The Paranormal Bigfoot (S7, E2)

Summary

Haunted Cosmos – S07E02: The Paranormal Bigfoot

Original Airdate: April 15, 2026
Hosts: Ben Garrett & Brian Sauvé
Main Theme:
Exploring the legend of Bigfoot through a spiritual and philosophical lens, considering whether Bigfoot is a mere cryptid, a physical being, a demonic manifestation, or a reflection of our own cultural mythmaking and existential dread. The episode weaves together folklore, firsthand accounts, theological perspectives, and skeptical takes to penetrate the enduring Bigfoot mythos.

---

I. Overview of the Episode

Purpose:

• Investigate why the Bigfoot myth persists
• Examine both physical and spiritual explanations of Bigfoot sightings
• Interrogate the boundaries between material reality and supernatural phenomena
• Use specific stories and ancient mythologies to illustrate Bigfoot's unique place in culture

---

II. Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Bigfoot Narrative as Modern Myth/Allegory

(Timestamps: [00:00]–[15:44], [21:26]–[27:12])

• Opening Question: Why is the Bigfoot legend so persistent? Is it a mass delusion or is there reality to it? (Ben, [00:05])
• Bigfoot is rooted in ancient traditions—Woodwose, Sabe, Sasquatch, and others.
• The hosts see Bigfoot as more than a cryptid: perhaps a mythic, even spiritual figure.

Quote:
"Maybe it's a test. Maybe it's a distraction. But maybe it's something a little bit more." — Ben ([00:06])

2. The Firsthand Account: An Encounter with Evil

([00:41]–[15:44])
Story Summary:

• A 16-year-old girl living in rural Montana experiences a terrifying night: strange clicks, a porch light flickering, guttural bestial laughter, and her father confronting a massive, red-eyed, hairy creature.
• The following morning, it’s revealed her father had a prior encounter: seeing a similar beast digging up stolen trinkets and Christian icons in their yard.
• Neighbor corroborates similar sightings, noting police indifference and the creature's affinity for Christian symbols.

Memorable Description:
"Looking down the barrel of his shotgun... stood the devil himself, a bulking thing with a twisted face of pure malice. Beneath two glowing eyes as red as coals." ([01:55])

Thematic Focus:

• The story fuses high strangeness with spiritual warfare motifs: dread, defilement of religious icons, and demonic attributes.
• Dread is a central emotional marker in Bigfoot encounters, paralleling religious or supernatural encounters reported in other paranormal phenomena.

---

3. Bigfoot as a Spiritual Manifestation

• Bigfoot stories often suggest something more than an undiscovered animal: a malevolent presence capable of inspiring unnatural fear (“the dread window”).
• The desecration of Christian icons (buried angel figurines) points to deeper spiritual undercurrents.
• Neighbor’s assertion: These things are devils, intent on destruction and defilement.

Quote:
"These creatures were devils. They always dwell where humans live. They seek to steal, kill, and destroy for destruction's own sake, and humanity's symbols of faith... would always draw their malice." ([Narrative paraphrased, ~[10:15]])

---

4. Mythic Parallels: Enkidu, Woodwose, and Sabe

([37:15]–[47:08])

A. Gilgamesh and Enkidu:

• Enkidu, the wild man from the Epic of Gilgamesh, is a civilization-era mythological template for modern Bigfoot.
• Like Bigfoot, Enkidu is hairy, bestial, and occupies the border between human society and untamed nature.

B. The Woodwose:

• Medieval European “Woodwose” stories describe wild, hairy men—often depicted in religious art and folklore.

C. Ojibwe Sabe:

• Ojibwe legends personify “honesty” as the Sabe: essentially, Bigfoot—a real animal to them, not mythical.

Insight:
Bigfoot/Woodwose is the cross-cultural archetype for our relationship with the wild, the “other,” and spiritual/interior chaos.

---

5. Theological and Philosophical Ramifications

([21:26]–[56:41])

• Bigfoot as a Mirror: Hosts propose Bigfoot is the “manifestation of our moral bankruptcy”—an embodied symbol of Western cultural decline and apostasy.
• Contrast with UFO/Aliens:
  • UFO phenomenon is interpreted as a “myth of false transcendent hope.”
  • Bigfoot is the myth of guilt, shame, and spiritual deterioration.
• Themes from Plato, Christianity, and myth: Man’s struggle between beastliness and divine image, the danger of abandoning spiritual authority over nature.
• Interplay between materialist/naturalistic vs. supernatural/demonic interpretations.

Memorable Quotes:

• "Bigfoot is almost like the ghost of our guilt that's haunting us." — Ben ([26:04])
• "Man is always attempting to semi-deify or baptize some aspect of his fallen nature instead of crucifying it..." — Brian ([54:13])
• "The demonic and satanic being a deception is constantly...nurse into flame some idea of man and then latch onto it. And show man what he wants to see..." — Brian ([59:36])

---

6. Skepticism and "Egregores": Is Bigfoot Created by Belief?

([57:37]–[61:26])

• “Egregore” or “tulpa” theory: Some say mass belief can create thought-forms (entities given life by collective imagination).
• Ben and Brian mostly dismiss this explanation, favoring a spiritual/demonic explanation rooted in intentionality and deception.

Quote:
"One thing that Satan loves to do is...to show man what he wants to see. But it's all sock puppets all the way down... Bigfoot is a satanic sock puppet." — Brian ([60:20])

---

7. Folklore, the City, and the Wilderness

([61:26]–[63:16])

• After Eden, mankind became afraid of the wild, thus building cities to insulate themselves from the spiritual and natural unknown.
• Bigfoot figures as a symbol of the chaos and fear that resides outside civilization—demonic forces that exploit these anxieties.
• "Taking dominion": Hosts encourage listeners not to cower from the wild/spiritual unknown, but to assert spiritual authority.

---

III. Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

| Timestamp | Speaker | Quote/Highlight | |-----------|---------|-----------------| | 00:06 | Ben | "Is it an increasingly powerful mass delusion? Or are at least some stories mostly real?... Maybe it's a test. Maybe it's a distraction. But maybe it's something a little bit more." | | 01:55 | Narrative | "Looking down the barrel of his shotgun... stood the devil himself, a bulking thing with a twisted face of pure malice. Beneath two glowing eyes as red as coals." | | 26:04 | Ben | "Bigfoot is almost like the ghost of our guilt that's haunting us." | | 54:13 | Brian | "Man is always attempting to semi deify or baptize some aspect of his fallen nature instead of crucifying it..." | | 60:20 | Brian | "Bigfoot is a satanic sock puppet... Put that on a T-shirt." |

Comic relief, e.g.

• British Bigfoot/Woodwose banter ([47:08]–[51:10])
  • "Is the woodwose like a British Bigfoot?... At least our Bigfoot aren't giving people existential dread."
• Meta-jokes about Patreon “lost episodes,” and humorous British stereotypes.

---

IV. Key Segments & Timestamps

• Opening/Thematic Statement: [00:00]–[00:06]
• Missoula, Montana Encounter: [00:41]–[15:44]
• First Recording Fiasco ("Lost Episode" Banter): [15:46]–[20:00]
• Thematic/Philosophical Deep Dive: [21:26]–[29:13]
• Mythological Origins (Gilgamesh, Woodwose, Sabe): [37:15]–[47:08]
• British Bigfoot Banter: [47:08]–[51:10]
• Plato, Theology, and Human Nature: [52:05]–[56:41]
• Skepticism, Egregore/Tulpa Discussion: [57:37]–[61:26]
• Society, Wilderness, and the Spiritual Frontier: [61:26]–[63:16]
• Closing Evidence (1894 Photograph, Whistling Jack): [64:48]–[82:20]
• Outro/Credits: [82:20]–end

---

V. Closing Stories: Physical Evidence & Enduring Mysteries

([64:48]–[82:20])

• 1894 "Bigfoot" Photograph:

  • Old glass plate photo depicting an apparently juvenile, furry humanoid—interpreted as possible evidence.
  • Debates over coverup, provenance, and the persistence of such tantalizing evidence.

• Walden’s Ridge, “Whistling Jack” Legend:

  • Tale of a rural Tennessee Bigfoot encounter: terror, violence, and the creature’s supernatural traits.
  • The legend survives in local lore as another instance of inexplicable, paraphysical Bigfoot activity.

• Summary Statement:

  • The hosts tie together the physical and spiritual dimensions of Bigfoot stories, concluding that—real or not—Bigfoot operates as a potent indicator of reality’s unseen depths: “Maybe the Bigfoot myth is far more real than any of us would like. We can't say.”

---

VI. Tone and Style

• Conversational, witty, often humorous, but reverent towards spiritual matters.
• Weaves storytelling, theology, folklore, and philosophy.
• Frequent pop culture references and self-aware asides about the podcast medium.

---

In Conclusion

Haunted Cosmos approaches Paranormal Bigfoot not as a cryptid chase, but as a mythic, cultural, and spiritual phenomenon. The hosts unpack layers rarely considered: dread as a spiritual marker, Bigfoot’s assault on Christian iconography, links to ancient “wild man” myths, and the relationship between fallen humanity and the unknown wilderness. Whether describing harrowing encounters or analyzing allegories, Ben and Brian remind listeners that sometimes the greatest hauntings are the ones that reflect our own spiritual condition back to us.

---

For Further Exploration:

• [15:46]–[21:26]: Meta discussion of the “lost episode” and podcast production
• [37:15]–[47:08]: Extended mythological and historical exploration
• [64:48]–[82:20]: Closing stories and discussion of physical cryptid evidence

---

Recommended takeaway:
Bigfoot—real or not—is a mirror held to the soul of modernity, conjuring existential questions not just about monsters outside, but the monsters (and potential for redemption) within.

Transcript

[Ben Garrett]

The Bigfoot myth has existed for much longer than just recent history.

[Brian]

But why?

[Ben Garrett]

Why does it have such staying power? And why has it endured for so long? Is it an increasingly powerful mass delusion? Or are at least some of the stories mostly real? And why would God place such a story into this world? Maybe it's a test. Maybe it's a distraction. But maybe it's something a little bit more. In this episode, we'll explore stories of the Woodwose, the Sabe, the Bigfoot. This episode is brought to you by Jake Muller Adventures, a thrilling Christian audio drama.

