The Hunter Who Became the Hunted | Carl Higdon Abduction

It was a cold October afternoon in 1974. Carl Higden aimed his rifle at a bull elk and pulled the trigger. The gun didn't kick. The bullets slid out of the barrel, floated about 50 feet and dropped to the ground. Carl bent down to pick it up. Then a twig snapped behind it. He felt a tingle in the air, like the static before a thunderstorm. He turned around. He was face to face with a creature. It smiled at him. Carl had no idea what it was, but it called itself "also." I've never been someone with a complicated skin care routine. I just wanted products that actually made a difference instead of promising the world. And that's exactly why I used one skin. I used their OS-01 face moisturizer every day, and their OS-01 eye cream around my eyes. The moisturizer keeps my skin feeling hydrated without being greasy, and the eye cream has really helped that delicate skin feel smoother and firmer. What I like most is that one skin works differently. 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It had two short antenna growing from its forehead, and it watched Carl through small, deep hollow eyes. It wore a black-cover-all-jumpsuit with belts across its torso and waist. It didn't have hands, where one should have been a thin metal rod extended from its sleeve like a drill, and something floated near the end of it. The creature spoke first, "How are you?" The words came out scramble, like a vinyl record spinning backward, but Carl understood. He said he was doing pretty good. Carl Hedden wasn't supposed to be in the woods that day. He was a 41-year-old oil rig for him in out of Rollins, Wyoming. When a crew member called in sick that morning, Carl took the day off, borrowed the company truck, and drove south to Hun Elk. On the way in, he stopped to help two-streaded men fix their truck. They thanked him by pointing him toward a good hunting spot, deep in the medicine-bone national forest. His good deed sent him straight to our cell. The floating thing near our cell's drill was a clear cellophane pack, the kind to get gum or cold medicine in. It held four small pills. Our cell asked Carl if he was hungry, he said he was. The pack floated from the drill to where Carl. Our cell told him each pill would keep him fed for four days. But here's the thing about Carl. He didn't take pills, not vitamins, not even an aspirin for a headache. Carl took one and put it in his mouth without a second thought. Then Also asked Carl if he wanted to go with it. If Carl said, "I guess so." This bothered Carl later, not that a creature from space visited his planet, but he agreed to everything so easily. He didn't know what Also wanted to show him, but leaving Earth was the last choice Also let him make. Carl tried to lift his arms. He couldn't. He was strapped to his seat and pinned down. A large helmet weighed his head down. It reminded him of a football helmet, but this one had wires coming out of the top. The chair was inside a large glass box, maybe seven feet long in each side. Carl could see through it. He saw the clearing and his truck, but the Elp were gone. Also pointed his metal drill at it and the truck disappeared. Then the box lifted off the ground and started to climb. Slowly at first, then the trees fell away. The ridge, the state, a few seconds later, the earth was a size of a basketball. Then it was gone. Then all that was left was black. And Carl and Also weren't alone in the queue. The craft had four seats and an alien that looked just like Also sat in one of them. Carl's rifle was there too, but not a reach. On the wall, Carl saw a control panel and a strange symbol he thought might be a map of the galaxy. Then Carl noticed a mirror mounted above his seat. And the reflection behind his seat was the L key shot at or tried to. The four Elp were there too, caged and frozen, like not moving at all. The ship was too small to hold all of this, but there they were. Also told Carl they were going to his home, 163,000 light years away. Carl couldn't say along I traveled, but as fast as Earth fell away, a new planet appeared. The planet was barren, almost empty in every direction. When the craft landed, Carl saw a tower. It reminded him of the space needle, but this wasn't Seattle. "Thank God. Can you imagine? Effective by an alien and attention to Seattle?" "That's like when he won't cause golden ticket, but for his new factory making oatmeal." "Now?" "Uh, okay. That's like getting into Hogwarts and the sorting hat puts you in a county." "Nothing?" "Uh, that's like finally hook it up with the cute girl at school, and then you see her at the family picnic." "Uh, uh, these are jokes about this appointment." "I know what it is." On this planet, Carl learned he wasn't the only human ever taken. Five others were already there, and none of them looked surprised. 