We were completely powerless.
The teller grew up in Michigan loving everything outdoors. At sixteen he and three friends went backpacking along a river deep in the Huron-Manistee National Forest and camped on a ridge above the water, on what turned out to be a busy game trail. At sunset, from the opposite ridge, came a sound like a very strong man chopping firewood with perfect rhythm. They were far too deep in steep, wooded country for that to make sense, but it was the only explanation they had.
Coyotes circled their fire. That didn't worry them, since they were armed. On the second night they heard a distant pack yipping, and then a different call answering from about a mile off, a long wail that gave him goosebumps. It seemed as if they were talking to each other. Later he woke to the same scream from directly across the river, so loud it seemed to vibrate his bones. Then, as he drifted in and out, came the chopping sound again, but now heavy blows on wood that seemed to come from all around them and from above, perhaps ten feet over their heads. He lay frozen until dawn. Whatever it was left without a sound. They packed up and left in the morning.
A year or so later he heard recordings of supposed Sasquatch calls and wood knocks, and they matched exactly. He talked one of the friends into going back to the same spot, this time with a camera and plenty of guns. It was early spring and the forest was unnaturally silent. They found a den-like hollow inside a huge fallen tree by the riverbank and decided to watch it after dark.
Crouched fifty feet from it in the moonlight, his friend raised his rifle with shaking hands and whispered that he could see something moving. Then the friend turned and sprinted for camp. The teller followed, sweeping his spotlight across the ferns, and caught a large brownish blur keeping pace with them about thirty feet away, darting between the trees.
They zipped themselves into the tent and waited. From where the figure had gone came a soft, curious cooing or hooting, like a primate, getting closer. Then quiet, rhythmic footsteps on two legs, right beside the tent. Through the nylon, the teller watched the impression of what looked like a hand reach toward his friend's head and slowly feel, almost caress, the top of it from outside. His friend lay with his pistol pointed at it, tears running down his face, paralyzed. The teller found himself laughing helplessly at the absurdity of it: two boys with high-powered rifles, completely powerless. He couldn't bring himself to look up through the mesh.
At last it stopped, and they heard big branches snapping as something large moved away. At first light they found a young tree, as thick as an ankle, snapped in half at chest height, where none had been broken the day before. He still goes into the woods sometimes, but he's on edge every time the sun goes down.