[Brian]

What you're about to hear is a retelling of a firsthand account. The girl was only 16. She lived with her father in a farmhouse outside Missoula, Montana. From her front porch during the day, she could look into the wilderness of the Bitterroot Mountains. Surrounding the perimeter of the home, however, lay a quarter mile of flat plain. But this story takes place at night, a dark night. The moon hid behind heavy interspersed clouds. Only the light of a few stars twinkled high above. At the witching hour, the girl was half awoken from sleep by a clicking sound that repeated at odd intervals. She'd lived in that house her whole life and knew its noises. It wasn't the squeaking of her father walking down the stairs for a glass of water. Her room was on the lower floor. The windows were open, but it wasn't the knocking of the chain on the fence, for there was no wind. No, this sound was distinct. Half asleep and half reasoning through what it might be, she was suddenly aware of something else. Through closed eyes, a dark red flashed in sync with the clicking. She opened her eyes and all doubt vanished. The porch light outside her room flickered on and off. The clicking was the sound of the light switch. This made her sit up in bed. Why would her father be out on the porch at such an hour? Better yet, why would he be flipping the switch on and off so rapidly? Or perhaps he was using the switch just inside the front door. Still, why use the switch that way at all? She turned these questions over in her mind and grew uneasy. None of it made sense. Her unease sharpened into a subtle fear. What if someone was messing with them? What if they intended more? In a flash, that hint of fright became a wave of terror, for a new sound entered the scene. It started low, like a rumbling belly. Then it grew. It modulated until within seconds, she discerned roaring laughter. It was human in the sense that it was laughter, but beyond that it was bestial, groaning and crackling without equal in nature. It was loud enough to sting in her ear. The girl sprang from her bed in a panic, unsure what to do or where to hide. By then, the instinct of flight was overwhelming. Something was horribly wrong. She started to cry and froze in indecision, standing motionless by the bed. Then she heard the squeak of the steps leading to the second floor. It was her father. She knew by the cadence of his descent that he was running. He confirmed the urgency by shouting a single word through her closed door. Down. That was the word they rehearsed. He was armed, and that meant that she needed to hide in her room. And so she dropped to the floor and pulled herself under the bed. Outside her door, her father had stopped two thirds of the way down the stairwell. What he saw there was nearly indescribable. Looking down the barrel of his shotgun from just outside the front door stood the devil himself, a bulking thing with a twisted face of pure malice. Beneath two glowing eyes as red as coals. An arm the length and width of an adolescent maple tree stretched through the open window. Its bulk reached across the door. Gangling, hairy fingers still touched the light switch, turning the house into a strobing horror film for an audience of one. The father, the defender of the place. He fired at the door and sprang down, clearing the entire landing in a single surge of adrenaline. He met the guttural cries with animalistic screams of his own. He nearly tore the handle from the door as he flung it open. His girl would not be threatened so lightly. She heard him bounding across the porch, firing and screaming as he ran. It was the last strength of a desperate man ready to die for his daughter. But he didn't die. The creature, the devil he had seen, vanished into the night. Satisfied, he entered back into the house and opened his daughter's bedroom door. He pulled her, now shaking, from beneath the bed. He led her into the living room, sat her in his chair, the one farthest from any exterior wall, wrapped her in a blanket, and knelt down to hold her. In the hours that followed, the police came and went, but they were of little help. Despite the man's repeated pleas for an armed search of the woods near the home, the officers assured him that there was virtually nothing they could do. And so the ordeal ended. But the father and daughter were not yet finished with the night. Still shaken but able to speak, the daughter flooded her father with questions, but he wasn't able to answer any of them. How could he? What he did tell her was that he'd been waiting for that night for some time. She looked puzzled. He asked if she remembered two years earlier, her 14th birthday, when he had abruptly taken her to stay at their mother's parents house for three nights. She did remember. He explained why. For you see, this was not the first devil he had encountered on his own property. It was a special day for our unnamed father of one. It was his daughter's birthday. Fourteen years together, most of them one on one. The girl's mother had left them when she was still very little. He was driving home for lunch to make the final preparations for her surprise party. Despite her mother's leaving, the man's in laws had remained a welcome and pleasant part of his daughter's life. Thus, family from both sides were to come over while she was still at school so that she could walk into a house filled with all her favorite people ready to celebrate her birthday. He couldn't wait. It was the first time he'd ever attempted anything like this, and he knew that she would love it. His truck loped down the country back road until he saw the chimney of his farmhouse rise over the next hill. Once he crested it, he looked down and saw his house in full, as well as the neighbor's place about a quarter mile away. It was a view he knew as well as any other. But that day something wasn't quite right. A dark spot lay in his front yard was unfamiliar. The man stared at it as he approached. Turning onto the gravel driveway, he saw that the black mass moved constantly, if only slightly. It writhed in a sandy section of yard where his daughter had once played as a little girl. But only when he was 20 or so yards away did he begin to see what the thing truly was. A thick pelt of jet black fur completely covered the hunched yet undeniably massive body. The arms stretched long enough to look like spindles compared to the beast's trunk, but they were by no means thin. They were enormous and powerful, with sinews visible even through the fur. They stretched forward and pulled back again. The man watched this happen again and again. It dug almost frantically into the sand, forming a mound just in front of its crouched legs, which the man could see match the arms in both length and girth. The man registered all of this as he continued toward the house when he realized his peril. For whatever this thing was, it was not human, nor was it any animal he had yet seen. He checked beneath his seat, but his gun wasn't there. 10 yards away now, the monster looked up from its work and revealed a grotesque face. A chiseled jaw opened to expose Sharp, yellow, partially rotting teeth. It screamed at the truck in a cry the man found unnaturally high pitched, and its eyes glared with angry anger at both man and the machine. Not knowing what else to do, he slammed on the gas and sped the final feet toward it. While laying on the horn, the devilish fiend sprang upright and sprinted toward the tree line, reaching it in an impossibly short amount of time. For all its size, the creature moved with an agility, dare one say, a grace that struck the man as almost dreamlike. It took him a while to leave his truck. He didn't know whether the thing might return While he investigated the yard, deciding that going alone would be foolish, he called his nearest neighbor, the one whose house he had seen from the hilltop. The neighbor struck him as a bit of an oddball. Though the man considered himself to be a God fearing Christian, his neighbor practiced his faith with far more zeal. They had never shared a cross word, but neither were they really good friends. Still, the man told his neighbor a quick version of the events, making sure to mention that he didn't have his gun with him. In a surprisingly knowing tone, the neighbor assured him that he would be right over and armed. Sure enough, not five minutes later, the man saw the dust cloud of the neighbor's truck rolling up behind him. He stepped out to greet and thank him. The neighbor, wearing a wide brimmed hat and cradling a lever action rifle in one arm, met him with a comforting smile and asked if everything was alright. The man assured him that he was, and the two were walked to where the monster had been digging in the yard. At first glance, it looked like nothing more than a shallow hole in the sand. Only when the neighbor stirred the pile beside it with his boot did they discover what truly frightened them. Trinkets that could have only come from inside of both of their homes. Refrigerator magnets, a notebook with grocery lists scribbled inside, and worst of all, a photograph of the man's little girl that had been pinned inside his truck. He had noticed it go missing weeks earlier, but never bothered to search for it. Seeing these pieces of his life in the possession of that inexplicable horror terrified him. His mind raced with questions about how the beast had stolen them and how many times it might have been inside of his house. The neighbor nodded knowingly and explained that his family had seen the same or a similar beast on their own property many times. He told the man that he had once found such a demon even sleeping in his barn, sprawled across the seat of an old rusted tractor. It had been wearing one of his wife's dresses. The fabric had stretched and torn under the creature's bulk, but he recognized it immediately. There was no doubt. The neighbor said he had called the police about the incidents, but they brushed him off every time. At first they even tried to gaslight him, claiming that he was imagining things. But when the calls continued, they admitted that they knew of the thing, but they could do nothing. Shocked that his neighbor knew of the creature, the man asked why he'd never mentioned it before. The neighbor replied that he hadn't really wanted to trouble him or cause worry. After all, until now he had wondered himself if he might be going mad. Now he knew better. They turned back to the sand and noticed something else protruding beneath the scattered knickknacks. The man brushed more sand away, and both stepped back, speechless, at what appeared. 12 angel figurines. Some were ceramic, others plastic, some were small, others nearly as tall as a grown man's knee. All looked weathered, as though they had been kept, though not carefully, outdoors. Hidden in earth and among the trees, the sight felt surreal. The man saw fragments of his own life mixed with symbols of Christianity, all defiled by the same hand. A rogue wave of existential dread washed over the man. In that pile, the he saw a threat that transcended the normal, the very paradigm upon which he had built his life. Here was something unknown and alien, something that struck his foundations like a hammer, leaving behind a single but irreparable crack. The neighbor, disturbed by the angels but unsurprised, assured him these creatures were devils. They always dwell where humans live. They seek to steal, kill, and destroy for destruction's own sake, and humanity's symbols of faith, whether angels or crosses, would always draw their malice. Together they cleaned the mess the neighbor left, acting far more casually than the man thought appropriate, given what had happened. As for the man, he still had a party to throw, so he finished the preparations inside, flinching at every creek of the old house. Then he put on a smile and went to get his daughters. They stopped for milkshakes and fries at a burger stand, where he slipped in a few new house rules about not going outside alone. The girl seemed confused. They returned home to a house full of surprises. The party delighted his daughter and almost made her forget their earlier conversation. But in the middle of it, she glanced out a window and saw her father speaking with her grandfather. She wondered why her dad looked so angry and frantic. When the festivities ended, he loaded her into the truck, and the two stayed at that same grandfather's house for three nights before returning home. Now, with all of this revealed to her two years later, and after her own experience with the beast's return, the girl was at a loss. She'd heard of Bigfoot before. Even some of her friends at school claimed to have seen one in the mountains as children, but it always seemed more humorous than anything else. Bigfoot, to her, had been like a practical joke that nature had pulled on itself. Now, though, things were different. She realized that other things, things not so neat, somehow shared the world with her. That same existential dread tinged her heart with a blotch of despair that never really went away. To this day, she remembers that night with equal parts love for her father and fear for what he was forced to confront. The cryptid known by many names Bigfoot, Sasquatch, the Yeti, the Skunk Ape, the Rougarou, the Watiko, the Ohio Grassman, Momo, the Old Old man of the mountain, just to name a few, has stood at the forefront of the modern imagination for generations now. It's taken on qualities of a horror myth whose titular antihero serves as the preternatural double of mankind, one who seems always to have the upper hand and who uses that upper hand to feed off of our fear and terror. Given this description, a profound question eventually arises. Why isn't Bigfoot more violent? Sure, stories exist in which Bigfoot commits horrible acts of physical violence against its victims, but those accounts are rare. It's a strange thing. Either in the majority of cases, inspiring fear is the only goal, or our lack of explicitly violent stories reflects a case of survivorship bias. Maybe we hear less about violence because those victims will not, or, more likely, cannot talk. In any case, the Bigfoot problem remains unsolved. It seems there must be two options. Either on the one hand, the whole phenomenon is a multi generational, international, and increasingly powerful mass delusion, the product of deceived true believers at best, clout chasers and charlatans at worst. Or, on the other hand, at least some of the stories are mostly real. But again, if we accept the latter, only more questions. Why would such a being exist? Why would it behave the way it does, if real at all? Is it purely natural, a cryptid in the most technical sense of the word, a mere animal that's simply yet to be cataloged by the sciences of man? Or is there some spiritual element to it? At risk of stepping into idle questions we have no business asking at all. Why would God place such a story into this world? Perhaps it's a test, perhaps a Distraction, Perhaps something more. Perhaps real or not, Bigfoot can teach us something about the world we live in, who we are and where we're going. So join us in this episode of Haunted Cosmos as we search for answers in the strange mystery of the Bigfoot.

