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My name is Rick. I live in Indiana. I can't tell you more than that or name the company

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I work for or tell you where it's at. There aren't that many quarries around here

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that get used the way this one does at night, and I rely on the extra money that I earn

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from it. But there was a night. I was trapped down in that quarry with a big foot circling

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me, and I had no way out. I run heavy equipment. Loaders, dozers, excavators. I work nights,

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weekends, whatever they need. I'm used to bad lighting, weird noises, and being the only

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person at a job site. Also, let me clarify. The job I was doing when this happened is technically

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my second job, before the same company, so to speak. I do this on nights when I don't

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have to work my quarry day job the next day. That way I pick up a nice lot of extra money.

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This happened in late October 2022 at an old limestone quarry that's been mostly

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enacted for years. During the day it looks like a half-finished hole. Terrorist walls, a pool

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of water at the bottom, some scrub trees out on the benches. At night it turns into a place

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where certain outfits quietly dump, whatever they can't legally take to the transfer station

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by daylight. So, in essence, it's being used as a dump for certain other companies in

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the know. But done sort of off the radar if you catch my drift.

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My job that night was simple. Take a front-end loader down into the pit and push down and

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spread out a handful of fresh loads that had been dumped earlier. Mostly construction debris,

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some old furniture, and one load that turned out to be something else entirely. I went in

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figuring it would be four or five hours of boring work for some good decent money. Instead

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I spent the better part of an hour stuck in a dead loader at the bottom of that hole,

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while something very large, I mean a big foot, walked around my machine, and all the

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trash piles very much the way an old man would patrol his lawn and start yelling at

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kids who get on it. This quarry sits a couple of miles off a country road, down a long gravel

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lane with a chain gate. It's shaped like a big bowl cut into the side of a low hill. There's

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one main ramp road that spirals down along the wall to the bottom. There are no guardrails,

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just some berms of rock here and there. At the lowest bench there's a flat pad and a

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shallow pool of water off to one side where the groundwater seeps in.

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The outfit I work for has a loader staged down in the pit. It's a mid-size cat with a big

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bucket and a cabin close with safety glass and a roll cage. Up top, near the edge, there's

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a light tower that we run off of a diesel generator. Lower mast and four metal halide heads. You

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set it up at the rim so it throws down a wash into the bowl. There is no permanent power

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or wired lights there. There are no buildings aside from a shipping container where they

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keep some hoses and some extra fuel drums. At night, the only light is what we bring in.

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On this job, the trucking company drops loads all afternoon and into the early evening.

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Box trucks, dump trailers, you name it. They all come and they drop mixed stuff. Could

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be rubble, pallets, busted up drywall, old mattresses, you name it, they drop it.

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Toward the end of the evening, they will radio out that they're done for the night. Then

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they send me in with the loader to knock the piles down and push some of it off toward

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the water and I'll go around and smooth things out so the next day's loads have room.

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But on this particular night, they also brought in a special load and they didn't tell me

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much about it, but I found out what it was when I started working it over with the bucket.

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This was a Friday late October. I came through the gate about a quarter till 10. It was a

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dry and clear night somewhere in the mid-40s. We'd had a light touch of frost the night

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before, but there was no wind to speak of. I remember the moon was pretty in silver in

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the sky. You could see stars out there if you kill all the artificial lights. I drove

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my pickup down to the rim, parked it beside the container, and fired up the generator

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and light tower. Once the mast was up and aimed down into the bowl, you could see most

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of the bottom like a big stage, pale rock walls, dark piles of trash, and the loader sitting

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right where it had been left from the previous night. The light there doesn't fill every corner,

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though. There are shadows under the ledges, blind spots behind the piles, and a fair bit

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of gloom along the far wall. But once your eyes are just, you can see enough to work.

