You've probably heard of Bigfoot, Mothman and the like. Those are the ones who attract all of the cryptid-chasers. What you haven't heard of, I bet, is the Bighorn Grove Pinecrawler. Most people haven't heard of Bighorn Grove at all, so that'll tell you how successful it was at reeling people in.
I mean, Mothman is a neat idea. Big, red eyes, huge wings, all that cool stuff. And Bigfoot is a big ol' ape. Now that's a lotta' fun. The Pinecrawler, he ain't that. The sightings describe him as having shaggy fur covering its head and torso, like one of 'em bearded collie dogs, but his limbs are hairless, scrawny, and twice the average dude's height, with claws big enough to wrap around trees, and a membrane between the limbs like the one that those flying squirrels have.
You see them blurry pictures of Bigfoot walking by a tree or Mothman flying through the air? You wouldn't get that with the Pinecrawler. According to the stories, he used his freakishly long limbs to climb around the treetops and grab at its prey. But, since our boy is nocturnal, and he lurks at the top of the trees, nobody got any pictures of him! Imagine that, a cryptid without even a blurry image! Now that's just poor. The only real images were some sketches made from the witnesses' descriptions and a picture of the night sky and the treetops, taken by a witness "right before it moved away" from the camera.
Let's talk about the witnesses in question, by the way. The mayor, Oliver Miller, had always been talking about how we needed more tourism in Bighorn Grove. The population of the town was around two thousand in the 70s, and visitors weren't common. Mayor Miller thought that a lot of profit could be made from tourists, but we liked our town the way it was. Small. Quiet. His attempts to attract tourists were known to us, however, so when his son, Michael, as well as his college-aged friends witnessed the Pinecrawler for the first time in '71, everyone chalked it up to good ol' Miller seeking visitors.
Sightings of the creature from elderly folk, teenagers and drunks piled up over the next decade, none of which were taken seriously, 'course. In '79, Miller unveiled a statue of the Pinecrawler, which was ridiculous considering that nobody outside of the town had ever heard of the thing. People passing by the statue took to calling it Ollie, after our dear ol' mayor.
Around the start of the eighties, though, the killings started. A kid staying in his grandparent's cabin for the weekend claimed that his grandpa was carried into the forest while teaching him how to hunt. Two days later, they found the body. His legs were broken, and it appeared that his heart had given out not long after the injury. The mayor tried to insinuate that the Pinecrawler was responsible, to which he received no small amount of backlash. The townsfolk consider themselves a rational lot. They figured that some kinda murderer was roaming the woods.
A month later, a car was seen crashed into a tree on the roadside. The cops found the owner, a young woman, much further into the forest, also with her legs broken. The cops were slower to find her than a passing black bear, however. When a man went missing whilst on a camping trip three weeks after that, a huge search party went out into the forest that night. He was found with his legs broken and his head caved in on a rock. He however, was found outside a cabin belonging to one George Anderson.
George was a Vietnam veteran, and he'd always been a bit colder after coming home, but the few that were close to him would've never suspected him of doing something like this. But, the chief of police was the nephew of the old man that'd been killed, the mayor probably saw catching a killer as a way to get back in the people's good graces, and George had at most four friends, so they pinned the deaths on him and he went to jail for the rest of his days.
There weren't many sightings of the Pinecrawler after that. Was only passed around through story. I remember some guys I knew tried to make a short film about it when they were in college, but it got about fifty views on YouTube and they took it down.
I returned to Bighorn Grove recently because my dad passed away last week. Got mauled by a bear whilst on a hunting trip, no real way to sugarcoat it. I take some small comfort in the fact that he always joked that it's how he'd want to go out. Still, it's a bad way to go. I've seen The Revenant and Backcountry.
After the funeral today, Jack invited me to come drink with him. Jack went through Vietnam with my dad, and he's always been like an uncle to me. We shared stories about him and laughed, while his granddaughter, Sarah, rolled her eyes at us.
"A bear, of all things." I sighed.
"Listen, kid." Jack said slowly.
"Kid? I'm thirty-six." I laughed.
"No, really, kid. You gotta' listen to this. I don't think a bear killed your pops."
"Whaddya' mean, Jack?"
"Ooh, he's gonna show you his conspiracy theories." Sarah teased.
"Shush, now. This is serious." he snapped.
He began to lead me downstairs to his basement. When the light flicked on, I was met with a wall with dozens of pictures pinned to it. Looking at them, I realized that they were pictures of a creature in the trees that fitted the description of the Pinecrawler. These weren't blurry, either. These looked to be taken with a real high quality camera.
"It's real, kid."
"How long have you been collecting these, Jack?" I asked him.
"Your father and I started gathering proof since George got locked up. We wanted to prove that the Pinecrawler did this, not him."
"You're saying that it killed all those people in the 80s? Why'd it stop?"
"The old man thought that instead of driving to town for some food, he'd teach his grandson to hunt. Pinecrawler didn't like its prey being taken, decided it'd teach him a lesson. The girl in the car? Thing didn't like the noise, most people know not to drive through the forest at night anyways. The camper? Well, the Pinecrawler is smarter than your average bear. It saw that search parties were encroaching on its territory after the previous kills, so it snatched the camper and left him outside poor George's house to frame him. Then it stopped, because people don't go near the forest at night now and it can eat all the animals it wants."
"You've really thought about this, haven't you? And you think it killed my dad?"
"Kid, in the last couple of months, we noticed that it started killing predators recently. Wolves, mountain lions, bears. It's practically clearing the forest of them. I think that's why it killed your father while he was hunting."
"But why, Jack?"
"Well, kid. I think it wants to make the area safe for its little one."
"Huh?"
He opened a box to reveal a large, reddish-brown egg.
"Jack, how'd you get this?"
"I saw it in a tree this morning. I took a shot at the branch and it fell down. Thing barely got scratched, so I brought it back."
As if to demonstrate it's durability, he slammed down on it hard with his fist to no effect.
"I'm gonna figure out a way to destroy this egg, so we won't have to be dealing with a Pinecrawler Junior." stated Jack. "Now I'm gonna go to bed. It's getting dark out. You can use the spare room."
Rest sounds good. Neither of us were exactly sober, and he had just shown me some pretty strong proof of a monster existing. Despite my tiredness, I figured I'd write this down before I fall asleep. That was the plan, anyway, but Sarah just told me she saw some big animal outside. It could just be a bear or something, but I'm worried.
I think that the Bighorn Grove Pinecrawler is real.
And it wants its egg back.
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