[Ben Garrett]

Hey, everybody. Welcome to this episode of Haunted Cosmos, season seven, episode two. Attempt number two. Actually, this episode.

[Brian]

No, no. We just happened to change clothes completely for all the discussion portions of the episode.

[Ben Garrett]

No, I mean, that would be chill of us to do if we ever did it. So when we first recorded this episode, we kept the scripted section.

[Brian]

Stuff happened.

[Ben Garrett]

But Brian and I were both sick.

[Brian]

We were, like, deeply sick.

[Ben Garrett]

It was the most worthless episode, discussion wise. And that's saying something.

[Brian]

We're gonna have to can this whole episode.

[Ben Garrett]

We're gonna have to redo this, dude.

[Brian]

It sucks. Okay.

[Ben Garrett]

Nah, dude, this is elite.

[Brian]

Okay.

[Ben Garrett]

Anyway. That we've ever done. So we literally scrapped the whole thing.

[Brian]

The lost episode.

[Ben Garrett]

It's the lost episode.

[Brian]

Can I say, a certain percentage of Haunted Cosmos fans would have loved it.

[Ben Garrett]

Would have.

[Brian]

Absolutely.

[Ben Garrett]

It would have been their favorite.

[Brian]

And we might open up a Patreon tier where you get the lost episode. But it's gonna have to be like,

[Ben Garrett]

OPSEC's gonna have to be high thousand dollars a month, and you have to, like, send us your Social Security.

[Brian]

They have to send us, like, a pic, like a sworn affidavit that you will not leak it.

[Ben Garrett]

It's nothing bad. It was just like. It was really undignified. We'll say

[Brian]

I'll become even more undignified

[Ben Garrett]

than this, which is, again, leave my

[Brian]

pride by my side. I will dance, I will sing to be mad for my king. Nothing is hindering this passion in my soul, man.

[Ben Garrett]

But. But there is a possibility for one lucky listener who signs up for Patreon today to get an artifact for.

[Brian]

From that.

[Ben Garrett]

From this lost episode. Brian, can you reveal the article?

[Brian]

There is one Easter egg that explains why 90% of it had to be discarded.

[Ben Garrett]

So this. In this poster, if you sign up for Patreon today, you could be entered for a chance to win this beautiful poster that used to be on the wall in my office. And that's why it's full of holes from thumbtacks.

[Brian]

This is well loved.

[Ben Garrett]

But we. I signed it, Brian signed it, Martina and Evanescence signed it. The whole team. Okay. And there is an Easter egg.

[Brian]

This is the Easter egg that I wrote. And some of you will get it if you're terminally online.

[Ben Garrett]

Yes. And all we'll say is that that is a taste of what the lost

[Brian]

episode, actually, you should really be able to derive from first principles at this point why we had to throw away the episode. But I want to reiterate that it was because of how awesome, of how sick we were.

[Ben Garrett]

It was actually like we were ahead of our time and it was that good. But the people just aren't ready for how good it was. No, we were both sick. And it was.

[Brian]

It was truly a waste of everybody's time. Yeah, but you know what's not a waste of everyone's time, Ben?

[Ben Garrett]

Haunted cosmos in general.

[Brian]

Haunted cosmos is not. I know some people in the year 1850 looked into it and said, like, nobody's allowed to talk about it, but some of us. You know what? Some of us want to talk about Bigfoot some of the time. Not all the time.

[Ben Garrett]

No, not all the time.

[Brian]

But some of us. Don't be talking about Bigfoot all the time. I'm preaching about Bigfoot. No, I'm not riding Bigfoot around my property.

[Ben Garrett]

I will say you have mentioned Bigfoot in a sermon before, but it wasn't.

[Brian]

Have I really?

[Ben Garrett]

It was an example of something not to emphasize a lot.

[Brian]

Ah, okay. See? See what I'm saying?

[Ben Garrett]

Technically.

[Brian]

But like, this is the thing. I love a good Bigfoot story. Put me in prison. Put me in a maximum security prison. Okay? Lock me up, throw away the keys.

[Ben Garrett]

Solitary. Okay?

[Brian]

I don't care who knows it.

[Ben Garrett]

Is that what you were gonna say is not a waste of time?

[Brian]

No, I don't even.

[Ben Garrett]

Say something else.

[Brian]

Oh, you know what? It's not a waste of time.

[Ben Garrett]

What?

[Brian]

Checking out the current fundraiser that I'm running to help me finish my next full length album of original music that is also not about Bigfoot. But one of the songs does feature one of the Fae.

[Ben Garrett]

Ooh, I know which one it is. Do you? Do you? No. Cause you haven't heard it yet.

[Brian]

You haven't heard it. Unless you were at my live concert last year. New Christian press conference.

[Ben Garrett]

If you join the fundraiser, yeah, you could. You might hear it early. I actually have no idea.

[Brian]

I'm going to instruct Evanescence right now. If it is done in time to put a five second snippet of the album to play right now. Just.

[Ben Garrett]

Okay. Ready?

[Brian]

Go.

[Ben Garrett]

All right, that's five seconds.

[Brian]

If nothing but silence happened there, the album was not finished enough for that to have happened. And that was a total waste of.

[Ben Garrett]

And hopefully you didn't click off the episode thinking that there was some kind of arrow.

[Brian]

Anyway, we're back Listen, my music is made not by robots. It is certified human made. The AI demons aren't making my music. Real musicians playing real instruments are making it. And it kind of sounds like a cope. It costs a lot.

[Ben Garrett]

I'm kidding. Wow.

[Brian]

I'm singing it. We're doing stuff. I hope it's good. I think you'll like it maybe if you don't keep it to yourself.

[Ben Garrett]

Honestly, it is really good. I heard a lot of the songs at the concert that you did last year. I've heard a couple snippets here and there in the office. It's very, very good.

[Brian]

Thank you.

[Ben Garrett]

Well worth the support. I'm excited to hear the rest of it fully produced because, man, that producer, he really knows a few tricks.

[Brian]

Oh, dude, my guy Brandon is amazing. He is both handsome and talented indeed. Much like you. Perfect segue. Much like you. The person who wrote the Cold Open that we just enjoyed.

[Ben Garrett]

Yeah.

[Brian]

Which we should now discuss because, man, there is a lot in this story that is really fascinating. A lot of the thematic connections between some of the supernatural phenomena that we discuss on this show frequently and the religious spiritual overtones where these are not just like. You'll find when you get not even that deep into all of these different genre of stories, aliens to Bigfoot, that they are not just like materialistic phenomena, but that right under the surface there are spiritual elements, spiritual messaging, spiritual elements. And that's why I wanna discuss that with you today, Ben.

[Ben Garrett]

Yeah, I mean, you see that with. So the thing with Bigfoot that always comes up is that overwhelming sense of dread. We don't wanna ignore that. It's like that dread window that we always talk about with John Keel in the Mothman episode where you take a step and all of a sudden you're in this cloud of overwhelming fear. There's certainly that with Bigfoot, which already seems to imply something that's beyond the mere physical. But. But with this story especially, you see religious iconography buried in the ground around the personal trinkets and belongings of this family. And all of that comes on the heels of hearing from the guy's neighbor who's very religious about how like, oh, of course these things are devils. And we've seen a whole family at our house and one of them was cross dressing. Unless maybe it was a lady Bigfoot.

[Brian]

Ah, well, Patty's probably not.

[Ben Garrett]

They're probably cross dressing because demons cross dress. That's what they do.

[Brian]

So true, king. So you've said something, Ben. I'm just gonna interrupt you so rudely. You Said something before that I want you to. To use a youth pastor word. I want you to unpack it a little bit for us. Okay. I want you to unpack it.

[Ben Garrett]

I hate unpacking on a trip.

[Brian]

I know. It's the worst. That's why I get it out right when I'm through the door, I unpack.

[Ben Garrett]

I'll say it right here, right now. Unloading the dishwasher is ten times worse than loading the dishwasher.

[Brian]

I could not agree with you more.

[Ben Garrett]

Cool. All right, go ahead.

[Brian]

So you've talked about the UFO and UAP and alien phenomenon being a modern mythology and that big. And then I've heard you even say the Bigfoot thing is another form of a modern myth or mythology. So what do you mean by that? Yeah, you know, even, like, how you've talked about the UAP phenomenon as a mythology of hope.

[Ben Garrett]

Yeah. Let me unpack that.

[Brian]

Unpack that for us.

