The Expedition (closed)

[TheAntiRebel]

There was a certain peace in the woods, Michael Wheldon thought to himself. The birds chirping in the distance, the quiet rustling of the trees, the muted splashing of the river in front of him. There was some serene here. He felt like he was on a different planet, far away from the troubles of his ‘regular’ life. He was kneeling down on a blanket, near an easy going river. He was deep in Mt. Rainer National Park, in Washington and a few hundred miles from the life he had wanted to abandon in a hurry.

The college professor had accepted a research grant from the World Wildlife Fund to study the migratory patterns of river otters. The University graciously offered him a six month leave of his teaching duties, and he had decided that six months in a national park was exactly what he needed. In the distance, just under the surface of the river, he spotted three river otters swimming upstream. He raised a Canon SLR camera with a long telezoom lens and snapped a picture of the three males headed upriver to find a mate for the year. A mate. His heart stung with the thought.

Two months ago, he raced home to his apartment during his lunch hour. He had forgotten his laptop there and it had some important notes he needed for an afternoon lecture. The car belonging to his finance, Rachel, was still there, which was unusual. Another car was parked there as well, which was strange, but Michael assumed it was one of his neighbor’s “borrowing” his parking spot.

He had parked his car and headed inside his apartment. He heard giggling softly from the master bedroom. Confused, still not getting the whole picture, Michael headed back there, unsure of what was going on. He swung the door open. Clothes scattered across the floor. His fiancé in bed, on her back naked, giggling, another man’s head between her legs, her long fingers running through his hair, the man’s sweaty muscular back. Suddenly, the sudden realization of what was going on hit him like a shock to the chest. It left a weight on his heart that he was still struggling to get off. But, being away in the forest for two months had helped.

After all the screaming, shouting, thrown dishes and one slammed front door. Michael had finally understood Amy’s point. He wasn’t emotional enough. He acted like a “robot”. He was too absorbed in his work. She didn’t feel like he loved her. He did, of course. But, he had trouble telling her. And she decided to look for her emotional nourishment in the arms of another man.

Two days later, he had applied for the research grant. A week after that, he had it. He bought enough supplies to survive alone in the national park for six months, and locked up the apartment they had once shared together. Hiding from his aching heart.

He sat for a moment, waiting for another pack of river otters to swim near the surface of the river, when suddenly, something caught his eye in the distance on the opposite side of the river.

It was large, and brown, moving between the trees and walking upright. He just barely caught it and remained perfectly still. His heart raced, usually the only thing that was large, brown and walking around on its hind legs were bears. Grizzlies in these parts could be over 1,000 pounds and destroy a person in seconds. Some around these parts carried guns to protect themselves from bears. Michael didn’t, he was here to study wildlife, not shoot it, but the thought of a close encounter with a bear made him rethink that for a split second.

The brown figure got closer and closer. It was leaner than a bear. It was more human-like. It didn’t have the bulky fur of a bear, and it’s arms and legs were long and lanky. It had the gait of a human walking, not the lazy lumbering of a bear. Michael stood in awe. There was something majestic about the way it moved. He didn’t know what he was looking at. He raised his camera and prepared to take a picture, when the creature saw him. They stared at each other for a moment, then it bolted. Michael got up and ran after it.

It was running, not on all fours like a bear would, but sprinting like a human would run. Michael, frantically ran along the opposite side of the river bank, trying to get the creature in frame of his Canon camera. The creature had long, muscular legs and was outpacing the college professor, who wasn’t in bad shape himself.

Finally, the river started to get wider and wider, and the creature got further and further ahead. Michael knew he needed to be on the other side of the river, so, holding his camera above his head, he sprinted into the river. He gasped for air as the ice cold water surrounded him. He waded across the river, the water coming up to his chest, before he reached the other side. The creature was far ahead now, and seeing his final chance, Michael raised his camera and snapped one picture of the creature before it finally disappeared in between two distance trees.

On the long walk back to his campsite, it dawned on Michael what he was seeing. Bigfoot. The legendary creature. It had long been rumored in the Northwest for years, but had mostly been the domain of conspiracy theorists and other nutcases. Mainstream zoology and primate anthropology had maintained that the creature was nonexistent. No serious studies of bigfoot had ever been conducted and anybody who mentioned it was laughed out of academic circles. But, Michael had seen something. And his camera had recorded a blurry shot of something brown and hairy running away from him. He was unsure what to do next.