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Bitcoin services provided by Block Inc. brand, for additional information, see the Bitcoin Disclosures at cash.app/legal/podcast. [MUSIC] Carl covered his eyes, or tried to, while tears streamed down his face. The light from the top of the tower burned, and his ears rang with a deep buzz, like an electric razor. How so stayed in the shade, Carl couldn't. So Carl did a very human thing, and yelled at the aliens to shut the lights off. One of them answered, "Your son burns us too." So not a lot of sympathy from the aliens. At the base of the tower, Carl saw five figures standing in a circle. They were humans, ordinary people and ordinary clothes. A gray-haired man, a teenage boy, a couple of teenage girls, a younger girl, maybe 10 years old. They chatted with each other like they were killing time. Carl tried to get their attention, but they ignored him. And nobody looked surprised. I also guided him past them and into the tower. They got into an elevator. When the doors closed, Carl realized there were no buttons. They started moving anyway. When they stopped, the doors opened into a large empty room. Carl just stood there. He had no idea what he was supposed to do. A large glass panel emerged from the wall and floated in front of him. Still, Carl waited. How so moved to the far side of the panel turned around and looked to Carl through the glass. Then nothing. Three minutes passed. Then four. How so didn't say a word. The alien was studying Carl methodically, clinically. Carl knew that look. It's the look a doctor makes when studying a chart or an x-ray looking for fractures or a tumor. I know that look. I give it to a Chinese buffet. I just stand there. That I grinning in the homicide like private pile. And that's why we never go to lunch. I'm telling you, I got a reputation for eye appetizers. The bus boy calls me the Craig Ranguna. Carl didn't know what he was going to get from this creature. Maybe a message for mankind or some sense of what this all meant. Instead, Carl got a judgment you're not what we want. "We'll take you back." No apology, no explanation, just rejection. Owso walked him back to the ship and handed him his rifle. - This weapon is primitive, but I'd like to keep it. I am not allowed to. - Then Owso pointed his drill arm at Carl's pocket. The till pack floated out and up, back to Owso. They gave Carl back his gun, but they took back their evidence. Suddenly, the tower, the five humans and the blinding light were gone. Carl watched the doll fall away from inside the ship. Then through the bottom of the ship, a blue light grew out of the darkness. Earth, Carl didn't know how long the journey took, but he was home. Carl floated out of the ship and down into the forest. He never walked, he floated. Owso and his ship were gone. Carl was alone, but he felt strange. Then he realized he didn't know where he was. He didn't know how he got there. 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They'll walk you through moving physical gold or silver into an IRA or 401(k), tax and penalty free, or buying, hold it with cash. You'll also get a free portfolio review. No pressure, no hard sell. Just a straight conversation about what you're holding. And right now, golden crest is running a bonus of $25,000 in free silver on qualifying purchases. Go to goldencressmetals.com/thewifiles or text the word "files" to metals. The forest was more than a mile above sea level and wet. Snow covered most of the ground. His first step back on earth, cross-sliped on a rock. He fell down the hill and landed hard. He thought he dislocated his shoulder, but he wasn't sure. He suddenly had a splitting headache. He still didn't know his name, but something told him to not take it any longer. He was a little bit more than a mile above sea level. And wet, snow covered most of the ground. He told him to not take any pills for the pain. That much, he remembered. Carl wandered between the trees in the days. Nothing was familiar. He walked right past his truck, that recognizing it. He kept going. He walked a mile up the road, then he turned around and came back. He went back to his truck. He still didn't know it was his, but something made him get inside. He heard a woman's voice crackling on the radio. He picked up the handset and asked for help. Around 630 that evening, Carl's boss heard a familiar voice come over the company CB. He asked Carl for his name and location. Carl couldn't give him either one. I don't know. I'm so cold. Carl said he was sitting in a pickup with a funny stick in the middle. He was describing a stick shift. Carl drove stick his whole life, but he couldn't remember how it worked. The sheriff put together a search party. And six men went into the forest after dark. During the search, they saw strange pulsing lights in the sky. Green, red, and white moving information. Too high for a helicopter and too low for a plane. They hovered over the forest like they were also searching for something. The search party found Carl at 1130 that night soaking wet and shaking. He lived and worked in the area, so the men recognized him. But Carl insisted he didn't know any of them. He didn't recognize his own wife who joined the search. And when Carl finally spoke, he said only four words. He took my elk. Carl got to the hospital in Roland's at 230 in the morning. His eyes were bloodshot and stinging. He complained about the painful bright lights. He couldn't keep his balance. And through it all, he