[Ben Garrett]

So it starts with my, like, my working paradigm of what myth actually is. Yeah. Which is an admixture of historical events wherein the gods, quote, unquote, are involved with the affairs of men.

[Brian]

Dude, somebody quote that and make an Instagram post. Ben Garrett looking thoughtful, saying that. Because that was smart. That was some smart stuff.

[Ben Garrett]

Dude. That was off the dome.

[Brian]

Unbelievable. He used the word admix.

[Ben Garrett]

Admix. Go ahead, keep going. I really like you that, you know.

[Brian]

Keep going.

[Ben Garrett]

I was proud of that.

[Brian]

What a. What a. What a guy.

[Ben Garrett]

So since that's the case, that is the paradigm of myth that I operate under constantly. And one time I was reading through a compilation of Carl Jung's essays on mythology, and one thing that he mentioned that I thought was interesting was that the modern UFO phenomenon, and he's writing this long ago, is a modern myth. And that actually fits nicely into my paradigm of myth, which is fundamentally different from Carl Jung's, by the way, where you have, in the UFO occurrences, historical things. I think that they're really happening. That these things are actually occurring. Yeah, some of them, not all. And they're instances of people witnessing what I believe to be spiritual beings. I could see the argument being made that some UFOs or UAPs are angelic. Sure enough. Okay. But I'm talking really about, like, abduction stories and the really terrifying UFO stories that you hear. I. I think that that's people coming into contact with demonic entities, or we can say, quote, unquote, gods. The difference, though, is that in the cases where people come into close contact with these beings, but it's not always or only Terrifying. They're receiving some evangelistic message. We've talked about this at length on haunted cosmos, and that message is one of like a false hope. It's the not even world, but cosmic religious peace. It's the ascension. It's becoming being instead of becoming. It's, you know, all these things. It's man going up to the next plane of his spiritual evolution. And the aliens are giving these people this message and they're really convinced of it, and then they go and proselytize other human beings with the same message. That is why I call the UFO phenomenon a modern myth of transcendent but false hope. Yes, I think that there's a parallel with the Bigfoot phenomenon, but it's like an inverse of that. It's still false, but it's almost like Bigfoot is a manifestation of that really happens at times, but it's like a spiritual manifestation of our moral bankruptcy, especially in the west, as we apostatize from Christianity. The more that I read about Bigfoot stories, the more it seems like there's this allegorical connection where Bigfoot is almost like the ghost of our guilt that's haunting us.

[Brian]

Wow.

[Ben Garrett]

We're like. We've become so decrepit and so morally bankrupt and so confused and unwise that there's this now demonic entity that's meddling in our affairs. There's that myth aspect of it, and it's telling us some transcendent thing, but it's about our transcendent, like, damnation. It's like we're losing everything that we once had and we're haunted by this guilt and shame, but we wanna hide away from it. We wanna pretend like it's not even there. We wanna explain it away with materialistic things, things that don't matter. I think that it's a tenuous connection, but I do think it's a potential one. And the more that I hear stories about the ones that we read about in the cold open, the more I think that that actually could be like a meta possibility of, like. What is the big demonic narrative that's being played out here? Well, what if it's the demons showing us, in a sense, our. And it terrifies us, but because we're already apostate, that terror doesn't lead us to godly sorrow and repentance. It leads us to worldly sorrow, which is just more and more despair.

[Brian]

It's a flaunting of what is happening to man in his sinful estate, which is that he becomes like unto a beast.

[Ben Garrett]

Yeah, great. Use of like unto.

[Brian]

You're welcome.

[Ben Garrett]

I would like to say that, yeah,

[Brian]

we become like a beast. So, you know, Paul talks about this in Titus with the Cretans, and he basically quotes a poet of their own that said that all the Cretans were liars and they were basically evil beasts. And then he says this testimony is true, this generalization about the culture. Not every individual Cretan was like this, but generally speaking, their culture was like this. The scriptures routinely talk about sinful man as if he is descended from his place as the crown of creation. Like that Psalm 8, that God has put everything under man's feet, and yet in his sinfulness he imitates the beasts instead of imitating God. And so he's just ruled by his desires and brute desires. You see this in myth, all over the place, this theme of the bestial half man.

[Ben Garrett]

Yeah.

[Brian]

So I could see a demonic trope emphasizing this or playing along with it and recasting that before our eyes in a bestial half part wild man type of creature that is meant to, like, sort of mock us. We've also talked in the past about demons can be doing more than one thing at a time about the way in which certain corners of the materialist world view Bigfoot as sort of a missing link, Australopithecus or, you know, between the ape and the man in our evolution. Like a bygone, vestigial, leftover, you know, dying line of human evolution.

[Ben Garrett]

Yeah.

[Brian]

And so there's that as well, you know, like reinforcing this narrative that man is a beast come from beasts. He's not made in the image of God. He's just the result of chance and, you know, the chance turning of genetic folds.

[Ben Garrett]

Yeah.

[Brian]

With selective pressure in nature, we're just a part of nature. We're in no way spiritual. So there's lots of different themes that you could see being emphasized, played up in some of these accounts.

[Ben Garrett]

I'll also say, too, there's. You've talked recently off, offline about the tendency of modern Westerners towards, like, suicidal altruism or like, suicidal empathy, where we constantly are drawn to the fringes of things in order to try to, like, fix stuff there. But in doing so, we're even willing to sacrifice our station. But it accomplishes nothing. All it does is give away the blessing that we had and it even, like, gives it to a waste, so to speak. And I think one of the big ways that you see this in the modern west is with an environmentalistic bent. I didn't say that. Well, an environmentalism that is suicidal, where, like, humanity becomes its own in groups, out group, where humanity is seen as a villain to the rest of the world, a cancer on the planet. And so in order to repent for our cancerous presence on the planet, we actually submit ourselves to nature instead of ruling over it. And. And when you do that, maybe the demons are playing into that a little bit and Bigfoot is showing us the consequence. Like we're submitting ourselves to this wild thing and instead of taking charge of it and subduing it, and now that wild thing is going to take what it wants, which is our own souls, you know, like, I think. Yeah, like, yeah, I'm digging a little bit.

[Brian]

So anyway, but reached his arm through the window trying to get you.

[Ben Garrett]

Well, it reminds me of, if you've ever read listener Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, one of the big symbols in Frankenstein is that the monster is a manifestation of Victor Frankenstein's own hubris. Like, Victor Frankenstein's actually a very likable character, but one thing that he has is hubris to believe that he can create life ex nihilo. Right. And then the monster is produced and that monster continually comes back to haunt Victor Frankenstein and. And it's like the punishment of his pride. And I see like, kind of a parallel in some of these Bigfoot stories where we, speaking generally in the west, have just become so prideful, but also so self loathing. Like, we just hate ourselves. We absolutely hate ourselves and everything that God has done for us and we produce a monster in a world of chaos where, like, we stop again, we stop taking dominion, we stop trying to subjugate the world to the glory of God and we submit ourselves to it. We shouldn't then be surprised if the demons play into that and try to lead us further down that line while also showing us our existential fear.

[Brian]

Yeah. So what do you think about the angels? The buried angels?

[Ben Garrett]

Oh, yeah, the defiled Azog the Defiler.

[Brian]

Dude, deep cut. Actually not. It's not that relative for. For movie watchers.

[Ben Garrett]

My sons recently watched the Hobbit movies and I decided that if you don't like the Hobbit movies, you're just like, not a fun person. Like, I get. They're not faithful. I get all the. I get it. But they're terrible. They're fun movies.

[Brian]

Like, if you think, wow, the Hobbit book is at all related to this, it's not. It's a foot project. You just view them as like Jason Bourne but with elves. That's Jason Bourne, then. It's kind of fun.

[Ben Garrett]

Orlando Bloom, by the way. You can tell he's wearing so much makeup. Poor guy looks way older.

[Brian]

Anyway, not my guy.

[Ben Garrett]

Orlando Azog, the Defiler. No, I think that the Buried Angels is one of the things that drives me to these speculations is they're not conclusions, it's just thoughts. But to see that very overtly religious and Christian iconography being given back to the earth. Given back to the wild, Stolen by the wild man. There's just. There's a lot there. You know, I think that you can run with that to a lot of places, but all of them lead back to. This is more than just a material phenomenon. This is spiritual defilement of even a Christian heritage.

[Brian]

Yeah. And it comes along with all the other elements of this. The feeling of dread, the smell of hell. Like all of these different experiences that are through lines, through all of these encounters is that there is a spiritual element to all of them, or at least a good percentage of them.

[Ben Garrett]

Even the whole thing with the Bigfoot attacked the home that was the single father with the daughter. And the father was a good father from all accounts. And the daughter loved her dad. And he wants to interrupt that.

[Brian]

He.

[Ben Garrett]

Bigfoot wants to interrupt that thing. Wants to drive a wedge between those two in some way. Like get a lot.

[Brian]

Leave people alone. Leave them alone.

[Ben Garrett]

Like, touch grass, Bigfoot.

[Brian]

Touch grass, Bigfoot. Mind your own business, man.

[Ben Garrett]

Also pound sand. Also mogged.

[Brian]

He just. He got probably frame mogged by that dad. He got frame mogged when that damn show.

[Ben Garrett]

That's why you ran away.

[Brian]

We can't. We can't go back down. We can't descend back into the abyss of the first attempt.

[Ben Garrett]

I think what you mean is ascend the pinnacle. That was the first attempt.

[Brian]

Before this episode gets hit by bazooka, could you go ahead and maybe lead us into this next discussion or this next story?

[Ben Garrett]

Yeah, absolutely. But before I do, we are going to take an ad break and we're going to hear a little bit about our friends over at Nutracel, who are the headline sponsors of this episode. So stay tuned. Listen to Nutracel. Amazing products. They make you feel better, they make you healthier. I use them. Methylene blue. Other things.

[Brian]

They make your pee blue. Yeah, they do also get this. If you skip these ads, Bigfoot will kill you. I didn't want to say it.

[Ben Garrett]

And that's not a threat.

[Brian]

I didn't want to say it.

[Ben Garrett]

That's just an observation.

[Brian]

We're just observing the world around us. We're taking notes. Okay.