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I grabbed my coffee thermos, walked down the ramp on foot to the loader, which was about

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a three minute walk, and climbed in. Check the fuel, just over a half tank, checked the

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oil pressure, and there were no obvious leaks. I did all my normal checks, then I turned

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the key. The diesel caught real quick, then settled into that low rumble that you can feel

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in your spine. I flipped on all the work lights. Two forward head lights, two back at lights.

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A couple on the rear pillars. Between that and the tower above, the bottom of the pick

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glowed a bright yellow white. It was just me, one machine, and five or six scattered piles

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of junk and garbage. The first tower was routine. I took the loader around the bottom, keeping

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to a slow pace. You don't want to run fast in a place like that. The ground is uneven,

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and the last thing you want is to pop a tire on some rebar or scrap, or to tip your loader.

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Up by the base of the ramp there was a pile of demolition debris, broken cinder block,

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simbusted two by fours, and ripped up carpet. I took a few passes scooping bucket fools and

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pushing them away from the ramp, knocking down any tall points.

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Next was a pile of mixed household junk, couches with the guts filling out. I refrigerated

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the smell bad when the bucket knocked it over, and black trash bags full of, well who knows

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what, just the standard stuff. But the third pile, that's where things changed.

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At a glance it looked like more demolition trash, blue tarp over the top, some broken pallets.

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When I dropped the bucket edge and bit into it, the tarp ripped, and a different smell hit

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me in the cab. Rodding meat, very strong. The kind of smell you get if a deer carcass sits

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in a ditch in the sun for a few days. It came through the clothes vents, and it hit the

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back of my throat, even with the window shut. I backed off a second, and took a closer look

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in the loader lights. Under the tarp there were a lot of plastic tubs and trash bags. Some

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had split open. Inside I saw shapes wrapped in clear plastic. Lems and torsos, all bloated,

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pale and gray. There were at least half a dozen, maybe more. It looked like either road-killed

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deer or if that somebody had been storing or some butcher's shop waste, and it was all

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dumped together. It was some kind of meat load that had been sitting somewhere far too long.

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I didn't like the smell, but my job wasn't to judge the cargo. My instructions were to

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push everything down, spread it out, same as the rest. So I sucked it up, and went back

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in with the bucket, trying to break that pile down fast. Every scoop of the bucket dug up

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more of that sweet, stinking rotten smell. It came in waves as I lifted and curled and pushed.

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I put several bucket loads toward the far corner by the water, trying to get that stuff as

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far from the ramp and my working area as I could. I kept moving though, focused on the job,

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but that awful smell settled into everything. After I'd knocked the worst of the meat pile

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down, I backed the loader away and killed the bucket lights for a second. I wanted to let

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the engine idle and cooled down a bit, and that smell had had my head pounding. With the

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bucket lights off, the only illumination was the tower overhead, and the two upper headlights

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on the loader. The bowl went dimmer, shadows deepened under the ledges. My ears adjusted

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to the quieter engine note, and that's when I heard the first rock fall. Sound came from

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the upper rim on the opposite side of the pit from the ramp. A clatter of loose rock,

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a heavier thud, then silence. In a quarry, that's not unusual. You will get small rock

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falls now and then, especially after a frost. I kept one hand on the steering wheel and

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listened. Nothing followed. No echo, no second slide. Then from a little further left along

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the rim, I heard something else. Two deep thudding impacts pretty close together. It didn't

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sound like rock on rock this time, not a rock fall, I mean. It was more like something

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heavy stepping on loose stones, and then jumping to bare rock. It was a subtle, but distinct

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difference in the sound. I leaned forward, looking up at the rim. The light tower threw

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its beam down into the bowl, not up onto the lip, so the very top was mostly just a black

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outline, with a little spill catching the first few feet of the slope. For a moment, I

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thought I saw movement in that boundary between light and dark. A darker shape up against

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the rock. I told myself it was just tree shadows, or my eyes were just adjusting. I clicked

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the bucket lights back on, swung the machine around, and went back to work on a different pile

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closer to the ramp, partly to put some distance between me and that meat load. The loader's