still had no idea who he was. Doctors examined him and put his x-rays up in the lightboard. Years earlier, Carl had to burglose his so badly that the scar showed up on every chest x-ray he ever took. That night, they didn't. The scans were clean. Carl's kidney stones were gone too. He had them for years. They were bothering him earlier that week. But after that night, he never got a kidney stone again. Something healed Carl. The doctors had no idea what could have done it. But they agreed on one thing. Something happened to Carl Higdon. But it wasn't all good news. Carl had no appetite. That worried the doctors. His wife pushed him to eat but Carl refused. Then Sunday morning, he woke up starving. He tore through his breakfast, then he ate more. And more and more, he ate everything in the house. And complained there wasn't enough food. It was the first thing Carl ate since he swallowed Owso's alien food pill. Doctors didn't believe Carl's story of being abducted. They couldn't find any proof of it in his body. But they found the proof in his pocket. While Carl was in the hospital, his wife Marjorie went through his hunting clothes. She folded his pants. She hung his wet shirt out to dry. When she picked up his jacket, she realized it was inside out. The sleeves were pulled all the way through. As she straightened the jacket, a bullet fell from the pocket. It had been fired. She was the wife of a hunter. She was no stranger to bullets. And she knew the difference between a bullet that was fired and one that wasn't. But something was wrong about this one. Carl's rifle fired seven-millimeter Magnum bullets. Carl liked to point out that a seven-millimeter Magnum could punch clean through telephone pole. But the bullet in Carl's jacket was peeled back and turned inside out. The lead core was missing. Only the copper jacket was left. The police couldn't explain it. So the bullet went to Dr. Walter Walker, a metallurgy consultant. Walker said the bullet hit something extremely hard with tremendous force. That means something was in the air 50 feet in front of Carl on that mountain. The bullet went into storage at the University of Wyoming. Then it disappeared. And then there's the truck. The two men Carl helped on the drive-in knew where he was headed. The search party knew where his truck was supposed to be. Parked at the end of a logging road. But it wasn't there. They found it three miles away, sunk to the axles in a mud hole. And it sounds like one of those seven sangs when someone's in big trouble. Boy, I missed up so bad that I've just sunk to the axles in a mud hole. You're right. It kind of does. They got the best sangs. So I'm in so much trouble. I'm crap and him knows and praying and cursive. It's so hot out and thankfully lower than a fat greenie's porch swing. I'm so hung over, I'm blinking in most code and apologizing to the furniture. This was rugged country. Carl's two-wheel drive truck had no business going there. The searchers couldn't even drive it out. They had to tow it. And the men who found it all agreed on one thing. That truck didn't get there on its own. But there were no tire tracks. Not from the truck. Not from anything that could have dragged it there. The truck just appeared in the mud. To the men on that mountain, the bullet and the truck were proof that something happened to Carl. They couldn't say what. But Carl eventually got his answer. Carl Hick didn't learn exactly why the aliens wanted an undamaged human body. And exactly how they planned to use it. Between writing episodes, editing and everything in between, I'm lucky to get five hours late tonight. But if I'm only getting a little bit of sleep, it needs to actually be good sleep, not tossing and turning, not waking up more tired than when I lay down. So lately, I've been looking into upgrading my mattress. And Brooklyn vetting is the one that actually caught my attention. And here's why. These aren't some imported beds with a logo slapped on it. Brooklyn vetting designs and builds the mattresses themselves in their own factory in Arizona. No middlemen, no gimmicks. Just people who know what they're doing. And if you could tell the difference, in order for that being stiff, doesn't sleep hot, doesn't fall apart after a year like other mass-produced mattresses, you'd get options for pretty much every kind of sleeper too. Side sleepers, hot sleepers, hard to find sizes, plus a 129 trial if you want to test it out for risk rate. Go to BrooklynBetting.com and use my promo code "TheWiFiles" to check out to get 30% off site-wide during the back-to-school sale. That's BrooklynBetting.com and promo code "TheWiFiles" for 30% off site-wide. Exclusive with my code, BrooklynBetting.com, promo code "TheWiFiles." Karl was right about the symbol on the wall of the ship. It was a map of Also's solar system. Nine planets, circling one volatile star. Also's planet was harsh and dying. It sunburned so hot that Also's kind had to wear special coveralls outside. The ocean used to be full of life, but now nothing could survive in the water. This was a critical part of the food chain that collapsed. There wasn't enough food on their world, so Also's people went