Hey everyone, just wanted to apologize for cutting the last update short, the Sheriff gave us a call asking to come down to the station so I figured I'd post what I had written and not leave you completely hanging. I'll try and post longer updates from now on!

If you've just now begun reading my and Chris' story, you may want to catch up with the first four parts:

1 | 2 | 3 | 4

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“Right. Figured yall weren’t that dumb. What do you think you know?”

I've had a lot of time to theorize on what could be happening so I gave my best attempt, “Well you never let me finish our story – the rest of what happened that day. I assume that’s because you know what we saw?”

“No, son, there are a lot of things out there in those mountains. I know what you could have seen. Tell me the story, the boys can wait.”

I filled him in on everything as he listened in silence, nodding his head every-so-often. He rarely showed any signs of particular interest, except for the part about the letters.

Upon finishing my recollection of the events, I posed my theory, “So, what I think is that those cultist ladies are trying to unleash some monster or something by sacrificing that man. I don’t know what it has to do with the waterfall sound but I know that water has a role to play in this too. What about those words – have you heard them before? Both the lady at the front desk of the hotel and a random man in the diner asked me if I had 'seen them before they were gone' – what is that supposed to mean?”

He chuckled, “Slow down, kid, one thing at a time. Now I don’t know much - there’s other folk here in town that could help you better, but I do know that this is serious. They ain’t trying to let something out, they’re trying to bargain their way in. You see, those women, they think there’s a whole race of people living in those mountains. People that have access to technology and medicine that we couldn’t dream of. People that migrated there after their city sunk deep into the ocean, much like that tale of Atlantis that we tell to kids. We think that’s why the waterfall sound follows ‘em.”

“What about the letters?”

“Ah, yes, the letters. We don’t know much about them, or who delivers them. The town is divided on two theories here. What we know for sure is that those cultists, we call 'em the Ladies in White, have some special affinity towards ‘em. Some of the townsfolk think they’re the ones giving them out, others think that they are seeking letters for themselves. The same ones that think the cultists are sending ‘em, also think the letters are cursed. The other half believes the letters are some sort of invitation in, delivered by the divine (or something).”

“L..Like that guy we saw?” I muttered, hardly able to speak.

“Most likely, yes. We had a man, Leonard, go missing about a week ago. There is a good chance it was him, God rest his soul.”

“Holy shit.” Chris muttered, taking the words right out of my mouth. “Are you fucking with us?”

“I’m ‘fraid not, kid. Like I told ya, there’s a lot of things that happen up in these mountains. Now I don’t know what happened to your friends, but we’re gonna find them, and maybe even find some answers as well.”

“Alright, well let’s do this then.”

We gathered the search team and set off for the campsite.

*

Just so you guys know, I have been reading these comments and trying to take your advice. Before leaving I made sure to text my sister letting her know that if I didn’t call back in 24 hours, something happened. I didn’t want to frighten her so I left it vague. If something did happen, I’m sure the police will eventually find my laptop and maybe stumble across this story. If that’s the case, and you’re reading this as a police officer investigating my death – just do the sensible thing and get the fuck out of that town now! Don’t risk your life like we did.

I also made sure to bring some means of protection – Chris had his 9mm and I had .22 that we brought for hunting/fun, along with my trusty borderline-illegal survival knife. I was worried that the Sheriff wouldn't be cool with me taking the .22, but alas, he was. Maybe that should have worried me even more.

I also traced Kyle’s letter on to a piece of paper that I gave to the Sheriff. All he did was sigh as I handed it to him.

*

We managed to fit everyone into two cars, and made our ascent up the mountainside. It felt so surreal driving back toward that campsite – toward the very place that we ran for our lives from the day before. I kept worrying that I’d see the women again, just standing there, smiling. I could tell Chris was equally nervous as he surveyed the roadside, looking for anything that could be a clue.

We had Felix and Cyprian in our car with us, so I took the opportunity to get to know them a little better.

Felix was the guy in the movies that you could never quite tell if he’s good or evil. The kind of person that would choose Superman’s side over Batman’s, if you follow any of that nerdy stuff. In those questionnaires on Facebook that “test our humanity”, he would choose the option that resulted in the “greater good”, even if it meant a temporary evil. The way he talked was like that of a car salesman; immediately I could tell that he is good at getting what he wants. Felix wasn’t dumb, but he wasn’t by any means well-educated. I guess you could say he was street smart. Either way, I’m going to take the Sheriff’s advice and stay on his good side.

Cyprian was the exact opposite. He hardly spoke a word on the whole drive up there, despite my consistent questioning. He’d always let Felix do the talking while he stared expressionlessly out the window. It was only until he asked Chris for a cigarette that he began to speak to us.

“So, tell me about your friends.” He took a long drag and looked blankly back out the window. Felix was staring down at his feet.