[Ben Garrett]

Yeah. So anyway, listen to the ads and then we will roll, right.

[Brian]

We'll roll right into the. In the story.

[Ben Garrett]

Yes. Thank you.

[Brian]

Ben. Have you heard of the Jake Muller Adventures?

[Ben Garrett]

What's that?

[Brian]

A Christian audio drama? Zombies, vampires, global conspiracies and faith at the center. I was up all night on the edge of my seat.

[Ben Garrett]

Is it fully immersive sound effects and cast and everything?

[Brian]

Yes, full cast cinematic sound. It's like you can hear the danger coming.

[Ben Garrett]

Ooh. So kind of similar to Hana Cosmos, but no your mom jokes and more drama.

[Brian]

No mom jokes yet, but yeah, tons of drama.

[Ben Garrett]

So it's kind of like your mom then?

[Brian]

Not quite. Check it [e-mail] haunted for 10% off.

[Ben Garrett]

Brian, let me paint you a scenario. You wake up in the Charlotte, North Carolina area. The swamp ape has flooded your yard overnight. What do you do?

[Brian]

Ben, I wouldn't even know where to begin in answering this question.

[Ben Garrett]

Okay, well, let's let me answer it for you. You call the good old boys at Drain My Lawn and they'll rush right over. These drainage experts are the swamp ape's greatest foible. They can remove his habitat in no time. Plus, their sister company, Fence My Lawn, can follow up the drainage with a fence that is scientifically proven to keep swamp apes out. And it also looks really good.

[Brian]

Wow. If you live in the Charlotte, North Carolina area, go to drainmylawn.com haunted and you'll get 5% off any service. Does your outdated website give your visitors sleep paralysis? What? What?

[Ben Garrett]

Is that a thing?

[Brian]

Are you haunted by that logo your uncle's pet werewolf made?

[Ben Garrett]

Brian, what are you talking about?

[Brian]

If you're ready to level up your brand and website, you need to talk to Josh at Valente Creative.

[Ben Garrett]

What's up, guys?

[Brian]

Josh, my guy.

[Ben Garrett]

What the heck? How did you just appear?

[Brian]

Head to valentecreative.com NCP to talk with Josh about your brand and website.

[Ben Garrett]

Oh. Oh, this is an ad that we're doing right now. Wait, how did he teleport into this room?

[Brian]

Ben, I wish I could tell you, but this is an ad. You have to go to valentecreative.com NCP and reach out. Today,

[Ben Garrett]

Gilgamesh, so tall, magnificent and terrible. Who opened passes in the mountains, dug wells on the slopes, slopes of the uplands and crossed the ocean, the wide sea to the sunrise. Who scoured the world, ever searching for life and reached through sheer force. Utna Napishti the distant. Who restored the cult centers destroyed by the deluge and set in place for the people the rites of the cosmos. With these words, the first epic myth of Western civilization begins. The hero of the tale, the demigod Gilgamesh, is introduced. A giant of towering proportions, formed by fallen gods. He began his reign in Babylon in terror. Mere mortals feared their king, and he had his way with them. He walked here and there along the walls of his city, challenging every man to combat with weapons. And no man dared refuse him, for then death was certain. Thus he killed many of Uruk's future strength. Women fared no better, for Gilgamesh took whichever maiden he placed, pleased the complaint of the people rose up to the pantheon of false gods ruling over them. Powerful, preeminent expert and mighty Gilgamesh lets no girl go free to her bridegroom. To their complaint, the goddess Ishtar paid heed. The warrior's daughter, the young man's bride. She heard each of their cries. Thus Ishtar persuaded the rest of the gods and goddesses collectively, they called upon Aruru, the great goddess and maker of mankind. They called upon her to fashion a match for Gilgamesh. The wicked hybrid demigod would only be broken into civility by a wild man fashioned by the gods alone, one who could offer him a real fight. Thus, in fighting the humanoid manifestation of the wild outside the walls of Uruk, Gilgamesh would conquer the wilderness within himself and become a benevolent ruler. Enkidu was made by Ururu of clay, fashioned in the badlands of the world. Enkidu, the offspring of silence. His body covered in a thick mat of hair, like the animals he ran beside. And he lived with those animals, for they were all he knew for many days. This was his way of life. Eventually, though, a young trapper caught sight of this wild man while on the hunt for game outside the city. He was perplexed, of course. At first, he marveled at the incredible strength, the inhuman size mixed with the unmistakably human frame. At once, the young man understood that this was the doing of the gods for some purpose that he did not understand. Thus, the first account of the wild man was written by poets thousands of years ago. To them, such creatures were far from purely natural. Rather, they were the offspring of demonic thought, bred for the purpose of persuading man to govern himself more rightly. But this is far from the only mention of a creature one might mistake for our modern Bigfoot. In antiquity, even when separated by entire worlds, human men wrote of similar things. Starting in the late 1300s, the Wycliffe Bible translations from the Latin vulgate, rendered the word translated as hyena or hairy one in the ESV version of Isaiah 13:21 into the Old English term woodwose, meaning wild man. The fact betrays a legend in the medieval folkloric tradition about a race of something not quite man and not quite animal that appears in some of the most highly regarded stories that defined that age. In Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, one reads about the hero Gawain warring with dragons and wild men, or the wood wos who dwelt within the craggy hills of rural Britain. In Carlisle Cathedral, a mesorecord depicts a woodwose fawning over a beautiful nymph. The wild man is partially hidden by trees. Something in the picture makes it certain that the nymph knows the creature is there and that he longs for her. She stares directly out of the carving with a confident expression, as if she knows the power she already holds over the lingering manifestation of the uncivilized. In Holy Trinity Church in Coventry, another carving shows a giant man covered in hair, sitting on a throne with a tamed lion curled at his feet. The image preserves a memory of an even deeper past, when myth and history were not so neatly separate. Perhaps it is all mere story, but other accounts from those times genuinely make one wonder whether the ubiquity of the wood woves was not indicative of something grounded in reality. Around the year 1160, the English historian Ralph of Coggeshall documented a woodwose being captured by local villagers. The story goes that some children living in Arford began telling their parents about glimpses of something in the woods that they couldn't name. They said it walked and ran like a man, but was large and somehow disproportionate. They also reported that the beast was covered in thick hair. Some of the people believed the children and went out to search for the thing. Ralph states that this group found the creature living deep in the marshes and that its features matched exactly what the children described. It was humanoid enough for them to know that it was not an animal. And though the thing did not or could not speak, a look in the eye betrayed some level of apparent intelligence or self awareness. The villagers watched stealthily, learning the habits of the creature until they could predict its movements well enough to attempt a trap. They succeeded in this, and they brought the woodwest back to Arford Castle. There the nobles of the land, intrigued by the novelty, attempted to civilize the wood woes, but all of their efforts failed. The thing refused. All cooked food, whether meat or vegetable, and despite thousands of man hours of effort, it never showed any growth in comprehending human speech. One morning, the castle groundskeeper was walking toward the stables when he heard a grunting sound from near the garden wall. He glanced over, but the morning fog was so dense that he struggled to make anything out. He shifted his head and moved around a little bit and focused his gaze until finally, ever so faintly, he saw the form of a man with locks of matted hair pulling himself up and over the stone wall. It was the escaped woodwose, and he was never seen again. The chronicle offered no commentary on these events. He merely recorded the story as a fact relevant to the broader community of his day. And this type of account was again not uncommon in those times. It seems the woodwose of yesteryear has merely changed names in modern day, retreating alongside the ever vanishing wildernesses of Britain. The Ojibway people were descendants of a clan from Babel who, upon expulsion from the land of Shinar, walked and sailed for a long time before eventually arriving in the rich but perilous wilderness around what we now call the Great Lakes. Much like the Seven Sages traditions of the ancient Mesopotamians or ancient Hindus or Mesoamericans or Greeks, the Ojibwe received their education in ethics and virtue from their own seven wise grandfathers, powerful Ojibwe spirits who took pity on the difficulty of mankind after the flood. In order to help men learn these immaterial skills of the world, the grandfathers enlisted the help of a prophesied child. The child would be taught by the gods and would lead by example for the rest of the people, being himself a perfect embodiment of wisdom, love, respect, bravery, honesty, humility, and truth. Thus the grandfathers carried the child away from his mother's womb and took him on a tour of the cosmos until he reached the significant age of seven. At that point they returned him to the earth and as already stated, they taught him into his manhood. At the onset of that manhood, they released him back to the Ojibwe, whereupon he became their pagan prophet, priest, and king. The people received the gifts and established their tribe in harmony with the earth and her bounty. As the man taught his people, the need to attach the virtues to visible and tangible examples beyond became clear. His early men struggled to reason in the abstract, so to help them, he carefully chose one animal from the earth to represent each of the seven gifts for wisdom. There was the beaver, who changed the courses of rivers with prudence and skill for love. There Was the eagle, an image of majesty and jealousy that love produces for respect. There was the buffalo, honored among the creatures for bravery. There was was the bear, who doesn't hesitate to defend the one she loves. For humility, he chose the wolf, an animal mighty on his own, but who nonetheless knows that he's doomed apart from the pack for truth. There was the turtle, who's slow and therefore models a sober restraint in the world. All of these made perfect sense to the man and to his pupils. But one final gift remained to be personified. The virtue of honesty. With great deliberation, the man took counsel within himself. He needed the symbol to be concrete, obvious to everyone, even to the children. And he needed to follow the theme of known creatures that he used for all the other gifts. After many days of thought, guided by the insight he received from the grandfathers, he finally understood. Thus, honesty was symbolized by the SA B. The image of meekness or honesty with oneself. The sabe is what it is. And everyone grasped the teacher's meaning at once. But what is the sabe? Well, it was the wild thing, the man like beast of hair and crude intelligence, whom everyone in the tribe frequently saw gathering and hunting in packs in the wilderness beyond the woods by the lakes. To the primordial Ojibwe, Bigfoot was. Was as obviously real as the beaver, the wolf, the eagle and the bear.

[Brian]

Well, welcome back from that wonderful story, Ben. I just want to ask a question to lead us in because there's so much there. We talked about Enkidu. We talked about my Chippewa heritage. Geechy gichi mukadae Quay we, which means big big black woman in Ojibwe. Just a heads up, we. But the wood woes. My question is just, is the wood woes like a British Bigfoot?