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engine note rose. The bucket clanked, the hydraulics hissed. They were all familiar sounds,

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and that calmed me down some. I was midway through, pushing a line of broken drywall toward

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the center, when I heard another clatter from above, but this time from behind me. The sound

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made me stop dead, bucket down. I put the loader in neutral and lifted my foot off the

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pedals. Behind me, up on the slope near the light tower, something rolled down the first

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few feet, and then hit the bench below with a muffled thump. Then I heard it, footsteps,

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distinct from falling rock. They were heavy, and measured steps on rock and dirt. That wasn't

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a deer, and it wasn't some kind of other small animal. This was big and heavy. I turned

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in the seat and peered through the rear glass. The rear work lights throw a decent beam,

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but there are blind spots. For a few seconds I saw nothing. Then a shape moved across the

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top of one of the benches. A dark, upright shape, cutting across a lighter patch of rock, just

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inside the spill of the tower lights. It moved, left to right, then disappeared behind

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a projection of wall. From that first glance, here's what I can tell you. It was tall,

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on two legs, and it moved with the smooth, balanced gate of something comfortable on that

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kind of terrain. It wasn't hunched over like a man climbing, and it wasn't looping like

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a bear. I sat there with my hand on the gear lever, staring, waiting for it to come back

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and to view. The loader's engine idled rough and loud in the cab. But nothing else moved.

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So I told myself, "Man, you're just tired. You've been staring into the work lights for

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over an hour, and the shadows are playing tricks on you." I told myself. I hadn't really

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seen anything, and I almost believed it. I went back to work, trying to get back into the

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rhythm, reminding myself at the hundreds and hundreds of nights that I've been out here

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alone in the dark and have never seen anyone or anything. But from that point on, I just

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couldn't shake the feeling that I wasn't the only thing moving around in that pit. About

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twenty minutes later, I went back toward the far corner where I'd pushed the meat pile.

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I wanted to flatten those mounds a little more, get them spread so nothing tall stuck up.

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And by then, the smell had softened some, or maybe I was getting used to it. Either way,

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I eased the loader in, bucket-low, work lights all on. The beams cut across the half-spread

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carcasses, glinting on plastic and raw bone. I dropped the bucket and started a push. Half

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way through that pass, with the loader pointed directly into that corner, and the engine under

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load. I felt a hiccup. Just a momentary stumble in the motor. But I felt it.

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"Oh, come on," I said out loud. And I eased off the throttle just a hair. Another few feet,

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and another stumble in the engine. This time much worse. And then, with no further warning,

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the engine died. The dashlights stayed on. The hydraulics froze where they were. The cab

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went from loud to dead quiet, except for the wine of wine down, and the faint click of

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relays. Then, complete silence. No engine, no fan, no hydraulics. Just me in a glass and

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steel cage, surrounded by mounds of rotten meat, and crushed junk at the bottom of a quarry.

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The work lights also went out with the engine. Only the tower beam above remained, shining

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down at an angle. It still lit the pit, but my immediate area went almost dark. I could

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see light shapes, but no detail. I tried the key again. The starter engaged, and the engine

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turned over three or four times, then cuffed and failed. I sat back and decided to wait

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30 seconds, maybe a minute. Then I tried again, and got the same result. Now diesel will do

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that sometimes if you've got fuel issues or air in the lines. But I'd had no warning,

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really. No sputter before the final ones. No low fuel light. This, though, felt like something

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else. Maybe something electrical. I found my radio on the seat beside me, and keyed up to

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the guy who was supposed to be up there in a pickup truck by the gate, waiting in case

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I needed something. But all I got was static. Now I knew the quarry walls weren't blocking

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me because I'd been able to use the radio many other nights. I suspected that once again

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he had the volume on the radio turned all the way down because he was watching videos

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on his phone again. I was reaching for the mic again. When something hit the button,

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I felt like a bucket. I don't mean it was like a collision. It felt more like a very hard