Back at his tent, he hung his wet clothes over a tree branch and climbed into his tent, where he connected his laptop to his satellite internet modem, which provided precious internet access in the middle of nowhere. First things first, he backed up the blurry image to his university server space, before he started a comprehensive web search of Bigfoot.

First, he tried searching for academic whitepapers about the creature on his usual academic databases. There was very little, and most of what was out there was simply to debunk and ridicule (in the way that only college professors could) all ‘evidence’ that had been found about the creature. The famous 16mm “Patterson-Gimlin film” that purported to have captured a Bigfoot walking had been eviscerated and dismissed by mainstream science. Michael looked at his own picture and sighed. His photo wasn’t just as blurry and circumstantial as the Patterson-Gimlin film. He would need more proof if he wanted to go public with this.

With academia being no help, Michael turned to the ‘civilian’ webpages. He started searching popular Bigfoot blogs, and came across a blog about legendary creatures written by somebody going under the handle Ash Kibs. The blog posts were surprisingly well written and when Michael clicked a link to her YouTube page, he was even more impressed. She was beautiful, and he couldn’t help but be attracted to her physically. But, moreso, in her videos, she was so confident and self-assured about her topic material.

Michael sighed and rubbed his forehead. If he was going to find proof that bigfoot, it that was it was, existed, he would need help. The academic world had failed him, and no doctoral candidate or graduate student would dare come anywhere near him on this expedition He needed an outside, somebody who wouldn’t be bothered by the stench of what academia had labeled a “pseudoscience”. Ash Kibs, or whatever her real name was, seemed like she was perfect for the role of helping him track down this creature.

Trouble is, he didn’t know how many good looking women would respond to requests to meet in person on the internet. It would take a miracle for her to even open his email. And an even bigger one for her to agree to meet him in person. He copied her email address from her blog and signed into his university webmail. Sending it from an official University of Washington email account may help his case.

Dear Ash Kibs,

My name is Michael Wheldon. I'm an Associate Professor at the University of Washington. I was doing some background research for a topic that not a lot of mainstream zoologists are interested in and I found your blog and YouTube videos.

You seem pretty well-informed about a certain subject matter that I'm interested in, and I wondered if you'd be interested in a job opportunity working with me. If you'd like to meet, we can arrange a meeting at a coffee shop or someplace. I promise I'm not wasting your time, this is a serious job offer.

Feel free to call me at (206) 555-0170 if you have any questions.

Thanks,
Michael

Michael sighed heavily. He didn't know what kind of reply he would get. He pressed "Send" and watched the email disappear from his screen. It was dark outside now. He unzipped his tent and started off into the abyss, wondering exactly what kind of creatures were out there.

 

[KattDclaw]

It was just typical night for Ashley McKibben, or Ash Kibs as she was more commonly known. She had holed herself up in her tiny one bedroom apartment, rendering herself slowly blind by staring at the brilliant glow of her computer monitors in the absolute darkness of her room. A pair of thick black framed glasses offered some comfort, their lenses flashing brightly in the monitor's reflective gaze. Those stormy gray eyes were hidden behind those thick frames, shifting in a twitchy fashion over the screen while slender digits hammered feverishly on a well-used keyboard. Nothing but the contanst 'taka-taka-taka' of the keys could be heard besides for the occasional squeak or groan from the old office chair Ash presently sat in. Most people her age would have more pressing engagements than sitting in front of a computer, at least those as gifted in the physical department as she was. Ash Kibs was strikingly beautiful, even if she did little to try an accent her alluring features. Her features were angelic and ravishing, with large, emotional gray eyes, a strong jaw and plush nose, complete with full and expressive lips – the bottom one presently being gnawed out quiet heavily as she typed. Her hair was a riotous mop of raven, cropped short if for no reason other than it was far easier to manage than anything else. Presently a few thick locks fell about her brow, one resting against the bridge of her nose between her glasses. A slender, gracefully arched neck gave way to proud yet slender shoulders and a figure that was down right sinful in its proportions. At an unimpressive five foot two inches in height, Ash was far from tall, though her frame was both svelte and shapely, with just the right amount of curve in her hips to make her waist appear even more slender. And take about a rack, those lush swells strained tightly against the T-shirt she wore, ample, round and firm despite being contained by nothing but the flimsy material of her shirt. All in all Ash was an incredibly beautiful young woman; she should have been able to carry herself with a certain sense of dignity and poise on that alone. To an extent she was, behind the keyboard or in front of a camera lens she could exude a certain sense of personality and charisma that was undeniable. That smile could send a flutter in the breast of even the hardest of personalities. Her confidence was undeniable when she spoke of things she cared for, though few could really take those things seriously.