[Ben Garrett]

I think so.

[Brian]

Is it just like, hey, I'm a Bigfoot, innit Beans. All right. Well, at least our Bigfoot aren't giving people existential dread. Well, at least our Bigfoots, they can't even read. Well, they're stealing jobs. Well, at least the world Wood wolves. Does it impede Sir Gawain in the Green Knight? Yeah, so like. So the Wood wolves, what do you think about the Woodwells?

[Ben Garrett]

Well, I think that Bigfoot are Forest Fae. Wood Fae, if you will. Demonic Fae. And so yeah, it makes sense that you'd have like regional manifestations of the

[Brian]

same kind of motif. Why not?

[Ben Garrett]

And I think the Woodwose is just the British version. Especially like the old Christendom British version.

[Brian]

Yeah, he's Got a bad teeth.

[Ben Garrett]

It's way. He's way more low key.

[Brian]

Yeah.

[Ben Garrett]

You know, he's like, riding around town in a Rover. If I see Ops, it's over. You know, he's not. He's not like ratchet.

[Brian]

Have you seen the one? Okay, this would be the last thing. And then we'll actually talk about real things. Have you seen, like, the Wood Wolves? Exactly. Have you seen the Instagram reels where the guy's like, point of view? You're a British waitress in an inn in, like, 1643, and it's the guy whose face is all distorted by a villain, and he's like, you know what, love? Just a light one today. If you could just bring me a raw trout and the teeth of a donkey.

[Ben Garrett]

Have you seen.

[Brian]

They're so good.

[Ben Garrett]

Have you seen the one where it's like, different countries arguing about best beer food combo, and America's like a Coors banquet with a cheeseburger. And then the Italian says, some Italian beer with pizza. And they're all like, oh, that's a good one. And Germans say. And then the British guy's like, what about a nice warm brew with a side of beans?

[Brian]

That's literally what they're like, though.

[Ben Garrett]

Hey.

[Brian]

I lived there for three years.

[Ben Garrett]

British people. Yeah. Need to get some better opinions about everything.

[Brian]

I lived in England for three years and it was. I mean, constantly in fear for my life.

[Ben Garrett]

Yeah. Okay. So, yeah, I think the Woodlock is just, like, British version of Big.

[Brian]

He's like, British version. And he can't learn to, like, he can't read.

[Ben Garrett]

No, you can't teach him. Yeah. Just like the rest of

[Brian]

the British people. Literally built, like, the greatest empire in history. And, like, we're all descended from sun never Sets, dude. And, like, we're. They're great and amazing.

[Ben Garrett]

Yeah, we're just.

[Brian]

We're dunking on them. No, man.

[Ben Garrett]

Hey, we. We. I mess with you because you're my friend. You're my.

[Brian]

That's right.

[Ben Garrett]

Yeah. Love you British people.

[Brian]

Yeah, exactly.

[Ben Garrett]

And then there's the og boy thing.

[Brian]

Well, hang on. The scribe, though. Like, the village scribe told us this about the woodwolves.

[Ben Garrett]

Yeah, yeah.

[Brian]

So that. So it happened.

[Ben Garrett]

Well, yeah, it's well documented.

[Brian]

Can you imagine being the village scribe? Like, that's your thing, the village scribe, you just keep track of what's been happening.

[Ben Garrett]

The village scribe, he's talking to the prince or the king or whatever, and he's like, so then what happened that next week?

[Brian]

Yeah.

[Ben Garrett]

The king's like, oh, that was the wood woes.

[Brian]

We caught the wood woes.

[Ben Garrett]

Like, hundreds of villagers helped come together to capture a woodwose. We all saw him, kept him at the castle for months.

[Brian]

Try to educate him.

[Ben Garrett]

Tried to educate him, Couldn't do it.

[Brian]

He had to evangelize him.

[Ben Garrett]

He ended up just running away. He finally leaves, and the scribes like, yeah, yeah, okay. Of course. Checks out.

[Brian]

What Next. Yeah, then he's like. And then the draw bridge had to be replaced.

[Ben Garrett]

I just.

[Brian]

Because the timbers was roll.

[Ben Garrett]

And, man, the high Middle Ages, those guys, they knew how to just roll with stuff.

[Brian]

They did. Because they'd be like, you know, talking about doctrine, stuff theologians are writing. And then like. Yeah, and then there's the hobgoblins. Like, here's what. Here's what they've been up to. And then anyway, like, penal substitutionary atonement.

[Ben Garrett]

Next, you know, but there's even carvings of wood. Wood woes. Wood woses.

[Brian]

Yeah. Wood woesen.

[Ben Garrett]

Wood woesen. Yeah. On churches.

[Brian]

Yeah.

[Ben Garrett]

You know, and I can't remember which ones they are. Like, Carlisle Cathedral, I believe, on the front door has a carving of a wood wose being, like, tempted by a nymph. Wow. Like a river nymph. And the nymph is just staring right out of the frame at the onlooker. And then the woodwose is, like, trying to get her attention from it. It's just. Yeah, that was just the water they were swimming in. They were like, this is our world.

[Brian]

It's real. Yeah, it was enchanted. Did that image. So you have the nymph tempting the wood woes. Is that representative of, like, your higher nature trying to convince your lower nature not to make your mom jokes in the middle of every Hana Cosmos episode?

[Ben Garrett]

I got a little turned around by the question, but probably because it is.

[Brian]

That's autobiography.

[Ben Garrett]

Probably. Well, no, it is interesting how this kind of goes back to the Gilgamesh Enkidu thing as one of the founding pillars of Western civilization in a civil sense. The Epic of Gilgamesh, with the whole Gilgamesh Enkidu episode was, I think, attempting to give a fallen. Of course, just post Babel take on how man reconciles all the different appetites inside himself. And so Plato talks about this, how outside of man, you have our shell, our outer shell. It's the body. It looks like a man, but inside there's three different appetites. There's the human appetite for wisdom, true wisdom. There's the kind of middle road of strength and spiritedness and courage in the lion. And then there's the Scylla, the multi headed monster. And that's our base affections and emotions that we are bound just by being created to tame. We have to cut the bad heads off so that the more human heads can flourish. And if you invert that order and you put Scylla at the top, then you're going to get total chaos, societal chaos. You'll turn into a democracy and then

[Brian]

a tyrant is what it almost sounds like the id, the ego and the superego.

[Ben Garrett]

Yeah, yeah.

[Brian]

It's all in Plato.

[Ben Garrett]

It's all there in Plato. It's all there in Aristotle and Aquinas as well. They basically said the same thing. But it's interesting how the Babylonians were giving that similar commentary on the Gilgamesh thing. But they, you see, were actually saying that there's a way in which the man and the beast or the Scylla can coexist.

[Brian]

Yeah, interesting, but.

[Ben Garrett]

And the way that that happens. Just little ears, maybe plug them. I don't. The way that that happens is intercourse is through an expression of sexuality. So they were tying sensuality to humanity and reasonableness in such a way that we then shouldn't be surprised when their false worship and when so many other forms of false worship after them were focused around perverse sexual action. Yeah, because the demons have been telling us from the beginning the thing that makes you most human is sexual expression.

[Brian]

Man is always seeking in his fallenness to understand himself, but he does so imperfectly because he's not willing to take the medicine he needs, which is death. To die with Christ and become a fundamentally new creation which is a perfection of nature. It's not like a denial of our original created purpose or a denial of our humanity. It's not fundamentally to become something other than a man, but it is to die to the flesh, to this aspect of the bestial nature of man that we're always trying to explain. Why do I do these things? Why is man evil? Why does he bring chaos and destruction? But also he's capable of civilization and rational thought and beauty and all the. Even in his fallenness, he still echoes and he is still a man. Yeah, right. So we're always trying to understand ourselves. But apart from the guiding light of Christ and the revelation of the God man who shows us the perfect man, he does more than that, of course, but he does show us the perfect man. Man is always attempting to semi deify or baptize some aspect of his fallen nature instead of crucifying it and seeking the true Restoration of man.

[Ben Garrett]

Paul even Talks in Ephesians 2.

[Brian]

It's all in Bigfoot stories, really, like everything I just said.

[Ben Garrett]

I know. Seriously, it's all in the wood woes, obviously. Paul even talks in Ephesians 2. He uses the language of us already being dead. Like we're born dead in trespasses by nature, like the rest of mankind is what he says. And so there's a sense in which we're trying to still be human beings. And we are still human beings, but we're fallen, but we're dead at it. Like we have no sense of how to do it the right way. And so when we're resurrected with Christ and the spirit, it's not grace turning a human into something that he's not or something that he was never meant to be, but it's restoring that humanity. It's grace restoring and then perfecting nature. Not even. Not like transcending what man was never created to be.

[Brian]

Because man is a good thing that was corrupted. And so it's not that the nature of man is bad badness. No. Man's corrupted self corruption of sin touched every part of what it means to be human. And so we are totally depraved. That's what the words mean. It's not that we always do the most evil possible thing, but it's that every part of our humanity is touched by sin, infected by it, corrupted by it. But man is a good thing that can be redeemed into a glorified and glorious thing that bears the image of God and represents his character on earth.

[Ben Garrett]

This is why too, our hope as Christians isn't that we would live forever as souls, disembodied souls. Our hope is a resurrected body that is finally glorified, perfected by grace, and then able to enjoy all of the goodness that God has for us in glory as embodied souls as fully human beings.

[Brian]

Could a glorified man wrestle a Bigfoot and win?

[Ben Garrett]

I think for sure, dude.

[Brian]

Like, what do you think? Like nine rounds boxing.

[Ben Garrett]

I don't think Bigfoot make it one

[Brian]

glorified man versus dude. It's over.

[Ben Garrett]

When I'm glorified, I'm able to fly, right?

[Brian]

A glove. Obviously a glorified man sees Bigfoot. It's on site. It's on site.

[Ben Garrett]

He pulls out his like heaven gun.

[Brian]

He just.

[Ben Garrett]

Blood or something from. From Nazi zombies. It's like this amazing weapon.