looking for others. They came to Earth, but not to make contact and not to share knowledge. Also told Karl exactly what it was doing in those woods that afternoon. It was searching for food. Also was like Karl. He was a hunter. Karl remembered none of this at first. His memory came back in pieces, and it started when his daughter walked into his hotel room. He knew her face, and then his wife came back to him. Then the broad strokes of the hunting trip. But when Karl reached for what happened on the alien planet, he hit a wall. - So, Marjorie called Dr. Sprinkle. - Is she called the ice cream man? - That was Mr. Frosty. - Dr. Leo Sprinkle was a psychologist at the University of Wyoming and he was a hitman test. - Hey Dr. Sprinkle's research partner was Dr. Ginny's. They had a falling out over regional terminology. - Okay, eight days after the encounter, Sprinkle drove down to the Higdon home. His family gathered around and Rick Kenyon, a local art teacher sat nearby with the sketch pad. Sprinkle swung a pendulum and guided Carl deep into subconscious. Once Carl was under, some memories came back. As Carl talked, Kenyon drew the creature Carl described. That sketch became the face of this case. Every picture of how so you've ever seen started in that living room. Every time Sprinkle guided him down, Carl stopped at the same place, the elk, finally the wall broke, and his memories rushed back all at once. The elk in the cage, the tower, the other humans, and the thing Also told him on that barren planet. Also hunted animals, collected them and carried them home to breed them for food, animals like elk, and animals like Carl. - Soiling feed his people! - Right. - It's a cut-buck, feed me Seema! - Are you done? - I hear a lot of quotes about aliens eating people. My favorite is in his belly, you will find a new definition of pain and suffering as you are slowly digested over a thousand years. - I'll be right back with it. - Return of the Jedi. - Yep, there's C-3POA, he was talking about the sandiness that ate Boba Fett. - Okay, that's enough. - You know, I wish Boba Fett stayed in that anus. - Yeah, me too. Anyway, the pill Carl swallowed wasn't a kindness. It was feed. The kind you give livestock to keep it healthy and transit. The examination in the tower wasn't a scientific curiosity. It was a meat inspection. Then Carl understood why he'd been rejected. Years earlier, Carl had a septumic. You're not good breeding stock if you can't breed. Carl wasn't prime. It wasn't even select. He was worthless. Carl went into those woods at the top of the food chain. He came out knowing it wasn't at the top anymore. But Carl wasn't the only human on that planet. Five others stood at the base of that tower and nobody knows what happened to them. As for the rest of us, either we didn't make the cut or we're still waiting to be examined. (upbeat music) A hunter goes into the woods looking for food. Instead of being an apex predator, the hunter becomes prey. It's a good story, but is a true. Well, in a case like this, most of the evidence is just the witness account. Carl Higden was an oil reformant, not a writer or performer. Marjorie wrote a book about the case, but they never really cashed in. He gave interviews for years until his death in 2022. And in all that time, his story never changed. Not the dropping bullet, not outsource appearance, not the glass cube, the tower, or the exam. In 1978, Charles McQuiston ran recordings of Higden's voice through a machine he co-invented. The psychological stress evaluator. A voice stress lie detector used by police departments. McQuiston found no signs of deception. He stopped short of confirming an alien encounter, but he believed something extraordinary happened to Higden. Well, in caveat, and it's a big one. Voice stress analysis is shaky science. Later, government studies found that these machines catch lies at about the rate of a coin flip. So McQuiston's verdict tells us Carl probably believes his own story, but it can't tell us if the story is true. Now the hard part. The core of Carl's story appeared within days, but many details only came out after Carl met Dr. Sprinkle after he was hypnotized and hypnosis is also a problem. Dr. Sprinkle was a real psychologist at a real university. And by every account, he was honest and careful, but hypnosis is unreliable. Under hypnosis, the mind fills gaps. It borrows from movies, from dreams, from things you read. A person can come out of hypnosis, sure of details that their own brain manufactured. Honesty is not the same as accuracy, and we can't fully separate the two. So the five other people, the examination behind the glass, the idea of breeding us for food, all that comes from hypnosis, a process that we know garbles and manufactures memories. But there is some actual evidence. Everything Carl said and did before 6.30 that evening happened hours before anyone mentioned hypnosis. The bullet was already in his pocket. The truck was in the mud. And a man who drove stick shift to soul life was already on the radio, unable to name the thing in the middle of his own truck. Whatever scrambled Carl Higdon's brain that night, it wasn't hypnosis. But there's