Ash was a self proclaimed 'amateur cryptozoologist', those that searched for animals whose existence had yet been proven. It was a pseudoscience, no one in their right mind would claim that things like Bigfoot, Hellhounds, or Man-eating trees actually existed. There was little in the way of actual evidence to suggest that anything like that existed, which in itself intrigued Ash beyond imagination. The idea of finding one of these elusive beasts consumed her since a young age; a childhood in front of the TV watching B movies, absorbing any comic book and fantasy novel in reach didn't help it one bit. It had begun as a simple hobby, much like any inspired youth Ash took to it with relish. As the years went on she found her encyclopedic knowledge useful for impressing neckbeards on the internet, though it proved of little use anywhere else. Most people she met out in the world only gave her weird looks when she mentioned cryptids (that was at best – usually it was followed by a huff of laughter and some dismissive comment).

Eventually the hobby became more. It started with a blog about her interests, which quickly gathered a sizable following eager for her comments and stories. One thing lead to another and Ash decided to give YouTube a chance, it took some time but Ash managed to throw out a few videos on more 'mainstream' cryptids like Bigfoot. People really seemed interested in the giant furry man running around in the woods. Ash absorbed all she could about it, unsurprisingly her blog posts and videos about the lore and interesting sightings caught the attention of many. Still, it didn't prove squat. She hadn't actually seen anything herself, despite several outings in the woods where several well-documented bigfoot sightings took place. Thus far, it was nothing but anecdotal evidence at best, a few scraps of fur that couldn't be identified and a few nuts who liked to bang on trees with sticks and whoop and yelp really loudly.

Fortunately for Ash, she was easily distracted by the next topic. There was always another cryptid to investigate, another story to read up on and a witness to try and track down. Thankfully her day job of data entry left her with plenty of time to pursue her own agenda. It was a paycheck, a mindless drug of eight hours before she could return home and lose herself behind her screens once more. Tonight she worked feverishly on a new post relating to a recent rash of sightings of the Chupacabra, that blood sucking little monster that supposedly stalked the Southwest, even into Mexico. The case was interesting, Ash had always found the idea of such a creature intriguing and terrifying. So with the customary devotion Ash worked long into the night on the topic at hand, blissfully unaware of the world that wasn't part of her tiny little room. She had lost all sense of time, that was until a loud electronic bleep snapped her out of her daze. She outwardly jolted in her seat, slender dark brows furrowed above her gray gaze as she glanced at the blinking icon in the bottom right corner. Ash hadn't realized she left her email program open, at least until she saw the new mail icon. With undeniable curiosity she scrolled over it and brought the tab into view. The fact it was from a state university helped peak her interest, she couldn't rightly delete it without at least giving it a glance.

From her experience so far, Ash had little stomach for the real academic type, college professors as a whole her little more than pompous asshats with next to no imagination. Slowly those gray eyes widened and an incredulous look drifted across her face as she read the short email. Here was one of those Professors, the same type that would have openly laughed in her face if they knew what she believed it. Ash couldn't help but let out a hearty guffaw as she finished the email, only to read it once more and laugh all over again.

“He must really be desperate...” She finally broke the silence, her voice a soft, throaty murmur deep in her throat. Her first instinct was to laugh again and toss the email into the trash bin. It was obviously a joke, perhaps some troll managed to hack into the good Professor's email account and sent it. No doubt someone was sitting in front of their computer laughing as well, no doubt tipping their fedora to themselves in praise of a job well done. Yet for some reason Ash resisted the urge, instead she read it again, and then once more before she leaned back in her chair and started to contemplate. One finger rose and tapped at her chin absently, all the while gnawing her bottom lip. It felt like an eternity of inner debate before she reached for her cellphone. With a swipe of her finger she brought the slender device to life and without realizing it she had already begun to type in the number. If it was a troll she would find one, at least then she could put to rest any doubt. After all, an opportunity was an opportunity, perhaps at long last this was the break she needed. Or, she could tell them to burn in the seventh layer of hell, either way.

