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| The Mimic: The Creature That Calls You From the Dark |
It started with the door.
The old front door groaned on its hinges every time we shut it, the wood swollen from heat and storms. My father slid the iron bolt into place—hard enough that it scraped and clanged against the metal bracket. The sound echoed through the empty house. Rusted or not, that bolt wasn’t going to slide on its own.
At least, that’s what we thought.
The house was abandoned—had been for years by the look of it—but it was the only shelter for miles. Night had already settled, thick and heavy, pressing in against the broken windows. My mother unrolled blankets while my father checked the corners of the room with a lantern.
Outside, our wagon horse stomped nervously in the dirt. The dog refused to come inside at all. He just stood on the porch, hackles raised, staring into the dark.
That was the first sign.
The second came a few minutes later.
The bolt slid open.
Not slowly. Not by accident. It moved with a sharp metallic click, like someone on the other side threw it back with purpose.
My father froze, lantern held in front of him. He shut the door again, forcing the bolt into place until it scraped hard against the bracket.
Five minutes passed.
Click.
The bolt slid open again.
Then again.
And again.
By the fifth time, even my father wouldn’t stand near it.
We moved deeper into the room, blankets clutched tight. The lantern flame fluttered. The air felt wrong—thick and restless, like the house was holding its breath.
Then we heard it.
A baby crying outside.
Soft at first, drifting through the trees. Then closer. Then close enough that the hair on my arms stood straight up. My mother went pale. My father stepped toward the window but never crossed the threshold.
The dog whined and backed away. The horse screamed—actually screamed—and tore free of its reins, disappearing into the night.
The bolt slid again.
The door eased open.
We didn’t sleep until morning.
Months later, another relative stayed in that same house on that same lonely road.
They heard the crying too.
The bolt sliding.
The animals panicking.
Whatever lived there…whatever called out with a voice that wasn’t its own…
it wasn’t human.
(From a personal family account.)
What Is a Mimic?
Most people today hear the word “mimic” and think of a creature from video games or tabletop RPGs — a monster disguised as a chest or piece of furniture. But long before fantasy games existed, folklore across the world told stories of beings that could imitate voices, cries, footsteps, or even familiar people.
In older traditions, a mimic isn’t a shape-shifting creature with teeth and claws.
It’s something far more unsettling.
It uses sound.
Mimics imitate things we instinctively respond to:
a crying baby, a distressed animal, a loved one’s voice, knocking, footsteps outside the window. Their motives vary across cultures, but the pattern remains the same.
Across folklore, mimics tend to have:
• a voice where no voice should be
• a cry designed to lure
• a presence that stays outside
• animals reacting before humans
• a sound that feels “wrong” even when familiar
The idea of the mimic predates modern horror. Early travelers, settlers, and isolated families reported these voices centuries before the internet gave the creature a name.
Origins & Folklore Variants
Mimics appear in folklore worldwide. Names vary, but the idea stays consistent: something outside calling you closer.
Southern Haints
Restless spirits tied to homes, old roads, and abandoned properties. Many stories involve knocks, cries, or voices lingering around thresholds—places believed to be vulnerable to crossing spirits.
Appalachian Lure Spirits
Travelers report babies crying in the woods or women calling for help. These sounds lead nowhere, and many families kept strict rules about never going outside after hearing such cries.
Native American Tricksters (shared cautiously)
Some oral traditions include beings capable of imitating voices to deceive. Details are culturally protected, but mimicry appears in many secondhand accounts.
Irish Fae and Changelings
Old Irish warnings cautioned families never to answer a baby crying outside after dark. A cry at night could be a lure from something that wasn’t human at all.
Scandinavian Water Lures
Beings near rivers or marshes were said to produce the sounds of crying or calling to draw travelers too close to dangerous waters.
Australian Bush Spirits
Early settlers and some Indigenous accounts mention voices calling across open scrubland when no one was there. Many of these reports centered around cries that shifted direction unnaturally.
Across all these traditions, the message is the same:
Don’t trust the first voice you hear in the dark.
Documented Encounters & Modern Reports
While mimics aren’t as widely recognized as ghosts or cryptids, encounters with “impossible voices” appear in public folklore archives, historical journals, and modern testimonies across North America and beyond. What stands out is the consistency — the same types of sounds, heard in the same isolated places, often by people with no connection to one another.
Crying Baby Phenomenon (U.S. & Canada)
For more than a century, hikers and hunters have reported hearing infant cries deep in forests, ravines, and mountains — places where no child could be. Some accounts come from pioneer journals and early 1900s logging camps. Search teams often followed these cries only to find silence and empty woods.
Appalachian “Caller at the Door” Legends
Mid-20th-century folklorists collected cabin stories of late-night knocking followed by familiar voices calling from outside. When the door opened, the porch was empty. These accounts appeared repeatedly in oral histories across West Virginia, Kentucky, and Tennessee.
WPA Folklore Accounts (1930s America)
Federal Writers’ Project interviews recorded stories of voices on old roads, babies crying near derelict houses, and horses refusing to approach certain properties. Many interviewees spoke of these encounters not as ghost tales, but as simple facts of rural life.