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shove. It made a dull low sound through the frame. The loader rocked a half inch in front

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of me. I froze hand hovering in mid-air. Something on the other side of that bucket was in

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contact with it. The bucket was down, the cutting edge resting on the ground. The front

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of the loader, including the bucket in front tires, was pointed into the corner where the

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wall curved and the meat pile spread out. The light towers being reached that area enough

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to give me a usable view, though not as bright as my work lights would have been. In that

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wash of light, on the pile directly in front of the bucket, something stepped up. I watched

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a leg emerge from behind the bucket's right corner, knee bent, foot placing itself on the

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crushed trash. It was bare, dark, and larger than any human foot I've ever seen. The toes

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played slightly as it took weight. The hair grew down to the ankle, then thinned out around

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the foot itself. Then the rest of it came around into view. It stepped up onto the trash

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mound in front of my machine and stood there, part sideways, turned toward the loader cab.

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The tower light from above and behind me struck it from the front right, lighting the entire

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figure from head to toe. From my seat, through the angled front glass, I saw it clearly.

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I put it at around seven and a half to eight feet. It stood taller than the top of the

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bucket arms, and about level with the top of the loader cab roof. And the shoulders and the

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chest, they were something else too. Massive, muscular. The whole upper body was shaped like

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a big thick oil drum. There was no gym built leaners to that build. The limbs were proportionately

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long and thick as well. It was like someone took a Mac truck, covered it in dark hair, and

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somehow made it stand on two feet. The hair was everywhere long without looking shaggy.

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I saw the head in the way it sat down on the shoulders, and I then had an idea for sure of

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what was out there. There's not much in this world that has said to stand on two feet.

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Have hair everywhere. Is that big and tall? And they say has little to no neck, like what I was seeing.

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With the lighting coming down in the shadows cast, I could only see the space where the face

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surely was. I could see the highlight of a jawline in the light, and I knew where the eyes were.

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But everything else looked strong, wrong, exaggerated, you know? But then it turned its head just a bit,

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and I caught a tiny reflection of light from one eye, just a dull flash, but enough that I knew this

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was real. It was dark, and the light was playing shadows around me everywhere. But I had no doubt then,

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and I have no doubt now as to what was standing there. It was maybe 12 or 13 feet from the front of my

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cab, and it was looking directly at me. The expression, if you want to call it that, wasn't what I would call

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aggressive. It seemed focused, maybe studying is a better word. It shifted its weight once, and in that

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motion I could see the muscles move under the hair. I saw the thigh flexing, the calf tensing, and the

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skin bunching slightly over the knee. Then it stepped down off the pile out of my direct line of sight.

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For the next 30 to 40 minutes, that's my best estimate, though it sure felt longer.

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During that time, it moved around my loader, and the trash piles in a slow, deliberate pattern.

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I didn't see it the whole time. Sometimes it would disappear behind piles, or into deeper shadow.

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I tracked it by sound then. The cruncher broke in drywall. The crack of a palette underfoot,

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plastic tearing. Sometimes I didn't hear anything for several minutes, but I still knew it was out there.

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When it was out of sight, I sat perfectly still in the dark cab, the engine dead, one hand on the

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key, and the other on the seat beside me, and I was trying not to breathe too loud. I kept

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keying the mic on the radio, but the guy up top never answered. Every so often, it would step back

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into the light somewhere that I could see it, and it would stop, and pointedly look in my direction.

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I wasn't sure if it was making sure I was still there, or letting me know that it was still there.

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Maybe it was doing both. The whole time I remember thinking, this is not really happening. No,

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any second, a bunch of guys are going to come out, busting their guts, laughing at me.