[Brian]

It's amazing the infinite ammunition, how we can go from that to that. And I think everybody knows what I just said, what I mean 100% by that.

[Ben Garrett]

So the one thing that I would like to touch on before we go into the close, this is an idea that I had kind of off of that first discussion. Yeah. That we talked about, and that is this topic of. Or this idea of Bigfoot being like a thought form, an egregore or a tulpa. So I.

[Brian]

Hang on. What if Bigfoot's like a thought form? You know, like a tulpa.

[Ben Garrett]

Yes, indeed.

[Brian]

And then your friend looks at you and goes like, dude, bro.

[Ben Garrett]

Yes.

[Brian]

What's a tulpa?

[Ben Garrett]

I'll just say, I don't think that that is true.

[Brian]

Okay. But I'm interested in hearing a lot.

[Ben Garrett]

So a tulp. So a tulpa or an egregore, they're basically the same thing. One's Eastern, one's Western, but both are thought forms that manifest in reality if enough collective thought or emotion is ascribed to that idea.

[Brian]

Yeah.

[Ben Garrett]

So like, we actually. There's a lot of accounts from the east of these mystic religions wanting to curse people. And so they create together a tulpa. Yeah, that's this. Actually Talmudic Jews talk about this with golems. Yeah, exactly. Like they form this clay thing and then they give it enough thought and it eventually comes alive.

[Brian]

They put their will into it.

[Ben Garrett]

Yeah. And it wreaks havoc. I don't think that that is the case with Bigfoot, Partly because it has to be intentional. And the other reason is I just don't like that idea.

[Brian]

The other thing we've talked about before with the tulpa egregore thought form thing, that's a season one throwback right there. Is that back when we only did Italian accents? I think you all know what I'm getting at.

[Ben Garrett]

But now, what is a Gregory Ninja torpor? Oh, that torpor is very skinny and short and running very fast. He's bad at driving. Shout out to all my Asian listeners. Love you guys.

[Brian]

The ones that are still here are so real for that. They are. So here's what I was getting at. We discussed this in the past, that the demonic and satanic being a deception is constantly. It always stays the same. In a sense, its purpose is the same. It's to steal, kill and destroy. But it brings. It's clever. It's cunning. It will adapt. It will be an angel of light when needed. It will be a thing of darkness when needed. It deceives. And so one thing that Satan loves to do is to latch onto, to nurse into flame some idea of man and then latch onto it. And show man what he wants to see. To show man. Yeah. This is this. This wrong idea you had about the world and everything in it and yourself.

[Ben Garrett]

Totally true.

[Brian]

It's true. And let me. Let me demonstrate for you. But it's all sock puppets all the way down. You know what I mean? Like, it's fake sock puppets all the way down. Sock puppets all the way down, man. So, like, Bigfoot is a satanic sock puppet.

[Ben Garrett]

I love that.

[Brian]

Put that on a T shirt. Put that on a flipping T shirt.

[Ben Garrett]

You even see, like, one of the. So Anthony Esalen has this really fascinating lecture series on the roots of Western civilization. And he has building blocks where he talks about the fall of man and how before the fall, man's dwelling place was in this beautiful garden and he was cultivating nature. And it was wild, but it was tamed wilderness. And so it was a full expression of, like, God's creative glory with man's agency involved. After the fall, you have Babel going up. And that shows that now man is so afraid of that wilderness that he's supposed to go and tame that he would rather ignore it altogether, come together in collectivism and form a city. And so the next building block of Western civilization is the city, and then you have the nation, and it goes

[Brian]

on and on and on.

[Ben Garrett]

But I do think it's that, like, dichotomy between the city and the wilderness is an interesting one, where, if you buy into that idea at all, you can see how the demonic deception might play out. Where, if man is so afraid of the wilderness that he's going to content himself with the city walls, admiring the city walls and just staying there, and he's never going to go and subdue anything else, just that one patch of earth. Then anytime he does go outside of those walls, if he were to encounter some embodiment of the wild, whether it's an Enkidu or a woodwose or a Bigfoot or whatever it may be, that thing is gonna terrify him and drive him back to the city so that he would again be more confirmed in his fear and not bother to subjugate and subdue. And so it's this, like, cyclical thing of our fallenness and our sin. It turned the wilderness that God created that we were fit to rule and subdue into this haunt of jackals and demons and all this stuff. And then when we realized how terrifying that was, we came together in this Tower of Babel type mindset. It gets judged, but we still have that city mindset after that. And so cities are popping up all over the ancient world and anytime they go out, they go back into the haunt of jackals and that drives them back to the city and then you never actually take dominion. So we need to be so Bigfoot, basically.

[Brian]

We need to be getting the Bigfoots.

[Ben Garrett]

We need to be, we need to

[Brian]

round them up, we need to re. Educate them.

[Ben Garrett]

We need to not apostatize as a people.

[Brian]

I would.

[Ben Garrett]

And in doing so, we need to go and preach the gospel to all creation.

[Brian]

That seems more important than what I said.

[Ben Garrett]

Well, but that would include that.

[Brian]

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. If we caught a bunch of them, like we'd evangelize 100%.

[Ben Garrett]

And then, and then they'd be like, but we're demons. And we'd be like dead.

[Brian]

On site.

[Ben Garrett]

On site. Yeah. Guys.

[Brian]

What? I think that's, that's probably the logical conclusion.

[Ben Garrett]

Yeah, I think so.

[Brian]

To this discussion.

[Ben Garrett]

And now we're going to go in to a closing story, a hot close, if you will, that introduces a piece of evidence that I was actually unaware of until writing this episode that I think gives a lot more credibility to the reality of Bigfoot encounters. It doesn't touch as much on the spiritual implications of it, but it's just to show you guys that even when you get just basic snap and shoot pictures of Bigfoot, there's a lot of drama, fear, wickedness that are still involved. And so we want to leave you with that story until next time. Do you want a six pack? No, I don't mean abs and I don't mean beer. No, I'm talking about the six pack. You really want a six pack of masculine smelling bars of soap from Indigo Sundry Soap Company. And if you're buying masculine soap, then we all know your beard needs some grooming too. And that's why they sell a beard care bundle with beard oil, balm and mustache wax. Get the soap and the beard [e-mail] and subscribe for 10% off your order.

[Brian]

The nighttime is crawling with dangerous creatures. Bigfoot, sleep paralysis demons, the Mothman. Now imagine what would make them even more terrifying. That's right.

[Ben Garrett]

Guns.

[Brian]

Cryptids with guns. That's where Armored Republic comes in. They equip law abiding citizens to stand against the unthinkable. Even if it's a gun wielding devil worshiping Bigfoot. From combat tested coatings to high performance carriers, every piece of their ballistic armor and tactical gear is built to protect. Visit armoredrepublic.com or text join all caps J-O I N to 88027 to get involved in the preparedness effort hey Ben, I just read that our great grandparents probably experimented with butter on their dry skin as a moisturizer. Is that why you look so radiant?

[Ben Garrett]

Maybe it's Grandma's Butter recipe. Or maybe it's Gray Toe Tallow.

[Brian]

Their tallow products are 100% organic and naturally contain the good stuff your skin craves. No mystery there.

[Ben Garrett]

So say Sayonara Sammy to kitchen experiments and say hello to healthier Skin Great O Tallow Trusted by Skin Envied by Great Grandma's Butter Recipe.

[Brian]