Ash listened for the ring before she brought the phone to her ear, her eyes settling on the screen before her if only to focus herself. It wasn't until she heard the ringing stop and a masculine voice on the other end that Ash really snapped back to reality. She awkward clearly her throat into the phone before starting out with the infamous: “Uh...”

It took her only a second to push herself up in the chair, a finger pressed against her glasses and nudged them up the bridge of her nose. Ash forced the flutter of nervousness from the pit of her stomach and proceeded with her 'on the air' voice, full of confidence and with just a hint of huskiness.

“Is this Professor Wheldon? This is Ash Kibs...you sent me a rather cryptic email about my blog?”

 

[TheAntiRebel]

Michael was back at his office at the University. As one of the most junior members of the zoology faculty, his office was small. An aging iMac sat on the desk, next to coffee stains that were left by a previous resident. The ceiling tiles were stained yellow from somebody who had smoked in here before cigarette smoking had become a major taboo. His attempts to keep the office clean had succeeded today, mostly, but only because he had been out of town. During a semester he was teaching, the desk was usually spilling over with graded and ungraded student papers.

He was going through a large red dusty old book, the spine embossed with gold letters spelling “Extinct Members Of The Ursidae Suborder of North America”. By M. Wilson, R. Vanderbosch and J. Mcllroy. Published 1969. It was a particularly dry academic text about extinct bears. The dust on the cover and the stiff old pages made him wonder if he was the first to get it out of the library since it was put there.

Going through the awful old tomb with its hard, statistical, boring information about bears that were long dead made him want to pound his head against the wall. But, after sending his email to Ash Kibs, he quickly packed up his campsite and returned to the University, for its library to see if proper academia could explain the creature he saw. He had started to wonder if was some kind of exotic bear that was thought to be extinct. Then his phone started ringing. Without looking at the number, he reached down and answered it.

“Hello?” He said into the phone, his mind still skimming a lifeless description of an even lifeless bear species.

A young female voice replied, “Is this Professor Wheldon? This is Ash Kibs... you sent me a rather cryptic email about my blog?”

Michael almost jumped out of his chair. He wasn’t really expecting her to call him back. “Yeah, this is Professor Wheldon. Call me, Mike, please,” he said, holding up the phone to his ear with one hand while he closed the dreadful old book with another. “Listen, I’m on to something here and it’s a little bit outside I’m area of expertise. I was wondering if you would be interested in helping me.”

He leaned back in his old office chair and looked at the ceiling. The chair made a long, annoying squeak as it went back. “I was doing a study on river otters in Mt. Rainer National Park and well, I saw something. It was tall, brown and furry. It was walking upright, like a human.” His voice got low and solemn. “I’m not quite sure what it was. I think it might have been…” he paused, and glanced over his shoulder. His office door was open, but he couldn’t see or hear anybody walking by. If one of his colleagues in the zoology department heard him, he would be laughed out of the builder before he even could collect his things.

“…Bigfoot. Or something. I’m not sure. It definitely wasn’t a bear. I’ve been to Kodiak Island in Alaska for research in grad school and seen enough bears to last a lifetime. It ran away on its hind legs. Bears run on all fours. It’s gait… it walked like a human. It didn’t slumber along.”

“I tried to get a picture of it. It’s rather blurry, but you can kind of make out the brown figure going through the trees. I chased it down a river bank for about 500 yards. It outran me. I can send the picture to your email where I sent my first message.”

He navigated his laptop with one hand while he kept talking on the phone with the other. He attached his blurry picture of the brown creature escaping between two trees to an email and sent it to Ash Kibs’ address.

“I want to back to the forest, this time prepared to find this creature. Real, undeniable proof. Photographs and video. If it’s survived this long without being discovered, then it must be deep in the park. Deeper than any humans regularly go. Maybe where where none have ever gone at all. I want to bring kayaks and hiking gear and go deeper than the weekenders on camping trips go.”

He nervously traced imaginary circles on his desk. “And, I’d like you to come with me. I don’t know anything about this thing, whatever it is. Mainstream academic zoology treats…” Another glance over the shoulder, “…Bigfoot like a joke. I need an expert in this field and all my Google searches came back to you.”