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But that never happened. At one point, it was on the left side, it the loader, between me and the pool

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of water. It moved through my side window's arch of view, close enough that I could see the texture of

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the hair on its forearms, and the way the water glistened on its feet, where it had just walked through

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the shallow part of the pool. It bent over one of the trash bags from the meat load, gripped it with

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both hands, and ripped it open in one clean pool. That plastic parted like wet tissue. A lump of meat

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wrapped in clear plastic rolled out. It bent over, picked that up, examined it briefly, then set it

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back down and moved on to the next piece. There was no frantic tearing, no frenzy like hogs at a

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carcass. It was very methodical and very deliberate as it went through the piles. It seemed to be

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sampling and testing the piles more than actually feeding. At one point, it came to the rear

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ladder of my cab once. I heard the metal creek. I did not turn around. I sat there

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frozen, staring dead ahead, watching the dim circle of light on the rock wall. I heard the squeak

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in the flex of the metal as more weight came on top of the ladder. Then eased off. The cab door latch

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sat inches from my left elbow. It never tried it, thankfully. The closest and the worst was when it came

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to right in front of the cab. I was watching the meat pile corner again, trying the key every few minutes.

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The engine would crank a couple of times, and it would almost catch, then immediately die.

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I knew that each attempt was a risk. There was noise, vibration. But staying there indefinitely

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wasn't an option. I had just let go of the key, and silence had fallen again when a shadow blotted

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out the light on the front glass. I looked up, and I saw nothing but a dark shape pressed up to

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the windshield. For a second, my brain didn't want to acknowledge what it was. Then it leaned back,

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just enough for the tower light to catch it. It was staining on the pile directly in front of the

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loader again, but this time it was closer. Leamed forward, one hand flat on the top edge of the bucket,

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the other resting on the front frame just below the windshield.

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You had its face maybe two feet from the glass, angled slightly, so one eye in the

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bridge of the nose were in clear profile. From that distance I saw more than I really wanted to see.

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I could see that the face had a lot less hair on it than it had everywhere else.

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The hairline along the cheeks was irregular. I saw cracks at the corner of its eyes.

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The bridge of the nose had a slight bump, like it had been broken sometime in the past.

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There was a scar along one side of the upper lip. It was faint, but it was large. It was a lighter

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line through all the darker skin than very noticeable. All of that told me one thing, age and where,

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that this was not a young creature. This big foot, or whatever it was, had been around long enough

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to get hurt and heal, probably more than once. It tilted its head of fraction to the side,

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like a person trying to see around the glare on a window. The eye nearest to me tracked

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left to right, taking in the full cab interior. I dropped my gaze without meaning to.

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Some part of me did not want to make direct eye contact.

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And we stayed like that for maybe three or four seconds. I know that doesn't sound like much,

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but it felt like such a long time. Then it suddenly withdrew, stepping back down off the trash pile.

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The loader's suspension bounced to fraction as the weight shifted away, and suddenly I could see

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outside the cab again. I knew I couldn't start the loader with that thing standing on the bucket frame.

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If the engine kicked over suddenly and the lights came on right in its face, well, I had no idea

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how it would react. Once it moved away to the left again, ripping into a different pile,

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I then decided it was time to gamble once more on my machine. I waited until I couldn't see it

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through any of the windows, just heard it on the periphery. Then I turned the key, set a prayer,

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and held my breath. The starter grabbed. The engine turned over slow once, twice, then finally caught,

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coughing, coming to life, and then settling into a rough, but steady idle.

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The work lights came back on at once, blasting the pit with bright white.

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I immediately throttled down to keep the noise lower, but any hope of being subtle was out the window.

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The loader was loud again, and the lights left me exposed. I scanned all arcs of view.

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For a few seconds, nothing moved out there except dust moats.

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Then from the corner by the water, I saw it again. It was mid-strived, walking away from the meat pile

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toward the base of the wall. It wasn't running, but it was making a fast and steady exit from the area.

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I put my loader in reverse, lifted the bucket just enough to clear the ground, then backed out of that

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corner as smooth and steady as I could, my eyes flicking between mirrors and windows.

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I did not try to knock down any more piles. Far as I was concerned, my job was done for the night.