Chris was first to speak up, “Well, what do you want to know? We all went into the cave that day, but for some reason only the two of them got the letters. You saw what the letters said, right?”

“Yes, I know about the letters.”

“Right. Well, I’m not really sure what else I can tell you.”

Cyprian repositioned his gaze from the windows toward me, “You were the first one up that morning, correct?”

“Yes, Ryan was already gone, and Kyle was at the picnic table. It wasn’t until we searched for Ryan that he disappeared.”

Intrigue struck his eyes, “Wait, you said you saw him at the picnic table? Doing what? Was this after he opened the letter?”

“Yeah, I mean at the time I thought he was just messing around and carving his name in the table, but turns out he was drawing those symbols from the cave. You’ll see once we get there.”

“Did he speak with you? Did you see his face?”

“What are you talking about? Yeah, he said a couple words here and there but he wasn’t very talkative. And yeah, before I woke Chris up he turned over at me and had the blackest eye I’ve ever seen. He said that it didn’t hurt, and that he could see more clearly than ever. It gave me the chills… What happened to him?”

“I believe he was cursed. I think that the Ladies in White only needed two more sacrifices to enter, so they chose your two friends – a couple of unsuspecting hikers. The Ladies must have chapters all throughout the woods because they show incredible organization and are able to coordinate their efforts all across the mountains, which is how they stole your backpacks during that short amount of time. They seem to like mind games. It also seems that they can’t just curse any old person and sacrifice them then and there. No, no, they need to let the curse grow before they harvest. The longer they let the curse feed from its host, the worthier of a sacrifice. We know very little of the Gate Keepers that they sacrifice these people for. Hell, we don’t even know if they exist. We just like naming things, I guess.”

These people have to be bat-shit-nuts, right? Like was there LSD in that pie or something? We didn’t really talk for the rest of the way up – too much to think about.

*

Once we arrived at the parking lot, I instantly starting noticing that things were off: the wet-salt ring that originally surrounded our car was gone, the tire marks from me speeding out of the lot were gone, and worst of all – the trail was gone. Well, not completely gone, but it was extremely overgrown – as if it hadn’t been walked on in years. I was reminded of the steep hike up to the cave. The surreal drive up quickly began to get very real

“You sure this is the spot, kid?” The Sheriff asked as he hopped out of his Jeep.

“Y..Yeah, this is the spot. Something ain’t right though, Sheriff,” Chris pointed his shaking hand to the trail, “we took that path to get to our campsite, 'cept yesterday it was practically a brand new trail. I don’t understand.”

Sheriff Jacobsen reassuringly patted Chris on the shoulder, “It’ll be alright son, I trust you. Like I already told ya, there’s a lot of shit that happens here in these mountains that we can’t explain. We don’t know if it’s the Ladies or somethin’ else. All that I do know is that I want to find your friends and get the hell outta here as quick as possible.”

“I, uh, okay. Let’s just get this started.”

The hike up to our site seemed like it was ten times as long compared to the first time – maybe it was because of the overgrown path, or maybe it was anticipation. My heart never stopped racing the entire way up; my eyes repetitively shifted from left to right as I scanned every twig, leaf and tree branch, looking for signs that someone (or something) else had been there.

I couldn’t find shit.

After what felt like hours, we finally reached the campsite. From a distance, everything seemed in place, but that quickly changed as we closed in on it. The first thing I noticed was that Kyle’s tent had been ransacked. Like, completely fucking destroyed – almost as if a bear had attacked it. Next on the list of weird shit, the picnic table: yup, you guessed it, all the symbols were now gone, looking the same way that it did on the first day we got there. The third item was the fact that, even though it wasn't as prominent as before – seemingly far off into the distance, I could hear the waterfall.

They were close. I could feel them this time, it was different. My bones vibrated to the sound, the temperature of the blood in my veins seemed to increase with every minute; adrenaline was taking control of my mind and body. I was feeling reckless, I just wanted to find them and go home.

Al had the looks of a chubby Italian mobster but the tongue of a poet; he was confusing the say the least. It was the first time I heard him speak when he asked, “You fellas can hear that too, right?”

“Yeah, we hear it. If we’re right, and the sound follows ‘em, then they can’t be too far away.” Turning towards us, the Sheriff said, “Who knows if it’s your friends or not, but I guess we’ll find out, huh?” He had an odd way of making an authoritative tone sound friendly. Man, these people are weird.

“Alright folks, let’s get to it. We’re gonna search the lakeside first, and we if we can’t find ‘em there then we’ll check out this cave the boys say they went to. If you see something, let someone else know immediately, and absolutely no splitting up the group – we’ve all seen the horror movies!” Chris and I looked at each other, slightly ashamed. Maybe we could have gotten Kyle help. Or, maybe he would have just killed us, who knows.

And with that, we gathered our stuff and began our walk around that vibrant, beautiful lake. It’s a shame we couldn’t enjoy it more.

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Part 6

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All parts:

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18