no second witness to the ship. No one else saw how so. But the strange lights in the sky that night, the search team really did see those. And they saw them before their own vehicle started moving, so it wasn't headlights. Same with the truck. It really was three miles from where it should have been in rough, mucky terrain, and it had to be towed out. But some firsthand accounts say it was stuck in deep ruts, not in a bog without tire tracks. Either way, the searchers agree the truck couldn't have got there on its own. The bullet is a sticky piece of evidence too. It really was inside out, and the lead core really was missing. Dr. Walker said it hits something extremely hard, but he's not sure if calling it anything alien. A hospital evidence is also interesting. Doctors found no drugs or alcohol in Carl's system, and they said his distress seemed honest. But I couldn't find proof that his kidney stones melted or scars vanished. X-rays can be an exact, especially in the 1970s. It's possible the scars didn't show up on one scan even though they were still there. The trip to the planet, I can't prove. The story also told, I can't prove. But something physical happened to Carl Higden on that mountain, and nobody's ever explained it. The truck, the bullet, the flashing lights, the changed man. There's no simple way to explain any of that. But here's what's unique about Carl's story. Every alien abduction story you've ever heard is, underneath, a story about being chosen. They picked you, you matter, they wanted you. It's terrifying, but there's a strange comfort in being special. Carl's is the only abduction case I know of that's about being rejected. Something came a long way, looked to human being over, had to tell, ran a bunch of tests, and decided he wasn't worth keeping, and sent him home like a dented can, put back on the shelf. The abduction isn't the scary part. The judgment is, the quiet possibility that are already on a list somewhere, already accounted for, already graded. So the worst news isn't always that you were taken. Set you were sent back. (upbeat music) Thank you so much for hanging out with me today. My name is AJ, that's Heiko Fish. - Yeah, but smiling yellow guy would have drilled for a hand or if it's you a pill, you say no. Less a salty can, that I didn't use your judgment. - This has been the Y-Files. If you had fun to learn something, doing the favor, subscribe, I'm at night share. I know I'm broken record, but that stuff really helps the channel. Like most topics we cover here, today is recommended by you. Someone sent me that, no, I think Gino did a story hour on this one, and I was fascinated by the sketch. The drill arm, it's just, it's a chicken dinner all day long. Anyway, if you've got a story you want to hear, go to thewifiles.com/tips, or send us an email, catch us in chat, you can find us. Now, if you enjoy the stories I tell in the Y-Files, check out my other show on the channel called The Basement. That's a conversation show where I chat with the interesting people behind the episodes. Some of them you know, some you don't, but they're all people at Y-Files fascinated. We have experts on topics like moon landing, JFK conspiracy, DMT laser code that was Danny Golar. 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Oh, what did he space the book up, he vibes, and you can stick your fist in, or you drill a arm, or you're a little knob, or whatever you slide in, yeah, but they check you. Grab a hoodie, send my face on it. I'll get one of these adorable screens. Ah, look at that, look at that. Get a squeezy, stuck-to animal hecklefish. Look at that, bud. But if you get a buy merch, become a member on YouTube. YouTube members get 10% off everything in the Y-Files store, and it's only $3. So if you get to spend $40 on merch, join, become a member. It pays for itself, and then you can just cancel. I think he's still going to charge, but maybe not. But the point is, I don't care. It's there to save you money, not make me money. All that revenue goes to the team, I don't touch it. Hey, keep that secret on your door, Josefé, huh? What have you got in there, keep it in there. Those are the plugs, and that's going to do it. Until next time, be safe, be kind. Another you, I appreciate it. But then another conspiracy theory becomes the truth, my friends and it never ends, no it never ends. I feel the crack at and got stuck inside my home, with MK out truck. I feel it only to a whiz. Do you stand like you've reaped the moon landing alone? On a film set, I wore the shadow people there. The rest were aliens just for the smiling men. I'm told, and his name was Cole. I can't agree. I'm dancing with the fidget. And the fish are thirsty, they're not sweet, they're J2N. And when I'm happy, I'm doing the night. All I ever wanted was you to see the truth. So the waffles on your feet all through the night. The Muffman side and van, the solar storm still come to a god the city underground. Mysterious number of stations, planets are phoned to Brachek's dark cave. And where the dark watchers found. In a simulation, don't you worry though. The black nights are delighted to meet so I can't believe. [MUSIC PLAYING]