Park Ranger Testimonies
Rangers in the Pacific Northwest, Appalachians, and parts of Canada have described hearing children’s voices echoing through empty trails at night. Some describe hearing footsteps circling their camps, only for tracks to be absent in the morning.
Home Security Audio Cases
Modern rural homeowners have shared recordings of human-like cries captured on backyard cameras. These homes often have no neighbors within miles, and footage frequently shows no movement — just the voice.
Police Dispatch “Phantom Cry” Calls
Officers in several states have responded to late-night calls about a baby crying outside a house. In a few cases, officers reported hearing the sound themselves. Searches turned up nothing — no tracks, no animals, no child. Dispatchers note that callers often insist the cry sounded exactly like a real infant.
Whether these encounters are echoes, spirits, animals, or something unknown, one detail repeats across every account:
The voice always vanishes the moment you get close.
Why Mimics Terrify Us
Mimics target human instincts.
The Cry Response
We’re wired to respond to a baby in distress. A mimic uses that reflex against us.
The Uncanny Voice Effect
A sound that is almost right is far more frightening than one that’s obviously wrong.
Threshold Fear
Doors, windows, and treelines are liminal places. Something waiting just beyond them activates a primal warning system.
Predator Mimicry
Many predators use bait sounds. Humans evolved with that risk.
Sense Distrust
If you can’t trust what you hear, you can’t trust your environment.
That fear keeps mimic legends alive.
Why Crying Babies?
(The Sound No Traveler Should Ever Follow)
Of all the sounds mimics use, the crying baby is the most universal — and the most disturbing.
Biology plays a role.
Humans are hardwired to react to an infant cry. Even the suggestion of it triggers urgency, fear, and protective instincts.
It’s a sound that shouldn’t exist in remote places.
A baby crying in deep woods or abandoned houses feels impossible. That impossibility is what makes the sound so frightening.
Nature uses this trick.
Cougars, certain birds, and some predators mimic distressed cries to lure prey. Humans evolved to recognize this danger subconsciously.
Symbolism matters.
In folklore, a crying baby tests compassion or caution. Responding can save someone—or doom you.
The mimic’s intent is manipulation.
A creature that imitates an infant isn’t trying to startle you.
It’s trying to pull you toward it.
For centuries, many cultures warned:
If you hear a baby crying outside after midnight, stay inside.
Whatever’s calling isn’t human.
What Mimics Want
Folklore explanations vary:
Restless Spirits
Crying or calling without understanding—lost echoes of trauma.
Tricksters
Entities that want a reaction or moment of fear.
Predators
Voices designed to draw victims to unsafe places.
Location-Bound Echoes
Sounds trapped in a place, repeating endlessly.
Trauma Residue
Echoes replaying like loops.
Modern Mythology
Today’s internet reimagines mimics as intelligent, deceptive creatures.
Across all versions, the motive is the same:
A mimic wants you to answer.
Similar Legends
Mimic-like beings appear in cultures worldwide, often with eerily similar behaviors. While names differ, the pattern repeats: a voice in the dark calling you somewhere you shouldn’t go.
Skinwalkers (Navajo Tradition — Cultural Boundaries Apply)
Secondhand accounts speak of beings capable of mimicking voices or cries to lure travelers. Respectful retellings note that responding to a voice outside at night is considered dangerous.
Boo Hag (Gullah/Geechee Folklore)
A skinless night creature that slips through cracks and can imitate crying, scratching, or muffled voices to lure victims. Always associated with thresholds.
Wendigo (Algonquian Legends)
Some regional tales mention the Wendigo calling in the voices of loved ones. Hunters described hearing their own names whispered from the trees.
Rakshasa (India)
Shapeshifters known for deception, sometimes imitating the voices of crying children or lost travelers to confuse the living.
Crocotta (Ancient Mediterranean & South Asian Lore)
A legendary beast said to perfectly mimic human speech from the treeline. Ancient writers described it calling to travelers in familiar voices.
Appalachian Calling Spirits
Mountain tradition warns never to answer your name when it’s called from outside after dark. The voice always sounds almost right.
Pontianak (Malaysia/Indonesia)
A spirit whose soft crying or calling draws travelers closer to danger. Her voice is beautiful, human, and deeply unsettling.
Crying Child in the Woods (Modern Reports)
Hikers and rangers still report hearing a child crying in remote areas. Many say it sounded unmistakably human.
Across continents and centuries, the warning repeats:
A voice in the dark may not belong to the living.
Love creepy folklore and twisted tales? Follow the blog for a new story every week—where legends get darker and the truth is never what it seems.
Discover even more terrifying folklore in our companion book series, Urban Legends and Tales of Terror, featuring reimagined fiction inspired by the legends we explore here.
Because some stories don’t end when the blog post does…
Further reading and other stories you might enjoy
• Free Story Friday: Haint Blue
• They Sound Like Someone You Love
• Free Story Friday: Autumn Harvest: A Bubak Story
• Free Story Friday: The Crooked Man
• Three Knocks After Midnight: The Terrifying Legend of the Midnight Knocker
• It Ends: The Legend of the Road to Nowhere
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