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At the midpoint of the pit, I swung the loader into a wide turn and lined up with the ramp.

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As I started up, I chanced a glance in the side mirror.

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Down in the glow of the tower light at the bottom. The big figures stood there again.

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Now between two piles, it was turned and watching me go. It looked much smaller at that distance,

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but that shape, it was unmistakable. It stood there until the loader crusted the first turn,

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and then I lost sight of it down on the floor. At the top, I parked the loader over by the container,

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shut it down and walked over to the light tower. Before I killed the generator, I took one last

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look down into the quarry. The bottom was lit. The piles casting shadows like low hills.

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At the far edge of the light, near where the ramp met the upper bench, I saw a dark figure step

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up onto the ramp road and stopped. It stood there, just inside the edge of the beam,

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facing up toward me. I couldn't make out details at that distance, but the outline was the same,

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tall, wide, and long armed. I shut off the tower lights. Everything below dropped into black.

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I didn't wait any longer than it took for me to crank up my pickup truck. I drove out,

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not bothering to close the gate behind me, and I didn't look back. I sped past the goober in his

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truck. I saw his head was down. I could tell from the glow of his phone lighting him up. He was

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watching videos. Now, normally, I stop and let him know that I'm done, but I figured screw him.

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His whole purpose in being there is in case something happens to me. Maybe the loader tips over.

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Maybe I have a heart attack or some other accident. Whatever happens, someone is up top to help or

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call emergency services. And he couldn't bother to answer the radio when I really needed him.

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The first time ever that I needed someone in the middle of the night. So screw that guy.

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I tore past him and flipped him the bird. Not that he saw it. He looked up way too late as I passed,

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but I didn't care. I did not have to go back to that quarry for three weeks. The schedule just

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worked out that way. Now, during those three weeks, I had a long talk with myself about whether or not

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I'd go back down into that hole at night. But the thing is, there were ex-wives and there's

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child support and some other debt. They all told me I was getting my butt back in that loader and

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going back down in that hole at night. The pay was too good not to, and I needed it. I did eventually

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tell a co-worker. I told him everything that happened. And I'm talking about a guy who's been in this

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business way longer than me. He listened all the way through, nodded, then said, "You know,

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you're not the first one to see something down in that hole at night." And he left it at that.

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If this were one of those BFRO reports, I'd call it a classic, extended duration siding at close

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range. For me personally, all I'm going to say is I had a very bad time, trapped in a metal box with a

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dead engine and no one answering the radio. And something that I know was a big foot of some kind

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of variety was out there walking around in the hole that I was supposed to be leveling out. I was stuck

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as it mosey to about doing whatever it wanted. Now, I have not seen anything down there in that hole

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again, but I also haven't had another load of rotting meat either. And I hope I don't.

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Oh, side note, I reamed the guy in the truck up top that didn't answer his radio. I reamed him out

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good. I told him I had been sitting down there with a cut-off engine for a long time. I made the whole

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situation sound much worse than it really was. I just didn't add in the big foot. I told him if he

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didn't ever answer that radio again when I'm down there, I would put everything I learned about

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boxing from the United States Navy to good use on him. He finally admitted that he had turned down the

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radio because he was watching funny videos on YouTube and wanted to hear them. Oh, what irony, YouTube.

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And where did I send this? I hope no one's neglecting their work listening to this.

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You can call me Rick from Indiana. Well, I have to say, if you ever find yourself in a dark hole

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like that and there's something big out there walking around, well, you better hope someone does answer

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that radio and listen up. If you're out there listening and you're supposed to be listening for

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someone who might need help as in the radio, turn that radio up. Go ahead and turn on the closed

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captioning on the YouTube videos, but you answer that call. Well, Sasquad, that is all I have for you

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tonight. Until we meet up again, be sure to keep your radio turned up and keep watching the shadows.

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And always remember absence of proof is not proof of absence. Thanks for listening.

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[Music]

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[BLANK_AUDIO]