“Three weeks in the forest. I’ll bring everything we need. Tents, food, the kayaks, photographic equipment, GPS. If you’re available. I don’t know if you can get away from work, but…” Again, he paused. His $300,000 research grant from the World Wildlife Fund was supposed to cover his salary and expenses to research river otters for six months. He could, and probably should, get in real trouble for using it for something than the river otters. But, this had sparked something in him and he needed to find out what it was.

It could be a real chance to make a name for himself in academic zoology. He’d be able to write his own ticket to teach at any school in the country, Harvard, Yale, Columbia. Even Oxford and… shit. Cambridge. He might have a chance to teach at Cambridge, the same university that churned out Charles Darwin. Paid lectures, a book deal. Most important, he’d have pioneered something. Those sleepless nights throughout college, the angry girlfriends leaving, he’d have established that his academic career wasn’t for nothing.

He realized he had trailed off without finishing his sentence. “Oh, sorry about that. Well, I don’t know if you can get away from work or whatever but I could pay you. How does $30,000 sound? Not bad for three weeks of work. We’ll call you a research assistant.” He asked, hoping she would say yes.

 

[KattDclaw]

To her surprise, a Professor answered. Or at least that was what he called himself. In all honesty he didn't much sound like a professor, at least at first. All the Professors she had ever dealt with were old and snobbish, it was a surprise to say the least to hear the voice and realize that Professors even had first names. Ash was a little taken back, she still wasn't sure exactly what this had to do with her. River otters, Mt. Rainer and something big, furry and brown.

“Bigfoot?” Ash was quick to put in, almost at the same time that Mike said it. She cringed at herself for her assumption, even if she was right. Ash didn't want to sound excited, even if the very notion of a Bigfoot sighting sent a tingle up her spine. Her frame quivered lightly from the jolt of excitement, she nibbled on her bottom lip to keep from spurting out anything more. Mike was all too eager to talk, to assure her (or maybe himself) that what he saw wasn't a bear, couldn't possibly be a bear. Before she could even acknowledge it her inbox was binging at her with new emails and attachments. Ash scrunched up her face cutely as she re-positioned the phone in her grasp and snatched up her mouse. With a few clicks she was face to face with a horribly blurry picture of some brown shape in the woods. Ash couldn't help but feel a little disappointed, from the picture it could very well be a bear. But it went against the rest of Mike's story, the fact it out ran him on two legs. Ash did enough research to know that bears simply didn't do that. She was all about debunking hoaxes as much as finding the truth. Disproving all the possibilities meant that whatever was left, however improbable, was probably the truth. Or so Ash liked to think. She worried her lip a bit more as she looked over the picture, trying to use her imaging software to give it some definition.

“It's no Patterson-Gimlin film...but you might have something here Professor...er...Mike...” She started out so good, though faltered on his name and couldn't help but cringe once more at herself. There wasn't much time to linger on it though, the man on the other end of the line was going on and saying things Ash had only dreamed of. It was...to be honest...way too good to be true. Even as her heart started to swell and the excitement quivered through her limbs, Ash bit down on her doubt all the more. The cherry on the pile was money, not a little bit, but more money than Ash could rightly comprehend as one large sum. Her lips parted and she let fly a burst of incredulous laughter, a sharp, husky guffaw that echoed about her tiny room. Instantly she clasped her free hand over her mouth, exhaling through her nose and mentally screaming at the top of her lungs.

“Huh...oh shit...I'm sorry. I didn't mean to...laugh at you...Mike? Er...but seriously...this sounds too good to be true. I don't know you from Adam...I've never heard of you before and I'm not really keen on ending up as your lampshade. So...how about we meet to discuss this? In a...public area? Coffee shop maybe...” Ash was a whirl of conflict on the inside. She so wanted to say yes without thinking about it, but even as she was making plans her fingers were a blur of motion on her keyboard. She brought up the University's website, seeking out classes and staff and searching for a familiar name. A one...Mike Wheldon. The name was there, he was a legit Professor...or at least Mike Wheldon was. Again, the thought of the real Professor hanging from a hook in a meat locker sprang to mind, Ash really preferred to not be flayed anytime soon, or ever if she could help it.