For more information and to get a sample pack, check out graytoadtalo.com don't forget to use the code COSMOS15. That's all caps COSMOS15 for 15 off your order. The photograph was taken in 1894, back when pictures were imprinted on glass sheets through punctuated light exposure. One can imagine how subpar conditions affected image quality in those days. Given the environment in which this particular picture was taken, the whitewashed overexposure present comes as no real surprise. The provenance is about as ironclad as one might hope for. Given the circumstances, there is little doubt that this photo was taken when and where it claims to have been taken. The proof comes from an inscription penned on the photo's rear side. It reads, Year 1894 Yallicorn river around Lilliet, BC Forestry Hudson's Bay Company they took the picture and the guy that was in the picture went and stole them back from the forestry records. Hudson Baco I believe the last name was Holliday. Don't know the first name. Never took all the pictures, only one, and took pictures of the rest. Glass plate Photography the top half of the scene shows rugged winter wilderness, rolling hills beneath a whitewashed sky, and a sparse evergreen forest buried in deep, deep snow. As the eye traces downward, the trees break off on the left side of the lower third. Snowshoes from the time period are stuck into the ground, their bottoms facing the viewer. These were presumably placed there as a size reference for what lies on the right side of the lower third of the frame. A creature of some kind that it is lying down and dead cannot be mistaken. Even in a still photograph, one can sense a lack of vitality to the creature. The body is half prone and half on its side. Both arms stretch forward from the torso into the snow. The wrists appear bound with a length of cord, and hair covers the thing completely, except for a thinner patch where one might expect a face to be. Patches of snow still cling to the matted fur. The feet fall out of the frame. Assuming the body aligns with the snowshoes and minimal parallax is involved, the creature's estimated length is around 60 inches, 5ft. For years this picture remained hidden, but since its resurfacing in 1982, cryptozoologists and average enthusiasts alike have believed that what's pictured here is an adolescent Bigfoot, 5 to 7 years old by most guesses of indeterminate sex. Of course, we can't answer exactly what the image shows, but there are other questions about the photograph that can be addressed. The story goes like this. In the frontierlands of North America's northern reaches, the two hunters came upon a strange thing while stalking elk. The creature, a young man of the wild, was busying itself beside a river. Despite the frigid temperatures and pelting snow, the river had not frozen entirely, providing precious sound cover that allowed the hunters to approach extremely close. The gunshot rang out through the trees, scattering whatever game the hunters had pursued. But honestly, they didn't care. The strange entity's body lay motionless on the rocky beach, shot through the center mass and now utterly bereft of life. Believing the beast carried a high value pelt unlike anything they'd ever heard of, the hunters chose to cross the icy water immediately rather than search for an easier crossing elsewhere. Up close, the monster made them shiver. A face resembling a human's, bipedal but hunched, unclothed and covered, head to toe in fur as thick as a buffalo, save for the face. After an exhausting struggle dragging the corpse from the beach, hauling it up river to a narrower crossing, carrying it back across, and then dragging it once more to their makeshift game sled. The hunters reached the settlement of Lillooet just after nightfall. The cold bit hard. Wind announced itself in waves of powdery snow, spinning into little twisters along the streets. Apart from oil lamps glowing on a few porches, darkness ruled the town. They stopped the sled in front of a fur trading post just as a particularly vicious gust tore through the town. The wind forced the men to turn their faces downward when they looked back up. A man stood in the doorway of the post. In those days, and in that region, fur trading meant one thing the Hudson's Bay Company. The building belonged to the company and and the man who greeted them was one of its buyers. For the hunters, the timing couldn't have been better. They sold the corpse to the company man with little hesitation, distracted by the handsome sum offered, and then made for the Warmth of the bar further in the town. The story continues that upon close examination of his purchase, the Hudson's Bay representative commissioned a local photographer to document the creature. How many photographs were taken remains unknown. But both the stories, the story itself, and the inscription on the back of the recovered image corroborate that there were multiple. If our interpretation of the note is correct, one of those photographs even included the man who later stole the image bearing the inscription, the man identified only by the last name Holliday. At any rate, this picture was safeguarded, perhaps passed down through generations, until its eventual release to Bigfoot researchers in the 1970s. By then, the Hudson's Bay Company had modernized and showed little concern for an old stolen photograph. Ultimately, nobody knows who the hunters were. Nobody knows for certain what the picture portrays. Nobody knows exactly why the photograph or photographs were taken. Nobody knows who Holliday was, and at this point, nobody likely ever will know. What is known is the strange story and the unsettling curiosity of the image itself. By all accounts, the notes on the back dates from shortly after 1894. It's cryptic and clearly written in haste. Some have taken this as evidence of a cover up by the Hudson's Bay Company. Perhaps they knew Sasquatch existed within the ecosystems of British Columbia. Perhaps they didn't want the public to know. Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps, but perhaps not. If secrecy was the goal, why take multiple photographs? Why hire an organization, ordinary photographer? Why failed to guard the images more closely in the first place? If this was a corporate cover up, the operational security seems strangely lax for a company with such immense resources. As for the photograph itself, its subject does remain in dispute. It does not appear to be a man. It doesn't resemble any known animal. The discernible physiology alone seems to rule that out. Either it depicts a true cryptid juvenile Bigfoot or a man in a fur suit playing dead beside a pair of snowshoes. But if it's the latter, then why the Bigfoot myth will endure? Of that there can be little doubt. If it's merely a chase after the wind, it shows no sign of stopping. Clues will continue to be found where none exist. Confirmation bias dies hard. If it's a chase after something real, then we may never hear the truth at all. If even a fraction of our speculation about Bigfoot is accurate, should we really expect full disclosure within our lifetime? And yet, hints of truth still surface from time to time. This 1894 photograph, the Patterson Gimlin film thermal footage from Expedition Bigfoot. All of these, if not hoaxes, suggest that something real may be present. Alongside these hints stand volumes of alleged eyewitnesses testimony, much of which adds a terrifying preternatural dimension to the purely physical evidence. We've said it before, people lie. But people do not only lie. So maybe it is nothing. Maybe it's something far less remarkable than many hope. Or maybe the Bigfoot myth is far more real than any of us would like. We can't say. Remote parts of eastern Tennessee were still wild in the early 1900s. It was a section of the country that was rugged and difficult to reach to boot. The people there had lived there for generations, all descended from Davy Crockett and Daniel Boone. As such, they took to change very slowly. All of this meant that the forest around Walden's Ridge was like one big time capsule. Very few roads, no electricity, and virtually no cities had yet taken hold in the area. Walden's Ridge was a dense and dark holler. Of course the trees were thick there. But it was not only the forest that kept it from being developed by the farming families. The ground was sandy and laced with tough clay. Granite boulders grew up from the bedrock and made sections of the holler feel like a labyrinthine canyon. Somewhere much further west than Tennessee, two families owned massive farms on either side of the holler, the Smiths and the Browns. These two families were friendly with one another, and thus a trail was carved through Walden's Ridge that allowed the families to host one another somewhat regularly for card games and meals. One night the Brown boys were at the Smiths home. The friends fellowshiped on homemade wine for so long that night that the Browns didn't remount their horses until after 1:00am Remember, the trail was rough and neither family owned cars yet. The trio of men and horses started down the trail and eventually reached a rocky section that wound tightly and had short crags on either side, a natural choke point. Suddenly, just after a bird call echoed from the rocks above them, the three horses went berserk. Kicking and bucking in a confined space forced the two eldest brothers to spur their steeds into full gallop. They ran about a quarter mile until the horses had finally calmed at the crest of a hill. The third brother, however, didn't fare as well. At the onset of his horse's mania, he was kicked straight off and onto the ground, but his oil lantern tumbled into a rare patch of sand in the trail. Providentially, it neither broke nor went out, and he was glad for this. Even though he had been bucked off his horse, his horse kept panicking. It didn't try to run, but it could not or would not calm down either. For a few seconds that felt very long, the young man lay on the ground watching his horse bounce about with wild eyes shimmering on the mix of lamplight and moonlight. After those seconds passed, he finally saw what had spooked the horses. The silhouette of a man against the moon. Massive red eyes stared back at his the man was covered in what was clearly hair, and his size rivaled the trees. It was a monster unlike anything the brown brother had ever conceived of before. After another whistle, as if from a bird, the shape bounded down the rocks toward him. It entered the lamplight with a terrible grimace, slashing with dreadful claws at the horse. One slash caught the animal's throat, and warm blood immediately began gushing out. Brown, without thinking, unholstered his revolver and emptied all of his shells into his attacker. His target stood no more than 10ft away, and he later swore that the lion's share of the shots had struck the beast. Despite this, the monster let out nothing more than a grunt before leaping and climbing back up the rocks at incredible speed. As the youngest sat there glancing around wildly while trying and failing to reload his gun, the elder brothers returned and saw the grisly scene for themselves. The sight of the mangled horse and utterly terrified brother shocked them, and of course they asked what had happened. The brother shouted about a monster, about not missing, about getting out of there, and then leapt onto the rear of the eldest brown's brother's horse without invitation. The brothers waited for nothing more. They left the horse and all its gear behind and rode home as fast as they could. The next morning, they returned to the hauler to recover the saddle and whatever else remained. When they came upon the spot where it had happened, they found the place swept totally clean. No horse, no blood, no prints, no saddle, nothing. Thus the legend of Whistling Jack was born. Decades later, an army veteran stood atop a sandstone cliff some miles away from that dark hauler, though still within the wilderness of Walden's Ridge. It was night, and the moon shone with a bright, silver, raining, cold light down onto the valley beneath him. There he could descry the lights of houses and shops winding down for the day. Headlights betrayed cars heading for home. The man, tired but content after an afternoon of hunting, sipped bourbon and soaked in the peace of his home woods. He knew them well. Into this tranquility came a bird call. The man knew his birds, and he knew this one was a bobwhite, a quail. The sound came from the trees at the base of his cliff. Normally, this would have meant nothing, and at first he didn't register why. The sound unsettled him immediately. After a few seconds, he heard an answering bobwhite a few hundred yards away. But at his elevation, his unease sharpened into a palpable fear, and he finally understood why. Bobwhites were not nocturnal birds. To hear one so late at night was rare. To hear two was unnatural. The man hurried to his feet, shouldered his backpack and cradled his shotgun. Something was wrong, and he could feel it. He worked his way stealthily through the woods and down the slope until he reached the base of the cliff, heading for home. The bobwhite calls continued from different sides, all sides around him. It soon became impossible to deny that the calls were actually following him and drawing closer to him with each sound. Not wanting to give away his position too easily, but also not wanting to be caught off guard, he pulled out his flashlight and some tape and secured the light to the magazine tube of his gun, just in case. More minutes of careful movement passed. More Bob White calls, calls that were not Bob White calls closed in on his position. Then he heard the footsteps. Heavy thuds in the leaves, spaced at intervals he could not match. Something was close now, Something that stepped slowly but moved fast, which meant it was big. He'd grown up hearing the stories of Whistling Jack, and now they flooded back into his mind. He cursed himself for never taking them seriously. A pattern emerged. The man took furtive steps through the shadowed woods a few yards at a time. Every time he stopped, he heard one or two heavy footfalls steadily closing in behind him. Before they, too stopped. They were mirroring his movements. Pure instinct took over. He made for a slot canyon he knew lay not far away. Once there, he wedged himself into it and chimneyed to the top. More bobwhite calls. Both were very close now. He heard them approach the slot's entrance just as he crested the rock and scrambled up the scree into an old pine forest above. He poured with sweat and shivered in the cold night air. Everything blurred into frenzy. Everything felt curious and wrong, and it was hard to think. When he finished scrambling, he sprinted deeper into the pines, dropped to a knee beside a thick trunk, flipped on the light, and aimed his gun back the way that he had come. He could already hear two pairs of heavy steps entering the first few rows of trees. He pointed the light where he heard the sounds. Believe the monster stood. But he still couldn't see anything. Finally, with his patience exhausted, he fired two 12 gauge buckshot blasts toward where he judged the creatures to be. After the second shot, a horrible shriek tore through the forest. It was somehow both deep and shrill, layered with the highest and lowest pitches all at once. Into the beam of his light rose a massive figure, hairy and powerful. It opened its mouth and screamed again. Massive fangs glistened and eyes reflected red like burning coals. The scream sounded angry rather than pained, but the shots did their work anyway. When the man recovered from the ringing in his ears and the shriek faded, he heard the footfalls now, loud and careless. Retreating into the woods, he sprinted to his car, drove home, and never returned to those woods again. Mothman in the skies Wolfman in disguise Giant angel cries we hear other lies Moon eyed children here to steal your soul Bigfoot skin walkers are from my

[Ben Garrett]

control

[Brian]

Hunting God's fools I'm so scared

[Ben Garrett]

all this mystery I'm not preparing Want more Haunted Cosmos? Then make your way over to Patreon, where you can get early access to our content, as well as exclusive content and regular dusty tomes and monthly live streams with Brian and myself. So go to patreon.com haunted cosmos and sign up now.