• 58:39
  Speaker 1: There are communities of people who've encountered these entities, who
• 58:42
  Speaker 1: support each other and share protective practices. There are researchers
• 58:45
  Speaker 1: and investigators who take these reports seriously and work to
• 58:48
  Speaker 1: document and understand them. And there are indigenous knowledge keepers
• 58:52
  Speaker 1: who hold centuries of accumulated wisdom about these beings and
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: how to coexist with them, or at least how to
• 58:58
  Speaker 1: avoid attracting their attention. The five encounters I've shared are
• 59:01
  Speaker 1: not closed cases. Sarah Chun still sees shadows moving wrong
• 59:05
  Speaker 1: in her peripheral vision. Tom Morrison still burns Sage at dusk.
• 59:09
  Speaker 1: And leaves off. at the edge of his property. Jake
• 59:12
  Speaker 1: and Amanda still can't fully explain what called their names
• 59:15
  Speaker 1: in that canyon. Patricia Williams still sees that face in
• 59:18
  Speaker 1: windows when she's overtired and her guard is down. The
• 59:21
  Speaker 1: Begay children still struggle with fears that therapy can't fully address.
• 59:26
  Speaker 1: These encounters don't end, they become part of the witness's
• 59:29
  Speaker 1: lives permanently. A constant reminder that the world is stranger
• 59:33
  Speaker 1: and more dangerous than most people realize. That there are
• 59:35
  Speaker 1: predators who hunt in ways that violate our understanding of
• 59:39
  Speaker 1: natural law. And that sometimes the old stories, the ones
• 59:42
  Speaker 1: we dismiss as primitive superstition, contain truths that our modern
• 59:47
  Speaker 1: civilization desperately needs to acknowledge. So as you finish listening
• 59:50
  Speaker 1: to this, as you perhaps check the locks on your
• 59:53
  Speaker 1: doors or glance at your windows, wondering what might be
• 59:56
  Speaker 1: looking back from the darkness outside. Remember, the indigenous people
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 1: of the Southwest have been warning outsiders about these entities
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 1: for centuries. The fact that those warnings have been dismissed
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 1: as folklore doesn't make them less true. It just means
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: that every person who ignores those warnings and ventures into
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 1: isolated areas without proper respect and protection is gambling with
• 1:00:17
  Speaker 1: their safety and their sanity. The Skinwalker phenomenon is real
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 1: enough that it shaped the culture, traditions, and daily practices
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 1: of entire communities. It's real enough that tribal elders still
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 1: teach their children the protective practices, still perform ceremonies to
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 1: ward off these entities, still refuse to speak their name
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 1: after dark. It's real enough that people like Sarah, Tom, Jake, Amanda, Patricia...
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 1: And the Begai family have had their lives fundamentally altered
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 1: by encounters that they can neither explain nor forget. Whether
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 1: it is real enough for you to take seriously is
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 1: a question you will have to answer for yourself. But
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 1: don't wait until you're alone on a desert highway at night,
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 1: watching something impossible, keeping pace with your vehicle, to decide
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 1: whether these warnings deserve your attention. By then, it will
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 1: be too late for skepticism. You'll understand finally what all
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 1: these witnesses understood. in the moments of their encounters, that
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 1: there are things in this world that should not exist
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: but do, and once you've seen them, once they've seen you,
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 1: the comfortable illusion of a safe, rational, fully explained world
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 1: is shattered forever.